Worth of a Try

Starscream slowly reopened his optics after hours and hours of traveling, the metal box he was in shaking as it wasn't really stable. He didn't know where they wanted to get them to, but he knew that it wasn't something really near as they were traveling for days. The icy box was getting icier every two hours of driving. He looked around and saw that nothing seemingly changed, so he frowned. He wanted to get out of the box as soon as possible; he couldn't stand being imprisoned in a little cage as he couldn't even stand up. He wanted to rise up once again, he wanted to fly…

Then he looked down and saw Arcee's head at his chest. She was still sleeping, complying herself with a servo at his chest. He narrowed his optics and mumbled something, trying to push the sleeping femme away, but she was just falling back at his shoulder. He narrowed his optics and showed his dental plates in fury, trying to push her down again. It wasn't working, so he gave up and the blue femme slammed at his chest and got her servos at it. He widely opened his optics in surprise and felt immeasurable awkwardness that moment, but he just blinked. After a few seconds, he heavily sighed and carefully took her into his servos to set her down. As he did and backed off, she silently moaned but then curled up once again. He sighed in relief as he knew whether she'd wake up on him or he wakes her up, she'd be angry.

He was watching her sleep for a minute only to make sure she's really asleep. As soon as he realized that she was asleep, he silently prowled away from her towards the center of the small box. He was crawling as he couldn't do anything else and the desire to feel the wind and rise up once again was as big as back then when he lost his T-cog.

His misdeeds were surely coming back to bite him in his aft.

He fluttered with his wings by the very thought of flying, making a weak gust which managed to wake Arcee. She stretched and slowly opened her optics, seeing the seeker fluttering with his wings like a little bird which didn't know how to fly yet. She slightly smiled at that, but rolled her optics.

"Starscream, what the frag are you doing?" she asked, her smile turning into a smirk.

As she asked that, he stopped his movement and looked at her, his optics widened.

"Well… I… I guess I can't explain that one, can I?" he rhetorically asked, lowered his optic ridges and his wings drooped down.

She didn't respond in any way as she knew that he wouldn't really appreciate a conversation about that so she just crawled over to him and looked up to meet his optics which were already locked at hers

"Is it just me or is this place getting colder every second?"

"I'm not really sure… But I guess not, the metal here is a poor conductor of heat. I just know that we aren't really lucky to be trapped in this pathetic excuse for a cage," he started, slightly smiled and his wings rose up, "already mentioning the cold… perhaps you would like to cuddle some more, Mrs. Sleepwalker."

As he said that, he fluttered his wings and she looked down as she was ashamed.

"Oh… or did you do that on purpose? 'Cause it certainly looked like you did", he said in a mocking tone, smugly smiled and she narrowed her optics and looked back at him.

"Could we please not talk about it anymore? Like… ever again?" she asked and he grinned.

"Why? Are you actually telling me that you're embarrassed about it? You, the independent Arcee? It was just for survival... or was it?"

She narrowed her optics even more and he came closer to her face with his, his smile reducing, his optics half-closing.

"Or are you telling me that you actually like me…?" he silently asked and she opened her mouth in disgust to hear that. Then she turned her servo into a blaster, charged it and pointed it at him so that he had to back off, rising his servos. Her optics were looking at him with hate and he gasped and looked away.

"Or… Could be that I'm just imagining stuff", he squeaked and she turned her weapon into her servo again, but was still looking at him.

"You're right. It could be your imagination", she stated and looked away from him, putting her servos at the wall of the cube they were in. He put his servos at the ground and his wings drooped once again. He was looking at her in fear, not knowing if he should do something as well or just stay there and wait until she yells at him to do something. He was tired of a life like that, but he had no choice, she just had the authority which was missing in him.

She was pushing the wall, trying to detect an exit or to actually break it. It wasn't working so she looked at him, her optics still being narrowed. He flinched a little as she moved suddenly, lowering his optic ridges.

"You could try to help, right?" Arcee angrily asked and he tilted his head.

"Why… would I?" he silently said, "It's not that it's going to work. It has to be made of something really strong as not even your blades can do anything special to it."

She raised an optic ridge, sat on her shins and crossed her servos. He raised his optics ridges and stroked his pointy chin as he was thinking about it. He soon stopped stroking his chin and crawled over to the wall, gently touching it with his big hand. He stroked it with a finger and then looked at it, his optics narrowing. He soon licked the finger and Arcee tilted her head, not sure what he was doing. Then he got his audio closer to the wall, knocked at the metal to hear how it sounded like and then looked back at her.

"No doubt. Silver colored, low density and high strength… group for, period four, d-block."

She slightly shook her head as she didn't really know what he was talking about, but he didn't really seem he'd stop soon.

"High strength to weight radio… It's the metal with a relatively high melting point, more than 1650°C… or 3000°F, if you want it so. Useful as a refractory metal. Paramagnetic, fairly low electrical and thermal conductivity… No mistake! It's titanium!"

Arcee was just looking at him for a few seconds.

"What is that supposed to mean…?" she asked.

He rolled his optics and answered: "Well; the humans are smarter than I thought… You can't get out of here with a simple cut with your blades."

She narrowed her optics and frowned, claiming: "I'm definitely not staying here… as far as I know, you could blow me up in a second if you wanted to", she suddenly widened her optics and smiled.

"That's it! Starscream, fire your missile!"

He lowered his optic ridges and tilted his head, silently saying: "You want me to blow you up just because you can't stand me? Well, you do hate me and everything, but isn't it a bit extreme? Taking your life away just because of a simple mech… that's not even moral, it's a sin, you know. Like I didn't collect enough of them, you want me to go to", he stopped as she interrupted him.

"No, you moron!" she exclaimed and he looked at her, "Fire it at the metal!"

His optics widened.

"What?!" he exclaimed, "I'm only going to kill us! Sure, I could blow the fragging titanium up by launching my missile at it… I'd blow it up by its melting point", he began to think about it, but then stopped, "but nevertheless! I don't want to get scrapped just because of your silly ideas!"

"But Starscream", she silently said his name and lowered her optic ridges.

"No means NO!" he shouted, "My whole life I've been groveling, I've been bossed around!" he narrowed his optic ridges, "I lost everything and anything that ever meant something to me, you know?! I was always the bad one; I was the one who was blamed for everything! I've never had something to live for except of my goal to be a leader one day…! And then you all blew it!"

He was furious and Arcee was sure if he doesn't stop shouting, the humans would go check on them. Nevertheless, she narrowed her optics at the mad mech.

"Starscream… calm down", she silently said, but Starscream's optics narrowed even more.

"Calm down?! How could I?! I wish my life would just fragging end, I wish you never rescued me in the first place!"

As she heard that, she narrowed her optics even more, yelling: "You're such a glitch!"

As she said that, he widened his optics. He never knew she would stand up to him when he was furious, the others wouldn't dare to protest when he was in that state.

"We wanted to give you another chance, but you blew it, even though I warned you! We all wanted you to be with us; to be an Autobot, but you just had to exchange us for that thing!", she continued and lowered her optic ridges as soon as she saw that he lowered his wings yet another time, "We only wanted to help you, Scream… but you didn't accept it. You're still that same 'Con, you're still the same evil guy like before. And you know what, Starscream?"

As she asked that, he lowered his helm but searched for her optics, trying to hide that he was affected by her speech.

"What…?" he almost whispered so she wouldn't hear the sadness in his voice.

"Maybe… if you'd be nicer to the others, they'd be nicer to you as well… You're your own worst enemy, Starscream."

As she said that, she went into the corner and sat down, her head lowered. She wanted to try to escape at all costs, but she ended up getting disappointed.

They were silent for a cycle, but then, Starscream approached her on all fours, trying to catch her sight. He was tilting his head to end up locking their optics, but she was just turning her head away from him. As soon as Arcee realized that he wasn't going to give up, she looked at him, her optic ridges lowered, yet her optics narrowed.

"You know… I've been considered a bad boy… Really bad," he said and came closer to her face. She narrowed her optics, not knowing where this was headed to, "in fact; my whole life was just a series of mistakes", he said and she felt relieved as he added a twist.

"I can't do anything right… it's just that if I fire the missile at the wall, we manage to stay alive and escape, I'll do something wrong again and they'll capture us yet another time! It's… useless to ask me for help, I'll blow whatever you assign me to do", he lowered his optic ridges and she raised hers. It was the first time he actually opened up to a real 'Bot. It was also the moment when she realized that he knew he was never capable of being a leader, but he wanted to be one more than anything.

"Why did you try to be a leader at the first place then? Even the Vehicons knew you weren't capable of being one", she said and he looked oddly at her, raising an optic ridge. After a few seconds, he sighed and lowered his head again as he knew she was right.

"Well… I don't really do back story, but… I always wanted to be a leader… It was my personal dream", as he said that, he realized that a slight smile appeared at her faceplates.

"But… oh well, dreams are for those who can't get anything done with their life… So they keep dreaming although they know that the dreams they have cannot be fulfilled", he turned his head away from her, but soon felt her touch his servo, so he looked back at her, her bright blue optics shining in the dark.

She gently smiled at him.

"No, they're not."

He looked at her servo at his one and then back into her optics, slightly smiling.

But then, the box suddenly harshly moved as the vehicle stopped to drive, resulting Starscream to fly towards the femme. He managed to put his servos up so he wouldn't even touch the femme, even though he ended up right in front of her faceplates. She half-closed her optics and frowned and he bit his lower lip and dumbly smiled, tittering.

She put a servo at his chest plate and pushed him away, making him fall at his aft. She crawled towards the wall and then looked at him.

"See what you did? We could have been escaped, but you had to ruin everything!"

He rolled his optics and replied: "Did you even listen to me?! Of course I ruined it, I can't get anything right!"

She backed off and touched the wall with her back, turning her servo into a blaster. She soon aimed it at the wall and Starscream pushed himself over to her, touching the wall with his back as well.

"Wait, you ignorant femme! What part of my science talk didn't you understand?!" he exclaimed and she smirked.

"Half of it… I doubt you want to explain it all over again," she said and shot the wall, but as soon as it touched it, it started bouncing all over the room. Starscream shrieked and closed his optics tightly as it was headed towards him, but Arcee put her blade right in front of his faceplate and the blast disappeared. As the sound of it disappeared, he opened his optics and squealed as he saw her blade in front of his optics.

She removed it and smiled at his reaction, saying: "You're pathetic."

"I am pathetic?! You could have killed me!" he exclaimed and she smiled even wider.

"I could, but instead, I rescued you… So you owe me one", she smirked and he rolled his optics and got his sharp index claw at the wall. The mech quickly made cuts into the wall which seemed like numbers, but the seeker wrote them all over the wall so that it looked like something she would never guess what it was if she wouldn't have seen it from the start. The numbers soon extended and he wrote some complicated formulas all over the walls. Arcee looked at every formula he had written at the wall, but couldn't realize what it was about. It was the moment when she finally realized that Starscream, in fact, was a genius. The seeker soon stopped writing and smugly smiled at all the formulas. Then, he narrowed his optics and pointed his missile at the wall as opposed to them.

"We'll see that in T minus three, two, one", he fired his left missile and as soon as he saw that it worked, he hugged the femme to protect her from the shards which were coming towards them. A few of them managed to hit him, but he didn't want to show that it hurt. As soon as the shards stopped flying towards them, he released the femme and she looked into his optics, slightly narrowing them.

"I don't really like to stay in someone's debt", he smiled showing his dents and then transformed to fly away. She saw that he was actually intending to get rid of her, so she jumped at him and put her servos around his wing. He flew out the fastest he could, and after they flew away from the metal box which was being loaded on a giant boat, a big truck next to it, Arcee lowered her optics. The femme wasn't sure why, but she had a strange feeling about the silver seeker who didn't seem that evil anymore. Trying to suffocate the fact that she started seeing a friend in him, she assumed he really just didn't like staying in debts, just like the last time he spared her even though he could have scrapped her when she was hanging down, tied in Airachnid's web. Starscream soon coughed for attention.

"So… When can I get rid of you…? " he asked and she smiled.

"As soon as the others bridge me back… could be a long time."

"Awww," he stated, "well, at least I'll have someone who's laugh at my lame excuses for funny quotes".

As he said that, her smile got even bigger. She looked at the ground and saw the reason why it was so cold, everything was white. There was snow all over the ground, only a few trees were greening the place. The snow practically glowed white.

"Oh, here it comes. The next time, maybe they'll think of hoarding us into an airplane and clip my wings… not on a lousy boat. Totally 18th century", he stated and she tittered, looking back. As soon as she looked back, she widened her optics.

"Well… Maybe not, Scream", she said, worry in her voice.

"Why? Did I get the century wrong…? No, I'm pretty sure the humans invented the airplane in the 19th century".

"I guess century of the invention of planes is fine… but the humans thought about aircraft", she stated and Starscream immediately knew what she meant was that the humans were after them, being in planes.

"I stand corrected", he stated, bent a little and speeded up, starting a chase.