Starscream wasn't prone to subconscious fantasies. Or as the humans called them: dreams. Yet he knew intuitively that where he had found himself transposed was not a dream either. But memories.

Not his.

He was standing in a familiar corridor on TC's ship. Alarms were sounding. Thundercracker's squadron had been decimated by something violent and swift. The ship was damaged beyond repair.

Starscream watched as Thundercracker and a vision of himself manifested before him. Both Seekers were leaking energon and covered in burns. TC had a violent slash below his neckpiece, a leaking wound on his right servo. Starscream's hand was tightly clasped above his chassis.

"Skywarp is…" The Starscream couldn't finish the sentence. He was agitated, no, something worse, his face alighting with tragedy and the unsettling appearance of what could have been perceived as fear. "Warp didn't even…"

Alexis ran toward them. She was covered in dust and debris, scratches and an unseen wound was bleeding on her right shoulder. She held a small container with a very unsettled meowing feline inside. "Did you…"

"He's here," the Starscream answered. He unraveled his hand to reveal her son and the dog. The boy was mostly unaffected by whatever had occurred, but the dog's leg had been injured, making the creature whine.

She wrapped herself around the boy as soon as his feet touched the ground. Tears were coming out of her eyes. Aaron gripped to the back of his mom's shirt. More explosions sounded behind them. Thundercracker grabbed to Alexis and Aaron, transforming in the tight space before taking off at full speed.

The ship began to explode.


More flashes came. Intermittent visions of what were the past for her, but for him, a possible future.

Months passed as the galaxy around them changed. They were constantly on the move. Always being hunted. First all the Seekers were eradicated, then any Con or Bot that stood in the way. More species disappeared that didn't vow their allegiance to the newly self appointed ruler of the cosmos.

The new conqueror of time and space was vicious. Effective. He was absolute. He didn't do battles. He eliminated. Taking control of one planet then the next, his dominance went unchallenged.

Yet from the violence came relief on the planets he conquered. For those that survived there were no wars. No famine. Follow the very precise rules and life could be reasonable, even tolerable, if one could forget the horrors of what had come to achieve such effective harmony. Everyone had their place and purpose. The illusion of certain freedoms gifted to those who excelled under the new dominion.

Starscream didn't know how their small group ended up forging an alliance with Megatron. But losing Warp and running low on ordnance they had been forced to make some hard decisions.

There were glimpses of fights, fortified obsessions and unresolved tensions, jealousies and then a predictable betrayal.

And then suddenly there was Alexis screaming and wailing, her face bitter with tears as she and her son was dragged away from what looked to be his unmoving body.

He did not see Thundercracker.


He was standing alone now. An infinite landscape appeared around Starscream that was merely vague outlines. Filled with Cybertronian structures and human buildings that seemed to merge, then separate, then shift places as if unable to decide what form to take. The atmosphere was not foreboding, but there was a definite hum that made his circuits buzz and his wings tingle, a sensation that was more distracting than the memories had been.

"So I die." Starscream spoke with detachment. He had felt her presence for a while now. The boldness of her life signature was softer here, dampened by his own energy that overlapped and joined her own.

"Yes." She walked around to stand in front of him. Her face fell in defeat. "I'm so sorry."

"Why are you sorry?"

She looked deep into his optics, her gaze achingly sad. "Because your death was terrible." Her tone turned hard and bitter. "He didn't just kill you, Starscream." Her eyes widened at the remembrance. She shivered. "He…"

"Do you like me at all?"

"What?"

"Or do you just feel guilty?"

She gave him a small, sad frown that made his tank roll from her advertised empathy. "Surprisingly, I came to like you… before."

The tension went away from his wings and servos. This wasn't a dream at all. And yet everything was so real. The human may have been unable to connect with a Cybertronian as a femme would have been able to upon a bonding, but her mind was capable of this closeness, this sharing that was astounding and rich with ripe undiscovered curiosities. Humans were so limited. Yet this vastness of Alexis' mind - the way she was able to communicate like this - made him want to believe in things strange and compelling.

"Did you?" he asked, his voice terribly low and apparent. "How much?"

The female immediately frowned. "Sometimes not very much," she replied with frustration.

He suddenly had an idea. What he said to this female didn't matter. She was only a possible Alexis from the near future, which meant whatever he said here would not be remembered.

"It's beyond physical impulses," he told her slowly. A low rumble of excitement went down his body with the declaration of discovered truths. He was still at odds with what he felt. But he could combat that later. "What I feel for her, what I want, it's more than just a need… I… I revere her."

"Younger me or me?" she asked without hesitation, her inflections calm and precise. A strange unexpected smile spilled onto her mouth. What he said didn't seem to unsettle her. She seemed more curious than anything else. "We are the same. And yet, I suppose…"

He grabbed to her arm. Starscream brought her closer, suddenly grateful for this evened perspective, this landscape that their minds gave them allowing them to be the same size. Even here her skin was soft under his digits. But that did not alight his spark, but clear his reasoning.

She was right. She was Alexis. Yet she wasn't quite the Alexis he knew. And yes, she made his skin hot and itchy, made his spark compress and tighten, made him want to do the most preposterous things to her.

The Seeker's optics dimmed. He allowed one of his fingers to glide along the round of her elbow. She was more an Alexis than the others of before; she left him resolute and anticipative.

"Did you, back then, even for a moment, think of me?" He brought his optics back up to her eyes, catching a momentary flicker of deep, tangible emotion that made his tank roll with derision.

She pushed his hands off her arms. Took a step back to distance herself from him and inhaled a small breath of air.

"Not like that. Not me."

"Not you?"

"No. Not me, me," she seethed, suddenly sounding angry. Her eyes burned with undefinable rage. Reminding him for the umpteenth time that this Alexis had seen, witnessed and experienced things that he did not know of. That years upon years had passed, and they had changed her in ways he wouldn't have time to learn.

"What the slag is that supposed to mean?"

Her eyes slowly went down his body. For an odd, highly arousing moment, Starscream felt her hands where her eyes traveled, felt the pressure of her feminine body and the taste of her skin, a buried vibration keening through his flesh as if a reminder of…

That all cut away when she spoke.

"I hope you never find out."

She took a step back when he took one forward. Shook her head with further rejection. The human disappeared, taking the light with her, leaving Starscream in the thick, pulsing shadows.


He knew there was more to see and experience. Yet while they were sharing their minds, she was not completely open to him. Starscream only saw what she was willing for him to see. And while they were sharing a weak connection, they were not synchronized.

"Whom are you waiting for?"

He'd been watching her since he found her again. It could have been hours. It could have been days. Time was irrelevant here. Now they were on some unfamiliar ship, standing in the middle of an empty corridor.

Starscream knew whom she was waiting for. Didn't know why he wanted to hear her confirm it. He was restless, he supposed, and turning impatient. The things they could do here. The things they could accomplish. Laid to waste by some precautionary protocol that activated upon his arrival, making him want, but making him not act.

His processor was finally finding a tolerable perspective. This female, she was... not the same. Starscream had finally managed to achieve something between indifference and detachment in regards to her, reaffirming that she was only a potential Alexis.

Sudden thoughts of killing TC came to Starscream. No, having someone kill TC for him. Alexis would have no course but to stay with him then. The spark pains from her lover's death deadly even for a human, unless with him. Only he couldn't kill TC. And while Thundercracker's removal would have made things move forward, that wouldn't be progress the way he wanted, especially not if it had the potential of being traced back to him.

Starscream knew he'd find the answer though. This future Alexis held the solution. He'd seen the way she looked at him that couldn't have been just kindness. That had to mean more.

Which meant the Alexis he wanted…

The female walked forward. TC appeared from nowhere. He bent down, waiting for the female to climb aboard his open palm. She paused, then did so. The two faded away and Starscream was knocked out and back.

His systems came back on-line.


The human woke moments later. She seemed a little calmer, and oddly embarrassed. He followed her to the medical bay, watched as the doctor prepared a special health pod for her. She seemed more frightened of being enclosed in the pod than she did the terrible spark pains, but was finally urged into the small container.

Her lids slowly shut.

Starscream stayed.


"I know Thundercracker," Starscream spoke to the female several days later as some medical drones helped her get the last sensory patches off her. He could have given her privacy, but her showing skin was the least of his concerns, even if it made his treacherous spark squeeze. The bright reemergence of her body's energy didn't help either. "He wouldn't leave you to this," he deprecated.

She bit her mouth, motioned for the attendants to leave. Her eyes were leaking immediately following his words, confirming the truth.

"Why did you lie?"

She glared at him. Standing to her feet, she tugged the rest of the patches off her with unforeseen violence, then covered herself with a nearby robe.

"I didn't lie. TC is alive. What I endure is because I need to," she tried to validate to herself, to him, to someone that wasn't even there.

"That's preposterous."

The look she gave him next was hard and unforgiving. "If I return, they'll kill him."

"If you don't, you'll kill you both."

"Not if…" she swallowed her words. She stared at him in the most curious way.

"Not if - what?"

She walked over to him, lightly pressed her tiny hand against his pediform, then motioned for him to come with her. He debated for several moments why he shouldn't. But when she returned, looked up and gave him a look of affectionate expectation he was lost to her command. Starscream followed.


She told him her plans that she must have been thinking about for some time. Her words came out in an excited sort of rush, her cheeks building with color as her skin flushed with renewed energy.

"Won't work." He said, succinctly shutting down her eager chatter.

Alone on what passed as a conservatory, the small female stood on a view-port that allowed her to stand near his level. She only wore that robe, her pale legs exposed. Her eyes were bright and vibrant as she stared up at him unflinching. That strange, warm familiarity between then reappeared making him want to lean forward and slip his digit under that small tie on her robe.

"Because you don't want to help me?"

He took a moment to focus, his optics moving back to her face. With the expression the female wore, she knew he'd been staring. "That and…"

"And?" She crossed her arms, her mouth tightening.

"And your plans are depending on too many unpredictable circumstances. One thing goes wrong and he'll do as he pleases with you, and…"

She stepped forward. She grabbed a nearby branch that had grown up and along the view-port. She stared at the unopened buds before releasing the plant. "I have to try. I am dying anyway, Starscream."

"You don't have to die." He made a gesture with his hand. Shrugged his shoulders. Swift apathy saturated his mainframe. His remarks came out cold and sparkless as he reminded himself that the female wasn't his Alexis, and what happened to her was beyond his concern. "Return to him. Give him what he wants. You could save your life and TC's."

Her mouth trembled. Her eyes filled with liquid. She walked quickly down the side of stairs and walked through the vast variety of bushes and trees, following the stoned path out of the conservatory.

Starscream cursed, wishing her reaction didn't bother him so.


Her quarter's doors opened with a light swoosh. Already, the female was standing there with an accusatory stance, not forgetting what he had recommended days ago.

"I will help you," he relented, watching her expression change into open delight, the drastic transition making him revel in the feeling of brittle dominance. "But changes will be made."

The smile dropped off her face, replaced by a somber frown.

"Let me in?" he forced himself to ask for permission.

For some reason the female blushed, but she let him in just the same.


They planned for several days. She was highly animated, even, if one looked at it in a certain angle, seemed to be in a very good mood. He could have stayed. She and TC's relationship was strained by forced circumstance, by necessary separation and she liked him. One little nudge, maybe two, and he'd wedge himself inside of the female deeper, beyond this offered friendship of hers.

"They are sending me back tomorrow." He finally decided to tell her. "We need to make sure we get you started by tonight."

She dropped her head, thinking for several long strained moments. Then the female lifted her gaze back up to his and gave him a tremulous smile as she placed her hand by one of his digits in offered assurance.

Yes, he could have stayed.


"Feelings can be ignored."

His spark pounded in warning at the seemingly innocuous statement. The things he wanted to believe about this Alexis were torn apart with four words.

"What?"

She put down her tablet, sat up straighter on her chair. "I mean, how you feel about me...about her," she corrected, "it only makes things worse. And I, we... We all go through so much pain and difficulties. If you opted not to…"

He glared at her. "And can you stop how you feel? Like that?"

She shook her head. "No. Not all the time."

"Then stop saying such absurd things," he groused, unable to hide his bitterness.

"I just don't want you to get hurt," she whispered.

Her words both warmed and cut him.

He needed to leave.


They came for him, and he was led to an empty room. He was scanned three times, by three different devices, then led to another room.

One of the technicians came up to where the Seeker sat, hardly deterred by his diminutive size that was even smaller than a human's.

The male spoke factually, "Repairing the damage you have done took far longer than necessary. Have you any questions before we send you back?"

"Just a message I'd like to leave."

"Proceed."


Being sent back was uneventful. One minute he was sitting on a metal cot, the next he was standing on Sunstreaker's ship. Alarms blared, and he watched wall turrets folding out, aiming at his head and chassis.

He was confused for exactly 5.34 seconds. But then a hidden protocol activated, a highly invasive program he had created that restored a hidden backup of his recent events.

Starscream's memories flooded back. All the information he had collected automatically offloaded to a safe server through a secured relay.

He'd failed to find her. Failed to bring her back.

But he'd see her again. Starscream knew that much.

And soon.