Forget Me Not: Part 2: Stars and Swords (Side1)
Forget Me Not: A Three-part saga from the planet Cybertron
Part 2: Stars and Swords

I’m floating in a sea of light and darkness. Void and brilliance wash over me in turn, trying to pull me under. Memories swirl past, incoherent images that are both familiar and strange to me. I see towers crumbling. I see eternal struggle. I see fire. I see stars. I see heroes. I see monsters. I see wondrous beauty. I see horrendous evil.

None of it makes sense. Voices whisper at me, babbling and tremulous. I’m overwhelmed. In desperation, I search for something, anything that I can understand.

A shaft of blue fire splits the maelstrom. Slowly, it resolves itself into a blade. Then into a sword.

It is a beautiful thing, forged from metal and glass and from elegant lines and flowing curves. I reach out and grasp the hilt, praying it will lift me into sanity. At my touch, the radiance engulfs me. A feeling of bliss flows into my being, so wonderful, so pure…

But something is wrong. Darkness, oily and black, flows over the blade from tip to pommel. I feel as if I’m being torn in two, as if something is stretching me across the universe.

The blade spins away, a thing of vile destruction. I fall. The sea consumes me.

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A sound. Soft footsteps coming towards me. Voice in the distance. My body is still, face down, drained of life.
“I tell you, it’s got to be – oh!”
A clatter.
“Oh holy Primus, tell me I’m seeing things! Tell me that’s not who I think it is!” This speaker sounds younger than the first.
“It…ah…certainly looks like…er heh…are you sure we’re in the right place?” A nervous, high pitched voice.
“Yes.” A gruff tone. I think it’s the first voice again.


I try to lift my head, to turn and face the voices. My joints protest and do not move.
“Um…ah…he looks…how do you think he…ended up down here?”
“Tripped over his ego?” The gruff one, closer now. “Looks far gone. It might not actually be him. What’s to stop it being any other Seeker?”
“How about no other Seeker being caught dead in that colour scheme?” the younger shoots back.
“O-oval’s right… We must…h-have taken a wrong turning… Let’s g-go before –”
“We’re where we should be!” Gruff sounds tired and angry. “These are the coordinates they gave us! They said we’d find a mech to be their wielder. They didn’t say anything about who it’d be. He’s the only mech here so it’s got to be him!”

Oval mutters something I can’t make out.
“What was that?”
“H-he said…er…heh…that if it is him, then we might as well go home now and not bother trying to free them. And I-I…agree!”
Now it’s gruff who mutters.
“Hey, what was that?”
“Mind your own business.”

Someone walks around my body, stopping in front of my shoulders.
“Ahem. Hello? Anyone in?”
I put all my strength into the effort and finally tilt my head back.

Gruff is tiny, or so it seems to my labouring optics. He’s boxy looking though, with a broad torso and bulky arms. There are wheels on his shoulders and thighs and a wide visor obscures his face.
“Well someone’s lights are on.” He puts his hands on his hips and glares at me. “Name and function!”

Steeling myself, I croak back.
“Pardon?”
My vocal circuits seem to be full of rust.
“Your name and function: what are they?”
“I don’t…”
“Oh, fer Primus sake!” He looks exasperated. “It’s not difficult, even for a Decep! Look, my name is Clench. My function is Minicon Leader.” He’s speaking slowly, exaggerating every syllable. “Who are you?”

“Starscream, Decepticon Aerospace Commander!”

The words are out before I realise I’m speaking. They feel odd, right and very wrong at the same time. Clench leaps backwards and contorts. Moments later, he’s changed into a miniature missile truck. His canopy pulses as he bellows.
“Stay where you are! Make one move and I blast you!”
“Blast him now!” Oval yells. An orange being runs into view, gesturing at me.
“W-we’re f-fragged! Doomed…er…arrrggghhh!”
“Will you two shut up!”

“Excuse me,” I begin.
“Shut up! Oval, we can’t risk it. Sonar said –”
“Slag Sonar! We’ve got to –”
“What’s a Decepticon?”

Silence.

“D…did…he…er heh…j-just…”
“It’s a trick! Clench, please –”
“Quiet!”
The ebony and maroon truck transforms back into Clench. He peers up at me, frowning. I try to hold his optic.
“I just asked…because I’m not sure where that came from. That name, I mean. I don’t know what it meant. I…”
Trailing off, I try to shrug helplessly. It doesn’t work very well. Clench is still frowning.
“A Decepticon is a mechanoid who believes that the strong should rule the weak and follows the leadership of Megatron.”

Megatron. The name is familiar to me. But the memory dances away again.

“You are…or were…possibly…Starscream, one of Megatron’s lieutenants, a member of his inner circle.” He stops and moves closer. “Does any of this ring any bells?”
“Vaguely.” It’s like trying to catch smoke. Images float past and are gone before I can seize them.
“Clench,” Oval says, putting a hand on the leader’s shoulder, “We need to talk. Now.”
“Right. Sideburn, get over here.”
A smaller red mech scuttles up and the three of them huddle together.

I try to hear what they’re saying but it’s a struggle to stay conscious and they seem to be using another language. At length, the break apart and face me. Oval looks very angry and the masked Sideburn is swaying as if on the verge of fainting. Clench is the only one who appears vaguely comfortable around me.
“Starscream, whether it’s you or not, we need you. You’re going to help us free the Star Sabre. After that –”
“Star Sabre?” I jerk up onto my elbows, the blade of my dream clear in my mind. “You said Star Sabre? Where is it? Tell me!” I remember the sensation of bliss when I held the ethereal sword and can think of nothing else.

Whatever reaction Clench expected, this was not it. He steps back while Oval raises his arms to aim at me, tubes alongside his hands glowing.
“Please, tell me! Where is it?” My voice is shot through with panic and desire.
“It’s…it’s…in D-darkmount,” Sideburn answers weakly, “Megatron’s got it…er heh…” He trails off, stiff as a board.

“As you well know,” Oval snarls.
“Why would I know that?”
“Because,” says Clench, “Megatron broadcast news of his triumph across Cybertron. You can’t have missed it.”
“T-that’s it!”
We all stare at Sideburn.
“T-that must be…I mean…that’s how they…and he must have…”
“Sideburn.” Clench puts an arm round the smaller mech’s shoulder. “Speak slowly, think carefully and fer Primus’ sake, finish your sentences.”

“I-I t-think that I know what h-happened to him. Y-you…I mean, Clench, Sonar mind-pulsed you didn’t he?”
“Yes. Felt like he hit me with a sledgehammer. Shoved loads of data down my CPU.”
“A-and that was just one of them. W-we know t-they’re more powerful combined. What if they used Megatron’s broadcast…what if they backpacked a data burst onto the signal – one aimed at Starscream. A sh-shell program that would turn him into their wielder.”
“But combined, their minds are submerged,” protests Oval, “That’s kind of the whole point of all this! And how would they be able to override his ego just like that?”
“Th-they could have set a t-timer or something – an inbuilt trigger for a pre-programmed pulse. And they’ve been close to St-starscream before. They could have done something to him…”

A thoughtful silence follows while Clench looks first at Sideburn, then at me, then back at Sideburn. I just look on dumbly, hoping someone will explain what’s going on in words I can actually understand.
“You know…that’s just the kind of deviously overcomplicated thinking I’d expect from those three.”
“If Sideburn’s wrong…” Oval persists.
“If anything goes wrong, we’ve had it anyway. And it’ll be worse if we don’t get them out.” Clench looks me in the optic again. “We’re going to have to risk it.”

I must have gone off line at that point because the next thing I’m aware of is someone forcing energon into my mouth. I gulp instinctively, sucking the liquid down into my tanks. Pain blossoms in my lasercore as it’s suddenly shocked into maximum output. I spring to my feet, giddy and even more disorientated than before.

“Too much to drink, Starscream? You should learn patience.” A voice like gravel wrapped in oil echoes in my head. “Your eagerness will be you undoing.”

“Hey Starscream! Wake up!”
Reality snaps back into focus. I’ve managed to fall over and I’m now sitting against a pillar with an uncomfortable dent in my side. Clench is in truck form, guns trained on me.
“What happened?”
At least my voice is working properly. The Minicon rolls backwards a fraction.
“We gave you some tetrahelix energon to kick-start your systems. Sorry. Didn’t expect you to jump up like that. Are you fit to move?”
“I think so.”
As I stand again, Oval and Sideburn emerge from behind another pillar. Oval’s self-consciously dusting himself down.

The structure we’re in is circular with a high roof and columns at regular intervals around the wall. The only sounds are those we make and the light, such as it is, is pale and weak.
“This way.”
Clench leads me to a tall archway. Beyond, a long tunnel slopes gently upwards.
“Wait.” I cross my arms. “I want to know what’s going on. I want to know who I am. You must tell me.”
“I’m going to. But we have to get moving.”

The other Minicons transform so that I don’t have to shuffle to avoid outpacing them. Oval becomes a sleek four-wheeled vehicle, Sideburn a slightly more boxy craft. They lag behind me a little while Clench stays at my side. As we climb, he talks.

He starts by asking me questions, trying to find out what, if anything, I can remember. Sometimes, his words dredge images out of the whirling fragments of my memories. ‘Cybertron’ makes me to see a serene silvery globe hanging in space, majestic and beautiful. ‘Vos’ conjures up a cityscape full of spires and minarets. ‘Megatron’ again. This time, as shadowy shape hovers before me, vast and menacing. ‘Optimus Prime’ creates something similar.

I have knowledge of concepts like time and distance, materials and life-functions. I can perform mathematical operations and recite scientific laws. But my experiences are gone. My life before the dream is gone, save for wisps and echoes. Starscream’s life is gone. I cannot help but think of it that way.

Then Clench starts describing the Great War. He tells me of the Autobots and Minicons who have shared Cybertron since the dawn of time. He describes the faction that grew out of dissatisfaction and resentment, describes how Megatron drew mechs from both races to his side with promises of power and freedom.

When he speaks of the Decepticon’s first strikes, I stumble, visions of explosions and fire, of raining death down on helpless civilians bursting around me. The stink of ozone and molten metal fills my sensors. Screams, of living beings and jet turbines, mingle with thunder and static.

It leaves me feeling weak and…sickened? Is that it? How much destruction must this war have caused? Could anything be worth such waste? Could anything be worth embracing it?

I press Clench about my past, not just general history. He’s hesitant.
“If we’re right…if you’re old personality has just been submerged…I’m not sure it’s a good idea to remind you of it.”
I stop. The other two brake just in time to avoid my ankles.
“I have to know. Everything you’ve told me has been familiar. But I still can’t remember who I am. I’m still…confused, disorientated… How can I explain? I…haven’t got a reference point. You say I’m a Decepticon but I don’t understand why anyone would be one. I can’t work it out based on reason alone. You talk about war and the destruction of your villages and of resistance movements and Autobot champions. But I can’t place myself in that world. All I know for certain is that I’ve just been woken up in a room full of pillars by three mechs who say they’re Minicons and that I’m someone called Starscream. And I want to get to the Star Sabre. That’s it! I don’t even know what the Star Sabre is! Everything else is vague and…alien! It’s like I’ve got someone else’s thoughts in my head. They’re where my memories should be but I can’t reach them or understand them if I could. Tell me about Starscream. Please.”

He looks up at me through his blank golden canopy, silent.
“Please.”
“Very well.” His reply is soft, whispered.
“Clench…” Oval warns.
“I’ll tell him.”
Our little convoy starts moving again.

“Starscream…where to start? Murderer. Traitor. Warrior. Backstabber. Seeker. Flyer. Vain and snobbish. Cold fuelled and hot-headed. I could go on for vorns. He was one of the first high profile defectors to the Decepticons. He went from being a Vosian politician to being one of Megatron’s top lieutenants. He’s Decepticon Aerospace Commander, in charge of the biggest airforce ever known. He sees himself as Megatron’s successor and isn’t afraid to say so. He’s self-obsessed and devious to the point of being totally untrustworthy. The only things that motivate him are power and survival. He’s hated by both sides and would double-deal everyone in sight if he thought he’d get something out of it.”

“Why?” It’s the only response I can think of.
“I don’t know. He sees himself as superior to everyone else and ‘reasons’ that he should rule the world. He sees that the only way to do that is by being a Decep. Why he thinks all that, no one knows. It’s just how he is. Or how you were.”

I try to understand. Surely crude brute force should be an absolute last resort? I mean, if you were better than those around you then, logically, you should lead. If there are obstacles, they must be overcome. But force should only be used when there’s no other way out. Didn’t that make sense? And how do you judge who is the better mech? You can’t just decide that you’re the best. That’s not right. Is it? What if those around you are doing a worse job than you would in their position? What if you can see what they’re doing wrong but they won’t listen to you? What if you’ve done everything short of fighting and it makes no difference? What then? Did that situation justify war? Did that justify deceit?

Questions innumerable fill my head. I need time to rationalise what I’m being told, to reconcile it with what I feel in my spark.

I ask Clench about the Star Sabre. He grunts
“That brings us to what’s going on now. Sonar, Runway and Jetstorm: the three oldest and most important Minicons on the face of Cybertron. They’re supposed to be as old as time but it doesn’t really matter. They’re three of the best engineers in living memory and they’re collective intelligence is off just about every scale. To top it all, they just happen to combine into the most powerful hand-to-hand weapon in history. The Star Sabre’s more than just a sharp energo-sword. It’s a living thing that turns whoever holds it into a weapon. I’ve seen it used to win battles in an instant and they say it’s the blade Alpha Prime used to destroy the Fallen. It’s a symbol and a thing of vast power. And Megatron’s got it.”

Once more the shadow rears up, flecked with purple and steel.
“Soon Starscream, soon,” the voice croons, “it shall be ours.”

“I couldn’t believe it when they were brought in.” A touch of anguish creeps into the Minicon’s words. “How Megatron pulled it off, I don’t know but there they were, huddling in the corner of that box like trapped turbo foxes. The best of us…caged…urgh.”
“You said something about a ‘mind-pulse’?”
“Yeah. Hmmm…watch this.”

His gun nozzles flare, projecting rays of light. They intersect about level with my chest. An image forms, an elderly looking being. Sonar. I know him without knowing how.
“Hear me Clench. You must free us. I know it will jeopardise your position but if Megatron extracts the secrets we hold, the consequences do not bear imagining. We do not call you to this task alone. Long ago, we planned for our downfall. We created a mech to wield us, to be our protector. He will help you. Bring him to us. I have encoded coordinates into this pulse. Go to them, Find our wielder. Bring him here, Clench. By all that is holy, bring him here and free us.”
The projection fades.
“I see.”
“Good. After they sent that, they combined, locked themselves in sword mode before anyone could stop them. Like that, they’re dangerous but no one can get at their individual minds. Their secrets are safe. Until Shockwave and Soundwave manage to split them up again.”

Glimpses of a single green optic and of a slash of pale purple set into indigo armour.

“They could do that?” I ask, “I mean, it sounds like the Star Sabre is too powerful to be tampered with.”
“It is, or should be. But as you used to know, Decepticons are persistent when it comes to things that give them more power.”
If at first you don’t succeed, I find myself thinking, try, try, try again.
“Why were you in a Decepticon base? You’re a Minicon…were you a prisoner?”
A bitter chuckle comes from the little vehicle, echoed by Oval.
“Y’know,” says the orange mech, “I’m starting to think he really has forgotten who he is.”
“Yeah,” Clench’s voice is soft again. “Yeah, I was a prisoner. I still am.”
“What do you –”

“Shut up!”
He stops abruptly, transforms and presses his audio to the tunnel wall.
“Can you hear that?”
I listen. A rhythmic, pounding noise, very faint but getting closer.
“Oval!” Clench hisses, “You said they weren’t planning anything!”
“Look, I don’t exactly have Prime’s unconditional trust! Anyway, it might be your lot.”
“If it is, someone’s in for it. Megatron’s called a halt to all expansions till he can…”
He trails off. A thin trickle of dust is falling from the roof.
“Oh.”

With a sound like a world splitting in two, the trickle becomes a torrent of broken metal. Something massive plunges into the tunnel, splitting it in two. Reflexively, I shield the others, throwing myself in the debris’ path. It cascades painfully across my back, forcing me to my knees. Through the rumbling I can hear machinery, the pounding noise mixed in with whirring and grinding.

All at once, it’s over. Cautiously, I straighten up, shrugging the wreckage off my shoulders.
“Are the three of you all right?”
The Minicons nod. Or Oval and Clench do. Sideburn still has his arms over his head.
“You saved us.” Oval sounds shocked.
I nod, not sure what to say. Of course I did. Did they think I would abandon the only chance I have of finding out what happened to me?

Turning away, I stare at the object that has smashed its way in. A giant drill, maybe as wide as I am tall, it now completely blocks the tunnel. It is made of faintly lavender hued steel, its teeth chipped with use and its point embedded immovably in the floor.
“I hadn’t realised we were so close to the surface.”
I look down at Clench.
“What is it?”
“Not sure. Could be a Mad Gunner, could be a mobile fortress.”
None of this means anything to me. He picks his way over to the drill.
“Looks like it came down pretty badly. Guess this part must have been weakened just enough to let it through but not give it a chance of surviving the trip. We’ll have to climb up.”
”St-starscream won’t…er heh…”
Sideburn has finally stopped cowering.
“Yeah, how were you planning on getting the guzzler out?” Oval joins us.
“How do you think?” Clench retorts. “Starscream, your blasters working?”
“Um.”

I examine the guns built into my arms, searching for the mental command that charges and fires them. Ah. Focused energy explodes into the floor.
“Youch! My foot!”
“Good. Hop over here and widen this hole.”
At Clench’s bidding, I stagger my way to his side and look up. The break around the intruder is far from clean and I can see a faint glimmer of light past what looks like a long flexible tube. Taking more careful aim, I select a promising gap and fire.

The beams cut through the metal, enlarging the hole a chunk at a time. Molten globs and sparks fall around me but I make sure nothing larger comes down. Eventually, it’s wide enough for me to get through. The Minicons scramble up first, finding purchase where I would never be able.
“You follow us up,” orders Clench, “You’ve not forgotten how to fly have you?”

Forget how to fly? No. That would be impossible. Whatever else I have lost, flight is something I still have. I lift off, glorying in the instant when I break gravity’s hold. It is so right, so natural that I don’t even have to think about it. For an astrosecond or so, I hang there, focusing on what I’m doing, anchoring myself to one certainty: I can fly.

“Can’t you fly? Poor thing. What a shame. Tell me, Thundercracker, Skywarp, what are we to do?”
“We could take the poor slagger for a ride.”
“Yeah. Heh heh. Straight up, straight down and his problems get solved!”
Is that my laughter I hear?

“Screamer! Come on up!”
Another recollection drifts away. I let it go. I’m not sure I want that one.

One pulse to my motors and I rise, leaving the tunnel behind. I pass ruined pipe-work, mangled girders and thick plates of circuitry. And I ascend into hell.

A wasteland of twisted shapes and macabre shadows stretches below me. From here to the horizon there is nothing whole, nothing intact, nothing unsullied by the devastation. I cannot imagine what the landscape must have been like originally. It looks like it was ripped apart, torn to shreds then trampled back down. A few immense rotting hulks that were once towers stand guard, scattered without pattern. Far in the distance, I can see a few spires, clustered together as if for comfort. Most of the plain is flat, burnt, crushed and dead.

I tear my optics from the nightmare, afraid I will become transfixed. Dwarfed though it is by the vast tracts of lifelessness, the drilling machine is still huge to me. A square hub squats low to the ground, four thick tendrils snaking away from the sides. Each ends in a ‘cap’ from which the drills hang. Three of these are pushed into the dirt, the fourth lies on its side, inert. Atop the hub sits a mass of guns and antenna, all mounted on a turntable. It lists to one side, unmoving. Only a few dismal lights separate it from the endless scrap.

I float down to where Oval, Sideburn and Clench are waiting.
“Welcome to the Desolation.”
All trace of sarcasm and suspicion has left Oval’s voice, leaving only sorrow.
“How…?”
“This used to be the main link between Iacon and Cronum. It’s been captured, recaptured and re-recaptured so many times that now there’s nothing left worth fighting over. It’s been abandoned.”
“Then what’s this?”
I point at the machine. Clench answers.
“We call them Mad Gunners. Officially, they’re MAGEs: Mobile Auto-Gun Emplacements. They were part of this place’s defences.”

Oval places a hand on the hub, almost tender.
“They kept getting reprogrammed. When one side captured them, they’d tell them to target the other. It happened so much the AE computers couldn’t cope. They went insane. Some just shut down. Some blew up. Others started firing at everything. Some started wandering, randomly anchoring and de-anchoring until their power cells run out.” He sighs and pulls away. “We’ve got to get moving.”

“Right.” Clench taps his shoulder.
“Where are we going?” I ask.
“That way.” He points to the southeast. “To Coppermount. Better known as the Crimson Castle.”
“We’re walking?”
“We’re going by the hoversled I just called. You’re flying alongside.”

Flying makes it impossible to carry on talking. I follow the grey disk as it skims over the waste and think.

I am Starscream. I am a Decepticon. These are certainties. Or is it that I dare not think anything else? That I can’t afford to deny them lest I lose all grip on the world?

No matter. If I assume I am indeed who they tell me I am, then what do I do now? I’m following Clench’s lead because it will take me to the Star Sabre. What happened to me must be connected to them and I am also certain that that makes them the key to my memories. But… If I am a Decepticon, it cannot be in my interest to actually set the Minicons free. At least, that is the conclusion I reach. Which means at some point I will have to betray Clench and his comrades.

Does their freedom matter? Perhaps it will be enough to touch the sword. Perhaps enough to see it. I so want to find something beautiful and pure in this world of death and loss. Maybe it would be better to keep them for myself…

I remember the oil slick of darkness from my dream. Was that a warning against holding onto the Star Sabre?

Arh! How can I choose my path without knowing where I have walked before? What would I have done before?”

“I’ve done what you asked…”
The little scarlet Minicon is quivering, the wheels on his shoulders going like loud speakers.
“Well done Swindler, very well done!”
He looks up, suddenly hopeful.
“You said you’d let me go if I did it…”
“So I did, so I did.” I touch a stud on my wrist. Swindler looks at me wide opticed then convulses and screams. “But I’ve grown rather fond of you.” I scoop him up. “And what I like, I keep.”

I come back to my senses, reeling once more. Had I been prepared to think of a living being as nothing more than a tool? Revulsion twists my innards. No one should have to suffer under someone else’s will. No one.

Maybe I’m not a Decepticon after all.

We’re still in the midst of the Desolation but the hoversled slows to a halt. Sideburn clambers off while Clench speaks to me.
“We split up here. You’ll have to go with Sideburn while I get Oval in. I’d rather keep and optic on you but I can’t risk being seen with you.”
Oval snorts.
“I still think this is crazy.”
Clench taps his foot.
“Probably. But this just seems too elaborate for a trap.”
“Famous last words.”
“I know. But we’re already rolling down hill. Can’t put the brakes on now. Get going you two.”

With that as an abrupt farewell, the sled zooms off.
“Er heh…”
I look down at Sideburn.
“T-this w-way…”
He starts picking his way forward. I follow, placing my feet cautiously. We make painfully slow progress, my frustration growing steadily with every unsteady step.

As we start up yet another incline, I finally snap.
“Wouldn’t it be better if I carried you and we flew?”
”Er heh…um…we can’t fly…well…y-you c-can’t…”
“Yes I can.”
“N-no…a c-couple of d-d-decacyles ag-g-go, y-you t-t-t-tic-ic…er heh…an-n-noyed M-m-megatron. H-he said y-you weren’t worthy of b-being a D-d-d-d…’con. T-till you c-could p-prove th-that you are…h-he said-d you had-d t-t-to w-walk into b-base.”
“I’m not allowed to fly?”
“N-n-n-n-n…er heh…n-no.”
“That’s…humiliating!” It’s the least of the adjectives that come to mind.
“Th-that’s th-the id-d-d-dea…”

We trudge on.
“I could still carry you.”
He flinches.
“Er heh…I…I d-d-don’t th-th-think that th-th-that’s a g-g-good id-d-d-dea…W-wouldn’t look-ok r-right…er heh…”
His stammer keeps getting worse. I wonder if it’s because he’s alone with me. Swindler swims before my optics.
“It-t-t’s Ok-k-k-kay.” He totters over a nearly intact section of roadway. “W-w-w-w-we’re n-n-n-n-nearly th-th-there…th-the Cr-cr-cr-crim-crim-crimson C-c-c-c-c-c-c-ca-ca-ca-ca-ca-c-c-c-c-c-c…”

I think he’d about to go into meltdown. Sideburn slumps onto the hill, scrabbling at his faceplate. I lean down to help but he shrinks away. He manages to pull a canister from his chest compartment, nearly dropping it in the process. The mask has dropped away, revealing a gasping mouth. He fumbles with the canister, tears the lid off and jerks it to his aperture, pouring in a stream of seething fluid. Gouts of it splash over his armour, hissing and bubbling. At last he stops, shuddering.

“Sideburn…?”
He waves me away and pushes himself back to his feet before sealing the canister and stowing it again. Finally he retrieves his faceplate. With it back in place, he looks up.
“S-sorry…er…er heh. As I was saying, the Crimson Castle is just over this hill.”
“That was tetrahelix energon wasn’t it?”
He turns round.
“Yes…TE…I use it sometimes…to help me focus. Come on.”
I stare Sidebun is no longer cringing, his voice has dropped a least two octaves and he is suddenly moving faster. I wonder how much ‘TE’ he just sucked down.
“Come on!”

We crest the rise a few moments later and I get my first – relatively speaking – view of the Crimson Castle.

It sits at the bottom of a deep crater, rising out of the sea of ruin, three immense towers arranged on the points of an invisible triangle. They rise above the rim on which we are standing. I must have been focusing so much on balance and Sideburn that I had not noticed their peaks. Each of the towers tapers to a knife-blade point, bending inwards as they do, giving the whole thing the look of a pyramid that has been split through the core. It must once have been completely coated in a coppery varnish but even this daunting structure is not unsullied. As the tower rises, the colour dies. The pinnacles are just blackened metal, as pitted and scarred as the world around them.

Getting down to the fortress does not prove very difficult. Staying upright and moving with dignity does. Having skidded, scraped and clattered our way to the base of the nearest spire, we come to a heavily barred service gateway.
“Isn’t it going to be a little odd if I come in by the back door?” I question, “And why can you Minicons get in and out anyway?”
“Er heh…” Sideburn points upwards. “The only other way in is up there and we can’t fly in. M-minicons like me can get in because the D-deceps use us to check the perimeter sensors. Wait a ‘second…” He digs about in the dust and drags out a small cube of circuitry. “I used this to make it look like I was just wandering around the crater looking for faults. No one misses someone like m-me.”
“You, Clench and Oval are slaves?”
“Me and Clench are…er heh…I’m a utility-mech and Clench is…M-megatron’s personal servant…Oval’s a prisoner.”
“Don’t they…we worry about you just walking off?”
He prods his chest panel where there is a slightly raise hexagonal plate marked with a strange symbol.
“These m-make sure we can’t go outside Decepticon territory. You had better g-go in first.”

The gate grates aside revealing a long staircase. Something tells me I ought to be striding ahead and so I do. Halfway up, I get sick of walking and fly the rest of the way. I can fly so I’m damned well going to, Megatron or no Megatron.

At the top is a steel walled landing with three doors leading off in the fortress. I’m slightly embarrassed to realise that I have absolutely no idea where to go next. I’ll have to wait for Sideburn. Fortunately he does not take as long as I had feared. The TE is presumably still keeping him at full power.
“The labs are this way,” he points, “Clench and Oval will meet us there and get us in. Then all we’ll have to do is get you to the Star Sabre.”
“It will be that simple?”
“Clench thinks so.”

I start for the door then stop.
“Where are my quarters?”
“W-what?”
“I presume I have some here? Where are they?”
“Well, yes…th-there that way…but we don’t have time! We have to get to –”
“What do I usually do when I arrive here?”
“Um…er heh…you go to your quarters and clean up after the journey. But –”
“I suppose my arrival will have been detected?”
“Oh…probably…”
“Then we had better make sure no one’s suspicion is aroused.”
Imperiously, I walk off. I do however make sure that Sideburn stays at my side.

We come across a few Decepticons en-route and I make sure that I sweep past as coolly as possible. The quicker I move and the more aloof I am, the less chance there is that anyone will notice that I don’t feel comfortable in this grim, functional place. If only there were statues or carvings or some other form of decoration to break up the monotony of doors and walls it might be bearable…

The door to my quarters is no different from the ones around it. The lights come on as I enter, the base’s computers responding to my energy signature. I stride quite a way into the room before I look around, determined to make it look like I am at home. Then I stare.

Mirrors cover the walls completely. There is not a fraction of surface that is not reflective. Floor, ceiling, right, left, front, back – all I can see is myself replicated to infinity. For a moment I feel like the sight of nothing but me will drive me mad but slowly I calm down. It is in a strange way soothing. And of course there is no chance of anyone creeping up on me…though I’m not certain why anyone would…

The end of the room is dominated by a vast throne-like structure, a machine that looks like its purpose is to clean, recharge and sooth the occupant all at once. Gingerly I sit in it and instantly relax. It’s certainly extremely comfortable. I study the rest of the furnishings, such as they are. A small computer terminal sits roughly in the centre of the room, alongside a rack holding data-disks. Though it’s concealed, I can make out a storage compartment in the right wall. The only other feature is a ledge over the door on which sits a chronometer, fixed it seems at 00:00:00:01. Scant the equipment may be, it is at least rendered in gold and silver, making it infinitely preferable to the world outside of the room.

“Why is the clock stopped?” I wonder aloud and nearly jump when Sideburn answers. I’d completely forgotten that he had followed me to the throne.
“I don’t know. You…St-starscream never discussed his choice of décor.”
“You’ve been in here before?”
“Once. He tried to…er heh…r-recruit me.”

I don’t press. Instead, I stare at the clock and wonder. This room with all the mirrors seems, on the face of it, to have been built by a paranoid self-obsessive. A homicidal, treacherous paranoid self-obsessive. And I am comfortable here. An uncomfortable thought. Starscream must trust only himself, must care only about himself…or rather, he only relies on himself…I stop. Self. That is the important thing here. It is a sense of self that I lack and as such I am a shadow of a mech. What if that was what I, as Starscream, always feared might happen, what if I was terrified of becoming just another cog in a machine, what if all these mirrors were there, not just for practical, paranoid purposes, but to remind me who I am. What then of the clock? Why stop it, why leave it at that point, forever frozen in one instant…in one moment…

Ah. Ah ha.
“St-starscream?” Sideburn coughs nervously.
“Time makes everything possible but only a fool waits. Act before others can act against you. Move fast, think fast. In other words, seize the moment and win the day.”
I get up, suddenly aware that the throne has been quietly removing the grime from my armour. It has been restored to shining silver and maroon, an effect that is most attractive.
“Take me to these ‘labs’, Sideburn. The Star Sabre is waiting.”





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