Chapter 4

Sarge, Difficulty: Unknown

Even if they hadn't reacted well to his suggestion that they convert the engines (and Nautica's wrench, and Brainstorm's internal systems) to diesel, Sarge liked the Autobots. Especially their science team. They were creative, the way scientists ought to be.

"So," he said, cupping his chin as he looked over the impressive array of weapons on the lab's wall. "That one," he pointed. "Shrink ray, right?"

"Actually, it's-wait." Brainstorm looked up from the blueprints on his datapad, blinked his optics and did a double-take. "You're right. That is the shrink ray. How'd you know?"

"Looks like the setup I'd use if I was building one! Had the plans and everything, just couldn't get ahold of enough rock salt." Sarge grumbled. "Would have been the perfect plan against the Blues, too. Shrink 'em, then send them back to Red HQ in shrink rap! Thought they'd appreciate the pun. Command, I mean." He waited a beat. "Mind if I borrow it?"

"Yes, as in no, you can't borrow it or anything in the lab. Even if I wanted to lend my things out to strangers, which I don't, I'm sort of under pretty strict supervision here." Brainstorm thumbed at the security mechs watching everything in the lab, particularly Brainstorm himself. "I'm only out of the brig right now because you all need my particular genius to help you out. Don't they, Perceptor?"

"Ignore him," Nautica piped up. "He's just cranky because he's a SPY and a TRAITOR and I need some help deciphering this equation. And Perceptor is busy!"

"He's not busy! He's pretending so we leave him alone! He's looking at crosswords. Trust me."

"I heard that," Perceptor's level voice came from across the room. He didn't look up from his desk. "Aren't you just working on inventing that Human Repellent you mentioned?"

"What? Me?" Brainstorm startled. "No! Nooooo. No. It's just a sign. Coated in human repellent. Which doesn't exist yet. Totally separate."

Sarge had to mostly ignore whatever was going on between the feuding scientists while he concentrated on making it across the big room and climbing onto Nautica's table. "Hold on! Hold on, almost got it...hnngh!" He pulled himself up and swung his legs so they were hanging off the edge. "Still got it. Fit as a well-oiled machine. Does that metaphor work for you folks?"

Nautica blinked and frowned, looking over Sarge with concern. "You could just ask for my help getting up next time. Unless it would be awkward."

"And impose on a lady? Never. Now, what seems to be the problem? Equation, you say? Not much for the math. Sort of a doer instead of a planner. Scientific improvisation."

"Really? Wish I had the confidence for that." Nautica vented and rested her chin on her hands. "I'm just trying to trace back what brought you here in the first place. If I can decipher it in the logs, maybe we can reproduce it to create the same effect. Without collapsing our respective universes into a singularity and killing everyone in both."

"Huh. That would be a pretty bad end. On the other hand, no universe, no Blues!" He chuckled, only to grasp from the confused stare on Nautica's face that the joke hadn't landed. "Right. Keep forgetting, Red Team won in your universe! No more Blues."

"For the last time," Perceptor said, "we don't have a Blue Team."

"Course you don't! Cuz they lost! What's his name, Ultra Magnets gave us that history lesson when we got here. Nice guy, little dry. Could use a less-blue paint job. But you seem to count badges over armor, since you're...made of armor, and your badges are red! And your eeeevil opponents were purple, which is Blue enough by my reckoning! No offense, Nautica. Like I said, badges, not paint. Why, it's inspiring! All we need to do is find a Matrix of Leadership, sacrifice Grif to it, power up Lopez after we find him and...um..."

He trailed off as a long purple finger tapped him lightly in the chest several times over, nearly knocking him onto his back once. Nautica was frozen in an intense look of concentration as she poked him.
Sarge was unsure if he should be embarrassed, annoyed or just concerned about falling off. "Something wrong...?"

"Oh! Uh, everyone says humans are squishy like jellied Energon. But you're kind of solid."

"Well!" Sarge couldn't help but puff his chest out.,"I do try to stay in tip top shape. Lift weights every morning. Weights made out of guns. Not, uh, one for the personal space, are ya?"

"Nautica, leave him alone. We must be careful with our guests." That was a new voice, coming from the doorway. Sarge scolded himself internally for being too distracted to hear the doors open. What if it'd been the Blues, attempting to assassinate him while he was separated from his team?

Then Sarge recognized the speaker and fell silent.

There. Megatron knew he could trust his instincts. He saw it in action, the way the Red Team leader went from cheerful, easygoing bluster to defensive. Was it defensive?

Human body language wasn't difficult to read. Organics had chemicals in their blood controlling their emotional and physical responses. When in fear, they shook uncontrollably, a trait which they shared with some Cybertronians. Their pulses and breathing patterns accelerated in times of stress.

He had to admit, he hadn't seen much of how humans acted when they weren't frightened or stressed. It was a natural reaction to what he and his Decepticons had done to them.
Maybe this was guilt, as Rodimus thought? Perhaps Megatron was looking at the defiant soldier standing across from him and seeing Manhattan and Beijing in his subconscious. It should not bother him so. He could just ignore Sarge.

Well, now he couldn't, as Sarge had agreed to speak to him in private. And he had a shotgun.

"I thought we'd confiscated your weapons," Megatron said to break the awful silence.

"You did! But you understand, can't be expected to go around without my shotgun. Leaves me feeling naked! One of your guys got it back for me in exchange for posing in a photo. Lot o' folks here ain't seen many humans before!"

"I see." Megatron narrowed his optics. "And this soldier-"

"Totally forgot his name after I promised to forget his name. You know how it is when you get old."

Gritting his teeth at the proof of insubordination, Megatron knelt and held out his hand.

"Nope, sorry! I already handed her over once. Twice in one month? It'd be too much for my heart. Besides, you can't expect me to go unarmed around the Blues, can you?" Sarge held the shotgun close to his chest, rifle up.

"Or me," Megatron added evenly.

"Does it look like I'm pointing it at you?"

Megatron stared down at the tiny red soldier with his even tinier shotgun, a weapon no longer than one of Megatron's digits. It couldn't harm a turbofox, let alone anyone on the Lost Light. He could easily pick the weapon from Sarge's hands, bend it into a circle and crush it underfoot as a show of power. The old Megatron would have done it.
The old Megatron would also have killed all the humans as soon as they arrived on board, without bothering to learn their names. Maybe he would have interrogated one first to make sure no others would slip through the leak in time. The old Megatron would have died unrepentant and unmourned.

"Fine. You may carry it with you, as long as you do not threaten or fire on any member of my crew, or damage our equipment."

"What about shooting at Grif?"

"What you do with your own troops is none of my business. And no, that is not why I called you in here." It was obvious to Megatron that despite his surface bluster, Sarge was fidgeting and shifting his weight. The human soldier wanted very much to leave.

"...then what is it? I got a shrink ray to borrow." Sarge wasn't shouting the way he had with Nautica and Brainstorm, or anyone else he interacted with for that matter. He sounded flat and distant.

"I have questions about your behavior towards me. Before you ask, no, it is not unacceptable or worthy of punishment. You have done nothing wrong." Megatron said it in part to remind himself. "But you act differently towards me than with the other Cybertronians."

"...Not sure what you mean," Sarge said, turning away. "Or what you're getting at. Quit bein' indirect. It's sneaky."

"Yes, you're right. I did not mean to be deceptive." He had to allow himself that little turn of phrase. "I want to be sure you are not planning anything against me, or conversely, that you understand I am no threat to you. As I have assured my co-captain and director of security, and your fellow humans, I mean you no harm."

"What makes you think I'm scared of you? You wanted me dead, I'd be dead, right? And trust me, it goes both ways." Sarge crossed his arms. "Ask the Blues. I'm really persistent."

"So I have heard."

"And I got the best team behind me! And Grif. And believe me, it was kind of tempting to take revenge on behalf of Earth after the bull biscuits you pulled there, Bucket o'Bolts."

"Actually, Bucket of Bolts is part of the maintenance crew." He turned into a motorized mop. "But I am to assume if you wanted your revenge, you'd have it by now."

"Well, I got you talkin' to me, personally, like you're scared of me. Got in your head! Played you like a game of dominoes, in which I'm winning!" Sarge threw back his head and laughed, though Megatron thought it sounded a little hollow. "But I'm not stupid.

We wouldn't stand a chance against you. S'not our revenge to have, you know? I bet that Earth has their own ideas about what they oughta do. Besides, I can only handle one vendetta at a time, and right now it's vengeance against the Blues. For being Blue."

At that, Megatron snorted. "I knew someone who did that, would claim however things went sour for him that he'd planned it all along. It's a panic defense. On the other hand, I gather I genuinely do not read as a threat to your life, or you would have attacked. No being, organic or otherwise, remains passive when its life is at stake."

"Don't even really get what your issue you have with my 'behavior,'" Sarge said with finger quotes around the last word, not addressing Megatron's observation. "Like you said, not doing you any wrong."

"You're not quiet around anyone else."

"Quiet? Me? You got that right! I'm not..." Sarge trailed off, staring off past Megatron at the corner of the room. "Well. Guess I was. But so are you, Buckethead."

"I don't believe in wasting words."

"Not what I mean! I see you starin' at us, like we're gonna start crawling up your legs and infecting you with alien acid spit. Which we don't have, cuz Mother Nature's a cruel mistress. I think there's something about us that unnerves ya, gets under your skin. Like lookin' at a mirror."

"A mirror?" The rest Megatron could not deny. Even outside of the guilt which should have been obvious to him, he found organics unsettling, so far removed from Cybertronian life down to the cellular level and yet sentient. But that last accusation was different. What did he have in common with this strange old man?

"Just, you know. Once in a while you come across someone and it's like looking at yourself through one of those funhouse mirrors. 'Cept instead of being all wobbly-looking with a corndog in your hand, you're, oh. I dunno. A guy who used to have a lot of convictions, fightin' a good war in his youth, and now..."

Megatron held his head high. "And now, I am hated by my crew, disrespected unless I enforce my command, and confronted every day with the evidence of how wrong I was about people. Not my philosophy or my cause, but what became of it. Perhaps pitiable to someone so zealously dedicated to your own quest."

Silence from Sarge again.

"A visible, public figure becomes a sort of mirror, an item upon which others project their own self-image. You look upon me and you fear your own failure. No one likes to think they could go too far, make one wrong decision that propels them on a lifetime of them." Megatron spoke without judgment. It would do no good to condescend to the human. "And you would not have centuries more to make amends."

"Got nothing to make amends for! No regrets. Wanna keep it that way." Sarge was clearly trying to recover some of his energy from earlier. "Not even supposed to be thinking about this, doubting myself. A true solder never doubts anything!"

Megatron frowned. "Is that so."

"It's Grif! Grif's the one who played the psychological trick on me, and I didn't even see it! See, he's this soldier. The worst, just the worst soldier ever. Terrible at following orders. So I'm at that bar your pal Swerve runs, telling some old war stories, standing on the table because I got way too much dignity to sit on a booster seat like my teammates."

"Go on."

"And I overhear Grif, about 32 sheets to the wind, rambling about you. You and that, uh, Optimistic guy? But mostly you. You know what he does? Compares you to me. No, compares me to you. Like you're what I turn into if I get a few million years to keep on ticking. Which is ridiculous! Don't even know why I listen to the guy! I don't respect him at all! And here I am, venting my spleen to you like that Rung guy kept trying to make me do." He grunted, turning away. "Never liked psychological warfare anyway."

"...Compared me to you." Megatron tilted his head. "Interesting. You are his model for a warlord who claimed entire planets. I'm not sure what I think of being used as a cautionary tale. Perhaps it's fitting. But I will say two things."

"Well, go on," Sarge said. "You already sapped my dignity. Got me talking about feelings I don't have."

"One, no matter how I feel about what I did before, I do not regret being here now. I am not lowered by my change of heart, or the knowledge that I have done wrong. You may look upon me and see something weakened and pathetic; you would not be the only one. I know nothing of your cause or your actions; I hope they are as just and true as you think they are. I hope you never go so far astray as I have." He focused his optics right at Sarge. "But should you open your eyes one day and realize the universe is not as you saw it, know there is no shame in embracing a new vision."

Sarge huffed, crossing his arms. "Well, good thing that's not gonna happen. Told ya, I'm over it."

"Of course." Megatron had to hide a smirk. "As for the other thing. You should pay the closest attention to those soldiers who argue with you and question or disregard your orders."

Sarge sputtered. "What the hell kind of leader lets people disrespect him!?"

"I didn't mean 'let them.' Listen." Megatron's mind conjured up the image of a red Seeker wearing the crown of Cybertron like he was born with it. The smile vanished.

"They can surprise you, Red Team Leader. Don't let them."

As Megatron left the room, Sarge stomped out after him before a nervous-looking Nautica picked him up to take him back to the lab.

"Uh," the quantum mechanic asked as she looked up at Megatron, "he's not in trouble, is he? I wanted to ask him about the time dilation effects his crew experienced when they crossed over here. You need to know that sort of thing!"

"You do? I mean, no," Megatron assured her. "No one is in trouble. Except Brainstorm," he amended, "but no more trouble than he was in before. Sorry to have interrupted your work. Oh, and no more poking. It's disrespectful."

Nautica grinned and headed back to the science wing, though Megatron could hear Sarge's voice carry over the metallic ring of her footsteps.

"I'm telling you, I can walk just fine! Just might take me a few more hours. Nothing wrong with that! At the very least, could you hold me a little less doll-like? Man's got to think of his dignity!"

As they vanished down the hall, Megatron heard a mech approach and was surprised to see Ultra Magnus walking up to him. He narrowed his optics. "You were not listening in, were you?"_

"What? Of course not," Magnus insisted. "That would be childish and against protocol! We were observing you on security same as everyone else."

"And you did not seriously think I would harm him?"

"For what it's worth, I did not." Magnus gave Megatron a sympathetic look, the kind that always made Megatron feel a little uncomfortable. "The situation with the human in the ceiling has gotten more complicated than Skids can handle alone, so Rodimus is helping out. Rodimus and several others." His frown deepened.

"I will...trust him to handle that," Megatron decided, his processor aching just imagining what could be happening. "You are here on his behalf?"

"Yes, well." Ultra Magnus opened a compartment and pulled out a gold badge with a picture of Rodimus's grinning face.

"Another one?!" The processor-ache deepened.

"It is possible to earn more than one. Rodimus is planning some kind of prize system for accumulating Rodimus Stars as soon as he gets around to it. I believe the current record-holder is Hound." Ultra Magnus, as usual, showed an impressive amount of restraint for someone forced to deal with something so ridiculous. "In our co-captain's absence, we can skip the attending Rodimus Star Ceremony."

"Thank Primus." For all his exasperation, Megatron couldn't help but smile. "So, what's this one for?"

Ultra Magnus stood straight, reading the back. "For Developing Your Skills in Organic-Cybertronian Relations, And Not Killing Any Hu." He squinted and looked twice. "I suppose it didn't all fit."

Pressing his hand to his forehead, Megatron took the badge and looked it over. "I'll wear it for a whole hour this time."

(Author's Notes: Simmons also got a Rodimus Star for assisting with Grif.

He had no idea what to do with it.

Also, hope you've enjoyed this little crossover-for-the-sake-of-it! Like I said, I'm probably going to write more short fics in this universe, though not on any particular schedule. After being stuck for so long on Not Your War, I needed to ease back into writing RvB and fanfic in general and this turned out to be just the thing.)