K so this one hasn't been updated like, EVER, but guess what it's NOT DEAD before it even begins... its just not a priority story (mostly because i dont write down story outlines and consequently have forgotten a lot of material i had set down for this one in my head and am starting a bit from scratch chapter wise ^^; )
But all the same, i daren't even call this a chapter. At under 3000 words, its more a drabble than anything for me, HOWEVER im thinking thats the style i'll be maintaining for this fic, simply because it might actually get somewhere that way, and thats more the way its always been structured in my head anyway. It's not a linear plot. It's a snapshot plot. Events that make up a whole picture. But again, i have to rediscover all those clever little ideas i had about why this situation was supposed to work so well .;
Nye, it'll come along, but again it comes in about 4th on my priority list after Cure, Repro and seeker!bee (S!B is almost finished though... its got like two chapters tops before i consider it done, its quite short)
SO ANYWAY enough rambling, i think you'll like this update, i did when i thought of it, and when writing it... honestly, sparkling prowl, carer screamer, how is it not fun? XD )
I'LL LET YOU GET ON WITH IT THEN. Also, ideas! If you have them, throw them at me, this story is open to situational suggestions :3 Its a concept, so it's all fluid and adjustabl-y and stuff.
~Death Out
Starscream returned from his ornly tactics meeting with Megatron and the other Decepticon officers, striding tiredly into his lab.
He hadn't gotten much recharge last shift, because Prowl had decided he wasn't going to stay offline for most of the off-cycle. He seemed to be having bad memory purges of the day his home was destroyed.
Starscream wondered if the sparkling knew on any level that his carer was one of the mechs who had caused the destruction.
He was so distracted by his train of thought that what he was seeing didn't register immediately.
The air commander paused in the middle of his lab, refreshed his optics a few times, then spun frantically on the spot, realising that…everything had been moved, changed around, re-ordered…
What the frag?
"SKYWARP!"
The black and purple seeker strolled into the room from the adjoining lounge that connected to all three of their quarters. "What?" he said blankly.
"Who the frag has been in here? Who did you allow to re-arrange all my equipment?" Starscream asked, voice dangerous as he glared at his wingmate.
The black jet merely stared at him non-plussed. "No one's been in here except me, TC and Prowl."
"So one of you did it?" Starscream pressed incredulously.
"Well it wasn't me or TC so it must have been Prowl. I mean he was in here for a while, he seemed happy and he wasn't touching anything at the time, just looking, so I left him alone." Skywarp shrugged.
Starscream pinched the bridge of his olfactory sensor and shuttered his optics. "You left a sparkling alone in a laboratory full of highly corrosive substances and delicate experimentation equipment, and you're trying to tell me he did this?" the air commander deadpanned, praying to Primus Skywarp unthickened his helm plating before answering.
Skywarp seemed to grasp the concept of his possible folly and rubbed the back of his neck cables nervously. "Well… he's a smart kid, I didn't think he'd hurt himself." he offered.
Starscream glared openly at his trine mate. "He is barely a vorn old, and anything under a deca-vorn is insatiably curious. Now where is he? Or did you leave the door unlocked again. I wouldn't put a stunt like this past Shockwave, it would be right up his alley as far as practical jokes go, the imbecile…"
Starscream grumbled, turning around and searching for his charge under and behind boxes and crates.
"Uuuuh… screamer… I found him…" came Skywarp's tentative voice after a few astroseconds.
The red and white seeker looked around and frowned when he saw the black and purple jet pointing up nervously.
Starscream turned his optics to the ceiling beams of the high roofed room, only to find a golden pair of bright optics looking right back. Prowl gave him a happy greeting chirp and Starscream pulled a face.
"What in the pit are you doing up there? And how in Primus' name… oh, I see-"
The lead seeker looked to where the sparkling's gaze had turned to a stack of tumbled crates against the wall. Apparently he'd been able to stack them in such a way as to use them to get to the support beam, but had seemingly knocked them down somehow upon reaching his destination.
Starscream sighed and ignited his heel thrusters, bringing himself level to the beam which Prowl was straddling proudly, surveying the room.
The jet reached out to pick the sparkling up, but Prowl seemed more interested in pointing something out to him.
Frowning slightly, Starscream looked at the benches that the black and white youngling was gesticulating towards.
"I didn't upgrade your lingual database for nothing you know. Are you trying to tell me you did this to my lab?"
The sparkling chirred and flicked his winglets proudly in affirmation.
The air commander picked up the small mech and lowered them both back onto solid ground before he finally, critically examined the work the little bot had apparently done.
After about 10 astroseconds, a pattern seemed to emerge to Starscream's processor.
The whole arrangement had been changed in such a way that the things he used most were concentrated in one area, the least used were stored under benches, and all his raw materials and minerals were more easily accessible, their order in relation to one another not actually changed, so that chemicals that could be dangerous to one another remained at a safe distance apart.
It was all very…
"Logical." Starscream muttered, a slightly surprised look on his faceplate.
"Logical!" Parroted a little voice, and Starscream looked down into the sparkling's beaming faceplate. It was the first word Prowl had ever actually spoken since Starscream had updated his speech programming an orn ago.
"Indeed." Starscream replied after a moment, turning to go to their lounge and procure himself some energon.
It seemed that the sparkling had taken that one word affirmation as praise, and he chirred contentedly in the crook of Starscream's arm as the jet opened the cooler and pulled out two cubes.
Once he'd settled in a comfortable lounge chair that allowed room for his wings, the air commander pulled a feeding tube out of sub-space and popped it into the cube of low grade he'd gotten out. Prowl, settling back on his lap against the gold cockpit, accepted the cube eagerly and popped the tube in his mouth, winglets swishing slowly as he sucked up the fuel.
Starscream drank his own regular grade in silence. It was a comfortable routine they had fallen into… he always kept a clean set of sparkling care paraphernalia in sub-space, and he always refuelled with Prowl. Thundercracker and Skywarp only fed him if Starscream was on shift for one of his refuel times, and apparently the sparkling would not sit with them in this manner if they did.
This was a good thing as far as the lead seeker was concerned. It meant Prowl was imprinting on him, and was less likely to emulate others if Starscream told him not to.
Of course, the downside was the air commander had to be careful not to do anything he didn't want Prowl to pick up on. It also meant the sparkling wouldn't be calmed by anyone else if distraught or roused from recharge. It was stressful, but Starscream found he didn't mind so much. He had, he reminded himself, brought this on himself after all. It was his choice, and he had accepted the responsibilities, so there was little point in complaining about it.
He mused quietly as Prowl shifted in his lap, still slowly drinking from his over half-full cube.
For the most part, he'd counted himself rather lucky. He didn't have a lot of experience with younglings, but Prowl seemed like a good sparkling on the whole. He was generally quiet, able to amuse himself, fairly easily pleased and if he had tantrums or emotional outbursts, they rarely lasted very long once they'd solved whatever issue was causing it.
But today's development… that was truly odd.
Logic was, in his mind, always strongly associated with his hated arch rival Shockwave. The mech was nothing but logical, to the point where he was just plain creepy. If Starscream hadn't felt the strength of the purple gun's ire and contempt, he would have believed him nothing but a sparkless super computer incapable of emotions of any kind.
But there was no way Prowl could have been influenced by the other scientist. He hadn't even had any more contact with Megatron, let alone anyone outside the trine, since his first day there about four orns ago.
And while the air commander knew he wasn't the messiest of mechs, he hadn't displayed any strong habits of organisation in is lab. However, Prowl had made a habit of just observing him as he worked. He seemed interested in how others went about performing tasks. He'd flick his winglets in intrigue if an action & reaction scenario played out, and click excitedly.
Perhaps this sudden involvement in Starscream's lab was a manifestation of Prowl's own personal qualities? Clearly the sparkling had watched him enough to get a handle on what his favourite tools and bench-spaces were, as well as his more commonly used materials. When he thought about that, it didn't seem like such a stretch for the youngling to decide to 'help' him by changing how things were arranged. Starscream had always just placement-filed his belongings, putting them where there was space, knowing where he kept things but not caring if they were kept in useful relation to one another.
That did require a little deeper thinking… and from a sparkling as young as Prowl, it was quite an achievement, despite the simplistic motives.
Finishing his cube, an idea came to the red and white seeker. He waited patiently for Prowl to finish his ration before he disposed of their energon containers and threw the used intake tube in the sterilising unit. He then took the content black and white mechlet over to the main console. Prowl sat happily in his lap again as Starscream quickly added some inane data to his sparkling 'log'.
Once that was done, the jet got Prowls attention as he pulled up a simple programme that the small bot had once or twice seen Thundercracker using.
"These are puzzles. Would you like to try solving some?" Starscream explained, lifting him to stand on his thighs so he could reach the console keys.
Prowl glanced back at him with curious gold optics before giving a small nod, looking back at the screen with slightly flapping winglets.
"Alright, in this first one, you have to move the red block to the red square, but to do it, you have to move around all the other different shaped boxes. Unless you plan the correct paths for the other boxes, you will not be able to get the red one where you want it." Starscream explained.
Prowl screwed up his faceplate in concentration, his attention fixed intently on the screen and puzzle before him.
After nearly a click, he reached out into the sensory field that generated in front of the screen to allow for orchestration style motions, which were interpreted as actions digitally.
His little tapered digits worked with slow, measured movements, arranging the shapes inside the contained area, shifting small squares and rectangles around each other, inching the red block closer to it's target. He paused again for another half a klik when he came to a slightly difficult bit, but it was clear to Starscream the youngling was engrossed. Most sparklings would get bored with the game before they even got this far. But soon, Prowl's fingers were moving much faster, and he waved his hand confidently through the sensory field, flicking boxes in a pattern he'd already worked out in his CPU, until finally the red box came to rest in it's designated area and the screen flashed his success at him.
"I did it!" Prowl exclaimed, almost sounding surprised with himself, and Starscream smirked indulgently at his charge's triumph. This was quite an interesting development… an insight into the mech Prowl would likely become, if Starscream nurtured the talent properly, and he certainly planed to.
"Would you like to try another one?"
"Yes!" the black and white mechlet squeaked excitedly.
"What's going on in here?" Skywarp asked curiously, striding in from the lounge where he'd been browsing a data pad of newscast video, depicting cities he had helped destroy. It gave him a sense of accomplishment every time he saw his handiwork.
"It seems Prowl likes to solve puzzles." Starscream said quietly, throwing his trine mate an amused smirk.
Skywarp frowned and gave a small moan. "Great, don't tell me he's gonna be a smart-aft insufferable show off like you."
Starscream threw him a dirty glare, wings flaring on either side of the chair back.
"Watch your glossa Skywarp! And might I point out, you are not one to talk about showing off."
"Ah cool it Screamer, I was only joking. Anyway, if he's gonna be raised by 'Cons, he's gotta learn how to swear sooner or later."
Starscream growled softly in frustration, "That is not your decision to make."
So engrossed in his game that he was oblivious to the seekers argument, Prowl suddenly piped up. "Look 'Warp, look! Watch what I can do!"
Stunned into silence by being addressed (and with his nick-name no less) by the sparkling for the first time, the black and purple seeker wandered over to stand behind Starscream's chair with an amused look on his faceplate.
Both jets watched in bemusement as the sparkling paused, then moved a few blocks swiftly, then paused, then executed the rest of the moves necessary to complete the second puzzle.
"More?" Prowl asked, turning hopeful, shinning gold optics on Starscream, who smiled and nodded, bringing up another, harder puzzle. It was bigger and block shapes got slightly more complex so they were harder to shift around each other.
"Wow. He is pretty good at that." Skywarp stated as he leant on the chair back and watched Prowl methodically work his way through the difficult maze of moves possible to him.
Starscream smirked indulgently to himself. "Indeed. This is a very interesting development. It seems some of his deeper personality traits are finally beginning to emerge. It looks like he has a very perceptive processor."
"You gonna put this in your log?" the black seeker asked nonchalantly as he crossed one pede over the other, still watching Prowl work with a slight smile at the little digits twiddling in the air through the movement field.
"I will elude to his further development, but not specify. No doubt Megatron will want to meddle in his prospects. This youngling has great intellectual potential, and if Megatron sees that as a threat he will likely try to manipulate Prowl's teachings and dumb him down. I will not allow that. It is not my intention to warp my sparkling against our leader anyway, so what that big grey oaf doesn't know won't hurt him."
Skywarp gave a non-committal sort of hum. "Kay. Better hope he doesn't hear you callin' him that though, cause if he slags ya, Prowl will probably get upset, and I ain't any good at dealing with a crying sparkling."
Starscream merely twitched his helm in the equivalent of an optic-roll.
"Hey, what's going on in here?" Thundercracker's curious deep voice came across the lab as the doors whooshed open to admit him.
"Come watch this TC, Prowl's gonna blitz your score here!" Skywarp sniggered, making the blue seeker scowl in confusion and wander over to see what on Cybertron his trine mate was on about.
Prowl seemed too engrossed in his puzzle to notice Thundercracker's arrival, and the third jet's orbital ridges shot up when he realised the sparkling had almost solved a puzzle that had been stumping him for the past few orns.
"No slag… little pit-demon's actually doin that?" he grumbled, earning a disgruntled growl from their trine leader.
"He has just had his first language packet and learning upgrades, can you two not make his first new lines of vocabulary consist solely of crude slang terms?"
Skywarp smirked but Thundercracker seemed to ignore Starscream's irate request.
"Seriously, did he get to that level on his own?"
The red and white seeker's ire seemed placated by Thundercracker's interest in Prowl's activities.
"Yes, he's begun to show a great aptitude for problem solving and lateral processing."
"So he's smart." Thundercracker replied bluntly.
Starscream huffed slightly through his vents. "Yes, Thundercracker, he's smart. Probably already more so than most of Megatron's army." the trine leader sneered indulgently as Prowl continued his puzzle solving, seemingly oblivious to their conversations and apparently loving every klik of his game.
