Closed Log: Murder

[crackofthunder]

WHO: Starscream, Thundercracker, Blackarachnia and Murder
WHERE: StarWave Tower
WHEN: Murder Time
WARNINGS: Murder
SUMMARY: Murder
FORMAT: Murder

Comments

[loltraitorlol]

Oh frag.

It's the only thing he can think as Thundercracker breaks the desk almost as though it's nothing.

He was always the stronger of them, physically. Thundercracker for strength and grace, Skywarp for pure speed (at least, with his teleportation) and Starscream, supposedly, for cleverness.

Which was really just enough rope to hang himself with.

The kick connected solidly with his face, fracturing his jaw and breaking teeth, sending him to the floor. He lay, stunned and dizzy, not able to respond to Thundercracker's words, or even think straight for a few seconds. A cough escaped him, along with a few shattered teeth.

Get up, slag you. Find the energy. Return fire.

But what he says is logical.

And at once he's torn.

His own spark tells him to snap, to rage, to deny everything Thundercracker's saying; but that selfsame cool logic which has kept him from fleeing tells him: He is correct. It would be a waste of time and resources.

A compromise, then. Buy time. Or try to.

"You're right," he says, his voice almost a whisper this time. "... you are right. But by the Pit, Thundercracker, I am trying. I do make the same mistakes, but for once I... I am attempting to learn from them..."

It's hard to talk. His face hurts. No. This won't work at all. He pushes himself up enough to be in a seated position. Gathers his strength.

And then unleashes it in a volley of lasers fired at both of them, a rapid succession of shots. Not as strong as he'd like, and he won't be able to fly. But he doesn't think he's going to escape this anyway. Not in this body.

"But there are other reasons I am chasing you," he tries to hiss.

[crackofthunder]

Starscream was always quicker than him, and even diseased and bleeding, the laser fire catches him in the shoulder, spinning him around and back... but he does his best to roll with the impact, pirouetting into a crouching stance, steadying himself to pounce as soon as he recovers from the pain.

"Then learn this! I don't care what reasons you have, Starscream," he spits. "I'm here to make sure you learn from the mistake you made in destroying our life. I'm here to make sure you and your slagging immortal spark learn that I am no longer yours to abuse!"

A quick glance to Blackarachnia, and a swift hand gesture to ask her to hold back for the moment - this animosity goes back several million years, as should be obvious to her, but he's not about to deny her her own vengeance, either.

"In the only language you ever slagging understand!"

There's the leap, diving to tackle him back to the ground, driving his shoulder hard into his midsection.

[borrowyourpower]

The femme manages to dodge any lasers fired her way. She was always a hard target when things were more in her control.

Thundercracker's gesture elicits a hiss from her. What's the point of her even being here if there's nothing she's allowed to do? She's more than half tempted to just leave. Something that'd be very easy for her to do.

[loltraitorlol]

Starscream's exhausted. At this point, he can't even gather up enough energy for a proper return of fire. He takes the hit full force, the wind knocked out of him by the blow, and goes to the ground.

At this point, he lets himself go limp. Sometimes, it's better not to struggle. Take your punishment like a Decepticon, you useless pile of scrap!

So he will.

[crackofthunder]

There was a song Thundercracker heard once in prison. Somebody was singing it while he was delivering laundry to people in solitary confinement. It was a song about a man who had spent his life turning away from conflict, avoiding fights whenever he could out of a sense of obligation to his miscreant father. Until a line was crossed. A woman was savaged. And he slaughtered the three men responsible.

Nine million years of crawlin' was bottled up inside him. He wasn't holdin' nothin' back. He let 'em have it all.

In the beating that follows, the surreal silence of Starscream refusing to fight back and Thundercracker not caring, only the sounds of impact are heard.

As much as he hates Starscream, he can't deny that there are times when he's seeing Megatron's face in front of him to be pummeled - always his greatest fear.

Finally, he lets out a loud, wordless shout of exertion, flinging Starscream across the room at Blackarachnia's feet.

There's blood on his hands as he pants, his body shaking at this raw moment of truth for him. Eyes blaring with a fiery red fury.

A fury that truly befits a Decepticon warrior.

[borrowyourpower]

Blackarachnia watches, slightly horrified by the savagery in which Thundercracker beats Starscream. However she does her best to not let that show.

When Starscream's body lands at her feet she can't stop herself from taking a step back. She looks from Thundercracker then back down.

She's beginning to regret this. Just another thing to add to her ever growing list.

She kneels next to the downed seeker, quickly snagging a handful of his hair. She jerks his head up so that she's nearly face to face with him. A slow grin forms on her lips.

"Would you like your pain to stop?" her voice comes out surprisingly sweet.

[loltraitorlol]

There's something almost comforting about this. Familiar. Being beaten savegly for his mistakes is something he inherently understands, even if the source is one unexpected and without authority.

He hates himself for almost feeling reassured. For feeling like some kind of status quo has been restored in his life. He has erred. He is punished. Hasn't he been trying to escape this?

He is bleeding and bruised and broken when he lands at Blackarachnia's feet. He doesn't resist when she pulls him up by his hair.

"Please," he says, his voice a harsh whisper. "Please?"

[crackofthunder]

Thundercracker's hair is covering his face as he leans down, looking at his bloodied hands. A snort of self-contempt at his idea that this would be a clean hit, in and out, leaving nothing for the police to find, now that the office is a bloody mess.

There's a wave of revulsion within himself - some unsettling nostalgia for a life he's loathed for so long, some entirely inexplicable moment of fraternal remorse, perhaps. Remembering Liadrin's words about compassion, which are quickly drowned out by the angering image of her swallowing Koltira's tongue.

He straightens up, collecting himself as he flicks some of that blood off his fingers. Taking a deep, steadying breath in order to watch the woman he'd loved, the woman Starscream had killed, do as she will with the bastard's helpless form.

This should be good. It's not something that they've ever explored, but he'd always suspected that when it came to being downright evil, she would completely outclass him with what she was capable of.

[borrowyourpower]

The femme shakes her head. Somewhat disappointed.

"How easy it'd be to beat you further. To leave you here bleeding. Dying painfully slow. Or I could just poison you. Sure it would be relatively painless but you'd be conscious long enough to feel your heart stop and your lungs collapse. You'd slowly suffocate." she explains, raising her free hand to gently touch his face.

"Oh, such a tough decision." she sighs while tightening her grip in his hair, pulling his head back and then throwing him toward the floor with as much force as she can manage.

"Perhaps I should crush your skull. Or run you through the heart."

She stands, leering down at him. She's disgusted with herself for the words coming from her mouth. For her very thoughts. She snarls and kicks him hard in the ribs and then again in the gut.

"There's just so much I could do and so little time."

oh look an IC reason to use this icon

[loltraitorlol]

He cried out at last, a hoarse, pained sound as he spit up blood. His ribs were already cracked - she had simply broken them.

Soon you won't even have to worry...

"Well, frag, woman," he managed, laying, unable to move. "Make up your glitching processor already."

[crackofthunder]

Thundercracker watches carefully. Noting that he still thinks he knows her well enough to sense that disgust. Or perhaps he just identifies with it readily. For all the talk about how neither of them like the Decepticon way... this is how Decepticons solve their problems.

Or maybe this is just how you solve a problem with a Decepticon.

It's necessary, he reminds himself. They have to prove themselves as mechs who will not be subjugated.

[borrowyourpower]

"I do have a problem with that, don't I? Oh well." she replies, grinning down at Starscream.

That's it. A cry of pain, that's what she wanted to hear.

Mostly satisfied she kneels down again, grabbing him roughly by his hair and lifting him. She smiles at him as she brings her free hand up. Her fingertips gently glide over his cheek, down his neck, before stopping at his collar. Her smile fades, a cold expression taking it's place, as she grabs his collar and tears it away from his neck.

She looks him in the eyes before quickly dipping her head down. Sharp teeth pierce the skin and she pumps him full of her poison. Every last drop is pushed into his system.

It'd work just fast enough. First everything would go numb, as if his whole body had fallen asleep. Leaving him awake and aware but unable to move or speak. And then slowly his body would shut down. The heart and lungs would stop at about the same time. And then he'd slip into darkness. Not a lot of pain, but plenty of fear.

Once she's done she releases him, letting his limp body fall to the floor. She wipes a hand across her mouth and stands. Her expression remains hard and cold as she glaces over at Thundercracker.

[loltraitorlol]

It's not like he's in any shape to resist. He cries out one last time as those fangs bite into his neck, and then...

At first it's almost blissful. The burning pain, the aches, the fever, all of it is gone, seeming far, far away. He doesn't even feel the impact as he hits the floor, his eyes rolling back in his head.

It's when his lungs and heart stop that he feels the fear.

It's like being in the black again. That cold, dark emptiness of space, where he felt nothing, saw nothing, was nothing but his own thoughts. Cold. Alone. Even pain was preferable to that.

Some part of him still idly wonders, Is this what it was like for Skyfire? Under the ice, his systems shutting down, one by one?

No. At least he knew someone was trying to find him.

Primus, please, just let it -

And then, silence.

[crackofthunder]

Death for a death. It's fair.

It's fair, isn't it? Isn't this justice?

The cold look in Blackarachnia's eyes chills him for a moment. As if they've crossed a line together they can't return from and -

No. No. This is right. He deserved this! If this didn't happen, he would run roughshod over them at every turn and constantly force his will onto them whenever he wished.

He walks over to Starscream, watching his eyes struggle against the poison, having never actually seen her venom in action... and there's another chill through his spine - how often did she tell him she had to struggle against the urge to bite him and do this to him, even when they were at the height of their happiness? How close was he to suffering this same fate every night of their life together?

He pushes that aside for now, crouching next to Starscream's body.

"I know your spark is immortal. I hope you can still hear my words right now. When you find your way back, remember this. This is the price you pay for imposing yourself on our lives. We are not your pawns and we never will be. We're not Autobots either, so don't think we're defectors you need to deal with. The fighting is over for us. Consider us casualties of war. Consider us gone."

His fingers start to glow in their orange heat.

"Please don't ever cross us again."

Thundercracker's hand covers Starscream's face, and intense flame erupts from it, starting a funeral pyre for his fallen brother.

Standing up, he observes it for a moment, before turning to face Blackarachnia. Reaching a hand out to take hers and, if she allows it, pull her into an embrace.

[borrowyourpower]

She'd dealt the final blow. It was over and now she could leave.

She watches the blaze for a moment before looking back to Thundercracker. Conflicting emotions show on her face as she stops herself from reaching to take his hand. She closes her eyes and takes a deep breath.

"We should go." she says, turning away from him.

[loltraitorlol]

He hears it, certainly. The words don't register - he's still dazed from dying (he'll never get used to it) - but he'll remember later.

What he thinks of it? That will remain to be seen.

As it stands, he stays, for a time, inside his own corpse, not feeling a thing, just laying stunned. It's only after the fire begins to consume what's left that he slowly sinks through the floor and into the cool darkness between rooms, eventually finding enough presence of mind to zip into a ventilation shaft.

Down he goes to a secret place, one he's told no one of. He's gone. The body is just that, a body.