Plays of Shadow

By: Amber Dawn

Chapter 9: Truce

PG

Disclaimer:  Beast Wars belongs to Hasbro, not me.

Airazor stood and cocked her wrist gun, pointing it in the direction of the voice. “Show yourself, Blackarachnia,” she ordered.

There was a moment’s pause before the she-spider stepped from the shadows of the trees, her missile launcher pointed at Airazor.

“I’m warning you,” Blackarachnia growled threateningly, “I’ve had a very bad day and I’m just raring to shoot something. But if you leave right now I’ll try to control myself.”

“Oh, by all means,” Airazor shot back heatedly, “make my day.”

“With pleasure,” Blackarachnia snarled and was just about to squeeze off another missile when Fleetshade popped up between the two, her arms held out to each side in a warding gesture.

“Hey!” she yelled. “Cool it, girls. I don’t care what you do on the battlefield but there’ll be none of that around me!”

To Airazor’s surprise, Blackarachnia stepped back and addressed Fleetshade.

“I told you that you were too trusting, Fleetshade. Just because Airazor’s a female doesn’t mean she won’t try to reprogram you – or worse.”

“Hardly!” Airazor yelled. “You’re the one who would twist her to your own treacherous schemes, spider!”

“Enough!” Fleetshade screamed. “Blackarachnia, Airazor does not want to reprogram me! Airazor, remember what I told you about what I’ve learned?”

Airazor shook her head, her arm still leveled at the spider-bot. “Fleetshade, sorry to break it to you, but some femmes just aren’t made of the same material as you and I. And she’s one of them!”

Blackarachnia made a very unladylike noise. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

Fleetshade made a frustrated gesture. “Don’t you understand?” she yelled. “Blackarachnia, what has Airazor ever done to you? Not her faction, but her?”

Blackarachnia thought for a moment. “She punched me,” she finally said. “Knocked me out. Right before the transwarp wave.”

“Yeah,” Airazor admitted, “’cause you insulted my leader!”

Fleetshade nodded. “And Airazor, what has Blackarachnia ever done to hurt you?”

“She’s shot at me lots of times!”

“In battle?” Fleetshade guessed. Airazor nodded. “That doesn’t count. So what you’re saying is despite the fact that you belong to different factions, you have nothing personal against each other?”

“But Fleetshade, she’s a Predacon,” Airazor insisted. “She’s evil and manipulative and treacherous. She’ll stab you in the back!”

“And she’s a Maximal,” Blackarachnia returned. “She’s prejudiced and self-righteous and she’ll reprogram you because she thinks their cause is holier than Primus!”

“What proof does either of you have of any of that?” Fleetshade asked, looking frustrated. “Airazor is here because she’s had a hard week and she needed somebody to talk to. Why are you here, Blackarachnia?”

The spider looked momentarily stunned. “Same reason,” she said quietly.

“See?” Fleetshade said, her tone pleading, “it’s like I said. It doesn’t matter what faction a femme belongs to, where she comes from, what she’s been forced to do, she’s still a femme and where I come from females stick together when nobody else will!”

Airazor looked at Fleetshade’s face and realized the girl was close to tears. With a final glance at Blackarachnia, Airazor lowered her weapon and went to put her arms around Fleetshade, who pulled away.

“I don’t care what you two do to each other in battle,” the neutral femme continued, addressing Blackarachnia as well, “but I’ll have no part in it. So either call a truce while you’re here, or leave.”

Airazor looked up and saw Blackarachnia staring into the forest with a fearful expression, as if realizing just now that the three females had been making a lot more noise than was prudent. Then the spider-bot sighed and put up her weapon.

“Fine,” she sighed, looking at Airazor. “Truce. But only because I might need to use you as a shield.”

Airazor smiled and stuck out her hand. As a Maximal, it was in her programming to accept a truce if one was offered. “Fair enough. But you have to tell me what I’m shielding you against, Predacon.”

Blackarachnia stuck out a claw and pinched Airazor’s fingers – hard. “Fair enough, Maximal.”

Airazor stepped back and looked over at Fleetshade, whom it seemed was suddenly trying hard not to smile.

“Primus, you two are the most stubborn ‘bots I’ve ever met!” the deer-bot blurted, dissolving into giggles.

The tension broken, Airazor joined in Fleetshade’s laughter. She had to admit, their situation was funny. Blackarachnia looked at the two of them like they had had their logic circuits cut for a cycle, then cracked her own hesitant smile.

‘She’s really pretty when she smiles,’ Airazor thought with a jolt. ‘I wonder why she doesn’t do it more often?’

And all of a sudden, Airazor realized that Blackarachnia may be a Predacon, but she was also a female. A female trapped in a base with the other Predacons, who were all less than honorable characters. Her laughter died as suddenly as it had come.

“So why are you here, Blackarachnia?” she asked.

Blackarachnia’s smile was wiped away in an instant. She glanced back over her shoulder into the trees; she kept getting the feeling she was being watched. All the yelling the three of them had been doing would have woken the dead, and if Tarantulas or Rampage was following her.... Maybe it would be best if she just headed back to base, before she led the male Predacons right to her – and to Fleetshade.

Blackarachnia was surprised to find herself thinking protective thoughts about the deer femme. She told herself that it was to further her own plans: Fleetshade was a powerful ally with her energon weapon and her ability to go undetected. She wouldn’t let herself admit that she was starting to think of Fleetshade as a friend. ‘Predacons don’t have friends,’ she told herself sternly, ‘they have temporary allies. So stop being foolish.’

“I don’t think I’m going to discuss that in front of a Maximal,” Blackarachnia said primly in response to Airazor’s question. “In fact I think I’ll head back to base now, since you two look so cozy.”

Fleetshade frowned. “What’s in the forest, B?” she asked.

B? Blackarachnia raised an optic arch. She was never one for nicknames, but somehow when Fleetshade said the initial it sounded…right.

“Nothing,” she said quickly, startled at the perceptiveness behind the girl’s question.

Fleetshade raised her own optic arch. “B, Airazor won’t say anything. Will you, Airazor?”

Blackarachnia turned to look at the Maximal. She didn’t really know much about Airazor, save that she was the only other female in the Beast Wars and that she had disappeared a while ago, apparently on some mission to collect stasis pods. Blackarachnia had assumed her dead, swallowed up by that alien plant, but apparently not. Could she really trust this femme who was supposed to be her enemy?

“Depends,” Airazor was saying. Fleetshade had asked the question, but Airazor was addressing Blackarachnia. “Does it have anything to do with evil Predacon plans to take over the planet and melt the Maximals to scrap? ‘Cause then I might want to let one or two of my teammates know.”

Blackarachnia had to smile at the bird-bot’s choice of words. It sounded so much like what she would have said. Perhaps Fleetshade was right, she mused. Perhaps she and Airazor weren’t so different after all.

“Not exactly,” Blackarachnia replied slowly.

Fleetshade snorted and reverted to beast mode, then rolled over in the long grass.

Airazor plopped down on the ground as well. “Then I can keep a secret.”

The female Predacon looked down at the only other femmes on this planet and thought, ‘What the Pit. If the Maximal laughs at me I’ll toast her, I don’t care what Fleetshade says. And if she understands…. Isn’t that what I wanted? For someone to understand?’

And with that, Blackarachnia lowered herself into the grass and, after a final furtive glance into the trees, proceeded to tell the other femmes about her day.

If she expected them to laugh, she had been mistaken. They both watched her seriously as she told them about what Rampage had said to her. Fleetshade shuddered.

“You think he might be following you?” Airazor asked.

“Yes,” Blackarachnia admitted. “Him or Tarantulas. Or maybe both. Heck, I’ve got a whole collection of creepy, sadistic males waiting to pounce on me! What can I say? I’m just such a charmer.”

“That’s not funny,” Fleetshade said quietly, staring into the woods. The night had settled in completely, and the waxing gibbous moon had risen above the treetops, casting long shadows over the meadow. “That’s not funny at all.”

The three females were silent for a few cycles. Blackarachnia was listening to the trees at the meadow’s edge, waiting for a crunching footfall or rustling of branches that would mean she was found. She still couldn’t shake the prickling sensation of being watched.

It was Airazor who finally broke the silence. “Fleetshade, you were about to tell me before we were interrupted,” the Maximal glanced at Blackarachnia, “what happened to you after you left your colony?”

“Colony?” Blackarachnia repeated, confused. Both warriors looked inquiringly at the deer, who winced.

“I suppose you should know,” she said. “You two have told me your stories; I might as well tell you mine.”

Fleetshade hesitated another cycle. If Blackarachnia and Airazor knew she was a slave, would they still help her? Only one way to find out. She took a deep breath and began:

“I was created in a neutral colony in the Carron nebula, on a planet called Bedon. It was an organic planet, much like this one. My mother, as I recall, was a botanist, my father a biologist. I don’t remember much else about them, nor of my two brothers. I was ten stellar cycles old when a band of slavers came and destroyed my colony. Those who were physically able were taken prisoner, the rest were killed. I was separated from my family and taken to the desert planet of Marajo to work as a slave in the energon mines.

“I was considered less than the lowest creature as a slave. I was given a number upon my arrival and stripped of my name, belongings, and the right to speak, laugh or live unless the Masters saw fit. I was put into a barracks and given a space on the floor in which to recharge. I was forbidden to interact with my fellow slaves, who were all female. All the slaves on Marajo were female, because the Masters considered us weaker and more pliant than males. We were all in such close quarters that it was hard not to interact with the others, and I was beaten countless times for misbehavior before I finally learned to keep my peace.

“Work in the energon mines was grueling and physically demanding, and for a young femme it often proved impossible, earning me more beatings. Not to mention for the first ten stellar cycles or so, I was in a constant state of energon overload, sick and often too weak to work. I was beaten and starved as punishment, and sometimes put into isolation, which was worse than being packed in like livestock because in solitary confinement you were all alone with your pain.

“Finally, after almost eleven stellar cycles Marajan time – which are approximately one point five decacycles; Marajo orbits very close to its sun – the energon sickness started to subside. The beatings stopped for a while, because I was able to keep up with the other slaves. The continual exposure to energon had stopped making me weaker and I began to grow stronger physically. But not strong enough. I was still beaten occasionally, often for no reason at all, and that wasn’t the worst of it. The Masters had to make sure we were constantly in fear of them, but they couldn’t hurt us badly enough that we couldn’t work. So they yelled at us, locked us up, raped us. They broke our minds and spirits – or so they thought.

“Over time, my tolerance to large amounts of raw energon kept getting greater, as did my physical strength from manual labor in the mines. I think the thing about me is that I never gave up hope: never let the Masters lead me to believe I was nothing. I knew I had to keep my mind as sharp as my body, had to never lose that hope. I knew I had a family out there somewhere, and I promised myself that one day I would escape and find them. So I lived day to day, each day growing more and more determined to break free.

“I think it was around my fiftieth stellar cycle on Marajo that I finally learned how to communicate with my fellow slaves. We were allowed to speak to one another but rarely, and those precious few times were guarded closely, so we couldn’t say what we wanted to. A lot of how we communicated was facial expression, lip reading and gestures. At night, when we were all packed into one tiny room, we started to get to know one another using the most primitive of languages.

“Not all the slaves were neutral, like me. Some were Maximals, some were Predacons. It didn’t matter. We were all treated the same and we all reacted the same way. It’s amazing how little a programming chip matters when you’re stripped of everything but basic survival instinct.

“It was during my one hundred-eighty-third stellar cycle as a slave that I discovered exactly how we would make our escape. I noticed one day while in the mine that the energon buildup that usually accumulated throughout the day wasn’t affecting me at all, but was actually making me stronger. I felt it like a living thing in my circuitry, lying in wait, and I suspected that I could control it.

“I hardly dared at first, but over time I started to experiment. Just little things, like pressing my finger to the wall of the mine and watching the rock glow with released energy. I would practice shifting the energy to different parts of my body: first my hands, then my feet, then my chest, my head. Every day the amount of energon I could store grew greater. I found out that the other girls were experiencing similar effects, and together we planned our escape.”

“I had just completed my two hundredth stellar cycle on Marajo when the time came to act. It was the end of the work day, and the Masters were just leading us up from the mine shaft and into the barracks. We were led in a single file line, one after the other. I was to give the signal.

“I waited until we were all halfway between the mine and the barracks, on open ground. On my word, every slave in line halted and held out their hands for the others to take. We joined into one long line and called up the energon we had stored in our systems, building it all into one giant surge. Before the Masters could do anything to stop us, we released the surge and wiped them out. It was mass confusion, but the Masters stood no chance against our wrath. I used the carnage to cover my escape in a hijacked transwarp shuttle, hoping to get off Marajo and somehow find my family.

“I managed to get off Marajo, but once I entered transwarp space I fell into a wormhole and came out near this planet, the transwarp drive busted. I was hit by a flying piece of wreckage and then I crashed here.

"And that’s my story.”

Fleetshade had been looking down at her front hooves the whole time she’d been speaking, and when she looked up she saw two shocked pairs of optics staring at her.

‘They’re unsure what to make of me,’ she thought dismally. ‘Now that they know I’m nothing more than a slave, they’re rethinking helping me.’

Blackarachnia was the first to speak. “So that’s why you dislike males so much,” she said, “and trust females explicitly.”

Fleetshade nodded.

“Oh, Fleetshade,” Airazor said softly, “I’m so sorry.”

“For what?” the deer asked. Whatever reaction she had been expecting, it wasn’t an apology.

“Everything,” the Maximal replied. “For my own ignorance, mostly. I assumed things about you that I shouldn’t have. And I’m sorry about you being stuck here; it must be maddening not to be able to find your family.”

Fleetshade tried to hide her shock. Airazor wasn’t acting any differently, even though she knew Fleetshade was a slave!

“That’s not your fault, Airazor,” she said.

Turning to Blackarachnia, Airazor started to say something – then realized the spider was gone. “Hey, where’d she go?” Airazor asked.

Fleetshade lowered her head in shame, feeling lower than primordial slime. “Probably couldn’t stand the idea of being around me any longer,” she mumbled.

Airazor growled. “Slag. That scheming spider! More likely she’s gone back to her base to tell Megatron everything you just said about how you got your weapon. I tell you, you can’t trust a Pred-“

“Hey!”

Fleetshade and Airazor’s heads snapped toward the edge of the forest, where Blackarachnia had reappeared holding something in her outstretched claw, as if it repulsed her.

“I heard that, Maximal,” Blackarachnia snarled at Airazor, who frowned. “And no, I didn’t leave. I found out why I’ve been feeling like I’m being watched. Take a look at what I caught.”

With that, Blackarachnia hurled her catch at the other two femmes. Fleetshade caught it without thinking and placed it on the ground. It looked like a small probe of some sort, and it reminded her of something….

“Slag,” Airazor cursed, with feeling. “Tarantulas.”

Fleetshade gasped. The little spider-like creature indeed reminded her of Tarantulas in its colouring.

“It’s one of his arachnoids,” Blackarachnia confirmed, stomping over with a look of mixed anger and disgust in her optics. “I found it lurking at the edge of the woods, listening to everything we were saying.”

“So that’s how he’s been spying on me,” Fleetshade said without thinking, mentally slapping herself on the head. “Of course!”

“He’s been spying on you?” Blackarachnia asked quickly, turning to stare at Fleetshade so fast the doe recoiled in shock.

“Yeah,” Fleetshade muttered shyly, eyeing the arachnoid with distaste. “He cornered me the other day and asked if I’d be interested in joining forces with him. But the way he said it sounded like he wanted more than my allegiance, if you know what I mean. And he sounded crazy.”

Blackarachnia snorted. “I’ll say,” she said grimly, poking the arachnoid. “Knowing Tarantulas, he probably wants to put you on his lab table and take you apart to see how you tick, then piece you back together and use you and your energon weapon to take over the planet.”

Fleetshade swallowed roughly as she gazed at the little probe. The light on its front side was extinguished and it wasn’t moving thanks to Blackarachnia’s cyber venom, but it was beginning to scare her anyway.

“I don’t much like the sound of that,” the neutral femme said weakly. “What should I do?”

“There’s bound to be more of these critters out there,” Blackarachnia reasoned. “He would have backups in case one went offline.” The spider suddenly shivered. “No matter what, I’m not letting Tarantulas get his twisted claws on you. I know him better than anybody, and he’s about as sick as they come. You think what your slave masters did to you was harsh? That’s nothing compared to what Tarantulas can think up.”

“So what do we do?” Airazor asked the spider, worry in her brown optics. Fleetshade glanced between the two warrior femmes and realized with a touch of surprise that they seemed determined to protect her, even if it meant working together.

“Why are you two doing this for me?” Fleetshade blurted, “I’m just a slave; I’m not even worth the bother!”

Airazor slanted a look at the deer-bot. “Don’t be stupid, Fleetshade,” she said. “You can’t expect us to hear your story and think of you as just a slave. You’re a stronger ‘bot than even you know. The fact that you told us at all indicates a lot of trust in us, and who’d we be if we didn’t earn that trust?”

Fleetshade had to smile, awed and touched at the bird-bot’s compliment. Was that the Maximal programming talking, or the femme?

“Thanks,” Fleetshade whispered, her voice choked with emotion, “How ‘bout you, B?”

The Predacon femme rolled her optics. “Hey, I don’t buy into that Maximal honour stuff. I need you around ‘cause you’re useful, Fleetshade. But I guess when you have enough people believing the best in you, you start to believe it too. That and the fact that I wouldn’t wish Tarantulas on my worst enemy, let alone you.”

Airazor nodded, apparently satisfied. “So I ask again: what do we do?”

Blackarachnia sighed and poked the arachnoid again. Fleetshade watched the two of them: Airazor, so recently touched by her own tragedy, with worry in her optics. Blackarachnia, who danced the knife’s edge of safety and bravado, trying to protect a femme she barely knew. And for what? What had Fleetshade done for them, that they would help her so readily?

“I know you’re gonna hate to hear this Fleetshade,” Blackarachnia finally sighed, “but I don’t think you’re going to be safe in the woods any more, at least for a while. You’re going to have to migrate, and I don’t mean fly south. I’d tell you to come back to the Predacon base with me, but we can all imagine that would be much worse for you than staying here. So…Airazor….?”

Airazor nodded. “She could come back with me. Would you do that, Fleetshade?”

Fleetshade froze. The last thing she wanted to do was leave her forest and go to live with either faction. Oh, Airazor had assured her no harm would come to her at Maximal hands. But what if, once they had her at their base, they decided she was valuable to their cause and decided to reprogram her? She couldn’t defend herself in her current energon-deprived state, so what could she do?

But then again, she thought, that was only a maybe. If she was caught by Tarantulas, which she definitely would be if she stayed in the forest, it was almost assured that he would use her for his own schemes. The same went for the Predacons.

‘Caught between a rock and a hard place,’ she thought grimly. Finally she let out a long breath and nodded. “Seems like it’s my only option, eh?”

Airazor smiled sympathetically. “Seems like it. I promise you won’t come to any harm while you’re there. Hey, I bet you Cheetor will be happy to see you, and Optimus has been wanting to meet you. And you’ll have fun with Rattrap.”

The two warriors suddenly grinned wickedly and exchanged glances, and Fleetshade wondered just who this Rattrap ‘bot was.

“Are you sure?” she asked Airazor. The falcon femme nodded emphatically, suddenly looking excited. Fleetshade laughed. “Okay, okay. I’ll come, but only until it’s safe in the woods again.”

“That’s my job,” Blackarachnia put in, her face set. “I’ve got to face Tarantulas eventually, and it might as well be about you.”

“B, don’t,” Fleetshade warned. “It’s not worth it. If you put yourself at risk for me I swear I’ll knock you to the next planet!”

Blackarachnia just gave the doe a withering look. “Fleetshade, I’m at risk every time I walk into the Predacon base. It’s our way of life, and I like it, so don’t worry about me. I know how to handle Ol’ Gruesome; Primus knows I’ve tangled with him enough over the decacycles.”

Airazor nodded and stood. “You can take care of yourself, I’ll give you that, Blackarachnia. Or is it B? So our truce stands for now?”

“Only if you never call me that again, Raze.” Blackarachnia mocked as she stood.

Airazor laughed and started to rise as well. “Fine, fine. I understand. It seems we have a lot to learn about each other, Predacon.”

“Guess so, Maximal.”

Watching the two warrior femmes, it was like they were squabbling sisters and not wary enemies, thought Fleetshade with some amusement.

The neutral ‘bot stood up and transformed to robot mode as Airazor changed to beast mode. The falcon grabbed one of Fleetshade’s upper arms in each of her talons in order to carry her to the Maximal base. The moon was already on its way back into the trees, and dawn was only a few megacycles away.

“Oh, B,” Fleetshade said quickly as Airazor prepared to take off, “that sack of stuff you gave me to hide is under the hollow oak a few hundred meters west of this meadow. The entrance to the trunk is under the fern bush. And take the northern trail out of the valley: it’s the best-lighted. Just in case.”

Blackarachnia looked shocked and at all this information, but nodded. “Thanks, Fleetshade.”

“Any time, B.”

Fleetshade watched Blackarachnia wince at the nickname as Airazor let out a screech and took off skyward, pumping her wings to gain altitude with her charge dangling from her talons.

Fleetshade fought not to look down; she hated heights. “Please don’t drop me,” she said breathlessly, not sure if Airazor would hear her over the wind rushing by them.

Airazor laughed. “Not a fan of heights, Fleetshade? I don’t recommend letting Cheetor take you for a ride, then. He can get…overzealous, and doesn’t always think about whether his rider is still hanging on after one of his loops.”

Hoping with all her spark that she would find the welcome Airazor seemed to think awaited her at the Maximal base, Fleetshade tried to relax and enjoy the ride.