Ch. 96
Starscream wanted to scream. He wanted to grab the blue mech and slam him over and over into the berth in anger and fear. He wanted to cry. He wanted to make Soundwave feel the well of emotions he had been plagued with not for a mere collection of hours or days but almost two weeks. Optimus could feel the tension and simply took a gentle hold of the seeker's shoulder armor, squeezing firmly. The welling feelings subsided.
"Soundwave..." Starscream murmured, "Can you hear me?"
Soundwave flinched lightly when he tried to move. He must have still been in pain. Instead of moving again, the blue mech's visor displayed a simple smiley face and the seeker expelled a large intake.
"Good," he spoke gently, "I'm glad."
Soundwave's visor displayed another emoticon, a confused looking face, and the seeker nodded, "I don't know what you remember and I'm sure Ratchet can attend to your vocals, but you were hurt. Very badly. From what I understand, you died..."
Soundwave's visor went black. Starscream and Optimus watched in their own confusion as the blue mech's small frame began to tremble and then a horrid and pained wail erupted from him.
Starscream's wings stayed high in response and he gently pushed Optimus away from the medberth, moving back to grab Soundwave's servos as they flew up to grab at the medical sensors on his chassis, "Keep everyone back!" he ordered, "No Ratchet, no Knockout, no bots, no children!"
The Prime didn't hesitate. He removed himself from the situation and positioned himself some distance away to intercept any curious bystanders. Starscream growled at the strength Soundwave still had as he struggled to keep him pinned, the blue mech's horrid vocalizations of agony riddling through him like hot needles.
"No," the seeker hissed darkly to the mech beneath him, his optics bright, "Don't you dare do this. Don't you dare feel what you are feeling. Don't you even for a second allow this. Don't blame yourself. Blame him and blame me. You know you have to, it's the only logical conclusion. I changed too much so I created him. This is my fault, this is my doing."
Through the horrid wails and pinched static, Soundwave managed to speak, "Megatron: changed. Megatron: is not Megatron. Soundwave: scared. Soundwave: betrayed."
Starscream growled, "I know. So hate me. I made this all happen by doing what I have done. I killed Unicron, thinking so much could be avoided with his demise, and lo, yet again, I messed up. I took away what made Megatron see his own errors. Soundwave, I..."
The seeker paused. What else could he say? 'Sorry'? The silver mech was vehemently sure that 'sorry' wasn't going to cut it. But he had done what he had been dreading for the past couple of weeks: he admitted his greatest mistake by far to the mech who he was very sure had given him the most loyalties. Soundwave had given up an allegiance born from a passionate understanding and forged stronger by the utmost devotion and respect for Megatron. And what had Starscream done? He had taken away the future he had promised the blue mech, the leader he had 'foreseen'. It was all slipping away.
The seeker flinched back from his thoughts when he heard Ratchet stopped by Optimus behind him and he expelled a soft intake, "Soundwave... I know you have just awoken and I know your thoughts are plaguing you, but please... we need to speak..."
The blue mech's vocal had simmered to a gentle and pressing whine but Soundwave nodded, struggling to pull his arms free from Starscream's grasp; the seeker did not yet allow this.
"I want you to listen. Afford me that, and I will do everything I can, everything in my power, to give you whatever you want."
Soundwave's whine became a soft, almost inaudible, whimper as he nodded again.
The seeker's wings drooped, "I... I am genuinely sorry that I created this... I had hoped alongside you that Megatron would see the error in his ways. I did so selfishly. I wanted what I knew he would become to be something I could gloat over. That I could sit back from this side and say 'I did it first'. I created this new monster having destroyed the beast that would have pacified him... I am sorry... I... am..." words were becoming harder to form as Starscream spoke, "I was never equipped to handle all this... I should have suffered through what I knew and only fixed things nearer to the end... I should have left Breakdown to be experimented on... I should have left Airachnid and MECH alone... I should have just let Arcee beat me senseless and left both factions in favor of none... I should have remained the selfish creature that was born out of this war..."
Soundwave's whimper was gone. The blue mech was listening intently, his trembling frame no longer shaking as hard.
"I don't want to make excuses, though everything within me says I should... I... don't know what more I can say, Soundwave. This is all my fault. This is all my doing. I died and was given a second chance only to make things worse. Not just for myself, but for everyone around me. I actually tried. Can you believe that? I could have killed everyone with what I knew... and yet something inside told me that I wouldn't be able to. That certain things could never change. Soundwave, the Autobots will win. They will revive Cybertron, they will rebuild our planet, they will reach out to the colonies that left our home... I..." Soundwave's trembling ceased, the action now being held by the seeker as his voice cracked, "I... I'm begging you," he hissed, "I will get down on my knees and beg, Soundwave: don't leave the Autobots and go back to him. Don't go back to the Decepticons. If Megatron is fragged, don't go back out of some preconceived loyalty. What I did destroyed what he would have become and now that he has turned into this, I know you will only suffer ten times worse than what you were meant to if you go back. Soundwave, if I didn't change what I did, you would have been trapped in a parallel dimension, lost in shadows and invisible to everyone. You would have effectively been dead and gone and chained in a world where no one could see you or hear you. That was supposed to be your end. And now... now that all this..." Starscream whimpered, "now I don't know what will happen. And I'm not afraid of that. I'm afraid that my attachments will kill me. You, Breakdown, Knockout, the Autobots, you are my attachments. Having the lot of you, putting my trust in you, has kept me alive. But it very nearly almost got me killed. I tried taking down Megatron on that ice shelf and I nearly froze to death because of it. I'm nowhere near my 'DEAD' date. And I was... was willing..."
He didn't say anymore. He couldn't. The trembling Starscream was now racked with made his servos weak. The seeker released Soundwave and simply sat beside the berth in his chair, staring at nothing. He couldn't do any of this anymore. He didn't even notice the group behind him, the whole of the base, watching silently with held intakes and breaths.
Soundwave noted them and ignored them, looking to Starscream, "Starscream: believes Soundwave will return to Decepticons."
Starscream nodded.
The blue mech turned his faceplate away to look up at the ceiling for a moment, then turned back, "Decepticons: no longer resemble original faction. Megatron: no longer in control of sanity. Starscream: new leader. Soundwave: is Autobot."