Darkness and Lightning 04: Secrets Betrayed

Wing was in the lowest levels of the Citadel, grumbling under his breath as he slogged through the sewers. Some of the chores he was assigned as punishment were the worst available, and he was not allowed to trade them off to other Knights. This was the chore he hated most, and was not at all surprised that Drift had declined going with him this time. The white mech was out exploring, occasionally offering teasing or slightly sarcastic comments in response to Wing's mental grumbling.

Letting out an irritated snarl at life in general, Wing got to work, ignoring anyone else who happened to be in the area. In his temper, he even ignored a Knight he knew better than to ignore the presence of. It wasn't as bad as forgetting one of his creators was around, but to forget Thorn was watching you was to invite trouble. The black Knight thrived on learning and using secrets.

A spike of interest across their bond, still less than a metacycle old, drew briefly Wing's attention away from his work.

~Something got your attention?~ Wing asked, pausing in his work. Dark wings fluttered slightly, then returned to their tight tuck against his back.

~A spot we can built out to a very agreeable second home, one that your creators can't get to without using serious explosives,~ Drift sounded extremely pleased with his find. ~Big enough to be comfortable for an extended stay.~

Wing's purr was both through the bond and faintly audible, enough to tip off anyone in hearing range that something was up. Wing never purred when he was stuck in the sewers. Usually it was a stream of profanities and grumbling. ~There are times being a small mech comes in very handy. Much more leeway when it comes to finding places they can't get into.~

Focused as he was, Wing didn't see Thorn perk up and meld even further into the shadows with all his sensors locked on the shorter black and red trimmed jet.

~We're faster too,~ Drift chuckled, trying to send images of what he was seeing through the bond, along with image-ideas for what they could turn it into.

Dark wings fluttered again. ~Looks good. It will be very welcome to have a place they can't get into.~ Approval flowed back through the bond to his white-armored mate. ~Just be careful. Some of the tunnels are a little on the unstable side.~

~I will,~ Drift promised, even as he wordlessly reminded his mate what he'd survived with far less reason to. ~This area looks stable.~

Wing responded with another soft purr, pondering how best to go about purloining the supplies they'd need without anyone catching on. He plotted on that as he returned his attention to his work, his vocalizer letting out the displeased growl familiar to anyone who'd ever gotten stuck in the sewers with him.

Three breems of plotting, snarling and mucking out later a burst of distress-anger-pain torn through Wing from his spark.

Wing let out a sharp cry, dropping his equipment into the muck and curling in on himself, his reactions those of a mech reacting to some pain. But he himself was not injured.

"Wing?" Thorn dropped his effort to hide as he came close, concerned for his friend and occasional lover.

The smaller dark jet didn't seem to register Thorn's presence. He'd dropped to his knees in the sewer ooze, still curled in on himself, wings fluttering with distress but not flaring out, as if pinned to his back. Wing whimpered, low in his throat. "Drift!"

Thorn scowled, trying to make sense of what he was staring at. He knew it should make sense, but it was entirely too weird. Cautiously he reached out and caught Wing's shoulders and shook him, trying to get the younger jet's attention.

Wing jumped. Wide golden optics caught Thorn's dark red for a long moment, but the smaller jet didn't seem to actually see the other mech standing there. After a moment, Wing staggered to his pedes and bolted down the sewer tunnel, heading as directly for his mate as the tunnels would allow. He'd be out of the sewers at the first available access hatch.

Too startled to react, Thorn stood still for a moment, then twisted and took off after the other jet. Whatever was going on, he wasn't about to lose Wing. Axe would be pissed.

Wing scrambled out of the sewers as close to where Drift was as he could, ignoring his surroundings in his haste to reach Drift. He was leaving a trail of sewer muck behind him, making it easy for Thorn to track him. Taking flight, he headed straight for the collapsed tunnel. It was deep in the tunnel system that surrounded the city cavern, deep enough that Wing knew of mecha that had been taken out here to starve to deactivation, their frames never to be found.

Finding the place where the tunnel had collapsed, the dark jet threw himself at the pile, tossing rocks and boulders out of his way.

~Stop. Panicking.~ Drift growled at him, the full authority of one who had been a Decepticon battleship's SIC behind the demand. Pain and immobility rippled with the words, though both were studiously ignored by the grounder. ~Comm Redline for help. Say I commed you before I was buried.~

The dark jet trembled, then did as Drift asked. He had to turn down the volume on his internal comm to prevent the resulting rant from shorting out his audial receptors. Wincing, Wing continued to dig, trying to pick the best spots to throw the rocks without clogging up the tunnel behind him. ~They're coming. Redline is doing his best to short out my comm system with his yelling, but they're coming.~

~Good,~ Drift told him before drifting into the numbing half-aware existence of intense pain and limited mobility.

"Wing, what is going on?" Thorn demanded as he watched the bizarre behavior.

The whole time, from descending into the sewers to his desperate flight to reach his mate, Wing had somehow never noticed Thorn's presence. The dark jet almost hit the cave ceiling in surprise, whipping around with wings flared and armor on end. It took him a moment to realize just who had spoken to him.

"Drift was out exploring the caves and was caught in a cave-in," Wing growled at the larger mech, unease swirling in his thoughts. "He commed me just as the cave collapsed. Now get your aft over here and help me dig him out!"

Thorn gave him a scrutinizing, disbelieving look, then complied. "You've called in help?"

"Yes, I've called in help." Wing flicked a rock at him. Most of his armor had settled, but the armor on his upper back remained slightly fluffed. He eyed the other mech for a moment, aware that Thorn knew something was off, then went back to clearing the rubble, keeping an optic on Thorn as the slender Knight helped move rocks.

"You're entirely too attached to him, you know," Thorn said quietly after nearly a klik of silence.

Wing shot a glare at the other black mech. "He's my pet, and I find him very intriguing. What of it?"

"Next time you really tick your creators off, they might just take him from you," Thorn reminded him. "A pet is quite a privilege."

Wing's armor stood on end, pinions and wings flaring out. "He's mine! No one can take him from me!"

Thorn paused, regarding the youngest Knight in silence for a moment. "He's Master Dai Atlas. He can do anything he wants to."

The growl Wing let out held a mix of bitterness and rage at the sound of his creator's name. "Drift is mine. I don't care what my creators say."

The sounds of approaching mechs reached their audials, accompanied by the sound of Redline's ranting. Wing flared his audial fins, listening, then glowered at Thorn again.

"Good luck making that stick," Thorn x-vented before falling silent. It wasn't a conversation for other audials.

Redline appeared with two heavy-framed mechs, all three too large to easily move in the tunnel. No doubt it was why Drift was in this area.

"You're sure he's there?" Redline asked with a growl and glare at Wing.

"Yes, I am perfectly sure," Wing answered. He pointed toward the pile of rubble. "He's there. I tracked his comm signal to this tunnel."

Redline nodded at the worker mecha he brought with him and all give went to work in silence.

~Getting closer,~ Drift's thought whispered across the bond along with a sense of relief as some of the pressure was relieved from his crushed and pinned frame.

Dark wings twitched. ~Redline brought two big worker mecha with him. We're almost to you. Hang on, my lover.~ A tiny, distressed chirr rose from his vocalizer.

Only Thorn was close enough to hear, or notice how Wing focused on one specific part of the debris pile. Going on a hunch, Thorn moved to help him with that section.

~I am,~ Drift reassured him, memories of the beatings he'd taken and survived, including the one that put him in his current frame, drifting up to emphasis the point.

A klik later and Drift's very intentional groan drew everyone else and sent Redline into a frenzy of commands to hurry up so he could get to his patient. He didn't care what status Drift held. He was a resident of the Citadel and thus was one of his patients.

Wing all but pounced on the pile, sending rocks flying in all directions. He was making that soft, distressed chirr again. Finally, rock rattled against metal, and Wing let out a soft cry. White metal was showing through the piled debris.

White. Living metal.

"Thorn, get him out of the way," Redline ordered as he began to give careful directions to the workers. "He's too emotional."

"Yes sir," Thorn murmured and grabbed Wing by the shoulders to pull him back.

Wing let out a protesting squawk, briefly pulling against Thorn before subsiding. Golden optics watched intently as white metal was extracted from under the rubble, black armor bristling at every creak of damaged armor or sound from Drift. The dark jet somehow managed to forget just who was standing behind him, and who was probably getting way too much information from the way Wing was behaving.

Wing was a quivering mess by the time Drift had been fully extracted and laid on the ground for Redline do some basic field repairs to stop him leaking and sparking.

The medic's silence was telling to anyone who knew him.

Dark armor slicked tight to Wing's frame. He risked a step closer to his mate, peering anxiously at the damage to Drift's frame.

"How bad is it?" he finally ventured to ask, looking at Redline.

"He'll survive," the medic didn't look up from his work. "You won't be playing with him for a while."

~What he thinks,~ Drift snickered at Wing despite the amount of pain and system failures he was in.

"As long as he survives for me to play with later." Slowly, Wing's wings loosened from their painfully tight tuck. The dark jet eased as close as he dared, watching Redline work and wincing at the amount of visible damage.

~Survived worse,~ Drift repeated. ~A lot worse.~ There was a twitch and burst of panic across the bond before it went silent as Redline put Drift into medical stasis.

Without a word the medic picked Drift up and walked to the tunnel entrance before lifting off.

"Keep me informed," Wing told the medic. He looked at himself, at the sewer muck dried onto his armor, and growled. "Back to the sewers..." He muttered an interesting profanity under his breath.

Drift caught the medical overrides insisting that he boot slowly and in default order. He hated being put under by a medic. They never understood how stressful it was to be aware but without weapons, defenses or half your sensors. Every cable was tense when he finally managed to turn his optics on and take in the medical ward of the Knights of Shadow's Citadel.

Redline wasn't far away, watching the monitors. Gold optics, like Wing's, lifted from the display screens to fix on the white mech finally coming online.

Drift stared back at him before shifting to sit up. "I expect I owe you some thanks."

"And some explanations." Redline's optics narrowed. "You're quite clearly my own handiwork. But I have never seen you before Wing brought you back from the surface."

Drift let out a muttered grumble. "You didn't, but Redline did. I'm not from this dimension."

The medic lifted an optic rim. "Oh, really? And that's why I don't know you, yet your design is clearly one of my own building?"

"You have a better idea?" Drift cocked his helm. "Cause that's the best one I've got."

Redline gave him a narrow-opticked look. "If that's true, that might explain a few things. Of course, it's also practically impossible to prove, so I guess I will have to take your word for it."

"If you work out another way it all works out, I'll listen," he shrugged and hopped to his pedes with the easy grace of a Knight Initiate with a long lifetime of war. "For me, I've got Wing back and that's where I stopped caring about the how of it."

That got him another long look from the medic. "Your little jet will be along shortly. He's been pestering me every few joors like clockwork. I'm going to do something drastic to him if he doesn't mute his vocalizer and let me work."

Drift chuckled deeply. "Good luck on that one. He knows you're bluffing."

Redline gave the white mech a sour look, but whatever response he might have had was cut off by the sound of approaching jet engines.

Wing landed on the balcony, trotting inside. He looked from the medic to Drift. "Ah, good, you're fully repaired."

"Yes," Drift purred at him with a submissively coy look that promised all the catching up Wing could handle.

Wing's golden optics flared. "Good," he purred in response. "This time, I might have to put you on a leash to keep you from wandering off and getting damaged again."

Redline glared at both of them, brandishing a tool. "I would tell you two to take it easy, but I know you'll just ignore me. Now scram! Out of my sight!"

Drift smirked at him and took the three steps to wrap his arms around Wing's neck. ~Go before I remember how much I hate flying.~

Wing wrapped an arm around Drift, letting out a deep purr. ~Going.~ His engines revved to a roar, the dark jet taking two steps out on the balcony and lifting off. Rather than making a direct flight to their quarters, he swirled around the tower once before finally touching down.

The dark jet hummed softly, pressing his forehelm against Drift's in an effort to stop the grounder's trembling and the pure terror screaming across the bond. Slowly, too slowly, Drift's frame stilled against Wing's as processors and spark both accepted that he was firmly on a solid surface once more.

~We've landed,~ Wing purred through the bond, nuzzling his mate. He tugged the grounder inside. ~Flying is something you might have to get used to... It comes in very handy when ducking my creators.~

~Grounders aren't meant to fly,~ Drift grumbled, but didn't resist being led. ~I can hold on, and I'm pretty sure I didn't scream this time.~

~You didn't,~ Wing assured him. He tugged Drift over to the berth, curling up on the white grounder's lap with a contented purr.

~You are entirely too cute,~ Drift chuckled as he wrapped his arms around his mate and leaned back to lie down with Wing half on top of him. ~Redline ask for my story, so he knows at least I think I'm from another dimension.~ He nuzzled the black helm affectionately. ~He didn't look convinced, but he doesn't have any better ideas either.~