Chapter Text
Megatron had lost touch with Starscream after he'd escaped from GHOST, helped to take down a dweller and then refused his tree branch.
Perhaps it was as well...
His mental health had certainly improved in the child's absence, though he'd never say as much out loud.
He was therefore completely unprepared when he heard Starscream's over-enthusiastic voice coming from the lounge area of the Malto Family's dugout.
He considered turning around.
Walking out.
Sending his apologies to Dot and her family, claiming something unavoidable has come up.
He couldn't do that to his best friend, curse it all! He just couldn't lie like that.
He was still standing halfway down the ramp when the hatch closed behind him and he heard footsteps and the clinking of glassware approaching him.
"Megatron! Hi," Alex's voice greeted him cheerfully. "Would you like a Cybertronian cocktail? We have coolant, engine oil, antifreeze, cola..."
Optimus was very fond of a mix of antifreeze, coolant and cola. He hadn't tasted it himself and thought it sounded vile.
"Just a little oil, thank you."
Alex stepped in front of him and studied him carefully. He was hugging a box of glass vases to his chest.
"Only oil? Not feeling too well?"
Curses! Alex had been around bots too long.
"Just... thirsty. Long day."
He nodded slowly.
"OK, well, go join the kids in the lounge. They're watching YouTube."
He nodded stiffly and did as directed. What choice did he have?
The sight that awaited him was both a shock and a relief.
Bumblebee, Grimlock and Optimus were present in front of the screen.
Twitch was sitting on Bumblebee's shoulder while he lounged in an armchair, Grimlock and Jawbreaker were sharing an L-shaped sofa with Prime, Thrash and Mo were sprawled on the floor, Robbie and Hashtag were utilising beanbags and Nightshade was in their altmode, perched on the back of the L-shaped seat.
Starscream was not present.
Starscream was, in fact, posturing and preening on the screen.
"What is this?"
"Superstar Bonsai That Makes You Wanna Scream," Hashtag supplied helpfully. "He's just got a new tree."
"Which we haven't even seen yet," Thrash grumbled. "This is really boring! Let's watch wrestling instead."
"Nuh-uh," Dot called from the dugout's kitchen. "You kids get too excited and break things. Watch something quiet and be good."
"Trees are pretty boring," Bumblebee agreed with Thrash. "Maybe we can watch some racing or something next."
"Perhaps," Optimus turned to him with a frown, "you could be quiet and let those who are interested listen. Pause it a moment, Morgan."
Mo grabbed the remote and paused the video as requested.
Prime cleared his vocaliser. "For all his faults, Starscream does have the right idea. Showing a willingness to take interest in Earth's culture is a good start to integrating with humanity. Yes, growing plants does take a long time, but Starscream is probably the least expected to be patient or gentle out of all of our kind. This... actually helps us all, if he goes about this the right way. Good evening, Megatron, come and join us. Do you agree?"
He considered the question with care as he seated himself beside Optimus.
"I shall reserve judgement. Let's see him in action."
Starscream gestured wildly.
"This tree is a fabulous birch! Wait until you see it! Before I show you, let me explain that this yamadori specimen was destined to be tarmacked over. That's right, completely decimated – flattened."
Megatron snorted. "Oh, listen to him! He is playing up to environmental human sensibilities."
"Uh, yeah, most YouTubers play up to their audience," Hashtag told him. "You've gotta make it exciting or nobody watches. He's amazing at mixing good feelings with a little rage-bait."
Hmph. Of course he knew how to play his victims' emotions like a cybertar.
"It stood in the way of Progress, my friends," the Seeker continued, wings flaring as he spread his arms. "Tale as old as time. Luckily for this beauty, however, the Constructicons were contracted to do the work and they know about my love for this art. They called me up, rescued the tree and now it is all mine. It will make, at present, a gorgeous cyber-shohin. Let me show you..."
It was both huge and tiny. Probably the height of Dot, with Mo atop her shoulders. Not Megatron's first imagining of a bonsai tree, which he believed should be more in keeping with the scale of a model village or miniature railway.
What was the scale of a bonsai supposed to be against a human? 1:30? 1:50?
He asked Optimus, as if the Autobot Leader was suddenly an authority on All Human Things just because he had had human friends and been trying to integrate since 1984.
Prime didn't know, so Hashtag looked it up with the video paused again.
Thrash stood up with a stretch.
"I'm gonna take a leak. It'll be more exciting."
Megatron frowned at him, but Bumblebee and Mo stood too. Twitch flew to Megatron's side and shot her brother a disapproving frown of her own.
"Bonsai can be any size, kind of," Hashtag said, ignoring the trio. "They just need to be smaller than they'd be in the wild, styled with wire and cutting methods and kept in a pot of very specific proportions. Technically, Starscream's 100% got a giant bonsai."
Megatron hummed thoughtfully and rubbed at his chin.
"It is, at least, healthier – and less disturbing – than his previous hobby."
Optimus's finials tilted back slowly. "I'm afraid to ask."
"Taxidermy."
"What's taxidermy?" Twitch asked.
"Horrible," Megatron told her, before pointing at her sister in warning. "Do not look it up. You do not want to know."
"Isn't that a way of preserving an animal so you can keep it in a museum after it died?" Bumblebee asked, suddenly interested. "Spike took me to a museum once. It had a dead dodo in it – and dino bones. Very cool!"
Grimlock and Jawbreaker immediately looked interested.
Megatron grumbled. "It... smells," he said slowly. "And he occasionally used infested roadkill. He also did not stop at animals."
Optimus stared at him. "He... can bots be preserved like organics?"
"Hmph. Not us. Even Starscream is not that sick. Humans. He had a collection of 'B Movie Horror Victims' in dramatic poses on his desk. It turned my tanks! As if the fox and wolf playing a tabletop ball-and-stick game and the lion smoking a pipe and making a rude gesture were not bad enough..."
Prime looked physically sick.
The kids were clearly traumatised.
Megatron blinked.
Cleared his vocaliser.
"It was a long time ago," he said weakly. "Mostly for a response, if the fact that he stopped it and turned to drawing and painting when I ceased complaining or reacting is any indication."
Optimus shook his helm. "Oh. Naturally."
"I later found out that the humans were unclaimed and unknown bodies from a mortuary. Starscream apparently had a friend who would let him have them."
Grimlock tilted his helm. "So... they didn't suffer and nobody living missed them."
"There is that argument, yes," Megatron growled.
"How do you know all this?" Jawbreaker asked, helm on one side.
"We were living on a spacecraft that had crashed into the sea and lay beneath the waves – the craft was not large enough to avoid one another. I knew exactly what took place aboard it. Hmph. I could hear every fight and quarrel from the opposite end of the ship!"
Optimus chuckled softly. "It's a wonder you didn't join me within months of being confined to Nemesis, beneath the sea."
"Oh, you would say that!"
Hashtag started the video from the beginning, then sped it up through the parts she and her siblings had already watched.
Starscream proudly showed off his new tree.
He gently inspected and cleansed the bare roots, which had been crudely wrapped in newspaper, tied round with thin rope.
He demonstrated initial styling. Wiring, shaping.
This done, he set the tree in a 3D printed pot with a substrate of bark chippings, akadama the size of a human fist, mixed pebbles and chunks of pumice. He wired the tree in and ensured that it wouldn't wobble.
"There you are, pretty one," he crooned softly. "Let's get you lots of water."
Megatron blinked.
He had never heard Starscream use that tone before.
The watering was done with great care.
Starscream then, while puffing out his plating with pride, rotated the tree on a turntable.
"I hope you enjoyed the video! Please remember to like and subscribe, because I think my rescued tree deserves it. Oh, and in answer to the human who thinks he knows fragging everything: No, Cybertronian bonsai sizes aren't a 'thing' yet, but you try tending a microscopic plant and see how you manage, aftport!"
Hashtag was already scrolling through the comments section.
"Ohhhh, these are gold."
Megatron sighed heavily.
"I suspect I am about to regret asking."
"'Fake tree,'" she read aloud. "'That thing's bigger than my car. This ain't a bonsai.'"
Jawbreaker sighed.
"That's the guy he yelled at, isn't it?"
"Yep. And then somebody replied, 'Bro rescued a whole tree from demolition and you're mad about measurements.'"
Bumblebee leaned over excitedly.
"Read more!"
Hashtag grinned.
"'I came here for gardening and got robot drama instead' and, 'This channel feels like getting yelled at by a glamorous eagle.'"
Even Optimus made an undignified choking noise at that.
Megatron rubbed his faceplate.
"... Glamorous eagle."
"Wasn't his alt an Eagle, once?" Twitch asked thoughtfully.
The comments continued scrolling.
'Why is the angry robot weirdly calming to listen to?'
'I don't understand anything about bonsai but now I'm emotionally invested in this tree.'
'This channel cured my anxiety for twelve minutes and then immediately gave it back.'
Optimus's optics brightened with quiet amusement.
"... That one does sound rather like Starscream."
Megatron huffed despite himself.
"He has changed," he mused, thinking back to the old days. "Not completely, of course. He still enjoys conflict and dramatics–"
Optimus made a strangled noise at that.
Megatron ignored him.
"But he is... gentler. He tends to plants and talks to them with care. I have not witnessed that before."
"You have a garden," Grimlock reminded him.
He hummed thoughtfully. "I just plant things and hope they grow. That is very different to... this."
"Ooh! Here's another comment! 'This is so cool! We should totally make this an entire bot culture thing!' – FrenzyBot."
Megatron stilled. "Frenzy?!"
Since when did little Frenzy think Starscream was cool?!
"There's a lot of talk in there about bonsai experts helping bots understand bonsai and work out tree sizes we can work with, too. A few real experts, not the rude guy that Starscream called an aft–"
"Language," Megatron warned, turning a furious glare on her.
She blinked. "Oh, that's rude? OK. What do we say instead?"
Optimus groaned. "You don't. It's an insult."
"Oh, OK. Well... the guy Starscream argued with at the end of the video. There are humans in the comments that actually know about bonsai and think it should be welcoming for everyone, us included."
Grimlock chuckled. "Oh ho! They're saying we belong on Earth! That's huge."
"Yeah... rude guy says Transformers should just go home. Someone says they heard Cybertron got destroyed. Rude guy says that's not his problem. That comment has 2.5k dislikes and the others by him have got more than that. He's being told to go watch 'real' bonsai experts if a wholesome bot giving rescued trees another chance offends him so much. They're calling him an entitled cyberbully, too."
Megatron blinked.
"What is a cyberbully?"
"Ooh! Look!" Jawbreaker interrupted, pointing excitedly. "Starscream's given everyone sticking up for him a heart emoji!"
Optimus laughed. "We should give him some encouragement."
"Not from me," Megatron said instantly. "He would likely abandon the project, should he think I approve. Let Hashtag and her siblings write something."
Dot came in with a trolley piled high with drinks and snacks.
"Where'd Thrash go?"
"Outside," Bumblebee guessed. "He thinks Starscream's new channel is boring."
Dot froze. "I'm not sure I want you kids watching him on TV..."
"He's just making bonsai, Mom," Mo told her.
Optimus nodded. "He is surprisingly calm and gentle."
Megatron confirmed that with a shrug.
"I do not understand it either, Dorothy, but it all seems quite harmless and genuine."
Dot raised her eyebrows.
"Right. Well... good. OK, I'll just help Dad with the rest and then we'll join you."
Optimus stood. "Let me help."
"Nuh-uh. Guests sit and relax, OP. Enjoy Starscream's bonsai videos and we'll join you in a second."
Megatron relaxed as the next video started with an intro, explaining what the video would cover. Frenzy was apparently there to learn.
"Can you make bonsai roses?" Frenzy asked after the credits rolled. "Megatron likes roses and he was nice to me."
Starscream sneered. "He'd only kill it. He kills everything he looks at – get him plastic roses or something. Anyway, no, you cannot bonsai roses."
Frenzy wanted to give him a present?
Pity Starscream had to take the opportunity to be spiteful, but... all the same... it was nice to know that Frenzy was apparently coming around after he'd talked Optimus into giving the Cassettes a chance to turn over a clean engine.
Perhaps there was still hope for them all, even if Cybertron truly was gone. It was a pleasant thought, if nothing else.