Chapter 7 The Masked Decepticon
Over the next few days, on the ship became quite noisy. As soon as the soldiers learned that their Lord Megatron was still with them and hadn't died, most tried to inquire about his condition as well as whether he would be their ruler again.
This matter annoyed Starscream the most. Everyone should know that he is now the Lord of the Decepticons, not Megatron, and they should think of him as their ruler, yet every now and then he hears them in the corridors talking only about Megatron. He almost wanted to shoot a few of them for it but he knew that it would only bring losses to their army.
Four days have passed since Megatron was transferred to the ship. During this time nothing important happened except that the Seekers coordinated the extraction of the energon from the mines and the Autobots had problems with Scraplets in the base because the previous day from the Arctic, they took a frozen mysterious large object, which unfortunately turned out to be a trap for the Scraplets. The Autobots somehow managed to survive, but this adventure taught them a few things, including that they should check an item first before bringing it back to base even if it's from cold climates and that their young companions, despite being small, can really come in handy in difficult situations.
Three days earlier
Starscream was furious and walked restlessly around his quarters. Darkscream was there too, sitting with her legs crossed on her berth and with a serious face looking at her servo where she had the scar and also at Starscream. She knew the reason for his upset because she was also angry but tried to suppress it. The reason was obvious that it was about Megatron and the fact that he survived. They both still couldn't understand it. They expected that such an explosion would cause Megatron to be stripped of at least half of himself or even his limbs. And meanwhile he was only very weakened, he had burned all armor, there a few minor wounds but he was all whole thanks to the dark energon keeping him alive.
Starscream cursed to himself the whole time. Darkscream understood almost all the words especially those spoken in the Seeker's language, even if he whispered some of them. From time to time Starscream would knock the stacked datapads to the floor or bang his fist on the wall to calm his nerves. Darkscream couldn't listen it anymore.
''Okay, that's enough before you destroy the whole room," - Darkscream finally spoke up, standing up. "You need to finally calm down, Starscream. You are only harming yourself.''
''I'm supposed to calm down!? ME !'' - shouted loudly. ''Take Darkscream, don't make me laugh! You have any idea that now that he is here, everyone will want him to command the Decepticons again instead of me. I didn't take the trouble to take it away from him...'' Angry, he took out the shard from the cockpit which he now held in front of Darkscream '' ...so he could just come back to the living and despise us again.''
''But Starscream, he is... ''
''I know he's unconscious, and this on the Allspark is supposed to comfort me!? Scrap! '' - out of rage, he hit the desk with a shard of the dark energon, which bounced off the wall and landed back on the desk, but wasn't damaged.
After these words, Starscream simply sat down in the middle of his berth with a sigh and depressedly leaned forward slightly, holding the servos to his face. He didn't cry (it never happened to him), but his wings began to droop. Darkscream felt sorry for her brother and wanted to comfort him somehow.
''Listen,'' - Darkscream said calmly, sitting down next to him and putting her arm around his back. ''I know this situation is hard for you. Believe me, I can't accept that this bastard survived either'' - she said, and her wings also lowered for a moment and then lifted again, while Starscream's wings were still lowered. ''But you can't sit there and feel sorry for yourself that the one way which was to take away the shard of dark energon from him didn't cause you to get rid of him completely. For now he will remain in stasis for a long time because his internal circuits have also been burned and just providing him with energon won't be enough for him to recover in even a week. You will see that there will be not one and not the last opportunity and we will go through it ... Together. ''
After the last word she leaned her head on his shoulder and tried to hug him.
Starscream lifted his head from his hands and looked at his sister . These words comforted him so that he turned slightly toward her and hugged too with a smile. His wings had long since risen to their normal level.
''Thank you for being with me,'' - he whispered to her.
''I will always be there for you no matter what. Our bond will never tear us apart as long as we are together.''
Starscream knew very well what Darkscream had in mind. They backed away from each other slightly and as soon as they looked at each other, they began to intertwine their hands in front of each other and put the other hands where they had their sparks. They felt the bond between them and at one point their sparks for a moment gave off a strong light that could be seen through small holes in their armor.
For a few more minutes they sat like this until Starscream got up and started cleaning up the mess he had made. Darkscream also got up to help her brother and even came up with the idea to keep the dark energon hidden in one of their metal boxes for a while so that no one would see it out in the open (even though they had a door that opened with a code).
After some time, Darkscream decided to take Starscream on an hour-long flight together to further improve his mood and drive away from both him and her all thoughts related to Megatron. This idea appealed to Starscream because he also thought it was a good idea to catch some wind in the wings. Nemesis was located in one of the large energon mines, located near green hills and trees. The surrounding area looked beautiful and was completely devoid of any living human beings nearby. The Seekers had a lot of free time due to the fact that the worker Vehicons (Decepticon Miners) were engaged in extracting energon from the mine and this is also coordinated by several armed Vehicons (Decepticon Warriors). Just cutting through the crystals as well as turning them into liquid takes a really long time. There have been no recent instances of any of the Vehicons inadvertently setting the energon on fire, but the Commanders couldn't afford any mistakes even if they didn't occur.
Current time
Starscream was wondering with Darkscream in their quarters about the possibility of finding the Autobot base to get rid of them forever. Finding the base on the Earth was very difficult, because first they had to know exactly where it was, since it could be anywhere.
Starscream after thinking about it realized something.
''Hey, wait a minute?''
''What did you come up with ?''
''In our ranks is the Decepticon named Makeshift, who can transform into anyone ''
''Yes, I know him. I once caught him trying to turn himself into Megatron. As much as the resemblance was surprising, only his tone of voice was hopeless and I knew right away that it wasn't the real Megatron''
''Oh yeah. This one didn't even know you weren't me.'' This made them both laugh for a while.
''But back to the point. I have got some idea ''
'Is it related to taking on the role of one of the Autobots?''
''Exactly,'' smiled Starscream slyly at Darkscream, ''If we disguised him as one of those Autobots then maybe we could enter the Autobot base and find out its exact location. Then we would send an army of Decepticons there and they would do their job''
''That's a pretty good idea. The only question is who would we choose. ''
''Umm, I wonder''
Suddenly a distinctive sound came through Starscream's comunication which could mean that Soundwave found something. Darkscream also decided to go to find out . While going to the command bridge, Makeshift was walking through one of the separate corridors. Darkscream immediately called him out as soon as she spotted him and on the way they explained their plan to him. This one agreed without any protests but also asked the same question about the choice of the Autobot.
After a few minutes everyone arrived at the command bridge. Makeshift was told to stand aside while the three Decepticons deliberated. As it turned out, Soundwave intercepted the conversation that was between Bulkhead and Wheeljack. Soundwave had an accurate picture of the Autobot's appearance stored with him. They only had to get everything figured out as quickly as possible because time was quite short, given the inaccurate time of the Autobot's arrival as well as its capture and sending Makeshift over the GroundBridge there. Makeshift himself had to analyze information about this Autobot Wheeljack to play his role as best as possible and not say anything that would arouse the suspicion of other Autobots, especially the big Bulkhead, who like Wheeljack, was on the Wreckers team.
Starscream called him to come closer and then Soundwave, using a long tentacle, began sending him the necessary data. It took a while for him to transform into the Autobot, but eventually Wheeljack stood before them. Darkscream and Starscream had to admit that his appearance was completely indistinguishable and he even spoke properly.
One of the monitors suddenly caught the signal of a ship that didn't belong to the Decepticon. The camouflage didn't allow the other one to see them but the Commanders didn't expect him to arrive so soon even if he said he would be tomorrow. They had to act now or it would be too late. By now, six Eradicons had been sent after the signal, while Soundwave was on readiness to send Laserbeak as soon as he knew where the Autobot would stop.
Meanwhile, at the Autobot base, everyone was waiting for Wheeljack's arrival, especially Bulkhead, who hadn't seen him for some time and missed for him. Their computer signaled the presence of Decepticons close to Wheeljack's ship and the location where it should land. Ratchet tried to fire up the Groundbridge, but due to the recent invasion of Scraplets, the equipment was failing terribly and he needed a while to fix it somehow.
At that time, one of the Cons hit one of the ship's engines and, as a result, Wheeljack had a hard landing in a desert area probably in Egypt. After leaving the ship, Wheeljack pulled out his swords and started attacking the Decepticons. However, he didn't know that when they landed, Soundwave had sent Laserbeak across the Groundbridge and was waiting for the right moment to knock Wrecker out. Soundwave activated the Groundbridge as soon as Laserbeak was done, and Darkscream, Starscream and Makeshift ran across it. The two Seekers took away the unconscious Autobot and Makeshift took his place. They managed to close their Groundbridge just in time before the Autobots finally crossed theirs and could see them.
The Commanders didn't want to do all the work so they ordered two Vehicons to take their prisoner and chain him in one of the torture rooms. Makeshift attacked the other vehicons and the Autobots believed that he was Wheeljack while the real one was on the ship. As it turned out after Makeshift crossed the Autobot Groundbridge, his signal disappeared. Darkscream knew that she couldn't show up now so she headed to the quarters until Starscream said she can exit.
While the Autobots and children welcomed the new team member, Starscream and Soundwave walked toward the corridor leading to the room where their chained prisoner was staying. Wheeljack regained consciousness but was a bit weak after the attack. When Starscream corrected him during the conversation, saying that he lead of the Decepticons now, not Megatron, the latter scoffs at him, and Soundwave stops him from killing Wheeljack, because he might still be useful to them. Starscream has faith in Makeshift's talent and that at the right moment he will activate the Groundbridge at the indicated location and Starscream will send soldiers there. Now, however, they have to wait, although Starscream hoped it would be a quick action.
A few hours later, Darkscream (not being in quarters) was currently in the cloning room which next to it had a separate melting room. The machine itself checked whether the clone in question had its power source (in this case, not exactly a spark but an artificial source powered by energon) and whether it was still working and if not, it was melted down and its biomechanisms were passed on to the next one, or it was used for experiments, but that was done by Shockwave when he was still alive. In this case, none of the Vehicons after the fight with Wheeljack survived the blow after being pierced by sword or blaster's shot therefore there was no choice but to recycle those killed. Darkscream was grateful that they were just clones and not real Cybertronians although it was interesting that many of them even express their opinions which even makes them like living beings. After some time she left the room and just as she was about to go to the right, she stopped after hearing gunshots and looked the other way. She noticed a white trace running through one of the side corridors further away from her current location.
She followed him far enough and quietly that he didn't notice her. In the corridors, she saw about ten dead and damaged Vehicons and, as it turned out, a prisoner had escaped and was using a window large enough to escape instead of looking for a door. Darkscream contacted with Starscream.
''Starscream, are you there?''
''What do you want ? You didn't understand when I said you had ...''
''Now is not the time for this.'' - Darkscream interrupted him ''Your prisoner escaped. I saw him running down the corridor and then out the window and now he is making his way to the roof of the ship.''
''Why didn't you stop him?!'' - he shouted to her
''Hey! I was supposed to stop him? I only noticed him for a second or two and when I got to the corridor, he went outside. Besides, it was your soldiers who were supposed to take care of him while I was supposed to keep at a distance. Wasn't that the case ?''
''Okay, you're right,'' Starscream took a breath before continuing, ''Listen, I have to talk with Soundwave . We'll talk later.''
After these words he hung up and asked Soundwave if he had correctly given the location to Makeshift to which the latter nodded that he had done so. Starscream had enough of the long wait and was already about to add something, until the voice of the real Wheeljack came from the other side. Starscream gave the order to attack him, and the Vehicons immediately started shooting at Wheeljack. Earlier Starscream's army on the roof numbered about a hundred soldiers, but now there were eighty, and they were still dwindling. It was apparent that Wheeljack was doing quite well despite a lot of gunfire. When Starscream unexpectedly fired one of his rockets in his direction, Wrecker managed to do a dodge and ran towards him, breaking through the group of Vehicons. Soundwave, meanwhile, stood watching another Starscream defeat.
Meanwhile, at the Autobot base, Makeshift was finally discovered after he said the wrong thing regarding the last mission. He revealed that Bulkhead was present with Wheeljack while in fact Bulkhead left to join Optimus. The Autobots couldn't attack him because he was holding Miko hostage and they didn't want to hurt her. Makeshift, after opening the Groundbridge, retreated toward it with his back and waited for support to arrive. However, he didn't expect was that a real Wheeljack passed the bridge. This one let go of Miko in surprise and she landed safely in Bulkhead's servo.
Starscream slowly picked himself up from the floor after Wheeljack jumped on him and kicked him in the face before running towards the portal. He coughed a little energon and screamed furiously when the portal closed .
''I see that things didn't go right after all.'' - Darkscream spoke up
''Don't make me angry now !''
''This Wrecker gave more work even in the middle...''
''Darkscream, get quiet for a while and let me think,''- Starscream sighed furiously
The portal opened again and the soldiers looked at the Commanders.
''And what are you waiting for? Get moving '' - Starscream ordered
The Vehicons ran to the portal but halfway through the run they quickly began to turn around when Makeshift flew towards them. As soon as everyone left, the portal closed again. Makeshift landed on Starscream, who pushed him away. When Starscream asked him about the location of the base, Makeshift didn't notice that he had an activated grenade. Stasrcream, however, noticed it after hearing the beep and quickly escaped with Darskcream and Soundwav before the explosion occurred.
After a few minutes, the cloud of blue smoke finally cleared and the aviators landed on the roof. Of the army, there were only a few living soldiers left who had earlier stood back while the others stood closer. It was impossible to say, how furious Starscream was, not only because Makeshift ruined everything, but also because they once again lost the numbers of their army. Of the soldiers who were closest, virtually nothing was left, while others were only slightly injured, although there were some who had lost limbs. Darkscream ordered those who could stand to take those with severed limbs to the infirmary. She didn't want to talk about what happened for now because Starscream needed a break too.
After reaching the infirmary intended for the Vehicons (a separate room further from the one where Megatron was), Darskcream started checking, although she hoped that it wouldn't be anything complicated. There were only two berths in the room, so the rest waited outside.
After two hours, she was finally done. She was a bit covered in energon, but the Vehicons didn't leak heavily, so Darkscream didn't have to worry about repairing organs that she probably wouldn't have been able to fix anyway without the help of a real doctor. She much preferred repairing machines, such as computers. After leaving, she headed toward something that resembled a bathroom to wash off the energon.