IDW2 Glazer Supreme (tm)

There aren't too many but figure it doesn't hurt to mention.

#spoilers is all the spoilers from recent media. Generally unused now, sometimes for skybound comic media.

#valveplug is used for nsfw texts and images; #suggestive is used for slightly suggestive content.

And here are some less important, general tags under the cut if you're looking for art/aus/rambling.

god forbid a guy have a little snack huh

ah, the third time i've drawn galvatron seriously ever in my life. why did nobody tell me he was so hard to draw..

and he shows up in the galactic off-brand of a trendy earth fashion magazine of course.

@monotonedongs here - the moment I saw this I knew I had to get an image and throw it your way!

wa! my boyos!! they're on (a) tv!! ...??

I am so sorry. My poor babeys.

I would like to formally apologize to every single sweep personally for killing them all off in this one page. I think the story would have been way funnier with bumbling sweep shenanigans in that shop, but I don’t think I would’ve been able to juggle that many characters (as more were introduced) + the sexual tension that was supposed to be happening between the cyscourges.

Nightbird nearly toppled herself overboard in her panic.

And as the tips of the dreaded beast’s beak disappeared into the waves, punctuated with a rippling splash, her panic spilled into frenzy, confused, maddened terror. She turned from the railing to the frozen Sweeps with a look in her eyes, just as the reality started to sink in. 

“What do we do, what do we do?!” 

Spindrift wailed, his head buried in his hands as he paced rapidly across the deck, back and forth, only stopping when Swashbuckle grabbed him by the shoulders and steadied him.

“We–we–we must sail on, we were given our orders-”

“And what if he returns for more? Are we ready?” Scope interjected. “An’ Primes know what he’s doin’ to Scourge as we flounder about!”

It was enough indecision to throw her into a panic-induced rage. She took nearly a running start and threw herself against Scope, waving at the ocean, sails, harpoons and back again, grabbing Scabbard by the collar and dragging him to the nearest harpoon, beseeching him, pleading him silently to load the damn thing. They hadn’t the time. And she hadn’t the voice, but there was no voice that would be able to contain the cry she wanted to let out in the shock of the loss, the feeling of complete and utter helplessness as they drifted in dead waters, windless, cold. The first mate turned on her heel to make for the helm and just as she did, nearly tumbled into Swashbuckle’s arms, holding her back.

“Calm, ‘Bird! Yer makin’ me head spin with all yer scramblin’-!” He begged. “I wanna save our brother as much as ye, but–”

“Save him? What sort of thick-headed clam are you, he’s–” Spindrift scoffed, despair in his voice. “Cyclonus got ‘im, whattaya think happened next? There won’t be so much as a button left o’ him to save!”

“No, he wouldn’t, he’s surely still– don’t say that!” Sliver cried, running over to give him a great kick in the shins, her voice almost as frenzied as Nightbird’s temper. “Last we saw him, he was still out n’ barking at us–”

“Yah, til’ Cyclonus pulled ‘im under!”

“But didn’t eat him,” puzzled Scabbard. “Nor us. We was dead in the water tryin’ to save him. Couldn’t he have just knocked us asunder? Something’s not right.”

“We did give ‘im a good pummeling ‘fore he ran for it. An’ I think he said he was ‘full’ before,” said Swashbuckle. “Or else surely he’d’ve torn our brother limb-from-limb before us. We should move. We can find ‘im–”

Scope gave him a mocking look, clasping his hands together with a faux swoon. “Aw, sure, an’ I’m sure he’s just treated Scourge to supper an’ a lovely seaside serenade, waitin’ for us on the shores of Unicron’s Head–So wise of ye, Swash’, let’s chase ‘im to our deaths!”

“And when’d I say allat?!”

“He would’ve drowned on his way down, wouldn’tcha think? Gettin’ ate’s not the only way t’go in these waters-”

“Y’think he’d drown?!” Now it was Scabbard’s turn to yell. “Remember the time he dove under the ship to hide from the coats, and didn’t come up till–ay, why’re we turnin’?”

The squabbling Sweeps all turned their gazes to see the cannonsmith, one bloodied arm on the captain’s wheel, bringing it round. “Ayayay, an’ what in the Kraken’s name are ye doin’?!”

“I’m returning us to Chaar, where we shall reassess this fool’s crusade with better equipment and more of a crew than the likes of you!”

“But th’ island! Unicron’s Head! We made it so far-“

“SILENCE, you half-headed lunatics! Look where it has landed your own brother, but in the belly of the beast, I do not intend to follow when it returns to finish us all!” Screamed Shockwave. “I told him, as I had lectured our Lord, that he must not get rash, that he must listen to me, and he dismissed my word like worthless drivel, and now, like our Lord before him, he too has fallen upon the rocks of his hubris, and the rest of you squabble on like starving foxes in the henhouse, you’ll be the death of us all!”

“Hey, we promised! We have to see the island fir-“

“Your fool of a brother is dead!” Shockwave screamed, stamping his foot against the deck in an almost tantrum-like fury. “Of all the men to live the beast, to duel it for a dozen of years, to wind up washed up on my very own doorstep, it had to be him, it had to be you–you–you–classless, bilge-headed, mouse-minded thanatophiles!”

The Sweeps all stopped in their tracks and gawked as the furious cannonsmith held their bearing, slowly teetering back the way they came on the winds. And that was when Swashbuckle finally let Nightbird loose.

In an instant, she’d thrown herself up the deck, and in the next instant, her fist had met his bloated cheek, catching him off-guard and throwing him nearly off his feet. A moment later, the others were upon him, backing him into the railing for a piece of him themselves. But it left the old man undeterred.

“You insolent things! It explains so much,” the cannonsmith spat furiously, disgust still marring his features like a nasty scar. “You disgusting, nasty creatures. You all, you all were in on it, you knew of his perversion, you knew of this awful foreplay that your captain forced upon us all alike, you horrid–”

“It was nothing of that sort! You really think he could have done anything of the sort with that–” Scabbard shuddered. “I dun’ even want to think about how one could cavort with a beast like that. Eurgh.”

“You know full well I meant more than just of the beast, he’d been of this very state the whole time!” Shockwave cried. “You were all doomed from the start! He heeded the beckon of the sea for that monster that wears a dead man’s face, and look where it has landed us all!”

Spindrift wasn’t having a moment of it. He grabbed Shockwave by the collar and leered directly into his face, his finger jabbing so close to his good eye he might’ve gouged it out had he struggled just a little.

“None of this would have happened if ye hadn’t turned his attention away,” he snarled, his face curling in anger. “Ye distracted him! Ye tried spearing the beast when ye were told not to, over and over–”

“And yet had that beast been anybody other than damned Cyclonus himself, he would’ve felled that thing years ago!” Shockwave shouted back, undeterred. “Tell me otherwise, I dare you! Tell me that the only reason he’d embark on this odyssey of ignorami was not all for this petty courtship of a man who no longer lives!”

Spindrift’s face went white. The words dying in his throat, silence punctuating a truth long since uttered. His grasp dropped loose from the pudgy man’s collar, letting him to fall against the railing behind him, like a useless doll. Shockwave stared back at him, that high-and-mighty look of vindication dancing in his eye. 

“That look on your sorry visage tells me I am right, as always,” he leered. “And how much of your precious little time in the light have you wasted, for his own lustful pursuit?”

“What are ye, jealous, then?” Sliver asked. “That some sap would ever fight this hard for a man he loved, because nobody sur’ly ever loved ye so much. Not Duke Megatron, who ousted ye, not yer twin flame, who ran from ye, not even yer nasty little daughter would spit in yer direction if ye were burning alive!”

“And I need not a single one of them as he did, as you do,” Shockwave keened, almost softly, mockingly. “Go on, then, follow your brother into the impossible. Claim the beast’s heart as he once did. Flounder and drown for all I could care, but I have nothing left to guide you to.”

The deck was silence for a long while, not even the winds daring interrupt the moment. Spindrift’s face spun from fury, to hatred, to defeat, to fury again, but turned to his crew with a steely look. “Patch and brig the man. Mark our bearings. We ought to turn back.”

Nightbird immediately started to gesture no, but he held up a hand in pause. “We’ll return for the loot and sail back immediately, and it shall be our last voyage.”

The implication of the phrase uttered was not lost on them all. With an almost mournful nod, the first mate obliged him, turning the ship in the way of the currents. The others didn’t need to be told to start moving as they made down the steps, dragging away an incredulous, laughing cannonsmith.

“And after all I have told you, just like all the others, your own brother fallen in line,” he bemused, “And you still won’t heed me. Can’t you see it! This is beyond the mad chasings of a crew like yours! A ship like yours! You’ll follow the rest o’ them to the belly of the beast!”

Spindrift turned to him, glaring as the sails caught wind once more. “And if not us, then who else will finish this?”

—

It took another two days of quiet sailing for them to leave the open waters, and reach the secluded shores of the trove they hid.

Their stash at Chaar had been one of near pure coincidence, all those years ago. When a great winter storm had caught the pirates off-guard and crashed them into the jutting sea-cliffs of Chaar’s offshoot island rather than the motherland itself, they had found themselves stranded hopelessly for days, not another ship on the horizon to save them while they scrambled to unpeel themselves from the rocks.

But it had given them a wonderful hiding-place once they had made it out. The island’s calmer shores were just travelled enough that a ship around its shores would not be suspect, but the jagged, uncivilized caves carved out by sea were hostile enough to ward off all but the most daring–or foolish–of sailors. And with the cursed mists and the ever-lurking rumors of disappearances hanging over the whole of the Chaaran Sea, those brave, idiotic few were almost wholly numbered in their crew alone. 

And if one were to navigate just past a certain sea-blanched Chaaran pine, dodge expertly the roiling riptides beside the worst of the rocks and shimmy in through an opening on a good tide, one could find a small patch of gravelly shore leading up to a sizeable nook where the Sweeps had stowed away their treasures. Their life’s work of gold: some stolen, some bartered through the lucrative smuggling lines, and plenty plundered from many a rival crew, this treasure would bring them to salvation or doom in the following days of voyage. Provided that they could find it…

“Should we bother to count the loots?” Scope inquired, as he filed onto shore after his brothers. 

“No point, an’ if we’re short we’ll only feel the worse for it.” Sliver shrugged, hopping down after him and trotting to the front. “We haven’t the time, anyhow.”

The thought lingered over them, and the second damning possibility made itself apparent as they trod from gravel to stony shore. Their spoils were grand, so much so that its only protection was these cavern walls itself, but still yet, the prospect was that its amount could still fail them in their moment of need.

“Say,” said Scabbard. “Say we perchance did find our way to Unicron’s Head, but only to fall short a single coin. Which of us do ye think–”

“Quiet.” Sliver shut him up. “It’s not worth a gander. Where’s the gold?”

“Whaddaya mean, where’s the gold? It lies here in this damned cave, yes??”

“Yes, so… shan’t there be more crates lyin’ around these parts?” Sliver said, trotting around the damp cave, squinting into the damp darkness. “Scabbard, of your last tally, how many crates were there?”

“Two short of thirty of them, three chests, and Primes-knows the number of satchels, but–Scope, y’sure ye routed us to the right island?” Scabbard asked, peering around the dim rocks. “They would not have been moved so…”

The sailor’s voice trailed off coldly with the sounding of a shrill whistle from the side of the cavern. The source of the sound was their first mate, crouched in the dirt, and as Sweep alike came to see for themself what had alarmed her so, they too spied it, glimmering in the fading light. A single coin left buried in the grit, the symbol of Cybertron’s Prime emblazoned on the tail. And patted beside it into the thin dirt, were footprints. 

“Rogues, no mistake. I hadn’t erred.” Scope whispered, the stunned privateers following the trail from cave to gravel. Not one pair, but dozens of sets, in a variance of sizes. Somebody had been here. Someone with a sizable crew. “It’s gone. The whole lot of it. We’re plundered.”

Nightbird had needed no such reminder. She was already shaking with rage, her mind brought back to that night at Mayalx, about Shadow Striker and the surgeon in the night and the way he had been so quick to shoo her away from the bench, thought of the little drying violet now still tucked in her waist-sash. A promise to return in the morning, broken before it was made. And Scourge wouldn’t be so reckless as to forget to lock the doors upon his own ship…

“We’re lost,” whispered Scabbard, the reality of the situation sinking in. “Of all the blasted timing–of all the nights to be plundered, we-we-ARGH!”

The Sweep sunk to his knees, clutching his head and ripping at his helm, and the others succumbed after him in despair, one by one. This had always been a possibility. It had happened before to them, yes, when they weren’t so experienced, when they were outgunned and double-crossed. But always, always had they been altogether to shoulder the burden. And what now, at their most crucial moment of need, with no captain, and nothing to show for their years at sea-!

The pain was almost dizzying. Scourge was all but dead. Even to the Sweeps who held a notion of his living close to them knew there would be nothing to search for, and without the gold, no sliver of avengement in his name. On would live the Kraken, with not a minute moment of difference made to the world, like they had never even started their journey.

Nightbird had never seen Spindrift cry before. But she watched, tears blurring her own shaking vision, as he sobbed into his howling brother’s shoulder.

The sound of a painful crack rang out as Swashbuckle slammed his fist against the cavern walls, his head following, thudding lightly against the sandstone in devastation. It wasn’t like him to fall to despondency. Even now, he seemed intent not to let it best him, and perhaps for that, or some spectre of Scourge’s will resting upon them, it was he that broke the miserable silence. “What now?”

No words from any of his siblings. None had an answer, and it made his temper flare up.

“Will we sit here an’ sob about o’ cruel fate all the day, then?” He cried out. “Forget it, we oughta sail back to Cyclonus, find the island an’ make the worst o’ it, without the gold. We’ll be faster, anyhow.”

“And what then? If we shore upon Unicron’s Head, the curse’ll have us without anything to offer!”

“Well, what else to it, Sliver? We can’t just roll over and welcome death, we can’t–what would Scourge say to us now?” Swashbuckle yelled. “Even after all of our worsts–when we were all death-stricken by sea-plague and when our first ship dashed going after Cyclonus–did he ever tell us all to roll over and die?”

“But this is worse than our worsts! Our brother is lost and we have but a coin to our name–” Spindrift’s head fell into his hands, gripping his helm between heavy breaths. Swashbuckle grabbed him by the shoulders, trembling, but steadfast.

“Yer wrong. Wrong as usual. Our worst was that night.” He said. “The night we lost Captain Galvatron, an’ the ship, an’... … n’ we washed up on that shore, in the cold. Don’tche remember what it was like? Waking up screaming every night after? Didjye die then? Roll over and cry for mama like ye are now?”

“What does it matter? We’ve tumbled back to the very start. Preach what ye want, but–”

“We’ve lived worse! We’ve lived it tough every single day of our lives! We were supposed to die that night, but be it a hundred seasons later, an’ who’s braved the Kraken more times than us?” Swashbuckle cried, face bitter with determination. “An’ who’s got the curse’s greatest fanatic holed up in our brig, other than us? We ain’t at our worst, an’ we oughta use what we have, for all our sakes! Everyone, stop wailin’ like babes, use yer heads and think!”

That was right. Shockwave was still with them, and Nightbird thought about it for a moment longer. That time when they had embarked on the voyage out to Cyclonus and returned to Chaar’s shores hadn’t been more than a few days, and if Shadow Striker had somehow found her captain, it would have taken them days longer to make their way to Chaar. And their brigantine was sizeable, chock-full of crew and a cargo that bogged them down, nothing compared to the fleet speed of their own vessel…

“Nightbird! Where’re ye goin’?” Sliver startled, the lass springing to her feet and making for The Fleeting Sweep. Without so much as a beat missed, her hand darted from her blouse to drop something in her wake, leaving the Sweeps to see the stem of violet, fluttering to the floor. “A… violet? What does… oh.”

“T’was the purple bastard’s weasel of a daughter,” growled Scabbard. “And Sixshot. Thar’s a thought.”

“Then he can’t be far off. He might still have it on his ship. There be another thought.” Spindrift continued his observation, slowly stumbling to his feet, wiping the snot off his face with his sleeve. Swashbuckle gave him a reassuring smack on the shoulder. They had a plan. “Sweeps! Back to the ship! We’ve a bastard and his crew to hunt after!”

— 

The thick glass of the rum-bottles glittered like emerald in the warming light, held aloft by every bellowing buccaneer aboard a well-rejuvenated Wing-Wolf, at the behest of the figures at the helm.

“This toast, it goes to me, and the excellence of my privateering, across the storm-blasted waters of Chaar, without which, we would not prevail!”

“A toast!” cried the pirates, and all went to tip their bottles back, before the captain held his hand up in pause, commanding them all to halt.

“Hold, ye dogs! For I have one toast more,” he said, placing his arm snugly around the shoulders of the girl. “To the cunning of our mate Shadow Striker, whom so bravely sought the map of the very Scourge who had traded sword with us so foul-like, and led us right to their trove. Have ye any word to say, girl?”

Shadow Striker shook her head, good eye focused not on the crowd below her but on the rim of her bottle. Such a stash, she thought, hanging heavy in their lower hold, mountains of it, so much so that it seemed to spill over, weighing on her own mind. But it was just business, wasn’t it? 

“Well, ye heard the lass!” Sixshot crowed, eliciting a giggle from the masses below. “Then, a toast to good health and great fortune, drink, ye slimy trove-snatchers, drink!”

A cheer went up through the crowd, and all rejoiced as the bottles upturned, letting flow the liquor, for a successful raid was one to be celebrated raucously.

Shadow Striker tipped the bottle back with them. The thick liquor sat heavier in her than she liked, and she resigned herself to staring grimly at the rim.

There had been crates of it. Glimmering coins like shining minnows, nestled so carefully in the rock-sides, arranged with precision, thought. She’d never beheld such a large stash in her life…

“Aw, Striker, aren’tchae gonna finish that?” teased a voice at her side, a red-and-black lass with a thick bottle in each fist. “The sooner we’s drink, tha lighter our load!”

“But the rum would just go from the inside of the bottle to the inside of you, Flamewar. That’s no less weight; you become the bottle.” 

“Eh?! Well, tha glass etself goes, then!” Flamewar tipped the last of one of hers back, and with a hearty heave, chucked the empty vessel over her shoulder, where it bounced off another sailor’s head and dunked into the dancing waves. “There! C’mon, why so gloomy? We’ll drink an’ dance all night!”

Shadow Striker swilled her bottle in her hand, watching the liquid inside roll before she brought it to her lips again. “I met a girl.”

“Yae did? The likes of yae?”

“I suppose met isn’t the word, so much as we traded steel, and she took my hand in the strife of it.” She clarified, holding up her bandaged stump, now wearing a studded hook over it. “And when she could have as easily taken my head, saved me from the throes of the rot. Why offer me such grace?”

“Aww, yer pinin’!” Cooed her companion, swaying over herself to pinch her cheek. “I’n’t know ol’ scowl-face could do ‘at! Some romantic we got on us, eh?”

“But how do I repay her? How do I return the greatest kindness shown to me in all of my sailing days, but skim the gold right off her back?”

“A second kindness, then! She keeps us fed for th’ wintering season! Oh, Striker, ya’ll get over it soon enough. It’s the rule o’ tha sea!” Flamewar laughed, grabbing the bottle out of her hands. She took a hearty swig, despite her companion’s half-hearted attempt to swipe it back, punctuated with a loud belch. “Heh! And it’s not like she’ll come sailin’ up behind us tae bid yeh hello–”

Her sentence trailed off as the alarmed shouts rang out across the deck, and Shadow Striker’s heart dropped. She knew it before she had turned on her heel, shoving her way to the railing. She knew it before she could spy the distinct sail of the sloop, the sails head-on, course set, intended to clear. And standing at the mast was a small, grey figure, sword poised at her hip, and she didn’t need to squint to know the fury on her masked expression.

“It’s The Scourge of the Seas!” She cried, spinning in alarm across the sea of swaying, jostling sailors quick on their way to drunkenness. This was bad. They weren’t ready for a confrontation so soon–she wasn’t ready. “Cap’n Sixshot! A-all hands! We are–”

–

“Comin’ for yer heads, ye best believe, aim the pyros, lads! Let’s leave ‘em minnows in a barrel–”

“An’ risk sinkin’ em and the whole of our loot? Are ye mad, Spindrift?!” Scabbard shook him by the shoulders. “Look’it how slow their ol’ raft crawls; they’ll never escape the likes of us!”

“N’ how are we supposed to move all o’ the gold back from their ship, to ours?” 

“Leavin’ em alive won’t help it, I tell ye!” Crowed Swashbuckle. “Let’s sail ’em close, lemme right at them throats!”

So silently concurred the Nightbird, stood at their bow, scanning the colorful mass in the distance for the face she knew. Maybe the others would be chasing Sixshot. But she only wanted one other.

And it was as their ship approached the intercept range that she spotted the patched-over eye amidst the crowd. Just as The Fleeting Sweep blew across the currents and the towlines whistled across the sea’s gap to make mark in the railings of Sixshot’s bloated vessel. Her mark. She wanted–

“Sixshot!” Screamed Spindrift, hurtling himself up the mast and leaping, sword drawn mid-flight, from one deck to the other. “Ya slimy good-fer-nothing urchin, ye thought ye could just sail away with our gold?”

“If it ain’t the suckers of the season! Here to surrender yur lives as well?” Giggled the rival captain. He didn’t even have to snap his fingers as a row of his nastiest privateers leapt to attention, weapons in hand, all poised for the Sweep’s throat. Though none would find their mark with the leap of two other brothers, throwing themselves into the fray with far less inhibition than their first, drawing first blood. 

It became very apparent that their timing had been nearly angelic. Judging by the bottles strewn across the deck in panic, they were well on their way to drunkenness, and despite their numbers, were all but close to inefficacy. Spindrift was first to lunge for the captain, ducking cleanly under one blade and stepping neatly out of the way for Sliver to deliver a swift kick to another sailor, his sword sailed in an arc unimpeded for the man. He didn’t have any spiteful banter to return; his vitriol had consumed it all.

“And not a word to spare! Ya really are so bitter about it!” Laughed the captain, swinging down his own brutal show of steel, meeting Spindrift in the middle almost effortlessly. “And hold! If me own eyes do not fail me, do I not spy yer captain among ya?”

Spindrift opened his mouth to retaliate, furious, but Swashbuckle simply finished his thought for him with an unholy yowl and the glint of steel crashing down in place of a retort. Sixshot nearly jumped out of his boots, scrambling back to nearly topple over his own crew behind him, before whistling for desperate aid.

“Oh, ye dirty-” Swashbuckle snarled, several men rushing in between them to hold guard, and rushing forward to meet them himself. “Will these bastards save yer neck from my–hey!”

“Watch it!” Spindrift grabbed him by the arm. “He’s mine!”

“Does it matter who gets ‘im? So long as ye don’t get got yerself?” Huffed Sliver, bashing her way in with her sword and plowing another drunkard out of the way to join their flank. “An’ eyes up for the purple wench, too. She’s just as guilty for this as–” 

The thought was interrupted as a sailor screamed his way to the deck between them, splitting the space between them as he lay writhing in bloody agony, his throat spilling red. Swashbuckle turned incredulously to spy the culprit just as Nightbird barreled her way across the deck between them, bounding over the sailor to rush at the target just beyond them two.

A girl in purple, that scoundrelous, familiar face barred by patch, waiting by the mast, sword raised at the ready.

–

“We meet again,” Shadow Striker chuckled bitterly. “You know, don’t you?”

Nightbird gave no answer–could not give one. Not any but the weight of the sword bashing down over her own, striking with the fury of a thousand soldiers in one, nearly buckling her arms back into themselves. A recoil, and then again. Her blade spoke clear enough.

“I told you. I told you! Join me, to avoid this fate, I never–” she struck back, finally pushing back on the offense, shouting between their blades meeting, bouncing against each other, seeking the other’s weakest spots. “I never wanted this for you! But you had your chance–” 

Nightbird caught the blade against her own this time and pushed, holding them in stalemate. Her eyes were wide and furious as they ground against each other, unblinking as she burned her gaze into Shadow Striker’s. The lady stared back. “I don’t want to kill you. But you know that I will.”

She pushed her knee into the rival lady’s stomach, sending her stumbling. Her back hit another sailor–another of Sixshot’s–and he turned, dazed, to strike at her vulnerable stance, only for Shadow Striker herself to feint in and parry away the blow.

“This is between me and her. Get!” She yelled, pushing the man back into the fray, her head turned for just a split second–in which a flying fist met her cheek, sending her reeling. Between the stars sent flying, did she spy the sharp edge of her enemy’s glare–and the blade’s edge, hurtling down on her like a guillotine, only to be blocked with edge of her sword, brought up just at the last moment. Underhanded, she thought. But deserved, wasn’t it. 

“You know the rule of the sea. You know it. You know!” She yelled, her arms screaming from the recoil under Nightbird’s relentless assault, and striking back with one of her own. Her sword met its other with a raucous clang, retreating, circling around to repeat, pressuring the smaller pirate and forcing her to scramble. “I told you, back at Mayalx, you could have come with, spared yourself this strife–”

Her sentence was cut quickly as their swords met again and Nightbird twisted her arm, forcing her own blade to clip her in the leg just short of the knee-joint. She stumbled over herself, very nearly upending herself over a spilled bottle strewn across the deck, and kicked it at her opponent, who danced out of its path. Nightbird leered at her again, her left hand leaving the handle of her cuirass for a moment to drag a thumb across her throat. 

“And you, so brilliant with the blade, feet like a cat’s, why did you have to choose this?”

She cried out, swinging back at full force, just barely missing Nightbird’s frame. The frustration in her heart only grew, a fury widening and widening inside of her. She had brought this upon herself, of course, but so had her enemy, so stupidly stubborn for her old wretch of a captain and a glorified raft. And she couldn’t blame her, no, but how could she not feel resentful about it! She pushed again, that fury erupting into fire, slashing for flesh she knew she could not meet. “Why did you have to choose them? You, who were good to me, for what?” 

She slammed her blade down once more, and it met steel, and this time, she followed through. The sword bounced from her opponent’s grasp and slid far into the cluttered battlefield, leaving her defenseless. Nightbird’s eyes flashed with alarm, and she dived to follow her blade, but Shadow Striker knew this. The heel of her boot shot out like a viper, smashing her arm to the ground, pinning it under her weight. No more tricks.

And so she stood, stooped over the unarmed, masked figure of her rival, out of reach from her implement, writhing in pain. And even as she did, her face remained stone, leering up at her. She could end this. She should end her. It was her victorious right.

Yet, why was it so hard for her to bring the blade down? Even after all of this?

“I–I–” She spluttered. Her foot ground against the wriggling arm, and then slowly, released it from its prison. Nightbird sprung to her feet, massaging her crushed arm, eyes scanning quickly across the wooden battlefield–then freezing almost instantaneously. Shadow Striker looked at her confusedly, and noticed the stony, hateful glare she wore, now melting into fear.

She turned, at risk of attack, to see it for herself, and across the deck–unnoticed by all brawling crewmates–the armada on the horizon, just barely visible through the seaspray.

— 

Amidst the rest of the crew sowed pure, cascading chaos.

Spindrift’s sword cleaved through the flesh of another, an obstacle to the captain careening just out of his reach, parrying off Swashbuckle, who’d managed to flank his own opposition–if just for a moment–before the crowd carried him away as well.

Sliver was faring similarly by his side, keeping flank and holding her own against a torrent of drunkards, armed with blade or bottle, now swaggering much more than they had been. Her head turned every so often to her first mate, engaged heartily in combat with the traitor–but never for long, as to dodge the swinging of danger in her immediate radius, and to render another of the boundless crew immobile.

As were Scabbard and Scope, lost in the mass of bodies, battered, slashed, but still swinging. At some point they too had made their attempts on Sixshot–and promptly had been diverted far, far away. But in the midst of chaos and blinding, desperate fury, there was hardly the time to think, only the instinct to act. And as this skirmish dragged on, slicking the Wing-Wolf with blood and booze, the will to enact vengeance burned but slowly crumbled, and gave way to something far more primal, the simple urge to survive.

It wouldn’t be enough. Spindrift sliced, and he slashed, but the torrent of crew never seemed to diminish, laying flat on the deck, slowly rising back up for another go, almost always in the way of him and his ultimate target. And Sixshot seemed to revel in it, just out of reach, slipping in to hack at his weakest spots, and catching him sharply in the shoulder with his cuirass. A burning pain shot up his back and he howled in pain, falling back for Swashbuckle to jump into place with renewed anger, striking back at the captain’s bloodied blade. 

The weight of his strike must have caught the captain off-guard, because his arm near followed as his sword dropped to his side with the momentum, just barely jumping out of the way in time as it stuck firm into the deck. Swashbuckle cried out nearly jubilantly, his opponent now rid of a blade, and raised his back up just as another sailor, thrown back by an unseen spill, tumbled into his wielding arm, fumbling his balance on the deck–and the grip on his sword.

The cuirass clattered to the ground, landing under the sailor with a painful splat, and for just the briefest of moments, captain and sailor alike stared at each other, defenseless, useless. Save for their fists. Swashbuckle yowled his fury in one final rush and tackled Sixshot himself, throwing his fists across the teal-and-white of the captain’s body just in time to be bowled over himself by a trio of his lackeys. 

It wasn’t going to be a winning fight, his head screamed. Even as he writhed like an eel under the dogpile, clawing and elbowing at the arms hitting and restraining him, he could see it all across the deck: too many of them against his own, three blades for each of theirs. And his crew was getting tired. 

There was a reason they never tangled with other crews on their own ships. They really were nothing against a much-larger crew.

Someone was yelling in his periphery, but he couldn’t say who–maybe Spindrift, as he groaned in agony, confronted by a new set of fresh blades in his moment of weakness, maybe Sliver, cornered into the bow by a posse of semi-coherent sailors all slashing–or any of the other dozens of Wing-Wolves gallivanting across the deck, throwing their blades at anything resembling blue, or…

“Poor, poor boy you are, but ya fought fine. Though me men clearly did it better.” mocked Sixshot, rubbing his cheek, the malicious smile just visible from behind his torn mask. He turned to his wood-lodged sword and with some effort, removed it from his deck, brandishing it cockily. “Don’t worry, sailor, I’ll send ya whimperin’ back to yer captain soon en-”

“Stop! Stop!!”

A frantic voice rang out over the din, just barely audible from the fray, as Shadow Striker limped her way through the chaos. Sixshot glanced up at her, and replied with a scoff and a tip of the hat, his blade raised high into the light, poised to strike. “Ah, but I fear there is not mercy for marauders who board this sacred ship… none at all!”

But as the blade glimmered in the sunshine, it never found its way to its target. Not as the red-and-black deckhand ran between the two, nearly toppling over the captain, panic in her eyes as she gestured frantically across the chaotic deck. 

“She meant it. We ought tae go, the coats have found us!”

“What?!” That snapped Sixshot out of his triumphant stance, his head whipping up to the deck around him, crew and enemy alike falling from their battles into statues of disbelief as the figureheads of half a dozen ships lurched into view around them. But there wouldn’t be the time to reef the sails, not on a ship so big, and with a cargo so heavy. Not with the cannons of a naval firing squad trained on the brigantine, and a crew succumbed to injury or intoxication. 

If there was any chance of escape, it would have to be on a smaller ship. One unburdened by its cargo, almost too small to be hit by cannonfire…

“Sweeps! Back aboard!” Spindrift took his chance and sprinted across the deck, calling for his comrades to follow. He bounded over the bodies on the deck as fast as he could manage, eyes stinging from the pain of his wound, to the place where ropes met railing, and leapt for The Fleeting Sweep. He hit the mast heavily, sliding down in a splinterous descent as one-by-one his crew rejoined him–but all in vain. As he took the helm, it was already too late, the broad side of a warship already closing in, their avenue of sail closed forever. 

“Arms down, you filthy convicts, for your greed and savagery has led you to your ruin.” A voice boomed across the deck. All heads turned to see the red-and-blue coat barely visible across the gap, a beloathed, familiar face returning to haunt them. “In the name of the Prime of Cybertron, I, Admiral Magnus, am arresting you for your crimes against the hegemony!”

–

“If you attempt to flee or retaliate against my men, we shall strike you down without a trial. Lay down your arms and kneel quietly against your deck, and allow justice to take its righteous course.” The admiral continued, whistling for his men to bring forth the chains down the gangplank. This couldn’t be it. Nightbird’s gaze shifted to each of her crew, frozen in place. After all that they had done to get this far, all the fighting and the Kraken-battling and the plundering, they were being done in by the navy at last. So close, on the cusp of their final voyage, and this was how it ended?

She needed an in. She needed a way to shout and tell them to stop, so that Scourge would not be failed, so that their purpose all these years would not be in vain. She needed to bring back the window of opportunity.

She needed to run.

“Wait! It isn’t–you have to hear us out, sir, ye can’t arrest us now!” Scabbard spluttered, trying to buy them time, but the plea fell on deaf ears. The officers stomping across the deck grabbed him by the arms, shackling his wrists to the heavy chain.

One of the navy officers snorted at his statement, the one in green outfit. “Oh, if I had a gold-piece for every time I’ve heard that excuse–hey! That one’s running for it!”

Scabbard’s cry was just enough. In the minor distraction, Nightbird took her chance and sprinted across the floor, booking it for the cabin under the helm as sailors took alarm. “Someone stop that girl!”

She didn’t bother slamming the door behind her. She just needed to get their attention. Immediately, she bounded over the table and ripped the map from the table, bringing it up to shield her from the incoming interlopers, and praying that the crimson ink against the parchment would be enough to catch their eyes first, just as the form of the admiral barged into the cabin, blotting out the light of day. 

“You weaselish thing! What could you possibly–what is this? A pirate’s cartographing?” Magnus squinted, his sword–and gaze–trained on the brazen X across the Chaaran landmarks on the map. Nightbird peeked over top of the parchment, watching him stride over and peer at the trove of information she had brought him to. Laid across the table was the rest of their research, both Scourge’s and Shockwave’s, the latter of which containing the rough ramblings of Unicron’s Head. Magnus’s hand dropped from his sword to trace the map, noting the little insignia of the squid on the paper. 

The Kraken of Chaar. 

“We have a just cause! We have to stop the Kraken!” Shouted Sliver in the backdrop, already being led away in chains. Magnus glanced up to the sound of her voice, and then down to the papers strewn across the table, and noticing the scrolls around it with runes he recognized. His expression faltered from stern fury to… something else.

“All my men! Hold the prisoners!” He shouted out of the cabin, replacing his sword for the map, and taking Nightbird’s arm roughly in the other. “There has been a revelation, and I must have my answers first. Bring them back on deck!”

Nightbird heaved a sigh of relief, her wrist slackening in Magnus’s grip. They would be heard out. They had a chance after all. They just needed to play their cards right and to not spoil this chance…

To “put the gems in my children’s eyes” is a sort of courtship ditty/poem which the suitor will sing based around the gemstone/crystal most similar to their beloved’s eyes, essentially propositioning them to have children with them that will have their eye color (hence putting the gems in the children’s eyes).

There are no standard lyrics to this sort of thing, but it would be very brief, two short stanzas: the first compliments the gem of the beloved's eye color, and the latter usually goes along the lines of “put the [gems] in my children’s eyes”. Bonus points for originality/creativity, nobody likes a reused poem after all.

One example for blue eyes might go: “The sapphire’s the most beautiful gem, the color of the skies // So won’t you come and put the sapphires in my children’s eyes?”

For red/pink eyes it might be: “I covet the lustrous ruby, the loveliest rosy hues // so won’t you come put rubies in my children’s eyes too?” (would also work for garnets/spinels/whatever red rocks exist)

Drew @flameofthescorpion 's awesome Cyberworld Galvatron redesign because holy shit i'm obsessed-

I love the shawl and arm cannon so much. he looks so cool it's beyond words. kisses him 1 bajillion times. mmmmmmmmmm

bonus colorless + teeny tiny ron dragon yearning for his boat... i love how silly his dragon mode looks (and the hat on his back!!!!!) aaaaaahhh