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Chapter Text

It was supposed to be just another routine day at the beginning of Cybertron's long and bitter civil war—a simple patrol mission through the outskirts of a forgotten sector. Elita-One led a small Autobot reconnaissance team, her optics scanning the landscape with practiced vigilance. Their goal was to scavenge anything left behind—resources, power cells, fragments of old tech—anything that could tip the scales in their favor, however slightly.

They were deep in the ruins now, wandering what once had been a modest neighborhood built around the great mines of Kaon. The silence was thick, heavy with the weight of a past long buried. Crumbling metal walls leaned inward like broken ribs; collapsed roofs exposed rusted support beams and forgotten tools. Elita moved quietly, her pedes kicking up dust and fine ash as she stepped over what remained of old worker housing.

And then, memories stirred—unbidden, vivid.

This place had once been full of life. She remembered this sector clearly. Back then, before war had names like Autobot and Decepticon, Orion Pax and D-16 used to meet here. She could still see them, side by side, their armor gleaming in the high light of Cybertron’s twin moons, speaking earnestly about the future—about justice, about freedom, about dignity for the workers.

Back when D-16 was a miner. Back when Orion was just a humble archivist.

They had been so different, yet they had cared. Both of them had.

But that was a lifetime ago.

Orion Pax had become Optimus Prime—the noble commander of the Autobots.

D-16 had become Megatron—the ruthless warlord of the Decepticons.

The past was a wound that never quite healed. And here it bled through her thoughts again.

Elita-One exhaled slowly and turned to leave the remnants behind. That was when something caught her optic—something faint, something… glimmering.

She halted, optics narrowing.

Half-buried under a collapsed wall and surrounded by shattered stone and debris, something small flickered with a soft internal light. Intrigued, Elita stepped carefully closer, pushing aside the loose rubble until she uncovered it fully.

Her spark caught in her chest.

There, cradled delicately between bent support beams and what looked like the long-faded remains of insulation cables, was a pod—intact. A stasis pod, no... an eggpod. The kind used to carry fragile, premature sparklings.

But what struck Elita harder than the pod itself was the body nearby.

A young flier—an aerial model, clearly femme. She was slumped forward, arms spread wide, frame rusted and weatherworn. The central cavity of her chassis bore a blaster wound, clean and fatal. Her limbs were stiff with age and oxidation, but the positioning… it was unmistakable.

She had died protecting something.

Elita knelt, her hand brushing gently over the old, cold metal of the fallen aerialbot, reverent despite the years. And then she looked at the pod again.

It had clearly rolled out from under the femme's arms, nestled now against a broken wall. Time and fate had moved it just enough for it to survive.

She picked it up carefully.

The pod was still warm. Still warm.

She stared, unbelieving, until she saw the faint glow of spark energy pulsing from within the shell. Across the top of the eggpod, faded yet still legible, was a small etched nameplate:

Starscream.

Elita-One’s spark stuttered.

She wiped away the fine layer of moss and corrosion that had formed over the pod’s viewing panel. Her breath caught again. She expected to see a faint protoform barely clinging to life, but what she saw was far more developed.

A Seekerling.

Small, delicate, far too developed for this pod—its wings twitching weakly as it lay curled inside the cramped confines of the eggpod. There were no cords. No life support. No recent energy supply.

And yet… it moved.

Elita’s expression shifted from shock to urgency in an instant. Her comm crackled as she activated it, her voice sharp and calling out with unhidden alarm.

“Optimus! OPTIMUS!”

The Autobots nearby froze. Heads turned. Weapons lowered.

And from across the ruins, Optimus Prime came striding toward her, concern etched in every line of his great frame. He could hear the emotion in her voice.

And when he reached her side and looked down at what she held in her arms—

—the war, the ruins, the mission—everything else disappeared.

Because what Elita had found wasn't salvage.

It was a miracle.

The ground shook faintly under the heavy tread of approaching feet—Optimus Prime, leading the charge, weapon drawn, optics scanning for any threat. The urgent cry from Elita-One had been sharp enough to send a chill through his spark, and he wasn’t alone. Several Autobots flanked him from the rear, blasters raised, expecting an ambush or a Decepticon trap.

But instead of battle, what he found stole the words from his voice.

“Elita,” Optimus called as he slowed his approach, his voice edged with concern. “Are you alright? We heard—”

She turned toward him, and in that instant, the weight in her optics silenced him.

There was no visible injury, no sign of an enemy. But she was trembling. Holding something close to her chassis, as if it were made of glass. She took two steps forward, and then two more—until she was right before him, her vents shaky, her frame tense.

“I saw it move,” Elita whispered, voice nearly a gasp, as if speaking louder would shatter the fragile hope clutched in her arms. “It moved, Optimus. The sparkling—it’s still alive.”

Optimus’s optics widened. Slowly, disbelieving, he lowered his weapon and looked down.

The pod nestled in Elita’s arms was small, old, marked with time and corrosion—but unmistakable. A functioning eggpod. And within, beneath the dirty transparency of the viewing glass, something twitched—barely more than a flutter, but real. Fragile wings pressed uncomfortably against the confines of the too-small chamber. A tiny servo curled instinctively.

A Seekerling. Alive.

By Primus…

Optimus lowered to one knee, carefully bringing his face closer. “This shouldn’t be possible,” he murmured. “No pod could survive this long, not without a power source. Not through all this.”

Elita’s voice was tight with restrained urgency. “But it has. Somehow, it has. Look at him, Optimus. He’s fighting. He's alive.”

For a brief second, the world seemed to pause. The sounds of the wind, the soft groans of metal shifting in ruined beams above them, the cautious steps of the Autobots watching from a distance—all of it faded into silence.

Then Optimus blinked out of it.

“I’m calling Ratchet,” he said, immediately activating his comm.

A crackle, and then Ratchet’s familiar grumbling voice answered. “What is it, Prime? I’m in the middle of—”

“We found a sparkling,” Optimus interrupted.

Silence.

Then: “You what?”

Optimus’s voice stayed steady, but the weight in it was unmistakable. “A Seekerling. Still alive. Inside an old eggpod. Condition stable for now, but compromised.”

Ratchet’s voice came back like a thunderclap.

“By the Allspark—get back to base! Immediately! That pod could fail at any moment! Don’t waste time with proper transportation protocol—fly if you have to! Do you hear me, Optimus?! Get that sparkling back here now!”

Optimus winced slightly at the outburst, but didn’t argue.

“Understood.”

He cut the transmission and rose to his full height again, looking at Elita. Her arms cradled the pod as if it were her own spark. He didn’t need to ask—he could already see it in her.

She was not letting go.

“Come with me,” he said softly.

Elita-One nodded without hesitation, falling into step at his side as they moved quickly toward the groundbridge rendezvous point. Behind them, the other Autobots exchanged glances—uncertain, but respectful. Whatever they had found, it was clear their leaders saw it as something far greater than just an anomaly.

And in Elita’s arms, the Seekerling fluttered again, as if in response to the movement, the warmth… or perhaps the bond beginning to form around him.

Neither of them noticed the way the name Starscream still gleamed faintly on the pod’s side, catching the dying sunlight.

And neither of them could know what secrets, what blood, and what long-buried tragedies would be unearthed by this fragile, innocent spark.

The groundbridge opened in a flare of cold light, and Elita-One burst through it first, cradling the eggpod like it held the very future of Cybertron in its shell. Optimus was right behind her, his stride long and determined, his field tight with restrained urgency.

The moment their pedes touched the metal floor of the Autobot base, Ratchet was already waiting for them, snapping orders before the vortex had even closed.

“There you are! Don’t just stand there! Get it to the Medbay—now!”

He pointed sharply at the far berth, which was already prepped with diagnostic scanners, energon regulators, and insulation fields. The berth had once been used to monitor unstable spark signatures—it was now the last hope for a life that had somehow defied fate itself.

Elita moved quickly, her steps almost floating. She was silent, careful, as she placed the pod down like it was made of glass. Her fingers lingered just a second longer on the metal surface before she stepped back, hands curling against her chest.

Ratchet was already on it, scanners humming, tools deployed, and his optics locked onto the pod.

The rest of the Autobots—Bumblebee, Ironhide, Wheeljack, even Arcee—had begun gathering at the edges of the Medbay, drawn by the commotion. Whispers buzzed behind them, optics wide with curiosity and concern. None dared interrupt.

“What’s going on?”

“Is that… is that a sparkling?”

“Since when do those even exist anymore…?”

Ratchet was oblivious to them. His entire focus was narrowed on the pod as he ran his hands along its rim, checking vitals, scanning sparkwaves, calibrating its ancient life support matrix. And then the reality of what he was seeing began to hit him in waves.

“Oh, for the Allspark, this is impossible…”

One of his tools beeped in astonishment, showing readings he hadn’t seen in vorns.

“By Primus’ core, that’s a Seekerling! A fully developed frame—this pod isn’t meant for a frame like that!”

Elita covered her mouth with her hands as her optics widened in awe and disbelief. Her spark trembled in her chest. “He was still alive,” she whispered. “He… he survived.”

Optimus stood beside her, still, unmoving, stunned silent. His optics were fixed on the berth as though trying to make sense of it, trying to reconcile what his mind told him was impossible with what his optics were showing him.

Ratchet kept talking—his voice rising, half in wonder, half in frustrated disbelief.

“This kind of pod was designed for early protoforms—soft-bodied, energy-fed from the outside. No support for frame development, no nutrient mesh strong enough to sustain prolonged stasis. This Seekerling should’ve fizzled out or destabilized cycles ago!”

He slammed a diagnostic pad onto the table and paced around the pod, his vents flaring.

“But somehow… somehow… this pod remained charged. Not enough for complete awakening, but just enough—barely—to keep the growth sequence going. That Seekerling’s spark adapted. It adapted inside the pod. The protoform grew into a frame that should never have survived this long.”

He stopped and stared again into the tiny pod’s viewport.

“And the truly miraculous part?” he said, voice lowering. “It’s still stable. No signs of spark fracture. He’s… still growing.”

A long silence filled the Medbay.

Elita stepped closer again, her voice shaking. “You’re telling us he… he’s been alive inside that pod… all this time?”

Ratchet didn’t look at her—he was still watching the gentle pulse of the sparkling’s spark signature, mesmerized. “Not just alive. Evolving. Fighting. Surviving when no one should’ve.”

Optimus spoke then, quietly. “And his name… is Starscream.”

The word hung in the air like thunder.

Some of the Autobots blinked, confused. The name meant little to them. But to Optimus—and soon to Ratchet—it meant far more.

Ratchet straightened up slowly, optics narrowing. “You saw the nameplate?”

Elita nodded. “It was etched into the shell. Faded, but still readable.”

Ratchet’s face darkened—not with anger, but with troubled realization. He turned, walked to a console, and pulled up ancient data—records from before the war, sealed archives that he’d never expected to look at again.

Optimus and Elita exchanged a look. Something had shifted.

“Ratchet,” Optimus asked, voice low, almost cautious. “Do you know that name?”

Ratchet didn’t answer at first.

He only stared at the screen.

Ratchet stared at the screen for a long moment before he finally turned away from it, optics dim with memory. His shoulders were rigid, but his face betrayed something else—an ache deep and old, an unresolved wound left to fester quietly in his spark.

Elita-One took a tentative step forward. “Ratchet…?”

The medic's voice came low at first, almost like a whisper he wasn’t ready to speak aloud.

“A long time ago—vorns ago, even before the war had truly started—a young femme came into my old clinic in Iacon.”

He didn’t look at them as he spoke. His optics were somewhere far away, focused inward.

“She was a Seeker. Slender frame, clearly aerial—wings like brushed silver, though she had tried to hide them under a cloak. She was scared. Fragile in spark, but strong in will. And in pain.”

Ratchet exhaled shakily.

“She was going into early labor. Too early. It wasn’t time yet, but something was wrong in her systems—she’d been under too much stress. Energon deficiency, maybe trauma, maybe worse. She never told me her name. Wouldn’t give it, no matter how I asked. But she—she begged me…”

He paused. Elita's hand slowly rose to her mouth again.

“She begged me to save her sparkling,” Ratchet whispered. “Said she couldn’t lose it. That it was a miracle. That she and her mate had created it together, and it was hope for something better. She said her lover had finally found the courage to tell his closest friends… about her. About the sparkling. That they were going to build something new, together.”

His optics flickered. “She kept repeating it: ‘He said he’ll tell them. He said it’s time.’ As if she had waited for so long.”

Silence fell around the Medbay.

“I didn’t have much choice,” Ratchet continued. “The sparkling was coming. Too small, too fragile. The protoform was barely formed—nothing that could survive on its own. I did what I could. Transferred it into an eggpod and sealed it, activated a low-level energy field. That eggpod was one of the last from the old Vosian medical supply caches. Designed for extreme emergency incubation.”

He looked at Elita and Optimus now, voice heavier, lower.

“It was the femme who etched the name onto the identification plate. Used a fragment of wire, scratched it in herself while I calibrated the pod.”

He didn’t need to say it. They already knew.

“Starscream.”

Elita-One sat slowly on the edge of a console, her hands over her face. Her shoulders trembled.

Optimus remained still, one hand curled in a tight fist by his side, the other resting on the edge of the berth where the eggpod lay. His optics never left it. The Seekerling within shifted faintly, a wing twitching.

“I tried to keep her stable,” Ratchet continued quietly. “But she collapsed not long after the birth. Her spark signature flickered out before I could stabilize her. The authorities were already closing in.”

Elita slowly lowered her hands. “The Senate?”

Ratchet nodded. “It was when the crackdown started. When the Council started branding any spark that dreamed of reform, or rebellion, as dangerous. Bots were disappearing. Thrown in the Pits. I had heard rumors that they were watching the seekers in particular—especially the noble lines, the high-caste bloodlines.”

He exhaled. “She wasn’t just a Seeker. She had noble etchings along her wings. I think she was high Vosian caste. And I think she was hiding from someone.”

Optimus’s voice finally broke through the silence, calm but distant. “You think they were going to target the sparkling?”

“I think they already had,” Ratchet said bitterly. “She was trying to protect him. And in the chaos… after she died… the pod was taken for safekeeping. I sent it to a storage vault on the outskirts. But when the riots started and the Senate burned down half the city, I thought it had been destroyed with the rest.”

He stared at the pod now, his optics glassy.

“I never imagined… that he survived.”

Another long silence.

Then Elita whispered, “And the father?”

Ratchet looked at her. “She never told me his name. But… she said he was going to tell his friends. That he had finally chosen to stop hiding her.”

His voice dropped to almost nothing.

Ratchet’s gaze remained locked on the pod as he spoke again, quieter now, lost in piecing together a puzzle that had haunted him for vorns.

“…It’s possible,” he murmured, “that she didn’t die right away. That she fled when the Senate patrols came. She could’ve escaped, returned to retrieve the eggpod herself—before the clinic was overtaken.”

His voice faltered, a grimness settling over him.

“The buildings around my old clinic were leveled during the purge. The whole sector turned into rubble. If she made it back there… and tried to protect the pod…”

His optics flicked up, meeting Elita’s.

Elita-One’s face went pale.

“I found her,” she whispered, her voice catching in her throat. “In the ruins. A femme aerialbot… offline. Her frame rusted through… but the way she’d fallen—she was shielding something with her body.”

She looked down at the pod, her spark aching.

“She must have protected him until her last cycle. Carried him all that way. Chose to die over letting him go.”

A long silence fell over the room, heavy as the war itself.

Ratchet turned away slightly, swallowing the bitter truth. “Then… she was the same one I treated. And she kept her promise. She protected her sparkling—until the very end.”

The truth lay thick between them now. A mother long dead. A seekerling unknowingly born of rebellion and nobility, hidden from the Senate, buried beneath the war. A life meant to be silenced… but now breathing.

Elita turned toward Ratchet, her optics wide, uncertain—but steady. “What… will happen to him?”

Ratchet looked back to the readings. His hands moved over the console, calibrating energy fields around the pod.

“I need to remove him from the eggpod,” he said at last. “It’s no longer sustaining him fully. His growth is stable for now, but the system is failing. It wasn’t meant to house a Seekerling this size or this long.”

His jaw tightened.

“And I don’t know if his frame will hold. We’ve never seen something like this before. He may reject transformation sequencing. His proto-coding might collapse. I just… I don’t know.”

“But?” Elita asked.

“But I’ll try,” Ratchet said firmly. “I’ll do the impossible if I have to.”

Silence.

Then, slowly, Elita turned to look at Optimus.

Her fingers reached for his hand—her conjunx, her partner through vorns of hardship and war—and clutched it tightly. Her spark field trembled against his, but her voice was clear.

“I want to adopt him, Orion.”

He blinked. The use of his old name always disarmed him.

“I want to be his Carrier,” she said. “I want us to raise him.”

“Elita…”

“We’ve tried for so long,” she continued, pain cracking through her voice. “So long, before you were chosen by the Matrix, before all of this. And we were never able to make it happen. We could never bring a spark to life on our own.”

He didn’t answer.

Her grip on his hand tightened.

“But he’s here. He’s alive. He was born of love. And he needs someone. He deserves a chance, Optimus. Even in war. Especially in war.”

He looked at her, his expression unreadable for a moment, spark pulsing heavy beneath the weight of duty, of all the burdens that came with being Prime.

“We’re in the middle of a war,” he said quietly. “Creating a sparkling in this time, raising one—it will be dangerous. He’ll be a target. You will be.”

“It won’t be impossible,” Elita said, her voice gentle but resolute. “And he won’t be alone.”

Optimus turned his gaze back to the berth. The tiny Seekerling twitched in the pod, wings curled protectively around himself like he was still in the arms of the mother who’d died to save him.

A miracle in the ashes.

Optimus inhaled slowly, optics shimmering faintly, then turned to Ratchet.

“Then do it.”

Ratchet straightened, startled. “Prime?”

“Save him,” Optimus said with quiet steel. “Save Starscream.”

Ratchet stood over the eggpod, tools in hand, his frame tense as his optics flicked between the flickering readings and the little life curled inside.

“I’ll do it,” he said finally, his voice tired but firm. “But don’t hold onto hope too tightly.”

He looked at them both—Optimus and Elita—his expression heavy with realism and years of painful experience.

“I don’t know if it’ll work. We’ve never attempted something like this. That pod has kept him in stasis for vorns beyond design. We’re venturing into unknown territory now.”

Neither Elita nor Optimus spoke. There was nothing to say. All they could do now was watch.

Ratchet activated the thermal blade and adjusted its setting to surgical precision. The faint hiss of energon-heated metal filled the Medbay as he brought the blade to the curved surface of the eggpod’s glass.

The moment the blade touched it, steam hissed and pressure released in a slow, sorrowful sigh. Thin rivulets of clear, nutrient-rich stasis fluid spilled from the pod and trickled down the berth like the last tears of a forgotten time, pooling on the floor in soft puddles beneath Ratchet’s feet.

The incision was delicate. Ratchet’s servo didn’t tremble, but his vents cycled faster as he worked, cutting a clean arc across the pod’s upper dome. The moment the glass came free with a muted click, the pod finally opened.

The light from above fell onto the sparkling inside.

Elita's hands rose to her mouth again.

The Seekerling, delicate and glimmering with a faint sheen of stasis gel, stirred at once. His wings—tiny, graceful things—unfolded slightly, twitching weakly as if sensing freedom for the first time.

“Oh, Primus,” Ratchet muttered. “He’s… responsive.”

With utmost care, Ratchet slipped his hands beneath the small form and lifted him from the remains of the pod. The fluid clung to the sparkling’s soft protoframe, glistening under the lighting.

He was so small. So helpless.

But alive.

Ratchet placed the Seekerling gently on the center of the large medical berth. The sparkling’s wings fluttered again, twitching instinctively, then slowly curled inward as if to protect his tiny chassis from the new world around him.

Ratchet moved quickly now, voice all business as he adjusted the biolights directly above, turning them down to a soft golden glow. Then he retrieved a thin energon line—smaller than anything he’d used in vorns—and attached it to a port on the side of the Seekerling’s neck, connecting it to a fresh energon infusion unit.

“Elita, open the reserve,” Ratchet said without looking.

She did, and a faint hiss accompanied the slow push of warm, pure energon through the thin cable and into the Seekerling’s systems. It was a gentle, gradual introduction—anything stronger might overwhelm his small spark chamber.

The sparkling shifted slightly as the energy entered him, the line pulsing faintly. His frame twitched, and he let out a tiny, soundless gasp—just the intake of air for the first time outside his pod.

Ratchet gave a small nod. “He’s stabilizing. Pulse irregular, but present.”

He pulled a heavy, soft-lined thermal blanket from a nearby cabinet and began to carefully wrap the tiny form, tucking him into the enormous berth like a cocoon. When he was done, only the Seekerling’s head and the curve of his neck remained visible. His face was slack with exhaustion, still smeared faintly with gel. His small vents fluttered.

And for a moment, the Medbay was silent again.

Elita couldn’t move.

Ratchet looked at both of them once more, somber.

“That’s all I can do. Now… it’s up to him.”

He removed his gloves and placed them aside. “We’ll know in seventy-two hours whether he’ll live… or fade. But the next full cycle is the most dangerous. If his spark can’t fully synchronize with his growing frame… we lose him.”

Elita didn’t hesitate. The moment he finished speaking, she crossed the Medbay and pulled a metal chair beside the berth, dragging it across the floor with a screech that echoed like defiance. She sat heavily, her gaze locked on the bundle of blanket and life in front of her.

She reached out, gently brushing her finger across the Seekerling’s tiny helm, just once, as if promising she’d be there.

Optimus stood just behind her, silent. Watching.

He didn’t move.

Ratchet said nothing more. He stepped away and dimmed the Medbay lights to a soft twilight.

And so the vigil began.

A mother who had died to protect him.

A Carrier now sitting beside him, refusing to lose hope.

And a Prime who had witnessed war, death, and despair—standing still beside them, silently daring fate to try and take this miracle away.

Starscream, the Seekerling, slept on.

Chapter Text

Optimus stood in front of the gathered Autobots, his voice steady even as the weight behind it pressed deep into his spark.

They listened intently as he explained what had happened—the discovery in the ruins, the Seekerling in the pod, the miraculous survival. Some expressions lit with cautious hope. Others, darker, more skeptical, frowned or exchanged glances.

Ironhide folded his arms, optics narrowed thoughtfully. Bumblebee whispered quietly to Arcee, wide-eyed. Hound gave a slow, quiet nod, whispering something like a prayer.

But among all of them, Ultra Magnus said nothing.

He stood at the edge of the room, tall, silent, and grim. He neither questioned nor objected—he didn’t ask a single thing. But his optics were sharp, calculating, fixed especially on Optimus… and Elita-One, who still hadn’t left the Medbay. He spoke no opinions.

But he watched. Always watching.

And he withdrew further into himself than ever before.

Time passed. Slowly. Painfully.

The first day, Ratchet monitored the Seekerling every two breems, adjusting the energon line, stabilizing spark fluctuations, running scans. Elita hadn’t left the Seekerling’s side once.

Optimus visited often, though not as often as he wanted. He had to lead, had to organize, had to speak to bots who questioned whether it was wise to raise a youngling now—especially a Seekerling whose origins they did not know.

But each time Optimus returned to Medbay, he found Elita in the same chair beside the berth, hand gently resting over the small bundle, her optics red-rimmed but determined.

The second day, the Seekerling grew warmer. His sparkpulse strengthened.

But still he didn’t wake.

The silence in the Medbay became something sacred—Ratchet didn’t speak much anymore, only nodded when Elita asked questions, only muttered small updates. But there was something new in his tone now.

Hope.

The third day dawned.

It began with quiet—like any other cycle in the Autobot base. Vents hummed through the structure. Footsteps padded down hallways as mechs woke from recharge. Lights flickered to early brightness as another long day of war and waiting began.

And then—

A sound pierced the quiet.

A thin, sharp cry.

It sliced down the corridors with all the force of a blade, high-pitched and shrill. Startled shouts followed. A metallic crash rang as Ratchet fell from his own recharge berth.

Bots jolted awake from their bunks, blinking, spinning, confused.

And in the far corridor, already sprinting, was Optimus.

He didn’t think. He didn’t ask. He just ran.

He knew.

His spark knew.

The Medbay doors had already opened when he arrived.

Elita was standing at the edge of the berth, holding a bundle of thick blanket close against her chest. Her shoulders trembled with every vent, and her optics spilled bright lines of energon as she looked down, whispering over and over again something he couldn’t hear yet.

And from within her arms—

—the crying.

Powerful. Alive. Unyielding.

Starscream.

The Seekerling’s wings twitched against the fabric, his small helm pressing blindly upward as he cried out again, full of distress and light. His field shimmered erratically—newborn, bright, unshaped.

Elita was crying now too, trembling with joy as she lowered her face beside his, holding him as if she’d never let go.

“He’s alive,” she whispered between gasps. “Optimus—he’s alive—he’s alive—”

Optimus crossed the room in three strides.

He didn’t speak, didn’t trust himself to.

He simply wrapped one strong arm around Elita’s back as she cradled the Seekerling in her arms, and he leaned close, placing a servo gently beneath the soft base of the sparkling’s wings, helping support the fragile frame now shaking and shrieking with raw life.

The Seekerling hiccuped. He let out another shrill cry.

But Optimus was no longer afraid of that sound.

Because it was life.

It was defiance. It was survival.

Ratchet entered a moment later, a scan tool in hand, but stopped as he saw them there.

“…I’ll be fragged,” he muttered with a trembling smile. “He made it.”

And from somewhere behind them, down the hall, came the growing sound of footsteps—curious, cautious, drawn by the cry that rang like a bell through steel and stone.

The Autobots would come.

And soon, so would the questions.

But for now—

Optimus rested his helm lightly against Elita’s, their fields slowly intertwining, protective, burning with joy and something older, deeper.

They didn’t speak of war.

They didn’t speak of fear.

They simply stood together, holding the Seekerling named Starscream, who had survived everything fate had thrown at him to live again in their arms.

Ratchet didn’t waste a second.

He muttered something under his breath as he walked swiftly to the nearest counter and began pulling together parts, fragments, and scraps from a dozen medkits and energon processing units. Elita watched, still cradling Starscream close against her, while Optimus remained by her side—silent, protective, his optics never leaving the Seekerling’s small form.

With deft movements, Ratchet took a worn horseshoe-shaped bracket, gently stretched it into a curve with a few precise bends of his servo, and then wedged a soft corner of a processed energon cube into the curve. Using the heat of a medical torch, he molded the cube, reshaping it carefully until it formed a soft, thin nozzle at the end.

"A makeshift feeder," he grumbled, voice laced with both stress and tenderness. “It’ll have to do for now.”

He returned to them, knelt beside the berth, and brought the tip of the small beak to Starscream’s tiny mouth.

The reaction was immediate.

Starscream suckled instinctively, wings fluttering with slow, lazy motion as he drank. His small vents hiccuped and purred softly as the energon entered his system, his glow faintly stabilizing around his core. The softest coo escaped him. The room seemed to hold its breath.

Ratchet’s stern expression melted just slightly into something warmer.

“Little spark has an appetite,” he muttered.

Then, more gently: “Elita, hold this. Keep the tip steady. Let him finish. He needs all the energon he can take.”

Elita carefully adjusted Starscream in her arms, supporting his wings, his helm, his frame—and took the makeshift bottle with trembling fingers. Her optics were wet again, overwhelmed by the simple act of watching this Seekerling feed so eagerly. A miracle. A second chance.

Ratchet stood slowly, rubbing his servos together.

“And now,” he said, looking pointedly at both her and Optimus, “we have a lot to do.”

They both looked at him, blinking out of the trance they’d fallen into as Starscream drank.

“What do you mean?” Elita asked softly, never once taking her optics off Starscream’s little face.

Ratchet huffed. “I mean, you two are officially Carrier and Sire now.”

Optimus straightened, shoulders rising with surprise. Elita’s hands tightened slightly around the Seekerling.

“You’re keeping him,” Ratchet continued firmly. “You’ve taken responsibility. Spark-adoption or not, you’re his parents now. So—first order of business: he needs a cradle. A proper one.”

He began ticking items off on his fingers as he paced slowly through the Medbay, voice gruffer now—more commanding, as he fell into full medic mode.

“You’ll need to install it in your quarters. That means rearranging the whole layout—cradle mount near the wall, central heating unit, temperature and humidity regulators.”

He turned, raising an optic ridge at Elita. “You’ll need to regulate your field exposure too, Carrier. Sparkling fields are sensitive.”

“Of course,” she whispered, stunned but nodding.

Ratchet continued. “You’ll need purified energon crystals. We’ll need to synthesize sparkling-grade formula as backup. Sterilized nursing equipment, safe-warmth blankets, ambient light dampeners. A soundproof curtain for overload reactions. And—nothing sharp, no tools, no blades, no guns, no energon knives—absolutely no weapons anywhere near Starscream’s new quarters.”

Optimus was already making a mental list.

Elita clutched the Seekerling closer. He had stopped drinking, now nuzzling sleepily into her chest, one tiny hand resting on the edge of the blanket.

“Anything else?” she asked.

Ratchet gave her a tired smile. “Yes. Rest when you can. You’ll be lucky to get an hour a cycle for the next few weeks.”

Optimus gave a quiet chuckle. “I don’t think either of us mind.”

Ratchet turned to Optimus now, his expression softening.

“…You’ve carried many burdens, Prime. But this is different. This one doesn’t need a leader. He needs a sire.”

Optimus lowered his gaze to Starscream.

The Seekerling had fallen into light recharge, curled in the blanket, wings twitching faintly. That spark—bright, small, whole—beat so softly inside his fragile frame. And it belonged to them now. To Elita and to him.

Optimus reached out and gently brushed a single servo across the Seekerling’s helm.

“Then a sire I shall be,” he said softly.

Ratchet nodded once, firmly, and turned to gather tools again. “I’ll get to work on prepping a transfer pod for the move. And a new energon filter. You get the nursery ready.”

Elita held Starscream tighter, optics glassy but resolute.

“I already know where I want the cradle.”

The Autobot base, once quiet, now roared with sudden purpose.

Ratchet, in full command mode, moved like a storm down the main corridor, barking orders without pause. The gruff old medic’s voice echoed through every wall.

“Wheeljack! Jetfire! You’re on nursery tech! That means functional nipples for feeding—no leaking! Cradle with motion sensors, temperature stabilizer, no exposed metal, and toys—safe toys, no sharp corners!”

Wheeljack, already sprinting to his lab, called back, “On it, doc! Maybe even add a stasis-sound filter to keep him calm!”

“Do that and don’t blow it up!” Ratchet snapped.

Jetfire saluted with one wing and followed behind, already pulling blueprints from his wristpad.

Ratchet spun toward the others. “Ironhide! Bulkhead! Prowl! I want Optimus and Elita’s quarters remodeled before recharge cycle ends. Adjust wall thickness, reinforce it against outside cold, install a soft light dome and energy circulation vents. No sharp corners anywhere!”

Prowl caught the datapad as Ratchet tossed it his way. “You’re giving me specs like this, and you want it tonight?”

“Do I look like I’m kidding?” Ratchet growled.

“No, sir,” Prowl muttered, turning and waving Ironhide to follow.

“Autobots,” Ratchet called, turning now to face the others gathered, “we need energon. Pure energon. Crystals, preferably small. Blankets. Stabilizing wraps. Anything anyone can spare. I’ll accept donations or field-foraged supplies. Now’s the time.”

He paused, optics scanning the hallway. No one dared disobey.

“We’re not just fighting a war anymore,” he said, voice lowering. “We’re raising a spark.”

There was silence. Heavy. Sacred.

Then, a slow hum of movement—Autobots rising, gathering, some hurrying to their quarters to find anything usable. It was the kind of coordination rarely seen outside battle.

But Ultra Magnus did not move.

He remained standing at the end of the corridor, hands behind his back, helm slightly bowed. Watching.

Observing.

A glint passed through his optics as he spoke lowly to himself, too softly for any of the others to hear.

“…Interesting. Let’s see what grows from all this.”

And with a half-smile, faint and unreadable, he turned and walked silently to his quarters—like a shadow sliding across the walls.

Far away, across Cybertron’s broken land, in a cold and lightless chamber deep within Kaon, the Decepticon leader stirred.

Megatron jerked upright from his recharge slab, vents hissing with heat, armor scraping as he sat forward with a snarl. His sparkbeat thundered in his core.

It wasn’t just a dream. It never was. It was always her.

The same moment, again and again.

Back then—so long ago—he hadn’t yet been Megatron. He was only D-16, just a miner, just a rebel, just a mech in love.

He was running.

Down the stone corridors of the eastern slums, dragging her by the hand—his femme, his aerial love, breathless, clutching the delicate eggpod close to her chest.

They had packed what they could. Left behind what they couldn’t. They were escaping.

Freedom had seemed so close.

But the sky cracked open above them.

Sirens. Orders. Cold shadows dropping from the Senate’s fliers.

And then—they were surrounded.

No warning. No mercy.

Ultra Magnus.

He landed with his soldiers like a judgment from the stars. Steel and command and law in its cruelest form.

They tried to run. She screamed, begged them to let her pass, showed the egg, cried out her name, her house—

But Ultra Magnus raised his blaster. No hesitation.

“She’s not your daughter,” he said coldly, speaking to someone who wasn’t there—to the senator behind the curtain, perhaps. “You said it yourself. You have no daughter.”

The shot was silent.

Just a beam of white light. A perfect hole, straight through her spark.

D-16 screamed.

He never stopped screaming, even as they beat him to the ground and pinned his face to the frozen concrete. He thrashed, roared, bit, until energon flooded his mouth and hands held him down by the neck, by the shoulders, by the chassis— The eggpod had fallen to the side, still intact.

But when he looked again—when he reached—he saw nothing.

Gone. Vanished. Taken. Or destroyed.

They said nothing. They never told him what they did with it.

All he had left was the sound of her body hitting the ground, the way her optics dimmed staring at the stars she loved, and the silent, final flicker of the small egg’s pulse.

And as they dragged him, broken and bleeding, toward the transport that would deliver him to the Pit, where he'd be fed to the Arena—

—he became something else.

D-16 died that day.

Only Megatron survived.

Megatron panted in the dark chamber, his vents hissing, his optics flaring with heat. He sat in silence, trembling.

And then, he felt something.

Faint.

Like the sparkpulse of a seeker. But…

Familiar.

His optics narrowed.

“…No.”

He stood slowly, his hands curling into trembling fists.

“…It’s not possible.”

But in the dead silence of his chamber, his spark ached.

As if something long lost was no longer gone.

Megatron's frame remained rigid as he stood alone in the cold silence of his personal chamber. His vents still hissed with residual tension, the echo of a spark nearly torn apart by a ghost. But he forced himself to steady.

It had to be a mistake. A remnant of a wound too deep to fully close.

“Muscle memory,” he muttered to himself in a growl, forcing one hand to relax. “Nothing more than a reaction. The past.”

He shook his helm once, hard, as if trying to jar the lingering ache loose.

The nightmare—no, the memory—was too vivid, too real. But reality offered no miracles. What was lost remained lost. That was the law of the Pit. That was the code of war.

And so, Megatron exhaled slowly and began to dress in full armor. The leader of the Decepticons had duties. Command. Strategy. War. He could not afford ghosts.

He buried the pain behind his red optics and walked out.

Meanwhile, on the other side of the conflict, the Autobots were working in coordinated urgency.

Because now, in the middle of war—they had something they had almost forgotten how to protect.

A sparkling.

Little Starscream had become the brightest pulse inside their walls.

After Ratchet’s rallying command, the base had transformed into something half battlefield, half nursery. In record time, the quarters of Optimus Prime and Elita-One had been fully renovated—walls cushioned and thermally stabilized, corners rounded off, air filters changed for softer, sparkling-safe circulation. The cradle had been crafted from lightweight plasteel alloy, coated in energon-gel for comfort, with a soft energon light above mimicking gentle sunlight.

The berth had a reading node, a sound-muting field, a vibration stabilizer, and several lullaby recordings painstakingly filtered by Blaster himself.

Elita had spent hours sewing soft wraps from leftover fabric scraps and old banners, each colored with traditional Vosian shades. Optimus silently installed a security field that would prevent anyone from entering the nursery with weaponry of any kind.

And though the war still raged beyond their borders… inside these walls, something else had begun.

Hope.

Two years had passed.

The battles continued outside. Reports came in daily—skirmishes, supply losses, minor victories—but within the base, life had found rhythm again. A small, fluttering rhythm, held together by chubby wings, tiny giggles, and the soft rustling of toys across the floor.

Starscream, now nearing two vorns in age, had become a little light among the chaos.

His laugh, high and pure, echoed down the metallic corridors like a song.

Today, he was in the main common room, sprawled out on a thick energon-blue carpet, surrounded by small multicolored blocks marked with letters, numbers, and ancient Cybertronian runes. His tiny claws grasped a green cube with the letter "Ͼ" and turned it over carefully in his hands, wings fluttering every few seconds with joy.

Across from him sat Brainstorm, slouched into a lounge seat, optics dim, chin resting on one palm as he stared blankly into the air.

He sighed. Loudly.

Then again.

And again.

"Can’t believe they assigned me to nanny duty,” he muttered. “Me. Brainstorm. Senior weapons engineer. Inventor of the quantum phase cannon. First bot to survive entering his own brain module backwards in a hyperloop experiment.”

Another sigh.

Starscream chirped softly, tipping over a stack of blocks with a gentle giggle.

Brainstorm didn't even look. “You don’t even talk yet. Not until four, right? No vocal modulator, still growing your soundbox. And I’m supposed to just sit here and watch you giggle at cubes?”

The sparkling blinked up at him and sneezed. A tiny static poof escaped his vents and his wings twitched.

“…Admittedly adorable,” Brainstorm muttered, crossing his arms. “Still bored.”

Starscream returned to his play, tail fins flicking lightly as he sorted cubes by color now, the intelligence in his optics far more focused than Brainstorm gave him credit for.

Behind them, through the window, the clouds rolled dark over Cybertron. But here, inside the base, soft music played. The room was warm. Safe.

And for now, no war could reach them.

Brainstorm slouched deeper into the seat, arms crossed and helm tilted as he watched the little Seekerling continue playing with his cubes.

It was still boring.

Starscream had toppled and re-stacked the colorful blocks at least ten times in the last hour. Occasionally he giggled, letting his wings flap lightly against the carpet. Occasionally, he burbled and clicked softly in pre-verbal noises—still no real speech, which was normal at his age.

Brainstorm groaned. “I built a triple-phase accelerator in one afternoon, and now I’m—what?—block supervisor?”

He rubbed his helm and groaned louder for no one's benefit.

“Watch the sparkling for a few breems,” Ratchet had said. “You’re good with formulas; how hard can it be?”

He didn’t even like sparklings. Not really. Too fragile. Too unpredictable. Too quiet.

His optics wandered lazily back to Starscream’s little claws as they gently nudged one cube, then another… then another. He was focused, disturbingly focused. Almost like—

Brainstorm blinked.

The cubes had been rearranged.

Now, four blocks stood proudly in a line across the carpet.

C-A-R-R-I-E-R.

Brainstorm froze.

His ventilations caught halfway. He leaned forward, blinking rapidly, unsure if his optics were playing tricks on him. “Okay. Okay, that’s… that’s just a coincidence. Could be a random set of letters.”

Starscream chirped softly.

He wasn't even looking at Brainstorm—just watching the cubes, tiny claw tapping them one by one like he was proud of his work. His wings fluttered lazily again.

Brainstorm leaned down, optics narrowing. “Okay, kid. You got one word. Lucky. Let's see what else you can—”

Starscream reached out again. With quiet precision, he selected three more cubes from his pile. Pulled them forward. Set them neatly in place beneath the first word.

E-L-I-T-A.

Brainstorm’s jaw didn’t hit the floor only because it was physically attached to his face.

He stared at the line of blocks as if they had suddenly started talking.

He looked at Starscream.

Starscream looked back.

Not smiling. Not confused.

Just watching.

Brainstorm sat up, hands trembling slightly. “You—you know what you’re spelling.”

A small chirp escaped the Seekerling's throat. Not quite a yes. Not quite a no. But deliberate.

Brainstorm whispered, barely able to hear himself. “Do you know who your Carrier is?”

Starscream’s wings twitched gently.

He pointed—first at the cubes. Then at himself.

Then reached for a soft fabric square lying next to him—the tiny blankie Elita had sewn from Vosian colors—and held it tightly to his chest.

Brainstorm swallowed hard.

He looked again at the letters. Then at Starscream. Then back.

Brainstorm paced in a circle, servos twitching.

“No. Nope. Can’t be. He’s just mimicking. Coincidence. Pure coincidence.”

He looked back at the sparkling sitting calmly on the floor. Starscream had tilted his helm to the side, expression bright and inquisitive, wings flitting gently like the soft flicker of fireflies. He was still holding the colored pen Brainstorm had tossed at him a few moments ago.

The old scientist had drawn a basic quantum-fold resonance formula—but written it wrong. Deliberately. He even smudged a coefficient, thinking the baby might scribble on it at best.

But the little seekerling had stared at the formula, optics narrowed in thought.

And then—quietly, without hesitation—Starscream had grabbed another color and corrected it.

Cleanly. Precisely. Without even babbling.

Brainstorm blinked rapidly, spark fluttering with disbelief. He stepped back, crouched down again, stared at the newly drawn correction.

It was perfect.

He looked at Starscream. The sparkling just looked up and smiled, his tiny wings curling in delight.

“You—That’s—You—”

Brainstorm stammered, fingers twitching in the air like he wanted to rewrite reality itself.

“You corrected quantum resonance folding. At two years old.”

Starscream chirped proudly, as if he'd just built a tower of blocks instead of solving a formula most scientists needed decades to understand.

Brainstorm’s hand flew to his helm. “Oh frag me sideways, you’re not just smart. You’re—you’re past smart. You're beyond prodigy. You’re—”

He froze.

His optics slowly widened. “You’re smarter than me.”

Starscream blinked at him.

And then wiggled his tiny feet happily.

Brainstorm stood there in stunned silence for three whole seconds.

And then panic exploded in his systems like a bomb.

He scooped Starscream up with both hands, tucked him under his arm like a precious cube of energon—and ran.

“OPTIMUS!!” he bellowed, careening down the corridor with the speed of a panicked mech on fire. “OPTIMUS PRIME!! RATCHET!! SOMEBODY GET OUT HERE RIGHT NOW!!”

Starscream squeaked in surprise, but didn’t protest. He actually seemed to enjoy the ride, wings fluttering from under Brainstorm’s arm as they zoomed past confused Autobots in the hallway.

Wheeljack stepped into the corridor just in time to see Brainstorm barreling toward him.

“Whoa—hey, what the frag’s going on—?”

“GENIUS! GENIUS!” Brainstorm screeched. “WE HAVE A GENIUS SPARKLING ONBOARD! WE’RE TALKING—QUANTUM-FORMULA-FIXING—MATH-DOODLING—BLOCK-ORGANIZING—GENIUS!!”

Starscream burbled happily.

Wheeljack’s mouth slowly opened as he stared at the sparkling poking his head from under Brainstorm’s arm like a plush toy.

“…Wait, is that—?”

“Yes! It’s Starscream!!” Brainstorm cried. “And he just corrected a math error I put there on purpose!! The equation wasn’t even in blockform, Jack!! HE UNDERSTOOD IT!!”

Ratchet came out of Medbay then, followed by Elita-One and Optimus Prime.

Optimus’s optics brightened the instant he saw Brainstorm charging toward them with Starscream cradled awkwardly under his arm. “What happened?! Is he hurt?!”

“Hurt?! He’s fine—HE’S A GENIUS!!” Brainstorm screeched again. “Like, real genius! I wrote an equation wrong and this little—spark-blessed miracle— FIXED IT! On the spot!”

Elita’s hand flew to her mouth.

Ratchet frowned. “You tested a two-year-old with equations?”

“Yes! Because he was spelling words and I had to know!!” Brainstorm cried. “This isn’t normal development! This is accelerated cognitive formation and symbolic processing! His brain’s not just forming—it's leaps ahead!”

Optimus reached for Starscream, who chirped again and eagerly leaned toward his Sire. Optimus gently took him into his arms, and Starscream immediately curled against his chest, wings folding neatly in comfort.

“…He fixed a formula?” Elita asked, stunned.

“Cleaned it up and corrected it! He knew what he was doing. I thought it was just luck—then he smiled at me. Like he knew he’d proved a point.” Brainstorm shook his helm. “That little sparkling is either a walking math miracle or a gift from Primus—or both!”

Ratchet frowned more deeply now, but it was not out of doubt—it was concern. His optics slowly rose to meet Optimus’s.

“He shouldn’t be capable of that yet,” he said lowly. “Even Vosian Seekers—some of the smartest of their kind—don’t usually start demonstrating cognitive math processing until at least six or seven. And even then, it’s… rudimentary.”

Optimus held Starscream more securely. “What does this mean?”

Ratchet slowly answered, tone turning heavy. “It means… he’s developing faster than any known record we have. Mentally, perhaps even emotionally. And if that continues…”

“…It means someone’s going to come looking for him,” Elita finished softly, dread in her spark.

Because now, Starscream wasn’t just a miracle.

He was a threat to anyone who feared what he could become.

Optimus’s servos had barely adjusted to the weight of his little one when a familiar blur of yellow zoomed into the hallway.

“Hey! Hey, what’s all the noise abou—?” Bumblebee slid to a stop, antennae twitching, optics wide. His gaze instantly landed on the sparkling nestled against Optimus’s chest. “Wait—is he okay?!”

“He’s more than okay,” Brainstorm said with a slightly dazed scoff. “He’s terrifying. Brilliant. I think I’ve met my intellectual replacement and he still has trouble standing up without wobbling.”

Before another word could be spoken, Bumblebee stepped forward and—without hesitation—reached for Starscream.

Optimus blinked, startled. “Bumblebee—?”

“I got it,” Bee said casually, but there was something warm and serious under his tone. He gently took Starscream from Optimus’s arms and held him with surprising skill, like he’d done it a thousand times before.

Starscream chirped and snuggled close to him, tiny servos gripping the yellow plating on Bumblebee’s chest as if it was his favorite place in the whole base.

“I mean, look at this,” Bee grinned down at him, rubbing the back of the seekerling’s tiny helm. “Brainstorm says he's a genius. But this? This little cube with wings? He’s just a baby. A cute little thing. I don’t care how many formulas he solves—he still gets distracted by his own foot.”

A few Autobots nearby chuckled.

Brainstorm’s mouth opened. “Excuse me?! Are you seriously doubting the—?!”

But he didn’t get to finish.

Because in that quiet moment—simple, soft, held still in the hush of the hallway—

Starscream looked up.

Straight into Bumblebee’s optics.

The little seekerling opened his mouth.

And softly, sweetly, he said:

“...Bee.”

The air fell silent.

Bumblebee froze.

He blinked, optics wide, hands trembling slightly around the tiny sparkling.

“Did he—?” Elita whispered.

“Starscream just spoke,” Ratchet murmured, in disbelief. “He shouldn’t be able to speak. Not yet. Not even a word.”

Brainstorm’s processor whirred in frantic circles, calculations spinning. “But it wasn’t random. That wasn’t babble. That was a name.”

“Bee,” Starscream repeated, smiling now, optics bright and unguarded. His wings fluttered again, brushing against Bumblebee’s arms, and he clung just a little tighter to the yellow scout.

Bumblebee’s voice caught in his throat. He couldn’t move.

He stared at the little bot in his arms—the one who had spent the first month of his life whimpering from nightmares, curled into corners, afraid of sudden noise. The one who slowly, slowly began to trust him. The one who giggled when Bee transformed his arm into a blaster-shaped rattle or made silly noises through his vents.

The one who now called him by name.

“...You little glitch,” Bee murmured, voice cracking as he smiled. “You got me.”

Starscream just chirped, optics shimmering.

Bumblebee brought him close again and pressed his cheek gently to the top of Starscream’s helm.

“I got you too, okay? Always.”

From behind them, Elita covered her mouth with her hand, optics glowing.

Optimus didn’t speak. He only looked at Bumblebee and Starscream—and there was something deep in his expression. Pride, yes, and awe. But also a shadow, something stirring beneath the surface.

Something like fear.

Because a sparkling who could speak before his systems were ready… A sparkling who could fix quantum equations at two years old…?

That was a miracle.

And miracles always had a price.

The gentle hum of energy in the corridor dimmed as silence swept through the Autobots. Bumblebee still held Starscream close, the sparkling content and smiling, unaware of the storm building in the expressions around him.

Optimus’s optics lingered on the little one for a moment longer. Then he turned—to Elita first, then to the rest of the Autobots nearby. When he spoke, it was not as a friend, not even as a sire.

It was as a Prime.

His voice dropped, calm but full of finality. Authority bled from every word like steel.

“No one. No one outside this base can ever know about him.”

The air grew heavy, still.

Optimus's optics narrowed, the glow behind his mask colder now. “The Decepticons must never learn what Starscream is. If they discovered his intelligence… if they knew what he’s capable of becoming... they would do everything in their power to take him.”

His fist tightened at his side. “And if they ever found out that Elita and I are his adoptive parents—” He paused, jaw clenching, voice lowering. “—they would not hesitate to take him hostage. To break us.”

Bumblebee looked up at Optimus, holding Starscream more protectively now. “But… he’s just a sparkling.”

“No,” Brainstorm said quietly. “He’s more than that.”

“Exactly,” Optimus replied. “Which is why he must be protected. From everyone.”

Elita stepped forward, voice soft but firm. “We’ll keep him safe. I will keep him safe.”

Optimus’s optics flicked to her, and something unreadable passed between them. Not fear. Not even sorrow.

Determination.

Conviction forged in pain.

He nodded once. “From now on, Starscream remains inside Autobot HQ. No missions. No field work. No visits to neutral zones or supply lines. He is never to step outside these walls until I say otherwise.”

Ratchet folded his arms. “You think they’d really come for him?”

“I know they would,” Optimus said. “If Megatron ever discovered the truth, he would tear this planet apart to get his hands on him. We’ve seen what he’s willing to do for power. For leverage. He wouldn’t care that Starscream’s just a child.”

Everyone was quiet again.

Prowl was the first to step forward. “Then we won’t let that happen.”

“Ironhide too,” grunted the weapons specialist. “Let any ‘Con try. We’ll be ready.”

One by one, nods and quiet voices of assent followed. Jetfire, Bulkhead, Wheeljack—even the twins, who for once said nothing and simply saluted.

Elita looked down at Starscream, now sleeping against Bumblebee’s chest, tiny servos still curled into a fist. A peaceful face.

Innocent.

But with the fate of a planet written in the lines of his spark.

Optimus turned again, slowly, scanning every face in the corridor. “This isn’t just a security order. It’s a vow. We protect him with everything we have.”

His gaze settled back on Elita, and something in his voice—his tone, his cadence—softened just a fraction.

“We’ve lost too much already. I won’t lose him too.”

Chapter Text

Years had passed.

The war still thundered on across the stars, but within the Autobot base, time had carved a space of rare, strange peace. Starscream had grown—from a tiny, brilliant sparkling into a vibrant, elegant youngling. His wings had grown sleek and long, his optics brighter than ever. Though confined within the base’s high walls, Starscream had become the light of it.

A brilliant student. A helper to all. A spark so warm it made even the battle-hardened bots soften in his presence.

But Starscream was in his cycle of change now. Puberty had arrived like a crashing meteor—with wild emotions, rapid development, and… quirks.

At that moment, Bumblebee was the chosen victim of said quirks.

He sat on the floor, legs folded, engrossed in a datapad displaying mission stats and energy consumption reports. The door to the command room was half-open. The corridor beyond echoed faintly with bootsteps and voices.

And then—

A thump. A flutter of wings.

Bumblebee grunted as a full weight dropped on his back.

“Starscream,” he groaned, “again?”

The young seeker chirped with mischief, arms wrapped around Bumblebee’s shoulders, his wings rising and falling in a slow rhythm. His helm rested on Bumblebee’s back, nose buried against the scout’s armor as he simply soaked in the warmth of his field.

“You're warm,” Starscream said, voice muffled.

“That’s ‘cause you’re crushing me,” Bumblebee grunted. “Primus, you weigh more than a minibot shuttle now!”

“I’m growing,” Starscream said sweetly, tightening his hold.

“Starscream—!”

“Oh look,” Ratchet’s voice drawled as he passed through the room behind them, “youngling cling mode activated. Starscream’s chosen his favorite.”

Bumblebee shot him a desperate look. “Ratchet, help.”

The medic just smirked. “Nope.”

In the corner, just outside the room, Optimus stood with his arms crossed, jaw twitching, optics narrowed in something between dismay and long-suffering restraint. At his side, Elita-One barely kept it together, venting through her mouth with small huffs.

“Optimus,” she said slowly, voice trembling, “I swear if he touches Bee’s aft again I’m going to—”

“Elita,” Optimus warned, one servo raised.

“I will launch him into space. I carried him through his first sparkflush! I watched him sob when Bumblebee got scratched on a mission! Now he’s crawling on him like a lovesick turbofox—”

“Elita, please.”

But then—

Ratchet leaned into her field of view, datapad in hand, tone dry as ever.

“Well, clearly the brat’s hit puberty. He’s moody, clingy, and weirdly territorial. That’s usually when they get attached to one individual. Poor Bee’s the lucky favorite.”

Optimus stared straight ahead, face blank. “I am sending Bumblebee to Jupiter.”

“Optimus,” Ratchet said, now openly laughing. “Let the kid be. It's harmless. Besides, Bee can handle it. Look, he’s barely twitching.”

Inside the room, Bumblebee was, in fact, twitching. Starscream was humming now. Not singing. Just… humming a low, soft tune as he rubbed his cheek into Bumblebee’s shoulder like an affectionate turbohound.

“Help,” Bumblebee whispered to no one.

Starscream’s wings twitched. “I like your field,” he mumbled dreamily. “It makes me feel safe.”

That broke Elita.

She stormed into the room, pointed a sharp digit at Starscream, and said, “Off. Now.”

Starscream pouted.

“No.”

“Starscream, if you don’t get off my Bee this instant, I will personally reprogram your wings to twitch every time you look at him.”

“You wouldn’t.”

“Watch me.”

Starscream groaned but finally detached himself, flopping onto the carpet like a dramatic stage actor.

Bumblebee slumped forward, faceplanting into the floor, muffling something about needing a vacation.

Optimus walked in after Elita, hands behind his back. His calm voice carried the weight of someone holding back a scream.

“Starscream,” he said.

“Yes, Sire?”

“Find a new favorite.”

Starscream sat up, wings flicking innocently. “No.”

Optimus turned slowly to Ratchet. “Can I put him in stasis for three months?”

Ratchet shook his head, still chuckling. “Not unless you want Elita to murder you in your recharge cycle.”

Elita crossed her arms. “Try it.”

Starscream just smiled brightly, proud of the chaos he caused.

Somehow… the base felt more alive than ever.

And yet—

In the shadows of distant stars, the war still waited.

Optimus and Elita-One stood just outside the lounge, in what was clearly not a quiet, civil discussion. Their voices were low but tense, the kind of conversation only bonded partners with a shared sparkling could have—filled with fierce opinions and the simmering weight of unconditional love.

“I’m just saying,” Elita hissed quietly, arms crossed, “if Bee so much as kisses his helm again, I’m locking them in separate sectors.”

“Elita, he’s exploring attachment, not establishing a courtship ritual,” Optimus replied, trying very hard not to sound like he was amused. “You’re reading too much into it.”

“Oh, am I? Did you miss the part where our child practically purred while clinging to Bee like a magnetic barnacle?”

“I was trying not to commit war crimes in front of Ratchet.”

Their argument continued with the rhythm of longtime co-carriers: fierce love wrapped in relentless concern.

Meanwhile, on the other side of the room, Starscream had quietly detached himself from Bumblebee—who was currently hiding behind a datapad with the exhausted aura of someone recovering from affection overload—and walked lightly toward Ratchet’s side, wings low but not drooped, his field carrying both curiosity and… something heavier. Something quietly uncertain.

“Ratchet?” Starscream asked softly, tilting his head as he looked up.

The medic glanced down from his console. “Hmm?”

“I… had a question.”

Ratchet nodded. “Go on.”

Starscream hesitated for a moment, then stood a little straighter, hands clasped behind his back, wings fluttering slightly before they stiffened in place. His voice dropped just a little, lower than usual.

“At what age does a bot begin to… you know… have a life. A busy life. On the berth.”

There was a silence.

Ratchet blinked. Then blinked again. The question didn't sound like a joke. There was no mischievous glint in Starscream’s optics this time, no fluttering show of dramatics like earlier.

Ratchet cleared his throat awkwardly and leaned back.

“Well. Uh. That depends,” he muttered. “Curiosity like that’s normal at your age, nothing to be ashamed of. Usually… we start seeing instincts waking up around sixteen. That’s when most bots become physically and emotionally mature enough for interface.”

Starscream’s optics widened with interest.

“Sixteen,” he repeated.

“Yes. But,” Ratchet added, voice firmer now, “if you’re talking about anything involving conjunx bonds, spark sharing, or any long-term spark entanglement—then twenty-one. Earlier than that and it’s dangerous. The spark matrix needs to be fully stable, or—”

“I have to wait two more years,” Starscream interrupted with a dramatic groan, his wings dropping down like metal feathers slumping under gravity.

Ratchet nearly choked on his energon. “Wait—what—Starscream, Primus, I didn’t mean—! You’re not supposed to—!”

But Starscream had already turned around, sighing so loudly it could have powered a ventilation system. His wings dragged with exaggerated grief behind him as he walked past Bumblebee—who peeked out from behind his datapad and immediately looked terrified.

“No one understands my pain,” Starscream lamented loudly.

Bumblebee blinked. “What pain?”

“The pain of not being allowed to love, Bumblebee,” Starscream said solemnly, planting himself face-first into the couch.

“Oh no,” Bumblebee whispered, peeking over his datapad at Ratchet. “What did you do?”

“I answered a biological question,” Ratchet muttered. “I didn’t expect that response!”

In the background, Optimus and Elita had paused mid-debate as Starscream’s dramatic wail echoed across the base.

“What now?” Elita muttered.

“I don’t want to know,” Optimus answered flatly.

Starscream peeked up from the cushions.

“I want a romantic holodrama,” he declared to no one. “One with yearning. And forbidden love. Maybe a gladiator and a scholar. With wing touches and lingering glances and one tragic sparkbond.”

Ratchet buried his face in his servo.

“Oh no,” he murmured. “He’s entering the dramatist phase.”

Bumblebee groaned. “I’m not babysitting during this one.”

Optimus stared at the ceiling. “Is it too late to ask Primus for a refund?”

Elita huffed out a breath that was definitely not a laugh, but almost.

Starscream just flopped back into the cushions and sighed again, long and loud and full of unnecessary sorrow.

Bumblebee let out a slow, slightly exhausted vent as he gently patted Starscream’s helm, the familiar affection blooming in his spark like it always did. “One day,” he said, soft and honest, “you’ll find someone. Someone who gets you. You’ll see.”

Starscream's wings flicked upward like an excited proto-avian, and before Bumblebee could even react, the young Seeker let out a delighted sound and lunged—wrapping his long arms around Bumblebee and dragging them both to the ground with a metallic thud that echoed off the high ceilings of the command center.

“Starscream!” Bumblebee yelped, but it was muffled under the weight of the giggling, purring jet-former now sprawled on top of him.

Starscream, bright optics shining and wings fluttering with joy, stared down at the flustered yellow scout with unabashed delight. His frame vibrated with unfiltered happiness, and his field was practically radiating affection.

“I still have to wait two years,” he said dramatically, wings arching in a display of mock-tragedy—then he tilted his helm, gaze steady and a little too serious for Bumblebee’s comfort. “Could you wait?”

There was a pause. Bumblebee’s systems stalled for a full two seconds, a faint glow of heat rising to his faceplates as he processed the question—and the position they were in. He squirmed.

“I—I mean, yeah, sure, of course. I can wait, Starscream,” he said, half-laughing, mostly confused, and mostly wanting the taller mech off him. “Now maybe you should, uh, get off?”

Starscream beamed. The kind of beam that could melt warships.

With a graceful, over-the-top sigh, he finally rolled off Bumblebee and stood up, smoothing out his wings like a noble prince preparing to give a speech. “Then I’ll start my research,” he said, with all the solemnity of a bot accepting a diplomatic mission. “I need to study courtship customs across factions and planets. Especially tragic ones.”

And just like that, he trotted off toward his quarters, wings bouncing, field buzzing with glee.

Bumblebee stayed flat on the floor for a second, staring at the ceiling. “What the frag just happened?”

He sat up slowly, only to see Ratchet, off to the side, gripping a datapad so tight it looked like it might snap from how hard he was laughing silently. His shoulders shook violently with the effort to contain it, and there were actual tears forming in the corners of his optics.

“What’s so funny?” Bumblebee asked warily, brushing dust off his frame.

Ratchet wheezed, finally letting out a half-strangled, “Ohhh, Primus, you’re so dead—”

“BUMBLEBEE.”

The command bay temperature dropped ten degrees.

Optimus had his arms locked tightly around Elita, who looked halfway between enraged maternal fury and battlefield bloodlust. Her optics were blazing. The only thing stopping her from launching a missile at the scout was her bonded Prime’s grip around her waist.

“He didn’t mean it,” Optimus whispered desperately in her audio. “He doesn’t even know what he said.”

“HE SAID HE WOULD WAIT,” Elita roared.

Bumblebee’s optics widened as realization began to dawn, slow and painful.

“Wait for what—?” he asked, eyes darting between Elita, Ratchet, and the corridor Starscream had disappeared into.

Ratchet gave him a thumbs up, still crying with laughter. “Good luck, future conjunx. You’re doomed.”

Bumblebee paled so hard his paint almost peeled.

“W-WAIT—NO—WAIT!” he cried, scrambling to his feet, wings twitching in panic. “I DIDN’T AGREE TO ANYTHING!”

Optimus buried his face in his servo.

Elita lunged.

The base was chaos.

Elita, wings flared and optics blazing, was storming down the corridor like a warship launched into battle, with Bumblebee zipping ahead of her in full retreat, skidding around corners and knocking over crates as he fled for his life.

“I DIDN’T SAY I’D BOND WITH HIM, I JUST SAID I’D WAIT—!”

“AND WHAT EXACTLY DO YOU THINK THAT MEANS, YOU NITWIT?!”

A storage panel exploded as Elita’s cannon fired past Bumblebee’s helm. Several younger bots nearby dove for cover.

Meanwhile, Ratchet was practically doubled over in the command room, wheezing, one servo braced against the console as he tried to keep himself from falling over. His ventilations were erratic from laughing, static sparking around his vocalizer.

Most of the other Autobots were frozen in varying states of confusion, shock, or wide-eyed terror. A few of the medics from Ratchet’s team peeked from the medbay doors. Hound and Prowl exchanged bewildered glances.

“Did Bumblebee commit a crime?” Hound whispered.

“I think... he accidentally got engaged?” Prowl muttered, scanning rapidly through the logs for confirmation.

Optimus stood near the central table, one hand on his helm, trying to keep his processor from short-circuiting. He turned a helpless look to Ratchet, desperation creeping into his usually composed voice.

“Please,” he muttered, low and urgent. “Ratchet, help me. You’ve been a medic longer than I’ve been alive. You’ve raised sparklings, mentored soldiers, kept this army from falling apart. Please help me figure out how to talk to him about—about all of this.”

Ratchet waved a servo dismissively, still chuckling as he leaned on the console. “Nope. You’re on your own, Sire.”

Optimus blinked, startled. “What?”

“You’re his Sire,” Ratchet repeated, finally standing up straight. “It’s your job to teach him about spark development, emotional drive, the interface cycle, choosing partners, and all the rest of that lovely awkward mess. You wanted a son. You got one. And a brilliant one, at that.”

Optimus’s field twitched. He looked toward the corridor where Elita’s furious shouting echoed with another near-miss blast.

“And Bumblebee—?”

“Your problem,” Ratchet said, snorting. “Though I’ll admit, I never thought I’d see Elita go full predator mode on the poor scout.”

“Neither did I,” Optimus muttered.

Ratchet gave him a sympathetic but amused pat on the shoulder. “You’re thinking like a real Sire now. You’re worried. Confused. Protective. Proud. But also terrified.”

“I am terrified,” Optimus admitted in a low voice.

“And that means you’re doing it right,” Ratchet said. “Now go talk to your son before he tries to download all of Iacon’s banned courtship literature.”

Then Ratchet casually walked off with a datapad tucked under his arm, still chuckling to himself, leaving Optimus standing there in silence.

The Prime looked down at his hands for a moment, flexing them slowly. How did one even begin this conversation?

Starscream wasn’t just his ward anymore. He wasn’t just a lost Seeker. He was his son, his responsibility… and he was growing up. Fast. Smarter than most, more emotionally aware than bots five times his age, and—possibly—more dangerous than even he realized if anyone outside this base ever learned the truth.

And now he was asking questions. Important ones. Real ones.

The war was still raging. Megatron still ruled half of Cybertron with brutality. The Decepticons would destroy everything to get their hands on a genius like Starscream. If they ever found out...

Optimus looked toward the quiet hallway that led to Starscream’s quarters.

He straightened his frame.

Time to talk.

The door to Starscream’s quarters finally hissed open with a soft pulse of hydraulics.

Optimus stepped out slowly.

His shoulders were low, his optics dimmed, his steps a little heavier than usual. Elita immediately released Bumblebee—who had been dangling from her grip like a worn-out rag—and turned sharply, optics wide with concern. Even the ever-energetic scout fell still, rubbing at his now thoroughly scrambled vents.

“Optimus?” Elita asked quietly, walking to him, hands ready to steady him if needed. “How did it go?”

He stopped a few paces from her, dragged in a deep intake, then finally lifted his optics.

“It… went well. I think.”

“You think?” Elita echoed warily.

Optimus nodded, optics distant, like he’d just returned from a war zone—emotionally, perhaps, he had.

“I explained everything to him. About what he’s feeling. Why he’s curious. What it means. The bond instincts, the drives, the spark fluttering he described…” He sighed. “Starscream understood. Somehow. In that beautiful, terrifying mind of his—he understood.”

Elita exhaled slowly, visibly relieved. Her expression softened.

“I told him it’s normal. That it’s too soon. That it’s good to ask. That feelings don’t mean actions… not yet. And he agreed to wait.”

Bumblebee sagged in relief as well. He gave Optimus a small, grateful smile—until the Prime continued.

“But… he also said something else.”

The silence tightened.

Optimus looked at Elita, then at Bumblebee—gently, but with weight.

“He said that when he turns sixteen, he will begin courting. And he will court Bumblebee. Because—his spark has already chosen.”

Elita’s mouth opened. Then closed. Then opened again. Her optics flashed.

“HE’S STILL A SPARKLING!”

Without warning, she spun back toward Bumblebee and snatched him up again, more forcefully this time, shaking the poor scout like a bobblehead on high alert.

“WHAT HAVE YOU DONE TO HIM?! WHAT DID YOU SAY TO HIM?! DID YOU LOOK AT HIM STRANGELY?!”

Bumblebee flailed helplessly. “I DIDN’T DO ANYTHING! I DIDN’T EVEN TOUCH HIM—WELL I DID, BUT—ONLY HUGGING, NOTHING ELSE—!”

Optimus pinched the bridge of his nasal ridge.

Cliffjumper, watching the scene unfold from the corridor’s entrance, chewed on some energon gum and mumbled casually through a smirk, “Well, I mean… Starscream is a pretty little youngling. Wouldn’t be surprised if everyone his age wanted to court him.”

The entire hallway went silent for two seconds.

Elita dropped Bumblebee.

And turned slowly toward Cliffjumper.

Cliffjumper blinked. “...Wait.”

Then Elita lunged with a shriek, and Cliffjumper ran for his life, yelping.

“WHY WOULD YOU SAY THAT OUT LOUD?!”

As a new chase ensued through the corridor—this one involving shouts, slamming doors, and Cliffjumper screeching apologies—Jazz leaned against the wall with his arms crossed, casually sipping on a half-empty cube of energon as though watching a soap opera unfold.

“Huh,” Jazz commented to no one in particular. “So his type’s the smaller, cuter kind, huh?”

He turned his visor toward Optimus, tilting his helm slyly.

“I wonder where that preference comes from…”

Optimus narrowed his optics.

Jazz grinned wider.

“I mean, Elita is, let’s be honest, short, adorable, terrifying, and pretty much made of fire and danger. And you fell hard.”

Optimus refused to dignify that with a response. He turned away, hiding the faint heat rising in his faceplates.

Jazz chuckled softly and added under his breath, “Yeah, definitely inherited taste from Sire. No doubt.”

And while Elita’s roars echoed down the hall and Bumblebee climbed onto a rafter to avoid getting caught again, Optimus allowed himself one rare, weary smile.

This… was his family.

Messy. Loud. Confused.

But full of love.

And somewhere, in the quiet of his quarters, Starscream was likely already researching Cybertronian courtship traditions, with flowcharts, calculations, and maybe even a few color-coded proposals.

And Primus help them all when he turned sixteen...Primus help them all...

Chapter Text

Another year had passed.

Starscream was now fifteen full Cybertronian years—small for his age to seeker building but his wings more defined, his frame still sleek and light like a Seeker’s but stronger now, subtly refined with all the hours spent inside the base learning, building, evolving.

And yet... he had still never stepped foot outside.

Despite his deep and growing curiosity about the world beyond the base, about Cybertron itself, its cities, skies, and the stars above—it had never been enough to disobey the will of his creators.

Optimus and Elita had agreed, firmly but with love: not yet.

They feared what—or who—was still out there. They feared him finding out.

So Starscream, ever the obedient sparkling—if not sometimes frustratingly curious—had remained inside, never stepping beyond the massive secured walls of the Autobase. He never even complained, instead channeling all his thoughts, his questions, his intensity into helping the Autobots in whatever way he could. He read more data than any of them knew existed. He learned metallurgy, engineering, weapons physics, flight science—even the ancient designs of pre-war weapon tech.

He never wasted a moment.

So on that particular morning, when Brainstorm called a group of senior Autobots into his lab with no prior explanation, they were expecting something eccentric, volatile, and probably on fire.

Instead, they were met with a wide metal table, spotlit from above. Spread across it were a dozen weapons—sleek, shining, polished to perfection, but each unmistakably unique.

The Autobots gathered slowly, glancing between each other and the display.

There were placards beside each weapon—handwritten labels in perfect glyphs.

Ironhide. Optimus. Elita. Bumblebee. Prowl. Jazz. Windblade.

Ironhide was the first to speak, his voice caught somewhere between curiosity and awe. He stepped forward and picked up a long, matte-finished rifle with elegant joints and recoil-absorbing plating. It hummed with precision.

“Long-range magnetic accelerator rifle…” he muttered, examining it. “Balance is perfect. Sightline's clear. Recoil-dampening’s internal—by Primus…”

He looked up and grinned wide.

“I’m gonna kiss Brainstorm for this!”

Everyone turned to Brainstorm.

But Brainstorm—arms crossed, helm tilted—just shrugged.

“I didn’t make those.”

They blinked.

“What?” Prowl asked flatly.

Brainstorm pointed toward the far corner of the lab. “I didn’t design them. Didn’t blueprint them. Didn’t even assemble a bolt.”

Jazz raised a brow ridge. “Then who did?”

A soft whir of servos was heard.

From the far wall, a set of panels parted—and from a recessed platform stepped Starscream.

Slender but proud, his young frame now slightly taller, his wing posture more confident. His optics gleamed with restrained nervousness, but also unmistakable pride.

“I did,” he said simply. “They’re all custom designs. Based on each of your fight styles, stats, mission reports, and recorded footage from training sessions.”

He looked at them all in turn, wings twitching with slight excitement.

“I ran simulations. Refined the prototypes. Built them myself over the past six months. Brainstorm only helped by letting me use the high-temp forge and checking tolerances.”

He paused, then added with all the vulnerability of someone who wanted so badly to be taken seriously:

“I just wanted to help… Even if I can’t go outside yet.”

Silence settled into the room.

Optimus stood motionless, his spark twisting with so many emotions at once. He didn’t speak—but his optics were soft with something close to pain, and pride so deep it hurt.

Elita’s hand drifted toward her new twin pistols—delicate but deadly, light enough for her precise strikes, but powered with dual-concussive cores. She picked one up, held it.

The grip was perfect. The weight—flawless.

Her vocalizer caught slightly.

Bumblebee, meanwhile, had gone quiet staring at his new stingers. Sleek wrist-mounted energy projectors—compact and nonlethal. Meant to paralyze, not kill. Starscream had remembered.

He looked over to the seekerling, whose wings fanned slightly in anticipation.

“You made these… for us?” he asked softly.

Starscream nodded.

“I know I can’t be on the battlefield yet. But I can still protect you. In my own way.”

For a long moment, no one moved.

Then Ironhide stepped forward, his new rifle slung over his shoulder, and gave the young Seeker a firm pat on the shoulder that nearly made Starscream stagger.

“You’ve got fire, kid,” he muttered. “Good fire. Don’t ever let anyone snuff it out.”

Windblade smiled, quietly lifting the sword crafted for her. It shimmered in the light like a song given form.

“It's beautiful, Starscream. Thank you.”

Ratchet huffed from behind, trying to keep his face neutral, but there was a clear shine behind his optics.

Optimus, finally moving, walked over slowly and placed a hand gently on his son’s shoulder.

“You’ve already done more than we ever expected, Starscream. This is… extraordinary.”

Starscream looked up at him, wings slowly rising in pride.

He didn’t need praise often. But from Optimus—it made his spark glow brighter.

But then Elita—quiet until now—approached.

She walked up slowly, holding her twin pistols. Her face unreadable.

Starscream immediately straightened, a little uncertain. He never wanted to disappoint her.

She stopped in front of him, optics locked to his.

And then, wordlessly, she stepped forward and hugged him—tight, fierce, grounding.

“I’m proud of you,” she whispered, low enough for only him to hear.

His wings quivered, his arms slowly raising to return the embrace.

This... this was what he lived for.

And as the others continued testing and praising the weapons, Bumblebee found himself staring at Starscream longer than he meant to, a small smile ghosting over his faceplates.

Because in that moment, surrounded by warriors, leaders, protectors—Starscream had become something more than just their hidden sparkling.

He was becoming a hero in his own right.

As the hum of admiration began to settle around the lab, Starscream’s wings twitched lightly—an almost shy gesture.

“There’s more,” he added, his voice still soft but no longer uncertain. “I designed more than just weapons.”

Everyone turned their attention back to him. The light above the table gleamed off his silver frame, casting shadows behind his youthful form. His optics held something glowing—hope, purpose, and the desire to give more.

“For Ratchet,” he continued, glancing toward the medic with a quiet kind of reverence, “I made blueprints for a mobile medical case. Something compact but capable of carrying advanced surgical tools, energon stabilization patches, nanite injectors, and plasma coagulators. All self-powered.”

He hesitated, wings lowering a little.

“I couldn’t build it, though. I didn’t have the materials. Brainstorm and Wheeljack’s storage units didn’t have what I needed. The casing would need to be extremely light but durable—titanium, ideally.”

He bit his bottom lip-plate. “I know it’s rare. I know it’s hard to get. But if we could… it would mean Ratchet could save more lives in the field. It would matter.”

For a beat, no one spoke. The lab lights hummed, the silence echoing more loudly than any words.

Ratchet’s jaw flexed slightly,he had followed the group. His optics narrowed—not in irritation, but in something deeper. Something stirred beneath the surface: an emotion he rarely let show.

He stepped forward slowly, folding his arms with a huff.

“You’ve been designing med kits now too?” he asked gruffly.

Starscream nodded, a bit nervously now. “I—I ran simulations with different emergency scenarios. I figured out how to keep the tools powered longer, how to make the compartmentalization more intuitive for high-pressure triage... I just—wanted to help. I thought maybe... you'd like it.”

There was a long silence.

Then Ratchet made a noise—something between a grunt and a laugh—and looked away, optics shining ever so slightly.

“You’re going to replace me one day,” he muttered, shaking his helm. “A few more years and you’ll be repairing me.”

Starscream blinked. Then laughed softly.

But before anything else could be said, a strong hand gripped the side of Starscream’s helm.

And then another.

Before the young Seeker could protest, he was suddenly lifted off the floor—effortlessly hoisted into the air by two strong servos, held in the air at helm-height to his towering Sire.

“Optimus!” Starscream yelped, wings flaring with alarm.

Optimus was grinning.

A real grin. The kind no one but Starscream ever saw.

“You’re too smart for your own good,” he said, squeezing Starscream’s helm just enough to make the Seeker squawk again in protest. “And you’ve made me too proud for my own good.”

Starscream squirmed. “Put me down! I'm not a sparkling anymore!”

“Not until you admit you're brilliant.”

“No!”

“Say it,” Optimus smirked.

“I’m brilliant!” Starscream yelped, clearly only saying it to be released.

Optimus finally lowered him gently back onto the floor, and Starscream pouted, folding his arms and looking away while his wings flicked in flustered embarrassment. Elita was covering a laugh with the back of her servo. Bumblebee was outright giggling now.

But the mood shifted again when Optimus turned toward the rest of the Autobots—his expression serious now.

“We will find the titanium,” he said, voice deep with that command tone only a Prime could summon. “Whatever it takes. We’ll recover, barter, salvage—anything.”

He looked back to his sparkling, blue optics gentle now.

“You’ll build your medkit, Starscream. Just like you built everything else you dreamed of. We’ll get you what you need.”

Starscream looked up at him—shoulders tensed, wings trembling slightly with the emotion he couldn’t yet voice.

He didn’t say “thank you.”

He didn’t need to.

The look in his optics was enough—bright, shimmering, proud.

He wanted to help. He wanted to change things.

And his Sire… would move the stars themselves to let him.

Optimus gathered the group near the platform at the base's exit, his voice calm but unwavering as he began to assign roles. Outside the reinforced walls of the Autobot stronghold, Cybertron’s sun filtered in pale and cold, casting long shadows across the hangar floor.

“We’re going out,” he said. “We’ll divide into small units and scatter along different sectors to search for the materials—especially titanium. Check abandoned labs, wreckage fields, and old mining routes. Avoid confrontation if possible.”

Ironhide, already cradling his newly gifted long-range rifle with all the glee of a sparkling with a birthday gift, smirked. “Avoid, huh?” he said, optics gleaming. “If a ‘Con so much as blinks at me the wrong way, I’ll get to field test this masterpiece. Been years since I had this much fun locked and loaded.”

Prowl grunted disapprovingly. Jazz chuckled. Windblade rolled her optics. Bumblebee, still nearby, just flexed his new stingers experimentally, still clearly proud of Starscream’s genius work—even if his thoughts were a little… distracted.

Optimus gave a brief nod. “Ironhide, Prowl, Bumblebee—you’re with me. Elita will lead the second group with Jazz, Windblade, and Ratchet. Brainstorm stays to guard the lab.”

Behind them, Starscream lingered near the back of the room, arms folded loosely across his chassis, wings relaxed. His optics flickered over each departing bot as if mentally checking the tools they carried, the suits they wore, the paths they were about to walk.

“You rest a little,” Optimus said gently, glancing back at him. “That’s an order.”

Starscream rolled his optics with mock annoyance, but a soft smile tugged at the corner of his lip components. “I will, I will. I’m not reckless like some of you.”

“That’s still debatable,” Ratchet muttered.

But just as the bots turned to file out—helmets checked, systems humming, boots echoing on the floor—Starscream took a quick step forward and extended a wing to lightly tap Bumblebee’s shoulder.

The yellow scout turned, curious. “What is i—”

He didn’t finish.

Because in the next breath, Starscream leaned in—and kissed him.

Quick. Barely more than a breath. A touch of lips, soft and full of meaning, but gone in the blink of an optic shutter.

And then the lab door slid closed between them with a hiss of pressurized air.

Bumblebee froze.

Completely froze.

For a few seconds, he stood there staring at the closed metal door as though it had just erased his processor. His optics were wide, and small, faint trails of actual steam were beginning to waft up from the vents on the back of his helm.

“Bumblebee?” Ratchet called, walking by casually, optics squinting. “You good?”

“I’m great,” Bumblebee replied, voice way too high-pitched, way too fast. “Why wouldn’t I be? I’m fine, totally fine! Just—it’s warm in here, that’s all—system’s self-cooling.”

Ratchet narrowed his optics suspiciously. “You’re smoking.”

“I like dramatic exits.”

With that, Bumblebee turned sharply and started walking—no, power walking—down the corridor toward the scout vehicle bay. His feet clicked rapidly against the floor as he muttered to himself, “I’m fine. He just kissed me. Not like I’ve been thinking about that for two whole years. I’m fine. He’s not even sixteen yet! This is normal. Everything’s fine.”

Behind him, Ratchet gave a small, knowing grin.

Ironhide, who had overheard everything, leaned toward Jazz and whispered, “Fifty shanix says Elita finds out and throws Bee into the ceiling.”

Jazz snorted. “Fifty? Make it a hundred. That femme’s got wrath.”

The groups began to leave, laughter and weapon-checks echoing behind them, but somewhere just beyond the noise, a small warmth lingered in Bumblebee’s spark. One brief moment… but it meant everything.

And behind the sealed lab door, Starscream stood still, back pressed lightly against the metal, wings tucked in close. A faint blush glowed beneath his optics.

He whispered to himself, barely audible, “Worth the wait.”

- - -

Hours passed outside the base. The scouting groups moved through the fractured lands of Cybertron with a quiet, determined pace. Ancient battlefields stretched out around them—twisted metal, hollow ruins, scorched terrain that remembered everything. Even the wind that curled through broken structures felt like ghosts whispering of wars past.

Still, the Autobots pressed on. Ironhide had taken the lead, energized by the chance to try out his new weapon. Prowl, precise as always, surveyed every corner. Jazz hummed to himself while mapping the terrain in his head. Bumblebee, still slightly dazed from earlier, kept touching the place on his mouth where Starscream had kissed him.

They gathered what they could—scraps of rare alloy, buried caches of materials forgotten by time. Not all they needed, but enough to start. Enough for Starscream to continue his work.

As the light on the horizon began to shift—Cybertron's artificial dawn rising—Optimus Prime activated the comm-line and spoke with that calm, commanding voice that always brought a sense of grounding.

“All squads, converge on the marker. Ground bridge inbound. Time to return.”

Confirmation buzzed back one by one. The Autobots regrouped, transforming and moving toward the rendezvous. Some were quiet, others joked among themselves. Bumblebee glanced skyward, thinking of the Seeker he’d left behind in the lab and wondering what new project he might be buried in now.

A roar of energy cracked through the air as the ground bridge swirled open with blue-green light.

“Let’s head back,” Optimus said, leading the way.

The last of the Autobots stepped through the gate just as it began to close.

And that was when it happened—so quick, so fluid that no one noticed.

A dark shape darted through the shrinking vortex. Low to the ground. Silent.

A shadow on four paws, made of black armor and whispered secrets—Ravage.

The casseticon infiltrator barely made a sound as his claws touched the steel floor of the Autobot base. He moved like living shadow, slinking immediately to the dark corners near the walls, vanishing behind storage crates and long shadows. The gate closed behind him with a final hum of light—and the Autobot base was once again sealed.

But now… with a spy inside.

Far away, in the heart of the Decepticon stronghold, Soundwave stood before a pulsating projection array. His visor flickered with incoming data streams, soft beeps echoing in the silent command chamber.

“Ravage: status confirmed. Inside Autobot base. Active transmission link stable.”

Megatron stood nearby, arms crossed, his frame still and expression unreadable.

He did not yet know the full purpose of this infiltration. All he wanted was information. Weaknesses. Energy stores. Guard rotations. Bridge signatures. Safe zones.

For now, all Megatron said was:

“Let them grow comfortable. Let them think they are secure. We will bleed them slowly, from the inside.”

Soundwave gave a silent nod, still monitoring the quiet pings from Ravage's signal.

“Surveillance only. No interference.”

Megatron turned from the screen and walked toward the command dais, his voice like a blade dragged across metal.

“We don’t strike until we know their every move. And when we do… the Autobots will have no refuge.”

Meanwhile, back in the Autobot base, no one noticed the predator among them.

Not Bumblebee, who was still pacing the halls, unsure how to process the kiss from Starscream.

Not Elita, who was staring at a report, silently wondering how fast the Seekerling was growing—too fast.

Not even Starscream, who sat cross-legged on the floor of Brainstorm’s lab, surrounded by blueprints, wires, and parts, smiling to himself as he sketched yet another design in glowing blue lines.

He was happy.

He was home.

Ravage slinked across the thick pipelines and support beams of the ceiling, a silent predator among the unwitting. No footsteps. No shadows. Not a single sound.

No one ever looked up.

His optics glowed faint in the dark as he recorded everything—the layout of the corridors, patrol paths, Autobot interactions, supply rooms, security terminals. And every detail was transmitted in real time, flickering across the massive screen in the Decepticon throne room.

Megatron stood at the center of the room, arms in the trohne, observing everthing.

Beside him, Soundwave controlled the feed, tapping into the auditory and visual streams of his loyal cassette. Behind them, a few elite officers gathered around the throne’s lower dais—Dreadwing, Shockwave, and a few sharp-tongued strategists, all intrigued by what Ravage had discovered. None of them expected anything beyond intelligence—resource counts, ground bridge signatures, maybe weaknesses in defense walls.

They were not prepared for what they were about to see.

Ravage paused above a familiar corridor, hidden within the mesh of shadow and piping. Below him, metal footsteps echoed—heavy, measured, unmistakable.

Optimus Prime.

The Autobot commander approached a specific lab door. At the top, stamped in silver letters dulled by time and fingerprints: B.S. Laboratory. Brainstorm's domain.

Optimus lifted his servo and knocked, the sound echoing like a soft chime in the dim hallway.

“Time to wrap it up,” he called gently, voice quieter than he used with most of his soldiers. “It’s late. You need your recharge.”

The tone was… unfamiliar. It wasn’t commanding. It wasn’t firm.

It was… fatherly.

From the other side, a younger voice replied—light, impatient, but unmistakably bright:

“Five more minutes, Sire—I'm almost done calibrating the welding stabilizer!”

Optimus gave a quiet, amused huff. “If you don’t finish for today and return to your quarters… no energon candies.”

Silence.

Then the door hissed open with a soft hydraulic whine.

A light clattered through the corridor as the lab's warm glow spilled into the hallway—and from within it emerged a figure small and slender, covered in soot and grease, wings twitching slightly, red optics blinking rapidly against the change in lighting.

A Seeker.

Young. Too young to be a soldier. His plating still shone with that soft shimmer of fresh-forged alloy, his helm fins not yet fully sharpened, his movements precise and curious—full of fire and intelligence.

He looked up at Optimus with an expression that was equal parts irritation and fondness.

“You always say that,” he muttered.

Optimus chuckled, gently placing a servo on the Seeker’s helm, steering him down the hallway toward the dormitory wing. “And you always fall for it.”

And as the two walked away…

…Megatron rose from his throne like a thunderbolt.

The room shook as his frame shot upright, his optics flaring wide in stunned disbelief. The low murmur of the other officers fell instantly silent.

Soundwave tilted his helm, catching the rise in Megatron’s sparkrate and cortex activity.

“...Megatron?” Dreadwing ventured, stepping forward slightly. “What did you see?”

But Megatron didn’t answer.

His optics remained locked on the screen—on the young Seeker now vanishing into the corridor's depths beside Optimus.

His hands had balled into trembling fists.

His vents hissed shallow, uneven. He looked like a mech who had just seen a ghost.

Because he had.

Because the spark signature, the wings, the voice, the face, even older… even growing… he was like his older and only lover,Starshine. A femme from the noble clan Star of Vos of so many,many eons ago. The same wings,the same colours. The same name they had chosen for theirs sparkling...

And Starscream was supposed to be dead.

His spark had been extinguished before it ever had a chance to grow. That was the truth Megatron had been told. That was what Ultra Magnus had promised when he had buried the experimental pod.

But now, staring at the screen, that truth crumbled in front of him like brittle rust.

“...You lied to me,” Megatron whispered, more to himself than anyone else. His voice was almost breathless, but it vibrated with something far darker underneath. “Ultra Magnus… you lied…”

Dreadwing took another cautious step forward, processing the implications.

“That was—”

“My creation,” Megatron growled, his voice breaking free in full.

Shockwave’s visor flickered. “Then this is not simply a hostage…”

“No,” Megatron hissed, turning, his expression twisting into something between awe and rage. “That is my creation. My sparkling. My heir.”

Soundwave, ever still, only nodded.

“Recommendation: extraction and confirmation.”

But Megatron wasn’t listening.

He stared at the now-black screen, claws twitching at his sides. His spark felt like it was burning through his chestplates. Years of anger, grief, betrayal—all of it resurfaced like a weapon unsheathed.

His child had not died.

His child had been stolen.

And now… now the Autobots would pay.

Starscream walked with a spring in his step beside Optimus, the corridor bathed in the soft golden light of the base’s overhead lamps. He talked with animated gestures, servos flitting in the air as he described something from his last experiment—his smile wide, wings flicking upward in excitement every time Optimus looked at him with that rare but gentle amusement in his optics.

On the screen back in the Decepticon throne room, Megatron stood frozen in front of his loyalists, his red optics dimmed with a dangerous calm.

And then he heard it.

Clear as day, caught by Ravage’s audio receptors, the word that sent everything inside Megatron screaming.

“Sire, I think the new power stabilizers are working way better than the last ones,” Starscream said, lifting his servo and gently brushing some soot off Optimus’s forearm. “If I can finish the calculations tomorrow, can we test it together? Please?”

“Sire.”

The word echoed again and again inside Megatron’s mind like a thunderous bell tolling over a battlefield.

His optics sharpened in fury.

He was calling Optimus Prime his Sire.

Starscream, his own creation, was smiling at another mech, was calling another Sire, was looking at Optimus the way young ones did when they trusted without doubt or fear.

And worst of all?

He looked happy.

Megatron’s vents flared violently. His fists clenched so tightly the metal of his gloves creaked with strain. The silence in the throne room was suffocating.

On the screen, Elita-One appeared, turning a corner with datapads tucked under one arm. Starscream’s optics lit up again, and he darted forward with a chirp.

“Carrier!”

He bounded up to her, and she greeted him with a tired smile as he gently hugged her waist.

“Elita, when can I fly again with Windblade and Silverbolt? The aerial site—it’s safe again, right?”

Her servo moved slowly, brushing over his helm, fingers delicate as she swept a little static from his wing joint.

“Soon, little star. Wheeljack made another… adjustment.” She smiled wearily. “It exploded, again, and we’re still trying to clear the blast residue. But you’ll be back in the skies soon, I promise.”

Starscream groaned playfully. “Wheeljack owes me two fly days now.”

“Three,” Elita corrected with a laugh, as he clung briefly to her arm and leaned into her warmth like a sparkling would.

And then Megatron could no longer look.

He turned away from the screen—no, he tore away from it—his spark howling in his chest, his field flickering in storming rage and grief. His steps were slow and heavy as he walked from the center of the room toward the wide open expanse of the observation deck, metal groaning under his feet.

Behind him, Soundwave’s visor blinked.

“Megatron. Orders?”

But Megatron did not answer.

His claws pressed against the railing of the deck, his frame hunched forward, optics staring into the blackness of the void outside their ship.

He had not always been a monster.

Not when he was thrown into the Pit Arena—when he was nothing more than a gladiator with raw metal fists and fire in his voice, trying to survive each night under the roar of a bloodthirsty crowd.

And not when she came into his life.

She wasn’t a warrior. She was a noblemech’s heir—sharp, defiant, and beautiful. She wasn’t supposed to look at him with anything but contempt.

But she had.

And, somehow, against everything, they had fallen in love.

And when she told him she was carrying his sparkling?

Megatron’s spark had pulsed with something he had never felt before.

Hope.

He had whispered promises to her—freedom, safety, a better Cybertron, a future. She had been willing to leave everything behind. But before she could escape, her own Sire—shameful and enraged at the scandal of her carrying the child of a miner—had given Ultra Magnus a task.

Megatron’s vents shook as the memory ripped through him like fresh shrapnel.

Ultra Magnus had come to the Pit Arena with cold eyes and false authority.

He reminded Megatron of his place.

Reminded him of the price for reaching above his caste.

And then he showed him her corpse,photos of it,photos of the momment that D-16 would never forget he had saw—thrown like trash before his feet—and beside it, the pod.

The half-grown, undeveloped spark of their creation still flickering, fragile, inside its metal shell.

Left to die.

Left to rot.

“An abomination,” Ultra Magnus had told him.

“She disobeyed her house. And this... thing will not be allowed to exist.”

And Megatron had screamed.

Now, standing aboard the Decepticon warship, staring into the cold stars of deep space, Megatron’s claws dug deep into the metal railing.

His optics narrowed.

They lied. They took him. They took my creation from me. They raised him in the arms of my enemy.

He thought of Starscream’s face. Older. Changed. But still his.

The same red optics. The same crown of wings. The same fire.

They stole him.

They twisted him.

And they dared to make him love them.

Optimus Prime… you took him. You raised what was mine. You poisoned him against me.

Megatron’s mouth twisted into a snarl. His vents pulsed like thunder.

“...Soundwave.”

The comms clicked open immediately.

“Prepare the strike.”

Dreadwing stepped forward again, tense. “A full-scale assault, my lord?”

Megatron turned slowly, optics glowing like twin suns of wrath.

“No. Not yet. We don’t destroy the nest… not until we reclaim what they stole.”

He paused.

Then, in a voice deep and soft with deadly promise:

“Starscream is mine. And I will take him back.”

Soundwave stood silently at Megatron’s side, his frame rigid with the weight of memory.

He remembered that night.

The one where the warlord—bloody from battle, silent for hours—had sat upon the edge of the ruined command chamber with his blade still stained and his voice unsteady. Soundwave had stood in silence, ready for a report or a reprimand.

But instead, Megatron had spoken.

He spoke of the noble femme.

Of the love he was never meant to feel.
Of the sparkling they were never allowed to have.
Of Ultra Magnus, the symbol of everything that had ever tried to erase him.

“He killed her,” Megatron had said, voice steel and acid. “He left our creation to die. And now he wears that armor like he’s a symbol of peace.”

Since that night, Soundwave never questioned his leader’s hatred of Magnus again.

Not after seeing the raw, open pain behind Megatron’s optics—just once.

Now, standing in the throne room once more, Soundwave watched the expression Megatron wore as he stared at the screen.

The image showed Starscream turning back, giving Optimus and Elita a bright, warm smile—fragile wings flicking lightly as he stepped into the room beside theirs, his quarter.

The door sealed behind him with a soft hiss.

A silence stretched.

Then came the order.

“Do not let him out of your sight.”

Soundwave nodded without a word and transmitted the command to Ravage across the bond.

Somewhere inside the Autobot base, Ravage stopped in his stealthed crawl through the upper beams. The black casseticon turned with silent grace and padded into a ventilation tunnel just above the corridor.

He moved fast, undetectable, a blur in the pipes and shadows.

Within seconds, he was above Starscream’s quarters.

A thin grid vent let him peer down into the room, and Ravage settled quietly on his haunches like a statue, silent and still, optics glowing low as his lenses recorded everything.

The room was…

…unexpected.

It was personal.

The berth was clearly customized—polished edges rounded to avoid sharp corners, with a soft energon-weave blanket draped unevenly at the foot. One pillow had tiny stitched designs across the edge—simple stars and wing patterns. Someone had given him that.

Against one wall stood a well-maintained cabinet with a half-open door revealing small polished datapads, color-coded by a system only Starscream probably understood.

A curved emetal desk sat near a small charging node. A reclining chair was tucked under it, well-used, the leather worn at the edges where talons had tapped or gripped during long study sessions.

But it was the walls that told the truth.

Handwritten pages pinned up—calculations, starmaps, sketches of weapon stabilizers, poetic verses written in Old Vosnian glyphs.

Shelves were filled with books. Real, worn, physical books—not just digital formats. Some titles were etched in Vosnian, others in Cybertronian standard. One had a ribbon peeking out from the center, mid-read.

Scattered among them were—

Drawings.

Quick ones. Some done with precision. Others with the messy flow of someone sketching while excited or distracted. There were faces—some of Elita, some of Bumblebee, some of Windblade with a wide grin. There were sketches of flight patterns, anatomy diagrams of Seekers. A half-finished technical schematic lay next to a cartoonish drawing of Optimus holding an energon candy high while a chibi Starscream tried to fly up and snatch it.

It was…

A developing teen’s room.

Ravage blinked slowly. His tail twitched once, silently.

Below, Starscream entered, venting softly. His entire demeanor relaxed now that he was alone. He walked straight toward his desk, tossed down a tool kit, and slumped into the chair with a soft groan. He rolled the chair back on its wheels and stared up at the ceiling with a vacant smile, wings sagging slightly in contentment.

“Ugh… my vocalizer still hurts from talking too much,” he muttered to himself, then laughed quietly. “Bumblebee’s fault.”

He reached over and pulled one of the books from the shelf, then hesitated and chose a datapad instead.

As he turned it on, his voice dropped to a quiet whisper.

“...He said we could try synchronizing the output tomorrow. Maybe if I get the equations right, he’ll let me do the flight test too.”

There was no one there to hear him.

But the hope in his voice was unmistakable.

The kind of hope that only comes from a young spark that never knew how cruel the world could be. That never knew who watched him now, and why.

Back in the throne room, Ravage’s feed streamed silently. Starscream's private moment displayed before the Decepticon war council like a play for ghosts.

Megatron watched it all.

His optics narrowed as he saw the berth. The blanket. The books.

He saw his son—his sparkling—studying, dreaming, living.

Living the life he was never meant to have.

A life that they gave him.
A life Megatron never had a chance to offer.
And the longer he watched, the more Megatron’s fury boiled beneath the surface of his frame.

But this time it was not the cold, thunderous rage that shattered cities.

This time, it was something deeper.

Personal.

Because Megatron was not watching a soldier.

He was watching his child.

The one they had stolen.

And he would be the one to take him back.

Megatron didn’t move.

He simply stood, frozen before the screen, his massive hands clenched into trembling fists as he watched the quiet image of the room.

It was quiet now.

Starscream had worked for nearly half a cycle without pause, his wings fluttering every time he figured out a line of code or refined a formula. His optics would light up softly, lips moving as he whispered calculations aloud, so completely focused on his project that he never once looked toward the ceiling—never once imagined he was being watched.

And Megatron did watch.

He memorized the way his son tilted his helm when confused. The little frown he made when a number didn’t line up. The soft, unconscious clicks of his fingers against the desk as he thought. The way he pulled his wings inward when the recharge cycles began to creep up on him.

Now…

Starscream set down his datapad.

He rubbed his optics wearily, a tired little sigh escaping his lips, and then rose.

Without words, he walked to the berth and gently pulled back the blanket.

A moment later, he retrieved his pillow from the cabinet, held it close to his chest for a second as if drawing comfort from the feel of it, then laid down.

The blanket curled around him like a cocoon. His wings folded in. His face pressed into the crook of the pillow, and his whole frame relaxed.

He looked… peaceful.

A youngling finally allowed to sleep, protected behind steel walls.

Safe.

Megatron watched this with the eerie stillness of a statue carved from wrath itself.

For a few minutes more, the screen glowed with that image—his sparkling resting beneath Autobot insignia, unaware of everything that was building around him.

“He sleeps,” Megatron said at last, voice as deep as an abyss. “He sleeps among our enemies.”

Soundwave glanced at him but said nothing.

Megatron’s optics never left the screen.

“I want everything,” he said, low and sharp, like a blade unsheathing. “Everything the Autobots have on him. And the base itself—I want every corridor, every conduit, every defense system. I want to know how they breathe inside that fortress.”

Soundwave’s visor pulsed once. Then again. A quiet ping followed as he connected directly to Ravage.

Through the silent corridor pipes, near the still form of Starscream’s ceiling-vent, Ravage received the command. His crimson optics gleamed in the dark.

Silently, Ravage moved.

Through the narrow ducts, past tangled wires and recycled air vents, the small black casseticon crept with feline grace—tracking the neural lines and comm towers that ran under the walls. A trained spy. Unseen. Unheard.

Soundwave remotely synchronized the scan protocols, and what Ravage couldn’t carry, Soundwave would copy through subtle electromagnetic taps into exposed Autobot relay points.

The walls of the Autobot base—once impenetrable—were slowly being unraveled.

Every corridor.
Every room.
Every command hub.

Including the quarters near Starscream’s. Including the ones marked with the sigils of Prime and Elita.

“Download in progress,” Soundwave confirmed, his voice as emotionless as steel.

Megatron finally turned away from the screen—but only after one last long look at the sleeping seeker.

His voice, when it returned, was quieter now. But no less dangerous.

“They stole him from me,” he muttered. “They let him live a life that wasn’t mine to give… but it should have been.”

He moved down the dais, heavy steps echoing in the throne room.

“They gave him books. Blankets. Soft things. Dreams.”

His fists clenched again. His spark pulsed violently in his chest.

“They taught him to call that Prime his Sire.”

Megatron’s vents rasped as if fire burned through his core.

“But I am his Sire. I carried his spark. I gave my life for his. They tried to erase that—tried to make him forget.”

He paused at the massive war table. His optics gleamed crimson beneath the glow of the screen. Ravage’s scans began to fill the display—hallways, energy conduits, bunkers, weapons lockers, even weak structural points.

Soundwave, behind him, confirmed again.

“Base schematics: 37% complete. Primary server access ongoing. Starscream files: acquired.”

Megatron exhaled through gritted denta, low and ragged.

“Then we will take back what’s mine.”

A shadow moved at the edge of the room—Dreadwing stepping forward, helm tilted low in reverence.

“When?” he asked, wings tense. “Do we attack them soon, my Lord?”

Megatron stared at the blueprints. At the points marked Command Center and Quarter B-6.

Then he glanced at the still-running image of Starscream’s quarters—still quiet, still warm, still peaceful.

“Not yet,” Megatron growled. “Not while he still thinks of them as home.”

His voice dropped low.

“We will wait. Let them grow comfortable. Let him fall deeper into that illusion.”

His fingers curled slowly into a fist.

“And then we rip it away.”

The room had gone quiet.

The map of the Autobot base still flickered across one side of the throne room’s massive screen, lines and power conduits slowly appearing in careful scans Ravage continued to transmit. But no one looked at it anymore.

All optics—especially Megatron’s—were fixed on the other side of the screen.

It had begun when Soundwave, visor dimmed and quiet, broke his usual silence.

“Megatron. The plan… will not succeed. Not as it is.”

Megatron’s optics narrowed like twin blades.

“Explain.”

Soundwave tilted his helm and extended a long, dark finger to the console. One datafile opened—then another. The Decepticon symbol flickered as the encryption unraveled, and the internal logs of Ratchet filled the display.

“Ravage accessed private archive,” Soundwave said. “Autobot medical log. Dr. Ratchet’s personal entries.”

Megatron growled.

“I don’t care about the medic’s wounded scrap—”

But then he fell silent.

The screen changed.

And the room, all at once, was filled with images of him.

Starscream.

As a sparkling.

There were datapad images first. Grainy but real. The first was the inside of a medical bay. A nursebot's hands held a translucent, still-maturing eggpod cupped in a nutrient shell.

A fragile life. A spark that shouldn’t have survived.

Another image showed Elita-One holding the egg gently, optics soft, her hands cradling it like a precious artifact.

“I will do what I can,” came Ratchet’s voice from the log, slightly distorted but clear. “Elita found him with a femme corpse long gone… the pod wasn’t stabilized, but it had enough coding to indicate Seeker class. High-tier Vosian. Possibly royal or noble.”

A video started to play.

The egg had cracked. The sparkling was squirming now, pressing against the shell with tiny, clawed hands. A shimmer of pale wings peeked through.

The room around Megatron was silent. Even the Decepticons present didn’t move.

He watched as Elita and Ratchet wrapped the tiny Seeker in energon-cloth. Watched as Elita crooned something softly, holding the little one to her chest. Ratchet was pacing behind her, fretting about vitals, muttering about spark-rates and neural syncing. But Elita? Elita was smiling.

A new file auto-played.

“Starscream, cycle 04.3. Early wingspan development. Energetic and learning fast. Primus, this kid is smart—talking before he could fully walk. No one tells him not to fly indoors. Not even me.”

There was laughter in Ratchet’s voice. Tired, fond laughter.

“He knows he’s adopted. We never hid it from him. Elita told him she found him under the stars. Optimus told him his real parents were probably brave, that they tried to save him… but he always just says we’re enough.”

Images scrolled by.

Starscream at age two, perched on Optimus’s shoulder, chewing on his own wingtip.

Starscream at age five, surrounded by scattered parts, trying to build something that looked suspiciously like a weaponized drone.

Starscream at eight, wrapped in a blanket and holding Bumblebee’s servo while watching a movie, optics wide and wet from whatever tragic moment played out on screen.

Then came the video that stopped Megatron’s spark cold.

Starscream—now a gangly pre-teen Seeker, his wings already sharper, his frame growing fast—was sitting beside Bumblebee outside the base wall. The stars were behind them, and Windblade’s laugh echoed somewhere offscreen.

The video ended there, cutting abruptly to another datapad entry.

“Age 12,” Ratchet’s voice noted. “He’s getting too big to sit on Prime’s lap. Not that he doesn't try. Elita’s teaching him Vosian poetry. I don’t even know where she finds this stuff. He’s flying with the aerial team now—Windblade swears he’s already better than she was at his age. I believe her.”

“He wants to be a scientist. Says he’s going to make Cybertron better. Says he’ll find ways to protect both Autobots and Decepticons. He doesn’t understand why the war started, and… sometimes I think it’s better that way.”

Megatron hadn’t said a word.

Not a single word.

His optics were locked on the screen.

Frozen.

Haunted.

Then came the final video in the sequence.

It was only two weeks old.

Starscream—now fully fifteen—stood in the same base hallway Ravage had filmed. His frame was taller now, more defined. His wings sleek and sharp. But his optics—bright, inquisitive, gentle—were still unmistakably the same.

He leaned into Elita’s side, asking about flight again. Asked about Windblade. About Silverbolt. When she asked why, he smiled.

“Because when I’m in the sky… I feel like I’m free. And when I’m free, I want to share it with the bots I love.”

Megatron staggered backward from the screen like he’d been shot.

His back hit the dais, and he stood there, breathing hard.

The fire in his optics was still there—but now… it was fractured.

“He… he knows,” Megatron rasped. “He knows he was adopted.”

Soundwave nodded. Quiet.

“They never lied to him.”

“He still chose them.” Megatron’s voice cracked. “He had the right to come back. To find me. He should have felt it. I’m his Sire. I… I felt it when he sparked.”

Silence.

Only the soft buzz of the projector. And the image of a sleeping young Seeker, content in a life Megatron was never a part of.

“They raised him,” Megatron whispered. “Taught him to love them. To forget me. To be Autobot.”

His fist struck the table. Hard. Sparks flew.

“He’s mine!”

But his voice broke—torn between rage and sorrow. Between pride and ruin.

And Soundwave… still silent… slowly reached forward and paused the playback.

The screen froze on an image of Starscream, smiling, seated on the floor, surrounded by datapads, a screwdriver tucked behind one audial fin, and Bumblebee half asleep at his side.

Soundwave turned to his leader, his voice as even and soft as he had ever allowed.

“Then we do not steal him back.”

Megatron turned to him, optics wide and red with fury.

“What?”

“We do not steal what we must first teach to remember,” Soundwave said.

“If he remembers you only as a monster, he will never follow. If he remembers you as the reason his first family was destroyed, he will never listen.”

Soundwave looked to the screen again.

“He must see the truth. Not just history. But you.”

The warlord trembled, rage colliding with grief inside his massive frame.

And far away, inside a quiet base, a young Seeker slept—peacefully unaware that, for the second time in his life, a war was being drawn around his name.

The war room remained dim, flickering only with the low hum of Ravage’s transmission and the last still frame of the paused video.

Starscream—smiling, safe, unknowingly bathed in the dim light of the very monster who once gave him life.

Megatron had not moved from where he stood.

His shoulders—so used to carrying entire armies, to wielding planets into submission—hung heavy now, trembling under the weight of something far older than the war.

Guilt.

Grief.

A primal ache for the sparkling he never held. The child who had been ripped from his reach, grown far away from his claws.

He looked like a warlord on the verge of shattering.

And it was Soundwave, as always, who stepped in before that edge became destruction.

“Megatron.”

His voice was soft, yes—but also sharp. Tactician-sharp. Cold as a scalpel and twice as precise.

Megatron lifted his helm slowly, optics burning like dying coals.

“What now, Soundwave? Another file? Another lie? Shall I watch his first flight next? His first pet? His first dented wing while training?”

His voice cracked.

Soundwave said nothing at first. He only walked forward and touched the console again.

But instead of more videos, this time a blank directory opened.

“[New Folder: ██],” the interface displayed.

Empty. Untouched.

Waiting.

Soundwave turned slightly, his visor catching the dim red light of the room.

“We do not need more memories.”

Megatron narrowed his optics. “Then what do we need?”

“Doubt.”

The single word hung in the air like a dagger.

“Explain.”

Soundwave did.

“Starscream is intelligent. Too intelligent. Ratchet’s logs show accelerated learning, deep reasoning, innate code-breaking skills. High independence. High emotional cognition. If… presented with the right information—truths buried inside his datapad—he would not be able to leave it alone.”

Soundwave tapped the screen again, opening sub-directories, codes, security bypasses.

“We plant a folder. Not obvious. Not labeled. Hidden, encrypted, waiting. A riddle of truths. Medical documents. Archived military files. Decommissioned Vosian records. And… enough of the past. Enough for him to begin asking questions no Autobot will want to answer.”

Megatron’s optics flared, wariness joining the fragile storm of longing in his expression.

“You mean to manipulate him.”

“No,” Soundwave said simply. “I mean to awaken him.”

Silence.

Then, slowly, Soundwave activated one more screen.

It was a fragment of an old Vosian datafile—partially corrupted, but legible. A noble’s family registry.

Near the bottom, under a house crest long forgotten, was a name: -Starshine, daugther of High Lord Starblivion,from the noble house of Vos,Star clan.-

Beside it: -Designated Offspring – Subject: Unnamed Seeker Sparkling (Status: Erased).-

Megatron flinched.

“They tried to erase him. Just like they tried to erase her.”

“They failed,” Soundwave answered.

He opened another file: medical documentation from a destroyed data tower in Vos. An analysis of an unstable eggpod. Handwritten notes in another bot’s scrawl:

-The sparkling’s coding is unlike any I’ve seen. Seeker-borne, but marked by strange energon signatures. Almost Warlord-tier strength in spark readings. Potential dangerous—
DO NOT REPORT TO COUNCIL.-

And scrawled in the corner, a simple label:

-Identified: D-16 - potential Sire origin.-

Megatron stared at the words like they were a curse.

They’d known.

Even then—someone had known.

And left the sparkling to die.

Soundwave’s voice cut through the thick silence.

“Ultra Magnus ensured her death. He ensured his erasure. That truth alone is a blade.”

“Optimus and Elita…” Megatron’s voice dropped, grating and low, “They may not know.”

Soundwave nodded. “Likely not.”

“But Starscream will ask.”

A slow, bitter smile curled on Megatron’s lips. “And once he does…”

“He will dig. He will push. He will not stop.”

Soundwave’s visor gleamed.

“And when he learns what Magnus did—”

Megatron finished it for him. “He will never trust the Autobots again.”

The room was silent once more, but now it buzzed with quiet electricity. A plan was taking shape. Not one of brute force—but of rot. Of corrosion from the inside.

The kind of plan Soundwave mastered.

“When do we begin?” Megatron asked.

“Ravage is already syncing with Starscream’s datapad system. Transmission will be subtle. A whisper in the code. A forgotten folder tucked behind his homework logs.”

Soundwave looked at Megatron then. Not with loyalty—but with purpose.

“We do not steal him, Megatron. We let him come to you. Not as a child... but as a Seeker ready to burn down the lie he was raised in.”

And somewhere, in a quiet berthroom not far from the command center, Starscream stirred in recharge.

A flicker of static passed through his datapad.

No alert. No ping.

But behind a layer of adolescent essays, engineering sketches, and music logs… a new folder appeared.

Nameless.

Silent.

Waiting.

Chapter Text

The throne room of the Nemesis was deathly quiet.

No soldiers dared to approach.

Not even the loyal Vehicons spoke, or moved. The lights had been dimmed by Soundwave’s silent command cycles ago. The great warship seemed to hold its breath around its master.

Megatron sat on the throne like a shadow carved into iron—immobile, vast, ancient in his grief.

His elbows rested heavily on his knees. His servos, calloused from eons of war, clutched a small, humming datapad. The light from it washed over his helm in soft, flickering glow. But the images on its screen were anything but soft.

Photos. Videos. Fragmented memories not his own.

Starscream—his sparkling—laughing in a field beside Bumblebee. Young, so young. Bright optics and winged shoulders too large for his frame, stumbling as he tried to jump and glide. He flailed into the medic’s arms and chirped in that high-pitched, childish tone:

“Did you see me?! I flew for a whole klik!”

Next file.

Starscream again—smudged with paint, crouched over a datapad as Ratchet handed him tools clearly too large for his little servos. His mouth moved in silence. The file had no audio, but the pride on his face needed none.

Next.

A rare one. Starscream sleeping. Bundled under a thick blanket, curled tightly on a too-big berth with one wing drooped off the side. Optimus Prime was dimly visible at the edge of the shot, standing in the doorway, unmoving. Watching over him like a statue.

Megatron’s optics dimmed.

He should have been the one in that doorway.

He should have seen those wings grow. Should have held him through reformatting, cleaned his scraped armor, fed him when he fell into recharge mid-sentence.

Instead…

He had given that to them.

He had lost her… and in doing so, lost him.

“He looks just like her,” Megatron rasped. His voice was barely more than a whisper, like it hurt to speak. “Her colors… the way she’d tilt her helm when she didn’t understand something. But the eyes.”

He stared at the still frame of Starscream reading a book, head tilted ever so slightly in confusion.

“He has my eyes.”

The datapad trembled in his grip.

Soundwave stood silently beside him, unmoving, hands behind his back. He had not gone to his quarters that night. He wouldn’t—not when his commander sat in such a storm.

It was nearly morning now. The false stars above the Nemesis dome had faded into artificial dawn. But neither of them had moved in hours.

Finally, Soundwave’s visor flickered.

“Starscream: waking.”

Megatron didn’t lift his helm.

“Ravage?”

“Successful infiltration. Room mapped. Entire east wing filmed. Command center and medical archives: partially hacked. Transmissions secured. Files en route to my systems now.”

“And the boy?” Megatron asked.

Soundwave hesitated for the briefest second.

“Still unaware. Still dreaming.”

Megatron finally leaned back into the throne. It creaked under the weight of his massive frame, but he was exhausted. Not in body—but in spark.

“I missed everything, Soundwave…”

The base was silent, soaked in morning stillness.

Starscream sat at the edge of his berth, talons pressing tiredly into his optics. He scrubbed at them with a groggy groan, trying to force his processor into full wakefulness. The recharge had been shallow. Restless. Full of fragmented thoughts and drifting dreams that tugged at something he couldn't name.

He stretched. His wings flicked low, drooping behind his back. His joints ached—not from overuse, but from growth. Another painful inch added overnight, he was sure of it. Ratchet had said the reformatting cycles would hit harder now, and Primus, he wasn’t wrong.

Sluggishly, Starscream stepped off the berth.

The datapad on his desk pinged.

One soft chime.

He squinted at it, annoyed already. Probably Bumblebee again—another meme, another dumb video, another "come spar with me I swear I won’t cheat this time". The last thing he needed this early.

Still, he picked it up.

He blinked at the screen.

No message.

No sender.

No ID trace.

Just... a folder.

Unmarked. Unread. No timestamp. Just sitting there—quiet and perfectly still—nestled between system files it had no right to be inside.

His optics narrowed. He tilted his helm. His talon hovered over it. A flick of his finger would open it.

Instead—

He didn’t.

Starscream snorted softly. A cold little laugh. Then, with smooth familiarity, his claws danced across the screen. A few swift strokes of code later and the folder was gone—deleted. Not sent to trash. Not archived. Gone.

Then, as if it were instinct, he immediately set to work.

His optics gleamed in the dim light as he cracked into his own system logs, retraced the path of the intrusion, and rewrote his firewalls entirely. He layered protocols on protocols, silently muttering to himself as his claws moved like liquid across the screen. A shell of misdirection here. An encryption loop there. Backdoors closed. Traps laid in their place.

Within five minutes, he had hardened his datapad beyond most Autobot standards. Whatever had slipped in before, it wouldn’t again.

And then—only then—did he sit back in his chair, wings twitching.

“I don’t know what game you’re playing,” he muttered to no one, “but I’m not stupid.”

He tossed the datapad on the table and stood, padding across the room barefoot and exhausted, disappearing toward the communal wash station.

Back on the Nemesis, Soundwave froze.

His claws hovered above the keys. The war room lights hummed quietly, and the main screen showed a soft live feed of the Autobot base hallway—now empty. But Soundwave wasn't watching the screen anymore.

He was staring at the unreadable log on his interface.

::FILE DELETED::
::ACCESS LOG DISMANTLED::
::FIREWALL MODIFIED—BY USER::

Silence.

He stared at the words. They didn’t shift. They didn’t blink.

He processed the log again.

Starscream had found the folder—the one he, Soundwave, had hidden in the deepest strata of the datapad's memory layers, shrouded by passive code and mimicked systems files. It should have taken a specialist to even notice it existed.

But the sparkling… hadn’t even hesitated.

He found it. Deleted it. And rewrote the entire system in under six minutes.

Soundwave’s optics flickered.

The silence stretched.

Then, in a rare and genuine moment of surprise, Soundwave slowly leaned back from the terminal.

Megatron was at his side in an instant.

“What is it?” the warlord asked.

Soundwave didn’t answer at first. He simply turned the monitor toward him and displayed the results.

Megatron read the lines of code. And stopped.

The look on his face darkened.

“He didn’t even open it?”

Soundwave shook his helm once.

Megatron’s optics narrowed in disbelief.

“He just… deleted it?”

Soundwave nodded. Slowly.

For the first time, Megatron’s expression flickered—something between confusion and awe. And then... irritation.

“Why? He must be curious. No one simply deletes something like that without—”

“He is in his rebellious phase,” Soundwave said plainly. “A spark of independent logic. Emotional defiance. Cybertronian adolescents often reject outside guidance. Even hidden truths.”

Megatron paced once, turning his back.

“I thought he'd want the truth.”

“He likely knew it was the truth,” Soundwave answered quietly. “And still chose to refuse it. Because it came from us.”

That landed like a weapon.

Megatron stopped mid-step.

The bitterness in his spark ignited. This wasn’t just resistance—it was personal. It was him. Starscream, his own son, had turned away from the truth of his own origins… because it came from Megatron.

Soundwave, always careful, always deliberate, continued softly:

“He was raised by Autobots. Taught by them. Trusted by them. He knows there is war. And—he has loyalty to those who raised him.”

Megatron growled.

“They stole him from me. From her.”

“Yes,” Soundwave said. “But he does not know that. Not fully. Not yet.”

Another silence.

“Then we try again.”

Megatron’s voice was quiet. Steel in every syllable.

“If truth is a weapon... then we sharpen it. We plant it deeper next time. Not as data. Not as facts. But in the cracks of his life. In the doubts he doesn’t yet know he has.”

Soundwave tilted his helm.

“Emotional manipulation.”

“War, Soundwave. This is war.”

The lights above the war table dimmed as the next plan began to take form.

Megatron rose from his throne with slow, deliberate weight. His heavy frame echoed as he stood — not just with rage, but with something older, deeper. Regret. Resolve.

“If my sparkling won’t read the truth…” he growled, “then he will hear it. Directly. From me.”

His voice was steel. Final. Commanding.

Soundwave straightened immediately.

“Plan?”

“As soon as he is with Optimus. With Elita. With the others,” Megatron said, optics bright with cold fire, “you begin the stream. No requests. No permissions. Override every protocol. Open a direct channel. They will not have time to remove him from the screen.”

The room darkened with tension.

Soundwave's visor gleamed faintly. The plan was dangerous. But it was brilliant.

“Understood,” he said.

Without another word, Soundwave turned and began prepping the connection. Fingers flew over the console. Protocols were stripped. Frequency layers folded in on themselves. Firewalls prepared to slice through Autobot defenses like a scalpel to a wound. The feed would be raw. Unfiltered. Unignorable.

“Ravage?” he pinged silently.

From the Autobot base, a low purr vibrated across the signal.

::In position. Watching.::

The feline spy remained tucked in the ventilation ducts, optics glowing softly as he stared down at the Autobot medbay from a narrow grate. His quiet breathing was the only sound in his confined space. He dared not move.

Below, the day had already begun.

Starscream was there, curled over a bench, datapad tossed aside, optics still flickering sleepily.

Ratchet was the first to greet him.

The medic was already working at his station — gathering medical logs, scanning supplies, mumbling about someone stealing extra Energon patches in the night. When he spotted the half-drowsy seeker standing dazed in the corridor, he softened.

“You’re up early,” Ratchet grumbled, walking over. “Or late. Or whatever the hell you call it when your recharge cycle’s that fragged.”

Starscream rubbed one optic, wings drooping. “I couldn’t sleep.”

Ratchet didn’t press. He handed him a warm cube of energon instead. “Here. You’ll need it.”

Starscream took it with quiet hands. He didn’t thank him — not with words — but his wings flicked up just a little. A shy, silent gesture of appreciation.

Across the room, leaning on the wall with his arms crossed, was Ultra Magnus.

Awake. Watching.

He always was.

He said nothing. But his optics followed Starscream’s every move.

Others had already begun to file in. Jazz. Ironhide. Windblade, quietly discussing morning patrols with Prowl. Bumblebee bounding in late as always. The medbay was, for now, simply a hub of routine.

Then the atmosphere shifted.

Two figures entered the room—and time stopped for Soundwave.

Elita-One.

And Optimus Prime.

The moment they crossed the threshold, Soundwave struck.

The Decepticon signal sliced through Autobot defenses in a single flash.

There was no warning.

Every screen in the medbay blinked—then filled with static. Terminals crackled. Holos flickered. Even Ratchet’s monitor shorted for a second before reforming—

And then, his face appeared.

Megatron.

Full-screen. Towering. Impossibly real.

Not a pre-recorded message.

A live transmission.

The room froze.

Starscream dropped his cube.

Energon splashed across the floor.

He stared.

The air became suffocating.

The Autobots scrambled.

“What the frag is this?!” Ironhide shouted, drawing his blaster on reflex.

“We’re being hacked—!” Prowl snarled.

But no one could cut the signal.

Soundwave had locked the stream into every available interface.

And now, Megatron leaned into the feed. Close. Unflinching. The shadows of the Nemesis cast like scars across his frame.

Megatron’s frame filled every inch of the screen, the flickering feed unable to contain the rage behind his optics.

“I didn’t realize the Autobots were kidnappers,” he said, voice cutting like blades across the medbay. “And liars.”

The words hung in the air like poison.

Starscream, frozen by the door, was breathing hard — rapid, shallow ventilations that trembled with every intake. He stared at the screen, and for the first time in his life, listened.

Not because someone told him to. Not because he was forced.

But because something inside him was pulling toward that voice. That presence. That... massive, broken frame on the other side of the screen

He couldn’t look away.

Neither could anyone else.

Ultra Magnus shifted at last.

His normally statuesque stance had cracked — subtle, but clear. His optics flicked aside, arms crossed tighter over his chassis. His mouth tightened, jaw locked.

It was the first sign of discomfort he had shown.

And Starscream saw it.

“So you do know,” Megatron said, his voice dipped with contempt. “Of course you do. How could you not?”

He took a step closer to the lens on his side, shadows crawling across his scarred face.

“Was it not enough to kill her?” he demanded. “Was it not enough to end her life just because she dared to dream too much? Just because she loved me? Just because we hoped for something different?”

Elita-One’s optics widened.

A flicker — a sudden flash — a memory surfaced.

The aerial femme. Wings torn. Spark chamber shattered.

Elita had been the one to find the eggpod near her body. Buried beneath metal beams. Protected by her dying arms.

“No…” Elita whispered, one step back. “No, no, no…”

The pieces clicked.

The timing.

The location.

The coloring of the protoform’s wings and helm.

But Megatron was still speaking — now louder, fury rising, chest vents flaring as centuries of anguish detonated in one breath.

“You dare ask me what I’m talking about, Prime?” he bellowed, voice shaking the medbay’s walls through the feed. “Then let me remind you—since your second-in-command is clearly too much of a coward to speak the truth.”

His hand curled into a massive fist.

“I watched Ultra Magnus raise his weapon at her—my mate, my Starshine—and shoot her through the spark. Right in front of me!”

Gasps erupted around the room.

Even Ironhide looked shaken. Ratchet’s hands trembled slightly where they gripped a data tablet. Bumblebee stood frozen, mute. Jazz uttered a quiet “What the frag…”

Optimus turned sharply to Ultra Magnus.

“Is this true?”

Ultra Magnus didn’t answer.

He stared forward.

Stiff. Cold. Jaw clenched.

And that silence was all Starscream needed to hear.

Elita dropped to sit on the nearest bench, shaking her helm, mouth quietly repeating “no… no…” as if by saying it enough, she could undo the past.

Megatron continued, his voice breaking with pain.

“They threw me into the Pit for being with her. For daring to love her. For dreaming of peace, a new kind of future between us. They called me traitor. Laughed as she died. As they dragged me away. And Ultra Magnus—he came to me every cycle.”

The image on the screen darkened as the warlord stepped back, his helm bowed.

“He came to me. To remind me that she was dead. That I would never see our sparkling. That the eggpod was abandoned. Left to die.”

Megatron raised his helm slowly, optics blazing with defiance and grief.

“And now I see him—alive. Named by her, shaped by her colors. With my optics.”

His gaze shifted and locked onto Starscream through the screen.

“You.”

Starscream’s spark seized in his chest.

“I named you with her. Starscream. After my name. After hers. You are ours.We put the Star in your name from the house she come,We put the Scream as a image of finally shout about the freedom.To be together”

The seeker took a shaky step back, knees nearly buckling.

He was shaking now.

Megatron turned his gaze on Prime.

“And you, Optimus — the grand speaker of truth and justice — you kept him. You let them hide him. Raise him like a tool in your war. Never told him. Never gave him the choice.”

Optimus, silent, was still processing. But Ratchet finally spoke, stepping forward with visible pain in his optics.

“We didn’t know…” he said quietly. “Elita found the eggpod. We didn’t know he was yours. We—”

“But you raised him anyway,” Megatron hissed. “And never questioned it?”

The words rang hollow across the medbay.

Starscream’s mouth opened, then closed. His optics were wet. Too wet. He wiped at them angrily, but his frame kept trembling.

“You’re… lying,” Starscream said, voice cracking. “You’re just trying to mess with me. You're the enemy. You're—you're not—!”

But even as he said it, his spark pulled tighter inside him, as if dragging toward something ancient. Something familiar.

And deep down, in the part of his mind he never listened to — he knew.

Megatron stared at him — and his voice softened.

“I lost her. But I will not lose you.”

The warlord looked directly into the screen.

“I will get back what was taken from me. Who was taken from me. My son. My Starscream.”

Then the transmission cut.

Silence.

All screens went dark.

The war room on the Nemesis was quiet once more.

But in the Autobot medbay… everything was ruined.

Starscream looked around.

Elita.

Optimus.

Ultra Magnus — silent, unmoving, his guilt now exposed in full.

None of them said a word.

He turned and ran.

“Starscream—!”

Optimus’s voice echoed after the retreating seeker, but the young mech didn’t stop. His steps pounded like thunder down the corridor, frantic, furious, haunted. He turned the corner and vanished from sight before anyone could react.

A security door hissed shut behind him. The lock bolted. A red light blinked.

Brainstorm’s lab.

He sealed himself inside.

A heavy silence clamped down on the medbay, thick as smoke.

Ratchet stood still, his optics dimmed, posture hunched. His shoulders sagged not from exhaustion, but from memory — a memory buried for so long it hurt to bring it forward.

“She was so gentle…” Ratchet finally murmured, voice barely more than a breath. “A young aerial. Quiet. Kind. She came to me for medical clearance before travel. Told me she was going to meet her boyfriend’s friends. Told me she was ready to build a life with him. A family. She said… they were going to raise their sparkling together.”

His voice cracked.

“She was happy.”

Elita-One was still on her knees. Her optics locked on nothing, glassy with disbelief. Ironhide had come beside her, one large hand steadying her shoulder, while Jazz crouched low to offer silent support. But Elita was barely present.

“I held the pod,” she whispered. “I held Starscream’s eggpod… And I didn’t know. I didn’t ask. I just took it back to base like it was abandoned—I didn't know someone was trying to find it...”

The truth was splitting open around them, tearing through history like a jagged blade.

And then—

A roar.

Optimus Prime, trembling with barely-contained fury, surged forward and grabbed Ultra Magnus by the chest plating. In one explosive motion, he slammed his second-in-command into the wall hard enough to leave a dent.

“Was it true?!” Prime’s voice was thunder, shattering the medic silence. “Did you kill her?! Did you leave their sparkling to die?!”

Ultra Magnus looked him straight in the optics. His own were cool. Distant. There was no struggle. No resistance. Just bitter pride, worn like rusted armor.

“Yes.”

The air vanished from the room.

Ratchet turned sharply, Elita flinched, and even Ironhide’s vents stuttered.

Magnus didn’t blink.

“She was the daughter of a Senator from Praxus,” he said, voice cold as steel. “And she betrayed her House. She dared to fall in love with a miner—Megatron. She carried his sparkling, disgracing her entire lineage. My orders were clear.”

Optimus looked like he had been punched.

“From whom?!” he demanded.

“The Senator himself,” Magnus answered, voice flat. “He decreed she be eliminated quietly. Discreetly. Before she could bring further shame to their line.”

Prime’s fists clenched, trembling.

“You murdered a femme in cold blood. You executed your own people—an unarmed civilian—and abandoned an eggpod. A protoform, Magnus!”

“It wasn’t a protoform,” Ultra Magnus snapped, the first flicker of emotion breaking through. “It was his.”

“It was a sparkling,” Ratchet growled, stepping forward. “And you left it to die. You left Starscream to die.”

For the first time, the name hit Ultra Magnus like a weight. He blinked slowly. Realization seeped in, quiet but undeniable.

“You knew,” Prime growled. “All these years, you knew what we had done—what you had done. You knew what he was and never told us.”

“It was the past,” Magnus said stiffly. “A necessary act during a time of chaos. We had greater wars to fight.”

“That was a sparkling, not a war front!” Ratchet’s voice cracked with grief and rage. “And now that child is trapped in a war between us and the mech who lost everything because of you!”

Silence fell again — but this time, it vibrated with fury, heartbreak, and betrayal.

Optimus’s arm dropped.

Ultra Magnus fell to the floor, dust and paint chips cracking beneath him. The red paint of Prime’s handprint burned across his chest.

“Get out,” Optimus said hoarsely. “Get out of my sight.”

Ultra Magnus stood slowly. Dented. Unapologetic. But he obeyed.

And as he walked away, the others watched him with a sick churn in their tanks. For the first time, Magnus’s silence was no longer dignity — it was cowardice.

Elita finally stood on shaking legs, her optics filled with moisture, shoulders hunched with guilt.

“We… we raised him,” she whispered. “We raised him thinking he was just another orphan. All this time, he never knew. We never knew.”

Ratchet nodded once, solemnly.

“And now, he does.”

All eyes turned to the closed lab door.

Inside, Starscream was alone.

Surrounded by wires, experiments, and cold silence. The same cold he had grown up in.

But now, it was filled with the sound of a new truth.

He had a name that was his father’s.

A past built from stolen hope.

And a future—unknown, spinning out before him, filled with fire and war.

Chapter Text

The hours dragged on.

The corridors of the base, usually humming with activity, had gone quiet, suffocated beneath the weight of what had been revealed.

Starscream had not emerged from Brainstorm’s lab. Not for energon. Not for rest.

No answer.

The young Seeker had sealed himself in.

Not with fury — but with silence. The kind of silence that howled beneath the surface, a silence made of shattering foundations and a lifetime of false truths turning to ash.

Elita-One stood outside the lab for a long time. Long after others had gone back to duty. She remained, motionless, leaning her hand against the sealed door as if she could pass warmth through the metal. As if her presence alone would reach the youngling curled inside.

Her voice cracked as she finally spoke, not to him, but to the others nearby.

“I raised him. I don't care who his Carrier was. I am his Carrier. I was the one who taught him how to transform. I was the one who sang to him when he couldn’t recharge because he said there were monsters under his berth. I was the one who—who taught him to look at the stars and name them.”

Her hand curled into a trembling fist.

“So no matter what Megatron says, no matter what spark made him — Starscream is mine. He’s ours.”

Optimus stood beside her. Quiet. Immobile.

But his vents were unsteady, his frame tense with guilt he couldn’t name — or didn’t dare to.

Because beneath the layers of command and war, beneath the mask of Prime, was Orion Pax. The archivist. The mech who had once walked with D-16, had watched him rise from the mines with dreams burning in his chest.

And now he stood here, years later, knowing he had taken Megatron’s place beside the sparkling he never even knew existed.

Optimus’s voice was low when it finally emerged.

“I didn’t know. But I raised him like he was mine.”

He looked at the sealed lab door.

“But I can’t stop thinking… if I hadn’t been there, if things had gone differently, Megatron would’ve been. It wasn’t mine to take.”

The guilt in his voice wasn’t just about Megatron.

It was about Starscream.

A life raised in war, in confusion, in suppression — shaped by a thousand lies told with kindness.

And now shattered by truth.

—

Across the room, tension flared violently.

Ironhide's fists clenched as he turned toward Ultra Magnus, fury burning behind his optics.

“You knew.”

It wasn’t a question. It was a blade.

“All these vorns… You knew who he was. You let Elita raise him like some war orphan and said nothing. You looked Megatron in the optics on the battlefield and never told him. You knew.”

“I followed orders,” Ultra Magnus said flatly.

“To abandon a sparkling?!” Ironhide’s voice thundered. “To leave a protoform behind to die just because he was born from someone you didn’t approve of?!”

“He was born of war,” Magnus snapped back, rising to his full height, voice still even but eyes colder now. “What do you think Megatron would’ve done if he’d found him first? Raise him gently? Tuck him in with starmaps and lullabies? Don’t be foolish. With Starscream’s intelligence, Megatron would’ve forged him into a weapon before the sparkling could even walk.”

That silenced Ironhide.

And not just him. The other Autobots nearby — Springer, Blurr, Arcee, even Jazz — lowered their optics, their expressions clouding. The image was believable. Horribly believable. Megatron’s army. Megatron’s ideology. What better tool than a brilliant son molded in his image?

But Prime… no — Orion — couldn’t accept that.

He turned sharply, stepping forward, optics burning with a different truth.

“You’re wrong.”

Everyone looked at him.

“I knew him. I knew D-16, not the warlord. The mech who read philosophy by torchlight after working in the mines. Who questioned the system but still believed in rebuilding it. You don’t know him, Magnus. Not like I did.”

He exhaled sharply.

“He would never have turned his own son into a weapon.”

“But he turned everyone else’s,” Magnus said coolly.

Optimus flinched, because that too, was a truth.

But it wasn’t the whole truth. Not to him. Not to the quiet hopes he once saw in the miner’s hands. And not to the storm of pain now locked inside that lab, curled in the shape of a young Seeker trying to understand why everything he thought he was had just fallen apart.

The Autobots were beginning to fracture.

One truth had done what no battle ever could.

And still… Starscream did not come out.

Outside Brainstorm’s lab, the silence was heavy. Not the peaceful kind, but the kind that came when everything had shattered and no one yet knew how to pick up the pieces.

The Autobots lingered in uneasy silence — Elita seated again on the ground, her optics dim, hands pressed together as if in prayer; Ironhide pacing like a caged beast; and Optimus standing still as a monument, expression carved in guilt and doubt.

Then came the sound of metal shifting — not a dramatic move, just a soft scrape. Ratchet stood up from his seat in the corridor, quietly. A datapad flickered dimly in his hand.

“Don’t follow me,” he said quietly, before anyone could ask what he was doing.

He didn’t look at Optimus or Elita. He didn’t need to. They both understood. This wasn’t a moment for commanders. It wasn’t for carriers or sires. This was for the mech who had stitched Starscream’s frame together during illness, held his wings when he trembled, watched him grow with cynical affection all these long years.

Ratchet stood before the sealed lab door, and for a moment — just a moment — his shoulders sagged with weariness. Then he drew a deep, steadying vent and straightened.

Behind the metal wall, Ravage continued watching silently from a dark corner, unseen by all but one — Soundwave, who monitored the footage from afar, wordless and still. This was not a battle of weapons. It was a battle of souls.

Ratchet knocked softly.

No response.

His voice, when he spoke, was not gentle in the traditional sense — Ratchet had never been one for coddling — but it was steady, measured, familiar.

“Starscream. I know you don’t want to talk. I know you don’t want to see anyone. And I won’t ask you to.”

There was a pause, a breath.

“But… I have something I thought you might want to see. You see, I keep records — medical logs, images, scans. Every patient I’ve ever treated. Your Carrier… your biological Carrier… was no exception.”

Silence.

Long enough that it might have been the end.

Then—hsskt—the door slid open a few inches. Just enough for Ratchet to step through.

And then it closed behind him.

Sealing the two of them inside.

The room was dimly lit, cold, strewn with scraps of tech and broken datapads — things Starscream had clearly flung aside in despair before collapsing in a corner, back against the wall, wings drawn around himself like a shroud.

He looked nothing like the proud, sharp Seeker the Autobots had grown used to. His optics were dim, rimmed in bright stress lines, his hands trembling slightly where they clutched his knees. He didn’t speak. Didn’t move. He just stared, blank and brittle, at Ratchet.

The medic didn’t sigh. Didn’t pity him. He sat down on the floor beside him, slow, groaning a little at the old ache in his knees, and powered on the datapad.

“I figured,” Ratchet said quietly, “you might want to see her for yourself. Not through someone else's story. But in your own way.”

He turned the pad so Starscream could see.

There, on the screen, was a still-frame image taken in a medbay eons ago. A young femme, slender, aerial-class. Soft lines, fine wings. Optics glowing with that specific tired joy only seen in patients who’d just learned they were carrying new life. She had one servo on her abdomen, where Ratchet’s notes said the spark pulse had first been detected.

“She didn’t give me her real name,” Ratchet murmured, as Starscream stared. “Just said she was visiting friends. She didn’t tell me about the sire, either. Just that… she was excited. Scared. But happy. Said the sparkling would be brilliant. That he’d look at the stars the way she did.”

Another image. Her during a wing scan, smiling tiredly. One more — her at rest, optics off, spark stable.

“She said,” Ratchet added, voice faint now, “she was going to introduce the sire to her friends. That they were going to build a new life. A family.”

Starscream’s optics trembled. His jaw clenched tight.

“She died trying to give you that life,” Ratchet whispered. “And I think… wherever she is now, she’d be proud of the mech you became.”

There was a crackling sound. Not from the datapad.

Starscream’s vents hitched. His wings quivered — the trembling of a Seeker trying not to fold in on himself. The grief didn’t come in sobs, not yet. It came in silence and in the faint, broken whine in his vocalizer as he reached out with shaking fingers and touched the screen.

The image didn’t speak. It never would. But for a moment, something reached through that silence — something ancient and aching.

Starscream whispered:

“She was beautiful…”

Ratchet nodded. Still saying nothing. Just letting him feel.

Starscream’s optics were wide, haunted, and full of loss that had no name.

“All this time… I never knew.”

He pressed his forehead against his knees.

“And now it’s too late.”

Ratchet placed the datapad down carefully beside him, then — slowly, gently — placed one servo on Starscream’s shoulder.

“It’s not too late to grieve her,” he said, voice low. “It’s not too late to remember her. And it’s not too late… to figure out who you really want to be.”

Starscream said nothing.

Starscream said nothing.

There were no words left in him.

Just a sharp breath — and then the trembling of his wings gave way to motion. He leaned in and wrapped his arms around Ratchet.

Clung to him.

Not like a warrior or a soldier. Not even like a commander or strategist or even a bitter defector seeking reassurance.

But like a child—a lost, weary, grieving child who had held too much alone for too long.

Ratchet didn’t speak.

Didn’t say he understood, or that it would be okay. He didn’t ask questions. He didn’t offer answers.

He just returned the embrace.

Strong arms wrapped around shaking shoulders. And he held him there. Letting the young Seeker press his helm into his chest, letting his frame shake with the raw, wrenching sobs that had been trapped in his spark for centuries.

And Starscream wept.

It wasn’t loud. It wasn’t graceful. It wasn’t dignified. It was real.

The kind of cry that came when the dam finally broke.

He cried for the femme who carried him, who died for a dream that never had the chance to live.

He cried for the house that should’ve protected him and instead left him to rot in an eggpod.

He cried until there was nothing left in him but silent vents and the echo of old pain.

When, at last, he quieted… Ratchet didn’t speak right away. He only slowly leaned back, waited until Starscream did the same, and gently helped him sit against the wall. Beside him. Not above him. Not scolding, not judging. Just with him.

Ratchet pulled something else up on the datapad. Another image.

Two young mechs.

One with broad shoulders and a cleaner, more naive faceplate — no battle mask, no red armor. Just Orion Pax.

And beside him… a dark miner, younger, optics bright with mischief and unspoken rebellion. D-16, long before he called himself Megatronus.

They were laughing in the photo. Not staged. Not political. Just… young.

“It wasn’t always about war,” Ratchet said quietly, voice husky now. “There was a time… before the factions. Before the colors. When it was just two young mechs, wanting to change the world.”

Starscream’s optics lingered on the image.

It didn’t feel real. But something in his spark recognized it — not memory, but grief for what had never been.

“But Cybertron…” Ratchet continued, “was sick. Corrupt. It ate its young. It didn’t want hope. It wanted control. And anyone who dreamed too loud — especially someone from the wrong caste — was crushed.”

His voice turned bitter.

“Some were arrested. Others executed. The lucky ones were thrown into the Pits and told to fight if they wanted another sunrise.”

The datapad flickered again. A silent clip: the arena. The pit. Dust and blood and the screams of bots who had no choice but to become killers.

Ratchet shook his helm.

“That was the Cybertron your Carrier died in. That was the Cybertron your Sire survived. And the one you were born into.”

Starscream said nothing. He simply pulled his wings closer, as if trying to fold in on himself again.

“I know the rest,” he said hoarsely. “The war. The factions. The lies. The killing…”

His voice cracked.

“But now… I don’t know who I am anymore.”

That was when Ratchet turned fully toward him.

He didn’t scoff. Didn’t dismiss it. He took Starscream’s hands into his own — calloused and scarred and trembling from age — and looked him right in the optics.

“That’s not true.”

Ratchet’s voice was soft now. Steady as steel, but full of warmth.

“You always knew. Maybe not the names or the faces. But you knew.”

He squeezed his servos gently.

“You wanted to be a scientist. Like Wheeljack—only without the explosions.”

That drew the faintest flicker of something — a weak ex-vent that might have been a humorless laugh.

“A thinker like Brainstorm — but without the rambling.”
“A leader… like Optimus. But without the burden.”

Starscream finally looked up.

And that’s when Ratchet leaned in closer, placing a servo to the Seeker’s chestplate, just over his spark.

“This,” he whispered, “was never made to destroy.”

His thumb brushed over Starscream’s knuckles — stained from old battles, but still capable of creation.

“These hands weren’t made to kill. They were made to build.”

Starscream blinked rapidly. His optics shimmered again.

“You’re not a mistake. You’re not a weapon. You’re not a secret that should’ve stayed buried.”

Ratchet’s voice broke a little — just barely.

“You are our family. And nothing — not your origin, not your genes, not even your sire — will ever change that.”

And at last, something in Starscream broke again — not in grief this time, but something looser, something quieter.

Hope.

He looked down at his own hands as if seeing them for the first time. Not the talons of a Decepticon, not the servos of a soldier. But his. Fragile, flawed, brilliant.

And slowly… he nodded.

Starscream slowly wiped the fluid from his face.

His talons trembled slightly, still not fully steady, but there was clarity in his optics now—a faint, defiant light behind the redness of grief. He ex-vented, and when he spoke, his voice had regained a measure of strength.

“You’re right, Ratchet,” he said. “I was created by Autobots. Raised by them. Protected by them. They didn’t know the truth… but they chose me anyway.”

His voice cracked, but it didn’t break.

“Optimus. Elita. Even Ironhide, in his grumpy way… none of this is their fault.”

Ratchet grunted, satisfied, and leaned on one knee to brace himself against the wall.

“That’s all well and good,” he muttered, with a pointed glare. “But you’ll forgive me, Starscream, I’m too old to sit on the damn floor.”

Starscream blinked—then chuckled. Just once.

“You’re older than the towers of Vos,” he teased, stepping forward and offering both hands.

“I built half the towers of Vos,” Ratchet grumbled, but he took the help. Starscream pulled him up gently—carefully. And for a moment, the two of them stood facing each other, a rare peace hanging in the air like a bridge across a warzone.

Ratchet straightened with a groan, stretching his aching limbs, and placed a servo briefly on Starscream’s shoulder.

“Whatever you want to do next… we’ll help you,” he said, serious now. “All of us.”

Starscream hesitated, optics flickering. His next words came slower.

“...Would Megatron—” he swallowed. “Would he hurt the Autobots? Knowing I'm here? Knowing that you raised me?”

Ratchet’s helm lowered.

There was no avoidance in his expression, no soft lie to ease the fear.

He placed a hand gently on the side of Starscream’s helm—thumb resting near the edge of his crest, firm and fatherly.

“I don’t know,” he said, honest and low. “I don’t know what he’ll do. But no matter what happens…”

His optics held Starscream’s own.

“We’ll protect you. Especially Optimus.”

There was silence between them for a moment.

Then Starscream gave the faintest smile, soft and uncertain—but real.

“...He always does.”

Before the moment could grow too heavy, Starscream suddenly turned on his heel and darted to one of the lab benches. His wings flared just slightly in excitement as he pulled something out from under a pile of tools and schematics.

It was a polished silver briefcase.

He turned and walked quickly back, pressing it into Ratchet’s arms.

“I finished it,” he said. “The field med-kit I was designing. Reinforced, weather-sealed, and I retooled the injector set for easier grip even in combat tremors. I included six backup energon filters and a subspace beacon for emergencies.”

Ratchet blinked—then looked down at the kit as if Starscream had just handed him an artifact of myth.

“Well finally,” he huffed, though his voice carried pride. “I was starting to think I’d never see it finished before I rusted out.”

Starscream’s wings twitched, amused.

“Careful with that. It’s top-shelf work.”

“Oh, don’t worry,” Ratchet muttered with a malicious gleam in his optics, “I’m going to test it immediately. On Ultra Magnus.”

Starscream’s optics widened in surprise, then narrowed in wicked delight.

“Can I punch him? Just once?”

Ratchet snorted.

“Twice. You have my blessing.”

Starscream actually laughed this time—short and sharp, but brighter than anything the Autobots outside had heard from him in days.

And just like that, the atmosphere shifted.

The lab, once filled with despair and bitter memories, now held a different energy: a plan. A choice. A path forward.

Ratchet activated his comm as the two of them walked toward the door together.

“Ultra Magnus, this is Ratchet. I need you standing dead center in the command room. I have something I want to say to you.”

He ended the channel—then opened a second, private one, broadcasting only to the command floor team.

“Everyone else—clear the room. I repeat: nobody stand within five klicks of Magnus. This is going to be educational.”

Starscream smirked beside him.

The door opened.

And for the first time in cycles, the Seeker stepped out of the lab not as a recluse, or a fugitive of his own past…

…but as Starscream, created by the Autobots, claimed by none, and walking his own path now.

And Magnus—poor, sanctimonious Magnus—was about to get very educated.

The corridors echoed with the thunder of pedesteps.

Fast. Sharp. Unrelenting.

Autobots turned toward the sound, startled—expecting an alert, a threat, a Decepticon breach. But what they saw instead made them freeze:

Starscream.

Not walking.

Not hesitating.

Running.

His wings flared behind him, his optics sharp as firelight. He tore down the hall at full speed, not slowing even as the command room loomed ahead.

“Is that—?” someone gasped.

Too late.

The doors hissed open, and Starscream launched forward.

Ultra Magnus barely had time to turn.

“Starscream—?”

CRACK.

A devastating left hook collided clean with Magnus’s faceplate. A punch with speed, precision, and wrath behind it—so cleanly executed it might have made an old gladiator proud.

Magnus, the massive general, was lifted from the ground by the sheer force of it—thrown across the room like a training drone.

He crashed into a wall console with a shriek of sparks and a metallic thud, denting the wall, knocking over a rack of datapads, and silencing every voice in the room in a heartbeat.

The silence was deafening.

Even the machinery around them seemed to pause in stunned confusion.

Starscream stood where he'd landed from the punch, ventilations sharp and deep, optics burning—not with hatred, but with a fury born of heartbreak and betrayal.

Everyone stared.

Elita. Optimus. Bumblebee. Arcee. Ironhide. Even Wheeljack.

Not one of them had expected it. Not one had even imagined it.

“Was that… his non-dominant hand?” Bumblebee finally whispered.

Elita said nothing.

Optimus… simply stared. Something unreadable flickered in his optics.

And Magnus groaned from the floor, shaking his helm as he sat up against the wall.

Starscream didn't move. His fists clenched at his sides, wings tight, frame vibrating with the force of emotions still boiling beneath his plating.

“You knew,” Starscream said.

His voice was low—but it carried through the entire room like a razor through silence.

“All this time. You knew.”

Magnus coughed, rubbing his jaw as he staggered upright.

“Starscream, listen—”

“NO!” Starscream roared, stepping forward. “You listen!”

His voice cracked under the pressure—raw, thunderous, painfully honest.

“You knew what I was. You knew where I came from. You knew I was his. And you never said a thing. You let me live a lie. You let me fall apart when the truth came crashing down—and you stood there like it was strategy.”

He shook his helm, disbelief written into every twitch of his wings.

“I could have handled it. I should have been told. I should have had the right to know the truth about myself—not learn it through whispers and accusations in front of the whole base.”

Ultra Magnus opened his mouth—but nothing came out.

“Did you think I was too fragile?” Starscream snapped. “Or was it just too inconvenient to risk reminding everyone that I have Megatron’s CNA?! That I’m the Seeker you all quietly wondered about behind my back?!”

Elita started to move forward, but Optimus gently raised a servo, stopping her.

He knew… this moment was necessary.

Starscream needed to speak.

And they needed to hear it.

“You had no right,” Starscream whispered, voice trembling. “No right to choose what I should or shouldn’t know. No right to decide what I can handle. I deserved better than that from you.”

Magnus lowered his optics, silently absorbing the words.

Starscream’s vents heaved. His fists slowly unclenched.

“The Autobots raised me,” he said, quieter now. “You. Elita. Optimus. You were my world. My only world.”

A pause. The faintest flicker of pain crossed his expression.

“And now I don’t know what that world even means anymore.”

It hung in the air, thick and real.

Starscream didn’t wait for Magnus to respond. He simply turned, walked away with stiff, calculated steps, and went to stand beside Ratchet—his wings still high, but his spark now quieter. Hurting.

Optimus stepped forward at last, his optics locking with Magnus’s.

He didn’t speak at first.

But his silence said everything.

Magnus lowered his helm.

No one dared speak for a long moment.

Until, from behind Starscream’s shoulder, Ratchet muttered just loud enough for everyone to hear:

“That was one of the finest left hooks I’ve ever seen.”

Starscream’s wing twitched.

Bumblebee finally dared to breathe again.

The command room was still marked by silence, but it was no longer the silence of shock.

It was the quiet that follows a storm—the slow, tentative rebalancing of the air after lightning has struck.

The Autobots stirred gradually, slowly easing back to their positions, optics still flicking now and then toward Starscream and the dented wall where Ultra Magnus had crashed. But the tension… it was fading. The unspoken questions were no longer quite so heavy. Something had been purged from the air—released by a single, honest strike and a young Seeker’s breaking voice.

Starscream exhaled slowly.

He felt strangely lighter. Not healed—but less burdened. At least now, his truth had been spoken.

Before he could think much more, Elita-1 was at his side.

“Starscream!” she gasped, reaching for his servo. “Let me see your hand—are you hurt?”

He blinked at her, stunned by the sudden concern. Her grip was gentle, maternal, scanning his servo with optics trained by decades of battle. There were light microfractures across his knuckles, but nothing serious.

Starscream offered a faint, amused scoff. “You’re worried about me after that punch?”

Elita gave him a half-hearted glare. “You might have scrapped your hand. Ultra Magnus’s face is reinforced with secondary plating.”

“So is my patience,” he muttered dryly.

Ratchet snorted somewhere behind him.

Optimus finally stepped forward, his towering frame emanating calm. But there was a heaviness in his faceplate, in the way his optics lingered too long on the floor before settling on Starscream.

“We need to talk,” Optimus said gravely.

Starscream straightened, all hints of humor vanishing.

“Somehow,” Optimus continued, “Soundwave bypassed our secure systems. It wasn’t a full breach—but it was enough. He slipped through undetected, just long enough to gather data.”

He paused.

“And from what we can confirm… Megatron now knows.”

Starscream’s optics widened. Elita’s grip on his hand tightened.

The words echoed in his processor.

Megatron knows.

The truth no longer belonged to the shadows or encrypted files. The warlord of the Decepticons, the tyrant of Kaon, the one figure from whom Starscream had been hidden all his life—knew.

“What is he thinking?” Starscream asked, barely above a whisper. “What will he do?”

Optimus looked at him.

That look alone was enough.

“We don’t know.”

The words dropped like lead.

Optimus clasped his servos behind his back, as if anchoring himself against the weight of what he was about to say.

“But we must assume Megatron is acting on emotion—raw, violent emotion. He’s not stable. Not now. Not after this.”

“He’s my Sire,” Starscream murmured. “I want to see him…”

“And he will want to see you,” Optimus said gently but firmly. “That much is certain. He will come for you, Starscream. Of his own will, or by force. We don’t yet know which.”

The young Seeker’s wings curled tighter behind him. His processor spun with tangled thoughts—yearning, confusion, fear, and something older and deeper: the ache of a missing piece now found.

Optimus stepped closer.

“You have every right to know your origin. To know the one who created you. But—now is not the time.”

His tone held no anger—only sorrow.

“Megatron is blinded by vengeance. His war is consuming him. If he reaches you now, if he sees you before we’re ready… he may hurt you. Not because he wants to—but because he’s not himself.”

Starscream looked away. The truth stung more than it soothed.

“You’re not forbidding me from seeing him?” he asked, voice low.

“No,” Optimus replied softly. “I would never take that choice from you. But I am asking for time. For caution.”

Elita nodded, still holding his servo. “We need to find a way to make him listen. To remind him of who he used to be. Before all this.”

“Before I became his… secret,” Starscream muttered bitterly.

A long silence followed.

Then Ironhide’s voice cut through the room:

“We can’t let Megatron near this base. He’ll tear through our defenses. And he won’t stop until he has what he wants.”

Others nodded.

“And what if he takes Starscream?” growled Prowl. “What if he uses him as a bargaining chip—or worse?”

“He wouldn’t,” Elita snapped.

“We don’t know that,” Arcee added carefully. “Even Megatron has limits… but we don’t know what this discovery will do to him.”

The room began to buzz with overlapping voices. Opinions clashed. Fears surfaced.

Most Autobots—wounded by years of war—did not want Megatron anywhere near Starscream.

Even if he was his Sire.

Even if he had the right.

“He has no claim,” Prowl muttered. “Not after everything.”

“Biology isn’t family,” Red Alert added.

“Starscream’s one of us,” said Bumblebee, looking around.

Optimus let them speak—for a moment.

Then his voice rang out again, calm but resolute.

“He is also Megatron’s.”

All optics turned to him.

“We don’t need to like it. But we will not deny it.”

His optics softened as they settled on Starscream again.

“Our job is not to sever the bond between Sire and sparkling. It is to protect it—until both are ready to face it.”

Starscream’s throat tightened. He felt something inside him shift again—like another old wound beginning to ache.

Optimus stepped closer still, lowering his voice.

“And we will protect you, Starscream. No matter what comes. No matter who you choose to be. You’re ours.”

There was no hesitation in those last words.

Starscream blinked quickly, as though trying to blink away the heat behind his optics.

He nodded, slowly.

“…Okay.”

Optimus placed a servo on his shoulder.

Ratchet, from behind, added casually, “In the meantime, I vote we install about twenty more proximity alarms. And maybe paint a ‘NO DECEPTICONS’ sign around Starscream’s quarters.”

Starscream gave a half-laugh.

But then the air grew quiet again.

Because now… they were racing against time.

And Megatron would not wait long.

For a long moment, the command room held a low murmur—strategic debates, worried whispers, processing minds spinning like overheating engines.

Then, surprisingly, it was Brainstorm who spoke up.

The usually talkative and inventive mech had been uncharacteristically silent through the chaos. But now, optics narrowed and arms folded tightly over his chassis, his voice cut in with quiet, serious conviction.

“There’s something that doesn’t add up.”

All optics turned toward him.

“If Starscream never left the base,” Brainstorm said slowly, “and if none of us said anything to anyone outside... then how did Soundwave find out?”

He leaned forward slightly.

“We’ve been running a tight lockdown. Starscream’s presence was classified. Off-record. Only internal circles knew. So unless someone here talked, which I highly doubt... then we’ve got a real problem.”

“You’re saying there’s a mole?” Arcee asked, expression darkening.

“No,” Brainstorm replied firmly. “I don’t think any Autobot betrayed us.”

He paced a step, processor ticking faster.

“But if Soundwave accessed that info… then it was through the system. Through the tech.”

“Spy…” Ratchet muttered.

“Hacking…” Jazz added grimly.

“Data theft…” Prowl concluded.

Then, all four said the name at once:

“Ravage.”

Starscream, who had been silently watching their faces shift from concern to realization, blinked at the sudden chorus.

“Rava who?” he echoed, genuinely confused.

Optimus, Jazz, Prowl, and Ratchet all turned to him at once, their expressions caught between amusement and exasperation.

Brainstorm chuckled under his breath and clarified:

“Ravage. He’s one of Soundwave’s spy cassettes. A stealth unit—four-legged, feline chassis, cloaking field, silent as death. He’s the reason why half our recon teams have nightmares.”

Starscream’s optics widened in a slow ooooooh of dawning understanding.

“They have a... a ninja cat?”

“They do,” Brainstorm corrected dryly. “And if he was inside the base, cloaked and listening—he’s how Soundwave found out. It fits. No comm records were breached. No firewall tampered with. Just... information leaking.”

Starscream stood there for a moment, considering all of it.

Then his wings gave a hopeful little twitch.

He clasped his servos together with the tentative eagerness of someone about to ask a favor he knew would be denied but couldn’t stop himself from trying.

“Sooo,” he began, as innocently as only he could. “Now that the Decepticons already know about me, and the secrecy thing is... sort of irrelevant, does that mean—maybe—I can finally have access to war files? Just the basics. Tactical overviews. A few weapons manuals. Just for study! For educational purposes. Also…”

His optics sparked with faint, almost childlike anticipation.

“…Can I please have my own weapon now?”

A long, frozen silence.

Every Autobot in the room turned slowly toward Optimus.

The Prime said nothing at first.

Then, very calmly, he walked toward Starscream, stopping just before him.

His expression was unreadable.

He placed both servos gently on the Seeker’s shoulders.

Looked him right in the optics.

And said, with the solemnity of a mech swearing an oath:

“Over. My. Dead. Body.”

Starscream blinked.

“…So… that’s a no?”

“That’s a never,” Optimus clarified. “A primus-have-mercy absolutely not. You’re not getting anywhere near live ammunition, battle plans, or a datapad with the word ‘explosive’ in it.”

Starscream wilted slightly.

“But how am I supposed to defend myself if Megatron comes?”

“You’re not supposed to face Megatron alone,” Elita chimed in firmly. “You’re supposed to let us protect you.”

“So I’m just supposed to be helpless?” Starscream grumbled, folding his arms and wings in a clear pout.

“You’re not helpless,” Ratchet snorted. “You threw Ultra Magnus through a wall.”

“With my fists,” Starscream replied indignantly. “Fists are great and all, but they don’t exactly help if I’m ambushed by a Decepticon with a fusion cannon.”

“Then don’t get ambushed,” Ironhide offered with a smirk.

Starscream groaned and dragged both hands down his faceplate dramatically.

“This is unfair.”

Optimus gave his shoulder a gentle squeeze.

“It’s love,” he said simply.

Starscream made a noise that was somewhere between a sigh and a grumble, but… he didn’t argue.

Not this time.

Because beneath the denial, beneath the protectiveness, was something warm and steady and real.

They weren’t just forbidding him.

They were guarding him.

He looked around at them all—Autobots who had once seen him only as an enemy. Now, standing in a protective circle around him.

And even if he didn’t have access to weapons, or war data, or even a half-decent cannon… he had something else.

He had them.

Starscream, still standing in the center of the room with Optimus's hands on his shoulders, tilted his helm slightly in thought. His wings twitched with that familiar hint of mischief and curiosity—an echo of innocence not yet shattered by the cruelty of war.

“Okay,” he said slowly, “so no weapons, no data, and no cool gadgets... but—”

He glanced around at them all, optics shining.

“Could I at least keep Ravage?”

The room blinked.

Starscream’s wings fluttered a little more eagerly now.

“I mean… he’s quiet, small, stealthy, smart—perfect pet material! I’ve always liked cats. And birds. I could even build him a perch. Maybe teach him tricks. Wouldn’t that be cute?”

Dead silence.

Then, from somewhere in the back, Bulkhead muttered under his breath:

“Imagine if he knew about Laserbeak…”

Jazz elbowed him before Starscream could hear.

But it was too late.

The moment the word Ravage had been said, panic had already begun to creep like static through the Autobots’ ranks.

Prowl’s optics narrowed.

Ultra Magnus, who had finally recovered from his crash into the wall and was rubbing his dented faceplate, straightened in grim command.

Optimus didn’t even have to speak.

Magnus and Prowl moved in unison—snapping orders into their comms:

“Autobot squads: begin immediate perimeter sweep.”

“All scanners to maximum sensitivity. Search for cloaking field distortions.”

“We have a Cassetticon in the base. Repeat: we have an active Decepticon unit inside the base. Find him.”

Bots all over the command room dispersed instantly, every mech drawing their weapons and sprinting down corridors, optics flashing in alert.

Amid the chaos, Starscream stood there, confused and still somewhat hopeful.

He looked up again—completely unfazed by the sudden militarized mobilization—and asked in a quieter, more innocent tone:

“So… is that a yes? I can keep Ravage?”

“As a pet,” he clarified when no one answered. “You know. Like a little buddy. I could knit him a red collar or something…”

Ratchet turned slowly toward him.

He was holding a heavy, blunt-edged medical tool in his servo—one that looked far more like a torture device than an instrument of healing.

And he was smiling.

The kind of smile that held the calm of experience and the unhinged peace of someone who had seen far too much and decided to make it everyone’s problem.

“Sure,” Ratchet said with dangerous cheer.

He smacked the thick edge of the tool into his palm.

“Once I rip out his claws, burn out his targeting processors, and lock every single combat subroutine he has behind a ten-thousand-bit firewall, he’ll be the purring-est little kitten you’ve ever seen.”

Starscream’s optics went huge.

He stared at Ratchet, stunned and strangely impressed.

“You can do that?”

“You think I haven’t wanted to?” Ratchet snapped.

Jazz choked on a laugh.

Elita turned away to hide her smirk.

Optimus sighed and pinched the bridge of his noseplate.

“Starscream,” he said, voice long-suffering but still gentle. “Ravage is a lethal espionage unit. He’s not a stray you can feed energon to until he trusts you.”

Magnus growled, passing by with a cracked jawplate and a trail of angry soldiers behind him. “And we don’t negotiate with Decepticon weapons.”

“But what if he’s lonely?” Starscream tried, optics going wide and shiny with exaggerated innocence. “Maybe he just needs affection. And ear scratches. Do Cassetticons have ears?”

Ratchet was already advancing like a predator, tool in hand.

“If I get my hands on that little glitchcat—”

“Doc.” Jazz intercepted him with both hands. “Let the squads find Ravage first before you start prepping for emergency de-fanging surgery.”

Starscream looked up at Optimus again, a hopeful flutter to his wings.

“So... that's a maybe, right?”

Optimus stared at him.

Deadpan.

“No.”

Starscream gave a dramatic sigh and muttered:

“You're all so boring.”

And yet, behind the humor and chaos… a different current ran deep beneath the surface.

The countdown to chaos had already begun ticking down.

And no one—not even the Prime himself—knew what would happen next.

The search for Ravage dragged on for hours.

Teams of Autobots scoured every corridor, weapons drawn, scanners wide open, checking every hatch, vent, and energon crate. Ultra Magnus barked orders at increasingly stressed soldiers. Prowl rewrote the search patterns again and again, while Ratchet paced in a foul mood, threatening to surgically neuter the casseticon if he ever got his hands on him.

But still — no trace.

No one even considered looking up.

Starscream sat in a solid metal chair near the command consoles, his long legs awkwardly folded and his wings twitching with restless teenage energy. He was fifteen, after all, and more frustrated by being stuck in one place than worried about the chaos. He wasn’t exactly paying attention to the security teams.

No.

His gaze was fixed on Bumblebee, who zipped by, barking updates, his battle mask flickering on and off, looking absolutely serious and brave and — in Starscream’s teenage processor — unbearably cute.

Starscream sighed, a puff of static whistling out his vents.

Primus, he’s so round… so bright…

He nearly short-circuited just watching him.

Trying to distract himself, Starscream tilted his head back and let his optics wander up toward the highest corner of the ceiling —

—and froze.

A pair of red optics stared straight back at him.

Ravage.

Starscream coughed, nearly choked on nothing. “ACK—!!”

He pointed, sputtering. The straw fell out of his intake port.

“He’s up there!”

Weapons snapped up instantly as Autobots spun to follow his gaze, but the Cassetticon was already slinking out of sight, vanishing into the ventilation systems before they could target him.

He watched as Bumblebee ran in circles coordinating search orders, and a small but brilliantly dangerous thought hit him.

If Ravage was Soundwave’s cassette…
…and Soundwave was second to Megatron…
…and Megatron was…

Starscream gulped, cheeks heating.

His sire.

That meant Ravage technically was under his command, didn’t it?

He puffed up a little in his chair, wings fluffing out with that awkward adolescent confidence, and carefully tried to mimic the commanding tone he’d heard from Optimus, and even once from Megatron himself on the comms.

He pointed up again, voice cracking slightly but determined:

“Come here, kitty!”

Every Autobot stared at him like he’d gone completely glitched.

But then —
—like a shadow come to life —

Ravage jumped from a high support beam, landed lightly on a crate, then padded forward, tail swishing.

He moved straight for Starscream.

The Autobots collectively froze, slack-jawed.

Ravage paused in front of the teenage seeker, and after a second of stillness, gracefully hopped right into Starscream’s lap, curling up with a content purr like some oversized turbofox kitten.

Starscream’s optics went wide. His wings lifted, his hands fluttered awkwardly, not sure if he should touch him or freeze. But the Cassetticon merely flicked an audio fin and nestled closer, as if claiming him.

Starscream let out a shaky laugh, flushed with teenage pride.

“See? Good kitty…”

The entire command center fell silent, processing this scene.

Prowl’s processor sputtered, Ultra Magnus stared in horror, and Ratchet’s optics glitched offline for a klik in disbelief.

Starscream, only fifteen, had apparently tamed the deadliest infiltration cassette in Decepticon ranks like a sparkling getting a new pet.

Meanwhile, at the Decepticon war room, Soundwave had been watching the entire feed.

He paused — systems locking for a moment in total disbelief — then did a very slow, deeply painful facepalm.

Megatron, looming behind him, stared at the playback of Starscream’s awkwardly proud teenage grin while stroking Ravage, and… laughed.

A low, soft, almost broken laugh.

“My sparkling already has a command voice,” he said, quiet, spark raw and aching.

Soundwave hissed out a groan, as if his circuits were shorting.

“Apologies,” Soundwave monotoned, “failure to update Ravage’s hierarchy coding. Did not expect…youngling command.”

Megatron’s optics softened for one fraction of a klik, watching how carefully Starscream petted Ravage in the feed, gentle and clumsy and perfect — exactly the way a teenager might.

“No,” Megatron whispered to himself, spark twisting painfully. “That’s mine.”

And for that instant, his hatred, his fury, even his war — it felt so far away.

He only saw his child.

Starscream held Ravage gently in his servos, cradling the Casseticon the same way one might hold a beloved turbofox kitten. Ravage — while still hissing lightly through his vents — didn’t resist. He simply stared with his glowing red optics, tail flicking lazily as Starscream’s claws lightly scratched behind his audials.

“Look,” Starscream beamed, optics bright and hopeful, “he likes me!”

He turned toward Optimus Prime, his wings twitching with barely contained excitement. His entire frame lit up with that unmistakable teenage glow — an energetic flicker of someone who had never had something truly his before.

He gently raised Ravage up in his arms like a trophy and stepped toward Optimus.

“Can I keep him?” he asked, optics wide, voice trembling with hope. “Please? I’ve never had a pet before. I’ll feed him! And brush his plating! And—”

But before Optimus could even open his mouth to answer—

CLANG.

Ratchet strode in from the medbay, grabbed Ravage from Starscream’s arms like a rogue nurse confiscating candy, and unceremoniously stuffed the Casseticon into a thickly reinforced containment cage he’d clearly rolled in for just this purpose.

“Absolutely not,” Ratchet growled, slamming the latch. “He’s a spy, Starscream. A weapon. He is not a pet. He’s going straight to a secure vault.”

Ravage released a sharp, electronic hissss, crouched low inside the cage, claws out and tail lashing violently against the bars. Starscream flinched at the sound, stepping forward with panic in his voice.

“But that’s not fair!” he cried, wings fluttering high behind him. “He came to me! I didn’t force him! He chose me!”

Ratchet raised an optic ridge, already tired.

“And I’m sure he would’ve chosen all our throats next,” he muttered. “Sorry, kid. But he’s not leaving that cage.”

Starscream’s lower lip jutted out in a stubborn pout. His fists clenched, wings flicking again in protest.

“I want something!” he declared with adolescent drama, storming in front of Ratchet.

The medic sighed, arms folding across his chest.

“Fine. You can have anything else. Anything at all. Just not the murder-cat.”

Starscream’s optics snapped up to him.

“Anything?” he asked, voice suspiciously hopeful, his wings perking upward.

Ratchet glanced at Optimus, who looked tired but nodded silently, if only to keep peace and avoid another emotional breakdown.

“Yes. Anything,” Ratchet confirmed.

Starscream’s face lit up.

He spun on his heel and ran toward Bumblebee, who had just returned from the last failed sweep and was halfway through removing his helm guards.

“Bumblebee!!” Starscream called out.

Bumblebee turned—

—and Starscream launched into his arms, nearly knocking him over, arms wrapped tightly around the scout’s neck. Bumblebee made a surprised noise, balance shifting—

“Whoa! Screamer, what’re you—?”

Mwah!

Starscream pressed a firm, clumsy, and completely earnest kiss to Bumblebee’s cheek, his young frame trembling with excitement and nervousness. His wings puffed out behind him like he’d just won a grand prize.

Everyone in the room froze.

Ratchet’s jaw dropped. Prowl blinked. Bulkhead coughed awkwardly.

Elita pressed her hand to her face. Jazz looked like he wanted popcorn.

Starscream held Bumblebee tightly in a teen’s dreamlike grip, burying his face against the scout’s chestplate with a shy laugh.

“Can I have Bumblebee a year earlier than scheduled?” he asked eagerly, almost breathless. “Just a year, I promise! I’m fifteen now! I’ll be careful! I know how to be gentle and—”

“WH-WHAT!?” Bumblebee squeaked, his optics flashing in full panic mode, his arms frozen in place. “W-Wait, wait, Screamer—what—what scheduled?! Who said there was scheduling?!”

Starscream blinked, confused by the interruption. He leaned back a little, still holding Bumblebee tightly by the waist.

“You said...when I turned sixteen,” Starscream muttered, suddenly shy. “At the lake. You said maybe when I was sixteen you’d—we—you know…”

Ratchet wheezed. Optimus pinched the bridge of his nose. Jazz had to physically walk away to keep from laughing.

Bumblebee’s vents whirred as his systems tried to reboot emotionally.

“S-Starscream,” Bumblebee stammered, his faceplate now practically glowing yellow from overheating, “that—was—a joke! I didn’t think you’d remember—!”

Starscream pulled back, wings drooping a little, expression stricken.

“But I did.”

Silence fell like a hammer.

Bumblebee looked down into his wide, trusting optics — and his spark dropped to his stabilizers.

Starscream’s voice softened to a near-whisper:

“I remembered because I liked it. You made me feel… wanted. And it was the first time anyone ever said they’d wait for me.”

Bumblebee stood absolutely frozen, vents sputtering like an overworked turbine. His optics were wide—too wide—and if someone looked close enough, they could almost see the tiny smoke trails rising from the seams of his armor. A faint pssst escaped from somewhere near his hip vents. Then another. And another.

“Uh oh,” Jazz murmured, leaning toward Bulkhead. “Bee’s about to blow a gasket…”

“Nope,” Bulkhead whispered back, “several gaskets.”

Elita snapped.

She stormed forward, all towering authority and parental fury, a hand raised like she was about to slam it down between the two teens.

“ABSOLUTELY NOT!” she shouted, her voice echoing through the entire base like a thunderclap. “STAY. AWAY. FROM. HIM.”

Starscream flinched visibly, wings twitching in confusion and alarm, his arms still wrapped protectively around Bumblebee’s waist.

“But I—!”

“You’re fifteen!” Elita barked, towering over him like a storm. “You are still a sparkling, Starscream, whether you like it or not! You are not old enough to—to bond, or to think about crushes, or kisses, or any of this!”

Starscream’s optics dimmed slightly, shame and confusion sweeping over his young face. But he didn’t let go. Not yet.

Back at the Decepticon base, Megatron stood in front of the main screen where Ravage’s optic feed was being displayed.

Soundwave watched silently.

The angle showed everything: the cage, the base, the youngling clinging to the scout like a lifeline, and the very public meltdown now unfolding around them.

Megatron’s face was stone—until Elita shouted.

He frowned.

Then scoffed.

Then growled, arms crossed tightly across his massive chest.

“She is right,” Megatron muttered coldly. “Far too young. Far too soft.”

He looked down at Soundwave, voice dropping to a seething murmur.

“I will never, under any circumstances, allow my sparkling to be given away like a token to some—mid-tier Autobot scout.”

Soundwave slowly nodded, monotone as ever:

“Confirmed.”

“My heir, Soundwave,” Megatron said again, tone simmering now with something between fury and protectiveness. “Mine.”

Megatron's optics blazed red.

Back at the Autobot base, Starscream was starting to shake. Not from fear, but from the sheer frustration of being dismissed again. Treated like a child when he had felt, so strongly, that he wasn’t.

Still clinging to Bumblebee, his voice came soft—strained and cracking—but determined:

“I’m not a sparkling anymore…” he murmured, looking up at Elita. “I know what I want. And I want him. You can’t just decide who I can or can’t—”

“YES. WE. CAN,” Elita snapped back, cutting him off. “Because someone has to keep you from making mistakes you’ll regret for the rest of your life.”

Starscream trembled. Bumblebee, whose systems had just barely started coming back online, looked down and saw how tightly the young Seeker clutched him. His voice was barely above a whisper.

“Screamer…”

But Starscream wasn’t hearing it.

He pressed his face against Bumblebee’s chestplate again, muttering:

“I waited so long. And it wasn’t fair. No one told me I couldn’t feel this. I didn’t ask to feel it. I just… do.”

On the sidelines, Chromia stood casually beside Prowl, her arms crossed, a self-satisfied smirk playing on her lips. She held out one hand, palm up.

Prowl grunted and dropped a few credits into it. Behind him, Springer groaned and added more. Arcee sighed dramatically and handed hers over too.

“Told you,” Chromia said, counting. “He doesn’t see Bee like a big brother. That kid's got it bad.”

“Since when did we start betting on teen crushes?” Ratchet snapped.

“Since Chromia called it four years ago,” Jazz said, smirking. “She’s been waitin’.”

Elita, overhearing, growled:

“I swear to Primus, if I find out you all had money riding on this—”

Ratchet raised both servos.

“Don’t look at me! I only bet on when Bee would short-circuit.”

PSSSSSHT.

Another steam puff shot out of Bumblebee’s vents.

Optimus stepped forward—quietly but with the commanding presence only he possessed—and gently placed a hand on Starscream’s shoulder.

His touch was firm, but not unkind.

Then, with his other arm, he carefully peeled Bumblebee away from Starscream’s hold. The young Seeker didn’t resist at first, stunned and blinking like someone waking from a dream. But when Bumblebee was finally out of his arms, the loss hit hard.

Starscream’s wings drooped. His arms fell slack. His faceplates trembled with the effort of holding back emotion he didn’t understand—couldn’t name.

“You’re still too young, Starscream,” Optimus said gently. “Your frame, your spark, your processor… they’re not ready yet. Ratchet?”

Ratchet sighed as he crouched near Bumblebee, who looked beyond overwhelmed—his optics half-flickering, shoulders twitching, vents releasing low streams of heat. He held a diagnostic scanner in one servo, and in the other, a coolant spray canister that he was carefully aiming into the yellow scout’s neck joints.

“Sixteen,” Ratchet muttered, without even looking up. “That’s the minimum for romantic protocol initialization. Hormonal balancing, spark resonance syncing, all that. If you trigger it too soon, it scrambles the kid’s system.”

He gave Starscream a dry glance, though there was no malice in it.

“Which you nearly did.”

Elita rounded on Optimus, livid.

“How could you justify this?” she hissed under her breath, stepping in front of him like a protective wall of wrath. “He’s fifteen, Orion. Fifteen! And you—”

“I know,” Optimus interrupted quietly. “Believe me, I know.”

He kept his optics on Starscream, not flinching even once.

“But he’s not wrong to feel what he feels. I won’t punish him for that.”

Elita’s hands clenched into fists.

“You just enabled him.”

Optimus didn’t deny it. He just exhaled slowly, then turned to the fragile young Seeker standing in front of him, visibly trying not to shatter.

Starscream’s optics were glowing dimly. Not because they lacked power—but because he was trying not to cry in front of everyone.

He stared up at Optimus. His voice, when it came, was nothing but a whisper—so small, so full of heartbreak that it silenced the entire room:

“...But I love him.”

Something in Elita’s spark cracked. But it was the kind of crack that came not from rage—but from seeing herself in a youngling’s grief.

Optimus crouched so that his optics met Starscream’s.

“And you’re allowed to,” he said softly. “You can love whoever your spark chooses, Starscream. No one here will stop you.”

A beat of silence.

“But first,” Optimus continued, gently, “we have to solve what’s happening with Megatron. Your safety comes first. After that…”

He gave a faint, almost sad smile.

“...Then we can talk about dating.”

Starscream stood frozen, lip plates trembling. It wasn’t what he wanted. It wasn’t fair.

But it was something.

And in a voice so fragile it could barely be heard, he murmured:

“...Okay, Sire.”

He didn’t meet Optimus’s gaze as he turned away—wings wilted low, steps slow, almost dragging across the floor. He walked to the corner of the room, wrapped his arms around himself, and sat on the cold metal floor.

Watching him like that, Bumblebee stirred—but Ratchet quickly reached over and pressed a coolant patch to his helm, cooling his sensors again.

“Nope,” the medic grunted. “Not until your wiring calms down. You’re half a step from a meltdown.”

Bumblebee made a sad, static-filled whimper as he glanced toward Starscream. He looked like he wanted to go to him, hold him, say something—anything.

But Optimus raised one servo and shook his head once.

Not now.

Later.

Elita still looked like she wanted to kill Optimus where he stood. Her optics were glowing bright with fury as she leaned toward him.

“You encouraged him.”

“I gave him something better than a wall,” Optimus whispered back. “I gave him time. And hope.”

Elita scoffed quietly—but she didn’t argue.

Ratchet, meanwhile, was holding Bumblebee steady as more vapors hissed from the scout’s joints.

“Kid’s fried,” Ratchet muttered. “I told you this would happen…”

Optimus just nodded quietly, his gaze never leaving the small figure huddled in the corner of the room—his wings trembling, his spark aching, and a lifetime of war and longing caught in his still-developing frame.

Starscream didn’t say another word.

But neither did he cry.

Not yet.

At the Decepticon base, the silence was crushing.

The screen still showed the feed from Ravage’s optics—Starscream, curled in the corner of the Autobot common room, wings folded around himself like a youngling shielding his spark. Bumblebee was nearby, struggling under Ratchet’s grip, and Elita was pacing like a storm on the edge of breaking.

And at the heart of the command chamber, Megatron was boiling.

His hands were clenched into fists so tight that servos creaked and plates strained, grinding against each other. The red glow of his optics was a warning flare across the dark metal of his face.

“He was in his arms,” Megatron spat. “My sparkling—the Decepticon heir—in the arms of that miserable yellow scraplet!”

The snarl in his voice echoed off the chamber walls like a thunderclap. The control panel next to him cracked under the force of his punch, sparks flickering from the abused machinery.

Soundwave stood silent beside him, unmoving.

“He’s confused. Polluted by Prime’s influence,” Megatron growled, turning sharply toward Soundwave. “He’s young. He doesn’t understand the weight of what he is. What he carries in his frame.”

His voice deepened, thunderous and possessive.

“But I will guide him. I will cleanse him of their lies.”

Soundwave finally shifted, his visor flickering as his processor calculated the implications. His voice emerged calm, flat, but there was a note of tension even beneath his steady tone.

“Orders… Megatron?”

Megatron turned his gaze slowly toward the screen one last time—just as Starscream’s wings twitched, a shiver running through his frame, his optics dim and distant.

Something in Megatron’s expression twisted. For the briefest second, it wasn’t anger—it was something deeper. Possessive. Cold. Parental, in the most terrifying, consuming way.

“Prepare everything,” he ordered.

Assemble a strike team. I want him back before the solar cycle ends.”

“He will not grow up on the knee of my enemy. Not with that Autobot filth whispering false truths into his audials.”

“Starscream is a prince of war. The future of our empire. He is not some soft-shelled domestic kept in Prime’s tower, dreaming about scouts.”

“He’s not ready to choose his path. But I—”

His voice lowered, ice over iron.

“—I am ready to give it to him.”

Soundwave nodded once. Silent, obedient—but behind that visor, even he hesitated.

Because he remembered the way Starscream had said “come here, kitten.”
He remembered the way Ravage obeyed.
And he remembered the way the youngling had smiled—not with arrogance, not with power, but with innocent joy.

Joy that no one had ever seen in Kaon.

And for a moment, Soundwave felt the strangest thing coil in his spark.

Something dangerously close to doubt.

Chapter Text

The sky was still dark when Soundwave finished syncing the last of the systems. The base was ready. All squads were armed, deployed, awaiting the signal.

He turned to Megatron, the towering warlord standing at the head of the command deck, his expression carved from fury and purpose.

“Ravage… location confirmed,” Soundwave said, his voice smooth, mechanical, detached. “Autobot base. Northern quadrant. Cage reinforced, but optic feed remains active.”

Megatron didn’t answer at first. He simply stared at the screen — at the faint, flickering view through Ravage’s eyes. The cage bars shimmered under the dim lights of the Autobot medbay. Off in the background, the unmistakable figure of Starscream lay curled under a blanket, wings half-draped over his own frame like a youngling hiding from nightmares.

Megatron’s expression didn’t soften. It hardened.

“He sleeps in their nest,” he growled. “Their filth infects his thoughts. His future. No more.”

He turned, voice rising like a blade drawn from its sheath:

“At sunrise, we take him back.”

Around him, the war machines of the Decepticons responded at once. Dreadwing gave a sharp salute. Thundercracker and Skywarp revved their engines, optics narrowed and gleaming. The Vehicons fell into formation. Even the air smelled of ozone, of engines warming for war.

There was no retreat. This wasn’t a mission.

It was a claiming.

Inside the Autobot base, the dawn had not yet broken — but already the silence had.

An explosion shook the walls.

Starscream bolted upright in his recharge berth, optics flaring wide, wings snapping to attention in panic. The entire room jolted with the echoing tremor of the blast. Dust fell from the ceiling. Sirens screamed.

“Wh-what—?!” he gasped, stumbling from the berth, grabbing the frame to steady himself. His spark thundered in his chest. “What was that?!”

Across the hallway, Ratchet had already stormed out of the medbay, tools rattling around his hips, optics wide with disbelief.

“Attack! That was an attack!”

Another boom shook the base. Lights flickered. Starscream nearly fell, catching himself on the corridor wall.

“They’re here—” Optimus’s voice came over the intercom, deep, sharp, commanding. “Autobots, report to defensive positions immediately. Decepticons are attacking!”

Starscream’s wings flattened against his back. His processor couldn’t keep up.

They came. They really came for me.

Megatron—he’s really going to—

He turned just as Bumblebee came rushing up the hallway, face streaked with panic and static still fizzing from his comms.

“Screamer! You okay?! Are you—?”

But before Starscream could answer, an even louder blast tore through the outer wall. The shockwave knocked them both to the ground. The ceiling cracked. Sirens wailed.

Through the breach, the early morning sky glowed red.

Outside, the Decepticons had descended like a black storm.

Jet engines roared across the horizon as Seekers rained laser fire down over the Autobot base. Ground troops surged through the field, weapons drawn, led by Megatron himself — fusion cannon blazing as he tore through the front line with the unstoppable fury of a war god.

Soundwave walked silently behind him, arms folded, visor locked on the data feed. Even as the feed from hacked cameras flickered to static, the live stream from Ravage’s optics stayed active.

He saw the moment Starscream fell. The moment Bumblebee reached for him.

And the way Starscream’s wings shook — confused, afraid, and not knowing where he belonged.

Megatron’s optics caught the image, too. And his expression twisted into something merciless.

“They’ve poisoned him,” he snarled. “He belongs with me.”

Back inside, Starscream had made it to the central corridor with Bumblebee’s help. Elita ran past them toward the breach, weapons drawn, shouting orders. Ratchet was already pulling down the emergency shields.

Prowl slammed into the wall beside them, weapons primed, barking to Chromia:

“Get Starscream to the evac zone!”

“No!” Starscream protested, pushing back, voice breaking. “You can’t lock me away again—! I need to fight! They’re after me, aren’t they?!”

Ratchet turned to him sharply.

“They want to drag you back to Megatron. They’ll kill anyone in their way.”

Starscream’s optics burned. His fists clenched.

“I’m not a thing to be passed around!”

“Then run,” Ratchet snapped. “If you won’t hide, then survive.”

Another blast shook the walls.

In the distant medbay, Ravage’s cage rattled on its stand… and then stopped.

The door had slid open.

The evac corridor had become a battlefield of noise.

Lasers cracked through steel. Shouts echoed. Sparks lit the air like falling stars.

Starscream stumbled with Bumblebee at his side, Prowl and Chromia just ahead of them as a protective wall. Ratchet was behind, one servo already scorched from blocking shrapnel with his own arm. Somewhere behind them, Elita was fighting like a stormfront, keeping the Decepticons from breaching the inner levels.

But the tremors were getting closer.

Closer.

“We have to get to evac—now!” Prowl shouted, ducking fire.

“We’re trying!” Bumblebee snapped, pulling Starscream behind a crumbling wall. “Hold on—are you okay?!”

Starscream shook his helm. His optics were burning. Not from smoke—but conflict.

“I—I don’t want to run,” he whispered, voice cracking, wings twitching and drawn tight against his back. “He’s here, isn’t he? He came for me.”

“Yes,” Ratchet said grimly, dragging a medkit from his hip. “Megatron’s at the front line. He’s burning through walls like paper.”

Starscream looked away.

He felt it. In his spark. That presence—dark, vast, familiar. No matter how many times he tried to forget it. The way it pulled at him like gravity. That was the bond of creation.

That was the link between a sparkling and their sire.

Elsewhere… at the front gate, the final blast of Megatron’s fusion cannon obliterated the heavy doors. The base opened like a wound.

Smoke poured out.

Autobots scrambled.

And Megatron stepped through the smoke, tall and slow, the wrath of war in every motion. Behind him came the shadows of Dreadwing, Soundwave, and a unit of aerial Seekers fanning out like vultures.

“Stand down,” Optimus’s voice boomed from the end of the hall, already blocking the path with his blade drawn. “You will not take him.”

“He is mine!” Megatron bellowed, eyes blazing, armor flaring like molten iron. “He is Decepticon! My heir, my sparkling! How dare you keep him from me?!”

Optimus didn’t move. Not even as more Autobots flanked behind him.

“He’s a child,” Optimus said. Quiet. Measured. But every word was steel. “Not a weapon. Not a pawn in your war.”

“He was forged for this war!” Megatron roared, stepping closer. “You know nothing of him. Nothing of his legacy!”

“And you know nothing of love.”

The words cracked the silence.

Even Soundwave flinched.

Megatron’s voice dropped to a growl.

“Get out of my way.”

Back in the corridor, the words hit Starscream like thunder in his chest. His wings flared.

He stood.

“I have to face him.”

“Starscream—” Bumblebee reached for him, terrified.

“He’ll never stop, Bee,” Starscream whispered. “He’ll destroy this whole base. He’ll kill everyone just to get to me. I won’t let him.”

“You’re not alone,” Bee said, grabbing his hand.

Starscream squeezed it, holding tight just for a moment—then let go.

“I have to do this.”

He stepped out from cover.

Smoke and fire licked the halls. Rubble crunched beneath his pedes as he walked. His body trembled—not from fear. From the magnitude of what this meant.

And then—

He saw him.

Across the crumbling atrium.

Megatron.

The warlord turned. And for the first time in years, he saw his sparkling—not through Ravage’s eyes, not through data or surveillance—but truly.

The boy he forged.

The heir of Vos.

The young Seeker with starlight in his optics.

“Starscream.”

His voice wasn’t loud this time.

It was soft. The kind of softness that shouldn’t belong to a warlord. It was… possessive. Familiar.

Starscream stopped several steps away. His chest was tight. He couldn’t speak.

Megatron stepped forward.

“They’ve lied to you,” he said. “Filled your head with weakness. They’ll never understand you. Not like I do.”

Starscream’s fists clenched.

Starscream looked up, voice breaking:

“I wanted to be a scientist. I wanted to build, not destroy!”

A long silence.

Then Megatron’s voice, low and shaking:

“You’re too young to know what you want.”

Starscream shook his head. His optics were shining, not from power—but pain.

“No. I’m old enough to know what I don’t want.”

Behind him, Bumblebee had caught up, Ratchet just behind.

Elita and Chromia stood near the second corridor, weapons drawn, but not moving. All eyes on the Seeker and his sire.

And then Starscream did the unthinkable.

He turned his back on Megatron.

And walked back toward Bumblebee.

Megatron froze.

“No,” he whispered. “No—you can’t. You’re mine!”

“I’m not anything of yours,” Starscream said, without looking back. “You gave me a spark, Megatron. But you never gave me a life.”

He walked past Bee.

Into the arms of Elita, Chromia, and Ratchet.

Optimus stepped forward, raising his blade.

“Leave.”

Megatron didn’t move.

The air was thick with tension.

Megatron didn’t move.

Didn’t retreat.

Didn’t obey.

He stared at Starscream’s back, his vents ragged with fury, disbelief writhing like fire behind his optics.

Starscream—his sparkling—was walking away.

“No,” Megatron said again, this time louder. “NO!”

He charged forward like a meteor falling from the sky.

“Starscream!”

Bumblebee saw it first.

“Screamer—get down!!”

But before Starscream could even turn—

Megatron grabbed him.

With one massive servo, he seized Starscream by the waist, claws digging into the young Seeker’s plating like shackles. The boy gasped, wings flaring wide in panic, legs kicking, optics wide with fear.

“NO!—LET ME GO—LET ME GO!!”

“SIRE—!” he screamed.

But it wasn’t the cry of a child reaching for comfort.

It was the cry of a child pleading not to be taken.

Bumblebee didn’t think.

He launched.

Slamming into Megatron’s side at full force, a yellow blur of motion and protective rage.

“Put him down! PUT HIM DOWN!!”

Megatron snarled, stumbling a half-step, optics wild—

And with his free servo, he backhanded Bumblebee so hard across the helm that the sound cracked like thunder.

The yellow scout hit the ground with a horrifying crash, dented metal and limp limbs skidding across the floor.

“BUMBLEBEE!!”

Starscream shrieked.

His vents overloaded, his spark was screaming, burning—

“NO!! YOU HURT HIM!! STOP!!”

But Megatron didn’t stop.

He activated his thrusters, boosters roaring, the sheer heat of them searing the floor.

Soundwave deployed a smoke screen. Rumble and Frenzy laid suppressing fire. It was chaos in seconds.

“Megatron! DON’T YOU DARE—!” Elita screamed, firing at the warlord’s back.

“HE’S A CHILD!” Chromia cried, tearing toward them through the cloud of fire and smoke.

But Megatron was already airborne.

With Starscream held tight in his clawed arms like a stolen prize.

Starscream was kicking and screaming, thrusters firing, claws tearing at Megatron’s plating—

“I HATE YOU!! PUT ME DOWN! I HATE YOU!!”

“YOU ARE MINE!” Megatron bellowed, voice shaking the sky. “You are coming home.”

And then they were gone.

Into the ground bridge that Soundwave had opened when he got Ravage back.

Leaving fire and silence behind.

The smoke thinned.

Bumblebee lay on the ground, still.

Too still.

Ratchet dropped to his knees beside him, scanning frantically, energon leaking from the scout’s side.

“We need a medbay—NOW!”

Chromia was already shouting into comms. Elita stood frozen, fists clenched, staring at the empty sky.

And Optimus…

Optimus looked like he had aged a thousand years in one breath.

His face was unreadable.

But his voice, when it came, was steel.

“We get him back.”

Starscream awoke in darkness.

The world was cold. Cold and metallic and quiet in that sickening way that only Decepticon strongholds could be — no kindness, no light, no safety. Just empty corridors, steel walls, the hum of distant machinery.

He was lying on a berth. His wings were restrained — shackled in place. His wrists too. There were red bands of light above the cuffs, humming with power, suppressing his thrusters and dampening his systems. A silent prison with no doors.

Starscream blinked. His optics flickered in and out.

“Bumblebee…” he whispered weakly.

No one answered.

The silence echoed.

And then—

HSSSSHHHHK — the door slid open.

Footsteps. Heavy. Slow. Calculated.

He didn’t have to look to know who it was.

“My little star,” Megatron said.

His voice was calm now. Too calm. He was trying to sound fatherly.

“You are safe now.”

Starscream flinched at the sound.

“You’re not my Sire,” Starscream hissed, voice cracked and dry.

“You’re a warlord.”

Megatron said nothing.

He simply stood there, massive form casting a shadow over the berth. His expression unreadable, mouth flat, optics glowing with a dangerous stillness.

Starscream stared up at him, defiant even in his restraints. His voice trembled with pain and fury.

“I don’t care if we share CNA. I don’t care what your codes say. You didn’t raise me.”

“You abandoned me. You left me.”

“Elita raised me. Optimus protected me. Bumblebee loved me!”

Each name drove in like a blade.

Megatron’s servo twitched at his side.

Starscream pulled against the cuffs, wings twitching in pain.

“I want to go home. I want my family! Not your throne, not your war, not you!”

Silence.

Then Megatron stepped forward, slowly.

He knelt beside the berth — a strange mockery of intimacy, of closeness — like a predator mimicking affection.

“You are confused,” he said, voice a low rumble. “They’ve poisoned you against your own kind. Against your own blood.”

Starscream bared his denta.

“They gave me love. You give me chains.”

That… made Megatron pause.

Just for a second.

His optics flared, anger bubbling beneath his armor. But when he spoke again, his voice was eerily calm.

“You are young. You do not understand the galaxy. But you will.”

He stood. Turned his back.

“Soundwave will bring you nourishment. Rest. You will not be harmed… as long as you do not resist.”

“You’re not a prisoner, Starscream.”

Starscream laughed — bitter, sharp, broken.

“Then unchain me.”

The door slid shut.

And he was alone again.

The moment Megatron left, Starscream’s whole body trembled.

He curled into himself on the berth, wings shaking, fists clenched.

He had dreamed of knowing who his creator was — once. Before.

He had dreamed of belonging.

But this—?

This was not family.

This was ownership.

And he refused to be owned.

Starscream waited until the sound of the door’s magnetic seal hissed fully shut.

He counted the seconds — five, ten, fifteen — until he was sure Megatron was gone. Until the echo of his footsteps faded into the vast metallic halls of the Decepticon stronghold.

Then — and only then — did he allow the tears to fall.

Silent.

Burning.

He stared at the ceiling above him, wings trembling against the restraints, optics wide and raw. His spark ached — it ached so much it felt like it was cracking. He remembered what Megatron had said, the way his voice twisted kindness into a command. The way his hands hovered, like a puppeteer over a string.

“You’re not a prisoner, Starscream.”

And yet, here he was.

Alone. Chained.

Far from home.

He turned his helm to the side and summoned his HUD — what little of it hadn’t been disabled. A cracked corner of interface blinked dimly, distorted by the suppressors around his frame.

But he still had something. Megatron hadn’t noticed the backdoor. Starscream was a prodigy after all — raised among Autobots, coddled by science officers, taught to think, to question, to create.

And before the battle…

Before the explosion.

Before Bumblebee had thrown himself in front of him like a shield—

Starscream had hacked into Autobot records.

He had seen everything.

He had seen the death camps on Kaon. The scorched ruins of Praxus. The executions. The orders signed by Megatron himself. Thousands. No — millions.

Screaming sparks. Functionist purges. Decepticon prisons where Autobots disappeared and never came back.

He saw it all.

Including the recordings… the raw footage.

Megatron, once called D-16 — kind and unsure, gentle even — had become something else. Something colder. Something that no longer understood what love meant. Only loyalty. Only power.

“You are mine.”

“You belong to me.”

No.

Starscream didn’t belong to anyone.

The cuffs sparked faintly as he tested them. He had no strength left — not like before. His energon levels were low. He was sore, hurt, and tired. But the fire in his core wouldn’t die.

He thought of Elita.

Of Optimus.

Of Ratchet.

Of Bumblebee.

His family.

His real family.

“I have to run,” Starscream whispered to himself.

“Before he breaks me.”

“Before he turns me into him.”

Chapter Text

Starscream breathed in slowly.

His spark was trembling in its chamber, his wings stiff with fear, his wrists blistered from the heat of the energon cuffs — but he was not going to cry again.

Not now.

He remembered Ironhide's voice. Gruff, always a little annoyed when teaching, but his words were clear. “Get the angle right, kid. It’s not about strength. It’s about dislocation. Pain will come, but if you want to live, you’ll do it.”

Starscream closed his optics. He twisted his wrist just the way Ironhide taught him — sharply, precisely, painfully.

A white-hot bolt of agony shot up his arm. His vision flared.

But the cuff slipped.

The first one.

He held back a scream and bit into his own hand cables to muffle the sound.

Then the second one. Twist. Snap. Pop.

Pain.

More pain than he thought he could survive.

But it worked.

He was free.

His whole frame trembled, one arm hanging limply at his side — dislocated, raw, sparking at the seams — but he was free.

Starscream staggered forward, limping toward the far side of the room. He remembered passing it when Megatron had brought him in — a maintenance panel, old and rusted, with one corner slightly off-center. He knew that kind of design. The kind only used for high-tier internal wiring — the kind that plugged straight into the base’s spinal system.

He dropped to his knees.

His fingers, shaking, dug beneath the panel.

The pain was blinding. His vision doubled, his vents stuttering, his dislocated arm brushing against the edge of the wall — but he didn’t stop.

Metal gave way.

The panel popped free.

Behind it, a bundle of glowing data lines blinked and pulsed. Blue. Red. Violet.

Decepticon code.

Starscream stared at it for half a second before pulling a small interface cable from his forearm port. He hissed through gritted denta as he connected it — incomplete, because he was missing his medical stabilizer, but it had to work. It had to.

The moment his system connected, data started flooding in.

Encrypted codes. Alarm systems. Patrol routes. Names. Coordinates. Everything.

He filtered all of it — ignored it.

He found the location pin. His own.

And with one last surge of willpower, he overrode the firewall and sent a transmission.

::To: Prime. Ratchet. Bee.::
::Location: Kaon Outpost 7, lower sub-levels. I’m here. I’m—free. But not for long.::

::I want to come home.::

He hit SEND.

And collapsed forward, interface cable still plugged in, tears sliding silently down his cheekplates.

Starscream lay on the cold floor, his body sparking softly from overexertion. The interface cable was still connected to the wall, his dislocated arm trembling, energon trickling from where his delicate seams had split open. His frame felt too small. Too fragile.

He was fifteen. Just fifteen.

He shouldn’t have been here — in this cell, in this war, in this choice between names and blood and everything that hurt.

His vents hitched.

He remembered when Optimus had sat down beside him, quiet, heavy with guilt, and told him the truth. That his CNA didn’t match what he had believed. That the one who had raised him — the gentle D-16, the miner, the story-teller, the one who used to hum lullabies into his helm — was Megatron.

His Sire.

And Starscream had accepted it. Quietly. Carefully. Even painfully.

He didn’t scream. Didn’t cry. Not that time.

He had nodded. And said:

"Okay. I’ll meet him… when it’s quiet. When it’s safe."

Optimus had placed a servo on his shoulder and said:

"That’s all I ask. You decide when. No one else."

But Megatron hadn’t waited.

He hadn’t respected boundaries, or safety, or the fear of a young bot who only wanted time.

Megatron had taken him.

Dragged him out of the home where he’d grown up — away from Elita’s warmth, from Ratchet’s grumbles, from Bumblebee’s protective buzz and fumbling hugs. Megatron hadn’t asked. He hadn’t spoken.

He had acted.

Starscream curled into himself now, his cables twitching from the cold. But his processor refused to shut down.

He thought of the footage he had seen — the one he’d secretly hacked from the Autobot archive when no one was looking. He had wanted to understand. To prepare.

And what he saw…

He saw what Megatron had become.

Not the D-16 he remembered in dreams when he heard the stories of the past — no. The mech on those videos, giving brutal orders with a flat voice and optics colder than ice, was no story-teller. No loving Sire.

Starscream saw the lifeless bodies. The smoking ruins of settlements. The experiments. The summary executions. The sparkless calculations spoken with such conviction — "acceptable casualties" — as if lives meant nothing.

He saw what Megatron did to bots like himself. Young bots. Bots with wings. Test subjects. Disposable tools.

Megatron said he acted out of love.

But Starscream knew better.

Love didn’t take you away from your home by force.

Love didn’t chain your wrists and say it was for your own good.

Love didn’t try to own you.

And yet… he understood. A little. The edge of Megatron’s madness. The unbearable pain of loss that had twisted his logic.

Starscream remembered the way Megatron’s voice cracked — once — when he spoke of his lost mistress. His mate. He understood Megatron’s hatred for Magnus. Understood that the wound never closed.

But Starscream also understood that pain didn’t give anyone the right to hurt others.

Even Ultra Magnus, rigid and cold and full of unreachable orders, still had lines he wouldn’t cross. Even Ratchet — stubborn, grumbly, always one optic twitch away from throwing a wrench — had conscience. He was stern, harsh sometimes, but he never stopped being kind underneath.

And that was the difference.

That was the truth Megatron refused to see.

Pain didn’t justify cruelty.

And love… love without freedom… wasn’t love at all.

Starscream exhaled slowly, trembling as he reached with his uninjured arm and unplugged the interface cable. His message was out. The Autobots would come. They would come.

And when they did — he’d be ready.

No matter what Megatron said. No matter what promises or sweet lies he whispered about "family" and "power" and "heritage."

Starscream didn’t want thrones.

He wanted them.

His family.

Elita. Ratchet. Ironhide. Bumblebee.

And Optimus.

The cell was quiet again.

Starscream sat in the corner, one wing dragging against the wall, his body curled protectively around the injured arm. The pain was sharp — not just in the seams of his frame, but deep in his spark. A low, persistent ache that kept growing the longer he stayed here.

He had sent the message.

He had rerouted the signals, masked his energy signature, uploaded the ping through multiple mirrored backdoors in the Decepticon system. It had taken everything he had to bypass Soundwave’s firewalls, even with the minimal access he had through the wall console. He had disguised the message as an Energon requisition code. It had looked like a routine error.

But Soundwave was a ghost in the machine.

And Starscream couldn’t know — not for certain — if the ping had made it out before the lines were cut. If Soundwave had caught it. If Optimus and the others were already on their way… or if they had no idea he was even alive.

Starscream didn’t have the luxury of hope.

He had to assume the worst. That he was alone.

He sat up slowly, back scraping the damp wall behind him. The cell was poorly lit, a dim red glow bleeding from a flickering power conduit in the ceiling. It cast everything in blood and shadow. He looked down at his servos — trembling, oil-stained, fingers cut raw from forcing open the wall panel — and curled them into fists.

"I have to move. I have to move."

He whispered it to himself. A mantra. A push against despair.

Because Starscream was a genius.

He was a scientist, a strategist, a prodigy born of noble CNA and raised among the minds of the Autobots. And yes — he was fifteen. He wasn’t built for war, or blades, or prisons. He didn’t have weapons. He didn’t even have a sidearm.

And right now he wanted to scream at Optimus for never letting him carry one.

“You’re not a soldier, Starscream.”
“That’s a good thing. You’re more than this war.”

Primus, how he wanted to punch that beautiful, moral, frustrating mech in the faceplate right now.

Because what use was all that idealism when you were locked in a Decepticon dungeon, alone, powerless, and at the mercy of a warlord who thought love meant control?

Starscream ground his denta together. No. No more fear.

He stood.

His frame swayed, weaker than he'd expected. The energon loss from his dislocated arm and the strain of the hack had taken their toll. Still, he limped to the edge of the cell, pressing his audials close to the seam in the wall.

Voices outside. Heavy footfalls. Distant shouting.

An argument. He couldn’t make out the words — just the cadence. One was clearly Megatron. The other sounded like Shockwave — emotionless, precise, probably giving some report on his condition or Spark readings.

Starscream’s spark fluttered. If Shockwave got involved, he’d be tethered. Probed. Monitored. Locked down and unreachable.

“No,” he breathed. “Not happening. Not me.”

He turned back into the room, analyzing.

The console was fried — he’d burnt it on purpose during the last data spike to avoid suspicion. The wall panel was sealed shut again. The chains lay loose and jagged on the floor, fragments of metal and frayed cable. And above him — vents. A filtration grate, thin and narrow.

Too small for a soldier.

But maybe…

Starscream dragged a crate to the wall. Stacked it. Climbed, slipping once, biting back a cry when his arm sparked at the wrong angle.

He reached up. Grasped the vent.

And paused.

He was scared.

He was really scared.

But if he stayed, he would never get out.

And no one would save him — not this time.

He clenched his jaw, lifted the grate slowly — carefully — then slipped his thin frame inside, pressing his wings tight against his back, crawling like a rodent in the walls of the monster’s lair.

It was not elegant.

It was not dignified. He was covered in filth, energon, grease. His vents wheezed. His arm ached.

But it was movement.

It was freedom.

It was hope built not on waiting — but on acting.

Below, in the command center, Megatron slammed his fist into the console, optics burning.

“Where is he?!”

Shockwave blinked slowly, unfazed.

“We have lost direct readings. There appears to have been a power surge in the spark monitor. Possibly self-inflicted. Perhaps intentional.”

“You let him fool you.”

Megatron’s voice was low, venomous.

“I told you he’s dangerous. Not because of his wings. Not because of his royal frame. Because of his mind. That’s my son in there.”

He turned slowly, voice dropping to a whisper.

“And he’s just like me.”

Soundwave stood at the edge of the control chamber, his visor glowing faintly in the dim light of the fortress core. The Decepticon command center hummed around him — machinery, encryption cycles, low pulses of ancient architecture tied to war and empire.

But he was silent.

He always was.

And still, his processor was louder than ever.

He watched the monitors, each one flickering with slices of the base: security feeds, motion sensors, spark monitors, system logs. In the lower left corner, the feed flickered, glitched for a fraction of a second — and returned. The vent above Cell 12 had registered a tremor. A light displacement. The feed should have triggered a motion alert.

It didn’t.

Because Soundwave had manually disabled it.

He hadn’t said a word when Starscream’s ping reached the comms array.

He had seen it forming before it was fully coded — knew instantly what the sparkling was doing. There was brilliance in it, elegant efficiency, a desperate boldness Soundwave couldn’t help but recognize. The child was young, but he was a prodigy.

And more than that — he was afraid.

Soundwave did not allow the message to transmit.

He severed it mid-stream, erased its record, rerouted its ghost to a junk file that he promptly deleted. Not even Starscream would realize it never left.

And yet… he said nothing.

Because Soundwave knew Megatron.

He had known him longer than any bot still functioning. He had known him before the war, before the Decepticons, before the name "Megatron" was spoken with awe and fear.

He had known D-16.

Megatron’s voice cut across the chamber like a weapon.

“I want him found, Soundwave.”

The Decepticon warlord’s optics blazed with a light that was not anger — but obsession.

“He has run from me again. Again. Do you understand what this means?”

“Starscream is not a prisoner. He is mine. My sparkling. My heir. And I will not have him taken from me a second time.”

He turned, stepping toward Soundwave, the air around him rippling with static rage.

“If you know where he is… you will tell me.”

Soundwave did not flinch.

He met Megatron’s gaze, the thin white bar of his visor casting a quiet, unreadable expression.

“Negative,” he said at last, voice even, cold.

Megatron's optics narrowed.

“What did you say?”

“Visuals: inconclusive. Tracking systems: offline. Starscream’s spark: unreadable. Status… unknown.”

It was a lie.

But a quiet one. A surgical one. One that only Soundwave could get away with.

Megatron stepped in closer. For a long, terrible moment, nothing moved but the tremble of power in the air between them.

Then he pulled back, turned away, growling under his breath.

“Then search everything. Tear the base apart if you have to. I want every vent scanned. Every tunnel sealed. Every access point guarded.”

“Find him.”

Soundwave said nothing.

He simply bowed his head, turned back to the monitors.

His field rippled in silence.

And deep inside, something twisted.

Because Soundwave was loyal.

He had stood by Megatron since before the uprising, before the gladiator pits, before the word “Decepticon” was ever painted on a banner.

But this… this was not the same mech.

This was not the one who vowed to protect their kind. This was not the one who held the broken form of his conjunx in his arms and wept silent tears in the halls of Tarn. This was not the D-16 who once stood between a whimpering sparkling and a Prime's blade and swore, "I will not become what they are."

This was something else now.

Megatron had crossed a line.

And Soundwave, for the first time in centuries, was not certain he could follow.

He opened a secondary feed in the corner of his visor, silent and encrypted.

A tiny red dot blinked on a schematic of the base — crawling slowly through the ventilation network.

Starscream.

He was still alive. Still moving.

Still trying to escape.

Soundwave traced the path — and shifted one vent cover open with a remote override. He re-routed one patrol away from the hallway ahead. Delayed one camera's cycle. All in total silence.

He made no record of it.

He would say nothing.

But he had made a choice.

And no one — not even Megatron — would know it yet.

Chapter Text

Starscream dropped from the vent in a burst of dust and grit, his frame landing hard on the cold metal floor. For a moment, his vents wheezed from the sudden jolt, wings twitching from tension.

He didn’t know where he was.

The corridor stretched in both directions, narrow and dimly lit, the air carrying the heavy tang of engine coolant and the faint, pulsing thrum of energon pumps somewhere deep in the base. Pipes ran along the ceiling, leaking the occasional hiss of vapor.

His processor screamed at him to move.

He darted forward, keeping close to the wall, sharp optics scanning for any sign of an exit. If he could just get outside—just reach open sky—he could outfly any pursuit and send a proper transmission to the Autobots.

The sound of clanking metal echoed ahead. Patrol drones.

Starscream’s optics widened, and he ducked into a side passage just as the first pair rolled into view. He pressed himself against the wall, struts tense, spark hammering in his chest cavity. Their sensor sweeps passed inches from his plating.

They moved on.

Starscream took the chance and ran.

Every step echoed through the corridors, drawing the attention of more Decepticons. Workers, troopers, maintenance drones—all snapping their heads toward the sight of a sleek Seeker frame bolting past, his thrusters rattling with each stride. Their expressions shifted from confusion to alarm.

“Intruder—!”
“Stop him!”

Starscream didn’t stop. He vaulted over a smaller bot, shoved past another, ducked as a stray shot sizzled over his head.

Then—too late—he rounded a corner and collided with something solid.

No—someone.

The force sent him staggering back, wings flaring for balance. His optics lifted—

—straight into the burning crimson gaze of Megatron.

The warlord’s massive frame blocked the entire passage. One servo shot out like a trap, seizing Starscream by the arm before he could turn.

“Enough,” Megatron growled, his voice deep and dangerous.

Starscream twisted, kicked, but Megatron’s grip was unyielding. His claws dug into the plating at Starscream’s arm, forcing him still.

That was when Megatron noticed.

A gash across Starscream’s fist—deep enough that energon streaked down his plating, dripping onto the floor. His plating was scuffed, edges dented from the cramped crawl through the vents. The young Seeker’s field trembled—part rage, part fear, part exhaustion.

And for the first time… Megatron’s expression shifted.

Not to anger. Not to triumph.

But something colder. Something heavier.

Worry.

“Who did this?” Megatron’s voice dropped, almost a demand, almost… a question.

Starscream glared, but said nothing.

Megatron’s optics darkened. He turned his head sharply.

“Knockout! Hook!”

The shout reverberated through the metal walls like a thunderclap. His grip didn’t loosen on Starscream’s arm, but it was no longer crushing—only firm. Possessive.

Within moments, Knockout appeared at a brisk pace, followed by the hulking form of Hook. Both froze at the sight—Megatron standing with the Seeker, energon trailing from his servo.

“Get a medkit,” Megatron ordered, his voice low but sharp. “Now.”

Knockout exchanged a glance with Hook, something unspoken passing between them, before hurrying forward.

Megatron shifted his grip, pulling Starscream closer, optics scanning every mark, every dent, with something bordering on intensity.

Starscream hated it. Hated the way that gaze burned through him—not with the cold calculation of a warlord, but with the unsettling weight of… claim.

And yet, behind that, deep in those crimson optics—
Starscream could swear he saw something else.

Something dangerously close to regret.

Knockout crouched beside the berth, his polished crimson armor gleaming under the medbay lights. He reached for Starscream’s injured wrist with a certain flourish, though his optics were sharper than his smile.

“Hold still,” Knockout murmured, voice calm but edged with that practiced charm of his. “If you twitch, I’ll make it sting more. And trust me—you won’t like it.”

Starscream hissed as the disinfectant touched the torn plating, his wings jerking involuntarily.

Across the room, Hook had approached Megatron. His towering frame leaned just enough to speak low, his words meant only for the warlord.

“That wound,” Hook said flatly, “is self-inflicted. A typical maneuver—bots do it to slip cuffs. He tore the plating at the joint to force the lock mechanism.”

Megatron’s optics narrowed slightly, but he said nothing. His gaze never left the Seeker.

Hook straightened, reading the warlord’s silence for what it was—an internal storm Megatron would not voice in front of others. Without another word, he turned back to his instruments, though the faint frown on his face suggested even he didn’t quite know what to make of this situation.

Back at the berth, Knockout’s hands worked with quick, practiced precision, sealing the energon leak with a steady stream of weld-foam before patching the torn plating. His tone, however, shifted—low, conspiratorial.

“You’re lucky,” he said softly, leaning closer so only Starscream could hear. “Most who end up here in your position get a very different kind of treatment.”

Starscream’s optics flickered toward him, guarded, distrustful.

Knockout’s smirk softened—not into kindness exactly, but into something resembling understanding.

“Listen,” he continued, “Megatron… isn’t exactly the most expressive mech when it comes to… well… anything outside of war speeches and threats. Feelings? Not his strong suit. He’ll bottle them up until they come out sideways—and sideways, in his case, usually means causing a monumental mess.”

He finished adjusting the wrist brace, optics flicking up to gauge the Seeker’s reaction.

“I’m telling you this because—” Knockout’s voice lowered further, “—if you’re waiting for some grand, gentle apology, you’ll be waiting past the next stellar cycle. He’ll care, but he’ll do it in the worst way possible. So… have patience. Or at least enough sense not to provoke him when you’re still leaking energon.”

Starscream didn’t respond. His optics remained fixed on the far wall, jaw set tight, field spiking with a mix of defiance and uncertainty.

Megatron, still watching from across the medbay, said nothing—but the weight of his gaze never lifted from Starscream’s frame.

Knockout stepped back from the berth with a satisfied little hum, wiping his hands on a cloth and tossing it aside.

“There. Good as new—well, functional, at least,” he said with a smirk, then glanced between Starscream and the looming shadow in the doorway. “I’ll, ah… give you two a moment.”

The medic slipped out, leaving the air in the medbay thick and heavy.

Starscream swung his legs off the berth, intent on sliding to the floor and finding any way out of this place—until a large, clawed hand pressed against the frame beside his helm, barring his path.

Megatron stood there, towering and unyielding, his optics locked onto him with a mix of calculation and something harder to name.

“You were in the ventilation ducts,” Megatron said, voice low but resonating like a distant thunderclap. “Why?”

Starscream’s wings twitched in an instinctive display of tension.

“Because,” he replied sharply, “I wasn’t planning on staying here to find out what your next order for me would be.”

Megatron’s gaze narrowed.

“You injure yourself, risk being hunted by my drones, again, and you expect me to believe it was nothing more than a whim?” His tone sharpened, but there was an undercurrent there—not pure anger, something more strained.

Starscream met his optics directly, defiance burning in his own.

“I was trying to get out. Away from you. I don’t care if our CNA is the same—you are not my Sire. My family is with the Autobots, with the mechs who raised me, who cared for me without chaining me to a berth or locking me in a cell.”

Megatron’s field flared—anger, yes, but tempered with something rawer. He stepped closer, voice tightening.

“You think they will protect you forever? That they can keep you from the truth of what you are?”

Starscream’s wings angled sharply back, a clear sign of his rising agitation.

“I know enough. I know I’d rather take my chances with them than be one more possession in your war.”

For a moment, the two simply stared at one another, the silence between them thick with unspoken words.

Megatron’s hands curled at his sides. He could have grabbed him, could have ordered him restrained again. Instead, he leaned down slightly, optics glinting.

“You may not accept me,” he said, voice almost a growl, “but you will understand me. One way or another.”

Starscream didn’t answer. He simply turned his face away, jaw locked, his spark hammering in his chassis—not from fear, but from the deep, gnawing ache of wanting to be anywhere but here.

From his silent post in the far corner, Soundwave observed everything—every word, every shift in field, every small flicker of emotion that crossed Starscream’s face. In another time, another life, the exchange might have looked almost ordinary: a stubborn youngling arguing with a Sire, refusing to obey. But Soundwave knew better. This wasn’t family, not anymore.

Megatron would never admit fault, never grant the Autobots a victory in principle. And at that moment, he was proving exactly why Starscream now looked at him with the optics one reserves for a tyrant, not a parent.

Megatron was pressing too hard, too fast, as if sheer force of will could mend a bond that had been fractured long before they’d stood in this medbay. And with every push, Starscream pulled further away, not only in action but in spark.

Soundwave’s sensors flicked toward the far shadow where another presence lingered—Shockwave. Ever silent, ever calculating. The one mech in the entire base whose loyalty to Megatron was so absolute that morality never entered the equation.

Soundwave knew the risk. He could imagine it as if the orders had already been given: a brief command from Megatron, a nod from Shockwave, and Starscream would be taken into the lab. Memories altered. Processor directly accessed. Perception rewritten until the seeker believed, without question, that Megatron was Sire, leader, and sole keeper of the truth.

A perfect, obedient creation.

Soundwave’s digits curled into a slow fist. If Starscream ran again—and Soundwave feared he would—Megatron might see no other solution. And once Shockwave’s instruments touched Starscream’s mind… the seeker who stood here now would be gone.

And for reasons Soundwave could not, or would not, admit aloud, that was something he did not want to see happen.

Soundwave did not move, his expression unreadable beneath the smooth curve of his visor, but inside his processor, calculations shifted with quiet precision. Logic and loyalty warred in silence, and for the first time in countless vorns, Soundwave allowed the latter to fracture.

He knew what Megatron could do.

He knew the moment Starscream pushed too far, the instant patience bled away, the warlord would turn to Shockwave and issue that order—the one that would rewrite the seeker’s very existence. It would be efficient. Clean. Permanent.

But it would also destroy Starscream.

And for Soundwave, that was the line.

Without a word, he opened a channel buried so deep it had not been accessed since the earliest cycles of the war. A direct link—encrypted, shadowed, invisible to Decepticon scans—and he sent the coordinates of the base. No demands, no conditions, only data and a brief burst of code carrying his own unmistakable signature.

He included the warning in clipped, clinical language: If Starscream continues to resist, Megatron will order Shockwave to alter his processor. Immediate extraction advised.

It was betrayal, treason of the highest order. It was a knife to the very core of what Megatron believed Soundwave to be. And yet, as the transmission vanished into the ether, Soundwave felt no regret.

Not because he had chosen the Autobots. Not because he wanted to see Megatron fall.

But because Starscream—fragile, defiant, brilliant—would not survive what was coming. And Soundwave would not stand by to watch him erased.