CHAPTER 13

Starscream's log

Entry #29

Yesterday's event was quite embarrassing. That is, what happened after my successful energon raid.

I have decided to investigate the other Decepticon dispatch signals, other than the Antarctic, of course. With the Apex Armor in my possession, it should prove safer for me now.

Now, yesterday I went to a subway tunnel, which was empty except for some human workers. I have to confess, I reacted quite…embarrassingly, to say the least. I thought one of the humans was going to fire a weapon upon me, but now that I think about it, it didn't look dangerous at all.

It's as if I keep growing more and more anxious and fearful every day.

And my hunger doesn't stop, naturally. In fact, it's beginning to increase to an extreme level lately. I feel like I need at least three cubes a day, but so far I only have four, and I want to save those for later.

So for now, I sustain myself with the smaller crystals while the bigger ones get refined. Two cubes from each large crystal, I've learned. That means about twenty-four cubes in total, when this is over. Which means I'll have enough energon for about another week. Fair enough.

Since yesterday's investigation went so well, I've decided to go investigate another signal, one that lies close to the equator. I'm not sure what to expect when I get there, but I'll bring my Apex Armor just in case.

I'll let the refiner continue to convert the crystal while I'm gone.

Starscream exited the GroundBridge with the Apex Armor on his back, and found himself on a volcanic island of sorts. There was a peculiar scent in the air. Somehow, it smelled a bit familiar, but he couldn't quite put his finger on why or what. It smelled like bad energon, to say the least.

"There doesn't seem to be anything around here…" He scouted the area with a servo above his optics. He heard the faint buzzing of a mosquito swirling around his audio receptors. He waved a servo to make it go away, but instead it got louder and louder, and then deeper and closer…and then he realized the buzzing wasn't coming from his audio receptors, but from behind him.

He was knocked down by something heavy from behind. He tried to get up, but whatever was pinning him down was so heavy that he couldn't move. A wet snarl and a rattling shriek, a servo filled with sharp claws grabbing a hold of him, and he was lifted up to look straight into the face of an Insecticon.

"Oh scrap!" he shrieked, while trying to pry himself free from the Insecticon's claws.

The Insecticon let out a shrill roar and threw the Seeker against a rock wall, so the Apex Armor hit against his back, calling forth a series of pain from both the back and the inside of his chest. His chest pain apparently took the hit as a party invitation.

While the Seeker was recovering from the hit, the Insecticon walked towards him, slowly, because apparently it didn't think of him as a threat. Starscream decided to use this to his advantage.

He quickly, but shakily pulled forth the Apex Armor and placed it on his chest. The Insecticon apparently knew something was about to happen, because it sped up and went from walking to running towards the Seeker, who was now being enveloped in the thick, impenetrable armor. As the Insecticon approached him, he shot out a fist and punched the beast back. It flew into the air, but recovered quickly and transformed into its beetle mode, then flew down towards the armored Starscream.

As it transformed back to robot mode and put its claws into the armor, it seemed surprised to find out its claws couldn't penetrate the armor at all. Starscream took the chance and grabbed the creature's leg and swung it against the cliff wall, then jumped into the air and smacked it into the ground. He stood in front of it with a very satisfied and cocky smirk and cackled.

"Hah! I'm so powerful, even Insecticons can't beat me! I'm invincible!"

The wounded Insecticon lifted its head and upper body and let out a tremendous, shrieking roar at the Seeker. Though it was rather unpleasant for his audio receptors and he could literally feel the vibrations it caused, it didn't hurt him in any way. But then he heard a faint buzzing behind him, and this time he turned around to see…a whole horde of Insecticons coming towards him!

Ohhhhh, scrap…

The Apex Armor might be impenetrable, but a horde of Insecticons was too much even for him. He had to get out of there. But then he remembered he couldn't reach the remote while inside the armor. Which meant…

"Oh, Starscream, you better be fast!" he said to himself as he reluctantly pressed the button on the disc. The Insecticons were a few hundred feet from him. The wounded Insecticon didn't seem to be able to move.

It felt like the armor was taking forever to transform, and Starscream felt like stepping anxiously while waiting for his chance. The Insecticons were half a hundred feet from him when the armor was done transforming.

He quickly fetched his remote and pressed the button. The Insecticons were a few dozen feet from him now.

He picked up the Apex Armor and ran towards the portal at full speed. The Insecticons were less than a dozen feet from him.

I'm not gonna make it, I'm not gonna make it, I'm not gonna make it…

Starscream jumped through the portal just as an Insecticon had swiped the tip of his wing, and as he came out on the other side of the GroundBridge, he immediately pressed the remote to shut it down as an Insecticon arm was showing up in the green blur.

The portal closed, and the Insecticon arm fell to the floor, twisting and leaking energon before lying still. Back in the equator, one of those Insecticons had just been 'disarmed'.

"Phew…that was close," the Seeker gasped and wiped his forehead clean of lubricate. He sat up and held a servo on his chest, trying to calm his fast-beating spark. "That's enough excitement for today."

Starscream's log

Entry #30

Thirty logs. I think that calls for a celebration.

Crunch, crunch, crunch…

I'd drink a cube, but there are still plenty of crystals left, and I stand by my word that I want to save the best for last. There aren't many small crystals left though.

Yesterday was such a hectic day. Since the previous investigation had been so harmless, I naively thought this one would be so as well.

Primus, was I wrong.

I was attacked by an armada of Insecticons! And I just barely managed to get back in one piece! Thank Primus for the Apex Armor! Without that I would have been scrapped!

As reluctant as I am by now, there's still one more signal left for me to investigate. I haven't found any clues to the other relics as of yet, but I need to see if there's at least something to see in this particular area.

I'll just put another crystal in the refiner, and off I go.

As Starscream exited the portal, he found himself in a temperate forest. The last Decepticon signal was not far from the signal in the tunnel, meaning it might be either on the same continent or the continent right next to it. Either way it would mean a long, but possible walk home if he was to lose the remote here. Not that he expected to lose it, but it was a possibility. That small device was his only way of getting back to the Harbinger safely and quickly. He valued it with his life.

"Hello?" he said, deeming the silence too…silent. "Is anyone out there? Any Decepticons? Where are you?" He sang the last bit. He was hoping to meet someone he could beat up this time, having the Apex Armor and everything. It was his second-most valued object.

"Hello!"

Once again, someone hit him from behind, but instead of knocking him down, they instead knocked off the Apex Armor from his back. He turned to see who it was, but they were quickly gone. He turned to get to the armor, but his attacker then knocked and pinned him down on his back. He stared up at his opponent. It was a sleek femmebot with gray and purple armor, a yellow visor and a slashed Unicron insignia on her chest. She looked like a bigger, bulkier version of Arcee, but Starscream recognized her as the assassin named Nightbird. Her mouth was in a blank frown, and the Seeker couldn't tell if she was amused or angry.

"Y-you!" he said through gritted teeth.

"Yes, me," she replied coldly and aimed a laser gun at his chest, while pinning him down with the other servo. He noticed she had fingers instead of claws. "You can't imagine how much time I've spent looking for you, just so those annoying Heralds could save your petty armor! Very clever of Sideways to teleport you somewhere else before you returned to your hideout. But Sideways isn't here to save you now." She loaded her gun and prepared to fire. "Nobody is."

In a fast decision, Starscream kicked Nightbird in the stomach with the tip of his knee. She recoiled, and he used the chance to kick her with his whole leg, knocking her off him. She fired her gun, but missed and hit a tree instead, which was set on fire.

While she was distracted by her pain and the burning tree, Starscream got up and ran towards the Apex Armor on the ground, a mile away from where he was. Just get a little closer, you're almost there, he thought encouragingly to himself as he neared the armor…

A stinging pain hit both of his ankles, almost at the same time, making him fall over; Nightbird must have shot him while he wasn't looking. Either way, she walked over to him from behind, ignoring the burning tree, which had begun spreading to the trees surrounding it.

"You're pathetic," she said and loaded her gun again, preparing to fire once more. "You're weak and fragile, a coward, an incompetent liar and a constructed failure. Snuffing your spark will be easy." She aimed her gun at his back. "Turn around so I can do my job!"

There was silence for a moment, while Starscream was crouched on his stomach. To her surprise, he was cackling. "As you wish."

He turned around and revealed the Apex Armor on his chest, which immediately started transforming around him.

"No!" Nightbird exclaimed and shot at him, but the armor blocked her attacks and sent them off into the distance. "No, I was so close! To Pits with you!"

As the armor had finished transforming, Nightbird had reverted to motorbike mode and drove off into the woods. Starscream was now left alone, fully armored and with burning trees all around him. The fire was spreading quite fast, covering a large area of the forest now. Starscream looked concerned at the fire. The armor was impenetrable and waterproof alright, but was it heatproof too? He didn't think so, and it was already getting hard to breathe in there.

Though transformers like him didn't need to breathe oxygen like the humans did, it did cool down their internal systems and prevent overheat. There was no cool air here though, as the fire had quickly surrounded him and sucked up all oxygen and heated up the air around him. He had to get out of there, before he got overheated.

He began running in a random direction, hoping it would lead out of the forest, or at least a good distance away from the fire. But it seemed as if the fire was following him, as more and more trees around him caught fire. He wondered if this forest fire would alert the Autobots in any way? He gasped for air while running from the hot, bellowing flames.

He arrived in a glade, where the fire hadn't spread to yet, and decided this would be the best place to exit the armor and open a portal back to the Harbinger. He did it swiftly, just as the fire caught up to him. As he began walking into the portal, he learned his legs had taken more damage from the shots than he thought; he could barely move them, and struggled to merely take one step at a time, all while gasping for cool air, which was highly reduced by the surrounding flames. But as if his situation wasn't bad enough already, upon entering the portal, he heard a rumble from behind, and before he could close the GroundBridge behind him, Nightbird had made her way through to the ship along with Starscream, knocking the latter one down once more.

"So this is where you're hiding?" she cackled while pinning him down on his stomach, on the hard floor. "Ah, I see you have some operation tools lying around! Let's make some fun out of this otherwise frustrating situation, shall we not?"

She dragged him along the floor by his arms behind his back, rendering him unable to move other than kicking pointlessly in the air. She put him on the recharging table and turned him around, so he was facing her, holding a firm grip on both his wrists with one servo. She was grinning while reaching out for the durabillium drill on the instrument panel next to them. Starscream looked around for something to stop her.

"Let's get this over with, dear," she said in a sugar-sweet tone. She pressed the button on the drill and began slowly directing it to Starscream's chest, specifically at his spark chamber.

Starscream couldn't exactly see a way out of this: His legs were paralyzed, he was unable to transform, the femmebot had an incredibly strong grip on his servos, and his wings along with the femmebot's weight made it almost impossible to roll to the side. The drill was dangerously close to his chest now. If only Sideways or any of the other Heralds would show up…

No, I can't just rely on those scraps, he thought anxiously and annoyed. I have to get myself out of this mess, or I'll DIE!

Just as the drill brushed the metal on his chest, he made a quick decision and head-butted Nightbird on the forehead. The drill dug deeply in, causing the Seeker to scream in pain, but the attack made Nightbird recoil and fall backwards, the drill falling out of her servo. Starscream took the chance and jumped off the table with a servo on his chest, covering the leaking wound, running as fast as he could on his otherwise paralyzed legs; the adrenaline boost must have given him some mobility to flee. But he wasn't going to leave the Harbinger. He wouldn't give up his home a second time.

He grabbed the remote and stopped in front of the wall, facing Nightbird, who had just gotten up and pulled forth a laser sword.

"You little glitch," she spat and ran towards him. "You made a big mistake by not running away. A big mist—"

Starscream jumped to the side and opened a portal. Nightbird was taken by surprise, but before she could stop in her tracks, Starscream kicked her all the way through the portal and quickly closed it again, alone once more.

Where had he sent her off to? He had merely picked a random location to make sure she would get out. He looked at the monitor. The coordinates were set to…

"The Antarctic!" Starscream laughed maniacally. The femmebot was never going to find him again! Not unless she learned how to fly!

He looked down at the blue wound on his chest. It was leaking a lot, but thankfully it had not breached his spark chamber.

He would live.

Starscream's log

Entry #31

It has been two days since my battle with Nightbird. Yeah, I forgot to tell you about that. She followed me back to the Harbinger, and thus I had to clean up after our 'mess'.

Almost all of my large crystals have been refined to energon cubes. There's only one large crystal left. I have twenty-two cubes, and just used up my last small crystal this morning. I would have refined the crystals faster if it wasn't because of my recent 'explorations'.

Now that I have a somewhat steady energon supply, I am searching the internet for information regarding any of the other relics.

So far, I am disappointed.

"This is what the humans call the information super-highway?" Starscream said while searching a conspiracy website, scrolling over several pictures of fake aliens, ghosts and a car without a driver.

"A trillion gigabytes of data, none of it useful!" Next to the picture of the car was a GIF of a tap-dancing monkey. He clicked on it and watched it.

"Though some…oddly engrossing." He laughed merrily at the GIF and continued scrolling. As he scrolled through a few more pictures, he found one very interesting photo.

"What is this?" he purred and zoomed in on the picture, featuring a large red crystal in the middle of a construction site. He gasped in awe - at first he couldn't believe his own optics, but then he laughed maniacally. "Ignorant life forms have no idea what they've uncovered!"

Red energon…