A/N - Are you still here?
"I saw you sparring with Bluestreak earlier."
Sunstreaker glances over at the flame-red form of his brother, splayed across his berth in a picture of idleness: back propped against the wall and a giant slag-eating grin plastered across his face, fingers twirling a blaster he's been pretending to clean for half a joor. Sunstreaker's language banks keep shoving the words "Cheshire Cat" into his awareness and he aggressively quashes the thought. What the frag do felines have to do with anything, anyway?
"Speak Cybertronian," he snaps back in their native tongue. "It's bad enough having to speak Earthian around the humans, never mind in private too."
"English, Sunny," Sideswipe jibes back, still speaking the ugly Earth language. "It's called English."
Too irritated by the lack of logic to the humans' naming techniques, Sunstreaker almost forgets to retort to the nickname.
"Sunstreaker," he growls, pausing his delicate maintenance work of using solvent and a fine cloth to clear the grit and dirt from the joints of his fingers. "And they don't call themselves Engs, do they? Why name this planet's language English?"
Sideswipe laughs, slapping his servo against his thigh and rocking back and forth on the berth in a motion filled with theatrics, despite it only being the two of them in the habsuite. "There's no Earth language," he chokes out around the laughter, "this planet has over seven thousand-"
Sunstreaker uninstalls his downloaded language pack and his twin's words become weird gibberish in his audials. Ignoring Sideswipe's hoots of amusement, he leans back to his task; Earth has so many more tiny particles floating around than Cybertron, and they're forever worming their way under his plate and into his joints. Sideswipe, however, will not be ignored. There are orns when the Unmaker himself seems to whisper encouragement into the red mech's mischievous mind. Sunstreaker knows that when Sideswipe is sitting quietly in their habsuite it usually means that something loud is about to happen outside, and he resolutely tells himself that he just has to tolerate his brother's barbs until Prowl comes to drag the red mech away.
"You've been sparring with Blue every orn this cycle," Sideswipe says in deliberate, clipped Cybertronian, setting the blaster down and training his bright gaze on Sunstreaker. His servos grip the edge of the berth and he leans forward, anticipation thrumming through his form.
Sunstreaker purposely doesn't meet his twin's intense gaze, pointedly continuing his task and watching Sideswipe's coiled form from the periphery of his vision.
"I spar every orn," he grunts in a brusque reply.
"In your downtime."
"I always spar in my downtime."
"I saw you correcting his stances."
"None of these civilians know how to fight."
"I saw you helping him up after you knocked him down."
Sunstreaker finally spares his twin a withering look, rolling scornful optics. Sideswipe's knowing smile is one of someone who thinks they've speared their target.
"Isn't that what comrades are meant to do?" the yellow mech snorts.
Sideswipe laughs again, pleased to have finally drawn the rise he's been looking for.
"Comrades? Yes," Sideswipe nods, leaning further forward. "You? Never. You've never even offered me a hand when we spar!"
"That's because you're an aft."
Resigning himself to having no peace for the foreseeable joor or so, Sunstreaker reluctantly sets down his cleaning supplies and focuses on his twin. Sideswipe is like a pit hound once he gets hold of an idea, and liable to keep biting and shaking until something interesting falls out. Sideswipe gives a taunting smirk that makes Sunstreaker's servos tighten with the urge for violence and the red frontliner leans back against the wall again, fixing his yellow twin with a hot stare and a crooked smile.
Sunstreaker meets the stare with a glare of his own, silence spreading between the two mechs like a lake. The breems stretch out, but Sunstreaker has never been bothered by a lack of noise. Slowly Sideswipe's smile becomes a grin, and though his faceplaces don't seem to move, the expression begins to turn into something unsettling.
"Cut that out," Sunstreaker snaps, the words slicing across the room's quiet. He tosses a cleaning cloth at Sideswipe's stupid grinning face. "You know that doesn't work on me."
Sideswipe hoots a laugh again, snatching the cloth out of the air. Instead of throwing it back, he quickly pockets it into subspace - he always did know how to really push his twin's buttons - and points a black finger at Sunstreaker.
"You haven't helped anyone back up since the day you were sparked, Sunny," he taunts, dropping his thumb to his pointing finger and making a stupid "pshew" noise.
Despite himself, Sunstreaker can't help but take the bait. Sideswipe is a master of being the most annoying mech known to creation when he wants to be, and he knows just what to say to worm his way under the yellow warrior's plate.
"Sunstreaker," he snaps, "and why do you care who I spar with?"
"Can't a mech have an interest in his brother's life?" Sideswipe hums, stretching his arms over his helm in an overly nonchalant gesture.
"Why do you care who I spar with?" Sunstreaker repeats, temper rising despite the knowledge that he's playing straight into Sideswipe's game.
"We're not in Kaon any more, Toto," Sideswipe giggles, actually giggles, resting his chin on one servo and huffing a deep vent. "And don't you think the little Praxian is kinda cute?"
The comment about Bluestreak catches Sunstreaker off guard, and he scrambles to regain his conversational footing. The weird Earthian name Sideswipe just garbled seems like a prime target.
"What the frag is a Toto?"
Sideswipe's grin widens again, and Sunstreaker realises he's made a fatal mistake.
"So you do think Blue is cute," the red mech taunts.
"No." Sunstreaker grunts, folding his arms and leaning back, looking away from his twin and ex-venting hard to try and pull his temper back under control.
A flicker of genuine surprise crosses Sideswipe's face. "You don't?" he asks, tilting his head.
"No."
Sunstreaker's engine grumbles with irritation at the descriptor. He doesn't think Bluestreak is cute - such a weak and diminutive word shouldn't be applied to a mech like Bluestreak. The Praxian's slender frame isn't cute, it's agile and lithe. The flicker of his optics as he tracks a hundred targeting prompts a klik isn't cute, it's a mark of a seasoned warrior who never turns off. His jumbled, tumbling river of words aren't cute, they're the exported feelings and observations of a gentle, kind, and thoughtful spark.
Bluestreak isn't cute; he's beautiful.
But Sideswipe's momentary surprise gives way to a sly look as he picks up on his yellow twin's moment of reverie. He nods with a carefully measured expression of contemplation, recognising a chink in Sunstreaker's armour and twisting a knife into it.
"It's good you don't think he's cute," Sideswipe agrees slowly, nodding his head. "Because I think he's pretty cute, so maybe I'll ask him on a da-"
"Sideswipe." Sunstreaker growls warningly.
But Sideswipe has found a sore spot to worry at.
"What, Sunny?" he leans back again, lacing his fingers behind his head. "If you don't want him then he's up for grabs, right? I hear Praxians are a wild time in the berth, you know? Drive them feral with those doorwi-"
"Sunstreaker," the yellow mech grits out. "And stop being vulgar."
Sideswipe's optics are fixed on the ceiling. He waves one servo up, tracing in the air as though caressing something.
"Aw come on Sunny," he laughs, "I know you've heard what they say - I mean, Prowl's gotta do something to keep Jazz so interested and he's way more uptight than little Blue-"
The cold fury that usually curls, barely controlled, somewhere in the pit of Sunstreaker's fuel tanks explodes up, and the warrior's processor turns white-hot with rage. Before Sideswipe can finish the jibe, Sunstreaker is launching himself off his berth, arm twisting beneath his form to send him flying across the few paces between the two mechs. His servo closes over Sideswipe's helm and with a barbaric heave he sends the red mech tumbling face-first into the floor.
Sideswipe is unfazed, rolling with the impact and turning to reach up, jam his fingers into a thigh plate, and pull his brother down with a thud. He's laughing, delighted to have struck a wire. His arms lock around Sunstreaker's helm, black fins scraping welts in red paint, and playfully tries to hold his twin in a headlock.
"Aww, I'm just joking, Sunny," he sniggers, "you can have him if you want him."
Sunstreaker isn't laughing, though, and instead of playing along with the fight he twists his arms up, catching Sideswipe around the pauldrons and heaving the red mech over his head and throwing him into the door. He's sick of this stupid planet, of being stuck among organics, of being crammed into a ship with mechs who are too friendly and always too close, of energon rations and following commands and whispered comments and punishment detail. He's bored of always being on alert for the next Decepticon attack, of patrolling, of listening to debriefs. He misses Kaon, and the fighting pits, and the crowd screaming his name. He misses Cybertron, where there was space and privacy and you could court a mech without -
With a yell of rage he launches himself at his brother, servo balled into a fist to deliver a punch.
Sideswipe isn't laughing any more. His expression is grim, but hungry. He'll take entertainment wherever it comes; a joke or a prank or a bloody fight. The two mechs meet in a snarling ball, plates buckling and peeling under one another's servos. A chunk of Sunstreaker's helm fin breaks away in Sideswipe's denta, while Sunstreaker's knee beats into the red mech's side until the plate screeches and dents in. At some point the habsuite doors open and they roll out into the corridor, a screaming pile of fury. It isn't a fight to try and subdue or win, it isn't even a fight between two gladiators under the brilliant lights of a Kaon pit. It's two mechs trying to hurt each other as badly as they possibly can.
Somewhere beyond the haze of tearing metal, dripping energon, and the roar of the fury in his audials, Sunstreaker is dimly aware of a voice, then more voices. He doesn't care. Under his servos Sideswipe twists and hauls and Sunstreaker is rolling back, then he's using the momentum to rise to his pedes. A few metres away his twin is rising too, and Sunstreaker steps forward again with a roar. There's a flicker of movement, and someone steps between the two gladiators; Sunstreaker doesn't even know who it is. No one gets between him and his target. He snatches the smaller mech with one servo, throwing him into a wall and out of his way. Sideswipe's optics widen with momentary shock, but he grins as Sunstreaker barrels towards him, and red and yellow meet again in a storm of tortured metal.
Dimly Sunstreaker is aware of other mechs around them, of comms pinging frantically across open and closed channels. He ignores them. He ignores the increasingly alarmed pings of "ally, ally" that try to creep into his consciousness. His world is energon leaking down his face and the screech of metal straining against metal and looking for the next spot he can jam in a fist or an elbow and do some damage.
Until a ping burns across his interpersonal systems, searing hot against his cold fury. For a fraction of a moment both twins freeze, locked under the authority of a stand-down command neither of them can ignore.
The split second of silence is interrupted. Sunstreaker feels a huge servo wrap around his chest, lifting him like a ragdoll and slamming him into an orange wall. He's vaguely aware of Sideswipe, similarly pinned, to his right. The cold rage burns out in his spark, and he sullenly meets the furious optics of Optimus Prime.
Packing ammo has been an almost cathartic task for Sunstreaker since the war began, making it one of Prowl's less effective choices of punishment.
The rounds click neatly into the channel of the packer, then rattle into place as he loads them into the magazine. The fully loaded magazine is set neatly on top of a pile of likewise finished magazines, and a fresh one is selected to begin the process again. It's mindless, satisfying, and he doesn't have to talk to anyone. And no one needs to talk to him.
Sometimes he wonders how fragged up he is to enjoy preparing ammunition that's going to be fired into another mech's body.
It's a job that should be done on a factory line, but in the war the factories were the first to be obliterated beyond all use, and here on earth they didn't even have the materials to try and build a new one. The soldiers have become well used to the grunt work.
Click. Click. Click. Rattle.
The precise way the rounds fit into the packer, the rhythm of the clicks as they're placed and then the satisfying noise as they each slide into place… he could almost lose himself in it. If only the fragging energon cuffs didn't make it ten times more challenging.
Sideswipe was over in Wheeljack's lab, he knew, probably doing some similarly inane task. He'd heard Jazz quietly telling Prime that the twins should be kept away from one another for a few joors.
Behind him, on the other side of the medbay, the murmured conversation between Ratchet and First Aid drones in his audials. Guilt curls uncomfortably around Sunstreaker's spark as Ratched fusses over his apprentice. The CMO's usually gruff bedside manner had vanished when he'd heard about how First Aid got hurt; he'd attempted a mild criticism that the Protectobot should know better than to get between two warriors in a fight, but then he'd thrown a dirty look over to Sunstreaker and begun gently tending to First Aid's crumpled plating.
Sunstreaker hadn't meant to hurt First Aid - he hadn't even known it was the newly sparked Autobot that had tried to break up their fight, hadn't registered Hound holding back a raging Hot Spot from joining the fray when he saw his gestalt brother clang hard into the wall.
From across the medbay a plaintive protest reaches his audials: "But Ratchet, they were hurting each other!"
Sunstreaker hunches down and dials his audial feed as low as he can, so he can't hear the CMO's sharp reply reminding the young Autobot to make use of his medic identifiers next time - actually, to just let them kill each other next time.
Ratchet hasn't tended to either of the twins' injuries, other than to give them each a cursory look and proclaim that there was nothing life threatening. A bead of energon keeps forming over Sunstreaker's optic, dripping down the blue glass and running into his mouth. He doesn't wipe it away. The pain of a few damaged plates and torn wires is something he's grown used to over the vorns, and the only thing that really bothers him is the persistent damage warnings that flash up on his HUD.
He turns his sensory reporting system off.
Click. Click. Click. Click. Click. Click. Click. Rattle.
He's never seen Prime so angry.
Click. Click. Click. Click. Click. Click. Click. Rattle.
Which really is something, given that he sees Prime raging against Megatron's latest scheme at least once a cycle.
Click. Click. Click. Click. Click. Click. Click. Rattle.
But Sideswipe can be so fragging annoying.
Click. Click. Click. Click. Click. Click. Click. Rattle.
And it wasn't like they were actually going to kill each other.
Click. Click. Click. Click. Click. Click. Click. Rattle.
He isn't surprised when someone else enters the medbay, because he had Wheeljack install experimental long range spark signature software before they even left Cybertron. He is surprised when he sharply turns to see why Bluestreak is is here, and takes in the still-wet white paint dripping from the sniper's pauldrons, over his chestplates and running in a small stream down his legs. His optics slowly track across the medbay floor to the closing doors, following the white pedeprints and paint drips that trail across the floor.
Ratchet is shouting something. Sunstreaker dials his audial feed back up.
"- gone insane?" the CMO splutters, a wrench held menacingly in his servo and pointing at Bluestreak. "Has someone tainted the energon supply? As if I don't have enough to deal with! Get your aft in the shower before you even think about touching anything - and don't think you're getting out of this medbay until every speck of paint is cleaned up -"
"But Ratchet," Bluestreak protests, holding up paint-covered servos in a gesture that's half submission and half defence against the possibility of flying wrenches. "I swear I didn't even know what Sideswipe had planned for the paint, he asked me a few joors ago when we were in the rec room - we were having our daily energon ration and I'd just come off lookout detail overnight and it was really cloudy out - and he asked me to be by the shuttle bay doors at shift change and just say hi to Prowl and that -"
The wrench vibrates with transferred fury. Ratchet's repeated command of "Shower!" is a screech to rival the most noxious tones of Starscream.
With a resigned ex-vent, Bluestreak trails over to the small emergency shower in the corner of the medbay. He shuffles awkwardly to fit his doorwings in, then disappears for a few kliks under a torrent of water. Sunstreaker catches Ratchet's smouldering gaze, and quietly returns to his mag packing. He's had enough of being yelled at for the next few deca-orns at least.
After about five more freshly packed magazines, a slightly damp Bluestreak plops down next to Sunstreaker's temporary workstation. Beads of water trail along the edges of the Praxian's plate, and white streaks stick stubbornly to his grey paint. Wordlessly Sunstreaker pulls a rag from subspace and tosses it to the mech, who catches it with relief and dries off his servos, then attempts to rub some of the drying white paint.
"Thanks, Sunstreaker!" Bluestreak smiles - a genuine, pleased smile - as he reaches to take an empty magazine and a servo full of rounds. "It's going to take me ages to get all this paint out, and I hope it's not going to take a new paint job to hide any of the colours. I honestly had no idea what Sideswipe had planned, he just asked me to do him a favour and then said if I could make sure Prowl saw the section of wall the minibots had been repairing and-"
Sunstreaker nods along, letting Bluestreak's chatter wash over him as he clicks more ammo rounds into more magazines. When Bluestreak remembers to pause to let the other half of the conversation contribute, he can't stop his optics from straying again over the ugly white streaks of wallpaint marking the sniper's understated grey chestplates. It's a force of will not to let his gaze follow the drips down to where they spread and splatter over the bright red of Bluestreak's thighs.
"I have some solvent solution you can use - for the paint," Sunstreaker stumbles midway through the sentence, and is immediately glad that his usual gruff attitude to conversation helps hide the mistake. He forcibly tears his gaze away from the ugly white marks and back to the ammo - not that he couldn't pack ammo while he was recharging.
Bluestreak straightens in a motion of surprise, his doorwings perking high - frag it, Sunstreaker owes Sideswipe another punch in the mouth for mentioning doorwings - and then the sniper is beaming a bright smile.
"Thanks Sunstreaker!" he chirrups, earning a "You're meant to be being punished" hiss from Ratchet on the other side of the room. Sunstreaker can feel the medical officer's ire on his back like the warmth of the sun, but even Ratchet isn't enough of a hardaft to tell Bluestreak he isn't allowed to talk.
"A'right Sunstreaker," despite himself, Sunstreaker can't help but flinch when a hand claps down on his pauldron. He turns sharply with the beginning of a snarl that dies away when his optics meet the blank visor of the Autobots' third in command. Sunstreaker's optics flick to the medbay doors, then back to the small black and white mech; he wonders, not for the first time, why Jazz's spark signature doesn't register on his sensors. And how the mech can move so silently.
But as soon as the question crosses his processor, there's Jazz's spark signature, as bright and lively as if it had always been there.
Well maybe he'd been too caught up in listening to Bluestreak talk…
But that doesn't explain all the other times…
He needs to have a word with Wheeljack.
"Time ta turn in for the night," Jazz indicates his helm towards the doors, stepping back to give Sunstreaker room to stand.
The yellow warrior drops the ammo he's holding, rising immediately as the rounds tinkle to the floor. This small piece of insolence seems to have no effect on Jazz, who just casts a languid smile to Bluestreak in greeting. Sunstreaker glowers at the smaller mech, mostly out of a standard dislike of authority figures than any animosity towards Jazz.
"These seem a bit unnecessary," Jazz muses, raising a hand and deactivating the energon cuffs. He tosses the dead cuffs in the air, catching them before stowing them in subspace. "If ya make me need'ta put them on again, I'm gon'ta be annoyed."
The commander's tone is light, but Sunstreaker, looking straight into the flat glow of Jazz's visor, doesn't miss the flicker of something hard passing across his unreadable face. Sunstreaker quirks his mouth down, nodding a silent agreement.
Jazz leads him out, offering a cheery wave to Ratchet. Sunstreaker pretends not to see the CMO's rude gesture in reply.
"So what were you two fightin' about?" Jazz asks, helm turning to give a flash of his blue visor as he addresses the hulking warrior following in his wake.
Sunstreaker stays silent for a moment. He thinks about telling Jazz it's none of his business. He thinks about just staying quiet.
He says, "Sideswipe was being vulgar."
Jazz doesn't respond for several kliks, and staring at the impassive back of the other mech, Sunstreaker wonders if the commander might not have heard him.
They step silently into the Ark's lift.
"About what?" Jazz finally asks, leaning leisurely back against the lift's wall and folding his arms.
Sunstreaker stares blankly at the black and white mech. Jazz is the picture of a casual curiosity, as though they were in the rec room sharing a drink and not a superior escorting a soldier down to the brig. Despite Jazz's friendly demeanour, Sunstreaker feels as though he's being scrutinised in depth by the impassive visor.
"Praxians," his vocoder says before his processor can intercede, and he instantly regrets it. He thinks again about how Jazz's spark signature can drop off his sensors, and about how the third in command smiles when Prowl enters a room.
Jazz is silent again for a long while, but Sunstreaker has never minded the quiet. He waits, unmoving and keeping a careful mask of disinterest on his faceplates. Finally Jazz says, "Huh".
Sunstreaker shrugs, turning his optics away from the little mech and looking with a studied detachment at a scuff on the lift's doors.
When Jazz speaks again, it's with a thoughtful, nostalgic tone that Sunstreaker isn't familiar with.
"Proper courtin' always was expected, in Praxus," Jazz muses, and Sunstreaker can't keep the surprise off his face. "Scandalous for two mechs ta… get involved, without the social propers."
Sunstreaker frowns, optics raking Jazz's faceplates for any sign of taunting or humour, but the commander is as unreadable as always.
"A'course," Jazz says, mouth twisting down as the lift's doors open. "There's ain't no Praxus anymore."
Sideswipe is already in a cell, lounging back on the berth as though his red paint isn't streaked with yellow and the glass of one optic isn't shattered out of his faceplate. He greets his twin with a cheery "Sunny!" and an energetic wave.
Sunstreaker ignores the red menace, lying down on his own berth and staring up at the dark ceiling.
When they're alone again, Sideswipe muses, the mocking tones of earlier gone and an interested note entering his voice; "So - Bluestreak?"
Sunstreaker initiates his recharge cycle. "Shut up, Sides."