Disclaimer: I do not own Transformers. Only the plot and OCs.
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This is past late, and I'm sorry, but on the bright side life straightened out just in time to go back to work and classes so have a chapter. Hope you enjoy.
Chapter 39
Outrider wasn't all that sure what he was suppose to do now.
What did one do with an arm full of purring youngling while his sire was out and his carrier was in the shower? It did reason to Rider that, yes, he had been a part of a mechling's all too short life once, but for the life of him he could remember how he'd handled that. Besides, all he'd ever done was play peak-a-boo with Whiteout. He'd never had full say of his person.
And Whiteout had never been this tiny.
Even when he was a sparkling, Rider honestly didn't think he'd ever been as tiny as this little yellow purring thing was. Why on Cybertron was he so small?
Weren't they feeding this Pip Squeak?
Rider could almost feel the smack upside his head for that question should he have said it outloud.
But he couldn't help it. The little mech was just so . . . small. Yet he seemed so very important to bots he didn't even know existed. The huge hunter just didn't get it.
What was it that they were missing?
What was it he hadn't noticed?
Why did some of the evilest bots still alive on this retched planet want some runty little mechling? What was so special about him?
And how in all of pit were Rider and Smokey suppose to keep him from getting killed now? How were they suppose to haul in a bounty now? How was he not just going to try and punch War in the damn face the next time he saw him for putting them in this blasted situation in the first place? He might yell at Dust too, but then again he knew that wouldn't do any good. Just as hitting War wouldn't. It would only get his aft handed to him.
"So," The high pitch little squeak drew Rider's focus out of his processor and into reality that left him blinking down at the tiny mechling as he grinned. "You really is Rider."
The big red mech blinked. "Well, yeah."
"Hide's Rider." Bee pressed.
Smokescreen snorted.
Rider shot him a glare.
"I'm his brother, yeah, at least . . . I was."
"If was then is." Bee told him simply with a look that seemed to scream that the big mech must be an absolute idiot not to see that. "That not something that change."
At least not in the way Bumblebee saw things.
Outrider however, didn't know how to do anything to that comment other than snort out a laugh as he shook his head and looked away. "Hate to break it too you, little mech, but that isn't how the world works."
The stubby little antennas atop his head flickered for a moment before tucking back into their grooves and with a huff of being all kinds of put out Bumblebee rolled his optics.
Primus.
Why were all these bots so blind? They really couldn't see it could they?
They really didn't get it.
It saddened Bumblebee a great deal, but since it seemed he was the only one around here that understood he would just have to explain it to them. Them and everybot else because not even Blue understood Bee when he got over into this topic. It was one of the reasons he had dropped it for so long.
After all, it hadn't taken him long to figure out that his opinions of Mega-however were not the same as everybot else. Just as his opinions of how Optimus—and Roddy—viewed him were not the same either.
Bumblebee had seen it.
He'd felt it.
He knew.
No bot else seemed to get that, but for now that was alright. He figured that one way or another he'd make them all understand eventually. It would just take him some time to figure out how to say it. And hey, maybe this would be his perfect chance.
He could make Hide and Prowl understand what lay between them and Smokey and Rider. How it was there. Even if they didn't believe it was.
Bumblebee knew it was.
They were brothers. They were a part of each other.
That was not something that anything could ever really break.
Sparks did not forget bonds, especially ones like that.
"Is to how it works." He huffed as he gazed up into those deep cobalt optics. He saw a flash of something drift through them—the stupid meds still keeping him from truly being able feel it—though what it truly was he couldn't be sure. Amusement? Anger? Sadness? Lose?
It was gone too quickly and he was too clouded to truly make it out.
With a slow shake of his head Rider leaned back in his chair, making sure the little mech perched in the corner of his crossed arms didn't get knocked down because of it. He sighed at the pure determination and belief that shown back at him in those impossibly large for his size baby blue optics.
Rider could remember a time—as he looked down into those bright orbs—when he'd seen a look like that staring back at him from a mirror. It was not a look he'd seen in a very long time. One he figured would never grace his hardened faceplate, optics, and spark ever again.
That honest desire to hope, to feel, to believe that there was good in this fragged up universe . . . it was gone from him.
Gone forever.
He'd survived too much.
It hurt—though he wasn't sure why—to realize that one orn it would be gone from these bright blue optics as well. That the truth of the universe would snuff it out. That the light that show so brightly from the ball of life pulsing away inside that little chest would one orn have to become as guarded, mistrusting, and cold as all the rest of them. Because if it didn't, he'd die.
That unnerved Outrider more than he ever thought it would have.
With a heavy sigh the big warrior looked away from the tiny, innocent, naive sparkling. "No little mechling, it is not. Things are not that simple."
"Yes they is." Bee retorted. That was the problem. Everybot seemed to think it was so complicated and it wasn't. That was what he didn't understand, why no bot else could see it.
It really wasn't all that hard. They made it hard with all the reasons, excuses, and words. To Bumblebee it was in fact very simple. The truth that sparks didn't forget which meant feelings never really died. That was not to say that he thought they couldn't change.
Of that he knew they could. No emotion could exist without change, he got that. He also understood that spark could move on. They could overcome. They could learn just as processors could and whether that meant loving or hating they could do them both equally just as they could let go of each just as equally.
Bumblebee didn't mean to say that there wasn't the black and white truths of the world that made life and all the things that came with it; love, hate, anger, fear, pain, regret, betrayal . . . all of it . . . very, very complicated. They did. What was simple to Bumblebee was the parts he could see and feel.
The things that proved it was the grey area between black and white was the real place everybot in the universe really lived. Because there was no way for anything to truly, be just white or just black. Which was why Bee knew there was no way for love to turn to hate and there not be a bit of that love left behind.
For it was that left over love that made the hate so powerful. It was also what would make it able to be forgiven.
No bot else seemed to get that though.
Why that was, Bee didn't know. Just as he didn't know how to explain why he thought the things he did. How it was he knew these things. He sort of figured this was a trail of topic that existed in that category of things his family looked at him weird for when he started to bring them up.
Which was why he didn't bring them up.
He didn't know how he knew, or why he knew, he wasn't even all that sure what it was that he really knew. And that was hard to think about let alone explain.
It was easier just to not bring it up.
However, he wasn't about to sit back and let this anger, uneasy, and stupid pride keep his family from being happy. He would make them see that they didn't have to be hurt or angry. That the fact that they had—did—love each other meant more than simple emotions of the past.
They were a part of each other and no matter what that would never go away.
They needed each other, of that Bumblebee was also very sure.
Letting his sensor appendages flutter behind him he went on. "If wants to, anyway. If not want to then me not understand why is even here. But if does want to then is. Only have to want to. Nothing can't do if want it bad enough."
Except turn back death. Outrider bit hard on his tongue to keep the words at bay. That was defiantly not something to tell Hide's mechling. Mia just might relieve him of his vocal processor for that one. Even if as he looked down into those innocent optics he got this uneasy feeling in the bottom of his tanks that this little mechling already knew that truth.
That he knew it well.
Yet he thought these things anyway. Which lead to another interesting question. Why did a mechling that was still shorter than his ankle have any of these ideas in the first place?
"Life really ain't that simple, Pip Squeak." It was with a low voice and confused doorwings sagging in a dip behind his back that Smokescreen finally spoke up. His chin rested on his palm that was being held up by his elbow on the table. The handful of cards from their game laid down and forgotten.
Bee's bottom lip stuck out in a pout as he gazed over at the cool optics that stared unblinking back at him. It was wrong to say there wasn't a hardness in those bright optics because there was almost like a internal wall blocking out some of the light that seemed to want to shine from within the mech. Almost as if Smokescreen—over the vorns—had become so use to hiding who he was and what he felt that he had actually forgotten who it was he had once been. Who he really was. Who he had could no longer be no matter how bad he wanted to.
Bumblebee wondered how on the mark he was on with that, but he knew better than to ask. So instead of focusing on the cold, hard, guardedness in those optics he found that flicker of sadness glimmering dimly at the edges. Almost as if the coolant tears were there. Locked away behind that wall that did not allow the mech to feel, to express, to . . . cry.
So they were just locked away there at the edges of his optics.
Bee wondered why no bot else seemed to notice them. To see just how sad Smokescreen really was.
Was that why he was in here hiding? Was that why he didn't want to see Prowl?
And if it was, why wasn't anybot doing anything about it?
There were here, but Bee could see that they didn't know if they wanted to be. Why on Cybertron they wouldn't want to be here he hadn't the faintest idea, but he was pit bent on changing it.
"It not as hard as all you seem to think either." Bee retorted quietly in a clearer voice and use of syllables then he ever normally did, leaning back against the strength of the massive red mech's bent arm. Little fingers curling into the grooves of thick, battered armor. His big optics gazed back challengingly at the mech that looked so very much like Prowl. If only the bright optics weren't so sad.
A tired kind of snort left the mech as he slowly shook his chevron topped head as much as he could with it resting on his palm before he sighed out. "How about we just agree to disagree, huh?"
Bee sighed back at him with a dramatic roll of optics until he nodded as well and decided to turn the conversation to more usable topics.
"So," He hummed happily glancing up between the two tired faceplates. They really did seem exhausted. Bee suddenly wondered if they had been recharging at all since they got here, and if they weren't why no bot was making them. Bots always made sure he recharged. No bot really wanted to deal with him if he hadn't. Then again he was a real brat when he was tired so he couldn't say he blamed anybot all that much.
His words drew a soft chuckle out of the massive chest behind him. A sound that reminded him remarkable of the mech Rider looked so very much like as well.
"So what, little mech?" Outrider asked him, gazing down with those optics where a good few shades lighter than his Hide's, but held so much more coldness then the darker shade did.
"What has been doin'?"
That earned him a started blink from both the hunters. The big mechs suddenly seeming very nervous—he couldn't quite feel enough to be sure—as they shared a glance. Clearing his throat and shifting around so that Bee suddenly had to tighten his hold on the armor to keep from falling down as Outrider shifted his weight against the table.
"Not anything that needs to be of an interest to you." Smokescreen's suddenly cold voice cut Rider off in his attempt at figuring out how to tell a mechling that they became hired killers that murdered other bots for credits. That they were here to haul him in for credits as well.
That they didn't think they could do that now.
Cobalt blue optics drifted over to hold the cold bright blue across from them. Smokey had suddenly gone completely cold. A look like he was warring between since he fled the medical bay at the sight of something that Rider didn't know how to help him with. It left him feeling empty as he watched the pain practically seeping off the mech that became his main back strut just as he had become his. The two of them relied on each other—lived for each other—in every aspect.
They'd be dead by now if they weren't as good together as they had learned to be. They became the only brother neither of them had left, but now they were thrown back into the place where the reality of all they had lost and run from was everywhere. Haunting and hurting down to the very inner core of their sparks.
Rider was getting out of it lucky for some Primus forsaken reason. He didn't even know why because it was true that he was still uneasy with no idea what the pit he was going to do now, but he also didn't feel like his spark was breaking when he looked into his brother's darker optics.
Smokescreen wasn't getting that.
No.
Smokey was falling apart and Rider had no idea how to stop it because the mech wouldn't let him. It fragged Rider off to. He got that life had moved on without them and he was damn lucky to be getting looked at like he was, but what Prowl was doing to Smokescreen.
It boiled the massive warrior's energon.
Even more since he didn't know what to do about it.
"Oh," Bee's voice turned quiet and his bright optics lowered. Suddenly unsure what to do with himself.
However, he was then saved by Mia stepping out of the washracks, her optics focusing in on where her mechling had gotten off to. The smile that slowly curled up her lips suddenly made Smokey and Rider both feel a tad bit better. Not that either of them had any notion of how to admit to that or how to use it.
The low growl that bubbled in the chest of the huge golden frontliner set Ratchet's nerves on edge, but even he knew that at the moment there was nothing he could do to help either of the uneasy mechs.
Nothing he could say would appease them. He'd exhausted his supply of unknown answers and annoyed snapping to try and keep them from starting something they wouldn't be able to finish because Hide, Prowl, and probably Hammer would beat the slag out of them. Best frontliners the Autobot's had or not picking a fight with Rider and Smokey would end them both in a lot of trouble. Especially when they had no reason to besides a name and questions they couldn't get answered.
Ratchet didn't really feel like fixing them too after all the struggle that went in keep Blue alive a few orns before. He had already thrown the 'if any of you idiots hurt yourselves again I swear I'll murder you' rant the orns before. Enforcing the threat wasn't high on his to do list for this orn which meant he was just going to have to sit back and try not to strangle to two tightly wound up mechs until some answers could be fished out of those two idiots that had taken to hiding in Hide's room.
He couldn't really say he blamed Rider all that much, after all it was his brother and if they were going to fix any of this fraggin' nonsense it was going to have to start there, but Smokey was another issue all together.
He wouldn't look at Prowl let alone talk to him. He hadn't come out of that room for four orns. Mia and Hide weren't going to make him either. It was Hide that was sending Prowl away with the whirling warning of his canons every evening.
The truth was Ironhide had no right to stand between the brothers—Primus knew he wouldn't be too happy if somebot was standing between him and Rider—but Ratchet knew why he was doing it. For now Rider was willing to stay in that room for whatever reason and Smokey would stay were Rider was. If Smokey got mad enough to leave they all knew Rider would go with him.
And that would break Ironhide apart.
He couldn't lose his little brother. Not again.
The hard other side of that line of thinking however, was neither could Prowl.
"Can't we just go talk to them?" Suddenly Sideswipe was in front of his desk again, making the yellow and red medic look up from the inventory stock he was doing. He regarded those vivid, dark blue optics for a long moment before shaking his head and looking back down to the work he was doing to keep himself busy.
"No, Sideswipe."
"Why not!?" Sunstreaker's seething tone seemed to fill the whole medical bay to the brim before it grated against Ratchet's audios setting his spark on edge. That was the kind of tone used by the frontliner that normally got bots killed.
Ratchet didn't show the pain it created in his chest. "Because Optimus says no."
The golden mech snarled down at him. Lips curled up in a sneer that spoke volumes for the mech's mental state. If Sideswipe hadn't laid a hand on his elder brother's arm and tugged him back away from the desk a few feet Ratchet might have even been a little worried about the mech's temper going out against him. He wasn't though. Not really.
He knew neither twin would ever lay a hand on him.
Not even when they were like this.
"Chill a bit, Sunny." Sides told his twin quietly only to have the slightly bigger mech yank himself out of the grip and go back to his annoyed pacing around Ratchet's office.
"Don't tell me to chill out! It's been four orns! Somebot is going to damn well tell me what the frag they meant by Wardrums or I'm going to slaughter something!"
"I have told you what they meant by Wardrums, Sunstreaker." Ratchet scolded him. "They meant their manager. The mech that controls what they do in that damn pit."
"You said they have our scars!" Sunstreaker threw his hands above his head as he bellowed. "The owner mark of the Ring Emperor!"
"They do."
"That means they're gladiators!" The golden mech ground out through clenched teeth. "They can't be gladiators! Not and have anything to do with War! He was our manager! He didn't have any other students!"
"He wouldn't take them." Sideswipe put in carefully. "Ratchet, he hated taking in apprentices. He got tired of watching them all die because they were too weak to do what he wanted. There is no way they're telling the truth."
"You haven't seen that mech for almost as long as they've both been gone." Ratchet sighed. "You have no idea whether or not their telling the truth. And after all they've said I don't think they are lying."
"But what if they are!" Sunstreaker exploded. "They're bounty hunters! Their damn brothers or not they are here for Half Pint and you can't be slaggin' allowing this!"
"They aren't taking him anywhere." Ratchet growled out as he pushed himself to his feet. "They save his fraggin' life! They saved Jazz and Blue as well! If they were here to walk in and walk out with him they would have done it in that hallway! They wouldn't have waited around. We don't know everything that is going on right now, and no I don't like that anymore than the two of you do, but Primus help me if you don't calm the frag down and let us try and solve this I will lock you in your stupid room and leave you there!"
The growling and pacing came to an end at the pair of brothers stilled there in front of his desk, optics glimmering with emotion and fields pulsing wildly until they took a shared deep breath and sagged there before him.
"Yes Ratchet." They muttered.
"Are you two done yelling now?" Arcee's voice filtered through the expanse of the bay. The soft tone growing louder as she joined them in the back office with an arm full of datapads and a tired look in her optics. She'd spent most of the last orn helping Elita keep Optimus some manner of calm and not go demanding things from two hiding mechs.
The two massive frontliners sat down in the chairs that had long ago become theirs on the other side of the desk looking more like scolded puppies in the presence of the femme than anything else.
"Sorry Cee," Sideswipe said softly and then elbowed his twin in his side when he said nothing. Still, all Sunny gave was a grunt and a lower of his optics.
"Don't be sorry." She sighed back to them, laying the datapads on the desk before Ratchet before she slid around and deposited herself into the lap of her mate as he seated himself back down as well. Securing her with an arm around her waist as she leaned forward and started shuffling through the work he had been doing. "Everybot is on edge. It can't be blamed. And I know you two are upset, but when we have answers so will you. You know we will not keep anything from you."
"Yeah," Sideswipe huffed out, leaning back in his chair and propping his feet up on the edge of the desk in front of them while Sunstreaker leaned back in his chair and simply sort of sank. "We just don't get it."
"None of us do." Arcee replied in that soft voice of hers, most of her attention on the inventory stocks that were nervously low.
"Forcing Rider and Smokey to tell more then they already have isn't going to work." Ratchet said. "Hide is too afraid they will bolt. And they very well might."
"Who cares if they leave?" Sunstreaker growled. "They came here to take Bumblebee. You should make them leave."
Ratchet just stared hard at him until the golden brother shifted uneasily and looked away again.
"They came here for something, Sunny." Ratchet told him. "But it wasn't for that. And what the mech that taught you to be a gladiator has to do with it I don't know, but so help me I'm going to find out, and Primus help that mech when I do."
Evening found Bumblebee sitting in the big middle of the table-desk thing that Outrider and Smokescreen had commandeered with a cube of energon and a curly straw. He was bent forward with the straw stuck into the corner of his mouth as he suck absentmindedly at his warm dinner while he regarded his messy handful of cards in between peaking glances over them to the two big mech set across from him.
He had played cards a hundred times before, but Rider and Smokey weren't going easy on him.
He was having a ball.
And it seemed to be amusing the femme and the mech that were sitting together across the room with laps full of pups that were recharging lazily after having already gobbled down their own dinner. Chromia had been smiling since she got out of the shower and found the mechling with the other two. Ironhide hadn't been unhappy either when he returned with all their dinner. In fact it was only the two returners that had lowered their optics as if they were unhappy in some way. They didn't stay that way for long though. Their cubes were given to them and when Ironhide left them alone with little said they seemed to relax again. And then of course Bee had plucked up some of the cards that had been laying around him and offered them up over his head with a bubbly smile.
It seemed not even these two knew how to deny his smile.
So that was how the card game had started, and also how he'd got his little aft beat about twenty times now in the last four breems. It would have been frustrating if it wasn't so funny to watch Smokey and Rider snark at each other about who was beating a youngling this time. Neither seemed to have any issues with it when it was them beating not only him but the other bot as well.
Bee found that funny.
He continued to find it funny too, for four more orns to be exact.
But that eighth evening he found himself perched at the edge of the tale with a handful of cards as he rested between Mia's outstretch arms something changed. Maybe it was the fact that the meds had finally worn off and Bee had become aware over the course of that orn how many times Ironhide and Jazz along with Prowl sometimes clashed down the hallway.
He'd noticed by accident.
Really, he hadn't meant to be paying attention to things it seemed he wasn't supposed to be paying attention too. But seriously, who could blame him for turning his attention to his sire when the mech's whole spark flared with rage and he found himself looking into a fight about to break out two hallways away from his room between the most level headed of his family and the most trigger happy.
Bee was pretty sure if Hammerdown had suddenly appeared and done what Bee could only assume was shove Prowl and Hide away from each other—his own spark rolling in anger—that Bee would have heard a whole lot more than just sparks rolling with rage. There would have been energon drawn in that brewing fight. Of that he was positive off.
It was why he kept his whole focus outside the room for the rest of that orn. Tracking Hide, Prowl, and Jazz as they ended up in Optimus' office with Hammerdown, Roddy, and Magnus. He couldn't' tell what they were there, but he could tell what they were upset about.
Rider and Smokey.
Though nothing was said when Hide finally returned late this evening. The two mechs didn't seem to know, or at least they didn't care, and it seemed it wasn't going to be discussed in front of him. Since the two of them were doing little more than playing with him these orns meant it wasn't going to be discussed at all.
Nothing would have changed at all, probably, had Bumblebee not opened his big mouth.
And it wasn't even about the tension and the fights that were scarcely being avoided among his family for reason he didn't get.
Nope.
The stupid thing that Bee opened his mouth about was those marks he'd noticed a orn or two before. It wasn't often he saw them. Outrider's armor was thick and left very little gaps of protoform, but there were times, now and again since he'd relaxed in this room and let his armor relax as well that the little mechling caught sight of the dark protoform underneath.
It wasn't the protoform he was staring at though.
It was the things that looked like glyphs that were carved into it.
At first, a few orns ago, Bee had had no idea what to say about them. He even thought maybe he was wrong. Maybe they weren't anything more than scars. After all, everybot around him had scars. He knew about them.
It was the second time he caught glimpses of them that he knew they weren't normal scars. Though he hadn't been sure how to go about asking these mechs he still wasn't all that sure what to make of about them.
This evening however, sitting there between Mia's arms staring across the table at the big red mech holding himself up by his elbow and palm as he stared down at his dueling cards he finally decided he had to ask. If he had known the events the question would set in motion though he might have kept his mouth shut.
He had been switching between the players around the table for many orns now, so it wasn't all that big of a deal when he plucked his little self up and waddled over to Outrider from Chromia. Hide and Mia watched him sure, but Rider paid him very little attention having grown use to Bee climbing all over him. Which was probably why he didn't see the mechling planting himself in the crook of his elbow, sticking his little fingers into a grove of his armor, and prying it apart as much as he could with his tiny muscles coming. Nor did he anticipate the question sucker punching him out of left field.
"What this mean?"
Rider's focus had been fixed on beating Smokey's aft this time so it was only with half focus that he muttered back to the youngling sitting on his arm.
"What?"
"This." And then a tiny yellow finger gabbed into his newest carve and he jerked back with a yelp sending Bee falling down to the table with a soft thumb as the hunter recoiled, latching hold of his bicep as he curled his arm up to his chest.
He probably would have gone farther than that to. Like run completely off the ship far, far away had Smokescreen's voice not suddenly grounded him to his chair.
"Rider!"
The larger hunter froze.
Full frame froze, optics wide, and vents heaving in the beginnings of a panic attack, the like of which he hadn't had in over a vorn. All because Bee jabbed his thumb into a new healed cut.
"Rider stop!"
He wasn't sure when Smokey had jumped from his chair to Rider's but suddenly he had a very familiar EM field clashing against the frantic pulsing of his and hands cradling his jaw as the Praxian just about crawled up in his lap as he shook there in that chair trying to get his processor to slow down. Or really it was Smokey trying to get his processor to slow down, Rider was just trying to breathe.
Wings flared out wide behind his back in an effort to cut everything else Smokescreen kept hold of the trembling jaw keeping those drawn out of focus dark optics locked with his lighter ones. The problem was Rider wasn't in those optics.
Smokescreen swallowed hard and ignored the commotion behind him of the femme gathering the mechling and Ironhide behind him, Smokescreen let everything focus in on Rider's uneven breathing.
Damn. He hadn't spaced this bad in over a vorn.
Smokey thought he was the one having problems here.
He felt like utter slag too, because he should have been as carefully watching Rider was Rider had been watching him.
"Rider," He muttered softly, hardly audible over the hard, quick vents. "Rider, look at me. Stop it. You have to stop it and look at me."
Ironhide was saying something. Smokescreen was ignoring him. Outrider couldn't hear him.
"Rider," He called again. "Rider, it's me. It's okay."
His breathing slowed down a little bit and some focus slipped back into those dark optics leaving him blinking up at Smokescreen a few times as the smaller mech shifted in his lap.
"Rider?" He asked carefully, unsure just how much shaken bounty hunter he was dealing with yet.
A sharp gasp blew out of the larger mech and he pulled free of Smokescreen's hands shaking his head to clear it. At that point Smokey leaned backward until he was sat on the edge of the table behind him with his feet still resting on Outrider's thighs. It was the touch that the larger mech would center to, but too much contact Smokey knew would not be could either. It was a fine line—Rider's space outs—they never begun or ended well even when Dustoff was there with sedatives and a clean knife.
Dustoff wasn't here this time and the chances of Rider letting Ratchet help him were so slim Smokescreen wasn't even humoring the idea. This fit was different though. He'd been perfectly fine after they killed those two idiots. He hadn't felt a thing.
Smokescreen had chalked it up to him having no guilt over those idiots dying after all the times they'd tried to off the two of them in stupid ways. It was the fact that this wasn't like all the other times that Smokescreen wasn't sure what to do next as the larger mech lowered his clouded optics, crossed his arms in a tight hug around himself, and tried to even out his breathing.
The tri colored mech found himself leaning back on his palms when he realized how fast his own vents were breathing, doorwings sagging behind him as he watched for that turn point moment. That moment he was either going to have to knock the other mech out to keep that short knife out of his hide or he'd be fine. He wasn't sure which one it was going to be yet.
The frantic presence of the massive ebony mech beside him, the femme and the mechling behind, the pups circling around the floor. None of it was helping, but he had no idea how to tell them to stop. He had no right to he figured.
Just as he had no right to want to force them not to ask any questions. There were going to be questions.
There were going to be a lot of questions.
He wasn't sure Outrider was going to handle that . . . at all.
One more heavy breath puffed out of that thick chest before the huge hunter slid into a slouch and stared at his slightly quivering crossed arms. Then that right hand slide toward the locked away compartment above his left wrist and Smokescreen all but kicked him between the optics.
"Stop it!" He hissed using the foot to pin Rider back against his chair.
"Get off, Smokey." Outrider didn't hiss it back, but the low thunder of his voice was warning all the same.
"We talked about this." The Praxian growled back. "You said you were going to stop this!"
"And you said you were going to quit smoking!" Rider's dark optics shot up to hold him in a burning glare. "We say a whole pit of a lot of things we don't mean!"
But Smokescreen wasn't backing down. Not this time. Not about this.
He was tired of watching his brother hurt himself. They got hurt enough. His damn guilt was going to fraggin' destroy him and the smaller hunter couldn't just sit there and do nothing anymore.
"This is a lot more then my fraggin' cy-gars you idiot." He ground out.
Rider just glared back at him. "No it's not."
"I don't fraggin' make myself le—" Rider latching hold of his foot, twisting him around like a fragging rag doll, and then dumping him into a heap of the floor sort of cut off his little tirade leaving him a bundle of limbs and armor of the floor while the massive red bounty hunter snarled down at him as he rose to his feet.
"You mute it! You understand me? Mute it!"
Flipping over to his back Smokescreen shoved himself to his peds snarling right back. "Make me."
Anything to make him not reach for that damn knife.
"Enough!" Ironhide suddenly had a hold of both of them, pushing to them arms length away from each other while also refusing to let them go. "Both of you fraggin' calm down!"
"Get off me!" Rider shoved hard against his older brother's grip, but when it came right down too it Ironhide was stronger than he was. Letting go of the Smokescreen Hide latched a double handful of thick red armor bringing him in close and refusing to let go as the younger struggled against him.
"No." Hide spit out, optics narrow and spark frantically reaching for that slowly reforming still ever so cold link that was still severed between them. "No, I'm not letting go, Rider. Not this time. I'm not letting you run away this time. You're gonna stay here. And you're going to start explaining."
"You can't make me do anything!" Rider hissed at him through bared teeth as he fought against the bulk of his brother. However, he was getting nowhere fast, but that just seemed to be making everything all that much more worse. "I'm not some fraggin' sparkling that you have to take care of anymore!"
"You'll always be something I have to take care of." Hide quietly told him back, voice hardly audible over the struggling going on between their huge frames. "Because you'll always be my little brother."
"YOU JUST DON'T FRAGGIN' GET IT!" Rider was all but screaming at him now, fighting to the point that Ironhide had to yank him in and pin him to his chest just to keep him from hurting the both of them. Weapons systems were whirling to life, plating heating along with it, but they were too close for either of their arsenals to do them much good.
"THEN HELP ME GET IT!" Hide snarled back at him. "Tell me, Rider! Tell me, damn it! Because I'm not letting you walk away this time! You understand me!? I don't give a damn about your fraggin' manager or the damn Ring Leader or what the frag ever! Ratchet will take those damn things out of you and you never have to fraggin' go back!"
"What the pit makes you think we want to stay here!?" Rider spit at him over the whirling of blasters and cannons but that jab was a sucker punch to the gut and they both knew it. Though Rider didn't see Hide dropping him to the floor as soon as that taunt sank into his processor coming.
Growling, panting, seething there on the floor Rider glare up at his brother standing there over him with a look on his faceplate as if those warming weapons actually had just shot him. Pain glittered in those dark orbs while they stared down at him until Ironhide heaved out a heavy sigh and looked away.
"If you don't want to stay here they why are you here? Because I don't understand, Rider. I don't . . . . I don't want to lose you again. I don't think I can . . . but . . . if you . . . . You're starting to make me think . . . that . . . I already have."
That left Outrider laying there on the floor huffing out hard breathing after hard breath before his optics squeezed shut and he shoved himself upright. "You have." He whispered into the tense air trying to ignore the way it made Ironhide flinch. "You already have."
"Me sorry." The watery sound voice drew Hide to turn as well as Rider and Smokey both to look over and find the coolant tear filled, huge baby blue optics of one quivering little mechling tucked into Chromia's arms staring up at the three of them with a wobbly bottom lip. "Me sorry. Me really sorry. Didn't mean to—sorry. Sorry. Sorry. Please not fight. Please. Please! Me sorry! Didn't mean to. We go back to cards. Can! Not have to happen. Not have to be mad. Me sorry! Really sorry. Not want to fight. Not want to leave! Please! Me sorry!"
Chromia's hand tucked over the crying little thing, bringing him in to press against her chest as the tiny mechling sniveled. Antennas pinned down in their grooves, doorwings and winglets plastered down against his back, he looked down right miserable. Considering he was pretty miserable in that moment though that much might be expected.
And hiding behind his carrier's hand while still peaking out through her fingers did not hamper the impact of those watery words and wobbly lip. If anything, it amplified them. Leaving Hide sighing out a defeated breath as he returned to his mate's side and reached out stroking at that now tear covered faceplate while two pair of black pups whimpered and circled about Mia's chair legs and Hide's feet while he and Mia both quietly shushed the crying youngling. Smokescreen and Outrider were left standing there staring at the lot of them trying to not flinch with each little hiccupped sob that came from that itty bitty chest.
Finally Rider let out a sigh, his whole frame sagging to the point that he had to hold himself up by the edge of the table until Smokescreen walked the little bit of space between them and tucked his shoulder under the bigger mech's arm and shoved his weight up as Outrider picked absently at his upper arm.
Only the quiet hiccups of sobs filled the room for a long number of klicks as the pair of adopted creators hushed the upset bundle of protoform while he apologized for things that were not his fault. Things he couldn't possibly come to terms with. It took a good while for Mia and Hide to calm him down. For the quiet cries to settle down it took the helpful licks of two pups that crawled up in Mia's lap who settled around their littlest brother and licked him up his cheeks to try and banish the tears away.
It was after Mia finally had the tears quieted and Bee tucked against the warmth of the rhythm of her beating spark did Rider finally found his voice.
"I don't know how to stop."
It was hardly even real words. Softer then a whisper and with less power than a breath. It drew Ironhide's and Chromia's attention all the same though. Including the big blue optics of one still slightly sniffling youngling.
Smokescreen shifted against his side, more into a hug then really holding the mech up anymore, but he did look away from the down turned optics as Rider fought his need to reach for something he shouldn't.
"I can't stop. I've tired . . . I— I don't . . . . I can't . . . ."
He didn't know how to tell. Let alone how to explain. It wasn't something he talked about. Not really. Wardrums wanted to beat him for it and trying to talk to the massive mech about something as stupid as this never seemed like a good idea. Dustoff knew, hated it, but knew it. He had tried to stop Rider, but when it became clear that nothing would stop Rider and that trying to confront him about it only made him worse the medic took to just trying to make sure he didn't kill himself while doing it. Smokescreen had tried everything he knew. Far more than once, but even he was pretty much pointless in this aspect of Outrider's guilt. Besides, it wasn't like he had any Primus damn room to talk.
Standing here now, trying to talk to Hide—pit just trying to tell Hide—might have been the hardest thing Outrider ever had to do.
Pushing himself upright again Ironhide turned back to his little brother. Back to see the way such a big mech huddled in on himself in something between fear and shame. How a moment ago the mech he'd about cracked the backstrut of against the floor now stood there holding him up, looking up to those lowered optics before casting a glance to Ironhide.
"What are you talking about, Rider?" Hide questioned quietly, almost afraid that whatever he said would start up what had just ended all over again. The last thing he wanted was for it to start up again.
Rider didn't give him a verbal answer though. Instead the larger hunter pulled away from Smokey and with a slightly shaking hand latched hold of the armor of his upper arm and started prying. Smokescreen swallowed hard again, watching with dim optics. He didn't want to see it, he wasn't about to do anything to stop Rider though. Ironhide needed to see. Now the mechling, probably not so much, but if they were lucky he wouldn't understand what he was looking at.
Ironhide and Chromia however, they would understand, when that thick armor pulled back and depressurized to pry free from the protoform underneath.
The carved up protoform underneath.
Smokey was worried for a nano or two there Ironhide was gonna fall flat on his face.
And the sad part of it was, that section of Rider's bicep wasn't even the worst of it.
The whole expanse of both Rider's arms from the tops of his shoulders stretching down to around his wrists his protoform bore the marks of more names then even Smokescreen wanted to keep track of anymore. All of them cut as crude tattoos of sorts, only they were more scars then paint nanites most of the time because the huge mech hadn't had any. And all of them made most often with that same short knife tucked away in the mech's armor. All of them cut without regard to what it was they were harming. Normally no sedatives, no sterile environment, no . . . regard for how much they hurt to be made. Then again, them not hurting sort of made Rider's point of making them null and void.
Cybertronians' were known to have tattoos. The practice dated back to the Tribal orns and from the beginning of their society they were made with the points of blades, usually dipped in paint nanites, cut into both protoform and armor. They were badges of sorts. Some of them. Others marks of rank or family. Memorials and history books.
Other however, others were punishments.
It was not an uncommon thing long ago among the tribes that a bot guilty of some crime or another would be marked forever by the things they had done. Having their crimes carved into their protoform with nothing to duel the pain. And that was what Hide found himself looking at now.
It was Rider's guilt.
At least the guilt he thought he had.
Glyph after glyph of name upon name marked his protoform up his arms. A punishment he'd inflicted upon himself. For a crime he'd made up in his own processor. Not that Smokescreen, Dustoff, and even Wardrums didn't understand the reasoning in his processor behind why Outrider did what he did to his own protoform, it was the fact that nobot but him thought he was guilty in the way that he thought he was.
What he'd done, he'd done to survive. Over and over and over again, but that, sadly did nothing to change the guilt that burned inside him. The guilt that lead to the carvings up and down his arms.
For what felt like an eternity Ironhide could do nothing but stand there. Numbly. Staring in disbelief as Rider steadily pulled off his armor down his right arm letting show the magnitude of what he'd done over the vorns. The younger brother's optics stayed fixed on the floor the whole time as his vents struggled to stay even.
The truth was he didn't want Hide to know.
He didn't want anybot to know.
Ever.
He'd never meant for even Smokescreen to find out.
Now he was showing it, and it was terrifying. Especially when the slightly larger form of his elder brother took a few very shaky steps to him gently taking hold with trembling hands of him and his arm. Stopping the tentative pulling at armor. Instead staring down at the names that glared out in lighter nanite healed scars along the dark shade that made up his sparkling brother's hide.
He felt sick.
Like sick to the point there was processed energon surging up his throat that Ironhide had to forcibly swallow back down before he purged all over the berthroom floor. Hands shaking he traced a few of the random names that littered the protoform in ugly scars before he lifted his optics trying to find the ones that wouldn't meet his. There was no way the younger mech was looking up though. Not now. Not even when Ironhide choked.
"Rider? What—"
Carefully, the red mech pulled away from his brother and took a step back keeping his optics low. He didn't say anything.
"Rider?" Hide breathed.
He took another step away.
"It's names." Smokescreen speaking up had Ironhide's head snapping his way, optics wide.
"I can see it's names!" He snarled, confusion and fear bubbling up into anger in his chest. When the tone had Rider flinching and stepping even further back it made Hide drop his tone and whisper hiss. "But why the frag are they there!?"
"I put them there." Rider mumbled, head still tucked low so he wouldn't have to see the disgust that he knew would flare across those dark optics when the gaze snapped back to him. It wasn't discuss that filled those orbs though. It was pain.
Pain that had Hide's vents working three times harder as his spark squealed in agony in his chest while he looked down at the curled in frame of his brother.
"You . . . you put them there?"
Nodding Rider still refused to raise his optics.
"Why!?" That came out as almost a choked sob and Rider found he couldn't get his vocal processor to work. Instead he just stood there rapidly shaking his head back and forth as a whine worked its way up and out of his chest.
Smokescreen stepped forward, around the shaking shoulders of the huge ebony mech to tuck himself into his partner's—his brother's—side again and began carefully reattaching the armor he had pried off. Being without armor—others seeing what he had done—always did awful things to Outrider. The quicker it got back on the better the larger mech would breath. As he was doing it Smokescreen figured he might as well start talking. It would save Rider from having to try.
"It's the names of all the bots he's killed." Smokey began quietly. "In Ring matches, in bounty hunts."
Ironhide went very still.
"Bots that . . . really didn't need to die. Didn't have to." The Praxian went on softly. "He feels . . . guilty. He thinks it's his fault that they ended up in the situation that put the end of their lives at his hands. He doesn't listen when you try and explain that there is no way any of it could possibly be his fault. That a lot of it if he hadn't killed them they would have killed him."
Rider shifted more away, but Smokescreen wasn't about to let him go.
"You don't know that." Rider muttered.
"I do know that." Smokescreen sighed back. "And we've fought about this too much as it is. I don't want to fight about it right now."
"I don't want to talk about it." Rider whispered. "So can we just forget all about it and go back to the card game like the mechling said?"
Smokey cast a glance between the wide optics of the femme at the table and the trembling in the massive ebony frame. With another sigh he shook his head slowly holding a little tighter to Rider. "I don't think so, Rider."
Hide stepped forward again until he was hardly a breath between them and then in a jerked motion he reached out, snatched hold of the pair of them and pulled them into a strut cursing hug. And that, honestly, was the last thing either hunter saw coming.
Not much recharge was had in the berthroom that evening. Well, apart from the must had rest of a mechling that soon made it very clear he was going nowhere but Rider's chest for now. The massive hunter had been desperately trying to get him go back to his adopted carrier the first few moments of it, but he soon found just how settling that warm little ball of soft protoform and pulsing life could be. Which was why he found himself leaned back in a chair with a softly breathing mechling resting against the center of his chest.
Oddly enough, it made him feel better.
Even when Hide refused to let him go and the four of them found themselves talking quietly throughout the night. Even when Smokescreen and Outrider finally started talking. Actually talking. Explaining how they somehow ended up in the same Ring together. About what Smokescreen had done for so long before Outrider woke up on Dust's table. When it got alluded to that the smaller warrior spent more time in the back rooms and paid berths of the Rings then he did in the arena itself Chromia broke the empty cube of energon she'd been holding. Ironhide's weapons systems came online.
Smokescreen had shrugged them off though. Saying it didn't matter. He'd gotten over it, but the look in those optics made it very clear. He didn't want them to tell Prowl. Ironhide hadn't been happy about that.
"I'm already not allowing him in here." The massive mech sighed.
"What?" Smokey asked. "He's tried to come down here?"
"Yes." Ironhide nodded. "Four times and orn. I've been making him leave you alone. I was afraid you'd leave after how you acted about Blue. I didn't want you to take Rider with you. I didn't want either of you to go. I know that makes me a selfish bastard, but I was afraid."
Smokescreen had sat there quietly staring at him for a klick before he huffed. "I thought he was too busy taking care of my replacement."
"Bluestreak is not your replacement." Chromia told him firmly. "You were never and never will be replaced, Smokescreen. Yes, he took Blue in. Yes, he loves him very much. Yes, he treats him like a little brother. But no, Smokescreen. No, he never replaced you."
He stared for a long klick before shrugging. "You still can't tell him I was a berth ornament."
"Smokey—"
"No!" The tri colored mech hissed. "I don't do it anymore! The only bots that touch me are the ones I go after now. I'm not a pretty toy anymore. I don't . . . want him to know."
"He'll find out anyway." Outrider whispered, lifting his arm slightly and glancing to Hide. "You can't expect him not too."
"It's not like he'll care." Smokescreen whispered back.
Ironhide smacked him over the back of the head earning a hissing fit that the larger mech snarled back at.
"Don't you ever say your brother doesn't care ever again, you understand me!? Don't you ever! You mean more to Prowl than anything else ever has. You didn't see what he was like after he thought you died. You haven't seen what he's been like since. He wants to talk to you Smokescreen. He desperately needs you to talk back."
Staring back those light blue optics clouded before him, he looked away from the huge weapons specialist.
"I don't want to see it in his optics." Smokescreen finally sighed.
"See what in his optics?" Chromia questioned.
"The same thing I was scared to." Outrider sighed, rubbing at the soft doorwings fluttering in the mechling's recharge. "The disgust."
"There wasn't any." Ironhide breathed out. "I'm not disgusted by you. I . . . I hurt, I'm going to make you stop, I'm going to help you whether you want it or not, I'm not letting you go ever again, but I'm not disgusted by you, Rider. I love you. You know that."
"I'm starting to figure it out." The lighter colored younger brother whispered back, optics lifting slightly and a small smile on his lips as he looked at the other. He was, even if he knew well that Hide couldn't just fix him. That wasn't how this worked. It was never going to work that way.
This was a problem in his processor. An issue in his spark.
Neither he nor his brother could simply will it away. This was going to take time. Just like the highgrade, just like Smokescreen's cy-gars, just like every other issue they had, but the difference was. That sitting here now with his brother's arm around his shoulders. For the first time in a very long time the hunter felt like he had a chance. He felt like maybe they could actually have more than a life they hated waiting each orn for the moment when they weren't quick enough and some bastard shot them in their backs.
So the conversation went on. From how long they spent fighting for the lives in the Rings, to Smokescreen explaining when he'd taken up the cy-gars to calm his nerves—not long after War finally got him out of sick glitches' berths—and Outrider's fall into highgrade and old tribal rituals. The more they kept bringing up Wardrums teaching them not to die, Wardrums saving their stupid afts from what they got in lately, Dustoff putting them back together, Dustoff taking care of them when they hurt their idiots selves again, a pattern came to light and before long Hide was clearing his throat and braving it.
"This Wardrums and Dustoff," He started. "War is your manager. He put you in the Rings, he made you into bounty hunters, and this Dustoff just fixed what he let get broken but you talk about them like they—"
"Care?" Smokescreen smirked at him in a sad sort of way. "Well I guess that's because they kind of do. Dustoff anyway. He cares. He tries, as much as he can. He hates what they have to do, what they have to do to us. He's . . . not a mech you would think to find in that pit hole. War . . . ." The doorwinged mech laughed quietly. "War is War. I don't know how you'd really put him. He's . . . he is what he is. He cares in the only way he knows how. By making you unbeatable. No matter what that cost."
Ironhide didn't look impressed, but there was something more in his gaze that had Rider tilting his head and questioning. "What?"
"We have a pair of mechs here. Twins. They grew up in the Rings. They were raised by bots by the designations of Wardrums and Dustoff."
Two sets of optic ridges rose.
"You're joking." Smokescreen drawled.
"No I'm not." Hide shook his head. "Sideswipe and Sunstreaker. They really want to talk to the two of you."
"Sideswipe and Sunstreaker!?" Smokey just about fell out of his chair as he straightened to stare with wide optics and a dropped jaw at the mech.
Hide and Mia look startled for a moment, sharing a glance and then nodding. "Yes."
The two hunter shared a look as well, one of utter disbelief.
"I don't believe it." Outrider said.
"Small world." Smokescreen nodded.
"What are you two on about?" Mia questioned quickly.
"Dust told us about them." Smokescreen answered carefully. "The only other mechs they ever got out of that pit."
"And they're here?" Rider pressed.
"They were in that room upstairs when you killed those other hunters."
They hadn't put the connection together at the time. Now though, now it was staring them in the faceplates.
Sharing a look with Smokey, Rider muttered. "What are the chances that they knew?"
"There is no way." Smokey shook his head.
"This is War we're talking about."
"Yeah but—"
"It's possible."
"But why would he?"
"Why would he send us here in the first place? When he knew the chances of us not coming back if we could help it."
For another moment they were quiet.
Then.
"You know what we have to do." Rider said in a tone that chilled energon.
"Yeah." Smokey didn't sound to happy either.
"What do you have to do?" Ironhide sat up straighter, glancing between them worriedly.
The two mechs sighed.
"First, talk. Second, haul your mechling in."
Yep. Great plan, mech. Really. Brilliant. It's totally going to go over well.
Oh Outrider. My poor sweet, sparkling. He hurts my heart too much. And well, you guys knew the two of them had issues. Yeah . . . lots of issues, but on the bright side that's the last detrimental habit to their health either of them have. Now we can start fixing things! If they don't run off with a mechling to the Rings. Yeah, I suppose that's always on the can happen list. Can't wait to see what you guys have to say to them-on the blog-about some of this.
Anyway, once again thank you guys for your reviews and the amazing fan art. They all do mean so much to me and help me get this crazy cast to behave long enough for a chapter to actually make some sort of sense.
ARLH is coming up on its last bit, only a few more chapters-at least that's the plan-and then its off to Part Four. Hope you guys are still enjoying the ride.
See you next chapter! ^-^ Which will be back to every other weekend. Because classes, homework, studying, and work. Oh joy.
Again, you are all wonderful! Thank you!
-Jaycee