Protectors Of The Young.
Chapter Seven.
It had been pure luck that Soundwave had been returning from a lubrication break when he had seen Thrust heading down the corridor, his stride purposeful and with something cradled in his arm. Silently moving in beg-hind the Seeker, who had last been seen being captured by the Autobots, Soundwave gently brushed the surface thoughts of Thrust's mind, only dipping briefly and undetectably into deeper thoughts when the need to know more arose. Within seconds he knew what had happened, where Thrust was headed, and what he held in his arms.
He followed the Seeker, wondering how to handle this situation. Soundwave knew about the Seeker protective-programming, knew that if he made any threatening moves, Thrust would likely stop only to put the sparkling in a safe place before unleashing a berserker rage upon him. Soundwave was confident that he could defeat Thrust, even if the latter was in a berserk state, but he had no doubts that Thrust would injure him severely in the process.
This was assuming that Thrust did not call his wingbrothers, who would also go berserk at sight of the sparkling. One berserk Seeker, Soundwave could probably despatch, but not without injury to himself. Three could spell his death.
Despite which, even killing one Seeker would be a deplorable waste.
As he saw Thrust approach his wingbrothers' quarters, he knew he needed to act, and the first thing he needed to do was let Thrust know he was there, and that was easy. He needed only to speak.
"Thrust-returned. Sparkling-see."
As Thrust turned towards him, Soundwave saw uncertainty and wariness in the Seeker's features. The Seeker stood for a few seconds, the sleeping sparkling clearly visible in the crook of his arm, then dropped to one knee in a gesture of apparent subservience.
Soundwave knew Seekers well enough to know that they did not kneel without good reason, and he could see Thrust's gesture was a tactical one: if need be, Thrust could put the sparkling on the ground behind him and then leap upwards in an offensive move. People underestimated Seekers on the ground, considering a Seeker had to push themselves into the air in robot form with those legs, they were stronger and more powerful than they looked. More than one enemy had discovered this to their cost. Although not so good on the ground when fighting, Seekers were not totally defenceless out of the sky.
"Leader Soundwave, I only brought the sparkling to show my wingbrothers. I have been charged with its care and could not leave it behind, but I am also charged to protect it."
Soundwave nodded, receiving the unspoken message contained within that statement: Thrust was prepared to fight for the sparkling to return to its Creator. As a Creator himself, it was a sentiment he approved of and fully understood
Soundwave didn't respond at first, not with words, although he did run a brief scan of the sparkling.
"Young-femme, bright-of-Spark. Allspark-gone, sparklings-needed. Soundwave-not-wage-war-on-sparklings."
Thrust's vent-sigh would have been audible even if Soundwave didn't have ultra-sensitive hearing: he stood.
"Thank you, wise Leader," he said.
"Soundwave-go. Thrust-see-wing-brothers-then-go. Soundwave-not-stop-nor-aid-departure."
Soundwave continued back to the main control room, knowing that when Thrust left, his wing brothers would go with him. Letting the three Seekers go was a small price for the information Thrust had provided, both what he had shown and told Soundwave, and what Soundwave had gleaned from his mind.
Firstly, he now knew where the Command Trine, who had disappeared without a trace one day and had refused to answer his hails since, had gone. He suspected that they, like Thrust, had only needed to see a sparkling to be compelled to look after it, and it was easy to see why they might have chosen to stay. He had not seen them in any of the skirmishes the Autobots and Decepticons had engaged in since their disappearance, and assumed their loyalty was not to either the Autobots or the Decepticons, but only to the sparklings.
Secondly, there was the sparkling herself, which he had found from Thrust's mind was Optimus Prime's own femme creation. The last of the AllSpark-generated sparklings created on Cybertron would now be sub-adult or adult Sparks, likely in adult bodies. Their Spark-frequencies would have been fixed for a long time by now. Soundwave's scans had shown him that the Spark-frequency of the femme Thrust had been holding was still fluctuating, was not yet fixed, meaning that said sparkling had been sparked no more than ten orns ago. This told Soundwave that either the AllSpark fragment was not as inert as it looked, or that Autobot femmes, able to bear sparklings, had arrived.
The question Soundwave needed to ask as how could this information help them, and what could he do with it to best advantage?
Turning this question over in his processors, Soundwave returned to the control room.
oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo
Thrust stepped into the quarters he shared with his wing brothers quietly. His wing brothers were lying together on one of the berths in a tangle of wings, arms, and legs, and two empty cubes of energon suggested they had gotten overenegised.
He moved over and shook first Ramjet and then Dirge awake. They looked up with bleary optics.
"Th-Thrust? You're okay? You're back!" Ramjet said, throwing his arms around his wingmate in relief. Dirge reached up to pull Thrust down onto the berth, where he could better see him, and stopped as his searching hand came down on a small body. As the sparkling was jolted out of recharge, she gave a loud squeak of surprise.
The two other Seekers briefly froze. Then Dirge sat fully upright as Ramjet released his hold on Thrust, and looked down at the little femme. Two sets of red optics zoomed in on the sparkling during a moment of almost-silence, broken only by the sparkling, who, unnerved by the silence, whimpered.
Ramjet immediately raised a hand to stroke her.
"It's okay, little one, you'll be safe with us," he cooed, pulling his hand back as Dirge delicately scooped her from Thrust's arm with gentle hands and lifted her to his face, nuzzling her with one cheek.
"Where did you find her, Thrust?" Ramjet asked.
"After I fell from the sky, their medic took me back for repairs," he said, turning briefly to show them his newly repaired wings, still shiny silver in places. "While there, I saw this one. And that's not all I saw! The Command Trine are there, they are looking after the Autobot's sparklings. With the Command Trine's own three, and the three carriers waiting to give Spark, there's going to be forty sparklings at the Autobot base soon. I took the protector's oath and made the bond too, so I'm going to have to take Terraprima back soon, but I had to bring her to show you and explain my decision to you.
"Terraprima?" asked Dirge, breaking off from blowing raspberries on the femme's abdomen, making her stutter with laughter. "Prime's creation?" he guessed.
"Yes," Thrust confirmed.
"With the AllSpark gone, that must mean there are femmes at the Autobot Base," Ramjet mused. "Forty sparklings are a lot for just four people to look after, and I'm not staying here as part of an incomplete trine. I'm coming with you. Dirge, what are you going to do?"
"Forty sparklings, you say?" he replied. "Forty tiny ones to look after and protect? You need to ask? What concerns me at the moment is getting this little one away." He lifted the giggling sparkling for emphasis. "How you managed to get here unchallenged with her, I don't know, you must have been incredibly lucky, but I would not like to risk us having to fight our way back out, not with this one at risk of being hurt in the process."
Thrust decided not to mention his encounter with Soundwave at this time, but he had already had an idea about the sparkling.
"I have an idea," he said, looking from one wing brother to the other. "We get the sparkling out separately, by a different route. Let me make a call."
oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo
The three walked out of their quarters, having taken what little they wanted to keep and put it in their subspace. Their polishing kits were a must, as were various spare essential parts and pieces they had scrounged just in case, and tins of paint for their fuselage and wings. They had nothing else of value, all their personal effects were comprised of holograms of friends and long-dead family, and these were stored in their processors.
They got some odd looks, for some of those Thrust had passed on the way in had seen the sparkling, and to them its absence raised questions. Others who had not seen the sparkling wondered at the way the Seekers walked as a tightly-packed arrowhead, Ramjet at the tip, the other two wingtip-to-wingtip behind. No-one felt inclined to stop them or get in their way, plus there was no reason to do either.
Once they got to the doorway they took flight, with no goodbyes and no ceremony. Barricade commed Soundwave to tell him the Seekers had come with Optimus Prime's sparkling, threatened him, and then left two breems later. Soundwave acknowledged his call, and thanked Barricade.
As Soundwave watched them leave on the control room monitor, he idly wondered just what they had done with the sparkling.
oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo
Thrust landed first, followed by his wing brothers, and he commed the gatehouse to let down the force-field and let them in. As the gates swung open, Ironhide walked out, arms half-raised and his cannons whining. He did not look happy. Startled, Thrust took a step back as Ironhide pointed one of his cannons at Thrust.
"You left with a sparkling, with Terraprima. You have met with your wingbrothers, yet you dare to return without Terraprima? What has happened to her? Why have you left her? Where is she?" The Autobot weapons specialist looked furious, and Thrust raised his hands to his chest.
"I found myself in a situation where carrying her about myself might dangerous, so I contacted Skywarp and asked him to warp her straight back here. Ask him if you don't believe me!" he said, panicked.
"Skywarp left about six breems ago and hasn't been back." Ironhide said. "I will call him."
Ironhide's optics dimmed and then brightened again. He lowered his cannons and opened his mouth to speak, but was interrupted by a bang of displaced air as Skywarp, bearing a clicking, cooing sparkling, popped into existence ten feet above them. He gently descended, landing so gently that the sparkling wasn't jolted at all.
"Sorry about that, but as soon as I got her here, she seemed to enjoy flying so much I took her up for a bit longer." He handed her back to Thrust reluctantly. The Conehead tickled her, then held her up for Ironhide to see.
"Here she is, and as you can see, there's not a scratch on her. My wingbrothers have asked if they can come and help look after sparklings as well."
Ironhide put his weapons away as he peered at the little femme, who was bouncing up and down in Thrust's hands excitedly.
"In that case, you'd better all come in, "he said, gesturing with one hand as he stood aside.
Thrust beckoned his wingbrothers, and took them down to the medbay.
oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo
Soundwave had come to a decision. It would take some time, and would require quite some planning, and due to the sparklings and their effect on Seekers, he could not involve the Rainmaker Trine, or any of the other two trines he had on-base. Instead, his own offspring would serve.
Calling out Laserbeak and Ravage, he gave them very specific instructions.
"Locate-and-identify-Autobot-femmes. Then-report-to-me. Await-instructions."
He paused, then sent a com.
"Barricade: clear-the-Conehead's-old room. Alter-lock-to-open-from-outside-only. Prepare-it-for-femme-guest."