Exiles (32 page)

Axer, edging closer to Megatron, said, “I of course will not be surprised at the munificence of your reward.”

Megatron knocked him sprawling with a casual backhand. “Indirect flattery is the worst kind,” he said. Looking at Starscream as the two of them walked back toward the
Nemesis
, he said, “Remember that.”

“I always knew,” Starscream said. “When was the last time I flattered you indirectly?”

Megatron was thinking that it was best to keep your rivals and enemies close, the better to extinguish them when the time came. That time was not yet near for Starscream, but Megatron thought that he could see it coming.

What would he lose with the potential death of Starscream? A highly skilled fighter, a popular leader, and an enormous headache. It was a difficult problem. Sometimes one aspect of Starscream’s existence seemed to outweigh the other, but most of the time the Seeker was maddeningly close to the perfect balance of asset and hindrance. Often Megatron considered it surprising that he had not killed Starscream megacycles before. At other
times he was satisfied to have Starscream still available to execute his difficult tasks with his signature skill and aplomb, with the one blot on this otherwise stellar record, in Megatron’s mind, being Starscream’s failure to ground the Autobot Jetfire during the battle at Tyger Pax. This chase wouldn’t have been necessary if Starscream and the other Seekers had not been outmaneuvered by a single ragged Autobot flier.

The urge again rose in Megatron to end Starscream’s existence once and for all. He controlled it. Once the librarian was caught and the Autobot problem solved, that would be the time to make some final decisions about Starscream. But until then, Megatron could let the delusional Seeker think he was inching ever closer to a takeover of the Decepticons for himself. This, of course, was what Starscream wanted. But his desire to lead the Decepticons also played into Megatron’s hands. Nothing kept a leader sharp like an ambitious lieutenant.

“Thanks to Axer, we have what we need to gain possession of the Requiem Blaster,” he said. “Now let us go put an end to this once and for all. But before we raise up the Blaster itself, we need to make sure we have prepared a suitable welcome for when the librarian comes back. We wouldn’t want him to interrupt us.”

He turned his back on Axer and walked away toward where Starscream stood waiting. “Stay where I can find you, Axer,” he called back over his shoulder. “But also, beware. When I come back, it’s going to be with the
Nemesis
, and no bot is going to want to be anywhere nearby when the
Nemesis
makes its appearance.”

Ordinarily the threat of being annihilated by the
Nemesis
would have rattled Axer just a little. But the circumstances were far from ordinary, and Axer had assets that no bot knew about. He already had come to the conclusion
that it was time to hedge some bets. Before, he’d fooled Prowl by getting away without telling him where the Requiem Blaster was, but Prowl wouldn’t stay fooled forever. Axer had, after his first meeting with Megatron and Starscream, figured out that he was going to have to put that knowledge to use before it became worthless.

He had taken advantage of Megatron’s letting him go to do two things. First, he had scouted the exploratory shaft again and found it still stable. Second, he had touched base with the Autobots, making nice even though every single one of them would just as soon kill him as look at him. Megatron knew where the Requiem Blaster was, and Axer had decided that it was time for Optimus Prime to have that little bit of information as well. But Optimus Prime wasn’t around, and Prowl wouldn’t say a thing about where he had gone or when he might be back. The Space Bridge the Autobots had used might lead anywhere.

This development was frustrating because it prevented Axer from executing the classic escape maneuver of pitting two adversaries against each other. And he didn’t want to tell Prowl now because he had already lied to Prowl’s face once on a similar topic. There was no telling what would provoke Prowl to hand him over to Wreck-Gar, a situation Axer planned to avoid unless and until he got his hands on the Requiem Blaster or made sure that he had a way off-planet. Off-planet was preferable, but Wreck-Gar wouldn’t be in quite such a hurry to feed him into a furnace if he had the Requiem Blaster, now, would he?

“Stupid Autobots,” Axer muttered to himself as he sped away from the meeting with Megatron.

It was not always a life-extending practice to lie to Megatron. Axer had not seen the Decepticon leader in millions of cycles, but still he knew that. But Makeshift was out of the way right now, imprisoned by the Autobots,
and that was right where Axer wanted him. Because when Makeshift came out, Megatron was going to see that either he or Axer was lying about what Makeshift had been doing, and Axer was fairly confident that he could displace enough uncertainty onto Makeshift to preserve himself and simultaneously get rid of the troublesome shapeshifter.

But that meant he was also going to have to get the Requiem Blaster himself, since Makeshift’s prison was buried deep below the bottom of the main pit. If Axer was going to dare that trip again, it could only be once more. His self-preservation instinct was telling him that Junkion’s end was coming faster than anyone anticipated.

The homing component he had given Megatron was real enough. It would lead the Decepticons—or perhaps just the
Nemesis
—directly to the Blaster’s location. That did not, however, mean that the Blaster would still be there when the
Nemesis
arrived.

Because Axer knew where it was already. While Megatron thrashed ahead with his grand plan to destroy the Autobots, Axer would keep his goals simple. One, he would take care of Makeshift, and two, he would get the Requiem Blaster. Then he could decide whether to trade it or use it.

A plan. Axer liked having a plan.

From the edge of the pit, looking down at the Junkions’ pointless digging and up at the wrack and flotsam that drifted through their near space, Megatron put in the call.

The
Nemesis
emerged from behind its screen of space junk and slowly descended toward the surface of Junkion.

“This is where it all ends, Starscream,” Megatron said.

“I hope not all of it,” Starscream joked. Then he assumed alt-form and rocketed upward to rendezvous with the three other Seekers, who even then were detaching from the
Nemesis
and flying in a wedge low along the horizon in the direction of the Autobots’ Ark.

From the bottom of the pit, Wreck-Gar looked up. Far away at the pit’s rim, he saw an unfamiliar bot—and another flying away. Silverbolt? Perhaps, but then, who was that left behind, raising his arms and releasing an atavistic roar that carried all the distance down and cut through the roar of the furnace and the thunderous groan of the rolling machines?

What bot could that be?

“Junkions!” Wreck-Gar called out. “Work stoppage! Defend the resource! Defend Junkion! Rally!”

He wasn’t sure, maybe, and he didn’t necessarily trust the Autobots all the way to the bottom of the pit, but Wreck-Gar knew that if Axer was one of those Decepticons, that was all he needed to know. There wouldn’t be any Decepticons on his planet. Not any live ones, anyway.

Not unless every Junkion was dead first.

The great machines fell silent and the roar of the blast furnace ceased almost immediately as Wreck-Gar’s call went out. The Junkions, wherever they were on the floor or walls of the great pit, began their climb up the spiraling perimeter road, marching to the defense of their world. Some of them reached the top almost immediately, and the flash of energy weapons began to appear like sparks from Wreck-Gar’s position. He roared and accelerated, spoiling to get into the fight.

Outside the Ark, Prowl, Bulkhead, and Ironhide were complaining about not being able to go with Optimus Prime. “Big mission through the Space Bridge,” Bulkhead was saying. “See a whole new part of the universe, but no. Not us.”

“Enough,” Ironhide said. “Optimus knows what he’s doing.”

“I don’t doubt it. He still could have brought all of us. I mean, I love Bumblebee, but communications aren’t that easy when he’s around. Also, you know what? I feel a little better when Silverbolt’s around, just because that means we’ve always got some air strength while we’re waiting for the Ark here to get all patched up.” This was more consecutive words than Bulkhead had spoken since leaving Cybertron. He talked and talked because he was frustrated about being left out of the mission.

“I don’t know,” Prowl said. “Airpower’s overrated.
It’s not like we can’t shoot down Seekers from the ground.”

Ironhide had been about to agree with Bulkhead, but now Prowl had him convinced the other way again. “Okay, true. I’d like to be able to fly, though.”

“Not me,” Prowl said.

What he wanted at that moment was to know where Axer was. They had lost him a few cycles back and hadn’t been able to pick up the trail again. It was getting to the point where Prowl was considering cutting Makeshift out of his holding tank just so he could make a deal for Makeshift to go find Axer. It would be a bad deal, yes, but the uncertainty was killing Prowl, plain and simple.

The sound of thunder from the air reached them. “Huh,” Ironhide said. “A little quick for Silverbolt to be giving them a ride back, don’t you think?”

Prowl had the best optics of any of them, in keeping with his surveillance activities. He was looking at the horizon, over toward the great pit. “It’s not Silverbolt,” he said.

“Who is it?” Ironhide said. He jumped to his feet and squinted in the direction Prowl was looking. Cut out for close combat, he couldn’t get a lock on the target yet.

“You mean ‘they,’ ” Prowl said.

They
. The implications of the word sunk in. Silverbolt was the only flier among the Autobots. If there was more than one flying in now, that could only mean one thing.

The Decepticons had found them.

“Three,” Prowl said. “No, four.”

Bulkhead got on the commlink and sounded the alert. “Autobots, assemble! We have ’Cons on Junkion, and we will commence immediately kicking them off again! All Autobots report for ’Con-kicking duties now, now, now!”

He broke the connection as Autobot reinforcements, led by Clocker and Mainspring, came running and rolling to join them from the back of the ship. “How’d that sound?” Bulkhead asked.

“A little informal for my taste,” Prowl said.

Ironhide shrugged. The Seekers were close enough now that he could see all four of them. “Got the job done,” he said.

Prowl nodded. “Guess so,” he said.

The Seekers drew closer. When they were within range, they opened fire.

Amid the somber beauty of Solus Prime’s tomb, Optimus Prime was stunned at the first words from her avatar’s mouth.

“Leave?” he repeated. Optimus Prime felt awe, pure and simple, at being in the presence of one of the Thirteen even if, as must have been the case, it was a hologram-persona given a fleeting sentience by the Matrix of Leadership. He did not want to leave. He wanted to learn from her the history of the Thirteen, their falling into schism, their scattering and their deaths … How much this remnant of Solus Prime must know!

“Leave,” the hologram said. It opened the tongs, and the star spun outward into a great spiral galaxy. Optimus Prime felt as if the universe was spinning around him as the galaxy grew in size, exploding outward until it filled space as far as he could see in any direction, overlaying itself onto the real backdrop of stars. “Here is a Space Bridge,” the hologram said, and a blue spark lit in the hologram galaxy. Simultaneously, a blue flare appeared in the emptiness near the asteroid, opposite the Space Bridge that had brought them from Junkion.

Yes, thought Optimus Prime. Silverbolt had seen it when they got here, and so had he.

“There you will find the Requiem Blaster, which your
enemy seeks. But it may be that he has already found it. You must go quickly lest he escape with it; if this were to happen, your quest for the AllSpark would be delayed for far too long.”