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lexicorp · 21 days ago

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Transformers Earthspark: Another Place, Another Prison

This marks the end of season 3 episode references, and actually has some direct dialogue, hah. Starscream just wanted to get out of one cage and gets landed into another as we all know how that scene goes. So this chapter shows a bit of leadup to what little we did see and the flavor of unhinged the situation is making him. Bro is erratic af and constantly wanting to act like everything is great and definitely not shit lmao.

Previous Chapter: No Soldier Left Behind

First Chapter: The Need For Read

Next Chapter: Lingering Ghosts

Chapter 3: Judgement Day

Starscream might just have been starting to lose his processor a bit. Maybe. No he wasn’t. He was fine! He could live forever in this corpse and had plenty of time to get out eventually!

Sure, A.M and Sprite still weren’t talking, they definitely weren’t, and that was a drag; but such minor details! Yes the walls seem to be made of some absurdly sturdy rock that laughed at any dent he made. That could be managed with time! He just needed to be patient. Especially with all other Decepticons jumping planet, the Autobots had to come for him soon! The Terrans can operate the door. It’d be easy for them. Then they’d be out. It’ll all come together any time now!

A chaos surge pulsed through the Titan and interrupted Starscream’s scheduled pacing session. His peds were stopped in their tracks as the electricity forced his frame to convulse in place. As the surge dissipated, he stumbled and his wings vibrated with the lingering sparks. Although the energy boost that resulted was invigorating, it made something swim in his processor that gave an addled warning. He ignored it as usual. He couldn’t be bothered with the feeble gripes his frame would give him. It should be grateful it still functioned and leave it at that.

Starscream vented indignantly as he straightened himself and addressed the room, “It is rude to be interruptive, you know.”

“They should call you whiner instead of screamer.”

Starscream flinched at Spitfire’s voice, which sounded not entirely like herself. Because, of course, she wasn’t talking. He knew that. He did! Yet he responded with a flick of his wings and a retort, ��I should call you Spitty instead of Sprite.” He laced his tone with an exuberant amount of snark one might see in a teenager, pointing a digit at her accusingly.

He foolishly found himself waiting a moment for her to give in further to the banter, which she did not. She just sat there with her arms folded disapprovingly as he had propped her to be. This knocked at his spark in a way that made his tank twist.

“Oh the silent treatment again, how mature.” Starscream tipped his helm with a roll of his optics, and drifted in the direction of the two chaos Terrans. “If you are ready to finally online your optics and your vocalizer– instead of just chaos energy transmitted thoughts– then why don’t you just get up already?” He prodded Spitfire’s helm rather forcefully in tandem with the last couple words, which caused her to fall over in defeat, and he scoffed. “Your charade is getting increasingly old, Spitty. You cannot continue to convince me that you are incapable of functioning, as you ping my communicator with nonsense.” Starscream shook the little drone’s frame, then picked her up to squint at her faceplate. She could be conscious while in stasis, he supposed. The voice he heard had to have come from somewhere, and perhaps with the surges of energy through the Titan, she was able to send a signal to him. Although she used those moments for extremely petty means. Yet then why couldn’t he induce a connection directly by infusing her chassis with the power? Not that he had tried that…

Starscream pulled his optics away from Sprite’s and made certain to control his frustration as he placed her down against Aftermath again. She was the brains of the two kids, so of course she would tap into some special ability or whatever this was while A.M. hadn’t. That could make sense. The theory about the chaos energy linking them is perfectly viable. Even if tests performed to prove it hadn’t exactly yielded consistent results, it was still the only explanation he would accept. He wasn’t crazy.

“Fine…” Starscream ex-vented in defeat at her continued unresponsiveness and circled the table. “Well, even if you insist on carrying on with this game, I intend on orchestrating something with more reliable results. I am sure we all have been having great fun with our little plays I've directed thus far! So, how about another? It is not like you two have much of a choice if you don’t want to move–” He tried in vain to perhaps bait them out of their catatonic state– “Oh well!” Alas, yet again, no movement. They were clearly absolutely ecstatic to take part in his newest adventure! Well, more like a continued fantasy.

Starscream proceeded to collect his assortment of makeshift props he had constructed over the past… however many cycles it’d been. He’d created artifacts, datapads, his crown, cups, energon cubes, some figurines of a select few characters; an assortment of things to add to a scene. His favorite was his crown, of course, although it wasn’t nearly as illustrious as he would prefer it. There is only so much a mech could do with rock, scraps of metal, and meager organic material.

Starscream’s favorite story to tell was pre-war, what led to its start, and how perfectly everything could have gone differently. He loved to play out and regale the terrans of his days in the High Guard, the scientific community, his trine. A bit more intriguingly, about Megatron before he showed himself as the slagger he is, or the history around the counsel of Primes. Recounting such topics would occasionally lead to unwelcomed reactions from his processor, but they were still entertaining. More particularly when he bent history to his whim, actually. Reality could often be overrated, after all.

For instance, a fabulous divergence into a realm where Starscream himself had rallied the Decepticon cause, and Megatron never existed. He began his tale with a grandiose speech about the struggles presented by the caste system and how Cybertron’s current leadership was corrupt and outdated. Sprite was given Thundercracker’s roll and Aftermath Skywarp’s. He would occasionally have them back him up as perfect little supporting characters, aside from a couple moments of Thundercracker questioning his approach, but that was typical. Skywarp was wholly on board with purging the Primes from their positions and instating themselves in their place. Of course, Starscream would be Cybertron’s Emperor, but Skywarp and Thundercracker were given plenty of power of their own by his side! So they had no further complaints in his world. Everyone loved him and listened to everything he had to say with the utmost interest and consideration!

The Titan shook rudely in the middle of a rather important scene, which caused Starscream to yelp and bark at it to stop, calling out to whatever was causing it. He stomped over to the optic window, and scanned what surroundings he could, eventually casting his gaze to the sky. Oh. The Quintessons were here.

“THE QUINTESSONS ARE HERE?!” Starscream exclaimed vocally in a far less calm manner as he jumped back from the glass. Fear tugged at his spark as he tried to comprehend why those galactic menaces had stationed ships over his head. “I… I do suppose Quintus’ most significant relic was unearthed on this planet and subsequently exploded at this location…” He began to pace. The Quintessons were rather obsessed with Quintus as well, so of course they would have kept their sensors alert to any signs of their Prime’s power. “Ah… that is not going to be good.” Starscream decided as his peds locked in place.

He glanced out at the growing chaos outside. Could he use it to his advantage? Did they know he was here? He hoped they wouldn’t decide to just nuke the Titan with him inside. What were they doing? Were they going to destroy the other Terrans? Were they going to try and collect the shattered sparks of the Emberstone? What would the Autobots do? They wouldn’t care unless it were a danger to their interests. Are they down there? Would they enter the Titan to elicit his assistance? What could all of this entail?!

The crimson lightning littering the Titan shuttered up his frame and his wings shook. His optics flickering from red to blue rapidly.

He couldn’t do anything.

He was stuck. Powerless. Left at the whim of his enemies.

Starscream abruptly in-vented and whipped around back to face Spitfire and Aftermath at their table. “Never mind that!” He laughed and ushered their cups back into their servos, since they kept dropping them. “With me as your Emperor, I can assure you that everything is absolutely fine and under control!! Nothing at all to worry about! Now–” He retrieved the energon extractor spear as his own prop as a show of his power– “Back to what’s actually important: delegating duties and all of you reminding me how awesome I am!”

“You are a pathetic excuse of a leader.” Spitfire’s echoed communication told him.

Starscream’s optic twitched and they flashed red as he quickly bit back in a disdainfully sing-song voice, “Wrong line Thundercracker!! What you meant to say was: Oh Starscream, you are so wise and perfect and always know what to do! How could we ever manage without you!”

“Tch. You’re delusional.”

Starscream’s wings vibrated with the chaotic energy and his vents quickened, his grip tightening on the spear, then yelled “I AM NO SUCH THING AND YOU WILL CEASE THIS INSUBORDINATION!” Suddenly, he was right in Spitfire’s face and aiming the weapon at her threateningly. He blinked rapidly as his vision shifted from blue to red. He stared at her dead face. At his shaking servo ready to carve out her spark. Over two sentences. He had told Megatron the exact same things many times. What was he doing?

Starscream’s optics realigned and he pulled away from the table. He cleared his throat, “Moving on…” and pulled up a grin to his faceplate to reassume his role. They both had their own little outbursts. It didn’t matter.

Not long later, they were interrupted from their imaginary energon tea when the door opened. The door– it was open! Starscream had jumped with a yelp so intense that his crown clattered to the ground, but he didn’t care about that anymore. He had visitors!! He could be getting out of this Primus forsaken place! He didn’t care who it was. Prime? The bug– Hashtag! Oh maybe he could negotiate with them!

“Welcome, welcome! Lovely to see you all!” Starscream greeted emphatically with a slight bow to the newcomers. The bug’s first response was to point a gun at him, and dismiss his presence for some apparently more important conversation with the bot Prowl. He would be offended if his nerves weren’t through the roof, like where he’d like to be right now. He quickly put his servos up placatingly and couldn’t help the scared noises that escaped his vocalizer.

Starscream couldn’t care less what the bug was rambling about, but it sure sounded like some inspiring Autobot slag. He inched closer to Hashtag’s side with the spear held up to his chassis in an attempt to look non-threatening. “Perhaps I should wait outside…” He tried desperately. Given their disinterest, why should they care if he saw himself out? The door was right there… left completely open. Taunting him. But the little orange dinobot bit his leg and drug him swiftly away, “D-augh!” This caused him to lose his grip on the spear which landed in Hashtag's servos. That’d be fine! He could absolutely convince her of the value an alliance with him could be!

As the bug came to the end of his speech, Starscream tried rapidly clapping with a show of enthusiasm for whatever he’d just spouted out. He’d hoped it would show some sort of goodwill and support, but it just got the bot’s aggressive energy directed towards him with a blaster again. He vented anxiously as he tried to show he meant no harm. Evidently, the mechs continued on with their conversation again, leaving him to swat at the slagging dinobot sparkling that insisted on nipping at his peds.

Starscream’s attention was caught however when he heard reference to him within their string of words. Prime wanted to send him to a brig? Wait wait– no! That wasn’t how this was supposed to go!

He whimpered as Prowl approached and tried to back away. “B-but you need me! The quintessons are notoriously vicious- for the small price of freedom I’m willing to freelance for the autobots an– AAAHAHOW!” A sharp jab stabbed through his back and shot violent electricity through his frame. This time the energy wasn’t intent on aiding his energon reserves but instead weaponizing it. Ah right. The spear.

The world went dark as he fell heavily to the ground.

When his optics finally onlined again, he was alone. His processor and spark ached. Pit, everything did. Where was he? The Titan? It was quiet…

Starscream groaned with a servo to his helm as he pulled himself off the floor. Then when he looked up to survey the room, he froze.

He was back in G.H.O.S.T.’s Pit. Scrap.

#Starscream #earthspark starscream #transformers earthspark #transformers #Earthspark #fanfic #tf fanfic #season 3 final #next chapters are gonna be more him actually interacting with someone other than himself #the struggler #hurt not much comfort #We'll get there hopefully #another place another prison

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