Chapter 16
-0-In an Autobot's quarters, boy's night in
"I thought my processor would explode. Its bad enough that you know, but to see it..." The expression on Sunstreaker's face was priceless.
Sideswipe who was lounging on his berth ate it up. "What do you expect? They're spark bonded," he said.
"Not in public. Not in front of … of impressionable minds," Sunny whined as he shook his helm with disgust. "Its like watching your genitors … you know."
"I think it's cute," Sideswipe said as he grinned at his brother's discomfort.
Sunstreaker shot him a look that could curdle milk. "You didn't see it. You had to be there," he retorted.
"There's worse," Sideswipe said as he considered the couples that existed in the world that could be so much more gruesome than a little Hatchet-Ironhide snogging.
"Name one," Sunstreaker said, goading his brother on.
Sides thought a moment then grinned. "Megatron and Starscream."
Smokescreen who was laying on the other berth with a still sore but essentially healed leg groaned. "That's a picture I don't need in my processor."
"Welcome to my world," Sunstreaker said with a smirk. "Actually, imagine it. Megatron and Screamer. I wonder if he is?"
They all groaned as Sideswipe kicked his brother. It settled a moment again.
Then Smokescreen smiled.
"What?" Sunny asked as he settled back against the wall, the ball they used for 'basketball' bouncing in his hands, one to the other. "Tell, Smokey."
Smokescreen had the good grace to look abashed but he said it anyway. "Prime and Prowl."
It was quiet for a moment as the twins and the others mulled it over, then Sunny shook his head. "Prowl in the sack. I don't know. I don't know how you can keep the icicles off your prong."
Groans bloomed like roses in the room as Bumblebee and Blaster joined in, shaking their heads at the golden Lamborghini who was smirking with satisfaction. "You know it's true!" he said laughing loudly. "Just ask Starscream."
Laughter greeted that remark.
Then Sideswipe shook his head. "Starscream. What a terrible 'face that would be. I can't imagine."
"He's in a trine with two other idiots," Smokescreen said. "I wonder what a trine would be like?" he asked looking pointedly at Bumblebee as he said it.
Bee with surprise grinned at Smokey like the wiseacre little doodle that he was. "You never know until you ask."
They all laughed out loud noisily, then Blaster elbowed Bee. "His heart belongs to the AllSpark. It's a religion thing. He took a vow," he said as Bee leaned over to shove him to the floor. Blaster laughed loudly but didn't fight the mini-con. He surrendered as Bee sat back up with a huge grin on his face.
"That's you, Bee," Sunstreaker said with a knowing smirk on his face. "Religious."
Guffaws met that remark, then it got quiet for a moment.
"Sunny, how's Blue and when can he get out?" Blaster asked.
"I don't know about getting out but he's doing pretty good. That slaggin' Ravage. If he comes back again, he's mine." The look of predatory hatred on Sunstreaker's face was cautionary.
Then Sideswipe tapped him with his ped. "Do you really think Prime and Prowl are a bad match up?" he asked.
Sunstreaker thought a moment, then shrugged. "He's not my cup of tea. I don't begrudge him wanting to be with someone but I've never seen it."
"I heard he was with Sentinel," Blaster offered as he combed his data banks for details to find nothing firm.
"He's been S.I.C. since before the birth of Unicron. He's been through two Primes before Optimus," Sunny replied. "He's always been paired off with the Prime at hand by everyone with an opinion. It's because our Prowler has no life that anyone can find, even with Perceptor looking."
It was silent a moment.
"That's sad," Bee said. He thought back to his own interactions with Sentinel Prime when he was Sentinel Minor and in charge of his boot camp experience. There were 'misunderstandings' and Bee had found himself in the courtyard one night holding filled fuel barrels in each arm repeating "I'm a worthless oil stain, I'm a worthless oil stain" over and over. He shrugged. "Sentinel is a glitch head. All due respect..." he trailed off.
"You can't get over that moment can you?" Smokescreen said with a grin. "You almost flattened Sentinel when those things tipped over on him. You were lucky you weren't turned into garbage can liners."
"With *all due respect*," Bumblebee replied waggling his optic ridges.
They laughed, then Sideswipe thought out loud. "It seems so sad that poor Prowler has no one. Don't you think that's sad?"
To his surprise, most of the room did.
-0-Wheeljack's lab
First Aid sat on the couch, his angst angsting overtime as Wheeljack provided the shoulder. "I don't understand. They're on, then off, then on again. I can't keep it straight. Its like sitting down among fuel cans and blow torches. You never know what's going to explode in your face. And I can't get them out of my head wrestling in the lab." He looked at Wheeljack who was looking back at him with a fond gentle expression. "Do you know?"
"I do," Wheeljack said smiling behind his blast mask. "I've known Ratchet for such a long time. When he and Ironhide hooked up, no one could get it for a while and some still don't. But they're spark mates, two sparks destined to be together. They have a public face and a private one, a loving intense private side. You just happened to see them as they are to each other."
First Aid considered that, then shook his head. "It's pretty nice actually. Ironhide is sort of huge and interesting."
"That he is," Wheeljack said, laughing. "Most people don't get how smart he is because he's ready to fight at the drop of a hat. That's programming. His family's from Praxus. He came from colossal money and had the best schooling. He's smart, tactical and could do a lot of things but he likes soldiering best. It's the family occupation among other things. Even his ada's family is amazingly interesting. The best part of him, the part that glitches your processor comes out around Ratchet. And with Ratchet, the funny side, the good side comes out, too. They compliment each other."
First Aid sat back. "Thank you, Wheeljack. I just wondered if its safe to go back."
"You never know until you try."
He grinned and patted Wheeljack's leg. "Thank you. I better get back. I have to check on Bluestreak."
"How is he?" Wheeljack asked as he stood up, too.
"He's going to be off duty a few orns but he's going to be alright."
"Good," Wheeljack said. He walked First Aid to the door and as he did First Aid turned to look at the engineer. "Uh, the next time you decide to tie one on let me know. I think I need practice on the wild side."
Wheeljack snickered. "I will."
With that, First Aid left the room.
A bubbling sound attracted Wheeljack's attention away from First Aid's nice shapely aft and with a shake of his head, he walked back to the table to work.
-0-At the soldier's barracks
They sat together, soldiers from the same training group polishing and cleaning their gear and weapons. The soldiers who'd left on the mission with the Autobots were being grilled by those who hadn't. They were curious about both it and working with the big bots.
One of them, a big brawny corporal named James 'Big Jim' Johnson listened, his arms crossed over a very muscular chest as his feet rested on his foot locker. "So, what's it like fighting with them?" he asked.
Arne Feltman looked up from the barrel of his rifle held in his hands as he cleaned it, having first broken it down. "Awesome. Ironhide is the man. The mech," he said correcting himself. "All of them are awesome. Bluestreak is just a kid I hear but he's got a pair. And Mirage … the first time I saw him disappear I almost crapped my pants."
Johnson nodded, the oddities appealing even if the delivery system wasn't. "What are they like together? How do they act?"
Feltman glanced at his bunk neighbor, a soldier named Oscar Richards.
Richards shrugged. "They're pros. They know what they're doing and they save it for the battlefield."
"They can communicate together without speaking … something they have inside. That makes their stealth something to see. They also don't seem to have any fear because they'll stand up and fire directly when return fire is incoming. They can take a lot of hits and they self-repair to a degree or so I'm told," Arne Feltman said.
Richards nodded. "I never saw such soldiers before. They forgot more about soldiering than we can learn and their sensors can find the enemy from miles away. I love working with them. They're great teachers and beautiful to watch. Especially the twins. Those two can corner on a dime."
"You didn't go with Ratchet did you?" Johnson asked.
"No. He was with the Prague squad that went with the Prime. We were with Ironhide, Bluestreak, Sideswipe and Mirage. That was a blow out. You should have seen Ironhide's cannons destroy that building. There was nothing left when he was finished. Watching him take Ravage apart was amazing."
"I went to Prague with Ratchet and the others," Tom Seldon said glancing at Johnson as he reached for his beer. Polishing stuff was thirsty work. "Why?"
"I just heard a lot of stuff about that one and I wondered what he's really like. From our perspective," Johnson replied.
"He's one tough bastard and a sweet ride," Seldon said oblivious to the double entendre as he considered the seats in the Hummer that was Ratchet. They formed to fit your backside and that was awesome in his book among other things.
Johnson grinned. "I guess I'd have to ask Ironhide about that."
The three soldiers glanced up at him various expressions of surprise and distaste on their faces. They glanced at each other, all of them having heard disparaging remarks from the soldier and his friend, Sam Hedges, before. They were perpetually on the wrong side of Epps and Lennox and it was considered likely that they'd be cut if they didn't change or learn to shut their faces.
"That kind of remark will get you cut from here," Oscar said glaring at the big soldier. "You'd deserve it, too. You have a problem that they won't allow to be here when they figure it out. The relationship trumps everything. They told us when we came here and they mean it. Lennox will scrub you no matter what if you keep this shit up."
"I'm good at what I do. I can shoot, run and jump just about as well as anyone here. Better," Johnson said without a shred of humility. "Lennox needs me."
"Does he remind you of someone?" Feltman asked the others with a grin.
"He sure does," Oscar said with a chuckle. "Your favorite car doesn't happen to be a Lamborghini does it?"
"Which ones are the Lamborghinis?" Johnson asked after thinking for a moment.
"Man, you don't even have them memorized? What kind of problem do you have, Johnson?" Feltman asked as his irritation boiled over. He liked Sideswipe. Most of them did. They were aware of his vain mercurial brother and although he wasn't the most liked Autobot he was feared and respected for his unbelievable skills and courage. Sunstreaker was, in short, afraid of nothing.
"I don't have a problem," Johnson said picking up his beer to sip it. "They do."
"How?" Oscar asked with incredulity as he paused in his effort.
"First of all, where are the girls? There's no women. What's with that? They have weird relationships and they do weird shit. Don't tell me you don't see it, too. Ironhide and Ratchet are … they're not natural."
As he spoke, Sam Hedges came through the door and walked toward them. He sat on his bunk in nervous agitation, then tapped Johnson on the arm. "There's an Autobot outside. He wants to speak to you."
Johnson looked at him with surprise. "Which one? Who?" he asked with a trace of concern in his voice.
Finally.
"The yellow Lamborghini," Hedges said. "He's outside and he's locked and loaded. What the fuck did you do to him?"
Johnson sat up as concern finally showed up on his face. "Nothing. What does he want?"
"He wants to talk to you. Why? I wasn't going to ask the bastard. He's asking for you, not me." Hedges got up to walk to the window to peer outside.
A huge Autobot was there standing on his wheel skates, all twenty-five feet two inches, two point nine metric tons of lethal front-liner gleaming in the sunlight. Sunstreaker was waiting, his battle blades retracting into and disgorging out from his wrists as his door wings flared then resided with what they took for irritation. He looked good, really good and gleamed a brilliant yellow, waxed and beautiful as he waited for Johnson.
The others including four soldiers who were talking together at the other end of the barracks came forward to look out the window together. They glanced back at Johnson with concern on their faces when they saw who it was outside.
Sunstreaker.
The 'crazy one'.
They moved aside as Johnson came closer to stare out the window, a paler shade of himself than before. "I'm not going out there."
"Have you considered the possibility that if he wants you badly enough this barracks won't hold him out?" Oscar said as he watched all manner of emotions play across the big tough's face. "What the hell did you do to him?"
"Nothing! I didn't do a thing!" Johnson said as fear finally broke across his face.
"I'll go out," Feltman said tossing his rifle barrel onto his bunk. He began to go as Johnson stepped in front of him. "Are you nuts? Look at him. He could kill you just by stepping on you."
"Why would he? He isn't asking for me and I didn't do anything to him," Feltman said removing Johnson's hand from his chest.
"He's an alien. You don't even know what pisses him off," Johnson said turning to watch as seven foot swords slid in and out of Sunny's wrist gauntlets. He was turning small irritated circles as he waited, his face returning with each movement to remain on the barracks.
"I didn't piss him off and I'm not a coward," Feltman said pushing past Johnson. He walked to the door and collected himself as he assumed his game face. He opened the door and walked outside catching the big mech's attention right away.
They watched as he walked to Sunstreaker to holler up to him. They watched as the big mech bent down, his fearsome face framed with peaks and other metallic embellishments that swept from his jawline up to the top of his head as he moved close to Feltman. He looked as ferocious and exotic as anything that any of them had ever seen. He was alive, metallic and terrifying.
His blue optics were intent on the conversation he was having with Feltman and from time to time he would glance up to stare at the barracks. They could hear the sound of a high octane engine rev, then die down. After a few minutes, they could see another mech rolling in on tire skates, an exact match of Sunstreaker.
"Oh, fuck. Here comes Sideswipe," Hedges said moving back from the window.
"Count that as a good sign," Oscar said glancing at the two men. "Sides is the easy one."