#Optimus and Soundwave are haunted by what was; Rodimus is haunted by what could have been

[cluescorner]

Optimus, melancholic: It never could have worked. We were too different in the end. Our goals were aligned, but the methods we chose were far too different: reforming the system vs tearing everything down. We have both changed, frequently for the worst, though I'm happy that he was eventually able to reclaim a bit of the peacefulness that he used to hold in his spark. But we can't be what we were and there is no path for us moving forward. The love was there and I'll always appreciate us for what we were.

Soundwave, bitter: It never could have worked. I was so loyal to him that I would have died at his command, and the only thing he ever felt loyalty towards was the cause. Not that it was surprising, I knew what I was getting into. I was fine with his devotion to his ideals. I admired it, even. But then he went and threw it all away with that speech. The love was there, but it was for a bot that's long gone.

Rodimus, anguished: It could have worked. Frag it all, it could have worked.

[desdemonafictional]

A list of mechanisms whom Megatron has loved:

Crunch, a shift supervisor in shaft 1-b who taught Megatron what it meant to live in the dark, how to sing drinking songs, how to sleep on a healing weld, and how to say goodbye (but not how to mean it)

Impactor, a friend who was too bullheaded to watch his own back, let alone Megatron’s; who, nonetheless, always insisted that he would, until the day he could not

Terminus, who taught him to let go—and then, very admirably, furnished his first practical demonstration in the art

Optimus Prime, who saved his life, although Megatron would not love him until well after Optimus had tried his best to undo that mistake

Gladiatorial Participant of bout 736 cycle 340, Grune, who walked into the arena like one who had seen the steps up to their own waiting guillotine and had decided to wink saucily at the executioner, for, indeed, what else now could be done to him?

Soundwave, who always knew better than to draw too close, or presume too much; who therefore was safe to love, and more importantly, to trust—and Megatron, for all his hubris, understood at least that everyone must trust someone, so you had better make the decision with care

Starscream, who was so many things; bitter, petty, brilliant, jealous, insatiable; Starscream, foremost of all his enemies and dissidents; Starscream, who was the easiest of them all to manipulate, because he cared so much, because he cared so much for Megatron’s regard be it good or ill; Starscream, whose hatred made Megatron feel more God than mech, elevated and electric and invincible—and whose testimony, at the 11th hour, had for the first time in 4 million bloody glorious years made Megatron at last feel small and absurd

Minimus Ambus, who expected so little, and yet was so often disappointed; who was so easy to please with so little effort, and yet who would not have been moved with all the riches or treasures or conquests of the cosmos; Minimus, all right angles in a garbled, tangled world

Rodimus Prime, who lied for him, even after everything; a hot coal star burning in a secret pocket of his armor plating; careless and vain and haunted, lover of losers and misfits, patron saint of the lost and lonely

Was there someone else? He is sure there was someone else. It will come back to him, one moment.

A list of mechanisms that Megatron should have loved, but did not:

This list is long, 5 million years long, a graveyard of blue sparks beneath a mirrored sky; an army of splintered spark cases; today, it has been truncated for brevity to three most dire names

Damus, Glitch, Tarn