Title: Of Thongs and Mechs
Fandom: G1
Author: femme4jack
Characters: Carly, Bluestreak
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Total crack, might cause sympathetic itching and beverage spraying.
Summary: Bluestreak gives Carly a ride to work and starts asking questions about things that have him concerned regading his little friends' well being.
Notes: Written for the Spring Fever & Lingerie 2011 challenge at the flesh_and_steel community on livejournal. While I'm not sure this really has much to do with spring fever, there is plenty of lingerie. I have to give great thanks to livejournal friend ayngelkat for her inspiration about First Aid being an "alternative medicine" kind of medic. This story was in no way influenced by the author having to deal with a certain itchy condition this week.
Of Thongs and Mechs
"Carly, I know that Prowl said I wasn't supposed to talk to you too much on these drives. I guess I've made some of the humans feel really uncomfortable. I'm not sure why, but I do have a lot of questions and I think humans are fascinating and so cute and small and soft," the gray Datsun began as they drove out of the main entrance of the Ark. Carly's car was having problems again, so Sparkplug was keeping it for the night to check it out. Bluestreak had happily volunteered for the duty of shuttling her back and forth from her evening shift.
"Go ahead Blue, you can ask me anything. It won't bother me," Carly said sweetly, patting Bluestreak on his dash.
"Oh, that's great, because I have so many questions and the others keep stopping me when I start asking. So, my sensors couldn't help noticing that your undergarments aren't the same kind that Spike, Sparkplug and Chip wear. Spike wears cotton ones that are a bit tight, and he said that they keep his girls in place. I'm not sure what girls he's talking about, because you are the only girl around right now and you aren't in his underwear, and you are a woman, not a girl. There was the one from Peru, before he met you, and the medieval princess he kissed when he went back in time, but they can't fit in his underwear when he is wearing it. I guess they were both girls, because they are both under 18..."
Bluestreak, not needing to breath, was about to go on when Carly interrupted him with a nervous laugh, putting her hand on the radio to stop him. "Um, Spike never told me about any girl from Peru or the Middle Ages, Blue, so I'm going to have to ask him just which girls have been in his underwear, but to answer your question, he was talking about his testicles - that he doesn't like them flopping around. Why he can't call them by a normal name, I'm not sure. Briefs, the kind of underwear he wears, can bring down a man's sperm count, and I'm beginning to think that might be a good idea, as far as Spike is concerned."
"Oh, I'll have to tell him that, Carly! He might not know, and the other mechs are so careful about what they say to you guys. Even Ratchet, and he scans everything!" Bluestreak's spark hurt when he thought about Spike not being able to have progeny, and he quickly commed Bumblebee to talk to his human about the topic before it was too late.
"You do that, Bluestreak," Carly said sweetly, giving him an affectionate pat that made the Datsun purr. "I'm sure he'd like to know. You might also ask him which girls have been in his underwear, and when."
"Oh, ok, but I still don't understand how a whole girl could fit into his underwear, but anyhow, that wasn't really my question. I was just noticing that you wear different underwear than Spike, Sparkplug, and Chip. Well, at least some of the time you do. I did notice that Sparkplug has lacy things that are similar to yours that he sometimes wears on his chest and covering his genitals"
Carly choked and began laughing hysterically. "Sparkplug wears girl's underwear?" she asked when she could finally speak.
"I'm sorry Carly, I didn't mean to make your eyes leak Are you ok?" When she nodded and gestured with her hand for him to go on he continued. "They aren't a girl's underwear, Carly" Bluestreak explained. "They clearly are the right size for a full grown woman, not a girl. And they definitely belong to him. There is no trace of any one else's DNA on them. I scanned his room one day and he had several sets, but he only seems to wear them when he gets grumpy, and he sure does get grumpy sometimes, almost as grumpy as Ratchet. I haven't asked him about them yet, because every time I start to, Ratchet stops me. Ratchet thinks Sparkplug doesn't want anyone to know that he wears them and about that club he sometimes goes to, which doesn't make sense to me at all. They are all really pretty colors. But his don't have the string that goes between his aft plates...I mean his buttocks...not like yours."
Carly shifted uncomfortably, suddenly keenly aware that her 'aft plates' were touching another sentient being who could sense pretty much everything and had no inhibitions about doing so. "So...what is your question, Bluestreak? Did you want me to explain why Sparkplug sometimes wears women's underwear?" she asked carefully.
"On, no, that wasn't my question. I can ask Sparkplug, or maybe Spike, about that. What I wanted to know was why you wear the kind of underwear that doesn't cover you aft at all? That string going between your plates looks really uncomfortable, but I'm not a human, and I don't wear underwear, well, at least most of the time I don't. There was the time that Sideswipe reprogrammed my color nanites and made it look like I was wearing the kind of underwear you wear, after the first time we met you when we were talking about your underwear..."
"Sideswipe did what?" Carly squealed, "and you all were talking about my underwear?"
"Well, yes, we were, because I was wondering if they were comfortable, and Sideswipe thought they would look nice on me, and Ratchet was wondering if you knew that the string is often in contact with your fecal bacteria and acts as a conduit for that bacteria to get into your vagina causing Bacterial Vaginosis or Vulvovaginal Candidiasis. We've all noticed that you have Candidiasis quite frequently, and you'd probably save a lot of money on medications for it if you didn't wear that kind of underwear. It must be really uncomfortable being that itchy..."
Carly suddenly put her hands on the wheel, and dug in her nails hard enough to make Bluestreak yelp as she sharply ordered, "Stop the car, Bluestreak!"
Not knowing what else to do, and not finding another car around to stop, Bluestreak immediately halted, and then began apologizing profusely for the minor case of whiplash he caused the human who was so delicate and he just forgot their necks weren't made of metal sometimes and that sudden stops could be alarming or even injure her, and did she want him to comm First Aid to come and check out her neck because the junior medic had been studying chiropractic medicine in his off hours (First Aid was fascinated by human alternative medicine, did she know that?) and he might be able to help and First Aid had been worrying about her recurring yeast infections as well and had considered suggesting that she go on a special diet to change her pH.
"Bluestreak, open the door and stop talking!" Carly said sharply. Getting out the Datsun when he quickly complied, she walked away stiffly, her hands balled into fists.
"Carly," the Datsun called after her in a frantic tone once had transformed. With a single stride he was next to her and kneeling down. "Are you ok? What did I do? Prowl was right, I really should keep my questions to myself about you guys, or ask Jazz because he understands humans even better than Bumblebee does. Next time I have a question about your underwear, I'll ask Jazz, I promise. I'm sorry Carly..."
"Bluestreak, just stop," she said quietly, sighing and putting a patient hand on gray mech's leg. "It's ok...it really is. Just...I wear them because they are more comfortable. That's all. But now I'm really uncomfortable because I know that all of you have been scanning me and talking about things that are private. It really isn't polite to scan a woman's underwear, ok? Or to scan her vaginal flora, for goodness sake! Those things are between me and my gynecologist, and aren't topics for conversation. Do you understand?"
Bluestreak nodded contritely, but then frowned. "Carly, there is something you should know, though. I can't really stop scanning those things. Taking complex scans of the environment around us is an automatic subroutine, and I'd have to ask Ratchet to disable it, and I know he wouldn't do that because then I'd be bumping into everything and might accidentally step on you, and I'd never forgive myself if I did that. You are such a nice human, and I'd feel bad if I hurt any human, but especially you."
Carly shook her head, and patted him again. "Tell you what, just promise me you won't talk about stuff that humans consider private with your friends, ok?"
"Um...ok. I'm not sure that you'll have any luck getting Sideswipe to stop, though. He thinks squishies...sorry...humans are hilarious."
"Leave that to me," Carly said in a tone that could make a mech quake. "Now go ahead and transform and take me to work. Let's see if we can come up with some questions for you to ask that aren't...so intimate."
And that was pretty much the end of it. Carly and Spike recovered from the revelations about Spike's medieval fling. Sideswipe came out of recharge one day to find a black and white polka dot thong and matching bra had been painted on his armor with a paint compound that could not be stripped off and lasted for a full month before his color nanites were finally able to absorb it. Spike, after a heart to spark with Bumblebee about future progeny, began wearing boxers. Sparkplug, after plenty of urging and well aged scotch, gave Wheeljack and Ratchet a show they never deleted from their memory files, which led to a whole new Autobot hobby that involved holograms and drag shows (which is another great story about mechs and underwear). Finally, all of the mechs noticed that not only did Carly never wear a thong again, her incidents of vaginal yeast and bacterial infections significantly decreased, though whether that was from the change in underwear styles, or the probiotics First Aid began putting in the human water supply on the Ark, no one was certain.
