Author's note : For the purpose of this fic, I'm assuming the Constructicons were with the rest of Megatron's army all along, rather than being built in some caverns.
Also, virtual cookies to Starfire201 for noticing what all the titles have in common. :)
Chapter 3: The Sleeper Awakes
Megatron sat up, fusion cannon already humming into life as his gaze fell on Motormaster. "Who are you?"
Motormaster sank to one knee. "My name is Motormaster," he said, "and we are Decepticons from the future. You built us, Lord Megatron, and we are your loyal warriors. As proof…" He swept a hand out to indicate the Autobots' corpses.
Megatron's optics gleamed, and he got to his feet. "You did this?"
"My team and I did this." Motormaster accepted the hand Megatron extended to him to help him rise. "Dead End, my second-in-command." Dead End tilted his head, hoping he wouldn't have to make a profession of allegiance for the second time in his life, but Motormaster continued. "Breakdown is our scout and Wildrider's the terrorist."
"Hey, what about me?" Drag Strip said.
Motormaster jerked a thumb in his direction without looking away from Megatron. "Oh yeah, that's Drag Strip."
Megatron didn't bother looking either, since his gaze had alighted on Optimus Prime's frame. "He still functions."
"He does," Motormaster replied. "The honor of deactivating him should be yours, my lord."
Megatron's mouth curved in a smile. "Loyalty and good judgment. There are others in my army who could learn from you, Motormaster!" He waved an arm at the Decepticons' bodies. "And speaking of my army, it's time to bring them online as well."
Motormaster turned to the Stunticons. "You heard him—start reviving the rest of them. Lord Megatron…" He turned back. "When you created us, you promised us this planet would be ours."
A brow ridge quirked above a red optic. "And you wish to collect on that claim?"
"I do." Motormaster's voice was respectful, but there was nothing hesitant about his tone. "My team—the Stunticons—were created by you from Earth vehicles and this rather than Cybertron is our home. We will remain loyal to you no matter the place or time, but this planet is what we were given and what we want."
Megatron let the silence draw out fine as a wire before he shrugged. "I have no use for this planet, Motormaster, other than to collect as much energon as we need for our return to Cybertron. If you want it, it's yours—provided you tell me how you came to travel through time and give me that technology."
"Of course," Motormaster said. "The time machine is over here."
Dead End didn't listen any longer as he went about the process of getting the Autobot shells out of the way and pulling the Decepticons towards the reformatting ray—not an easy task when so many of them outstripped him in weight. And not all of them seemed to notice his insignia when they revived, either. Skywarp immediately stuck a gun in his face, and if Megatron hadn't noticed that and rapped out a command just in time, Dead End thought he would have made the best-looking corpse in the collection. After that he had Breakdown, weapon in hand, stationed by the computer console so that they could get the drop on any 'cons more belligerent than grateful.
Starscream, of course, was the least appreciative of the lot. He rubbed the dent in his side, looked suspiciously about the room and asked why exactly Megatron had felt some need to build five groundpounders—if indeed Megatron had actually built them. Dead End ignored him, but Drag Strip made a sarcastic reply about Megatron obviously being disappointed enough in his air support not to bother creating any more of those.
At that, Stasrcream advanced on him with a null ray primed, but Motormaster got there first. "Stay away from my team, got it?" he said, and hauled Drag Strip away by one arm, shaking him for good measure before he dumped him next to the time machine. Where he's safest, Dead End thought, because Megatron wouldn't allow anyone to damage the device.
By then he and Wildrider had finished reviving the rest of the Decepticons, though they all reacted more or less in the same way when they discovered who had brought them all online. Dead End knew that mechs who had known each other for millions of years would not react warmly to sudden strangers in their midst—he'd seen that often enough on the Nemesis since the Stunticons had been brought online—but at least then the other Decepticons had been aware of Megatron's plan to create them. Rumble had stolen their frames, the Constructicons had helped design and build and paint them, Soundwave had recorded their activation by Vector Sigma.
Now, no one knew them… or seemed to want to know them. Bonecrusher muttered that these newcomers, whoever they were, seemed to have grabbed all the glory they could instead of leaving the 'bots for those mechs who had been fighting them for millennia, and Scrapper told him to ignore them. "We have work to do. Constructicons, let's see how much of this ship we can salvage," he said, and led his crew off. Dead End watched them go, wishing—insofar as he ever wished for things to improve—that they had stayed.
Then he remembered that these Constructicons had played no role in their creation at all. Which raises the question of who exactly created us, in this brave new world.
Before he could think about that further, though, Breakdown sidled up to him. "Everyone's staring at me," he whispered. "Can we go someplace else?"
Dead End glanced around. Wildrider was playing with the computer controls and Drag Strip, still parked by the time machine, was pretending not to notice that he was being ignored by all the other 'cons. Motormaster and Megatron finally seemed to have finished talking, though, and Megatron turned to look at Optimus Prime's body, which still lay in the middle of the floor. No one had gone near it, and the other Decepticons stood around the periphery of the room in little groups, waiting for their orders.
"Dirge." Megatron's voice rang out. "Thundercracker. Revive him."
Even Wildrider backed away from the computer at that, and Dead End went over to the time machine. He didn't fear any 'bot, even Optimus Prime, but the Autobot leader had been able to silence even Motormaster when they had been captured and locked in the brig, and Dead End didn't look forward either to that or—which was more likely—to Prime's long-drawn-out death at Megatron's hands. Breakdown stayed hidden behind him, but Motormaster didn't even seem to notice that. He watched greedily as Dirge and Thundercracker pulled Prime's body beneath the reformatting ray, releasing him so his helm clanked against the floor.
The ray glowed down. Across the room, the other Autobot strained against his bonds before slumping back. Optimus Prime sat up. He froze at the sight of Megatron, and his helm turned slowly as he saw he was surrounded.
"Prime!" the other Autobot cried out, and Prime's startled gaze went to him at once. "I'm so sorry…"
"Wheeljack." Prime was on his feet in the next moment, and a dozen weapons immediately locked on him. He didn't move, though when he looked at the deactivated frames of the other Autobots, his hands clenched into fists.
"You murdered them!" he said to Megatron.
"No." Motormaster stepped forward, drawing himself up to his full height, optics alight with triumph. "I did that—and enjoyed it. Payback is a glitch, isn't it?"
Prime looked at him with evident incomprehension. "Who are you?"
"Motormaster, leader of the Stunticons and the King of the—"
"Hey," Skywarp broke in, "he looks like he's got the same alt-mode as Prime, doesn't he?"
"I wonder what else they have in common," was Starscream's contribution.
Motormaster glared at them both, but the interruption had given Prime all the time he needed to grasp the situation. "You slaughtered my friends while they were defenseless?" he said, still sounding incredulous. "How could you do such a cowardly thing?"
"So ungracious in defeat, Prime?" Megatron said as Motormaster's helm snapped back, fury flashing in the violet optics. "You should be on your knees begging for mercy—for your single surviving Autobot, if not yourself—rather than trying to antagonize a loyal and effective Decepticon."
"A strutless mass-murderer, you mean." Prime no longer even looked at Motormaster. "Tell me, Megatron, would you have needed to have your enemies offline before you dared attack them?"
"Shut the frag up!" Motormaster said through clenched jaws.
"Don't allow him to get beneath your plating," Megatron said before he turned his attention back to Prime. "No, I wouldn't. But I fail to see why it is somehow better to destroy one's enemies in battle, with casualties on both sides, injuries and collateral damage, rather than simply and swiftly deactivating them as Motormaster has done. Could you explain that to us, Prime?"
When there was no reply other than a contemptuous look from Prime, he smiled faintly. "But don't worry. I have no plans to deactivate you at the present. I even intend to take you back to Cybertron with us. Starscream, see that he and that inventor who so thoughtfully contributed to our cause are securely locked in the brig. I want two guards stationed there at all times."
"Certainly," Starscream said with a grin, raising one of his null-ray guns. "This way, Prime. Roll out. Skywarp, get the other idiot."
Dead End watched as they left and Megatron gave the other 'cons their assignments. He wanted Soundwave's cassettes to get the lay of the land and spy out energon sources, he wanted Soundwave himself to have the communications systems up and running so they could contact Shockwave on Cybertron, he wanted Thrust to find out where the Nemesis had crashed, because whoever this planet's natives were, they didn't need to obtain Decepticon technology. Dead End considered giving him the coordinates of the ship, but the Stunticons in general seemed to have faded into the background, and even Motormaster stood there looking faintly irresolute and evidently waiting for orders that did not come.
Megatron's not used to us, Dead End thought. At least, not this Megatron. He doesn't know our capabilities and we don't factor into his long-range plans. He's probably glad he doesn't have to take us back to Cybertron with him. It was a sobering thought.
After what felt like a very long time, though, Megatron seemed to notice they were there. "Motormaster, you and your team can take that device to the nearest laboratory for the Constructicons to look over later," he said. "By the time you secure it and have your battle damage seen to, we'll have energon again and you can return here for your share of it."
"Yes, Megatron." Motormaster saluted and Dead End helped Wildrider to pick up the machine, while Drag Strip took the generator. Breakdown, who was most familiar with the Ark's layout, went ahead to find the closest laboratory and they set the time machine down on an empty workbench.
"What do we do now?" Wildrider said—as usual, vocalizing what they were all thinking.
Dead End tilted his head at Motormaster's abdominal plating. "You could get that repaired."
"Get what repaired?" Motormaster was always testy when it came to damage he'd received, unless that was bad enough to have incapacitated him, meaning he couldn't ignore it. "And the Constructicons are busy, or haven't you noticed?"
"Even if they weren't, I wouldn't want to go to them," Breakdown said. "To them, we're strainers."
There was a moment of bewildered silence before Wildrider shook his helm hard and said, "Uh, OK. What I wanna know is what's going to happen to us now we messed with the timeline?"
"What the frag are you talking about?" Motormaster stared down at him, brow ridges knotting beneath the heavy cowling around his head. "Nothing's happened to us, so let's get out of here and find a place we can use as a base of operations when the rest of 'em leave."
He turned to go, and stopped. Starscream leaned casually against the doorframe, wings casting a wide slanting shadow into the room, but he swiveled as if to make room for Motormaster to pass. No one moved except for Breakdown, who slid behind a worktable as fast as he could.
"Goodbye, Motormaster," Starscream said pointedly. "I'll take charge of that device now."
"Megatron said it was for the Constructicons."
"I was a scientist, though of course you couldn't be expected to know that." Starscream straightened up. "I'm also the Air Commander, which makes me the second-in-command of this army, which means I outrank you. So get your Prime-shaped aft out of here before I throw you out."
Motormaster's engine growled, and Dead End moved automatically into a flanking position—both to give Motormaster enough room to swing a fist and to defend his side. Another Seeker appeared behind Starscream, shadows turning white armor to grey and grey plating to a funereal black. Dead End's fuel pump jolted, but he recognized Ramjet a moment later.
He wondered if any of the other Seekers planned to back their commander up. It occurred to him that in the here-and-now, they had one great advantage—none of the 'cons knew about Breakdown's ability to sabotage mechanical devices with his engine's vibrations—and that might well be their final card to play if they were in a no-way-out situation.
"You can try, traitor," Motormaster said softly.
Starscream looked offended. "Don't insult Ramjet like that."
"I'm talking about you, you backstabbing loser. Yeah, you heard that right, you're a failure even when it comes to betraying our leader. Even with the Combaticons behind you, you couldn't—"
"The Combaticons?" Starscream said, staring at him.
A sudden flash on the other side of the laboratory made them all whirl to face the new threat, but the winged shape which appeared was Skywarp, a cheerful grin on his face. "Sorry I'm late," he said to Starscream. "What's going on?"
"Nothing. These idiots are talking about some 'cons who were locked in a detention center long before we left Cybertron." Starscream's expression hardened from speculation to a sneer. "Are you and your little gang political prisoners as well, Motormaster? Is that why you ran away from your own time and place to come here?"
Motormaster's optics narrowed. "That's it," he said, and sent a transmission, opening the link to his speakers so they could all hear the exchange. "Lord Megatron? This is Motormaster, seeking permission to beat some respect into your second-in-command."
There was an instant of silence on the other end—Starscream's posture had tensed, wingtips twitching—but Megatron only said, "Your reasons why?"
"I'm not interested in taking his rank, so this isn't a leadership challenge," Motormaster said. "But I've had it with his backbiting and jealousy."
"Jealousy?" Starscream snapped. "What the slag do you have for me to be jealous of?"
"Megatron's trust," Motormaster said. "You may want to know, my lord, that in our own time, Starscream tried to betray you and seize leadership of the Decepticons numerous times."
Megatron laughed, the sound echoing over the comm link. "I'm not surprised to hear that. Very well, Motormaster, if you wish to meet him in combat you're free to do so—in public. There's plenty of space outside this ship, my warriors will enjoy the entertainment and I've never been averse to—"
"Megatron!" Starscream cut in, voice full of indignation. "Do I have no say in this?"
"No. Unless you want to decline his challenge? Perhaps you're concerned for your chances of victory."
Starscream's mouth thinned to a line. "Never. Not against any groundpounder… yourself included, my lord." His optics went to Motormaster, and they looked like glowing red pits in his head. "Let's settle this."
