Soundwave watched Megatron run off into the woods at full speed. He sighed and opened a groundbridge that unleashed a swarm of drones down into the river below. The Autobots immediately began to fight the Decepticons in a flurry of water and plasma bolts. Soundwave flew through the sky in lazy circles and watched all of the chaos happening from above.

Megatron's haste to capture the Seeker was… unfortunate. The Seeker needed to die, oh yes, but Soundwave had hoped his Lord would be a bit less... feral about it. He missed the old days in which Megatron had been a gladiator and had disposed of his enemies with grace and bravado—not by chasing them through the woods like some angry beast. He idly wondered when this change in Megatron had occurred.

Bulkhead burst through the trees and back into the river in a full run while clutching tightly onto the traitor. The two of them stumbled into the water with a massive splash as they looked behind them in fear at something. Soundwave flew back a bit to get a better look at Megatron as he inevitably raised his sword to kill the two bots—

Wait. That wasn't Megatron pursuing them. No, Starscream and Bulkhead fearfully stared at another mech.

Thundercracker stood upon the bank in all his blue-and-grey glory.

He looked just like he had before Soundwave and his Lord had enacted their Grand Plan to dispose of him.

He was dead. Soundwave had watched Thundercracker die in Starscream's arms. This had to be an imposter. So then who—?

Realization hit him like a brick and he nearly fell out of the sky. Who indeed?

Thundercracker glanced up into the sky and his optics widened at the sight of Soundwave circling above.

Soundwave sent a ping over to Laserbeak. "THAT IS NOT YOUR FACE, MY DEAR CASSETICON."

Thundercracker grimaced and returned his attention to the two terrified mechs in the river.

"IT IS NOW," Laserbeak responded. Then the comm went dead.

A purple burst of light flashed in the air behind Starscream and Bulkhead. Skywarp materialized and leaned down over Starscream.

"It's good to see you again, Trineleader!" he laughed.

"You're not real!" Bulkhead spat. He swung his wrecking ball, but faltered at the last moment. He crashed into the side of the bank with a clang. Optimus turned at the sound of the noise and his optics widened at the sight of them all—but then a blaster bolt grazed past his helm, and he jumped back into the fray of battle.

"Hey, 'Scree! Where have you been all these years? We waited for you," Skywarp laughed again. He walked right past Bulkhead and reached a servo down to help Starscream up.

Starscream stared at Skywarp in silent horror. No. He'd seen him die. It couldn't be him—but at the same time, how could it not? Those cheerful red optics, that twinge of joy in his field, that mischievous smirk on his faceplate—it could be no other than Skywarp, the mech he'd made his trinemate, the mech he'd called his brother, the mech whom he'd completely and utterly failed—

He knew he should just swat away the fake Seeker's servo and run for the hills and never look back. But the idea of hurting his trinemate—even a fake version of him—made his armor lock up and his vents come in quicker gasps.

"Stop it, 'Warp, you're scaring him!" Thundercracker groaned. He stepped up beside Skywarp and the two of them loomed over Starscream's prone frame in the rushing water.

Skywarp made a clicking noise. "He's always scared, isn't he? But that wasn't how it always was! Oh, you used to be so brave, Trineleader… but now? Well, now you're all shook up." He leaned down until he was right above Starscream's terrified faceplate. "Don't worry, though. We can fix you."

"...Fix me?" Starscream asked softly. He stumbled to his pedes, but then fell back into the river again with a splash. He looked past the frames of his trinemates for help, but all of the Autobots were too caught up in their battle with the drones.

"Bulkhead?! Where are you, you imbecile?" Starscream stuttered as he frantically looked around for any sign of green armor. He saw Bulkhead up high on the bank with his optics locked onto the sky.

"Bulkhead, help me! " he shrieked. Pleading for help made something cold settle in the pit of his tank—but the way his trinemates looked at him made him feel even colder.

Bulkhead said nothing and continued to stare into space. "I worry… that… that my end…"

Starscream froze. "No."

"That my end…"

"Don't say it!" Starscream shouted as he punched the river with his fist. He sent a flurry of water into the air that splashed across his trinemate's frames. Instead of looking annoyed, they just looked amused.

"My end… will bring about…" Bulkhead said as he slowly turned around to face Starscream. His optics shone a brighter shade of blue than Starscream had ever seen them shine before. He reached a servo out to Starscream, but then his servo spasmed and his arm fell flat by his side again.

"Yours," Bulkhead finished quietly. His final word was so soft, yet Starscream could hear it boom within his helm.

"Oh, tsk tsk tsk, you've been betrayed again, haven't you?" Skywarp cooed. "First it was the Academy, then the warlord… and then… you were betrayed by yourself. "

"No!" Starscream shrieked. He rose to his pedes and—

A wave of nostalgia suddenly struck him and coolant prickled in the corners of his optics.

He was standing with his trine again, the way he had dreamed of doing for over a thousand years now.

Thundercracker and Skywarp's frames flickered and briefly vanished before reappearing again.

The nostalgic illusion ended.

"You're not real, you are not , and I don't want anything to do with you!" Starscream shouted at them.

"We're a part of you, Starscream. You can't escape yourself, " Thundercracker scoffed. A smile slowly spread across his faceplate as he held a servo out to Starscream. "Or can you?"

"What are you saying?" Starscream shook out. He could fight them, he could, but Bulkhead's blaster bolt had harmlessly passed through the fake Skyfire, so what good could his own shaky talons do?

Bulkhead slid down the bank and back into the river. His optics rapidly flickered on and off and his entire frame shuddered as he tried to reach Starscream.

" Subspace… log… my end… no, Starscream, I'm coming, I'm coming , hold on you pesky little Seeker, hold on— Subspace Log 47… ." He collapsed into the river with a splash and reached a shaky servo out to Starscream.

"Stop holding on!" Thundercracker shouted as he waved his arms about. "Stop holding onto all of this and just let go!"

"What are you even talking about?!" Starscream shrieked.

Skywarp and Thundercracker looked at Starscream and spoke in unison. "Let. Go."

Bulkhead rammed through their frames. They vanished for a split second and dissolved into pixels of light that hovered in mid-air. Then the pixels grouped back together and Skywarp and Thundercracker became whole again.

"You... you're gonna have to go through me first to get to him!" Bulkhead grunted.

Skywarp and Thundercracker glared at him, but then they both looked behind him and their optics widened at the same time.

Starscream held still. There was something behind him, he could feel it.

The air buzzed.

He was kicked into the water and held down by a heavy pede into the cold violent rapids. Soundwave's cracked visor stared at him through his reflection as he ground his pede deeper into the scar on Starscream's back where his other wing had been.

Megatron burst free from the trees and stood in the river up ahead. Optimus tried to run forward to fight him, but then a new swarm of drones emerged out of the groundbridge and overwhelmed the Prime.

"There's too many! They just keep coming! We can't keep fighting forever, Optimus!" Bumblebee beeped in alarm as he fired off volley after volley of blaster bolts.

Optimus grunted as he kicked another drone off to the side. "Megatron, this is our fight!" he shouted as yet another drone ran up to him to fight him.

"No," Megatron said as he turned around to look at Starscream. "Not anymore. Bring Starscream to me."

Soundwave flipped Starscream around so that they could look at each other faceplate-to-faceplate.

"No!" Starscream cried out as Soundwave tightly held him into the water. "Bulkhead, I need you, I need you—! "

"Subspace Log 47… Subspace Log 78…" Bulkhead muttered.

Skywarp and Thundercracker flashed into existence right beside Soundwave and the three of them stood tall over Starscream's prone frame. Their frames flashed and flickered over and over again and all of their optics glowed blood-red in the dark night.

"Bring him to me!" Megatron shouted again.

Soundwave looked over his shoulder and narrowed his single visible optic at the warlord. "NOT YET. MISSION OBJECTIVE: TO BREAK THE SEEKER."

He grabbed ahold of Starscream's single wing in his thin servos and held it tightly to the ground. He extended his thin and sharp digits—took one last look at Starscream—and then began to gouge deep cuts into Starscream's wing.

"No, no no no!" Starscream shrieked as his wing was mutilated. His trinemates stood over him and leered down at him with unhidden glee in their red optics.

"Please stop, Soundwave, stop, please!" he begged, but Soundwave ignored him.

Pure and raw desperation filled his field. He tried to grab ahold of the rocks to pull himself away from Soundwave, but then his trinemates just brought their pedes down onto his thrashing limbs and pinned him down even further into the riverbed.

Optimus looked over at him through the frenzy of battle, but then yet another group of drones swarmed him. He watched Starscream cry from far across the river. "Starscream!" he shouted, but the sound of his voice was drowned out by the sound of the rushing water and the sharp noises Soundwave's digits made as they cut into Starscream's wing.

"Soundwave, stop this foolish nonsense and bring me the brother. Right. Now!" Megatron hissed.

Soundwave ignored him and continued to cut into Starscream's wing. Energon bled out from the cuts and floated through the water and made the river itself glow bright blue with Starscream's blood.

He leaned in close until his cracked visor was right above Starscream's coolant-stained faceplate. "DO YOU… REMEMBER… WHAT HAPPENED IN THE SENATE ALL THOSE YEARS AGO?"

Starscream froze.

"SO YOU DO REMEMBER."

"I didn't m-mean to!" Starscream choked out. "I swear, I swear, I'm sorry!"

"Sorry won't cut it!" Skywarp snapped.

"Saying 'sorry' won't bring us back to life," Thundercracker said.

"I'm sorry, I know it won't help, but I wish it could! " Starscream sobbed. He looked out across the river and saw Bulkhead knelt in the water. Starscream's energon poured into the river and flowed around Bulkhead's half-submerged frame.

"Subspace Log… Subspace Log…" Bulkhead muttered as he shakily reached down and let the bloodied water run over his servos.

"Subspace… Log….." His helm shot up and he looked at Starscream. His jaw continued to move up and down as he continued to recite the logs.

"Bulkhead, please help me!" Starscream cried out.

Bulkhead continued to stare into space.

"Skyfire, please help me!"

No response. Bulkhead continued to stare into space and mutter on and on.

Starscream held back a cry of pain as Soundwave cut into a particularly sensitive part of his wing. He dipped his helm in the river and held back his sobs as the pain just increased and increased—

" Just… just let me hold you…" Bulkhead said softly.

Starscream sniffled and looked up at him.

"I don't know how much longer I'll be able to hold you," Bulkhead said mournfully.

Starscream's optics widened. "You're… you're reliving that memory…"

Soundwave yanked Starscream closer to him and his trinemates dug their pedes into his frame even harder.

An idea formed in his processor. His entire processor was overwhelmed with a sense of hot white swift pain and it was hard to think, so so so hard—and it would be even harder to put this plan into action—

But he had to try.

Starscream took a deep vent. "D-don't talk like that, Skyfire!"

Bulkhead's helm looked up at him and he made optic contact. "I might have to face the Enforcers down."

Starscream grunted and dragged himself across the riverbed to reach Bulkhead. More of his blood poured out into the river and pooled around their two frames. "No, you won't! I-I'll be there with you!"

"You're too small, Star!" Bulkhead said.

Soundwave continued to tightly hold onto Starscream's wing as he watched their conversation. Megatron held up a servo and the Decpeticons stopped fighting the Autobots. Everybody turned around and looked at Starscream and Bulkhead.

"I'm not s-small. I can protect you."

"Oh, Starscream," Bulkhead laughed. "You can't protect me from everything."

"I-I can, and I will!" Starscream choked out. He thought he could protect the shuttle from anything, but he couldn't even protect him from one measly storm.

Bulkhead looked off into the distance as if noticing something.

"What? What is it?" Starscream asked,

"Go to sleep, Star," Bulkhead said. He shuffled forward through the river and gently grabbed ahold of Starscream's bloodied servos.

Soundwave watched the two of them very intently. He tightened his grip on Starscream's wing and made Starscream yelp in pain.

"I can't," Starscream gasped out. "Not when they are out there w-waiting for us!"

"They don't know we're here! We just need to lay low and hide—"

"Just like rats! We're worthless to them!"

Bulkhead's field flared with warmth. "You're not worthless. Not to me. Go to sleep, Star," Bulkhead said as he patted his helm. "Subspace Log 52… I worry about what you will do when I am no longer here. My end is near. I can feel it. And I worry that my end will bring about yours..."

Bulkhead's optims dimmed and he stared blankly into space.

"The m-memory is over! You have to be yourself again, right? Help me!"

Bulkhead did nothing. "Oh, Starscream."

No.

The plan failed.

Reenacting the memory should've pulled Bulkhead out of the memory lapse and not into the present—it wasn't supposed to make him zone out again!

Nobody spoke. The only sound was the roar of the river and Starscream's quiet sobs.

"I have been replaced yet again!" Megatron snarled. "And the Seeker has chosen a bumbling Wrecker as his new companion, of all bots to choose from!"

Megatron broke into a run and charged at Bulkhead at full speed with his sword extended. He leaped forward with a roar and—

—Bulkhead swung his wrecking ball out. It smacked into Megatron and made the warlord skid back into the river. Starscream's spilt energon pooled in the water around his pedes. Megatron looked up again, and his optics shone redder than ever before.

"Look what you did, Soundwave! You allowed the wretch to fool another bot into becoming his brother! Look at what you have done! "

Soundwave stood up and stepped right over Starscream's mutilated frame until he stood right before the warlord. He marched right towards Megatron and left Starscream behind in the bloodied water.

Soundwave and Megatron stared coldly at one another and said nothing as the bloodied water rushed by their pedes.

Starscream took the opportunity. He shot to his pedes and ran to Bulkhead at full speed. Bulkhead tightly held him in his arms and dragged him away from the two fuming Decepticons and over to the Autobots. He gently held out Starscream's wing and made a choking noise at the sight of all of the bloody cuts in it.

Megatron moved to chase after the Seeker, but Soundwave moved in front of Megatron and blocked his way.

"Soundwave, you dare thwart my plans yet again?!"

He stood tall before his Lord and tried to keep his frame steady in the rushing water of the river. He would not— could not— afford to show any kind of weakness before Megatron. Starscream had shown his weakness and paid for it a thousand times over. Soundwave was no Starscream, he was Soundwave— despite what his misled Lord might believe.

He needed to be careful about this. One wrong word would be enough to incite the warlord's wrath. Soundwave was no longer as immune to his Lord's mood swings anymore.

"Well? Answer me!" Megatron shouted. Knock Out walked over to the Autobots with his electro-prod. Megatron raised his servo and Knock Out immediately halted.

"Why the delay, Big M?" he scoffed as he twirled his prod around. "Don't you want me to dispose of them—?"

"If you dare try to hurt Starscream, then you will die in your attempt," Megatron snarled as he looked out across all of the Decepticons. The Seeker ran down the river and back over to the shaking Wrecker. Optimus concernedly looked over his soldiers before he then briefly glanced up at Megatron. He narrowed his optics at the warlord and then turned around to block Starscream and Bulkhead from sight.

"I gave you an order," Megatron rasped quietly. Soundwave knew that tone of voice.

It was the calm before the storm Megatron would create.

"AFFIRMATIVE."

"I told you to bring Starscream to me, and yet you did not !" Megatron shouted. He kicked his pede into the water and sent a wave of bloodied water right at Soundwave. The dirtied river water splashed onto Soundwave's frame. Starscream's energon coated his thin servos and dripped down into the violent waters below.

"Answer me!" Megatron repeated.

He had to answer the warlord, he had to—but for some reason, he could not bring himself to activate his vocalizer. Why had he disobeyed his Lord?

"Soundwave…" Megatron growled.

He always answered Megatron's questions immediately, and yet here he was— hesitating. Soundwave was not the kind of mech to hesitate.

He had not hesitated to take his revenge upon Starscream, though.

Megatron tilted his visor up so that he and Soundwave were faceplate-to-faceplate. "Oh, I know why you didn't obey my orders."

Something flew over their helms and they looked up. Laserbeak darted through the sky above the river and trilled as she passed over their helms. She hovered in the dark night sky like a hot violet star as she floated over the terrified Seeker and the muttering Wrecker. Bulkhead tenderly held Starscream's bloodied wing and wiped the energon off as the Seeker sniffled.

Bulkhead grimaced at the sight of the cuts on Starscream's wings. "W-woah, Star, your wing, is, um… You know what, no. Let me clear the blood away," Bulkhead asked. He held Starscream close to him and smeared the energon away with his shaky servo.

"You're you again! Thank… thank…" Starscream whimpered. He wasn't sure why, but it suddenly seemed extremely difficult to force those two words out of his intake. Thank you . It was so little, yet so much at the same time.

He rested his forehelm against Bulkhead's chestplate as Soundwave and Megatron argued. The Autobots approached them and the rest of the Decepticons hung back and watched it all go down with wide optics.

"You saved me," Starscream muttered as he offlined his optics.

"Oh, no problem," Skyfire said.

Starscream's optics shot wide open and he looked up and into the faceplate of Skyfire.

"No!" Starscream shouted as he tried to pull himself away.

"Hey, hey hold still! Don't hurt yourself any further!" Skyfire scolded. His voice sounded like a combination of his voice and Bulkhead's mixed together.

"Where did Bulkhead go?!" Starscream snarled.

Skyfire frowned. "I'm right here, Star! Did you bonk your helm too?!"

His faceplate flickered and for a single second Starscream saw Bulkhead underneath the hologram of Skyfire. Thundercracker and Skywarp flickered into existence and stood behind Skyfire—or was it Bulkhead?—as he continued to clear the blood off of Starscream's wing.

Soundwave continued to remain silent as a smile spread across Megatron's faceplate. Breakdown, Knock Out, and all of the drones rapidly looked back and forth between the Autobots and Soundwave and Megatron.

On the other side of the river, Megatron leaned in so close that Soundwave could feel his warm vents wash over his blank visor. "I know why you did not bring the Seeker to me."

Soundwave's spark pulsed in his chestplates. Not even he knew the answer. He had just looked at the Seeker and felt something within him snap.

"Ohohoho, don't be coy with me, my loyal second. You refused to obey me because you wanted to take the Seeker and hurt him, you wanted to watch him bleed. "

Megatron tightened his claws over Soundwave's shoulders. This was it. This was the moment he'd acknowledge that his new second-in-command was no better than his last one, this was the moment Megatron would tell Soundwave that he was being just as greedy and power hungry as the traitorous Seeker.

Megatron growled. "You want Starscream to be your brother."

...What.

Farther down the river the trinemates prowled around Starscream like a pair of hungry spark eaters.

"Don't you miss us, Screamer?" Skywarp said.

"Why did you forget about us?" Thundercracker sighed.

"Ignore them," Skyfire—maybe Bulkhead?—said. "They're not real."

Starscream looked up at him with wide optics. "Are you real?"

"Of course I am!" the mech said. His voice sounded warped and distorted and his faceplate kept vanishing and then reappearing. One moment it was Bulkhead before him, then Skyfire, then Bulkhead, then Skyfire, and his trinemates were watching him, laughing at him, crying and crying—

Starscream held his helm in his servos and screamed. "How do I know who's real and who isn't?! "

Bulkhead—Skyfire—Bulkhead frowned. "Star, I'm real!"

The rest of the Autuobots jumped into action around him and fired up at something purple that hovered in the sky. Optimus sat beside Starscream and looked into the Seeker's wet optics.

"You know who is real and who is not. I know you do," Optimus said gently.

Megatron grabbed ahold of Soundwave's arm and dragged his new second-in-command farther down the river and away from the Autobot's commotion. He dragged Soundwave away to isolate him, the same way he used to drag Starscream away to isolate and punish him back when the Seeker was still his Lord's servant.

"Do not lie to me, but also do not lie to yourself! You are jealous of the brotherhood between Starscream and I, so you attempted to make the Seeker your own!"

Soundwave stepped back and nearly tripped on the rocks that jutted out of the river. "QUERY? QUERY?"

"Oh, you know precisely what I speak of! You tried to mentally break Starscream so that he would come crawling to you! How dare you?! I was the one who broke and tamed that wretch in the first place, I was the first one to play brother to him—and here you are now, trying to usurp my place? Trying to break Starscream so that he can also be your plaything? I think not, Soundwave. I. Think. Not. "

Megatron's servos creaked as he tightened them into fists. Laserbeak swung around and flashed her red visor as she shone a light onto Bulkhead. A hologram of Skyfire appeared and overlaid itself right over Bulkhead's faceplate. Thundercracker and Skywarp shimmered into existence and stood beside the confused and frightened Seeker as he struggled to tell who was real and who wasn't.

"So, this is what your bird has been up to?" Megatron hummed as he watched Starscream panic from afar. "She is trying to reenact the Grand Plan. It worked before. Perhaps it could work again… yes, all it took was some smoke and mirrors to completely destroy Starscream's sense of reality—perhaps she could pull it off again."

Soundwave's spark sank. There's no way the warlord could approve of this foolish plan. If Laserbeak failed, then she would become just as dead as the bots she pretended to be.

"MY LORD… WHY NOT TAKE STARSCREAM?"

Starscream did not notice the Decepticon's fight. He could only stare in silent horror as Skyfire's face overlaid itself across Bulkhead's.

He then did the only thing he could think of. He reached his servos out and grabbed ahold of the sides of Bulkhead's helm.

"Do-do you remember when you grounded me? When you took me aside in the woods and made f-fun of me and got me to calm down? That was Bulkhead. That was Bulkhead, not Skyfire. Do you remember?"

Skyfire—Bulkhead—Skyfire nodded. "I remember, Star. I remember. I said that… that what we saw in the woods was messed up… and that we could talk about it if you wanted to. Do… d'ya wanna talk about it?"

Starscream leaned back. Skyfire's faceplate reappeared and overlaid itself over Bulkhead's. Starscream looked up and saw something purple in the sky above both their helms.

He shrieked and pointed his servo right at Laserbeak. "You, why you little—!"

"Laserbeak, end the hologram," Optimus said firmly as he looked up at her. "Now."

Megatron turned around and tightly grabbed ahold of Soundwave's shoulders again. "Why not just go over there and claim the Seeker for myself, you ask? I could do that I suppose, but watching his sense of reality shatter again is far more entertaining. Besides—showing my new second-in-command what will happen to him by making him watch the old second-in-command go insane will surely teach you to never disobey me again."

Soundwave looked up into Megatron with pure shock in his field. The rest of the Decepticons watched from afar and warily stared at them. He was completely alone there in the river with just the warlord and a hundred pairs of optics on the two of them.

Megatron roared and fired his fusion cannon at the water. It slammed into the waves right in front of Bulkhead and Starscream and sent up a massive wave that made the Seeker fall to the ground.

Starscream landed in the water with a splash and heard laughter all around him. Thundercracker and Skywarp's reflections leered at him as they stepped closer.

Starscream sat up in the river and scrambled away from his fake trinemates. "No, no, you get away from me!"

"We are you!" Thundercracker laughed.

He tried to rise to his pedes, but the sheer force of the river overwhelmed his legs and he fell back into the water with a clang. "Stop wearing their faces!"

Skywarp sighed as Starscream shakily rose to his pedes again. "Stop lying to yourself, Starscream! We're real, we're real, we—are— REAL—"

Soundwave tried to come up with some defense—some rebuttal, some refutation that would make the warlord see reason— but then he looked, and actually really looked into Megatron's optics.

They were violet. Not red, but pure violet.

The color of dark energon.

There was no point in arguing with the warlord when he was infused with the blood of the chaos-bringer. That was the source of the insanity, the madness, the irrationality. It was the dark energon's fault that Megatron was now insane—it was no fault of Megatron's own that he'd begun to develop delusions of brotherhood.

It was just the dark energon.

It had to be.

"You are nothing without me, Soundwave. Nothing. If you ever dare to try and usurp me and end my plans again, just remember…" Megatron rasped as he leaned in. "My end will bring about yours. "

Soundwave gave a stiff nod and stepped back as he opened up a groundbright back to the Nemesis. As Megatron stomped through the green vortex, he took one last look over his shoulder.

Soundwave's spark froze. Perhaps the warlord had turned around to apologize to him—

No, wait, Megatron wasn't looking at Soundwave. Soundwave turned around and followed his Lord's gaze.

Megatron stared right at Starscream as the Seeker had a panic attack.

Megatron smiled and vanished through the bridge.

The dark energon was the only reason Megatron was insane. It was the only explanation Soundwave could accept. Soundwave had no idea what he'd do if it turned out that Megatron's insanity did not come from the dark energon, but from within the warlord himself. He shook his helm and stared up at Laserbeak as she laughed and chittered in the sky. He was unable to save his other creations, but by Primus, he would find a way to save her. He walked through the bridge.

Skywarp's voice became distorted and his entire frame became blurred and pixellated as he lunged right at Starscream. Starscream jumped backwards and tripped on a rock that jutted out of the river. His frame fell backward and at any moment he would feel the cold water rush over his frame as he smacked the riverbed—

An arm reached out and wrapped itself around Starscream's abdomen. He blinked the water out of his eyes and looked up at Bulkhead—not Skyfire, not anybody else—at Bulkhead.

"You… you…" Starscream sputtered.

Bulkhead gripped onto Starscream tightly and stopped the Seeker from falling into the river.

"I'm groundin' ya, Starscream!" he laughed.

Starscream's frame shook with relief. "I… thank you—"

Bulkhead violently shuddered and his optics shone a pure bright blue. "SUBSPACE LOG 89," he shouted. His voice boomed across the entire river and made everybody flinch back.

Starscream shrieked and tried to pull himself free from the Wrecker's grasp, but Bulkhead tightened his grip on the Seeker even more.

Megatron and Soundwave watched this all from afar and said and did nothing.

"Together, forever, the Council must end, you are so much stronger than you really know, my end will bring about yours—"

"Bulkhead, let me go!" Starscream shouted. "You're— hurk— crushing me!"

Optimus rushed forward and tried to pry Bulkhead's arm off of Starscream's abdomen, but the Wrecker completely ignored the Prime and only tightened his grip on the Seeker even more. He slowly tilted forward into the river and fell into the violent water with Starscream tight in his grasp. Starscream spat water out of his intake as it rushed over his frame. He looked up into Bulkhead's blue and unseeing optics.

"My end will bring about yours."

Bulkhead was suddenly pulled off of Starscream. Optimus and Bumblebee wrenched the Wrecker back and dragged him away from Starscream's shaky and bloodied frame.

Laserbeak hovered in the sky and watched them all with a single blood-red optic.

"End this farce and stop manipulating Starscream's sense of reality!" Optimus shouted up at her as he held Bulkhead back.

Laserbeak chittered and flew off.

The Skyfire hologram she had been overlaying atop Bulkhead vanished and Bulkhead was just Bulkhead again.

Arcee walked over to Starscream and helped the Seeker rise to his pedes. For a single second the two of them made optic contact.

They both froze.

Arcee's optics widened and she looked away. "Come… come on…" she muttered as her field fizzled with a strange emotion Starscream couldn't identify.

Bumblebee commed Ratchet and a green groundbridge spun to life right next to them all.

Optimus knelt down and looked at Starscream's wing with wide optics. "We are returning to base right now."

Arcee, Bumblebee, and Optimus helped Starscream and Bulkhead to their pedes and through the bridge.

Starscream took one last look behind him right as he limped through the river. The shimmery forms of Skyfire, Skywarp, and Thundercracker watched him leave.


Starscream fell out of the groundbridge. A torrent of water washed down from his frame and formed a puddle on the floor. His wing's energon sluiced down and into the puddle. Starscream just stared at his shocked reflection in the water before he then raised his fist and slammed it into the ground. It sent a splash of water over his frame and the concrete floor of the base.

The groundbridge shut behind him and the Autobots just stared at him.

Bulkhead knelt on the ground and shuddered non-stop beside him.

"Subspace Log 52…"

"Quiet," Starscream snapped.

"I worry about what you will do when I am no longer here..." Bulkhead droned on. Starscream rose to his pedes and stomped towards Bulkhead. He shoved Ratchet back with his arm and grabbed the Wrecker's faceplate in his shaky talons.

"You… you better be quiet now! You're being weird!"

"My end is near. I can feel it…"

"Stop. Stop saying that ominous doomsday prophecy, I had enough of that with Megatron—"

Optimus stepped forward and rested his servo on Starscream's wet pauldron. "Starscream, Bulkhead is not… mentally well."

Starscream whirled around to face the Prime. "He saved me, you know that? Reached out, grabbed ahold of me, held me, and then dropped me like a brick! And why won't he stop reciting the logs?!"

"And I worry that my end will bring about yours..."

Optimus's optics widened. "So they are logs? That is what he has been reciting?"

"And I worry that my end will bring about yours..."

Starscream shut his intake. He'd said too much. He wasn't sure why, but the idea of looking Optimus in the optics and telling him that there was another mech he'd loved a thousand years ago, that there was another mech he still grieved for, another mech he still missed every day, and he felt like that mech was back within Bulkhead—

He bit his lip and felt energon well up in his intake.

"And I worry that my end will bring about yours..." Bulkhead repeated.

"Optimus… you have not been entirely honest with me, have you?" Starscream said. All of the Autobots glanced between each other.

Optimus sighed. "No. We have not."

Starscream tried to ignore the pang he felt in his spark at those words. Of course the Prime hadn't told him everything, and why would he? He was still just the rogue 'Con, the defector, the newcomer, the unwanted newcomer. Why would Prime entrust him with important information? It made so much sense, yet the revelation still hurt for some reason. This entire problem with Bulkhead felt so close and yet so personal to him because it concerned the words of Starscream's old friend, it was the logs meant for Starscream that were being recited, and it was the voice of Starscream's dead friend that were killing his new friend.

"The data cylinder," Starscream blurted out. "When it hit his helm…. All of that data…"

Optimus frowned and nodded grimly. "The data is indeed erasing Bulkhead's memories and personality."

"...Oh."

That didn't hurt. It did not. That is what Starscream told himself. But there was a voice in the back of his helm that sounded an awful lot like Bulkhead—or was it Skyfire?—that was telling him to stop lying.

Stop lying to yourself, Starscream!

Optimus tightened his grip on Starscream's shoulder. "I can assure you that we will—"

Did Skyfire live through the storm? Was he buried under the ice? Did he slowly freeze? Could he feel his helm and memories and personality rotting away as he died under a hundred tons of snow?

"—try our hardest to end this affliction—"

"My end is near. I can feel it…"

Did Bulkhead live through the storm of data that hit his helm? Was his spark buried under all of the intrusive data? Did it slowly creep into his helm? Could he feel his helm and memories and personality rotting away under a hundred equations and logs?

"—I can assure you that he still has some time left—"

"And I worry that my end will bring about yours..."

"—he will not be the same, but he will still be with us—"

"I worry about what you will do when I am no longer here..."

"—his personality may come to an end—"

"And I worry that my end will bring about yours..."

" but…"

Blue, so blue, blue blue blue, Skyfire's optics were blue too, so was the ice that killed him—

"I'll be fine, just you see!"

Starscream turned around and looked at Bulkhead with wide optics.

Bulkhead just rubbed his neck cables and looked around at everybody. He cleared his intake and pulled Starscream closer.

"There's no need to fear, Star," he said. His frame shuddered and his faceplate spasmed, but then he stilled and returned to normal. Well, he was normal for that moment at least. It was only a matter of time before the dead shuttle's words crept their way back into his processor and hijacked his intake again.

Starscream's jaw dropped. "How?! How can you be this—this relaxed ? This calm and optimistic?! It makes no sense!"

Bulkhead's smile wavered. "Oh, Starscream. Truth is..." He leaned in until their faceplates were a breath apart. "...I am totally losing my bolts right now. If I lose my processor, then I won't be able to shield lil' Arcee, or give Bumblebee hugs, or make fun of Ratchet when he's being too stuffy, or respect Prime—"

"Wait, wait wait wait…" Starscream said as he held up his servos. Bulkhead looked at him with wide optics and a field full of confusion. Confusion.

Confusion. The Wrecker just didn't understand.

"You just listed off all the reasons you're scared to lose yourself. And it seems like the only reason you're worried about having your personality erased is because you won't be able to protect the team anymore."

"Well, duh," Bulkhead said.

"Aren't you worried for your own wellbeing?!"

"Of course, Screamer! But I worry even more about their wellbeing."

Starscream shook his helm. "Autobots. So sentimental."

Bulkhead laughed and wrapped an arm around Starscream's shoulders. "Hey, you're one of us now, Scree! Soon a day will come when you'll be the sentimental one!"

Starscream sputtered. "I would never—"

"Y'know, if I had ever put my arm around you like this in the past, you would've just shrugged me off. But now? You just allowed me to hold you just now!"

"What? No, no, I didn't even notice your arm!"

"You curled up into me! And I'm not seeing you trying to remove my arm, now am I?" Bulkhead laughed as he tightened his grip around the offended Seeker.

"Oh, you little—!" Starscream began to swear. Bulkhead's optics went dim and his smile vanished.

Starscream's spark pulsed in his chestplates. "...Bulkhead? Are you there?"

Bulkhead's grip around Starscream slackened and he leaned heavily against the wall. Starscream shrieked as the Wrecker went down with a clang and fell onto the floor.

"Oh slag!" Starscream yelped. He grabbed ahold of Bulkhead's arm and yanked the Wrecker up just before his helm smacked into the concrete floor.

"S-subspace…" Bulkhead rasped as his optics began to glow a brighter shade of blue.

"What are you saying? What? Don't say what I think you're about to say! Don't! " Starscream shook out.

"Subbbspaceeee…." Bulkhead moaned. His servo lashed out and he tightly grabbed ahold of Starscream's shoulder in a vice-like grip. There was nothing warm or comforting about this shoulder hold. Grief and fear pulsed in Bulkhead's field. He turned around to face the Seeker and he opened his intake—

The fear and grief in his field vanished in a split second and a calm field of smooth static replaced his emotions. His optics dimmed and all of the warmth in them disappeared.

"Subspace Log 52… I worry about what you will do when I am no longer here."

Ratchet ran up to them and his entire frame drooped. "Oh no…"

Starscream glared. "Don't you 'oh no' me, medic! You're the doctor, it's your job to be comforting, slag it, it's your job to fix him—"

"—Starscream," Ratchet interrupted. He dropped to a knee and looked the Seeker right in the optic. "I can't fix him."

"Wh—what? Why not? Do your job, idiot!"

"I'm telling you that I can't , okay? The data is taking over his processor."

"Okay. Now what does that actually mean? "

"My end is near. I can feel it. And I worry that my end will bring about yours…"

Ratchet sighed. "It means that the data is going to delete him and leave him as…"

"...As an empty husk," Miko finished. Starscream looked up and saw the Autobots and humans all watching.

Starscream looked between them all with wide optics. "No, you have to be wrong. There still has to be a way. You… you knew all along that this was happening?"

"No! Not until recently!" Bumblebee beeped. "We only learned this morning."

Starscream's jaw dropped. "That was hours ago and you're just telling me this just now?!"

"I am sorry, Starscream," Optimus said as he stepped forward. "We saw that you were already severely distressed and did not want to upset you further until we found a cure."

"Oh, I'm distressed all right! Ratchet just said he can't fix it!"

Ratchet shook his helm. "I'm working on a cure, okay?"

"Oh, you're working on one, but you don't actually have one, huh?"

"Starscream," Bulkhead said weakly.

"That makes it all better, now doesn't it?! His mind is slagging disappearing!"

Bulkhead coughed. "Screamer..."

"But it's okay because Ratchet maybe, kind of, sort of has a cure but not really, not really!"

Bulkhead moaned. "Screee…."

Starscream's helm whirled around to face him. "What?"

"Screamer, I won't be, like, totally gone! I'll be here," he said as he weakly lifted his servo and rested it atop Starscream's helm. "I'll be here in your—"

Starscream snarled. "Don't say it, don't say it —"

"—I will be here in your memories, Screamer."

"No!" Starscream shot to his pedes. "I am sick and tired of having the bots I care about living on only in my memories or as holograms, slag it! I want them to be real and alive, not stuck in my h-helm and haunting me!"

He grabbed onto Bullhead's arm and helped the Wrecker rise unsteadily to his pedes. He began to lead Bulkhead away and deeper into the base.

"Screamy, where are you taking me?"

Starscream said nothing and continued to lead Bulkhead off. Ratchet moved to follow, but then Optimus put a servo on the medic's shoulder. Ratchet glared up at Optimus, but the Prime just shook his helm. The Autobots and humans all watched Starscream stomp off into the base with Bulkhead in tow.

The two of them emerged into a storage room. Starscream shut the door behind him and pushed Bulkhead down onto a dirty crate.

"Screamy, what—?"

"Tell me a story."

Bulkhead blinked. "...What?"

Starscream took a deep vent. He wasn't seriously considering doing this, right?

He looked up and into Bulkhead's confused blue optics. The Wrecker was confused for now, but soon, he would feel nothing at all.

"Tell me a Wrecker story. You said, and I quote, that 'Wrecker stories are the best stories.' So. Prove it."

Bulkhead blinked slowly. He opened his intake to speak and Starscream leaned forward to hear him better—

"Subspace Log 52..." he droned out.

"No!" Starscream groaned. He gently grabbed ahold of Bulkhead's helm in his talons. "No! Tell me a Wrecker story! Focus! You were talking about one idiot in particular—Wheeljack! Tell me about that buffoon, yes!"

"Oh, J-jackie! Lemme tell you about him! So there we were, Jackie n' I, on a mission…"

Bulkhead trailed off. Starscream listened to him speak and tried to ignore the way the Wrecker's optics dimmed and the way he began to shake more and more as he spoke.

He didn't know how long he just sat there and listened to Bulkhead tell crazy story after crazy story, each one more ludicrous and stupid than the last.

A while later—he had no clue how much later—Optimus briefly appeared in the doorway to the storage room. He glanced at Bulkhead and Starscream and then smiled before he then walked away and left them alone again.

"And then," Bulkhead said much later on. "And then… Jackie was like 'Why spark bond to a Conjunx when ya can bond to grenades?' and I was like, 'Jackieeee, no! '"

Starscream scoffed. "Idiot."

"And then… and then…" Bulkhead's voice grew fainter and he trailed off.

Starscream shook him. "Come on, wake back up. I need to figure out if that idiot blows himself up or not."

Bulkhead's intake opened and closed over and over again.

Starscream felt as if a heavy weight just descended upon his spark. "Bulkhead…"

"Sub…" he began to say.

Starscream leaned in. "Yes? Yes? What happened next?"

"Sub…"

Starscream growled. "Don't say it you fool! Don't say it—"

"Subspace Log 52… My end is near. I can feel it."

"Slag it!" Starscream swore. "This shouldn't be happening, making you tell stupid stories should be preserving your memories, so then why—?"

A pair of servos wrapped around him from behind and Starscream found himself being led away. Bulkhead didn't even notice him leave and just continued to mumble as he stared off into space.

Starscream was pulled into the hall and out of the room. He turned around and scowled up at—

—Optimus and Ratchet.

"Well? Do you have anything to say, Prime?"

Optimus sighed. "I am sorry."

"Sorry for what?" Starscream scoffed.

"I am sorry we did not tell you sooner. But I am especially sorry that there is no cure for this."

Starscream's wing drooped. "No cure," he said flatly.

Optimus shook his helm. "I am deeply sorry. I know that the two of you have been becoming friends lately—"

"What?!" Starscream sputtered. "No, no, not friends, of course not! He's just… I'm just…"

"You are lying to myself."

Starscream bit his lip. "No," he said softly.

Optimus crouched down and looked at him in the optic. "Yes," he said even more softly. "You are. What happened to you on that mission with him?"

"We told you earlier. That little winged rat tried to trick us with some hologram."

"Who was the hologram of?"

"Um. Who was it of?"

Optimus nodded slowly. "Yes. Who was she trying to impersonate?"

It was Skyfire right in front of him in all his glory, his wings, his armor, his paintjob, his warm blue optics, it was Skyfire, all the way down to the tiniest of details

"Where did the logs come from?" Optimus said.

Starscream took a deep vent. "They came from—"

His voice broke and he went silent.

"This cylinder is our secret meant for trusted bots only," Skyfire had said as he had looked at the cylinder reverently. "Nobody can ever be allowed to know about it. Who knows what the Council would do with this information?"

The Council was dead. He'd killed them with his own talons. And here he was, surrounded by the bots he knew he should trust—

Optimus and Ratchet just stared at him.

—and he just couldn't bring himself to trust them.

"I…"

The last time he'd seen that wretched cylinder… No. He couldn't let himself think about that incident.

Ratchet sighed. "Well?"

"You'll have to tell us one day," Ratchet said.

"My end is near. I can feel it. And I worry that my end will bring about yours…" Bulkhead droned on. Ratchet stared at him with wide optics.

"Are those his last words, or someone else's?" Ratchet asked.

Bulkhead continued to stare into his space. He moved his servos in circular motions through the air, almost as if he was envisioning himself holding and rubbing somebody close to him.

"They're…" Starscream stuttered. "They're both."


So close, yet so far. She would have to work harder to bring her plan to fruition. The plan hadn't gone quite as well as she'd hoped. The sight of the traitor's trinemates nearly broke him, but the Wrecker had regained his senses and came to his rescue.

She would have to work on that.

Laserbeak chittered and settled down on the stump of a smoking log that had been rended apart by a stray blaster bolt. Steam hissed up around her scratched wings and energon sluiced down her frame. That was okay, though. The energon wasn't hers. It was the traitor's energon that had sprayed across her frame—she'd waited years to feel it and spent so long dreaming of what it would be like to watch the lifetaker's lifeblood drain from him. She had to wonder no more.

The air shifted and buzzed. Something pulsed on the other end of her bond to her Creator and she reluctantly pried open the bond. A dizzying array of muted emotions stood on the other side of the bond.

Soundwave slinked out of the trees and stood over her. He looked out into the smoking ruins of the ruined river.

He slammed his servos down onto either side of the stump. Laserbeak did not react.

"QUERY?" he asked. He did not need to specify what he was asking. The pent-up fear and anger in his normally calm field did all of the asking for him.

"YOU CAME BACK. I BROUGHT JUSTICE," she chittered out. She liked that word a lot and wanted to use it a lot more. Justice, justice for Ravage, justice for Rumble and Frenzy, justice for all of them.

"NEGATIVE. NEGATIVE. PLAN: FOOLHARDY. TRYING TO REPLICATE MEGATRON'S PLAN… WILL NOT WORK."

Laserbeak swiveled around and her single optic flared with red light. "YOU WERE THERE WHEN OUR LORD'S GRAND PLAN WAS ENACTED. YOU WERE THERE TO WATCH THE TRINE FALL. YOU KNOW THAT THE PLAN COULD WORK AGAIN."

Soundwave said nothing and clenched his thin servos into fists.

"YOU KNOW I CAN DO THIS," Laserbeak hummed. "YOU LIE TO YOURSELF."

Soundwave tilted his helm towards her and narrowed his single visible optic. "PLAN: WILL FAIL. STARSCREAM…"

Laserbeak sensed his hesitation. "PLAN: WILL WORK AGAIN." She had her doubts about Megatron, but she had to admit that the warlord could come up with brilliant ideas and that Soundwave could do a brilliant job at executing them. She remembered the day the Grand Plan came to fruition—the day the trine died and Starscream died on the inside. That was a lovely day. The Seeker still had no idea that she and Soundwave helped execute the Grand Plan—or that there even was a Grand Plan. The inner workings of the traitor's complex little processor were bared to her. He'd fallen for the holoforms before, so he'd fall for them again.

A disturbing thought entered Laserbeak's processor. "DO YOU FEEL... REGRET FOR WHAT WE DID TO HIM?" she whispered.

Soundwave recoiled. His field hissed static and he leaned in until his faceplate was right in front of her.

"NEVER."

"THEN WHY HESITATE?!" she chirped.

Soundwave stood up and stalked off to the other end of the river. Laserbeak took flight and flew after him. She flew around his helm in loops and circled round and round and round.

"DO YOU FEEL REGRET?"

"WE DID WHAT HAD TO BE DONE. TRINE WAS IN THE WAY."

"THEY WERE, THEY WERE OBSTACLES," she hissed. First the trinemates were now the obstacles, and now the Autobots were as well. "DON'T BECOME AN OBSTACLE TOO."

Soundwave's helm shot up to look at her. His servo lashed out and he gently, but firmly grabbed her out of the air and held her in his cupped servos.

"I AM NO OBSTACLE."

"Soundwave!" Megatron shouted over the comms. Speaking of obstacles…

Soundwave's shoulders drooped and he let Laserbeak perch on his shoulder as he responded to the comm. Normally Soundwave responded immediately, but this time… this time, he hesitated.

"Have you found your little pet yet?" Megatron rasped over the end of the comm.

"AFFIRMATIVE."

"Return to the Nemesis. I wish to have her explain her mayhem. Your worrying better have been worth something."

Soundwave opened a bridge amongst the smoking ruins of the forest around the river. He turned his helm to look at Laserbeak and his visor flashed hot violet. Laserbeak flashed her own red optic back at him. She was worth something, she was, she was.

Soundwave clutched her tightly in his thin servos—was he shaking? —as they walked through the groundbridge.

A blast of cold air blew against her frame as Soundwave emerged onto the Nemesis's command bridge. Megatron stood in front of a glowing computer console and his frame cast a sharp shadow down onto Laserbeak and Soundwave below. He tightened his talons and some purple material held within his grasp cracked sharply and fell to the ground in a purple powder.

Megatron turned around and Laserbeak instinctively skittered onto Soundwave's back in fear. She hated it when the warlord was like this, hated the way his optics glowed hot violet and the way his raspy voice was even more hoarse and guttural than usual.

Soundwave turned his helm to regard the dark energon crumbled on the floor. Laserbreak felt his field tighten.

"Oh, the troubles you have caused me and my new second, little bird. He searched for you, you know. He searched and searched when he instead should've been searching for the traitors! " Megatron growled. His optics glowed hot violet and his frame shuddered as a wave of electric violet lightning raced across his chestplate. He walked behind Soundwave and leaned down until his ugly faceplate was the only thing Laserbeak could see.

"So tell me… what was so worth the chaos?"

Laserbeak chirped in fear. "THE PLAN, MY LORD."

Megatron blinked at her. "The plan?... Oh, the plan. What a spectacle that was! You desire to recreate my genius, bird?"

"DESIGNATION: LASERBEAK."

Megatron snarled at her. "I will call you by your name when you earn that right. Until then, you are nothing to me but yet another frame in my way. What makes you think you can recreate the circumstances of the trine's death?"

"THE TRICK IS NOT TO DESTROY STARSCREAM."

Megatron leaned forward and his optics flared. "That is precisely the goal, you wretch—!"

"THE TRICK IS TO MAKE STARSCREAM DESTROY HIMSELF. "

The warlord's optics widened and he smiled. It was all teeth. He threw his helm back and laughed and laughed and laughed.

"The bird has learned well, it would seem. But what makes you think you can pull this off?"

Laserbeak activated her holoform generator.

"Hello, Megatron," Optimus Prime's voice said.

Megatron snarled and whirled around. Optimus Prime stood up on the steps above him and glared down at him down below.

"You—!" Megatron roared. He fired his fusion cannon and sent a bolt of energy right at Optimus's frame. Optimus had no reaction as the bolt slammed towards him and struck his frame. He vanished in a shimmer of blue light.

Soundwave was completely frozen. He clutched onto Laserbeak and held her tight to his chestplate.

"No… you…" Megatron rasped. He turned around and pointed a talon right at Laserbeak. "You dare to wear the face of my greatest enemy, bird?!"

Now or never. This was the critical moment, the time in which she'd convince Megatron to either give her the go-ahead for her plan, or the moment in which he'd kill her. She activated her holoform generator again.

"I can wear Optimus's face, and so many others!" a new voice said. Megatron turned around and saw Thundercracker standing there with a confident look on his faceplate. His optics shone blood-red in the dim light of the bridge and his frame was smeared with energon—the same energon he had had on his frame when he died.

Megatron frowned. "So you can replicate Thundercracker, but who else?"

She switched holoforms. Thundercracker smiled and vanished in a shimmer of blue light. Skywarp stood in his place and smirked at Megatron.

"Interesting, interesting…" Megatron hummed. "If we are to recreate the circumstances of their deaths, we must confuse Starscream even more though. Who else?"

She was winning, she could do this. She sent a pulse of comfort over her tense bond with her creator and activated her holoform generator again and again.

"REFRAIN," Soundwave said over their bond.

Skywarp vanished and Skyfire replaced him. Megatron frowned. The shuttle didn't mean anything to the warlord—not yet. He did not yet understand the shuttle's importance, but he soon would.

Soon.

Skyfire vanished, and then Bumblebee appeared, and then his yellow armor was replaced with green and then Bulkhead appeared in his place.

"REFRAIN. NOW. NOW!" Soundwave shouted over their bond.

Megatron hissed and the stench of dark energon floated out of his intake. "Not enough. Not enough!"

Bulkhead vanished and Ratchet appeared, and then he disappeared and Arcee took his place.

"Not enough. Not. Enough. " Megatron growled.

Laserbeak chittered. Sparks flew from her frame as she pushed the holoform generator to her limit. Megatron always wanted more, more and more and more, like a greedy little sparkling. She had to impress him, she had to show him a faceplate he hadn't seen in a long time with such detailed accuracy that he would think it to be real. Soundwave sent plead after plead over their bond for her to stop, but she couldn't, not now—once the wheels of vengeance were spun into motion, they could never be stopped.

She generated the frame of the first person she could think of.

Arcee's frame vanished and a new frame took its place.

Megatron's optics widened and his jaw fell. Soundwave forcibly transformed her back into his chestplate and clutched onto her tighter than he had in a hundred years.

"You dare to recreate his faceplate?" Megatron roared as he stared at the holoform before him.

Orion Pax stared back.

"FORGIVE HER," Soundwave said. "FORGIVE HER. SHE DOES NOT KNOW WHAT SHE HAS DONE."

Megatron shakily reached his servos towards the red and blue frame of Orion Pax. His servos passed right through his chestplate and the warlord's faceplate fell in disappointment.

"No, Soundwave… she knows precisely what she's done… doesn't she?" Megatron rasped as he turned around to face her.

Mistake. Mistake. The last time he'd had that look on his faceplate was when he had Optimus and Starscream kneeling before him. It was that mad deranged look of somebody who wanted something extremely badly, but knew that they could never have it

Soundwave backed up and clutched onto Laserbeak more tightly. A pair of magenta optics watched from the shadows in the back of the room.

"Do not dare to manipulate me using the image of his faceplate!"

"NO MANIPULATION. NO LIES."

"Then why did you show me his face?!"

"TO SHOW YOU WHAT YOU COULD REGAIN."

Megatron just stared at her coldly. "Tread very, very carefully." He began to march towards her as he extended his sword. The sharp edge of his blade reflected the violet glow of his dark-energon infused optics.

"DON'T YOU WANT ORION BACK?" Laserbeak trilled.

Megatron stopped his march forward. "What?" he hissed.

Laserbeak hesitantly floated forward. "I CAN LURE THE SEEKER AND THE PRIME IN. I CAN LURE ALL OF THEM IN, AND THEN YOU WON'T BE ALONE ANYMORE."

"Do you dare accuse me of being lonely and needing company, like some needy sparkling? The only 'needy' person is Starscream!"

"STARSCREAM NEEDS CLOSURE—WHICH I WILL PREVENT HIM FROM GETTING. HE WILL NEED TO PAY FOR WHAT HE DID IN THE SENATE THAT DAY."

Megatron stood there and breathed heavily. He turned back around and knelt down so that he was optic level with Orion. He shakily reached out and held Orion's neck in his giant talons.

Orion smiled. "It's good to see you again, Megatronus!"

Megatron snapped Orion's neck.

Laserbeak simulated the sound and visuals of a snapped neck and made the holoform of Orion crumple to the floor.

Megatron stared out into space for several silent and tense moments as field roiled and thrashed around him.

"Why should I not kill you, little bird?"

"BECAUSE IF YOU LOSE ME, YOU RISK LOSING SO MUCH MORE THAN JUST ME."

Megatron activated his fusion cannon and pointed it right at Soundwave. The heat of the violet barrel blasted right over Soundwave and made the air shimmer and waver.

He said nothing and continued to breathe heavily.

Megatron suddenly turned around and slammed both of his servos onto a computer console. It smashed under the blow of his servos and crumpled into a jagged mess of metal and glass.

"Leave my presence. I wish to communicate with my god!" He grabbed ahold of another crystal of dark energon so tightly that it cracked in his grip.

Her plan had not been approved of—but it hadn't been rejected either. That was enough for now.

Laserbeak trilled and flew into the air in happy circles.

Soundwave practically ran out of the room and into the hallway. The sound of Megatron's rage echoed through the ship as he smashed the command bridge apart with his sword. Soundwave walked faster and faster until the sound of the angry warlord was a distant roar in the distance.

"ARE YOU NOT PROUD, CREATOR?" Laserbreak trilled.

He walked faster.

"ARE YOU NOT PLEASED WITH YOUR CREATION?"

He ignored her.

"ARE YOU NOT CONFIDENT IN MY ABILITIES? I WILL NOT ALLOW YOU TO MAKE ME LOSE THIS NEW MISSION—"

Soundwave grabbed her out of the air and held her up in front of his faceplate. Laserbeak tried to squirm out of his grasp, but Soundwave just held her tighter.

"SOUNDWAVE: CANNOT AFFORD TO LOSE ANOTHER CASSETICON. CANNOT AFFORD TO LOSE YOU. "

Laserbeak stilled and her protests died in her intake.

Soundwave continued. "RAVAGE TRIED TO DO THE SAME AS YOU DO NOW."

She said nothing. Laserbeak trilled and Soundwave tucked her close to his chestplate and just held her.

A thin and spindly silhouette curled up in the corner of the ceiling. Airachnid watched Soundwave and Laserbeak down below.

She smiled.


Starscream winced as Ratchet patched his wings. Optimus sat beside him on the berth and winced whenever a new rivulet of energon bled from one of the scratches.

"Don't…" Starscream sighed. "Don't do that!"

"Do what?" Optimus asked.

Starscream waved his servo around. "Y'know, that ! That thing you do where you look all sad and concerned."

"Do you not like it when people are concerned for your wellbeing?"

"Well, I, er—"

"There is no shame in admitting that you like it when people are worried for you."

Starscream shifted away from Optimus and offlined his optics. "Why are you telling me this? And why now?" he asked softly.

"Because I am concerned for you. We all are."

Ratchet sighed. "Starscream, the reason we didn't tell you was because—"

"I don't want to hear it. Just patch my wing already!" Starscream snapped. He only had one wing left and could not afford to allow anymore harm to happen to it. A shudder coursed through his frame at the thought of losing his other wing. The lack of the sky was beginning to grate upon him and it was only a matter of time before the concrete walls of the base would overwhelm him completely.

Bulkhead's voice echoed through the medbay. "And my end will bring about yours, yours, yours—"

"Will he ever stop that?" Ratchet grumbled.

"Only if you fix him!"

Starscream felt Ratchet go still behind him.

"I don't… Starscream, I will try, but the processor is a complex machine! I… I will try."

"No, of course you don't know what's going on! How usual. I mean, can't you just delete the intrusive data?" Starscream asked as he shot up from the berth.

Ratchet scoffed. "And risk deleting his entire processor? No."

The Autobots just had to be overreacting, right? Surely Bulkhead was not going to lose all of his memories? Starscream pressed his mouth into a thin line and tried not to think about what that could entail.

If Bulkhead lost his memories—

No. He wouldn't go down that path.

"Good. It is best not to dwell on such things," Optimus nodded.

"Gah! Did I say that out loud?" Starscream sputtered.

"You say many things," Optimus said softly.

"I mean, not all of him will be gone… right?"

Optimus sighed. "Yes. He will be gone, all of him. His memories—"

"Just let me hold you, Screamer," Bulkhead's voice echoed in his helm. The Wrecker had held him so tight to his chestplate on that awful night.

Starscream's spark lurched. Bulkhead won't remember holding him.

"His personality—"

He won't remember joking with him or calling him Screamer.

"His thoughts—"

The only thing he'd be able to think about anymore would be that Primus-forsaken series of logs. No more stupid Seeker puns, no more weird observations, no more Bulkhead.

"Are you done with the patches?" Starscream grit out with a strained voice.

Ratchet sighed. "Yes, now I am just—"

Starscream shot to his pedes and ran from the medbay. He heard Optimus and Ratchet yell after him, but he couldn't possibly spend another moment with them. Their pitying stares and quiet and mournful fields smothered the air and made him feel even more claustrophobic. Starscream leaned against the wall in one of the halls and slowly slid down to the floor.

He just needed a moment free from warlords and the ghostly images of dead mechs and pitying stares and—

Heavy pedesteps stomped across the floor.

Starscream froze. It wasn't Megatron, it could not possibly be Megatron—yet there was still some part of him that jolted in terror whenever a heavy pede struck the ground—those heavy pedes had struck his frame so many times before.

Bulkhead walked down the hall and looked down at the Seeker in surprise.

Starscream jumped to his pedes. He couldn't afford to show weakness. "Bulkhead—"

Bulkhead suddenly leaned in forward and pressed his warm forehelm to Starscream's cold one. He let out a breath across the Seeker's faceplate and his entire field pulsed with warmth and grief.

"In the event that I die, I have constructed one last log for you, one final message, to warn you and guide in the event that the Council claims my spark—"

"Don't talk like that!" Starscream snapped. He pushed his talons out against Bulkhead's chestplate, but the Wrecker didn't budge an inch. He just moved in closer and held Starscream's bruised and scratched frame even closer to his green armor. "I worry. I worry and worry and worry."

The sound of more pedesteps sounded into the air. Starscream opened his optics—when had he closed them?—and saw the rest of the Autobots down in the hall. They watched him with wide optics as a strange emotion Starscream could not identify tangled in their fields.

"Together, forever," Bulkhead whispered as he stared deeply into space.

The Autobot's fields pulsed and Starscream's spark sank. Oh, he knew that emotion.

The hot stench of pity hung in the air.

"You do not have to watch this happen," Optimus said softly. "You do not have to listen to him constantly repeat his final words. You can say goodbye to him… let your last memories of the old him be of him when he was still whole and not—"

"Rotting away?!" Starscream shrieked. He kicked Bulkhead away and stumbled backwards. "I'm sick of this! You all think I'm just a ticking time bomb, don't you?"

Optimus sighed heavily. "Starscream?"

"Don't you?" he whispered. Optimus looked up at him and dipped his helm.

"I can't believe this," Starscream scoffed. "Why are you so worried? Are you scared I'll lose my mind if Bulkhead loses his?"

"That's not why we hid his condition from you, Starscream," Bumblebee beeped. Arcee said nothing and stood in the back of the hall, yet even her field also pulsed with a faint note of pity.

"It is not your fault that the formula of the Ancients is doing this to him," Optimus said.

Arcee growled. "If I could find the bots who made that cylinder…" she said as a dark look crossed over her faceplate.

"Do you remember… when we finished the formula together, Star?" Bulkhead whispered so softly that only Starscream heard it.

"I did that with Skyfire," Starscream whispered back.

Optimus watched them both with wide optics, but neither of them noticed.

"Do you remember, Starscream, our long and quiet nights together?" Bulkhead laughed loudly. The rest of the Autobots helms shot up and they looked at Bulkhead.

Starscream froze. "Um, Bulkhead?"

"Just you, me, and science!" he laughed.

"You weren't there!" Starscream scoffed.

"Oh, but don't you remember? I was, Starscream, I was there, the three of us—you, me, and the Ancients."

Optimus stepped forward. "Starscream?"

Starscream stood there and stared at Bulkhead with wide optics. He was completely deaf to the world around him as he stared right at Bulkhead's bright blue optics, the same blue optics Skyfire had had before he—


The vast expanse of ice stretched before them.

The harsh cold wind bit and blew into their frames, but they needed to keep walking onwards. Energon trickled down from the welded scratches on Starscream's wings. Skyfire's large wings continued to flutter nervously behind him as the two of them walked across the icy barren wasteland.

"Keep going, Star," he rasped, but Skyfire sounded as if he was trying to reassure himself as well.

"Do you ever consider just smashing the thing?" Starscream said. He glared at the cylinder and growled. This wretched machine contained what was needed to make Cybertron great again—and it had to remain hidden, it had to be locked away deep in the ice because the even more wretched mechs who ran Cybertron wouldn't allow it help their world.

"Starscream, how could you say that?" Skyfire gasped. The wind blew harder and sent a white flurry of snow into the air and over his frame. Starscream could only see Skyfire's faint silhouette through the snow. He reached out and tightly held onto Skyfire's icy servo. A wave of relief washed through his aching frame. He had Skyfire with him. Good. He needed to keep an optic on him, it would be easy to lose the shuttle amidst the blizzard. But he'd be careful, he'd keep watch over Skyfire and would assure that they stay together.

"Star, I worry about what will happen to you when I'm not here. My end is near. I can feel it. "

Starscream tightened his grip on the shuttle's servo. The wind was picking up now. That was strange.

"Is it me, or is it getting… colder?" Starscream said. He raised his arm to protect his faceplate from the harsh icy gale. Skyfire peered into the oncoming blizzard and his optics widened.

"What? What do you see? Do you see something my optics don't?" Starscream asked.

Skyfire took a deep shuddering vent and said nothing. He merely tightened his grip on Starscream's tiny talon and began to shake.

"Sky—"

The shuttle suddenly knelt to the ground. An enormous pair of arms wrapped around him from behind and he felt his frame get pushed up against the curves of interstellar-grade armor. Starscream let out a high-pitched keen and sank into Skyfire's hug.

"This is… nice, but this is sudden. Sky?" Starscream whimpered into the folds of Skyfire's armor.

The shuttle's field shuddered around the both of them. "I need you to be strong for me, Star. Okay? I worry that my end will bring about yours..."

"Don't… don't be like that."

Skyfire looked up into the stars. The growing blizzard unleashed a flurry of snow into the air that made it hard to make out the stars above. The snowy clouds parted and for a split second, a thousand stars shone above their helms.

"Remember…" Skyfire coughed. "Remember which one is Cybertron?"

"We can't see Cybertron, silly! It's too dim."

"Not if you look really hard, Starscream. Really, really, hard. Look for me, Star. If I don't make it—"

"You will make it, you will, slag it!" Starscream swore.

"—then you need to know which one is Cybertron. Point to it."

Starscream sighed. Skyfire was being far too melodramatic. He didn't need to know where Cybertron was located in the sky because the shuttle could easily use his nav-computer to get them back to Cybertron for them. The only scenario in which he'd have to know where Cybertron was would be if he was headed back to their homeworld alone. That was preposterous. He'd never leave Skyfire behind, ever.

He opened his intake to protest, but froze at the sight of Skyfire's faceplate. It was hard to see through the whirling snow, but he swore he could see the faint outline of coolant beneath Skyfire's bright blue optics. Skyfire's optics shone bluer than he had ever seen before.

Starscream reached his arm up and into the sky and pointed one of his digits at a faint cluster of bright blue stars.

Skyfire wiped the snow off of Starscream's arm and held tightly onto his upraised arm. "Good. You found it. Now look at it, remember it—"

"Stop freaking out!"

" and remember, Starscream. Remember where it is because I might not be there to remember it for you."

He clutched tightly onto Starscream's arm and kept it pointed right at the stars above. Starscream took a vent and let out a shaky nod. Another harsh gale of wind blew out of the sky and drove ice into their frames.

"Relax, Sky. We'll just scout this area out, see if this is a good place to hide the cylinder, and then we'll be back at the Academy in no time!"

Skyfire nodded and looked up at the stars. A snowy cloud blew in and hid where Cybertron was.

"Then let's go. I've got the cylinder in my cargo bay."

Starscream grabbed ahold of Skyfire's frozen servo and led him into the blizzard. This storm was nothing to them. They've flown through much worse storms before. They could weather any storm.

The two of them walked off into the cold dark night with a thousand stars above their helms. Everything would be fine.


Starscream blinked sluggishly and came back to awareness. The Autobots all stood around him and argued with one another as Bulkhead muttered on and on.

"Oh, Stascream," he moaned.

"Well, there has to be something you can do!" Arcee snapped at Ratchet.

He grabbed a wrench and waved it at her. "I'm trying my hardest!"

"C'mon Bulk, I know you're in there!" Bumblebee beeped as he waved his servos in front of Bulkhead's faceplate.

Optimus stood off to the side of the room and just stared at Starscream as his team fought around him. The Prime's field pulsed in grief and for a split second, he and Starscream made optic contact.

The Prime knew.

He wasn't entirely sure how, but Starscream somehow knew deep in his spark that the Prime was aware of his past with the formula.

The two of them just stared at each other for several moments. Optimus looked away from Starscream and glanced at Bulkhead before he then looked back at Starscream.

He'd lost Skyfire to the crushing ice and cold—he couldn't afford to lose Bulkhead to the crushing weight of Skyfire's dead last words.

"It's my formula!" Starscream shouted.

Everybody stopped and stared at Starscream.

"What was that?" Ratchet said with wide optics.

Starscream let out a heavy vent and clenched his talons into fists. "You know what I said."

"How could it possibly be yours?! It's the Ancient's formula!" Ratchet said. Optimus just looked back and forth between Ratchet and Starscream with a frown.

"The Ancients started the formula, yes, but I finished it."

"You? A scientist?" Ratchet sputtered. The other Autobots looked surprised.

Starscream offlined his optics. He'd tried so very hard and for so very long to bury down that scientific part of himself. Megatron had taught him that he was good as a soldier of war and as nothing more. But maybe…

He took a deep vent.

Maybe…

"Yes. I was a scientist. "

Maybe he could be good as a scientist again.

Bulkhead painted an equation onto a slab of metal in front of him. Starscream sighed and grabbed ahold of Bulkhead's wrist with shaking servos.

"B-but… Subspace Log 52, 52, 52—"

"Slag it, Bulkhead, you already recited that log to me, okay? I…" His talons clenched tightly around Bulkhead's servos. "You have all of Skyfire's logs in your processor, correct?"

"C-correct…"

Starscream gulped. "Which means… you remember Log 15, right?"

Bulkhead stared into space with wide optics. "Yes, yes indeed, but I already recited that one—"

"Recite it again."

"W-what?"

Arcee leaned over and hissed to Ratchet. "What is he doing? "

Ratchet just shook his helm. "I… I don't know. I've never seen Starscream look that concerned for Bulkhead before."

Starscream flared his wing and began to tilt over and Bulkhead caught him.

"See, Wrecker?" Starscream said. "You caught me. Remember how Skyfire caught me? Remember what he said to me that day?"

Bulkhead tilted his helm forward and pressed his forehelm to Starscream's. If Starscream offlined his optics, then he could almost pretend that he was pressing his helm to Skyfire's and not Bulkhead's. Almost.

Bulkhead took a deep vent and began to speak with Skyfire's accent. "Starscream, we will finish the formula together. It will be the work of both of our servos."

Starscream picked up a paint brush and began to paint numbers onto the metal slab.

Bulkhead looked at Starscream with wide optics. "It will be our tandem masterpiece and we will complete it, trust me! It will be ours. We will remember this formula—"

Bulkhead picked up a paintbrush and began to paint numbers onto the slab alongside Starscream. Both of their paintbrushes whirled around each other and both of their formulas complemented and flowed alongside one another.

Starscream looked up at Bulkhead and smiled sadly. "We will remember this formula forever and ever."

He looked over his shoulder at the shocked Autobots behind him. "If I help Bulkhead complete the formula, then he won't have to complete it all by himself. If I finish the second half of the formula for him—"

"then the second half of the formula might not take over his processor," Ratchet breathed.

Starscream nodded. He picked up his paintbrush and continued to write more equations. He could do this, he could. He used to do stuff like this all day every day in the old days before the war, before Megatron, even before his trinemates. He was so used to using his talons to kill bots, he wasn't sure if he could use them to create anything anymore.

"Listen to me, Star," Bumblebee said. He leaned over Starscream's shoulder and placed a comforting servo on his pauldron. For once, Starscream didn't flinch. "You can do so much more than destroy, I know you can!"

Starscream bit his lip and kept shakily painting new equations. "I said that out loud, didn't I?"

"Um…"

He sighed. "I already know the answer. I just—"

His hold on his paintbrush wavered and it clattered to the ground. Starscream hurriedly snatched it back up again and went back to smearing paint on the slab. "I just… I don't think I can create anything anymore."

Optimus knelt down until they were optic-level. "Starscream, you are capable of creation. You created a new and better version of yourself. If you could do that, then you are capable of recreating yourself as a scientist and finishing this formula."

"Subspace Log 47…. Subspace Log 47…" Bulkhead muttered over and over again.

"I don't know if this will work!"

"Maybe it will work," Optimus said. "But maybe it won't. Maybe helping finish the formula will rid Bulkhead's processor of the urge to force it all out of him and will save his processor. Maybe it will fail and the data will erode his processor and he will write out the entire formula anyway. But even if you do fail, I want you to know that I'll be proud of you for trying to save your friend anyway."

Starscream bit his lip. "Well, he's not my friend, er, he's just an acquaintance, really."

"Hmmm." Optimus hummed as he looked down at Starscream. "I suppose you are right."

Starscream sighed. "Thank you!" He couldn't afford to go around slapping the friend label onto every bot who was nice to him. Every single one of his friendships ended in bitter failure. He couldn't have a repeat of what happened to his trinemates.

On the other hand, Bulkhead had been very nice to him, and he had treated him with respect…

"Bulkhead is not really your friend," Optimus said.

Starscream nodded. "Yes, yes, that label is far too strong—"

"It seems to me he is becoming more like your brother ."

Starscream's talon spasmed and his paintbrush clattered onto the ground. "What?!"

Optimus just smiled. "I speak the truth."

"I… oh, shoo, shoo! Now isn't the time for big emotional chats. Now is the time for science ."

Optimus nodded and he and the rest of the Autobots stood up and left the room.

"Subspace Log 47…. Subspace Log 47…" Bulkhead continued to shake and mutter.

"I hear you, Wrecker, I hear you. Don't tell me anymore of Skyfire's stories for tonight."

"W-what?"

Starscream picked up his paintbrush and finished up an equation Bulkhead had begun to write. "Tell me more about your stories. You said that this… 'Wheeljack' mech did some more stupid, yet also entertaining things?"

Bulkhead looked at him with wide optics. "O-oh, um, yeah. So Jackie ran up to me one day…"


"Just carry the one and… no, wait, that's wrong, slag it all Just one more equation, come on, come on—"

Starscream sighed and fell forward with a thunk. His wrist ached from painting so much and his optics blurred. Bulkhead wrote out the equation on a slab near him. All he wanted to do was just shut his optics and pretend that this awful day never happened.

"Wrecker, are you done—-?"

Starscream abruptly stopped speaking. He turned around and looked at all of the equations he and Bulkhead had just spent hours writing down.

"What… what did you do ?" he gasped.

"Subspace Log 23. Subspace Log 27—"

All of the formulas for the synthetic energon were completely painted over with blue paint. Vosian and Iaconian script looped and whirled over the equations. Bulkhead looked up at him, his faceplate smeared over with blue paint, and smiled.

"I'm writing, Star," he said. He picked up his blue paintbrush and went back to work.

"No, what are you doing?! You drew right over it all! The equations, you ruined so many of them!" Starscream shrieked as he ripped the paintbrush out of Bulkhead's servo. "Do you understand what you've done?!"

"These are my final messages, my final words to you so that when the Council claims my life..." His entire frame shuddered and he shot to his pedes. He grabbed Starscream and whirled the Seeker around in the air. "...so that you can hear my final words, my absolute final message, and—"

"No!" Starscream shouted. He pulled himself out of Bulkhead's grasp and stumbled backwards into the paint cans. He watched in horror as they tipped over and spilt a huge puddle of blue paint over even more of the equations.

"No, no, slag it!" Starscream shouted as he knelt down and tried to wipe away the blue paint. All he ended up doing was smearing it more. He looked down at a white and blue mess of equations mingled with the final words of a dead mech.

Bulkhead placed his servo upon Starscream's shoulder as the Seeker began to shake. "Look," he whispered.

Starscream clenched his talons into fists. "I'm trying to save you! How can I complete the equation and get it to stop taking over your processor if you keep undoing my work?!"

"No, look," Bulkhead said as he pointed at something across the room. "It's us!"

Starscream followed his gaze and felt his spark drop into his tank. A blurry and smeared painting of two silhouettes was splattered onto a massive metal plate. The unmistakable silhouettes of a Seeker and a shuttle covered the entire plate.

"No, Bulkhead, what did you do?"

"That's us, Starscream! Don't you recognize us?" Bulkhead asked. His faceplate fell in disappointment and Starscream felt a twinge of hurt flare up in both of their field's.

"Don't you recognize yourself, Bulkhead?"

He turned the Wrecker's helm so that he was looking at him, but all Bulkhead did was just stare into space with a thousand-mile stare.

"Oh, Starscreammmm," Bukhead sighed as he gently held Starscream's helm.

Starscream offlined his optics and tried to quell the anger he felt rising within him. He wasn't sure who he was angry at—Megatron, Skyfire, Bulkhead, the world—or maybe even at himself.

He walked over to the painting of the two of them and smeared the painting of Skyfire. "That's not you, you imbecile," he muttered as he grabbed the paintbrush. If Bulkhead couldn't remember his own face, then Starscream would just have to help him remember it. If Bulkhead couldn't remember his own designation, then Starscream would tell it to him. He'd help Bulkhead to remember whatever it is that he needed to remember.

Starscream smattered some more paint onto the wall until it vaguely resembled the Wrecker. He grabbed ahold of Bulkhead's helm and turned it so that he could see the painting. "See?!" Starscream laughed bitterly. "That's you, that's you— "

Bulkhead suddenly reached up and wiped all of the paint off. The painting of Bulkhead was now gone and now only the lone painting of Starscream remained.

"No. Not me."

Starscream felt something within him snap. He grabbed onto the metal plate that the painting was on and he rammed the spike of his knee right into the bottom of it. The metal plate parted into two pieces with a metallic screech and crumbled into jagged shards all around him. They fell down and nicked Starscream's legs. He stood there and breathed heavily as beads of energon welled up from the dozens of new scratches all over his legs.

The painting of Starscream was shattered into pieces. He was shattered, completely and utterly broken.

Bulkhead sighed. "Oh, you're broken, Starscream. I can see the way the discrimination is affecting you. One day the Council will be struck down—"

"I personally killed them all myself!" Starscream shouted. "Every single one of them in the Senate, even bots I shouldn't have killed!" He stomped over to the corner of the room and picked up the white paintbrush again. If he was quick then he could fix the ruined equations.

Heavy pedesteps shuffled up to him.

"Star—"

"No."

"But Starscream—"

"I said no. "

"Oh, Starscream—"

"What part of no do you not understand?!" Starscream shouted in Bulkhead's faceplate.

The Wrecker flinched back.

Instant guilt flooded Starscream's spark. "Okay, no, that's not… that's not what I meant to… oh, slag!"

An alarm blared through the base.

"I can't keep being so reliant on you!" Starscream shouted into Bulkhead's faceplate.

Starscream's wing shot up and he looked around. Bulkhead completely ignored the alarm as he stared off into space.

"I have one final message for you, Starscream," he mumbled as red emergency lights turned on and lit up the entire room in a blood-red glow. "One final log for you to look at. I think the Council is watching us, so I dare not tell you what I think will happen right here and right now... instead, I'll keep my final warning on the cylinder, so don't lose it—!"

He wanted Bulkhead to just shut up so badly. Every last word of Skyfire dug itself into Starscream's spark and made so much hurt and nostalgia well up within him all at once. He had to stop this awful habit of clinging onto the mechs who cared for him. First it was Skyfire, then Megatronus, then Optimus, and now Bulkhead—and all of them were now dead, insane, or probably going to die. And one of them was dying much more quickly than all of the others.

He was capable of controlling the entire Decepticon army by himself for years, yet he couldn't even control his own emotions.

"Worthless," Megatron's voice whispered. "Pathetic."

"I'm not… I'm not…" Starscream whimpered as he backed up into the wall.

Optimus appeared in the doorway.

"Prime! What's wrong?"

When Optimus looked at Starscream a grim expression crossed over his faceplate. "It is best that you two stay in here."

"Why, what's the problem?" Starscream asked.

"My end will bring about yours—" Bulkhead moaned.

"Your assistance is not required in this situation and I fear that if you attempted to help, you would just grow more distressed," Optimus said.

"Worthless," Megatron's voice whispered. "Pathetic."

Starscream's wing flared. "I won't be ignored—!"

Optimus shut the door.

Starscream's jaw dropped and he stared at the back of the door's smooth metal surface.

Another painting of him and Skyfire was smeared onto the back of it.


Optimus looked up from his datapad as the alarm blared. That specific kind of alarm was meant to warn of one certain mech in particular.

He put the datapad down and walked through the halls of the base so that he could see what his lost brother wanted. Light shone out from the open room Starscream and Bulkhead were in. He looked inside and his spark sank.

"I can't keep being so reliant on you!" he heard Starscream shout.

Optimus leaned his forehelm against the cold surface of the wall beside the doorway and let out a deep and heavy sigh. He could feel the stress and anxiety in the edges of the Seeker's frazzled EM field all the way out in the hallway. If Starscream knew of who was hailing them—

He could not afford to lose Starscream to insanity the same way he had lost Megatron. He wanted to just walk in there and comfort the Seeker, but he knew that he was not the right mech for the job. The only mech who could still possibly comfort the Seeker was the very reason Starscream even needed to be comforted in the first place.

Starscream whirled around and his optics widened. "Prime! What's wrong?" His legs were covered in nicks and scratches. He didn't even seem to notice. Did he not feel the pain anymore? Had he gotten so used to the abuse that he just stopped feeling much of the pain that came with it?

Starscream could not be allowed to know that his abuser was calling them all.

"It is best that you two stay in here," Optimus said.

"Why, what's the problem?" Starscream asked.

Your abuser is the problem. Skyfire is the problem. I am the problem for failing to save you when I had the chance all those years ago—

"My end will bring about yours..." Bulkhead moaned.

Optimus sighed. "Your assistance is not required in this situation—"

Starscream's optics widened with hurt and betrayal, the same way Megatronus's optics had widened when he spoke against him in the Senate, the same way Elita's had widened after he had told her what he needed to do.

"—and I fear that if you attempted to help, you would just grow more distressed."

"Optimus, he's getting impatient!" Ratchet shouted over the comms.

Starscream's field flared out in a frenzy of static and anxiety. "I won't be ignored—!"

Optimus shut the door and briskly walked down the hall. He tried to push down his uncertainty about whether he had made the right choice to not involve the Seeker.

"Megatron is calling us," Ratchet said grimly as Optimus walked into the main room.

"What does that slagger want now?" Arcee growled.

Bumblebee squinted at the screen. "He's talking about… returning his property?"

"What?!" Ratchet shouted.

Optimus sighed heavily. "Autobots… we must answer his call."