Chapter Text
Starscream woke up gasping on the cold, hard, dirt covered ground of the forest. The last thing he remembered was coming back to Silas after shooting the scouts T-cog, ready to give the good news of one less auto bot to be worried about when he…
Then he remembered. That slimy, fleshy shot me! He thought groaning as he sat up. He wasn’t too upset by this. Their partnership was good while it lasted, but it would be difficult to acquire more energon now that it was evidently over. They must have knocked him out when they shocked him because he couldn’t remember what happened next, and his memory was usually pretty good.
He jumped to his feet when he heard the sound of whirling energy accompanied by a flash of green light. A ground bridge. He kept up between the trees and peeked at the swirling vortex of light. Curious and fearful as to which faction would emerge.
Sounds of heavy footsteps could be heard from where he was, and when he spotted Optimus’s signature red and blue paint, he felt panic bloom in his chest. He quickly took cover behind one of the larger trees around him, spying from between the branches. He clenched his fists and flexed his wings, willing himself to transform, afraid of being captured. Oh how he longed to be up in the sky again.
He paused, confused when he realized he was still standing on his feet. He tried again, this time realizing the problem. “My T-cog!” He cried in anguish, clutching his abdomen. It must have been Mech. There was no way it wasn't. Now aware he was without flight and of Mech’s obvious betrayal, Starscream quickly fled deeper into to the forest dragging his newly disabled frame to safety.
Starscream slowed his pace. It ached to move. It seemed MECH had done more damage than he had initially thought. “Frag,” he whispered to himself wincing as his lower back began to leak energon from his sudden movements. Obviously the incisions hadn’t healed yet and his wings were scratched up from the fall. He was going to bleed out fast if he didn’t have himself fixed soon. Without knockout to help, or any tools to do it on his own, he was vulnerable to a shut down if he lost too much at once.
A shrill shriek interrupted his thoughts and he spun around, scared that the Autobots had been alerted by this scream of terror. After checking he was safe, he turned back to the path in front of him.
“HOLY F**CKING GOD! HOLY Sh*t! WHAT THE F**K!”
Starscream located the source of the swearing. It came from a single human. Frozen in spot. No doubt from sheer terror he thought.
“Ah frag.”
He bent down and scooped up the human which released another bout of curse words.
For all he knew this human could be another mech agent. Or an agent of another tech obsessed organization who would love to pull him apart. He growled and squeezed the human tighter, pulling it closer to his optics. The light from his optics illuminated the creature in his claws, bathing it in red light and letting him see it with more detail. Not that there was much to see.
From what he knew of human biology, he could tell it was a female from its chest and higher pitched voice. It’s clothing he noticed, looked nothing like any he had seen the mech agents wearing and it showed no signs of possessing a weapon. He released his grip by a fraction feeling safer with this information.
A thought struck him, though it was quickly dismissed. What if this was one of the auto bots pets? No, they only had one female that he knew of, and this certainly wasn’t it. He pulled back his arm ready to cast her away when she shrieked,
“WAIT WAIT WAIT, DONT THROW ME HOLD ON!”
Starscream paused and snarled, his audio receptors buzzing with static.
For their small size, humans seemed to have incredibly powerful voice boxes.
“What”. He snapped, whipping her closer to his face again. Repulsed by the greasy fleshy feel of what he held in his claws.
Its hair was strewn across its face and it was as white as ash.
“Uhhhh, I uh. I-“
Starscream loosened his grip forcing the human to cling tighter to his claws to avoid slipping out and falling the long distance to the ground. She yelped and he shivered as her tiny hands grabbed at him. Leaving oil streaks everywhere no doubt. He wasn’t vain like Knockout but he did detest the feel of oily servos.
“I CAN HELP!” It shouted, its watery eyes staring wide up at Starscream.
“I doubt that” he remarked, resisting the urge to crush it in his claws, knowing he would have to clean them of fleshy bits afterwards.
The human glanced pointedly at his wings and said, “I’ve got a welder back at my cottage, I can fix that for you if you’d allow me to.”
Starscream didn’t need this pathetic creatures help.
“I don’t need your help,” he growled, voicing his thoughts.
But then he thought about it. He certainly didn’t want to bleed out in the middle of nowhere, and if the human didn’t want anything in return then… what was the harm? Normally Starscream wouldn’t hesitate so long if it meant his survival, but with his recent experience with mech, he’d learned to be more cautious.
“Fine.” He gave in reluctantly. A former air commander reduced to asking help from lower life forms for a second time, pathetic.
“Point the way,” he ordered, and adjusted his grip to be more secure on the human.
The girl led him through the thick trees. Having to duck on multiple occasions to avoid some of the longer branches. Though he tried not to to show it, the pain was getting worse, and his vision was starting to get blurry around the edges. No doubt from energon deficiency. He was used to functioning with little Energon. When Megatrons… lessons, had him hospitalized, he rarely passed out. Not that this was a good thing most of the time. But he knew how to hold his own. He was strong.
It was a longer walk than expected, even with the length of his legs, but perhaps it was because of his limp, or slower pace.
For the most part it was silent, which is something Starscream had always hated. He hated silence. Whenever he had any free time on the Nemisis, he would seek out knockout or any other vehicon to willing to listen to him, to vent to chat with. He loved to talk, and got uncomfortable when it was quiet. He was used to the constant bustle of his seekers. They were always trying to find the latest gossip on the airship. Constantly comparing flight times and speed records. Hell, he was even friendly with some of the mech agents.
Starscream cleared his throat, bringing his free servo to his intake to break the silence.
“Why were you so far from home this late anyways?” He asked the human in a particularly bored tone, not actually interested in the answer, but just trying to fill space.
It looked up at him surprised, but he avoided its gaze, opting to look ahead instead.
“I like taking long walks. Especially on windy days. It feels nice to be alone” It said.
“When the wind is especially strong, I like to imagine I’m flying. It feels free.”
The human smiled at the thought, lost in some other memory, or perhaps puzzled as to why it was opening up to a strange and threatening bot.
Starscream could relate. Though he was not one for walks, he could understand the feeling of freedom in flight. And even though he was quite social, after a particularly tough day, he would often take long, solitary flights outside the Nemesis.
Even if it did burn some extra energon, it was worth it. Just him and the sky. He felt a jab of sorrow in his chest when he realized that he wouldn’t be going on any flights anytime soon, or perhaps ever again. The thought twisted in his spark and knawed at his insides. His wings involuntarily drooped and his face plates shifted into a deeper frown.
“Hmm” the human remarked.
“What?” He asked. Snapping back into the composed bot many aboard the Nemisis had come to see him as. (Or so he thought)
“Nothing, sorry. You just reminded me of a cat.”
Starscream was bemused by this and he raised an optical ridge.
“A what?”
The human waved it off and simply remarked, “I’ll show you later.”
He huffed feeling dismissed.
It was irksome how comfortable the human had become around him. Was he really that nonthreatening? He squeezed his claws a little tighter. To reassure himself that it was him that had all the power there. All it earned was a puzzled look from the human though. This was to be fixed. Preferably soon.
They then arrived in a decently sized clearing. Off to the side was a small, but well built and kept cottage. It wasn’t new by any accounts, but it certainly wasn’t in shambles. Beside that was a fenced off area of plants. Though he was not familiar with the vegetation of this planet, he could tell that there was a good variety of them, and that they were in good health. What took up the rest of the clearing was a shed. Though not nearly as big as the house, it wasn’t lacking in size either. From what he could see from his height there was a few tools, pieces of scrap metal, and a couple of oddly assembled parts.
“Just put me down there,” the human instructed.
Hating the fact that he was taking orders from her, he dropped her rather roughly on the ground from a taller height than she expected. She stumbled a bit before falling down but she quickly brushed herself off before scurrying towards the shed.
Starscream sat down with a very audible groan, which seemed to motivate the human to return quicker. His venting was getting shallower and his movements felt heavy and slow. Even his claws felt like they were frozen from the lack of Energon. His frame was pulling it out of his limbs and closer to his spark. Prioritizing his vitals over the rest of his limbs.
She returned with the welder, a flashlight and what he assumed to be a face shield of some sort, as well as a pair of gloves.
She strapped the third item to her face,
(he was pleased to see he was right), and held the welder out in one gloved hand. “I can’t reach the wounds if you’re sitting up” she said in a muffled voice. Starscream knew what he was being asked to do and reluctantly lay down on his front, albeit scoffing as he did, though the pain in his back stopped him from complaining further.
He felt vulnerable like this. With both his back and wings exposed he would be helpless and completely unprepared for an attack, from Decepticons, or Autobots.
The human struggled to climb up his hip and once on top of him, sat where the first wound was.
Out of the corner of his optic he saw the welder light up as she got to work. He was surprised that she put as much effort in as she did. He half expected her to start melting his joints together.
She was surprisingly efficient. As if she had done this sort of thing before.
The welder didn’t hurt so much that it was too uncomfortable. It was more of a prickling pain. Besides, Starscream was good at handling pain. He had developed a surprising amount of tolerance from the frustrated and intense, beatings from Megatron.
Certain he was safe he folded his arms underneath his chin and slowly relaxed to her steady movements. His nosiness peaking, he glanced over to the shed again. Lower on the ground now, he could see farther inside. He caught a flash of blue as he glanced at a motorbike covered in dust and dirt.
Memories flashed through his mind. He remembered almost dying at the hands of Arcee. The Autobots feral two wheeler. He shuddered and closed his optics when he remembered the feeling of her cold metal blades at the delicate plates of his throat. He remembered the determined look in her optics. He had been certain his spark would have been extinguished that very moment.
If it hadn’t been for the mute scout of theirs, he’s sure it would be.
The human must have felt his movement because she paused to ask him, “you good?”.
“Fine,” he stated bluntly, startled by her concern. “Continue.”
She had moved onto his wing now and was in much closer proximity to his face than before. If she moved fast enough she would probably be able to burn out an optic. Recognizing this, Starscream tried to smooth out his harsh response. He was nothing of not a good conversationalist.
“Do you actually use that pathetic excuse for transportation?” He asked gesturing towards the motorbike.
“I used to.” She said, and that was all.
Starscream stressed that he had offended her. He had no way of knowing what she was doing back there. For all he knew, she could be welding his wings together.
He kept talking.
“I never understood why someone would choose a land vehicle over something that has the power of flight.” He remarked, remembering what his conversation with Knockout.
“Well,” she said, “not all of us have wings.”
She patted his wing and with that, slid off his back landing with a soft thump on the ground. “I’m done.” He sat up and flexed his wings. Though it was a crude fix, it did the trick. He was no longer pouring energon or in constant, agonizing pain.
She removed the face mask and gloves, holding one up to him.
“What is this blue stuff anyways?” She asked, shining the flashlight on it, genuinely curious.
“Energon,” he replied getting up.
“My life blood.”
He mused tapping his chin,
“though I do remember it being quite harmful to humans.”
She carefully folded the stained spots towards themselves and tucked the gloves in one of her pockets.
Starscream stood to his full height and the girl stumbled back at his size. He smirked at this, finding glee in his power over her.
“your service will be remembered but I must acquire more energon.” He said, trying to evoke as little protest as possible.
Starscream needed to leave. He could already begin to feel his vision tunnelling. He stumbled as he took his first couple of paces before an alarm in his helm started beeping rapidly. He groaned and clutched his helm, stepping onto many of the carefully tended to plants.
He heard many shouts of anger in the back of his mind and collapsed, crashing into a couple of trees.
Then he blacked out.
Ah scrap.