Chapter Text
Skyfire landed on the edge of the ridge overlooking Iacon, stretching his arms out above his wings. The transport system between cities was already operational once more, but the white seeker vastly preferred flying for himself.
There was a strange emptiness to his flights these days, like the planet was too large, and he, too small. It wasn't the smallness he felt ten million meta-cycles earlier when he first arrived to Iacon as a graduate intern. It was an absent pang, a loneliness that kept pulling at him, lingering just at the edge of his processor. On earth, he seldom flew alone; the aerialbots joined him in the sky, and often in battles, combat with the Decepticon trines sometimes became more of a dance than mutual attempts at destruction.
But now, the Decepticon seekers had likely all returned to rebuild Vos (aside from the few members of Decepticon high command lingering for conferences and… whatever Decepticons did), and the aerialbots had taken a mission to aid the excavation of Kalis, leaving Skyfire alone in the sky.
He savored the thin atmosphere and the faint wind, letting his wings take in the currents around him. He could easily walk the rest of the way to the facility, but instead, he kicked off of the ground, transformed in midair, and took off through the city.
There weren't designated flight lanes yet, and only about a third of the once-grand Cybertronian city was lit up once more. Grand buildings that once served as massive towers of industry, high rise habitations, and offices alike, now stood empty. They provided a rocky landscape, an exciting and narrow obstacle course for the seeker, who took to it with a gentle excitement, twisting in the air and ducking beneath abandoned bridges, sliding beneath the different skyscrapers, feeling the changes in air pressure and the wind around his wings, hyper aware of his surroundings to maintain his speed and aerodynamic ability. It was thrilling, but he was thoroughly exhausted by the time he landed outside the research center.
Even after landing, he took a moment to let his processor cycle through all of the extra sensory data from his wings, updating his map of the city and its current state, sorting out the wind currents and compensating for the slight delay of his attitude adjuster.
Allowing himself a moment to shake off the exhilaration of the flight, he stood there for a few seconds in root mode before he realized that Wheeljack was standing there, near the door, beckoning to him.
He wasn't alone on land. He had friends among his fellow autobots, and colleagues in this newly-developed research and science association.
It wasn’t a formal organization yet, but they were hoping to create what could eventually be a new academy for sciences; the beginning of a mutual effort between the two factions for the recovery of Cybertron. Brainstorm suggested they call it the “Science and Technology United for Planetary and Interstellar Development.” Or, the STUPID for short.
“Yo, Skyfire! Glad you could make it! You okay there? I guess flying around this city must be pretty depressing. Or distracting,” Wheeljack called out to the seeker, who was snapped back to reality by the sound of his voice.
“Huh? Oh, sorry! I was just… yes, I’ve been mapping the city, and it’s a lot of sensory feedback. Thank you for your concern, Wheeljack.”
“Oh! Well all right then, you were spacing out for a sec after you landed there, I was gettin’ worried. Come on, the gang’s all here!”
Indeed, “the gang,” as Wheeljack called it, was assembled inside. In another time, this meeting could be monumental. Perceptor, Wheeljack, Shockwave, Brainstorm, Mainframe, even intelligence officers had assembled, including Blaster and Soundwave, and… Starscream.
Skyfire should have expected Starscream to be here, but seeing him still made Skyfire’s spark twist and swirl. Their relationship after Skyfire left to join the Autobots was… complicated, and full of unanswered questions and unresolved conflicts, a distant longing left hanging.
Starscream had called him a traitor.
Before that, they’d been courting to bond.
Now it felt impossible, the divide between them a chasm too deep and too wide.
Skyfire assumed Starscream didn’t want to see him, but of course, their optics met as soon as Skyfire entered the lecture hall. It was a large, round room that tiered downwards, with the highest steps along the outer walls, and Starscream was perched on the opposite side from the entrance, sitting on the highest tier of the room steps. He had one leg crossed over the other, and his wings straightened up as Skyfire entered, as though he wanted to look like he was far less bored than he was.
Skyfire made his way across the room, nodding his greeting to each of the autobots he passed, to sit beside Starscream. “I didn’t expect to see you here,” he admitted, letting his wings relax a little as he sat down and pulled a datapad from his subspace to take notes.
“Why? Because I have bigger dreams than standing at the front of some lecture hall, I can’t find intellectual discussion stimulating? Besides, I'm smarter than most of the processors in here.” There was a spark of amusement to Starscream’s optics as he said this. “Not to mention, I want to see how long we last before someone blows something up. There’s a betting pool, you know. Brainstorm, Wheeljack, or Shockwave?”
Skyfire glanced the tri-colored seeker over, trying to keep it casual. Starscream was talking to him so casually, and he didn’t sense that tone he adopted when he tried to mask his true intentions in his voice. Was this really a chance to start over? A chance to…
He shook off the thought.
Starscream wouldn’t forgive him for the “betrayal” of joining the autobots so easily.
“Shockwave? I didn’t think he would count. He favors unethical science, the far more likely candidates are indeed Brainstorm and Wheeljack. Wheeljack is more likely to do… inadvisable chemistry, but Brainstorm is a bit more prone to showing off his inventions of experimental hubris… so here? If I was a betting mech, I’d put a few shanix on Brainstorm.”
At this answer, Skyfire could feel the amusement in Starscream’s field as it brushed up against his own. Good, he was relaxing. Starscream always kept his field so tight, always had a cautious decisiveness to his energy. Of course, they both knew the bias against seekers in the academic fields, but Skyfire always took it a bit more in stride. He was used to it as a seeker raised outside of Vos.
“Brainstorm? Interesting. Oh, right, you must be unaware of Shockwave’s… synthetic energon experiments.” Starscream was smirking. “They went just about as well as you’d expect, with the… crude materials we had on earth.”
Skyfire didn’t hold back the small laugh. “Is that so? Well, regardless, I’m glad to see you’re doing better.”
Starscream’s wings stiffened up almost instantly, and it made Skyfire regret the question. There was no need to be so guarded around Skyfire, but factionally speaking, they were enemies up until recently. It made Skyfire’s spark sink.
“Better?”
“Well, yes. You seem happier now. Your wings even say that you’re a bit excited,” Skyfire admitted, cautious with his words.
Starscream stared at him for a moment, then burst into laughter. “I always wonder how you do that, but then I forgot you’re not like the rest of us Vosians. It makes me underestimate you, a mistake that could prove fatal to me on the battlefield.”
Skyfire recovered by sitting up a little more. Starscream was more predictable to him than he let on, and he was glad his earnest answer could ease his companion. “Well, we aren’t enemies anymore, Starscream. So no need to worry about hatching schemes or anything. The war is over. I even heard Optimus and Megatron are rekindling an old relationship. So. You can finally relax. Or try to.”
Starscream let his voice drop to a whisper as the room dimmed and new plans appeared on the holoscreen at the center of the room, signaling the beginning of Perceptor’s presentation.
“...Right. About that, actually. Despite this… cultural center they are developing here, I was planning on returning to Vos…” Starscream began, and Skyfire noticed his wings twitch in a peculiar way. Like he was actually struggling to come up with the right words to say. Odd, since Skyfire knew that no one loved to hear themselves talk as much as Starscream himself.
“We’re organizing a gauntlet for the next winglord, you see, and as a natural leader, it’s my duty to participate. As the Decepticon air commander, I have to choose my priorities. So… I’ll linger around here until these buffoons can get organized, and then I’ll be returning to Vos with my trine. You know, basically all the seekers are going…”
Skyfire suppressed a tiny laugh, keeping his voice quiet. Luckily they were far enough back that the only mechs in earshot were Ratchet and Red Alert several steps down, and Ratchet was idly working on some unrelated medical report as he listened to the presentation, rather than listening to the idle chatter of the reunited seekers.
“Ah, ambitious as ever, I see. You want to be Winglord?”
A beat passed. Starscream looked like he was about to protest Skyfire’s immediate read of his ambitions, but there was something else to it. Something…? Was it disappointment? A hesitance? “I’m the perfect candidate, of course.”
The presentations outlined plans for creating a united front of autobot and decepticon scientific research, including a restoration of a major Iaconian research facility. If successful, they could establish branch facilities with the intention of supporting vital industries for the reconstruction of Cybertron, including energon refinement, construction, and infrastructure optimization. It was a vague plan, and of course Red Alert had a substantial list of concerns, but he wasn’t in opposition to the plan overall.
Shockwave went on with a summary of decepticon wartime findings and methods of repurposing their technology for peaceful use, followed by Wheeljack with a similar presentation about autobot findings. The open-floor discussion afterwards carried on for some time, and Starscream paused before he got up.
“You know, Vos is a city of seekers… even if you didn’t grow up there, you’re still one of us. Nobody’s going to rebuild it if we don’t. So…”
Skyfire had never seen Starscream so…? How could he describe it? Choosy about his words? Uncertain? His words usually had double meanings, and he was a skilled weaver of lies to most, but Skyfire could always read right through such a facade, simply by looking at how the colorful seeker held his wings. He was usually so cocky, with several schemes cooking, but he lingered near the door, optics glancing back to look over Skyfire.
“I don’t leave for a few cycles. And the gauntlet is a social event. I’m just saying, one hasn’t happened since decavorns before the war, no self-respecting seeker would want to miss it. Participating, or spectating.”
There it was again. That something else, that nervous flutter to Starscream’s wings as he explained it. That awkward glance over Skyfire, as if looking for something. It was almost… un-Starscream body language. Not that the seeker was ever particularly stoic, he had an unrivaled flair for the dramatic.
As they stepped out into the cool night air, Skyfire opened up his sensor suite to the surrounding area. He took in the wind, the way it curved between and around buildings, the gentle air current above where the atmosphere was thinner, and concentration of dust in the air from both the crumbling buildings and the now-perpetual construction of the city. It was overcast, but Skyfire could tell through his wings that he didn’t need to worry about precipitation. Luckily, Iacon’s natural environment wasn’t as destroyed as other parts of Cybertron, where they could expect clouds of ash to fall like snow, blown up to the atmosphere from the heated vents beneath, and falling back down upon the ruins of once-proud cities.
“Good-night, Starscream. Perhaps I will see you in the next cycle or two. If not, have a safe journey back to Vos. It was nice to see you again. I’m glad you’re doing well.”
He kicked off of the ledge leading to the second floor of the building, transforming in midair. Skyfire wanted to look back and see if Starscream was watching, but he was too busy taking in the landscape around him and computing it all for optimal flight. There was a slight extra bit of current alteration he had to compensate for due to the height of the surrounding buildings, which he kicked back to his secondary processor, dropping an additional reminder on his HUD to watch for debris as he flew.
He fired his thrusters and tore off between the buildings, twisting and turning as he tried to recall the route back to their current base of operations, balancing his navigation with his other processes, in addition to the reminders he had for himself to be aware of the sky above and potential hazards below.
It was a lot, and he felt the exhaustion creeping in and gripping him, causing extra lag he hadn’t expected. He’d flown all the way here from the new temporary base outside of Kalis, and dropped off supplies at Protohex this morning, so a quick flight around Iacon should be nothing. He was fueled up enough, but he set another reminder for himself that he’d agreed to head back the next day. It would be a long flight, but with proper fuel and enough rest, it could be relaxing. Flying gave him plenty of time to think.
He sure was thinking a lot these days.
His processor kicked back another reminder that he’d have to defrag while he was recharging tonight. He had a lot of excess data from the long flights this morning, and it was awfully late. Okay. That was easy. Now to just…
Oh, and another reminder to compensate for this additional feedback lag from his processor. He pinged back that now that he wasn’t carrying much in his subspace, his thrust-to-weight ratio was far better, and he could go a bit faster if he just…
A strange feeling brushed over his wing and he ducked down, correcting with his flaps to compensate for the sudden drop, and—
>>WHOA, hey! You’re flying awfully low there! Watch out for—<< a voice pinged him on the public channel, and Skyfire kicked back up to the height where the main flying lane should be, narrowly avoiding a highway bridge for ground vehicles, and he sensed another EM field near his own, another flier, ducking around buildings, keeping pace with him.
It was a black seeker, and he moved his wings in some way Skyfire didn’t understand, before easing up on the thrust enough to let Skyfire pass, veering off to one side.
>>Oh, thank you. Sorry about that, I was a bit preoccupied…<<
Skyfire initiated another scan of the area, filling in his digital map as he went. It wasn’t a normal flight procedure, but he was mapping out the area, despite this extra processor lag from exhaustion, and—
>>Hey, you okay down there?<< The EM field from the black seeker blipped out and reappeared slightly above and behind him. It startled Skyfire, enough that he forgot he still had his map open in his HUD and wait a nanoklik, he had to remember the slight tailwind, his wings were telling him that he was still under the partial cloud cover, and—
He didn’t even realize why his systems were flickering from overtaxation until he almost hit the ground.
Almost.
He heard the familiar sound of transformation, clearly a flight-frame similar to his own, and servos grabbing at his wings, trying to steady him, before everything flickered again, and he fell into bluescreen.