Starscream wasn't there when it happened.

Ever since Skyfire had left, he'd been more waspish and quicker to anger. He knew it in the distant sort of way everyone knew when they were acting out but couldn't seem to stop himself. Part of him didn't care. The other part blamed it on the shuttle.

'Look at what you've done. You did this. You betrayed me.'

Starscream was not the only one in a fury. When Megatron realized the Stunticons had vanished and no amount of summonings could draw them out, he decided to prove he didn't need them to win battles and sent his forces to attack a highly populated city on the coast. It was a rash and stupid plan. Starscream said as much, which only riled up the warlord more. Megatron sent his air commander out alone to steal energon from a power plant while the rest of them battled, as a not very subtle way of saying he didn't need the dragon to win either.

'Like I care.' Starscream insisted to himself at the time. He may have been insulted, but at least he wasn't involved in the obviously ridiculous plan. There was no end goal other than to cause destruction and hurt Autobots. They gained nothing even if they succeeded in those two goals. What kind of plan was that?

So he wasn't there when it happened. But he most certainly heard about it later.

Why Skyfire was at the battle, he didn't know. It was stupid of the Autobots to bring him along. The elemental was a pacifist! They should have kept him back at their base where it was safe! Either way, the Decepticons were abuzz about how he'd gotten within Megatron's line of sight. Still remembering the mech's refusal to join them, Megatron ignored Optimus and tore into the ice elemental. With heavy injuries Skyfire had started to retreat, and no one was exactly sure what happened next. Some said buildings had fallen on him, their bases weakened by the fighting. Others claimed the Insecticons had tried to kill him since he'd looked like easy prey. The trio had denied it, keeping wary optics on Starscream.

The dragon didn't care and he was certain he was doing an excellent job of showing how much he didn't care.

Still, the other Cons stayed away from Starscream and kept their cheering of how that traitor was at death's door to themselves. Not that Starscream didn't hear them. Subtle wasn't in most of his comrade's vocabularies.

He waited patiently. Giving no indication he cared one way or the other about Skyfire, he ignored the others and kept his audios on Autobot chatter.

'It doesn't look good.' They said. 'Ratchet's worried.'

And silence. The fools were actually smart enough not to talk too openly even on heavily encrypted channels. Still, after nearly two weeks, one loud mouth mentioned the ice elemental.

'Did you hear? They're putting him in spark isolation. His frame is too damaged-'

Spark isolation?! Of all the things they could have done... Fix his frame! They just had to fix his frame! The Autobots had the only real medic still alive and they couldn't even fix Skyfire?! Starscream seethed, conveniently forgetting he'd helped nearly get rid of the medic before. It hadn't been his plan after all. Another point to Megatron's folly.

Days turned into a static-filled blur, punctured by his trinemate's worried voices and Megatron's demanding explanation for what had crawled up his tailpipe. Starscream smiled like a mask and simpered, 'What do you mean Lord Megatron?'

He was doing a fine job of showing he didn't care. An excellent job! Why would he care about that traitor Skyfire? See how he went about his days plotting and scheming like always? See how he didn't react to the whispers and low-slung taunts that his old acquaintance was dying? Couldn't they see that he didn't care?

See See SEE?

Starscream himself wasn't sure what the problem was. Skyfire had left him. Betrayed him, even! So why did the knowledge that his oldest friend was alone and shut away in a dark place stab into his spark again and again? The snakes coiling around inside him shifted uneasily. The dragon didn't know what his problem was, and he certainly wasn't going to tell anyone that. With nothing else to do, and refusing to face the issue, Starscream threw himself into plots and plans and weapon ideas.

He didn't care, obviously. Pay attention you fools.

A month after the city battle, he found an encrypted message pinging him from an unknown comm. Annoyance creeping into his already foul mood, Starscream listened. When it finished the dragon reached out and grabbed the closest object, a broken shell of an ion cannon, and threw it against the wall. A chair was hurled across the room. Several moments passed followed only by crashing, shattering glass and screeching.

No one came to investigate. No one ever did when the air commander threw one of his famous fits. When it was over, his lab was trashed and Starscream was venting hard. Whirling around, he fled out the door and took off for the sky.

He gained altitude and dropped, free falling thousands of feet through the atmosphere and twirling until the air whistled over his crystal plating and wings in a seeker song. It shrilled and shrieked through the sky. Another drop, another spin and climb and drop... The seeker song picked up and became desperate.

But no one answered. His trine mates were back at base and there was no one else now.

It was very cold up there. Starscream started to feel numb.

Slowly, he descended to the meeting place specified in the message. After a quick sweep of the area, he landed quietly in the clearing among the pines and transformed. Across the open space, Sideswipe stood up from where he'd been sitting. "Glad to see you didn't think it was a prank."

"I'll tear your throat out now if it is." Starscream replied in a hiss, scanning the area. The golden lennox was around here somewhere, no doubt watching and waiting in case the Decepticon tried anything unfriendly. Where one twin was, the other was never far behind. Their greatest strength was also their greatest and most obvious weakness. Despite that, Starscream would admit the pit-spawned duo were a challenging enemy.

"Right." Sideswipe smiled, trying to be charming and as at ease as he could when conversing with the enemy's air commander. "Well, hmm." He rummaged through subspace before pulling out a spark isolation box and holding it out. Frost flowers had bloomed at it's corners, with dripping currents of cold air made visible in the warm evening rolling off of it. "We think you should hold onto him."

Starscream didn't move right away. Staring at the container, he tried to feel for a sense of Skyfire and felt only a chill brushing towards him. After a long moment, the dragon finally pulled his gaze up to curious blue optics studying him.

"Why?" He rasped. "Why can't your medic just put him back in his body?"

"We don't' have the parts right now." A grimace flicked across the Autobot's face as he pulled the spark closer to his chest. "It'll take awhile and even when we do fix him... He's a pacifist. He doesn't know how to fight."

A heavy blow punched Starscream in the chest. "Do you mean to tell me," his voice rose in volume and tuned into a screech, "that Prime won't sanction returning his spark to frame because he can't use him as a FIGHTER?!"

Of all the reasons... HOW FRAGGING DARE THE PRIME EVEN THINK-

"NO!" Sideswipe waved his one free hand and shook his head violently, optics wide and wary. "Absolutely not! We can't..." He struggled to explain quickly, "We can't protect him all the time. If we put him back in his frame, eventually, he's gonna be out at a battlefield for some reason or another and he's gonna get hurt again. And maybe Ratchet won't be able to save him a second time. He's dangerous, I'll give him that, but he doesn't know how to fight. And Prime's never gonna make Skyfire fight or learn to fight, and …. he's going to be in a lot of danger because of that. Prime wants to keep him safe, in spark isolation, until the war is over."

The dragon digested that for a second, the violent glow fading from his optics even as they narrowed at the red mech, "And you disagree with this idea?"

"My opinion doesn't really matter to high command. Why would it?" Sideswipe shrugged.

Starscream lifted his arms, ignoring the way his enemy tensed, and gestured to their far-from-civilization surroundings. "I don't know. You're out here now, aren't you? Dare I assume this meeting wasn't sanctioned by your officers?" A smirk answered him.

"So," he continued, tilting his helm at the other mech, "why me?"

Shifting his fingers a little as frost started to gather on the ones holding the spark container, Sideswipe smiled blandly, "Skyfire didn't say much, other than that you two used to know each other. But we have our ways." He wiggled his fingers at Starscream. Whatever that was supposed to mean. "And you haven't been super subtle about things, you know? Your teammates have been complaining about your bitchiness levels rising since Skyfire got hurt. It really wasn't too hard to figure out."

"What are you talking about?!" The commander snapped, "I don't care about that traitorous elemental-"

"Says the Con meeting with Autobots far away from both their bases." Sunstreaker rumbled, stepping out of the tawny brush to the left of them. The evening sun lit up his plating as he padded near silently in beast mode over to his twin and settled down on his overly large paws, feline face bored.

There was nothing really to say to that. Growling, Starscream flicked his wings in insult and looked back and forth between the pair. "And yet, I still don't know why you're offering me his spark."

Sideswipe sighed. "Okay. Simple explanation. Keeping Skyfire away from the fighting is a good idea. Bad part is how the war ends. If we win, he's fine. If you guys win or at least, raid our base, he's in a slag-storm because Bucket-head has made it pretty obvious he hates him." Starscream's clawed servos twitched on reflex. "Now, if you have him, being all friendly with him and all..."

"And Primus knows how he puts up with you." Sunstreaker tossed in.

"...then it's a different scenario." The red twin continued. "We win, we wouldn't hurt him. You guys win, Megatron or the others never find him. Sound about right?"

That should have been flawed logic, but somehow it made a strange sort of sense. "And you're doing this because?" They had to want something. No one goes through this much trouble and risks a fight with him just out of the kindness of their spark.

Sideswipe pouted, optics wide in what Starscream thought was supposed to be innocence."I'm a goody-two shoes, soft-sparked Autobot. Duh."

An unamused glare answered him. Starscream waited. After a moment of no response and more waiting, the lennox finally sighed and rolled his optics. "Fine. I like him-" Jealously flashed across Starscream's face, wings flaring out angrily. "-as a friend." Sideswipe finished slowly, both of the twin's optic ridges raising simultaneously. They watched the dragon like they expected the Con to try and kill them at any second. Which Starscream was considering. Just a little.

"He's a friend. And maybe he helped me out a bit with something because he's a good mech. So I'm paying it back."

Wings lowered. Starscream was very very tired all of a sudden. And not in the mood to deal with Autobots for much longer. "So this is you making him safer to pay off your debt to him."

"Yeah."

That at least, made sense. "Fine." Starscream held an empty servo up and gestured at the box.

Trading glances, the twins moved forward together slowly. Sunstreaker's tail swung back and forth, optics never leaving the seeker's. Starscream gave them points for not hesitating. He struggled to keep his own plating from flaring as his enemies drew near. He really should kill them. Then they couldn't tell anyone else about this, about Skyfire. No one would know...When within a few feet of each other, Sideswipe held out the container and Starscream gently took it. Both parties backed away from each other slowly.

Neither relaxed until they were as far away from each other as they had been before. Starscream tried to keep his attention on both the twins and on the cold spark he held close to his cockpit and prevailed purely out of the unwillingness to let enemies so close without watching them. Cold bit his servos and the glass on his front but he paid it no mind. It reminded him too strongly of Skyfire to feel like pain.

The snakes and dragon-lets inside hissed and writhed, scales curling tighter around his spark. Carnelian optics focused on the Autobots. He had to know.

"What happened, during the battle?"

Sunstreaker shifted so his horns were lowered and pointed at the Con, plating flaring in unease. Sideswipe frowned and answered for the both of them. "We don't know for sure. He and Bucket-head fought and then Optimus jumped in, keeping Megatron distracted. Skyfire took off away from the rest of us where the heavy fighting was. We all lost sight of him. When we found him after..." he couldn't seem to finish the sentence. Starscream wasn't sure he wanted the mech to finish it.

Rage and hate riled the beasts inside him. It didn't matter that no one could tell him who had really brought Skyfire down. Skyfire would have been fine if Megatron hadn't attacked him. It always came back to their damned leader.

Of all the sins and faults Megatron had, of all the indignities he'd put upon Starscream, this was going to the top of the list.

What he did to Skyfire was not going to be forgotten or forgiven. Ever.

"Thank you." The seeker rasped before launching himself into the air and transforming. He couldn't deal with Autobots anymore and their stupid pitying ways. With a speed that was unrivaled in the air, the dragon clutched the spark to his chest and flew away like a bullet. Clouds of frozen water particles brushed by him, ice crystals shattering to tiny fragments as he pushed himself faster and faster until the frigid temperatures dug into his plating and threatened to freeze his wings thousands of miles above the earth. Until darkness threatened to blind him as night swept in on wings even faster than his.

He landed quietly, talons digging into the soft snow atop a lonely mountain.

Thin, needle-like claws had never been so careful as they opened the outer shell of the gray container and peered inside. A glowing ball of light and cold spun slowly, wreathed in rings of ice with swirls of red and blue. The seeker would have liked to believe that the spark glowed brighter in welcome when he leaned down to let his muzzle rest against the clear glass casing that kept it safe. He would have liked to believe that he heard Skyfire's voice greeting him.

'Hi Star.'

When frost gathered too thickly upon his face, the seeker pulled himself away.

Starscream stared at the barren landscape for a blank moment, silent except for the sweep of wind over rock and crevice, dark dusted with the gray of snow. Then the dragon raised his head to the star-splattered night sky and screamed.

.

.

.

If I hear a single Frozen joke, I swear to Primus...