Figure 8, ch.21

When the groundbridge blasted open and Soundwave went through, Oracle lifted her gaze from the dusty ground of the desert. Her optics only collided with his black face mask. Oracle felt fury rising in her spark. She hadn´t forget about what he had done. Or better what he had NOT done. He hadn´t prevented Starscream from almost killing Megatron.

Angrily, Oracle took a step forward and said "Soundwave, I need to talk with you!".

Soundwave stoped, his face mask just seemed to be looking down at her. He said nothing. What a surprise... "Don´t act like you don´t know what I´m talking about!" Oracle said angrily "I have been THERE! I have SEEN what you have done! Or better what you have NOT donr!". She paused to let her words sink in.

"He has been about to kill him!" she shouted then "Starscream, that traitor, was about to take Megatron off the life support systems. Just because HE wanted to be master of the Decepticons. It had just been for his own good!".

Still, Soundwave didn´t show any reaction on her words and that made Oracle even more furious. Couldn´t he at least show any kind of reaction when she was talking with about a topic like this?!

"And you´ve done nothing!" Oracle cried out. Now, she just couldn´t hold back those struggeling emotions anymore. She still couldn´t believe that it was true, what she had been watching the medical laboratory on the NEMESIS. She still couldn´t believe, that they had tried to really kill Megatron.

"You have just stood there and watched." she screamed at the still silent Soundwave "Like you are allways doing! You never react to one fragging thing! Even not know, when I´m shouting at you like... like a... like... ah, shit, you see?! You are making me so furious I can´t even form right sentences!".

Oracle stoped when she noticed, that Soundwave still hadn´t showed any reaction. It was like he wasn´t even hearing, what she was saying, or better shouting, at him. She groaned in frustation and clutched her hands to her forehead.

Primus, what was she actualy doing?

It hadn´t even been all his faut. Starscream had been the one who had tried to convince him, that Megatron was lost would never wake up from the stasis.

And Knockout had helped him!

Primus, out of all Decepticons had he been the only one who had ever at least cared a bit for her. And then he had tried to kill Megatron?! What the frage had been wrong with him?! Oracle was sure, that Starscream had told him, he would get something in return, like a better position in the ranks of the Decepticons. And he had just went for it like fool.

She had allways believed, that he would know better than this...

Oracle sighed and looked back in Soundwave´s dark face mask. At least he had taken care of, that nothing had happened to Megatron when Arcee had blasted of one of the lines of the slife support system.

She took in a deep vent to calm down herself again. Even as she felt again fury rising in her spark... but this time not because Starscream had tried to kill Megatron. She wasn´t mad at him or at Soundwave not even at Knockout now. She was mad at herself. Because she had lost controll over her feelings. Again.

Primus, what ever it is that is sending me those strange emotions at the moment, I HAVE to stop that...

Taking in another deep breath, she said "I´m sorry. I shouldn´t have lost my cool and shout at you like this. I know, that you have been allways loyal to our leader and I´m sure you would never let something happened to him. Starscream was the one who had planned to kill our rightful lord and master.".

She looked up to his face mask again, not expecting any reaction. And he didn´t gave any reaction. The next minutes, Oracle explained what she had reached since she had joined the Autobots. She told Soundwave, that she was part of their team now and that even Arcee accepted her like one of them. She also gave him some information she had been able to find. For example, that the Autobots were searching for the Iacon relicts as well as the Decepticons were and they already had a few of them. But Oracle was still not able to give him the one most important information.

The coordinates of the Autobot base.

Oracle had tried it several times to find out the exact coordinates of the base, but sadly she hadn´t been succsessful. All she could tell Soundwave was that the base was in the desert somewhere near the small town Jasper in Nevada. But the Decepticons already knew that.

At the end of the meeting, Soundwave just gave her the coordiantes for the next meeting and left without giving her any more information or orders.

Oracle stayed behinde alone in the desert after the groundbridge had closed and Soundwave was back on the NEMESIS again. Only then she suddenly realized, that this had been their last meeting in this month. The next one would only be in four weeks again. Unless Soundwave would contact her over the sensor he had given to her before she had left the NEMESIS.

But she doubted that this would happen. It would be pretty risky. So, she would only see him in a month again. Until then she had time to find out new things. For example the coordinates of the base. But for now, she was alone again. Alone with her mission and her still twisted up emotions.

***************
***************
***************
***************

CRACK!

Pain flarred up her neural net and Oracle groaned in pain. But before she had at least been able to notice where it was hurting, she also felt the next bow hitting her hard.

CRACK!

This time, it was pretty obvious that he had beaten her right in the gut. Oracle gasped, almost not able to breath when she felt his fist slamming in her stomage once more before he griped her shoulders and slammed the back of her head into the floor. Terrible pain exploded in her head and she saw stars dancing infront of her optics.

Before she was able to see straight again, he kicked her in the side. Helplessly, Oracle scraddered over the floor unable to help herself anymore. In the next moment, he had yanked her up at her neck and turned her around, slamming the front of her body into the floor with as much force as he could.

The air was pressed out of her lungs and Oracle desperately tried to catch some air in her vents. Weakly, she bounced herself up on her arms and knees coughing out several flows of energon. The stiky blue fluid streamed down her chin and her chassis from the several open wounds in her body. It dribbled on the floor and created little pools wich quickly became bigger.

When she was able to breath again, she felt a hit to her head again and in the next time, she found herself pinned forcefuly to the floor by one of his pieds.

She heared him laugh above her. The sound hollowed terribly in her audio receptors.

"You are not fast enough, Oracle!".

She wanted to lift herself up, but she wasn´t able to move. His pied was pressing down on her back to hard. He laughed again added even more pressure on her back, pinning her painfuly down to the cold floor.

Oracle grunted in pain and coughed out some energon again. In the next moment, she was yanked up and flung around again and her back hit the floor forcefuly. Stars exploded in her optics again when her back was smashed into the floor with so much force, that it cracked beneath her.

"You are weak!".

He slapped her across the face again. Energon was running down her chin from her mouth and her nose in large flows. That meant she had several inner wounds. Her chest was already stained light blue with her own energon.

CRACK!

His fist hit her chest again.

"I have wasted my time with you!".

CRACK!

"I´ve teached you, that there is no place for fauts out there!" he growled.

Then he stoped his attacks on her and Oracle was finaly able to catch some air again. She panted heavily, every breath send an pricking pain through her systems. When her frizzy optics were able to focus again, she saw that familar pair of red optics above her. There was the same hateful gaze in his optics as allways.

"You worthless little glitch!" Megatron shouted at her "You are just failur! You´ve failed so badly on your mission, you little traitor! I should have known it. Fraternizing with the Autobots- how typical of you!".

Oracle couldn´t believe what she was hearing. This couldn´t be true! But by the way his red optics blazed in raw fury and hate, she slowly began to realize what it all was about. Her mission. Those Autobots who had been kind to her. The day, when they called her a part of the family. Her doubts about the Decepticons....

Primus, NO......

Her boddy tensed when she felt his claws into her neck cables, gripping her neck so hard that she was barely able to breath anymore. "Isn´t that right, Oracle?" he hissed "You should have betrayed the Autobots. But instead you betrayed ME!". His fist slammed into her chest again. Megatron leaned down to her audio receptor and growled dangerously "And I don´t tolerate traitors!".

Before she could even had been able to think about a responde, she felt his claws cutting deep into her neck, gripping a hand full of her cables and yanking them out forcefuly. Oracle screamed in pain and tryed to struggle away fro him. But Megatron steped down on her chest, pinning her to the floor beneath him with no chance to escape.

Unable to defend herself in any way, Oracle could only look up to him. His face was twisted into the most hideous grin she had every seen and his red optics were blazing of hate as he hissed "I will punish you so hard, you will be BEGGING for me to kill you!".

Savagely, he pulled out another heap of cables. Feeling parts of her body yanked free, Oracle screamed again. Her hands reached up and scratched at his feet that was pinning her down, desperately trying to get herself free from him. More of the bright blue energon trickled down her chest now, staining her whole body and forming a bit pool on the floor around her. Her processor tried to understand what was happening, but she wasn´t able to focus on anything. The pain was simply to much. And it didn´t stop.

This was unreal. She had betrayed the Decepticons? But how... she couldn´t understand it. She just couldn´t understand what was happening. It just couldn´t be real...

He lifted her hand, the sharp tips of his claws shined in bright silver. "This is just the first stage of your punishment!" he hissed dangerously and before Oracle could say anything, he slashed is claws down at the left side of her face. Her high pitched shriek was caught in the back of her vocals as she felt his claws digging into her face plates, leaving deep and bleeding scratches on the left side of her face.

Her body shivered and tensed, desperately trying to move away from the furious Decepticon leader above her who was slowly tearing her body apart. But it was like she was frozen, completely unable to move or to help herself. It felt like an invisble force was keeping her immobilized and imprisoned in shock. Only her horrase screams of pain and terror escaped her vocals.

He teared his claws out of her destroyed face plates again. He trailed an leisure diggit around her widened left optic and purred "Isn´t that ironic, my dear Oracle? When I´ve thrown Starscream out of the untiy of Decepticons, I thought that would be warning enough to everyone. Even to someone like you. But it seemed like I have been wrong!".

A wave of hot pain crushed down at her as Oracle felt how he digged his claws into her left optic and she felt her hands clenching into fist. A high pitched shriek echoed from her vocals as he slowly teared out her left optic, crushing it in his forceful grip. Megatron gave a sick laugh again, enjoying her painful shrieks and desprate trys to escape him. He had never been like this to her before. Of course he had allways been stricked and violate with her in their training fights. But never like this.

Was this the sadistic side of Megatron the Autobots had allways talked about?

What? No! She was not thinking like this! She was...

Her thoughts were interrupted when he punctured her claws through the scratches on her faceplates and the gaping hole where her optic had been and Oracle couldn´t stop the scream that rocked through her body. Energon was streaming down the remains of the left side of her face in large flows and she wondered whether she would be killed by Megatron or whether she would bleed herself to death before.

"Since you are an Autobot, you deserve nothing better than to be treatened like one!" Megatron snarled and his claws digged into her neck again, chocking her so hard that she wasn´t able to breath. "How does it feel to be helpless?" he taunted her with a harsh laugh, his claws were scratching painfully at her open wounds.

"Do you have fear?" he mocked her sickly, optics glittering firely with hate and a hint of hidden insanity she had never noticed before in his gaze. "Do you want to beg for mercy?" his claws scratched down her neck, tearing up her open wounds and the dryed energon once more. Oracle screamed in pain, bucking and arching she tried to move. But Megatron and the invisible force still pinned her down to the floor without any mercy.

Megatron laughed sickly again and Oracle´s right and only optic widened in horror and panic as she saw him even ENJOYING her pain and her desperate screams. He was LAUGHING with sick amusement and looked down at her, taking in the horrible sight of her scratched face and crushed optic. Starring panicaly up into his sick red optics, he asked her mockingly "Does it hurt?".

She shrieked again when he plunged his hand into her neck again, claws digging deep around and energon pulsed up fro the open wound, streaming like river down her neck and chest. Her sounds of pain only encouraged him. "Good." he purred dangerously "Because trust me, Oracle, it´s going to hurt a lot MORE until I´m finish with you!".

The pain crashed down at her again, when she felt his claws digging and scratching at her plates now. "I wonder if you will beg for mercy when I´m scratching your spark into little pieces." he hissed curely "But even if you would, it wouldn´t help you. I will tear out your spark right infront of your optics and then I will crush it in my grip until nothing is left but a tiny crushed piece of disgust!".

Pure terror and panic rocked up her systems as Oracle felt his claws digging into her chest plaiting, cutting in deep and slowly and ever so painfuly starting to tear her spark chamber open until he had reveiled her spark from beneath. It was beating violently in pure sight now. He reched his hand into her spark chamber, slowly scratching the highly sensetive surface of her very life force. A wicked grin spread across his features "I can just hope for you to beg for mercy. But... well. It won´t help you nevertheless!".

The pain that fkarred up her neural net from her chest and shocked through every vibe of her body was almost to much for Oracle to stand. She screamed, right abd only optic tightening in pain and fear as he slowly scratched at the surface of her bare spark, everytime his claws cut into it a bit deeper. Oracle jerked her head back, shuddering violently with pain and her hands scratched so hard on the surface of her berth that she created deep scratches-

Her berth!

She was dreaming! This wasn´t real. It hasn´t happened in real life! This-

Again a wave of pain crushed through her systems as she felt Megatron digging his claws right into her spark chamber, slowly digging beneath it to rip it out of her chassis. Despite the terribly shock that hit her like a splap in the face and send a crushimg wave terror and fear through every vibe of her beeing, Oracle tried to focus.

This wasn´t real! It was NOT really happening! It was just a dream kept her trapped in a terrible deep and dark hole of her own fears! It has just rosen out of her own fear! And she could win above her fear!

Oracle grinded her dentas and closed her right and only optic. She forced herself to ignor the pain Megatron was causing her. It was just a dream! Nothing of that was real! This pain wasn´t real! Megatron wasn´t real! The fail of her mission wasn´t real! It was just some sort of sick fantasy and imignation!

Screaming with determination, Oracle tried to free herself out of her sick dream. She wouldn´t let it win above her! This wasn´t happening! It wasn´t real! She wouldn´t allow this to happen!

THIS WAS NOT HOW IT WOULD END!

***************

Oracle shot up to a sitting position in her berth, panting and shaking violently in horror and shock of the terrifying nightmare. Shaking so hard that her armor was ratteling lodly, Oracle sat in her bed unable to do anything else except of gasping in heavy cycles of air, trying to calm herself down again.

The ghosts of the hideous nightmare still ghosted around in her processor and she squeezed her optics shut, trying to forget the nightmare. But she could still see that hateful gaze in his red optics. She could still hear his laughing while he had slowly killed her. She could still feel the pain...

She opened her optics again as the pictures of the nightmare started to grow infront of her inner eye. Hot tears started to rise in her optics and felt down her cheeks only in remeberance of it.

What had happened? Megatron had called her a traitor. He said she had been fraternizing with the Autobots and betrayed him. In her nightmare, she had failed on her mission. She had stayed with the Autobots instead of going back to the Decepticons like she was supposed to. And she had dreamed of what would happen when she would do this.

But how could she....? Why had she dreamed of this? She would never betray the Decepticons. What had been in her dream would never happen. She wouldn´t allow it to happen! Fraternizing with the Autobots... that wasn´t true!

But, Primus why? WHY had it felt so real?

Oracle shivered when a cold wave of panic and fear rushed through her, but she started to take in careful and deep breaths. That twisted dream haunted her in her mind and in her spark. It was still something, that COULD happen. It wasn´t impossible that this would end like this. It wasn´t impossible that she would stay-

NO!

She clenched her hands to her forehead as those thoughts rose in her spark again, trying to shake them off. She wasn´t thinking like this. Here was not her home! She would never stay here. Nothing could ever bring her to stay here and betray the Decepticons!

Oracle trashed her head free of those stupid thoughts again and tried to forget the warm feeling she allways had in her spark when she was laughing with- she growled in fury and slammed her fist as hard as she could in the wall next to her when her thoughts started to betray her again. Primus, she was so angry with herself that she had simply LET those Autobots bring her to those feelings and thoughts.

She shut her optics again, but the picture of Megatron came back immediately. That hateful gaze... that hideous grinn... his claws cutting into her metal as easy as in chees... the sadistic shadow behinde his optics... what the Autobots had allways warned her about...

NO! She shook her head again, taking in heavy and deep vents to clear her hizzy porcessor of these twisted and corrupt thoughts. It was wrong! It was so wrong! So sickeningly wrong! She could actualy believe that she was thinking things like this.

Oracle grittered her teeth, squeezing her optics shut tightly again and fighting the picture of the sadistic Megatron with all her might. That wasn´t how he really was. She knew it better! And despite her damnable spark was telling her otherwise without even a reason. Oracle sobbed in shame, struggeling in a war with noone else but herself.

Her spark was betraying her. It was telling her, that the Megatron in her nightmare, the one who had totured her to a slow and painful death, THAT was the real Megatron. But her porocessor argued with her spark. That wasn´t true. Megatron wasn´t like this. Maybe he had never been the friendliest bot towards her, but still he had treatened her well. He had allowed her to live. She owed him her whole life.

Right?

But her spark wasn´t convinced. Of COURSE she didn´t owe him her life. She owed him anything but nothing! When she had been a child, Megatron had never cared about her. He had allways left her alone. He hadn´t done a fragging thing for her. Just captured her on his ship and teached her nothing but lies.

Her processsor reacted almost violently. That wasn´t true. He taught her the truth and nothing else. He was the one who had saved, who had made her to the femme she was now. And her spark was just contaminated by those doubts the Autobots had told her in. Her spark was nothing but- corrupt!

Her spark only laughed back at her processor. Corrupt? Really? Does this mean everyone who was believing more in the feeling of their sparks than in their processor was corrput?!

A desperate cry was caught in the back of her vocalizer as she felt her spark betraying her more and more and she almost wasn´t able to surpress the sobs wich chocked up in her traoth. Her spark was what hold her alive. She couldn´t live without it. She needed it. She needed those feeling wich her processor called corrupt. Without those, she would be a lifeless figure without a soul and any feelings. Without her spark, she would loose her true self. Her processor was just telling her what she wanted to hear. Nothing of it was true and her spark was even telling her, that she knew it. That she had allways known it!

Oracle choked on a helpless cry again as she felt how a part of herself broken down into pieces and fell apart. In those years on the NEMESIS... had she really lost herself there? Lost who she was... in the lies Megatron had teached her?

A wave of pain crashed through her as her spark continued to mock her. `When had been the last time you really have been happy, Oracle? What do YOU really know about yourself? You are something beyong yourself, not even able to realize what is the thruth and what is just a lie. You are just believing everything Megatron is telling you. Are you really just an unfeeling robot who wallow in self-pity in a wretched state that wasn´t even aware of its own identity?!´

`And what of those evil questions, Oracle? Like "Are you allright?" or "How are you?". Just a simple question, innocent asked by Bumblebee without any aims. Curiously or worried by Raf or Crosshairs. And you are not even able to answer this simple question with the truth? You are allways answering the same. Come on, tell me you little worthless glitch! What do you answer?´

I´m fine...

`You are not!!!´

The words cut as deep and easy as Megatron´s claws had cut through her metal. Trembling, Oracle hitched up her legs and wrapped her arms around her knees, clenching as hard as she could on herself as she inwardly screamed for help.

It´s breaking me...

Her processor lashed back at her spark. Her true self had DIED in Crystal City! There was nothing left! The Autobots had attacked the city and they had killed her parents. But not only her family, but also herself! She was no more! The Autobots had cared for that when they had destoyed Crytstal City. It had been the Autobots! It was all their faut!

Her spark only laughed about that. The Autobots had attackted the city and killed her parents. Yes, that was what Megatron had allways told her. But did she really know that? Did she really know that this was the truth? No. She didn´t know it! She didn´t know whether that was the truth! It was just what Megatron had told her and she went for it like fool and believed it without questioning it. Like she allways did. It was also a lie, her spark shouted at her. It wasn´t true! The Autobots hadn´t attacked Crystal City. And she knew it! She had allways known it, her spark shouted. She had just been too cowardly to realize it.

Another scream was caught in the back of her vocalizer as she felt the pain in her spark rising and rising. Her spark and her processor were agruing and this was tearing her apart. She didn´t know what to believe anymore. She didn´t know what was right and what was wrong. What was true and what was a lie. What was real and what was just imignation.

I´m falling apart...

Her spark was telling her, that Megatron had terminated her real self and replaced it with an willingless and feeless identity that was just traped  in her own processor by his lies. She had lost herself a bit more everytime she had believed what he had told her. And she was too weak to even realize and accept it.

But her processoe told her, that her spark was corrupt. Corrupted by the things the Autobots had told her and that she should never believe what it was telling her. Her processor told her to believe Megatron. He had done much more for her than those Autobots. He had saved after the Autobots had broken her. That was the only truth!

´Out there is no place for fauts.´

A violent tremble rushed through her, when Oracle heared Megatron´s words echoing in her audio receptors, haunting her like a dark shadow. He had allways teached her that. THAT was the only truth, her processor shouted angrily at her. That was the only thing she needed to know and nothing else.

Her spark could only laugh about this. Out there in the real life was no place for fauts? As if she knew anything about the real life! She didn´t know a fragging thing about the world out there! Megatron had allways just kept her imprisioned in his primus forsaken ship and told her those words over and over again. And she had just believed him. Now she might was outside, but she wasn´t free.

I AM free!

Her processor shouted, but her spark just answered that she wasn´t. She would never be free as long as she believed Megatron and his pit spawned lies. They would allways keep her imprisioned. Her processor shouted in blind furry, that her spark would never be able to save her. Even IF her spark was right, it would never be strong enough to save her out of the darkness.

After all, her spark retreated but not without the last haunting words.

`Would you really let yourself fall so deep, that you are not even able to save yourself and worth an own life... and in the process, betray the only ones who had ever cared about you?´

`You know that you are not strong enough for that, since you are not even strong enough for having an own soul.´

Oracle shuddered, her hands clenched to her helm and only now she realized that she had leaked so much optic lubricant, that she would be able to fill millions of tubs with it. The echo of her spark still was haunting her and mocked her weakness. She shook her head violently, trying to clear her head of the dark haze that had clouded her.

She tried to push her spark further away, but it stayed within reach for her, letting her know that she wasn´t able to escape. Slowly, she tried to calm herself down from her panic again. Still, hysterical shrieks and sobbs treatened to escape her vocals. But she forced them back with all her might. She needed to gain controll over herself again. Nobody was allowed to see her like this.

But she couldn´t shake of the knowledge that both, her processor and her spark were a part of her... and she would have to choose.

´Don´t forget on wich side you are standing.´

Another pained whine filled her berth room as she remebered Knockout´s last words to her before she had left the NEMESIS. She would need to choose at the end of this. Between truth and lie. Between reality and imagination. Between freedom and imprisoness. Between Autobots and Decepticons...

...between life and death.