#dreadop

Here, though, with several tons of tumbling sediment licking at their heels and the exit a distant frame of the night sky, they could only do as Optimus had commanded the moment Dreadwing’s stray shot shattered a rotting support beam.

“Run!”

Optimus was grateful that Dreadwing had quickly given up his fighting to keep pace, but he feared it still wouldn’t be enough to save them both. Against an opponent that did not care about Autobots or Decepticons, Optimus too forgot factions, and his processor instead tagged Dreadwing as a Cybertronian in danger, in need. Borrowing the Matrix’s strength, he hurled Dreadwing forward, sending them stumbling. Optimus tried to catch himself, but the ground rolled beneath him and he tripped. He could feel himself falling, knew he wouldn’t be able to catch himself and make it out in time—

And then a hand seized his wrist and yanked.

He and Dreadwing tumbled outside, sprawling. Behind them, the mine gave a final shudder as the ceiling gave in and the tunnel vanished under upset stone, dust billowing out to blanket the kneeling robots. Optimus’ processor pinged with errors, sediment in his ventilation system and overtaxed actuators, and he had to take a moment to clear them before he could check on Dreadwing.

The jet was kneeling on the ground, powerful fans running louder than Optimus’ own. He looked for a moment like he might slip into shutdown, but in a flash of movement too fast to process Dreadwing was on his feet, the light of his cannon mimicked in the glare of his optics.

Like twin stars on the brink of supernova, Optimus thought as his systems primed, waiting on the signal to duck.

The night slipped into calm. Dust settled, a few pebbles skipping down to their final resting places. Insects, Optimus’ second favorite species from this planet, shook off their stunned silence and stirred up an enchanting, invisible chorus that sounded the way the dead shrubs around the mine entrance looked. Optimus stared into the barrel of his assassin’s weapon and was reminded of how, during the day, the sun would glare down on this part of the Earth until every living thing had fled its intensity. The cannon, a standard issue model, should have been the most familiar object in his vicinity.

Instead, he found it alien.

Dreadwing snarled. He threw the weapon to the ground, where it landed with a hollow clang. Its superheated core faded back to dim standby and the whine of its power converter bowed out to the native sounds. Tracking the greatest source of danger, Optimus glanced at it before returning to Dreadwing, whose face turned toward the stars, gaze flicking between them like a ship charting its course.

“Well, Prime?” he said. After the cacophony of the mine and the violence of his outburst, his voice sounded like an ancient engine, barely puttering with life. “It seems I am unable to kill you. I would recommend you take advantage of my failing, before my lord comes to dispatch us both.”

Optimus stood, though his frame protested. Not the ache he had expected, but upright he could see the dents, scores taken out of his paint where falling rocks had torn at his plating. A warning about fuel pressure disappeared before he could address it, which meant self-repair was busy in so many systems that priority trees had been scrambled. Not a dire syndrome, though he would be feeling his injuries longer.

It would be a long drive back to base, followed by inevitable hours of Ratchet’s repairing and lecturing before he could lie on his berth and let his own systems finish the job. The ache in his struts intensified.

“Dreadwing,” he said, “if you would—”

“No, Prime, I will not become an Autobot.”

It wasn’t an unreasonable assumption, that Optimus would try to ask again. He had formed a habit of it, possessed by an untethered optimism each time he found himself alone with the Decepticons’ first lieutenant. It could be blamed on the leftover thrill of survival, but he knew it leaned more toward hubris: once he had experienced the way their movements and strategies synced amid the heat of battle, the way they could project their intentions with a look, he started imagining what they would be capable of if they had more than a minute to communicate. Optimus did not relish combat, but he understood its art; he recognized that the way he and Dreadwing complemented each other was almost prodigious.

But the thought that they might join in something more permanent was fantasy, and whether by the passing of the night or Dreadwing’s finite patience, Optimus knew he was on a timer.

“I understand,” he said, “but in fact, I only wished to ask for a few minutes. To rest together, before we depart for our respective bases.”

Dreadwing stared at him, optics widening before narrowing again as he turned half away from Optimus.

“Whatever you’re trying to—”

“No games, Dreadwing,” Optimus interrupted, “just one aged mechanism appealing to another. I can’t imagine you’re considering your coming flight with much enthusiasm.”

“We do not follow orders because they excite us,” Dreadwing growled.

“Ah. If Megatron has called you back, I will not keep you.” Both for Dreadwing’s safety and because Optimus understood what it meant to live for one’s duty, no matter the personal cost.

But Dreadwing did not move, and Optimus felt warmth bloom in his spark, the same buds that grew when he looked on his soldiers, or the humans they had befriended. Though at odds with Dreadwing’s glare, Optimus thought he saw it reflected in the way his foe hesitated before returning to him.

“If you turn on me, Prime, you will regret it,” Dreadwing swore as he stepped forward.

And what a remarkable thing that was, to know Dreadwing trusted him enough that Optimus could betray him. It was a precious thing, that trust, and Optimus nodded, watching as Dreadwing retrieved his cannon and holstered it.

He turned, keeping Dreadwing in his vision, and started for a bank of broken stones that led into the hills above the ruins of the mine. Away from soil that had been hard packed by years underneath rolling tires, the ground fragmented, loose dirt spilling out from between rocks that seemed made of dust themselves. Further up, and native plantlife started to break through as well: bundles of firm, green stalks, mounds of balled vegetal flesh decorated with spines and pink flowers, and delicate stems decked in thorny cotton armor, interspersed with countless more species Optimus could not track from his height.

Optimus walked until they were well enough away from the mine to see anyone approaching with a few minutes’ warning. Here, a chunk of rock had broken through the ground, a flat plane upon which all but the most stubborn roots and vines failed to thrive. He sat, expecting Dreadwing to take a place regardless of whatever was trying to live there, and so felt his spark pulse when instead his temporary ally rested beside him. A couple meters away, it was the most distance their platform would allow, and yet far closer than Optimus had expected Dreadwing to abide by. Both still had their weapons available, but they were offline and holstered; the empty air between them was as fragile as a sheet of foil.

They glanced at each other, the landscape. Optimus doubted it would be right to let insects take the place of conversation, but neither did he know what to say.

“I don’t understand you,” Dreadwing said, breaking their stalemate. His tone had shifted. Still the rasp of an overworked vocalizer, but without the force required to project threats across a battlefield. “You act as though we could be friends, allies. Such a notion suggests you are either a fool or know nothing of loyalty, but because you have secured the unfailing commitment of your Autobots, I can only assume it is the former.”

A smile quirked Optimus’ lips, though he smothered it; he would not risk offending Dreadwing and disrupting whatever this was. When they weren’t fighting to kill each other, he liked Dreadwing, appreciated his view of the universe and corresponding insights. He would be lying to claim his mind had not occasionally drifted, crafting dialogues and arguments between them with topics ranging from warfare to the metaphysics of organic life. That Dreadwing might think of him in turn, even if as a source of bafflement, was an honor.

“You wouldn’t be the first,” he said. “I don’t consider it foolishness, though. The Matrix,” he placed a hand to his chest, “is hopeful. Whereas the Allspark brings us together in death, it hopes we might achieve the same in life.”

Dreadwing watched Optimus, but when he finished, his gaze turned to where the horizon might have been. The darkness of the world blended with the emptiness of space, so that the only way one might guess at their separation was to track the line of disappearing stars.

“Decepticons once sought the same,” Dreadwing said.

“Once?” Optimus asked, but Dreadwing stiffened again.

“I will not become an Autobot,” he repeated, each word weighted.

Without his bidding, Optimus’ plating compressed, a pinch of protectiveness that relaxed in the same rotation.

“I am sorry,” he said. “I will stop asking.” He could not suppress the Matrix’s hope on top of his own, but he would find a way to manage them.

That settled Dreadwing, but his gaze remained locked on Optimus. Optimus returned the look for a moment, then turned to the stars, taking his optics off Dreadwing for the first time since their escape.

“This world is far removed from our war,” he said. “I try to take moments to appreciate that. What they call life here is so distinct from our understanding of it, and yet there are times it almost seems our planets mimic each other. The way this one seethes with life, it reminds me of how Cybertron once was.”

“And you honor it by looking at long-dead stars?” Dreadwing asked.

“When were you last able to look to the sky without seeing a map?” Optimus returned. “Or battleplans? I take comfort in the reminder that for some, the cosmos are still a source of wonder.”

He glanced over, and to his delight found that Dreadwing was looking up, too, his wandering gaze turned slow and roving.

“Skyquake thought something similar,” he said, voice dropped down to a hush, like he worried the world was listening. Optimus leaned in. “This was his first off-world deployment, and he spoke of how the night sky would be different from our own.”

Dreadwing’s fists curled at his sides. On an instinct forged for the sake of his own team, Optimus reached a finger and brushed the clenched knuckles. Dreadwing’s tension flared, pulling in his whole frame, before he released it, his fingers opening onto the flat of the stone.

“I do not regret surviving our encounter,” Optimus said, “but I will always wish there had been another way. The only comfort I can offer is the promise that you and your brother will be together again one day.”

“I know,” Dreadwing said, dropping his gaze again so they looked into each other’s eyes. He tapped his chest with a claw. “I feel it. He waits for me at the threshold of the Well.”

Optimus did not know how the light caught his expression, but Dreadwing tilted his helm, a twitch on his lips that could have buried a laugh.

“Come now, Optimus, hasn’t my brother already proven his patience?” he said. “Despite the years this war took from us, I have rushed to his side only once, and even then I was already too late. I will not hurry again to join him.”

“Good,” Optimus said. Dreadwing’s tightly controlled expressions were an enigma, but this was the gentlest he had ever seen on the warrior. Not a smile, but the corners of his optics crinkled in a way that one might mistake for fondness.

“Whatever becomes of us,” whether he die by Dreadwing’s cannon, or Megatron’s, or something far less predictable, “I would like to see you there. Both of you, together.”

Dreadwing said nothing. But when their fingertips brushed, he did not pull back, and there was a hiss as his wings lowered out of standby configuration. They rested together, listening to the harmony of the alien world, their idle engines rolling in discordant melodies. It was the kind of sound that could be called silence, and Optimus did not dare break it when he pointed up to the passing shadows of night hunters or the band of whining, singing dancers that wove rhythmically across the plain.