[Fic] Seven Days -- Part 6/7: (Saturday) Human Touch
Title: Seven Days -- Part 6/7: (Saturday) Human Touch
Author: Lyricality (lyricality)
Rating: M/NC-17 overall for graphic sparksex.
Pairings: Eventual Bee/everyone. Finally, Bee/Sam.
Disclaimer: It's mine. I totally got it for my birthday last week. No, really. All characters are of legal age.
Note/Summary: LAAAATE. I beg your forgiveness, and can only claim sickness and self-pity as excuses. I give my profound thanks to nicole_dyria, who posted the score (which is still unavailable here in Colorado) on tf2007fun and thus provided me with the necessary inspiration to finish this part. ♥ For this entire fic, you can blame nemi_chan and her marvelous prompt o' doom, in which Bumblebee is the resident pleasurebot of the Autobots.
I love being back in the Special Hell. ^-^
Part 1/7: (Monday) Prime Time can be found here.
Part 2/7: (Tuesday) Iron Ride can be found here.
Part 3/7: (Wednesday) Doctor Love can be found here.
Part 4/7: (Thursday) Horizontal Jazz can be found here.
Part 5/7: (Friday) Scream Queen can be found here.
Part 5a/7: (Friday Evening) Special Handling can be found here.
Bee knew the moment Ratchet released him from stasis lock, because he began to dream.
Sam had asked him, once, if his kind could dream. Bee had considered the question and the meaning of the word, and decided that yes, the cycling of his processors during recharge did approximate the human experience of dreaming. The images themselves might lack coherency, but he could attribute meaning to them, in retrospect. Perhaps the only difference was that he recalled each dream with exact sensory detail; his dreams never disappeared on returning from stasis.
This time, he dreamt of Starscream.
Not of the seeker’s mindscape, not of what he had done, but of his body snared in Megatron’s hands. He hung motionless but screaming, helpless as Megatron’s claws opened his chest and ripped long shreds of energy out of his spark. Arousal and terror, desire and hatred caught in a horrible loop of longing, and Bee recognized it, resonated with it. He experienced that desolation again when Megatron cracked Starscream open down the center and drained him of essence, those long fangs turned vampiric. Discarded and robbed of flight, Starscream fell from his claws, past all the funereal lights of Iacon and into a darkness too profound for redemption.
With a shudder, Bee dragged himself free of that imagery and ended his recharge, optics coming back online and focusing on the ceiling with sudden and painful clarity. His chest ached. No surprise. Tiny twinges blossomed through his wiring, suggesting that Ratchet had replaced most of it. His optics flickered and he made a little sound, reassuring himself that he could still speak.
A jumbled whisper of cloth and limbs, and then his favorite creature in any galaxy scrambled up beside his head. Sam didn’t quite touch him, but his smile lessened the ache. “Bee? You’re okay?”
Turning his head, he pressed his forehead against Sam’s ribcage. “I’m okay, Sam.”
He was. Everything could have, should have ended in a way so much worse. By all rights, he should be permanently deactivated. Sam should be dead. The thought gave him the necessary will to lift one hand and curl it around Sam’s back, pulling the boy closer.
“God,” Sam whispered, leaning against him in return, both arms wrapping around Bee’s neck, returning the implied embrace. “You scared me. You scared me to death, Bee. I can’t stand seeing you get hurt again, okay? I can’t stand it.” A note of fragility in his voice made Bee moan, softly pleading in return. Sam pushed closer, his face against Bee’s audio vents, and Bee felt the sudden warm tracks of tears.
“Sam. No sacrifice, no victory,” he whispered.
Shaking his head, the boy made a hitching sound of profound denial, sitting back enough to wipe a hand over his eyes. “No. I’m not sacrificing you. Not you for me, okay? Never.”
Bee lifted his other hand, cupping Sam in all his fingers, holding him just above his chest. “You’re not allowed to make that decision for me.” A little amused, almost painfully touched, he brushed his thumbs along the angles of Sam’s hips, as far as he could reach. “I know my duty, Sam. Don’t try to convince me differently. Don’t lessen my commitment by questioning it.”
“It is not your duty to die for me.” Sam shook his head, swallowing so hard that Bee heard the dry click of his throat.
Bee settled him against his clavicle supports, the curve of the Camaro’s front bumper against Sam’s back. “Yes,” he said simply. “It is. And I’m glad.” He couldn’t move his mouth to show his emotion, but he strained to express it in his voice, the most pleasant sort of ache underscoring every word.
Silenced, Sam studied him for a long minute, and then he reached out with both hands, fingers splaying against the vents. “Why?” he asked at last.
Quiet in return, Bee stroked his thumbs along Sam’s legs again. That the boy didn’t protest suggested he already knew the answer. Bee denied the impulse to retreat behind the safer voice of the radio--he was no coward, and no song could express what he meant so well as could his own voice. “Sam,” he murmured. “I care for you. So...very much.”
Sam’s fingers shifted against the vents. “Yeah. I care about you too, Bee. You’re my best friend.” His lips curved into the slightest smile, a little wry, a little frightened, and entirely beautiful. “But I don’t think that’s what you’re talking about.” His voice had lowered, and Bee’s fingers trembled against his back.
“I love you, Sam,” he whispered. It wasn’t a secret.
Or maybe it was a secret, but now they could share it.
Sam swallowed, and one of his hands trailed downward and back, his fingers wrapping around Bee’s thumb. “Bee...are you sure?” Then he chuckled, closing his eyes. “I guess you probably are, huh.”
“Very sure,” Bee agreed. He’d tried to be gentle with this--he had expected shock, fear, even revulsion, given his own understanding of human customs and taboos--and perhaps they would both be better off if he had never admitted what he felt, and what he wanted. Much too late, now, and a tremor of regret warred with the rush of relief at being cautiously accepted rather than simply denied.
Sam kept still, or at least kept his position cupped in Bee’s hands. His own fingers trailed up and down the interlocking plates of Bee’s thumb, strokes made almost accidental.
“How does this work?” he asked after a minute or so, voice catching on the edge of a laugh, more nerves than amusement. “I don’t have a spark and I can’t...I mean, I’m not like you guys. It’s not that I don’t feel it--God, Bee, I feel it, but...”
Bee shook his head, a soft sound escaping him, too much hesitation and too much hope. “I don’t care about what you don’t have.”
Sam ran a trembling hand along the sharp wing of Bee’s shoulder, stroking the armor. “Don’t know what I’m doing,” he confessed on a breathless laugh. He leaned forward, close enough that Bee could feel the warmth of his breath. “Can I kiss you?” he said after a pause. “Should I?”
Bee made another trembling sound, nodding. Do whatever you want, he wanted to say, but the words wouldn’t come.
With a low moan, Sam pressed his lips against the vent, slight and soft touches of metal and skin. “Can you feel this?” Sam breathed, lips parted, breath hot when he kissed again, his mouth too small to cover much area, but shockingly wet just the same. Bee whined in affirmation, his hands tightening in approval, just enough to hold and not to hurt. Shifting closer, Sam grasped the edge of Bee’s faceplate with one hand. The other hand slipped off Bee’s shoulder, delving for just a moment into wiring before Sam caught himself and curled his fingers around an armor edge, his fingertips surprisingly rough against sensor grids.
Bee arched his head back and made a metallic squeal, keeping himself so still, vibrating with the need to be careful.
Jumping back, Sam drew in a shaking breath, his eyes scanning Bee’s face.
“You didn’t hurt me.” Bee let the sensation go with a reluctant shudder. “You can’t hurt me like this, Sam, I promise...”
With a swallow and a nod, Sam leaned forward again. “Okay.” He sought his previous position, his hand slipping back between plates of armor, his eyes unguarded when he met Bee’s gaze. “Promise me you’ll tell me if I do.” His fingers grazed over sensors again, so many tiny ridges on his fingertips. Bee moaned his agreement and tried not to squirm.
“Sam. Sam.”
His boy took the gasp as plea instead of protest, and he stretched out his other arm, seeking, finding the symmetrical sensor grid under Bee’s other shoulder plate with a few bold strokes. Sam circled his fingers against both arrays. Bee shuttered his optics and keened. “You like that,” Sam breathed, unsteady but building heat in his voice. “You’ve got a lot of these, Bee.” He leaned up, and Bee shifted both hands to accommodate him. Once more, Sam kissed the upper vent of Bee’s mouth, his breath hitching. “Where else would you like it?”
Bee shuddered just enough to send a vibration racing through both of them, and Sam gasped. Heat crackled through Bee’s new connectors at the sound; Sam did feel something powerful in this.
“Show you,” Bee whispered. He gathered Sam up again, lifting him over all the intricate plating of his chest and settling him just below his spark. He kept all the paneling closed, but urged Sam to touch him with soft chirps.
Nervous, Sam bit his lip, raising both hands and curling his fingers into his palms for a long moment. His eyes lingered on the destroyed paint of Bee’s armor, but with characteristic bravery, he flattened his palms against the center of Bee’s chest with his fingers dipping into the seams. “Like this?” His fingertips slipped under a ridge of metal, found the rough pattern of sensor relays underneath. “Right here?”
Bee didn’t quite arch up off the table, didn’t quite dare to move, but his body strained with a sudden, groaning tension and his optics flickered as his vocal processors grated.
“Right here,” Sam confirmed with a beautiful little smile of self-satisfaction.
He explored, daring to stroke deeper circuitry, to follow wires to their trembling, sparking connections. When Bee couldn’t bear any more of it, he called on what he had learned of human anatomy and organic sensory input. His fingertips grazed along Sam’s chest, traced down his spine, and finally brushed between his legs. Very gentle pressure with just one thumb had Sam panting, faltering, pushing back against him with two short thrusts of his hips.
“Sweet Jesus,” he shivered, his teeth chattering together. “Bee.”
Encouraged, Bee rubbed against him again, slow circles of varying pressure, and Sam collapsed back into his hands with a cry that deepened into an inarticulate groan.
“Whoa, whoa,” Sam mumbled after a long minute, his hands pushing back at Bee’s fingers. “Just...nngh. Just wait one...second.” He went quiet until his breathing equalized again. “I want to--but--” He cast a wary glance around the room, and Bee recalled exactly where they were, sprawled together in the middle of the medical bay.
By human standards? Definitely exposed.
“I just really don’t wanna be all out here in the open like this.” Sam had turned an interesting shade of pink, and Bee noticed with some amusement that he displayed more strongly than usual on infrared.
To punctuate their tenuous privacy, a clatter sounded just outside the main door, and after a few seconds it slid open to admit Ratchet. Bee suspected the medical officer had been monitoring him and waiting for an opportune moment to interrupt.
“I would have preferred you stay in recharge somewhat longer,” Ratchet said, hands on his hips.
Bee tried for innocence and failed utterly, to judge by the medic’s scowl.
“I suppose a little personal responsibility is altogether too much to ask.” Ratchet approached him, glancing at the boy, who squirmed under that eloquent gaze. “Climb down, Sam. I have scans to run.” Sam obeyed him instantly, clambering down the angular wall of Bee’s side, jumping the five feet down to the floor. Bee missed his warmth already. “This will not take long,” Ratchet reassured on a low tone, and Bee chirped in reply, keeping still. He finished in less than a cycle, and Bee spared no time in reaching his hand down to Sam, lifting him up again. Ratchet stepped back, speaking over one shoulder as he sorted a set of instruments on the nearest table. “Your recovery is largely complete. No lingering aftereffects on scans, at any rate. I hope there’s nothing you aren’t telling me?”
Shaking his head, Bee turned to place his feet on the floor, wincing just a bit as his weight settled on stressed or replaced joints.
“No acrobatics,” Ratchet warned. His optics narrowed. “No leaving the base except in our company, for now. Optimus’ orders.”
Bee nodded. “How long until the protoform arrives?”
“Six hours. I advise you to rest until then.” The instruments were sorted and resorted, but Ratchet continued to fidget with them. “I suppose you may do that in your own quarters, as easily as in here.”
Arranging his legs to either side of Bee’s fingers, Sam tried a grin. “Wanna show me your room, Bee?”
“You may be disappointed, Sam.” He had peered into his boy’s room enough times to realize exactly how much importance humans placed on individuality through private space and personal belongings. War hardly lent itself to collecting material items, and Bee’s own kind had never valued possessions so much as practicality, even on Cybertron.
Sam wrapped both arms around Bee’s thumb. “Don’t think that’ll happen.”
Something clattered. Ratchet had unsorted his instruments yet again, and Bee sensed an approaching lecture or worse. The medic’s narrowed optics pinned first Sam, then Bee. “Whatever else you do, I expect you to take care with each other.”
Sam went entirely infrared again. Bee made a little chirp, fired off a salute with his free hand, and fled the medical bay before Ratchet could mortify his human any further.
Out in the hall, Sam’s blush faded, and he glared at Bee with exasperation plain in his eyes. “Does everyone know about this?”
Everyone did. Bee had only himself to blame, and so he answered with nothing but an eloquent shrug.
“Well, isn’t that just awesome.”
“I’m sorry, Sam.” They had reached the door to his quarters, and he transmitted the proper frequency, stepping through before letting it close again behind them. “What I choose to do affects them, too. I couldn’t lie. Even by omission.” Not to the ones he loved.
Bee settled onto the berth, and Sam took a long look around, taking in the narrow room with its undecorated walls, brushed chrome obscuring any reflections. In Iacon, before the war, conduits had maintained their own quarters for a certain level of sensual tranquility, and partners came to them for comfort. Direct service meant a shift in priorities. Bee had spent little time in his personal quarters on the Ark, offering his company to the others instead, and now his guardianship of Sam meant even less time recharging at headquarters.
“Pretty bare, Bee. I’ve gotta get you a calendar, or something.” Smiling, Sam reached out, his fingers trembling when he rested one hand against Bee’s vocal vents. “Star Trek poster, maybe.”
The radio surged to life. “To boldly go where no one has gone before...”
“Right,” Sam swallowed, both hands catching at the slats of the vent, pulling him up until they were almost eye to optic. “I want to try this, Bee. I don’t know how it’ll work, because I know you’ll live like...forever. I won’t, and...I care about Mikaela, too.”
Wrapping him in both hands, Bee nodded, gently to keep from dislodging Sam’s grip. “I only want as much as you’re willing to give.” He trailed his fingertips downward, soft strokes at the junction of Sam’s legs, feeling his immediate reaction with a flutter of deep heat.
“Bee,” Sam groaned, arching weakly away. “Keep doing that and I’ll come in my pants. Honestly. Shit.”
“That’s what I want, Sam.”
“Hoboy.” Sam made a softly whimpering sound, squirming away, and then he laughed. “Too sticky, Bee. Gotta take them off.” Twisting, he pulled off his shirt, shedding his sneakers and his socks, finally loosening his jeans with a fervent sigh. He kicked them off, one leg and then the other, self-consciousness warming his cheeks again.
Bee had no personal reference for being naked, but he understood vulnerability. He busied himself setting Sam’s clothes at the edge of the berth, letting the boy adjust for a cycle or more. When Sam touched him again, drawing his attention with both hands on his faceplates and another timid kiss to the vent of his mouth, he murmured approval and relaxed back against the berth, pulling Sam along with him.
They spent time exploring each other. So much bare skin, so much living warmth to feel vibrating against his cooler components.
“You’re so complicated, Bee,” Sam panted. His skin glided against armor, gilding metal with perspiration. Hips arching, he rubbed hard against Bee’s fingers, his face contorting in a shockingly transparent moment of pleasure. Expressions so mobile, eyes so candid, how could humans ever hope to lie? “Oh God,” Sam shivered, “where should I touch you?”
“Anywhere,” Bee pleaded, an answering vibration rippling through his frame. “Everywhere.”
For an instant, he regretted Sam’s diminutive size. Too small to hold him. But he wouldn’t trade warm skin for larger hands, or a fluttering heartbeat for a familiar spark. Something in Sam’s humanity touched him--maybe literally, a tactile heat constructed of emotion and sensation together. So much of simply Sam, transmitted in a single touch.
The boy let his head fall back for a moment or two, his breathing shallow, before he let out a shaking sigh and wormed his way out of Bee’s hands. Investigating, he worked his way downward, protruding bits of armor offering unexpected handholds until he paused at Bee’s waist.
Sam’s fingers slid into the nest of wires below his chestplates, separating them, stroking each one, and Bee stirred restlessly while his hands stayed there, safe from sharper machinery. Then Sam tightened his grip and pulled, gently at first, then harder when Bee made no protest, then harder yet until Bee shifted with awkward moans, the sounds wrenched from his very core. Not quite pain, not quite pleasure, but an unfamiliar sensation, like the anticipation of a long, slow stretch.
“Does that feel good?” Sam whispered the words against him, ticklish warmth in his breath, heavy heat in his voice. Bee whined his confirmation and nodded, squealing when Sam tugged at him again. His voice grated into static when those extraordinarily hot hands slipped deeper inside, smoothing upward to where the wires met in a tangle of spliced connections, direct sensory stimulation relayed to the casing above. The boy couldn’t know, couldn’t possibly know what this was doing to him, how intimate it was, teasing those fibers that led so immediately to his spark.
Optics flickering, he focused on Sam’s face, the features strong with concentration, lax with tenderness. A light shone in his eyes that had nothing to do with reflection, and everything to do with inner glory--the human soul, and Bee knew it was invisible, but saw it now nevertheless, mirrored in the devotion in Sam’s eyes.
Maybe he understood what he was doing after all.
Bee urged him back, caught him in both hands to help him disentangle his fingers from the wiring. Trembling, he sent the commands, his armor parting to both sides over his chest. Sam was bare against him; Bee could offer the same. Outer barrier, inner barrier, both dismissed, and then Sam made a sound of alarm in his throat when the spark casing came into view.
“Wait--Bee--can you--not yet--” His words tripped over each other. He swallowed. “You might hurt yourself.”
Bee shook his head. “Not like this. It’s all right like this.” Hesitant, Sam reached out a hand, smoothing a palm over yellow exoskeletal armor, and Bee tightened his grip, holding him back for a moment more. “Sam. Ratchet thinks it’s safe, for humans to be...exposed to us, to our sparks, but he can’t be sure. Not until-"
“Until somebody tries it?” Sam quirked him a smile, and pressed his lips together. “Fools walk in, right?”
“I won’t hurt you,” Bee promised, aching at the thought.
Sam stretched out both hands, plaintive, and Bee obeyed the unspoken demand. Cupping the boy close against his chest, he shuddered when Sam reached inside, so brave, fingers stroking into the seams of the casing. “Ratchet did a good job fixing this,” he said, swallowing hard. His thumbs ran along the sides, his skin picking up a sheen of lubrication. His voice lowered, almost inaudible on the human audio range. “Open for me, Bee?”
He should worry at how easy it was, to do as this boy asked. Instead, he let his chest slide open, just a gap, just enough to cast them both in iridescent light.
Rays of brilliant blue scissored between Sam’s spread fingers. Far steadier than Bee, he rubbed his thumbs along the edges of the casing, slow and sure, and Bee let out a wail that sent bright filaments of energy stretching outward from his spark. Sam gasped, but reached inward, and one vibrant strand reached back, twining around his fingers.
His body jerked and he panted, his hair lifting lightly from his scalp, as if from electric current. “Bee...oh, God, Bee, that feels...”
Bee could imagine how it felt--how good it felt. Even if they couldn’t share the deeper connection of sparks, they could share this. The sensation made his sensors sing, even as he sent them scanning over Sam, tuned as always to the rhythms of his body. No ill effects from such close exposure, nothing but a quickening heartbeat and a rising temperature.
Pressing his lips together, Sam glanced into Bee’s optics, gauging something in the pitch of his cries and the tremors shaking his frame. He pushed his hand deeper, and light arced between them.
Spark energy struck sharp as lightning. It arrowed into Sam through one hand and sought something to ground it, and Sam shouted as he plunged his other hand into Bee’s spark, completing the connection as surely as routing wires.
Bee flattened himself against the berth with a shriek, his fingers dancing over Sam’s body. The energy he gave off crackled back into his spark, but it was conducted through Sam, touched by Sam, amplified by Sam, creating an intensifying feedback loop that offlined his circuits one by one in shattering bursts of ecstasy. He kept his scanners trained on Sam, or tried his best, but overheating glitched his systems, overwhelmed sensors screaming pleasure from every extremity and destroying the accuracy of his readings.
They had to stop. He had to regain control. But he was already surging, his body quaking and his voice raw with entirely mechanical sounds of bliss.
Desperate, he rubbed his fingertips over Sam, seeking the most sensitive machinery of his body and caressing with focused intent. Crying out in return, Sam convulsed in his hands, surrendering into sudden release. Bee vibrated with another surge in return, the currents between them heightening so long as they stayed connected. He made a little keen, ecstasy tinged with worry. Finally, Sam’s hands faltered, both of them shaking, and Bee pulled him back enough to safely snap the casing shut. Connection cut, the energy dissipated in a rush of lingering static, pleasant enough to make them moan together.
Gathering himself, Bee flashed his scanners over Sam’s trembling form, fear leaden in his processors. But his boy was unharmed, scans revealing nothing but a slowing heartbeat and a body as spent as Bee’s sturdier frame. The evidence of Sam’s satisfaction was so physical, utterly organic, but so was Sam, and Bee couldn’t mind the mess.
“Sam,” he murmured at length. One fingertip trailed down the length of the boy’s spine--the most mechanical part of any human, so beautiful in its intricacy.
Sam drew in and let out a deep breath before stirring. When he pushed himself up, his forearms against Bee’s palm and the rest of his body sprawled out over Bee’s fingers, his eyes glowed with a vulnerability and a love so deep, they could bridge the gulf of galaxies and experiences and cultures that might otherwise have separated them. “Wow,” Sam whispered, satiation beginning to replace the deeper devotion in his eyes. But Bee had saved that image, stored it secure in his databanks to recall long after circumstances had inevitably separated them.
He hoped to make many more such files, between this moment and that one.
“Are you hurt?” he said. “I wasn’t sure...”
Shaking his head, Sam rolled his weight to one side, stretching out a hand to pat at Bee’s chin. “I’m good,” he breathed. “I’m so good, Bee. It was good.” Something glimmered in his eyes, suggesting understatement, but Bee didn’t press him. Weary, Sam stretched against his hands, pressing his lips to the edge of Bee’s palm. “Didn’t know we could do that,” he said between kisses. “Forgot that humans conduct electricity pretty well.”
And were often killed in the process. Bee thanked Primus himself that spark energy had a far more benign effect.
He brushed his fingertips along Sam’s back. They stayed silent together for some time, moving softly against each other now and then, a reassuring comfort in physical contact. The boy’s breathing had evened, his body naturally inclined toward sleep, but he surprised Bee by speaking again.
“Bee.” His voice was languid. “Being a conduit is honorable, right? The others act like it. They care about you.” Hand circling one of the gears at Bee’s wrist, he asked, “So why would Starscream call you a whore? Just to be an asshole?”
Bee murmured at the touch, pleasant pressure. “Decepticons have no conduits. They consider any weakness a terrible liability. Asking for help, especially among their own ranks, would be suicidal at best.” He had never considered the matter too closely before, dismissing the difference as ideological, rather than practical in application. But after what he had witnessed of Starsceam’s spark... He could rethink his position with experience as an unpleasant guide. Moreover, he could wonder whether Megatron’s dictate against conduits had anything to do with Ratchet’s memories of him as a partner.
“That’s too bad,” Sam snorted. “Seems like they could use one.”
“Sleep, Sam.” Bee settled the boy beside him on the berth, encouraging him to curl into the space between his neck and shoulder. “Stay here with me, and sleep.”
“Changing the subject,” Sam smiled, but obeyed, his breathing eventually going shallow. Bee lay with his optics shuttered, but he never quite slipped back into recharge.
*****
The Autobots drove together to the projected landing site, following Jazz’s lead south along the highway. This was Jazz’s first transformation since his return to their ranks, and he ranged far ahead of the others, doubling back again and again once they were free of other traffic. His bursts of careless speed spoke more eloquently of his joy than words ever could, and Bee let Sam goad him into a brief race. The setting sun reflected like firelight along the flanks of the Solstice, and Bee lost by a good three meters and didn’t care in the slightest.
The sun had fully set by the time they left the paved roads and rolled into a field edged by hills on three sides. Ironhide transformed immediately, cannons at the ready, optics fixed upward and scanning the sky. For jet engines instead of a protoform, Bee had little doubt.
Returning to his natural form, Jazz stood with his head tilted just slightly to one side, plainly receiving.
“There it is,” Bee said, transforming as soon as Sam stepped out onto the patchy grass. Far in the distance, a dot of light had appeared high above the horizon, streaking toward them with debris stretching out behind it in a brilliant tail. It had already entered the atmosphere.
“Optimus,” Jazz muttered. “I’m gettin’ a ghost signal here. Some sorta doubling.”
Their Prime went still, tuning into the frequency, searching for similar signals. At last he dipped his head in agreement. “It is not an echo. Something is strange.”
Something was strange, and now the phenomenon was visual as well as auditory.
Bee shifted his perspective, his optics magnifying the protoform roughly 1200 times until he could correctly interpret the phenomenon. Something rippled around the back half of the cometoid, a shadow like a reflection of heat, and then a second mass of metal flashed suddenly into full view, separating from the first protoform and twisting into a burning sphere. Two protoforms, their paths diverging. The original shot straight for the nearby field. The one that had shielded itself veered northward, toward the highway.
“Primus,” Bee whispered, taking backward steps until he bumped into Optimus. “Is it--”
Optimus caught him with both hands against his shoulders. “Yes. It is Mirage.”
“The other is Wheeljack,” Ratchet said with a certain fiercely understated joy. He was scanning for all he was worth. “He’s taken heavy damage. Most of it old.”
Wheeljack streaked toward the earth and crashed exactly as Jazz had predicted, setting fire to the grass and a distant spray of trees. Abruptly, a second explosion shook the fallen protoform, causing even Optimus to sway where he stood. Sam fell to his hands and knees.
“What caused that?” he squawked.
Optimus merely shook his head, regaining his balance and starting toward the crater. “Wheeljack,” he sighed.
Far in the distance, a bright flash and a tremble through the ground heralded the similar arrival of Mirage.
“That was near the race track,” Sam said, following Bumblebee as they regrouped around Wheeljack’s point of arrival. “I think.”
Ratchet knelt cautiously beside the cometary protoform, which had made no movement since its landing. Scanning beams slid over the silent form, and the medic frowned. Tools whirred into position as the armoring of Ratchet’s forearms flipped back. “The damage has put him into stasis lock,” he said as he began to work, sparks flying in a swift shower.
The rest of them settled into a rough semicircle, protective, waiting for word from Mirage. Ten cycles clicked away before Jazz tilted his head, receiving. “Found himself an alt. He’s on his way.”
“Good,” Ratchet muttered, glancing up from Wheeljack’s protoform, still locked in cometary mode. “We need to get him to headquarters.”
Optimus knelt beside him, sweeping over their comrade with scanning beams of translucent blue. “Will he recover?”
Ratchet shook his head. “I don’t know.”
More cycles of waiting. Sam wrapped both arms around himself, shivering against the chill of the wind, and Bee scooped him up in both hands, cradling him against his chest. His spark made a little leap at the boy’s proximity, startling him. Yet another unexpected development.
At last, a cloud of dust appeared on the horizon. It resolved into a low, dark shape that approached them at remarkable speed, a blur of deep midnight blue that skidded to a halt just outside their circle and revealed itself as a lean Formula 1 racer.
“Damn,” Sam whispered. “A McLaren.”
A McLaren MP4-20, Bee’s swift search of the internet revealed, even as the race car slid apart into millions of razored edges, a liquid transformation of rotating, upward recreation that stretched taller than any one of them except Optimus. Wheels slid into place at the bases of feet, at the upper back. Delicate slats of metal jigsawed together into a helm as distinctive as Jazz’s visor in its elegantly tapered shape. Almost Egyptian, Bee could note, with his time on Earth as reference.
Mirage had a far more slender frame than did the rest of them, and the minimalist metal of his chosen alt only intensified his appearance of lean strength. He folded his new form low to the ground, kneeling before their Prime with his head briefly bowed.
“I’m sorry for the secrecy,” he said, and Bee ached at the forgotten tranquility of his voice. He spoke in English--he’d obviously already made some study of his surroundings. “There was a danger of being followed.”
“Of worse,” Ratchet muttered.
Expression softened, Optimus squatted in front of Mirage, and offered him one massive hand. “Rise, my friend. Welcome to Earth.”
His own expression neutral, Mirage studied the hand as if he didn’t know quite what to make of it--as if he had expected no welcome at all, or perhaps a far colder one. At last he offered his own hand in return, strangely wary. Optimus took it, and they stood together.
“Prime,” he murmured, and then focused his attention on each of them in turn. “Ratchet. Ironhide. Bumblebee. Jazz.” He paused. “I heard you were...permanently deactivated.”
Jazz smirked. “Greatly exaggerated, ya see.”
Mirage offered a grim curve of his mouth in return, but turned to his partner in planetfall. “Wheeljack. Is there hope of repairing him?”
“There is always hope, however slim,” Ratchet retorted, glancing at Mirage. “These wounds...” He ran a hand along the protoform’s damaged flank. “They are disturbingly familiar.”
Kneeling beside Wheeljack, Mirage met the medical officer’s gaze. “I found him on the Vermilion. He had been tortured by Soundwave.”
Optimus made a deep, quiet sound like protest.
“You were on the Vermilion?” The first words Ironhide had spoken since they had arrived at the site, and he offered his question on a growl. “How long?”
Mirage did not quite smile; his expression gave Bee a chill. “Too long.”
“We can discuss all of this later.” Ratchet stood, impatience etched in every motion. “Optimus, your alt form should have room enough for Wheeljack, even in this mode. I can’t work here.”
With a sigh, Optimus nodded. “Autobots--transform and head back to base.” He returned to his Peterbilt form.
Bee lowered Sam to the ground, and Mirage seemed to notice him for the first time. “Samuel James Witwicky,” he said, with an incline of his head. “I’m pleased to meet you.”
“Yeah,” Sam swallowed, resting both hands on the hood of Bee’s Camaro shape, seemingly steadying himself. “Um, likewise.” Bee swung open the door, and Sam dropped into the driver’s seat before blowing out his breath in a sigh of relief. Latching the seatbelt around him, Bee made it comfortably snug, a subtle embrace. “He seems like he knows what’s going on,” Sam said after a minute, once Ratchet and Mirage had levered Wheeljack onto Optimus’ truck bed and they had all started back toward headquarters in a long, lighted convoy.
“Mirage is extraordinarily accomplished in surveillance,” Bee agreed, then clarified, “he is a spy. As well as a bodyguard. He was Optimus’ personal guard on Cybertron.”
Sam stroked the steering wheel with the pads of his thumbs. “Guess the invisibility thing must come in handy for all of that. He seemed...weird with Optimus, though. Like he expected to...I dunno, maybe get punched in the face.”
Silent for a moment, Bee considered what to say. “Before we left Cybertron to pursue the Allspark, Mirage was guarding another Autobot at Prime’s request. She traveled to a planet called Velocitron, without notifying Optimus or Mirage.” Some memories he preferred not to relive. “Megatron destroyed Velocitron. He exploited the energy to fully raise his armies. Everyone on Velocitron was killed.”
“The whole planet,” Sam whispered, his fingers tightening against the wheel. Bee knew he was thinking of Earth. Swallowing, he said, “And Optimus won’t forgive him? Because she died? It can’t have been Mirage’s fault.”
Bee made a soft buzz of denial. “No. Optimus forgives him. Mirage won’t forgive himself.”
“I get it.” Sam went quiet again, but he let one hand fall to the passenger seat, stroking the leather until Bee vibrated under his fingers. “Bee, what’s the Vermilion? And Soundwave, too.”
“A ship.” The equal of the Nemesis in firepower if not in notoriety, and the thought of it approaching Earth started a pounding dread somewhere deep in his fuel pump. “Soundwave and Shockwave are the Decepticons who command it. Together they’re Megatron’s third line of lieutenants.” Silence fell between them, and Bee reached for reassurance, something comforting to assure Sam that his world would be safe.
But he couldn’t guarantee the safety of the Earth.
“Sam,” he whispered, strained. “I do love you. I’ll never let you be hurt.”
“I know.” Sam’s fingers slipped between the cushions of the seat, holding tight. “I love you, Bee. I know.”
*****
Back at headquarters, they all settled into the recovery room just off the medical bay, giving Ratchet space to work. Most of them remained standing, but Optimus insisted Bee take the chair. He relented and encouraged Sam to perch on his shoulder. Mirage sat as well, folding his lean shape down to the floor and resting his back against the wall.
He gave them his report with characteristically spare detail. Occasionally, Optimus had to press him for more information.
Mirage had remained on the Vermilion for astral cycles. Hundreds of Earth’s years he had spent hidden on the Decepticon warship, gleaning details of strategy and weaponry from conversations and, more rarely, through unguarded computer ports. All that information he had transmitted back to Autobot command ships, modifying his own cloaking technology as a means of strict coding on every broadcast. He had continued to transmit, even when one by one the command ships began failing to answer, only static in reply on every channel but one.
The war had continued outside the struggles between the Nemesis and the Ark, of course. Bee had a little trouble reconstructing his perspective to include battles fought far outside their limited range of communication--battles fought without the knowledge of the Allspark, found and lost forever.
Far outside this galaxy, the Autobot battleship Sigma had fallen to the Vermilion. A handful of Autobots remained on the Vermilion as prisoners. Among them was Wheeljack--the only scientist to survive the attack, and the only Autobot to survive imprisonment for longer than a span of megacycles. Mirage had continued transmitting his limited information to empty channels, on the slim chance allies might still be listening. He had also done his best to escape detection while keeping Wheeljack alive.
“The Sigma was my last intact contact in range,” he said. “It’s rumored that others may have survived in the attached shuttle, but I would have to see it to believe it. There was nothing left but scrap after Soundwave and his symbiotes boarded.” He sighed. “The war isn’t going well. Outside this planet.”
“Did you intercept my message?” Optimus murmured.
Mirage met his gaze for a moment, but lowered his head. “I did. As did Soundwave and Shockwave. So they had already learned of Megatron’s death and the destruction of the cube, when Starscream arrived on the Vermilion.”
A ripple of uneasy anger slid through the Autobots already acclimated to Earth, and Bee imagined it as a physical thread, pulling each of them in turn. Sam’s hands curled into fists. Bee felt his fuel intakes trying to seize.
Noting the change in atmosphere, Mirage paused, but continued with his optics lingering on Bee. “They weren’t exactly pleased to see him. They accused him of all sorts of disloyalty--abandoning his troops, plotting Megatron’s downfall and the elimination of the cube. Questions were raised about his fitness for command.”
“Long overdue,” Ratchet barked from the other room.
Mirage spread his hands. “They weren’t much interested in his innocence or his authority, anyway. Even his wingmates turned against him after a few veiled threats. It was quite a commotion. He took superficial damage and fled.” Glancing at Bee again, he said, “Back here, I take it?”
“I am afraid so.” Optimus uncrossed his arms, and Bee realized with a jolt that their Prime’s fingertips had left heavy impressions in his own armor plating along each elbow joint, yet another sign of hidden strain.
Expression flattening, Mirage said, “The time seemed right to make an exit. For myself and Wheeljack both.”
Ratchet appeared in the doorway. “Rejection by the others--it might account for Starscream’s otherwise illogical behavior.” He had been working on Wheeljack, and the multiple tools of his hands showed a spattering of mech fluid and a coating of iridescent blue, liquid energon. One drop swelled at the base of a drilling apparatus, then ran along the bit, hanging for a long, long moment at the tip until it fell to puddle against the floor.
Bee recalled his dream, and in an instant his fuel intakes stopped threatening to seize and simply did so.
A backwash of energon and other fluids made him quake as if in seizure, warnings flashing across his optic screens. Sam clung to his shoulder for dear life, fingers slipping, but Mirage was nearest and caught the boy in both hands just before Bee’s convulsions might have shaken him loose.
“Out!” Ratchet snarled at everyone, with such authority that Bee actually tried to obey him before the medic pushed him back into the chair with one hand. “Not you, idiot,” he muttered, ignoring the mass exodus through the door behind him, as well as Sam’s loud protests. Ratchet reached for Bee’s throat with the other hand, and despite his lurching, Bee sidled away from the touch. He couldn’t speak; he reverted to a digital channel.
: Please don’t touch :
The medical officer halted, glanced at his fingers, and Bee felt an entirely emotional ache when horrified understanding replaced the impatience in Ratchet’s expression. For just an instant, he gathered himself, his practicality reassuming control. His optics flashed a scan along Bee’s intakes, and then he injected something cool, something calming, into his fuel lines.
Bee’s quaking eased. Ratchet left him alone for a cycle or so, and Bee heard a distant splash of cleaning fluid, murmurs of reassurance to Sam.
When he returned, his hands were clean. Bee’s fuel intakes had returned to normal, just a hiccup now and then as a reminder that his overall recovery remained less than complete. “There is nothing wrong with your systems,” Ratchet said after another scan. “The cause was emotional, not physical.” Sorrow edged into his expression, along with a touch of something unfamiliar, like shame. “I apologize.”
With a chirrup, Bee touched his hand, reassuring in his turn. “I’m all right.”
That hand drifted closer, fingers stroking along the mobile fins near the top of his head. “I have worries,” Ratchet whispered, and his fingers trembled, his voice hoarse. So much uncertainty from someone usually so self-assured in his profession, and Bee did what he knew best, wrapping his fingers around Ratchet’s wrist and drawing that hand down to the center of his chest.
Ratchet splayed his fingers. Hesitation played across his face.
“I’m all right,” Bee repeated, but his voice caught, scratched like a poor-quality recording.
Fingers shook against the seams of his armor, soft and doubting strokes.
Bee astonished himself; he quailed. More accurately, he recoiled, half his processors reeling as he pulled away from what he had always loved, the other half understanding all too well why he did so.
“Bumblebee,” Ratchet murmured.
Opening himself to Sam had been easy. Perhaps because he hadn’t truly opened himself at all. When Sam had touched his spark, they’d shared pleasure without sharing memory. If Sam had fears--and of course he did--Bee hadn’t felt them, hadn’t experienced them, hadn’t been touched by someone else’s pain. Their method of connection was not less, but it was very different by comparison.
“Bumblebee,” Ratchet repeated, drawing his attention at last, and Bee realized that the medic had both hands wrapped around his. “You are quite plainly not prepared.” His grip gentled, as did his tone. “Not to resume this particular duty.”
With a soft moan of distress, Bee twined his fingers through Ratchet’s. He knew what unnerved him. Not simply pain, but the terrible suspicion that Starscream’s spark might have somehow tainted his own, that he couldn’t feel pain without pleasure or pleasure without pain, that his perceptions might be twisted when his spark joined to another’s.
That he would do harm instead of good.
“Give this time,” Ratchet said, though he sounded shaken. His arms surrounded Bee, drawing him close, heedless of the other Autobots and the human boy gathered just outside the door. “Give yourself time.”
Bee shuttered his optics with a low whine. He didn’t want time, of course. He wanted all of them, and he wanted Sam, and he wanted a return to duty and to normalcy without the specter of Starscream hanging over his head.
*****
[saria_vo, you win. Hopefully I can convince you that both Wheeljack and Mirage do belong in this story, hee.]
Author: Lyricality (lyricality)
Rating: M/NC-17 overall for graphic sparksex.
Pairings: Eventual Bee/everyone. Finally, Bee/Sam.
Disclaimer: It's mine. I totally got it for my birthday last week. No, really. All characters are of legal age.
Note/Summary: LAAAATE. I beg your forgiveness, and can only claim sickness and self-pity as excuses. I give my profound thanks to nicole_dyria, who posted the score (which is still unavailable here in Colorado) on tf2007fun and thus provided me with the necessary inspiration to finish this part. ♥ For this entire fic, you can blame nemi_chan and her marvelous prompt o' doom, in which Bumblebee is the resident pleasurebot of the Autobots.
I love being back in the Special Hell. ^-^
Part 1/7: (Monday) Prime Time can be found here.
Part 2/7: (Tuesday) Iron Ride can be found here.
Part 3/7: (Wednesday) Doctor Love can be found here.
Part 4/7: (Thursday) Horizontal Jazz can be found here.
Part 5/7: (Friday) Scream Queen can be found here.
Part 5a/7: (Friday Evening) Special Handling can be found here.
Bee knew the moment Ratchet released him from stasis lock, because he began to dream.
Sam had asked him, once, if his kind could dream. Bee had considered the question and the meaning of the word, and decided that yes, the cycling of his processors during recharge did approximate the human experience of dreaming. The images themselves might lack coherency, but he could attribute meaning to them, in retrospect. Perhaps the only difference was that he recalled each dream with exact sensory detail; his dreams never disappeared on returning from stasis.
This time, he dreamt of Starscream.
Not of the seeker’s mindscape, not of what he had done, but of his body snared in Megatron’s hands. He hung motionless but screaming, helpless as Megatron’s claws opened his chest and ripped long shreds of energy out of his spark. Arousal and terror, desire and hatred caught in a horrible loop of longing, and Bee recognized it, resonated with it. He experienced that desolation again when Megatron cracked Starscream open down the center and drained him of essence, those long fangs turned vampiric. Discarded and robbed of flight, Starscream fell from his claws, past all the funereal lights of Iacon and into a darkness too profound for redemption.
With a shudder, Bee dragged himself free of that imagery and ended his recharge, optics coming back online and focusing on the ceiling with sudden and painful clarity. His chest ached. No surprise. Tiny twinges blossomed through his wiring, suggesting that Ratchet had replaced most of it. His optics flickered and he made a little sound, reassuring himself that he could still speak.
A jumbled whisper of cloth and limbs, and then his favorite creature in any galaxy scrambled up beside his head. Sam didn’t quite touch him, but his smile lessened the ache. “Bee? You’re okay?”
Turning his head, he pressed his forehead against Sam’s ribcage. “I’m okay, Sam.”
He was. Everything could have, should have ended in a way so much worse. By all rights, he should be permanently deactivated. Sam should be dead. The thought gave him the necessary will to lift one hand and curl it around Sam’s back, pulling the boy closer.
“God,” Sam whispered, leaning against him in return, both arms wrapping around Bee’s neck, returning the implied embrace. “You scared me. You scared me to death, Bee. I can’t stand seeing you get hurt again, okay? I can’t stand it.” A note of fragility in his voice made Bee moan, softly pleading in return. Sam pushed closer, his face against Bee’s audio vents, and Bee felt the sudden warm tracks of tears.
“Sam. No sacrifice, no victory,” he whispered.
Shaking his head, the boy made a hitching sound of profound denial, sitting back enough to wipe a hand over his eyes. “No. I’m not sacrificing you. Not you for me, okay? Never.”
Bee lifted his other hand, cupping Sam in all his fingers, holding him just above his chest. “You’re not allowed to make that decision for me.” A little amused, almost painfully touched, he brushed his thumbs along the angles of Sam’s hips, as far as he could reach. “I know my duty, Sam. Don’t try to convince me differently. Don’t lessen my commitment by questioning it.”
“It is not your duty to die for me.” Sam shook his head, swallowing so hard that Bee heard the dry click of his throat.
Bee settled him against his clavicle supports, the curve of the Camaro’s front bumper against Sam’s back. “Yes,” he said simply. “It is. And I’m glad.” He couldn’t move his mouth to show his emotion, but he strained to express it in his voice, the most pleasant sort of ache underscoring every word.
Silenced, Sam studied him for a long minute, and then he reached out with both hands, fingers splaying against the vents. “Why?” he asked at last.
Quiet in return, Bee stroked his thumbs along Sam’s legs again. That the boy didn’t protest suggested he already knew the answer. Bee denied the impulse to retreat behind the safer voice of the radio--he was no coward, and no song could express what he meant so well as could his own voice. “Sam,” he murmured. “I care for you. So...very much.”
Sam’s fingers shifted against the vents. “Yeah. I care about you too, Bee. You’re my best friend.” His lips curved into the slightest smile, a little wry, a little frightened, and entirely beautiful. “But I don’t think that’s what you’re talking about.” His voice had lowered, and Bee’s fingers trembled against his back.
“I love you, Sam,” he whispered. It wasn’t a secret.
Or maybe it was a secret, but now they could share it.
Sam swallowed, and one of his hands trailed downward and back, his fingers wrapping around Bee’s thumb. “Bee...are you sure?” Then he chuckled, closing his eyes. “I guess you probably are, huh.”
“Very sure,” Bee agreed. He’d tried to be gentle with this--he had expected shock, fear, even revulsion, given his own understanding of human customs and taboos--and perhaps they would both be better off if he had never admitted what he felt, and what he wanted. Much too late, now, and a tremor of regret warred with the rush of relief at being cautiously accepted rather than simply denied.
Sam kept still, or at least kept his position cupped in Bee’s hands. His own fingers trailed up and down the interlocking plates of Bee’s thumb, strokes made almost accidental.
“How does this work?” he asked after a minute or so, voice catching on the edge of a laugh, more nerves than amusement. “I don’t have a spark and I can’t...I mean, I’m not like you guys. It’s not that I don’t feel it--God, Bee, I feel it, but...”
Bee shook his head, a soft sound escaping him, too much hesitation and too much hope. “I don’t care about what you don’t have.”
Sam ran a trembling hand along the sharp wing of Bee’s shoulder, stroking the armor. “Don’t know what I’m doing,” he confessed on a breathless laugh. He leaned forward, close enough that Bee could feel the warmth of his breath. “Can I kiss you?” he said after a pause. “Should I?”
Bee made another trembling sound, nodding. Do whatever you want, he wanted to say, but the words wouldn’t come.
With a low moan, Sam pressed his lips against the vent, slight and soft touches of metal and skin. “Can you feel this?” Sam breathed, lips parted, breath hot when he kissed again, his mouth too small to cover much area, but shockingly wet just the same. Bee whined in affirmation, his hands tightening in approval, just enough to hold and not to hurt. Shifting closer, Sam grasped the edge of Bee’s faceplate with one hand. The other hand slipped off Bee’s shoulder, delving for just a moment into wiring before Sam caught himself and curled his fingers around an armor edge, his fingertips surprisingly rough against sensor grids.
Bee arched his head back and made a metallic squeal, keeping himself so still, vibrating with the need to be careful.
Jumping back, Sam drew in a shaking breath, his eyes scanning Bee’s face.
“You didn’t hurt me.” Bee let the sensation go with a reluctant shudder. “You can’t hurt me like this, Sam, I promise...”
With a swallow and a nod, Sam leaned forward again. “Okay.” He sought his previous position, his hand slipping back between plates of armor, his eyes unguarded when he met Bee’s gaze. “Promise me you’ll tell me if I do.” His fingers grazed over sensors again, so many tiny ridges on his fingertips. Bee moaned his agreement and tried not to squirm.
“Sam. Sam.”
His boy took the gasp as plea instead of protest, and he stretched out his other arm, seeking, finding the symmetrical sensor grid under Bee’s other shoulder plate with a few bold strokes. Sam circled his fingers against both arrays. Bee shuttered his optics and keened. “You like that,” Sam breathed, unsteady but building heat in his voice. “You’ve got a lot of these, Bee.” He leaned up, and Bee shifted both hands to accommodate him. Once more, Sam kissed the upper vent of Bee’s mouth, his breath hitching. “Where else would you like it?”
Bee shuddered just enough to send a vibration racing through both of them, and Sam gasped. Heat crackled through Bee’s new connectors at the sound; Sam did feel something powerful in this.
“Show you,” Bee whispered. He gathered Sam up again, lifting him over all the intricate plating of his chest and settling him just below his spark. He kept all the paneling closed, but urged Sam to touch him with soft chirps.
Nervous, Sam bit his lip, raising both hands and curling his fingers into his palms for a long moment. His eyes lingered on the destroyed paint of Bee’s armor, but with characteristic bravery, he flattened his palms against the center of Bee’s chest with his fingers dipping into the seams. “Like this?” His fingertips slipped under a ridge of metal, found the rough pattern of sensor relays underneath. “Right here?”
Bee didn’t quite arch up off the table, didn’t quite dare to move, but his body strained with a sudden, groaning tension and his optics flickered as his vocal processors grated.
“Right here,” Sam confirmed with a beautiful little smile of self-satisfaction.
He explored, daring to stroke deeper circuitry, to follow wires to their trembling, sparking connections. When Bee couldn’t bear any more of it, he called on what he had learned of human anatomy and organic sensory input. His fingertips grazed along Sam’s chest, traced down his spine, and finally brushed between his legs. Very gentle pressure with just one thumb had Sam panting, faltering, pushing back against him with two short thrusts of his hips.
“Sweet Jesus,” he shivered, his teeth chattering together. “Bee.”
Encouraged, Bee rubbed against him again, slow circles of varying pressure, and Sam collapsed back into his hands with a cry that deepened into an inarticulate groan.
“Whoa, whoa,” Sam mumbled after a long minute, his hands pushing back at Bee’s fingers. “Just...nngh. Just wait one...second.” He went quiet until his breathing equalized again. “I want to--but--” He cast a wary glance around the room, and Bee recalled exactly where they were, sprawled together in the middle of the medical bay.
By human standards? Definitely exposed.
“I just really don’t wanna be all out here in the open like this.” Sam had turned an interesting shade of pink, and Bee noticed with some amusement that he displayed more strongly than usual on infrared.
To punctuate their tenuous privacy, a clatter sounded just outside the main door, and after a few seconds it slid open to admit Ratchet. Bee suspected the medical officer had been monitoring him and waiting for an opportune moment to interrupt.
“I would have preferred you stay in recharge somewhat longer,” Ratchet said, hands on his hips.
Bee tried for innocence and failed utterly, to judge by the medic’s scowl.
“I suppose a little personal responsibility is altogether too much to ask.” Ratchet approached him, glancing at the boy, who squirmed under that eloquent gaze. “Climb down, Sam. I have scans to run.” Sam obeyed him instantly, clambering down the angular wall of Bee’s side, jumping the five feet down to the floor. Bee missed his warmth already. “This will not take long,” Ratchet reassured on a low tone, and Bee chirped in reply, keeping still. He finished in less than a cycle, and Bee spared no time in reaching his hand down to Sam, lifting him up again. Ratchet stepped back, speaking over one shoulder as he sorted a set of instruments on the nearest table. “Your recovery is largely complete. No lingering aftereffects on scans, at any rate. I hope there’s nothing you aren’t telling me?”
Shaking his head, Bee turned to place his feet on the floor, wincing just a bit as his weight settled on stressed or replaced joints.
“No acrobatics,” Ratchet warned. His optics narrowed. “No leaving the base except in our company, for now. Optimus’ orders.”
Bee nodded. “How long until the protoform arrives?”
“Six hours. I advise you to rest until then.” The instruments were sorted and resorted, but Ratchet continued to fidget with them. “I suppose you may do that in your own quarters, as easily as in here.”
Arranging his legs to either side of Bee’s fingers, Sam tried a grin. “Wanna show me your room, Bee?”
“You may be disappointed, Sam.” He had peered into his boy’s room enough times to realize exactly how much importance humans placed on individuality through private space and personal belongings. War hardly lent itself to collecting material items, and Bee’s own kind had never valued possessions so much as practicality, even on Cybertron.
Sam wrapped both arms around Bee’s thumb. “Don’t think that’ll happen.”
Something clattered. Ratchet had unsorted his instruments yet again, and Bee sensed an approaching lecture or worse. The medic’s narrowed optics pinned first Sam, then Bee. “Whatever else you do, I expect you to take care with each other.”
Sam went entirely infrared again. Bee made a little chirp, fired off a salute with his free hand, and fled the medical bay before Ratchet could mortify his human any further.
Out in the hall, Sam’s blush faded, and he glared at Bee with exasperation plain in his eyes. “Does everyone know about this?”
Everyone did. Bee had only himself to blame, and so he answered with nothing but an eloquent shrug.
“Well, isn’t that just awesome.”
“I’m sorry, Sam.” They had reached the door to his quarters, and he transmitted the proper frequency, stepping through before letting it close again behind them. “What I choose to do affects them, too. I couldn’t lie. Even by omission.” Not to the ones he loved.
Bee settled onto the berth, and Sam took a long look around, taking in the narrow room with its undecorated walls, brushed chrome obscuring any reflections. In Iacon, before the war, conduits had maintained their own quarters for a certain level of sensual tranquility, and partners came to them for comfort. Direct service meant a shift in priorities. Bee had spent little time in his personal quarters on the Ark, offering his company to the others instead, and now his guardianship of Sam meant even less time recharging at headquarters.
“Pretty bare, Bee. I’ve gotta get you a calendar, or something.” Smiling, Sam reached out, his fingers trembling when he rested one hand against Bee’s vocal vents. “Star Trek poster, maybe.”
The radio surged to life. “To boldly go where no one has gone before...”
“Right,” Sam swallowed, both hands catching at the slats of the vent, pulling him up until they were almost eye to optic. “I want to try this, Bee. I don’t know how it’ll work, because I know you’ll live like...forever. I won’t, and...I care about Mikaela, too.”
Wrapping him in both hands, Bee nodded, gently to keep from dislodging Sam’s grip. “I only want as much as you’re willing to give.” He trailed his fingertips downward, soft strokes at the junction of Sam’s legs, feeling his immediate reaction with a flutter of deep heat.
“Bee,” Sam groaned, arching weakly away. “Keep doing that and I’ll come in my pants. Honestly. Shit.”
“That’s what I want, Sam.”
“Hoboy.” Sam made a softly whimpering sound, squirming away, and then he laughed. “Too sticky, Bee. Gotta take them off.” Twisting, he pulled off his shirt, shedding his sneakers and his socks, finally loosening his jeans with a fervent sigh. He kicked them off, one leg and then the other, self-consciousness warming his cheeks again.
Bee had no personal reference for being naked, but he understood vulnerability. He busied himself setting Sam’s clothes at the edge of the berth, letting the boy adjust for a cycle or more. When Sam touched him again, drawing his attention with both hands on his faceplates and another timid kiss to the vent of his mouth, he murmured approval and relaxed back against the berth, pulling Sam along with him.
They spent time exploring each other. So much bare skin, so much living warmth to feel vibrating against his cooler components.
“You’re so complicated, Bee,” Sam panted. His skin glided against armor, gilding metal with perspiration. Hips arching, he rubbed hard against Bee’s fingers, his face contorting in a shockingly transparent moment of pleasure. Expressions so mobile, eyes so candid, how could humans ever hope to lie? “Oh God,” Sam shivered, “where should I touch you?”
“Anywhere,” Bee pleaded, an answering vibration rippling through his frame. “Everywhere.”
For an instant, he regretted Sam’s diminutive size. Too small to hold him. But he wouldn’t trade warm skin for larger hands, or a fluttering heartbeat for a familiar spark. Something in Sam’s humanity touched him--maybe literally, a tactile heat constructed of emotion and sensation together. So much of simply Sam, transmitted in a single touch.
The boy let his head fall back for a moment or two, his breathing shallow, before he let out a shaking sigh and wormed his way out of Bee’s hands. Investigating, he worked his way downward, protruding bits of armor offering unexpected handholds until he paused at Bee’s waist.
Sam’s fingers slid into the nest of wires below his chestplates, separating them, stroking each one, and Bee stirred restlessly while his hands stayed there, safe from sharper machinery. Then Sam tightened his grip and pulled, gently at first, then harder when Bee made no protest, then harder yet until Bee shifted with awkward moans, the sounds wrenched from his very core. Not quite pain, not quite pleasure, but an unfamiliar sensation, like the anticipation of a long, slow stretch.
“Does that feel good?” Sam whispered the words against him, ticklish warmth in his breath, heavy heat in his voice. Bee whined his confirmation and nodded, squealing when Sam tugged at him again. His voice grated into static when those extraordinarily hot hands slipped deeper inside, smoothing upward to where the wires met in a tangle of spliced connections, direct sensory stimulation relayed to the casing above. The boy couldn’t know, couldn’t possibly know what this was doing to him, how intimate it was, teasing those fibers that led so immediately to his spark.
Optics flickering, he focused on Sam’s face, the features strong with concentration, lax with tenderness. A light shone in his eyes that had nothing to do with reflection, and everything to do with inner glory--the human soul, and Bee knew it was invisible, but saw it now nevertheless, mirrored in the devotion in Sam’s eyes.
Maybe he understood what he was doing after all.
Bee urged him back, caught him in both hands to help him disentangle his fingers from the wiring. Trembling, he sent the commands, his armor parting to both sides over his chest. Sam was bare against him; Bee could offer the same. Outer barrier, inner barrier, both dismissed, and then Sam made a sound of alarm in his throat when the spark casing came into view.
“Wait--Bee--can you--not yet--” His words tripped over each other. He swallowed. “You might hurt yourself.”
Bee shook his head. “Not like this. It’s all right like this.” Hesitant, Sam reached out a hand, smoothing a palm over yellow exoskeletal armor, and Bee tightened his grip, holding him back for a moment more. “Sam. Ratchet thinks it’s safe, for humans to be...exposed to us, to our sparks, but he can’t be sure. Not until-"
“Until somebody tries it?” Sam quirked him a smile, and pressed his lips together. “Fools walk in, right?”
“I won’t hurt you,” Bee promised, aching at the thought.
Sam stretched out both hands, plaintive, and Bee obeyed the unspoken demand. Cupping the boy close against his chest, he shuddered when Sam reached inside, so brave, fingers stroking into the seams of the casing. “Ratchet did a good job fixing this,” he said, swallowing hard. His thumbs ran along the sides, his skin picking up a sheen of lubrication. His voice lowered, almost inaudible on the human audio range. “Open for me, Bee?”
He should worry at how easy it was, to do as this boy asked. Instead, he let his chest slide open, just a gap, just enough to cast them both in iridescent light.
Rays of brilliant blue scissored between Sam’s spread fingers. Far steadier than Bee, he rubbed his thumbs along the edges of the casing, slow and sure, and Bee let out a wail that sent bright filaments of energy stretching outward from his spark. Sam gasped, but reached inward, and one vibrant strand reached back, twining around his fingers.
His body jerked and he panted, his hair lifting lightly from his scalp, as if from electric current. “Bee...oh, God, Bee, that feels...”
Bee could imagine how it felt--how good it felt. Even if they couldn’t share the deeper connection of sparks, they could share this. The sensation made his sensors sing, even as he sent them scanning over Sam, tuned as always to the rhythms of his body. No ill effects from such close exposure, nothing but a quickening heartbeat and a rising temperature.
Pressing his lips together, Sam glanced into Bee’s optics, gauging something in the pitch of his cries and the tremors shaking his frame. He pushed his hand deeper, and light arced between them.
Spark energy struck sharp as lightning. It arrowed into Sam through one hand and sought something to ground it, and Sam shouted as he plunged his other hand into Bee’s spark, completing the connection as surely as routing wires.
Bee flattened himself against the berth with a shriek, his fingers dancing over Sam’s body. The energy he gave off crackled back into his spark, but it was conducted through Sam, touched by Sam, amplified by Sam, creating an intensifying feedback loop that offlined his circuits one by one in shattering bursts of ecstasy. He kept his scanners trained on Sam, or tried his best, but overheating glitched his systems, overwhelmed sensors screaming pleasure from every extremity and destroying the accuracy of his readings.
They had to stop. He had to regain control. But he was already surging, his body quaking and his voice raw with entirely mechanical sounds of bliss.
Desperate, he rubbed his fingertips over Sam, seeking the most sensitive machinery of his body and caressing with focused intent. Crying out in return, Sam convulsed in his hands, surrendering into sudden release. Bee vibrated with another surge in return, the currents between them heightening so long as they stayed connected. He made a little keen, ecstasy tinged with worry. Finally, Sam’s hands faltered, both of them shaking, and Bee pulled him back enough to safely snap the casing shut. Connection cut, the energy dissipated in a rush of lingering static, pleasant enough to make them moan together.
Gathering himself, Bee flashed his scanners over Sam’s trembling form, fear leaden in his processors. But his boy was unharmed, scans revealing nothing but a slowing heartbeat and a body as spent as Bee’s sturdier frame. The evidence of Sam’s satisfaction was so physical, utterly organic, but so was Sam, and Bee couldn’t mind the mess.
“Sam,” he murmured at length. One fingertip trailed down the length of the boy’s spine--the most mechanical part of any human, so beautiful in its intricacy.
Sam drew in and let out a deep breath before stirring. When he pushed himself up, his forearms against Bee’s palm and the rest of his body sprawled out over Bee’s fingers, his eyes glowed with a vulnerability and a love so deep, they could bridge the gulf of galaxies and experiences and cultures that might otherwise have separated them. “Wow,” Sam whispered, satiation beginning to replace the deeper devotion in his eyes. But Bee had saved that image, stored it secure in his databanks to recall long after circumstances had inevitably separated them.
He hoped to make many more such files, between this moment and that one.
“Are you hurt?” he said. “I wasn’t sure...”
Shaking his head, Sam rolled his weight to one side, stretching out a hand to pat at Bee’s chin. “I’m good,” he breathed. “I’m so good, Bee. It was good.” Something glimmered in his eyes, suggesting understatement, but Bee didn’t press him. Weary, Sam stretched against his hands, pressing his lips to the edge of Bee’s palm. “Didn’t know we could do that,” he said between kisses. “Forgot that humans conduct electricity pretty well.”
And were often killed in the process. Bee thanked Primus himself that spark energy had a far more benign effect.
He brushed his fingertips along Sam’s back. They stayed silent together for some time, moving softly against each other now and then, a reassuring comfort in physical contact. The boy’s breathing had evened, his body naturally inclined toward sleep, but he surprised Bee by speaking again.
“Bee.” His voice was languid. “Being a conduit is honorable, right? The others act like it. They care about you.” Hand circling one of the gears at Bee’s wrist, he asked, “So why would Starscream call you a whore? Just to be an asshole?”
Bee murmured at the touch, pleasant pressure. “Decepticons have no conduits. They consider any weakness a terrible liability. Asking for help, especially among their own ranks, would be suicidal at best.” He had never considered the matter too closely before, dismissing the difference as ideological, rather than practical in application. But after what he had witnessed of Starsceam’s spark... He could rethink his position with experience as an unpleasant guide. Moreover, he could wonder whether Megatron’s dictate against conduits had anything to do with Ratchet’s memories of him as a partner.
“That’s too bad,” Sam snorted. “Seems like they could use one.”
“Sleep, Sam.” Bee settled the boy beside him on the berth, encouraging him to curl into the space between his neck and shoulder. “Stay here with me, and sleep.”
“Changing the subject,” Sam smiled, but obeyed, his breathing eventually going shallow. Bee lay with his optics shuttered, but he never quite slipped back into recharge.
*****
The Autobots drove together to the projected landing site, following Jazz’s lead south along the highway. This was Jazz’s first transformation since his return to their ranks, and he ranged far ahead of the others, doubling back again and again once they were free of other traffic. His bursts of careless speed spoke more eloquently of his joy than words ever could, and Bee let Sam goad him into a brief race. The setting sun reflected like firelight along the flanks of the Solstice, and Bee lost by a good three meters and didn’t care in the slightest.
The sun had fully set by the time they left the paved roads and rolled into a field edged by hills on three sides. Ironhide transformed immediately, cannons at the ready, optics fixed upward and scanning the sky. For jet engines instead of a protoform, Bee had little doubt.
Returning to his natural form, Jazz stood with his head tilted just slightly to one side, plainly receiving.
“There it is,” Bee said, transforming as soon as Sam stepped out onto the patchy grass. Far in the distance, a dot of light had appeared high above the horizon, streaking toward them with debris stretching out behind it in a brilliant tail. It had already entered the atmosphere.
“Optimus,” Jazz muttered. “I’m gettin’ a ghost signal here. Some sorta doubling.”
Their Prime went still, tuning into the frequency, searching for similar signals. At last he dipped his head in agreement. “It is not an echo. Something is strange.”
Something was strange, and now the phenomenon was visual as well as auditory.
Bee shifted his perspective, his optics magnifying the protoform roughly 1200 times until he could correctly interpret the phenomenon. Something rippled around the back half of the cometoid, a shadow like a reflection of heat, and then a second mass of metal flashed suddenly into full view, separating from the first protoform and twisting into a burning sphere. Two protoforms, their paths diverging. The original shot straight for the nearby field. The one that had shielded itself veered northward, toward the highway.
“Primus,” Bee whispered, taking backward steps until he bumped into Optimus. “Is it--”
Optimus caught him with both hands against his shoulders. “Yes. It is Mirage.”
“The other is Wheeljack,” Ratchet said with a certain fiercely understated joy. He was scanning for all he was worth. “He’s taken heavy damage. Most of it old.”
Wheeljack streaked toward the earth and crashed exactly as Jazz had predicted, setting fire to the grass and a distant spray of trees. Abruptly, a second explosion shook the fallen protoform, causing even Optimus to sway where he stood. Sam fell to his hands and knees.
“What caused that?” he squawked.
Optimus merely shook his head, regaining his balance and starting toward the crater. “Wheeljack,” he sighed.
Far in the distance, a bright flash and a tremble through the ground heralded the similar arrival of Mirage.
“That was near the race track,” Sam said, following Bumblebee as they regrouped around Wheeljack’s point of arrival. “I think.”
Ratchet knelt cautiously beside the cometary protoform, which had made no movement since its landing. Scanning beams slid over the silent form, and the medic frowned. Tools whirred into position as the armoring of Ratchet’s forearms flipped back. “The damage has put him into stasis lock,” he said as he began to work, sparks flying in a swift shower.
The rest of them settled into a rough semicircle, protective, waiting for word from Mirage. Ten cycles clicked away before Jazz tilted his head, receiving. “Found himself an alt. He’s on his way.”
“Good,” Ratchet muttered, glancing up from Wheeljack’s protoform, still locked in cometary mode. “We need to get him to headquarters.”
Optimus knelt beside him, sweeping over their comrade with scanning beams of translucent blue. “Will he recover?”
Ratchet shook his head. “I don’t know.”
More cycles of waiting. Sam wrapped both arms around himself, shivering against the chill of the wind, and Bee scooped him up in both hands, cradling him against his chest. His spark made a little leap at the boy’s proximity, startling him. Yet another unexpected development.
At last, a cloud of dust appeared on the horizon. It resolved into a low, dark shape that approached them at remarkable speed, a blur of deep midnight blue that skidded to a halt just outside their circle and revealed itself as a lean Formula 1 racer.
“Damn,” Sam whispered. “A McLaren.”
A McLaren MP4-20, Bee’s swift search of the internet revealed, even as the race car slid apart into millions of razored edges, a liquid transformation of rotating, upward recreation that stretched taller than any one of them except Optimus. Wheels slid into place at the bases of feet, at the upper back. Delicate slats of metal jigsawed together into a helm as distinctive as Jazz’s visor in its elegantly tapered shape. Almost Egyptian, Bee could note, with his time on Earth as reference.
Mirage had a far more slender frame than did the rest of them, and the minimalist metal of his chosen alt only intensified his appearance of lean strength. He folded his new form low to the ground, kneeling before their Prime with his head briefly bowed.
“I’m sorry for the secrecy,” he said, and Bee ached at the forgotten tranquility of his voice. He spoke in English--he’d obviously already made some study of his surroundings. “There was a danger of being followed.”
“Of worse,” Ratchet muttered.
Expression softened, Optimus squatted in front of Mirage, and offered him one massive hand. “Rise, my friend. Welcome to Earth.”
His own expression neutral, Mirage studied the hand as if he didn’t know quite what to make of it--as if he had expected no welcome at all, or perhaps a far colder one. At last he offered his own hand in return, strangely wary. Optimus took it, and they stood together.
“Prime,” he murmured, and then focused his attention on each of them in turn. “Ratchet. Ironhide. Bumblebee. Jazz.” He paused. “I heard you were...permanently deactivated.”
Jazz smirked. “Greatly exaggerated, ya see.”
Mirage offered a grim curve of his mouth in return, but turned to his partner in planetfall. “Wheeljack. Is there hope of repairing him?”
“There is always hope, however slim,” Ratchet retorted, glancing at Mirage. “These wounds...” He ran a hand along the protoform’s damaged flank. “They are disturbingly familiar.”
Kneeling beside Wheeljack, Mirage met the medical officer’s gaze. “I found him on the Vermilion. He had been tortured by Soundwave.”
Optimus made a deep, quiet sound like protest.
“You were on the Vermilion?” The first words Ironhide had spoken since they had arrived at the site, and he offered his question on a growl. “How long?”
Mirage did not quite smile; his expression gave Bee a chill. “Too long.”
“We can discuss all of this later.” Ratchet stood, impatience etched in every motion. “Optimus, your alt form should have room enough for Wheeljack, even in this mode. I can’t work here.”
With a sigh, Optimus nodded. “Autobots--transform and head back to base.” He returned to his Peterbilt form.
Bee lowered Sam to the ground, and Mirage seemed to notice him for the first time. “Samuel James Witwicky,” he said, with an incline of his head. “I’m pleased to meet you.”
“Yeah,” Sam swallowed, resting both hands on the hood of Bee’s Camaro shape, seemingly steadying himself. “Um, likewise.” Bee swung open the door, and Sam dropped into the driver’s seat before blowing out his breath in a sigh of relief. Latching the seatbelt around him, Bee made it comfortably snug, a subtle embrace. “He seems like he knows what’s going on,” Sam said after a minute, once Ratchet and Mirage had levered Wheeljack onto Optimus’ truck bed and they had all started back toward headquarters in a long, lighted convoy.
“Mirage is extraordinarily accomplished in surveillance,” Bee agreed, then clarified, “he is a spy. As well as a bodyguard. He was Optimus’ personal guard on Cybertron.”
Sam stroked the steering wheel with the pads of his thumbs. “Guess the invisibility thing must come in handy for all of that. He seemed...weird with Optimus, though. Like he expected to...I dunno, maybe get punched in the face.”
Silent for a moment, Bee considered what to say. “Before we left Cybertron to pursue the Allspark, Mirage was guarding another Autobot at Prime’s request. She traveled to a planet called Velocitron, without notifying Optimus or Mirage.” Some memories he preferred not to relive. “Megatron destroyed Velocitron. He exploited the energy to fully raise his armies. Everyone on Velocitron was killed.”
“The whole planet,” Sam whispered, his fingers tightening against the wheel. Bee knew he was thinking of Earth. Swallowing, he said, “And Optimus won’t forgive him? Because she died? It can’t have been Mirage’s fault.”
Bee made a soft buzz of denial. “No. Optimus forgives him. Mirage won’t forgive himself.”
“I get it.” Sam went quiet again, but he let one hand fall to the passenger seat, stroking the leather until Bee vibrated under his fingers. “Bee, what’s the Vermilion? And Soundwave, too.”
“A ship.” The equal of the Nemesis in firepower if not in notoriety, and the thought of it approaching Earth started a pounding dread somewhere deep in his fuel pump. “Soundwave and Shockwave are the Decepticons who command it. Together they’re Megatron’s third line of lieutenants.” Silence fell between them, and Bee reached for reassurance, something comforting to assure Sam that his world would be safe.
But he couldn’t guarantee the safety of the Earth.
“Sam,” he whispered, strained. “I do love you. I’ll never let you be hurt.”
“I know.” Sam’s fingers slipped between the cushions of the seat, holding tight. “I love you, Bee. I know.”
*****
Back at headquarters, they all settled into the recovery room just off the medical bay, giving Ratchet space to work. Most of them remained standing, but Optimus insisted Bee take the chair. He relented and encouraged Sam to perch on his shoulder. Mirage sat as well, folding his lean shape down to the floor and resting his back against the wall.
He gave them his report with characteristically spare detail. Occasionally, Optimus had to press him for more information.
Mirage had remained on the Vermilion for astral cycles. Hundreds of Earth’s years he had spent hidden on the Decepticon warship, gleaning details of strategy and weaponry from conversations and, more rarely, through unguarded computer ports. All that information he had transmitted back to Autobot command ships, modifying his own cloaking technology as a means of strict coding on every broadcast. He had continued to transmit, even when one by one the command ships began failing to answer, only static in reply on every channel but one.
The war had continued outside the struggles between the Nemesis and the Ark, of course. Bee had a little trouble reconstructing his perspective to include battles fought far outside their limited range of communication--battles fought without the knowledge of the Allspark, found and lost forever.
Far outside this galaxy, the Autobot battleship Sigma had fallen to the Vermilion. A handful of Autobots remained on the Vermilion as prisoners. Among them was Wheeljack--the only scientist to survive the attack, and the only Autobot to survive imprisonment for longer than a span of megacycles. Mirage had continued transmitting his limited information to empty channels, on the slim chance allies might still be listening. He had also done his best to escape detection while keeping Wheeljack alive.
“The Sigma was my last intact contact in range,” he said. “It’s rumored that others may have survived in the attached shuttle, but I would have to see it to believe it. There was nothing left but scrap after Soundwave and his symbiotes boarded.” He sighed. “The war isn’t going well. Outside this planet.”
“Did you intercept my message?” Optimus murmured.
Mirage met his gaze for a moment, but lowered his head. “I did. As did Soundwave and Shockwave. So they had already learned of Megatron’s death and the destruction of the cube, when Starscream arrived on the Vermilion.”
A ripple of uneasy anger slid through the Autobots already acclimated to Earth, and Bee imagined it as a physical thread, pulling each of them in turn. Sam’s hands curled into fists. Bee felt his fuel intakes trying to seize.
Noting the change in atmosphere, Mirage paused, but continued with his optics lingering on Bee. “They weren’t exactly pleased to see him. They accused him of all sorts of disloyalty--abandoning his troops, plotting Megatron’s downfall and the elimination of the cube. Questions were raised about his fitness for command.”
“Long overdue,” Ratchet barked from the other room.
Mirage spread his hands. “They weren’t much interested in his innocence or his authority, anyway. Even his wingmates turned against him after a few veiled threats. It was quite a commotion. He took superficial damage and fled.” Glancing at Bee again, he said, “Back here, I take it?”
“I am afraid so.” Optimus uncrossed his arms, and Bee realized with a jolt that their Prime’s fingertips had left heavy impressions in his own armor plating along each elbow joint, yet another sign of hidden strain.
Expression flattening, Mirage said, “The time seemed right to make an exit. For myself and Wheeljack both.”
Ratchet appeared in the doorway. “Rejection by the others--it might account for Starscream’s otherwise illogical behavior.” He had been working on Wheeljack, and the multiple tools of his hands showed a spattering of mech fluid and a coating of iridescent blue, liquid energon. One drop swelled at the base of a drilling apparatus, then ran along the bit, hanging for a long, long moment at the tip until it fell to puddle against the floor.
Bee recalled his dream, and in an instant his fuel intakes stopped threatening to seize and simply did so.
A backwash of energon and other fluids made him quake as if in seizure, warnings flashing across his optic screens. Sam clung to his shoulder for dear life, fingers slipping, but Mirage was nearest and caught the boy in both hands just before Bee’s convulsions might have shaken him loose.
“Out!” Ratchet snarled at everyone, with such authority that Bee actually tried to obey him before the medic pushed him back into the chair with one hand. “Not you, idiot,” he muttered, ignoring the mass exodus through the door behind him, as well as Sam’s loud protests. Ratchet reached for Bee’s throat with the other hand, and despite his lurching, Bee sidled away from the touch. He couldn’t speak; he reverted to a digital channel.
: Please don’t touch :
The medical officer halted, glanced at his fingers, and Bee felt an entirely emotional ache when horrified understanding replaced the impatience in Ratchet’s expression. For just an instant, he gathered himself, his practicality reassuming control. His optics flashed a scan along Bee’s intakes, and then he injected something cool, something calming, into his fuel lines.
Bee’s quaking eased. Ratchet left him alone for a cycle or so, and Bee heard a distant splash of cleaning fluid, murmurs of reassurance to Sam.
When he returned, his hands were clean. Bee’s fuel intakes had returned to normal, just a hiccup now and then as a reminder that his overall recovery remained less than complete. “There is nothing wrong with your systems,” Ratchet said after another scan. “The cause was emotional, not physical.” Sorrow edged into his expression, along with a touch of something unfamiliar, like shame. “I apologize.”
With a chirrup, Bee touched his hand, reassuring in his turn. “I’m all right.”
That hand drifted closer, fingers stroking along the mobile fins near the top of his head. “I have worries,” Ratchet whispered, and his fingers trembled, his voice hoarse. So much uncertainty from someone usually so self-assured in his profession, and Bee did what he knew best, wrapping his fingers around Ratchet’s wrist and drawing that hand down to the center of his chest.
Ratchet splayed his fingers. Hesitation played across his face.
“I’m all right,” Bee repeated, but his voice caught, scratched like a poor-quality recording.
Fingers shook against the seams of his armor, soft and doubting strokes.
Bee astonished himself; he quailed. More accurately, he recoiled, half his processors reeling as he pulled away from what he had always loved, the other half understanding all too well why he did so.
“Bumblebee,” Ratchet murmured.
Opening himself to Sam had been easy. Perhaps because he hadn’t truly opened himself at all. When Sam had touched his spark, they’d shared pleasure without sharing memory. If Sam had fears--and of course he did--Bee hadn’t felt them, hadn’t experienced them, hadn’t been touched by someone else’s pain. Their method of connection was not less, but it was very different by comparison.
“Bumblebee,” Ratchet repeated, drawing his attention at last, and Bee realized that the medic had both hands wrapped around his. “You are quite plainly not prepared.” His grip gentled, as did his tone. “Not to resume this particular duty.”
With a soft moan of distress, Bee twined his fingers through Ratchet’s. He knew what unnerved him. Not simply pain, but the terrible suspicion that Starscream’s spark might have somehow tainted his own, that he couldn’t feel pain without pleasure or pleasure without pain, that his perceptions might be twisted when his spark joined to another’s.
That he would do harm instead of good.
“Give this time,” Ratchet said, though he sounded shaken. His arms surrounded Bee, drawing him close, heedless of the other Autobots and the human boy gathered just outside the door. “Give yourself time.”
Bee shuttered his optics with a low whine. He didn’t want time, of course. He wanted all of them, and he wanted Sam, and he wanted a return to duty and to normalcy without the specter of Starscream hanging over his head.
*****
[saria_vo, you win. Hopefully I can convince you that both Wheeljack and Mirage do belong in this story, hee.]