The Diego Diaries: Strategy 2 (430) edited
-0-At the edge of the airfield
He stood watching the out world shuttle land, the one that serviced the forward bases even though there were now space bridges to do some of the work. Home Guard pilots and pilot-trainees were used to fly them to get experience. Within the system, the flights would continue. The shuttle settled, then the doors opened, the ramp coming down. Mechs began to step off along with the one he wanted. Out of view, he watched as they walked toward the city gear in servo. When they were far enough along he turned and hurried on his way.
-0-A short time later
He walked along the corridor leading to his apartment dragging his gear. Apparently, he was a 'glitch in the system' and was returned to Mars along with some equipment that needed repair. Reaching his door, he keyed the code and before he could open it a servo reached out and yanked him inside. The door slammed shut behind him.
-0-A short time later
He was pinned to the berth by a force of nature. Staring at the face above him he came to two conclusions. First, this was slagging awesome. Secondly, this was a big fragged up mess. He relaxed into the moment, his internals registering their immense approval, then he moved flipping his partner to pin him down himself. His partner grinned. "Nice move."
"I know," Hot Rod said with a smirk. "You aren't too bad yourself."
"I try," Smokey said. He twisted and turned, bucked and moved with all his might. Roddy pinned him meeting each measure with a counter measure. "Okay, I give up. What's my penalty?" he asked with a slight waggle of his optical ridges.
"I don't think the point is your penalty but mine." Hot Rod rolled off and relaxed on the berth.
Smokey suddenly deprived sat up and looked down at Hot Rod. "I realize I'm not the smoothest operator but I don't think I'm a total slag heap either."
"You aren't," Roddy said with a grin. "I didn't expect to be home for a while."
Smokey grinned. "You weren't. A friend of mine hacked the block on your orders and I got you back home. I have friends in the tech department of the city. And I know how you can thank me," he said leaning into Hot Rod.
A big servo pressed gently against Smokey's chassis pausing him. "Not so fast, sport."
"Why?" he asked sitting back up. "What's wrong?"
"Your grandatar paid me a visit on Io. He told me a few things I didn't know."
Smokey blinked. Then he leaned in with aggravation. "What did he say?"
"He told me that he loved you, Dev and him both. He also said you were Praxian. I didn't know what that meant until I followed his advice and looked it up," Hot Rod said.
Smokey looked at him for a moment, then flipped his legs off the bed. Rising, his wings arched in agitation, he moved to the door, then paused. Turning, he looked at Hot Rod. "So ... what does that mean for us?"
Hot Rod sat up and considered that. "He can invoke. If you and I frag and he doesn't like it I'm brigged."
Smokey looked at him. "We don't have to tell them. No one needs to know. Do you like me?" he asked in almost a plaintive voice.
Hot Rod nodded. "I do."
"Well, I like you," Smokey said walking closer. "Case closed. Right?"
"Its not that simple, Smokey," Hot Rod said gently.
Smokey looked at him. "It is for me." He turned and walked to the door. Before Hot Rod could clear the corridor the youngster was gone from the apartment. He stood staring at the door, then he swore. Life was truly fragged.
-0-At an apartment nearby
"You want anything to eat?"
"Sure," Smokescreen said as he sat on his chair reading the Autobot City Daily News.
Devcon made two plates, then turned and delivered one to the table, the other to his bond. Taking a beer for himself, he sat and began to eat. A stack of books awaited him as well as his own easy chair. The afternoon would be a pleasant passti-... A rap on the door caught both their attentions. "Come in," Dev said as both glanced at it.
It opened as an agitated grandson entered walking to the couch where he turned to glare at his grandfather. "Thanks."
"You're welcome," Smokescreen said. He glanced at Dev. "What is he talking about?"
"I don't now but he sure is polite," Dev said with a grin.
"Ha ha," Smokey said with some heat. "Thanks for ruining my life."
"This is your beating, Smoke," Dev said as he returned to his lunch plate.
Smokescreen grinned at Dev, then his grandson. "Sit down and relax, youngling. The sun will come up tomorrow."
"I was *HOPING* it would come with someone else there." Smokey crossed his arms and fixed his grandfather with an intense frown. He had no idea how adorable his grandgenitors thought he looked at that moment or he wouldn't do it ever again.
"And we are hoping that you will slow down and think with something besides your codpiece," Smokey said as he took a bite of his lunch. "Want a beer? There's one in the fridge."
Smokey glared at his grandfather then turned walking to the fridge. He took one out and popped the top staring defiantly at Smokescreen. "Don't *mind* if I do."
"Sit, youngling," Dev said as he put things to one side. He subbed a deck of cards and began to deal three hands. "Smoke, you in?"
Smokescreen picked up his plate and beer, then joined Dev. Taking his hand, he discarded two cards and got two more. Dev looked at Smokey. "How many cards, youngling?"
Smokey glared at both of them a moment, then sat and took his cards. All of them sucked. He tossed them at his grandada. "*ALL OF THEM*!"
Dev grinned and dealt the cards. "Did you do your homework, Smokescreen?"
"*NO*!"
He would later.
"Are you going to tell us what's on your processor? You know your grandatar and I don't like to see you upset," Dev said with a smirk.
"*NO*!"
He would now.
-0-Roddy
He walked into the dojo and sat heavily, the mechs pausing in their conversation to look at his sorry dejected aft.
"What's with you?" -all the mechs
"Nothing." -Roddy
"You going to tell us or what?" -all the mechs
"No."
He would now.
-0-Smokey
"AND THEN HE JUST *LOOKED* AT ME -"
-0-Roddy
"Then Smokescreen told me -"
-0-Smokey
"- like I was a kid or something -"
-0-Roddy
"...that they were Praxian and -"
-0-Smokey
"-AND I WAS SO PISSED! WHAT THE FRAG IS WRONG WITH ME? BESIDES YOU AND GRANDADA FRAGGING WITH MY LIFE! I AM JUST SO -"
"Ante up, grandson." Dev the smirker
"Okay." Smokey antes up. "I was saying," he said casting a gimlet optic on his grandparents who at that moment were the sun and moon to him even if they were two asteroids slamming into his groove at the same time. "I AM JUST SO -"
-0-Roddy
"You mean to tell me that you had a good looking mech like that dying to frag you and you didn't?" -all the mechs agape
"Whimper." -Roddy
-0-Smokey
"FRUSTRATED!"
Smokescreen laid down his cards and raked in the pot. "You are young, good looking, smart, going somewhere and ours. You will find a great mech to love on ya and we will be content. Hot Rod has to go a few more miles before he proves he isn't just trying to get into your critical energy port, then dump you later."
"I WANT HIM TO! I WANT HIM TO, GRANDATAR!"
"Dump you? He's good at that, grandson," Devcon said dealing the cards again. He would over and over as the youngling whined.
-0-Roddy
"Then you're telling us that the kid is on the market again?" -many of the mechs
Gimlet optics with malice aforethought and a few other thoughts pierced them with a sharpness only pent up lust could manage greeted that remark. "FRAG THAT!"
-0-Smokey
"I DON'T CARE! I WANT HIM TO, APA!" Smokey stared at his Grandatar a moment. "Well … maybe not that last part."
"More cards, Smokescreen?" Devcon asked calmly, a grin firmly on his handsome face.
"Two." He took them and fixed his hand. "HOW WILL I EVER HAVE A LOVE LIFE WITH YOU TWO STEPPING IN AND BREAKING US UP BEFORE ANYTHING CAN HAPPEN?!"
"Ante up, Smoke," Dev said with a grin. He did. So did Smokey but he did it grudgingly.
It made him feel better.
-0-Later that early evening (Or, When we walk into the club, all eyes on us, all eyes on us, all eyes on us ...)
He walked in sitting at the bar ordering a high grade, pondering getting drunk off his aft. Mechs came and went, some in pairs and he felt blue. Afternoon with the grandgenitors hadn't been horrible.
Getting shot in the aft was horrible. This was only mildly atrocious...
"Here you go," Dev said putting a dish down before his grandson with a glass of the Cybertronian version of warmed milk.
"GRANDADA! I AM TRYING TO TELL YOU MY WOES-" Pause. "Is this the kind I like?"
"It is," Dev said with a smirk. He put some down for Smokescreen too. Sitting, he watched two of the greatest loves of his life grin at their plates. "Made just the way you like it."
Smokey picked up his fork with a surge of delight, then remembered he was pissed. Affecting a frown, he took a forkful. "I suppose," he said as he ate the entire thing which was like a calzone crossed with an apple pie.
His Grandada was the only one who could make it just like he liked it.
Only his Ama.
-0-Roddy
Wandering the city in a funk, he looked for the usual suspects to hang out with. They were either fragging their lovers, working or on duty. Turning down Metroplex Highway 1, he walked to Club Cybertron and entered.
-0-Smokey
He walked from his grandgenitors' house with a facade of rage and a full stomach. He had also finished his homework, helped move a couch and gathered some spilled wires that his grandatar was going to weave for a tchotchke that was common in Praxus. His atar had one growing up made by his grandatar and Smokescreen was making a replacement. "Someday," he had said smirking at Smokey, "this," he said holding up a couple of fistfuls of pretty copper and silver wire, "will be all yours."
All three of them laughed. Then he knew he was defeated. He had excused himself and left. Walking in disarray around town, he entered Club Cybertron and made for the bar. Thus he was sitting there nursing a high grade when someone stepped into the doorway to peruse the room for prey.
His name was a stunner … Mistermaster and he was incredibly dapper and high maintenance. Spotting the comely winger pouting at the bar, he ambled over and sat. "Hi. You alone?"
"When am I not?" Smokey snarked.
"I see," Mistermaster replied with a grin. Making his order, he turned back to the youngling.
Handsome. Check.
Young. Check.
Robust and strong. Check.
Virgin. Probably. Check.
He grinned. "I'm Mistermaster. Let me buy you a drink."
Smokey almost said 'frag off' but for the reflection of Hot Rod that appeared in the mirror behind the bar. Pausing a moment, he turned to the big goofball beside him. "Sure. Why not."
Mistermaster did and they sat together knees touching drinking and chatting all the while Smokey watched Hot Rod out of the periphery of his vision. Hot Rod finally moved to a table nearby sitting with friends, his optics trained on the comely winger with the geek.
"What do you do, Smokey?" the geek asked.
"I'm a soldier." Smokey moved closer to Mistermaster who didn't mind a bit. He ordered more drinks. "You?"
"I was a money management official on Cybertron. I was the manager of most of the wealth on Cybertron," he said with evident pride.
Smokey tried not to wince as he sipped his drink. /... an accountant... this guy is an *ACCOUNTANT*! … this is like dating my atar … THIS IS FRAGGED! …/
He waxed on about his houses (plural), estate (singular), contacts in high places (numerous as grains of sand on the beach), toys that went fast, floated and shot holes in things and other mech stuff. Smokey listened with his body all the while his processor was going another direction.
/... look at me, Hot Blob … no … don't look at me … you could have had this … who wouldn't want this … why don't you want this? … /
Mistermaster put his servo on Smokey's thigh, then slid it further up to The-Place-That-Has-Never-Seen-Action. AND IT WAS CLEAR IT PROBABLY NEVER WOULD!
That place.
Smokey looked down to watch, then put down his glass. Gripping Mistermaster, he smiled. "Let's dance."
They did. In the swirling midst of gyrating bodies they fled. Groping and getting groped, humping and getting humped, Smokey found himself wandering in the midst of a lot of half slagged mechanisms. It almost felt good but for the mournful exceedingly hungry optics of a certain red, yellow and orange winger who was watching.
Then he wasn't.
Spying around the techno-melee gyrating all around and sometimes against him, he looked through the haze for his honey. Then he felt it, strong servos gripping his hips. A hard body pressed against his moving and grooving as Smokey fought to hold up Mistermaster.
Trying to glance over his shoulder, Smokey couldn't see who it was but the servos gripping him tightly by the hips were a dead giveaway. He was currently being humped by Hot Rod.
A part of him was circling Io sans ship and another part wanted to knee him in the codpiece. So Smokey compromised. He began to rub back thrusting backward to the Ultimate-Goal-Of-His-Life-At-The-Moment or the part known as Roddy's codpiece.
Hot Rod who had slipped into the gyrating crowd found the sweet aft of his lust object. Gripping it tightly, he began to move against the kid, a grin firmly on his face. That is until the motion began to raise emotions. A flash of sensation raced over his dermal layers, then coalesced into a burning pool in his man crevasse. His optics fritzed but he pressed on.
Literally.
Dribbling over his own smelting pool, Smokey continued to salsa with Roddy until the music stopped. Then he grabbed Mistermaster to go back to the bar. The crowd began to move away until Roddy was left trapped in his own vice grip of pending overload. He only stood a moment by himself before new music filled the room and a seething crowd of dancers swallowed him from view.
By then Smokey was half carrying half of Mistermaster as he stumbled out the door into the bracing cold. His own pending unfinished business fizzled out as they wobbled along the sidewalk. He could get it back if he applied himself with a furious set of pull ups on a bar somewhere, the method of choice for middle school girls everywhere. But it wasn't to be. Mistermaster was going off like a roman candle.
-0-Roddy
He stood in the middle of a seething mass trapped from leaving by the sheer numbers of dancers. He felt the overload fading away as the object of his desire no longer could be seen at the bar. Gathering himself, he quashed his libidinous programming with effort and with even more, he began to swim against the whirlpool of dancers to the door.
-0-On the way to Mandalay
He almost looked for a manhole cover to lift so he could deposit Mistermaster down it when a voice behind him gave him pause. "Hey, kid. Need help?" Turning, he looked into the bemused optics of the Head of Security for the city and planet, Springer, chief of the Wreckers, his bond, the equally legendary Knight, Drift, the legendary Kup and a few other legends that he couldn't see too well at the moment because Mistermaster was trying to kiss him.
"KISS ME, BABY! YOU KNOW YOU WANT TO! DID YOU KNOW I ONCE FRAGGED SENTINEL PRIME'S SECRETARY! SENTINEL PRIME! YES! I THINK YOU SO ARE PRETTY! KISS ME, BABY!"
Smokey nearly dropped him like a rock. Then Mistermaster did it for him. Stepping toward Springer, he took a header and lay on the ground babbling to himself.
"That mech is slag faced," Springer said with a chuckle. "A relative or a lover?"
"Neither," Smokey said shaking his helm. "He tried to pick me up in a bar."
"Doing a good deed are ya, youngling?" the 'legendary' Kup asked around his stogie.
Smokey looked at him worshipfully. "I'm trying."
"Let's drop him in the drunk tank," Springer said looking at the pile of mech at his feet. "At least he's a happy drunk."
"You come too, youngling," Kup said stepping closer to Smokey.
He looked at them with alarm. "Am I under arrest too? THAT WOULD CAP A PERFECT ORN!"
"There's a story here," Springer said knowing full well most of it and all the major players. "Come with me and talk. You'll feel better."
"No I won't," Smokey said glumly as he turned and began to walk away with Springer. "MY GRANDGENITORS ARE DETERMINED TO RUIN MY LIFE!"
Chuckles met that as Drift looked down at Mistermaster who was passed out cold. He lifted him in a fireman's carry and turned to follow the others. They would drop him off then venture to The Pit Stop for a warm up.
-0-At The Pit Stop
They sat listening to Smokey give them the edited version of his life story. He left out the virgin parts. The parts where his grandgenitors were the two best mechs in the known universe.
Most of the time.
He didn't leave out homework, Hot Rod and his pent up lust. They listened sympathetically, then sat back. "Well, this calls for tactics. You need a change in your life. I'll have you detailed to the Night Watch and you can walk a beat with us."
Smokey blinked, then smiled brilliantly. "THAT WOULD BE AWESOME! I CAN HELP YOU KICK TAILPIPE!"
The mechs grinned. "You still have to go to school," Kup said.
Smokey's expression fell comically. He really was a handsome kid, very expressive and funny without self awareness of it. His emotions lived and died on his face. "Awww. I hate it."
"Did you do your school work today?" Kup asked leaning in closer.
"I did. My grandada made me. I don't want you to get the wrong impression. Those two are the greatest but I'm not a little kid anymore. I want to have adventure and stuff. I also want to date and have that too."
"You're horny then," Kup asked.
A moment of downloads and clarity sprang up along with embarrassment in two youngling mechs as Lon had joined them at the same time they entered the cafe. "Yeah," Smokey said brazening it out. Lon nodded too. "What's wrong with that?"
"Nothing," Drift said smirking slightly at Springer. "It means you're alive."
The mechs chuckled, Smokey sat back happy and all was well. Then Hot Rod walked in and sat down nearby with friends. Kup glanced at him, then grinned. "Time to go, boys." At that, the lot stood and walked out with Springer and Kup, Drift bringing up the rear. He grinned and nodded to Hot Rod who nodded back, his glum expression saying it all. The door closed behind him. He sat back and vented a soft sigh. /... slag …/
-0-On Earth
"WHAT DO YOU MEAN I ORDERED THESE!?"
"I have the invoice. Your card number … your signature." -assistant enjoying the moment
"I DIDN'T ORDER THIS! I DON'T CARE WHAT IT SAID!"
"It is here. Your name, number and the rest." Both turn and looked at a small mountain of boxes containing 2,500 personalized t-shirts.
"I CHANGED ALL MY NUMBERS AND CARDS AND SHIT WHEN THE ROBOTS STOLE MY PHONE! FUCK THIS! GET RID OF THAT SHIT AND ChANGE MY NUMBERS AGAIN! I DON'T WANT TO SEE IT AGAIN!"
The assistant complied. The spider program sent the new stuff to Springer and Drift. The new hack would occur in a few orns time. Meanwhile, galloping across the plains of Outer Mongolia, small children rode their steppe ponies wearing t-shirts donated from a local aid organization. On the front it had a picture of a pigs' ass with the curly tail standing at attention. Words underneath said, "Have you seen this man?" The names on the back of the t-shirt read, "Michael Bay."
-0-TBC September 12, 2013