The Senate chamber had barely settled into its usual rhythm when Starscream activated his private comm. The debate below had already begun; some industrial delegate was arguing about transport allocations in Polyhex, his voice droning upward through the chamber with the familiar self-importance of a mech convinced that cargo routing was the center of Cybertronian civilization.
Starscream ignored it. “Skywarp.”
Static crackled briefly before Skywarp’s voice answered, far too pleased with itself. “You’re gonna love this.”
Starscream narrowed his optics. “Report.”
“Oh, I’ve got one.”
“The arena moved.”
Skywarp chuckled. “Yeah.”
Starscream waited only a beat. “So where is it?”
There was a pause, just long enough to be irritating. “Well, that’s the funny part.”
“Skywarp.”
“Relax. I already found it.”
Starscream leaned slightly forward. “And?”
“And then I got arrested.”
Starscream closed his optics briefly.
Thundercracker’s voice cut into the channel from the visitors’ gallery. “I told you that was going to happen.”
Skywarp laughed. “It was worth it.”
“You were supposed to observe,” Starscream said, pinching the bridge of his nose.
“I did observe. Turns out the arena was last night.”
Starscream opened his optics again. “And now you’re in prison.”
“For the moment.”
“I will retrieve you after this session.”
“Don’t bother.”
Starscream frowned slightly. “What?”
Skywarp’s voice lowered, amusement sharpening every syllable. “Look down.”
Starscream looked across the Senate chamber and nearly sighed again. Skywarp was sitting in the empty visitors’ gallery across from him, one leg draped casually over the railing, grinning as if he had done something clever rather than something inevitable.
“You were in prison,” Starscream said slowly.
Skywarp shrugged. “I get bored.”
Thundercracker groaned. “You escaped again.”
“Escaping is the fun part.”
Starscream stared at him for a moment, then asked the only important question. “Did you find the arena?”
Skywarp’s grin widened. “Oh, yeah.”
He leaned casually against the railing across the chamber, clearly enjoying the attention. Starscream did not indulge him for long.
“Well?”
“You should’ve seen it.”
Thundercracker’s voice went flat. “Just tell him.”
“Alright.” Skywarp shrugged. “They built the whole thing in a few hours.”
Starscream’s optics narrowed slightly. “Built what?”
“The arena. Not a pit like the old ones. This thing was modular.” Skywarp tapped the railing for emphasis. “Platforms, barriers, lighting rigs. Looked like something out of an industrial fabrication yard. And when the fights were done? They tore the whole thing down.”
Thundercracker frowned. “How fast?”
“Faster than the Enforcers could get there.”
Starscream tilted his head slightly. “Who built it?”
Skywarp thought for a moment. “Whole team of them. Construction types. Green and purple paint. You’d notice them.”
Starscream made a mental note. A coordinated engineering crew capable of assembling and dismantling large structures rapidly. Interesting.
Skywarp leaned back a fraction, but Starscream did not give him time to wander. “You stayed to observe the fights.”
Skywarp barked a laugh. “Frag, yes.”
Thundercracker sighed. “I knew it.”
“There were a bunch of matches,” Skywarp continued, ignoring him. “Crowd was huge. But the last one…” His grin faded slightly. “That one got ugly.”
Starscream watched him carefully. “Megatron.”
Skywarp nodded. “Yeah. That guy.” He leaned forward slightly, elbows braced on his knees. “That match was downright fatal.”
Thundercracker frowned. “Meaning?”
“Meaning the other mech didn’t walk out.”
The chamber below them continued its debate, oblivious. The delegate from Polyhex had moved from transport allocations to tariff exemptions, and several platforms flickered as senators requested the right to make equally irrelevant replies.
Skywarp’s voice lowered. “And after the fight? That’s when things got weird.”
Starscream’s optics narrowed. “Weird how?”
“He didn’t celebrate.”
Thundercracker blinked. “What?”
Skywarp shook his head. “No victory pose. No crowd play. He just stood there.”
Starscream already knew what was coming.
“Then he started talking,” Skywarp said.
Starscream leaned slightly forward. “About what?”
“The caste system.” Skywarp tapped the railing again, but more slowly this time. “Said it was broken. Said Cybertron was built to keep most mechs down.”
Thundercracker muttered quietly, “That explains the crowds.”
“Oh, yeah.” Skywarp looked directly at Starscream. “They were eating it up.”
Starscream said nothing. Below them, the Senate continued arguing about trade routes. Above them, the future of Cybertron was being quietly described by a mech who had just escaped prison after attending an illegal arena.
Skywarp tilted his head, the grin returning by degrees. “So. You still want to meet him?”
Starscream did not answer immediately. His optics drifted away from Skywarp and down toward the Senate floor below, where the chamber continued its endless debate. A transport levy in Polyhex had somehow turned into an argument about cargo routing across the northern energon lines. No one below seemed aware that something far more important had already begun.
Finally, Starscream spoke. “I already have.”
Skywarp blinked.
Thundercracker straightened slightly. “You what?”
“I met him shreds,” Starscream said, gaze still fixed on the chamber below.
Skywarp’s grin slowly widened. “Oh, frag.”
Thundercracker shook his head. “You went alone.”
“Yes.”
Skywarp laughed quietly. “You’re serious.”
Starscream nodded once. “For a gladiator, he was remarkably composed.”
Skywarp leaned forward now, interested. “So what happened?”
Starscream finally looked back at them. “He explained his position.”
Thundercracker folded his arms. “That doesn’t sound like the Senate version.”
“It was not.” Starscream glanced briefly toward the distant skyline beyond the chamber’s open archways. “He believes the caste system cannot be repaired.”
Skywarp shrugged. “After last night’s speech, I’d say he believes that pretty strongly.”
“Yes.”
Thundercracker studied him. “And you walked away from that meeting?”
Starscream nodded. “He allowed it.”
Skywarp raised an optic. “That’s… interesting.”
“At the time, I wondered why.”
Thundercracker tilted his head. “Why what?”
“Why he came with only two others.”
Skywarp blinked. “Wait. You mean Soundwave and—”
“Shockwave.”
Thundercracker frowned slightly. “That seems light for security.”
Starscream looked back toward Skywarp. “Until now.”
Skywarp tilted his head.
“You just described the final match,” Starscream said.
Skywarp nodded. “Yeah. That fight was brutal.”
“Fatal.”
“Very.”
Starscream folded his arms again. “The gladiator you described does not require guards.”
Thundercracker understood first. “Oh.”
Skywarp blinked, then laughed. “Oh. That makes a lot more sense.”
Starscream looked back toward the chamber floor. Megatron had not arrived at that meeting with a small escort. He had arrived with the only two minds he actually required: Soundwave for information, Shockwave for analysis, and Megatron himself for everything else.
“Yes,” Starscream said quietly. “Now it makes perfect sense.”
Thundercracker watched him for a moment. Starscream had gone still again, optics narrowed slightly as he stared down toward the Senate floor. Thundercracker knew that look. It meant Starscream was thinking, which usually meant someone was about to get into trouble.
“Oh, no,” Thundercracker sighed.
Starscream did not respond.
“I know that look,” Thundercracker said.
Skywarp glanced between them. “What look?”
“That one.” Thundercracker gestured toward Starscream. “He’s planning something.”
“I am evaluating information,” Starscream answered calmly.
Skywarp grinned. “Yeah, that’s the look.”
“And when you start evaluating information,” Thundercracker continued, pointing between himself and Skywarp, “one of us ends up doing something extremely stupid.”
Skywarp shrugged. “Usually me.”
Starscream finally turned his head slightly toward them. “That is because you are extremely qualified.”
Skywarp laughed. “I knew you appreciated my talents.”
Thundercracker groaned quietly. “This is exactly what I mean.”
Starscream returned his attention to the chamber below. “The arena was assembled in hours.”
Skywarp nodded. “Yeah.”
“And dismantled just as quickly.”
“Also yes.”
“That requires planning.”
Thundercracker frowned. “Construction teams.”
“Mobile infrastructure,” Starscream said.
Skywarp tilted his head. “So?”
Starscream finally looked at him. “You said they painted their armor green and purple.”
Skywarp shrugged. “Yeah. Construction types. They’re always around the fights. Not just building, either. They keep the crowd where it belongs, patch up fighters when they have to, haul pieces in and out. Big one looked like he could carry half the arena by himself. Another one had a crane rig. One of them worked like a medic. I didn’t get names.”
Starscream absorbed that with sharpened attention. He did not yet know what the team meant. Not fully. But Skywarp had seen enough to make one thing clear: the arenas did not move themselves.
“That team is worth identifying,” Starscream said.
Thundercracker slowly understood. “You think they matter.”
“I think anything that allows Megatron to continue operating after the Senate ban matters.”
Skywarp leaned forward eagerly. “Oh, this is good.”
Thundercracker closed his optics briefly. “Starscream…”
“If the Senate intends to stop the arenas,” Starscream continued, “they will fail.”
Thundercracker nodded reluctantly. “Probably.”
“Because they are looking for arenas.”
Skywarp grinned. “But the arena isn’t the important part.”
“The infrastructure is,” Starscream corrected. “And the mechs who control it.”
Thundercracker opened his optics again. “You’re about to send him after the construction team.”
Starscream did not deny it.
“I knew it,” Thundercracker muttered.
Skywarp straightened up. “Hey, I already got arrested once this week.”
“That simply means you understand the environment.”
Skywarp beamed. “See?”
Thundercracker rubbed his forehead. “This is how problems start.”
Starscream looked back toward the chamber floor again. “No. This is how answers are found.”
Skywarp did not wait for more encouragement. By the time the Senate debate slid into its next procedural recess, he had already left the visitors’ gallery. Starscream did not ask how. Thundercracker did not either. Asking Skywarp how he entered or exited official buildings tended to produce answers that made the situation worse.
The report came less than a breem later.
“Found one,” Skywarp said across the private channel.
Starscream kept his expression neutral as a senator from Polyhex continued speaking below. “Which one?”
“The big one.”
Thundercracker’s voice entered the line. “That is not a useful description.”
“It is if you see him,” Skywarp replied. “Big. Green. Hauler frame. Looks like he wakes up annoyed that things have weight.”
Starscream’s optics narrowed faintly. “Where are you?”
“Kaon. Outer yard near the old freight corridors. He’s moving support beams.”
“You are observing him.”
“I am talking to him.”
Thundercracker made a low sound. “Of course you are.”
There was a faint shift in the comm, followed by the distant, heavy noise of machinery and Skywarp’s voice, now no longer speaking only into the channel. “So, you work the arenas?”
Another voice answered, low and suspicious. “Why are you talking to me?”
Skywarp sounded delighted. “Because you’re standing here.”
“That’s not a reason.”
“It is for me.”
Starscream leaned back slowly in his seat, listening.
Long Haul—because that had to be the hauler Skywarp had described—made a sound like a tired engine. “I’m working.”
“Yeah, I saw. You move those fast.”
“They need moving.”
“That arena last night moved fast too.”
A pause followed. Not long, but enough to tell Starscream that Skywarp had hit something relevant.
Long Haul’s voice lowered. “Don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Sure you don’t.”
“Are you an Enforcer?”
Skywarp laughed. “Do I look like an Enforcer?”
“You look like trouble.”
Thundercracker muttered, “Accurate.”
Skywarp ignored him. “I was at the fight. Good work. Whole place vanished before the Enforcers got there.”
“Then maybe you imagined it.”
“I don’t imagine that much green and purple.”
Another pause followed.
Long Haul said, “You should leave.”
“Probably,” Skywarp agreed. “But one question first.”
“No.”
“Who runs the builds?”
“No.”
“That’s an answer.”
“That’s me telling you no.”
Skywarp’s grin could be heard through the comm. “You’re very direct. I like that.”
“I don’t.”
Starscream almost smiled despite himself.
“Fine,” Skywarp continued. No names. Just tell me this. If the Senate keeps looking for pits, are they going to find anything?”
Long Haul was quiet for several seconds. When he answered, his voice was flat. “They’ll find holes in the ground.”
“And the arenas?”
“They’ll find holes in their plan.”
Skywarp laughed. “That was almost clever.”
“It was clear.”
“Better.”
“Leave.”
“Yeah, yeah.” A faint distortion crackled through the channel. “Nice talking to you.”
“It wasn’t.”
Skywarp’s voice came back fully into the private comm a moment later. “I like him.”
Thundercracker sighed. “He does not like you.”
“That’s fine. Most people start there.”
Starscream’s gaze remained on the Senate floor, but his processor was no longer with the Polyhex delegate, or the tariff debate, or the soft flicker of platform lights across the chamber.
They’ll find holes in their plan.
That was not a boast. It was operational confidence.
The builders understood the Senate’s failure before the Senate had even finished making it.
Sentinel Prime entered the chamber a few moments later for the formal opening of the next session, and the quiet murmur across the platforms began to fade as the tall Prime stepped onto the central dais. His presence had a way of pulling the room into order without raising his voice.
“The Senate of Cybertron is now in session.”
Lights across the platforms brightened as consoles activated. Starscream straightened slightly on his platform, attention returning fully to the chamber floor. Thundercracker leaned forward from the gallery above, muttering under his breath.
“Here we go.”
Sentinel continued, “The first matter before the Senate concerns resource allocations and infrastructure stability across several city-states.”
Starscream already knew what that meant.
Ratbat rose from his platform. The Kaonian senator spread his wings slightly as he addressed the chamber. “Honored senators. As this body is aware, Cybertron’s energy reserves continue to face increasing strain.”
A few senators murmured agreement.
“Recent analysis indicates that one of the most inefficient energy expenditures currently maintained by the Senate is the aerial city-state of Vos.”
Starscream’s optics narrowed.
Thundercracker groaned softly from the gallery. “Oh, you have got to be kidding me.”
Ratbat gestured upward toward the projection of the floating city that appeared above the chamber floor. “The stabilizers required to keep Vos aloft consume a disproportionate amount of energon compared to ground-based settlements.”
Starscream rose from his platform before Ratbat had even finished. Several senators glanced in his direction.
Ratbat continued as if he had expected the interruption. “I therefore propose that the Senate resume deliberation on relocating the city-state of Vos to a permanent surface location.”
Starscream’s voice cut through the chamber. “Absolutely not.”
The chamber quieted slightly.
Sentinel looked toward him. “Senator Starscream.”
Starscream stepped forward to the edge of his platform. “Vos was designed as an aerial city. Its infrastructure, transportation network, and defensive grid all rely on its altitude.”
Ratbat inclined his head slightly. “That does not change the energy requirements.”
“It changes everything.” Starscream surged toward the edge. “You propose grounding a city of aerial citizens whose entire culture, industry, and transportation systems are built around flight.”
Ratbat replied smoothly, “Cybertron must adapt to changing resource realities.”
“No.” The word echoed clearly. “You are not adapting. You are dismantled a functioning civilization because the Senate refuses to address the real problems in its energy distribution.”
A ripple of reaction moved through the chamber.
Ratbat’s optics narrowed slightly. “Be careful with your accusations, Senator.”
Starscream did not step back. “The data already presented in this chamber showed that Vos is not the source of Cybertron’s energy strain. Those figures were never answered.”
A few senators exchanged uneasy looks. Shockwave’s empty platform remained dark.
Starscream continued, careful not to let his gaze linger there too long. “Now you intend to ground an entire city rather than explain where those resources are actually going.”
The chamber erupted into louder conversation.
Sentinel struck the central console. “Order.”
The room slowly quieted again.
Ratbat watched Starscream with open irritation now. “You make many claims, Senator claims.”
“I make observations.”
Ratbat gestured toward the projection of Vos again. “The energy demands remain unacceptable.”
“Then solve the energy problem.” Starscream folded his arms. “Do not destroy a city to hide it.”
From the gallery above, Skywarp whispered to Thundercracker, “Oh, this is going to get good.”
Thundercracker sighed. “Yes. Yes, it is.”
The Senate chamber slowly settled back into its uneasy rhythm as the debate resumed. Starscream remained standing at his platform for a moment longer before sitting. Ratbat continued speaking below, calmly presenting numbers and projections to support his proposal. Most of the chamber listened. Some of them even agreed.
Starscream watched the proceedings in silence.
Across the chamber, Shockwave’s platform remained dark. Empty.
Starscream remembered the smooth metal faceplate where Shockwave’s features had once been. He remembered the single yellow optic, the altered clamps where hands had been, the voice that had remained too calm because the Senate had made it so. Logic alone had not protected him. Correct data had not protected him. Procedure had not protected him.
Starscream’s optics shifted toward Ratbat, then toward Sentinel Prime at the central dais.
Megatron’s words returned to him.
The Senate understands very little.
Starscream sat back in his chair, posture composed, expression coldly attentive. He would have to be careful. Very careful.
Because now he understood exactly what Megatron had meant.
And he had no intention of ending up like Shockwave.