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Nova Black 10/?
The Ascension of Nova Black
Part 10 of 17
Verse: G1 AU (all characters are OCs.)Wordcount: 3,750+
Rating: M for violence, dark themes, etc.
Warnings: Some violent content in this (an upgrade, but a painful one, described in detail.)
Summary: Nova finally meets with Bane. And gets her upgrade. And her chance to prove herself.
Thanks muchly to meaisin_caoin @ LJ (somehow it's eating her userid, gah!) for betaing.
Part 1 - Part 2 - Part 3 - Part 4 - Part 5 - Part 6 - Part 7 - Part 8 - Part 9 - Part 10 - Part 11 - Part 12 - Part 13 - Part 14 - Part 15 - Part 16 - Part 17
Nova Black nodded for what felt like the thousandth time. "Yes, Subcommander," she repeated automatically, half wishing she'd recorded herself saying it earlier and could simply play it back for him.
Still, if she did that, he'd notice her lip plates staying still, and catch her ignoring him. Better to just keep telling the big flier what he wanted to hear.
Her optics darted around the room. It was big, big and empty, the walls' color dimmed by dirt and streaked with rust. Still, compared to anything in Settlement Four, it was palatial, and the Decepticon symbols painted on the walls glared defiantly through the decay.
Bane sat in a broad, featureless seat. It didn't look terribly comfortable to Nova, but the big flier lounged in it as if it were a throne. He held a large cube of energon in his hands. Several other cubes lay in luminous pink piles around the base of his seat.
Bane turned the one he held, inspecting it. His red visor gleamed, reminding Nova for a moment of Brightbolt. Her fist clenched reflexively.
The Subcommander nodded once, lifted the cube to his lips, and took a long sip. His broad, tan wings twitched slowly as he drank.
Nova wondered why he was inspecting it. He'd already finished one off earlier, tossing it next to the piles around him.
Still, she was glad to see he liked it so much. Without a decent bribe, he wouldn't even have listened to her at all today.
If he even was listening. He'd paid attention enough to her in the beginning, asking questions about her plan, about the Settlement, about what she'd recommend doing if it all went wrong. Now she had the sneaking suspicion he was going over the details again and again simply because he liked wearing her down.
The only clue she had that he was looking at her at all were the guns mounted on his shoulders, which he'd kept trained on her. Those twitched minutely when she moved, reminding her that if she said anything he didn't want to hear, he could shoot at any moment.
And while she knew very well that the glutton had weaknesses, they weren't ones she could easily take advantage of with his shoulder guns fully charged and aimed already.
"And you're confident this plan will work?" he asked, his head tilting to stare idly at the cube of energon in his hands.
I can't think of anything else that makes any sense, if that's what you're asking. And I already answered you before. "Yes, Subcommander."
He tilted the half-empty cube, watching the glowing liquid slosh around inside it. "Still, it seems risky. You've run into one of these rebels before. Why not wait and gather more information?"
Nova's hands, clenched tight at her sides, twitched. How many times did he need her to go over this? "Because one of them caught me spying already. Because half the Settlement doesn't trust me. Because if I don't miss my guess, they're building weaponry.
"With all due respect, Subcommander, we can't just sit here and do nothing. If we don't hurry up, we're handing them time --"
Supremely unconcerned, he held up a hand. "Enough. You are the one who uncovered this, so I will certainly consider --"
"Consider?" She snarled the word before she could stop herself, her wings clicking far too loudly as she spoke. "What is there to consider?"
Good, she thought viciously, relishing the crackle of heat racing through her exhausted systems. If she was going to lose control anyway, she might as well enjoy it.
She glared back at him, no longer caring what he thought of her attitude. "These are Autobot rebels, building a weapon right in front of us. And you're going to let them?"
His wings moved again, the same slow twitching as before. "Nova, I understand your concern. But the Autobots are disorganized, broken, scattered. If they did build a weapon and did choose to attack us, half the sector would be on them before they could hit one of us."
He took another sip of energon. "They're nothing but vermin, crawling over the surface of the planet just long enough to annoy us and then diving back into their holes. For spark's sake, most of them are grounders. Light ones."
He leaned forward, his visor flashing brightly in the darkness of the room. "Then there's us. In the grand scheme of things, Nova, we mean very little. The factories turn out enforcers by the tens of thousands, whether Seekers or not, and almost as many like me. We're not here to scour the planet."
Nova's optics widened. Was he really saying he'd ignore hostile enemies on his doorstep, knowing they were planning something? Even he couldn't possibly be that stupid. Or that lazy.
Which meant he had his own ideas about what to do, and was still testing her to see if hers were better. Even though she was the one who'd lived in the Settlement.
She no longer belonged. And as soon as she'd returned, she'd fought and had nothing to show for that but a broken chestplate she'd had to give even more energon to Leech and his little green friend to repair. The cracks in it were still obvious.
Between that and paying Bane to let her fly here in the first place, she barely had any of the energon she'd brought left for herself. Which meant she'd soon have to settle for standard rations, the kind that tasted like slag.
If they deigned to give her any. Which would depend on whether they accepted her.
Which depended, in turn, on this tedious little interview.
Which should have been over twice by now.
"Maybe not, Subcommander, but how is that a reason to ignore vermin crawling through our sector?" She snorted. "Yes, this place is hell -- you know it and I know it. And yes, I'm sure no one three ranks above you remembers your name." Because of things like this, you lazy heap of scrap. "But this sector belongs to the Empire. We belong to the Empire. That means it's our job to scour it clean. And like it."
She grinned. "And if you won't like it, I will. You know me well enough to know that, Subcommander."
The corner of his lip quirked. "Yes, Nova Black," he said. "I do know that."
###
Nova stepped into the blue-lit room, her wings clicking as she looked around. It was big, bigger even than the other, and clean and polished as only a medbay would be. Indeed, the walls were lined with small berths, all of them empty now, the monitors near them dull and lifeless as they waited for occupants.
Nova paid them no attention. She was too busy staring at the chamber on the far wall.
Most of the blue light came from it, its glow stinging her optics. She could see bars and clamps inside, dark against the bright light, and wide spaces at the top and sides.
She walked toward it, trying to ignore the nervous energy crackling through her circuits and making her wings click like that over and over.
She didn't look behind her. That would look weak, and besides, she knew perfectly well what she'd see: pair after pair of crimson optics, staring at her, waiting.
Waiting to see if she'd go through with this. Waiting to see if Bane would go through with this.
Leech stood to one side of the chamber, his pale plating shining in the bright light. His green medic friend was even now scrambling up the other side, settling near a control panel, his thin appendages dangling just by the controls.
Nova stared at him for a long moment. Then she turned, walking the last few steps into the glowing chamber backwards.
She saw the red gleam of the others' optics in front of her, but barely had time to focus on their faces before she heard a loud clicking and felt the restraints locking tightly around her. Whether the medic had tapped one of the controls or it had grabbed her automatically, she didn't know.
She shuddered violently once, instinct urging her to break free, to avenge herself upon those who'd trapped her.
Calm down, she told herself firmly, as she caught sight of Bane walking toward her. You're the one who asked for an upgrade in the first place.
Besides, any moment now Leech or his little green friend would tap something and the thing holding her head would send a jolt through it and offline her while they worked. She'd online again changed, repaired, rebuilt, if a little sore and tired.
Something clicked, swinging down from the space high above her, a gleaming lens irising open, then shut as it passed over her.
She gaped at it, uncomprehending, as it clicked and whirred, passing a beam of light over her.
She tried to turn her head toward Leech or his little friend, but it barely moved, held where it was by something behind her.
She stared at Bane instead. "Why am I still online?"
He chuckled. "You trust us enough to go offline in front of us?"
Nova grunted. Held as she was by the clamps and restraints gripping her wings, her limbs, and even her head, she was at Bane's mercy now whether she trusted him or not. He had no reason to do this but malice. Malice, or revenge for Cinder's death, maybe.
Still, staring at the three sets of optics glittering in front of her -- Winder on one side, his head twisting this way and that as he looked her over; Bane in the center, his visor bright as she smirked at her; Colossus on the other, his broad mouth twisted into a scowl -- she realized he might just be offering her something.
Painful as it would be to go through this awake, it gave her another chance to prove herself. They'd never seen anyone take that kind of pain awake, because no one had ever had to before.
If she did, they couldn't doubt she deserved her place. Mistrust her, yes. Doubt her, no.
And it was an upgrade, after all. By definition, it wouldn't kill her.
She nodded as best she could with the clamp holding her head. "All right. Go ahead."
The medic chirred a response. She heard the click of his movements and kept her optics fixed ahead, not daring to look at the things dropping down from the high space above her.
Something grabbed her cracked chestplate. In one swift motion it tore the broken one away, sliding back the way it came. Nova howled, tipping her head as far as she could.
As if from a great distance, she heard Leech's rattling sigh. The mechanism behind her head tightened, forcing her to stare ahead again.
She felt like thanking him. She didn't want to know what the things around her were doing.
She felt them, grinding into the surface of her chest and limbs, filing out dents and scratches, the abrasives biting deep into her plating. Every part of her burned with it. Even the smoothing afterward stung. With no way to move, she simply clenched her dental plates. That hurt too, a new spark of pain she barely noticed as her frame screamed with it. She willed herself to focus on it, the only pain she could control.
The medic clawed its way over to the edge of the chamber and peeked in, its red optics shining as it inspected her. Leech said something -- she should have understood what, but her audios were full of the hum of the chamber and the echoes of screams she hadn't remembered making.
Two long metallic arms descended, one holding a new chest plate, lowering it into place. The other attached it, grabbing roughly at her cables. She cursed it, then suddenly remembered it would neither know nor care that she was still awake.
She struggled to look down. The new chestplate shone, bright and whole, against metal that gleamed brighter than she ever remembered. She smiled through her pain, then grunted again, determined to reveal only endurance to the others, whose optics she could still see glowing red in front of her.
She heard the smooth click of something sliding out near her feet and sides, winced as it loosened tight bolts, then roared again as it ripped whole sections of plating free.
They're replacing -- ? She didn't need to finish the thought. The arms slid back into their sockets, returning with bright tiles of metal, screwing them into place with sickening twists that made Nova glad for the clamps holding her still.
Her optics flickered. She shook her head, willing her systems not to give out. She heard Leech's sibilant voice report some reading, and then the medic's chirp of alarm and the skittering of his limbs over the controls.
Something jutted out from the wall beside her, sliding itself toward a port in her chest. She felt it plunge in, then a jolt of current, impassive and pitiless, as it fed her the energy she needed to keep herself from shutting down.
She twitched, too much energy crackling through her systems. Bane frowned.
"I'm fine," she spat.
He nodded. The ever-present arms reached for her guns. She hissed as they twisted free. The energy in her weapons systems roiled a protest, and Nova clamped her lips shut on a whimper. She felt worse without them there mounted on her arms than she had with half her chest uncovered, empty of purpose and power.
They'll be replaced, she told herself, the energy the medic had pulsed through her rapidly souring to twittering panic. Calm down. Focus on the future. Slaggit, focus on the pain if you have to, just --
Then they re-emerged with the replacement weapons, and Nova's frown of horror twisted itself into a smile. Her weapons systems hummed with stored energy, waiting as the mechanisms lowered the lasers -- still not null rays, but I'm not complaining -- into the sockets in her arms, locking them into place.
They thrummed with heat, eager to be tested, seething with dark potential. Nova, her programming taking over, struggled to move her arms, to aim, to discharge the energy pooling in them and watch something, anything, redden and blacken and burn.
But she could not move. And now the greatest of the arms were descending down toward her, great black hands that twitched as they locked onto her wings and held.
Leech wheezed something and pressed his fingers to the console. Nova's head clanged against the mechanism holding it as she twisted too fast too hard, desperate to see what was happening.
No, she thought. Not my wings. Not while I'm awake. They aren't possibly going to replace my -- Primus, no --!
Then everything became white-hot agony as the claws tore away part of her very being, uncaring, unknowing, not even seeing that she was still online to feel it.
She shrieked, her head twitching so violently it slammed against something behind her, and went on shrieking, the sound echoing through her own audio receptors, alien and horrible, as the saw the wide, triangular shadows that had been part of her borne away.
Then something invaded the space where her wing had fit and she flailed, not wanting anything to touch her, not there, not after what had happened. Even the weight of something new, something dark and sleek and polished, sliding inside, meant nothing to her. She wailed again, trying to shake off the things attaching something foreign to her wing joints.
The world went white, or maybe blue -- she couldn't tell, light filling her vision and agony overloading her sensor net. She gritted her dental plates, instinct and pride driving her to fight the emergency shutdown she knew was coming anyway.
Then she heard Leech, his soft voice crying something urgent as loudly as it was capable.
Annother jolt, shocking her upright, as the medic's frantic skittering over the controls sent wave after wave of energy through her systems, forcing her to stay online. She quivered, completely out of her own control, awake only because she had to be.
And then there was something there, something attached through the burn she still felt, something she knew that her systems controlled. She felt a clamp retract and moved the new things on her back, just barely.
Pain sent static racing through her vision again. But they were there, moving, hers. They were light, and new, and a part of her. Torn between vertigo and triumph, she cycled air through her vents, panting.
Two small, thin arms extended toward her face. She grunted, unhappily. Of course. Her optics. She'd waited long enough to get rid of these hideous yellow things. More pain wouldn't matter.
She felt it twist something loose, then twin flares of pain in her head, then everything flickered and went black.
Her spark swirled with sudden fear. She was blind now, blind and immobilized, and the others stood gathered around her -- Bane, Winder, even Colossus, who she'd fought and had bested her and had only barely spared her. She felt new heat surge through her weapons systems, as she frantically calculated how she might fight like this, pained and blind and barely able to move.
Then the new optics lowered into their sockets, and the world flickered to new life around her, her systems feeding her information as her vision flickered from Winder to Bane to Colossus and back to the red visor of the leader again. She grinned fiercely as her targeting systems fed her data. Just wait until I get out of here, you slaggers. And hurt less, she thought as her sensor net sent a new wave of discomfort through her frame.
The medic chattered. Leech hissed something about success. She twitched her new wings again, but she found she could not move anything more.
"Come on," she panted, cycling air heavily through her vents. "It's done now. I made it. Now let me test this new stuff out."
Bane gestured. The medic clicked an answer, then skirled a long appendage over the controls again. The clamp holding Nova's head released, and it pitched forward, unused to freedom. She twisted her neck to get comfortable, and then looked at herself.
She'd never seen anything so shiny. Not even looking at Brightbolt back at the Settlement. She smiled again, her spark whirling with sudden vanity. She wouldn't look like this for long, but not many got to look like this at all, not since first emerging off the assembly line in some fancy city like Kaon, some important place they'd never see again.
She studied the new wings, their contours, their smoothness, the design painted on them, like her old design and yet unlike, the wide gray stripe and then the yellow, thin line accenting it.
Her optics widened in shock. She wondered, for a moment, if her new sensors were defective.
The black expanses of her wings were blank.
"What the hell --!" she stammered, staring at the bright light of Bane's visor in fury. "You give me an upgrade and take away my insignia? What the hell are you doing?"
"You're not one of us," Colossus said quietly. "Look more like it now, sure." The corner of his broad mouth quirked into a smile. "But you're not. Not yet."
Winder nodded, cackling. "He's right. You came to us as a Neutral."
Bane, for his part, remained silent.
Nova snarled. "Subcommander, this is insane."
He tilted his head. "Is it? You did come to us hiding your badges and wearing new optics. You told me you wanted reinstatement."
His wings clicked lazily. Primus, she was beginning to hate that. Again.
He smiled. "You'll have to swear your loyalty, like any other convert."
"Convert! I'm not -- I never -- it --!"
She looked up. This chamber had torn her apart already. It could easily do so again. And not bother putting her back together.
"Fine," she grunted, not at all sure it was. "But I'm tired. If you expect me to get through the whole Oath of Loyalty when you've just taken me apart, you're malfunctioning."
She looked around again. Damn it, couldn't they have installed some sort of filter between her processor and her vocalizer while they were doing all that? "Subcommander."
Rich, rolling laughter answered her. "I'm not. Takes too long. Just expecting a vow, and the ritual."
For once, Nova found herself stunned into silence. After all they'd put her through, now they were going to --!
But apparently they were. At a twirl of Leech's pale fingers, she felt herself pulled forward, familiar restraints locking around her wings.
And now that she could turn her head, she could see what was emerging in front and behind of the centers of her wings: bright metal gleaming purple in the shape of the symbol adorning the walls, Bane's wings, Colossus' chest, the middle of Winder's forehead...
They're going to brand that on me after all this?
Bane nodded again, watching her stare.
"Do you swear loyalty to the Decepticon Empire, and to Megatron as its head?"
She tore her optics away from the gleaming purple. "I do." Of course I do, you worthless heap of scrap.
"And to me, as your direct superior?"
Wish I didn't have to. "I do."
He didn't even bother to pronounce her ritually inducted. He simply nodded.
"Then it is done," Leech wheezed, apparently wanting to sound official, and pressed a pale finger to the console.
Nova watched the bright brands move toward her, the glowing symbol filling her vision.
Then agony tore through her wings, new as they were, torment singing through them so perfectly she knew they belonged to her.
She screeched again, surprised her vocalizer could still emit anything, and her vision burst white and purple and blue.
Someone said something. Bane, maybe. She couldn't tell. She felt restraints loosening, clamps freeing her.
"Yes, it is done," she said, her lip twisting into another fierce grin. "Finally."
Determined to ignore the pain in her wings, she took a step forward, unable even to see clearly where she was --
-- and promptly collapsed, her vision fading to white, the smile still frozen on her faceplates.
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Holy slag, you're fast!
And thank you! I'm so glad you're enjoying it.
Re: Holy slag, you're fast!
No, just kidding. Was doing my 11 pm cruise through the hinternetz and it updated. Yay!
Now, however, I do not think I will have happy dreams.
Re: Holy slag, you're fast!
And I'm sorry to have messed up your dreams. But it's a compliment to hear that I write well enough to affect you that much.
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That's kind of dark and twisted (although I have heard that authors need to have the ability to be utterly vicious and nasty to their creations and put them through Hell and worse...)
The ending shot of Nova collapsing into unconsciousness (offline-ness?) is brilliant, because my instant thought was: is that just the toll of the experience, or is it something that Bane etc had put into her as a safeguard against future treachery? Which of course is the huge draw to "don't forget to tune in next week, folks!"
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And yes, it is rather dark and twisted.
But so's the choice she made going back.
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I want a little green medic bot of my very own, to sit on my shoulder and be creepy at people. I like the hints that the medic is sentient in this. It seems to be making decisions about which controls to activate, and it gave a warning, which indicates that something's going on upstairs.
Nova's triumph at being the shiniest thing she's ever seen is wonderful. I can imagine that in a world made of metal, being shiny is very highly prized indeed (as an indicator of status/wealth/power). After all, if you can afford to keep yourself shiny when everything around you is also made of metal, you obviously have significant resources at your disposal (and dude, she's shinier than Brightbolt, who obviously puts a lot of effort in, but who I imagine to be covered with a network of tiny everyday scuffs and scratches that you only notice really close up, but which he can't get rid of entirely, and which stop him looking as new and brilliant as Nova at that moment). This is by far my favourite piece of the world/culture-building thus far, and I think I've rambled on about it far too long :P
Bane is a lazy bastard. And beautifuly repellant (it's not the branding scene that makes me think that, but the bit where's he's lounging about at the beginning). I really want Nova to slag him :P
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