Dum dum dada da da, da dada DA da, da dada DAAA da, da dada DAAAAAA! Flight of the Valkyries, if you hadn't guessed. Penultimate chapter, guys and girls! (Do I have any guy readers? From the sounds of it, most of you are girls - I'm going on very little here so no offence.:D) Last but one - barring the epilogue or three I'l probably end up doing. I've got four days till I have to start working (sigh) so I'm going to go hell for leather and make the last bit(s) ones that those two mechs certainly won't forget... Mwahahahahah... (rubs hands together and cackles. In a very nice way, of course.)
Jess: Thanks! Geez, I love getting reviews...
Pinkfuzzyone: Thanks and thanks, and we have more of Missionary in this chapter. Enjoy...
Alirion: Yep. I thought up the window bit before I started the chapter - that was originally going to open it. ;) I thought Skyfire as a teacher'd be miffed, but pleased as a person - I like using little twists. Keeps it fun. And again, Missionary returns! Mwahahaha!
Skins Thunderbomb: Don't worry - I'll go into all that at some point, but the adventures'd probably be a fresh story if I do. I want to focus on the early stuff here, then take it further in another. I haven't really got it sorted out in my head properly yet, but give me time... ;) get better soon, m'kay?
Cyblade Silver: yet more thanks, and I can tell you now they won't like it. XD I'm eeeeevil...but then so are they, so I suppose it balances out. heh.
Set...
Hurried conversation was cut off sharply as a soft chime sounded at the door. Skyfire glanced at Starscream, who sighed resignedly before darting into the next room and out of sight. The scientist took a hurried look around the room as he got to his feet, ensuring there was no sign the jet had ever been there, and walked over to the door - he keyed in the short digit code and it hissed open.
To his relief - and surprise - a young femme from his class stood there, fidgeting with a writing case she didn't seem to realise she still held.
"Lander? Is something wrong?" he asked, looking down at the restless femme and trying not to sound impatient. He didn't have any time to waste - the longer they took to find some evidence on the two groundmechs the less chance they had of finding any. Skyfire had been as composed as he could for the past week, but with one thing and another his resolve was now starting to look just a little shaky.
"Uh..."
Lander didn't know where to start. She wasn't too happy about having to drop a bombshell on anyone, let alone a teacher, and the fact she felt so guilty about it really wasn't helping matters much. She paused for a split second to steady her nerve, as much as possible under the circumstances, and blurted out "Professor, Derby and Combine were messing around with Starscream's null ray before it blew up. I saw them go over, but I thought they were just being nosey and poking around so I didn't say anything and then Starscream got blown up and I forgot about it..."
Skyfire looked stunned as the femme rapidly wound down, staring at him with a faceplate full of guilt. Someone saw them with the null ray! He glanced quickly up and down the corridor and pulled her gently inside, Lander absently gazing around the room as he closed the door, and turned to face her.
"All right Lander, now this is crucial. Did you actually see them pick up or tamper with the null ray?"
The femme looked down and frowned deeply, going over the scene in her memory banks before lifting her chin, staring him straight in the optics and saying clearly "Yes. Combine turned it over and stood half in front of Derby, but I could see him from my bench - he did something to the base of the ray, the converter or something like it, then shut the hatch down and they sauntered off. They were only over there for a moment or so, but they definitely opened it up and did something. I'd swear to it."
A muffled but heartfelt "Yes!" came from the next room. Skyfire's optics flickered and Lander looked startled - her optics jumped wide and she stared at Skyfire as dawning comprehension spread across her face. As Skyfire braced himself and opened his mouth to say something, anything, the purple femme's head tilted and her optics narrowed consideringly.
"It's funny" she said carefully, looking Skyfire straight in the optic. "I could have sworn I just heard Starscream." She gazed at him steadily, and Skyfire's internals seemed to sink as he had a horrible mental image of just what he'd let the two of them in for...
"But it can't have been" she said cheerily. "Starscream's barred from the Academy, for a totally biased and unfair fight that wasn't his fault, so he can't be here."
Skyfire stared at her, trying not to let his jaw drop quite so visibly. "If he was here, though" Lander continued, so determinedly oblivious to Skyfire's expression and the choked snorts of laughter from the adjoining room she should have won an Oscar, "I'd be able to tell him that the rest of the Academy's behind you- two," she hastily corrected with a gleam in her optics, "and we can't wait for him to give the pair of slaggers what they deserve. No offence, Professor."
Skyfire stared at the purple femme grinning maniacally up at him in shock. Once again he had the unpleasant sensation that the Universe had just pulled the rug out from under him - but this time, it seemed, he could land doing a handstand.
"If Starscream was here, I'm sure he'd thank you" he said carefully, noticing with a start of incredulity - and trying unsuccessfully to ignore - the black head peering past the doorframe and sky-blue hands gesturing wildly. To a human it would have looked rather like the jet was doing the Macarena.
Skyfire tried not to laugh - the unruly hands and the conspiratal grin on Lander's face added to his relief to make him giddy. He fought to keep a straight face as he continued. "Would you say this before the Council? Hold to it in front of a panel of investigators? They'll try to belittle anything you say, you realise..."
Lander shook her head, waving the words away with a snort. "Pff - what they did to Starscream wasn't fair. I'd stick to it if they set a Guardian on me."
"Thank you" Skyfire said, the relief and gratitude shining in his face like a beacon, his optics glowing a bright, sunny blue. Starscream stood hidden behind the doorframe and grinned like a Cheshire cat, rubies flashing like diamonds in the dark of his face - it was amazing how alike they looked at that moment, and no-one knew or noticed until years later the similitude of a smile.
For now, though, Lander left with assurances to say nothing. Skyfire waved her out with a wide grin she happily returned, shut the door after seeing her down the corridor and turned to see Starscream standing before him with an anticipatory smirk on his face.
"Well?" the flier said, staring hopefully into his teacher's face as Skyfire stood gazing back at him. "What do you think?"
The scientist arched his back and stretched, flexing his wings before answering gravely "I think, Starscream, that we are in business."
o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o
Missionary knelt on the cold steel floor, a hand on each side of the colour divide as he perched directly over the thin line between black and white, light and dark - his duty, as was every Combiner's: achieving Balance.
He stayed there, head bowed and optics lowered, until he was acknowledged by the one who had summoned him.
"Missionary."
He raised his head, optics going straight to the pale grey transformer before him. "Luminaire."
The mech had never been totally sure whether the Converter was a mech or a femme. His opinion seemed to change every time the light did - not that it was his place to wonder about an Auditor, one only lower in stature to the Watchers and part of the loose Council that governed Missionary's fellow Overseers. He had to serve the Programme by spreading the Balance to new members and preserving it in any slight way he could - Luminaire was responsible for watching over the Overseers themselves with (his? Her?) fellow Auditors. It was a credit to the Auditor that (she? He?) had achieved such Balance between the two that a fellow Converter couldn't tell which (he? She?) was.
Luminaire walked quietly past him, motioning slightly for him to rise and follow. They moved over to the window, standing silently for a time and watching Cybertron glitter in the sunlight.
"You have done well, Missionary" came the Auditor's soft voice. No matter what news he brought from his cell of the Converters, Missionary had never heard Luminaire speak loudly.
"Thank you Auditor" he said formally, bowing his head in an unconscious gesture of respect. Luminaire's thin lips turned up so slightly that any other mech would have missed it, but Missionary saw and was elated. He kept his composure however, and stood quiet and deferential until Luminaire spoke again.
"The seeker was an interesting choice. Your converts, however, do not truly understand the Balance and fail to keep it as impartially as they should. As they were a temporary measure, however, they have sufficed."
"The brothers were programmed with their own biases, Auditor - I was fortunate enough to turn them far enough to serve the Balance for a short time, but they would never have been true Converters. Their partiality saw to that." Missionary suddenly froze in horror and bit his lip at his audacity - the Auditor may think he was presuming to instruct another, and instructing anyone would set their minds and upset the Balance. But to do it to an Auditor, and especially to Luminaire...
He started to stammer an apology, but Luminaire raised a hand slightly and he fell silent.
"In conflict, the balance will shift both ways. I trust you have laid out the path for the others to find?" Missionary nodded, unable to speak. "Then you have done well. The seeker and your two young mechs have served their purpose - the conflict will continue and eventually resolve without you. Relocate yourself and your cell - it is time to move on."
Again the slight smile touched thin, pale lips, and Missionary bowed reverentially as he departed.
o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o
"You know what to do?" Skyfire asked anxiously as Starscream got ready to leave.
"Of course!" he replied, shooting a quick, flashing smile over his shoulder as he hunched half-in, half-out of the window. "There's not much to it, if you think about it...I'm surprised no-one's done it before."
"No-one's needed to" Skyfire muttered, hovering next to the silver jet like a mother hen. "The Council never banned anyone before."
Starscream stopped, scarlet optics locking on to his own blue ones and searching through them as if he was falling through Skyfire's spark. "I'm the only one to get kicked out?" he whispered disbelieving, his wings trembling ever so slightly as his optics went wide.
Skyfire kicked himself. He put an arm round Starscream's back and said, as comfortingly as he could, "It's not your fault. If this goes as it should-" And it had better, he growled to himself, or there'll be Hell to pay... "- it'll be Derby and Combine in the record books."
Starscream stayed quiet for a while, not moving, making the most of the moment. After a minute or two he sighed and straightened, tactfully moving away from Skyfire without pushing him away. He looked up at his teacher and gave him a wry grin. "Well...if you can't be famous, be infamous, hm?" Skyfire groaned and nudged him gently to the window. "Get going now, and hopefully you won't be either for the wrong reasons."
"See you later" Starscream said quietly - it may have sounded like a statement but his optics begged the question. Skyfire smiled at him reassuringly and nodded. "See you later."
The flier grinned quickly and jumped, not bothering to transform as he arced upwards to the high, pale wall of the Academy. Touching down hurriedly, a swift glance to see if he'd been noticed, and he ran over to a small cupola sitting solidly in the centre of the broad walkway.
It was here that a returning expedition to a foreign planet had installed a large bell - a gift from the natives they had brought back and donated to the Academy. It was a myth from the donating people that if anyone had been wronged or dishonoured and justice had not been done, they could go to the Bell and ring it for audience and the revealing of the truth by the Gods themselves - the students joked that the Council would have to stand in for the Gods since they were too busy with their own people to listen to transformers. After a rare prank or two in the Bell's early days, by a few students disgruntled with their exam results or by life in general at the Academy, the Council had ordered that the clapper have a muffle wrapped round it to prevent any more "foolish stunts."
It took Starscream two minutes with a blowtorch to get rid of it.
The flier picked up the hammer, lifting it from the hooks on the pristine cupola wall, and hefted it thoughtfully in his hands.
He shrugged, and swung the great hammer with a shriek.
Skyfire, head and shoulders out of the window after watching Starscream drop away, listened to the pealing of the Bell as it commanded the Academy to hear it and listen to it's cry of tolling injustice rolling through the air.
Skyfire watched heads turning across the Academy grounds - in the classrooms, on the wall, in the Towers; voices raised in exclamation and surprise from the students to the staff, and only Lander listened and understood in an instant.
Skyfire heard the Bell, and smiled.
Ye-es! Hooray!
The bells, the bells - do me a favour guys, and play something really inspiring that makes your heart thump a bit faster when you read that last bit. That's how I felt when I read this over again. Just me being sappy, but still...
oooh! The 'boots is HAPPY! She finally got back onto angelfire and updated her-my, I mean - website! Yes! The shoebox is up and running! Wahay! As ever, read, review and gloat at the unsuspecting chumps. YEEEEEES!
Now I've just got to figure out what to do with them. I've got a nice little plot-twisty ending, if I can swing it...Mwahahaha! (That's the third time now - I'm worried.)
Starscream and Skyfire are © Hasbro or someone like them. The story, however - along with Missionary, Luminaire, Lander, Derby, Combine and various students - is © me. And right at the minute, I'm really, really proud of it. Go Screamer!
