TRANSFORMATION Act II: HELMET [+audio!]

[Audio version available here! One link for each scene in the story; each is about 20 minutes]
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Act II:

HELMET

Scene i

As time pressed down on him, Optimus found himself measuring the rusted, dusty room in units of Megatron. The restless gray mech paced its sides so often, that the Autobot had memorized the number of steps his old opponent could make along each wall. Nine strides across, and fourteen along its length, with a ceiling that was 1.2 times the height of the two tall mechs at its peak; the room had seemed ample enough when first they had arrived here. Now Optimus fretted at confinement with his longtime enemy. And Megatron raged and fought against it like a caged Nebulan Tigrus.

They'd come to this abandoned warehouse immediately after their bond, and forbidden all their clamoring subordinates from entrance to this hastily-chosen sanctum. Prime hoped that a few orns in seclusion would be enough to give them both the time they needed to adapt to their new relationship, and to plan their strategy for uniting all of Cybertron under their joint rule.

But ever since the spark-bond, Megatron had grown increasingly uncommunicative, his temper more volatile, his mood more bitter. Prime watched him with a growing sense of sadness.

His own spark churned, as love and hate fought for supremacy within his soul. But at his core, Optimus had always believed in the basic decency of all mechs, even the one against whom he had fought for the majority of his existence. And the proud and wounded soul that he had taken into his own had only strengthened that belief.

Now though, as he watched his new brother strive to adapt, Prime felt uneasy in spite of himself. Was it, after all, asking too much of any being to change as much as Megatron was trying to do in this short time? Was such comprehensive revision of a mech's personal parameters even possible? Prime worried that Megatron might not be able in the end to abandon his hatred and his lifelong pursuit of vengeance. He feared that he and his reluctant soul-mate might not be able to hold onto their fragile dream of peace.

Usually, Optimus refused to contemplate what might happen if Megatron could not, in the end, find his way in the new world they had agreed to form together; for to even face the possibility of such a failure made his own spark ache. If Megatron foundered now he would almost certainly die insane. His loss would signal an immediate descent into anarchy for their race. And his loss would mean an endless, terrible grief for Prime.

Optimus shook himself out of such negative thoughts. He refused to give up on Megatron, refused to relinquish his longstanding belief that there was more to the old warrior than madness and destruction.

The morning which followed the declaration of the ceasefire dawned a terrifying red. Before anyone recognized the seriousness of what was happening, an energy storm the like of which no one living had ever seen lashed down upon the planet. Lightening struck constantly, and a corrosive rain sent mechs everywhere scurrying into whatever shelter they could find. A few were seriously burned before they could find safety.

And then the earthquakes began. The whole surface of Cybertron buckled and groaned. A few spooked mechs swore they could hear a moaning from the depths, as of some monstrous being crying out in agony. The command centers of both factions were inundated with distress calls, as more and more mechs were trapped, injured, or just plain terrified in the abrupt, inexplicable cataclysm. "Why," they cried, "When we have finally made a real attempt at peace; has Cybertron turned on us?"

Startled by the unpredicted ferocity of their planet, Shockwave sent a carefully-worded priority pulsewave to Jetfire, and the two of them hurriedly assembled a team of like-minded scientists and assistants from both factions. They then began a desperate, scrambling effort to find out the cause of the planetary breakdown. The lives of all depended upon their finding some answers.

On the second day, after exhaustive research in a hastily pulled-together laboratory, they offered their conclusions. The general ceasefire seemed to have effected Cybertron itself, not just the mechs who cowered on its torn and ruptured surface. The planet, they said, was entering into a healing crisis of its own - a crisis on a global scale. The sudden cessation of warfare seemed, ironically, to have thrown the planet into chaos. Over countless millennia of being continually bombarded, their world had come to a kind of set-point in which cataclysm was the norm. Peace, it seemed, was driving the planet crazy.

Jetfire's team believed that the whole of Cybertron was now engaged in a frantic effort to cleanse itself; and it wasn't being too gentle about it either. The almost-constant earthquakes, the scientists said, were attempts by the planet to heal the gashes in its battered surface which had opened during the years of warfare. The residue of countless battles, which until recently had roiled unceasingly in the upper atmosphere, was now, they said, being gathered up and vomited onto the cringing heads of Cybertron's inhabitants. Mechs unfortunate or foolish enough to be caught out in the storms faced lethal lightening strikes, and a chemical rain that ate through their armor and disrupted their internal systems. Only in a dire emergency would anyone emerge from hiding and risk exposure.

Already some uneasy alliances and even a few uncertain friendships had been struck across the factions, as mechs from opposing armies had been thrown together in struggles for survival all over the planet. But most of them were simply biding their time, quietly hiding out until they could figure out where things now stood, and the new lay of the land. Above all, they wondered what their leaders were doing. They waited for the word of command.

Outside, the storm lashed the walls of the tumbledown storehouse in which the two Commanders had taken refuge. The tired old building shook with the buffeting of the wind. Occasionally, with a nerve-wracking thud, some heavy object torn loose in the gale would slam up against its side.

Optimus had gradually become accustomed to the sounds, and he paid them little heed. But as a tremendous thump shook the floor only a few meters from him, he jumped up, startled. Apparently, Megatron had picked up their one bench and hurled it across the room in his frustration.

Abruptly, Prime decided that the time had come to abandon his policy of patient waiting. Tersely ending his briefing with a startled Prowl, Optimus closed his communicator, slapped down a stack of datapads, and walked across to his bond-brother.

"What's grinding your gears, Megs?" He knew that using the nickname would anger the other mech; but getting Megatron angry had so far been the only way he'd found of getting him to talk.

Megatron whipped around, and stabbed a finger at Prime's chest. "You." Punctuating each word with a 'clank' as his finger jabbed Prime's chestplate, he growled, "You and your high and holy way of thinking. It's like a virus. And I'm becoming infected with it. By the Pit, I wish I'd slagged your aft when I had the chance!"

Prime deciphered the outburst as well as he could. Trying to sound calm and unconcerned, he asked the pacing mech, "So, what 'thinking' has got your servos so jammed up now? Feeling the need to strip yourself down for spare parts, and donate them to the empties, or something?"

Megatron froze, his optics blazing fiercely. Prime unconsciously clenched his own fists as the Decepticon set his feet and raised his hands in belligerent defense.

"Actually, I do feel that I ought to get rid of... something," Megatron admitted grudgingly. "But I don't see why the slag I should have to do it!" he added, grinding his jaws.

"So... you're thinking it's finally time to give up that fluffy petro-rabbit you cuddle with while you recharge?"

The big mech snarled in sudden rage, and Optimus saw that his teasing attempts to pry information from his opponent had gone too far. He backed away a step, raising his hands in a gesture that was both placation and self-defense. The spark-bond might make it theoretically impossible for either mech to ever again bring harm to the other, but Megatron's murderous glare convinced him that the Decepticon wouldn't hesitate to test that hypothesis.

"I'm sorry," Prime said gravely. "I have no right to make light of what you are going through. I'm just trying to understand, Megatron; to find out how I can help you... if indeed I can help at all. I do not want you to have to find your way alone." He paused, and his gaze dropped to the overturned bench. "Neither of us should have to do any of this alone," he murmured sadly.

Still angry, Megatron glared at Prime, his hands balled into fists. "So now you claim that making cheap cracks is your way of trying to help me?" he snarled.

Optimus shrugged. "As you well know, my perception and decisions have never been perfect."

He extended a hand, a peace offering. But looking into the face of his longtime enemy, Prime felt momentarily overwhelmed by all the obstacles they had yet to overcome if they were indeed to have peace. He pushed down his doubts, and said firmly, "I need you to be willing to talk to me, Megatron. There are a whole lot of things that need sorting out now. I had hoped that we could work through them together. I need your advice. The time has come for you to take your place in this new world, if that is still what you want."

Megatron's fists began to unclench. He knew that Prime was right.

Optimus dropped his hand to his side. He'd known the other mech wouldn't take it, but he'd wanted to make the offer nonetheless. "We need to be able to trust each other, Megatron. Please," he entreated as he turned away, "Please don't let all this... everything we've done... come to nothing."

Prime picked up one end of the battered old bench, righted it, and dragged it resolutely back to its place against a crumbling, dirty wall. Then he sat down, rested his elbows on his knees, and allowed himself a moment of frustration.

After a time, Megatron slouched across the room to where Prime sat, flopped down beside him, and threw his arm across the bent backrest. "All right," he grunted, in conscious imitation of a beaten prisoner. "I'll talk."

"What's bothering you?"

Sighing melodramatically, Megatron made an attempt to speak the thought that had taken over his mind. But there was no way to say it without sounding ridiculous. Barely audibly, he muttered, "I think I have to get rid of my helmet."

"Oh?" Optimus shifted a little, uncertain how to go on. "Is it still so important to you then?" he asked.

Megatron huffed resignedly. He loathed being so forthright, even with Prime, to whom he still couldn't quite believe he had allowed access to his innermost self. His particular difficulty would seem so small and foolish, once he put it into words. He hated the idea that it was possible for him to struggle so desperately with such a seemingly insignificant thing. It made him feel small, and he hated that. But feeling foolish was even worse.

"You slagging know," he grumbled, "How this scrap-eater's helmet has always served to remind me why I do everything I do..." He broke off. "Everything I did," he corrected himself angrily. He pounded his fist on the old, dented armrest, and flakes of ocher enamel fluttered to the floor. "I wanted to destroy you all. I hated you." His belligerent voice sank to a whisper, "Now it's all I can do not to hate myself."

Prime nodded. "Mmmm." There was really nothing further he could say.

A sudden flood of bitter words poured out of Megatron like a system purge. "I made one decision, took one step, and as a result I find myself required to be a completely different mech." His voice rose with his increasing desperation. "But I don't even like the mech I'm supposed to be now! And I can never go back! It's not as if being the old me was any more enjoyable, but...Slag it all-! Autobots! I'm... helping... Autobots!" The Decepticon Commander fought for control, settling his gaze coldly upon his former adversary. "I'm a traitor to my own cause, Prime," he said flatly. "Now I'm wondering if I've even betrayed myself."

"Hmm," said Prime.

"Optimus, if you make one more noncommittal, 'yes-I'm-listening' grunt like that, I swear I'll rip your cortex from your- Aaaugh! What the frag was I thinking?" Megatron pressed his hands frantically to his head, as if attempting to stop it from flying apart. "Slaggit, what is there for me to do, if I can't tear you to pieces?" Desperately, he jumped up, and began smashing anything that came to hand.

Optimus left him to it. A few more holes in the walls wouldn't matter much, and the rudimentary gear that they'd brought with them could be replaced if necessary. He hoped that if Megatron were allowed to vent all of his pent-up frustration - even if the method he had chosen of doing so was somewhat destructive - the results might be worth a few pieces of damaged equipment. As if in response to that thought, the chair which Prime had been occupying earlier came flying toward his head. Prime dodged it distractedly, and watched it smash on the floor beside him.

Megatron's rage did not abate quickly. But when he punched a hole so deeply into the wall that his hand was caught, he was at last compelled to stand still. The Decepticon stared down unseeing at the appendage he was unable to tear free from the tangles of wiring and jagged metal. Then with slow determination, he began to beat his head against the cold, hard surface in a relentless, unforgiving rhythm.

Optimus felt each weary blow as a physical pain within his spark. It was horrible to watch any being self-destruct like this. He'd thought he'd been acting so selflessly, in agreeing to the bond with Megatron. But he saw now that any risk to himself had been laughable by comparison. Prime, to his surprise, had gained a friend. Megatron, he was beginning to worry, had lost himself.

Hoping that his actions would not rouse the Decepticon to further anger, the Autobot picked his way through Megatron's wake of destruction, to stand beside his former enemy. The gray mech did not even seem to sense the arrival of his old opponent. Optimus reached out, and began loosening the twisted metal from around the huge trapped fist.

"I was a fool," Optimus admitted in a low, troubled voice. "A selfish, blind fool." As Megatron's freed hand dropped listlessly to his side, Prime lowered his head in shame.

"I ought to know better!" he chided himself. "I was so worried about my own precious soul that I didn't give much thought to yours. I never made certain you understood the consequences, or made preparations for your transition. Now it seems that there is nothing I can do to help you, nothing to make any of this easier for you, not even a way to make amends." His shoulders sagged as he watched the big mech dully beating his head. "I am so very, very sorry, Megatron."

He meant every word, but knew that his feeble apology would mean nothing, mend nothing, undo nothing. Frustrated by his own helplessness, he reached out, and gently turned the heavy gray head away from the wall. Blue optics stared ruefully into blank red ones dulled by despair.

"I can't change things back to the way they were before," the Prime began. "But I offer you all I have to give: myself, my friendship." With a little shrug, he extended his hand for the second time that evening. "Take it if you need it... Brother."

The hulking gray mech stared bleakly into steady blue optics. He turned back to look at the wall, at the dents he'd made with his own head. He looked down at Prime's extended hand. Slowly, reluctantly, he reached out, and grasped hold.

Optimus dropped his gaze, and pressed the palm of his free hand against Megatron's scarred chest. It was the first time he had fully acknowledged their bond.

To his surprise, he saw black fingers brush his own red chestplates in return. "Hello, Brother," the gruff voice said. "Greetings from a fellow idiot."

"Idiot?" replied Optimus, relieved. "What did you do?"

Megatron laughed bitterly. "I thought this would be easy." He snorted derisively. "I believed that I could dump all my slag onto you, and that would be the end of it." He leaned his back against the wall, and slumped to the floor. "I thought you could heal me somehow," he said fretfully. "I thought I'd come out on the other side all shiny and new and... and happy..."

"I imagine it was quite a disappointment to discover what a silly glitch-head I am, then," Prime replied dryly. "We both were fools," he declared. "Have been fools, are certainly now fools, and will most likely continue to be fools in the future..."

"Shut up, Prime," the Decepticon growled. He shoved the tall red mech aside at the knee, so that he stumbled, off-balance. "Your rambling speeches are going to be the death of me!"

"I'll stop speechifying, if you'll get up off your aft and act like a civilized mech," said Prime, optics twinkling.

"Civilized? When the slag have I ever been civilized?" But the gray warrior reached up, and allowed Optimus to pull him to his feet.

Kicking aside a little of the mess he'd made, Megatron walked away across the room and flopped back down onto the comfortable old bench. He spread his arms across its back, and propped one foot on his knee. Optimus, following, sprawled out on the floor, and let his head fall to rest on the seat beside his old adversary. Now that the tension had finally broken, both mechs realized that they were exhausted. The past few days had taxed both mental and emotional reserves, and it was a relief to finally relax.

Optimus dimmed his optics, and ran an internal cooling protocol. Finally he asked, "Back before you decided to incorporate yourself into the architecture, you were saying something about your Primus-forsaken helmet. Why do you think you need to get rid of it?"

Megatron chuffed. "Primus-forsaken," he repeated. He looked down at Prime. "We were, you know. Forsaken. Primus had nothing to do with that place..."

Optimus remembered what he had seen while bonded with Megatron's spark: the supercilious Senator's curt dismissal of all those hapless, lowborn mechs who'd labored in the old C-12 mining outpost... The brutal silencing of that nameless one who had spoken out... The riot... The slaughter... What hurt Prime most about the memory that he now shared with Megatron was the prominent Autobot symbol displayed arrogantly by the guards as they brutally put down the workers' weak resistance...

"I saw," he said sadly. "I remember. I wish-" he broke off.

"I know," cut in Megatron impatiently. "But it was before your time, so just process it and let it go." He groaned, leaned back, and stretched out his legs to loosen a few stiff joints.

"I swore I'd never forget, never forgive." The old warrior tapped his fingers restlessly against the long black fusion cannon mounted on his arm. "I clawed my way through the fight pits. I made myself stronger, harder, bolder. Built myself an army. Declared war on those I thought had condoned everything that happened back there." He clenched his fist, remembering. "I was determined to wrest the power from the fools who did not know how to use it properly, and make them all pay. And by the Pit, I made them pay."

Megatron looked down at his fist. Slowly, he let the hand fall open. "I've spent my life seeking more and more power," he murmured, "Because I never wanted to be talked down to again. I forced them to respect me. I refused to let anyone tell me there was anything I couldn't have, anything I couldn't do..."

The big mech's vocal purge seemed to have wound down, so Prime finished the thought. "And you kept your old mining helmet as a reminder; a focus-point to pilot you on your Death-To-All-Autobots course. Only now..." He paused, grunted, and shifted to a more comfortable position. "Now you find yourself spark-bonded with the leader of those same Smelter-spawned, Primus-cursed Autobots, and trying to bring an end to the very war you started... Well, mostly you," he amended judiciously.

"My oath of 'Never forget! Never forgive!' is proving quite an obstacle," said Megatron with a mirthless grimace, "Since it seems I'm going to have to break it if I ever want to feel whole again..." He looked down with a twinge of envy at Prime, lying there so relaxed and peaceful. In a barely-audible hiss, he added, "Slag me for an empty ditch-crawler, I'm trying..."

"I do see it, my friend," said Prime quietly.

Megatron smirked. "Yeah, well – If I want to do more than try, I'd better get rid of this helmet."

The Decepticon sagged, looking exhausted. Looking up at him, Prime wondered idly if the big mech had been getting the full recharge he required.

Megatron turned, and cocked an eyebrow at the red Autobot on the floor. "Believe me," he sneered, "I realize what a pathetic, exhaust-sucking excuse for a mech I am, to be so bound to an old work helmet." He scowled, and shifted restlessly. "But if I get rid of this wretched thing, I'll be letting go of my last link to the familiar path that I carved out so carefully for myself..."

Optimus made no reply. It seemed to him that he owed Megatron some kind of response, but he was suddenly so very, very tired. As usual, his good intentions were being thwarted by his own weakness.

In the long silence which followed, Megatron's churning engine gradually slowed; and at last he allowed his head to loll back against the bench. "I thought I could start over," he whispered. "But I don't even know where the start point is. And not even the Illustrious Optimus Prime can find it for me." The Decepticon Commander dimmed his optics, and acknowledged his own fatigue at last.

"The one thing I can promise is that you won't have to look for it alone," said Prime. "But right now..." With an effort, the Autobot pulled himself up to a sitting position, and shook his head in an attempt to clear it. "If I don't go recharge soon, I'm going to go into stasis-lock right here, and it won't be pretty. Let's finish sorting all this out in the morning – If we get a morning, that is. I've never seen a storm like this." With a creak and a groan, he hauled himself upright, and stumbled off down the hall to his makeshift berth.

Megatron signaled the lights in the room to shut down, and sat for a while in the darkness, red optics glowing. Then he too shuffled off to his bunk for a few hours' recharge.
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Scene ii

There was no real morning. The clouds of charged particles in the atmosphere blocked out almost all available light. Optimus slowly booted up his systems, and bemoaned the freakish weather. He was increasingly worried about the other mechs he knew were stuck out there, in places much less sturdy than the one he occupied himself. It was long past time, he thought as he listened to the tearing wind, to pull together a more effective rescue force.

He walked over to Megatron's berth, hoping to start organizing the recovery and repair of all the abandoned Cybertronians. He knew that any such rescue work would only be possible if members of both factions worked together, and he wanted Megatron's help in its planning.

But the big mech's bunk was empty. So was the large central room where they worked. He searched the disused rooms and hallways that ran toward the back of the building. No Megatron. Hmm.

He wondered if he ought to be concerned; this was the first time the big mech had left their small sanctuary, and the weather outside was downright life-threatening. But he knew he couldn't pad after Megatron like a worried minder; doing that would certainly drive the old mech to rebellion. He'd have to continue to have faith in him, and let him make his own choices, he decided.

So Optimus got himself some energon from a storage tank, and looked over the datapads full of work that he'd left unfinished the night before. When he felt a bit more alert, he opened a communication channel.

"Prowl, Jazz, Jetfire: this is Prime. How are you all on this lovely morning?"

He watched as the holographic images of the heads of his three friends shimmered into the air, grimacing at his attempt at humor. He returned their wry greetings with a self-deprecating salute.

"First of all: Jetfire, how are things with your team? Is everyone still managing to get along?"

Jetfire's image faded, and was replaced by scenes of the scientists working at their various stations. So far everyone seemed intent on their work, and Prime was heartened to see Hook hand some samples to Perceptor without even a second glance.

"Shockwave never reveals anything unless he has to," said Jetfire, returning to the screen, "But so far he seems more willing than most of the other Decepticons to make an honest attempt at working peacefully together. It's possible he's responsible for keeping the others in line. But frankly we're all so busy right now that no one's had any time to start any arguments or recriminations. I don't think you'll have anything to worry about with this bunch, Prime. Most of us tend not to worry about faction when we're so deeply involved in a project."

"That's what I had hoped," replied Prime, relieved. "Jetfire, I'll be relying heavily on you and your, um, old connections with the Decepticons. We are, all of us, going to have to find ways of working together.

"Which brings me to the matter I wanted to discuss with you, Jazz and Prowl..."

"Lay it on us, Prime," the saboteur grinned.

"How well is our global monitoring system holding together? Can we still locate all of our mechs, keep apprised of their status?"

The two Autobot lieutenants glanced at each other, hesitating. Gravely, Prowl answered, "Much of the system is still functioning, but not all. We've lost the signal in several key areas. Last we knew, we had mechs trapped there; but now we have no way of contacting or monitoring them. And we've been getting more and more distress signals. I don't have the resources to get them all out, Prime." The white mech looked as unruffled as ever, but his voice betrayed the depth of his concern.

The Commander nodded. "That's what I am hoping to change today, Prowl. I suggest we organize a rescue force-"

"But-!" interrupted Prowl.

"-Made up of both Autobots and Decepticons," Prime continued smoothly.

"But Prime! Don't you think it might be a bit too soon for a stunt like that?" asked Jazz, while Prowl gaped, his blinking optics refreshing rapidly.

"Too soon or not," said Optimus, "We can't leave those mechs out there any longer. Many of them have been holed-up since the ceasefire began, and they've got to be running low on fuel-" For an instant, Optimus dimmed his optics, and pinched the bridge of his nose. "I want you to go after everyone," he told them, "No matter what their faction. Get them all out; get them all to safety. If we're going to make this work, if we truly mean it when we say we want a lasting peace, then we've got to stop classifying the Decepticons as the enemy. And the sooner we start, the better.

"So Jazz: I need you to coordinate the work with any Decepticons who are willing to help with this attempt. Jetfire, you and Shockwave offer him any insights you have on which mechs might be able to work together without killing each other. Prowl, I'm afraid I'm still going to have to leave most of the overall logistics to you. I'm still... tied up here. It's taking Megatron a little longer to settle in to his new role than I think either of us had anticipated..."

Suddenly, none of the mechs seemed able to meet each other's eyes. The subject of Megatron was still an extremely awkward one.

"I will offer one suggestion," continued Prime, trying to ignore the shifty silence. "I'm sure that, despite the ideals we hold, there are a few Autobots who are feeling dissatisfied with this peace agreement."

"You're not thinkin' of anyone specific, are ya Prime?" interrupted the ever-cheerful Jazz. "Like oh, say, Grimlock and his band of misfits, or that crazy little slagger Cliffjumper?" The saboteur grinned, his visor flashing dangerously. "I've got a list! It's a long one!"

"The habit of blasting Decepticons might prove a hard one to break for some," Prowl agreed wryly.

Prime chuckled in spite of himself, but when he spoke, it was without mirth. He knew what he was asking. "I suggest that the top mechs on that list of yours be the ones you send out on the most dangerous missions. If they're genuinely worried about saving their own sparks, they might not have much energy to spare on kicking skidplate. The same goes for any Decepticons who participate in this effort. Send the berserkers out on the 'death-defying' missions. They'll get a buzz from the danger."

Prime picked up a stack of datapads, preparing to sign off. "Keep a close watch on every team, my friends. Megatron seems to have put the fear of the Pit into them, and it's kept them from breaking the ceasefire so far. But no matter what happens, you get... them... all... out," he growled, jabbing a finger to emphasize each word. "We've lost more than enough good mechs over the last few million years; and I don't want to lose anyone else, now that we have a real chance of ending this Primus-damned war."

"My, such language, Prime!" gasped Jazz in mock horror. "A little of ol' Megsy's programming get uploaded into your systems?"

Prowl looked shocked at Jazz's brazen (and worse, flippant) reference to the recent bond. Usually such bondings were not spoken of; and if they were mentioned, it was with reverence. Jetfire's usually calm face showed that he'd also been deeply offended.

Prime set down the datapads he'd been holding, and hissed a hot sigh from beneath his faceplate. He'd known that a link between himself and the Decepticon Commander would cause a terrible confusion in the ranks; and although it would be very hard for him to discuss it, he supposed that it was good that Jazz was brave enough to bring it out into the open and force everyone to deal with it directly.

"It all uploaded, actually," he said bluntly. Optimus spread his palms against his desk, straightened his shoulders, and told himself sternly to go on. "It's all right to talk about it," he assured his lieutenants. "We're all going to have to get used to a lot of new things in the next few cycles, and I'm fully aware that this... bond" the habitually reticent mech forced himself to speak the word, "Is going to be one of the hardest ones to accept."

Though Jazz still wore his cheeky grin, the light behind his visor was soft as he watched his Commander. He'd worked with this Prime too long not to know what it had cost his friend to be so forthright. Until now, the red mech had always been quick to squelch any speculation about his private life.

"While we're on the subject of Megatron," Optimus continued reluctantly, "If any reports come in on our old enemy, relay them to me, would you? He disappeared this morning. I don't think it's anything to be concerned about yet," he continued hurriedly, as he noticed his lieutenants' horrified expressions, "But if anyone hears anything, let me know..." He leaned back and sighed. There was so much to do! "I think that's enough to be going on with for now. Good luck to all of you. Prime out."

Megatron cursed the weather creatively, profanely, and profoundly. He dodged his way between lightening bolts toward a nearby short-range shipyard. The storm was making flight extremely difficult. It was also making it dangerous; the Decepticon had already been given a few new burns.

He wanted desperately to avoid prying eyes and curious questions. He didn't want to explain or justify his mission to anyone, but the old bluff and bluster just wasn't coming to him as easily as it once had. So he had determined to steal a shuttle, instead of chartering one.

As Megatron came within view of the hangar, he broke into a new volley of curses, this time directed at the few miserable mechs who still braved the storm in order to kept a dutiful watch over the motley assortment of space-faring vehicles. What the slag were they doing out here now? Shouldn't they be snuggled away in some hidey-hole? Who did they think was going to come out in weather like this to compromise their precious transports?

Who besides him...

The gray mech flew in close enough to recognize the guards as low-level Decepticons, and growled more profanities under his breath. He would have preferred a few Autobot groundpounders. These mechs would be able to fly after him, if he was spotted.

Formerly, he would have blasted them into oblivion without giving it a second thought. But lately, he'd found himself, like Prime, stubbornly determined not to lose a single mech more if it could be helped. Stealing a ship was one thing, but shooting down lowly mechs just to save his pride was another. So using whatever cover was offered, but trusting mostly to the weather to camouflage him, Megatron sneaked quietly past the miserable, huddled guards.

He hot-wired the shuttle which he thought had the best chance of slipping away unnoticed. It was smaller and lighter than he would have preferred, but it would have to do; the larger, sturdier ships were much nearer to the guards who cowered, still unaware of him, under their makeshift shelter. Keeping close to the ground until he was out of their sight, he slowly accelerated away.

Almost immediately, however, Megatron began to wonder if he ought to have slagged the guards despite his high new ideals, and taken a sturdier ship. The storm was playing merry havoc with his guidance system, so that try as he might, quite a few lightening bolts seared through his ship as they sliced across the sky. He could hardly see; his optics could not adjust quickly enough between the burning white flashes and the pitch darkness between them. Each bolt that strafed his tiny shuttle sent energy surges throughout the ship's systems, and by extension into his own. The pain when that occurred was intense, for his buffers could not protect him from the voltage. But Megatron was paying more attention to the flickering readouts on his rapidly-failing instrument panel, as he fought his bucking, plunging ship.

At last, he burst free of the tumultuous atmosphere into the relative safety of space. In that vast, starry darkness, the Decepticon Commander pushed, pulled, kicked, and cursed the battered craft toward the nearby C-12 outpost. He arrived there just as his last readout screen cracked, sent up a feeble trail of acrid smoke, and went dark.

His landing wasn't pretty. One engine had been blasted away by a bolt of lightening soon after takeoff; and as the sensitive guidance systems had one by one been melted into oblivion, flying the ship became more like trying to balance on a falling sheet of scrap metal. His "landing" took out not only the landing gear, but most of the shuttle's under-plating as well.

As the ship finally ground to a stop in a cloud of dust and debris, Megatron smiled grimly to himself. He'd been more concerned than he liked to admit that the bond with Prime might have weakened him somehow. But he'd made it here alive. It seemed that he still had the touch.

Disembarking, he clapped a hand against the blackened hull of his stolen vessel. The proprietors of the shipyard would hardly have recognized the little craft. But the gray warrior gave no thought to the return journey just yet. The test that faced him here worried him far more than the dilemma of how he was going to get back to Cybertron ever could.

Slowly, unwillingly, Megatron raised his head to view the ancient mine. Ever since that fateful day, he had always found reasons to avoid this place. And from the looks of things here, so had everyone else.

Once, the C-12 Outpost had been rich: a bustling hive teeming with toiling laborers who extracted the raw energon crystals, processed the ore, and shipped the clarified fuel down to the hungry planet below. Abandoned in haste after that first disastrous rebellion, the mine had been left to fall into ruin. Now the site was nothing but a gaping maw, with nothing to devour but itself.

Like crooked teeth, remnants of the old outbuildings could still be seen sticking up here and there. Drooping lines that had once run the ancient machinery now hung crazily over the pit, reminding Megatron of strings of sputum in the mouth of some hideous organic creature.

Wishing he was somewhere else, the Decepticon Commander walked into the pit.

When the ground he'd been standing on gave way, Megatron activated his thrusters just in time. He watched, as an entire gatehouse fell down into the opening mouth of darkness beneath him, to be consumed.

"Idiot!" Megatron glanced back in apprehension to see if his ship had fallen in with the tumbledown building. But the old dock on which he'd crash-landed still looked relatively sound. He pressed onward then, more carefully than ever, to do what he knew he must.

The old miner remembered his intended destination all too well. But he wasn't sure if he'd be able to get down to the place. He didn't even know if it was still there. Treading with unaccustomed care, Megatron made his way gingerly into the mine.

After several close calls during which he was nearly crushed, entombed, or bisected, he allowed himself to question whether it was really necessary to go to all this trouble just to get rid of a helmet. But he was so close now. And he craved the satisfaction of a worthy end for his talisman.

At last, pushing through a dragging door hanging crookedly in a rusted wall (and dodging a few falling beams as the ceiling collapsed behind him), he found himself in the familiar wide, open space which he had been seeking. The workers' assembly hall was remarkably unchanged, considering its precarious location in the heart of the old mine. He stepped warily into the room, not knowing if the rust-streaked floor would bear his weight. It creaked and trembled, but it held.

Megatron raised his head to look around him, and saw ghosts on every side.

There, lopsided and crumbling, was the podium at which, so long ago, the Senator had stood up to give his oblivious, patronizing speech. Once, the ruin of tangled beams at the front of the room had been a raised rostrum, from which the huge, impassive sentinels had watched. And there, indistinguishable from the rest of this wrecked chamber to any other living mech but Megatron, was the spot where that single crazy, loud-mouthed bot had stood up to it all...

Megatron wondered if, in the rust beneath the layers of debris, that long-dead mech's life-fluids still stained the floor. He looked unconsciously at his own hand, and remembered the first shock of seeing it slicked and dripping, after he'd pounded it through the body of a captain of the Cybertronian Guard.

Reverberating across his mind, the Decepticon Commander began to hear faint echoes of forgotten sounds from the past: the feral clamor of the crowd... the sickening thunk of his axe as it buried itself in the Senator's shoulder... the guard captain's panicked shout of "Fire at will!"... the tumultuous, heaving screams of trapped and unarmed mechs faced with pitiless blaster fire...

Megatron swayed, sickened in the queasy rush of memory. True, he had grown from an unknown laborer to a Commander of armies. But his thoughts were still as disordered now as they had been on that fateful day. He'd proclaimed a desire to bring equality. But his plans had quickly morphed into a more self-serving goal of personal domination.

For over a hundred thousand vorns, the Decepticon Commander had lived surrounded by death. He'd plunged ahead, splashed and caked and stinking of bled-out fluid, constantly pursued by an ever-increasing army of ghosts. How long had it taken him, he wondered, to cauterize his soul? When had he last felt anything at all, as he smashed through another mech's spark-casing, and raised his dripping fist in triumph?

The fire that burned within him had exploded into white-hot rage that day, and he had killed without mercy. He had become a murderer. But to what end? He hadn't come far, seeing as he had only ended up here at the beginning of it all, once again.

The gray Decepticon sank slowly to his knees; and with the same sense of dark ceremony which he had displayed in the arena, he lifted his hands (he was faintly surprised to see that they were unblemished by the too-familiar stain of purple mech fluid), and removed his helmet.

Then he leaned over, gagging, and purged; and the filthy splash of his bile was added to the layers of rust and slime around him.

He remembered what he had come here to do. But it all his efforts now seemed like nothing more than the pathetic thrashings of a loathsome, dying worm.

For how could he have dared to think that it was possible for Megatron to become anything but a destroyer? And what heights of arrogance had led him to believe that he could actually be forgiven? It was hopeless. He was broken. And some things could never be repaired.
-------------


Scene iii

During the long, dark course of the last three orns, Mirage had gradually come to accept the fact that he would have to die. He was resigned to his fate. He'd just never imagined that he would die from a slow bleed-out, in the dark, buried in a blasted sink-hole.

A heavy truss was driven through one side of his torso and into the side of the cleft beneath him. From there, it extended up to what might charitably be called a ceiling: a mass of loosely-piled junk that, but for that one beam, would slither down into the broken cavern and crush himself, Windcharger, Gears, and Hound to scrap metal.

That first earthquake had caught the four of them unawares. Hound had barely raised his head in sudden alarm, when the ground beneath them had given way. In a confusion of snapping beams and buckling metal, the four bots fell, too shocked and frightened to make a sound.

That had been three days ago.

The pain, the long darkness, the constant effort necessary to prevent himself from sliding into the crack below, and above all the lack of energon, had dulled his feelings on the matter of his own death. Hound, Windcharger, and Gears had all donated some of their own fuel to give him the strength he needed to brace his body. But despite their sacrifice, he had begun to fade in and out of consciousness. He hoped that the others would be rescued before he slipped, and they all perished here together.

Suddenly, a bright light broke through above them, startling them all into bleary wakefulness. Shakily, they raised their heads to squint into it.

Mirage heard the grating voice of one of his least-favorite Autobots call out, "Me got three – four live ones down here!" Sounding surly, an unfamiliar voice answered, "Wonderful. Let's haul their sorry afts to the shelter and get out of this awful weather! I'm never gonna be able to fly straight again!"

Sturdy cables were thrown down, and Mirage watched as his three friends were hauled out to what he hoped was safety. With a groan, he relaxed his wedged body, and prepared to let himself fall into the pit below. He couldn't seem to summon the energy required to explain to Grimlock that if a rescuer came down to pull him out, they would both die...

A soft pop sounded nearby, and there was a flash of purple light. At this, Mirage was able to put a face to the voice he'd heard. Skywarp. Death seemed almost welcoming by comparison. "C'mon, Mr. Big City," the black Seeker hissed close to his audial. "We wouldn't want that fancy finish to go to scrap, would we?"

Mirage tried weakly to protest. "The beam... the roof... all fall in..."

"Shut up, idiot," said the voice. "I'm not as dumb as you think I am. Now trust me and hold on, Fancy-Bot. I'm gonna give you the ride of your life!"

Mirage grunted as the Seeker reached under his arms, and locked his grip around his broken torso. He cried out as the beam scraped painfully across his chest, and the roof began to cave in...

There was another soft pop...

...And Mirage found himself out in the open, striving weakly to clear his intakes in a cloud of dust. A little distance away, a mishmash of broken metal was subsiding messily into the sinkhole that had trapped himself and his companions for four days. He looked up, and saw Skywarp's smirk.

"What did I tell you?" gloated the black Seeker, as he dropped Mirage unceremoniously onto the ground a few feet below. "Ride of your life!"

Mirage had always been repulsed by Skywarp's brutish lack of manners. But he was forced to admit that the rough-edged Decepticon had not only saved his life, but that he was the mech who could have done so. "Thank you," he said shortly.

"Don't mention it, my good 'Bot!" replied Skywarp in a mock-highbrow tone, then added with a growl, "Don't you evermention it..."

The motley group turned, and began making their way toward a nearby emergency shelter.

It may have only been a breem, but it might also have been half an orn, before a thought as clear and piercing as a beam of light broke through the blackness of Megatron's despair. In its brief illumination, he remembered an outstretched blue hand. One mech, at least, had forgiven him. The Decepticon Commander had often mocked Prime's stubborn belief that there was something good within the spark of every mech. Now he found himself clinging to that belief as to a lifeline. It might be just enough to keep him going for a while. Maybe.

But he hated the idea of depending on Prime for reassurance. He was determined to make his way in this new life independent of anyone else.

He scrambled to his feet, embarrassed to have succumbed to such weakness. His future might be one big blur, but at least he'd face it on his own two feet.

From the most ancient, primitive center of his spark, a whisper sounded. Out of habit, he shushed it sharply. But it came again, more insistent this time, and Megatron was forced to admit that he was hearing voices.

"I believe in you. I always have."

The gray mech hissed, chin lifting in defiance. He told himself it was only a thought, a voice in his mind. He told himself it had only been a random firing of neural synapses.

But he knew the voice. It was deeply familiar; part of, but separate from him; not a creation of his own consciousness. After a long hesitation, he shut down his optics, and let the primordial stillness seeping into his spark grow to fill him. This once, here at the beginning and the end, he would listen to what the Voice had to say.

"You were not meant to be what you chose to become. I had hoped great things for you."

That was certainly true. Megatron snorted. He would never be anyone's pawn.

"You chose the way of my brother, the destroyer. In doing so, you allowed him to destroy you.

"Now you have been given a rare gift: the chance to choose again. The chance to change your future.

"Who are you?

"Who do you choose to be?"

Megatron stood quietly in the empty darkness, as motionless as a monument. "Primus," he whispered, testing, tasting the name in his mouth. He was intensely surprised that the ancient being would choose to speak to him. But he was not overawed. He had been angry at his Creator for far too long to retain what some mechs considered to be the proper respect.

He pondered the questions the Voice had posed.

"I want to be me," he said, finally. "I'm warning you, you may not always like it. I'm not nice, like your Favored Son, Optimus Prime. But I am strong. I get things done."

"What is it that you want to do?"

Megatron thought about this for a long time. After all, wasn't his whole problem that he didn't know the answer to that question?

There was, however, one thing he did know. It wasn't much. But it was significant.

"I don't want to be a murderer anymore," he said. "I'll be a soldier. I'll be an enforcer. Slag, I'll even be an executioner. But I don't want to be a murderer ever again."

"That is a good start."

"Oh, I'm so glad you think so!" Megatron's anger, never far beneath the surface, exploded from his mouth. "I've 'made a good start,' have I? Well, three cheers for the Mighty Megatron! But now that I've started, where do I fragging go? I don't have a shiny Matrix like your Beloved Prime. Slag it all, if I do what I came here to do, I won't even have a fragging helmet!" He clamped his jaws to stop the flow of bile. "My one true compass," he sneered, spinning the helmet between his fingers. "And I actually came here to melt it down."

He managed to keep silent, holding his acidic thoughts inside. But still his anger boiled. Their god had set them all adrift in the universe, and then gone off to take a nap. And now here he was, out of nowhere, expecting Megatron's obeisance. He swore. As far as he was concerned, the Creator ought by now to be used to disappointment. How dared Primus give his guidance to only one mech out of millions? What did he expect the others to do? Guess? If so, why should he be so be dismayed that his precious creations had ended up trying to destroy each other? Didn't Primus realize that if he gave their lives no meaning, his so-called 'children' would have to invent some sort of meaning for themselves?

"I did not set you adrift." The ancient, careful voice broke into the turmoil of his mind. "I did not leave you alone. I sent a piece of myself with each of you, within your sparks. I can speak to each of my creations in the same way I am speaking with you now. But they so often refuse to listen..."

"We don't listen because we don't trust you!" Megatron almost screamed. "You hide yourself away in there somewhere; and when things get really dangerous, you expect us to protect you! You're nothing but a selfish puppeteer, playing mind games with your little toys. I hate you! You're such a fragging coward!" Megatron's chest heaved as he tried to cycle enough air to cool the heat of his overwhelming rage.

"It is true I do not know everything. I do my best with the knowledge I have; which, incidentally, is far greater than your own. I do what I must. I resist my brother. I am not a coward. By choosing the path of resistance to chaos, I have severely limited my own course of action. I did in some sense create you all to do what I could not, hoping that some of you would resist him with me..."

Megatron sniffed. "Oh yes, very brave and noble of you..."

The quiet old voice continued, unruffled, "You are jealous of the Matrix. But it is not a perfect guide. It is the accumulated wisdom of imperfect mechs, nothing more. I choose a Prime whom I hope will lead you to resist the forces of chaos and destruction. I hope to be able to guide him in that resistance - to influence him just a little - through the Matrix. But I can not control him. He makes his own decisions as best he can."

There was a long silence during which Megatron perversely tried not to think of anything at all.

"Do you know that I once considered choosing you to lead them? But with Nova, I had seen to my sorrow the results of choosing a leader who was too focused on expansion and power. Sentinel's scholarly compassion did counteract some of the ruthlessness of Nova's methods, but he proved too weak in the face of your own physical brutality. Optimus is, I believe, the best Prime I have found yet..."

Megatron snorted, forced despite himself to admit the fairness of that assessment.

"But just like all the others, he was unable to achieve a lasting peace. Watching him struggle and fail, I almost gave up hope forever. I think he could feel it. I could sense his fear, feel his despair...

"Now, this bond of yours has given me hope once again. Perhaps the two of you together can undo some of the damage which the forces of chaos have inflicted here. Together, you two are extraordinarily powerful... if you choose to be."

Megatron was unrepentant. "Powerful," he repeated with a snort. "Oh, yes. But since, as you may possibly recall my saying, I now have no idea what to do with all my 'power,' what can you expect from me other than that I'll 'powerfully' ruin a lot of things? You tell me to choose my path. But you offer me no help in finding it. You leave me in the dark – the same way you've always left all of us... all of us except your precious Prime..."

His tirade was interrupted by the Voice of Primus within him. Its tone was unusually harsh.

"You lie. You lie to yourself as well as to me. I leave none of you in the dark. You have always known the way to choose your path. It is easy. It is only you yourself who make it difficult. There are only two paths: the path of progress, and the path of ruin. It is easy to tell which one you have chosen, for there are always, always signposts. The second will lead to your own destruction – as you well know, for you have felt its decaying effects within yourself. The other- Do you not see that your own happiness and fulfillment only adds to my own? I may have created you for my own purposes, Megatron; but I have not shackled you to my desires! Now stop whining to me about flailing around in the dark. Any darkness you face is of your own personal making. Stop blaming others for the consequences of your own choices! If you want light, then step out into the light! Choose a path, and walk!"

Megatron froze. He became suddenly and intensely aware of everything around him: the pulse of his own spark, the cycling mech fluid cooling his softly-whirring servos, the gritty rust on the shaky floor beneath him, the soft, ominous creaking of the ancient metal surrounding him. He was alone. Or at least, as alone as he would ever feel again. He cursed his spying Creator. Primus was worse than Soundwave had ever been for sneaking into his private thoughts.

With a harsh chuff of air from his vents, he stood. Moving resolutely up to the rickety old podium, the Decepticon Commander placed his helmet carefully, almost lovingly on its leaning surface. Then he backed away, and made a wry salute to the empty item resting there. Then he activated his thrusters and rose up into the air.

He raised his right arm, and aimed his fusion cannon precisely. It hummed as the charge rose to full, devastating power.

"I... Choose," he proclaimed, and released the pent-up blast of energy.

Optimus Prime was finding it more and more difficult to concentrate on the minutiae of government restructuring. He'd never had the knack of diplomacy, and finding a balance in this topsy-turvy armistice was taxing his equilibrium to the utmost. He barely managed not to shout at Grimlock, who'd interrupted his work with an irate communique, before signing off and shutting down the holo-projector with a snap. His concern for Megatron was mounting with each reverberating crash of thunder, each tremor beneath his feet. Not even the dispatches detailing the successful rescue of stranded mechs gave him comfort, since they only served to remind him that his bond-brother was out somewhere in all of this, and that no one would be saving him. Prime began to mumble half-formed prayers to whatever powers might be listening.

It wasn't only the helmet which ceased to exist in the explosion. Megatron intended a much more thorough cleansing. The big gray mech punched upward through a tangle of falling roofbeams as the entire mine collapsed inward. Megatron watched it from above. His cold expression never changed as the twisted remains of everything he had spent his life fighting to avenge was incinerated in a tremendous conflagration.

He realized, too late, that he had forgotten about the remaining ends of ancient energon deposits still buried deep within in the mine. With a gyro-lurching shudder, the crack the mine had so long ago opened in the tiny planetoid widened suddenly into an immense crevasse. From its unknowable depths, a storm of white-hot energon was rising...

With a snort that was both gratification and defiance, the Decepticon Commander sped away, while behind him the entire asteroid burst apart into quivering, jagged fragments. He was left alone, out in the black immensity of space, to somehow limp home on his own.

It was an utterly impossible task. While he might have just enough power to make his way back to nearby Cybertron, it was preposterous to believe he could survive the journey through the planet's tempestuous atmosphere without a ship to shield him. But Megatron felt light, happy, free. He felt as if he were being upheld in a bubble of absolute safety. He knew without a doubt that, one way or another, he would make it back home. Home, to a ramshackle old storehouse, where a simple-minded red mech believed that he could change.

Prime almost failed to notice the tiny addendum attached to the latest report of system upheavals. But a few words caught his gaze. And when he read about the explosion of the minor planet on which the abandoned C-12 mine was located, Optimus cursed. Of course, he'd wondered if Megatron might try to go there. Before, Prime could have found a kind of justice in Megatron perishing in a fireball of his own making. But not now. Not when there had been so much to hope for...

His bonded spark twisted painfully, and Optimus fell to his knees. He wasn't certain whom he called to, but he hoped that some merciful Power might be listening. "Please save him!" he cried. "Don't let him be lost while he is trying to do so much good! Please let him come back safe... and whole..."

He felt a gentle hand fall lightly onto his shoulder.

"Thank Primus! You had me worried, Megs, you worthless piece of-" He turned. "Elita!"

Still kneeling, he threw his arms around the femme, and let his head fall with a thump against her blessedly familiar body. "I'm so, so sorry sweetheart!" he whispered.

"I know you are," she replied. She reached down, took his chin in her hand, and raised his face to hers. Running a sly finger along his brow and down along his mask, she told him, "We've got a lot to talk about, don't we Orion?"