Chapter 29

"Emperor"

For a moment, upon exiting recharge, Hawkmoon was tricked into thinking she was still alive. Or, at least, that she was still... human. The surface beneath her was not cold frozen earth or an equally cold hard berth, but woven of delicate silk, tickling her back and her... yes, even her wings, but they were so ingrained in her psyche by then that she forgot how unnatural they truly were on her in the grand scheme of things. There was a weight by her side, the comfort of someone else's presence, someone she had an arm draped over, and-

And some of the room's light, from the crystal-carved windows peering out at a sunlit tropical world, was blotted out by the wing of her partner. That broke her right out of her reverie. Hawkmoon pursed her lips, optics shuttering. The stark reminder wasn't unpleasant, but it was far from comforting - because it meant that everything that had happened, all the horrifying realizations she'd rolled through during the previous couple of orns were real.

That this was her reality.

Cyberwarp shifted. Hawkmoon kept still, kept quiet.

It wasn't the worst reality, though. It had its merits - ranging from okay to pretty damn awesome. The company she kept was definitely one of the latters.

"We have to get them back," Cyberwarp murmured. She turned her helm to look at Hawkmoon.

"We will," Hawkmoon promised, keeping her voice low. "One way or another."

"You say that like we stand a chance at storming the place."

"Who's to say we can't?"

"Every armoured alien with a gun. Every Taishibethi with a sword. And me. We're not storming their Emperor's home - I'm telling you that right now."

"Okay, I suppose not," Hawkmoon groaned. "Y'know, you can be mildly frightening, sometimes."

"No, don't - that's what I'm supposed to say about you."

"It's fine, you can be frightening and I can be terrifying."

Cyberwarp snickered. "Oh? And what about Nacelle?"

"He's just awkward."

"Yeah, that suits."

"Thought so." Hawkmoon paused. "Now - I realize you're an incredibly lazy person, and that this is the best time for you to lie about and do sweet frag-all, and don't get me wrong 'cause this is great for me too, I like to occasionally be very lazy as well, but there's an alien city and alien palace I want to explore, besides the fact that we have to save our formation leaders from an alien emperor's clutches, and I also realize that you hate being called lazy so I'm taking that back-"

Cyberwarp groaned and got up.

"There we go," Hawkmoon cheerfully said, sitting up and stretching her wings out.

"You ruined the moment."

"We had plenty of moment."

"Not enough."

"All good things come in moderation."

"When did you get so wise?"

"Meh, it comes and goes - but mostly it goes. I guess I'm just in a better mood. It won't last, me thinks, but I feel great, lotta fun, so..."

"Fun," Cyberwarp snorted. "Yeah, sure, of course."

"You know I did, I know you did, we're great."

"We are that." Cyberwarp rolled her pauldrons experimentally and glanced around. "Do you think Ikitri was being serious?"

"About?"

"That we would need guards if we wanted to wander? I'm just wondering - because those clam soldiers don't strike me as being very fast, and I'd appreciate the chance to fly a little."

"Myods, they're called, and they're snails, actually. Not sure where you're getting the clam part, but you know what, I applaud the effort." Hawkmoon turned on her heel and marched to the door. "Yeeeaaah, no, I don't think they'll be letting us fly."

"That's upsetting."

"Tell me about it."

Nacelle was in the main room, by the table, looking at a collection of somethings.

"Hey, Nas," Cyberwarp greeted. "What'd you find?"

"Ikitri came by," Nacelle said quietly. "He delivered these."

"What are they?" Hawkmoon asked.

"Solar-powered batteries."

"Ohhhhh..."

"Did you... tell him we can't use them?" Cyberwarp slowly questioned.

"I did." Nacelle glanced at them. "He looked a little sad to hear it. Maybe. Tai have weird faces."

Hawkmoon snorted. "Sad? Really?"

"Yeah. He did a thing with his eyes and beak. I tried to tell him what energon was, but he didn't really understand. Or, at least I think that he didn't understand. But I told him where to get some on the Aurorus, so there's that."

"Isn't it locked?"

"Yeah. So I told him he'd need to ask the Dartwings to get him inside. He only just left to go do that."

"But they..." Cyberwarp's optics widened. "Oh scrap, we never gave them the language files."

Hawkmoon snorted again. "Brilliant."

"You aren't worried?"

"Frag no." Hawkmoon fell back onto the couch and sprawled out. "My fuel counter's still hitting high."

"But Ikitri-

"Deserves a lesson in humility."

"You're merciless," Cyberwarp accused half-heartedly.

Hawkmoon hummed. "Yes I am."

Ikitri came by give or take a joor or two later, with a pair of energon cubes clutched under one of his arms and Deciforge tottering along beside him. He dropped the cube's on the dining table, turned to Hawkmoon and said, "I filed an inquiry after your kin."

Hawkmoon stood up straight, stepping closer. "Yeah? And? Are they alright?"

"I believe so."

"You... believe?" Nacelle questioned. "What does that mean?"

Ikitri hesitated. "The... the Emperor will see you now."

They were roused and gathered out in the plaza in front of the Scarlet Palace's habitation wing, where a regiment of Myod soldiers were waiting - led by an abnormally massive mollusc almost half again as tall as Hawkmoon and buried beneath a mountain of ivory power-armour. At the sight of it, Ikitri bowed at the hip with awe, "Excubitor-Castellan. It is an honour."

"Marooner-Captain: rise," the Myod told him, its voice-modulator deep and harsh - but it carried with it the spark of nobility too. It carried no railcannon, no energy-rifle or slug-thrower, but a massive polearm with a fearsome beam-emitter and a long silver bayonet fitted just beneath. The Myod shifted its focus onto Hawkmoon, and then to the other Seekers with her. "Cybertronians: summoned."

"Will we be getting our people back?" Hawkmoon all but demanded.

"Cybertronians: summoned," the Myod repeated. It was a fearsome thing, all elaborately decorated plasteel and flickering energy shield. Ornamental beads of carved gold hung on silken threads beneath its stinger-tentacles, its visor was polarized to pitch-black and its helmet was built in the likeness of some terrifying alien beast. Medals and dataweave-banners hung on gilded chains over its cuirass and the bulk of plate about its shell. "Follow."

::I think we should do as it says,:: Nacelle reasoned. ::Just to play it safe, yeah?::

Hawkmoon grimaced. "Fine," she said aloud. "Fine, sure, lead on."

The other Myods took up formation around them - boxing them in with blast-proof armour and weaponry fit to rip through an armoured gunship. The lead creature stamped the haft of its lance onto the paved tiles of the plaza and signaled them onwards. "Cybertronians," it droned over its shoulder. "Flight: prohibited."

::Well that answers that question, I guess,:: Cyberwarp murmured.

The Helioarian Palatium, the building-complex situated at the farthest, highest tier of the Imperial Palace's grounds, was a sight to behold. Each tier before had its own identity carved into their architecture - and the Helioarian was ornamental, ancient, traditional, a thing of archaic arts clad unseen in new technologies and the renovating progression of an advancing culture, with an allusion towards the symbolic and cosmological aspects of old Tai society. The columns running up high to support the colossal ceramic-tiled roofs were ridged, ringed in the etchings of many-eyed sea-serpents. There were enclosed pools built into the sides of the grand marble stairway leading up to it, where fronds of pond-orientated plants peeked out, and the clicking of small amphibious animals emanated. At the top of the stairway, leading into the first grand hall, was a floor made entirely of delicate mosaics predominately white inlaid with blue paints and green gems for the eyes of each artistically-realized beast - mythical or otherwise. Many talismans hung from the top of the giant doorframe, threaded with old fishing-net rope and clinking with weathered iron coins and brass bells at their ends.

The walls were a rich red, but like the mosaic-floors and patterned ceilings, they were done up by creative hands to give life to yet more fantastic imagery - depicting great stalking waterbirds and huge beasts of the sea, including one scene where a flock of early Taishibethi bearing tribal markings descended upon a beached alien squid with hooked spears. An Abalon, supposedly - the ancient Tai's dreaded foe.

Overall, the place looked more like a cross between a temple and an art museum than a living residence - but that was not all. Within the space of the first hall, where two corridors diverged on either side into the wings of the Palatium, there was a set of dual-stairways ahead, running up to the second floor. That was all Hawkmoon could make out; the Tai had cast the stairs out of a fine reflective glass, morphing it into a strange series of distorted mirrors where the edges of each step could be scarcely made out. It didn't end there, either; the mirrors spread up onto the walls lining the sides of the twin stairways, reflecting rays of light all around the room. Her optical sensors just couldn't make sense of it - and turning to other avenues of trying to figur it out, like bouncing signals in a vain attempt at sonar, turned out to be just as fruitless - because something in the building was jamming her attempts, strangling all foreign signals and scattering them apart into a chaotic mesh of static.

"Halt," the Excubitor-Castellan ordered. The lesser Myods bowed and filed back out the gateway behind them. There were others of their kind - like their guide, larger than was natural for their species, standing to attention along the walls and blankly watching them with beam-lances in hand. Beyond the ivory-garbed molluscs, only Ikitri remained with them, and nervously at that. The Marooner-Captain looked ill-at-ease, like he wanted to be anywhere but there, his dark eyes flitting around the hallway and his hands clasped behind him to prevent them from shaking. It wasn't fear, per se, but... something else. Like entering Eden and realizing you were totally unfit to be in the presence of paradise.

Hawkmoon could almost relate. She remembered feeling the same, the first time she saw the Traveler - and the Last City below it. But then she'd entered its walls and found it to be just like any other survivor's camp, if a little bigger. Better leadership, bigger barricades, more Lightbearers to fend off Fallen and Warlords both, but that was it. The Traveler didn't do much for them besides blot out the glare of the South American sun. It had been a bit of a let down. She wasn't so sure the same would be true for the Palatium, though. Mainly because she wasn't expecting near as much as Ikitri was.

There was movement from the top of the mirror-stairs. A Tai. No, two. Hawkmoon narrowed her optics, trying to make sense of it; the figures were merging together and then diverging seemingly at random. Both were identical but for the way they walked, the garb they wore and the items they held. They were tall - taller than any Tai she'd met before, with great cranial tufted quills running from the rear of their heads and the back of their necks. They both had the patterned colouration of Earthborn magpies, snow-white and blue-back. Their four eyes were not sea-trench dark like other Tai, but bright and full of fire and life, surrounded by a collection of jade scales that shimmered so wonderfully they were like emeralds, all poised above short, compact hooked beaks - more in line with those of falcons than gulls and hawks as their people were wont to have. Both of them had a set of larger-than-usual wings, not vestigial like those of their kin elsewhere but capable of actual limited flight. Their tailfeathers were very long, and like all Tai, there were animated dataweave tattoos running along the tips of them and the ends of their wingfeathers to relay the impression of flames.

That was where their similarities ended. The one on the left wore a suit of light armour, dark grey steel clasped about their frame, with a slender Arc-edged bardiche clasped in one set of black-painted claws. The Tai on the right was no warrior but something else, something noble, garbed in long flowing red-and-purple robes gilded with gold thread at the edges of their sleeves, and bearing a luxuriously soft mantle of black fur about their shoulders. They carried a small ornate harp under the crook of their elbow.

The two reached the last few steps - and Hawkmoon realized she was right the first time, that it was just one Tai having pulled off a clever optical illusion, with ornate armour packed over splendid robes, being a warrior and aristocrat both, bearing both weapon and instrument. The Taishibeth stood a little over her own optic-height, lithe and splendid, straight-backed and proud. She knew at once who it was - and even if it wasn't, they deserved to be.

"I bid you all welcome," the Tai warmly told them in a paradoxically powerful yet soft voice, both melodious and imperious, having barely opened her beak to speak.

Ikitri fell to a knee and dropped his eyes down to the floor. "Imperial majesty..."

"Be at ease, Captain." The Tai Sun Emperor gestured for him to rise with a claw. "You have my gratitude for bringing them here, hale and healthy. Thank you."

Ikitri hesitantly glanced up, averted his gaze, and awkwardly got back to his feet. The Emperor turned to Hawkmoon, tilting her head - plainly not heeding how close within-killing-distance she was. Weren't heads of state supposed to be-...

Ah, there. The flicker of an energy shield, just over her arm. A subtle one, advanced. That was interesting.

"What is your name, Seeke-?"

"Are they alive?" Hawkmoon interrupted

The Excubitor-Castellan sung a warning. Ikitri inhaled sharply, horrified. The Emperor merely blinked, a little taken aback, but otherwise unfazed. Understanding came quick to her. "Your leaders," she guessed. "Swiftsear. Sandstorm."

"Yeah. Where-"

"In my gardens. They are alive, I assure you, and well. Recovering from their ordeal."

"Is that why you took them?" Northwind challenged. Skydive tried to shush him, but to no avail. "Without telling us?"

"They were in jeopardy." The Emperor's eyes softened. She bowed her head - with shame, perhaps. Hawkmoon wasn't so sure. "Their souls were misaligned, their lives blurring on the edges of death. I had no choice; I was forced to occupy myself for a day and night to keep them from drifting on. I can only offer you my sincerest apologies, and hope that it is enough."

"... Okay. That's... that's great." Northwind shuffled, lost. He stood straighter, apparently trying to grasp at that anger within all over again. "Can we see them?"

"Of course!" The Emperor gestured to the stairs behind her. "I welcome you into my home. I'll take you to them immediately. Please, follow me."

Hawkmoon exchanged a bewildered look with Northwind. The Emperor turned about and began marching - and they helplessly followed, struck silent.

"What are your names, noble Seekers?" the Tai Emperor asked, lifting up over the first three mirror-steps with a single powerful flap of her wings. Hawkmoon, taking a page out of her book, softly activated her thrusters to hover behind - because she just didn't trust herself in navigating the reflective stairway. It was just too damn confusing. Didn't help that the walls on both sides were mirrors too. Made everything so much more complicated than it needed to be.

"What's yours?" Hawkmoon warily shot back. She heard another gasp Ikitri's way, but nothing from the giant Myod so maybe she wasn't crossing as many lines. Not that she much cared.

The Emperor laughed. Laughed. Lightly, shortly, but it was a haunting sound. Like heavenly birdsong. "Some days I am almost convinced it's 'your majesty'."

"Oh, it isn't?"

"Not quite."

"Your grace, I'm sorry-" Ikitri rushed past, grabbing Hawkmoon's pauldron, probably to get her to shut up, but the Emperor waved him back.

"It is alright, Captain," she told him, sparing Hawkmoon a scrutinizing look. "This one has earned her skepticism. You are the informant, are you not?"

Cyberwarp nudged her. Hawkmoon shot her a warning look, shook off Ikitri's hand and reluctantly answered, "Yeah, I am. You were told?"

"Auger Seven-One is an old friend and confidant of mine," the Emperor told her, halfway up the starwell - splitting almost into two forms all over again, the fractal surfaces forcing the very sight of her through a hallucinatory form of partial mitosis. Quell very nearly slipped behind them, but was caught and righted by the massive hand of the Excubitor-Castellan. The Emperor paused until she was sure the mech found his balance, then continued. "He has taken particular interest in you - and by extension, so shall I."

Hawkmoon grimaced; so she hadn't been imagining it. The Verunlix really had been staring at just her, then. "Great."

The Emperor laughed again. Hawkmoon found she was instinctively relaxing at every reverberating puff of air and noise, and when it ended she subconsciously bemoaned its absence. There was something... otherworldly about the Taishibeth. She was different in a grander capacity than appearance alone. "Oh, I concur, the Verunlix are… I think you know. They suffer from being socially maladaptive. They mean well, though - the Auger in particular. I think you will grow to like him, in time. Perhaps the same will be true of you and I as well."

We'll see about that, Hawkmoon thought. The idea didn't entice her so much - at least in relation to the fox-orb.

"What are... fragging Pit," Cyberwarp hissed out a curse, grabbing at Hawkmoon's wing in a panic. It didn't exactly feel great - and she pinged 'Warp to get that very point across. Cyberwarp sheepishly let go and took to hovering herself. "Scrap, sorry. Uh... what are they? The Verunlix? I've never seen or heard of anything even remotely like them."

"Ancient," the Emperor replied. "And outcast. They were once a prosperous people like mine and yours, though they predated my Taishibethi - and perhaps even your Cybertronians - by a great margin of time. For now, they persist in a marginally separate level of... reality, I should say, and one running alongside our own - trapped and free both. The orbs they use are relics of their own age, seeing-lenses peering between their plane of existence and ours." She paused, then added as an afterthought: "You may call me Úthaessel, if the use of honourifics bothers you so."

They reached the top of the stairwell. Hawkmoon landed, having double-checked that the floor wasn't another sneaky fractal step. "We'll do that, then," she murmured.

The Emperor, Úthaessel, sent another unreadable look her way, then swept out an arm towards the open archway waiting beyond - where the building gave way to a vast garden built atop a rocky plateau. It was, in a word, beautiful. A paradise to surpass all the other little groves they'd glimpsed in the city. Nothing about the vegetation on display truly matched what Hawkmoon was familiar with from Earth or the unusual growths that had popped up across the other planetoids of Sol, but it wasn't far off either. There were trees, fern-like plants, blooming flowered bushes with odd hanging fruits, vines bearing colourful striations, and more small freshwater pools for the little animals of the place to subsist off. There were sculptures and grand canvases of fantastical arts too; it was a big place, with a couple of Excubitors scattered about to stand guard.

And they weren't the only ones present, either

Sandstorm was standing by the lip of the first central pond, situated in the middle of the beaten path leading out from the Palatium, and stared at nothing in particular - yet standing fully upright by his lonesome and watching the water ripple with clear optics. Alive. He was alive - and in far better form than when they'd seen him last. Hawkmoon looked around, still worried, until she found Swiftsear some distance away at the edge of a balcony and gazing over the alien ocean beyond. A shadowed Verunlix was there too, floating near Sandstorm, and speaking with what looked like an Eecharik nest-mother - smaller than Iix'ii'xii, but still of fearsome stature. Hawkmoon caught a glimpse of something else, a shadow of something truly massive even to her. It momentarily glanced her way, stalking within the cover of the sparse forest leading on from the rear of the garden, and its six hellish eyes locked with her own optics. It had a featureless face almost identical with the Khargrive from the Star-Court; it must have been a flesh-and-blood Tenerjiin.. It turned away not a moment later, apparently disinterested, and strolled off into the canopy of the small rainforest with what looked like a datapad in one of its four clawed hands. It was easily the largest living thing Hawkmoon had ever seen since... well, since the dragon that had put her there in the first place.

"Sir!" Northwind and Quell rushed ahead. Sandstorm glanced their way, optics sharpening, and flicked his wings - a cautious, exhausted welcome. Not entirely recovered then. His gaze carried on past the two, finding Hawkmoon - and his faceplates hardened.

Nothing more needed to be said there.

"Alive, as I promised," Úthaessel told them. "Their cores are stable now; you need not fear for their survival any longer."

Nacelle turned to her. "Thank you. Truly."

"But," Skydive began, "how did you know to..."

Hawkmoon zoned out, left them and made her way over to where Swiftsear stood, alone. She took up position beside him, looking over the expanse of rich blue and the bright, red-tiled mass of Khidai-Viis. His field fizzled with surprise and retreated from her own, but slowly, not in a panic. There was anger in there, trepidation, fear, and horror. Loss. Misery. The beginnings of acceptance.

It felt exactly like how she used to, thinking about Gecko. How she sometimes still felt, whenever her memory of him resurfaced. There was an absence in her heart and it was never going to leave her. For Swiftsear, the same was probably true of Vale.

"She didn't deserve to go out like that," Hawkmoon said softly. "I'm so sorry. I should've... I think that might be on me."

"You didn't kill her," Swiftsear replied, voice clipped and cold.

"But I acted out, acted rashly. I should've made sure everyone was safe first. Before I..."

"Broke rank?"

Hawkmoon said nothing.

Swiftsear sighed. "What's going on, Hawkmoon?"

"I can't tell you that."

"But something is going on, yes?"

Hawkmoon grimaced. "I can't exactly say no, everything's alright, don't worry - can I?"

A tense silence stretched out between them.

"I'm going to send the Dartwings home with the Aurorus," Swiftsear announced. "To update Cybertron on what's happening. There's no energon to be found out here - not enough to warrant the risk of crossing those... Foe-aliens."

"I've already bartered for safe conduct with the Taishibethi," Hawkmoon mentioned. "They'll let you go free."

"I'm not leaving."

"Sir?" Hawkmoon frowned.

Swiftsear shifted, turning towards her. "I'm not leaving. I can't. Vale hasn't yet been put to rest."

"She's dead, sir," Hawkmoon said softly, sympathetically. "The best you can do for her and yourself is to go home and mourn."

"I can't do that. I don't think you quite understand-"

"I understand plenty."

Swiftsear shuttered his optics, surprised, and gave her a scrutinizing look. "Maybe... maybe you do. And did you let it rest?"

Hawkmoon glanced away. "Not yet."

"You're staying too, aren't you, 'informant'?"

She pursed her lips. "I have to."

"I don't understand you anymore. Not that I much did in the first place..." Swiftsear trailed off, thoughtful.

"No one does." Hawkmoon spared Nacelle and Cyberwarp a brief look. They were still talking with the Tai Emperor, relieved and wearing budding smiles.

Swiftsear caught sight of it and quietly asked, "Do they know you're staying?"

Hawkmoon swiveled back to face the ocean. "Yes."

"And?"

"'Warp wants to stay too. I have no idea what Nacelle wants, but he's... he's too helpful for his own good. He might stay, he might not - but he'll be a pain to deal with either way." Hawkmoon paused. "What about Sandstorm?"

Swiftsear grunted. "He's remaining. He's too angry to let this rest."

"I figured."

"A part of that anger's aimed at you."

"I figured that too."

"Nothing escapes you, does it?" Swiftsear snorted, voice hollow. "You're every bit Contrail's star student. You've got his rebellious stubbornness and all.""

"That's me," Hawkmoon murmured. "Stubborn."

"She's been asking about you."

"Who?"

"That Tai. Úthaessel."

"Right."

"You're her... I don't know." Swiftsear hesitated. "It didn't translate perfectly. Her 'golden feather', I think."

"That's not comforting."

"Because you know what they're fighting. And more than that - that you know something else."

"Yeah? Great."

"Hawkmoon."

"We're going to die here," she admitted. "All of us. Everyone who stays. You, Sandstorm, me - Cyberwarp and Nacelle if they don't get that into their helms, and Northwind if he tries to be a hero. We're going to die. I don't think there's anything we can do to change that - besides running back home."

"Then why are you staying?" Swiftsear inquired.

"Because I've got a score to settle with those Hive fraggers."

"... That makes three of us."

More silence. Hawkmoon leaned against the stone railing of the balcony and tried to commit the sight of the city below - the beautiful alien city caught in a warm yellow morning light - to memory. The Tai were slated to die, and she, the fool, was sticking around to stand with them as they marched before the firing line.

But if it gave her a shot at Xol... hell, even the other Hive gods, then...

Then it was worth it.

"'Moon?"

Hawkmoon half-turned. Cyberwarp approached and jutted a thumb towards Úthaessel. "Eh... she wants to talk. With you."

"Joy." Hawkmoon pushed away from the railing, spared Swiftsear a nod, and followed Cyberwarp back to the Tai Emperor. "Sorry, what?"

"Oh, yes." Úthaessel, still in the midst of discussing something with Nacelle, Skydive, and an overwhelmed Ikitri, neatly craned her neck around - almost like an owl. Skydive and Nacelle quickly excused themselves to go speak with Swiftsear, but Hawkmoon caught the latter's arm. He gave her a questioning look.

::Might need you, master diplomat,:: she quipped, letting go. ::I think I'm at the end of my tether.::

::That was quick.:: Nacelle turned on his heel and clasped his servos behind him. "Yeah, this is Hawkmoon, as I was saying."

"A pleasure," Úthaessel said, bowing her head. She turned fully and offered Hawkmoon her hand, palm downturned. Hawkmoon hesitated a split-second before warily grasping it. Úthaessel chirped with amusement and pulled her claws back. "So you are the one who led the sortie against the Foe aboard the Prosperity Burns, are you not?"

"What's it to you?" Hawkmoon retorted.

Nacelle sighed. ::I see what you mean. Defensive much?::

::She's never NOT defensive...:: Cyberwarp grumbled.

Fortunately, Úthaessel's eyes lit up with a smile as opposed to a scowl - a far cry from Ikitri's genuinely horrified expression. "I think you should come with me."

"Excuse me?"

"There are matters both grave and personal we must speak of, much of it of great urgency." Úthaessel paused. "You have questions. I can taste them. I have questions for you as well. Please - join me. There are marvels within my home that I simply must share with you, and like-minded guests I think you will be more than pleased to make the acquaintance of."

Hawkmoon frowned and hesitated. "I'm... grateful, but we came this way to make sure-"

Úthaessel reached out and laid a hand on Hawkmoon's pauldron - the gesture meant to comfort, perhaps, but in truth it just made her flinch. "Relax, please. I understand that your journey here has been trying, and a source of great pain, but please understand that you may finally find shelter and respite here, beneath the sanctuary of my wings. We are here to help - myself and all my beloved peoples. We are here to understand. I am here to understand."

"Understand... what?" Nacelle questioned, sounding just as confused as Hawkmoon felt.

Úthaessel glanced at him, then Cyberwarp. "These two... they are trustees of yours, yes? You do trust them?"

"More than I do you," Hawkmoon replied, wary. Then glanced over at Ikitri. "Him - not as much."

Úthaessel spared Ikitri a thoughtful, unreadable look. "The Marooner-Captain... No, you don't fully trust him. But... I believe you will find him worthy of that trust in time. He is dutiful and valiant; he is the epitome of his station."

Ikitri's neck quills stood on end and trembled. He bowed his head, stammering a shaky thanks.

"He will accompany us, as my own guard." Úthaessel turned to the Excubitor-Castellan, raising a hand just as the Myod began to groan a complaint. "You may rest easy, Aazhen. I am among friends, not foes."

"Are you certain, your majesty?" the Myod worriedly rumbled.

"I am. But I thank you for your diligence all the same." Úthaessel pointedly looked at all of them in turn, then began strolling back to the Palatium.

Hawkmoon stifled a groan and followed. Mostly because Cyberwarp urgently tugged on her wrist. That femme had her wrapped around her digit and they both knew it.

"I didn't expect you to be Cybertronian," Úthaessel admitted, only half a breem into their leisurely trot through the Palatium. They were out of earshot of even the closest Excubitor guards, but Hawkmoon didn't for a moment believe they were alone. Not when they were with the Tai Emperor of all people.

"Excuse me?" Hawkmoon asked, almost shrill. "Wait, wait, wait a damn second. You were expecting me?"

Úthaessel stopped, turned and hesitated - in a strangely refined manner. "We were expecting something," Úthaessel explained. "Not necessarily a person. I am glad you are, though."

"What do you mean?"

"The Foe was always fated to return. Auger Seven-One and his kin saw their rise on the horizon before my Tai even reached the stars. The Verunlix have seen it all; they know what is to happen. Your presence changes much."

"And you... so... what, you know the future?" Nacelle asked, glancing at Hawkmoon with a frown. "You've seen the future."

"Not I. My domain is the past and present. But the Verunlix..." Úthaessel trailed off. "They reside in realms we have only barely begun to understand."

"Okay, look, this is great," Hawkmoon started to say, "but you're saying a lot of things that're honestly starting to get me concerned, so-"

"You represent a foreign variable," Úthaessel interrupted - staring at Hawkmoon alone. "You. I can see it, now that you're here."

"See it?"

"You hold to desires one would consider unnatural to a mechanoform. When I look at your kin," Úthaessel pointedly looked at Cyberwarp and Nacelle, and then back to Hawkmoon, "I see they adhere to instincts you entirely lack. And... and I see what ails you. The wound you carry. The mark of having been preyed upon by something terrible."

"... Oh. Oh, I think I get it." Hawkmoon relaxed. "Okay."

"You doubt me."

"You're playing the 'otherworldly' card really well, I gotta say."

Úthaessel tilted her head. "You think me a common soothsayer. A mere fortune-teller."

"A con-woman?" Hawkmoon guessed. She shrugged. "Eh, something close."

Ikitri started to say something, but Úthaessel raised a claw for silence. She was smiling - somehow. The beaks weren't all that flexible, but her face was contracting in parts, crinkling around the scale-rimmed eyes. As if at a joke only she understood. "Let me show you something else. It's very close. I'm certain the Auger won't mind the delay..." Úthaessel took off at a brisk march down a hallway seemingly at random, forcing them to rush in an effort to keep up.

Mention of the Verunlix almost had Hawkmoon reconsidering, though.

They stopped before long, where the red silk-draped walls gave way to ancient stone-carved murals. Old, flaking paints ran up and over the grand scene - a history of Tai, running on and on and on. Úthaessel beckoned them forth, to a particular spot on the sculpted timeline. Ikitri stepped forward at the sight of it, eyes wide with wonder.

"Here stands Hraesh," Úthaessel breathed out, running a talon over the tiny Taishibeth figure. The ancient avian was clad in sparse silks, bearing a circlet of colourful feathers not his own and hefting a slim spear. A collection of lesser, smaller Tai gathered behind him. "He was the first chieftain to look beyond the horizon and understand that our destiny lay beyond the confines of each tide-locked shore."

Hawkmoon raised an optical ridge; Úthaessel spoke with a scarcely-concealed excitement reminiscent of a child showing off their favourite toys. Or maybe that was too harsh, that it was her impatience and irritation at being left in the dark speaking - but it was the first thing to come to mind.

"It was to my understanding that the Myods granted the Tai the ability to travel through space," Nacelle said cautiously.

"That is true," Úthaessel replied, nodding with sage understanding. "But it was Hraesh's dream that laid the groundwork. You see, Hraesh knew that his clan alone could not reach up to touch our Father Sun alone. He wanted all the clans united, sharing their strength and knowledge to overcome the Abalon tyrants and give praise to our creator. And the Sun - He wanted a voice with which to speak to our people, to understand us and be understood. Hraesh was who He picked - but Hraesh could not hear the Sun's words, and he despaired. However, Hraesh was not satisfied with living a life of lacking, and so he set out to find a way to hear the Sun's voice and give it to his people. The Sun searched too, and knowing that He and Hraesh needed to work together to reach their common goal, called out into the null of the void between the other, empty stars. And something answered. Something soared down, glimmering, from beyond the heliopause and swooped down before Hraesh, bearing the Sun's desire locked in its teeth. A dragon."

Hawkmoon's optics widened. Her mouth opened - but no words came out. No one noticed. Nacelle, Cyberwarp and Ikitri were politely listening, their attention stolen away - and even Úthaessel herself was caught up in her own tale, enraptured by her own words. The mural depicted two Tai: one sand-brown with dark specklings and the other a deep black from head to toe, with great leathery wings spread out behind her. Hraesh and the dragon.

A Tai and an Ahamkara.

"The dragon caught the scent Hraesh's wish for a better future for his people, a beacon to guide their disparate clans and families and island-nations together as one - one world, one people, one Taishibethi, one unkindness of Sun Ravens. So the dragon became a Tai Raven of sheening dark feathers. She was Aiakos, Sun-borne star-bride of Hraesh - and together, they bore a child."

"A half-dragon child?" Hawkmoon asked stiffly, halfway incredulous.

Úthaessel nodded solemnly. "This child was loved by both - but events beyond their control passed and forces beyond their power to fend off interceded. The Abalons rallied as one with the rousing of their mother-father machines." She indicated to the next portion of the mural, where the tides rose up the cliffs of the Tai-islands and the waters broiled with colossal tentacled life - most of them pink, but a few cast in cool silver and larger than the rest.

"Hold on," Cyberwarp said, puzzled. "Are those... are those Quintessons?"

Úthaessel nodded vigorously. "Indeed! Fresh from their defeat on Cybertron. The bands of Quintesson survivors were hunted and harried to the very edges of what would soon become your empire, and still they fled further yet afield for fear of Seekers in the night. One warband, under the leadership of a five-faced Quintesson Judge, fell into the trenches of our world and began taking from the seas around them - sampling local organic material and meshing together living biomass to produce their Abalon armies. They rose up a great many years later to crush Hraesh's dreams of freedom and hope and to beat the Taishibethi into slaves, ostensibly to fuel the production of mass weapons to be used against your people."

"What happened next?" Nacelle asked, almost... eager. Already so invested.

Úthaessel solemnly bowed her head. "Hraesh led the Tai to war against the Abalon, felling many, but the Quintesson Judge laid him low and slew him in their farce-trials. Aiakos alone was left to care for their child, and the Abalon hunted her to the edges of what was once Hraesh's domain. She slew all who came to steal away her hatchling, until the Judge grew weary of listening to reports of defeat and set upon her by themselves. Aiakos and the Judge fought for four-hundred and seventy-eight days and nights - and entire solar rotation. A whole Tai-year. In the end, they slew one another - and even unto death they fought, strangling each other, each keeping one another from returning to the realm of the living. The child was reared on the sight of war and suckled on the spill of her mother's blood and the Judge's energon."

"Energon is toxic to organics," Cyberwarp dubiously pointed out.

"Indeed. Fatally so." Úthaessel dipped her head. "But you see, the child was the daughter of a dragon! And she wished, so very desperately, for sustenance - as any lost, hungry child would. Her mother dutifully provided. When the battle was over, all that remained were disorganized Abalon and a single lost Tai child. But the child knew she was not the last of her kind - she couldn't be! And so she set off to find her father's people. And find them she would, growing fast and strong and clever, already well-educated in the matters of conflict. She led the ailing remnants of the Tai in a brave counterattack, spearing through the Abalon swarms and leading great deep-sea hunts to clear out what remained of the Quintessons' stranglehold on the planet - at the behest of the wise Sun, who warmed her feathers and whispered into her ears. All the clans inevitably bowed before her, fulfilling Hraesh's dream of a single unified Tai people. All but one, that is, but that... that is another story."

The next portion of the mural displayed a Tai bearing the same patterned colours as Úthaessel herself - standing up over a crowd of many-coloured warriors, raising their spears to the sun overhead while Abalon corpses washed up on the shores at their feet.

"So that child became the first Emperor?" Nacelle questioned.

"And all those to come after," Úthaessel somewhat agreed.

"All those... what?"

"First-mother, first-daughter. A cycle forever repeating. A loop - for our Father Sun does adore its self-proving, self-evident loops. One life, rising again and again."

"I'm... sorry, I don't..." Nacelle shook his helm. "I think I speak for us all when I say - I don't understand."

"The wish to thread the clans together as one could not be muddied with external interference," Úthaessel murmured softly, all her eyes alight. "Hraesh's ambition and the dragon's hunger - nothing could be permitted to snip that immortal connection apart. When the Myods arrived in their great starships, they found a world not only recovering, but progressing far beyond anything the Tai before had ever dreamed possible. They asked - what is it that fuels this grand race for innovation and initiative? What prompts your progress? And the Tai answered: our Emperor Raven. And so the Myod shipmasters sought her out on this very island, within the very first Helioarian Palatium - a cathedral of rule and faith dedicated to leading the Tai in worship and governance beneath the loving light of the Sun. They were seen to by the Emperor and, in exchange for sharing the Sun's embrace and extending her governance to their own people, offered her every available resource at their disposal. The first thing the aging Emperor asked of them was give her a daughter - herself, in every conceivable way, to keep the dragon's sacred wish alive.

"That second wish was granted. The Myods built an engram beneath the stern light of the Father Sun, and the Emperor's genome was encoded within. It became the egg of the very next Emperor."

"So every Emperor..." Nacelle warily, uncertainly began to say, "is a clone?"

"Indeed," Úthaessel nodded. "If one were to put it so simply, yes."

"But why-"

"What's the point of this?" Hawkmoon asked, the nervous thrumming of her spark so loud she was surprised no one else was hearing it. She gestured almost helplessly to the murals.

"Of our history?" Úthaessel asked, surprised.

"Of you telling us about it."

"Oh, it was for you. It was for your benefit."

"Mine?"

"Yes." Úthaessel stepped closer and hooked a claw under Hawkmoon's chin. "Because I wanted you to know - to know and understand."

"Understand what?" Hawkmoon stiffly questioned, almost fearing the answer. The idea of a dragon - even some hybridized half-mortal thing - had all her nonexistent nerves afire.

Úthaessel spared her a sympathetic smile. "That I could be a world away and still sense the fangs sinking into your throat, o wayfarer mine."

AN: Huge thanks to Nomad Blue for editing and helping me bounce ideas!