Bob didn't. Sunstreaker and Megatron did. This was a short, spontaneous fling that wouldn't change anything.
Title: Get It
Warning: Awkward. Silly. Sad. Vague BDSM and sparkplay.
Rating: PG-13
Continuity: IDW.
Characters: Megatron, Sunstreaker, Bob the Insecticon.
Disclaimer: The theatre doesn't own the script or actors, nor does it make a profit from the play.
Motivation (Prompt): From Tumblr - "Obvious."
[* * * * *]
He didn't get it for a short time, longer than he cared to admit to once he figured it out. It made no sense on the surface. His initial impression was that it was one of Rodimus' foolish, juvenile attempts to exclude him from some sort of function or duty belonging to the captain of this blasted ship. It wasn't that Megatron particularly wanted to take partial responsibility for idiotic traditions like 'Bob Walkies' (what was a Bob and why did walkies-ing it involve a leash hung by the door to the bridge?), but the fact remained that if he let Rodimus hoard anything involving the captaincy, the crew would look to the moron to lead them and ignore Megatron entirely. They would relish the opportunity.
So Megatron gritted his teeth and resigned himself to another piece of insanity. Today was the day he investigated yet one more odd, tacked-on, bizarre tidbit that being a captain aboard this ludicrous ship of fools required. The job grew more ridiculous by the hour, he'd swear it.
Blaster gave him a blank look when he casually inquired about the Bob's whereabouts. Megatron thought it was a person or creature of some sort, maybe, based on the uneasy assumption that 'walkies' was supposed to be a verb and therefore 'Bob' was the subject of the verb.
"Uh, he got off on Cybertron, m'mech. Captain." The communication specialist's face took on the odd look of someone who couldn't believe he had to address Megatron using official terms of respect.
Megatron was used to it. "Then I take it this…thing," he eyed the leash in his hand as if it'd come to life and bite him, "can therefore be disposed of." With much prejudice.
"Yeah, sure. I guess. Sunstreaker has his own."
That gave him pause. Wait, what? Sunstreaker? The vicious sociopath Starscream had manipulated into betraying the Autobots? Sunstreaker was the Bob?
Maybe it was a codename. He'd always assumed Optimus Prime held control over the more insane of Autobot frontliners via unconventional methods, but a leash seemed rather extreme. Hmm. Or not. Now that he thought about it, it seemed like a brilliant idea. He should have put Overlord on an actual leash centuries ago. Rodimus would benefit from being put on one, certainly.
Megatron kept the leash. One never disposed of potentially useful items.
[* * * * *]
He didn't get it for a little while, not that he wanted to admit to ever figuring it out. It was just that he knew the crew of the Lost Light and their varying levels of strangeness. Unlike most of the mechs left on Cybertron, he found them neither intimidatingly weird nor potentially infectious. There was some sort of rumor about Whirl being a catching thing, apparently.
Also, people didn't want to courier messages out now that Megatron co-captained (everyone else thought that was a made-up title, but anyone who knew Rodimus just nodded like it was to be expected) the ship. Sunstreaker figured that made competition for the job nonexistent. Pair that with the fact that half the Autobots still on Cybertron still hated his chassis, and courier duty was a decent position for an out-of-work frontline fighter. It wasn't as though he wanted to work directly for Starscream, and frag no was he going back to Earth with Optimus Prime. That left puttering around in Iacon looking for enough work to get by, or steady employment ferrying messages to and from places.
Whatever else Sunstreaker was, he at least could guarantee nobody was going to intercept a message he'd been tasked to deliver. That sucker was getting to where it was sent. Nobody wanted to tangle with him.
The few who did, he fed to Bob. For some reason, mechs had short memories. They'd forgotten in the short time since Cybertron had been purged of the Swarm what it was that the feral Insecticons preferred to eat. Bob didn't like his meals to scream on their way down his gullet, but Sunstreaker had no problem butchering meals before feeding time. Attackers made good Insecticon chow. Less expensive than buying Bob food, anyway.
Brutal, yes, but so was attempting to core out his spark chamber in order to steal confidential government messages. He felt guilty about a lot of things, but regret wasn't what he felt after taking out ambushers. Although he had the feeling half the messages he was risking his life to deliver were the equivalent of Starscream yelling, 'Neener neener I'm still elected!' across the galaxy at Megatron.
What an aft.
Still, what other job in the universe allowed him to spend hours waiting in bars? Sunstreaker smirked to himself and ordered another drink on Starscream's tab. In theory, this was the next check-in location for the Lost Light. Okay, so the actual check-in location was half a planet and another spaceport away, but this was why and how he earned his exorbitant paycheck. He knew the ship, he knew its crew, and he knew the casino and entertainment street at this spaceport was a much more likely target for Rodimus to shoot for. What Rodimus wanted, he wheedled until he got. Ultra Magnus fought the good fight, but Rodimus could run him in circles when the co-captain (totally a title, it fit perfectly with the rest of the ad hoc command structure of the ship) set his mind to it.
Ta-daa! Look it there, Sunstreaker won the lottery of predicting Rodimus again.
"Over here," he called across the bar as a disgruntled co-captain appeared in the door. Megatron obviously hadn't been warned what planet-side with the crew was like in practice. In theory and by regulation, most officers kept their distance from the riff-raff, staying dignified and professional above the crew's shenanigans. The Lost Light's officers, however, were generally the ones who needed to be bailed out at the end of the night.
Megatron glared at the grungy bar as if it were to blame as he stomped over to Sunstreaker's table. "I take it you have a message."
"Yeah, Screamer sends his love." Sunstreaker smirked up at him, not bothering to rise. "Take your time recording a response - what the frag?" He froze, optics wide.
Violence, as always, was his first reaction, but sheer dumbfounded bewilderment held him stock still as Megatron bent over him. The clip clicked closed. Looped around his neck, the leash tightened to a comfortable tautness and no further.
"There," Megatron grunted, straightening. "You sit, for now. Later," he waved a dismissive hand at the door like that explained anything, and Sunstreaker's optics flicked toward at it. The rest of him didn't move a wire. His optics flicked back just as Megatron extended the same hand in imperious demand. "Message."
Too shocked to think of a response, the gold Autobot gave him the message. Then he sat there in his seat blinking a lot.
Leash in one hand, message in the other, Megatron pulled out a chair opposite Sunstreaker. As he sat, he accidentally kicked the Insecticon hunkered down under the table. Bob was too used to bars to even stir from post-gorging slumber. He merely squeaked and curled around Megatron's feet. Free pillows for him.
The ex-Decepticon stopped, optics directed at the blank surface of the table as if he could see right through it. "What…is that?" he said in the soft, suspicious tone of very dangerous people everywhere. It was a tone of voice that threatened vast amounts of violence if the answer provided wasn't to its owner's liking.
"Bob," Sunstreaker said in much the same tone.
Megatron's optics went subtly wider. "Bob?"
"Bob."
Calling his name brought him out of the stupor. Bob uncurled and put his head on Megatron's knee to snuffle at the big mech. Curiosity, Sunstreaker had long noted, would kill the Insecticon. It was his theory as to why Bob and Rodimus had gotten along so well.
Megatron pushed back from the table slowly. Just as slowly, his head cocked to the side to look under the table. Bob snuffled and squeaked.
Megatron stared. "That's Bob?" he said, less asking than just checking to make sure he was absolutely correct.
Bob whuffled cheerfully at the sound of his name. Yes, he was Bob. He nudged Megatron's knee in demand. Pet the Bob.
Megatron's optics traveled gradually to the leash in his hand, up to the end wrapped around Sunstreaker's neck, and back down to the Insecticon on the floor. "I see," he said in a stifled sort of voice. It was the tone of voice that said there was so much its owner could say right now but probably shouldn't.
"Do you." Oh, the things Sunstreaker's tone said he could say. He dipped his chin and glared out from beneath his helm when Megatron's optics traveled the circuit again.
Cue an uncomfortable cough. After a second's hesitation, Megatron evidently decided that the wisest choice was to not risk his fingers reaching across the table. "Later," he repeated, burying his attention in the message in his hand. Official co-captain business, right here! Do Not Disturb.
Speechless and affronted, Sunstreaker gaped at him. He - what?
Admittedly, it was such a Lost Light co-captainy thing to do, he didn't even know why he was shocked.
Of course, that's about when Bob caught sight of the familiar and much-beloved leash. Sunstreaker immediately had to deal with a large, heavy bug with nothing on the brain but walkies. "No! Calm down! No walkies!"
Yes walkies! Bouncing around under the table, Bob wagged his aft so hard the table legs danced across the floor. Sunstreaker had to make a dive to rescue his drink, and he yelped as the strap around his throat brought him up short. "Get - " He scrambled back into his seat and tore at the leash with his free hand. That was easier said than done, since it was made to restrain the same daffy bug leaning all his weight against Sunstreaker's arm right now. The clip was one of those safety clips he couldn't open without being able to see it. "Get this thing off me!"
Megatron glanced up over the message tablet. "Later."
"Now!"
"But I haven't taken you for walkies yet," the silver mech said with saccharine-sweet insincerity.
Which was exactly the wrong thing to say while Sunstreaker was attempting to wrangle Bob. "Arrrgh! Would you just - "
"No."
Sunstreaker yanked one-handed at the leash around his neck, swearing viciously as he hauled on the leash attached to Bob. He was being pulled two directions with his neck in the middle, and he had to choose which direction to fight first. Despite his temper, caution chose the lesser evil to deal with. "Bob! Sit! Sit, you dumb bug! Sit your fat aft down before I glue it down!"
The leash around his neck stayed infuriatingly taut. Sunstreaker fought against Bob's wriggling weight, trying to force that wagging aft to the floor while trying not to strangle.
By the time Bob was squished properly and Sunstreaker could turn his attention to the other sonnuvaglitch, said sonnuvaglitch wasn't even pretending to read the message anymore. Instead, Megatron had his elbows on the table, chin resting on his folded hands as his optics gleamed at the fuming Autobot on the other side of the table. They kept traveling from the leash in his hand to the Autobot struggling on the end of it. They lingered on the tight stretch around Sunstreaker's neck.
There was a peculiar look in those avidly watching optics. It was almost…hungry.
When Megatron smiled, slow and full of all the charisma that had founded an entire cult of personality, there wasn't much question of what interested him about the leash across Sunstreaker's throat. It took Sunstreaker a while to catch on, and no time at all to wish he hadn't.
[* * * * *]
He didn't get it then or ever, but his brain wasn't wired to figuring such things out. He'd admit it if he could. The mechs warped into the Swarm were still mechs, but they were twisted, limited. More alien Insecticon than native Cybertronian, now. They remembered who they'd been, in a hazy burn at the back of their retinal lenses like afterimages from staring into the sun, or at least Bob did. His limbs felt clumsy sometimes, wrong and twisted on their joints, but attempting to walk on two legs instead of four hurt somewhere in his head as much as in his knees. His feet would tangle together, he'd fall, and the echoes of someone else's past would jar loose.
The Megatron-mech smelled of weakness, age, and bad energon. Bob decided he must taste as awful as he smelled from how his Master turned sharply away, lips pulled into a disgusted snarl. Sunstreaker-Master had that expression whenever people bumped into him on the street, but Megatron-mech didn't back off. He yanked on the leash wrapped around his fist, and Master stiffened.
Antenna perked forward, Bob watched with interest. He knew what the leash-pull felt like. He knew how hard it was to fight against, but he also knew that the leash was a command. Struggle as he might against it, in the end the leash was to be obeyed. It was an order from Master, and Master had trained him to follow the leash-pull. Bob didn't know why Sunstreaker-Master had a leash on, but the fact was that it was a leash. The leash was held by the Megatron-mech.
Bob didn't get it, but it didn't occur to him to try any more than it occurred to him to be distressed by vague memories. It simply was, and he accepted it. It didn't surprise him when Sunstreaker-Master reluctantly allowed himself to be pulled into the silver mech's arms, mouth refusing to taste but accepting being tasted.
Sunstreaker-Master was a glistening tasty treat, plating thick and painted a warning shade of violent yellow that threatened lesser mechs to keep their distance. The Megatron-mech all but devoured him with his optics before even using his mouth, but use it he did. Bob approved of the Megatron-mech's enthusiasm. He seemed intent on tasting every polished inch of Master's body, but he lingered on the best parts to really savor them, sucking softly on neck cables and exploring helm vents with his tongue. Bob understood that kind of enthusiasm.
It wasn't the way he ate now, but it hadn't been so long that he'd forgotten what it was like to starve. Treats were to be begged for at every opportunity and gobbled messily to show that his Master how much he adored them, but that was how he ate now. Master provided for him. Before, in the cold times alone, Bob had been alone. Food had to be dragged away and hidden to keep the rest of the Swarm from stealing it from him, and the best parts, the most rust-free, fluid-dripping parts were squirreled away to be eaten in slow bites to make them last, to make it seem like he had more than he did.
Bob knew what it was like to be the runt. The Megatron-mech smelled old and feeble, although he clearly remembered better days, and Bob understood why he tasted Master like that. He wanted to make the best parts last.
Although now the Megatron-mech had a strong mech on a leash, just like Master kept Bob, and maybe Sunstreaker-Master would hunt for him. The Megatron-mech tasted Master with open-mouth kisses down his chest, but he also pet him. One hand kept the leash short like when Master kept Bob heeled for training, but the other hand pet and pet, finding the good spots, the spots that made Master's fans catch. The sweet little places were returned to, rough black fingers digging into the opening chest plates, and it made Bob think of Master's fingers playing behind his antenna. Maybe Sunstreaker-Master wasn't just the Megatron-mech's treat. Maybe he was his Bob. Petting like that was for Good Bob.
Sunstreaker-Master wriggled like Bob did, too.
Growling, snarling, engines revving, Sunstreaker-Master suddenly snapped. His head lunged forward, and he took a bite at the Megatron-mech's hands. The Megatron-mech snarled back, deeper and more menacing. The hand sliding into Master's chest drew back, and Bob jerked up onto his feet as it clapped over Master's mouth.
Red optics slid sidelong. "Sit."
Bob hunched down, spikes bristling in defense and open threat around his helm. He might be a runt, but he remembered. He remembered hunting prey, prey that screamed and died. Prey that shot at him. Prey that traded gunfire, his weapon raised as he took aim -
He blinked away the haze and rumbled warning at the Megatron-mech.
Metal squealed as Master bit down hard, and the Megatron-mech's attention snapped back with a low curse.
"Go lay down, Bob!" Sunstreaker-Master ordered through bright energon and fierce defiance.
Bob relaxed, blinking a bit as his head came up. Master gave him a Look, and his aft thumped to the floor. The Megatron-mech chuckled and bent down to nibble at Sunstreaker-Master's helm, murmuring a smug purr of words all the while. More energon dripped as Master took another snap at the hand over his mouth, chewing on thick fingers as if retaliating for all the licking. Bob knew that game. Master brought a chewtoy to appointments with the Ratchet-mech and all the needles just for that game. It helped keep him from being a Bad Bob.
The Megatron-mech left his hand to occupy Master's mouth while the hand holding the leash unwound enough strap to go back to the light coming out of Master's chest. Dipping in, the light brightened. Master arched, a muffled groan turning to a growl. The smug purring picked up.
It stopped as Sunstreaker-Master bucked, hips throwing the Megatron-mech off-balance. Bob jittered in place as the two mechs wrestled. Was this play? Was this a fight? Master barked, snarling angrily, but he didn't call for Bob. The Megatron-mech yelled in a booming roar. Armor clashed.
Bob settled back down when it was clear Sunstreaker-Master was on top. Still on the leash, bent over with the strap around his neck pulling him down, but straddling the Megatron-mech with his hands planted on either side of the bigger mech's helm. The Megatron-mech seemed amused by the sudden challenge. It reminded Bob of clambering up on top of Master in the morning, demanding to be fed. Attention had to be demanded, sometimes.
Sunstreaker-Master's optics dimmed, mouth opening in a soundless cry as the Megatron-mech slid both hands into his open chest. The Megatron-mech watched, his own optics dimming in appreciation, and he sat up slightly to taste Master. Master turned his face away, disgusted snarl in place.
Part of Bob agreed, because the Megatron-mech smelled like he wouldn't taste very good.
Another, older part of him agreed for reasons he didn't get and never would.
[* * * * *]
He didn't get it for a short time, longer than he cared to admit to once he figured it out. Mostly because he was busy smoothing the guilt from his expression. He wasn't guilty. He was at fault, certainly, but he didn't exactly feel bad about it. Slightly under pressure at the moment, if anything.
Fortunately, Rodimus and Blaster were too occupied chasing Bob around the bridge to look at him. "Where is his leash?!" Rodimus demanded at a near shriek (not that he'd ever admit to using such a high-pitched version of his co-captainy voice) for the fifth time.
"He took it!" Blaster yelled back for the fifth time.
Megatron contrived to look mildly irritated at the finger pointed accusingly in his direction. Avoidance of any sort of question as to repurposing of the leash in question was key. Time to turn the guilt back on someone else before Rodimus got the bright idea to ask what had actually happened to the missing leash. "Blaster informed me that this Bob creature had departed the ship. I subsequently disposed of it." By taking it away for his own purposes. Ahem. "A leash doesn't belong on the command bridge," he said to Ultra Magnus, who was standing at his side in the door of the bridge.
It made total sense. He expected the ship's calm, collected, and above all proper Executive Officer to back his decision, and then the focus could be put on Blaster for passing along incorrect information.
There was a strained moment of silence. When Megatron looked sidelong at him, Ultra Magnus occupied himself coughing into a hand and looking at a fascinating spot on the wall. Clearly the bridge hadn't been cleaned in far too long. Megatron could almost see the mental note being made to assign the next rulebreaker bridge-cleaning duty.
If that wasn't an evasion of the current topic, then paint Megatron in red and gold and call him Rodimus. Suspicious, the ex-Decepticon squinted at Ultra Magnus harder as if he could pick the reason straight out of the mech's helm.
Ultra Magnus abruptly turned on a heel to stride back down the hall the way they'd come a minute ago, drawn by the noisy, chaotic chase. Bob squeaked gleefully and galloped around the (co-)captain's chair, straps trailing out of his mouth, and Blaster reversed to chase him. He ran headfirst into Rodimus, who'd been sprinting the other direction. They went down in a resounding crash.
Megatron stared at the tangled, cursing knot of limbs on the floor. Well, at least they weren't asking what he'd done with the leash, because like frag was he giving it back. The Lost Light was scheduled to be docked at this spaceport for another four days, and he intended to keep Sunstreaker aboard the ship every hour of that time even if he had to tie the gold Autobot down. Hence the leash.
Bob chirped at the pile of garish plating thrashing on the deck. Rodimus made a shrill little squeak of his own as the Insecticon skittered toward the door. The squeak repeated at a much louder volume in protest when Bob stopped, aft wagging, to nudge at Megatron with whatever piece of equipment he'd evidently stolen from Megatron's counterpart.
Expecting some form of contraband or other idiocy, Megatron bent to take the straps. Rodimus obviously wanted it back, but he just as obviously didn't want Megatron to see it if the increased struggle to get up and garbled, "No, don't, bad Bob!" noise meant anything.
Rodimus' panic made much more sense a second later. Ultra Magnus' coughing fit infected Megatron's intakes this time, and Megatron ironed all expression from his face. Rounded optics stared at him from halfway across the bridge. Blaster was still trying to stand up, but Rodimus had stopped dead, face frozen in horror. Megatron got it. Too late to spare either of them, not that he'd ever admit to a mistake, but he got it.
The spark harness dangled limp from his hands. He looked at Rodimus. Rodimus stared at him. Ultra Magnus, being the smartest officer, had already retreated. A good thing, since he'd clearly know what Bob had taken, which Megatron inferred meant that he was likely involved in some way with both Rodimus and spark harness, and while Megatron had decent control over his face, he wasn't sure he'd have been able to keep a neutral expression if Ultra Magnus was still here.
Rodimus' optics darted to Blaster. They returned to Megatron, pleading the tiniest bit.
Megatron crumpled the harness into an unidentifiable bundle of strapping again just as Blaster regained his feet. "I'll…be disposing of this as well," he said coolly.
"Okay," Rodimus squeaked. Relief sapped his normal levels of sass. Megatron would have to remember the trick. Nothing else worked.
He nodded to the speedster and turned to leave the bridge, Bob trotting at his heels. Oh, yes, he'd be disposing of the thing in his hands. Much the same way he'd 'disposed' of the leash.
[* * * * *]
He didn't get it for a little while, not that he wanted to admit to ever figuring it out. It was just that it was Megatron who understood, of all mechs, and while it made sense in a twisted sort of way after he thought about history, there wasn't much in life that prepared a mech for thinking objectively about a genocidal tyrant that had driven their race to the brink of extinction and had, more recently, been clanging him through the berth in a most satisfactory manner.
There was too much baggage on that train of thought. Best to just leave it sitting on the tracks and go rut until thinking was the last thing on his mind.
It wasn't hard to do when Megatron showed up with a spark harness of all things, because apparently looping a leash around Sunstreaker's neck wasn't kinky enough. Sunstreaker stared blankly at the handful of straps for so long Megatron's optics narrowed in discomfort at the lack of reaction.
"You wear it," he said, phrasing it as a demand, but Sunstreaker could tell he didn't know how to handle silence. Their fragging had been violent, loud, and frequently broken by harsh insults, harsher commands, and the scraping skreel of abused metal. Sunstreaker had been anything but silent up to this point.
A whirling turbulence ever-boiling in the back of Sunstreaker's head had gone abruptly still, however. It shocked him the way braking to a halt at the edge of a precipice did. He had been in motion, and now he was not, and he teetered on the edge of continuing forward or stepping back. One meant safety. The other…
Megatron fell into a combat stance on reflex as Sunstreaker surged to his feet, but the gold frontliner snatched the harness and strode past him without pause. For all the violence of the motion, Sunstreaker didn't attack.
Megatron relaxed in his wake, looking after him with curious optics. "Do you know how to put it on yourself?"
Sunstreaker paused at the door to the washrack to bark a laugh, because Megatron had no idea. "You don't have the slightest clue who I am, do you?" he scoffed, but he focused on those red optics, searching for a hint of recognition.
It flickered in their depths, and he smiled. It wasn't a mocking smile. It flattened at the ends where war and a parade of idiots had made him cynical of recognition, but recognition was recognition. He'd been an artist too long not to love the attention.
Once upon a time, being known had been everything. His reputation had preceded him on stage. It'd hung around him like a cloak of respect warding off greedy hands, and it'd been a long, long time since he'd put on a performance for someone who hadn't known what he was getting into.
It made sense, in a way. Beautiful as his body was, it wasn't the gold plating and classically sculpted face that had earned him place of pride as Most Beautiful Autobot. Those that didn't know his true pride and calling assumed it was arrogance. Vanity. Self-centered self-promotion of his own appearance intended to boost his ego by forcing his opinion of himself down everyone's throats.
Megatron had started out as a miner, not an upper class patron of the arts. It would be surprising if he knew more of Sunstreaker than that surface beauty, but evidently some of the rumors had reached even the Decepticons, if Megatron had an inkling of who and what he'd been. Sunstreaker's private performances were things of legends. People who'd never even seen him in person could describe secondhand memories of intense beauty, stories passed down by word of mouth from lucky patrons of the arts. Witnesses to what he was famous for had started the rumors in the ranks.
Sunstreaker took his time in the washrack. It wasn't that he needed a buffing. His plating was already pristine, polished to a fine shine, but he went over himself one more time with concentrated attention to detail. The ritual was important. It centered his mind like meditation, and it was an essential start to the performance.
In his thoughts, he pulled in his concept of self, picturing every bond he held to anyone else, no matter how insignificant, as strands of sparkling light in shades of sungold yellow. He studied them. The distant, estranged relationship with his twin. The affection he held for Bob. The debt he owed Ironhide. The wildly frayed threads connecting him to the Autobots he'd betrayed.
Then, one by one, he deliberately severed the bonds.
People often accused him of being cold. Sociopathic was the term they used when describing him. He saw no value in attachments to other people, using them as tools or perceiving them as irritating objects in a world that should be centered on him. In a warped way, that was a true accusation, but it was true of every artist who confronted their art, grappled with it, and in the end, took the bitter, freeing, tearing choice of placing it above all else in their lives.
Sunstreaker had chosen his art. He would sacrifice everyone and everything else for it. Ruthless in his creativity, he sliced through the threads, clipped the cords, and pruned the thicker ties as thin as possible. Not all of them separated from him completely, or easily for that matter. There were some connections that kept their holds on him like feeble rays of light flashing distraction from the mental picture he constructed of himself. That annoyed him. He wasn't perfect. If this was an actual performance in front of a paying audience, or even a gallery sponsored by a patron, he'd put more effort into scouring his spark clean the way he smoothed the rough welds on his plating.
For this private performance, it was good enough. Taking deep, measured vents, Sunstreaker held the image of still peace in his mind as he shrugged into the harness. The straps had to be adjusted. Whomever Megatron had gotten it from was smaller than Sunstreaker.
Secondhand equipment added to the improv feel of this performance, and anticipation lit in his tanks. It had been a long time since he'd tried to perform. He tried to tamp his hopes down. Expecting Megatron to appreciate art was a recipe for disappointment.
That didn't stop him from moaning silently as his spark chamber irised open, the petals delicately sliding back until the unnaturally calm, nigh-perfect sphere of Sunstreaker's spark was fully exposed. Cool air surrounded it, shivering against the outer layers of the corona, and he had missed the feeling so much. There was something indescribable about exposing the most intimate part of himself, about making the most mysterious part of a Cybertronian's body into a fullblown show. This. This was why he performed. This was why he was an artist.
For this feeling, Sunstreaker would turn his back on a thousand people. He was doing something no one else could do like him, stretching a skill he'd honed into a true craft, displaying the beauty he created out of nothing but his own body and spark. Oh, he'd missed this.
He didn't want to get his hopes up, but he knew exactly what shade of royal blue his optics flushed to as he opened the door to the washrack. He knew every facet of his own performances down to the tinge of blue on the arch of his cheeks from reflected light. He knew the obscenely luxurious curve his mouth made as he stepped into the room. It wasn't quite a smile. It was an expression of utmost pleasure, and observers couldn't help but react to it.
Megatron did. He looked up from whatever tablet he'd been reading, and the tablet dropped from his hand. Sunstreaker stopped halfway to the recharge slab, and Megatron came to his feet as if the Autobot's mere presence pulled him upright.
"Don't touch," Sunstreaker warned him, throat hurting around the words. He shouldn't have to say it at all, but he'd said it so often, over and over and over to overconfident, crude brutes. They saw what they wanted and didn't listen to what they were told. He was so very tired of his looks being prioritized over his words. The excuses were always the same, a nauseating chorus of 'I could sense what you really wanted' and 'I felt you reaching out from behind your denial.'
There were rules to protect an art piece, but they had been broken so often he had no faith in their strength anymore. He didn't believe anyone respected him, much less the art. They saw what they wanted, and they grabbed for it.
Broad black hands stopped in midair. Blinking, Megatron looked at him, truly looked at Sunstreaker. After a second, his hands pulled back. Sunstreaker didn't know what the sudden thoughtful look on the ex-Decepticon's face meant, but Megatron took a step back to give him space.
His throat ached. Sunstreaker didn't relax.
"I'm meant to watch?" Megatron asked after studying the tense line of Sunstreaker's throat, how the gold frontliner's hands opened and closed in and out of fists.
Sunstreaker pressed his lips together, marring the perfect curve. Words just didn't convey things correctly. He jerked his head, shaking it.
"Ah." Megatron dropped his optics slowly, tracing over the harness. Sunstreaker liked the way he licked his lips. "Is this…performance art?"
Yes. Yes, Sunstreaker nodded, at a loss for words. It made him feel helpless and freed that he didn't need to speak. He inhaled deeply, every vent open, as red optics settled on his open spark chamber. This was what he was known for. This was the beauty that made him famous. Improper appreciation for his craft was why his beauty had become a myth and legend.
Sunstreaker didn't want the flicker of understanding that stirred in the ex-Decepticon's face. Perhaps it was because Megatron had been a poet. Optics locked on the variegated gold of Sunstreaker's exposed spark, Megatron took another step back, then another, until he could sit down on the recharge slab. Fumbling slightly, Megatron curled his hands around the edge of the recharge slab for extra security, and Sunstreaker's optics flared in excitement.
It sent a ripple of pure light across his self, his soul, his spark. Only the thinnest disturbance laced the orb, blurring an otherwise perfect sphere. Without connections, without relationships to draw him out from centering on himself, it showed every change in emotion. Megatron leaned forward, utterly enchanted. Awe held him paralyzed as Sunstreaker dared step close enough that the heat and energy crackled in highly controlled patterns across silver plating.
Gold swirled lazily, directed and beautiful beyond words. It was a dance yet far more, a primal map of the Cybertronian life force but an elegant display of control at its peak. Standing in front of someone who was and wasn't his most hated enemy, Sunstreaker gave a light show of the most personal nature possible, an absolute rarity made impossibly gorgeous by the talent directing it. His body was beautiful, but his spark could entrance an entire theatre. As the artist moved, every small expression mirrored, ever twitch of a finger made so much more, the ex-Decepticon leaned forward to watch.
Sunstreaker balanced on the edge, standing as if waiting for a push, but Megatron offered him nothing he didn't ask for, and when Sunstreaker took that last step out into freefall…he flew.
[* * * * *]
He didn't get it then or ever, but his brain didn't comprehend layers of complex history or the complicated shifts of emotional ties. Bob understood physical things, things right in front of his optics, but even then they had to be fairly simple. He no longer had a grasp of why past events mattered, or if the future could change how things were today. He was a simple creature compared to regular mechs.
Sunstreaker-Master wasn't simple. Master brooded over things Bob couldn't smell or hear or see. Sometimes Bob could break the melancholy by dragging Master on walkies. Playing sometimes mellowed a bad mood. But sometimes the best Bob could do was curl up around Master's feet, growling deep in his chest at the world in general.
The most confusing time was after the Megatron-mech left, his scent lingering on Sunstreaker-Master's plating like a stain. It wafted out of his joints, drifted from his seams, and trailed behind him in a delicate, elusive mix of hot lust, cold anger. Frozen heat made him restless, emotions woven through him like tunnel snakes twined together in a nest. Even a new coat of polish didn't banish the memory of rough hands gentle on satin-sheened gold armor, it seemed.
Bob sniffed Sunstreaker-Master all over, thoughtful, but couldn't find the traces left behind. The smell just…stayed. Hate, interest, play, fighting, surrender, challenge. Master had refused to taste the old, feeble Megatron-mech, turning his face aside every time the Megatron-mech bent to his face, but that hadn't stopped the silver mech from nipping and nibbling, marking him like territory in subtle whispers of lips inside opened chest plate. It wasn't a collar, but Bob wondered.
He wondered, and he snuffled at the scent that refused to leave long after the Megatron-mech left. The leash had gone with him. Bob would follow after Sunstreaker-Master even without one. It made no sense to him that Master didn't follow the Megatron-mech.
But, then again, he didn't really get it.
[* * * * *]