Disclaimer: Still don't own them…*sigh*
Author's note: Hey! Thank you all for the reviews, they make me grin so much my face hurts (and that's a good thing, really)! I reply to every review I can to say thanks, but since I can't say thanks to anonymous reviews personally, I'll say it here: Thank you so much!
Okay, the chapter starts out with a flashback, but it's not a super long one or anything, so bear with it, please! Also, I should mention warnings for angst and a possible tissue warning (idk, I was tearing up a bit, but I never know about other people). I really didn't mean for the chapter to get this angsty, but it kinda did before I realized it. Also, hey! It's longer than 1000 words! Hooray! Hope you enjoy reading, and please review if you have a minute, if only to say whether or not you hated it.
Victory Is So Sweet…For Some
Part the third
By Elora Vashara
{Flashback}
"Is it finished?"
Starscream didn't reply for a moment as he reviewed the last numbers. Everything was operating in the optimum ranges, and the last panel had been closed. All that remained missing was a single, living spark to inhabit the still empty spark chamber that rested beneath the gleaming glass of the cockpit. The form was a dull gray, still, and it would not take on color until it had a soul inside. He glanced up at Megatron.
"It is finished, yes."
"Good. Then all we need is a spark. Tell me, Starscream, what do you know about spark transplants?" The harsh red optics narrowed in scrutiny of his SIC as the seeker formulated his answer.
"I know, mighty Megatron, that very little research was put into the matter before the war started, and that in every illegal operation performed, the spark being transplanted was extinguished upon or shortly after its removal from the original body. There was never any measure of success in the method. I had assumed you intended to place a new spark in this frame, not an already existing one."
"Perhaps," Megatron began, shifting his weight and stepping ever closer to an uneasy Starscream as he spoke, "they just weren't strong enough. Your spark, however, has a rather annoying habit of sticking around. And, if you are indeed proven right and your spark extinguishes, then the operation shall be a success anyways…" He stood just behind the seeker now, one clawed hand resting ominously on each shoulder.
"Too much of a coward to try it yourself?" Starscream retorted, jerking out the tyrant's grasp. "Tch. Typical of you to send me off for something like this. If I'm not as strong as you, as you're always claiming, then why don't you do it yourself? Surely a spark that has beat as long as yours would continue to beat once outside your frame." He sneered at his commander, while in the back of his processor he desperately tried to figure a way out of this. When did Megatron plan to do this? Probably right now—the tyrant knew he'd try anything to get out of it, so he'd waited until the last possible moment. Slag, how would he get out of this one? As he'd been slowly backing toward the doorway he had failed to notice the arrival of Hook, the Decepticon medic. So when he realized that Megatron had, uncharacteristically, remained silent at his jab and instead was looking past him, he spun around. With the seeker blocking Hook from Megatron's view, the constructicon dared to mouth the words "I'm sorry," before a needle slid into one of Starscream's lines and everything fell dark.
Starscream paced the length of his quarters that evening, his processor racing so quickly he doubted even Soundwave would have been able to follow his train of thought. What, in Primus' name, had happened earlier? To sum it up, he'd gone a bit…googley-optic'd at Optimus earlier, and the Autobot leader had nicely (oh, so nicely) gotten him to agree to train those glitched Aerialbots. The Prime, who he had once suspected didn't have a single devious strand of coding, had just pulled his own trick on him. It stung a little that he had fallen for it, but it was hard to stay annoyed when it had felt so right.
He had been frustrated to the extreme when Optimus had left him there, though to be fair he supposed the mech really hadn't know just how close he was to overloading just then. The build-up of energy trapped in his systems had surged about frantically for some time as he'd tried to cool down, finally resorting to siphoning what he could to his null rays and blasting anything in sight down the range. But still he was left with that niggling feeling deep in his spark, craving the release his circuits (and every other part of him) had been expecting. What surprised him now was the deep emotional ache he was left with, conflicting urges shouting at him to simultaneously punch Optimus and frag him senseless, while a smaller urge told him to curl up on his berth and sob like there was no tomorrow.
Like a true scientist, he did his best to step away from the situation and analyze it piece by piece. Optimus had called him down to the practice range. On his own assumption (which had been proven correct) that Optimus wanted something, the mech had instead broached the possibility of simply wanting his company. Involuntarily, his spark gave a little lurch, and he frowned and quieted it. No one he'd known had ever really wanted him just for him, besides his creators, and he supposed that was what hurt. Optimus, a mech he now respected and was at least somewhat attracted to, had done something that reminded him starkly of Megatron.
He had dangled the sweetest possibility (though with Megatron it had been appreciation of his ideas and input he'd sought, not…very strong liking. He didn't want to call it love yet.) just out of Starscream's reach, offered it, promised it, nearly, then retracted it. Instead, his whole reason for that…interlude, was to get Starscream to do something. He'd used Starscream's attraction to soften him up, then thrust an unpleasant new job into his servos, and then the slagger had just walked away, leaving him trembling for reasons other than fear and pain.
Starscream could distance himself no longer, and with his new realization the force of his emotions slammed into him like a wall. A choked sob escaped his vocalizer and his frame trembled as his spark twisted in agony. He hurt, but this time it was not merely a physical pain that could be cured with new plating and some welds. His spark was pulsing erratically, wrenching with greater force as each new sob broke free. He staggered to his berth and collapsed weakly, some part of his processor dimly registering that his spark was, in fact, hurting quite physically and flickering dangerously. Ratchet had warned him to try and stay level, emotionally, as his spark was still weakened from being transplanted. It would still be a few more years before it was back to full strength. He struggled to open a comm line to call for help, but his optics went dim as his body shut down automatically, and his last sob cut out halfway through, the room falling into grim silence.
Optimus always made it a point to walk down the personnel quarters corridor before retiring himself. It was his way of checking on his troops and friends, and there had been several occasions where he had been able to help one mech or another out by talking to them or consoling them or just listening to them. So when he heard the faint sounds of one mech sobbing, he followed the sounds until he reached Starscream's room. Guilt plagued him immediately. He had no doubt that he was the cause of the frantic crying from the seeker, but indecision gripped him.
He was sure it would be better for him to go in now and apologize profusely, take whatever the seeker hurled at him (he certainly deserved it, he thought guiltily) and make sure it never happened again. On the other servo, that took a great deal of courage, and while Optimus was not one to ever be short on courage, he held a certain amount of fear towards the eventual outcome of that scenario. If he was lucky, Starscream might forgive him (years and years from now) and they might someday be on semi-civil speaking terms. At worst, though, he feared Starscream flying away from him forever, maybe even returning to the Decepticons. After all, Optimus had just shown how capable he was of manipulation. Clearly he hadn't thought it through. He'd just wanted to give the seeker a taste of his own medicine, (and get a taste of the seeker) but he'd gone about it the wrong way entirely, and he certainly hadn't taken Starscream's emotional stability into account.
Bracing himself, he prepared to enter when the sobs suddenly cut out. He hesitated, straining his audios to try and detect any movement or other noises. There was only the sudden and deep silence, like the room was empty. Worry overcame his other emotions and he slid the door open swiftly, optics scanning the room before centering on the prone form of one seeker. Something was wrong. He rushed to the seeker's side, alarmed to find the vibrant colors of the Starscream's paint fading slowly, and the most he could find on his scanners was an extremely weak spark signal. He sent an emergency signal to Ratchet, praying that they weren't too late. He laid one servo over the faintly flickering sparkchamber, wishing there was some way for him to physically hold on to Starscream's life force.
"I'm so sorry, Starscream," he murmured, and then Ratchet was there, pushing him out of the way and shouting instructions to First Aid as they tried to revive his spark, hooking up power generators to Starscream's main systems to take the strain off his spark, sending bursts of energy at regular intervals to try and coax the spark into beating again. Nothing they were trying seemed to be working, and Optimus staggered back to sit heavily on the couch. He felt awful. He was the worst kind of scum there had to be. He'd known Starscream's spark was still somewhat delicate, he'd known (at least in hindsight) that what he'd done had great potential to hurt Starscream, so somewhere, in his subconscious, he must have known that this was a possible outcome, and yet he'd blindly gone through with it. For a few moments, he had a very deep appreciation for Prowl's love of analyzing every situation from every possible angle before taking action.
Ratchet and First Aid were still working, trying to keep the tiny light alive and pulsing.
It was black. That much he could comprehend at the moment. He wasn't sure where he was, entirely, but as his most recent memories trickled in he surmised he was unconscious, possibly on the verge of offlining, and this was his processor's way of keeping him from the trauma of actually offlining. To be frank, it had not gotten any more interesting in the time since his last involuntary venture here, though he supposed its function was not to be interesting, it was merely to provide an intermediate place for his mind to rest between death and life.
Starscream was startled by the sudden occurrence of a noise, and he turned to see semi-lit hazy shapes forming out of the back mist. It was his carrier's face, he realized with a start. He was smiling, though there were lines of worry and pain etched deeply into the expression. It was the moment his carrier had died, shortly after the death of his other creator. He'd only been a sparkling at the time, and they had lived in the politically turbulent Vos. Their deaths had been the result of a riot that they hadn't even participated in.
The memory grasped him vividly, and he could almost feel the weakening grip around his waist, feel the rough metal beneath his slender knees, the familiar warmth and protection of his parent slipping away, the bond they shared threatening to break at any moment.
"Starscream," came that warm, soothing voice, which managed to stay nearly even, as though this were merely an important talk, not a goodbye.
"Papa…" Starscream echoed his younger self, reaching out to touch his carrier's face in his memory.
"Starscream, I want you to listen to me very carefully now. Are you listening?" The blue and white seeker shifted slightly, a faint grimace appearing at the movement.
"Yes, papa, I'm listening." Sparkling-Starscream leaned forward to touch a tiny blue finger to his carrier's faceplates, a small sob building.
"I love you, very much, and so does your daddy, okay? We both love you, so much, sweetspark, but we have to go now. I want you to be careful."
Starscream nodded along with his memory counterpart, echoing his next words, "I love you too, papa, I love you too, it hurts!" The seekerlet sobbed, tiny servos grasping one much larger blue one as if to keep his parent from slipping away.
"Shhh, sweetspark, I know it hurts, and I'm sorry. I want you to be good for me and your daddy, okay? Be good, grow up into a mech we can be proud of. You can do great things, honey, if you put your mind to it."
The little Starscream tried to put on a brave face, whimpering a small, "I will!" before breaking down into sobs again. A servo drifted up to gently stroke the seekerlet's helm and rubbed his back struts, soothing the cries temporarily.
"Someday, Starscream, you'll find someone who loves you as much your daddy loves me," the dying mech whispered, "and I hope you love him back just as much. Someday, you'll meet your sparkmate, and you'll know. And maybe both of you will do things you'll regret, but sparkmates are meant to be together. The pull will always be there, and the more you try to resist, the harder it gets."
The relationship advice was a little beyond Starscream at that age, but he could certainly appreciate it now. He leaned closer, vents hitching as he realized the last moments were fast approaching.
"I wish you every happiness, my little Star, I…" the mech coughed roughly, back-flooding energon leaking out from between his lips. "I love you…" The blue optics fell dark, and with them, the carrier-sparkling bond. Starscream sobbed loudly as waves of pain wracked his young frame, and he curled instinctively next to his carrier's graying frame.
The mists that had formed the vivid memory slowly faded out, leaving Starscream to ponder his subconscious' choice of memories. The pain of the moment still lingered, but it had been long ago, and time had dulled its current effects. It had been one he must have blocked out at that age, for he could not recall it. He had recalled, as a sparkling, that they had died, and he was certainly traumatized, but everything had seemed hazy then, a huge commotion followed by deep pain and despair. Was his subconscious trying to tell him something with this particular memory?
Good timing, he thought sourly. There was some important realization waiting there for him, and his processor decided to wait until he was at death's door to spring it on him. After sulking for a moment, he concluded that he may as well use this time to try and figure out what the message could have been.
~Fin~
Author's note 2.0: Sorry for the cliffhanger! And this was really not supposed to be angsty. Oh well. I'll lighten it up as soon as the current plot allows, I guess. Darn you two for wanting to go all angst-a-rific on me! Cookies and love for everyone who reviews, and love to all you silent readers out there!
P.S.—Just to save any confusion, I'm changing the status to In-Progress, though I will still end each chapter with ~Fin~. That's just how I end my chapters, sorry if it was confusing anybody!