Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

To say that overthrowing Shockwave was easy would've been an understatement. Megaempress was more powerful, more charismatic, more driven than he could've ever been and it showed in the work of her loyal followers. Swaying the small army of seekers he held under his command went so remarkably smoothly that Moonheart was tempted to call it suspicious , but she had other things to worry about right now. Megaempress had taken Shockwave on hand-to-hand and, strong though she was, she'd sustained a not insignificant amount of damage in the process.

The Empress was uncharacteristically quiet as Moonheart replaced her knee joint, gaze flittering about the newly conquered medical lab as she idly bounced her good leg. Moonheart moved a careful hand to her Empress' thigh to keep her still — the movement made the tangle of wires she had to connect keep swaying out of reach.

"Oh, sorry," Megaempress vocalised airily, distracted, and shifted to looking down at Moonheart’s handiwork while tapping her fingers.

Moonheart had only been in Megaempress’ entourage for a quartex before Megatron left Cybertron in pursuit of Optimus Prime and his ilk, but in the time between that and now she’d never gotten such a close, personal look at her new boss. Interestingly, almost nothing of the grandiose and larger-than-life mech she had to accustom herself to following showed through as Moonheart fixed her. The difference between public and private was alive and well in Megaempress, it seemed.

Her patient twitched, just a little, and Moonheart looked up to see a face of barely contained something on the Empress.

"Is something the matter, Your Majesty?" Moonheart asked, ceasing all motion on the injury, worried that she might be causing pain. "I can offer you an anaesthetic if you want?"

"Oh, no, no need. It tickles, that's all."

“If you’re sure…” She proceeded on reattaching the lower leg, sneaking glances upwards just because, but Megaempress had turned back to pensively scanning the lab, and nothing of note happened afterwards.

Chromia shook off a thick layer of grime and dust from her chassis as she entered the new location her squad had moved into during her mission, an old molding station left over from Quintesson days. The upper levels had been razed to the ground in the initial Decepticon revolt, but the underground space from sentio metallico extraction remained, and certainly no ‘con would dare to venture into this place. Hopefully.

She tapped the basement’s trapdoor with her foot once long, twice short, thrice long again. Moonracer welcomed her with a blaster pointed straight at her spark, but lowered it upon a cursory once-over. 

“Did you see what happened out there?”

“You won’t believe the things I’ve seen,” Chromia told her with a grimace, “Take me to Elita. She needs to know this.”

Evading Lunaclub’s little party might’ve just been the most annoying thing Flowspade had ever done. That pink rapscallion had held on to her arm and tried to drag her to the main hall where the traitorous Seekers she’d convinced to take part in celebrating “liberation” waited, but Flowspade was stronger and fixed her with a nasty glare before transforming and speeding off. She had a mission to accomplish yet.

The catacombs of Darkmount were still untouched — Megaempress’ cronies hadn’t started to search them just yet; maybe she’d volunteer to do it, just to be safe — and the dark dampness of it was almost like home to Flowspade. As one who’d worked in them all her life, it was like second-nature to find the encrypted data terminals hidden in them.

Inside a disguised alcove, Flowspade accessed the computer indicated by her instructions and connected through seven redirecting servers and firewalls to her true master’s hideout.

Greenlight had figured Lancer would still be fuming in the makeshift training room in the depths of the new mine base, but she hadn’t expected that level of destruction from one who had, like herself, until not long ago been an academic.

Lancer sat in a corner with her legs hugged close to her chassis and her face scrunched up in a spark-rending expression of anger and despair.

Greenlight wasn’t quite sure what to do about it.

“Lance…” She called out, muted, approaching as much as she dared and bowing to look at her friend in the face. “Is everything…” She stopped herself before she could finish the question. Of course everything was not fine.

Still, Lancer’s frown softened, just a little, and she motioned for Greenlight to join her on the floor. Greenlight did so.

“It’s so… unfair.” Lancer finally said, a breem or so into their sitting together. “He took everything from us and we don’t even get to be the ones to take him down.”

Greenlight didn’t know what to say to that, other than murmur a soft “yeah” and throw a companionable arm around Lancer’s shoulder, pulling her close. The both of them had lost so much due to Shockwave’s machinations — not more than their companions, but she knew that to Lancer it was personal —, to the takeover of Sistex University and massacre of dissidents within its student body and faculty.

Greenlight at least could comfort herself knowing that he was taken down by one of his own creations, but that wouldn’t do for Lancer’s quest for vengeance. She wasn’t sure if anything ever would.

Atop the tallest building still standing in Polyhex, Wingthing wiggled her tiny wings as her master cleaned her of the dust she’d picked up while scouting all sides of this unprecedented situation. It was a shame to overwork her this much, but she’d been the only one they’d been able to squirrel through their portals in such short notice. They’d make an effort to correct this, pluck other intelligent and capable and loyal critters from space-time as soon as possible, but for now she would have to do.

The information the little bolt-bat had acquired painted an interesting picture, a complicated game they’d have to stage to set things to their correct state. But they didn’t think to make it quick — they would have four million years to settle this, they might as well enjoy it.

Logos Prime chose an appropriate shape. Large black wings spread from her back, and her chest shaped itself to properly house her beloved, exhausted minion. She touched Wingthing’s head with the golden mask of this new form before letting her transform and dock.

Over the eternal twilight of a planet of three suns, Logos Prime — now Soundblaster — flew to make her first contact.

Chapter Text

Chromia’s report was harrowing. The destruction caused by this instance of Decepticon infighting was much greater than recorded in any previous power struggle their opponents had had in the past, and now a dark singlehorn — a Decepticon leader who, like Megatron, had been built for no purpose other than to lead — had control of the enemy forces, rendering most of their current strategic planning worthless.

Elita One pinched the bridge of her nose, now alone in the gallery she’d chosen for a war room. Playing shadow resistance in Polyhex after feigning death in Iacon had been expected — planned, even —, but she had failed to account for Shockwave’s rogue experiment and the remnants of Soundwave’s own infiltration team.

They’d lost no mechs to it, at least, all of their meager team accounted for and safe now with Chromia’s return. Still, Elita felt like she’d failed them, somehow.

“Sir?” Moonracer's head peeked from behind a wall, tone concerned, "Could I have a word with you?"

When Moonheart awoke, she knew straight away it was nowhere near time for her assigned shift and she was more than ready to hold Lunaclub accountable for crimes against proper recharge. What surprised her, though, was that there was no sign of her sister in their shared room, and instead she found herself staring up at an orange little critter sitting on her chest.

And then she screamed.

The little creature started flicking its limbs in a panic, clearly startled by Moonheart's reaction, and that made her… feel a little bad about it. She shushed the mechanimal — a bolt bat? — and softly pet its wings, coaxing it into calming down. And now to find where this baby had come from.

A quick sweep of the room revealed that the skylight above the centre of the room was open — it must’ve flown in through there. She got up and walked there, so certain that it’d been closed before…

A shadow fell upon her as she stood under it, and her spark almost went zero-point when something else came in through the skylight.

Instinctively, she released a defensive burst of sedative mist, but it was for naught, as she noticed the intruder's battlemask and, taking in their entire frame, their startling resemblance to one of her old boss' previous frames.

The bolt bat flew to their shoulder in a stark imitation of Buzzsaw or Laserbeak perched on Soundwave. And, as this mech extended their hand, from it played a recording: “Come with?”

Moonracer quietly settled herself in a shadowed corner atop a building just outside Polyhex's old city hall, now Decepticon capitol. Through the sight of her rifle, she accompanied the figures coming in and out of the main hall into the patio as they held some sort of celebration. She had orders not to shoot though, so she just observed.

It seemed to be mostly grunts out there, but with a careful optic Moonracer pinpointed one of Megaempress' team — the pink helicopter, Lunaclub —, pressed against the wall by a garishly yellow Seeker whom she struggled to identify — was the monochrome one Nova Storm or Sunstorm? —, seemingly having a blast. The intel Chromia had gathered highlighted her as a frightening fighter with a pyromaniac streak and a penchant for hedonism, but she was no immediate threat, occupied as she was.

She traced the full contour of the fortress with her gaze, noting the uncharacteristic absence of the guardian drones Shockwave had kept as staff before unusual activity on the roof attracted her attention. A pair of mechs climbed out of a skylight and stood a few mechanometres apart atop the building, seemingly absorbed in conversation. One of them she managed to identify as the Decepticon medic Moonheart, but what she could see of the other one matched no other than an outdated version of Soundwave , which should’ve been impossible if their intel on the crew of the Nemesis was correct. She had to get a better look at this.

Gun safety off, Moonracer prepared to take a new leap.

Lunaclub was having the time of her life. Between all the arson and general destruction of property she'd been allowed and the pretty Seeker she'd picked up with some light conversation about mass destruction, this was shaping up to be the best assignment she'd gotten since her construction.

Nova Storm had the same generic face and build as her mold siblings and was even solid colour , but had painted her face with striking black and purple for Lunaclub’s party and that little show of individuality — like Lord Starscream’s striking own tri -colour and loud personality — caught Lunaclub’s attention instantly. What a bonus it was that she had triple-reinforced tantalum carbide armour and an appetite for destruction to match Lunaclub’s own! They could definitely play with fire together a little.

But for now it was enough to mash faces with one of Shockwave’s elite troops against the wall of the fortress they took from him. Nova Storm wasn’t really that great of a kisser, but Lunaclub could easily forgive her for that.

Over the muffled music coming from inside and the sound of her energon pumping hard through her body, Lunaclub heard a strange sound that had her pull away spooked from Nova’s purple lips.

“What is it?” Nova Storm asked, looking out behind her.

“Blaster shot. Right above us.” Lunaclub disengaged, unsubspacing her Flame Sword. “Flank me?”

She didn’t wait for Nova’s staticky “of course” before engaging her thrusters and flying off in the direction of the figure leaning over the railing atop the building overlooking Darkmount’s patio. She deflected a shot with her sword before releasing a burst of flame from it, toppling her quarry. 

Soon enough, Lunaclub and Nova Storm had a badly burnt Autobot in custody and a frantic Moonheart flying towards them, Blizzard Blade in tow.

“Right on cue, sis!”

"Is she— She shot her ." Moonheart sounded barely coherent, expression a wild mix of emotions.

"Shot who?"

Moonheart paused, an edge of uncertainty tinting her voice. 

"I wish I could tell you."

Logos Prime warped back to their cozy little pocket dimension, shedding their physical form and shrugging off the damage their shell had taken. It had hurt , the first damage they'd taken in living memory, but it could not affect their true, transcendent form.

Wingthing couldn't come with them, unfortunately, her little body too primitive to withstand dimensional travel. Logos hoped she'd caught their last transmission, telling her to keep close watch over their new ally without giving herself away to the rest. They were sure the poor thing would be sick with worry until she could see her master again, but they needed the time to fix up their shape again.

The Decepticon medic, the spark of that whole operation, would be a key player to have in their arsenal. She was compassionate, level-headed, and had an emotional response to their chosen form — Moonheart was perfect . They must follow up with her soon, lest she become too worried after seeing them simply fade from that plane of reality after being shot.

They maybe could've let her fix their shell the old-fashioned way — it'd certainly foster a level of trust, intimacy between them —, but surely Lunaclub would have interfered, and she was too chaotic an element to allow into their plans. They couldn't help but wonder though…

Firestar knew something wasn't right the moment she went to check on Moonracer only to find her assigned quarters empty. She was quick to take it to Elita One, discovering that she had undertaken a solo scouting mission and had failed to check in at the fifteen breem mark. It hurt her that Moonracer hadn't warned her, but at least Elita had already begun strategising a possible rescue party.

“Do you reckon you and Lancer can bring her in safely or should I send Chromia as well?” Elita asked after giving them their briefing.

“We’ll do it. Chromia’s earned her rest.” It was clear that Lancer was just raring to go into action, but she was right in that Chromia must be tired after a decaorn out in the field. Still, it’d fall to Firestar to cover for Lancer’s inexperience either way.

But soon they were armed and equipped, ready to brave the halls of Darkmount and take Moonracer back.

Moonheart had done an excellent job putting the Autobot sniper back together, even if Megaempress could see the hatred burning in her optics as she did so. Lunaclub had been the one to bite the bullet and ask why they were bothering to do so, clearly bothered that her celebrations had been interrupted and that she wasn’t allowed to have her new paramour present.

At the time, Megaempress just smiled and winked — the little fiend might hear, after all —, but she told them later, after the Autobot rescue party came and went. The presence of this assassin indicated the existence of an active resistance cell here in the heart of Decepticon territory, one even Shockwave had not known about, and it was up to them to scour their numbers, location and abilities.

She’d ordered her soldiers to relax defenses, put up only enough of a fight that it wasn’t suspicious, and had the Autobot in simple bindings at the very mouth of the Catacombs. All carefully calculated to seem like the simple carelessness and disarray of a freshly established regime.

What she hadn’t accounted for was Flowspade’s presence deeper in the mechanisms of Darkmount, uninformed, and her decision to fight the orange duo they’d let make their way unimpeded through the fortress. She was truthfully a ferocious fighter, probably the most skilled Megaempress had at her command, and that was something this operation very much didn’t need, so she sent their worst fighter to muck it up a little. Trickdiamond was both unskilled and uninterested, but her little gadgets would be very useful, in time.

“You asked to see me, Your Majesty?” Flowspade asked, very deliberate, after all was said and done. Megaempress admired her courage and lack of shame.

“Why, yes. I was hoping we could have a chat about your… explorations.”

Flowspade did not waver, explaining that her familiarity with the place led her to believe possible dissidents might be taking shelter there. Megaempress did not believe her, not really, but let it slide for the moment. She had another loose end to tackle, after all.

Wingthing had to keep herself from squeaking in the shadowed corner she’d taken for herself when the Decepticon Empress’ imposing form came to question their new ally. Not being able to communicate with her master had her jumpier than usual, but she managed to get a good position to record this conversation without being seen.

Megaempress handled her medic with careful gentleness — much like Wingthing’s master did with her — as she fished for answers regarding the situation that led to their capture of the Autobot sniper. Moonheart’s emotional response was strange, she said, considering neither she nor Lunaclub were injured in the scuffle.

It looked like Moonheart might break, confess her communications with what to her seemed like a ghost, but she brushed Megaempress off, telling her she’d had a fitful recharge and that was probably to blame. Megaempress seemed concerned, but simply wished her a speedy recovery before leaving.

Satisfied, Wingthing revealed herself once more to Moonheart, who this time yelled an expletive instead of a simple screech. Wingthing took it upon herself to correct her, stitching together pieces of recordings with this new one:

“Sweet— Logos —Prime.”

“What did you just say?”

Wingthing repeated her recording, and began to play again the file she’d stopped on back on the roof.

The rescue party had come in safely back to base, though Chromia couldn't help but think they got off too easily. Moonracer was unconscious, but fully repaired as they unloaded her from the back of Firestar's alt and transported her to the common room for observation, and both her rescuers had only minor scuffs and dents. She knew Greenlight would help Lancer buff hers off, but Firestar would usually have Moonracer do it for her, so she accompanied her partner’s condition bearing all the marks of combat and with no intention of repairing them until she was sure Moonracer was fine. Chromia chose not to interfere, but she did join in watching over their downed comrade, as a superior officer if not as a friend.

It took a little over a joor for the effects of Moonheart’s venom to wear off completely. Chromia didn’t get to hear the initial feverish mumblings of a half-awake Moonracer, but soon Firestar called out to her.

“Tell her, Moonracer.”

“It looked like Soundwave, but it wasn’t them. I don’t think it was anyone .” Moonracer squeezed her optics shut, opened them, and then tried again. “It wasn’t a Cybertronian. Not like us. It looked at me and I just knew . It wasn’t right.” 

“What looked like Soundwave, Moonracer?”

“The thing the medic was talking to. The thing I shot.”

“Do you think it was on the Decepticons’ side?”

“I… Maybe. My head hurts.”

Firestar moved to wrap her arm around Moonracer’s back, and Chromia was certain they’d gotten as much from Moonracer as they would for the moment. Whatever it was that Moonracer saw that caused her to break cover, she had to take it to Elita, who intimately knew things that were Cybertronians but also not.

She just hoped it didn’t mean what she thought it meant.

Chapter Text

Whatever was up with the whole incident the previous quartex, it left Megaempress with the necessity to do some deep rearranging of her command tactics. With both Flowspade and Moonheart acting strange, it became priority to tackle faults she’d previously let slide, such as Trickdiamond’s persistent lack of commitment. Their resident techie might not really care about the cause, but it was past time she started pulling her own weight.

An initial idea was to assign her to tail Flowspade, but then Megaempress remembered that Trickdiamond was ridiculously bribable and would probably bring her false information in exchange for more interplanetary market shares or not having to do maintenance chores.

It was a pair of Seekers complaining about their jobs that gave Megaempress the idea to assign her to artifact storage. Hotlink and Bitstream were very gifted in keeping things orderly, but they would be of more use in developing spyware to look into both her rogue agents and the Autobot resistance cell, and, well, Trickdiamond could use learning some patience and organisation.

“You called for us, Your Majesty?” Sunstorm bowed before her, radioactive glow dimmed, most likely to make up for his companions being too absorbed in their fun little gadgets to greet their Empress.

Megaempress smiled as she explained to them their new assignment. She was going to make very good use of Shockwave’s pet nerds.

Moonracer recovered without issue after her rescue, but the crawling sensation provoked by that thing that was not a Cybertronian remained. Elita hadn’t explained to her exactly what the creature was, saying that she couldn’t know for sure until they had more information, but she had said it certainly was powerful, charismatic and beyond Cybertronic limitations. The possibility of it having allied itself to the Decepticons was frightening.

With that in mind, Chromia and Elita were organising a new scouting mission to the catacombs of Polyhex, and Moonracer most definitely wanted in. Yes, it was supposed to just be a quick inventory sweep, but she was itching to kick some ‘con tailpipe after Lunaclub and her paramour took her out so easily. Elita had helpfully pointed out that her low performance was probably a consequence of beholding the thing she had called a transcendent technomorph, and so Moonracer was sure it wouldn’t happen again.

Also, Firestar was scheduled for the mission already. Why mess up the perfect pair?

Acid Storm had a mission. They were outraged that they had to receive their orders indirectly — that whatever that weird thing they and their commander had didn’t qualify them to be the leader of this undercover operation —, but let it not be said that Acid Storm was not as loyal as they came.

The drones were still out of commission from Megaempress’ initial attack, and Acid Storm had very important plans for the deactivated frames Trickdiamond was now guarding in the storage rooms. It was delightful that Megaempress saw fit to replace the turncoat techhead trio with the apathetic little capitalist  — minimal interference guaranteed.

They were in the middle of updating their catalogue when a strange noise came from up in the rafters.

Not taking any chances, Acid Storm quickly blasted in its direction with their null-ray, hearing a pitiful squeak and loud struggling now. They took another shot, this time infusing it with the acid that coursed through their lines, to melt the panelling under the intruder.

Out from the space between floors, fell down a little orange bolt-bat.

The Polyhexian catacombs were a special kind of filthy, Chromia thought as she led her party of three through the passages leading up to Shockwave’s old warehouse, a little ways out of Darkmount itself. They were old — almost as much as their new hideout —, devised by the Decepticon resistance in Quintesson times to facilitate rebellion against their colonisers, but the Golden Age saw them completely abandoned, left for unscrupulous mechs to dump the evidence of their misdeeds.

“This place is creepy like the Pits.” Moonracer mumbled, her headlights having just caught a greyed out corpse that easily looked like it had been there for centuries. Right next to it shone the reflective tape marking the emergency exit to the Decepticon warehouse. “You’d think Shockwave would keep his backyard clean.”

“You’d think he’d have cannibalised these for parts already, I think is more likely.” Firestar answered from the rear, “Figure you can open it, Chromia?”

Chromia quirked her lip, taking the lead and getting out her hacking tools.

“You know I can.”

Trickdiamond hated artifact storage. Those might be strong words, but she definitely meant them after the Empress lifted her by the scruff of her neck and told her that if one small item ever went missing from that bountiful collection of thrift she would subtract every meager cent it was worth from Trickdiamond’s paycheck. ( Having a paycheck in the first place had already been a mess to negotiate, what with the full collapse of the Cybertronian economy, but having her allowance of interplanetary market shares redistributed to other mercenary ‘cons was not an option.) Her current assignment was to look over the security footage from the underground annex and keep track of every single delicious item detailed in the storage manifest, no touchie .

To be completely honest, Trickdiamond couldn’t care less about watching a boring livefeed of a place without active foot traffic, but the storage manifest was juicy . Whatever Shockwave had been up to before Megaempress rebelled, it had earned him some very fun and interesting knicknacks. She’d scrolled past a Liquefier, a cased spark, and feather armour from an ancient Predacon by the time someone tried to knock the monitor room’s door down.

Acid Storm barged into the room with an expression as acrid as their outlier power, holding a struggling little mechanimal by the neck, and practically snarled at her:

“Have you even been keeping watch? There’s slagging Cassettes loose in your department.” Trickdiamond didn’t even have the time to protest before the struggling Recordicon was forced into her hands and Acid Storm took the manifest. “This thing has a Deceptibrand, but you know that doesn’t mean anything here.”

Trickdiamond held onto the little animal as the angry Seeker checked the positions of everything on the list through the cameras. Was there even anything else she could do? But then Acid Storm cursed loud , hitting their hand on the desk, and the small scare had the bat finally free itself from Trickdiamond’s hands and fly off into the corridor. She would have gotten up and chased it, but Acid Storm had grabbed her shoulder and turned her to the video feed.

There were intruders in the complex. Her market shares were so getting redistributed.

The portion of the Decepticon storage complex they ended up in was surprisingly orderly, but had signs of being long untouched. Firestar had been ordered by Chromia to stay in this room, check out its contents, and be ready to load everything they took in her alt mode or to provide backup if necessary. 

With the aid of the flashlight on her forehelm, Firestar carefully looked over the room’s layout — several cabinets, each with many drawers labelled with one body part or another, and not much else. Just to be sure, Firestar picked a random drawer, the one labelled “voice box”, and opened it. As announced, it contained about a dozen of that piece. Interesting.

It figured that Shockwave’s storage would involve the materials for building new Decepticon soldiers and drones when coming by sentio metallico had become so rare, but the true beauty of finding this treasure trove was that they could use this.

Firestar continued to inspect the labels on the drawers, looking for parts that would be worth keeping spares of. She’d thrown a few tens of joint actuators and optic bulbs into her subspace by the time she ran into a label that had a deathly chill crawling up her life cord. 

Spark.

She froze, her own spark thrumming in her chest. If Megaempress were to know they had these stashed down here… She didn’t want to think about it. Resolutely, but still fearfully, Firestar pulled the drawer open like ripping off a scraplet.

As she unshuttered her optics, a single cased spark shone back at her.

An array of feelings flashed through her conflicted mind as she pondered how best to deal with this yet unborn Decepticon, but, as she took it in hand, the door to the rest of the complex came flying open, and Firestar instinctively subspaced the spark as she summoned her blaster.

Chromia stopped by the door, firing her own heavy-duty blaster at grunts Firestar couldn’t see. Before she could give voice to the fear that possessed her, Moonracer ran past Chromia, vents dumping heat, and the door was shut, shots still ringing against the reinforced metal.

Firestar had no time to rejoice that her comrades were fine, as Chromia reminded her of her duty and their urgency. Converting to vehicle mode, Firestar let her friends load their loot into her trunk and they soon sped out of the creepy body part room and back into the creepy tunnels.

Wingthing was terrified. She had been caught , and only a fluke allowed her to escape. Her master would not be pleased, and that tore at her little spark. Taking care not to be seen again, Wingthing flew to Moonheart’s quarters in the upper levels of Darkmount. She had known the young medic for only a few orns, but her master had chosen her, and Wingthing’s own evaluation of her person had her down as both trustworthy and nurturing — a friend to confide in, even if she didn’t have a voice to do so.

The room was dark and unoccupied when she reached it, but Wingthing was nothing if not patient, and hid in a shelf of datapads in her compact mode until at the very end of third shift the doors slid open and a very tired blue helicopter slumped inside. Wingthing waited a few breems, letting the medic recompose herself, before transforming back into bat mode and chirring to attract her attention.

Moonheart didn’t jump this time, just widened her optics, and soon offered Wingthing a soft smile, patting a spot beside her on the cushioned bed. The little bat did not miss a beat, cuddling up to her at mach speed.

“It’s good to see you, little thing,” Moonheart began, petting her little body with careful hands, “I hear you’ve caused quite the mess today.”

Wingthing squeaked indignantly. It wasn’t her fault! She had been keeping watch, as she had been told to, and she did not think either Trickdiamond or Acid Storm would risk their individual agendas to expose her. She had been wrong, evidently. Intra-faction sabotage was a much better looking failure than allowing an Autobot incursion, it seemed. 

“I know, I know. I’m just glad you’re alright. I wouldn’t want to explain to your mommy if you were damaged or captured.”

Wingthing chirred in response, almost a laugh. In some manner, it did feel as if her Prime was also her mother, from what she knew of mentors anyway. Moonheart smiled at her, clearly noticing her mirth, and moved to scratch under her little chin.

Flowspade finished typing out her report to her master and slammed her hands against the alcove surrounding the data terminal. Incompetent Rainmakers , she mumbled subvocally as she lowered herself to her knees, trembling with pent-up rage. Nova Storm was too comfortable with her playgirl façade, Acid Storm couldn’t keep their investigations quiet, and Ion Storm… Ion Storm hadn’t done anything yet; he was a saint, as far as Flowspade knew.

The news of the strange Recordicon found in the storage complex could work in their favour, if Flowspade knew how to play it; it could shunt Megaempress’ attention to this other yet unknown coup attempt and lift suspicions from herself and her comrades, and this should be the angle to be presented to Megaempress, but Acid Storm’s choice to remain quiet about the other incursion was very much a problem. Sure, it kept Megaempress out of the storage complex, out of the resources Flowspade and her Rainmakers would have to juggle, but Autobots were much better as a distraction than an anonymous Recordicon, and Flowspade was interested in what they might have taken — and what for.

But this was all just frivolous. Flowspade was a keen spy and knew how to play her cards. This regime would only run as long as she allowed it. This was undeniable.

Dusting herself off, Flowspade hid the terminal once more and prepared the sweet mercury she would pour in Megaempress’ audial this time.

Elita One had just finished debrief with Chromia half a joor ago when the knock came on the door of the supervisor’s quarters she had claimed for herself in their new hideout. She hadn’t yet begun resting, still taking care of filing mission reports to Alpha Trion, so it was all things considered a good time for a personal request from one of her soldiers.

As she opened the door, Firestar stood outside with her head hung low and her lips twisted in a grimace. Elita had noticed that the rescue worker had been unusually quiet during full team debriefing earlier, but she had not been this guilty, this scared.

“Is there something you need, Firestar?” She asked in as gentle a tone as she could manage. She knew she had quite the authoritative voice, and it wouldn’t do to scare her away.

“May I please come in?” Firestar answered, almost soundless.

Elita allowed her. They sat at the small, broken couch a little ways in, and Firestar, voice still cutting out a few times before she could begin, laid on her a detail she did not mention in her report of the body parts depository:

“They had a spark.”

She couldn’t help the look of surprise on her face. Deliberate spark production had been a lost art since decolonisation, she would never have expected the Decepticons to have one specimen at the ready in these times.

“You do know what this means for us?” She began, voice tight.

“I do,” Firestar assented, still restrained, and summoned from subspace that very spark, “I was hoping for your guidance as to what should be its fate. I thought of snuffing it, but our party was flushed out before I could.”

Elita One bit her lip as Firestar transferred the spark to her hands. What could they do with it? Elita was firmly against the slaughter of innocents, and this proto-Decepticon had yet to do any harm, but they did not have the means to keep it “prisoner” for long. What if Megaempress’ cadre found out they had it and decided to give it a full body, gaining another footsoldier?

“I will consult with Alpha Trion,” she decided, “In the meantime though, do not speak of it to the others. Thank you for trusting me with this matter. You are now dismissed.”

“Any time, Commander.” Firestar said as she took her leave, “It sure would be nice if we could have our own newbuilds.”

Elita looked down at the spark. It sure would.