[Transformers] Wayward Sons - Act II
Aug. 24th, 2013 10:18 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dracoqueen22Title: Keeping the Innocent
Series: Wayward Sons, Act II
Universe: Transformers (G1, Bayverse, Prime)
Characters: Sunstreaker, Tracks, Hoist, Prowl, Red Alert, OCs
Rating: M/NC-17
Warnings: Dark themes, possibly triggery content, non-explicit non-con (depending on what you consider explicit), canon typical violence
Act II – Sunstreaker
Sunstreaker wanders around in a circle, tracing the edges of the room, peering into every nook and cranny. He climbs onto his chair, tries to remember, peers across the table, and climbs down again.
He's forgotten something. Hasn't he?
He looks under the chair and under the table. He wanders to the window and peers through the thick glass into a dark sky. He sifts through his stack of datapads and stares at the vid-screen for a few moments.
He has to find it. It must be important to him. There's an ache in his spark and only it will ease the twinge.
What is it?
Sunstreaker huffs a ventilation and starts his route all over again. He has to find it.
“What are you doing, sparkling?”
He startles, looking up guiltily into the bemused optics of his caretaker. Nightfall is sitting on the big couch, digits poking at his holo-display, a mech's frame spinning in slow circles in front of him.
“I'm looking for something,” Sunstreaker answers. He ignores the laughter from behind him. His brother is an aft, though Sunstreaker isn't supposed to know or say that word.
His caretaker smiles, tilting his helm. “What is it, Sunny? Maybe I can help you find it.”
“I don't know.” Sunstreaker fidgets, optics glancing to his left and right again. “Maybe I'll know it when I find it.”
“You're so fragging weird,” Tracks says with a loud laugh that instantly cuts off when Nightfall shoots him a stern look.
“Hush, Tracks,” their caretaker says. “And mind your glossa.” He saves his progress on his work, setting the display unit on the table. “Come here, Sunstreaker.”
He obeys, the urge to find the missing item fading.
Sunstreaker gladly climbs into Nightfall's lap with the help of his caretaker's strong servos. Caretaker has big, blue optics and a beautiful grey chevron. Sunstreaker likes to trace it with his digits over and over, until Nightfall laughs at him because it tickles.
“What makes you think something is missing?” Nightfall asks, his warm servo resting on Sunstreaker's backplate.
Sunstreaker rolls his shoulders in a shrug. “I don't know. I just do.” He looks over his caretaker's shoulder, at Tracks who is staring at them and making weird faces. He's so mean sometimes. “I feel like I'm forgetting something important.”
Nightfall makes a thoughtful noise in his chassis and Sunstreaker leans closer, resting his audial against his caretaker's chestplate. He likes to listen to the sounds echoing in the bigger mech's chassis.
“Does your spark still hurt?”
Sunstreaker shakes his helm, metal rasping softly against metal. “Not anymore,” he says. The achy twinge has gone away.
Whatever he's missing, maybe it's not important because he can't remember what it is anyway.
Sunstreaker looks up, offering Nightfall a smile. “Can I have an energon gummy now?”
His caretaker laughs, patting him on his backplate. “I don't see why not.” He leans closer, vocals dipping to a whisper. “We'll make Tracks share his.”
Sunstreaker giggles.
o0o0o
He can feel Nightfall's amusement in his caretaker's energy field and then Nightfall squeezes his servo affectionately. “This, Sunny-bot, is an art gallery.”
Art?
Sunstreaker isn't sure what to call it himself. Everywhere he looks is color, bright splashes of it. The huge dome with its high ceiling and big, open windows only make it seem that much brighter. The smell of hot metal is thick in the air, and it's not unpleasant.
There are statues, both carved and welded. And there are paintings, lots of them, hanging from the walls and the ceiling and set up on displays in the middle of the floor. There are drawings and sketches and woven tapestries of the finest metallic fiber and there's something playing from the speakers, a soft melody that vibrates through Sunstreaker's spark in such a way it makes him sing.
“It's amazing,” Sunstreaker says on the edge of a ventilation. He whips his helm around, trying to see everything he can see.
Nightfall chuckles. “I thought you might enjoy it. What do you want to see first?”
“Everything!”
Nightfall laughs again and leans down, sweeping Sunstreaker up into his arms so that he can get a better view without being hampered by the forest of mech and femme adult-limbs around him. “You have to start somewhere, Sunny-bot. We'll get to everything in time.”
Sunstreaker grins, but indecision wracks him. He doesn't know. Everything is so optic-catching. He thinks about the statues only to get distracted by the splash of purple-blue over on that canvas. The painting looks fascinating but over in the corner is a display of frame-designs and loyalty threatens to win out.
“The designs,” he says finally. “They must have dozens of yours!”
Nightfall gives him a brief, affectionate squeeze. “They do have a couple. But you've seen all of mine already.”
“Want to see them again.”
“If you insist.” Humor rippled in Nightfall's energy field, dosed with bright rings of fondness. “To the designs it is. Though, I'll have you know, one of Tracks' recent works is on display here, too.”
Sunstreaker's face contorts with annoyance. “Don't care about Tracks.” In fact, he doesn't want to think about his brother at all. The firster likes to make Sunstreaker's orns miserable. He's a glitch and a half.
“He's your brother, Sunstreaker.”
“He hates me,” Sunstreaker retorts, and squirms in Nightfall's arms, suddenly wanting to be on his own two pedes again.
Nightfall doesn't fight him, setting him down, but keeping a grasp on his servo, not that Sunstreaker is going to run off on his own. “He does not. He is simply jealous. He will learn otherwise in time.”
Sunstreaker frowns, the itchy-squirmy sensation starting up in his chassis again. His helm dips, one servo touching his thin chestplate, feeling the irregular pulse of his spark energy beneath it. His frame thrums from the force of it.
“Jealous?” he repeats, but his vocals sound distant, even to his audials.
There's... something.
Sunstreaker's focus turns inward, anxiety threading through his spark. It doesn’t hurt, not this time, but there's something else, a feeling of sadness. Of being lost and alone. Abandoned.
He is missing something. He is forgetting something.
What is it?
His frame jerks and Sunstreaker startles, stumbling forward in surprise. He squeezes Nightfall's servo, trying to catch his balance, letting loose a burst of ventilation.
Nightfall turns back toward him, confusion in his energy field. “Sunstreaker?”
He shakes his helm, unable to explain it. At least, not in ways that won't make Nightfall get that weird look on his faceplate, interest and regret and disappointment all roiled together. Sometimes, worry overrides it all and then Sunstreaker gets taken to Steadfast again and the medibot never finds anything wrong.
No. Best not to say anything at all.
“Sorry,” he says. “I was distracted.”
Nightfall gives him a long look but finally offers a smile. “Easy to do here, isn't it?” He squeezes Sunstreaker's servo and starts walking again. “We'd better hurry if you don't want to miss anything.”
Sunstreaker nods and falls into step beside his caretaker, determined to ignore the strange sensations in his spark.
o0o0o
“Almost done, Sunstreaker,” Dragline says, amusement ripe in his tone, as well as affection for the youngest spark of his master.
“I know. I'm patient.”
Sunstreaker offlines his optics and carefully cycles his ventilations, controlling his every motion. Except, however, for the lingering twinge in his spark chamber. It aches from time to time but Steadfast hasn't been able to find a plausible explanation for the ache.
'Growing pains' Steadfast had called them. He had assured Nightfall that they would go away with time. Perhaps even by Sunstreaker's second upframe.
The pains themselves harken back to a time when all Sunstreaker remembers is pain. Pain and darkness, all before Nightfall and Tracks, a time Sunstreaker prefers to forget.
Except, perhaps, the designation Wirelight. He keeps that little tidbit close to his spark and never utters it aloud.
“Are you well, young master?”
Sunstreaker fails to stop himself from grimacing. “I'm fine. Please don't call me that, Dragline.”
Behind him, the door to his personal chambers opens with a chiming announcement. Efficient pedesteps identify his visitor, not that Sunstreaker would have worried otherwise.
“It is a matter of respect, Sunstreaker,” Nightfall says as he enters Sunstreaker's chamber, the door closing behind him. “It is in Dragline's coding.”
Happiness nearly makes Sunstreaker move, though he thinks twice about it. “Nightfall! I thought you had left for Polyhex.”
He can feel his caretaker's optics on his frame. “Did Tracks tell you that?” There is a hint of displeasure in Nightfall's tone.
“Maybe,” Sunstreaker hedges. He doesn't want his brother to get reprimanded again. It never helps and tends to make Tracks even more obnoxious. “You're not going?”
“I am. I have a few joors yet.” Nightfall steps up beside him, standing within Sunstreaker's peripheral vision. “Did you think I would leave without saying goodbye?”
The fine-bristled brush sweeps one last time over a pectoral line before Dragline steps back. “All done, young master,” he announces.
“Thank you, Dragline. He looks exceptional as always.”
Dragline dips his helm, though it fails to conceal the pleasure and gratitude in his expression. “It is my pleasure, sir. Excuse me.”
Gathering up his supplies, Dragline exits the room and Sunstreaker finally lowers his arms, ex-venting a sigh of relief. He can move again!
He turns toward his caretaker, briefly admiring the stunning sheen to Nightfall's navy and grey paint. “I understand that you are busy,” Sunstreaker says quietly. “And that I cannot be selfish.”
“True.” Nightfall gives him an approving smile. “But I will always strive to say my farewells in person. I don't wish you to feel abandoned.”
“It never crossed my processor, Nightfall,” Sunstreaker replies, which is the utter truth.
“And I will speak with your brother,” his caretaker adds, resting a hand on Sunstreaker's helm, an easy feat considering that he's two helms taller than his ward. “I suspect he was playing a prank on you, if not one mean in spirit.”
Sunstreaker accepts the offered embrace, leaning his helm against Nightfall's expertly polished chestplate, the symbol of their house prominent and bold. “Don't be too hard on him. I think he's still angry.”
Nightfall chuckles. “I think he is, too. He will get over it.” His caretaker's fingers stroke his helm in a soothing pattern that Sunstreaker remembers from the darkness, bringing him back to consciousness. “How are your lessons?”
Ugh. Those.
“They'd go faster if you'd let me upgrade and download data chips,” Sunstreaker replies, unable to hide the hope in his vocals.
Hope that is quickly dashed when a rumble of disapproval resonates in his caretaker's chassis. “No, Sunstreaker. That is how ordinary mechs assimilate. You have an advantage here. Enjoy your youth. Embrace it.”
He lifts his helm. “But--”
Nightfall taps him on the olfactory sensor with a single digit. “I said no.”
Disappointment wells. Sunstreaker's helm dips, his shoulder slumping. He hates being so far behind his brother. It reminds him of all the things he wants to forget.
“I understand,” his caretaker says, tone gentled. That same digit tilts Sunstreaker's helm back up. “You want to catch up to your brother as soon as possible.”
How does Nightfall always know these things? Sunstreaker nods.
“Every mech has their own pace. You merely need to find yours.” Nightfall smiles, the curve of his lips reassuring. “No cheating. Understood?”
He expels a ventilation of resignation. “Yes, Nightfall.”
“Good.” His caretaker's smile brightens and he leans forward, brushing his lip components over Sunstreaker's forehelm. “I'll be back in a diun. Mind Dragline and Windshear.”
Sunstreaker nods again. “I will.”
“Keep up with your lessons. If I get a good report, we'll see about incorporating the arts into your future instruction.”
Excitement wells. History and mathematics and the sciences are boring. But art? Music and poetry and sculpting and dance... Sunstreaker's spark gives off a happy pulse. He's been longing to explore the arts!
“Really?”
“I never say anything I don't mean.” Nightfall dips his helm, pressing it briefly against Sunstreaker's. “Remember that.”
“I do.” Warmth suffuses his spark, chasing away the lingering itch. “Have a safe trip.”
Nightfall smiles and pulls away. “I'll bring you back something nice.”
Sunstreaker watches his caretaker go and manages to hold himself in until the door closes behind Nightfall. Only then does he pump his fists into the air in excitement.
Art! Finally!
o0o0o
Dragline is off-grounds attending to some business for Nightfall and Windshear excused himself not long ago. Besides, both of them have the privilege of entering without knocking by order of Nightfall.
There's only one mech who would actually ask for permission and Sunstreaker's not in much of a mood to speak with his brother. He's still smarting from Tracks tricking him into playing that stupid game.
He ignores it.
Tracks chimes again.
“Go away!” Sunstreaker shouts at the door, glaring at his datapad as he angles his frame away from the door, curled as he is in the windowseat, facing the gardens below.
His door opens without his permission. Outrage pulses through Sunstreaker's spark as he whips back around, interest in his datapad forgotten.
“Tracks! That's rude!” he protests, glaring at his brother, only to pause when he sees the look on Tracks' faceplate.
It's neither amusement nor playful, as it usually would be when Tracks comes by just to annoy the frag out of Sunstreaker.
Something inside of Sunstreaker goes very, very cold.
“What is it?” Sunstreaker demands, setting his datapad off to the side to be forgotten. “Why are you looking at me like that?”
Pulling out the chair at Sunstreaker's terminal, Tracks sinks down into it, leaning forward and bracing himself on his knees. “Sunny--”
“Don't call me that!” he bites out and his servos bunch into fists of uncertainty. His optics search Tracks' face for a clue and he gets nothing.
Fear starts to wind its way with the disquiet.
“I'm sorry.” Tracks cycles a ventilation and rubs his servos down the length of his thigh paneling. “Sunstreaker, there's something I have to tell you.”
A sharp degree of fear stabs through his spark. Mechs only start conversations like this if they have bad news to deliver. At least, that's what always happens in the vid-shows.
Sunstreaker's vocalizer clicks, but no words emerge.
“Nightfall's gone, Sunstreaker,” Tracks starts, and his optics are everywhere but on Sunstreaker, misery at once cascading through his expression. “There was an accident. A collision. He didn't even make it to emergency medical.”
The words don't compute. Sunstreaker hears them, but he can't translate their meaning. It doesn't make any sense.
Of course it doesn't. Because Tracks can be a real fragger when he wants to be.
Sunstreaker's optics cycle down as he jerks to his pedes, glaring at his brother. “That's not funny, Tracks!” he says, stomping one pede loudly. “It's the stupidest prank you've come up with yet.”
Tracks' expression doesn't change though. He doesn't get that look he always gets when Sunstreaker catches him in the midst of a lie or trying to play on Sunstreaker's gullibility.
“I wish it were a prank,” his brother says, vocals edging with static and his shoulders drooping. His optics are dim, carrying not the brightness of his usual dark humor. “But it is the unwelcome truth. Nightfall is gone.”
“You're lying.”
It feels as if someone is squeezing Sunstreaker's spark. His ventilations stutter and his vision swims.
Tracks stands and Sunstreaker looks up at him, but his brother is blurry and his chassis hurts and it's a lie.
“You're lying and you better stop or Nightfall's going to cut off your allotment for a whole diun this time!”
He hears a hum, a soft sound that carries through the air and straight to his audials. It's familiar in a painful way. It's the first thing he remembers after the pain. And then arms are wrapping around him and Sunstreaker still can't see a thing.
“I'm sorry,” Tracks says, his vocals rumbling in his chassis, vibrating against Sunstreaker's helm, one servo stroking his helm in comfort. “Primus, I'm sorry that it's not a lie. He's not coming back and it's just us now. You and me.”
He clings to Tracks because he doesn't know what else to do. He doesn't want to believe the awful truth, but Tracks has never lied about something this serious.
Fear and grief collide within Sunstreaker's spark, the pain amplifying, and his short functioning catches up with him. A strangled keen rises from his vocalizer.
It's not fair!
“It's okay,” Tracks murmurs, still making that noise, that familiar hum that Nightfall had used to often to soothe a purge-haunted Sunstreaker. “You're not going anywhere. I promise. You're family, Sunstreaker.”
“But you hate me!” he wails, thoughts bouncing back and forth in his processor.
Nightfall's gone. He's alone. All alone again.
...Again?
Tracks' arms spasm around him, tightening his embrace. “I don't hate you,” he says with a sharpness to his tone Sunstreaker's never heard before. “You annoy the Pit out of me, but I don't hate you, Sunstreaker. You're my brother. You'll always be my brother.”
It's not right. This isn't how things are supposed to be. Nightfall promised!
Sunstreaker sags, curling inward, his spark aching and twisting and firing with a familiar ache. He sobs a ventilation, Tracks' murmuring a buzz in his audials.
“I'm going to take care of you, of us,” his brother is saying, over and over. “It's going to be okay. I promise.”
Why can't Sunstreaker believe him?
o0o0o
It is a slow progression that takes them down. The low hum of half-a-hundred mechs and femmes vocalizing their grief seems to resonate in the hallways, vibrating through Sunstreaker's pedes and through his chestplate. That ache has returned, stabbing through his spark chamber, but he doesn't dare show his wince.
He walks beside Tracks, and they, in turn, are mere steps behind Nightfall's casket. His frame has been mended, cleaned, re-painted. Sunstreaker half expects him to rise from the duryllium sheet and declare it was all a joke. A tasteless one, but a joke nonetheless. Sunstreaker would prefer that outcome.
He looks up at his brother once, but Tracks' faceplate is a mask of emotions, mirroring their once-Caretaker already. Emotions are allowed in private, around the boundaries of their home. Here, in public, he has to be controlled, even in the face of Nightfall's funeral.
Half-a-hundred mechs walk behind them, in near matching strides, adding to the vibrations in the hall. The humming dirge shifts to words, an old dialect that no one really speaks anymore, but that Sunstreaker's expected to know.
The mausoleum is small in comparison to the Towers. Cybertronians function for a long, long time. Failing sparks are few and rare between. They pass eight caskets, guarded by their intricate statues, displaying a frame-style of a different time. It's like walking in a history vid and any other time, Sunstreaker might have had some interest in studying the unusual designs.
It has taken a diun to craft Nightfall's sentry, the large construction rising taller than Nightfall had ever stood, the expression on his faceplate unfamiliar and unfriendly. He better resembles a stern teacher than the smiling, kind caretaker that Sunstreaker remembers. For that reason alone, the sentry looks nothing like Nightfall.
The casket is slotted into position, the lid laid over the top. Sunstreaker, silent, stands and watches. The song continues its mournful tune, though the half-a-hundred mechs behind him are all but strangers. Politicians and coworkers and fellow Towers-mechs. Not a one of them really knew Nightfall.
Dragline and Windshear hadn't been allowed to attend. It isn't proper. Sunstreaker's half-surprised that no one protested his own attendance.
One of the priests from the temple comes forward. He launches into a speech about Primus' Will, how Nightfall is now one with the Allspark, and how his unexpected offlining is a disheartening loss for the Towers community. He speaks of grief and hope and bright lights in a dark hour and Sunstreaker tunes out most of the insincere blather.
The rest is a blur of speeches. Mechs Sunstreaker has never met or barely knows rise to offer words about his caretaker.
Tracks speaks but his words are a carefully crafted speech that say a lot without saying anything at all. He can't talk about all the things that really made Nightfall a mech worth knowing. Those truths are private and his speech sounds as empty and flat as all the others.
Sunstreaker hates it all. He doesn't give a speech. No one asked him and he doesn't offer. He doesn't want to stand up there saying things that don't matter.
Nothing helps. And nothing's going to bring Nightfall back.
o0o0o
Sunstreaker pauses mid-step, helm cocked. That had sounded like his brother's voice, raised like Sunstreaker has never heard it before.
“No offense, your honor, but I am certain that I know what is best for myself and my brother!”
Who is Tracks yelling at?
Frowning, Sunstreaker picks up the pace, following the sound of Tracks' voice to one of the offices on the main hall. It's the one Tracks favors because of the large windows overlooking the back crystal garden.
The door is parted by a mere sliver, but there's just enough for Sunstreaker to peer inside. He can see his brother's back, the twitching stabilizer, and beyond it, the edges of a large monitor. Tracks is obviously in conference with someone, but Sunstreaker doesn't know who.
“--no duty for your caretaker's decision,” a voice is saying, one Sunstreaker doesn't recognize, but it has a thick Iaconian accent. “You are not obligated--”
“Enough!” Tracks' servo whips through the air, the word a near-snarl of anger that is also new. “Sunstreaker is family. He is my brother, regardless of his origins. I will not abandon him because you are of the opinion it is the better course.”
Oh.
Emotions twist and tangle within Sunstreaker, his spark giving a lurch of understanding. He drops his optics, half-turned from the door.
Another voice cuts into the conversation, the smooth lilt of a femme. “Lord Tracks, you are barely into your third frame. You are not equipped to mentor or raise a youngling.”
“Then lucky I am not a commoner. I can afford to acquire the necessary aid.” Tracks' vocals are as cold as a carbon freezer. “Sunstreaker is staying here. That is my decision.”
Sunstreaker's ventilations are shallow. Even so, they sound like they echo in the ensuing silence.
Someone on the monitor cycles their own ventilation. “Very well,” the mech from before concedes. “It is your right to make that decision, however ill-advised it might be.”
“Your support is appreciated,” Tracks replies, but he sounds far from appreciative. His tone is flat and unwelcoming.
“Noted.”
There is a beep and a blat of static, the sound of a transmission ending.
Sunstreaker lifts his optics back to the door, a debate raging inside of him. He should turn away because it's impolite to eavesdrop, but that twisting-churning sensation in his spark just won't go away.
His brother looks tired, shoulders slumped, and his servo lifting to rub his faceplate. Traces of his energy field are tangible, flat with annoyance.
You are only a burden, a tiny voice whispers in the back of Sunstreaker's processor, but he bats it away violently.
The ache in his chassis magnifies, and with it a return of the loneliness, the strange pain that afflicts him from time to time. The pain that no medic has ever been able to explain and the designation that floats in the back of his nebulous memories whispering Wirelight.
Sunstreaker pushes the door open and slips into the office before he entirely knows what he's doing. He scuffs his pede against the floor by accident, announcing his presence.
Tracks whirls, and offers a shaky smile of surprise. “Sunstreaker, I thought you were studying.”
He's young, but he's not a moron. His brother is concealing a mishmash of emotions that must be giving him sensory whiplash.
“Why didn't you listen to them?” Sunstreaker asks.
Tracks cycles his optics, helm tipped with confusion. “What?”
“You don't owe me anything,” Sunstreaker says, treacherous parts of his processor murmuring reminders at him. “You don't have to take all this worry on. You don't have to keep me.”
Keep. Like a toy, a pet. He's a youngling, but Sunstreaker's heard the rumors. He's seen the way the other Tower heirs look at him. He's not stupid.
They wonder, why would Nightfall adopt some abandoned youngling from common stock? Why would he bother?
Why else but to amuse himself? Why else but to have a pet?
They are wrong. They know nothing. But only Sunstreaker will ever understand that. They had not been there, they had not seen the way Nightfall smiled at him, pulsing love and affection in his energy field.
Nightfall loved him and sometimes, it is the only truth Sunstreaker can cling to in the darkness.
“No, I do not.” Tracks agrees, and gets closer, his vocals firm. “I want to. You are my brother, no matter what they say.”
“But--”
Tracks shakes his helm, and Sunstreaker clamps his mouth shut. His brother kneels in front of him, his servos resting on Sunstreaker's shoulders. “You let me worry about adult things, Sunny. You just concentrate on your studies. Understand?”
His fingers curl into a fist over his chassis, the ache receding by degrees. “Yes.”
“Good.” Tracks smiles and this time, it doesn't look like a mask for the turmoil beneath. It is genuine to the core. He pats Sunstreaker's shoulders and rises to his pedes. “Now come show me what you've been learning.”
o0o0o
But he cannot, because Tracks is hosting this business social and to do so would be rude. Sunstreaker's had enough codes of conduct drilled into his processor to make his helm spin. He wouldn't want any of these stupid mechs to look down on his brother, though he doesn't care what they think of him. No matter how much he polishes or perfects himself, he's not one of them and he'll never be one of them.
This gathering, amongst so many others, has made that abundantly clear.
And he especially doesn't want to embarrass Tracks with their leader present. Sentinel Prime is a large, imposing existence at center stage in the grand hall. He's holding court with most of the attendees, lords of other Towers, senators, and mechs of high repute.
Sunstreaker clutches a cube of mid-grade energon, the highest Tracks would let him have, and lets his optics track over the various frame designs present. Some of them are his caretaker's work. He can recognize Nightfall's flair in an optic ridge here, or a finial there. Others are by Tracks' design, whose aesthetics lean more toward swathes of paint to accentuate sleek curves and angled lines. There are other, lesser known designers represented as well.
Admiring and cataloging and criticizing, even if only in his own helm, is the only method Sunstreaker has learned to get through these pompous affairs.
His optics slide past Mirage, lordling of a nearby Tower, closest perhaps to his own frame-age. They know each other by reputation alone. Tracks has encouraged Sunstreaker to meet with Mirage on more than one occasion but Sunstreaker has always declined. It doesn't take a genius to know that he wouldn't be welcomed beyond a required politeness. Because Mirage and his caretaker, like everyone else, knows that Sunstreaker isn't one of them. He is other, no matter what Nightfall had intended.
He wasn't commissioned, he was adopted. The horror.
Sunstreaker huffs over his energon, and sips at it. He checks his chronometer. Two more joors of this tiresome and pretentious affair and it will be over. He has only to hold himself together until then, even if the twitching under his plating is growing more irritating by the breem.
“Whyever are you hiding back here?”
Sunstreaker startles at the unexpected voice so near to his audial. He whips around, nearly tripping on a table leg, to see a mech standing just beside him, an amused grin curling his lipplates.
It takes a klik for Sunstreaker to remember the elegant poise he is supposed to display. “I was not hiding,” he replies, edging a step back from the unfamiliar mech who is still too close. “I was observing.”
A husky laugh emerges from the mech. “From behind the table. Should you not be out socializing?”
“I suppose I should,” Sunstreaker agrees, optics flicking to his brother, but Tracks is deep in negotiations with Clarity, Mirage's caretaker. “But that would require initiating a conversation that I am sure no one wishes to have.”
The mech lifts a cube, the opalescent sheen of pure grade gleaming within. “That is the only problem with these events. We are too busy being pretentious to actually make friends.”
Some of the tension eases out of Sunstreaker's frame. “I noticed.”
His companion laughs. “It's a shame, really. You are well-spoken for a youngling.” He directs a hand toward himself, affecting a shallow bow. “I am Senator Malus.”
“Sunstreaker,” he offers, tilting his helm in return.
Malus laughs again. “Oh, I knew that,” he replies, tones rich with amusement.
Sunstreaker feels his faceplates flush and hides behind his cube. “Of course you did.” See this right here is why he doesn't socialize. Because he continues to make a fool of himself.
Malus, however, merely smiles. “You have quite an exquisite design,” he comments, and pulls up a stool, as though quite content to chat with Sunstreaker all night. “Is it your brother's or Nightfall's?”
This is a topic Sunstreaker is very comfortable discussing. He all but beams. “Nightfall's,” he says, some of the embarrassment fading. “But Tracks promised that he'll design my next upframe. With my input, of course.”
“Of course,” Malus agrees. “I hear you are something of an artist. Frame design as well?”
Sunstreaker shakes his helm, and relaxed enough, finally indulges in his energon. “No. I understand the general aesthetics but my interest lies more in the display arts.”
“Ah.” Malus inclines his helm, approval writ into his expression. “A true artist then. What is your favorite medium?”
“Anything Tracks will let me try.” A tiny grin tugs at Sunstreaker's mouth. “But I like painting the most.”
“I should have guessed.” Malus lifts a servo, digits brushing Sunstreaker's left finial, but so lightly that it tickles. “You actually have a little here.”
Embarrassment wells again. He can't believe Dragline left him out of his suite like that!
He reaches up, trying to find the spot. “What color is it?”
“Blue.” Malus's amusement flickers in his energy field, tangible now, as though evidence of his relaxed state. “And a bit of red here, too.” His fingers brush Sunstreaker's left cheek-ridge.
How embarrassing. No wonder mechs have been staring.
“Sunstreaker!”
He startles again, whirling at the sound of Tracks all but barking his designation, like he's done something wrong. His brother is approaching them at a fast clip, and though his expression is smoothed over, there's a gleam to his optics that usually only appears when Sunstreaker is in trouble.
“I'm socializing!” he protests before Tracks can berate him. “I was just talking to--”
“I know,” Tracks says, smoothly sliding between Sunstreaker and Malus, his servo landing on Sunstreaker's shoulder and pulling him back. “But there's a mech I want you to meet.”
“Now?” Sunstreaker frowns. Tracks is always trying to help him make friends.
“Yes, now.” The fingers twitch on his shoulder but Tracks isn't looking at him anymore, instead looking at Malus. “Senator, I hope you don't mind that I steal my brother away.”
“No, of course not.” Malus offers a smile, but there's an edge to it that wasn't present before.
Sunstreaker's frown deepens, gaze darting between the two mechs. Do they not like each other? Then why would Tracks bother inviting someone he didn't like to his exhibition? Primus, noble politics give him a processor-ache sometimes.
“There's more high grade. Help yourself,” Tracks offers, steering Sunstreaker away from the senator with not-so-subtle pushes.
“Thank you.” Malus dips his helm in a respectful bow. “You are, as always, a gracious host.”
Tracks hurries Sunstreaker away, all but shoving him to the other side of the ballroom. There's an urgency to his emotion that's more than a little alarming.
“Sunstreaker,” Tracks says in a low tone, his optics distant and sharp. “I want you to stay away from Malus.”
He cycles his optics in confusion. “What? Why?”
“Because I said so!” Tracks' vocals hit a sharp note and he pauses, cycling back down. “He is not a good mech.”
Sunstreaker twists to get a look over his shoulder and finds Malus watching them, that small smile still on his lips. “But he was nice to me.”
“Nice doesn't mean good. Just trust me, all right?”
Huffing a ventilation, Sunstreaker crosses his arms over his chassis.
Tracks' grip on his shoulder tightens, a warning note entering his vocals. “I am serious, Sunstreaker. Please do as I say.”
“Fine,” he agrees though he doesn't understand why. Malus had been the only one willing to be polite to him at this stupid social. “Can I leave then?”
Tracks cycles a ventilation, an audible systems check. “I did have someone I wanted you to meet, but if you would rather return to your room, I will not argue.”
Curiosity wars with disappointment and the memories of all the other times Tracks wanted him to meet someone who was less than impressed. “I want to go back to my room,” Sunstreaker mutters.
“Very well.” Tracks activates his comm, no doubt summoning Dragline to come get him. “Perhaps I can introduce you to Grapple another time.”
Sunstreaker tries not to feel guilty at the disappointment in his brother's tone. He tries to keep his indignant anger fresh. But it's hard. He's enough of a burden on Tracks without acting like a spoiled youngling.
He thinks to apologize but Dragline appears just then, ready to escort him back to his room, and the words die on his glossa.
o0o0o
“Yellow,” Sunstreaker says with a nod of his helm.
A small laugh leaves his brother's vocalizer. “You are already yellow,” Tracks says, tapping his stylus against the transfer pad. “Don't you want to try something new?”
“No. Yellow.” Sunstreaker leans against the desk, looking up at the rendering of what is to be his first pseudo-adult frame. “And I want five digits with four joints.”
“All the better for your art, I imagine,” Tracks replies, but his stylus flicks across the pad, adjusting the frame on the holographic display. Long, elegant digits replace the four stubby ones on the original design.
Sunstreaker smiles in approval. “Can I have a visor?”
“Why?”
“So I can cycle through a series of visual acuity.” Sunstreaker has put a lot of thought into this. “I want to be able to approach my ideas through a range of spectrums.”
Tracks leans back, stylus tapping in hesitation. “Hmm. That might be a bit advanced for your first-frame, Sunny. Maybe your second.” The tip of the stylus scritches across the pad in an idle doodle. “How about I upgrade your visual processing centers instead and we'll see if that suits? You might not like the visor.”
He ponders the option. “Can I just see what it would look like?”
Tracks chuckles and makes the changes on the pad, the image shimmering as the pair of blue optics are replaced by an opalescent optical band.
Sunstreaker tilts his helm. Tracks has a point. The frame doesn't look right with a visor. Frag. Well, it was an interesting idea.
“You're right,” he concedes. “No band. But my faceplate is too plain.”
Tracks grins, deleting the band and doodling something else. “Your faceplate is hardly plain, Sunstreaker. It's a perfectly symmetrical design fashioned to reflect your patrician heritage.”
“It's plain,” Sunstreaker says flatly, crossing his arms over his chassis.
“I will add something to your helm. Finials perhaps,” Tracks says, conceding at least on this, though not without an element of amusement.
“No finials.” He hates the ones he has right now. They were fine at first, but he feels he'll still look like a youngling if he keeps them.
“Sensory suites?”
“No.”
“Helm vents?” At this point, Tracks sounds exasperated. The holographic projection itself flickers through the options, almost too fast to register.
Sunstreaker pauses, considering the vents. He likes the way they frame his face. “They will do,” he declares.
“At last,” Tracks responds dryly. “Now, let's talk about--”
“Excuse me, sir.” Windshear's comm cuts through their discussion as the speaker on Tracks' desk beeps an announcement.
Tracks hits pause on the rendering, temp-saving their work. “What is it, Windshear?”
“Senator Malus is on the main line. He is asking to speak with you.”
Sunstreaker perks, though flattens at the look in his brother's optics.
“Tell him I am with a client,” Tracks replies, stylus tapping a faster rate on the pad. “I will return his call as soon as I can.”
“I already relayed as much,” Windshear says, and he sounds agitated. “He is most insistent that he speak with you.”
A sigh gusts from Tracks' vents as he taps something on the datapad, perma-saving their progress. “Very well. Give me a moment and I will take the call in my office.”
He pulls a spare datapad from his desk and uploads the contents of their work, handing it to Sunstreaker. “Look this over. Add your suggestions. I'll approve or disapprove and we can continue working on it later.”
Sunstreaker takes the pad, but lifts an orbital ridge. “Do you think it's another merge offer?” His brother has been getting them in droves as of late. He is of bonding age, after all, and who wouldn't want a stake in all that fortune?
Tracks snorts. “He should be so lucky.” He urges Sunstreaker toward the door. “You shouldn't be talking about merges anyway. Go work on your upframe.”
“Yes, brother.” He grins, tucking the datapad against his chestplate. “But it would not hurt for you to actually consider these offers rather than decline on principle alone.”
Tracks rolls his optics and points to the door. “Out, brat. My future bonding is none of your concern.”
Sunstreaker laughs before he can help himself, but does as Tracks asked, leaving his brother to accept the call. Tracks can be such a prude, sometimes.
o0o0o
The tip drags across the screen, a skritch of metal on transparent steel. He pauses, contemplates color. Blends shades of blue into a variegating pattern that mimics the night sky, well, at least a sky when Cybertron had a sun.
Sunstreaker draws a lot of things that don't exist anymore.
He paints in the drawing room, broad windows giving him an excellent view of Protihex. He likes to try imitating the skyline, the rise and fall of the buildings, the gleam of the Crystal gardens in the distance, white and gleaming.
The room is filled with paintings, completed, in progress, and abandoned. They line the walls, stacked two or three deep sometimes. Sunstreaker doesn't think they are good enough to attempt to display or sell, but every once in a while, he'll come in and find one or two missing. And not long after, there's an extra deposit in his ornly allotment.
He knows it is Tracks but Sunstreaker says nothing. He used to get angry because the paintings are his and Tracks has no right to take them and sell them. But Dragline had calmed him down, told him that sometimes Tracks just doesn't know how to talk to him and this is how he shows his faith in Sunstreaker's ability.
Sunstreaker lets it lie. He shows his gratitude by pretending he doesn't notice the paintings are missing. And even though he abhors being observed while he's creating, he pretends he doesn't notice when Tracks is standing at the back of the room, watching him.
It's actually kind of nice. It's times like this when they feel like something of a family, rather than the forced facsimile of one that Nightfall tried to create.
Sunstreaker's stylus wobbles.
He misses Nightfall desperately sometimes. Tracks tries, and he's doing his best, but he's still Sunstreaker's older brother, and Sunstreaker will never forget the brat Tracks had been back when Nightfall still functioned. To be fair, Tracks has done a complete one-eighty in the wake of their caretaker's accident, when the weight fell most heavily on Tracks' shoulders. Sunstreaker is reminded constantly of this fact.
It's not Tracks' fault Sunstreaker is a burden. Though he had countless opportunities to give up the extra chain that is Sunstreaker, Tracks hasn't.
Most mechs would have. Most towerlings would have. Mirage certainly would have, Sunstreaker thinks.
Tracks had only just upframed to full-adult. No one would have faulted him for admitting he couldn't care for his younger sibling. Especially since Sunstreaker is adopted.
But he didn't, and Sunstreaker doesn't know what to do with his gratitude or how to even show it. Half the time, he acts like a brat and he knows it. He lashes out, and snaps, and is a general nuisance and he can't even explain why.
Sunstreaker lowers his stylus completely and stares at the sketch. It is utter slag, not what he wants at all. He wipes the screen before he can convince himself otherwise, and pretends not to notice the surprised ventilation behind him. He is his own worst critic.
Tracks never asks why Sunstreaker abandons certain projects. And Sunstreaker never offers an explanation of his own accord.
They don't talk or acknowledge each other, but somehow, Sunstreaker likes these quiet moments of shared time the most.
o0o0o
Sunstreaker doesn't remember getting taken, only that he had been out in the garden, sketching, when his world went dark.
He onlines somewhere he doesn't know, on an unfamiliar berth, surrounded by unfriendly energy fields. His reaction wavers between alarm and surprise and helm-addled confusion. He feels like he's processing at half-speed.
“Ahhh,” a voice sneers. “The lordling wakes.”
Susntreaker jerks upright at the disdainful tone, like acid in his audial receptors, and awkwardly scrabbles backward on the berth, away from hostile energy fields. Two strange mechs sit to either side of him, both bulky and obviously military-build, judging by the red of their optics. One has a visor and rotary blades, the other a massive cannon.
“Recharge well?” the tank asks, but there's no concern in his tone.
“Who are you?” Sunstreaker demands, if only to hide the fear that's churning his tanks. “Where am I?” He tries his comm and gets nothing. Not a bleep. Not even a burr of static.
The rotary chuckles, but it lacks humor as much as his companion lacked concern. “Just like a noble. Doesn't know when to keep his mouth shut.”
“Don't you worry your expensive little helm,” the tank croons. “You'll be out of our possession soon enough. Someone paid good creds for ya.”
Creds?
Fear clogs Sunstreaker's vocalizer, static spilling from his mouth. “What? But I--”
“Vortex! Brawl!”
Another voice barks into the room, a door on the far side sliding open as an even larger mech strides inside. “Back the frag off!”
“Slag, Ons, I never touched him,” the rotary says, holding up his servos as if to prove his innocence. “On my honor.”
“Ya don't got any, Tex.” The tank snickers.
“Oh, yeah.” The rotary's visor flashes darkly. “Well then, I still didn't do it.”
'Ons' gives them a flat look, though it is hard to tell considering his face is concealed by both visor and mask. “The client is on his way up. See that he doesn't get lost.”
“Isn't that Swin's job?” The tank whines, hauling himself to his pedes as though he's dragging weights behind him with every step.
“Do it.” The command in the tone could not be denied.
Griping and groaning and jostling each other, the tank and the rotary leave and Sunstreaker is left staring up at the massive mech. A baleful visor looks him over from helm to pede, assessing and dismissing all in the same motion.
“Relax,” the soldier says. “I'm not going to do anything to a youngling.”
Fear turns into a bravado Sunstreaker actually doesn't feel. “That didn't stop you from taking me from my home!” He wants to go home, but he suspects that whining such a thing aloud isn't going to help.
A warrior-grade engine rumbles. “That's business.” The mech stomps to the window, peering out the thin metal-glass. “Are your energon levels satisfactory?”
Sunstreaker draws his knees up to his chassis, wrapping his arms around them, trying to present a small target. “What?”
“Are you fueled?”
“What does it matter to you?”
“It doesn't.”
Tension throbs in the room and Sunstreaker's spark skips another helpless beat. He has never been so aware of his own frame, how small he is in comparison, how weak. He has no weapons, has disdained the self-defense classes Tracks tried to get him take an interest in. He is pathetically helpless and there's no one to save him.
The door chimes. Sunstreaker's optics swing toward it as the door slides open, several mechs striding inside. One, Sunstreaker immediately recognizes, the other three are security detail, going by their weapons, matching paint schemes, and empty expressions.
“Senator Malus!” Sunstreaker exclaims, optics rounded with surprise. A burst of hope and relief fills his spark.
The senator doesn't look at him, his gaze reserved for the military mech waiting on him, and some of the relief fades in brightness, replaced by unease.
“You work fast, Commander Onslaught,” the senator says in a pleased tone, energy fields radiating ripe approval.
He knows the mech.
Senator Malus knows this mech.
What remains of Sunstreaker's hope dies in a pit of melted slag. The senator is not here in the intent of rescue. How can he be?
“Yes, well, you paid for that courtesy,” Onslaught replies, angling his frame away from the senator, making no moves to initiate a business-contact.
Senator Malus chuckles. “I trust he is undamaged?”
“See for yourself. We are professionals.”
Only then does Malus look at Sunstreaker and suddenly, he wishes that the senator hadn't. He doesn't like the eerie gleam to Malus's optics, the way he looks Sunstreaker over from the tip of his helm to the bottom of his pedes.
“Not so much as I scratch, I agree,” Malus says, helm nodding as though holding an internal conversation. “Very well done.”
Onslaught makes a noise, like gears scraping together and a ventilation clogged with debris. “Our fee?”
“It should already be in your accounts.”
Malus still hasn't looked away. The unwavering stare is more than unnerving. Sunstreaker backs against the head of the berth, where it latches onto the wall, unsure why he's so uncertain all the sudden.
“You are quite beautiful,” Malus murmurs, taking a step closer to the berth, as though he's forgotten about every other mech in the room. “Tracks is indeed one of the best frame designers. He's outdone himself on yours.”
Sunstreaker frowns. “What does this have to do with my brother?”
Malus chuckles, sweeping a palm over the crown of his helm. “Everything and nothing, my pet.”
The telltale click of a vocalizer reset echoes in the room. “Will that be all, Senator Malus?” Onslaught asks and if his tone got any flatter, it would be a sheet of metal.
“Yes, yes. I have no further need of your services.” Malus flicks an impatient servo over his shoulders.
Onslaught dips his helm in a barely polite bow and leaves without another word.
“You three, outside,” Malus orders without a glance to his guard. “Sunstreaker and I must chat. Ensure that we are not disturbed.”
“A chat?” Sunstreaker repeats, his optics tracking the departure of the three security mechs.
Sunstreaker doesn't have a clue what's going on here, but it can't be good. Mechs don't get taken from their homes for happy reasons. What does Malus want from him?
“Do you know why you are here?” Malus asks once they are alone, taking several steps closer to the berth, though slowly. Like he's the one who needs to be cautious.
Sunstreaker twitches, processor bringing up several possibilities but only one of them seems remotely plausible. “Ransom? But you've got more creds than we do so that doesn't make any sense.”
Malus laughs, a soft and husky sound. “Tracks has certainly kept you locked in that Tower, hasn't he? No, Sunstreaker, I don't need creds. Nor do I want them.”
“Then why?”
Malus sits on the edge of the berth, his pale blue and ocher paint gleaming in the bright overhead lighting. “If your brother had accepted my offer, things would have turned out quite differently. But Lord Tracks is a stubborn mech.” He pauses, tilting his helm. “This outcome, perhaps, is far more preferable to me.”
“Offer?”
“Lord Tracks is a very desirable mech to many Cybertronians,” Malus says, his tone conversational as he slides further down the berth, within touching distance. “He's attractive. Wealthy. Talented. And utterly devoted to his adopted brother.”
Sunstreaker rolls his optics. “So you got offended? Primus, he rejects everyone. What makes you think you're special?”
He uncurls his frame, pushing away from Malus and off the berth. There's a weird trill in Malus's energy field and he doesn't like the way it feels when it touches his own. It's unwelcome and uncomfortable and Sunstreaker would really like to go home now.
A servo snaps out, digits encircling his wrist, stopping him in place. “Because your brother is not as smart as he ought to be. Though he has good instincts.” A thumb digit strokes along the inside of Sunstreaker's wrist.
He tugs on his hand, but Malus doesn't let him go. “What do you mean?” Sunstreaker asks.
Malus's vocals dip into a lower register, pulling on Sunstreaker's hand until he's forced to strain the cables in his wrist or move closer to the senator. “You're a bit older than my usual tastes, but for a frame this beautiful, I believe I can adjust.”
No, Sunstreaker doesn't like the sound of any of this. His energon pump stutters, ventilations missing a cycle.
“Let me go,” he says, and hates the way he sounds scared and small. Even if that's exactly how he feels.
Malus's optics drop, watching his own fingers as they stroke Sunstreaker's wrist, his other hand smoothing the inside of Sunstreaker's palm, following the flow of his plating upward. “You've only been a first frame for what, a quarter of a vorn?”
“So?” Sunstreaker jerks on his wrist again, but Malus's grip has firmed, become unyielding. The weird trill in his energy field has deepened to a grating buzz that scrapes along Sunstreaker's own.
Malus makes a humming noise, pulling Sunstreaker's servo toward his mouth, ex-venting warmth over his delicate fingers. “You're practically a youngling still, untouched and naïve.”
Sunstreaker jerks as sensors in his servo light up at the unexpected stimulation, his processor unsure how to translate it. Good? Bad? It doesn't hurt, but is it supposed to feel good?
“Stop that,” he says, and his spark is throbbing so hard that it feels like his chestplate is creaking.
“No, I don't believe I will.”
Malus tugs and Sunstreaker resists, but the mech is larger, taller, stronger, and another yank sends Sunstreaker tumbling forward. He tilts off his pedes and Malus is there to catch him, pulling Sunstreaker into his lap like Nightfall used to do when he had all those terrible purges about Wirelight and pain and darkness. This is nowhere near as comforting, sending jagged lances of fear through him instead.
An arm loops around Sunstreaker's waist, pulling his backplate against Malus's chassis. He can feel the rumble of the mech's energy plant, the thrum of his frame. He feels surrounded by that thick, sticky energy field, like he can't ventilate through it. Malus is too warm and Sunstreaker's cooling fans burst to life, struggling to suck in air.
Malus's helm slides against his, metal scraping over metal, and Sunstreaker hates it because Nightfall used to do that, too, only it didn't feel like this. Wrong and disgusting. Sunstreaker shudders, squirming to get free, but Malus's hold on him only tightens.
“You are so beautiful,” Malus says, free hand pawing at Sunstreaker's lateral armor, finding the panel that conceals his medical port. “A bond with you would hardly be a chore.”
A bond?
Sunstreaker thrashes, throwing his helm back. “I don't want a bond!” he shouts, arms flailing, but all he's managing to do is ding and scuff Malus's armor. It doesn't seem to hurt the Senator at all.
Malus laughs, popping open the panel. “You don't have a choice, Sunny,” he says, foredigit touching the connectors in Sunstreaker's port, electricity crackling over it.
Sunstreaker goes utterly still, revulsion crawling through his systems. His tanks churn, spark trying to push through his chamber.
“What are you doing?”
Malus's digits go away and Sunstreaker thinks of relief, thinks that maybe his demands have gotten through.
Until the plug sinks into his port with a loud click, an alien presence battling at Sunstreaker's systems. It's a weird sensation, one he can't describe, only knowing that Malus doesn't feel comforting like Nightfall had or clinical like Steadfast. He doesn't ask permission, only batters through Sunstreaker's firewalls as though they are crafted from air and not the finest Tracks' creds can buy.
“Stop!”
Malus ignores him.
Sunstreaker can feel the senator rifling through his processor, through his coding, like he's looking for something. He's poking and prodding, an alien presence with alien thoughts and alien emotions that aren't Sunstreaker's.
Satisfaction and pleasure, amusement and glee.
Sunstreaker whimpers, desperately sucking air into his vents. He feels like he's overheating, and he can feel Malus's ventilations against his helm, the energy field like a thick blanket keeping him still.
“I will enjoy breaking you,” Malus says, vocals barely above a murmur. “Though I only have time right now for a taste.”
The arm around his midsection creeps upward, fingers scraping across Sunstreaker's chestplate and the invisible seam protecting his spark. Terror lances through him.
“No!”
There's a sound. A shout.
Sunstreaker thrashes as Malus's grip on him tightens. There's a smell of scorched metal and a blur of colors. Pain courses from Malus' side of the connection.
Malus falls and Sunstreaker falls with him. The cord is yanked from his port, connectors sparking angry charge.
Sunstreaker scrabbles, on servos and knees, trying to crawl out from under Malus's bulk. The floor vibrates, the noise of a dozen angry pedes, and then Malus's weight is gone. Sunstreaker lurches forward on unsteady limbs until another mech grabs him.
He shouts, flailing, words crashing against his audials. An energy field washes over him, pulsing warmth and soothing waves of calm. There's even more shouting, the sound of metal scrabbling, but it slowly fades.
“Shh,” says a mech, servos gentle but firm, and Sunstreaker cycles his optics, blurry vision still giving him sweeps of color and light and things unfamiliar. “It is all right, Sunstreaker. You are safe now.”
“Prove it!”
He's shaking. He can feel it in his limbs, the rattle of his plating, heat and cold flushing through him all at once. He resets his optics again and again, the blur firming into black and white and blue.
Blue optics. Black and white paint. A slash of a grey chevron. Sensory panels.
Praxian, Sunstreaker's addled processor informs him. The mech is Praxian, not Malus or one of his security detail.
“I am going to set you down now,” the Praxian says, still in that calm and even tone. “I apologize for grabbing you, but I did not wish to see you further harmed.”
And then he actually does. Sunstreaker feels himself lowered, feels floor beneath his pedes, and he wobbles, standing upright. That he is a little over half the Praxian's height is more apparent when he has to look up, except that the Enforcer kneels to put them on a more even level.
“Is that better?” he asks.
Sunstreaker folds his arms around his chassis, looking all around him. This is not the same room he was in earlier. It's smaller and quieter. There's no sign of the Senator, but there is another Enforcer by the door, not Praxian but still displaying the familiar sigil of the Enforcer corps.
Another shiver wracks Sunstreaker's frame. He feels cold and his connector aches. He twists to look down, watching as sparks spit from the frayed port. He sways on his pedes, processor glitching.
“Sunstreaker?”
“I want to go home,” he blurts out, curling into himself, arms locked around his frame. He aches from helm to pede and he can still feel Malus slithering about inside him like a virus.
The Enforcer's energy field pulses with sympathy but Sunstreaker flinches back. It scrapes against his own, unwelcome like Malus' and wisely, the Enforcer clamps it down.
“I apologize,” he murmurs, for the second time. “Your brother is on his way already. He should be here shortly.”
Sunstreaker stares at the floor. The swirling lines of color are hypnotizing, a blur to his optics. He can feel the weight of an interrupted upload in his cortex, waiting for the rest of the data, half-finished alterations itching and throwing errors at him.
He shivers, legs wobbling.
“Sunstreaker?”
His vision swims in and out of focus. His ventilations come sharp and panicked and he can't seem to get them under control. His digits draw into fists, knees buckling and Sunstreaker feels himself falling from a distance. His helm aches like the time he fell down the stairs and cracked an equilibrium sensor.
His tanks churn and Sunstreaker doubles over. “Something's wrong,” he says, or tries to say. It comes out a static-laden series of unintelligible syllables. “Something is...” His vocalizer locks up.
Someone shouts. He hears the words, muffled as they are, and then his chestplates twitch. Horror floods through Sunstreaker, his servos scrambling for his chassis, trying to hold himself together. His spark feels too big, too bright. He can't possibly keep it contained.
There's yelling. Servos on his plating. Digits prod at his damaged medical port and Sunstreaker hisses in pain, the sharpness of it a brief spark in the darkness. It's not enough, like so much in his functioning isn't, and Sunstreaker never feels himself hit the floor.
Awareness is a blur.
He feels, dimly, mechs touching him. He wants to fight back, to resist, thinking Malus has returned to finish what he started, but Sunstreaker's frame isn't obeying him. His servos won't respond, his pedes are made of stone, and his vocalizer has glitched.
Pain interrupts a strange lack of sensation, quick and sharp, with a lingering throb he can't ignore. He hears voices, but the words are indistinct. Energy fields vibrate against his own, one frazzled and terrified, one calm and composed, a third focused and confident.
“--attempted to reprogram--”
“--possible viral upload--”
“--as soon as you are able--”
Words wash in and out of Sunstreaker's audials. He doesn't know who's speaking them or why. His optics are on but he can't see a thing. He's cold, plating rattling from the inside out, and he can't seem to get his cooling fans to shut down.
Color and sound swirl together. Haptic sensors misfire, one after the other, cold and heat intermingling. Something sifts through his systems, less invasive than Malus' blunt force attempt, but no less unwelcome. Sunstreaker's too tired to fight back, can do nothing more than silently watch.
The nagging, itching feeling of an incomplete upload starts to lift. His processor no longer feels heavy and clogged, but lighter, as though he can think again. He tries to move his servo, check his chestplate and his frantically pulsing spark, but he still can't access his motor functions.
The dark returns, swamping over his processor, and Sunstreaker is reminded of pain, so much pain. His spark constricting and expanding, his frame bucking, the worried blue optics of a mech he only half-remembers.
Wirelight!
Grey on the edges. His processor struggles to compute, parcels of thought clawing upward, fighting for coherence. The pain dulls to a throb, then an echo. The memory recedes.
His left servo is warm. There's a tangible weight resting across his palms and digits. Sunstreaker stirs from the darkness, emerging into a brightly lit room, a soft berth beneath him. He cycles his optics in wake of the brightness, surrounded by unfamiliarity.
His servo is still warm.
Sunstreaker turns his helm, optics tracking down the length of his arm to his servo, his digits currently clasped by another set. He follows that arm to find Tracks sitting by his berth, slumped in a chair, his helm tilted at an odd angle in his recharge.
Judging by the equipment, the white walls, the odd silence, Sunstreaker can only assume he's in a medical center. He gropes at his chestplate with his free servo, relieved to find that it hasn't cracked open. And then, steeling himself, he touches a digit to his medical port. Relief leaves him in a whoosh; it has been repaired.
The physical evidence is gone. All that remains are the memories.
Tracks stirs and Sunstreaker's optics shift back to his brother, watching as Tracks' optics flicker and then online. He cycles them a few times before noticing that Sunstreaker is awake, jerking upright.
“Sunstreaker,” he says, leaning forward, second servo clasping over his first. “How are you feeling?”
He doesn't think there's a word to describe his emotional state. Sunstreaker searches his database and comes up short. Better, he thinks, to ignore the question altogether.
“Are we in Crystal City?”
Tracks releases a long ventilation. “Yes,” he says, digits rubbing gently over Sunstreaker's own. “Are you in any pain?”
He takes a moment to consider, peering at his HUD, before he answered. “No.”
“Good.” Tracks' optics flick away, focusing on the end of the berth. “Do you... remember anything?”
Sunstreaker's optics shutter, a small tremble wracking his frame. It's another question he doesn't want to answer. “How did I get here?”
“I believe I can answer that.”
His optics snap open, gaze whipping to the doorway where a familiar Enforcer is entering, a green mech wearing a medic's brand following behind.
“Prowl,” Tracks greets, though he makes no move to stand. “I thought your shift had ended.”
“I still have some paperwork that needs completion,” the Enforcer answers and his warm gaze turns to Sunstreaker. “I am glad to find that you have been well-repaired, Sunstreaker.”
Sunstreaker squirms, shifting his optics away. “Thank you.”
The medic edges out from behind Prowl, approaching the other side of Sunstreaker's berth, between the equipment and the wall. “I am Hoist,” he says with a smile and a soft ripple of his energy field. “I am the medic assigned to your care.”
“He is doing a great job,” Tracks says, squeezing Sunstreaker's servo. “He fixed you in record time and even touched up your paint.”
It feels false, empty. Their smiles and their soft tones and the gentle way they treat him. Granted, Sunstreaker feels as brittle as a rust stick but this only makes him feel more so. It's like they are all tiptoeing around the Empty in the corner, trying not to stir the ravenous beast.
“What happened to me?” Sunstreaker demands, and only belatedly notices that he's spoken over Prowl. All optics draw his way and Sunstreaker fights the urge to squirm, his spark quailing in his compartment. “I mean... I just...”
Tracks sighs and seems to sink further in his chair. “It's my fault.”
“It is not,” Prowl says and his tone is firm, invoking no argument. “You are not the one to blame for the senator's proclivities nor his actions.”
“I knew,” Tracks insists, digits flexing as his voice grows in volume. “I should have been prepared for something like this to happen. Arranged for better protection, rejected him sooner. Something.”
Sunstreaker pushes himself upright, and startles when Hoist rests a servo on his arm, helping him sit. The medic offers an apologetic smile, withdrawing his touch.
“I apologize,” Hoist says, his optics softening. “I only meant to help. Do you mind if I access your systems? I would like to complete my final check.”
Sunstreaker presses against the berth, away from the offered cable. “Check for what?”
Tracks mutters a curse subvocally, his energy field rippling with guilt and disgust, neither of which are directed at Sunstreaker.
“He has a right to know,” Hoist says.
“He's only a first frame, practically a youngling still!” Tracks snaps, anger sifting through the guilt. “Do you intend to make it worse?”
“Concealing the truth will not help matters. How is he to heal if he does not know the dangers?” Prowl says.
“And how is he supposed to feel safe carrying that knowledge?”
“I want to know,” Sunstreaker insists, raising his vocals to be heard, feeling forgotten in the wake of the three adults and their discussion. “And I'm not a youngling anymore, Tracks! That was a vorn ago!”
Silence. Sunstreaker's vents are heaving as though he's just sprinted down the halls of the manor, chasing after a rogue cleaning drone again. Tracks fidgets, Hoist pretends to study a piece of equipment and Prowl waits, his optics focused on Sunstreaker's brother.
A deep in-vent echoes in the room and Tracks sits up, both servos clasping Sunstreaker's own. “Sunny,” he says, and visibly hesitates, faceplate losing heat. “Malus was trying to force a bond with you.”
Coldness seeps into Sunstreaker's spark. “A bond?” He works his intakes, a rattle rippling across his plating. “Why?”
“Because I wouldn't accept his proposal on my behalf or yours.” Tracks' gaze falls to the berth lining, as though he can't bear to meet Sunstreaker's optics. “It is a little advertised but understood fact that Malus has certain tastes. Aware of that, I refused every offer he made, but he is not a mech used to taking no for an answer.”
Hoist makes a noise, one Sunstreaker can't decipher, but he says nothing, still busily investigating his equipment.
It still doesn't make much sense to Sunstreaker. Malus hardly needed Tracks' wealth. He was easily worth three times as much as their family. And there are better positioned, higher-ranked nobles to be found in the Towers.
“I don't understand,” Sunstreaker says and knows he's upset his brother because Tracks flinches, his energy field flushing a sickly guilt. “Why—?”
“Because Clarity had already refused him, he failed to acquire Synergy, and you were a safer target,” Prowl says, when it is obvious Tracks cannot find the words. “Malus assumed that once the bond was completed, there would be nothing any mech could do.”
Sunstreaker feels sick. His tanks roil, clenching on nothing. He presses his free hand to his chestplate, feeling his spark surge and churn beneath the metal, thicker than it used to be but still so very vulnerable.
He'd been that close to losing everything, losing himself.
He closes his optics, tries to find his balance again. It feels like he's falling even though he's sitting up on a berth. He's falling and there's nothing to catch him, nothing and no one.
“Sunstreaker.”
It takes more effort than it should for him to lift his gaze to Prowl, who has moved closer, his chassis shining in the bright medbay lighting, his Enforcer crest stark and gleaming.
“You have nothing to fear,” Prowl says, and presses a servo to his own chestplate, over his spark, palm flat. “Malus has been arrested. He will not hurt you again.”
The sickness doesn't go away. It surges and grows and the room is too small, there are too many mechs, and their energy fields grate against his own.
Sunstreaker curls into himself, servo still over his own spark. “I want to be alone.”
“I don't think--”
“Your systems are still in need of some rest,” Hoist says, before Tracks can finish whatever he intends to say. “Perhaps after a bit of recharge, you will be one hundred percent.”
Sunstreaker makes a non-committal noise. He just wants them all to go away. He wants to think without their words crowding him, their guilt and their comfort and their empty promises.
He turns on his side, servo slipping from Tracks' hold, facing the wall.
Tracks, of course, protests. “But--”
“He needs time,” Hoist says, voice quiet but not so much that Sunstreaker can't hear him. “Do not push, Lord Tracks.”
“It is just as well. I need to speak with you in private,” Prowl adds, and Sunstreaker watches their shadows on the wall, the medic and the Enforcer ushering his brother from the room.
“Fine,” Tracks acquiesces. “I will be back as soon as I can, Sunny. Rest well.”
And then he, too, is gone. The silence wraps around Sunstreaker like a mesh blanket, all consuming. There's a steady beep from the machines surrounding him. One arm is uncomfortably warm, from whatever is being injected into his lines.
His processor is clean and clear, unburdened by an unwelcome upload. His neural pathways itch with an imagined presence. He can still feel Malus within him. He doesn't want to close his optics.
Nothing's going to be the same ever again.
o0o0o
Dragline forces him out of the showers more than once, tutting over the streaks in Sunstreaker's paint, the places where protoform-grey shows beneath gold.
Tracks eventually locks him out, won't let him scrub unsupervised anymore. Sunstreaker feels like a sparkling and he argues with his brother about it. Tracks does not relent, only giving him that pitying, understanding look.
Sunstreaker hates it.
He hates the recharge purges more. He used to purge memories of pain and darkness and a mech named Wirelight.
Now, his cycles are interrupted by Malus.
His voice. His touch. His faceplate. His cables. His vents.
Sunstreaker hasn't had a full defrag cycle since... since then.
He ignores the inhibitor chips Hoist left for him, too. He can't really explain why except that he doesn't want to feel that helpless ever again and he doesn't know what effect the chip will have. He doesn't want to be so deep into recharge that he can't defend himself.
He hasn't been to his studio since either. It's pointless. He can only see shades of grey, flat edges, empty skies. His digits don't twitch. The blank datascreen stares at him, mocking him for his lack of talent.
Far better to let the studio get covered in dust.
So he wanders. Back and forth through the halls of the manor. He doesn't stray from the reach of Tracks' comm or that of Dragline's and Windshear's. He only drinks energon if Tracks brings it to him. He doesn't go outside anymore.
Nothing is the same and he doesn't know how to make it right again.
Tracks is stumped.
He tries, in his own way, but it's not enough or maybe too much.
Sunstreaker misses Nightfall terribly. His caretaker would have known what to do, how to fix this mess. He probably would have never let it happen in the first place.
Diun pass with no improvement.
Sunsreaker withdraws. He doesn't go to galas. He doesn't attend dignitary functions. His art supplies collect dust.
He onlines before fully cycling down with screams caught in his vocalizer and venting frantic bursts. Terror claws at him, inside and out.
His beautiful frame is a disgrace.
He can't do this. Something has to give before he breaks.
o0o0o
“I wish you'd let me help you,” Tracks whispers, one orn when he thinks Sunstreaker isn't listening.
He's supposed to be in recharge but Sunstreaker fakes it most of the time. He doesn't like to recharge. He doesn't want to shut down.
Sunstreaker can't think of anything that'll help.
“The Trading Post received a new shipment of paints today,” Tracks says on another morning, stormy with acid rain, preventing them from leaving the Tower. “I thought we could go look at them when the rain stops. Reverb tells me there's a dozen new shades.”
Curled in the windowseat, Sunstreaker watches the acid drip from the skies, sheeting down the window, pooling in the gutters and empty streets. “No, thank you.”
Tracks sighs a ventilation and sits on the edge of the seat, within touching distance though he doesn't reach out. “The Prime Exhibition is in a quartrex. Pre-sales start tomorrow. I can get us tickets.”
“You can go.”
Sunstreaker, however, has no intention of leaving anytime soon.
Frustration bleeds into Tracks' energy field before he can restrain it and Sunstreaker withholds his own wince.
Burden, that voice whispers at him. He doesn't have the strength to bat it away.
Tracks scrubs a servo over his helm, slumping where he sits. “Sunny, I'm worried about you,” he says. “This isn't healthy.”
Sunstreaker has no response for that. He hasn't the words for several vorns now.
“There's a mech,” Tracks continues when the silence stretches heavy and aching between them. “A medic. His designation is Rung. He's a processor specialist. I think you should--”
“No,” Sunstreaker says before Tracks can finish because he knows where Tracks is going with this and he's not going there. He's not going to let some medic mess around in his helm.
“He can help you, Sunny,” Tracks insists, frustration coloring his field a sickly edge. “You won't talk to me but you need to talk to someone. You can't keep on like this.”
Sunstreaker folds his arms over his drawn up knees, resting his chin upon them. Maybe, if he keeps himself quiet, he'll disappear.
Tracks sighs another ventilation. “Sunny...”
Nothing. No words. No answers.
It's no surprise when Tracks gets up and leaves a few breems later, his energy field hanging off his frame like a lead weight of disappointment. And then Sunstreaker has guilt to add to the shame filling up his spark. He's starting to run out of room.
o0o0o
He'll never be safe so long as he can't defend himself.
“I want to upframe,” Sunstreaker announces the next time Tracks brings him a cube of energon. His vocalizer sounds hoarse, he uses it so rarely.
Tracks cycles his optics in surprise. “You've been a first-frame for a vorn. You've centuries until an upframe is necessary, much less recommended.”
Sunstreaker folds his digits around the cube. “I want to upframe,” he repeats, because he's sure it's the only way.
“Sunny.” Tracks sighs and lowers himself down until he can meet Sunstreaker's optics. “I don't think--”
“I want to upframe,” he repeats, and there's a waver in his vocalizer that betrays the tremble wracking his frame. “And I want to learn Circuit-su. Or metallikato. Or crystalocution. Or Diffusion.” He stops, sucking in a ragged vent.
Tracks' mouthplates compress into a thin line. “It won't be comfortable,” he explains quietly.
It can't be any worse, Sunstreaker thinks.
He looks up at his brother, fatigue lining every corner of his energy field. “Please. I want... I need...” Sunstreaker hunches, unable to verbalize himself.
A moment of silence, think and tangible, falls between them.
Finally, Tracks releases a defeated ex-vent. “All right. I'll start work on a design immediately. And find you an instructor. Do you have any ideas regarding your upframe?”
Sunstreaker curls into himself. “I want to be strong,” he says, spark pushing a hesitant beat within him. “And fast.”
“And yellow?” Tracks says, but the tease falls flat. Once, it might have garnered a laugh.
Tracks' expression morphs into something unreadable as he rises back to his pedes. “Drink your energon, Sunny,” he says, pressing a kiss to Sunstreaker's helm. “It's going to be okay.”
He's been promising that since the incident. It hasn't come true yet.
o0o0o
He won't be small anymore. All that remains to ease is the helplessness.
There's a strange sense of not-belonging that lingers, like Tracks said. It's a bit uncomfortable, like he doesn't quite fit, but it's better, far better, than the weakness.
Sunstreaker admires himself in the mirror. Yellow-gold armor gleams in the lighting, perfectly polished. Helm vents frame his face, a carryover from his first frame. He's tall and sturdy now, with servos that are strong and capable.
Tracks had looked so sad when Sunstreaker vetoed his previous articulated design. But his old servos were too delicate. They wouldn't stand up against any use of force.
Tracks had argued that Sunstreaker wouldn't need to use force.
But Tracks didn't have purges of Malus haunting his recharge. He wouldn't and can't understand. Sunstreaker doesn't bother to help him try.
His door pings.
Excitement mingles with dread. Tracks hadn't said who he hired to train Sunstreaker, but he is assured that his brother wouldn't select someone untrustworthy. And despite Tracks' reluctance, Sunstreaker has gone ahead and downloaded all he can about Circuit-su into his processor. He knows the mechanics but a practical instruction will ensure he doesn't hurt himself applying them.
“Master Sunstreaker?”
“Coming!”
He gives himself a critical look once more in the mirror but can't see any imperfections. At least, not on the outside.
Satisfied, Sunstreaker steps out into the receiving room, only to cycle his optics in surprise at who's waiting for him.
“P-Prowl!?”
The Enforcer – or wait, the identifying crest is gone – offers him a soft smile. “Hello, Sunstreaker. You're looking much larger than I remember.”
“I've upframed,” he says, and struggles to regain his composure. “What are you doing here?”
Prowl gives Sunstreaker's frame an assessing glance. “I understand you need a circuit-su instructor. It so happens that I am an alpha-class in that discipline.”
“But...” Sunstreaker frowns, crossing his chassis. “Why would you have time? Are you not an Enforcer any longer?”
A soft vent escapes Prowl. “That, I believe, is a story too long to tell. You wish to learn, after all. And I can teach you.”
There's more to this, Sunstreaker realizes. But judging by Prowl's expression, maybe the former-Enforcer just doesn't want to talk about it.
“All right,” Sunstreaker says, relaxing fully. At least Tracks had found a mech he could trust. “I am a willing student.”
Prowl's sensory panels drift downward, displaying his own laxing tension. “And I am a willing instructor.” He gestures for Sunstreaker to come closer. “Sit. Let's discuss what you know already so I know where to begin.”
o0o0o
Sitting behind his desk, his brother looks quite distracted. There's an array of datapads, some stacked two or three high, and an empty decanter of mid-grade, spiced with magnesium, proof that Tracks has been working for some time.
“Hmm?”
Sunstreaker pulls up a chair, sliding into it. He probably shouldn't bother Tracks right now but the curiosity has been gnawing on his processor for the last diun and he has to know. Something about it feels necessary to know.
“Why were you able to hire Prowl?”
There's a long pause before Tracks puts down his stylus and sits back in his chair, rubbing his faceplate. “Because he was suspended from active duty pending the results of an investigation.”
“Pending?”
Tracks scowls, his lipplates pressing together in a thin, disapproving line. “It's a pretense. They have no intention of re-commissioning him.”
An uncertain feeling begins to coil in Sunstreaker's tanks. “Why?”
Venting softly, Tracks rubs his faceplate again. “Because Prowl is good at what he does and there are some who do not appreciate his dedication to his duty.”
Sunstreaker frowns. “That doesn't make any sense.”
“Not much does anymore, Sunstreaker.” Tracks reaches out, fiddling with one of his datapads again. Despite the energon, his optics are dim, his energy field heavy with fatigue.
How long has he been working this hard?
“When it comes to power,” Tracks continues, “some of us have it and some of us don't.” His faceplates shift, dark with anger. “Senator Malus has more power than any of us.”
Understanding trickles over Sunstreaker like an ice cold bath. “He was fired... because of me?” His servos scrub over his thigh plating.
“No.” Tracks leans forward, bracing his elbows on his desk, shoulders slumped. “He was too close to the truth and he refused to ignore it. He wanted Senator Malus to be imprisoned.”
And someone, most likely Malus himself, had Prowl dismissed instead. Because he's a senator and important and Sunstreaker is just the adopted sparkling of a frame-designer, wealthy but far from influential.
Sunstreaker sags, spark constricted into a tight band within his chassis. “I...”
“I'm sorry I didn't tell you.” Tracks' gaze dips down, as though focusing on his datapads is the easier course. “But you had enough to worry about.”
He presses his servo to his chestplate, that old pain returning with a vengeance, an ache in his spark that never fades. “So he got away with it. He's not even sorry. He'll probably do it again, if he hasn't already.”
“Yes,” Tracks admits and the fatigue in his tone is even more evident now, though he lifts his optics back to Sunstreaker. “But I swear, he's not coming near you again.”
It's not a consolation. Not at all.
What does it matter? If it's not Sunstreaker, it'll be some other mech. Probably a commoner with even less protection than Tracks has to offer.
Sunstreaker's tanks churn. He rises to his pedes, disgust like a thick web through his systems.
“Sunstreaker?”
He shakes his helm, turning toward the door, servos forming fists at his side. He needs to train, work harder at his lessons. He needs to master Circuit-su as soon as possible and move into another discipline.
His safety has only ever been an illusion.
o0o0o
He spends every online moment in the practice room until every motion becomes second nature to him. Until he can slide from one position to the next with instinctual smoothness.
Prowl doesn't only know circuit-su. He's fairly skilled with weaponry, too. He shows Sunstreaker how to fight with bladed weapons and how to use artillery. He's a fair shot with a blaster, though he won't be winning any tournaments.
Getting strong is the only thing that matters to Sunstreaker.
He tries not to notice how disappointed Tracks looks.
And he doesn't miss the madness that has somehow infected Cybertron the whole planet over.
Riots in Kaon. Building collapses in Tarn. Energon shortages. Mass desertions from the army and even larger groups of mechs leaving Cybertron in mass exodus.
Talk, talk, talk. The airwaves are full of it. Grumbling in the streets and over the net. Socials are rife with simmering tension, the few that Sunstreaker attends, and Tracks' commissions start to dry up. No one wants sparklings anymore, not that it matters. The Senate has put the Allspark on lockdown.
And in the midst of it all, Sentinel Prime abandons his post. Abandons Cybertron when it is most in need of a leader.
Little pockets of rebellion are rising everywhere, from Slaughter City to the gleaming gardens of Praxus. No one is happy. Everyone is hungry. Dissent ripples across the planet's surface in an encompassing wave.
“They call themselves the Decepticons,” Tracks says, disgust thick in his tone.
“What do they want?”
“Freedom. Equality. Or so they claim.” Tracks' servo makes a broad sweep over Sunstreaker's dorsal plating, wax swirling a fine polish over his armor. “But they seem more interested in chaos to me.
Equality. Sunstreaker contemplates.
“Maybe they're tired of being energy-starved. And cold.” His faceplates shift into a scowl. “Maybe they hate the Prime that's failed them.”
Sunstreaker can relate. Malus is out there, cheerfully existing in his freedom, with no care for the purges or the stain he's left on Sunstreaker's functioning.
Tracks sighs a ventilation. “Maybe. But it doesn't matter.” He picks up another cloth, smoothing the wax into a fine sheen. “The Enforcers will stop them soon enough.”
Tracks is wrong.
The Enforcers try but they are too few and the angry commoners, workers, laborers, and soldiers too numerous.
The riots increase as energon gets more and more scarce.
And then, the unthinkable.
Someone makes a mistake, the uneasy balance shatters, and Tarn suffers for that weakness.
It is a smoking heap. There are few survivors and any chance for peaceful resolution drains away like stripped paint.
The Decepticons blame the High Council, claiming it was a heavy-handed attempt to put down the rebellion.
The Senate and the Council claim that the Decepticons are at fault, trying to sow dissension and fear through Cybertron.
Without a Prime to lead them, and Primus a silent deity, there's no one to mediate, no one to slow the fierce rush to war.
Neither side bends. Both sides are lying. And the violence continues to erupt.
Sunstreaker doesn't know what to believe.
“We're Neutral,” Tracks tells him. “We're going to stay out of it. That's the only safe option to be had.”
Sympathizers to either debate are being harassed and attacked. The Decepticons wear their allegiance proudly, purple sigils stamped on their chestplates--or their wings, as many of the Vosian Seekers are flooding the cause.
“It won't last,” Sunstreaker replies, his optics fixed on the vidscreen, watching clip after clip of violence and misery and anger.
Tracks isn't so pessimistic. “Neither will the Decepticons.”
Sunstreaker, however, isn't so sure.
o0o0o
He’s left in the middle of the dark cycle without so much as a note or a word, abandoning a job he has held for most of his functioning.
Dragline tells them he's returned to Vos, looking for his hatchmates. That he's been talking about the Decepticons for diun but only where Tracks and Sunstreaker couldn't hear.
Are you going to leave us, too? Sunstreaker wants to ask, but he doesn't. He already knows the answer. He can see it in the firm set of Dragline's mouthplates.
Whatever promises the Decepticons have made, they are more alluring than the eons Dragline has spent working for their Tower.
Tracks is the only one surprised when, several diun later, Dragline vanishes, too. That it coincides with the Senate-sanctioned bombing of Tarn isn't lost on Sunstreaker.
Millions of flight-build mechs, offline in the streets, their homes turned to husks, their livelihoods ash. Sparklings and younglings and adults alike, all offline.
The backlash is terrible, violent, fear rippling through Cybertron like an infectious virus. An invisible line is drawn, Decepticons on one side, the Senate and the High Council and the Enforcers on the other. Neutrals, made of civilians and workers and nobles and laborers and soldiers alike, dance the great divide, wanting no part of the hostility.
It's an uneasy existence. Sunstreaker trains harder.
Uraya falls, vengeance for Tarn.
There's no such thing as a routine anymore.
Mechs fight in the streets over the tiniest scrap of energon. The shops close up. No one's requesting sparklings anymore.
Invitations for galas appear in Tracks' inbox on a weekly basis. It's enough to make Sunstreaker's tanks churn. How can they think about celebrating at a time like this? How can they party and laugh and have fun when Cybertron is tearing itself apart?
Tracks turns them down. He's too busy poring through their finances, trying to find stability on a planet bereft of it. He keeps saying that everything is going to be fine, and Sunstreaker wonders if his brother actually believes it.
o0o0o
Sunstreaker finishes and turns toward his brother, snagging a towel from a rack to wick the condensation off his frame. “Something happen?” he asks.
“We have to go to Iacon,” Tracks says, his optics assessing Sunstreaker's frame. “We need to leave in a breem.”
Sunstreaker frowns. “So soon? Why?”
“A new Prime's been chosen,” Tracks answers and his energy field gives another anxiety-driven ripple. “They've asked me to design his reformat.”
Confusion and surprise echo through Sunstreaker. “A new Prime?”
Tracks shakes his helm. “They wouldn't tell me much, but this is an opportunity I cannot let lie. Our inheritance is not unlimited.”
In other words, they are going broke and if things continue as they are, it will not be long before Tracks and Sunstreaker find themselves in the same crashing transport as everyone else, scrabbling for a scrap of energon in the streets.
It should be a great honor that Tracks has been offered this, but it stinks of desperation to Sunstreaker. He doesn't like it. But he also knows that Tracks is right. They cannot afford to turn it down.
“Will we get to meet him?” Sunstreaker asks as he falls into step beside his brother, Tracks' pace hurried and near-frantic. “The new Prime?”
Tracks huffs a ventilation. “I doubt it. We're not that high-ranked, Sunstreaker.”
“But you can't design a frame without knowing what he wants.”
Tracks gives Sunstreaker a long look, something inexplicable in his energy field. “I don't think the new Prime has much of a choice. The Council is signing off on the design.”
“That's slag,” Sunstreaker says, disgust winding through his field. “You can't put a spark into a frame it doesn't like.” He's not a frame-designer, but even he knows that much. Otherwise, you run the risk of the spark rejecting the chamber at first transfer, or worse, upon reboot, an input-output disconnect between the spark and its frame.
Sunstreaker's never seen it himself, but he's heard the stories from both Tracks and Nightfall before his offlining. Mechs go crazy, go glitched, when put into ill-fitting frames.
His brother ventilates a long cycle. “The Council seems to think that won't be an issue.” His frown deepens. “The Matrix has its own plan.”
“Matrix?”
Tracks shakes his helm. “That's all they would tell me.” His lips form a thin line of disapproval. “Come on. We don't have much time.”
Sunstreaker doesn't like the sound of any of this, but Tracks is right. He desperately needs the commission. They both do if they plan to survive.
Frag this war.
o0o0o
It's getting emptier and emptier in here. In the whole manor, truth be told. With no commissions flooding in, creds are getting tight. Energon is pricier and there are images to uphold. Better to sell a few useless artifacts.
Sunstreaker slides from one kata to the next, feeling the fluid shift in his motor cables, the motion as natural to him as venting. He's no master, not yet, but he's definitely on the right path to becoming one.
“Thank you,” he says, focusing intently on his efforts.
It helps. In the dark of night cycle when Sunstreaker lies online and stares at his ceiling, purges creeping at him from the shadows, the focus helps. He can ventilate, slow and steady, hear Prowl's voice in the back of his mind, like a soothing cadence.
He's not weak. Not anymore. And he has Prowl to thank for that.
“There is very little I have left to teach you,” Prowl continues, pacing in a slow circle around Sunstreaker, optics scrutinizing every flex of cabling and shift of plating. “Which is fortunate, all things considered.”
Sunstreaker pauses, mid-shift. “Fortunate?”
“Finish your routine,” Prowl says and Sunstreaker obeys before he fully processes the order. “I have been given an opportunity that I cannot refuse. It means, however, that I will be unable to continue your lessons.”
“What kind of opportunity?” Sunstreaker asks, though he does not allow himself to be distracted from his routine. If anything, Circuit-su has given him a great deal of focus.
“Excellent form,” Prowl praised and Sunstreaker felt the warmth building within him. “The new Prime is in need of a tactician.”
Sunstreaker caught himself from startling this time. “He asked for you specifically?”
“So I am told.”
Sunstreaker finished the last of his routine, condensation gathered on his frame, but otherwise he was unwinded. He turned toward Prowl, dipping his upper frame into a respectful bow, which Prowl returned, master to student.
“This will be our last lesson,” Prowl said as he straightened, sensory panels flicking into their usual position against his backplate. “You have been an excellent student, Sunstreaker. I hope that you continue your training.”
“Thank you.” Sunstreaker cycles a ventilation, shifting uneasily. “Are you certain this Prime is worth following?”
Prowl inclines his helm, doing Sunstreaker the courtesy of at least considering the question as opposed to dismissing him. “I can not be certain of anything anymore,” he says and he clasps his servos behind him, at the base of his spinal strut. “But having once met Sentinel, I have faith that the Primacy is finally on the right path. Optimus is a good mech.”
“And if he fails?”
Prowl meets his gaze firmly. “I shall have to be certain he does not.” There is so much conviction in Prowl's tone that Sunstreaker finds himself nearly forming a faith of his own in the new Prime, this Optimus who holds the fate of Cybertron in his newly-crafted servos.
Sunstreaker does not trust the Senate, the High Council, or the Primes. But he does trust Prowl, he believes in the former Enforcer's convictions. And if Optimus has enough sense to bring Prowl in as his tactician, perhaps he is not as large a fool as his predecessors.
“He made a good choice,” Sunstreaker says. “The best. He's lucky to have you.”
Prowl's lips quirk upward in a faint smile. “Thank you.” He unclasps his servos, offering one. “Good luck, Sunstreaker.”
“And to you as well.”
o0o0o
Tracks skids, nearly collides with another mech, and bursts into his root mode, staring with evident horror at the fireball that their home had become. Sunstreaker's transformation is equally awkward, his spark a clench of distress in his chassis.
“I don't understand,” Tracks is saying, more to himself but Sunstreaker can hear him anyway. “We were Neutral!” His servos form fists at his side, energy field a wave of desolation and despair.
Sunstreaker says nothing. He has no words and the few he might have, feel juvenile. He had guessed, long ago, that Neutral means nothing to the Decepticons.
The streets are getting clogged with citizens, all shifting to root-mode, all staring with horror at the destruction of the once-beautiful skyline. Mechs and femmes alike are gaping. Somewhere, a sparkling is crying. Adults are keening as well.
Nearby, a mech drops to his knees, a mournful warble filling the night-cycle, his frame slumped in misery.
“Out of the street!” Someone shouts. “Run!”
Sunstreaker hears them long before he sees them, the sound of battle-class engines, Seeker engines. He hears something that's like a piercing shriek, a sharp rap-rap-rap that echoes above everything else. And then the ground rumbles and the world shatters.
Fire.
Fire and smoke and the feel of servos grasping at his armor.
Sunstreaker hits the ground hard, systems screaming errors at him, his left leg a mangled wreck of pain and agony. His visuals perform an automatic reset, but all he can see is a haze of smoke and energon splattered around him, so bright against the dark of the street. He coughs, ventilations stuttering on ash, and that sound, it's still there, shrieking and getting louder.
There's shouting. Someone trips over his frame, their pede impacting Sunstreaker's mid-section and he grunts in pain. Someone else tramples on his leg and Sunstreaker shouts, vision fritzing with static. Primus, it hurts.
He has to get up. He has to run. He has to... Tracks? Where is his brother?
Sunstreaker pulls himself up, helm swinging back and forth. “Tracks!” he shouts, spark hammering in his chest like it's trying to burst free. “Tracks!” He tries his brother's comm and gets dead air.
Nothing. Like a blanket of silence has been dropped on the city.
Sunstreaker looks down at his leg, which is a mangled mess of circuitry and plating and energon pooling beneath him. His HUD is already shouting errors at him, warning him of energon loss. Cold sweeps through Sunstreaker's systems, pain stabbing him in all directions. His paint is charred and there's heat at his backplate.
Something's on fire.
Mechs are running, screaming, crying. The sound of Seeker engines still fill the sky above him, along with the noise of weapons-fire.
He needs to stop the leaking somehow. Sunstreaker has no medical training whatsoever but that seems pretty obvious to him. He pulls out his polishing cloth and a few strips of metallic mesh, kept on hand when he used to sketch.
He needs to find Tracks. He needs a medic and to get away. He can hear fighting, the sound of metal against metal, and the world shudders again. Something explodes. Everything is a blur of fire and smoke and his vents stutter again, choking on the ash.
“Sunny!”
His helm swings around, hearing his brother's voice. He shouts for him again, peering into the smoky dim. “I'm here!”
Tracks limps into view, one arm dangling at his side, energon streaked down his frame. But he's mobile, and that's what matters to Sunstreaker. He's injured, but it's not life-threatening.
“The Decepticons are bombing Protihex,” Tracks says as he drops to his knees beside Sunstreaker, one hand running over the gold frame. “Primus, your leg.”
“It hurts,” Sunstreaker says, unable to hide the relief in his energy field.
Tracks worries at his bottom lip. “You need a medic,” he says. “We have to get out of here.” His optics shift away, trying to peer through the madness.
“There's nowhere to go.” Sunstreaker struggles to pull in a ventilation, his plating clamped closely to his frame. “We can't go home.”
“No, we can't.” Tracks ex-vents softly and stoops, throwing Sunstreaker's arm over his good shoulder. “Come on. We have to get out of the street.”
Pain lances through Sunstreaker's sensor net as Tracks jerks him up. He struggles to balance on the one limb, everything Prowl had taught him about focus entirely forgotten.
A gasp escapes from Tracks' vents. “Come on, Sunny. You have to help me out here.”
“I'm trying,” he grits out, struggling to get his one functional leg beneath him as he throws his arm over Tracks' shoulders.
The ground shudders again, throwing off his balance. He clings to Tracks' side, ignoring a hiss of pain when his digits skitter off an open wound. The smell of ash and charred energon is so thick in the air it burns.
“Where are we going?”
“Somewhere out of the streets,” Tracks says. “We need shelter.”
Sunstreaker cycles his optics through a variety of settings, at last having another use for the range of acuity. “There's a building over there. It's still standing,” he says, pointing in a vaguely leftward direction. “It's close enough.”
“Then that's where we'll go.”
It's a grueling trip, Sunstreaker stumbling as Tracks tries to drag him toward the dubious shelter. Explosions rattle through the air, the ground rumbles, but the press of a frantic crowd has gone at least. All that's left are the sounds of mechs and femmes groaning in pain, pleading for help from anyone who might answer. It's chaos.
“I told them,” Tracks mutters, sounding frustrated and broken all at once. “I told Clarity that we couldn't reason with them. But they wouldn't listen, frag it. Creds aren't enough, I argued. Frag them all!”
Exhaustion sets in. Sunstreaker sags, his lower extremities feeling cold. His HUD screams another warning at him, shouting about energy loss. Quarternary functions have already shut down and Tertiary systems have begun a countdown.
Something in the distance explodes into a ball of red-hot flame. Blaster fire echoes in a sharp rapport. It's getting closer.
“Almost there,” Tracks says as Sunstreaker's digits tighten in their grip.
The pain is too sharp, too sudden. Sunstreaker's ventilations stagger, heat spilling through his frame in an unwelcome wave. His helm throbs to the same frantic beat of his spark. His world goes grey around the edges.
“Sunstreaker!”
His optics snap open, frame rattling left and right as Tracks gives him a hard shake. “Don't offline on me. I need you aware and focused.”
“M'not,” Sunstreaker replies, and surprises himself with the glitchy slur. He sags a bit more against his brother, who grunts at the additional weight.
Tracks adjusts his grip, hauls Sunstreaker higher, and takes another few steps.
There's a loud rattle and then Tracks gives him a harsh jerk. Sunstreaker yelps as he's pulled inside a building, some kind of general shop by the look of things. Turning to kick the door shut, Tracks loses his grip and Sunstreaker clatters to the floor, jarring his shattered leg.
“Ow!”
A rattle and a clunk, a shriek of protesting guide-rails and the door shuts, sealing them inside. Sunstreaker tries to pull himself upright, leaning against the low wall beneath the front window. He's panting hard, pain making it difficult to think.
“We should be safe here,” Tracks says as he comes back to Sunstreaker, kneeling in front of him.
“For now,” Sunstreaker grunts.
“Yes, for now. Let me see that leg.” Tracks' servos gingerly run over the ruined plating, shredded lines, and twisted metal. “This is going to have be completely rebuilt.”
“So you're a medic now?”
Tracks gives him a long look. “You don't design frames without knowing a bit about how they work.” He sighs, glancing over his shoulder. “There has to be something here we can use to seal the lines.”
The world's going grey again. Sunstreaker makes a noncommittal noise, feeling his frame sag against the wall, metal skritching against metal. He tries to catch himself but his arms flop uselessly. His chassis aches, a familiar pain.
Tracks is talking. He can see his brother's lipplates moving, feel the worried and fearful edge in Tracks' field, but he can hear nothing. There's a weird rushing in his audials, a strange numbness from his motor cables.
And then the grey darkens to black.
o0o0o
“Be careful!” his brother yells and Sunstreaker feels himself being lifted by an invisible force.
No. Tracks is here. Not Malus. He's safe.
The scent of hot metal invades his olfactory sensors.
His frame jostles and there's pain and then darkness again. A darkness without Tracks and Sunstreaker's shouting but no one hears him.
Servos on his plating, servos he doesn't know and Sunstreaker jerks, fear turning his insides to a white-hot flush of desperation.
“Shh, shh,” a voice says, and it doesn't help because Malus had shushed him, too. “It's okay.”
Sunstreaker's vocalizer clicks but no words emerge, except a terrified keen.
“I'm a medic,” the voice says, trying to be soothing but utterly failing. “I'm going to help you. I promise.”
Something grasps his arm. There's a pinch, and then it's the darkness again. Sunstreaker is starting to hate that inky, silent black. It's not quite recharge, but something outside of it, where his processor flits about from one purge to the next.
The darkness lightens to grey. Sensation returns in itchy prickles across his sensory net. His servos twitch. His audials online before his optics, but the itch in his haptic net is the worst.
“--around any moment now.”
“Thank you,” he hears, recognizing his brother's distinct tones.
“My pleasure,” says an unfamiliar voice, similar to the medic's tone when he had been briefly cognizant earlier. “He's got a strong spark, for all that it's... unusual.”
Tracks' engine rumbles. “If it's all the same to you, I'd prefer if you didn't share that little detail with anyone else, especially your commanding officers.”
Systems reboot and recalibrate. Sunstreaker's optics online, his world muted shades of color and blurry lines and bright, bright lights.
“Don't be concerned. I am a medic first. We have rules regarding privacy,” the voice replies and Sunstreaker is starting to recognize it. There is an edge of familiarity to it. “That is, so long as it does not threaten the Prime.”
“Of course,” Tracks agrees.
Shapes coalesce, taking form. Sunstreaker cycles his optics and finds himself staring at a pale ceiling, lights bright and annoying. He winces, turning his helm away, only to come face to face with a familiar mech.
“Hoist,” he says, surprise coloring his tone.
“You remember me,” the medic replies, clearly delighted. “I am flattered. How are you feeling?”
Sunstreaker twitches, only to wince again. “Sore,” he replies and turns his helm, spying Tracks sitting nearby. His brother looks completely patched up, his arm restored, the cuts and scores in his plating fixed. His paint is terrible, but merely cosmetic. “Are you..?”
“I'm fine,” Tracks says, backing up the reassurance with a smile. “It's you we were worried about.”
“Severe energon loss can be a problem,” Hoist agrees. “Luckily, you are in the finest servos that the Helix Academy of Engineering has to offer. You have a new leg as well.”
Sunstreaker sits up, though Hoist moves to help him, and looks down. He does have a new limb, one protoform bare and unarmored. He'll need new plating and paint to match his own else he'll look horribly mismatched.
“And we appreciate that,” Tracks says when Sunstreaker finds himself wordless.
Hoist smiles, patting Sunstreaker on the shoulder as he rises to his pedes. “I recommend medical grade energon while his self-repair is integrating the new leg. He should be one-hundred percent within a few orn.”
“Again, thank you.” Tracks half-rises, tipping his helm in a respectful bow.
“Your recovery is all the thanks I need.”
Hoist leaves them alone, door sliding open and shut behind him.
“Where are we?” Sunstreaker asks, taking the opportunity to look around him.
It's a small room in a medical bay, no doubt. The shutters on the windows are drawn and there's a thick-paned inner window. They are probably under observation.
“Iacon.” Tracks rises fully, moving to the window where he draws the shutters. “It is one of the few cities still under Autobot control.”
Sunstreaker looks down, poking at his bare leg, watching pistons hiss and shift as he attempts to move it. It is strange to see his limb without the protective plating. “Autobot?”
“That's what they call themselves. The red symbol on Hoist's chestplate is their mark.”
Tracks peers into an inky night cycle. “They are remnants of the Senate's guard, plus merchants, civilians, you name it. They say they fight against the Decepticons.”
Sunstreaker sighs, leaning back against the head of the berth, frowning. “You don't believe them?”
“I do. I am disappointed it has come to this.” Tracks turns away from the window, returning to the chair where he sits with a gravity that belies his upbringing. “They are led by Optimus Prime.”
“The self-same mech Prowl serves?”
“The very one.”
Sunstreaker's helm dips, contemplating. This Decepticon uprising has become too much if it requires another faction to fight against it.
“They did their best but we are some of the few survivors from the attack on the Towers,” Tracks continues, his gaze distant and his energy field flat. “There's nothing left.”
Sunstreaker's digits draw together on one servo, the other tracing the bare protoform of his leg. “What now?”
“The Autobots have arranged transport for all survivors to a Neutral colony. It leaves at the start of day shift.”
“No.”
He feels Tracks' optics on him and Sunstreaker looks up, meeting his brother's gaze. “No. I'm not going to some Neutral colony.”
Tracks frowns, his orbital ridge flattening. “What are you talking about?”
Sunstreaker shakes his helm, nameless emotions squirming around his spark. “I want to fight. I want to do something more than cower in fear.”
“We're not fighters.”
“We'll learn.”
“We'll just get ourselves scrapped.”
Sunstreaker flattens his servo over his chestplate, feeling the burn of his spark beneath. “Then we'll have died for something rather than of something.”
Tracks ex-vents loudly, servo sliding down his faceplate as he sags in his chair. His optics offline. “I don't understand you anymore.”
You never did. But Sunstreaker doesn't say as much aloud. It's unnecessarily harsh. Tracks has tried, which is more than most mechs have, and that's what has always been important. The attempt.
“I'm going to fight,” Sunstreaker says, and surprises himself with the conviction in his tone. “You can go to the colony.”
Tracks' mouthplates flatten with disapproval. “I'm not going to leave you here, Sunstreaker. That's not how this works.”
You don't owe me anything. Sunstreaker never says that either though he has thought it often enough over the vorns.
“I hope I am not interrupting anything.”
Sunstreaker stiffens at the unexpected voice. He awkwardly turns on the berth, looking to the doorway, where a red and white mech waits expectantly. The red crest of the Autobots is prominent on his chestplate, but there is another symbol as well, one Sunstreaker does not recognize.
“A family debate, nothing more,” Tracks says with practiced, polite ease. He straightens in his chair. “Have you found any more survivors?”
The mech shakes his helm, stepping fully inside so that the door can slide shut behind him. “We have not, unfortunately. The Decepticons were quite thorough.”
Blue optics track to Sunstreaker, giving an assessing glance. “You are looking in better repair, Sunstreaker. I am glad to see it.”
“Red Alert was a part of the team that rescued us,” Tracks explains as Sunstreaker starts to bristle.
His indignation deflates before it manages to build up much steam. “Thanks,” Sunstreaker says.
“It was luck that we found you,” Red Alert replies. “There isn't much left in Crystal City anymore. It's a ruin.” His plating lifts and flattens, a soft sigh escaping his vents. “I've come to inform you that you have a place on the next orn's shuttle. I'll return to escort you when it is about to depart.”
“We're not going,” Sunstreaker says.
Red Alert turns, an orbital ridge lifting.
“What he means,” Tracks hastily interjects, rising to his pedes, “is that we would prefer to join the Autobots rather than run away.”
“You do know that it's not required? We didn't help you to force you to join our ranks,” Red Alert explains, a cautious relief in his tone. “This is war. Mechs are dying. You shouldn't make such a decision lightly.”
“Cowering in a Neutral colony is no safer than joining the fight here and now.” Sunstreaker's servo slides down from his chestplate, landing in his lap. “There's no such thing as Neutrality. Not in this.”
Red Alert tilts his helm. “Optimus Prime respects Neutrality.”
“And Megatron doesn't.” Sunstreaker lifts his chin and yes, he knows the name of the villain, the enemy. He has paid enough attention to the vids, to the rough and craggy voice bellowing about freedom and dignity while ripping the sparks out of any mech standing in his way. “If you're not a Decepticon, you're an enemy. His destruction of the Towers has made that clear.”
Silence ripples through the tiny medroom.
“It's our decision,” Tracks finally says in a quiet tone. “We have no skills, no experience, but we can learn. We can help.”
“Fortunately, or unfortunately depending on your point of view, we Autobots are largely comprised of mechs with little military experience. You will not be out of place.” Red Alert offers them a faint smile. “I will present your petition to my superior officers but I have no doubt you will be accepted.”
A few lines of polite chatter later and Red Alert leaves them alone, with a promise to send another Autobot at a later date to explain the rules, regulations, and what would be required of them.
Tracks cycles a ventilation, sinking back down in his chair. He turns his helm toward the window, bracing his chin on his servo. “I cannot decide if Nightfall would be proud or dismayed by this.”
“Nightfall's not here,” Sunstreaker says and there's an edge to his tone that he can't restrain no matter how much he tries. “We're on our own.”
“Not entirely.” Tracks energy field stretches out then, reaching for Sunstreaker's, warm with affection and exasperation both. “I'm still your brother. And I'm still here.”
Sunstreaker's lipplates twitch. “Yes, you are,” he agrees and returns the pulse of warmth with affection and gratitude of his own.
Together. Come what may.
End Act II
