[TF] Despicable Me - 09

[dracoqueen22]

Despicable Me
Chapter Nine

Time passes.

Not quickly enough for Megatron’s liking, and far too quickly for hope of Soundwave’s rapid recovery.

It becomes obvious that he is of no use while perched at Soundwave’s bedside. He spends several days doing it anyway, because he doesn't know what else to do with himself. He is assured that the scientists are all working speedily and diligently, and while Megatron is loath to trust the word of an Autobot, he knows he can trust Shockwave’s work ethic when it comes to a scientific quandary.

Idling has never been one of Megatron’s strong points. The longer he watches over Soundwave, the longer the anger burns in his tanks, until it becomes a bubbling mass he can’t ignore. It rises up and up in his intake, and if he doesn’t find something else to do, he’s going to make a decision he’ll regret.

One of which Orion in the corner will highly disapprove.

He leaves Soundwave, and the Autobot rookie is pacing the hallway outside, as he always seems to be. He perks when he sees Megatron, then abruptly schools his expression into something stern.

If Ultra Magnus had intended to assign Megatron the least-offensive babysitter, he’d succeeded. Megatron can’t decide if Smokescreen annoys or amuses him.

“I need access to the intranet,” Megatron tells him.

Smokescreen shifts his weight, his face telling Megatron of his indecision, his hesitation, before he cycles a ventilation and says, “Okay. We have a place you can do that.”

“Without restriction?” Megatron asks.

Smokescreen scratches at his nasal ridge. “I mean, you won’t be able to get into any of the secure databases, but it’s not like we have a caretaker-lock on the system.”

“It’ll do.”

Smokescreen takes him to a building, centrally located in Kaon, small and squat, with wide open doors that suggest a general welcome. No one looks twice at Megatron as he enters, and he realizes he doesn’t recognize any of the mechs loitering about or perched at the publicly available workstations. They all have the appearance of youth -- soft and yielding armor, innocent optics, and unshielded fields, betraying their emotional state to anyone who might be interested.

Newsparks, Megatron realizes too late. These are all products of Optimus’ sacrifice, of the Well’s first bloom.

He doesn’t recognize them, and they don’t recognize him.

What are the Autobots telling the newsparks about the war? About the Decepticons? About why Cybertron is in its current state? Are they telling them anything? Have they painted the Decepticons as monsters?

A few gazes linger on Megatron’s chassis, on the Decepticon badge still gracing his armor, pitted though it is. Others notice and quickly look away.

Megatron sits at an unoccupied workstation and ignores the way his armor crawls under the scrutiny. He has more important things to do -- such as determining which Decepticons currently reside on Cybertron. It’s an answer he could’ve gotten without the database.

Shockwave, Soundwave, and Megatron are the only registered Decepticons. If others have petitioned to return home, Megatron can’t find any record of them. There have been no transmissions from farflung Decepticons, or any attempts by the Autobots to contact them.

They have, of course, reached out to other Autobots and a few Neutrals.

Unacceptable.

The anger returns, vibrating through his armor, through his engine, through his spark. Megatron does not know how to find his Decepticons. He sincerely doubts the Autobots are willing to provide the assistance he needs, either.

If he is going to bring his soldiers home, he will require Soundwave’s assistance.

Let them try and deny the Decepticons to their face. Let them say aloud that the Decepticons don’t belong, and see what happens then. Megatron does not want to fight again, but he won’t sit idly by while everything he fought for rusts into ignominy.

Megatron clears his search history and stands from the workstation. Nearby, Smokescreen startles out of his wall-lean, as if he’d been halfway to a stasis nap.

“Get what you need?” he asks with a guileless smile.

“Not even close,” Megatron says.

He leaves without waiting to see if Smokescreen will follow, and pauses once he’s among the bustling throng of newsparks and returned Autobots, all hurrying to whatever tasks fill their days. To his left, the Autobot headquarters rises like a beacon for all around, to his right, construction equipment dominates the skyline. Above, Eradicons zip through the air without a hint of their former badge to be seen.

Had the Autobots convinced them all to defect? Had they given the Vehicons and Eradicons a choice in the matter?

“You are hardly one to judge,” Orion murmurs in his audial. “They were little more than canon fodder to you as well.”

Megatron snarls and turns to the left, pushing through the crowds until there are fewer and fewer Cybertronians around. Here, there is too much reconstruction for there to be anything but work crews. While Optimus and the Autobots had made use of the Omega Lock, it had not been enough to restore Cybertron in its entirety.

It was a good start.

It’s not enough. It will never be enough until the Decepticons are welcome home as well.

Megatron pauses in front of a large, open space. It only takes him a moment to register its use. For all that the war is over, self-defense is apparently a thing the Autobots find necessary to train the newsparks.

He recognizes Arcee and Wheeljack both -- one of them working on hand to hand combat while the other focuses on marksmanship. The echoing rapport of blanks firing across the target range floats to Megatron’s audials.

Are they training an army or is it purely for self-defense? Have the Autobots already sunk their claws into the newsparks just as they’ve manipulated the Vehicons and Eradicons? What great danger do they expect the newsparks to face?

Megatron has half a processor to leap into the training arena and demand answers from the two Autobots, save that he knows one of them would rather shoot first than listen, and the other is too reckless to know what he’ll do. They might accuse him of being violent, and while Megatron has never been one to restrain himself, Soundwave’s condition holds him back.

He does not trust the Autobots to keep to their word if Megatron causes trouble. They might forego repairing Soundwave if only to spite him.

His Autobot shadow is still here.

“Smokescreen.”

Surprise radiates from the mech, but he cautiously moves up next to Megatron. “Yeah?”

“Did my soldiers have a choice?”

Smokescreen’s sensory panels hike up in outrage. “What are you talking about? Of course they -- oh.” He scratches at his nasal ridge. “You mean the Vehicons, right? And the Eradicons?”

Megatron folds his arms, optics narrowed as he continues watching the newsparks in their Autobot training, a few Vehicons lurking in the background as they perform janitorial tasks.

“Honestly, as soon as we told them that they’d have energon and medical care and wouldn't have to fight anymore, most of ‘em practically ripped off their badges.” Smokescreen gives him a sidelong look and inches a few steps away. “They have to work, same as anyone else, but they don’t do jobs they don’t want to do. Most of ‘em like rebuilding.”

Megatron works his jaw, a sour taste at the back of his intake. “Most?”

“About a dozen or so just… wandered off.” Smokescreen makes a vague gesture out of Kaon. “I don’t know if they left the planet or decided to try their luck on their own in a different city. We figured they’d come back if they wanted to.”

Smokescreen coughs into his fist and sidesteps until he’s far from Megatron’s reach, but still close enough to be heard. “It was hard, at first, because we thought they were drones for the longest time, but then it turns out they aren’t? At least, not entirely.”

The Eradicons and Vehicons had been Shockwave’s purview. He’d been the one to design their frames, to build Megatron’s army and supply him with his endless troops. He’d reassured Megatron that they were clones, endlessly copied after the perfect, Decepticon soldier, and more intelligent than the average drone, but still, essentially, a drone.

A drone with a spark apparently.

Guilt clawed at Megatron’s chassis. He should have paid more attention, asked more questions. He should have looked deeper into Shockwave’s research, instead of gleefully accepting the Vehicons as more cannon fodder to throw in Optimus’ way. They’d outnumbered the Autobots thanks to the Vehicons and Eradicons. Many a battle had been won by his loyal, obedient, and seemingly endless army.

“Ratchet says their sparks are kind of primitive compared to ours, but they do have them, so we gave the ones who stayed citizenship, and let them pick their own names. They, um, also had some Decepticon loyalty coding.” Smokescreen gives him another sidelong look, and moves away again, far enough that their conversation is now absurd. “We took it out of those who asked us to.”

Smokescreen shuffles his feet. “I don’t really get it, but if you ask Ratchet, he could probably tell you more.”

“I’ll be sure to do that,” Megatron mutters, not that he has any intention of following through. Smokescreen is too stupid to lie. He’s quite sure the mech has told him everything there is to know.

At least he’s kind enough not to call Megatron a despot to his face even if it is painfully true. In his search for equality, Megatron had let his anger and desperation make a choice which led to the enslavement of others.

Worse than a despot, he is a hypocrite.

“Uh, Megatron?” Smokescreen inches back closer to him. “I just got a comm from the scientists. They have some good news for you.”

Megatron whirls toward him, and Smokescreen leaps back before squaring his shoulders and lifting his chin.

“They’ve rebuilt the formula?” Megatron asks.

“That’d be my guess,” Smokescreen says, and throws a thumb over his shoulder. “Want to head back or…?”

At last.

Some good news.

Megatron does not answer Smokescreen because it should be fairly obvious what he intends to do. His regrets about the Vehicons will have to wait.

Soundwave comes first.

~

Starscream doesn’t know why this is worse.

It had been uncomfortable watching Megatron sit at Soundwave’s side as if he can will his most loyal servant into surviving longer. It is downright revolting to see Megatron stand in front of Soundwave’s CR tube, gazing up at Soundwave’s floating frame as if their parting is something he can scarcely bear.

It bothers Starscream, and he’s not sure why.

It just does.

He hates that it bothers him in the first place.

“It’ll take awhile for us to synthesize enough for another burst of the Omega Lock, but that we can do it at all is a fragging miracle,” Ratchet mutters behind him, less conversational and more of a general grumble. “Still too much of a cheat in my opinion but it’s not like anyone asked me.”

Starscream glances over his shoulder to find his partner furiously scribbling in a datapad, hunched and slightly manic. “No one has to ask your opinion. You always freely offer it.”

Ratchet peers up at him, optics narrowing. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

Starscream forces himself to turn away from the window so he doesn’t sit and stare at Megatron and Soundwave and a decency he never earned from either of them. “Nothing,” he sighs. “How long until Soundwave recovers?”

“Situations like these aren’t exact sciences. It’ll depend on his will to live,” Ratchet says, but he’s still squinting at Starscream, when he’d usually leap on Starscream’s acerbic tone as an opportunity for some witty repartee. “It’ll be a week at least.”

“Wonderful.” Starscream slides in front of his workstation and picks up the vial of omega fluid, swirling it within the tempered glass.

My but hadn’t Shockwave been smug when their combined efforts resulted in a functional formula. As smug as Shockwave is capable of emoting, at any rate.

“Cybertron is saved,” Starscream mutters as he stares at the fluid. “Soundwave will be back to his old self soon. What a cause for celebration.”

Ratchet puts down the datapad with a quiet click and circles the workstation, edging into Starscream’s peripheral vision. “I’d say we’re still more or less performing emergency surgery on a dying patient to stabilize them. Cybertron has a long way to go.”

Starscream makes a non-committal noise.

Ratchet plucks the vial of omega fluid from his hand and sets it on the workstation. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” Starscream bites out, but he knows it’s a lie as well as Ratchet does. He tries to rein in his field, but it’s a dark, poisoned thing. It roils and writhes to match the seething hate and envy boiling in his spark.

Only for Soundwave would Megatron be diligent and loyal. He is the only mech to earn Megatron’s approval and praise, while Starscream had worked twice as hard to receive half as much. Megatron had made every effort to break Starscream, while devoting his passion toward lifting Soundwave onto a pedestal.

They are opposites. Always have been. Soundwave with his vow of silence; Starscream with his ideas and suggestions, daring to speak when one of Megatron’s outlandish plans was destined to bring them to ruin. His only crime had been his intelligence, seeing outcomes where Megatron’s need to outshine Optimus Prime was not tactically sound.

But no.

Soundwave had been content to let Megatron destroy them, so blinded was he by his loyalty. So convinced Megatron had the just and right path, even if it meant the wrong decisions. Meant abandoning the Decepticons and returning with that poison, that dark energon. In Starscream’s opinion, said dark energon was a direct line from a position of triumph, to their sound defeat by an enemy they outnumbered and out-powered in every other way.

Damn them both.

Starscream hates them, and he despises them, and he’d saved Megatron, but Soundwave’s is the berthside where Megatron clings. Shockwave finished the omega formula, and he’ll be praised, and Starscream is here, half an Autobot, whose loyalty isn’t enough. Will never be enough.

Ratchet pulls him into an embrace, and Starscream realizes he’s shaking. His vents hitch, and his hands have pulled into fists, his wings vibrating so deeply that they ache. His optics burn, and the scream rises up in his intake, burns at the tip of his glossa, until he swallows it down. Grinds his denta. Lets it beat against the back of his denta.

Starscream clings to him, this old, grumpy, half-rusted Autobot medic who knows better than to ask questions, and the value of a quiet moment where Starscream can grieve over the things he’s never had, and never will.

But he still doesn’t regret saving Megatron -- and by extension, Soundwave. How’s that for pathetic?

“I hate them both,” Starscream says, when the silence has grown too heavy, and the words won’t cease trying to claw out of his intake. If he doesn’t say something, he’s going to explode.

“I know,” Ratchet says.

He cups Starscream’s face, thumbs sweeping the ridge of his cheeks, and he says, “I’m proud of you for saving them anyway.”

Starscream scoffs, rolling his optics. “I didn’t do it for praise.”

“Didn’t you?” Ratchet arches an orbital ridge, full of too much knowledge about Starscream to be anything but right. “Not from us, of course. You don’t care what Autobots have to say.”

A scowl twists his lips. “You don’t know me.”

“You think I don’t. There’s a difference.” Ratchet gives him a crooked smile and draws Starscream’s forehead down to his, the warmth of his field soothing over the jagged edges of Starscream’s tangled emotions. “If you’re worried that I’m jealous, I’m not. I know what you’re looking for from them isn’t the same as what you want from me.”

Starscream grips his hips, talons scraping light curls over Ratchet’s armor. “Speak plainly, medic. I don’t have the patience for riddles.”

Ratchet strokes his cheek again. “You admired Megatron, and so you wanted to be validated by him, but you learned far too late that the only mech who ever mattered to him was Orion Pax.”

The designation is like a knife to the spark.

If there is one mech he hates more than Soundwave, it is Orion Pax. Not merely Optimus Prime, but Orion Pax, the mech who built something with Megatronus, and when he threw it aside, he ruined the great leader Megatron could have become.

Optimus Prime and Orion Pax are not the same mech, Starscream doesn’t care what anyone has to say about it. The Matrix killed Orion Pax; the same as the Allspark killed Optimus Prime. And neither of them died at Megatron’s hands.

“He isn’t worthy of my admiration,” Starscream mutters.

“He used to be. A long, long time ago.” Ratchet’s hands slide, resting on Starscream’s shoulders, thumbs stroking his intake cables gently. “I don’t blame you for that. Megatron wasn’t wrong in the beginning.”

Starscream snorts. “He used to be good at the speeches. He said exactly the things mechs wanted to hear.” He cycles a ventilation and eases out of Ratchet’s embrace. Last thing he needs is someone walking in and seeing his moment of weakness. “We can’t do anything for Soundwave but let him cook. Why don’t we go work on some of our own projects for a while?”

“Or we could go back home and indulge in some much needed rest,” Ratchet suggests, his vocals light, but something sly in the undertone. Rare is the occasion when Ratchet is playful; Starscream feels he ought to pull out a calendar just to mark the date.

“You’re just trying to get me out of the lab,” Starscream accuses.

Ratchet rolls his shoulders. “Well, don’t let me stop you from staring through the window and seething. If you’d rather do that than share an oil bath with me, that’s your prerogative.”

Starscream stares as Ratchet pats him on the cheek and turns away, the heat in his field lingering before Ratchet tugs it away.

He pauses in the doorway, however, his hand resting on the frame as he looks back at Starscream. “We wouldn’t have accomplished half as much in Kaon without you, Starscream. And we’d have lost the war if you’d been given half a chance. You don’t need Megatron. You never have.”

And then he’s gone, and Starscream’s spark thrums a happy cadence in his chassis.

He glances at the window, where Megatron stands vigil over a mech so blinded by his loyalty he’s lost everything that ever mattered to him, and then Starscream goes after his partner.

Maybe Megatron can’t let go of the past, but nothing’s stopping Starscream from doing it on his own.

It’s time to live for himself.

~

There are far too many emotions lingering in the air. It makes every vent taste stale, and had Shockwave the means, he’d find some method of removing emotional output for all those he’s forced to work with.

He supposes he is meant to feel guilty or ashamed, judging by the outraged looks the Autobot medic keeps tossing his direction. He’s unsure what Knock Out wants of him, since the Decepticon defector is keeping a ridiculous distance, reeking of such pungent fear Shockwave very nearly hangs an air freshener from one of his tires.

Starscream’s disdain is perhaps the most appealing of the emotions, if only because he and Starscream work well together because of that disdain. Starscream is an adequate scientist when he pays attention to the quality of his work and not merely out of some vain attempt to impress Megatron. One of the easiest ways to get Starscream to create something useful is to tell him he can’t do it.

Shockwave likes to think of it as weaponized spite.

Soundwave would have been the preferred co-conspirator, but since Shockwave came to Kaon specifically to help said mech, he can’t be choosy about his assistants. They are adequate enough that the formula is reconstructed within a week. While the others celebrate to varying degrees, Shockwave makes his own copy of the formula. It will please Predaking to learn that he will be able to breed his Predacons much faster with the omega formula than the basic energon bath Shockwave has been using.

It pays to keep Predaking’s favor.

Predaking’s protection keeps the Autobots from sticking their noses into his research, and the Predacons are very talented at gathering the exact equipment Shockwave needs. So long as he spends a portion of his time ensuring the propagation of their species, they leave him to his own ends.

It is a mutually beneficial arrangement.

It is also very fortunate because it appears Megatron is no longer in a position to be useful to Shockwave. Pity.

Shockwave saves his work and unplugs from the workstation. He’s been reliably informed that there’s a refueling area nearby, and he’s been given directions to a habsuite he can use for recharge. He fully intends to take advantage of both now that the immediate crisis has passed.

As the last mech to log out, Shockwave locks the door behind him. He consults the map he’s downloaded from the mainframe to find his way to the refueling station. Luckily, given the late hour, it is mostly deserted.

Mostly, being the operative term here, because Megatron is seated at a far table, cupping a decanter of energon, while he gazes out the large window. It is Cybertron’s approximation of night currently, but construction seems to never cease, and the steady drone of equipment fairly vibrates the transteel.

Shockwave retrieves a serving of energon for himself and joins his former commander at the table.

“Has no one offered to remove the rest of Unicron from your frame?” Shockwave asks.

Megatron chuffs a laugh and shifts his attention to Shockwave, taloned fingers rapping a nonsense rhythm on the thick steel of the decanter. “You are as talented at small talk as always, Shockwave.”

“I find idle conversation to be a waste of time. My question was pertinent,” Shockwave says. He tilts his head, a brief scanning burst reading the composition of the remnants of Unicron’s reconstruction. “It’s fully integrated into your frame. Fascinating. Have you tried re-scanning an alternative mode?”

“No.” Megatron stares at him, and while that look might unnerve others, Shockwave simply stares back. “What are your plans now that you’ve finished the formula?”

Shockwave unspools his intake line and feeds it into the energon cube, triggering the siphon system to start pumping. “Do you ask because you have intentions of reuniting the Decepticons and returning to the status quo?”

“The war didn’t give me anything I wanted. I see little point in pursuing it further,” Megatron frowns. His gaze wanders to the window once more.

“A logical answer.” Shockwave follows the lines of Megatron’s gaze, but finds nothing of scientific interest. “I only wish to continue my research. The war was an efficient way of acquiring the funds and materials I needed, but absent that, I have no interest in it either.”

Megatron finally lifts his decanter, taking a long sip of the energon. “Predaking suits your purposes?”

“As much as I suit his.” Shockwave pauses for a moment to screen the particulates of the energon the Autobots use for their supply. The results indicate it is Terran in origin.

So. The Autobots are still mining from Earth. That explains a lot, and why they are so focused on perfecting the synthetic energon formula. The Omega Lock has restored much for Cybertron, but energon shortages remain an issue.

It may be time to return to his research on seeding stationary celestial bodies for energon growth. If Cybertron could coax a satellite into orbit, and seed it with energon, their energy crises would be solved in a matter of centuries. With a little bit of rationing and logical thinking, the current population could certainly survive long enough for that outcome.

“If I can continue working with the scientists in this facility, I believe we can solve many of the issues still plaguing Cybertron,” Shockwave says as he files away both the data and the hypothesis for later consideration. “They are adequate assistants.”

Megatron snorts, and judging by the curve of his lips, it is meant to be amusement. “I’d like to be there when you call them your assistants.”

“I am many things but not foolish. I use their designations to their faces. They know what they are,” Shockwave says.

Megatron chuckles and shakes his head. “I have missed your arrogance.”

“I prefer to think of it as confidence.” Shockwave’s cube makes an obnoxious smacking noise, and he plucks his line from the now empty container, shaking off the last few stray drops. “And what do you intend to do with yourself now?”

One taloned finger traces the rim of the decanter. “I am considering my options.”

“Ah.” Shockwave tucks the line back into its compartment. While the energon had been satisfying, he does believe he is in need of some coolant as well. He will have to seek out where the Autobots store it. The medbay perhaps. “Might I make a suggestion?”

Megatron vents. “Fine.”

“Consider what you would have become if you’d had the choice,” Shockwave says. It is a question he has never had to ask himself, having the fortune to be sparked into the scientist caste from the very beginning. However, he’s aware of the inequalities which inspired Megatron’s initial rebellion. “You fought because you believed in something for other mechs. Did you once consider what you wanted for yourself?”

Megatron stares at him, and judging by the stunned look in his optics, this question must come as something of a revelation to him. Honestly, Shockwave is not surprised. While Megatron’s motivations during the course of the war had seemed obvious to many, the very disordered nature of his methods have always suggested a mech who only knew what he wanted on a grand scale, but never on a smaller scale.

Megatron dreamed far too large, before he dared dream small.

Shockwave stands, sliding his chair back into place beneath the table. “If I am allowed, I intend to travel freely between Kaon and my laboratory with Predaking. You know how to contact me if you have an offer that might be of interest.”

“You mean, in case I need another army?” Megatron asks, but at least his tone suggests one of jest rather than serious intent.

“You will have to wait your turn,” Shockwave says. “Predaking has already asked for one.”

Megatron’s optics widen, and he straightens. “What do you mean?”

“Exactly what I said. Though Predaking and I have different definitions of what he’s asking of me.” Shockwave’s fingers rap a nonsense rhythm on the back of the chair. “He’s calling it family.”

Megatron sinks back into the chair, relief visibly wafting from his frame. “Predaking wants what he’s lost. I can sympathize with that.”

“I cannot for I have not lost anything that cannot be replaced,” Shockwave says. There is nothing he holds that precious, and where others might assume he is lacking for not having such a weakness, Shockwave considers himself fortunate.

He is not held back by his spark, nor is he ruled by it.

“Nevertheless, Cybertron is vulnerable right now. Should an aggressive alien species come our way, we are incapable of defending ourselves. There may come a time that Predaking and his kin will save us,” Shockwave says. “Bear that in mind.”

“Noted,” Megatron says, but he’s staring out the window again, a storm in his face and his field.

No matter.

Shockwave has his map, and relatively free rein over Kaon. He will wander where he pleases and see what the Autobots have made of the city before he returns to the laboratory.

He’s got plenty of time to waste.

***