A/N: The next few chapters might be a bit late since I've got a deadline at work coming up. Hopefully, they should be out on Thursdays as usual but I figured I'd offer a warning, anyway *cough*
Will came back online to a world that felt disturbingly, pleasantly... fuzzy. There was a nagging feeling somewhere at the edge of the fuzziness, something he was supposed to remember, but it was lost again in the haze of... wherever he was before he could grasp it. Stubbornness made him try again and watch it flutter away once more but this time it was joined by the only slightly more substantial feel of a hand held gently but firmly against his neck and a scan brushing lightly across his actual, physical processors. His optics were still offline but that knowledge was nothing but a distant little flicker of awareness and gone again a moment later as well, the fuzzy, woollen feeling of his mind too nice to bother with little things like that.
"Awake, I see." A voice somewhere in the haziness – Ratchet, he realised, Ratchet, he knew that one – and then the scan was gone and the grip on his neck tightened slightly and the medic continued before Will could even think of an answer in the pleasant, fuzzy haziness. "Do a full scan of your wings."
He recognised that particular tone of voice as one he shouldn't argue with and he obeyed without conscious thought. The scan started up sluggishly as it slowly became something substantial in the fog in his mind, then grew faster as his processors caught up with it and had just about reached something approaching normal speed by the time the stream of results appeared.
"No damage found, full responsiveness, no loss of sensors, not even as much as a scratch," Ratchet summarised somewhere beyond the haziness. "Agreed?"
Not a question, that, and Will was still too out of it to do much more than notice that his own sound of agreement was clearly Seeker based rather than Cybertronian or human, and the grip on his neck seemed to hesitate for just a second before it let go.
"Good. Do it again." Definitely not a request and this time the scan responded faster as the unnerving haziness he kept being unable to get a proper grip on slowly lifted. The result was the same – no surprise there – and this time Will managed to get his thoughts together enough to actually respond.
"All good. Nothing's wrong, Ratchet." Cybertronian this time – not something he would normally have thought about anymore, switching between Cybertronian and English without even thinking about it, but for the moment his mind was still sluggish enough to notice something like that.
He was about to ask what the medic was on about when Ratchet spoke again and chased the thought away.
"I'm glad we're in agreement, then." Sarcasm, Will's mind told him, and didn't he know big words today? "Release him, Ironhide."
Release him from what, Will was about to ask, but the answer came when Ironhide did exactly as told and the blanket of haziness was torn away between one second and the next. Knowledge flooded his systems, brought optics online and sensors back to full strength and the world into perfect, painful clarity, and it felt like the worst hangover of his life as god-knew-how-many-hours of sensory information caught up with him.
Disoriented, confused, a weird feeling in his processors and an even weirder one in his spark... he shifted through memories that still hadn't settled down right-
- Fear, pleasure, possessiveness, Ironhide, mine-
- And the dawning panic at the memories of a wing he couldn't feel and couldn't use and couldn't fly was ruthlessly suppressed as the scans that Ratchet had repeatedly insisted on took priority and calmed down the still-confused Seeker in his mind. The memories were still enough to make the Seeker shudder but at least it wasn't about to panic anymore.
Ratchet watched him carefully – and given the reaction he'd just had, Will really couldn't blame him – but didn't object as Will sat up carefully and his wings shifted instinctively to reassure the Seeker part that the scans had been right. No lag, no numbness, no sign at all that one of those wings had been injured and while Ratchet was good at what he did, repairs did take time, and that brought up another question.
"How long was I out of it?" he asked, almost scared of the answer.
"Sixteen hours," Ratchet reported and the glare he gave Ironhide told Will without a doubt that his... mate? Bonded? Whatever you called someone you shared a soul with had been given a few choice words about... whatever had happened. More stuff he didn't know, Will realised, and didn't the day just keep getting better?
Ratchet seemed to know what he was thinking – the bond, probably, because Will was in absolutely no condition to care one bit about the bond, much less shielding it – and answered before Will could ask.
"Ironhide, in one of his usual stunning displays of restraint and good judgement, managed to injure your left wing. It wasn't a serious injury but it was enough to trap several important wires and cut off roughly two-thirds of all sensory input from that wing. The wing itself was undamaged but you were unable to feel it. As a result, your Seeker half panicked. Ironhide, in a display of actual common sense, used your new bond as spark-merged mates to keep you from... I suppose 'going on a rampage' would be an exaggeration. You would probably have hurt yourself more than anyone."
Frag. He'd already had a bad feeling about the utter lack of memories after the panicked realisation that he couldn't feel his wing – nothing but blankness between that moment and then waking up in Ratchet's care in a fuzzy, hazy world – and that just confirmed that bad feeling.
He turned his head to look at Ironhide who waited a bit away, knew instinctively where to find him and just as instinctively needing to see him, and then asked the second question he was scared of hearing the answer to. "'Hide?"
His processors took a quick stock of what he saw, matched scars and marks up with memories and winced at the stuff he couldn't recall. The glyph on Ironhide's chest sparked plenty of images, a mental overlay of glowing pink where armour had been repaired but not yet repainted, and a muted feeling of smugness-pride-mine that he couldn't quite suppress. Thin lines almost overlapped to the right of it, small enough to be almost invisible against plating and a perfect match for his fingers. No sign of the Energon line he'd cut open but then, it would mostly have sealed itself and it was normally hidden under a piece of plating, anyway.
Plenty of damage dealt that he remembered... and looking at the missing paint from one piece of shoulder armour, something that looked like it had been dented and twisted and then forced back into place, probably more than a few injuries that he didn't.
Frag.
Something stirred in that unfamiliar place in his spark, reached out instinctively to find his mate, and memories that weren't his flooded his processors to fill in the missing pieces that Ironhide knew he needed to see. There was no request, no argument – Ironhide simply knew, knew that Will had to know and reassure himself, knew that whatever Will's mind could imagine on its own with no facts would be much, much worse than the truth, and so he made no attempt to stop it but merely pushed the memories carefully to the forefront of their bond to let the spark-merge handle the rest. It was different from a normal bond, Will understood that now at a level he hadn't before – something much deeper, much more permanent, much more intimate, and he didn't realise how much that spark-merge craved physical proximity until Ironhide moved closer with a bit of hesitation Will knew instinctively was based on Ironhide's fear of driving off their human-turned-Seeker more than any fear of what said Seeker was capable of.
At their side, Ratchet merely snorted. "All minor issues. He almost lost that piece of shoulder plating but it wouldn't be the first time. Old plate-head there has had encounters with Megatron's cannon at point-blank range in the past and lived to tell the story. I assure you, there would be very little one young, panicked Seeker would be able to do to its spark-merged mate that would cause Ironhide serious damage. He can consider it just payment for his stupidity in not listening to his medic."
Lessons, their bond filled in before Will could even ask. We needed lessons before doing... this.
Lessons. Will had forgotten about them entirely and Ironhide... had probably done the same, since none of them were stupid enough to cross Ratchet without good reason. Will had obviously been forgiven on basis of his age, being a Seeker, and general reasons of formerly-human stupidity. Ironhide, on the other hand...
"I got it, medic," that familiar voice rumbled in annoyance. "I get the point. I'm not going to forget again."
Lessons, Will realised in between Ironhide's memories of claws and bright, panicked optics and a screech that could have deafened a human, were a good thing. He could have killed someone. Maybe not Ironhide – even if Will was not going to put that theory to the test – but Ironhide hadn't been the only thing out there, not when they'd been in the middle of-
Something else hit home and Will groaned. "Tell me we didn't get in on in the middle of a runway."
"Technically," Ratchet corrected him, "you were close enough to the hangar that you weren't on the actual runway anymore. Which is rather good, considering the damage the two of you did to the tarmac. But to answer your question: yes, you did in fact put on a rather thorough display of claiming your mate, and there were quite a number of calls from ground control who were somewhat worried about the two robots that were apparently trying to kill each other. I believe Commander Epps was complaining rather loudly about paperwork last he visited."
And wasn't he a cheerful little sadist today, their medic. Will groaned again. "Please tell me nobody caught it on camera."
On Diego Garcia? Ironhide's smirk carried over entirely too well through their mental bond, and it was going to take for-fragging-ever to get used to that sort of bond. Everything he ever wanted to know about his mate-partner-brother-in-arms was right here and not all of it was easily blocked. At least there was the comfort of knowing that Ironhide didn't seem to regret it. Considering that the mech had just spark-merged with a Seeker that was only slightly more stable than nitroglycerin, Will had honestly been a tiny bit worried. Not something he would ever say out loud but then, he apparently didn't need to anymore. Ironhide, at least, seemed to be able to filter the connection a lot better than Will but then, he had practice and plenty of stubbornness to back it up. Will and the Seeker, on the other hand...
Yeah. Definitely something that would take some getting used to. Like certain other things but there was a limit to how much his brain could handle at a time and right now, he was pushing it.
Frag it, he finally sent back. If they were stupid enough to hang around to watch, they deserve the mental trauma.
Another smirk from Ironhide as he held out a hand in a silent offer and Will accepted it, hauling himself to his feet before Ratchet could object.
The world wobbled slightly as his mind got used to the whole place feeling somehow... off, like a faint, superimposed image on top that didn't completely match what he saw, and it wasn't until he focused on it that it faded and made his dawning processor-ache stop again.
Ratchet's soft snort was enough of a 'told you so' and the faint feel of a scan wasn't unexpected, either. "How do you feel?"
His wings moved on their own accord to reassure him that they were still there, still attached, and still functional, and Will gave the weird, mental sort-of-overlay a cautious poke in his processors. "Weird. Floor stopped spinning but brain can't really decide what it's doing. Seeker's..." he paused, genuinely surprised. "Pretty damn quiet, actually. I'm mostly me. I think." A shrug, awkwardly accepting what he really couldn't change. "I'll probably never know for sure anymore."
Ratchet just nodded and didn't look surprised in the least and that small fact alone did a lot more to reassure Will than he had thought it would. It was entirely unfamiliar ground for him and it helped a little to know that their medic recognised his state of mind... or was good enough to fake it. Right now, Will wasn't going to be peculiar about that.
"Your Seeker part, I suspect, is focused on your spark-merge. You react slightly different than I would expect a normal, newly spark-merged Seeker to, but it's your first merge and you have two distinct personalities at play. Far less distinct than at first, I'll grant you, but still very much individual personalities. One spark-merged mate at any one time is what most ground-based mechs will be happy with. Some have more, certainly, but they aren't programmed for it in the same way a Seeker is. Any proper Seeker Trine has spark-merged. It is in your programming to not just be able to adapt to multiple mates like that but to consider it a preference, too." He paused to let Will catch up with it all and when he continued, his voice was slightly gentler and more sympathetic. "You will feel unsettled as the spark-merge is fully integrated and the bond becomes a permanent part of you but it won't take long and once that has happened, that unsettled feeling should disappear. It usually takes a little longer and is felt a bit more strongly with your first spark-merge but nothing to be concerned about."
The world looked less confusing already, so Will settled for hoping he was right about it and just nodded. "So human's present and accounted for and the Seeker's... off doing stuff, basically. Making sure the temporary wiring won't snap on accident or something."
"Essentially, yes," Ratchet agreed. "Ironhide kept the Seeker as well as a good part of your mind... sedated, I suppose, while you woke up. It gave you a chance to return online with a level enough head that the repairs to your wings could register before you panicked again. Leaving any part of the Seeker in charge would more likely than not have brought you out of recharge fighting."
Which explained the fuzzy world he had woken up in and which he really had no wish to visit again any time soon. Even less so now that he'd learned what it actually was.
Flickers of memories from Ironhide, too small to really block anymore with a bond as deeply-anchored as the one they now shared, and it was too little and too much and too confusing, and he made a frustrated sound before he was even aware of it.
"So what happened while I was out of it?"
He had his suspicious, bits and pieces of a conversation that couldn't quite be blocked, an overwhelming flare of anger that was gone again a moment later, and the silence that passed for several seconds before Ratchet spoke was all the answer Will needed to confirm those nagging suspicions.
"Starscream."
And frag it all to the Pit, but he hated being right.
His optics met Ironhide's, didn't need to ask but received a silent acknowledgement, anyway, and then his mind was gone in the unnerving sensation of being here-but-there, watching the world through Ironhide's eyes, from Ironhide's point of view and with Ironhide's bias, and it was like stepping into shoes that someone else had already worn – comfortably used but not quite right and he wondered briefly if it was one of those things that he would adapt to or if it would always feel somehow off.
"It is an offence punishable by slow, painful offlining to keep a Seeker from the skies, Autoscum," Starscream sneered in the memory and felt entirely wrong in the way his voice made him shudder from the sound of it, a world away from the smooth, compelling power the Seeker heard and entirely unwanted now. He had been mostly neutral about Starscream's finer qualities in that regard as a human – he'd had plenty of reasons to hate the Seeker as it was – but if that was how a ground-bound mech like Ironhide heard his voice, it was absolutely no wonder they hated it so much.
The memory of Ironhide was furious and looking through his optics, it was a wonder that Optimus' response had been every bit as calm and even as it always was.
"In that case, Starscream, it is fortunate that we have not done so. Freedom is his right, as it is for all of us. I would not keep him from the skies. He is free to fly as he chooses."
Starscream sneered again in a way that felt entirely too familiar to Ironhide. "Obviously, then, it is purely coincidental his... reluctance to fly comes immediately after I spoke to him. How strange, Prime, when he has not been reluctant to communicate with me before. Perhaps someone was disappointed that he chose to listen and hear about his kin? Or did you use the Hatchet's knowledge of us to ground him in a web of weak, pathetic, worthless Autoscum lies? No true Seeker would keep from the skies, Prime."
It was insulting, it was snide, it was baiting, and still their Prime didn't rise to the bait and even without his new Seeker temper, Will wasn't sure he could have done the same if it had been directed at him. Optimus Prime had the patience of a fragging saint.
"A compliment, Starscream, or simply a convenient deception until he rejects your offer?" their Prime asked with deceptive mildness, and Will didn't doubt in that moment that the mech knew a lot more about the Seeker side of politics than he let on sometimes. Seekers who had joined the Autobots in the past had all rejected their loyalty to kin in the process, and more often than not their loyalty to bonded ones or mates as well. To Starscream, no Autobot Seeker was a true Seeker, and the strong lure in his words and clear interest in Will was only there because he wasn't convinced that this new, young Seeker was an Autobot by choice.
And whatever Will or Ironhide had expected, the smirk in Starscream's voice in response was not it.
"Merely the truth, Prime. He is young and untested but a Seeker nonetheless. Whatever mate you keep leashed to rein him in, whatever chains you have put on him, he will break them. No true Seeker would keep from the skies and no true Seeker would remain with those that would see it grounded, chained, and reduced to nothing more than a mere ground-pounder. Even his name is almost a proper Decepticon one. Release my kin, Prime, or suffer the consequences."
Snide, proud, compelling, Decepticon, and even through Ironhide's view, even with the shudder from the sound of Starscream's voice in his head, the lure had appeared again. Seeker instincts overrode it all, the instinctive need to listen to his Air Commander and leader of the first-among-trines, a shiver at the sheer power in the words and awe that it was for the sake of him; that Starscream's claim on his kin was enough to pit him against Optimus Prime, against Ironhide and Sideswipe and anything else the Autobots could throw at him, simply to reclaim someone he considered rightfully his and offer the freedom that the Autobots didn't give-
- And the sudden, clear shudder of disgust through their bond was enough to remind Will that his bond with Ironhide was permanent, what he felt, Ironhide would be able to feel as well, and right now he was doing very little to shield that bond. A good reminder that his Seeker side's fascination with Starscream was definitely not shared by his mate and Will at least had the good grace to offer a silent, embarrassed apology before he surrendered to the last bits of the memory.
"With Megatron's blessings?" Only Optimus Prime could put so much of a challenge into so mild a question, spoken as little more than a casual remark but with all the weight of a serious warning behind it and the silent reminder that Starscream's word, whatever the Decepticon Second in Command thought, was not yet law.
The bait failed as Starscream laughed, harsh and grating on Ironhide's processors. "Lord Megatron was not brought online with wings. He was a mere ground-pounder but saw the wisdom in Primus' creation of our wings and reformatted himself accordingly. He is not a Seeker but understands... enough. Far more than you ever will, Prime. Prepare your mindless little drones. You will surrender him freely or we will take him back by force. Hail the true children of Primus!"
The last declaration sparked something in Will, memories of a talk they had already had, and it forcibly pulled him out of the memory and back to the present. His processors were still a jumbled mess from it all and it took him a lot longer than he liked to sort through what he had just learned.
Starscream, Megatron, war, trap, battle, claim; and frag it, he didn't want to deal with it but in the end there was little choice at all. He might not want to deal with it but that wouldn't stop the 'Cons from going through with...
"What's their plan, anyway?" he asked quietly.
He saw the glance Ironhide and Ratchet exchanged through Ironhide's eyes as they seemed to silently debate something, and then the medic spoke.
"They've apparently prepared to strike against a number of targets that are sufficiently vulnerable to large amounts of damage and important enough to matter. They are being rather blatant about it, too. We suspect they will be equally blatant when they do choose their target. They will strike with their full force, which leaves us with an all or nothing option. To send only a fraction of our forces would see those mechs offlined and unable to stop Megatron's forces. Either we do nothing – which we are all perfectly aware is not an option to Optimus – or we send our full force to match them. Depending on whether you go with us or remain here, it will either bring you within close range of Starscream and Megatron, or leave you vulnerable here, which you would object to. They may not be able to get through our defences here easily but it would not stop Starscream from contacting you and the bond with Ironhide is still new and vulnerable. With Starscream so close and your spark-merged mate so far away, you might not go with him but he could still very easily draw you outside of the defences here."
"And I wouldn't stand a chance in the Pit against Starscream in a one-on-one fight," Will finished and stated out loud what they all knew. "Why me? I know I'm a Seeker but you can't tell me they do this sort of thing for anyone. I'm just a Seeker, Ratchet. We're stupid and impulsive and got wings. If they do this, they're going to suffer casualties. You can't tell me that Megatron-"
"-Would do in on principle," Ironhide half-growled and sent a surge of anger through Will systems before it was gone again, reined back in. "You're the only Autobot Seeker left. He'd want you away from us one way or another for that reason alone."
Which didn't make any more sense than Ratchet's explanation did and Will made a frustrated sound before he focused on his mate.
I'm just a Seeker. I'm not even good at it, 'Hide. I'm not that important.
He could feel Ironhide try to find a way to explain it better, to make it make sense to a human who wasn't used to their society at all, but surprisingly it was the Seeker part that spoke first, quiet and unnervingly docile in what was clearly a very long afterglow.
We used to be. We are Seeker. The sky is our dominion.
It didn't make much more sense than Ironhide's words had but it still triggered something in him, some dawning understanding of what he was up against. Megatron was old – younger than Ironhide, but still older than dirt. He'd known Seekers when they ruled the skies with violence and all the possessiveness the breed usually showed. There weren't many left of any kind of Cybertronian anymore but that knowledge had stuck with Megatron. If the loss of a mere ground-pounder could earn him a Seeker, Will realised, then Megatron would do it without a second thought... especially on a planet with so little in the way of air defences that could be used against one of the breed.
Yeah, Ironhide finally agreed with a small sigh. What it said.
The order to put things into motion, work out what they were dealing with and how to counter it was at the tip of his non-existing tongue when he stopped himself with a sick feeling in the pit of his equally non-existent stomach.
He couldn't give those orders because he wasn't the one in charge anymore. Epps held the human side of NEST now, Epps would be the one in charge of planning it all out, Epps would be the one to give those orders. William Lennox would have been able to do that once but that wasn't who he was anymore. It hadn't sunk in until now, until the Seeker was sated and docile and resting for the moment and his head was as clear as it had ever been since he had first woken up in his new body. It hadn't sunk in until now and the knowledge made his spark twist painfully.
William Lennox had been in command. Will, the Seeker, was not. Plans would be laid, decisions would be made, and he might even be asked for his opinion on it all, but it didn't change the fact that it was officially out of his hands and all he could do was wait until someone gave him his orders.
Like a pawn. Like a fragging little trinket to be fought over.
He felt Ironhide's worry at the flood of emotions that followed and put every last bit of focus he had into blocking their bond to the best of his ability. He couldn't deal with that now, not when he had so much else to handle, not when he wasn't even sure himself what was happening.
Was that why Megatron had made Starscream his Second in Command? The one way to prove that he counted the breed – their breed, Will's breed – as something more than just flying weapons or chess pieces to be used as seen fit? The mech was a ruthless, psychotic freak of nature but then, most Seekers apparently shared those traits, too, and having Starscream for a Second in Command more than made up for that. A Seeker to command Seekers, like it should be. Not a ground-pounder who didn't know the first thing about what they truly were beyond their wings. Starscream was a manipulative, back-stabbing pest and undoubtedly had some very selfish reasons for what the 'Cons were planning but it didn't change the fact that he and Megatron were willing to sacrifice ground-pounder lives to claim him. Not a pawn in Starscream's hands, but kin. Protected, respected, and claimed.
"Will?" Ratchet sounded worried and Will ignored him. Ironhide was there, Ironhide was stability, but Ironhide was Prime's. He would lay down his life for his mate, would kill and die in his name, but the dark mech was Prime's and that wasn't something Will could deal with now. Not Prime and not Megatron, and Starscream made sense and it was too much to deal with.
The shockwave of raw energy from his scan came instinctively, draining but not nearly as much as the first time he had done it, and it didn't make Ratchet wince the way it had the first time, either – definitely weaker but no less effective, now that he knew how to do it. Sarah's presence lit up in a nearby hangar – lingering there, he knew from Ironhide's memories, because they were worried about his state of mind when he woke up and not willing to have someone small and fragile around when it happened.
Lennox?
Ironhide this time but Will just shook his head. "I need to talk to Sarah."
Sarah was neutral, Sarah was on no side but his, Sarah didn't care in the least as long as he was safe, and he desperately needed that now. Someone safe and trusted and his.
He ignored the way the world still looked strangely off and headed out of the infirmary before either of the two other mechs in the room could move to stop him. He heard his name, felt Ratchet's hand on Ironhide's arm as a silent order to stay where he was, and then the door closed behind him and the bond with Ironhide – mercifully – stayed silent as the mech understood what he needed and let him have his space.
He needed someone to talk to. Maybe Sarah wouldn't understand, maybe she wouldn't even know half of the things he tried to explain in a way that made sense to his now entirely-too-alien mind, but she would listen, he knew that much. Sarah would listen and Sarah was family. The 'Bots all had the higher authority of Optimus Prime to consider and Epps wasn't any different, but Sarah had none of that.
She was mate, she was family, and he trusted her.
To Seeker and human both, that was all that really mattered in the end.