Chapter Text
Skyfire awkwardly followed the speeding forms of Elita-1 and Arcee across the frozen desert. His alt-mode wasn’t designed for speed over short distances and would attract too much attention, so the large Cybertronian was left to attempt to keep pace with a car and a motorcycle. He would have gone alone, but Red Alert and Prowl had insisted that no bot was currently allowed to leave base on their own at the moment.
“If Unicron really is back,” Prowl had said. “We need to take extra security precautions. No exceptions.”
The news still didn’t sit right with the shuttle. Not only had the Unmaker returned, but he had, for whatever reason, chosen that blasted Seeker as his herald. The Starscream he had known, the one who prevented bots from stepping on bugs because they were good for the environment, had loved Cybertron. Sure, he had always been a bit of a glitch, but not full-on laughing maniacally over a deactivated frame. Okay, maybe his laugh had always sounded a little evil, but that wasn’t the point!
Skyfire shook his helm. He needed to stop thinking like that. Starscream was dead and a wicked creature was running around wearing his frame.
<Hey, Big-guy, you okay back there?>
<I’m fine, Arcee.>
There was a moment of silence over the comm line.
<I’m insulted that you think you can lie to me, but we’ll talk later. I want to see baby seals.>
Skyfire’s comm was suddenly flooded with pictures of ocelots, giraffes, puppies, and eagle chicks. Arcee always requested to accompany the shuttle whenever one of his scientific expeditions involved one of the many organic species that occupied this planet. Although, her interests were less in the knowledge they could obtain and more on how cute these animals were.
<To answer the inevitable question: no we can not bring one back with us,> interrupted Elita.
<I assumed, but it’s always worth checking.>
<Arcee, the answer is always going to be no. A seal is not a pet.>
<Humans are allowed to have pets.>
<Which is a fact you dislike, judging by that human bar you destroyed last week.>
<They were forcing dogs to fight each other! It was no better than the gladiatorial pits in Kaon.>
Skyfire had only been with the Autobots for so long, but Arcee’s past as a gladiator was no secret. He tended to avoid conflict whenever he could, at most preferring to act as transport for the others, but from what he had heard, the motorcycle could be a nightmare for the enemy in battle. Despite her brazen personality, it was hard for him to reconcile that image with the one of the same bot cuddling a rhino like a domesticated house cat.
The two vehicles slowed to a stop before transforming into their bipedal forms. Several meters away, a small den was hidden by the snow. Skyfire routinely checked on the arctic seal that lived inside and had discovered that she was pregnant about nine decacycles ago. According to what he had been able to learn about the creatures from the natives, seals typically gave birth nine to eleven ‘months’. After some calculations, he had determined that the Terran mammal would have emerged by now.
Arcee carefully crouched down behind the cave and waited in silence. Elita stood off to the side, arms crossed, but with a patient expression. Fortunately, it was only a few breems before the white, furry blob eased her way out of the den, followed by her pup. A smile spread across Arcee’s face.
The pup looked up at her and made a small, friendly noise that Skyfire’s auditals almost didn’t pick up. It opened its little mouth again, but any noise it made or was going to make was drowned out by the sound of an explosion in the distance.
Arcee scowled before reluctantly tearing her gaze away from the seal family and transforming. Elita followed suit and took off after the motorcycle that was speeding toward a tall pillar of smoke that had begun to form in the arctic sky. The shuttle, unable to take off in his vehicle mode without disturbing the seals or the icecaps, relegated himself to once again stumbling after his two friends.
Unfortunately, in his haste, Skyfire had forgotten the impact of his weight, causing a layer of ice to crack beneath him. His fuel tank reached up to his spark as he plummeted before everything was brought to a painful stop. A loud cracking sound pierced through his auditals as he slammed into the hard stone beneath him.
Skyfire resigned himself to lying on the ground in a misguided attempt to ride out the pain. However, his attempts were thwarted by the sound of approaching heeled pedes. The shuttle reluctantly pushed himself to his feet and examined his surroundings. Everything was spinning, but he was able to piece together that he was in some kind of underground tunnel system with strange violet crystals sticking out of the walls as a glowing light source. Fascinating. None of the human databases he had scoured about this location said anything about this.
But at the same time a voice in the back of his processor was screaming memories at him of right before he had been trapped under the ice.
“Sky?”
He stiffened at the sound of the voice that was coming from behind him. Skyfired braced himself and slowly turned around to face the inevitable confrontation.
The former Decepticon SIC had certainly changed from when he had last seen him. The vents on his helm twisted up to resemble horns that were almost covered by a crown that seemed to melt into his head, his wings and optics were the same shade of purple as the crystals around them, and the familiar red and blue paintjob had been corrupted by the color that Skyfire had begun to hate.
“Sky,” the jet said again in a sing-song voice, engines purring. “It’s so nice to see you again, old friend.”
The shuttle looked down at his former partner, who, despite all the changes, still held himself like he was the taller of the two despite barely reaching the midpoint of his waist.
“We,” he said. “Are not friends.”
The jet dipped his wings and shot Skyfire a hurt look that, despite everything, still pained him. “How can you say that, Sky? It’s me: Starscream.”
No,” Skyfire said, surprised by his own ability to keep his voice from trembling. “You’re not him. Starscream would never do the things that you have done.”
His opponent ignited his thrusters so they could look each other in the eyes. He rested his hands on his knees and smirked over at his opponent, purple optics shimmering with a mesmerizing light. “You were right, you know,” the jet said softly, reaching out and tracing a pattern onto the shuttle’s shoulder plates that had always helped him relax.
“I. . . was?”
“Mmhmm.” Starscream wrapped his arms around the shuttle’s neck. Skyfire didn’t have it in him to stop him; unable to look away from those shimmering optics. “This war is petty. It should have ended long ago.” He caressed his former friend’s face. “And that’s what I’m going to do.”
Skyfire began to subconsciously wrap his arms around his Seeker. Desperate to keep Starscream close so that they would never again be separated, with one frozen in time and the other left burning with the hatred and evils of war. Skyfire tried to fight with the instincts he thought he had managed to beat into nonexistence, but all resistance melted away like ice in magma when Starscream began to nuzzle into his neck.
“You can join me in my quest,” he mumbled against the shuttle’s neck cables, sending pleasant, tingling vibrations to his processor.
“How are we going to do that?” Skyfire asked as he began to absently stroke Starscream’s wings, which fluttered beneath his touch.
Starscream disengaged his thrusters, trusting Skyfire to support him. “If there’s no life,” he whispered. “There’s no war.”
The shuttle abruptly snapped out of the daze he had found himself consumed by. “All life?” he asked, glossa heavy in his intake. “What about science?”
“I will herald our master's arrival. There would be time to study planets before they are devoured. I am sure he would let you out for that.”
A bitter taste bloomed in Skyfire’s intake as he asked his next question. “What about ruling the Decepticons?”
Starscream’s frame stiffened in his arms, claws digging into his back ever so slightly. “Meaningless. They will all be consumed in the end.” The shuttle flinched as the Seeker’s voice overlapped with an unfamiliar, far more ancient voice. The jet abruptly lifted his head and began to plant quick, gentle kisses on his facial plates. “You’re perfect.”
Skyfire scowled at the affection. “You have to know that I can’t let you get away with this.”
Unicron’s herald dramatically rolled his optics, helm following the motion until it hung limply in what seemed like a bid to get as far from the shuttle as possible. After a long moment of silence where Skyfire began to wonder if the jet had died, his helm snapped forward, a manic grin on his face. “I knew you would never accept my offer. But it was worth a shot.” The Seeker cackled at his own attempt at a joke.
Skyfire subtly adjusted his grip on his enemy. Whatever it was, the Unmaker’s plan couldn’t come to pass.
The Seeker looked up at him with those deplorable purple optics. “I guess all I can do now is destroy everything you love.”
Skyfire glared at the wicked thing he had caught. “Not going to happen.” He swung around and spread his arms, sending the jet flying across the tunnel. Before it could retaliate or escape Skyfire leapt into action and knocked Unicron’s puppet to the ground.
“I must say, I ne—”
Skyfire brought his fist down. Hard. Once. Twice. Again and again, faster and harder each time. Thump. Smash. Crack. Anger consumed his vision as he beat the blurry Seeker into the ground. The shuttle unleashed all his bottled-up rage that he never released while with the Autobots in fear of rejection. All the rage he felt for this jet who had shot him. Who had killed his best friend and then wore his frame like a costume. This jet who was so evil he was willing to trade all the life in the universe for a sick grab at some semblance of power.
He tuned out the Seeker’s screams and pleas for mercy. It was too late for that. This monster needed to suffer for what he had done.
It wasn’t until all the thrashing, all the screams, had stopped that Skyfire took a step back.
Skyfire felt like he was going to puke. His legs shook as he looked down at his hands, stained purple with unholy energon. He looked down at the frame before him. Optics offline, everything broken, and energon everywhere. There wasn’t a doubt in his mind. Starscream was dead.
The shuttle stumbled backward, igniting his thrusters in a burst of panic and launching himself out of the tunnel system and back onto the cold surface of the arctic tundra. Once he was clear of the entrance, Skyfire collapsed into a snow bank.