1. It's widely believed that when a seeker's wings are irreparably damaged, said seeker tends to slip into madness. The humane thing to do in this case is to put the seeker out of his or her misery.
Starscream is shot down in battle and his wings are utterly trashed. Megatron opts to leave him behind (no sense wasting resources on a mech who's just going to go mad, after all) and the Autobots take him back to their base in the hopes that something can be done for him. When it turns out there's no way Ratchet can repair Starscream, it kicks off a moral dilemma: should they kill Starscream while he's in stasis or let him live in misery?
2. A variation on the first bunny and incorporating some of
this bunny as well. Vos has aerial seekers (Starscream et al) as well as non-aerials or "skimmers" (Cliffjumper); skimmers are actually the Vosian variant of minibots. When an aerial's wings are irreparably damaged, Vosian medics either modify the frame to non-aerial or - if the damage is too great - transfer the ex-aerial's spark to a non-aerial frame.
Same scenario as above happens, only when the debate starts Cliffjumper and any other minibot that might actually be Vosian (I'm thinking Bumblebee) insist on modifying Starscream into a non-aerial frame. When questions start being asked, the two minis reveal that they're actually seekers, discard whatever excess armor they've been using to disguise themselves, and reveal what has actually been happening to damaged aerial seekers over the eons.
Bonus points here if Bumblebee/non-Cliffjumper mini was actually an aerial seeker long before the war and was modified due to severe damage.
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