Understood
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Chapter 25
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Tailgate smiled as the blue cassetticon femme led him excitedly up the gangplank of the White Palace. He was excited too, but at the same time feeling a bit guilty. He'd not told Swerve about the job, and had decided not to... ever. Eventually they would take the cruise together, and he'd pretend to be completely new to it. He could do that.
On meeting the rest of the femme's family, he was happy to see that his client's brother had found Hot Zone and hired him for the trip. Though the surprise had been seeing that the dark green Cybercat had brought a tall, elegant femme along. Even more surprising was that she had the cybercat on a gold-toned leash and was leading him about like a submissive pet. His dark green plating had been oversprayed with a glitter coat and bright green bows had been tied around each ankle. The red optics of yesterday now gleamed yellow. The femme herself was a lovely shade of green that had been decorated with golden studs. A shawl of woven golden fibers draped from her arms. The overall effect was of some throwback to the Golden Age when the wealthy made a show of themselves. Some of the other passengers were asking for image-captures, and the pair not only allowed for it but even posed for their sudden admirers.
The carrier was with them, a tall host-mech with a third bipedal symbiont, this one not a cassetticon, but a long-range receiver array. He perched upon his carrier's shoulder, the identifying wing-like structures of his alt-mode curling forward over his own shoulders. The carrier, like his four symbionts, all wore the Decepticon insignia. He too had a cruise companion with him—an equally tall though less bulky mech stood next to him, this one also a Decepticon. The receiver array mech semed to be alone.
Once the ship was underway, the carrier paid Hot Zone and Tailgate their promised thousand credits, and their respective cassettes immediately whisked them off to their cabins below. "See you in the gorge," giggled the femme to her brother as she unlocked the door and pushed Tailgate inside. He'd had just enough time to see the cat and the green femme disappear into another cabin.
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Later on, the family gathered atop the White Palace's upper deck, taking a large, low table and sprawling onto the cushions around it. The green femme lay there with the cybercat half in her lap, the beast rumbling happily as she stroked his head. Review and Replay sat side by side with Hot Zone on his hands and knees propping up their feet. The carrier sat with his companion, shoulders touching and hands entwined as they stared up at the walls of the gorge. The other Decepticon obviously had not been hired for the journey. A tiny bottle of Pollon oil was passed around the table, everyone dripping a little into their joints until it was empty.
Tailgate was sent to fetch drinks for the others. At the bar he found the receiver mechsitting alone, a glass of high-grade in hand and two full glasses at the ready. Three empty glasses sat with them. He stared out at the scenery flowing past without really seeing it. "Are you okay?" asked Tailgate. "Did your date not show?"
The white, green, and gold mech sighed. "I didn't want one."
"No? Why not? That's a big part of this cruise, isn't it?" Tailgate wondered aloud, before suddenly realizing he might be offending the tiny mech. "I'm sorry. It's none of my business," he apologized.
The mech threw back the rest of his current drink and turned to face Tailgate. "Not everyone returns from the battles..." he said sadly.
"Oh... Oh I'm so sorry. I really shouldn't have said anything," Tailgate said, now feeling awful about his pointed question.
"It's okay. I'm here with my family. That's what's important." His unfocused optics drifted over to the others. To Tailgate's surprise the cassetticon suddenly took Tailgate's hand. "So keep smiling and make sure my sister has a good time," he said with a sudden and forced cheer. "She was so thrilled to find a cute little minibot like you to go along on this cruise. We all save up to go once every five meta-cycles. Sometimes I think it's what we live for." He then turned away and grabbed another glass.
Tailgate picked up the tray of drinks the bartender had set in front of him and took them back over to the low table.
Replay got out of the big cushion and grabbed her ordered drink in one hand, and with the other hand she grabbed Tailgate and pushed him down into an unoccupied cushion before stretching out beside him. She was strong despite her diminutive size. Replay kissed him and then took a drink, kissing him again with energon-flavored lips. "So what did Skysight say? Our brother over at the bar."
"Not much. He seemed a bit... well, a bit depressed."
"His bondmate died only a stellar-cycle ago. Killed in battle."
Tailgate tensed. "Oh gosh... He said something about not everyone returning. I guess that's what he was referring to."
"Yeah. Tragic."
"Poor guy. I didn't realize it had been something so recent." Tailgate turned his head to look again at the tiny communications mech sitting alone at the bar, drowning his sorrows in high-grade. Will he be okay?"
"He'll be all right. He still said he'd come even if he just sat around drinking."
"Poor guy," Tailgate repeated.
The femme cocked her head. "You're an odd one," she said, staring at the blue and white minibot.
"Odd?" Tailgate looked flustered. "I'm sorry. Tell me what I'm doing wrong."
She laughed. "There's nothing wrong. It's just that I'm not paying you to care, but you obviously do."
"I guess I'm a bit soft-hearted," Tailgate said embarrassedly. "Sometimes I do care a bit too much."
The femme laughed and kissed him again. "And then you get taken advantage of."
"Sometimes, I guess."
Suddenly Replay leapt upon him, pushing him deep into the cushion. Everyone else at the table began giggling at her antics. "Mmm...I think I'll take advantage of you right here." Her hand pawed at his array cover.
"Replay, not outside of the cabins. At least not until the return journey when it's dark," the carrier-mech reminded her.
She laughed. "Of course. Of course." And then she threw back the rest of her cocktail and whispered into one of Tailgate's audial receptors. "Hurry up and finish your drink and we'll go back to our cabin. This Pollon oil and your cuteness have got me revved up hard. I want to have you again before my brother decides to trade off."
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Later just before the ship docked at Ironforge, Tailgate left Replay recharging in their cabin and he made his way back to the upper decks. There was Skysight, still sitting at the bar, his optics focused elsewhere. Tailgate pressed a data slug into his hand. "If you need someone, you can call me. Even if you just need someone to hold."
Skysight looked at him with optics that didn't want to focus. "Thanks... You're a good mech."
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As the White Palace left the gorge and the crew turned off the deck lights and raised the privacy curtains around the upper decks, Tailgate found himself pressed into a large cushion with Skysight atop him, the tiny mech drunkenly rutting into him. His sister sat beside them, watching her widowed brother loose himself in pleasure. "Thank you, Tailgate," she whispered, leaning down next to his head. "I think he needed this, and he finally got drunk enough not to care."
"I still care," argued Skysight, his vocalizer weak with static. "I just got drunk enough to remember how much I like a good frag."
The femme laughed and patted her brother's shoulder, and then she smiled at Tailgate. "I'll pay you extra for him. It wasn't in our contract that you'd service him as well."
"You don't have to," Tailgate answered, looking up at the femme as he returned the smile. "Sometimes I don't mind being taken advantage of."
"You're such a sweetie," she purred and leaned in to kiss him.
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"Understood" continues in Chapter 26
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Author Notes:
I love the concept of a host-mech and his cassettes/symbionts being very familial. In this case there is the carrier, his lover, his twins Replay and Review, his receiver array, and his cybercat. The lover is just another Decepticon he's grown attached to, probably not the sire of his family, but possibly. The twins are just that—his Rumble and Frenzy. The cybercat may or may not be his direct offspring, but he possibly has the highest status of the four symbionts. And the cybercat's companion is a long-time lover... perhaps a prostitute. But she and the cat have found this common love of dressing up pretty and parading together.
And then there's the widowed receiver array. I created this alt-mode/job for my story "Wayward Angel." The receiver array's alt-mode is a complicated set of satellite/radar dishes that can pick up communications signals far better than the carrier mech can. In "Wayward Angel," Raoul meets (and is bedded by) a femme named Telemetry, who serves Blaster in this capacity.
As for the gorge cruise, it's based upon the pleasure ships that once plied Chinese and Roman lakes, as well as the riverboats that once traveled American waters.
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