A/N: This started from a prompt on lj by chimeradark and deathstallion. I blame this all on them. As always, I own nothing, not even the idea, woe is me.


Harken young spark to my tale of love's folly listen well. For though thou thinkst' the loss of love is deadly, the fleeting of love's loss 'ere brings new love unending.


Ratchet gently shut the door from his suite and leaned back wearily, helm thunking heavily against the stout door. How had things gotten so complicated? The question spiraled in his processors even as he turned his attention to the strange symptoms Sideswipe had displayed.

The hardening of the primary energon lines from poisons in his mech blood, the aggregates blocking the neural relays making him immobile. If these had occurred hours or a couple days after feeding on mortals it would make sense but not – what? Time seemed to become elusive as he counted – nearly six weeks later. Some contaminants in mortals could take that long, but it took continual slow poisoning for the effects to set in.

No, Ratchet was positive, something else was at work here. He moved as other patrons of the inn moved past, glancing in concern at the master healer who looked worn to the underplating. Ratchet merely nodded to them and strode purposefully towards the room shared by 'Jack and Aid.

He pushed open their door, glancing worriedly around the silent room. The twin beds and in suite table was covered with vials and journals, evidence of a healer and deranged alchemist sharing minimal living quarters. Worried at the silence of the room Ratchet made to call out to them until a sharp blow from behind landed soundly on the back of his helm. Staggering, cursing soundly he rounded on his attacker and came to a dead stop when his optics landed on First Aid. Unrepentant and standing tall the journeyman healer held a wrench in his hand.

"What the pits?" Ratchet asked flatly, optics darting between Aid and 'Jack leaning casually against the door watching the spectacle.

"Are you ready to listen now or do you still want to kill your patient?" Wheeljack asked flatly, his calm words chilling Ratchet to the core.

"What are you talking about?" Rattled and angry Ratchet rounded on his brother.

"Sideswipe's symptoms are a physical manifestation of a curse." First Aid filled in pulling an ancient tome Ratchet had never seen before from his berth. "Do you remember our last normal day? It was early morning and I was panicking over a myth."

"Yes," Ratchet replied hesitantly, "You asked me if nightwalkers were real."

"Uh huh, do you remember that myth?"

Ratchet rubbed his helm bemused, "The old story of the nightwalkers that nearly ended the world.

"Uh huh, the ones sealed by the Great Priest. I found the original text from Alpha Trion in the Temple here in Crystal Spire. They let me borrow a transcription of it. You might find this interesting." First Aid leafed through the age worn text, a newer copy of the dilapidated original that scribes of Primus Temple had transcribed repeatedly over the passing centuries. Finally finding the location he wanted Aid began to read out loud.

"Today the will of Primus has been done. The Blood Twins, the infernal nightwalkers no mortal can slay have been ensnared within their eternal tomb of cold iron and granite. By the divine incantations of the Creator they will never enslave the world with their nefarious ways.

"However my assistant decided to make an alteration to the eternal curse, a way out. He ordained that only one of pure spark seeking their release without gains alone could set them free once more.

"I know these creatures, what they can do and have done. If their will be loosed upon this world unchecked once more they will destroy it utterly with their long pinioned fury. To ensure such a reality never comes true I have made assurances that they will never run alone. Should they lose their benefactor's affections of any kind, or even believe they have, they will sicken and die within the fortnight."

Ratchet gaped, looking from Aid to Jack in shock. "He's dying because of me?" The thought twisted his internals and froze his spark. He never wished ill on the mech twins, never sought to harm another if he could help it. Yet, he was killing the very mechs he had fallen in love with.

"Yes you titanium helmed twit!" Aid snapped. "They have doted on you every day since I showed up. They gave you your cloak, helped with the room fees in Pax Crystalia, they even assigned those miserable mini guards to me just so I wouldn't travel alone. What have you done for them?" Aid held his hand up forestalling the rebuttal, "We know, you're on rotation, this is your assignment, but fraggit Ratch what's wrong in letting them love you and giving a little back in return?"

Ratchet gaped, world spinning as everything seemed to reverse itself on him. Aid hit him, 'Jack yelled at him and he was killing the two best things in his life. "So what am I supposed to do, go back to them gush my apologies and miraculously see Sideswipe all better? Life doesn't work like that!"

"Says the mech who performs miracles," 'Jack growled spinning Ratchet around to face him fully. "I spoke to Lady Flipsides before we left, Sideswipe and protection glyphs on Aid were the only things that kept him alive in Unicron's Gate. You owe them Aid's life, and yours. If nothing else you owe them that. They only owe you their freedom, and thanks to that priest you are their master, and their executioner. They are enslaved to you whether they like it or not."

Frozen, sick and facing a world that spiraled before his optics Ratchet balked, how could he force Sunstreaker and Sideswipe to be his slaves? What right did he have to keep them at his side for however long he lived – how long? Suddenly a greater fear burned through Ratchet's spark, of him living a short mortal life and taking the pair down with him. Horrified, and suddenly desperate to ensure he had not killed them with his cold selfishness he fled from the overcrowded room, back to the unconscious twins.

"Did we push him too hard?" Aid asked uncertainly as his master fled the room.

"Nope." Jack replied as he turned back to testing the twins' blood. "My brother is as thick as they come when sparks are involved. Let him fret, you'll see once he gets his processors in right he'll make everything better. He always does."


Ratchet slammed the door behind him, intakes gasping as he counted the soft breaths of the twins. They were alive. That confirmation goaded him into action, he still had a chance to make this better. He pulled his healing kit to the berth side, swiftly stripping Sideswipe down to his plating and began a full examination looking for any ailment present within the red twin.

Hands busy he catalogued every inch of plating, every curve and plane. He traced seams he had never seen before and fine tracing scars that bespoke of injuries so drastic that even a nightwalker should not have survived. How long he worked, he had no knowledge. He could not tell from the glowing candles adding additional brightness to the room if daylight yet shone or if the night still ruled the heavens. This city, his duties, the many ill and wounded cared for in other wards across his district suddenly no longer mattered. Only here, these two mechs, only they registered in his processors.

What seemed like an eternity flashed by in a spark beat, before he was sealing the last section of plating back in place on Sideswipe's frame. Ratchet sighed, not weary but relieved. The hardening of the fuel lines and thickened nodes of the neural relays had diminished. Not by much, but some. Sideswipe yet had hope.

With the hopeful prognosis Ratchet turned to the still unconscious Sunstreaker, repeating the process and finding to his horror even more fine scars tracing along the shimmering golden armor. Beneath the shiny exterior Sunstreaker's chassis was horrific from old damages and suddenly Ratchet feared he knew why the vain mech who always focused on his exterior perfection had such terrible ancient scars lacing through his under plating.

Sunstreaker had allowed their family, whatever family they had had back then, to focus on Sideswipe's condition and all injuries were hidden, covered and allowed to fester in ways that produced scars even in powerful nightwalkers. Ratchet's opinion of the pair slowly altered through his examinations. Sideswipe had been the more fragile of the two. Sickening when contaminated by too much mechblood and Sunstreaker, the more doting of the pair protected him the only way he could.

At least, Ratchet thought as he stumbled across several scar tracings on Sunstreaker's chassis near his interface circuits, he hoped that was all it was. Otherwise he was dealing with victims of the worst sort of abuse. He swallowed thickly, and worked on the scars tracing in deep, long trails from spike housing to spark. Buffing, gently mending he made the scars diminish as he had with the rare tracings along Sideswipe's frame.

Finally, finished, weary and somewhat feeling as if by tending their old wounds he had made himself whole, Ratchet finally sealed his healing kit. Like the past nights since they had come to the inn he turned to the couch for his rest, and pulled up short just before he sat down.

He had, somewhere in his recharge, led himself to believe that he'd wake up to them staring at him, counting his intakes as he rested …

The memory came back like a blow to the internals, nearly doubling him over with the remembered sensation of having been used. He turned looking to the pair on the berth and sighed. They had left him with the impression that he had been used. They, however, had been used by him. He buried his face in his hands, nearly keening his grief. He had used them.

Finally, spinal strut straight and shoulders back and strong, he returned to the berth. With a sigh, wondering if this was really his best idea, he stripped down to his tunic and slipped between the twins. Tonight he would watch them as they rested counting each intake and thanking Primus that they yet lived. Sitting against the head board he pulled them closer, one then the other, resting their helms against his pelvic plating and thigh as his hands ghosted over their helms.


Brilliant sunlight striking First Aid's shuttered optics wrenched him painfully from deep recharge. He sat up wearily, blinking away the spots blurring his vision. Ratchet had been a slave driver since they left Pax Crystalia. Now, at least, First Aid knew why. He scrubbed his hands over his face and pulled himself from his berth, noting wryly that Wheeljack had already vanished from their room.

He emerged from his room moments later staggering from exhaustion still heavy in his frame. He needed his morning ration, and to get out of the inn before Ratchet woke and came out bellowing for their work to be done. Despite the trepidation of facing his mentor First Aid could not shut out the memory of his words to Ratchet the night before. A cold, dreadful feeling poured through his spark as he reached the closed door.

What if the twins had terminated in the night? What if Ratchet, grief stricken from Jack's and his accusations, had self terminated to follow them? The horrific thought of finding the three of them cold and grey, entwined in a frozen lovers' embrace made him tremble as he pushed open the door – and stared. There on the berth, lay Sideswipe and Sunstreaker naked as they day they were sparked lying against Ratchet, barely covered by his tunic asleep as if watching them, hands possessively placed along their helms.

"Let him rest." Jack whispered by Aid's side, smiling with his face mask down. "Maybe I'll become an uncle after this."

Aid shut the door and turned on his roommate scandalized, "You can't mean that!"

The alchemist shrugged with a roguish wink, "Hey, changed nightwalkers can't spark younglings. I know, I've tried as has every other sorry slagger in Goldstone. Once changed our interface array dies somewhat.

"Born nightwalkers, however have no such difficulties. Besides, our creators have been praying to become grand-creators since Ratchet left for the healing academy. Chromia thinks Ratchet is ten years beind her chronometer setting."

"Oh," Aid murmured while they headed towards the back door to the inn, one that led down into underground tunnels 'Jack used to travel by day. "Thank you Jack, for helping Ratchet."

Behind them, looking squeamish from the discussion they had to hear Cliffjumper and Bumblebee followed silently, the bodyguards to the apprentice. It still stung the pair to their laser cores that Wheeljack had gotten the drop on them their first morning guarding the apprentice. Yet, ture to their words they had never told Aid nor Ratchet who they were. Wheeljack took care of it and the terrifying nightwalker twins couldn't do anything about it – which made Cliffjumper smirk every time he saw them.


Sunstreaker slowly came to consciousness, optics heavy from his drugged recharge. His berth was warm, warmer than it had been since Ratchet had left them, somehow believing they had used him and left. He curled tighter into the berth, wishing for a second chance, for a way to make amends to their beloved healer. The spark that had freed them from their eternal prison the bright light in their endless darkness had left them. Only, instead of finding a smooth flat mattress beneath his hands he found curved hip plating and soft tunic material twining about his fingers.

He booted his optics looking up disbelievingly at the pale, pallid features of Ratchet's resting face. Part of Sunstreaker froze, somewhat disbelieving the prayers of a nightwalker being answered by Primus. Monster's did not dwell within the Creator's light, they only knew darkness. Above him Ratchet shifted, head lolling uncomfortably to the side and intakes whistling shrilly from the strain.

Sunstreaker snorted in amusement, the healer was going to be too stiff to move if he stayed sitting up like that. Shifting easily he moved to his knees, pushing Sideswipe's still slumbering form gently aside to pull Ratchet down between them where he belonged. Sunstreaker curled around the resting healer in his arms, tugging Sideswipe to rest once more against the white plating. Wondering if this was the second chance at happiness he had prayed for, or if this was the last moment before they terminated from Sideswipe's hardening fuel lines and his own broken spark.

::Is he with us?:: Sideswipe's presence asked weakly across their bond to his brother. Deep lingering hope tinged his mental voice.

::For now:: Sunstreaker murmured back bleakly. He could not believe in good fortune, history had shown him such was folly. Why else would every good thing in their agonizing existence be stolen from them?

Despite Sunstreaker's melancholy Sideswipe smiled slightly, frame too taxed to even boot his optics. Still he leaned closer to Ratchet enjoying the healer's warmth. They rested as the morning sunshine through their window brightened, relishing in being able to hold the healer.

:: Didn't he say he could sense us? The nightwalkers?:: Sideswipe finally asked, feeling restless from the long, enforced bed rest.

Sunstreaker scrutinized the healer's face intently, mind going back over the last few weeks, recalling the healer's words. Ratchet had, somewhere, mentioned felling the nightwalkers of Steeldale. Of sensing their presence nearby and closing in while in Pax Crystalia. Sunstreaker frowned, mind paralleling his brother's as they came to the same burning question. :: Then why can't we feel him? ::

Optics slitted Sunstreaker thought over their dilemma. They needed to know what Ratchet thought and how he felt. Yet they could not trust to words. They had to know the depths of his spark. With a smirk Sunstreaker leaned forward, kissing lightly along Ratchet's strong jaw and neck. Nuzzling close, hands tracing exposed seams along the white chassis, smirking as the healer shifted restlessly in his recharge. The healer's pale lips slowly parted, glossa tapping his lower lip plating with a huff of increased intakes.

:: Find him, :: Sunstreaker ordered his twin casting Sideswipe like a hawk after prey to seek the tenuous bond between the healer and them. Hands and glossa mapped the healer's swiftly heating frame making Ratchet writhe slightly beneath him. In the back of his mind Sunstreaker felt Sideswipe pull away from the twin bond seeking Ratchet's spark. As his brother pursued their lover's connection to them Sunstreaker continued his delightful toils of waking their lover with arousing caresses.

"Not that I'm complaining, but is this the only way you know to wake me up?" Ratchet asked thickly, sleep still heavy in his processors. Optics deepened to late sky blue of needy desire he could only focus on Sunstreaker's attentions. Mindlessly he reached for Sunstreaker, pulling his lover closer in a deep kiss, the past weeks of angst forgotten in his haze of needy, sleepy lust. Glossae tangling they moved together hands tracing along sensitive seams, igniting ribbons of burning lust coursing through each others' frames. Fingers mindlessly delved beneath armor plating searching out the spots that would make the other writhe deliciously.

They moved languidly in their lovemaking neither rushing as they built their mingling desire. Sunstreaker continued his gentle nips, for once his desire to enthrall his lover little more than a mild hunger letting him focus on enticing Ratchet's unbridled lust. In the back of his mind, distantly from Sideswipe's side of the bond deep frustration seeped towards him as Ratchet continued to elude their intangible clutches.

Shifting swiftly, Sunstreaker flipped his position putting Ratchet above him in a neat twist of their frames, "I want you in me." He whispered harshly in the healer's audio freezing the white frame above him.

Ratchet pulled back, searching Sunstreaker's twilight dark optics hesitantly, "Are you sure?"

Sunstreaker could only nod realizing that he was trembling in anticipation of taking the healer's spike. He smiled as Ratchet leaned down hungrily consuming him with his searing kiss. Hands now hot as magnesium flame burned their way down his frame igniting his circuits into needy conflagration. He needed the healer now.

As if sensing his urgency Ratchet was suddenly between his spread legs kissing from knee to thigh nipping intermittently drawing wanton mewls from the golden nightwalker. Sunstreaker wanted to seal his lips, to cease the needy sound he never knew he was capable of making. As the golden mech tried to silence his own cries Ratchet nipped sharply at the pristine interface panel tasting rich lubricant while the tang of high quality wax mingled in his olfactory sensors.

Gasping at the stimulation Sunstreaker's panel snapped opened with a soft snick. Writhing and undulating as Ratchet's glossa lapped teasingly along the outer rim of his valve, teasing exterior nodes made Sunstreaker moan his pleasure so deeply the bed frame vibrated. Ratchet swallowed dryly glossa delving deeply into Sunstreaker's wet, dripping valve stimulating the sensitive surfaces and buried nodes while drinking desperately of the sheer amethyst hued lubricant that tasted of Primus' heavenly nectar.

It wasn't enough Sunstreaker could not find the words to demand what he needed and only mewled his complaints as he longed for something more filling him. He thrust himself against the healer's mouth pushing the searching glossa deeper into his clutching channel, needing, longing to be stretched by Ratchet's thick, hot spike.

Suddenly Ratchet pulled away, reeling as if slapped in his need. He had barely slipped his glossa from Sunstreaker's depths before thick fingers worn from years of work slipped into the nightwalker's soaked entrance stretching and stimulating the innermost depths. Shaking, optics too bright with desire Ratchet slipped his fingers free of the clenching nirvana Sunstreaker offered.

Teasingly, with deliciously slow ecstasy Ratchet thrust his burning spike into the achingly cool drenched channel. Sunstreaker writhed as the burning heat filled him clinging desperately to the white frame above him seeking to be ever closer to Ratchet. Fully seated, their frames pressing almost painfully close Sunstreaker knew it still was not enough. Ratchet's spike pulsing within him in time with the dawn fae's pounding spark the press of searing plating that radiated blistering heat tight against his frame and still Sunstreaker needed more.

Sideswipe's presence along their twin bond appeared then, delivering the gateway to knowing Ratchet's spark to satisfy Sunstreaker's aching need to be one in every way with the healer above him. Slipping along the mental pathway he slipped deeply into Ratchet's burning desire, bathed in his tangible fears and achingly tenuous affection for the brothers that dominated his attention. Only when his need to know his place in Ratchet's spark was sated could Sunstreaker finally move with the healer; his lust trebled in intensity.

Suddenly desperate to feel the healer moving within him Sunstreaker grasped desperately for the form impaling him and forced the other to move. Ratchet ground his hips slowly against Sunstreaker's building the nightwalker's desire slowly as he fought the stronger form's intent. Sunstreaker keened, spark singing from his chest as the connection to the healer flooded with desire and intense need.

Desperately Ratchet finally pistoned his hips thrusting ever harder, the shriek of metal impacting metal filling the room with the sound of overworked intakes and systems burning too hot adding accompaniment to the rhythm of their love making.

Above him Ratchet shifted, dark jade green optics hazy with lust, his spike reaching deeper as Sunstreaker was spread obscenely across the berth allowing Ratchet to reach a hidden node that made the world explode behind Sunstreaker's optics spiraling him as he overloaded lost in all consuming rapture.

Ratchet gasped as Sunstreaker's valve tightened desperately about him making his thrusts smaller and strained before he finally found his release. His world explodes while static consumed his vision and all his overwhelmed processors could register was the feel of Sunstreaker.

Sated, they collapsed, intakes heaving while they rested. Ratchet felt strutless and blissfully lethargic as Sunstreaker's valve continued to milk his spike. Both trembled and shuddered, desperate and grateful Ratchet gently kissed Sunstreaker down from his high, soothing the larger mech until the last of his trembling had ceased. Then the memories returned.

Are you ready to listen now or do you still want to kill your patient? Wheeljack's echoing words from the previous night forced the horrible events to revive blindingly behind Ratchet's optics. The last two weeks tumbled through his processors so much of his memories blurring by while others, more painful and despicable held frozen behind his optics branding his selfishness and callousness into his spark. His optics snapped open as the memories over took him and he found himself staring straight into Sideswipe's sated, weary optics.

Sideswipe rode his brother's overload as if it were his own, drowning in the emotional torrent that flooded in from Ratchet and Sunstreaker's sides of their bond. His systems hummed contentedly, the ghostly presence of Ratchet's spike filling Sunstreaker almost too much to take in his weakened state. Still he would rather face the burning sun unprotected than lose this connection.

He watched as Ratchet's strutless frame suddenly stiffened, worry and fear flooding in from the healer's side of the bond and suddenly he was staring into worried green optics. "You're alive." Ratchet breathed, an unsteady hand tracing Sideswipe's face and making the residual agony of his illness fade with the ghosting fingers.

Sideswipe sighed, leaning imperceptibly against Ratchet's hand as his optics shuttered enjoying the caress. "Can you forgive us?"

"You?" Ratchet sighed, pulling out of Sunstreaker with a groaned hum. He turned to face Sideswipe completely, "Aside from not leaving a note, you did nothing wrong –"

"Good," Sunstreaker shrugged slightly pulling Ratchet down to lay between them once more.

"That's it? I put you two through the Pits for weeks, you nearly self destruct from my actions and that's it?" Ratchet asked bewildered, his spark writhing between a dozen emotions all dark, all directed at himself.

Sideswipe weakly pulled a hand to his lips, kissing the cherry red plating lightly, "Yes," He gazed deeply into optics deepening from forest green to dark depression blue. "You feel everything so strongly, especially your fears."

Ratchet froze, suddenly realizing what the crimson nightwalker was saying. "You – you're in my processors."

"No," Sunstreaker turned Ratchet gently to face him, "We can only sense what emotions you feel. We never wanted to control your processors, we just needed to know your spark." The golden nightwalker leaned forward, capturing Ratchet's lips in a gentle, worshipping kiss.

"What next?" Ratchet sighed, he was not done with the twins, not by a long shot. They still had a lot to answer for, but for now they just needed to rest.

"We need to get cleaned up." Sunstreaker pulled Ratchet from the berth with one hand and gathered his brother in his arms. Turning he headed to the in suite wash racks grateful to finally have that steamy shower scene he had been losing rest over since they had last made love to their healer.

Ratchet sighed slightly once the hot spray washed over his frame then looked over Sideswipe's weakly standing frame with a dark optic leer. "Too bad Sideswipe's not in peak condition."