So it seems these chapters are just staying this length. I'm sorry, it'll get better! The chapter after the next one'll be a long one, I promise! These things just refuse to go any longer then what they want.

Thank you to all of you who reviewed last chapter, it really helps me to get these things written. Knowing that there are people out there who actually read this stuff is a really good kick in the pants to get me working on it. Thank you also for all your helpful comments concerning my first overload/smex scene and I'll try to apply it to the next chapter which will be much more of an "M" chapter than this one. This is sort of a PG-13—I wasn't up to writing so much smut and managing to make it read different. I got the feeling that if I wrote too much more at this stage it'd eventually just blend together and sound like the same chapter just with different mech's names. So sorry about the lack of smut but stay with me till next chapter! It's some Prowl/Jazz fun-ness!

An extra humongous pile of thanking goes to Kesera who has officially deigned me worthy enough to become my beta-reader. The most amazing person, if only because of the willingness to wade through my spelling and grammar errors. Also pointed out and helped me with Wheeljack's mask issue. Thank you!

Thanks also to The Greatest Boba Fett Fan, .groove, and Azkadellia who were kind enough to lend me some extra constructive criticism. They pointed out a few more of those spelling errors that I seem so prone to.

Right, that's enough of that author's note. Enjoy!

"When any sense of ours records intense, pleasure or pain, then the whole soul is drawn by such impressions into that one sense…"

"Ooooooh, did you just rhyme?"

"It was a quote. It's not like I had a choice."

"It's adorable."

"Don't start with me, brat."

"Does somebody need a hug?"

"You try it and you'll find yourself in so many parts that not even all the kings' men would be able to put you back together again."

"…did you do that one on purpose?"

"Maybe. Maybe not. I'm counting on the fact that you'll never know to drive you completely insane. Is it working?"

"I refuse to play into your little games and answer that."

"I'll take that as a most definite yes, then."

"Now who's being a brat?"

"Still you. I'm too old to be a brat."

"Perhaps I should say who's being the irritable, ornery old mech then?"

"You could, but my threat still stands."

"Fine. You be that way."

"Don't worry, I will."

"Good."

"Yes."

"Brilliant."

"Indeed."

"Stupendous."

"Absolutely."

"…At least let me have the last word!"

"No."

"Agh!"

"Just so we're clear, that doesn't count as a word."

Wheeljack snickered as Bluestreak let out another mindless frustrated noise. He absolutely loved torturing the younger mech. Though, he supposed, Blue had been nice enough to help him out in his lab today—the least he could do was pretend to let him win a verbal battle.

Trying his hardest to control his laughing, Wheeljack still felt at ease in letting his smile creep up at the corners of his mouth, his ever present mask hiding the smirk, "All right Blue, you win. I'll let you have the last word."

"No. I don't want it anymore." Bluestreak said, turning his face away from the engineer with a pout, though he was still careful to keep a firm hold on the vial of swirling blue liquid he had been coerced into holding. It had been the gunner's idea in the first place for Wheeljack to read to him via the internet—he had been desperate for anything that could relieve the boredom of holding a vial for what seemed like several cycles but that could only really have been a breem or two. Wheeljack was always so silent when experimenting. Having him read a file off the internet was often the only chance Blue got to break the monotonous silence. But when he had started to spout off Dante of all earthian authors, Bluestreak had found it justly within his rights to interrupt.

"Don't be so petulant," Wheeljack admonished, rolling his optics and carefully adding three drops from a pink solution into the vial Blue was holding. Having another mech there with him while he worked always strangely helped him focus—he loved the added input at his disposal. Even the most unscientifically inclined bots sometimes had the most interesting and thought provoking questions for him. Unfortunately, he always had trouble finding anyone willing to help him when he was working with potentially combustible chemicals. Go figure. Even Bumblebee had made a mad dash for the Ark's door with the excuse of meeting Sam when Wheeljack had tried to ensnare the little yellow bot's help.

"I know you are but what am I?" Blue shot back, eyeing the turkey baster that Wheeljack had used to drip the chemical in. Wheeljack snickered at the childish human saying as he drew his mismatched instrument away from his mate's hand. Unfortunately for Bluestreak, being his lover had all about guaranteed that he would be roped into "volunteering" if no one else had been found to be the sacrificial victim first.

"And how are using earth-child sayings going to prove your maturity at all here, Blue?" Wheeljack absentmindedly shot back, his mind more on the bubbling mixture before him then the continuing argument.

"Is this thing gonna, I dunno, burn a hole in my hand or something, 'Jack? Because I like that hand. If it's gonna burn through a hand, I'd rather it be the other one." Blue said, still eyeing the chemicals. He winced as a bubble spilled over the top and dripped down onto his finger. Luckily, the wince was more from surprise than actual hurt—the chemical wasn't toxic to autobots, thankfully. Why'd he have to hold it again? Didn't they have stands for this sort of thing?

"No, you whiney thing, it's not going to hurt you," Wheeljack responded, jotting a few more things onto his handheld datapad, "Besides, I like both your hands. I'd rather not have either of them burned."

Raising an optic ridge, Blue just had to take the setup, "Like my hands, do you? Because I can think of a thousand other things they'd rather be doing for you then holding this thing. To you, even."

"Blue…"Wheeljack admonished, breaking his gaze from his notes and lightly glaring at the gunner beside him. A sudden stab of heat from his spark momentarily caused his focus to haze, but Wheeljack shook it off. Where had that come from?

"What? You weren't expecting a pun?" Blue shrugged and leaned against the table they were standing around, stepping around the towering and slightly leaning piles of old datapads by force of habit.

"I suppose." Wheeljack answered sardonically.

"So…" Bluestreak began, drawing the vial he was holding closer to his optics to see it better, "Why'd I have to be holding this thing again? Why not use one of those metal stand thingies?"

"'Metal stand thingies'?" Wheeljack sighed and shook his head, laying his datapad of notes down on the table and snagging the vial from the gunner, "Because."

"…Yes? Because of what now?" Bluestreak prompted after a short silence.

"Just cause." Wheeljack repeated, his ear-fins flashing in humor.

"So you had me holding potentially dangerous chemicals 'just cause,' did you?" Blue growled, pushing off from the table and advancing on the engineer.

"Not exactly…"Wheeljack added, his voice rising as he quickly backed away from the advancing mech, weaving around the other tables full of dangerous looking objects and liquids and the stacks of datapads that constantly cluttered the room, "It's not that dangerous! It didn't even burn you!"

"Beside the point, 'Jack." Bluestreak growled, continuing to advance on the other mech, pleased when he realized that Wheeljack had managed to drive himself into a corner of his lab, "No where to run now…"

"Oh come on, Blue! Look, it's just a modified energon goodie!" Wheeljack tried to placate the advancing mech, retracting his mask and upending the vial into his mouth.

Blue felt a brief stab of absolute horror at the realization that his lover was drinking anything that he had made in his own lab until the inventor's words caught up to his CPU and he could process what that meant. By the time Blue stopped having minor CPU crashes, Wheeljack had swallowed the goodie and was waving the empty vial as proof of its lack of danger.

"See? Nothing bad!" The engineer smiled reassuringly and, with his mask still retracted down into his mandible plating, Blue could easily see it. Blue smiled a bit internally, it had taken him forever to get Wheeljack to give him a chance—not to mention how long it took for him to take off the bloody mask. Once he had, though, it was as if it didn't quite matter if the gunner saw him without it anymore and he frequently had it down if it was just the two of them. Bluestreak still hadn't figured out yet why Wheeljack felt the need to wear it, but he had figured out that he would tell him the reason given time.

Blue had enough problems of his own to know how irritating it was when people tried to figure them all out. The engineer would tell him when he was ready; the same went for Blue and his issues.

"So let me get this straight," Blue said, the internal smile nonetheless creeping into his voice despite his attempts to clamp down on it and completely ruining the evil gravely tone he had been going for, "You had me holding energon goodies while letting me think it was something like eroding evil chemicals of doom?"

"Well, I didn't exactly plan out the whole 'eroding evil chemicals of doom' aspect…" Wheeljack said and Blue caught the small smirk that his mate forgot to hide as he said it. Blue loved it when Wheeljack left off his mask not only for the trust it showed, but for the emotions it did as well. The engineer had worn it for so long that when it was off he was absolutely horrible at hiding any of them. It was beautiful.

"I think you should be punished for that, sir." Blue said in a smooth voice, his optics glinting, parodying the term of respect.

"And what punishment would that be, solider?" Wheeljack shot back, his own optics gleaming with mirth, flickering slightly. The heat from before came back tenfold and he had to force down a gasp at it.

"I can think of a few things." Blue said, his voice going husky for a different reason as he inched over towards the mech in the corner, backing him against the wall.

"Looks to me that you're just all talk and no action." Wheeljack remarked, his own voice drawn and tight. His spark, pulsing already from the unknown heat, made his whole body supersensitive, the smoldering cold fire within reaching towards the contrasting heat from the mech before him and away from the freezing metal at his back, causing his whole frame to shiver in anticipation and startling need.

"You want action, do you?" Blue purred into Wheeljack's audios, causing the older mech to groan and arch into the gunner.

"Maybe. You going do anything about it?" Wheeljack responded unsteadily, drawing one hand up the side of Blue's right doorwing, causing the other bot to shudder in return.

"Slag yes," Blue said before crushing his lips against the other's, pressing his back into the wall. Wheeljack responded in kind, roughly thrusting his chassis up to meet Blue's, forcing their frames into contact, the connection drawing another groan from both their vocal processors. The small crash of the vial meeting the floor and shattering fell on deaf audios, both mechs momentarily lost to the world and completely immersed within the slowly brewing sensations.

"Somebody's eager. I don't think we've ever done it in your lab before…" Blue mumbled after they broke apart, smoothing his hand down his partner's chassis before slipping it into a gap and stroking the wires there.

"Seems to me that we should rectify that mistake." Wheeljack gasped at the sensation, his hands responding in kind. It was true, he was a bit more eager than usual. It was just…it felt like he needed Blue, so badly. Now, more than ever. His spark was burning for him. Wheeljack spent about a second considering the fact that he was tired of simple overloads before he promptly decided that he wanted more. His optics flickering, he spoke shakily, "Take me? Here?"

"Wh-What?" Blue stuttered, momentarily shocked as he jerked back to stare optic to optic, knowing that his partner meant more than just an overload. They'd managed those before just fine, but they'd never done anything at the level Wheeljack seemed to be implying, "Wheeljack, what are you asking?"

"Sparks…" Wheeljack moan-whispered into Blues audios. The grey mech shivered as the air from the older mech's intakes brushed over his facial plates in a phantom caress.

Blue was no stranger to his partner's spark; they'd interfaced with each other enough times in the past that their sparks' pulses could correspond almost at the start of their lovemaking. But connecting sparks, actually opening their chassis and having their two sparks come into contact…that would lay bare too many past events that Blue had thought they hadn't been ready to talk about just yet. There was no room for secrets after a spark-bond.

"I don't…Wheeljack, what do you mean?" Blue gasped out, locking optics with the mech between him and the wall. He was startled to find that his mate's optics were slightly offlined—dark and harshly empty.

"Take me. Bond with me. Please, Blue?" Wheeljack asked with a whine of need, rubbing one hand up and down Bluestreak's doorwing. The sensation combined with the nickname that he knew Wheeljack knew he loved hearing caused his CPU to momentarily cease functioning, his own optics offlining in reaction. The small skip in his processors was almost enough to make him forget that this wasn't a decision they should be rushing headlong into. He pushed the eerie thoughts of his engineer's optics to the back of his CPU, the slightly off-feeling forgotten in favor of much more pleasant ones.

"Butnow? Isn't it a little…sudden?" Bluestreak choked out once he started to process again. Wheeljack's continuing caresses against his doorwings were not helping in his efforts to think clearly.

"Blue…" Wheeljack mewled. That was it for Blue. Whenever Wheeljack made that noise Blue couldn't help but give him whatever it was he wanted.

Including, apparently, his soul.

A note on the last part: I'm just going with the fact that an autobot's spark is like the human's soul/heart/mind/etc. And while I know an autobot might not exactly think in those kinds of human terms, this was the only way I could think to end this chapter without it feeling unconcluded. Sorry if that trips anyone up! Once again, thank you for reviewing and if you have anything to say please feel free (PLEASE?) to leave a review. They're the bright point in my life. Next chapter's going to be Prowl/Jazz so fans rejoice! Yay!