“I suppose on one hand it is lucky I have known Wheeljack since we were young. Any of the other Scientists around here would need to really make an impact after all the impromptu explosions and fires I’ve seen.” - Perceptor.
Dear Galvatron, what are your favourite things to do when you're not leading the Predacons?
Why hello dear internet messenger,
I love to read a lot when I have downtime! I have an entire library of books from pretty much anywhere I visit! History books are a favourite of mine even though they often make me sad...
So much of history is written from the ‘winners’ point of view...
Ah, I’m sorry I got side-tracked! Even when I’m not leading them my men are still on my mind! I like to catch up on them and what they’re doing, A good leader must care for their men! I’m sure you understand after all you appear to be a “Lord” are you not?
Of course, it also serves as an excuse to have more bonding time with my dear little brother! He tries to stick it out on his own and avoid me and while I admire his determination, well, he’s my family! I can’t help wanting to get involved and help whatever way I can! If aside from that I do want to make sure he’s fit to lead should anything happen to me...
I’d hate for him, or any of my men, to be left in the lurch should I be unable to help them...
Okay so the bastard warlord dads au. I just adore it? That's amazing! I just wanna hear more stuff about Star and Megs trying to be dads to Orion. How does that all go?
It’s actually part of an AU called Transformers: Toku, largely based off of tokuketsu tropes and stories, that I share with @drawma-king but the warlord dads were one of my contributions- a combination of the common trope where one of the protagonists turns out to have an Evil Dad (or two, in this case) and the fact that every so often I look at Optimus Prime and Starscream and remember that it’s funny they have the same color scheme.
(if there’s anything I re-use from this AU into others, it’ll probably be the warlord dads arrangements because *chef’s kiss*)
Also because I wanted to post it- here’s a little short story about Orion’s first “real” face to face meeting with Megatron and Starscream! It goes about as well as you’d think.
UNDER THE CUT because long. Sorry, mobile users.
As for how it goes...it goes well at times, poorly at others? They’re trying, but also the kind of people who look at conquering a world because they’ve decided they have the Divine Right of Kings are gonna have some issues from the get-go. After the supposed death of their kid, Megatron and Starscream decided very actively to never approach the concept of family again- it hurt terribly, neither of them have much emotional maturity, and they had a war to run. So unfortunately they don’t actually know how to deal with kids, having avoided them for so long.
Not to mention that Orion(at the time named Guiltaur)’s loss was overtly traumatic. A Decepticon fortress was hit in a surprise attack by Autobot forces that outright destroyed the entire structure and sent the high-ranking Decepticons who were holed up there scattered- it was a tremendous step in destabilizing the Decepticon empire for the Autobots, a good move tactically. The Autobots who were combing through the rubble afterwards were horrified to find a sparkling- miraculously unharmed, and ushered the child away in secret- in no small part to hide the fact that they’d operated on bad intelligence and attacked a building that was not just military, but apparently domestic as well.
Megatron and Starscream, believing that their child had died as a result of Autobot attack, kicked the war into high gear, and that’s when stuff started getting real interesting. Meanwhile, Orion’s past was scrubbed to keep him safe from both autobot retribution for his parentage, and to keep him hidden from Decepticons, and he was placed into the care of the Order Pax- a religious order that took in a lot of war orphans, and eventually he was taken in by Alpha Trion, an archivist looking for an apprentice who definitely didn’t fortell all of this happening that would be silly you’d have to be, like, a prophet or a prime to tell that stuff :)
Anyways
Megatron struggles with treating Orion like a new recruit- he’s deeply impressed when Orion turns out to have excellent combat and self-defense skills for sparring (thanks to Orion’s secret life as Optimus Prime, Hero) and tries to bond with him through training- but inevitably pushes too hard because he can’t tone it down. On the flip side, Megatron’s preferred method of showing affection is just by giving people things, so a whole-ass lost library is an appropriate present for a kid, right? Right????
At the very least, Megatron gets that parental relationships are hard (given his own rocky family relationships) and isn’t really sure how to be attached to Orion. He feels like an interloper, and the fact that Orion is very clearly not interested in sticking around only makes it sting- but Megatron at least tries to convince Orion that sticking around is worth it. Sure, things are a little nasty right now, but wouldn’t you like to be crown prince of an empire? Wouldn’t you like to someday rule? We are from royal stock, and you carry the blood of kings.
Starscream instantly becomes attached. And covetous and overprotective. He hovers over Orion, and while Orion’s more or less okay dealing with it because he likes physical affection, Starscream is *very* touchy, literally. He’s constantly touching hugging him, touching his face and shoulders, kissing his helm or outright grooming him like he’s a youngling. Skywarp and Thundercracker are more casual, but still super affectionate towards Orion- especially since they basically become defacto babysitters for the most part, and Orion finds himself surrounded by a triad of very loud, broody birds a lot.
Starscream’s also a little disappointed that Orion’s favoring a grounder altmode, seeing as Orion also has the “genetics” more or less to become a Seeker as he’s still a youngling (I’ll probably post my lil thing about genetics in this setting) but is damn proud that Orion’s inherited a lot of his appearance- they both have longer faces and bright yellow optics/biolights, he has Starscream’s color and long legs and Orion even has little semi-thrusters on his heels (that give his truck altmode a jump-boost)!
Megatron is afraid of becoming attached, because losing those he loves is standard fare. Starscream is afraid of not being attached enough, as if raw love and want could keep Orion safe this time.
Orion would like to leave. This is terrifying- he’s been moonlighting as a power-armored hero fighting the Decepticons- including Megatron and Starscream themselves, and if they found out he’s pretty sure it would be catastrophic. Even without that, though, he’s an Autobot kid- he wants to be back in the Archives, with Alpha Trion and his friends. He’s been dragged out to basically a castle in the middle of nowhere, halfway across the planet from his home, and he can’t get out. It would wear on anyone’s nerves.
Megatron is terrifying and stern and way too eager to throw other people around literally, not to mention that Megatron is pretty intense in his growing megalomania, and Orion picks up on the fact that this dude legitimately believes it’s his divine right to rule and that’s not just a story to unite his forces. Seeing as Orion has interacted with the spirits of several ancient Primes at this point, he knows EXACTLY how that sort of thing usually goes down. It never goes down well. And then Starscream is overbearing and obsessive, treating him like literal treasure, but not toning down the inherent violence of his inclinations in the slightest, while still insisting on grooming him, touching up his paint, and constantly feeding him.
The part that freaks out and ultimately hurts Orion the most is that he can see how much they both desperately want this. He’s shown Megatron and Starscream not as monsters to fight on a battlefield, but as broken, wounded people who’ve turned their pain into brutality, but treat him like he’s made of precious crystal. He learns about grand-creators and family histories he never knew, he learns about Decepticon history and how these people all came together.
Worst of all, he learns that Megatron and Starscream love him.
And that love can truly sink some people to unspeakable depths.
Knowing that someone would do anything for you is a terrible curse, when that person is willing to literally turn people into mindless monsters to fight for their cause.
