Happy Holidays! :D

Thank you BrewedSugar for editing! *hearts*

Starscream knew something was wrong the moment the ship emerged from the space bridge, all communications were blocked and the ship was slowly being pulled in through a magnetic field.

He had been off planet for a few hundred years - he and Skyfire- as they explored the galaxy for new resources concerning the energon crises. To see the planet in ruins as he stared out the window was a tremendous shock. The civil riots between the workers and the elite must have escalated into a full scale war.

As soon as the ship touched ground, it was immediately raided by the Cybertron Security Force and Starscream was arrested.

He was taken to the intact fortress of Iacon and stood in front of the Council of Elders. This wasn't the first time, nor would it be the last.

"What is going on?" Asked the Seeker as he attempted to wiggle his wrists free from the stasis cuffs. "Why have I been taken prisoner?"

The Council, ever displeased with seeing the troublesome Seeker, looked down at him from their high desk. "Have you located any suitable planets to harvest for energon?" One asked with a tone that implied that he never cared to know what the answer would have been.

There was enough energon on Cybertron for everyone. The only problem was that the elite were greedy and never wanted to share with the common workers. But why did they need to capture Starscream and his ship? So the enemies wouldn't have got to him first if he did know a suitable planet for energon? Even so, why bring him to the Council of Elders and not the Science Council? And why had he been stasis-cuffed? "Can you not wait until I write my report?"

"Do answer the quest-"

"I demand to know answers!" Interjected the Seeker who had grown rather impatient. "What is occurring? Why the need to place stasis cuffs on me?"

"Obnoxious Seeker. No wonder your kind was destroyed."

Starscream's entire frame went frigid. He had seen the destruction on Cybertron as he was being pulled in, was his home city destroyed? He never had a chance to even seek out a trine...

"Where is Skyfire?" Announced one of the council members. His bellowing voice awakened Starscream from his thoughts.

Anger spiraled through the Seeker's processor at just hearing that name, though his voice displayed a seemingly neutral tone. "He is trapped back on the last planet whose data was inputted into the ship's black box. I came back to send a rescue team. The ship's energon would not have sufficed had I stayed longer to look for him." Starscream had searched for him, searched just to make sure...

"We do not have the resources to send out a search party, however, we do require all the information you have gathered during your exploration."

Starscream anticipated that to be their answer. That planet was far too many light-years away to waste valuable time and resources for just one scientist. Starscream still felt their bond; that meant that Skyfire hadn't offlined. His systems must have gone into stasis. The bond would remain, but if blocked, like it has been these last couple of vorns, then hopefully the bond would disperse and will finally be broken. Or if Skyfire's systems shutdown from the extreme weather conditions or lack of energon. Either way, Starscream would have been freed from the bond.

As for the information, he will talk, but he won't say anything that will lead them to Skyfire's icy tomb. Just in case they decided to rescue him later on, he couldn't take that chance.

-0000-

Starscream emerged from recharge with a faint grin. He wished that was one of those memory purges that were wiped out the moment one awoke. But no, his processor wanted him to remember that memory. But at least it was a somewhat pleasant one. He remained in berth, waiting until all his systems were fully online.

An empty fuel tank was the only motivation he received to get off the berth and leave his quarters. If he had his own energon dispenser, he would gladly live out the rest of the vorn in his quarters. He would have even overcome his claustrophobia, anything to avoid Skyfire.

It was still relatively early in the cycle; hopefully Skyfire would still be in recharge and Starscream would be able to grab some energon and return to his quarters without any arguments in-between.

But there he was, seated on the new couch, reading a datapad and drinking energon.

Skyfire looked up from his datapad at the Seeker's scowl. Whoa, someone woke up on the wrong side of the berth. The bigger of the two knew Starscream hated him. But to have that much hate for someone, you would of had to have loved them too, right? Skyfire mused at that. He didn't hate Starscream, he was...indifferent towards him. Starscream's reaction to this situation was amusing. If the Seeker wasn't going to make the best of the situation, Skyfire was. At the expense of the Seeker.

Skyfire also knew that the Seeker was powerless and out of his comfort zone. The poor Seeker hated being indoors for too long, hated that his ex-bondmate could shock him with the pit-spawned collar, and hated that he couldn't escape this engagement for at least a vorn.

"Recharge well?" Asked Skyfire, who tried to be courteous.

Starscream wished Skyfire would spontaneously combust. " ...Quite." He walked past the shuttle and proceeded to pour himself energon and quickly let it cascade down his intake.

Deciding that that was not enough words to satisfy a question, he asked another, "You haven't thanked me for buying you your upgrades and items."

Starscream dispersed the empty cube and turned to face the shuttle. "Yeah? Well you are not going to receive one."

He knew he should have let it be, but he didn't. There was something inside of him, something that urged him, to ruin the Seeker's day. "...Why?"

That irked Starscream. He had had enough. "You should have offlined! How the frag are you still online?"

Skyfire stayed quite as Starscream yelled, almost franticly, from vorns of frustrated confusion.

"There is no possible way for your systems to have survived for millions of vorns under extreme temperature. If you had offlined I would have finally gotten rid of the remainder of the bond and moved on. But I still felt your presence even with the bond blocked. The bond just wouldn't disperse. I knew you were still functioning. That is why I told Megatron of the resources found on Earth. So we can go there and I can offline you myself and finally get rid of the bond!"

Despite being yelled at because he still functioned, Skyfire smiled. "Then why didn't you offline me? Why did you have me join the Decepticons instead? Besides, you should also be offline. I chose to save you from the Elders."

Starscream became silent. Unable to or even know how to respond to that.

Skyfire sighed and continued, "Somewhere along the way, you were becoming... distant. Avoiding me and blocking our bond more and more. Then after our breakup, you seemed, well, different. You made it clear that you wanted nothing to do with me. I was actually expecting you to offline me yourself in order to deactivate the bond instead of having to wait for it to degenerate on its own. Our exploration together was very stressful and frightening to me. Believe me, I tried to find a way out of going but the Science Council wouldn't hear of it since we were the most qualified. Finding out I've been frozen for millions of vorns was puzzling. You still had resentment towards me, that was evident, but I would have expected to, you know, finish the job and finally end the bond. But you ...did not."

Starscream couldn't explain why he hadn't offlined Skyfire, he himself hadn't even known. But he definitely knew it wasn't because he loved the shuttle, he despised him more than anything, even more than Megatron. But he knew he shouldn't have, Skyfire never really did anything that made him upset.

Both stared at each other. Starscream completely furious mixed with confusion and Skyfire relatively amused.

"Skyfire, I truly despise you and wish you would have offlined back on Earth." Starscream headed towards his quarters.

"Can you answer me this question?" Asked Skyfire knowing full well that it would most likely go unanswered.

Starscream didn't respond, he kept walking, so Skyfire just asked it. "What did I do to you to make you despise me this much?"

"Nothing," was the only response Starscream gave before closing the door to his quarters.