Swindle & Wasp – The Difficulty in Finding What They Call "Beautiful"
Chapter 2
By the time Swindle arrived at his next destination, any stupid notion of keeping Wasp for himself was long since forgotten. The odd creature was sort of cute-ish, in his own way, but Swindle had not the time nor patience nor desire for a pet of any kind, even of the dubious-Autobot variety. Besides, money was far more important.
Instead, he now had to focus on cleaning up his little find and prepping him for sale. The better shape Wasp was in, the more money he could get for him, after all, so if he wanted to make a decent profit, he was going to have to put in a little effort.
For now though, he had a little free time. Leaning back in his seat, Swindle instructed the ship's computer to begin flying on autopilot; he had been flying it manually for a good while now, and was starting to get tired. It was time for him to take a break and let the ship do the flying for a while.
With a soft sigh, he put his servos behind his helm, lifting his peds and setting them on the control panel. He switched off his optics and, though it was another rare thing for him, just relaxed.
He hadn't really intended to recharge, only to rest his optics for a while. But all the same, he found himself coming out of stasis sometime later, to find a pair of triangular purple optics staring back at him.
Swindle jumped, giving a startled yelp. Numerous weapons embedded in his plating snapped up, ready to fire at the thing that had surprised him; being in such a shady business, he had to be constantly prepared to fend off trouble.
"Swindle-bot on?" Wasp asked, tilting his head to one side. "Wasp hungry."
Swindle groaned audibly, glaring at the smaller as he put his weapons away and sat up, brushing Wasp off of his perch on the merchant's chassis with a single servo.
"Don't ever do that!" Swindle snapped. Wasp recoiled, and Swindle sighed, correcting himself gently. "No, no… Ah, Swindle-bot might have accidentally hurt Wasp. So, he shouldn't sneak up on him that way. See?" His voice was dripping with manufactured care and affection, and the smile on his face sold it.
Wasp climbed into the seat next to Swindle's, and sat there in an almost animal fashion, hunched forward on his knees with his servos between them. His alert optics darted about as he took in the sights, and sounds, of the ship's cockpit.
"Sorry Wasp wake Swindle-bot." Wasp said. He glanced out at the sea of stars around them and asked, "Where we going?"
"Back to Swindle-bot's home," Swindle answered without hesitation. "Swindle-bot told Wasp we were going somewhere he'd be able to get food and shelter, right? Well, that's where we're going."
Wasp seemed to accept the answer, and turned his helm away from the weapons merchant to watch the stars lazily drift by.
Swindle stretched and got up. Well, he'd had a good rest, but now he had work to do. After all, the sooner he had Wasp ready, the sooner he could sell him. He'd made a few calls after Wasp had gone into stasis, and already he had several offers on the little creature.
First things first, though. He still had to feed the little nuisance.
Swindle made his way down to the storage area to collect some more energon cubes, stopping first at Wasp's temporary room to retrieve the bowl he'd used before.
Walking down the hall, the still-empty bowl now in servo, Swindle let his processor wander a bit. The last planet he'd been to had caused him nothing but trouble, but hopefully that wouldn't be the case with his next stop.
Thanks to just one small, yellow Autobot, his plans had gone up in smoke. After that, he'd been drained completely of his strength and taken away by humans.
Fortunately, however, the tiny organics were primitive and stupid, and their attempts to scrap him had been futile. Had they really thought that their simple machinery could harm his Cybertronian body, especially when he'd enhanced it the way he had? Hah! It had been a pathetic and frankly very insulting display.
The effects of the timepiece were far from permanent without his own invention to amplify it, and so, over time, he had regained his strength and simply let himself out of the holding area he'd been placed in.
And now, he was already back in the game. Life had its difficulties sometimes, but in the long haul, things were still going swell for him.
Swindle put his free servo on a luminescent pad by the storage bay door to let it read his energy signature. With a beep, it released the lock, and the door slid open automatically.
******
Back in the cockpit, Wasp was still busy looking out at space.
Unlike Swindle, he did not prefer to consider the conditions that had brought him here, instead trying to forget everything that had happened to him. His limited mind considered very little in the long run, his foremost thoughts being survival and revenge, though he rarely cared to remembered why it was he wanted the latter.
Wasp was still rather young, but his sanity had long since left him to think very much like an animal. He had, at one point, been quite intelligent, if more than a little mean-spirited, but little of that could be seen now, as he traced patterns between the stars with a digit on the display, playing a game of "connect-the-dots" with the distant lights.
The yellow and green of his faceplate and helm reflected faintly on the glasslike material, illuminated by the bright purple of his optics. It was not long before Wasp noticed this, and became captivated by his own image.
He still would not remember why, but dimly, he thought he recalled once having blue optics, instead of the brilliant purple he now had. Weren't blue optics a definitive trait of some kind…?
The sound of the door hissing open behind him caught Wasp's attention. He whipped around to face the source of the sound, hydraulic muscles tense and body ready to pounce. Seeing it was only Swindle-bot, Wasp calmed and sat down, this time on his behind, his legs spread out with servos planted between them.
Swindle-bot smiled at him and approached, holding another bowl full of the small energon cubes.
"There you go," The taller mech said, presenting Wasp with the bowl.
Wasp snatched it away and put it in his lap, his legs crossing around it like a protective wall as he began to ravenously devour out its contents, careless about the mess he was making.
******
When Wasp finished eating, he tossed the bowl onto the ground and turned back to keep looking at the stars, disregarding all the luminescent purple crumbs he had gotten on his face and on the floor and on the chair and on his own self.
Swindle frowned at the mess before giving an agitated sigh. He had known that things like this would happen as he prepared Wasp for sale, but that didn't make it any easier to deal with. Good thing he had been able to snag such nice offers, or he would be considering throwing Wasp right through that window right about now.
Slowly, he crept toward Wasp, his heavy peds quieted by careful steps. Servos raised and bent like claws, Swindle sneaked closer, and closer, until suddenly, he pounced, grabbing Wasp up into his arms.
The small green creature gave a loud, startled cry and began to struggle violently in Swindle's arms, making his disdain for the situation well known, kicking and biting and flailing for all he was worth.
"Relax, relax!" Swindle said. "I'm just taking you downstairs."
"Why!?" Wasp demanded, almost in a frenzy. "And why Swindle-bot grab Wasp? Why he startle him? Why he not let him go!?"
"Well," Swindle said smoothly, his voice like silk. "It's just that, since Wasp made such a mess, it's time for Swindle-bot to give him something called a 'bath'."
Wasp's effort to struggle redoubled. Ah, so he did know what a bath was.