Little One Chapter 3

Little One

Chapter 3

The Deception base in Kaon was perhaps one of the worst places on Cybertron. It was the kind of place that anyone who wasn't a Decepticon would never want to go to. It was old and dark and parts of it were crumbling to pieces despite frequent attempts at repairs. For the Decepticons though it was their center of operations and it served its purposes for now. It was large enough for the majority of the Decepticons to convene and go over battle plans and there was enough room for a brig of sorts to hold captured Autobots or troublesome soldiers. It was here that the Decepticon leader, Megatron, was currently listening to his second-in-command give the report of the assault on the Autobot base in Iacon that had taken place only a few joors earlier. From the sounds of things the assault had been a complete waste of time. While they had not suffered any major losses, it seemed that nothing useful had come from it either. Megatron rose from where he was sitting and looked down at Starscream before backhanding him.

"You disappoint me yet again Starscream, was no useful information of the Autobots plans or weaknesses found during the assault!" he demanded.

"Well… not exactly," Starscream said.

"Explain Starscream," Megatron growled, threateningly stepping towards the Seeker.

"Laserbeak may have mentioned something about spotting survivors from the Youth Sectors in the base," Starscream answered backing away.

"Is that so? Is that all Laserbeak mentioned Starscream? I will find out if you withhold information from me and believe me when I say that the consequences of your actions will not be pleasant."

"Of course I would never purposely withhold information from you Lord Megatron. He said that there were two younglings and a sparkling there. Apparently the sparkling seemed to be fond of Prime."

"Intriguing," Megatron mused.

"Lord Megatron?"

Megatron ignored his second-in-command and resumed his pondering. His brother had always been a compassionate fool and in his mind this made Optimus weak. Finding a way to exploit this weakness had proven to be a bit of a challenge however, but perhaps this was the opportunity he had been looking for. If this sparkling truly was fond of Optimus like Starscream had said, then there was a great chance that Optimus in turn was also fond of the sparkling. Of course if he was correct about all this, Optimus was simply making this all too easy for him now. Why get close to something that was such an easy target? Unless… unless this sparkling was more than just any sparkling to Optimus. The prospect of his brother possibly having or adopting a sparkling of his own had never really crossed his mind before. Perhaps it should have. Or maybe he was wrong; he was going to have to find out more about this sparkling before he could plan anything. He was also going to have to make sure that Starscream wasn't lying to him about this information as well. He contacted Soundwave on his com-link and told him to come to the command center with Laserbeak at once.

"You are dismissed Starscream."

The Seeker grumbled something as he walked away, but Megatron paid him no mind. He had more important matters to deal with right then. Moments after Starscream left, Soundwave and Laserbeak entered the room.

"Soundwave reporting Lord Megatron," Soundwave greeted.

Megatron nodded in acknowledgment before speaking.

"Starscream tells me that Laserbeak said that he spotted some younglings and a sparkling in the Autobot base, is that information correct?" he questioned.

"Yes, the Autobots have two younglings and a sparkling. The sparkling seems close to Prime," Laserbeak replied.

"Soundwave continue espionage on the Autobot base," Megatron ordered. "I want to know just how close Prime and this sparkling are."

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Optimus gently rubbed Bumblebee's back with his digit while he watched his sparkling slumber. Bumblebee was such a sweet, innocent sparkling and he hated the fact that he had to grow up during a war. It was too dangerous of a place to live in. That was one of the main reasons he had sent him to the Youth Sectors in the first place, so he could be away from the war. The other reason was to prevent the Decepticons from finding out just who Bumblebee was related to. If the Decepticons ever found out that Bumblebee was his son, Optimus feared that would practically be a death sentence for him. The Decepticons had already shown that they were willing to kill younglings and sparklings; he doubted that they would even hesitate if they knew the sparkling was his. They didn't even know now and they had almost killed him twice already.

He let out a sigh, trying to figure out what he should do. For a brief moment he thought of trying to distance himself from Bumblebee to protect him, but he quickly discarded that thought. It was much too late to do that and it wouldn't be fair to Bumblebee if he did. He wanted Bumblebee to have some sense of normalcy in his life during the war if possible and distancing himself from him would not give him that. All that would really do was confuse and distress Bumblebee, and Optimus did not want to do that to him.

: Optimus we found something you might want to see from the security cameras. :

: I'm on my way. :

Optimus stood up looking back down at Bumblebee. He didn't want to and he couldn't leave him here all by himself. Even though he was recharging right now, there was a chance that he could wake up if Optimus left and Bumblebee had proven to be a rather curious sparkling at times, which made leaving him alone a bad idea. Careful not to wake him, Optimus picked Bumblebee up and left the room. Within a few moments Optimus was standing in front of the security monitors.

"What is it that you thought I should see?" Optimus asked.

"Take a look," Jazz replied. "I was looking through the footage to see where the 'Cons got in at and found this. This is a few breems before we lost feedback from the cameras. There's the closet that 'Bee, Sides, and Sunny were hidin' in and look who shows up."

Optimus watched as Laserbeak appeared on the monitor and subconsciously he tightened his hold on Bumblebee.

"This was after they were already hiding in the closet?" Optimus questioned.

"Yes," Jazz answered.

"But we lose feedback before Laserbeak leaves the vicinity, so we have no way of knowing just when he did leave," Ratchet added.

"Then there is a chance that he saw them," Optimus said.

"And if he saw them then the rest of the 'Cons probably know that they're here as well," Ironhide concluded.

"Where did the Decepticons enter the base at?" Optimus asked.

"Looks like the southeast entrance," Jazz said. "Not as much security down there since it's harder to get to that entrance. What do you want us to do Optimus?"

"Increase security at all of the entrances for now. We do not know for sure if the Decepticons know anything, but it is better to be prepared in case they do and plan another attack."

"Next time we'll be ready for them," Ironhide stated.