Buildings loomed around the roof Starscream sat upon, curled into a ball against a wall. It was a sad view at best, but if he sat in the right place, he could see a sliver of horizon between two skyscrapers. If he sat there at the right time, the sun would dip through that crack during its setting.
Starscream shuttered his optics to slits as it did just that, giving up most of his sight in exchange for the heat on his icy frame. If only the sun's rays could reach into his innermost workings. Perhaps then he would find peace.
A jet roared overhead, stabbing yet another dagger into his spark. At this point, he was surprised there was still area left to burrow blades into. He was so jaded from the dozens of jets that had passed overhead that when one landed softly behind him, he didn't even flinch.
"Starscream." It was Thundercracker. Starscream couldn't decide who he would have preferred find him.
The blue seeker came up beside him, and Starscream felt his gaze bore into his helm.
With a sigh, Thundercracker sat as well. His slightly lowered wing brushed against Starscream's thruster. The seeker made ovals with his wingtip, and Starscream didn't want to look at him to see if it was intentional or not.
They were like that for some time. Through the sliver Starscream could see the top of the glowing disk, only a tiny square of light from his perspective.
Thundercracker's arm draped over Starscream's shoulders.
Optic covers that had grown heavy shot up. He glanced over, confirming the gesture's legitimacy when he saw the wires and sensitive plating that joined the seeker's arm to the rest of his frame. His trinemate sought his closeness. If he could even call him his trinemate anymore.
He wanted to pull away. He wanted to hurt him the way he had been hurt. But none of that mattered right now. He leaned into Thundercracker. Then his arm curled around the seeker's waist. Then the other. Then they were clasping each other so tightly that an onlooker would have had trouble distinguishing one mech from the other.
Thundercracker's ventilations were hot on the top of his helm. "I told myself I wasn't going to love again." His voice was thick with emotion. "Then Skywarp came along. And then you."
Starscream's claws dug into the seeker's back plating and he hid his faceplate in his trinemate's chest.
"What's changed?" he croaked out.
Somehow, Thundercracker's embrace tightened. "Nothing."
Starscream ventilated shakily, forcing his voice to steady. "Then why are you here?"
Thundercracker's thumb traced circles on the base of one of Starscream's wings. It felt as soothing as it had looked when he would do the same to Skywarp. "Because I never listen to myself."
Starscream cracked open his optics. His field of vision was consumed with his trinemate's blue and silver chest plating. Beneath it, his spark beat erratically.
"Why were you a saved spark?" Starscream ventured.
Thundercracker froze. His sparkbeat became more audible.
"I don't think of you any differently," Starscream assured him. "I just want to know why."
"You have every right to be prejudiced." Thundercracker turned his helm away.
"I'm not you," Starscream said coldly.
Thundercracker shifted into a more comfortable sitting position, resting Starscream's helm in his lap. His servo pet his helm with calming strokes.
"You and Skywarp are not my first trine," Thundercracker started.
"Can you even call me that now?" Starscream said bitterly.
Thundercracker's servo lifted off of his helm, then returned, hesitantly. "You made your decision." The seeker's free arm cradled Starscream closer. "And I, mine."
"And Skywarp?"
Thundercracker ignored his question. "My first trine..." The seeker stopped, his voicebox overrun with static.
Starscream took his trinemate's servo and kissed the back of it, hugging it to his chest.
"M-my trinemates were brave." The seeker shuddered as he exvented. "We were off-world, scouting planets to see if the energon planted on them had germinated. We were told the worlds were uninhabited..."
Starscream glanced up, concerned by how much his trinemate's servo was shaking. The rest of Thundercracker shook even more violently, and his optics were so wide his yellow pupils were nearly swallowed up by the surrounding blackness. He jumped when Starscream gently laid his servo on the side of his faceplate.
"S-Skywarp." Thundercracker's wings started to ascend. "No. Starscream."
Starscream lifted himself into his trinemate's lap and pulled him into a hug.
"I was wrong." The seeker hid his faceplate in Starscream's neck. "You are worthy."
"...Where's Skywarp?"
The seeker shook his helm, burrowing further into Starscream's plating. "Stasis."
"Stasis?"
"He couldn't take it."
"Take what?"
"The separation." Thundercracker's wings sagged. "He needs you."
"He doesn't want me." The words were quiet, bitter.
"It doesn't matter." Thundercracker shook his helm. "You're a part of each other." He sucked in a ventilation. "A part I hope to share with you."
Starscream pulled away, unable to look Thundercracker in his optics.
"I'm sorry, Starscream." Thundercracker laced his digits with Starscream's, gripping tightly.
Starscream didn't reciprocate. He shook his helm slowly. "How can I be sure you won't leave again?" His throat grew tight. He swallowed a couple of times, only exacerbating the issue.
"You won't," Thundercracker said, unhelpful.
Starscream rolled off of his trinemate, rubbing his arms against the cold. Thundercracker kept his grip on his servo.
"You can never be sure what the outcome of any relationship will be," the seeker went on. "You have to trust them, love them, and hope for the best."
"There's no guarantee that I'll ever be able to fly." Starscream sighed sadly.
Thundercracker shrugged. "We'll just spend more time on the ground."
"I can't erase my past."
"You did what you had to."
"Why are you so accepting now?" Starscream asked accusatorily.
"We're not so different." Thundercracker's warm optics fell on his faceplate. "We've all faced discrimination at one point or another."
"'At one point or another'? For you, maybe. This is my life."
"...I'm sorry." Thundercracker squeezed Starscream's servo.
"You're lucky," Starscream said jealously. "You can hide your past."
"I suppose I am." He leaned over onto Starscream.
Starscream traced a seam on his leg. "Nexus."
Thundercracker looked up at him, a questioning look on his faceplate.
"That was his name, wasn't it?" Optics, half-shuttered with sadness, met the seeker's.
Thundercracker's faceplate crumpled. "How did you know?"
Starscream looked up, the stars just beginning to twinkle in the sky. "I must have read it somewhere."
"What the hell happened to you?" Starscream stood before Megatron, fury in his optics. He started pacing before the berth, servos gesturing wildly along with his words. "You get a comm from that Orion and suddenly you're flying off to meet him, and you come back with a new name and a cannon strapped to your arm! What, your right arm's not dangerous enough for you?"
"Calm down, Starscream." Apparently, this was the wrong thing to say.
"Calm down?!" The performer stopped to glare at him. "How the frag am I supposed to be calm when you come back with a cannon?!"
"It's not going to fire on its own."
"Why do you need to fire it at all?" The performer threw up his arms and stomped away from the gladiator.
"It's a precautionary measure," Megatron explained.
"For what? What did Orion rope you into doing?" Starscream got back in Megatron's faceplate.
Megatron rolled his eyes frustratedly. "For the last time, Orion had nothing to do with this! If anything, he's helped you."
"Oh, yes. He's helped me so much." Starscream crossed his arms, disgust on his faceplate.
"If you hadn't freaked out about these minor changes I could have shown you," Megatron grumbled.
"Oh, so these are minor changes?"
Megatron groaned.
"Gee, why don't I just go off somewhere for a few solar cycles. I could change my name to Starscre and get a shiny new giant gun attached to my arm too. Then we could match and be the envy of all of Cybertron."
"The sarcasm is really unnecessary." Megatron leaned over, reaching for the berthside table.
"About as necessary as a gun, I'd assume."
"Where is it?" Megatron ignored Starscream, pushing things out of the way on the table, searching.
Starscream rolled his optics, clearly unimpressed. "Don't tell me, there's more guns?"
"This for you, actually," Megatron said. Then, under his ventilations, "Not that you deserve it."
"I don't want it." Starscream turned his back.
"There it is." Megatron bent down to pick it off of the floor.
Starscream turned to look, fear alighting his optics when they fell on the data pad. "What is that?"
"A malfunctioning data pad, it seems." Megatron mashed the power button, but the screen didn't light up.
"Where did you get that?" Starscream took a step away.
"Orion." The gladiator hit it hard with his servo.
"Where did he get that information?"
Megatron looked up, confused. "You read it?"
Starscream nodded, optics trained on the useless piece of tech.
"I thought you'd be happy." Megatron sighed, shoulders sagging.
"Happy? I don't remember any of it!"
"They could have the answers you need." Megatron opened a drawer, procuring a functioning data pad from it. "I could even tell you where they are."
"Why?" Starscream sounded defeated. He hugged his arms to himself and went to curl up in the chair.
"You're a seeker, Starscream." Megatron shifted down the berth towards him.
"Don't you mean 'Nexus'?" Starscream said scathingly.
"You'll always be Starscream to me."
"Oh, like you'll always be Megatronus to me?" Starscream spat the words like daggers.
Megatron groaned. "It's not the same, Starscream."
"Whatever."
"At least talk to them. Skywarp and Thundercracker could have the answers you're looking for."
"I doubt it." Starscream curled more tightly in on himself. "If they wanted me they would have found me by now."
"And if Shadowplay was involved?"
Starscream put his helm in his servos, shaking it back and forth.
Megatron plucked him from his seat, depositing Starscream onto his lap. He held him tightly. He hung limply in Megatron's arms, his shallow ventilations the only indication that he was still alive.
"What am I supposed to do with this?" Starscream's words were weak and tired.
"Help in my fight for equality," Megatron suggested. "If you had never been... changed, you would have been treated with the utmost respect. Poverty would have been the least of your worries. Your circuits, your plating, it's all the same. All that they're judging you for is your title."
"What's a seeker without a t-cog?" Starscream's optic covers fell as if he was just too tired to keep them open.
"I'll get you one. Somehow."
Starscream rolled his optics away from Megatron.
"I will."
"I'll believe it when I see it."