Author's Notes: So this story is starting to take a mind of its own. I intended this to be a collection of short stories at first, but now it's something much more! Not that that's a bad thing... I'm just giving you all a warning. And you can thank Nova for a lot of the prank ideas coming up, I couldn't have thought up all of them on my own!
Sideswipe pranced through the Ark. It had been about two weeks since the paint balloon incident, and although Prowl had obviously been peeved about the situation, he had done practically nothing to punish the twins. True, Sideswipe and Sunstreaker had had to clean the mess up around Prowl's office door, but cleaning up after their own pranks was so routine now that it was basically part of the deal. Bluestreak had finally stopped looking up whenever he approached a doorway, Prowl hadn't sentenced them to hard labor, and so even though it was a whole fourteen days after the last prank, Sideswipe was still glowing with victory. He wanted to test the bounds of this new found freedom, and so he was currently in the throes of his second most favorite thing to do, and that was formulating his next practical joke (second only to pummeling Decepticons on the battle field, and one above teasing Sunstreaker about his paint job).
What to do, Sideswipe thought as he made his way to collect his work schedule for the day. Another direct attack on Prowl? Or should he beat around the bush a little bit first, circle in, like a sharkticon? Prowl was the tactician, but little did he know that Sideswipe also had a love for the game, however in his case his goal was not to defeat the 'cons on the field, but to find the most effective way to peeve of his superior officer.
But for now it was time to collect his schedule. Sideswipe entered the crew room, shoved his way past a couple minibots, and found his own name on the time sheet. He read his day's activities over, read them again, and then again. And then he frowned.
"Sunsteaker!" Sideswipe burst into the room he shared with his twin. "Prowl's given me the weirdest schedule today!"
"Oh," Sunstreaker dead panned, seemingly uninterested as he lay on his back inspecting some new paint bottles he had recently received.
"Yeah," Sideswipe continued. "First: 10 am to 1:30, patrolling the forest route that Hound usually takes. Next: 2:15 to 6:00 pm, guard duty?"
"Guard duty?" Sunstreaker echoed in confusion.
"Yeah, what the frag is guard duty?! Have you ever heard of that?"
"Nope," said Sunstreaker, already disinterested in the conversation.
"Well, I'm calling Prowl," Sideswipe declared. He activated his comm. and didn't even bother hailing the tactician before bursting into his audios.
"Prowl! What the frag is guard duty?!"
"You have really got to stop doing that." Prowl replied, in reference to the uninvited conversation start.
"Yeah whatever, but you didn't answer my question, what the frag is guard duty?"
"You stand in front of the main entrance, and you guard it," Prowl said simply.
"From what!"
"From intruders."
"What intruders? And besides, that's what Red's security system is for; doesn't he have like a bazillion cameras just for the main entrance?"
"He has five. One of them is going to be down for maintenance between 2:15 and 6:00 pm, so Red Alert would like somebody to keep watch during that time," Prowl responded.
"Tell Red to shove it! That's the dumbest thing I've ever heard," Sideswipe ranted.
"I will not tell Red Alert to shove it. I don't know why you are complaining, this is a relatively simple task to complete, even for you."
"Oh, that was a burn Prowl."
"I try."
"What are you going to do if I refuse?"
"The usual."
"Hmpf. Fine, I'll do it."
"Of course you will. Now go away, I have important stuff to do." And with that Prowl cut the link and the conversation was over.
Sideswipe huffed and flopped down on his own bunk. "Ugh, then I have to clean out the wash racks, at 6:15!"
"What's my schedule," Sunstreaker asked, ignoring Sideswipe's last remark.
"I don't know, get off your aft and figure it out for yourself!"
o~o~o
The red frontliner stood in front of the Ark at 9:55 am, waiting for whoever it was he was going to be patrolling with. Much to his displeasure, it had rained last night and so the patrol route was going to be made of mud. But whatever, the dirt didn't bother him nearly as much as it did his egotistical brother.
"Let's get this over with."
Speak of the devil; Sideswipe was startled to find the golden warrior himself walking past.
"Hey, what're you doing?" Sideswipe asked as he hustled to catch up.
"Idiot, we have the same schedule."
"Really?"
"Yeah."
"Huh, what the heck was Prowl thinking?"
Sunstreaker just grunted. And that was the start of awesomely not-fun day. The route was in fact made of mud, and Sunstreaker refused to go down any path where he might get even a little splashed, even though he was already dirty from the trip so far. As a result, Sideswipe had to go on his own more times than not while his brother stayed behind and buffed his armor.
In addition, Sideswipe was forced to listen to Sunstreaker's complaining, his groaning, his grumbling, and his moaning the entire time. Little known fact: Sideswipe actually couldn't stand his brother's constant complaining, not in the long run at least. People thought that he could put up with it because they shared the same room and spent a lot of time together. Oh, and because they were split-spark twins. But in reality, being exposed to Sunstreaker's negative personality for long periods of time really grated on Sideswipe's nerves, and right now all he wanted to do was punch him in his big, ugly (yes, he said it) face. And then shove it in the mud. And then sit on it.
Well, luckily for Sunstreaker's face, Sideswipe had somehow managed to restrain himself until it was 1:30 and time for them to head back in. They passed Hound as they were trudging back into the Ark.
"Oh, are you the guys who took my morning shift?" Hound asked when he saw them approaching. "I don't know how that happened, that's the shift I always have!"
"Yeah, we noticed," Sideswipe grunted as he walked behind his brother. Sunstreaker didn't even acknowledge the existence of the scout as he led the way inside. Hound watched them disappear into the Ark, shrugged, and then walked off.
"We have half an hour before 'guard duty'" Sideswipe said, putting air quotes around the description of their next task. "Wanna hit the wash racks?"
"Where do you think I was going?" Sunstreaker snapped back.
Of course, Sideswipe thought. Where did I think Sunstreaker was going?
The two eventually made it to the wash racks, to find them completely empty. Not that either of them minded. They each chose a station as far away from each other as possible and proceeded to wash the mud off of their armor.
Sideswipe finished first. "Hey Sunny," he said as he walked toward the dryers. Sunstreaker just grunted, so Sideswipe continued, "Does something seem weird about the soap?"
"What do you mean?"
"I don't know, like it's kind of sticky or something."
"Maybe we're using a different solvent now," Sunstreaker replied absentmindedly as he scrubbed vigorously at a fleck of dirt that didn't seem to want to come off.
"Hm," was all Sideswipe had to say. He found a suitable dryer and pressed the button to activate it. What came next, he was not expecting.
"Geeyaa! What the frag!"
Sunstreaker looked up at the sound of his brother's alarm. "What happened to you?"
"I don't know!" Sideswipe responded. He was now completely covered in some kind of white and glittery powder. He rubbed furiously at his armor, but with no success. "It's not coming off!"
"Well, how did that happen?" Sunstreaker asked as he approached his now white and glittery twin.
"I just turned on the dryer, and then this! Gah fraggit!" Sideswipe exclaimed as he now tried to scrape the stuff off, only managing to remove a thin layer off the top.
Sunstreaker poked Sideswipe's armor, and then shook his hand vigorously when the powder stuck to his finger.
"Wait," Sideswipe said and grabbed Sunstreaker's arm to get him to stop shaking it.
Sunstreaker jerked his arm away, "Don't touch me!" he exclaimed. But it was too late, a white handprint had been left on his armor. He glared at his brother.
"Dude, I think we've been pranked," Sideswipe informed the other.
"No, you've been pranked," said Sunstreaker as he turned to walk away. 'I'm getting out of here, and I'm not touching anything for the next week. So good luck with... all of that on your 'guard duty,'"
Sideswipe glared at his golden twin. And suddenly, he decided that he didn't have to put up with this. So before Sunstreaker could get very far, Sideswipe smashed his fist into the button for the dryer next to him and in seconds the other mech was engulfed in a cloud of white glitter.
"Aaargh! Sideswiiipe!"
"Slag!" Sideswipe yelped and raced out of the wash room, his enraged and glittery twin hot on his tailpipe.
Sideswipe led his brother on a merry chase through the Ark. They ran through the main passageway, past the rec room, through the officer's conference room, up two flight decks, and finally into a room along the hallway. Sideswipe slammed the door shut before Sunstreaker could follow him, backing away as the furious mech pounded on the other side.
"Can I help you?"
Sideswipe whirled around, to find himself face to face with Prowl. He had just barged into the tactician's office.
Prowl looked Sideswipe up and down before he spoke up again. "And what happened to you?"
"Uh, Prowl! I think we've been pranked!" Sideswipe said.
"Do you?"
"Yeah! Look at me, do you think I would have done this to myself?"
"I don't know and I don't care what you do with your spare time, Sideswipe, but I do know that you and your brother have guard duty in five minutes. So it looks like you're going to have to calm your brother down and get out there pretty fast," said Prowl as he listened to Sunstreaker rage at the other side of his door.
Sideswipe gaped at Prowl. "Seriously? We are not standing outside for four hours like this!"
"Oh I think you are. Or else do you want me to get Ratchet involved?"
"Pft, seriously? What are you going to make Ratchet do? Beat us up?"
Prowl looked up at Sideswipe with a 'don't question my ways' kind of look. "Would you rather stand in front of the Ark like that voluntarily, or have Ratchet march you out there and make sure you stay out there?"
o~o~o
Five minutes later found Sideswipe and Sunstreaker standing guard in front of the Ark's main entrance. It was a sunny day after the rain last night, and so their glitter-coated armor glinted nicely in the bright light.
Sunstreaker had his arms crossed and a surly expression on his face. "Your pathetic," he informed his shimmering duplicate.
"You're here too, glitch face," Sideswipe snapped back.
The two stood in silence. For the next half hour, they stood in silence. Several 'bots passed by during the time; they all gave the twins odd looks but simply kept walking. Until Tracks found them. He walked out of the Ark, saw the two standing on either side of him, and gave them a funny look but kept walking. He walked for a bit, without looking away, until finally he stopped and came back, facing Sideswipe.
"I have to ask, what are you two doing?" Tracks asked.
Sunstreaker completely ignore the mech, but Sideswipe glared at him. "guard duty," he said.
"Guard duty?" Tracks said, confused. "What are you doing that for?"
"One of Red's camera's is being worked on, so we have to keep watch" Sideswipe gritted out, now glaring ahead.
"Really? That's the most ridiculous thing I have ever heard!" Tracks laughed. "And I have to ask, what is all over your armor?"
By now Sideswipe's face was screwed up in anger, and he really wanted to sock Tracks in the mouth right now. But he somehow restrained himself and answered the question, "I don't know, it came out of the dryers in the wash racks."
"Oh, didn't you get the memo?" Tracks asked. "Prowl sent out a message that the wash racks were out of order today."
Sideswipe stood in silence for a second, fuming. "Obviously we didn't," he finally said in a hardly restrained voice.
"Haha! It looks like you two got a taste of your own medicine!" And Tracks laughed again. He turned and walked away, still laughing hard.
Sideswipe was furious. This was the most humiliated he had ever been, and it didn't get better. As the next few hours passed, quite a few mechs saw them on their 'guard duty.' The two received a mixture of reactions: Ironhide gave them a bewildered look before turning away, shaking his head and muttering "kids these days;" Jazz took one look at the two and burst out laughing; Wheeljack saw the material they were covered with and said "Oh, so that's what that was used for!" before chuckling and leaving; and finally Tracks got a second laugh at them as he was returning to the Ark.
Finally, as their horrendous shift was coming to a close, Hound passed them by as he was coming back from a long patrol. He gave them that same odd look that everybody had been giving them throughout the day. "What happ..."
"IT WAS THE WASH RACKS! And no we didn't get the memo!" Sideswipe burst at the scout, finally losing patience with the situation.
Hound jumped at the shout. "Oh, okay," he said and walked into the Ark.
Several more minutes of silence passed. But suddenly a realization dawned on Sideswipe and he smashed his fist against the hull of the Ark behind him. "That fragger!" he growled. "Sunny, it was Prowl! Think about it, he scheduled all of this, and our next job is to clean the wash racks!"
"Yeah, and you just realized that?" Sunstreaker replied from where he hadn't budged an inch for the last four hours.
"He's getting his revenge for the last pranks we pulled on him," Sideswipe continued, ignoring Sunstreaker's smart remark. "Well don't worry, our retaliation will be swift!"
o~o~o
Prowl was quite pleased with himself. Several days ago he had pulled off what he felt was a successful retaliation against Sideswipe and Sunstreaker. Although he knew this wouldn't stop the twins' pranking behavior, he hoped he had gotten the message across that he was willing to capable of stooping to their level to punish them. And he considered his 'prank' quite the success. He'd even gotten those twins to clean up after his own mess.
So yes, Prowl was pleased. He strolled through the Ark, with what was as close to a smile on his face as he could possibly get. That smile was going to be short lived.
He finally reached his office and punched in his personal access code. When the door swooshed open for him, he was stunned, and his doorwings drooped in shock. Every inch of surface in his office was covered... with data pads. From the ceiling to the floor to the walls to the desk, there wasn't a bit that wasn't data pad. There were hundreds of them, and not even his chair or even the legs of his chair had been spared the treatment.
Prowl was stupefied. The one question on his mind was how. He already knew who, and then by default why, but how? He had just been in his office last evening, how in the Pit did those two manage this in one night. He was still standing in the doorway trying to process the event, when he finally noticed something out of place. It was still a data pad, but this one wasn't stuck to a surface, it was innocently sitting on top of other pads on his desk, almost inviting him to come hither.
Now came the hard part. Prowl couldn't leave this obvious message unread, but first he had to get to it, which meant walking all over the data pads, which meant the possibility of breaking them, which meant the possibility of losing precious data. Prowl looked down at the path he was to take to his desk, and quirked an optic ridge in mild amusement. A trail of footsteps had been painted onto the ground leading to the beckoning message, in white glittery paint. How quaint.
And so Prowl carefully stepped into his office, cringing as the screens cracked under his pedes. When he reached the waiting pad, he picked it up and turned it on. The message that appeared was bold and clear: "Do you really want to play this game?"
Oh yes he did want to play this game. Prowl had never before wanted so badly to get back at the twins. The opportunity was here, if he backed out now he'd be letting them win. And he would never do that. But, looking around the room, Prowl recognized the fact that he was up against some stiff competition, and that he was entering a field he was not the expert in. He was the tactician, and he knew when he needed backup.
o~o~o
Prowl's office door swooshed open and Jazz bounced in. "Ya rang?" he asked as he pulled back the waiting chair and plopped himself into it.
"Yes, I did," said Prowl as he rearranged some data pads. Prowl had spent a long time clearing his office of the objects, and with each data pad he unstuck from the surface of the room his drive to get back at the twins grew more intense. During the time he had given much thought to who would be best to help him on his mission, and who would be willing. To him the answer was clear.
"Well, what'd ya want?" Jazz prompted. "Not in trouble am I," he asked with a grin.
"No," Prowl responded. "But I do need to ask a favor of you."
"K, shoot," said Jazz.
Prowl explained the situation, and when he was finished Jazz just stared at him. "Lemme get this straight," he finally said, sitting forward. "You," and here he pointed at Prowl, "want me," and he pointed at himself, "to help you," point at the tactician, "to prank Sideswipe and Sunstreaker?"
"Yes."
"Seriously?"
"Yes."
"An' I'm not gonna get in trouble or nothin' from it?"
"Seeing as how I would be helping, it would be illogical to punish you without punishing myself as well. So no."
Jazz stared at Prowl again, considering the proposal. For a good couple of seconds he just sat there and stared, until a wolfish grin spread across his face.
"I'm in!"
Author's Notes: Begin the war! And by the way, did anyone figure out what the title is supposed to mean? Instead of "rest and recreation," it's "revenge and retaliation." So if you didn't figure that out, well now you know.