Memoirs of the Silver Hawk

Back to the Stars (On Hiatus)

2007-11-04T20:53:55Z

OOC note: These characters are on hiatus for the indefinite future. See my LJ for details

"I think," Starscream told Skyfire, "the twins will be all right. I've taught Strata and Photon everything I know--the rest is practice, and I taught them how to that, too. Photon has overcome that little bit of hesitation, and Strata isn't playing over-protective leader to Photon anymore--she's letting her sister carry her share of the combat."

"Leaving that responsibility behind was worrying you," Skyfire observed as he packed scientific instruments away in a cargo crate.

"Of course! Especially if the Quintessons are poking around Earth. Rodimus will just have to handle the Quint threat on his own; I understand he's done it before," Starscream said drily. "Back to Deneb, then?"

"Beyond Deneb," Skyfire replied. "Gvurrdon Sector."

"Fewer human pirates."

"More Vargr corsairs."

Starscream chuckled. "It'll keep me occupied, covering your aft."

"What else are partners for?" Skyfire replied with a smile.

"Ask me that after we've cleared the Solar system and have a little privacy, and I'll demonstrate."

Deep under the sea...

2007-09-08T16:48:39Z

Deep under the sea, the Decepticon underwater base, Terradessa-1, waits quietly for whoever may arrive. Decades ago, it bustled with a full complement of Decepticons, preparing the way for Megatron's conquest of Cybertron and Earth and anything else in reach. Now it's almost empty; only a few inhabitants linger on--those in charge of the mothballed base, and those refugees who've slipped through the cracks of time and duty--or are just plain AWOL--but refuse to dwell in any Autobot base, truce or no truce. Those who dwell here, living or dead, are all Decepticons.

It's not totally quiet; the place is two decades old, and the resting place of mechs far, far older than that. The hull creaks and groans at the shifting tides above subtly change pressures, or distant seaquakes shiver the foundations. Elusive scurrying and scuttling noises sometimes sound just behind the walls. Somehow, in spite of seals and doors, the sea's humidity gets in, and the chill of the ocean depths condenses it into beaded drops on the portholes, or a fine mist in the air at times. Cybertronian alloys don't rust, but in the everpresent dim lighting and moisture, things grow in the cracks and corners.

There's a portal from the Nexus that opens into an empty length of corridor, not too many levels from what was once the Constructicons' lab and repair hangar. An empty wall shimmers and twists as the portal opens...

Fire at the Sanctuary

2007-06-26T01:49:41Z

Skyfire steps carefully through the Nexus portal and finds himself on the short path to the Temple of Primus on that other Cybertron. He's exactly where he planned to be, which can be a matter of luck with Nexus portals. Now, is he when he planned to be?

He walks down the path to the simple gray building that is the sanctuary of Auspex, Priestess of Primus. Skyfire stops to read the inscription on the lintel.

"And so I enter," he says, and steps within, looking for Auspex.

Portal crashing

2007-06-12T02:17:13Z

(( cf. here. Starscream is still LOL'd. ))

Starscream dives through the yawning archway, not caring where it leads, except OUT of this nightmare! Skyfire hasn't caught him yet, and now, won't, if Starscream has managed to shake him.

A flash of darkness, and Starscream pulls up abruptly in his headlong flight, just short of plowing face-first into a metal wall. Fortunately that he had transformed before hitting that archway--his F-15 form would have been a half-mile through the far side of that wall--or rather, plastered across it in tiny bits--before he could have reacted. Riveted metal plates, scaly with oxidation--very Cybertronian, Starscream thinks as he looks at them from about six feet away.

He backs away and settles to the floor with a clang that startles him. It's silent here--or was until the Air Commander intruded. Where is he? Some sort of tunnel... underneath Cybertron. The gravity feels right, and there's that subtle buzz of energy in the air, all the electrical fields and myriad communications chatter going on in the background that's so familiar. Starscream is home.

The red and blue Seeker looks around; there's some dim lighting up ahead. A row of plinth lines each side of the tunnel. Starscream ignores them and heads toward the light.

The tunnel leads to an intersection of tunnels, a rotunda well lit by flickering energon crystals. Motionless figures of metal and ceramic loom over Starscream; suddenly, he knows where he is.

This is the Decepticon Crypt, the place of rest and propitiation for those dead so respected or feared that the living still walked carefully around even their memories. Starscream represses a shudder; he's the Air Commander of the Decepticons, second only to Megatron himself--and that not for much longer! What does he fear of the corroded, forgotten dead?

Still, he finds his steps drawn toward that one certain niche--the one with his own shrine so carefully prepared. Not that he'll need it for a few million years, but it still exerts a certain irresistible fascination.

Aftermath

2007-05-22T21:13:51Z

(( cf. here ))

Starscream accepts the offer of another room in the temple sanctuary, and some energon without a word beyond simple thanks. No sarcasm or face-saving remarks--he's simply too weary in mind and spirit. He holds himself still until Auspex leaves the room.

Starscream knew the price, when he opened himself up to the Allspark, and called his Air Command to Blackstar's aid. He knew the price--but he still had to pay it, and is still paying it. The ache is in his spark--the terrible anguish of separation, of loneliness, of being shut out of that glorious company once again. In his spark, yes, but so intense that it pervades his body as physical pain and weariness.

"Sky..." he says, and his wings begin to shake uncontrollably.

Skyfire gathers him up in his arms and holds him....

Midnight Excursion

2007-04-10T20:52:15Z

Skyfire was on the final approach to Autobot City, on his way back from the Decepticon Underwater Base, when Starcream called him.

// Sky--unless you have something just critically important to get back to, abort that approach and meet me upstairs. //

// Starscream? Y-yes, of course, // Skyfire replied, startled by the unexpected message. 'Meet me upstairs'... That meant something, a long time ago. It meant 'I'm done planet-side, head for orbit and let me board'.

Skyfire sent a hurried abort message to Autobot City Flight Control and pulled up, heading for the sky.

Of Base Flora and Fauna

2007-03-19T18:57:25Z

As he flew over the ocean, Skyfire contemplated the little 'errand' Starscream had asked him to undertake. One, Starscream had talked him out of Autobot City while Starscream stayed behind--after a lengthy conversation with the Autobot Security Chief. Ulterior motive, or happenstance? Either one was possible. Red Alert had never quite trusted Skyfire because of his connection to Starscream, and the former Decepticon Air Commander was certainly at the top of Red Alert's long list of "People NOT to be Trusted Anytime, Anywhere".

So why did Starscream want Skyfire out of the way? Hmmm. Starscream was much too cheerful for a 'conversation' with a (former) enemy security honcho, too. Hmmmmmm. How many pieces was Skyfire going to have to pick up when he got back?

Second, Skyfire thought as he circled over the coordinates he'd been given, Starscream had asked him to meet surreptiously someone who 'wasn't supposed to be there' at the Decepticon Base. And given him full access to Starscream's old facilities, possessions and records. Very hmmmmm.

Skyfire hoped he wasn't going to have to have words with Starscream again.

// Decepticon Base, this is Skyfire, awaiting permission and entrance. //

I love it when a design comes together!

2007-02-15T14:25:04Z

A sense of time running out nags at Starscream; "To the Pit with it!" he snarls to himself, and ignites his afterburners. He arrives considerably ahead of his original ETA.

Touching down at Autobot City, Starscream is still amused at just being 'waved in' by Metroplex, though the irony is less bitter now. I'm not even doing this for the sake of my fellow Decepticons or Rodimus Prime anymore; they went and got themselves fixed. I'm doing this because Skyfire and Ratchet asked me to. To help Autobots who were either my enemies or I don't even know. And yet... I don't mind. I rather like the challenge.

What's happened to me?

Starscream finds his way to MedBay--the route is getting quite familiar, and lets himself in. Sorry, Ratchet, you're not good enough to keep your codes from me, and you didn't change them each time. Much to his surprise, the Medbay is virtually deserted.

He finally notices Skyfire quietly keeping watch in Jetstorm's IsoWard, holding the recharging jet and Auspex. Gentle blue optics look serenely into Starscream's.

// Shhh, don't disturb them. Jetstorm was in a bad way, and Auspex is way overdue for recharge. I think I badgered her into it as a way to comfort Jetstorm, // radios Skyfire.

Starscream smiles. If Auspex were awake, she might sense his triumphant satisfaction, and a certain calm acceptance underneath--if she could sense it past the deep, fierce love for Skyfire.

// Rest yourself, Sky. I'll keep watch; I've got it figured out now, it was in my old files in the lab, and I'll be working here. Recharge; you've been busy. // As he heads for his console and starts re-arranging the panels to suit him, he glances at Skyfire again.

// I'm glad you didn't stay with the Decepticons for my sake. //

Tales of the Crypt

2007-02-06T19:11:29Z

The highest point of Autobot City is the communications tower; outside that tower, there's a catwalk for maintenance access to the antenna. Skyfire lands on that catwalk; from here, he can see the stars clearly, without the city lights interfering. The night is crisp and clear; the polar storm has passed away, leaving the stars as bright as diamonds.

He can also see all that passes below, on balconies and heliports and rooftops. Skyfire watches, his own lights dark, his outline indistinct against the larger tower as Starscream stalks out onto a rooftop below, his feet ringing metallically against the armored surface. At the edge of the rooftop, Starscream waits, looking up at the stars, turning his head from time to time to glance at the entrance he used.

To Rest on Denali

2007-01-29T07:08:07Z

Though it's Skyfire who has the coordinates, it's Starscream who finds the battle site first. Every ridge that he struggled over, every river that he stumbled across on frozen ice is engraved in his mind. He knows where reality came apart and two beings that could not die struggled to the death.

// Here, Sky. // Starscream hovers and points at an ice-covered shard of wing sticking up out of the snow.

Skyfire turns his thrusters on the ice and snow; the heat of them quickly turns the area into a boggy, blackened waste covered with scorched parts of Starscream. Of the beast, there is no trace.

Starscream finally touches down and begins to gather up the shreds of his former body. He works in silence until the last of it is packed away in that box in Skyfire's hold.

"Where now?" Skyfire finally asks.

"Denali."

Flight tests

2007-01-27T15:33:08Z

Satisfied now that all his guns work, Starscream quits the firing range in the back of Wheeljack's former lab and moves quickly through Autobot City's halls to the outside. Once again, he can't help but reflect on the irony of now moving freely through the very place they'd once fought so bitterly to take, one brutal meter at a time.

I wonder if humans have the same sense of irony? What does an American veteran think when he tours the beaches of Normandy?

He smirks in amusement at the double-takes from the occasional Bot or human in the halls. His audials can just pick up the occasional exclamation: "Hey, was that--? Nah, couldn't be!" Oh yes, the irony is rich indeed.

Outside, and he transforms for the first time in his new form. Cockpit and nose unfold from his torso, wings reverse, legs become engines and tail--and a red, silver and blue F-22 idles on the landing pad, compressors turning over slowly. He sets brakes and starts with the static engine tests.

After ruining the eardrums of any flesh creature within two hundred yards, he's ready to fly. Lifters, check. Engines, check. Flight controls and avionics, check. Lifters engaged, he rises into the air--and opens the throttle.

Starscream flies again!

Rescue Rangers, Ho!

2007-01-16T22:36:36Z

By the time everyone gets rounded up, equipped and ready to go, Skyfire has a destination on the coast of British Columbia. Further north, snow and cold in winter is expected, and not a catastrophe, though the raging winds keep everyone inside. But north of Vancouver, the ice and snow and chill aren't usual for this time of year. Not this much, anyway.

Skyfire sits on the landing pad in shuttle mode, waiting for everyone to come aboard.

// Strata, Jetstorm: save your fuel for when you'll need it later. Come aboard. //

Denali Mountain High

2007-01-12T20:10:48Z

Again, he's turned loose from Ratchet's MedBay--why is that place starting to feel as much a prison as the old Undersea Base? Speaking of which, he really ought to go over there and see what needs setting to rights.

Air Commander is in my soul. I can't seem to let it go. Starscream transforms and flies north. Not for him the fire and ice of Crater Lake--nor, this time, the canyons. Now is a moment for the high places.

At supersonic speeds he flies along the coast, high above the fjords and inlets of British Columbia, the Yukon, and southern-eastern Alaska. Sometimes the mountain clouds hang heavily over the inlets, blanketing them in impenetrable fog. Starscream isn't aiming for those misty harbors. His goal lies much higher, on the western spine of the continent.

Denali, the Great One, highest mountain in North America. Starscream perches on its icy, wind-swept summit, regarding with fresh optics the pristine wasteland of ice and snow and rock--and the blue, blue sky above, and the vast, distant land beyond this peak.

He's switched to space protocols; the chill here would freeze the energon in his fuel-lines otherwise. It's a place to be alone, undisturbed--

So why is a gigantic wolf loping across the snowfields toward him?

It leaves no tracks in the snow, and is far larger than any natural wolf--waist-high on the solitary Seeker. It stops in front of him and sits on its haunches, tongue lolling, watching him brightly with one blue eye and one hazel eye.

"Is there some reason you're up here bothering me?" Starscream asks.

"You looked like you needed company," the wolf answers.

"Funny, I thought I came out here to be alone." Starscream's tone is only mildly annoyed.

"Nah, that's just what you tell yourself when you know you can't get any decent company." The wolf begins to lick its paws clean.

"Just how many of the voices in my head were you lot, anyway?" Starscream asks, his tone curious.

The wolf grins. "Just the ones that told you to do sensible things." He cocks his head slightly; one ear flops forward. "Seriously--and I'm never serious--how many ancient graves and sacred mounds did you pillage looking for power sources?"

"Let's not go there!" Starscream said abruptly.

"Ooh, touchy are we? Something about your own grave being desecrated and invaded--and that waking you up?" The wolf tilts his head the other way.

"That's irrelevant to right now! I'm here, aren't I? And why are you an organic wolf? The first time you showed up, you looked like Carnivac's drunken twin!" Starscream snaps.

The spirit-wolf laughs. "You don't need the illusion now."

"Now that I'm dead, you mean?" Starscream asks.

"Now that you can see us clearly," the wolf replied. "That you died first--eh, sucks to be you."

"I've always loved your cheerful and sympathetic nature, yes."

The wolf grins again. "Well, one out of two ain't bad. Seriously, you really got to stop clinging. It's holding you back, messing you up. You're no fun when you won't throw the dice."

"Oh forgive me for not keeping you entertained! Just replay your memories of me shooting Megatron in the back at his last staff meeting if you need a laugh!" Starscream flexes his wings in irritation.

"Hey, I only suggested that idea! I didn't make you do it. You got to admit, those meetings were killers! I think they were putting the blue tape guy to sleep, and he's the chief of dullards." The wolf rolled over in the snow, again leaving no prints.

Starscream sits on the peak and looks sidelong at the spirit-wolf. "It's too hard to let go. I was Air Commander for so long, and I was good at it, and they need me!"

"No, they don't. If they really, truly needed you as Air Commander, you'd be still-very-much-alive Air Commander Starscream--and by now, probably twice as mean as you were." The wolf rolls in the snow on his back and waggles his feet in the air.

There's a long silence as Starscream looks at him. "You look ridiculous. If not as Air Commander, what, then?"

"Of course I do! Um, as who you really are now? Pocky-on-a-stick, you don't need me to tell you that!" The wolf rolls back over and gets to its feet, shaking snow out of its fur.

"Maybe I'm up here trying to figure out who that is."

The wolf snorts. "What, you got a flat learning curve all of a sudden? I taught you enough!"

Starscream smirks. "Enough to trick Unicron at any rate!" He stands up and grins wickedly at the spectral wolf, optics shifting from Decepticon crimson to hazel green.

"Now that's more like it!" The wolf sits back on his haunches. "You got the medicine, you know how to dance the dance--think you can deal with Galvatron and his two corbies?"

"Two corbies?" Starscream looks sharply at the wolf. "I'd never thought of Cyclonus and Scourge that way, but--" He frowns, slightly puzzled.

The wolf rolls in the snow, laughing. "You don't know the Gallows-Reaper and his Ravens when you meet him? Oh man, you really need to get it together, Screamer!" He picks himself out of the snow. "Or brush up on local mythology, anyway--the archetypes are universal, but I use local referents. I'm a local kind of guy."

"For someone so local, you certainly get around. I could have sworn I first talked to you on Monacus." Starscream's optics shift back to crimson.

"Hey, Monacus is a grrreat place! My kind of place--hehehe! Course they really hate what I do with the games." The wolf chuckles.

Starscream grins again, his optics turning hazel again. "They would."

The wolf resumes cleaning his paws. "Just remember, you, me--our type ain't so good at ruling and running things. When we do, we screw things to a fare-thee-well and back. Every fucking time!" He giggles.

"I can't just ignore it when the Warlord or whoever ruins everything for us! I'm supposed to just step aside and say 'Oh well! Didn't need those Decepticons or that future anyway'?" Starscream's optics are red again.

The wolf rolls his eyes. "Learning curve: flat, flat, flat! Be true to your nature--like you were at Charr. Keep 'em from getting complacent. Keep faith with your friends, annoy your enemies, keep it from getting dull!" The wolf trots alongside as Starscream paces on the mountaintop. "Sheesh, I gotta tell you this? What, Galvatron fry your brains along with the rest of you?"

Starscream stops abruptly. "Well, yes."

"Oh, right, guess he did. I still shouldn't have to tell you this stuff. You know who you are--you're just letting yourself get distracted by the past. You know that." The wolf's voice is reproachful.

"Don't try to tell me Skyfire is the past!" Starscream glares at the wolf-spirit, his eyes flaring ruby red.

"Hey, no way am I going to do that! He's one of the friends you keep the faith with, 'cause he'll haul your ass out of your own fuck-ups." The wolf wags his tail as he trots along.

Starscream laughs, his optics turning hazel-green again. "Your optimism is appreciated! I danced with Unicron, what makes you think I'll fuck it up again?"

The wolf dives betwixt and round Starscream's legs, snapping at snowflakes blown by the wind. "Underbase. The Combaticons. Warworld--uh, ask around the Nexus about that one! A certain interrupted coronation--I mean, Starscream, you fuck up in classic trickster style! You overreach, drop the dice and get handed your head on a platter--or you pull off the most awesome screw jobs with grace and style!"

Starscream laughs, and it's a joyous laugh this time as the wind blows fierce and cold across Denali.

Unicron isn't the only Chaos-Bringer.

Duty is heavier than a mountain.

2006-12-22T15:51:25Z

High above Autobot City, Skyfire and Starscream stand, looking out at the countryside. Or rather, Skyfire does; Starscream is looking inward at something only he can see. They're taking a break from the reconstruction of "The Machine".

The red and silver Seeker looks out at the far horizon, but it's not the mountains he's seeing. Skyfire stands close to him, a very large white and blue, winged, mech.

"What is it, Starscream? You've been angry and beaten down in a way I haven't seen in months, ever since that private comm you got in the Medbay," asks Skyfire.

Blue hands tighten on the railing of the lookout, and Starscream sighs; his jet turbines whine softly.

"That was Onslaught. He's such a small-minded fool--can't think beyond his own little unit, and can't set aside his old grudges for the sake of the Decepticons as a whole. Do we all have to die first to learn to set aside our fool egos?"

Skyfire frowned. "Is he a danger to us, here?"

Starscream's wings twitched slightly. "I don't think so. He'll probably hole up in his base, terrified that I'll try to take it away from him. Like I have any use for his base! It's him and his team I'd like to have, but I can work around him. No..."

The smaller jet turns to face his friend, his lover, his partner. "I'm so tired of this, Sky. Nine million years and one lifetime should have been enough, but I look around, and there's no one else! There never were than many to begin with; strategic command seems to be a rare talent among Transformers. Another thing I envy humans--people who can see the big picture, plan for it, and get hundreds and thousands of humans all moving toward a goal seem to litter the ground of this planet!"

"Starscream... someday you are going to have to let someone else handle it." The only sign of Skyfire's deep concern was the gentle hand he rested on one red air intake.

"Who? Megatron is gone. Soundwave needs someone above him to tell him what should be done--he can lead groups of us, but he can't figure out direction by himself. Onslaught, Scrapper, Motormaster, Razorclaw--none of them can see beyond their own small groups. Cyclonus could lead very well, but he won't so long as Galvatron lives. Astrotrain, in his own megalomaniac god-delusional way, can lead, and can sometimes set goals, even--but where is he? Octane can organize things well, and take the long view, but he's never been any good at making our more idiotic troops fear him. I can see the big picture, I can organize it, I can terrorize the difficult cases, I can manipulate individuals into doing what I want--but I'm no good at getting people to like me, to be willing to follow me the way they did Megatron. Primus help us, Galvatron is the best leader we have, and his 'big picture' doesn't always belong to the same universe as ours!"

Skyfire could feel how much it cost Starscream to say that. "Then... ?"

"...why not just finish our task here and leave it to him when he returns? Because I need to know, Sky. I need to know that he knows what Decepticons are for, and that he values them as much as I do. If he does, I'll leave it all in his and Rodimus Prime's hands." He stops there, hesitant.

"And if he doesn't?"

"If Galvatron believes the Decepticons are his personal playthings to be tossed away when he gets bored, the way he thinks his Unicron-forged companions are... I will kill him and drag him back to the Allspark with me. Let Cyclonus take over after that; he'll do a good job."

The only sign of Skyfire's feelings was the railing crumpling between his hands. "Starscream... please. Just let it go."

"I can't, Sky--any more than you could just 'let it go' when I was going to kill the humans. I can't sit by and watch someone screw up everything for my people when I would have done and can do a better job of it!" Starscream looks out at the distant horizon again.

"They all know I have an insatiable desire to rule, but they never understood why."

Other RP activities...

2006-12-14T03:02:06Z

Tosses his 2 cents in on Pyro Black

What is going on out there?

2006-11-25T00:57:49Z

Starscream looked around at the tarmac of what passed for a starport on Zyra.

"Skyfire, this place is a dump! Cybertron looked better than this during the Great Shutdown! Are you sure they have any kind of long-range commo? Do they even have energon here?" The smaller jet waved his hands at the ramshackle sheet-metal buildings and weather-stained concrete control tower.

The immense white spaceship transformer named Skyfire looked down at the red and silver Decepticon. "Looks can be deceiving," Skyfire noted mildly. "You didn't travel much while you were Megatron's Air Commander, did you?"

Starscream looked away at the hazy blue sky. "No."

"Zyra doesn't have much worth exporting, so their port doesn't get much attention. It's modern enough for our purposes--it has energon, though not high-grade, and the usual hyperwave facilities." Skyfire pointed one big white hand at the control tower.

Starsceam frowned. "Fine, fine. Now I just need to figure out who to call to get a straight answer from. And what to ask them." He walked toward the control tower; Skyfire followed.

Skyfire looked at Starscream with a fondly exasperated expression. "I still don't know just what you're going on about. All you've told me is that you think Galvatron is dead, but you won't go into details."

"I don't have the details," Starscream said, looking pensive. "He was angry at someone threatening an ally of his, and he was dead. I don't know anything more than that. Who does Galvatron count as an ally? Galvatron doesn't have allies; he has cringing followers!"

Skyfire hesitated as Starscream opened the door. "The Autobots might know something--especially if they had something to do with Galvatron's death."

Starscream looked up sharply at the bigger mech. "Not that I could ask them. But..."

"...I could." Skyfire smiled. "I think a few people at Autobot City still know who I am."

(( Continued somewhere else. Maybe ))