A/N: Thank you IDW for not painting the Thirteen as shiny and perfect as their original G1 selves. It makes this part even easier to write.
Disclaimer: Nightraider, Dreadnought and a very poorly sparkling are mine, all else belongs to Hasbro, TakaraTomy, Marvel, and IDW.
Warning: More of the same as the previous two chapters, one very veiled mention of underage sexual contact, and some spiritual disillusionment from a couple of characters that the Thirteen aren't as saintly as they originally appeared…
Crossfire: Part 8
Cybertron, the Golden Age, unconfirmed location beneath City State of Iacon…
"…Growth state of Project; 96%..."
"…Spark state stable. Solus, he's waking up…"
He slowly opened his…optics? Yes, that was what they were…and tried to focus on the sound of the last…
The last…
Vocaliser…yes, that was it. Not a voice box, a vocaliser, if it was a cybernetic or robotic life form.
He tried to take in a vent of air. It seemed strangely magnified and yet, localised.
He looked down and registered the two filters attached to his…chest vents. Yes, chest vents.
He was a robotic life-form, yet one that still required nitrogen, oxygen and hydrogen.
Wait…
Something in his chest surged in time with his…his mind.
Something whispered to him that he should not know that fact yet.
He forced another vent of air through his chestplates and concentrated.
He studied his surroundings. He was in a circular tank full of gestational fluids, with air filters attached to his chest, a…
A gentle tug on the cord connected to his chestplates resulted in a strange inner ache that shook him to the depths of his frame.
A spark monitor then. A spark monitor, and various tubes connected to his…energon valves.
They, whoever they were, were fuelling him.
He stared down at his…well, his body.
Blue and silver plating gleamed in the low light. He raised his…hands…and was confronted by perfect silver digits and spotless silver palms. A glance upwards revealed a reflection of a handsome set of silver faceplates, framed with a royal blue helm, and accented with bright blue optics.
Optics that perfectly matched the ones staring at him through the glass of his…maturation chamber.
And not just one set, but, one, two, three…thirteen.
He suddenly felt very small, and very, very afraid.
Somewhere above his cranium, a speaker clicked on. One of the sets of optics looked down and held a microphone in front of them. "Can you hear us?"
He stared at the speaker and nodded cautiously.
The speaker stepped into the glare of the lights, their plating shining an odd silver-pink. Coils of silver cabling snaked down their back, restrained by two audial fins. Their frame was covered in the same silver-pink plating, and on their back was something that looked like a giant lever.
The speaker raised their…no, her, it was a femme for certain, her hand and spoke again into the microphone. "My designation is Solus. Do you know your designation?"
He shook his head, fear building in his tanks.
Solus looked to her left and right before making a sharp gesture with her free hand. Her optics narrowed as she jerked her head and pursed her lip plates.
Somehow, he recognised the gesture as one aimed at a person or group of people to step forward, and there was no option to refuse.
The resulting shuffles and clanks translated as staticky bangs through the speaker as several mechs stepped forward. "There are other here who would like to meet you. May I introduce them?"
He nodded, even as his hands clenched into panicky fists.
Solus studied him for a moment, concern in her optics, but pressed on. The cluster of mechs had formed a rough semicircle around the gestation chamber, their optics all fixed on him.
She patted the arm of the first mech, whose clockwork-covered armour gleamed silver under the lights.
"Vector."
A scarlet and purple mech with silver whiskered faceplates stepped forward. "Alpha Trion."
The shortest mech, clad in battered blue and white plating, flipped him a salute and a smile. "Micronus."
The next mech cleaned a pair of what looked like magnifying lenses before settling them against his nasal plating and peering down at the chamber. "Alchemist."
Odd shapes slithered and flickered across the new mech's grey frame as he crouched down low enough to look at the sparkling. "Nexus."
A massive silver beak and twitching wings framed this mech's faceplates. "Onyx."
Six insanely jointed bronze and silver limbs swung out of the shadows. "Amalgamous."
Golden organic robes covered this mech. Two extra sets of optics adorned his face, his gaze sharp. "Quintus."
Two horns twisted out of the tall mech's green cranium, while a mechanical cape clanked against his back. "Liege Maximo."
A tall black and red mech gave him a penetrating look, one he could feel himself shrinking from. "Megatronus."
Only the barest hint of a silver and blue frame was visible under the lights. "The Arisen."
He wasn't sure how, but he knew something was missing.
Something from almost all their designations.
Something Solus refused to speak.
The femme nodded at The Arisen's retreating form and moved towards the one mech who had not stepped forward. Here, she paused and shot a worried look at the last figure still hidden in the shadows.
"We are the Thirteen…and this is our leader. Prima."
White plating accented with neon blue shone under the fluorescent lights. Armour that looked like silver robes cast flecks of fire over every surface. The polished hilt of a platinum great sword gleamed just over a perfectly sculpted shoulder-plate. Triple-crested audials threw pointed shadows over the tiny frame in the tank.
Piercing blue optics studied him closely, as if waiting for something to appear.
He tentatively met the tall mech's gaze with his own and froze.
The voices in his head started to scream.
Prima…Prime…Primus…
That face…
His frame started to shake.
Prima…Prime…Primus…
Those optics…
His vents slammed shut.
Prima…Prime…Primus…
That was…
"Solus, what's the slag's happening!?"
Prima…Prime…Primus…
The word Solus wouldn't say…
His tanks roiled.
Prima…Prime…Primus…
"He's going into sparkshock, I knew this was a bad idea!"
The Thirteen and their leader…
Prima…Prime…Primus…
Prima…the first…
PRIMA…PRIME…PRIMUS…
"Stabilise him, now! We can't lose this one…"
Primus's first. Primus the god. Primus the creator. Primus and his opposite.
PRIMA…PRIME…PRIMUS…
Unicron. The opposite of Primus. Primus fought Unicron. Primus won. Unicron will rise again. Primus must win.
His optics widened in horror.
PRIMA…PRIME…PRIMUS…
Primus's creations. Primus's army. Primus's weapon.
His CPU surged.
PRIMA…PRIME…PRIMUS…
Primus Dawn. Primus must rise.
Project Primus Dawn.
His scream was drowned out under the gestational fluid as his frame spasmed.
PRIMA…PRIME…PRIMUS…
They were the Primes. They created him. He was the Project. He was Primus Dawn. He would be Primus's weapon against Unicron.
PRIMA…PRIME…PRIMUS…
The last thing he saw was Solus smashing the side of the tank with a giant hammer and reaching in to grab him by the back of his neck.
Alpha Trion darted forwards, wires clutched in his hands. Electrodes suddenly pierced his temples. Energon flowed down his faceplates.
PRIMA…PRIME…PRIMUS…
"300 volts, NOW!"
Electricity burned across his CPU, and everything went black.
Prima…Prime…Primus…
Cybertron, City State of Polyhex, Darkmount Fortress…
"…We assumed that it was seeing Prima's face that triggered the memory cascade. He was forged in the image of Primus…Solus had wanted to exercise caution, but she was overruled."
Perched on a battered stool, Alpha Trion kept his optics fixed on Shockwave's disembodied cranium as he haltingly recounted the tale.
"We purged his memory of anything to do with the Primes, Primus or Unicron. It was safer for his wellbeing that he could not recall them."
The old mech closed his optics.
"We replaced his emotional processor with a stripped-down version. He would be able to identify emotions, but not feel them himself. Emotions would- they would be dangerous, to him and all those around him."
The gun-former's shattered optic stared blankly upwards.
"His plating was changed to a sparkling version of the form that you see now. Nothing was left that could trigger even the most insignificant file in his CPU."
Alpha Trion opened his optics and finally stared up at his aghast audience.
"When he came online again, he recalled nothing of that first experience. Solus and I, we kept the others at a distance until we were certain that there would be no further memory issues…and then…"
Nightraider remained stony-faced as she flicked the safety catch on her sedative pistol on and off.
"Then…?"
"And then Prima asked me to use the Quill to make certain of it."
The implications of this statement filtered slowly into the CPUs of the assembled mechs and femmes.
Glit finally spoke.
"Metaphysical shadowplay. You rewrote his mind with an artefact from prehistory."
"His memory, his mind…and the events leading to his destiny. His destiny, however, will remain as it has always been."
"Which is?"
"When Unicron arrives, Shockwave will transform to his true size. He will fire upon the Chaos Bringer. He is Targetmaster to Primus himself, and he will preserve and defend Cybertron according to Primus's will. And he will die for Cybertron, should it be needed."
Nightraider's CPU was screaming.
"And what if he doesn't want to die for Cybertron?"
"He does not have the luxury of choice. This is his destiny, it has been written as this for thousands of vorns, and I will not change it."
Silence fell over the lab as Nightraider tried not to purge, Howlback and Glit stared blankly ahead, and Knock Out slowly backed away from his tutor, his optics filled with fear and disgust.
Dreadnought finally spoke, his vocaliser staticky with fury.
"Did you ever ask him?"
Trion stared at him.
"Did you ever ask him if he wanted this?"
"No. That would have been a futile endeavour."
The engineer stood up from where he had been slumped next to Shockwave's berth.
"Why. Not."
"Because he has been programmed not to know of his destiny until the Chaos Bringer approaches Cybertron. When that occurs, his systems will engage their emergency protocols, and he will transform as it has been written."
"'As has been…'?!"
Dreadnought took in a shaky vent of air. "You could've just designed a giant gun for Primus and stashed it somewhere under Iacon with a big-aft 'Do Not Touch Until the Endtimes' sign. Why Shockwave? Why a sentient gun?"
Trion's vocaliser was soft. "Because we had trialled it, and the power output was nowhere near enough to put even a dent in Unicron's plating. For that kind of power to be accessible, we needed a spark."
"…So, you made a living weapon, who has no knowledge of where he came from, what he is, or what he will be, and is incapable of understanding what makes a sentient being sentient." Dreadnought started to pace up and down the narrow strip of flooring between Shockwave's berth and the medical team, his optic band flashing a sickly pale yellow.
"Forget any basic arguments about morality, this violates so many conventions of war and genetic engineering on so many worlds, I can't even begin to count them."
The Third of the Thirteen stood up, blue optics cold and calm.
"We intended, and still intend, to preserve our planet and our race from the greatest calamity in the known universe. If Shockwave does what needs to be done, fulfils his destiny and Unicron is destroyed, will anyone on Cybertron really quibble about how it was brought about?"
"I would know!" Dreadnought gestured to the silent, horrified medical team behind him. "They would know!"
"And this is why we restricted his emotional processor. So that he would not be restricted by his own or anyone else's compassion or fear."
The same cold blue optics narrowed as they studied Dreadnought's seething frame.
"Or love."
Knock Out flinched at the sound of the medbay doors slamming shut and slowly ex-vented.
He didn't bother helping his tutor pick himself up from where he had landed after Dreadnought had delivered a beautiful right hook to his faceplates.
He watched as Nightraider crouched down before the Prime, a look on her faceplates that promised only pain. Trion glared up at her, the back of his hand pressed to his energon-covered nasal unit and his left optic flickering from where it had cracked on impact with Dreadnought's fist.
"Do not tell me I deserved that."
"You deserve a broken spinal strut and your innards to be dropped into the Pit before your optics, but I'll settle for that punch."
One black hand darted out and pinned Trion's pointed helm crest to the wall. A laser scalpel was pressed against his jugular tubing with a disturbing sizzling sound.
"You will help me save Shockwave and his sparkling. You will help me get him back to full health, and you will tell him why he was constructed. Then you will leave Darkmount, and never come back."
"And if I refuse these terms?"
Nightraider's lip plating twisted itself into a leer worthy of a serial-killer. The scalpel moved just enough for a dribble of energon to emerge from Trion's jugular tubing.
"Then I get to find out what it takes to kill one of the Thirteen."
A tense silence fell over the med-bay. Trion's optics darted swiftly between the femme crouched before him, the silver feline perched on Shockwave's berth, and his young apprentice, arms folded across his curved chestplates and his faceplates set in cold revulsion.
He sighed and looked away.
"I believe you have three orns at the most before both sparks begin to fail irrevocably. Get the protoform's frame prepared if it isn't already, and your neo-natal cot needs to be set up and running at the highest possible support setting."
The laser scalpel was withdrawn.
"Glit, surgical prep and continue dual spark monitoring. Knock Out, neo-natal cot, then get started on cleaning the rest of Shockwave's frame. Ask Glit if you don't know where stuff is."
The femme jet stood and turned just enough to catch Howlback's gaze. She nodded once. "Any and all communications out of the med-bay will be prohibited. The entire medical wing will be on lockdown, essential personnel only."
Nightraider narrowed her optics as she glared back at Alpha Trion.
"You are staying in here for the duration, so pick a berth. Any non-medical requests go through Howlback. She won't approve any of them, which will at least give me that nice warm glow of petty satisfaction." She clasped her hands together in mock delight.
The old mech poked warily at his still-tender nasal plating. "And what precisely will you be doing?"
"Trying to repair some of the emotional trauma you just inflicted upon my chief engineer."
She sucked in a vent of air through her dental plates and reluctantly strode out of the med-bay.
This was not going to be pleasant.
Dreadnought hadn't bothered locking the lab doors for once, so she tentatively stuck her head around the hatchway and scanned the room.
The mess of scrap metal covering the floor gave her some indication of her best friend's mental state as she picked her way through the lab. A pile of reinforced cybertonium plates had been shoved sideways off one of the giant storage units. Several previously neatly organised boxes of wires and spare transistors lay in a pile beside the east wall, and the nearest window panel had several fist-sized impact marks sprawling like cyber-arachnoid webs across its surface.
Nightraider finally spotted the battle cruiser slumped beside his workstation, his optic band flickering between yellow and amber. His hands rested in his lap; the plating was cracked and thin trails of energon oozed from his servo joints.
The shaky, fluid-filled venting made her bow her head in sympathy.
"Dreadnought?"
He looked up just enough for her to see the trails of cleaning fluid spilling out from under his optic band.
"Dreadnought…"
She clambered over a pile of fuel pipes and finally escaped the chaos of Trypticon's spare parts repository just before Dreadnought's faceplates crumpled in sheer agony. He pressed his damaged hands to his optic band and started to rock desperately back and forth.
Not caring who might see her, she managed to scramble into the battlecruiser's lap and wrapped her arms as tightly round his neck as they would go, burying her face in his shoulder-plates.
His arms tightened around her frame, great grey swathes of plating crushing red and black wings against his chest.
It took her a few moments before she realised that the horrible, high, keening wail echoing around the lab was coming from him.
It was the sound of a being that had been pushed beyond sparkbreak and into pure, absolute grief – unleashing all of the emotions she knew he had been suppressing from the moment he had first encountered the cycloptic Military Ops officer.
She closed her optics and let her own tears fall.
The wail finally stuttered and became a mess of broken sobbing.
"H-He was m-made f-f-or that…"
She clung onto him as tightly as she could.
"They…they di-did that to h-im and-and he di-idn't get any ch-choice…"
She fought down the sob building under her chestplates.
"They m-made him so he can't…he can't feel…"
Dreadnought pressed his face into Nightraider's shoulder-plates.
"…He c-can't…he can't…love…"
The sob fought its way past her vocaliser.
"…I'm sorry. Dreadnought, I'm so, so sorry…"
For what seemed like forever, the tetra-jet and the battlecruiser simply cried and clung onto each other as if they were drowning. There was no need for words, and Nightraider wasn't even certain of which words to say. Nothing she said would be able to touch Dreadnought's spark or mind until he came back to himself, and before that could happen, he needed a long-overdue crying jag. Letting him soak her plating in his tears was the least she could do to help him.
The battlecruiser finally lifted his head after about half a joor, his optic band and faceplates drenched with optical fluid.
His vocaliser stuttered as he took a much-needed vent of air.
"What they did to him…the Thirteen…"
Nightraider braced herself mentally for what was coming.
"…It…it means Shockwave will never feel anything for anyone except tolerance."
She pulled back from him just enough to be able to see his faceplates.
"…He'll n-never love me…the way I love him."
She smiled weakly and cradled his face in her hands.
"Oh…never say never."
Dreadnought wrapped his hands around Nightraider's and stared sadly at her. "Don't- don't patronise me, 'Raider."
She leaned forward to press her helm against his and closed her optics.
"…I don't know what else I can say, Dreadnought. I don't know enough about what's been done to his emotional processors to try and reverse it, and at this point, I don't even know if it's safe to try."
"…Would you? I-if you could?"
She opened her optics and stared warily at him. "…Would you want me to?"
The battlecruiser fell silent at that, save for the odd hiccupping sob.
"If you love him—I mean, if you really do love him, despite all that he is and all that was done to him, then changing him to fit your desires and your intentions…that's even less of a choice than the Thirteen gave him."
She tilted his head up so that their faces were barely a nano-millimetre apart.
"Love isn't conditional. Your love has never been conditional. You're better than that."
Tears still streaming down his cheekplates, Dreadnought silently closed the distance between their faces and kissed her.
Stillness fell over the lab as they held each other close. There was no passion or attraction in the kiss; only desperate sympathy and a need for mutual comfort, along with the warm safety they always felt in each other's company.
Both of them knew the other was imagining the respective mech they had fallen in love with.
They finally broke apart after a few sparkbeats. Nightraider slid down Dreadnought's chestplates to settle more comfortably in his lap, and Dreadnought wrapped his arms around her and rested his helm against hers.
He choked back a sob and stroked her spinal plating.
"Primus…this never would've happened if I'd had the sense to fall for you instead."
She let out a small, mirthless snort, which was quickly ruined by a hiccup.
"Ditto."
She wiped her optics with the heel of her right hand.
"Unfortunately, we're the pair of idiots who fell for the two Thirds-in-Command of the Decepticon Empire. Pretty sure that means we both got a common-sense bypass."
Dreadnought sniffled, sighed, and leaned back against the wall, his left hand moving to rest against his best friend's neck struts while the right settled again the curve of her waist.
"So…what happens now?"
Nightraider rested her head against the battlecruiser's chestplates. "We operate ASAP. We aim to save both, if we can."
"And if we can't?"
"We aim to save the sparkling."
Dreadnought's head snapped downwards to glare at her.
She met his glare with a raised digit. "Ah-ah-ah. Hear me out."
He raised a distrusting eye-ridge.
"We aim to save the sparkling because the sparkling is the unknown variable in this situation. Shockwave - if what Trion says is true and he's destined to do what he's supposed to do, then his survival is guaranteed, or at the very least, much more likely than that of the sparkling."
The glare morphed into a thoughtful frown.
"Trion's confirmed that he's prepared to do whatever it takes to ensure Shockwave's survival, including shadowplay and apparently rewriting the future for Cybertron's gain. If there's even a chance that Shockwave might fade out, I'm willing to bet that he'll either interfere, or he'll use the Quill again."
The frown turned pensive.
"In all the histories and myths about the Thirteen, Alpha Trion was only ever the Archivist. There's no record of him having surgical skills like Solus or Alchemist, and it sounded like a team effort to remake Shockwave that completely after he came online. And if Prima asked Trion to use the Quill to make sure Shockwave stayed the way he was…"
"…Then he could be persuaded to do it again."
"If Shockwave's condition goes downhill enough to warrant it."
The battlecruiser sighed and absentmindedly tapped his digits against her wing.
"What if he tries to do something to the sparkling?"
"…I've made it clear that should he refuse to help, or if he hinders us in any way, I will personally make sure all the energon in his frame exits his body extremely fast and very painfully."
He squinted down at the back of her cranium. "Does that technically count as hubris?"
"Only if it's against a god, I think. Trion's mortal enough."
Nightraider leaned back slightly and wiped the last traces of tears from Dreadnought's faceplates.
"Come on. We've got work to do."
She slid out of Dreadnought's lap, stood up and stretched. The battlecruiser hauled himself to his pedes and held tightly onto the edge of his workstation.
"'Raider?"
"Hm?"
"I know I don't say it enough but…I love you. You know that, right?"
"I know." She quietly hugged him around the waist. Grey arms tightened around her once again.
"I love you too."
"But, y'know, not in that way, because ewww."
She smacked at his hip plating. "Charming. And ditto."
For the first time what felt like orns, Dreadnought smiled.
Howlback, like felines the universe over, was not fond of any kind of fluid being even vaguely close to her.
A private part of her CPU noted that some vital fluids belonging to Ravage, and Ravage alone, were the exception, and only because he was as fastidious as she was about making sure said fluids were cleaned up after any occurrence that caused the fluids to be shed. And there had been more than a few.
Right now, she was choosing to ignore the proximity of the cleaning fluids as she watched the youngest temporary member of the medical team arrange Shockwave's various limbs and internal systems into something which looked like an expanded diagram of his body. Each part was laid out neatly on the floor of the washracks with notations made on the tiles in permanent marker as to where the part connected to, its function, and any observations on how best to clean it.
Knock Out had raided the stores and had assembled a dizzying array of cleaning products, brushes and rags at Shockwave's pedes. He tested the action on one of the rotary buffers, frowned, exchanged the head for another, gave it another spin, and nodded.
Something about his mannerisms and the way he had previously spoken to Alpha Trion didn't strike her as being completely…Autobot.
The red-plated fledgling glanced up at her with a raised eye-ridge and a smirk.
"Are you about to sit there all orn, or do you intend to help?"
She answered the smirk with one of her own. "Do I look like I am about to help?"
Knock Out chuckled, setting the rotary buffer on the floor. "I would never presume anything of a femme, or of a felinoid. Or a felinoid femme."
"Then there's your answer." Howlback tucked her paws under her chest and let her optics shut half-way, just enough so that she could still spot any untoward behaviour.
Knock Out's smirk widened as he turned away and picked up a sealed canister of hydrogen sulphide. If he had understood his metallic chemistry studies, cleaning each component, treating the resulting waste with hydrogen sulphide and then running it through the various metal cleaning cycles would yield a multitude of metal sulphides. Many of these metal sulphides would replenish the medical store's dwindling reserves, and anything else was a pleasant bonus.
Considering all that he had just learned in the past two orns about the Decepticons, the medical team and of Shockwave, he was oddly keen on easing their burdens however he could.
As for his mentor…
The smirk dropped off his faceplates like so much hot slag. He glanced at the doorway leading into the med-bay and felt his tanks roil in disgust. Trion was bent over the gun-former's spark chamber, taking readings with a laser measure and looking distinctly concerned.
The datapad he was entering his findings into wasn't the Covenant, which was a massive relief.
There must have been something in his expression that invited inquiry, as the head of the Cobalt Sentries sat up and tilted her head quizzically at him.
"How did you fall into his servos?"
He glanced back over a beautifully polished scarlet shoulder-plate and blinked.
"How do you mean?"
"I mean, how does a very young mech, with no obvious designation or lineage to speak of-"
"Oh, thank you very much."
"—come to the attention of the Third of the Thirteen? And not only that, but subsequently get instructed on a variety of subjects, including medicine, chemistry, and theology?"
Knock Out was silent for a few moments as he turned to look Howlback in the optics. He sat down on one of the ledges along the washrack walls, drawing his right leg up to his chest plates and letting his left leg hang down, his pede dangling just above the faded grey tiles. His right arm rested atop his knee plating, while his left hand rested in his lap.
He leaned back and rested his head against the metal plated wall.
"Before the War…where were you from?"
She growled softly. A fair question.
"Stanix. An errand-femme for the Senate, before you ask."
Knock Out acknowledged the information with a nod.
"Because you're a beast-former. There was no question about you staying exactly where you were, having to bow and scrape to so-called better mechs who you could run rings around even if you were half-dead."
She acknowledged the veiled compliment for what it was.
"You had other people's expectations forced upon you, other people's rules and beliefs. When you got the chance to be something more, you took it, correct?"
The tiniest of nods was all he received in return.
"My brother and I were onlined after the War began. I don't remember much about my creators, only that they were kind, and we lived in one of the better areas of Nyon."
He studied his fingertips with a practiced air.
"They were killed in a bombing raid. Whose raid, we don't know. They had left us in a basement dwelling while they snuck out to find energon."
A story she had heard too many times before.
"We had been wandering the streets half-dead for about three orns before an Autobot patrol picked us up. They took us back to Iacon, cleaned us up, refuelled us, and then started arguing about what to do with us."
Knock Out's handsome faceplates drew up into a sneer.
"My brother…is an idiot. He was a cycle or two south of his majority at that point, and he demanded to be admitted to the army corps as a grunt as soon as he took the Autobrand. He's all leap first and think never, and he's convinced that one day, he'll be the next Prime."
His right hand clenched reflexively into a fist.
"They asked me if I wanted to follow him when I was of age. I told them, not a chance in the Pit. Unlike my dear brother, I have a well-developed self-preservation instinct, and I have no desire to die for any particular cause."
His fingers flexed briefly.
"They really didn't like that. Before they could start yelling about it, Trion broke in, said that I might be just what was needed, and dragged me off to his lab."
He took a deliberate vent of air.
"I thought at that point, he was like all the other rusting relics around Nyon. Just an old perv looking for 'what was needed', especially if what he 'needed' was underage. Figured I could play along, wait until the moment his plating retracted, then stab him and run like Unicron was on my heels."
Howlback narrowed her optics. "But that wasn't what he was after."
Knock Out shook his head. "Nothing like it. He sat me down at a desk, told me to read a section of the Covenant of Primus, and asked me what I thought about it."
"Which section?"
"Epistemus, chapter 25, verse 17. The path of the righteous mech is beset on all sides by the inequities of the selfish and the tyranny of evil mechs. Blessed is he who, in the name of charity and good will shepherds the weak through the valley of darkness, for he is truly his brother's keeper and the finder of lost sparklings.
And I will strike down upon thee with great vengeance and furious anger those who attempt to poison and destroy my brothers. And you will know my name is Primus when I lay my vengeance upon thee." [1]
He blinked once and sighed.
"Earned myself an apprenticeship and a cycle of cleaning duty for saying it could apply to the Prime and Megatron equally. After that, Trion was determined to make me a 'jack-of-all-trades." [2]
He stretched rather deliberately, stood up long enough to grab a pack of sterile cleaning brushes, and sat down cross-legged on the washrack floor and started to test some of the smaller brushes with his thumbs.
Howlback opened her optics fully and studied the young mech thoughtfully.
Eloquent, compassionate, considerate, practical, vain, self-absorbed, sarcastic, intelligent, wilful, smart of vocaliser, and fully able to back-talk one of the Thirteen without hesitation.
None of those qualities was exclusively Autobot or Decepticon.
He was young, he was rebellious, he was foolish.
What would it take to get him to turn?
TBC
[1] Ezekiel 25:17, slightly tweaked. Because it's Pulp Fiction, because I will watch pretty much any Tarantino film on repeat (bar The Hateful Eight), and because Samuel L. Jackson is THE MAN.
[2] 'A jack-of-all-trades is a master of none, but oftentimes better than a master of one'. Jack-of-all-trades, or an Elizabethan version of this insult, was used by Robert Green to attack William Shakespeare in 1592. It'd be nice to think someone once said the same of Wheeljack, back in the day.
