Queen of Spades

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Chapter Eight: Someday

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The base was alive with talk of the new additions to Soundwave's family. The big host-mech had delivered a black and purple Chiroptacon cassette-former. Buzzsaw delivered half an orn later, a bipedal cassetticon mech with his own colors having come from the efforts. It shouldn't have been possible given the sires involved, but somehow it had happened. Soundwave had instantly suspected that Rumble and Frenzy had interfered, but in the long run it hadn't been important. Buzzsaw conceiving a Chiroptacon had simply been the fallback should Soundwave's effort have failed.

A meta-cycle later when Soundwave's sparkling began flying lessons, Mindwipe watched from the sidelines as the Chiroptacon, christened Ratbat, took his first ungainly flights. And he watched jealously as Soundwave's brood assisted and encouraged their youngest mechanimal to join them in the air. He wanted to reach out to his offspring and show him the joys of wings that flapped and the slow but agile flight patterns of his frame-type. Buzzsaw flew with him while his own sparkling, the black and yellow Buzzbomb, sat with Rumble and Frenzy watching his carrier and his youngest uncle.

Weirdwolf, watching alongside him, put a hand on Mindwipe's shoulder. "I believe I know what you're thinking," said his leader.

Mindwipe shrugged the hand away. "Sure you do."

"I know you wanted more than just siring duties with her."

Mindwipe suddenly straightened defensively and looked at Weirdwolf. As close as they were, he'd never talked with his teammates about what had happened though they'd suspected what had transpired. "I didn't want to be a parent. Not at first. I just thought I'd help out some mechs that wanted to get pregnant. Build some status and get a few presents too."

Weirdwolf smiled enigmatically. "There will be another surging someday. There will be more carriers. Maybe one of them will want a father around someday. Maybe even a mate..."

"I don't wa..." He paused. Weirdwolf knew him better than he himself did sometimes. "Well, maybe."

Weirdwolf gave the shoulder a comforting squeeze. "Don't let it get to you, because you did well. One, you fulfilled your obligation very successfully. Two, you sparked all three carriers. And three, you got a really nice ceremonial dagger out of the deal."

"Yeah. I guess I did do well," he said, hoping he could somewhat console himself with the statement.

Weirdwolf smiled and patted the hypnotist's shoulder. "Besides, we still have our obligation to Zarak first. He has big plans for us, you know. Now let's go get some lightweight at that oilhouse that mech from Gannacol just opened up. I'm sure Soundwave doesn't want us hanging around."

"Buy me a cube of high-grade?" Mindwipe asked hopefully.

Weirdwolf took the Chiroptacon's arm and led him away. "I'll buy you two. And I'll call Skullcruncher to join us."

But all through the laughter and raucous camaraderie at the tavern, Mindwipe's smiles hid the fact that he regretted having been left out of the results of his success as a sire. According to new information in the Decepticon personnel files, Darkedge had given birth to two beautiful Chiroptacon mechs in the same time frame as Soundwave and Buzzsaw and had named the bitlets Spinwing and Nightflight.

And again, Weirdwolf seemed to know. "Drink up. There will be other surgings. There will be other carriers."

Mindwipe nodded. "You're right. Maybe not another Darkedge. Maybe not even another Chiroptacon. But there will be other carriers."

"And someday one of them will fall hopelessly in love with you and you'll have what you want."

Mindwipe sighed. "She's the whole reason I wanted this. At first it was just for the gifts and the status and for helping out the faction. But then I met her and she was so fun and sweet and so beautiful. And I thought that she loved me and I certainly loved her. And I wanted... I wanted..." His hands grasped at the table as if searching for the right words to describe what was inside of him. And suddenly feeling that maybe any words that he found would be too painful or too revealing, he grabbed his cup and downed the rest of the oil. "Nothing," he mumbled.

Weirdwolf patted him on the shoulder and pushed Skullcruncher's mostly full cup in front of the Chiroptacon. The big lizard was out on the dance floor stomping around with one of the Terrorcons. "Drink up and forget. Someday will come eventually."

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The End

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Author Notes:

Ratbat – Okay, so the timeline's a bit off. Ratbat did appear in canon before the time frame of when this story was set, but only briefly. He has a much bigger part in the Headmasters series.

Buzzbomb – In the Headmasters episode "Explosion on Mars! MegaZarak Appears" there is a moment in which one of Soundblaster's cassettes attacks Ramhorn. His colors are neither those of Rumble of Frenzy, but Buzzsaw's. There's a nice picture of this on the TFwiki. So maybe it was just an animation error... or was it?

Relationships – Technically Ratbat would be both Buzzbomb's uncle (on the carrier's side) and his brother (on the sire's side). Don't think too hard about it. Just trace the relationships through the maternal line.

More – along the same lines is to be found in my story "Some Lucky Decepticon." Gears starts surging and isn't interested in taking on any siring duties despite the number of Autobot carriers courting his favor. When he hurts Bluestreak's feelings, the others take notice. Gears suddenly finds he's burned a lot of bridges after he changes his mind regarding siring a sparkling or two. However the Autobots aren't about to let his his reproductive drive go neglected, and after a battle, two captured mechs are given the opportunity to become 'some lucky Decepticon.'

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