Warnings for graphic depictions of gore and violence for this chapter, as well the harm of minors, figured a heads up would be required for this one, I don't really wanna say 'hope you enjoy!' for this one.
Dusseldorf Germany
Run. Hide. Run. Hide.
Breathe. Run. Keep running. Don't stop. Don't look back.
Their legs were on fire, their side soaked with their own blood, causing their tattered clothes to stick and pull at the wound.
The knife was still stabbed into their side.
There was no time to pull it out, they had to run, keep running.
They banked a right when that cackle rang out from behind, the tips of deranged hands ghosting across one of their arms, but they jerked it away before they could take hold again.
Something caught their leg, with a cry they went down, the knife jarring further into their side, ripping a scream of pain from them.
The one chasing them just cackled louder.
A hand fisted into their hair, yanking them upright to stare into those crazed green eyes and manic grin.
The man spoke spanish, but she didn't know enough to understand what.
Just that she'd made a mistake.
His other hand was suddenly around her neck, squeezing with an inhuman force.
She gasped, trying to get air in, her lungs felt like they were on fire, desperate for oxygen.
The darkness of the alley hid the dark spots forming in their vision, a few moments later, they slumped, body going limp.
Fernando chuckled to himself, hefting the woman, the prostitute he'd picked, over his shoulder, and saunted back out of the alley, he left the knife where it was in her side, he needed this one alive, not bleeding out any faster than she already was.
Bonecrushers bulky and very much not subtle alt mode was waiting for him at the end of the alleyway, the back doors opening so he could toss this one in, the body caught by one of their now back awake prizes.
Wide fearful eyes stared out at him, too scared, weak or injured to move, to try and escape, it didn't matter, Bonecrusher wouldn't let them out.
Fernado let Bonecrusher slam his rear door shut.
He grinned and spoke. "That's the nights quota Crushy, Screamer's gonna be tickled!"
Bomecrusher's engine growled in response. Abjectly furious by the amount of organic fluids he was having to feel trickle about on his metal interior.
Fernado let off another manic chuckle. "It's your fault for scanning a personal transport and making yourself the perfect partner to my hunts! Now get moving!" He snapped, kicking the rear most tire before the holoform blinked out of existence, and his actual form rose from where he'd been hunched over on the roof of a nearby building.
His optics tracked Bonecrusher until the large vehicle vanished around a corner, heading back to where they were all hiding out at the abandoned air strip.
His gut growled at him and he glanced to it, generating that holoform thing always made him hungry…
A noise down on the street drew his attention, a group of humans, just out of a club from how they were stumbling and laughing in these dead hours of the night…
He glanced around them, no one besides the group…
A smirk pulled at his features, and with all the grace and care he could, he slid down the side of the alleyway next to the building, they were so drunk they didn't even register the noise he made.
In a gross rendition of that children's game he used to play, hungry hungry hippos, the moment the group was directly in front of him, his head lunged forwards, jaws snapping open wide.
He caught three of them, there was a scream, but it was drowned out by the sounds of his teeth smashing through bone and slicing the flesh and sinew of the hapless victims of his hunger.
Severed from the waist up, the blood splattered everywhere, and oozed out of the gaps in his face as he chewed, then swallowed, his attention shifted to focus on the flailing severed legs and the two he'd missed, who were scrambling up and trying to run from where his sudden attack had bowled them over.
With a dark chuckle he pulled himself out of the alleyway. "Run~ Run~ Run~" He crooned, before swinging a wing back.
Their heads bounced along the path, their severed necks suddenly little fountains of blood that painted the wall his wing blades had sliced through from their continued motion.
He pulled his blades loose from the brickwork, glancing to the shop he'd just sliced in two and huffed, not his problem.
It was easy enough to grab up the rest of the meat, the clothes were annoying, but he knew they caused his gut no issue, so he just focused on enjoying the taste of iron on his tongue, the crunch of bone, and when those internal organs ruptured in his maw.
He likely looked like a horrific mess, blood, gore and guts slipping out from the gaps on his face as his jaws worked to grind everything up.
Soon enough, all that was left was a few smashed beer bottles and the blood that had hit the ground and shop walls.
Oh and a shoe, a single shoe had fallen off in the chaos.
Letting out a belch he licked the sides of his face and turned his attention skyward.
He let his wings stretch out a bit, and after a quick bend of the legs, he kicked off the ground and spread his wings to their full extent, beating down to get him airborne.
He couldn't help but giggle to himself at what the news would report the next morning.
What would they call him this time? A monster? A freak?
Oh the possibilities were endless.
If only he bothered to understand German.
Orichiono Manor, Monaco
Wren grimaced as she read the news report she had on her tablet.
Aria, who'd been humming as she worked on breakfast, glanced over to her, her own expression mirroring her twin's concern as the words of the report filtered across their bond.
Megatronus and Derrick both stirred on their ends of the bond, both curious.
Derrick's holoform came online next to Wren to look over her shoulder, and Megatronus soon arrived via the lift, which he had to crouch a bit to fit into.
Derrick gulped as he read through the report and saw the picture of the sliced in two shop wall. "That… that… um… well…"
Wren turned off the tablet, the news report going dark as she turned her attention to Derrick. "Breathe, focus on that, not… the news."
He gulped down a couple breaths but then nodded. "I'm… I'm gonna go lay down… Go back to sleep."
Aria was at his side a moment later, letting him cling to her as she helped lead him towards the nearest set of stairs that led to the second floor, the breakfast she'd been prepping left forgotten on the counter.
Megatronus glanced to Wren as she powered back up the tablet, noticing when she clamped down on her end of the bond so the report she was reading didn't leak through anymore than it already had.
He glanced to where Aria and Derrick had disappeared upstairs, and looked back to Wren. "Something happened."
Wren opened her mouth a couple times, trying to figure out how to word this. "I… I can't tell you… I'm sorry… Derrick isn't ready to… he's not ready."
He gave her head a light pat. "I understand, when he's ready to talk, no sooner."
She nodded and he moved to carefully sit down next to her, they'd had the sofa's reinforced, just in case.
Wren settled into his side, his arm coming around to wrap around her shoulder so he could read the news report with her.
"So… What are we going to do about Fernando, Starscream, Bonecrusher and Demolisher?" He enquired.
Wren pinched the bridge of her nose. "I… I don't know… the Autobots have settled in, they're enjoying the fact they don't have to wake up with their combat protocols engaged, maybe we just… pick them off? One by one until only Fernando is left? … Stella made us promise not to kill him, until after she's dead… But because we're stuck in an alternate reality… " She added after noticing Megatronus' confusion of the bond.
Realisation came to him quickly. "Ah, Kia and Fernando's mother… I remember her… but... what happened… between Fernando and Derrick, was that what had her binding you to such a promise?"
Wren nodded. "Yes… it is not one we enjoy keeping… we wish for nothing more than to remove him of his damned head… but it would break Stella's heart to lose her son… when his plane exploded six months before we were brought here… she was inconsolable, her fury turned upon us in particular, we denied we were the ones responsible for the explosion… it was why Kia was in the Savanna, Stella was… words do not properly describe her condition… they would not be able to hold a candle to the magnitude of her grief… all in the know opted to allow her space… six months later… she lost Kia to whatever force brought us here… it's the reason Kia is so set on returning, and… as much as we don't like it, taking Fernado back too… so Stella can know her children are still alive."
He hummed in understanding, the arm he didn't have around her middle coming up to toy with her black locks, just running them between his digits as he read the report with her.
Wren took a few minutes, but the ministrations eventually got her to lose some of the tension from her shoulders, and she sagged more fully into his hold.
Evidently he still had the magic touch.
It was only when Aria came back down, looking a bit drowsy, but with a chuckle on her lips that he realised that Wren had fallen asleep on him.
They both pressed a digit and a finger to their lips in the universal 'shhh' symbol, before Aria settled into the sofa on his other side, curling up into something of a ball as he put his other arm around her.
He was more than happy to pull her in close, content to just let them have this time of physical intimacy.
Aria was quick to drop off into slumber, pulled down by her twin, leaving him the only one in the living room awake.
Breakfast was going to be a brunch.
But that was fine, as they were still getting used to expressing things over the rekindled bond, they were still very much non-verbal in their cues, just as they always had been.
Little feet padding down the nearest flight of carpeted stairs drew his attention to Prowl's newly acquired son, Rafeal, the boys arm still in that now heavily signed cast, his own designation was on there in both Cybertronian and English, just behind the palm, which Ira, Aria and Wren had put their names on.
Ira's handwriting was an atrocious scrawl that would've offend a spider, Aria's was… as good as it had ever been, she didn't have the dominant hand and writing with her holoforms right hand was somehow even more uncoordinated.
Wren's was, of course, pristine, though the cursive was near illegible anyway due to just how many swirls she managed to fit into her four letter name.
Kia just printed hers, no faf, no illegibility issues, looked like a printer had done it.
Focusing back on the small boy, he realised he'd been noticed, the tiny thing staring at him in tired curiosity, his free hand rubbing the sleep from his eyes while the cast held a plush bunny to his chest. "Ah, good morning young one." He spoke softly, being mindful not to rouse the two already using him as a pillow.
Acting fast, he turned off the tablet in Wren's lap, no need to introduce the child to the horrors beyond the manors walls anymore than he already had been.
"Morning Mr Megatronus."
Okay, he'll admit to the fact that his sisters had made him a bit softer around the edges… because that tired little voice was adorable.
He beckoned the boy over with one of his digits. "You look tired, young one, do you not desire to rest some more?"
"Mmmmhm… yeah… but…"
"Bad dreams?" He enquired, shifting his arm from around Aria to instead reach over and scoop the boy up into his metal lap, he doubted it was comfortable, but physical contact had always helped the twins when they were plagued in their dreams, though now it was a lot easier for him to provide it.
Rafeal nodded into the metal of his chassis, snuggling the big rabbit he believed Kia had seen to get from him.
Not even two minutes later the boy was back asleep.
Did he just have that effect on distressed humans?
Perhaps, but that wasn't something he minded, if they found peace in his presence, he was hardly going to rebuke them for that.
Prowl, with his amnesia, had no reason to be upset that his new son was using him for a nap.
Ironhide might though, and he didn't blame the mech one bit.
Even once he'd regained his own will over his frame, he had continued the war… yes he'd done it knowing attempted surrender would have him assassinated… but… after a point… he gave up even thinking of a way to curb the war without getting him slagged…
By some luck, it was Prowl who made an appearance next, his holoform, Megatronus had already noted, was much more advanced in it's mimicry of an actual human, he'd enquired about it to Prowl the day before, and he'd had no answer to give outside of a shrug of his shoulders.
At present, the mechs holoform looked well rested, dressed in thin but not tight pajamas a dazed dopey smile on his features that only grew wider when his eyes landed on Rafael, already back asleep and dozing away peacefully.
Before Megatronus really processed what Prowl was doing, the mech was holding a phone up and taking a picture with the built in camera.
Prowl chuckled. "Sorry, I should have asked first, but you all look so cute like that, I had to make sure Annie got to see it when she wakes up… Do… you want me to take Raf?" He asked somewhat hesitantly, drifting over to more aptly peer over the three currently using the former Warlord as a pillow.
Megatronus hummed for a moment. "How about you take him to the other sofa? I was hoping to speak with you more."
Prowl's eyebrows raised but he nodded, easily hefting Rafael up and into his own arms, before walking backwards until his calves hit the sofa and he sat down carefully so as not to jostle the nine year old anymore. "Um, sure? Not sure what I could really talk to you about?"
Megatronus raised an optic ridge as if to say 'really?' before speaking. "Am I correct in the assumption you've never raised a child before?"
Prowl's eyes widened for a moment, as realisation dawned on him. "Oh… Oh I guess you do have more experience with that…" He glanced between the twins resting on him.
Megatronus nodded. "Though… let us both be thankful you will not be trying to raise Rafael in the same environment I tried to raise them in… it was not good for them… and in ways I only made it worse by having to learn via trial and error… I hope I can pass on some of the things I learned to you. If you would humour a tired old fool like myself?"
Prowl regarded him with a confused but intrigued look. "I… they seem to be… doing fine? … There's things I'm missing… isn't there?"
Megatronus nodded, and carefully drew some of Wren's bangs out of her face with a claw, and gestured roughly to her right eye. "Early on… I did not read a room correctly… at the time I had little true interest in them, at the time I was of the belief that I wanted nothing more than to be rid of them…"
Prowl shifted Raf in his lap so that he could lean closer without squishing the boy. "What… what happened?"
For a few moments his lipplates almost danced as he fought to snarl and yet not scare the other mech. "I failed them… and Wren paid for it… it was the day I realised just how much they relied on me… how I was their source of comfort in a world that only desired to hurt them… I… I slaughtered a number of humans that day… I made myself known as their protector, even if I couldn't be seen… I accepted my role as their 'private poltergeist bodyguard'… but the damage… it had already been done…"
He tried not to fall into the memory… but he did…
Orichiono Castle, Scottish Highlands 1997
He'd never touched them… not until today…
They were so tiny in his invisible servos, curled up into such a tight ball only something made of only skin and bones could.
He snarled down at the last living being besides his wards in the gore filled room.
A severed hand slid from the overhead operating light and splatted to the floor right next to the already blood stained dress the wench was wearing.
Her expression was one of complete disinterest, not even paying the severed hand mind as she looked upon her daughters floating there, cradled in the hands of an invisible giant.
He snarled, she'd already heard him roar, bellow, spit curses like they were the fire from an enraged dragons maw, she hadn't twitched or flinched once.
This wench… she infuriated him, now more than before, when it had been a passing irritation.
But now, as he cradled her daughters, his wards, holding them close to where his spark would be, he wanted nothing more than to tear her limb from limb, rend her fleshy corpse to slivers so thin not even worms would bother to sample them.
But something was stopping him…
It wasn't the force that had stolen from him his free will before… it was something else, a compulsion, an soundless voice telling him he couldn't hurt the wench… couldn't rend her head from her body...
He spotted it then, the faintest quirk of a half deranged smile on her lips.
"You can't protect her forever…. The bloodline will be rid of this unnecessary mutation in time. I will make sure of that."
She turned then, and left the operating theatre.
The doors slid closed and he finally took the time to shake his helm, trying to dislodge the needling after effects of that… narcotic…
He turned his gaze down to his wards, carefully running a thumb over their curled up side, being mindful not to cut them…
Their blood pooled for a few moments in his servos, before dripping down to the floor far below, between the gaps.
With care he nudged them to roll onto their back, and nudged them further to unravel. "Let me see fleshbags." He growled.
Aria was pressing her hand over Wren's eye, the blood oozing out from between her fingers, staining them red. "H-h-hurts…" She whimpered out, her own half of their face tracked with tear streaks that continued to flow as they sniffled and whimpered in pain.
He knew their pain, he could feel it, he'd felt all of it.
He scowled down towards the tool that had hurt them all so grievously, the blasted probe with a bladed hook on the end.
He'd felt it when it had been smashed through the bone that surrounded the brain… the sudden lancing of pain had been what finally snapped him out of the daze the narcotic had put him under by proxy.
That tiny frail hand, little more than bone and some sinew, pulled away, the blood still flowed, the eye was completely bloodshot, but it was wide, oh Wren was very much alert…
It was impossible to tell where the tears mixed with the blood, it all flowed the same.
The puncture wound was too close… the eye had been damaged…
He lent in carefully, trying to get a better look.
They were still sniffling and whimpering, bodily shaking as a terror they had never experienced before consumed him.
He pressed the side of his helm to Wren's side, had he an engine to rev and purr he would of, but the contact was all he could provide, no soothing vibrations like he'd been able to perform in a lifetime long past, when he was passed a tiny Praxian bitlet to watch over while their adoptive creators rushed to break up a brawl which had casualties reported...
"I have you… I will not let this happen again… I promise you that… I promise to you with all that I am left…"
Aria's hand, soaked with blood, reached up and patted the side of his helm, a bloody hand print left floating there for a few moments before it seemed to disintegrate, crumbling to flakes and drifting down to the floor far below.
He was no medic… he had no knowledge of how to heal Wren of this wound...
She could very well loose her eye for his failings…
And it would be truly no one's fault but his own.
His rising, his rage, his assault on the now corpses he had little interest in now… their bodies smashing into the walls in pieces, the life swiftly fading from them all…
The hooked probe had gone off course in the process…
Aria sniffled and wiped the snot bubble from her nose. "Y-you… saved… me…" She mumbled.
That… that was true…
He looked to the operating theatre, at all the tools they had planned to shove through that hole they cracked into the skull…
They would have all but killed Aria… destroyed enough of her side of the brain that she would be an empty shell…
The unwanted half… just enough for that half of the body to continue functioning, but with little will of its own...
He would have held them closer if not for the fear of hurting them more.
They had to leave this place…
He knew if he took them from the Castle, they would die of the freezing winter outside… they would have to remain here, under his watch and guard…
The wench had to die… and that strutless excuse of a sire they had…
But not now…
No… Wren needed to heal… and Aria… he could tell these events had changed something in her…
The energy… the bubbly spirit… she felt like how those birds in the greenhouse looked… wings clipped… only kept for their pretty feathers to make quills out of…
He tried to comfort them, to reassure them that he would do better…
He wouldn't fail them again, not ever…
But he too was scared…
Had he not been roused in time… would the damage done to Aria… have been done to him as well?
Would he have his very being stolen from him again?
He was not going to risk that…
He would rather leave them the last humans alive on this organic mud ball of a planet, then let anyone try such a thing again...
A touch to the side of his helm snapped him back to the present, and he glanced down to Wren, who's expression was a mix of consoling and forgiveness.
"You learned brother, you kept us safe for nine more years, and we hold no ill will to you…"
He lent into the touch, he will feel starved for their touch and even others touch for a long while yet.
Prowl, who'd put his attention on his son while they had their moment, opted to tap his foot, just loud enough to get their attention.
Aria, who'd woken first of the two, looked to him first, followed by the others.
"So… um… that advice?"
Aria tried not to laugh, but the sudden honest to the ancestors embarrassment that Megatronus just experienced realising he'd just left Prowl hanging there for who knows how long while he was off in the past, was too much for the white twin not to laugh, though she did at least try to keep her mouth shut… which she failed at too.
Now he knew what Optimus felt like.
Primus he hoped this wouldn't be a reoccurring issue.
That's up to you Megs, anyway, thanks for taking the time to read this latest chapter! Until next time!
