So I got this particular scene haunting me from "burn your sins and wash away your virtues" a title submission from @skyite for an ask meme. Get ready because it's my take on what I wanted from the Camiens, the Thirteen Primes, and time-traveling humans that become Primes godfuckingdammit
“Nemesis Prime, Champion-bride of Megatronus and beloved sister of Solus!”
A voice rang through the underground furnace, clear over its roar and burning meat and frames, over the breaking stakes and noises of the dying, over the chants and screams and manic jubilation that swept across the city. The flames swelled within the mouth, consuming the dead as the cavern bore it all. The engineering was a marvel to behold as distant booms rocked the ground, and the mine still held true.
:: And so they laid together and became the Forge and the Forger. From their entwined essences, a new way of Life came forth, and Death casted His Shadow upon all. :: Ravage intoned over a private channel, and Juno saw unearthly shapes reflected upon her dark armature. Soundwave tensed as a crowd gathered around them.
Anticipation and euphoria ran rampant through the throng. Violence hummed in the air with the realization that the uprising was spearheaded by Camiens that armed Darhos’ slaves. Kitted frames, bright and vivid, were painted in blood from electric-blue and ancient-pink Energon to the near human-red, poisonous-green, and striking-violet. Several mecha held the same facial markings as Windblade: bright red loops of Caminus’ own face staring back at them, burning bright in the firelight. Long Camien-red robes shifting among, like fresh blood upon an altar.
There was no other way but down in the massive grave of untold numbers held by the mine, Juno had no other choice, not if she needed to prove herself as a Prime heralded by Megatronus Prime, the Breaker, brother-twin to Prima, the Eldest Sun, and husband to Solus, the Forger.
"Prima is of the Sun and rules above, but Megatronus is his mirror-twin and rules below." Juno recited quietly, optics forward into the mine-turned-firepit.
Ravage immediately understood, red optics glinting in firelight as she sat on her haunches. Still as a sentinel. And after a long moment, Soundwave loosened as well.
Steeling her resolve and bracing her senses, Juno walked through the hungry flames and refused to look back.
The first yards were easy, even blinded by the swell of yellows and reds, then resistance was met by the bodies. Most caved under her own weight. Darhos, unlike their Quintesson masters, preferred to keep their technological enhancements for their own upper-crust citizens. Others are meant to be fed through the grinder as raw as possible : blood and tears, life and death, all of it utilized as Darhos continued Quintessa’s ways of bridging the arcane and science to a horrifying scale of cruelty.
It went deeper, and bodies liquified from the scorching temperatures, and Juno sank into the remains, crawling through the pits, partly wading through the sludge of broken skeletons, melted slag, and magma. She could hear the whispers, countless and without end, all of them slowly realizing her presence. A steady trickle into an immense roar of unfathomable emotions swarmed her.
< Give me your grief, and I will free you of those shackles. > The words poured out of her without conscious thought. The deep thrum of Megatronus’ hand in it.
Juno sank deeper as the ground disappeared beneath her, falling as she had done a long time ago when a chained Fallen offered her the chance to remake the future. She managed to catch herself on an edge and haul over it, guided by the vague indents of the stairs to slowly crawl her way out as a titanic weight settled upon her. The voices of the dead were innumerable, words lost in an ocean of static woven by hatred and bereavement, but the curses on their lips were seared across their souls.
And it flowed into her, by mouth, by vents, by nose, it poured into her frame until there was another firestorm trapped within her bones, eating at her fuel lines, and devouring her insides as heat had no way to escape. She choked and cried out, but refused to stay still. Inching her way forward with every agonizing hand clawing into the rockface to pull herself. To stop was to die and she refused to consider it.
A hand suddenly reached out to pull out Juno from the miasma of all those Darhos had wronged. The change was so jarring that it took Juno a moment to gather herself as her senses felt muted as if she was blanketed away from the world.
And cold, so very cold. She went from a hell fire nightmare into freezing reality.
“And much like our ancient predecessors, you came from nothing and became everything.” The Mistress of Flame spoke with a fervent gleam in her yellow optics as the very hand that pulled Juno out began to smoke, paint bubbling.
This tall, sturdy femme with such a firm grip was none other than the Mistress of Flame. The Head Priestess of the Way of Flame, Caminus’ Truth Seeker, Speaker of the Forge, and Solus Prime’s Premiere Daughter. She was dressed in reds, oranges, and yellows, mimicking the colors of an active smithy. Her mantle designed to reflect the sun with kibble patterned as rays and the heart of a Forge as a window bared her very violet-blue spark to the world. She had an incredible pain tolerance as well: the elegant and intricate patterns of stylised flames weren't painted or tattooed, it was carved into the very protoform, nor did she fear fire and heat as her circuitry sparked and protoform charred, she kept her hand in a steadfast grip, even as her vibrant cape began to crisp and flake away from the immense temperature.
Instead, the Mistress of Flame stared at Juno with a deep sense of consummate love. Even her field was full of deep commitment and complete affection. It was the expression of how a parent would hold their newborn infant, a child to their parent, a spouse to their partner, a guardian to their charge, a servant to their liege.
A mortal to their Prime, Ravage's imagined voice rasped in low tones with the satisfied flick of her tail, Soundwave casting a haunting, protective shadow.
It was close, deeply intimate, and Juno uncomfortably knew with absolute certainty that if she fell back into the molten slag, then the Mistress of Flame would follow into the molten pit without hesitation.
Juno carefully stepped forward, guiding the other femme away from the furnace, and she simply followed, still holding her hand. They walked up the long set of stairs, the stone caked in filth, old blood, and soot, and the heat grew distant behind them as Juno spied something else in front of them, lights dancing upon the walls in familiar patterns - shapes that played across Ravage’s plating when they neared the portal to the mine turned sacrificial pyre.
“Solus is of the Forge and speaks in the flames, ash, and cinder. Within the cracks of the molten, the strike between swings, and whispers the final forms of a work. And She has spoken about you. I have seen your face, beloved of Shadow and Chaos. I have seen your ascension from the very roots of Megatronus’ altar and your glorious crusade against our long, forsaken enemies.” The Mistress of Flame said as they finally reached dias. There was the remains of an immense metalwork turned to kindling as a bonfire ate it. The piece once commanded the whole space, dwarfing all those that came, even a Predacon would feel miniscule, had warped and melted beyond recognition. Only the offerings piles remained at its base.
Upon closer inspection, those very piles, taller than a triple-changer, contained innumerable small bundles of scrapped, tiny skeletons, charred and broken. A chill surrounded them, and the whispers grew finally grew coherent to form a single word-
An ocean of the damned with waves of twisting, unnatural shapes lapped over the carved stairs, clawing at it with countless phantom hands, a testament to the sins that Darhos, Quintessa, Quintus had committed, surrounded the dias and the melting still-standing statue.
< Give me your grief, and I shall free you of those shackles. >
The ocean of wailing ghosts surged forward, flooding everything in its path, hungry as the molten slag, and ready to rise up and devour the city, the very planet itself if left unchecked.
Her spine stiffened, her own spark surged forward, chassis opening up to a dance of violent shadows against the raging dead, and Juno saw-
The flow of Darhos’ lifeforce and the Song of the Universe, indescribable colors of multiple streams and rivers interconnected and running into the ocean of the cosmos, but here, it laid foul and stagnant, a deep, drak wound left to fester and poison everything as it attempted to eat its way across the planet. Strands spooling out to connect to the smaller creeks leading into distant stars, already unraveling them to tear apart.
Megatronus was Beloved of Primus, too. When He stepped forward, the world held its breath.
Megatronus was one and all, and He freely shared it with her.
Megatronus was of Shadow that rose from the Sun, and so Nemesis burned the taint away.
The symbol of Darhos’ conquest laid in pieces, smoldering as the gruesome offerings to its altar had been swept clean away. The chaos above ground was a distant dream as Juno was on the ground, retching out putrid slag. Black and viscous, its slimy texture dribbled down her mouth. She coughed harshly, spitting out bone fragments, and Energon foamed on her lips.
There was a careful rustle of shifting plates, and the Mistress of Flame kneeled beside her, uncaring of the pulsating mess. “Sacrifice and suffering. Cruelty and mercy. Compassion and violence.” The Mistress of Flame intoned, voice in a lilting cadence. “These are the tenets left by the Thirteen and shaped the universe. The very tenets Solus Prime engraved into Caminus. And we answer your call to arms, sister to Solus.”
With a snap of her fingers, the Mistress ignited the spoiled mess into bright flames, still unafraid of pain as she helped Juno to sit, hands peeling down to the base, protoform sizzling. “Light the way, Solus Prime, with the Creation Lathe guiding the path. Light the way, Solus Prime, in clear vision of our smithies to arm your children in the upcoming crucible. Light the way, Solus Prime, by the way of your Conjunx’s newest bride, your newest sister-”
“I am not his bride.” Juno couldn't help but to interrupt the chant, exhausted beyond measure, chest scraped raw and empty as if someone took out fistfuls of her own chassis, only to leave her heart bruised and aching. She felt freezing, even as her very touch scorched others. “I am just a lost daughter from a lost people.” Truth covered by omission, and it was the closest thing she was willing to divulge about her unwritten future. “My name was June, and-”
The Mistress of Flame let out a soft noise, her optics gleaming with joyous wonderment, cupping Juno’s face in careful reverence, hands burning away, and Juno couldn't part away from her intense gaze. “Nemesis Prime from the very namesake that was once the martyred daughter of Chaos and Creation. You have returned to us, resurrected from the pyre, twice-blessed and twice-cursed by their mantle.”
The Mistress of Flame pressed a scorching kiss upon Juno's crest, her lips melting from the residual heat, and Energon dripped down and told her in the dying light with broken lips -a pact sealed in blood. “Caminus marches to war once more, Juno Nemesis, Prime of Megatronus and Solus. Caminus marches beneath your banners. Caminus is under your command.”
