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0 0 Part Nine 0 0

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Overlord settled back in his seat and looked at the screen displaying his pet project. The Combaticon was being attended to by one of the drones. He had reversed the drones' programmed responses as soon as he'd begun the hands-on portion of the training, so Vortex was getting nothing from the current drone but fuel. The 'glitches' that'd caused the drones' arms to wobble and prick their needles into the plastic had been carefully planned, and there was no longer any need for them. Now that the Combaticon's programming had been primed and fastened onto the bubble sounds as salvation, any and all such rewards would only come directly from Overlord's hands. Utter obedience would be ground into his processor as the only way to get that reward, and that obedience would be ground deep.

As he watched Vortex's visor listlessly dim toward recharge again, the triple-changer replayed the last session in his head.

The helicopter had been showing signs of successful conduct modifications for more than two weeks now. That was good progress. Better than he had expected, actually. Vortex did have a reputation, after all, and Overlord had expected more of a struggle before the breaking completed. Then again, he did have the upper hand.

He smiled to himself, reaching out to casually clean a speck of dust from the screen. Yes, this was going to be quite the notch on his record. Certain phrases and oblique references in Shockwave's continued communiqués with him indicated that the Guardian of Cybertron had been subtly spreading the word about his work here. Apparently, the relations between Shockwave and the Combaticon team leader were less than ideal. Shockwave had been letting the rest of the Decepticons know about Vortex's humbling as a way to humiliate Onslaught, but disguising it under a thin official veneer of informing potential troublemakers that behavioral issues could be dealt with on a much more terrible scale than mere physical brutality.

Overlord had know of the rivalry between Megatron's subcommanders, but he'd never felt a need to vie for the Supreme Commander's attention. When he made his move, it would be enough to garner Megatron's full interest. In the meantime, he merely curled his lip at Shockwave's hint of a threat if he didn't succeed in crushing Vortex. The Guardian had committed too much for this to be an unsuccessful project, but he hardly needed to worry. It would be successful indeed. Overlord was enjoying himself far too much not to follow through to complete victory.

It was such a gratifying spectacle to watch a mind rearranging its own priorities, slowly but surely, under the weight of its own base-code.

When he'd originally scanned the personal file of the mecha blearily struggling to stay awake on the screen in front of him, the information about the Detention Centre had stood out. He had been mildly interested on the practical applications of the data about spark extraction and psychological aftereffects of the detention spark boxes, but - Primus! He'd thought it would require a bit more effort for successful emulation than a few hundred meters of plastic and a month of isolation, but he'd been wrong. That had been a pleasant discovery. It seemed that tinkering with the Combaticon's stasis preparation protocols had created the right mental weakness. Isolation, immobilization, and dropping toward statis had prepared Vortex wonderfully. The involuntary memory recalls had been almost visible.

The results? Priceless. Even with a clear notion of what was being done to him, the illusion was still strong enough to trigger the rotary mecha. Which was, in a very pointed way, exactly what this was about. There was a part of every Cybertronian that could overwhelm conscious thought if manipulated correctly, and Overlord was a master manipulator.

He chuckled with satisfaction. A week more, just to be on the safe side, and then he'd test the Combaticon. He wasn't broken to heel yet, however promising the training progress had been so far. Overlord expected at least one or two more incidents as stubborn defiance took a last stand. He was looking forward to that. The enjoyment he'd feel while snapping the last of the little scrapheap's will…or rather, the enjoyment he'd take in watching Vortex snap it himself for his viewing pleasure.

On the screen, Vortex had lost the fight against his own body and fallen into recharge. Overlord smiled again and shut off the screen .

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