Title: Reboot – Sometimes, Crazy Works
Author: akisawana
Disclaimer: I don't think I've ever taken a biology class
Characters: Skyfire, Seekers, Aerialbots.
Continuity: G1 cartoon/IDW fusion AU
Rating: T for tardy.
Warnings: Bombs! Macking! Zebrafish!
Summary: Everyone's been turned human. Starscream has a plan. Silverbolt has a terrible plan. Skyfire has no plan.
Note the first: If I get hit by a bus, somebody clear my history before my mother finds out what I've been googling.
Note the second: If I ever meet David Wise, I am going to buy him a drink. Then ask him what on God's green Earth he was smoking in the Eighties, and where I can get some.
Note the LJ specific: I hear people are reading it here? I promise to update the masterpost.
If it's crazy, and it works, it's not crazy.
"So did Thundercracker massacre his co-workers?" Skydive asked, setting the potatoes on the self-checkout station.
"No," Skywarp said, not looking up from his phone. "Wasn't him." He stood there, texting someone, until Fireflight took him by the elbow and steered him past where Skydive and Slingshot were bagging groceries, over to the bench. He'd had to lead Skywarp through nearly the entire store like that, the Decepticon fascinated by the sheer variety of food.
Maybe the amount, too. Not all the Decepticon raids were about energon, but a good portion of them had been. Skydive squashed down the plume of sympathy trying to bubble up in his spark; the Autobots got by just fine by working with organics. Surely the Decepticons could have done the same?
Or perhaps it was just Skywarp. Fireflight had herded him through the store quite effectively, considering. Then again, they were at the store nearly every day, buying one thing or another to keep their human bodies in reasonable condition. Meijers was now familiar enough that Fireflight didn't need to touch every last thing, and after so long being on the receiving end, was it so surprising he was so effective at keeping Skywarp moving?
Skydive put the last of the bags in the cart and waved at the two on the bench. Fireflight waved back, nearly clonking himself in the head with his own cast.
Skydive loved his brother, he really did. And he knew that Fireflight didn't get himself in trouble for fun –that was Air Raid. But he was not taking Fireflight back to the hospital if his brother gave himself a concussion out of sheer spacey-ness.
Skywarp was still focused on his phone; Fireflight had to tug on his arm twice to get him following. He'd been bad throughout the store, but nothing like this. Only Slingshot's reflexes kept the Seeker from walking off the curb in front of a car. He did come down enough to help load the bags in the car, at least until his phone played the distinctive ringtone Fireflight had selected for Starscream.
"The power's back on," Skywarp said. While a text from Silverbolt a few minutes later confirmed the restoration of electricity, humans generally didn't turn white as Skyfire used to be after hearing good news.
Skydive was driving, so Slingshot had checked Skydive's phone. Slingshot hadn't sulked much throughout the trip –well, sulked much for Slingshot, which meant he only tried to start two fights even though Fireflight was intentionally aiming for glass. Skydive was downright proud of his brother's self-control. He wasn't surprised by it though; of all the Aerialbots, Slingshot was the best at putting aside his emotions to focus on the mission. Taking Skywarp, a Decepticon more known for pushing mechs down staircases gleefully than standing around disgruntledly, taking such a mech anywhere in public certainly counted as a mission. Aside from the trap they were laying for Megatron, none of the Aerialbots wanted to explain to human authorities their current situation. That was a political minefield best left to Prime and Jazz.
"Silverbolt says he knows," Slingshot whispered to Skydive a moment later, pulling him out of his reverie. "Did you tell him?"
"Tell him what?"
"About what I told you?"
"Have I ever before?"
"How else would he know?"
"Maybe he's psychic?"
Fireflight had been staring out the window the entire way back, hypnotized yet again by the swoop of power lines, but Skydive felt his head thunk against the back of the driver's seat as the two of them went around and around in verbal circles until they arrived back at the base. Skydive hadn't told Silverbolt about the sunglasses or the shampoo, but Silverbolt had a way of finding things out, a certain gimlet stare he'd picked up from Prime that strongly encouraged volunteering information before he got angry. Perhaps Air Raid had told, Air Raid folded like a cheap suit if anybody looked at him sideways. Or perhaps Fireflight had; Silverbolt hadn't said anything yet about totaling the car or ducking into the repair bay with a Seeker instead of a brother, and diverting Silverbolt's attention was certainly in his repertoire. Fireflight was more likely to have found out on his own too, he was far more observant than Air Raid. There were rocks and minibots more observant than Air Raid.
With Skywarp's help, even though he was almost as distracted as Fireflight on a bad day, they were able to get everything in one trip, and the elevator was working. On the top floor, it opened to reveal Silverbolt and Starscream, standing side by side, with identical, unhappy expressions. Thundercracker was there too, lurking on the other side of Silverbolt, and he handed a chocolate milkshake to his wingmate after Silverbolt relieved Skywarp of the six-pack of beer.
Silverbolt turned Prowl's patented unamused "if you tell me now I may show you mercy" stare onto a nonplussed Starscream. "Now, what is this all about."
"Not in the middle of the hallway," Starscream said, leading the way to the Aerialbot's apartment. He didn't have a key, and Silverbolt took his time letting them in.
Air Raid was in there already, and he made a beeline for Fireflight. Skydive knew why; he felt better on Slingshot's six himself.
The Decepticons positioned themselves in the living room like they always did –Thundercracker by the window, Skywarp on the floor in front of one end of the couch, Starscream claiming one of the chairs as a throne. All three separated, all three in Slingshot's line of fire, the Aerialbots between them and the door. Casual superiority, rubbing it in that the Aerialbots were not a threat? Or trying to disarm, by putting themselves at Autobot mercy? Skywarp slurped his milkshake. There was a third option –Thundercracker liked windows, who knew what went on in Starscream's head, and Skywarp was equidistant from the two of them. It could just be a coincidence.
And it could be a coincidence that they were in Detroit, in the same building, across the Primus-damned hall.
"Astrotrain has contacted us," Starscream said, timing Silverbolt's breaking point perfectly. "There is a slim chance the elite Decepticon forces might descend upon Detroit."
Slingshot snorted a laugh. "Good. We can take them."
Starscream raised an elegant eyebrow at Silverbolt. "I thought you might appreciate the time to prepare."
"Thank you for the warning," Silverbolt said, so chilly Skydive half-expected snowflakes to fall from his lips.
"You're welcome," Starscream said, meeting Silverbolt's coldness with mocking warmth. "I look forward to seeing what you do to them."
"I guess you guys are leaving," Fireflight said to his hands, folded in his lap. Slingshot nudged Skydive's ankle; sure Fireflight was laying it on a bit thick, but he was the one who'd been trained by Jazz, and whatever else he said, Skydive trusted his brother's judgment.
Skydive missed how Starscream's eyes flicked to Thundercracker, so fast no-one but Fireflight and Skywarp caught it. He assumed it happened, and Fireflight confirmed it later, when Skywarp asked, "Oh, you two are talking now?" Skydive thought he wanted to throw the milkshake.
"Nothing's changed," Thundercracker ground out. Skydive could practically see his wings flare.
"Of course we're not leaving," Starscream told Air Raid, Air Raid being the person farthest away from Thundercracker. "Why would we do that?"
"Because, um, I don't know," Air Raid said. "I'm not as crazy as you."
Skydive stepped on Slingshot's foot before he could say something indelicate about Air Raid, Starscream, and the relative insanity of both. Silverbolt sighed, and said, "Slingshot, do you have something you want to share with us?"
Slingshot huffed, folded his arms, realized how much that made him look like Thundercracker, scowled and unfolded them. "It's like hunting Breakdown," he told his brothers. "You make a big noise and see if he spooks. If they stay, Buckethead might think they're just regular weird humans. If they take off, he'll know it's them for sure."
Something, Skydive didn't know what, made Fireflight perk up. "If they come anyways?" he asked.
"You can take 'em," Skywarp said, staring mournfully into his now-empty milkshake.
"You mean we can shield you, while they put on a show," Skydive said, more bitter than he wished. He needed all the fact to formulate a strategy. That didn't mean he had to like them.
"Huh?" Skywarp asked. Starscream rolled his eyes.
"We put on the show," Thundercracker said, indicating himself and both his wingmates by waving his hand in a chandelle. "They…don't."
Silverbolt looked at him. "Really," he said, putting whole paragraphs of meaning in the single word.
"They might avoid you altogether; they'll certainly know you're here," Starscream said. Skydive had said Superion was a terrible alias, but nobody had listened to his suggestion to come up with a better one. "They have a healthy respect for your abilities. Something about a giant purple griffin and the Combaticons versus three of you?"
All the Aerialbots looked at Fireflight. He gave them a sheepish smile. "I got lost," he said for the ten thousandth time. "And anyways, Slingshot was there, he could have helped."
"I was missing my weapons console! And I still took out that …tentacled thing!"
"Took it out on a date, maybe," Air Raid snickered. "It sure liked you."
Slingshot threw a potato at Air Raid. Air Raid grinned, and Silverbolt raised his eyebrows and pointed at the two of them, the warning as clear as it was silent.
"Oh, for the love of," Thundercracker said, when Silverbolt resumed trying to kill him with eye lasers. "Look, what do you think would happen if Starscream told Ramjet "hey, we're going easy on those new Autobot planes?"
"He would fail spectacularly and blow the ruse?" Air Raid guessed.
The Seekers considered that for a minute. Starscream nodded, Skywarp smirked, and Thundercracker agreed, "Yes, if the Coneheads tried, they would fail. But they wouldn't try. They'd run right to Megatron and we'd be given two rotations to bring him your heads, or ours would be his shiniest new energon decanters."
"That's…pretty specific," Skydive murmured.
Starscream smiled. It was not a nice smile. "Skydive –not you, another Skydive- and his trine weren't very good at tracking."
"So you're changing your story?" Silverbolt asked.
"Refining it," Thundercracker growled, frustrated. "Since you didn't understand the first time. You really thought there was an armada-wide conspiracy to save your sorry afts?"
It had seemed plausible enough, given what other Autobots had said, minus the part where Starscream was involved. Silverbolt conceded the point to Thundercracker with a nod, though, since anyone with wings could easily see the yawning chasm between the Coneheads' skills and Starscream's, and there had been more than a few close calls for each of them under Ratchet's hand.
Starscream clapped his hands together. "So if you hear gunfire, please feel free to intervene. We'll be staying put." He stood up. "And we can take care of ourselves, should you be busy." Skywarp left his cup on the floor and followed his wingleader to the door. Thundercracker did too, tossing Skywarp's cup into the garbage as an excuse on his way.
"Wait," Silverbolt said, and Skydive knew the look in his optics. It was the look he got right before he came up with some brilliant plan to get them all killed. "Skydive, go with them. Make sure their base is defensible."
Starscream raised an eyebrow at Silverbolt.
"Have you ever studied defense on the ground?" Silverbolt challenged. "Skydive has."
"If you don't mind me borrowing his…talents." Starscream managed to make that sound vaguely obscene. Air Raid thought the same thing, whispered something in Fireflight's ear that made him flush. Thundercracker's hand twitched, as if he was repressing the urge to facepalm.
Skydive didn't bother. "I need Slingshot and Fireflight," he said from behind his hand. Silverbolt would explain later, he trusted. It wasn't that he doubted Silverbolt's decision. There was something behind it, there always was. But that something bore no resemblance to any form of logic Skydive had ever heard of, and sometimes led to large stockpiles of energon exploding. But if it kept the Seekers where they could keep a couple of sensors on them, Skydive wasn't going to argue.
"Fireflight, go with them." Silverbolt looked at Slingshot. "Slingshot will be along in a few minutes."
Air Raid snickered; the sound echoed oddly, and Skydive realized Skywarp was snickering too. Silverbolt wasn't very good at keeping a straight face, Slingshot was worse, and everyone was suddenly aware that Silverbolt had been upset before he heard about Astrotrain. Well, Skydive had tried to pull Slingshot out of the fire.
"Do you want me to set up the thing like I did here?" Fireflight asked. "Because if you do, I'm going to need more non-dairy creamer after."
"Non-dairy creamer?" Starscream repeated, hand still on the door handle.
"Don't ask," Skydive said. "He'll demonstrate."
Fireflight just smiled.
Skyfire spent six years in deep space for the Autobots once. To him, it was simply a brief trip out to survey Jupiter's moons. He hadn't expected much to change while he was gone –assuming he didn't crash into ice again. And even then, the Autobots needed him too much to leave him.
Nothing had changed substantially while he was gone; the war continued, the Decepticons searched for new sources of energy with which to wipe out the Autobots, and the Autobots attempted to negotiate enough energy from the inhabitants of Earth to retake Cybertron, plus supply all the Autobots off-world. The Aerialbots all became experts at medical transport. Starscream betrayed Megatron and ran away, but was welcomed back after the Autobots defeated him.
The exact details Skyfire never asked for. All he knew was that there had been a human accused of colluding with Starscream, and when the Autobots dismantled their underground lair, they saw too much potential in the machines to destroy them. As near as Perceptor could tell, Starscream had been tweaking bacteria into producing energon. Pink alchemy had been dismissed in Skyfire's day as only theoretical, and not worth the investment, but Starscream was the first to try it in single-celled organisms. He'd had some success with the Bifidobacterium family, before the Autobots had put a stop to him. Even if it seemed harmless, they couldn't risk Starscream throwing a temper tantrum and trying to blow up the planet. Again.
Starscream had invested a lot in the idea of pink alchemy with lower forms of life, creating a machine dedicated solely to manipulating genes. It was, surprisingly easy to convince it to work on zebrafish zygotes. Maybe not, they had been partners when Starscream was a scientist.
The survival rate of specimens took a hit, but given the sheer number of zebrafish gametes he had, Skyfire didn't have any shortage of embryos to watch develop over their three-day gestation period. Still, there was a lot of tinkering with just how much of that extra chromosome needed to be inserted, and where to insert it, and then he discovered that the models needed nearly twice the iron of the control group. Finally, he had one generation of breedable specimens, and their eggs were just as transparent as the control generation.
Skyfire watched, in real-time, as the cells divided, and at the fourteenth somite stage saw the first anomaly. Most, or all, of the extra iron was collecting in the third somite pair on each specimen. As they uncurled through the pharyngula phase, the iron shifted and moved, becoming more angular, more mechanical. Then the pigmentation clouded over, blocking his view through the microscope. Some of them Skyfire set aside, for dissection, and some he observed hatch. The transgenic fish seemed no different from the control fish; after three days, those that survived the larval stage swam and ate and bred much as the control fish. The next generation did as well.
In the sectioned larvae, Skyfire found two tiny bits of metal that had, impossibly, grown into specific shapes –a wobbly sphere and a more rectangular prism. An iron-wide filament, no wider than spider's silk, connected the two. He mounted one on his most powerful microscope –almost as powerful as Perceptor should be- and zoomed in as much as he could.
But he couldn't see anything other than iron, arranged by cellular forces he only dimly understood, for a purpose he could not guess.
By the time the Aerialbots left to purchase more non-dairy creamer, Skywarp felt considerably better.
Starscream had taken their phones back into his laboratory-slash-personal quarters, to extract whatever header data he could from the message each of them had received from Astrotrain. Fireflight had received one as well, halfway through setting up his bombs, and Starscream took that as confirmation that Astrotrain was simply sending out mass texts, hoping for a response.
Skydive stood in their apartment silently for a few minutes, until Slingshot came in the unlocked door with his ears burning. Then the strategy-minded Aerialbot had directed his brother and Skywarp into re-arranging the furniture for maximum defensive cover, while Fireflight showed Thundercracker how to mix up something close enough to firefog using stuff from the grocery store. Thundercracker liked weapons as much as the next Decepticon, which was to say less than his wingmates, but he paid attention and didn't get distracted by Fireflight's chest or impossibly blue eyes.
Which was, of course, why he built the bombs and Skywarp moved the couches.
He'd expected it to end up looking like the Aerialbot's apartment –after all, they had the same furniture- but Skydive had them stretching cords across paths and blocking offensive routes to the back, where the Aerialbot's layout was easier to walk through in the dark. Skywarp didn't know the first thing about groundpounder fighting, but Skydive put considerable thought into the placement of each piece of furniture, and Skywarp could appreciate the effort well enough.
Also, now they had bombs. Skywarp always felt better with bombs close to hand.
Starscream came out, inspected the arrangement, and returned to his lair without a word, which Skywarp helpfully translated as his version of a thank you. It wasn't, but no need to tell the Aerialbots that. Fireflight grinned at Thundercracker, and Slingshot all but dragged him after Skydive to get more supplies. Fireflight waved to Skywarp on the way out, a little waggle of his fingers that Skywarp couldn't help but return. Then they sat down on the couch, and waited.
Waiting was the worst. Waiting was always the worst. Thundercracker flipped on the television, but neither of them were paying much attention. "So," Skywarp said.
"I'll get some guns tomorrow," Thundercracker grunted. "Legal and everything."
Skywarp leaned against his wingmate. "Pistols?"
"Yeah, maybe a shotgun," Thundercracker shrugged. "Depends on how many they let me buy at once."
"That's good." Skywarp didn't really care. He just hated sitting in one place, waiting to get shot.
They watched a few commercials in silence, until Starscream came out and dropped their phones on Skywarp's lap. "I've narrowed them down to Miami," he announced, his back to Thundercracker. Skywarp wondered what would happen if he locked them in a closet together. Tonight, before they could shoot each other again. "I've got a tracer on the phone number now."
"Sure, fine, whatever. Where's Miami?" Skywarp asked. Thundercracker picked up the phones, fiddled with his.
"About thirteen hundred miles away," Starscream said. "I'll tell you if they come closer."
"Thanks for the warning," Skywarp said, sincerely, and then went back to staring at the television. So their execution would take a few days.
"They're firing in the dark." Starscream's voice was quiet. "They won't find us."
"You're the expert." Why wouldn't Starscream just go away?
Starscream huffed. "Look, he has to forgive us if I restore him."
"Forgive us for what?" Skywarp didn't look at his wingleader as he asked. Next to him, Thundercracker kept on ignoring Starscream because the two of them were fragging geeky rusty aftheads and he ought to hand them both over. "Milkshakes?"
Starscream didn't say anything, just turned and left. The door had barely closed behind him before Thundercracker dropped into Skywarp's lap, heavy and warm and here. Not something to take for granted, not always something they had, Thundercracker's weight on his legs –and he didn't always have legs, Thundercracker didn't always have knees on either side of Skywarp's hips, didn't always have arms to come up around his shoulders. Thundercracker reached up, cradled Skywarp's head in his hands, and Skywarp had a head, always had a head, but Thundercracker didn't always have hands, and quick as terminal velocity, soft as solar wind, they came together.
There was no use offlining sight, too much had changed, smell and feel and sound and Skywarp had hair now for Thundercracker to weave his fingers through and Skywarp didn't really understand his fascination with it but he didn't mind it in the least. They pressed their foreheads together, close as they could get, so close Skywarp couldn't focus, so close Thundercracker turned into a one-eyed shadow, and when Thundercracker blinked, Skywarp could feel the air stir. Close enough that long, stuttering ex-vent came out of Skywarp's mouth now and ghosted into Thundercracker's, obscenely intimate. Flesh gave under his fingers, and he was as gentle as he could be in a still-unfamiliar body, as he explored the still-new curves of Skywarp's jaw.
Kissing wasn't something a lot of Decepticons did, but Thundercracker guided Skywarp's head to the side and covered the teleporter's mouth with his own with the ease of long practice. They had mouths, had for a long time now, and kissing meant things. Meant they were both in the same place, at the same time, with arms and legs and heads and privacy, not precisely safe but not actively in danger, not going to die in the next five klicks. As good as they ever got.
Thundercracker had to break the kiss to talk to him though, and he said against Skywarp's mouth, "Like this, we can't survive the punishment he'll dole out."
"Dole out for what?" Skywarp demanded, fisting his hands in Thundercracker's shirt. They didn't have wings. It wasn't the first time for either of them but it was the first time it was the same time. They couldn't fly.
Thundercracker smiled, though Skywarp couldn't imagine what he was possibly smiling about. "For looking too much like Starscream." He kissed Skywarp again, thoroughly, not quite enough to make Skywarp's brain turn off. "He'll fix this, and we'll go home, and then it will be just another funny story, like Hydrus Five."
Hydrus Five hadn't been very funny.
But there was heat pooling in his belly, and far too many clothes on, and this was so much more complicated than it ought to be. Skywarp pulled away to tug Thundercracker's shirt off over his head and dragged dull claws down his back, where his airbrake was once. Thundercracker pressed back against the movement, shifting on his lap in interesting ways. Skywarp pressed his mouth to Thundercracker's bare chest. "I told Fireflight," Skywarp said, thinking about how doing this with the Aerialbot would be different.
"Told him what?" Thundercracker asked, undoing Skywarp's pants with an easy flick.
"About proxy flirting and he bought me a donut."
Thundercracker froze.
"He's cool with it," Skywarp said, looking up at his wingmate, who was shaking his head.
"Why would you even…"Thundercracker took a deep breath and put his hands on Skywarp's shoulders. "What were you thinking?"
"That he wants to swap paint with you, and I want to play with his boobs, and he said he likes me, and you want to do things with him that you don't even have words for," Skywarp said. It was screamingly obvious, but sometimes Thundercracker missed the screamingly obvious. That was okay, Skywarp was there to point it out to him. And push him along where he would stall and think too much.
Thundercracker shook his head. "Aerialbot, Skywarp. He's an Aerialbot."
"So?" Skywarp reached up to his wingmate, wrapped his arms around him. It wasn't quite a wingrub but it would have to do. "His brothers don't seem to mind."
"He's a baby Autobot," Thundercracker said into Skywarp's neck. That was good. That meant he wasn't sure he could say it with a straight face.
"Wouldn't be the first Autobot we shared," Skywarp reminded him, moving his hand in slow circles. "Do you not want him? Tell me I'm wrong."
"But he's a baby," Thundercracker repeated. "Do they even know what's going on?"
"They've learned the hard way," Skywarp said. "He knows. Do you want this?"
Thundercracker ignored the question, blindly finding Skywarp's hair. "What if he gets the wrong idea?"
"Well, TC, there's this thing I do called talking," Skywarp said, very patiently. "And then everyone's on the same jetstream. It's kinda like how you attempt to beam information into people's heads with your broody staring except it works."
Thundercracker stifled a laugh with Skywarp's shoulder. "We're going to get shot."
"Nope. Slingshot's totally cool with it," Skywarp said, turning his head against Thundercracker's and wiggling his hips. Thundercracker wasn't saying no, and usually he'd leave it at that, but he wanted to demonstrate the talking thing that Thundercracker failed at so spectacularly. "So you want this and I want this and he wants this, are we doing this?"
"Yeah," Thundercracker said, kissing him because he was there and they weren't going to die in the next five klicks and they were going to rediscover the best part of being human unless the television lied again. "Yeah, we're doing this."
Notes the end: A chandelle combines a 180 degree turn with a climb. This is not Silverbolt's most suicidal plan.
Thank you for reading.
Author: akisawana
Disclaimer: I don't think I've ever taken a biology class
Characters: Skyfire, Seekers, Aerialbots.
Continuity: G1 cartoon/IDW fusion AU
Rating: T for tardy.
Warnings: Bombs! Macking! Zebrafish!
Summary: Everyone's been turned human. Starscream has a plan. Silverbolt has a terrible plan. Skyfire has no plan.
Note the first: If I get hit by a bus, somebody clear my history before my mother finds out what I've been googling.
Note the second: If I ever meet David Wise, I am going to buy him a drink. Then ask him what on God's green Earth he was smoking in the Eighties, and where I can get some.
Note the LJ specific: I hear people are reading it here? I promise to update the masterpost.
If it's crazy, and it works, it's not crazy.
"So did Thundercracker massacre his co-workers?" Skydive asked, setting the potatoes on the self-checkout station.
"No," Skywarp said, not looking up from his phone. "Wasn't him." He stood there, texting someone, until Fireflight took him by the elbow and steered him past where Skydive and Slingshot were bagging groceries, over to the bench. He'd had to lead Skywarp through nearly the entire store like that, the Decepticon fascinated by the sheer variety of food.
Maybe the amount, too. Not all the Decepticon raids were about energon, but a good portion of them had been. Skydive squashed down the plume of sympathy trying to bubble up in his spark; the Autobots got by just fine by working with organics. Surely the Decepticons could have done the same?
Or perhaps it was just Skywarp. Fireflight had herded him through the store quite effectively, considering. Then again, they were at the store nearly every day, buying one thing or another to keep their human bodies in reasonable condition. Meijers was now familiar enough that Fireflight didn't need to touch every last thing, and after so long being on the receiving end, was it so surprising he was so effective at keeping Skywarp moving?
Skydive put the last of the bags in the cart and waved at the two on the bench. Fireflight waved back, nearly clonking himself in the head with his own cast.
Skydive loved his brother, he really did. And he knew that Fireflight didn't get himself in trouble for fun –that was Air Raid. But he was not taking Fireflight back to the hospital if his brother gave himself a concussion out of sheer spacey-ness.
Skywarp was still focused on his phone; Fireflight had to tug on his arm twice to get him following. He'd been bad throughout the store, but nothing like this. Only Slingshot's reflexes kept the Seeker from walking off the curb in front of a car. He did come down enough to help load the bags in the car, at least until his phone played the distinctive ringtone Fireflight had selected for Starscream.
"The power's back on," Skywarp said. While a text from Silverbolt a few minutes later confirmed the restoration of electricity, humans generally didn't turn white as Skyfire used to be after hearing good news.
Skydive was driving, so Slingshot had checked Skydive's phone. Slingshot hadn't sulked much throughout the trip –well, sulked much for Slingshot, which meant he only tried to start two fights even though Fireflight was intentionally aiming for glass. Skydive was downright proud of his brother's self-control. He wasn't surprised by it though; of all the Aerialbots, Slingshot was the best at putting aside his emotions to focus on the mission. Taking Skywarp, a Decepticon more known for pushing mechs down staircases gleefully than standing around disgruntledly, taking such a mech anywhere in public certainly counted as a mission. Aside from the trap they were laying for Megatron, none of the Aerialbots wanted to explain to human authorities their current situation. That was a political minefield best left to Prime and Jazz.
"Silverbolt says he knows," Slingshot whispered to Skydive a moment later, pulling him out of his reverie. "Did you tell him?"
"Tell him what?"
"About what I told you?"
"Have I ever before?"
"How else would he know?"
"Maybe he's psychic?"
Fireflight had been staring out the window the entire way back, hypnotized yet again by the swoop of power lines, but Skydive felt his head thunk against the back of the driver's seat as the two of them went around and around in verbal circles until they arrived back at the base. Skydive hadn't told Silverbolt about the sunglasses or the shampoo, but Silverbolt had a way of finding things out, a certain gimlet stare he'd picked up from Prime that strongly encouraged volunteering information before he got angry. Perhaps Air Raid had told, Air Raid folded like a cheap suit if anybody looked at him sideways. Or perhaps Fireflight had; Silverbolt hadn't said anything yet about totaling the car or ducking into the repair bay with a Seeker instead of a brother, and diverting Silverbolt's attention was certainly in his repertoire. Fireflight was more likely to have found out on his own too, he was far more observant than Air Raid. There were rocks and minibots more observant than Air Raid.
With Skywarp's help, even though he was almost as distracted as Fireflight on a bad day, they were able to get everything in one trip, and the elevator was working. On the top floor, it opened to reveal Silverbolt and Starscream, standing side by side, with identical, unhappy expressions. Thundercracker was there too, lurking on the other side of Silverbolt, and he handed a chocolate milkshake to his wingmate after Silverbolt relieved Skywarp of the six-pack of beer.
Silverbolt turned Prowl's patented unamused "if you tell me now I may show you mercy" stare onto a nonplussed Starscream. "Now, what is this all about."
"Not in the middle of the hallway," Starscream said, leading the way to the Aerialbot's apartment. He didn't have a key, and Silverbolt took his time letting them in.
Air Raid was in there already, and he made a beeline for Fireflight. Skydive knew why; he felt better on Slingshot's six himself.
The Decepticons positioned themselves in the living room like they always did –Thundercracker by the window, Skywarp on the floor in front of one end of the couch, Starscream claiming one of the chairs as a throne. All three separated, all three in Slingshot's line of fire, the Aerialbots between them and the door. Casual superiority, rubbing it in that the Aerialbots were not a threat? Or trying to disarm, by putting themselves at Autobot mercy? Skywarp slurped his milkshake. There was a third option –Thundercracker liked windows, who knew what went on in Starscream's head, and Skywarp was equidistant from the two of them. It could just be a coincidence.
And it could be a coincidence that they were in Detroit, in the same building, across the Primus-damned hall.
"Astrotrain has contacted us," Starscream said, timing Silverbolt's breaking point perfectly. "There is a slim chance the elite Decepticon forces might descend upon Detroit."
Slingshot snorted a laugh. "Good. We can take them."
Starscream raised an elegant eyebrow at Silverbolt. "I thought you might appreciate the time to prepare."
"Thank you for the warning," Silverbolt said, so chilly Skydive half-expected snowflakes to fall from his lips.
"You're welcome," Starscream said, meeting Silverbolt's coldness with mocking warmth. "I look forward to seeing what you do to them."
"I guess you guys are leaving," Fireflight said to his hands, folded in his lap. Slingshot nudged Skydive's ankle; sure Fireflight was laying it on a bit thick, but he was the one who'd been trained by Jazz, and whatever else he said, Skydive trusted his brother's judgment.
Skydive missed how Starscream's eyes flicked to Thundercracker, so fast no-one but Fireflight and Skywarp caught it. He assumed it happened, and Fireflight confirmed it later, when Skywarp asked, "Oh, you two are talking now?" Skydive thought he wanted to throw the milkshake.
"Nothing's changed," Thundercracker ground out. Skydive could practically see his wings flare.
"Of course we're not leaving," Starscream told Air Raid, Air Raid being the person farthest away from Thundercracker. "Why would we do that?"
"Because, um, I don't know," Air Raid said. "I'm not as crazy as you."
Skydive stepped on Slingshot's foot before he could say something indelicate about Air Raid, Starscream, and the relative insanity of both. Silverbolt sighed, and said, "Slingshot, do you have something you want to share with us?"
Slingshot huffed, folded his arms, realized how much that made him look like Thundercracker, scowled and unfolded them. "It's like hunting Breakdown," he told his brothers. "You make a big noise and see if he spooks. If they stay, Buckethead might think they're just regular weird humans. If they take off, he'll know it's them for sure."
Something, Skydive didn't know what, made Fireflight perk up. "If they come anyways?" he asked.
"You can take 'em," Skywarp said, staring mournfully into his now-empty milkshake.
"You mean we can shield you, while they put on a show," Skydive said, more bitter than he wished. He needed all the fact to formulate a strategy. That didn't mean he had to like them.
"Huh?" Skywarp asked. Starscream rolled his eyes.
"We put on the show," Thundercracker said, indicating himself and both his wingmates by waving his hand in a chandelle. "They…don't."
Silverbolt looked at him. "Really," he said, putting whole paragraphs of meaning in the single word.
"They might avoid you altogether; they'll certainly know you're here," Starscream said. Skydive had said Superion was a terrible alias, but nobody had listened to his suggestion to come up with a better one. "They have a healthy respect for your abilities. Something about a giant purple griffin and the Combaticons versus three of you?"
All the Aerialbots looked at Fireflight. He gave them a sheepish smile. "I got lost," he said for the ten thousandth time. "And anyways, Slingshot was there, he could have helped."
"I was missing my weapons console! And I still took out that …tentacled thing!"
"Took it out on a date, maybe," Air Raid snickered. "It sure liked you."
Slingshot threw a potato at Air Raid. Air Raid grinned, and Silverbolt raised his eyebrows and pointed at the two of them, the warning as clear as it was silent.
"Oh, for the love of," Thundercracker said, when Silverbolt resumed trying to kill him with eye lasers. "Look, what do you think would happen if Starscream told Ramjet "hey, we're going easy on those new Autobot planes?"
"He would fail spectacularly and blow the ruse?" Air Raid guessed.
The Seekers considered that for a minute. Starscream nodded, Skywarp smirked, and Thundercracker agreed, "Yes, if the Coneheads tried, they would fail. But they wouldn't try. They'd run right to Megatron and we'd be given two rotations to bring him your heads, or ours would be his shiniest new energon decanters."
"That's…pretty specific," Skydive murmured.
Starscream smiled. It was not a nice smile. "Skydive –not you, another Skydive- and his trine weren't very good at tracking."
"So you're changing your story?" Silverbolt asked.
"Refining it," Thundercracker growled, frustrated. "Since you didn't understand the first time. You really thought there was an armada-wide conspiracy to save your sorry afts?"
It had seemed plausible enough, given what other Autobots had said, minus the part where Starscream was involved. Silverbolt conceded the point to Thundercracker with a nod, though, since anyone with wings could easily see the yawning chasm between the Coneheads' skills and Starscream's, and there had been more than a few close calls for each of them under Ratchet's hand.
Starscream clapped his hands together. "So if you hear gunfire, please feel free to intervene. We'll be staying put." He stood up. "And we can take care of ourselves, should you be busy." Skywarp left his cup on the floor and followed his wingleader to the door. Thundercracker did too, tossing Skywarp's cup into the garbage as an excuse on his way.
"Wait," Silverbolt said, and Skydive knew the look in his optics. It was the look he got right before he came up with some brilliant plan to get them all killed. "Skydive, go with them. Make sure their base is defensible."
Starscream raised an eyebrow at Silverbolt.
"Have you ever studied defense on the ground?" Silverbolt challenged. "Skydive has."
"If you don't mind me borrowing his…talents." Starscream managed to make that sound vaguely obscene. Air Raid thought the same thing, whispered something in Fireflight's ear that made him flush. Thundercracker's hand twitched, as if he was repressing the urge to facepalm.
Skydive didn't bother. "I need Slingshot and Fireflight," he said from behind his hand. Silverbolt would explain later, he trusted. It wasn't that he doubted Silverbolt's decision. There was something behind it, there always was. But that something bore no resemblance to any form of logic Skydive had ever heard of, and sometimes led to large stockpiles of energon exploding. But if it kept the Seekers where they could keep a couple of sensors on them, Skydive wasn't going to argue.
"Fireflight, go with them." Silverbolt looked at Slingshot. "Slingshot will be along in a few minutes."
Air Raid snickered; the sound echoed oddly, and Skydive realized Skywarp was snickering too. Silverbolt wasn't very good at keeping a straight face, Slingshot was worse, and everyone was suddenly aware that Silverbolt had been upset before he heard about Astrotrain. Well, Skydive had tried to pull Slingshot out of the fire.
"Do you want me to set up the thing like I did here?" Fireflight asked. "Because if you do, I'm going to need more non-dairy creamer after."
"Non-dairy creamer?" Starscream repeated, hand still on the door handle.
"Don't ask," Skydive said. "He'll demonstrate."
Fireflight just smiled.
Skyfire spent six years in deep space for the Autobots once. To him, it was simply a brief trip out to survey Jupiter's moons. He hadn't expected much to change while he was gone –assuming he didn't crash into ice again. And even then, the Autobots needed him too much to leave him.
Nothing had changed substantially while he was gone; the war continued, the Decepticons searched for new sources of energy with which to wipe out the Autobots, and the Autobots attempted to negotiate enough energy from the inhabitants of Earth to retake Cybertron, plus supply all the Autobots off-world. The Aerialbots all became experts at medical transport. Starscream betrayed Megatron and ran away, but was welcomed back after the Autobots defeated him.
The exact details Skyfire never asked for. All he knew was that there had been a human accused of colluding with Starscream, and when the Autobots dismantled their underground lair, they saw too much potential in the machines to destroy them. As near as Perceptor could tell, Starscream had been tweaking bacteria into producing energon. Pink alchemy had been dismissed in Skyfire's day as only theoretical, and not worth the investment, but Starscream was the first to try it in single-celled organisms. He'd had some success with the Bifidobacterium family, before the Autobots had put a stop to him. Even if it seemed harmless, they couldn't risk Starscream throwing a temper tantrum and trying to blow up the planet. Again.
Starscream had invested a lot in the idea of pink alchemy with lower forms of life, creating a machine dedicated solely to manipulating genes. It was, surprisingly easy to convince it to work on zebrafish zygotes. Maybe not, they had been partners when Starscream was a scientist.
The survival rate of specimens took a hit, but given the sheer number of zebrafish gametes he had, Skyfire didn't have any shortage of embryos to watch develop over their three-day gestation period. Still, there was a lot of tinkering with just how much of that extra chromosome needed to be inserted, and where to insert it, and then he discovered that the models needed nearly twice the iron of the control group. Finally, he had one generation of breedable specimens, and their eggs were just as transparent as the control generation.
Skyfire watched, in real-time, as the cells divided, and at the fourteenth somite stage saw the first anomaly. Most, or all, of the extra iron was collecting in the third somite pair on each specimen. As they uncurled through the pharyngula phase, the iron shifted and moved, becoming more angular, more mechanical. Then the pigmentation clouded over, blocking his view through the microscope. Some of them Skyfire set aside, for dissection, and some he observed hatch. The transgenic fish seemed no different from the control fish; after three days, those that survived the larval stage swam and ate and bred much as the control fish. The next generation did as well.
In the sectioned larvae, Skyfire found two tiny bits of metal that had, impossibly, grown into specific shapes –a wobbly sphere and a more rectangular prism. An iron-wide filament, no wider than spider's silk, connected the two. He mounted one on his most powerful microscope –almost as powerful as Perceptor should be- and zoomed in as much as he could.
But he couldn't see anything other than iron, arranged by cellular forces he only dimly understood, for a purpose he could not guess.
By the time the Aerialbots left to purchase more non-dairy creamer, Skywarp felt considerably better.
Starscream had taken their phones back into his laboratory-slash-personal quarters, to extract whatever header data he could from the message each of them had received from Astrotrain. Fireflight had received one as well, halfway through setting up his bombs, and Starscream took that as confirmation that Astrotrain was simply sending out mass texts, hoping for a response.
Skydive stood in their apartment silently for a few minutes, until Slingshot came in the unlocked door with his ears burning. Then the strategy-minded Aerialbot had directed his brother and Skywarp into re-arranging the furniture for maximum defensive cover, while Fireflight showed Thundercracker how to mix up something close enough to firefog using stuff from the grocery store. Thundercracker liked weapons as much as the next Decepticon, which was to say less than his wingmates, but he paid attention and didn't get distracted by Fireflight's chest or impossibly blue eyes.
Which was, of course, why he built the bombs and Skywarp moved the couches.
He'd expected it to end up looking like the Aerialbot's apartment –after all, they had the same furniture- but Skydive had them stretching cords across paths and blocking offensive routes to the back, where the Aerialbot's layout was easier to walk through in the dark. Skywarp didn't know the first thing about groundpounder fighting, but Skydive put considerable thought into the placement of each piece of furniture, and Skywarp could appreciate the effort well enough.
Also, now they had bombs. Skywarp always felt better with bombs close to hand.
Starscream came out, inspected the arrangement, and returned to his lair without a word, which Skywarp helpfully translated as his version of a thank you. It wasn't, but no need to tell the Aerialbots that. Fireflight grinned at Thundercracker, and Slingshot all but dragged him after Skydive to get more supplies. Fireflight waved to Skywarp on the way out, a little waggle of his fingers that Skywarp couldn't help but return. Then they sat down on the couch, and waited.
Waiting was the worst. Waiting was always the worst. Thundercracker flipped on the television, but neither of them were paying much attention. "So," Skywarp said.
"I'll get some guns tomorrow," Thundercracker grunted. "Legal and everything."
Skywarp leaned against his wingmate. "Pistols?"
"Yeah, maybe a shotgun," Thundercracker shrugged. "Depends on how many they let me buy at once."
"That's good." Skywarp didn't really care. He just hated sitting in one place, waiting to get shot.
They watched a few commercials in silence, until Starscream came out and dropped their phones on Skywarp's lap. "I've narrowed them down to Miami," he announced, his back to Thundercracker. Skywarp wondered what would happen if he locked them in a closet together. Tonight, before they could shoot each other again. "I've got a tracer on the phone number now."
"Sure, fine, whatever. Where's Miami?" Skywarp asked. Thundercracker picked up the phones, fiddled with his.
"About thirteen hundred miles away," Starscream said. "I'll tell you if they come closer."
"Thanks for the warning," Skywarp said, sincerely, and then went back to staring at the television. So their execution would take a few days.
"They're firing in the dark." Starscream's voice was quiet. "They won't find us."
"You're the expert." Why wouldn't Starscream just go away?
Starscream huffed. "Look, he has to forgive us if I restore him."
"Forgive us for what?" Skywarp didn't look at his wingleader as he asked. Next to him, Thundercracker kept on ignoring Starscream because the two of them were fragging geeky rusty aftheads and he ought to hand them both over. "Milkshakes?"
Starscream didn't say anything, just turned and left. The door had barely closed behind him before Thundercracker dropped into Skywarp's lap, heavy and warm and here. Not something to take for granted, not always something they had, Thundercracker's weight on his legs –and he didn't always have legs, Thundercracker didn't always have knees on either side of Skywarp's hips, didn't always have arms to come up around his shoulders. Thundercracker reached up, cradled Skywarp's head in his hands, and Skywarp had a head, always had a head, but Thundercracker didn't always have hands, and quick as terminal velocity, soft as solar wind, they came together.
There was no use offlining sight, too much had changed, smell and feel and sound and Skywarp had hair now for Thundercracker to weave his fingers through and Skywarp didn't really understand his fascination with it but he didn't mind it in the least. They pressed their foreheads together, close as they could get, so close Skywarp couldn't focus, so close Thundercracker turned into a one-eyed shadow, and when Thundercracker blinked, Skywarp could feel the air stir. Close enough that long, stuttering ex-vent came out of Skywarp's mouth now and ghosted into Thundercracker's, obscenely intimate. Flesh gave under his fingers, and he was as gentle as he could be in a still-unfamiliar body, as he explored the still-new curves of Skywarp's jaw.
Kissing wasn't something a lot of Decepticons did, but Thundercracker guided Skywarp's head to the side and covered the teleporter's mouth with his own with the ease of long practice. They had mouths, had for a long time now, and kissing meant things. Meant they were both in the same place, at the same time, with arms and legs and heads and privacy, not precisely safe but not actively in danger, not going to die in the next five klicks. As good as they ever got.
Thundercracker had to break the kiss to talk to him though, and he said against Skywarp's mouth, "Like this, we can't survive the punishment he'll dole out."
"Dole out for what?" Skywarp demanded, fisting his hands in Thundercracker's shirt. They didn't have wings. It wasn't the first time for either of them but it was the first time it was the same time. They couldn't fly.
Thundercracker smiled, though Skywarp couldn't imagine what he was possibly smiling about. "For looking too much like Starscream." He kissed Skywarp again, thoroughly, not quite enough to make Skywarp's brain turn off. "He'll fix this, and we'll go home, and then it will be just another funny story, like Hydrus Five."
Hydrus Five hadn't been very funny.
But there was heat pooling in his belly, and far too many clothes on, and this was so much more complicated than it ought to be. Skywarp pulled away to tug Thundercracker's shirt off over his head and dragged dull claws down his back, where his airbrake was once. Thundercracker pressed back against the movement, shifting on his lap in interesting ways. Skywarp pressed his mouth to Thundercracker's bare chest. "I told Fireflight," Skywarp said, thinking about how doing this with the Aerialbot would be different.
"Told him what?" Thundercracker asked, undoing Skywarp's pants with an easy flick.
"About proxy flirting and he bought me a donut."
Thundercracker froze.
"He's cool with it," Skywarp said, looking up at his wingmate, who was shaking his head.
"Why would you even…"Thundercracker took a deep breath and put his hands on Skywarp's shoulders. "What were you thinking?"
"That he wants to swap paint with you, and I want to play with his boobs, and he said he likes me, and you want to do things with him that you don't even have words for," Skywarp said. It was screamingly obvious, but sometimes Thundercracker missed the screamingly obvious. That was okay, Skywarp was there to point it out to him. And push him along where he would stall and think too much.
Thundercracker shook his head. "Aerialbot, Skywarp. He's an Aerialbot."
"So?" Skywarp reached up to his wingmate, wrapped his arms around him. It wasn't quite a wingrub but it would have to do. "His brothers don't seem to mind."
"He's a baby Autobot," Thundercracker said into Skywarp's neck. That was good. That meant he wasn't sure he could say it with a straight face.
"Wouldn't be the first Autobot we shared," Skywarp reminded him, moving his hand in slow circles. "Do you not want him? Tell me I'm wrong."
"But he's a baby," Thundercracker repeated. "Do they even know what's going on?"
"They've learned the hard way," Skywarp said. "He knows. Do you want this?"
Thundercracker ignored the question, blindly finding Skywarp's hair. "What if he gets the wrong idea?"
"Well, TC, there's this thing I do called talking," Skywarp said, very patiently. "And then everyone's on the same jetstream. It's kinda like how you attempt to beam information into people's heads with your broody staring except it works."
Thundercracker stifled a laugh with Skywarp's shoulder. "We're going to get shot."
"Nope. Slingshot's totally cool with it," Skywarp said, turning his head against Thundercracker's and wiggling his hips. Thundercracker wasn't saying no, and usually he'd leave it at that, but he wanted to demonstrate the talking thing that Thundercracker failed at so spectacularly. "So you want this and I want this and he wants this, are we doing this?"
"Yeah," Thundercracker said, kissing him because he was there and they weren't going to die in the next five klicks and they were going to rediscover the best part of being human unless the television lied again. "Yeah, we're doing this."
Notes the end: A chandelle combines a 180 degree turn with a climb. This is not Silverbolt's most suicidal plan.
Thank you for reading.