Chapter Text
The sour scent of rusting metal rose among the eerily silent factories, rolling over him in suffocating waves. Orion tugged the ragged mesh sheet, a makeshift cloak scavenged from the wreckage to protect his vents, closer about his body as he crept along in the shadows of the smelters, optics trained upwards.
A low moan from a nearby alleyway “O Primus, preserve us…”
Orion hesitated. His window of opportunity was very narrow, but the despairing, plaintive tone wouldn’t let him turn away. Cautious, he inched into the alley, scanning warily for anything alien in nature.
There, the source of the cry: a bot, a dull grey creature writhing in pain. For a moment he was puzzled. The bot appeared intact and wasn’t visibly leaking energon, but as he approached he caught a glimpse of blackened plating, darker than the grey soot of the factories, a tangled web twisting across the expanse of the chassis, and he froze.
Plague victim.
Febrile yellow optics lit as they landed on him, “You there! P-please help me!” A hand clawed in his direction.
He took a step back, spark twisting in fear and shame. “Forgive me, I can’t.”
A moan of panic, “No, no, please, you can’t leave me!”
His internal chronometer tugged at him; he brushed it aside, “What’s your designation?”
The optics cleared briefly, “Steelhead.” A gladiator’s designation.
“Stay here and stay hidden. The Ejoornians aren’t interested in prisoners, but there may be rescue crews coming.” He knew it was a lie even as he said it, but it was the only comfort he could offer, “I’m sorry, but I have to leave.”
“Where are you going?”
Orion rearranged his cloak and looked out towards the smoking ruin of the city.
“To find help.”
--
The tunnels beneath the Kaon factories were a labyrinth. He traced the silent tracks, following the treads of miners and transports as they grew more scarce, pressing down into the blackness of the narrowing passages.
This would be easier if I had a clearer idea of where I was going.
Down, the songs and stories said. Down and down and down, into the darkness of Primus’s innards, which crawled with creatures dead and sightless. Salvation lurked here, they said, among the dried and stagnated rivers of a god’s blood and the fragments of his bones, defense against an alien threat. Yet he continued onwards, now scraping between misshapen boulders, now scrambling along on his belly in mimicry of some primitive creature stretching to free itself from the primordial muck, and found nothing.
Was he meant to seek the Core?
Somehow I doubt it. The handful of ancient etchings he’d uncovered, rimed with rust, had not resembled the Temple depictions of Primus’s holy light. They’d shown fanged shadows, surging up from beneath the ground to devour destruction raining down from the heavens, clashing and consuming as ordinary citizens stood below and stared in amazement.
If not for Prima, Saber held high, standing at the side of a flaming wraith posed as his dark mirror, Orion would have thought the images apocalyptic.
Struggling to his feet as the passage before him opened up into a wide tunnel once more, he brushed away dust and soot clogging his side vents and considered his position. He’d half-expected to stumble upon the salvation spoken of in his wanderings, but the passages remained mockingly empty and he did not have the fuel or the time to walk forever.
Perhaps there was a way to call it to him instead.
He’d never been taught the sacred hymnals, the subtleties of resonance which were known only those who entered into Temple orders, but he’d needed a working knowledge of them to perform his function and he could read the glyphs well enough. He knew of no prayer that existed to express this particular plea, but he was capable of improvisation.
Retrieving the fragmentary invocations from his memory cache, he began to splice them together, weaving a supplication which he broadcast out on a basic harmonic frequency, one that could be heard by any creature within range.
The priests of the Temple would probably have him executed for such blasphemy; he only hoped Primus might forgive him.
“Guardian of Darkness,” he called, because none of the ancient stories had offered a name. “Thou which shelter in the shrouded depths, Thy realm devoid of light, which holds the roots of the world secure. I beseech Thee: incline Thy sacred ear.”
He walked on, the hymnal taking on the rhythm of his footsteps as he pressed deeper, the harmonics bouncing off the walls of the tunnel, buzzing across his chassis.
He did not know when the rhythm changed, only that one moment he sang alone and the next a second voice rose to join him, deeper and wordless, filling in the spaces, the empty harmonics which he’d never been taught.
He stumbled in his litany, voice stuttering to a halt. Behind him the low frequency died away, remnants vibrating against him in a powerful sweep of sound. The heavy tramp of footsteps slowed in time with his as he came to a standstill.
Silence reigned.
A low chuckle, and then in the same sacred glyphs, “Well, little surface dweller, this is a novelty. It’s been a long time since anyone has offered me a prayer.”
Trembling, he turned.
A monstrous shadow, two shifting pinpoints of crimson light as the creature’s optics scanned over him. It did not resemble the flaming wraith of the etchings, or the toothed shadows, but Orion had no doubt that this was the creature of which the songs and stories spoke.
Stumbling and inwardly cringing at his poor ability, he struggled to piece together a sentence in the complex language, “Guardian of Darkness, I seek your aid.”
“Of course you do. Tell me, little one, what desperation has driven the Prime to send envoys? The voice was deceptively pleasant, “And what hubris has led him to believe that I will hear an envoy besides himself?”
“Sentinel Prime is dead.”
“Sentinel, eh? I’d wondered at the designation of the Council’s new puppet.” The optics flickered, “Well, no great loss, he was but a Prime in name after all. And I suppose you are his heir? Left to carry out his final command?”
He shook his head “I am a…” He lacked the ancient word for his function, “a scribe of Iacon. The monsters from above,” he coupled the glyph for Quintesson and a more general one for hostile alien life with a linkage that indicated alliance “have unleashed a plague upon us. They are destroying our cities, slaughtering our race. We need your strength to defeat them.” His precise, archivist’s processor quailed at the poor, fumbling account of the horror of the engineered virus, the pronged assault as the Ejoornians swept in as cities began to fall to the plague. The widespread terror at Sentinel’s deactivation and at the realization, as ships began to carpet bomb the cities, that the Quintessons weren’t interested in slaves anymore, only revenge.
“I see.” A long silence as the creature considered and Orion prayed mutely. Surely the creature must see, surely…
“No, I do not believe I will help you.”
“What?” Orion started, slipping back into Iacon vernacular in his shock. “Please, we face extinction otherwise, you must—”
A snarl as the creature broke in. “I must nothing,” it seethed in the same dialect. Some part of Orion’s processor noted the traces of an accent similar to Steelhead’s. “Do you think I care for the fate of the surface dwellers? Why should I call forth my army? The Quintessons will never penetrate the depths of this planet.” Optics narrowed, “I do not know what madness drove you to seek me out, but any alliance you hoped to invoke was broken long ago.”
“Please, there must be something that can convince you.”
“Do you have anything to offer me for performing such a task?”
Caught flat-footed, Orion stared dumbly. A bargaining chip? Of all the things he’d considered for this journey it had never occurred to him that he might have to bribe anyone. His processor flickered, helpless over his small subspace inventory: a few energon cubes and a datapad or two, nothing to tempt this monster of the deep.
The creature snorted at his silence “I thought not.” It turned to go, optics winking out and leaving Orion in darkness.
“Wait!”
A clank as the creature paused.
“You are right,” he confessed, “I possess nothing with which to bargain. Nothing save myself.”
The optics blinked on as the creature turned back, “Yourself? And what exactly are you offering?”
“Companionship,” he suppressed a tremor of unease and steeled himself, meeting the blazing optics squarely. “Permanent companionship if you wish. In any capacity you desire.”
For a moment, the creature stared at him, incredulous, and then it began to laugh.
“How remarkable!” it said. “You have some spark in you, little one.”
“Well?” he pressed. “Is that an acceptable bargain?”
The creature didn’t answer. Rather it approached with slow deliberation. Orion stood his ground as it loomed over him, struggling not to flinch as their energy fields meshed and sensory information began to flood in, giving him a clearer vision of the creature than his optics could, all monstrous spikes and ancient cold intelligence and power like molten metal.
“Well, surface dweller?” it rumbled. “Do you wish to retract your offer?”
Orion didn’t reply verbally, instead he expanded his energy field, stretching out in open invitation, letting it detect his submission, his determination.
He felt rather than saw the creature’s smile.
“Very well,” there was an edge of indulgent amusement in the tone. “You drive an interesting bargain, scribe.” One heavy limb stamped, ringing against the floor of the tunnel, and Orion jumped in alarm. “Rise, my warriors!”
Echoes welled up, vibrations rising and doubling even as logic told him they should fade, pressing against him and sparking little tremors in his internals. And below the clang of metal struck, a low roar approaching.
They poured out over the walls and floor of the tunnel, a floodtide of wings and mandibles and glowing optics and far too many skittering legs. And beneath them, more slowly, an endless surging wave of figures stumbling forward, their wrecked frames dripping energon -- not healthy blue, but malevolent purple, unseeing optics lighting the gloom.
A chill passed through his spark. Was this salvation: an army of corpses?
Trembling, he looked up at the creature as the tide of soldiers parted around them and caught his first true glimpse of the creature: spiked armor, curved helm lit by corpselight and a sardonic smile on a fanged mouth that seemed to say Do you see what you have unleashed?
A bot, he was startled to see; four limbs and body and head, a demon from the distant past, shaped for war, but a bot nonetheless, for all his prodigious size.
Though he couldn’t conceal his unease entirely, he straightened and met the crimson optics once more. I see. He thought, images roiling across his processor, the spires of the Iacon Towers shattering, Alpha Trion shoving him through a secret passage beneath the Hall, bellowing ‘Go! I’ll hold them off!’ Steelhead writhing as plague ravaged his systems. And I would do it again.
The smile remained a mask, but one optic ridge quirked ever so slightly, as though Orion had surprised him.
Gathering himself, he modulated his voice above the roar of the strange army and offered a polite bow, “My designation is Orion Pax. Might I inquire yours?”
The mech laughed once more, “Of course, I have forgotten myself.” He mirrored Orion’s little genuflection, “Welcome to my domain, Orion Pax. I am Megatron.”
Orion watched as the last of the soldiers shambled from the tunnel, headed unerringly for the surface. “Will they have any trouble? The plague strain is particularly virulent.”
Megatron made a derisive sound, “The dead have nothing to fear from a virus, and the Insecticons do not fear death.” He smiled darkly, “The Quintessons have forgotten the full power of Cybertron. It is beyond time they were reminded.”
The last of the soldiers vanished and the claustrophobic blackness closed in around them once more, reducing Megatron’s form to merely another, darker shadow. Megatron stepped forward and Orion caught the vague movement of a gesture in the direction from which the creatures had come, “After you.”
Suppressing a shiver, Orion tugged his ragged cloak around him and complied.
It seemed impossible that the tunnels might go further down, but Megatron ushered him deeper, along paths winding into the heart of the planet. And among the branching warren passages he caught glimpses of light, the gleam of optics, heard the rustle and clank of plating and the low, continual scrape of burrowing limbs.
Not a warren, he realized, but a hive.
Was this where Megatron lived, among this collection of ambulatory corpses and instinct-driven beasts? Was this where he was meant to live as well?
Groping for some means to break the silence, he asked cautiously, “Is it common for you to send forth your forces independently? If you’ll pardon me, you strike me as someone who might prefer to lead from the front.”
Close behind him, he felt Megatron stiffen, field flickering with anger and he tensed in anticipation of a blow. But there was only a brief, ominous silence. Hurriedly he added, “I mean no disrespect, I only—”
“You are correct,” Megatron interrupted him, voice tight with anger, but controlled. “But that is no longer an option for me. The Insecticons have their own generals and the others are incapable of deviation from commands. Have no fear, Orion Pax, they are more than capable of handling anything the Quintessons might have to offer.”
Orion bowed his head, “Forgive me, I did not know what to expect when I called on you. I only spoke of what I have seen, the records of your battles with Prima.”
Megatron made a short sound of contempt, “Your information is out of date, scribe. I never fought beside Prima.” Halting, he indicated the dark circle of a passage to their left, “Your quarters. You may wander as you wish, only keep away from the unused passages beneath the Hive.”
Surprised, Orion nonetheless did not press, nor question the restriction. Megatron was old, undoubtedly, but if he was not the wraith at Prima’s side, then who was he? Stepping into the mouth of the passage, he offered a gesture of respect, “Thank you.”
Megatron had already turned aside, striding further down the tunnel and did not answer.
The quarters to which he’d been directed were small, a single unlit berthroom. Feeling his way about by the dim light of his optics, he soon determined that it also lacked the basic amenities of an energon dispenser or any sort of washrack.
Not exactly a Prime’s accommodations. I’ll have to find a source of energon. Megatron must be obtaining his supply from somewhere. Sighing, he settled himself onto the berth and did his best to recharge.
--
“I received your communique,” there was a wealth of meaning in the small handful of words.
He glanced up from the datapad in his hand, “And?”
“I’ve run the simulations,” the mech growled. “Effective, but the strategy will result in overwhelming casualties—”
He waved the objections aside, “But as you say: effective. The campaign on Nebulos’s eastern continent should be the final display required to force them to sign the trade agreement. And as for casualties, it is not as if the Insecticons are citizens.”
Blue optics narrowed, “You know my stance on that particular bit of idiotic legislation.”
He lowered his optics, a dismissal, “You have your orders.”
“And I am expected to sacrifice my troops for an empty show of force?”
He stepped forward, bringing his height and mass to bear, “You have your orders.”
“And if I refuse?”
He struck, a sudden, backhanded blow and the other mech staggered under the force of it, “Do not forget, Megatronus. Each Prime is unique, but the Protector is interchangeable. I have no use for a Protector who will not obey my commands.”
Optics blazed at him, bright with loathing.
“You’re dismissed.”
--
The stasis dream flickered and vanished and his chronometer jerked him out of recharge as it always had during the handful of vorns of his function, five breems before his shift would have begun. He onlined his optics, staring up into the darkness of the berthroom. It seemed so meaningless now, that precise, little alarm. Who knew if he’d ever return to his post?
After refueling from a cube in his subspace, he wiped the soot from his vents and shook it from his cloak before donning the garment and venturing out into the corridor.
Empty, no sign of his host, but he could hear the nearby rustle of Insecticons. Perhaps he should start there; surely even subterranean beasts needed to refuel?
He followed the rustle and hum into one of the winding side passages until up ahead, he caught the glimpse of light as he stepped into an open cave.
Energon crystals lined the walls of the cavern, lighting the space with an eerie blue glow. Insecticons swarmed over the spiked formations, clicking and chirring.
He couldn’t help his openmouthed stare; he’d never in his life seen such a quantity of energon in one place.
Near the base of one of the large, crystalline formations, a huge Insecticon toiled, carving at the energon with heavy, recurved forelegs. At its feet a smaller creature, barely a tenth of the size of the digger, scampered about gathering shards of energon and collecting them into a pile as they dropped from the edges of spiked limbs.
With a grunt and click, the digger wedged its limbs into a narrow crevice and heaved. The crystal cracked, lines webbing out across its surface and several large fragments dislodged, tumbling to the floor of the cavern. One chunk clipped the small, scavenging Insecticon, pinning its abdomen to the ground, and the creature shrieked in pain, a high frequency cry that grated on Orion’s audio sensors.
He was leaping forward before he even realized it, grappling with the fragment, easily half as large as he was, struggling to roll it away as the tiny Insecticon continued to wail in distress.
At last, one final heave and he shoved the chunk of energon aside, vents cycling madly and cables groaning in protest. He hadn’t been built for the function of heavy lifting.
Though you wouldn’t know it, with the way Alpha Trion would load me down with datapads. He pushed aside the pang at the thought of his mentor and knelt by the creature, reaching for it. “Are you alright?”
The Insecticon hissed at him and he jerked his hand away as tiny mandibles snapped, “Easy there! I won’t hurt you, I just want to help.” He spread his hands out, tentatively reaching forward once more. “See? No nasty surprises.”
The creature’s small visor narrowed as it considered him. Slowly, it stretched towards him and he held quite still as it tapped its mandibles against the plating of his fingers, testing. From this angle he could see that one of the smooth elytra covering its back had sustained a few painful dents, the metal warped and wrinkled. “I’m no medic, but would you like me to take a look at those?”
A lengthy pause and finally metal clanked and ground as the creature erected the damaged elytron, the thin sheet of metal arcing up from its back like a curved blade. Mandibles latched around his hand, curved spines pressing briefly against his fingers before relaxing, a warning.
Cautious, he slid his fingers down the length of the structure, feeling out the shape of the dents. It would have been far easier to access them from the creature’s side, but it seemed more comfortable with his anatomy within reach of its jaws, so he did his best. Bracing his fingers against the upper curve, he pressed up with his thumb.
A clank and the fresh dent popped out. Shifting his hand, he repeated the motion until the surface was smooth but for a few scrapes which would require buffing to remove, before withdrawing his hand just as slowly, “Better?”
The Insecticon cocked its head at him, plating clanking as it settled its elytron back into place. It paused, taking stock, before it chirred at him.
He smiled, “Do you have a designation?”
A pleased chirrup and a brief databurst in a simple, binary dialect: Deathwatch.
“Well, Deathwatch, do you happen to know if there are some energon stores that I could share in? I’m afraid my own supplies are running quite low.”
Deathwatch clicked something incomprehensible at him and scampered towards the far side of the room. Orion followed, giving between the massive, toiling Insecticons a wide berth.
The room where Deathwatch led him was long and low, its walls lined with openings, some dark and empty, others bright with pale blue energon. Deathwatch herded him towards one at the far end, where a large Insecticon crouched near a pile of raw energon crystals, head buried inside one of the openings. Deathwatch scrabbled at the creature’s legs, chirping.
Slowly the massive creature raised its head, revealing strange mouthparts protruding forth from the opened plating of its face, pointed and dripping with energon. At first Orion thought it was feeding, but then Deathwatch chirred, turning up his faceplates and opening his small, fanged mouth. The Insecticon rumbled and bent, pressing a strange tube into Deathwatch’s mouth. A few drops of energon leaked from the sides of the connection.
He must be refining energon inside his own body and regurgitating it for storage. I’ve never heard of such a thing. I didn’t know it was even possible.
His function had never permitted him much contact with the intricacies of energon production, but he knew that refinement was a lengthy, difficult process. How could the Insecticons do it so easily?
Deathwatch withdrew, chirring with satisfaction and looked at him expectantly. Was he expected to imitate him? Take energon directly from another’s body?
Shivering and hoping he wasn’t causing offence by doing so, Orion unsubspaced one of his empty cubes and offered it to the creature. It stared at him for a long moment before leaning forward, flexible proboscis probing through the cube’s top. A brief ripple and then energon was flowing in, pouring out of the creature. In a few moments it was full and the Insecticon turned back to its labors, scooping up one of the rough crystals and shoving it between its fangs. The rock splintered with a shriek.
Deathwatch, evidently bored with watching, tapped at Orion’s foot and Orion allowed himself to be ushered out, eyes still fixed upon the large Insecticon. Stumbling as he struggled not to trip over Deathwatch, Orion braced himself against the wall of a small passage which sloped downwards, in the opposite direction from which they had come, and froze.
A faint sound, far too soft to reach his audio sensors through the air, vibrated across his fingers, carried through the wall. Yet it was like no sound he had heard since descending here, a melodic, comforting rhythm that resonated through his body, soothing his spark, calling to him.
Music?
Pain flared in his knee and he shouted in surprise and pulled away. Deathwatch had sunk his mandibles into the cables of his leg and was clicking in distress as he tried to drag him backwards. Half-dazed, he looked around, only to find that he had somehow managed to wander several meters down the passageway.
Frowning, he conceded to the distressed Insecticon’s pulling, but as he headed back the way they had come he couldn’t help glancing back in the direction of the dark passage.
What was that?
--
Bereft of the usual tasks of his function, he spent his cycles in idleness, sometimes observing the Insecticons as they went about their labors. At first he’d feared they might react with hostility, but it soon became clear that his presence was mostly beneath their notice. And so he lingered upon the fringes, exercising his archivist’s processor as he attempted to parse the complexities of their social structure and the obscure binary dialect that served as their primary means of communication. It bore some similarities to the language used to communicate with sparkless drones, though the Insecticons were clearly far more complex than mere drones, but even trawling the vast reservoirs of historical data within his own processor produced no references to such an archaic tongue. Perhaps the datatrax in the Hall contained such a record, but he was hardly in a position to verify.
When he was not among the Insecticons he wandered, mapping the endless twisting tunnels, trying to familiarize himself with his new domain, Deathwatch at his heels. At first he carried a shard of energon with him for its faint light, but as the cycles below ground dragged on his optics began to recalibrate themselves, nanites making tiny adjustments to the permanent low light levels and soon he found himself able to tuck the shard away in subspace and walk the tunnels as Deathwatch did, a creature of the dark.
It seemed to him that one sense dimmed, his others amplified and so it was that one cycle, as he followed an upward sloping tunnel, chasing the real or imagined scent of fresh air, he caught the distinctive rumbling growl of his host echoing down the long passageway.
He paused, straining to hear. Deathwatch stilled beside him, antennae twitching.
“—most are calling it a miracle, a sending from Prima,” a second voice said. The dialect was of Iacon, but spoken in a smooth, high accent that was distinctly Vosian, though it possessed a breathless quality that puzzled him. “But there are those among the Council ancient enough to remember the Insecticons. You might do well to be on your guard.”
“Those old enough to remember are old enough to fear.”
“That goes without saying, but nevertheless, your impending funeral aside, a little glitchmouse tells me that you have a guest.”
“And here I thought Soundwave wasn’t much for berth talk.”
The voice scoffed, “Don’t be ridiculous, Master. Your Insecticons are worse gossips than a pack of overcharged construction bots.”
“Perhaps they need reminding that my business is not a subject for idle chatter.”
“So touchy, this mysterious guest must be quite something.”
“Hardly. Only a slip of an Iaconian data clerk.”
A laugh, “Truly? Have you developed such specialized tastes in your dotage?”
“Jealousy does not become you, Starscream.”
“As if I could ever envy a pitiful—ah! Be careful, you oaf, I still have to fly with those!”
“You were saying?”
“I was saying that you should take your oil-drum fists out of my circuitry before you end up denting—oh! There, again!”
Megatron chuckled, “The clerk is nothing, Starscream. His presence is merely the result of an amusing…bargain.”
Starscream cried out again. Not pain, Orion realized with a low, uncomfortable thrill. Pleasure.
“Please, Master, I want—”
“No.” Megatron’s voice was hard. “You knew the rules when we began this, Starscream. If you desire satisfaction, then you will wait.”
Low, desperate panting, “Of course, my Lord, I only—ah!”
A short, sharp cry sounded, and then utter silence, but for the pounding of Orion’s spark and the hum of unfamiliar heat in his circuits.
“You’ve left scratches on my wings again, blast it.”
“I am sure Soundwave will be happy to buff them out.”
“Yes, well, he is something of a connoisseur of extended foreplay, unlike some I could name.”
Shaking and mortified for reasons he could not articulate, Orion began to withdraw. Backing stealthily down the passageway, he turned to leave, and barely bit back a cry.
Above him hung a monstrous, spindly shape, clinging to the low ceiling of the tunnel with thin digits and long, twin data cables which flexed restlessly, coiling over the rough metal, gripping and flexing. A blank mask stared down at him. At his side, Deathwatch flattened his body to the floor, elytra drawn tight as he cowered.
After several breathless moments, Orion dared to move, edging beneath the strange creature and back down the tunnel. The bot didn’t move, only watched him as he slunk away.
It was only once the mech had faded into the darkness, melting away as though it had never been, that Orion broke and ran. He didn’t stop until he reached his quarters. There, shaking, he curled into the relative security of his berth and drew Deathwatch against him, an indignity to which the little Insecticon submitted with grace. He lay sleepless until his chronometer, unfeeling mechanism that it was, beeped out its daily warning of his impending shift.
He began to wonder if he would go mad here, a misplaced shade from the surface, fruitlessly seeking a way back to life and light. He tried not to think of Jazz, of Alpha Trion, tried not to wonder at their fate.
He thought Megatron had forgotten him, but during one of his aimless walks, when Deathwatch had departed for his own explorations, a second set of footsteps fell in time with his own and he paused and saw Megatron, a shadow no longer, but rather limned in faint reflected light of his newly adjusted optics.
“Hello, scribe.”
He bowed in acknowledgement, “My lord.”
“I should have thought you starved or fallen down a mine shaft.”
“I had begun to wonder the same of you.”
“I have many duties to perform. Besides, I have heard that you pass your days among my soldiers.”
“The Insecticons have proved courteous; for all that they are beings of few words.” Orion hesitated, “However, with all due respect, my lord, I am accustomed to performing my own duties. Idleness does not sit well with me.”
“I see. And you think that I need a data clerk among my warriors?”
“I can perform whatever task you wish.”
“Ah, that’s right, you did say ‘any capacity’ that I might desire.” Megatron offered an unpleasant smile, “So tell me, scribe, do you possess any other talents beyond bookkeeping?”
Fear pulsed through Orion at Megatron’s knowing look. He bowed his head, his discomfort and shame at his own inexperience, his inadequacy, acute, and did not answer.
“I thought not.” Megatron made a derisive sound and turned away, “I have no need of you, scribe.”
“Then why did you take me?” Orion asked bitterly.
“Because you offered,” replied Megatron, and then he was gone, leaving Orion alone in the darkness of the tunnels.