A/N: This story is really AU and some of the characters' personalities may be slightly off. I haven't really watched Armada in a couple of years so forgive me if im off on anything, and if i am, please let me know. also, i read someplace a long time ago that starscream and skywarp are actually cousins. i think it was on wiki so im not sure if its true. and thundercraker is a character that was mentioned once in all of armada, which really pissed me off, so im including him in the story. this story isnt the greast in my opinion but i want some feed back on the ideas. i hope you enjoy it =]

and a very long time ago Devious Decepticon betaed this chapter for me, thanks!

For your information: I dont own transformers.


Sometimes Starscream wondered about the exact age of Thundercracker, especially when he looked into his optics. His stare was cold and piercing, with optics that seemed to peer into his very spark. Disappointment shrouded his regal face; he'd never been entirely pleased with anything Starscream did. But when he was, he smothered him with praise and reward. Starscream secretly craved praise, even expected it from his superiors, but rarely received it due to his ungrateful demeanor. And unfortunately for him, Thundercracker wasn't particularly pleased with him at the moment as usual; with an appropriate silence, he stared down at Starscream.

"Starscream, I know you see no point in this, and neither do I…but you need to control your poor manners" berated the older mech tiredly, almost half-heartedly. The long suffering air commander did, at some times, look his age, and now was definitely one of those times. "Stand straight; look alert, not jaded, you little glitch."

Starscream returned the insult with an uninterested stare; "glitch" was such an overrated word, it'd been used too many times on him to have an effect any longer. Going into that city full of poor, disgusting neutrals was a complete waste of time. Why? Why were they being ordered to kill everyone in the city? They were neutrals. They were no threat. Not at all. They never interfered or challenged the Decepticons in any way, especially this one. There were few neutral cities left on the planet; most had been forced to choose a side because the planet had been split between the Autobots and Decepticons. Many cities on the Autobots side had been able to stay neutral while most on the Decepticon's didn't even think twice about staying neutral. Most who had were annihilated by the order of the overlord…And now, only one was left.

"Starscream," growled the other mech. The patience that Thundercracker was so famous for was beginning to run thin, which never bode well for the unfortunate soul on the receiving end. "What did I tell you that tyrannical dustkicker wants us Seekers to do?"

He decided to grace his commander with a dry response. "Kill everyone within city limits, ensure there are no survivors. Take control of the city."

"That's right," Thundercracker answered. "And I will be playing no part in this pointless attack. Only you and one other, I don't need to be a part of mindless killing. "

The blue mech was fuming, but he spoke calmly.

"That tanker… Demolisher, his men have cleared most of the city except for the portion in which we are located, and the towers to the north. You and Skywarp will scout the rest of the city to make sure there are no survivors; should you find any, kill them immediately. It shouldn't be hard since there are no warriors in the city besides our own. Once that groundpounder and his men are gathered up and out of the city, run another sweep, then head back to the base in Kaon. I'll be waiting for you two there."

Starscream nodded. It was rare for Thundercracker to let Starscream do anything without supervising him the entire time. He didn't want to ruin the opportunity by saying something stupid.

Thundercracker swept his gaze across the area and asked "Where is Skywarp?" like he was just realizing he'd been gone this entire time.

Your age is showing again, oh wise mentor. Starscream thought with a annoyed look on his face.

"I'm right here." Spoke the black Seeker after a soft crack.

He gazed at his other pupil with wary optics. Slowly, over the past eons,

"Skywarp, stay with Starscream." His gaze then swiveled back to Starscream. "Do not let him out of your sight."

Yes, sir." Starscream said while Skywarp tilted his head in confusion.

^000000000000000000000000^000000000000000000000000^

He was gone.

Where a black figure once flew beside him, air was all that could be seen.

Keeping track of Skywarp hadn't been that difficult until about a cycle ago. He decided, for no apparent reason, to teleport while they where flying, in mid-conversation as well, to who knows where. Starscream only hoped he would keep his mouth shut about leaving his side when they got to the base.

He could find no point or reason to seek out his cousin; the moment he did find him, Skywarp would be gone in a klik. So the only order of business for Starscream at the moment was making sure the local residents were taken care of. Demolisher had missed a few mechs…

He couldn't help but smirk as he set the missile free.

Most mechs would think that a Seeker of Starscream's size couldn't do much damage, but one look at the destruction and the first thing that came to anyone's mind was that either one very large Decepticon, or a few dozen smaller ones, had come rampaging through the city.

But it was only one. And a Seeker at that.

Seekers. They were hated, though mostly because the majority of them were supremacist, and the real reasoning behind the hatred went deeper into one's mentality: Seekers could do so much that a wingless mech couldn't. Many had always wished to be able to fly without the aid of another or a ship, and Seekers could do just that, which went straight to their heads. Seekers were known for rubbing it in ground bond mechs' faces that they couldn't fly, and they could.

Starscream waited for the dust of his undertaking to settle before seeing who the screams belonged to. But they died down quickly, followed by an empty street.

Except for a blur of silver moving behind a corner.

Starscream thought it looked like fun, but all he saw were bodies. Bodies that twitched every few seconds, but that was taken care of with a few gun shots. He could always find whoever it was and have a little fun with them later. He needed to finish what he started first and began to search out any survivors of his attack.

But his hopes were soon dashed; all that was visible in the rubble was a single sparkling. He was similar to Thundercracker in color scheme, and even seemed to have the same serene look upon his face that Thundercracker wore when he was in a good mood. It lay there, dead: just the way Starscream liked sparklings to be. He hated them; they were loud and time consuming. Always wanting, always whining, always asking, and always in the way. They were a waste.

It did pain him that it could never grow up and fulfill its role in life. But he wouldn't ever admit that to anyone, though, not even to himself.

Not much stood on the street. The building he had aimed the missile at was nothing but a pile of scrap and empty shell now. Being the industrious type that he was, he moved on to follow the mysterious fleeing figure.

Demolisher and the others could be heard in the far off distance; following the sound, he walked down the skinny alleyways, which seemed to grow more and more narrow with every turn. Most looked as though no one had gone down them in vorns; the buildings bordering them were so cramped together, it was hard to tell where one ended and the other started.

Fresh foot prints spotted the ground in short strides; the mech was either very small, still young, or was a femme. Nevertheless, it was still fun to hunt someone down, even if it was proving to be extremely easy.

A red and black sign was plastered on top of a post before the entrance to an incredibly eerie looking road; 'Dead End' was written in black letters and the small foot prints went right past it without a falter in their step. Starscream would have yelled, but bit his tongue, allowing his mind to race. Who would be stupid enough to go down a dead end when they knew they might be followed? Unless they didn't know. Sometimes Starscream wished stupidity was always as lethal as it was going to be for this poor spark. Somehow he thought that would make his life better; perhaps he wouldn't have to deal with dustkickers ever again, or Skywarp for that matter.

It was dark and musky, with dust and grime piled up in the corners and windows. Disgusting slime could be felt under Starscream's feet; with every step he sank into the ground, threatening to hold him captive forever.

What is this stuff?

His face was verging on a scowl. He hated the ground and everything on it, including the people.

Silence encircled him. The first noise that this alley had heard in vorns were his feet being pulled up out of the grime that had grown on the ground. Thundercracker did say this place had been around for awhile. Not a sound. It was almost unbelievable how quiet it had become. He stood still in the void.

A broken scream was all it took for everything to come back to him. One shrieked, then another, and another. They were so very close.

At the end of the street where a metallic wall stood, screams and laughter could be heard. Light emitted from lasers came from inside a small doorway screams from a femme reverberating off the walls. She was yelling while a mech laughed with twisted amusement. Starscream knew who it was that was laughing; the screams were from the one he saw earlier. Hatred boiled up inside of him, that beloved cousin of his had gotten to them first. Starscream would have barged right in had Skywarp not came out, dragging a shell.

"Look what I found," Skywarp chuckled, proud of his 'work', as he threw the femme to the ground at Starscream's feet.

, Starscream felt disappointed and let out a growl of hatred. How had he known about them?

Upon seeing Starscream's face, Skywarp's smug grin melted into a frown. "What? She wasn't half as amusing as she sounded. All she did was scream," His crooked smile slowly crept back onto his face. "Her face did look a bit funny at times though," and he laughed again while doing an intimidation of what the femme's face must have looked like when Skywarp popped out in front of her.

"Let's get out of here, it's nasty," Starscream said while referring to the grime stuck to his feet. He decided to let this one go, it just wasn't worth it and he'd already gotten in trouble earlier that cycle for fighting with Skywarp. He turned around to go but was stopped when Skywarp teleported in front of him.

Starscream was beginning to get even more irritated. "We have to get back to the base."

"I know, I know," he grumbled softly, his optics narrowing to little slits. "But what about her?" Skywarp pointed to the femme lying in the filth.

"What about her? She's dead, just like she's supposed to be. Now let's go."

"She's not dead. I fired the gun to scare her a little bit, that's all; I just hit her over the head."

Growling with rage, Starscream whipped around to fire the laser gun attached to his arm, but was stopped by Skywarp as he teleported in his path once again, standing directly between Starscream and the femme.

"Hey! Let's take her there!"

"Where?"

"The base, our quarters. We can hide her, and have a go with her whenever we want; it's like recycling. Whenever we like… Though, you got the last one. I don't think I want to share."

"That's a horrible idea." Starscream stated bluntly.

"No, it's a good one. Don't you miss the Hollow back in Vos?"

"You don't think that something bad might happen? The commander said to kill everyone! If he finds out we're sneaking a femme into the base just so we can get a little spark high, we'll get slagged for sure."

"No we won't. You're great at lying."

Starscream had to stop and think about whether or not Skywarp was being serious about that last statement or not. "This is Thundercracker we're talking about, remember? I tried lying to him once, and do you remember how that turned out? He just laughed, and then we got slagged."

"That's because you lie all the time." He grinned. "I, on the other hand, don't ever lie; he'll believe everything I say if he finds out."

"Skywarp," Starscream tilted his head. "He will find out."

"If he thinks we're up to something, keep you mouth shut and let me do the talking."

"Then he'll want to know why I'm- No! No, I am not doing this… We aren't doing anything with her other than ripping her head off."

Skywarp looked as if he were about to pout. There was no wayStarscream would take a femme and hide her for him. He'd turned his back, wanting no part in anything that had to do with one of Skywarp's strange antics. What was he thinking? Wanting to sneak a neutral into a Decepticon base, one that they were temporarily stationed at, as well. He couldn't think of any way they could afford to get spare energon for her; she'd be dead in no time if they couldn't feed her. He couldn't believe any of this. But once again he was stopped short by a flash in front of him.

"Our mentor won't ever know. He's getting old. Well, he's been old for a long time, for as long as I can remember. But he wont know if I teleport her in, and then come back and fly into base with you. It'll look normal...he'll never know."

"No."

"Come on! How often do you see a femme? A femme who's a flyer? She's not that bad looking, either. Kinda pretty, if you ask me."

"Pretty? Skywarp I am not going to help you sneak a femme into a base that we'll be leaving in half a stellar cycle."

"You won't have to do much, just act like you normally do. You know, like you don't give a dustkicker's aft about a thing." Skywarp was practically begging by now. "Come on Starscream! I'll let you have a go with her."

"Would you quit it?! I don't want a go!" Gunshots rang out from the end of the street.

But before Starscream could react, Skyywarp was gone; he turned around only to catch a glimpse of a flash where the femme lay.

"You fraggin' glitch!" Starscream cursed, his concealed anger coming to a boil.

His engines roared to life, and left the street in a stream of fire and fumes. He transformed once he was above the rooftops, and sped off southward toward the base.

There was no way Skywarp was getting away with this.


A/N: please let me know what you think =]