Somewhat OC-centric. Meant to be short. Dragonsbane and Faith are mine - the 'Bots and 'Cons are not.
Dragonsbane had a prolem.
Unlike most of the femmes the Autobots had contact with, the dragonbot didn't have that near-constant 'treat me like your equal or I'll rip out your vital parts' attitude. She acted more like a mech-friend than a femme, and for a while, this had worked just fine…..since they had all thought she was a mech to begin with.
Her frame was much bulkier than a typical femme frame, and her voice wasn't of the usual light, higher tone. She wasn't very fast, she wasn't very light; anything feminine, she seemed to be the opposite. Even when drunk, she had never let slip on any detail that made her seem feminine. It wasn't until Cliffjumper made a mild gender-specific joke that anyone noticed anything.
"Dude, I'm right here." She made a face around her half-empty cube of energon as those around the table laughed. "You don't see me cracking' jokes about your masculinity…" A silence had fallen around the table as those words were processed; the others - for once - jumping to the correct conclusion.
"Wait…you're a femme?" Pipes finally managed. Dragonsbane raised one optic ridge over the edge of her cube.
"Yah….is that a problem?" A general chorus of 'no' had circulated those in attendance, but the general air never returned to its formal jovial state. At first, Dragonsbane had shrugged it all off, expecting everything to get back to normal after day or two. Five weeks passed, and the femme resorted to drinking alone.
Her fingertips drummed on the tabletop, clicking as the tips of her claws contacted the smooth surface before they were pulled up again. Audial feathers were pulled back into a single curved line, tangentially low off of her helm, and the energon cube - picked up nearly twenty minutes ago - was still untouched. Dragonsbane stared down into the pink depths, only looking up when a towering shadow fell across her table.
"You seem troubled." Skyfire stated simply. Dragonsbane sighed.
"I am…." She groaned. The big jet pulled out the chair across from the dragon and sat down.
"Want to talk about it?" He offered. Dragonsbane paused.
"….you know I'm a femme, right?" She asked after a moment or two of silence. Skyfire nodded.
"Yes, I do know." He replied. The femme made a face.
"Most of my friends didn't apparently…I mentioned something while we were drinking about a month back, and none of them have treated me the same since." She swirled the energon within the cube, watching the pink liquid inside lap dangerously close to the top edge. "Did I make them mad or something…?"
"No, you didn't make them mad." Skyfire shook his head. "They're just used to a femme being….a little more delicate….maybe of a lighter build…" He paused.
"Basically, everything I'm not?" Dragonsbane guessed with a huff.
"Uh…mostly…" Skyfire sighed. "Things will get back to normal. It's…just going to take them all some time to get used to the idea of a femme acting (and looking, sorry) like a mech." Dragonsbane stared at him.
"….I'm consoled, and a tiny bit insulted by that."
"Sorry."