A/N: Heee-heee-heee. An OC in this one, forgive me.

...Do YOU think he deleted it, reader? Hmmm.


Threat


As practical as Lockdown was, maturity was often a foreign concept to him.

He'd been isolated for so long and was so utterly dedicated to himself that childish reactions were almost natural, despite the heavy base of rationality and cunning intelligence he had to operate from. Maturity implied the willing decision to suppress one's uglier emotions for the sake of basic accord, and Lockdown was no such punch-pulling creature. He lived as he damn well pleased, and he'd never had anyone around to tell him when he was being an impossible bastard—not that he would have cared enough to do anything about it. Then again, no one had ever hacked with anything but his pride before: this feeling was beyond abnormal, but he knew enough about it to hate it on sight. Just because he'd banned a word from his vocabulary didn't make it any less potent when it finally struck, and, as he learned, denial didn't do a damn thing for it.

Especially if it arrived in the form of a weak little protofragger sporting a pathetic mess of paper-thin sophistication, vulnerability and freshly-activated stupidity who was making Prowl smile and relax in a way the bounty hunter had simply never seen before—and, horror of horrors, they needed the little shaftsucker alive.


"This is ridiculous. I ain't a slaggin' escort-tram."

Lockdown fairly bristled with hostility, shifting his weight from pede to pede and scraping his hook along his thigh. Prowl didn't bother glancing at him, instead keeping his visor turned toward the scorched (but obviously high-priced) three-tiered building ahead of them.

"Moot can't run on your dissatisfaction," Prowl reminded him. "We need the money."

It had been enough of a battle getting the bounty hunter down to the planet's surface in the first place. When the call came in, only Prowl's intervention had kept Lockdown from shutting down the link in the other 'bot's face. An elite mech's ward (a social facsimile of a biological heir for Cybertronians) had been on vacation and 'foreign study' in a culturally vibrant planet when the local organics began to riot over something or other. Hopelessly cerebral as the inhabitants of Irte were, the area became a (monologue-laden) war zone in a matter of solar-cycles, and the elite mech didn't want his soft-plated ward stuck in the middle of it. He needed to be rescued.

Autobot or no, he somehow obtained Lockdown's frequency.

The whole thing went over as badly as possible. The fact that the refined mech flinched when the bounty hunter's side of the transmission booted up, or glanced around nervously as though there must have been some mistake—well, none of that impressed Lockdown very much. The words 'escort service' didn't either. If not for Prowl's seizure of the negotiations and their alarmingly low account numbers (the market had been dry lately, and there'd been a certain incident with Prowl's idiocy and a medibot), he never would have taken the job—or rather, never would have moved aside and bit his vocal chip as the crafty little ninjabot settled on the projected price and requirements. Oh, and stomped on his pede as Lockdown made to sabotage the commlink with an old pair of wire-clippers.

So they had the job—the demeaning, excessive-measure farce of a rescue-run. Just because the promised sum was both glorious and sorely needed didn't mean he had to be happy about it. Lockdown the Undecided didn't play nanny, and their 'target' would know it by the end of the run.

Lockdown approached the villa first, hissing as some blathering, skinny little organics bolted underneath his legs and ran off to storm Primus-knew-what in the name of justice and intellectual free will. He slammed on the door with his fist. Both heard something crash inside, then some faint vocalizations, followed by what could only have been a dash up some stairs. Lockdown glared over his shoulder at Prowl, who nodded.

"Open up, kid," the bounty hunter called sullenly, hating every cycle of it. "My ship's runnin' hot and we're stallin' on you."

It took the mech a moment to respond: lured only by the sparkling auditory gem of Cybertronian vocals (as opposed to the guttural burbles of the romantic local populace, who really posed no threat to a mech—yet another reason the bounty hunter viewed the whole thing as pathetic), the young Autobot crept up to the upper-story window of the warm-colored stucco villa and peered out. When he saw Lockdown at his door, however, he screamed like a train whistle and slammed the shutters.

Great start.

While the bounty hunter should have expected it, it was a monumental task trying to coax him out. Their 'target' was a weak-strutted coward, and Lockdown didn't exactly make an earnest attempt at soothing him or convincing him of their altruistic mission: he settled for brittle orders and half-threats, chucking verbal bombs up at the closed window. Even when informed of the transaction, the ward absolutely refused to go anywhere with him, wailing through the shutters and crashing around his abode in a panic. Finally, after several back-and-forths that gave him a chance to stew in his humiliating situation, Lockdown threw his servo (and hook) up and snarled:

"Fine, rust in there, ya little protofragger! Hope the organics gut you and convert you into a scooter!"

No wonder the youngling was frightened. The bounty hunter looked like he could have bitten through a metal hull as he stomped back towards Prowl; he would have surely kept going until he reached Moot and drove her far into the reaches of deep space, but his partner stayed him with a neutral but firm servo to his front. Fuming head to pede, Lockdown vented hot air, glaring at Prowl as he stepped up toward the window. Stilling himself, the ninjabot cleared his vocals.

"Sir, it's our duty to make sure you get to your destination safely, and we will complete it as per Tinus' guidelines," he said clearly, smooth vocals absolutely saturated with delicate politeness. "Neither of us will harm you. My partner is a little vexed from the long trip, but he's incredibly proficient at what he does. Please come down and we can be on our way."

The shutters stayed shut so long Prowl wasn't sure if he'd been heard. Then, finally, they cracked open, and the mech's wide blue optics glowed out of the dark, rich interior. Line of sight flinching nervously past Lockdown, he found slim, gold-trimmed Prowl. He looked for a ridiculously long while, then poked his head out, rounded white plating shining in the clean light from the bomb-spared gas-lamps.

"Who… are you?" The kid called out faintly.

"My name is Prowl," the ninjabot offered—a toying hint of warmth in the sentence. Very convincing. Prowl, smiling slightly, raised a servo to the window. "I'm here to help you. Would you please come down?"

If Lockdown didn't know any better, he would've said the kid shook like a leaf (or an unsecured fan-pin) and blushed. Whatever the case, Anicon nodded soundlessly and sunk back into his lush organic villa (obviously the best his loaded elite warder could afford), dissolving into a mismatched mess of crashes and high-pitched exclamations as he made his way to the door. Once he was out of sight, Lockdown, grudgingly impressed by the kid's style, leaned close to Prowl's temporal plating and breathed:

"You're a real charmer when you wanna be, aren't you?"

"As are you," Prowl returned wryly, throwing his partner an almost sultry glance. "You just aren't making the effort."

"Can't argue with that," Lockdown grunted, a nonplussed expression settling on his tattooed facial plating as they waited for the kid to come out.

Even before they entered the ship, Anicon refused to be anywhere near Lockdown. This was only natural (and a fine example of survival-programming), but it also left him to cling to Prowl like the ninjabot was a life-support apparatus, skittering in his shadow with a shy affectation and even grasping for his arm when Moot nearly closed a door on him with a suspicious sound. Prowl accepted the new dynamic with his impartial calmness, and tried to offer the youngling small bits of comfort with words and light smiles, which Anicon took eagerly.

Lockdown was fine with the situation (or as fine as he could be while grinding his teeth and swallowing his dignity) and went about his business of programming the energon-conserving rate of flight to the little 'bot's home world, just relieved that he didn't have to amuse the silver-spooned soft-plated shaft-sucker… until they started talking.

First of all, the bounty hunter was still surprised that Prowl had mustered the loquaciousness to call Anicon down out of his gilded tower in the first place: it was something of an event to receive more than three words at a time from the ninjabot. So when their passenger started dropping the proverbial 'conversation' hankie, Lockdown nearly rolled his optics. It was a nervous, limp-jacked way of wasting time, and he had no doubt his partner would do nothing but nod and let the kid yammer on until he'd talked himself into stasis.

But Prowl responded. After the first few, halting inquiries, Prowl warmed under the dribble, and the soft interest in his vocals downright stunned Lockdown—and not in a good way.

Anicon was incredibly intelligent. The young mech was a budding organic scientist and a soft academic, admittedly, but his processor was always warm and brimming with thoughts. Once settled and face to face with open-minded Prowl, he was a well-spoken well of information and botanical fascinations, and not nearly as recently-activated as the ninjabot assumed: he was but a few decades short of Prowl's own length of function. No, naiveté aside, he wasn't an idiot. He was simply scared for his life back on Irte, and became a little stupid and short-circuitish when scared. He admitted so to the attentive ninjabot, who actually chuckled, and told him it was only naturally encoded.

They talked about nature. Each discussed different species of vegetation they'd come across; the differences between carnivorous and photosynthesizing specimens. The elite's ward was studying the flora on Irte in-between his cultural studies and passionately described all of his favorite finds to Prowl, who listened with a swelling contentedness and a dimmed visor—a sure sign he was caught up in his imagination.

They talked about philosophy. Anicon was considering a martial art to balance his set of skills, and Prowl spoke at length (proud, vibrant length) about his experiences with metalikato. The advantages of meditation—the joy it brought him, the expanded sense of techno-self. Anicon sucked it in like clean fuel, optics glowing a dazzling blue.

Lockdown's emotional state wasn't exactly a clean slate to begin with, but watching the whole thing only pissed him off more. He'd expected Prowl to tolerate the brat—out of the two of them the younger mech was by far the most socially adjusted, or most adept at lying through his teeth in that pretty cultured way—but to have him… enjoying the humiliating debacle made the hunter's mood plummet to rock bottom. He wasn't allowed to, for Spark's sake, not while Lockdown suffered—though his dissatisfaction was becoming less and less about their pitifully easy rescue-run and more about the circus taking place behind his aft.

Yes, his partner and their 'hit' conversed, perched at the back of the red-lit bridge with crossed legs and open expressions. Knees brushing. They were absolutely sucked into one another, and absolutely making Lockdown's optics twitch with all of their periodic chuckles and thoughtful noises. This was an entirely different side of Prowl that he'd nearly forgotten about. This… flowing, intellectual creature was not the same one that called him partner, or smirked at him over an unconscious organic soldier before sprinting into the waiting darkness. That attractive Prowl wouldn't be putting up with someone so pathetic… or staring at him like he wanted nothing more than to drag the brat into his Zen hotbox and interface his pretty little waxjob off to Fifillian's fifth symphony.

…Maybe that was a stretch. Taking the brat to his room would've been too personal, Lockdown knew, and was bitterly satisfied that Prowl had at least that much solidarity in his logic-drive, even if the bounty hunter hated having them on the bridge. Hated the obnoxious chemistry, the flow of goodwill and mutual interest. Still, he wanted both the little boltbags in sight.

Wasn't sure why.

Lockdown grimaced and off-lined his audio receptors, only to viciously boot them up a few cycles later when he caught Anicon putting a delicate servo on Prowl's knee. He told himself he was only curious in a professional way—watching the events unfold in his usual equal-opportunity detachment—but that well-known mindset had never made him grind his teeth quite so much.

Would've loved to pull a table-turn on him and hold the little slagger for ransom at the expense of his poor papabot. Maybe accidentally offline him in the process, after getting the money. Would have to knock Prowl out first, though. Kid wouldn't let him do it. Yeah, knock them both out at the same time, call up papabot, wager it out with a pair of wire-clippers behind his back then--

…Thinking about it too hard. It was not a good day.

Eventually, with Moot chugging along tiredly on autopilot and no need for a vulture-like vigilance at her controls, Lockdown became so sick of the situation that he stormed off to his room, seeking chilly respite from the cultured ebb and flow of Anicon and Prowl's intellectual exchange. The escape left him stranded in the boring box for three megacycles, which did wonders for his mood, of course. Their destination and the speedy drop-off couldn't come quickly enough for him, but the cycles ticked by at their own sweet leisure until Moot beeped sullenly at him and began to land.

As they made the final exchange, approaching the ridiculously large, well-lit, garden-rimmed dwelling that the punk called home, Lockdown stopped as soon as he could, letting Prowl walk Anicon to the door. Poor crankshaft would probably trip on a few atoms and offline himself if left to his own fumbling devices, Lockdown snorted inwardly, and they needed that cash. As soon as Prowl terminated the drop-off call to Tinus, he turned to the brat and probably said goodbye, and Anicon scuffed his pedes and whipped up some shy elitist banter. Then—then—after only a brief touch on the arm, he turned to Prowl and embraced him, whispering something against his cheek.

Lockdown cranked his sensors up so high that feedback snarled and squeaked in his audio receptors.

The distance was too great. He didn't catch anything: the scene remained a soundless little puppet-show, and he glared as Prowl completed the embrace with his arms around the brat's waist, then pulled back with a soft, surprised look on his long face. Prowl nodded, thanked the other mech courteously, and Anicon ran off and slipped through his solid-copper front doors.

Prowl sauntered back to Lockdown's side, looking unbearably thoughtful.

"He offer you a job as a scrubber-bot for your good deed?" Lockdown asked scathingly. Prowl, visor still an absorbed shade of teal, shook his head.

"Just… a frequency."

As lightly as Prowl dropped it, it impacted with enough force to make Lockdown's jaw hit his knees. The ninjabot walked past him without a glance, mouth twitching into a small smile, and left his partner to stare as he strolled up Moot's boarding plank. Shaking himself, Lockdown rebooted and stiffly pursued his partner back to their soon-to-be restored and refueled (and cleaned) ship, every circuit snapping.

Somehow, the knowledge that thirty-seven-thousand shiny credits were now sitting pretty in their joint account after a minimal amount of effort on both their parts… didn't feel as satisfying as he'd thought it would.


The next few solar-cycles were an exercise in coping with erratic behavior.

Lockdown was just as efficient and Lockdowny as ever, but his pattern had changed. When not storming past him or scrutinizing him suspiciously from across the room, his partner touched and groped Prowl constantly, gripping the ninjabot's slim waist while lounging at Moot's controls or wedging a semi-playful servo between his thrusters and rubbing away. While the large mech enjoyed physical contact (and its results) as a rule, Prowl knew where lecherous ceased and domineering began. With as close as he was hovering, it was as if the mech was forcibly claiming him—though why, Prowl didn't know. Even interfacing followed the trend: Lockdown downright consumed him, leaving him steaming and aching with a loose chassis pin or three, and still never seemed to relax afterward.

Exhausted and befuddled, Prowl couldn't fathom the almost neurotic change in his confident partner—at least, not until he considered the only thing that had happened before it. Yes, their contracted rescue run had upset him on a professional level, but he wouldn't take that humiliation out on his partner. So the only other option that had to do with Prowl… was Anicon. Prowl thought about it.

Technically speaking, the young mech had invaded the bounty hunter's precious territory. He… fraternized with his partner and made a move to further their relations (though only Prowl knew in what fashion). With his animosity towards the youngling and the surge of possessive behavior afterward, the ninjabot could only conclude that… ridiculous as it was, that Lockdown felt threatened by the invasion. And since Lockdown was impossible to intimidate and Anicon was downright pathetic next to him, it followed that the threat wasn't physical. It was mental. A mental or emotional threat: something Lockdown couldn't smash or shoot, and wasn't patient enough to solve with words.

When the ninjabot attempted to put his conclusion into terms that made sense with the bounty hunter, it yielded no result. There was only one word for what was happening to his partner, and even then it made him smirk in a confused fashion. It was too simple. Too… silly.

Lockdown the bounty hunter was jealous.


He waited until Lockdown had fondled his lower backstruts for at least four cycles until he said anything. It was an added bonus that the reclining bounty hunter took that passive opportunity to pinch and pat him purposefully, giving the ninjabot nothing if not motivation. Smiling thinly, Prowl turned to face his partner and prey, visor glowing a dirty teal.

"Do you… need something, Lockdown?"

He was hardly able to keep the amusement out of his vocals. Lockdown always liked that superior spark of his, but not when it made him feel like there was a mine under his aft. Startled, the burly mech looked up at Prowl, face immediately darkening.

"What?"

"Can I help you with anything? Can I give you… personal affirmation of some kind?" Prowl inquired, smiling in a terrifyingly understanding way that reeked of sly condescension. "Perhaps clear up a misconception."

Silence hung heavy and awkward in the bridge. Lockdown eyed him like he was crazy and, with that unwavering smile, he might've been.

"What the Pit are you on about?" He grunted finally.

"Forgive my impetuousness, but after that mission with the Elite's ward—"

Prowl hid another small victory as Lockdown's frown deepened into a full-on grimace and he shifted uncomfortably in his chair.

"Mission? That was a fraggin' coolant-run."

"Yes, I realize. Pardon, but… after Anicon left us, you… judging from your responses then and now, and the development in our conduct, you seem… I mean no offense, but--for lack of a better word…"

The bounty hunter's lip plating curled, fed up with Prowl's uncharacteristic indirectness (and his eloquent blather) and half-spooked by the whole situation. He raised a servo, growling:

"Just cough it—"

"Jealous."

Lockdown stopped. It was a full-system stop: Prowl couldn't even hear the hum of his core. His partner turned his head to stare at him, red optics thin and bright, truly searing through him with toothy offense—then erupted into a girder-shaking guffaw.

For the next three cycles, Lockdown absolutely killed himself laughing. At him. At Prowl. At the idea.

Prowl stood and accepted it, waiting patiently for his partner to finish. His placid expression did not waver, visor trained on Lockdown as he rolled in his chair—until his partner ceased to laugh far too abruptly and stood to grab Prowl's shoulder, jerking the other mech so they were face to face.

"Don't get cocky," Lockdown sneered sharply, glaring into his optics, then released him.

The bounty hunter stepped around his chair and stalked off awkwardly, retreating to his berthroom with a series of standoffish clicks and airlocks—as unnatural an act as he ever took, as his recharge station was his least favorite place on the ship. Prowl waited. Lockdown also seemed to realize this little slip in his façade after a handful of cycles, and exited a second later with his head held overtly high, decidedly storming into his warehouse without looking at Prowl and slamming the door every bit of power he could muster.

When the frustrated sounds of power tools snarled and buzzed up through the closed door, Prowl couldn't help but rub his temple and chuckle to himself.

The bigger they were, the harder they fell. Internally.


That lightless equivalent of night in their free-formed space roaming life, Prowl approached Lockdown in his shop. His plan was too simple to truly be a plan, but he still executed it with admirable flair. Even when Prowl didn't bother to speak or excuse himself as he bit down on his partner's neck and dug his servos into his sensitive black flanks, Lockdown almost resisted him: the bounty hunter hesitated for a bare nanoklik, almost as though stung or unwilling to give into his treacherous partner's advances—his sophisticated partner, who probably preferred disembodied walking Elite processors over him.

It wasn't hard in the end, but the fact that it was ever remotely difficult to coax the eternally hot-Sparked bounty hunter onto the floor with him (and in his favorite place nonetheless) still gave Prowl a quiet laugh. After they both rebooted, and Prowl had not moved to extricate himself from Lockdown's bulky weight in several cycles, the older mech finally seemed assured of something that had passed between them: most likely the simple fact that Prowl liked him better.

Granted, it was something Prowl would have been just as content telling him, but his partner would never, ever have wanted to hear it.

The boundaries of their double-layered communication were sharply drawn, and verbalizing such a thing would have been beyond inappropriate even if drowning in it during an interface and the preceding dance of gestures and implications was a perfect remedy. His partner's standards were finicky and bizarre, Prowl knew, but Lockdown communicated solely through touch and sound and the ninjabot had become quite skilled in speaking the older mech's wordless language. Quite… happy to be so fluent, as well.

Thus soothed, the bounty hunter finally wound down, dark Spark pulsing contentedly in his relaxed chassis as they cooled on the floor of the mod-strewn shop. Once Lockdown realized Prowl's passive (though notably unapologetic) mood, however, it wasn't long until he began to push boundaries. Warm and pleased at their renewed dynamics, he bullied and knuckled the ninjabot, and Prowl bit back after a few cycles of it, provoked into a swift wrestling match that proved to be just as satisfying as what had come but half a megacycle before.

Prowl sparred with his possessive lion of a partner for a good while, the mess only coming to an end when the ninjabot caught hold of one of Lockdown's more dominant abdominal pressure points and forced him to surrender—pushing boundaries himself as he made the demands. Servos up, pedes perpendicular, flat on his backstruts. The other mech pointedly obeyed, chuckling like an earthquake.

Lockdown went silent when Prowl simply lowered himself to his partner's side after his solid victory, aspirating gently, but spoke up after a few cycles.

"What frequency did that brat give you?" Lockdown growled as neutrally as he could from behind Prowl's warm shoulder. Prowl tilted his chin, almost thinking about it—or pretending to.

"I don't know. I deleted it," he answered quietly. When Lockdown said nothing, Prowl shrugged and leaned back into his partner's still-toasty chest-plating, murmuring just archly enough: "Janitorial service doesn't excite me."

Lockdown rumbled in a brash, approving way and indirectly looped an arm around Prowl, crunching him closer. Rare and impulsive. Affectionate. Immature, yes, but honestly affectionate. Prowl smiled and rolled his optics behind his visor.

Lockdown didn't fare well against things he couldn't smash or kill, and sometimes—most times—it was better to simply put him out of his misery.