Chapter 3: Command Presence
Vos struck the surface of Cybertron in controlled ruin.
Not a catastrophic shatter, but not intact. The massive city came down in stages, directional engines firing until the last possible moment, bleeding speed, correcting angle, forcing the impact into something survivable. Whole sections crumpled under the strain. Outer platforms sheared away. Structural spines bent under forces they were never meant to endure.
Dust and heat rolled outward in a wide shockwave.
Then silence followed, broken only by residual systems struggling to stabilize what remained.
From above, from distance, through surviving feeds and returning signals, Soundwave observed the aftermath.
The city still existed.
Broken.
Grounded.
Alive.
He did not focus on the wreckage.
He focused on movement.
They came in waves.
Seekers. Hundreds at first, then thousands, then tens of thousands, converging on the downed structure and the surrounding airspace. Wings cut across the sky in coordinated patterns, not chaotic, not scattered, not leaderless. Directed.
They did not search for leadership.
They moved toward it.
Soundwave tracked the convergence points. Every vector aligned. Every path narrowed toward a single location within the fractured remains of Vos.
Starscream.
He had remained through the fall. He had directed the descent. He had held the structure together long enough for evacuation to succeed.
Soundwave did not need confirmation from words.
He saw it in behavior.
Units arriving did not question. They did not hesitate. They took position. They waited.
Command presence had already been established.
Soundwave processed the scale.
One hundred thousand.
Then more.
Signals continued to rise as additional Seeker units entered range, responding to the same gravity of authority.
Two hundred thousand approaching.
Not assembled by order.
Drawn by proof.
Soundwave logged the shift.
Starscream was no longer simply the guardian of Vos.
He was the center of the aerial force.
Air Commander, confirmed now in force, not merely title.
Soundwave transmitted. “Megatron.”
The channel opened without delay. “Report.”
“Vos has impacted surface,” Soundwave said. “Structural integrity compromised. Survivability: acceptable.”
A pause followed.
“Starscream?”
Soundwave observed the incoming data feeds, the endless rows of wings glinting under the pale light of Cybertron’s sky, settling into defensive arrays around the fallen city.
“Starscream remains,” Soundwave reported, his flat vocal synthesizers carrying the weight of the numbers shifting on his screens. “Command authority: verified. The sky has chosen.”