Title: Motormaster's Awesome Day
Author: Kyra Neko-Rei
Characters: Motormaster, other Stunticons, a couple Constructicons, Vortex.
Warnings: Hints/references to dubcon.
Rating: T
Motormaster awoke to find himself flat on his back in the medbay, half his front and half his right side numb and coated with a layer of nanite gel. The plating on his back and aft felt rather more sensitive than usual, and he could feel little pricks of discomfort all over that felt like shrapnel had been embedded and then removed.
Snickering from somewhere above him---Drag Strip. Motormaster onlined his optics to find three of his teammates perched on the next berth over, around Breakdown, who lay on his front, still out of it and equally coated with gel. "Thought I told you to wait in the entrance bay," Motormaster growled.
"Yeah, well, you went and got yourself blown up so we came here instead." Drag Strip was gloating, and from within reach, too. Motormaster lashed out to show him the error of that combination only to come up short at the realization he was strapped to the berth.
Drag Strip and Wildrider burst out laughing, and Dead End unsubtly hid a smile behind his hand.
"SCRAPPER!"
The (as far as Motormaster could tell) leader of the Constructicons ambled into view. "Oh, good, you're awake."
"Why am I chained up?"
A puzzled look from the Constructicon. "I don't know, I didn't do it." Motormaster slowly turned toward Drag Strip and Wildrider.
Drag Strip and Wildrider edged back. "They thought it would be amusing," said Dead End, optics glinting, and was rewarded with a pair of growls from the two he'd just ratted out.
"Get me out of it then," Motormaster said, deadly calm, optics fixed on the two glitches who were looking back at him deer-in-the-headlights style. Scrapper and Dead End moved closer and Dead End reached the restraints before Scrapper said, "Wait."
"What?" This from both Dead End and Motormaster, the former curious, the latter in a tone of voice that tended to make people rethink things.
To his credit, Scrapper didn't flinch. "You need to not get up and slag your team right now. You need to wait until you're repaired. Understand?"
Motormaster fumed but nodded. He could wait. The little glitches had the audacity to look relieved, as if he was going to forget if he stayed put while his plating was repaired, and he was going to make them pay for that too. He flexed servos as Dead End and Scrapper released him, but did not immediately jump up and make two mech-shaped dents in the wall.
A chirp from the other berth announced Breakdown's return to consciousness; Motormaster watched as he tried to curl into a protective ball and was thwarted by a quick movement from Scrapper. His shoulder plating had been replaced, and Motormaster frowned at the reminder of Vortex.
"Your plating is healing well," said Scrapper, and Motormaster checked his chronometer to discover that only about an hour had passed since he'd gone to find Breakdown. The stuff worked fast, or else the burns hadn't been that bad. "Mixmaster won't be happy, that was his entire supply of his new favorite explosive acid compound that you just blew up, but he'll get over it. He'll get over it faster if you get him some potassium permanganate somewhere," he hinted, "but if you avoid him for a few weeks that'll work too. I think I can start repainting you now, once I get the gel off. Hold your position."
Motormaster rumbled acknowledgement and looked over at Breakdown, surrounded by the rest of the team, talking quietly amongst themselves. "Keep it quiet and leave me alone," he told them. "I'm gonna try to catch a nap."
They nodded, and the decibel count dropped slightly. Scrapper came over with a pressure washer and began washing the gel off of Motormaster's plating.
That took care of any chance of actually getting that nap; the water pulsed hard against sensitive plating and Motormaster arched up, interrupted by Scrapper's hand pressing him firmly back down on the berth. "Stay."
Motormaster growled, but stayed. Next berth over, someone snickered, only to be interrupted by Long Haul with another pressure-washer telling the non-injured three to clear out.
Breakdown's response to the pressure-washer was highly entertaining, and Motormaster smiled as he watched his recalcitrant teammate squirm and cry out. One could almost overload from these things, he imagined. Too soon they were done, however, leaving Motormaster a bit keyed up, and Scrapper disappeared with the pressure-washer and returned with primer, paint, and portable heat lamps. Motormaster smiled. He was no lazy, hedonistic layabout, but there was nothing wrong with a little time spent basking under heat lamps when immobilized in the medbay anyway . Scrapper started spraying on the primer, with Long Haul arranging the heat lamps in his wake; their heat struck Motormaster like sunshine in the desert: powerful, warm and relaxing, and Motormaster offlined his optics and let himself drift.
"Hey, Moto," came a smooth, perpetually-amused voice that had Motormaster stiffening and Breakdown tensing up to flee, optics bright with alarm and dislike. "Oh," said Vortex, voice lighting up as he came further into the medbay. "Hi, Breakdown," he cooed.
Motormaster growled, loud enough to drown out any answer Breakdown might have given. "Vortex. Have I or have I not adequately explained that you do not touch my team."
Vortex gave him a perfectly innocent look, that, given that it was on Vortex, fooled no one. "I touch you," he pointed out. Breakdown boggled.
"Different kind of touching."
"Well, I could touch him like that too, if you wanted."
Breakdown's reaction was a muffled squeak and a flood of highly conflicted emotions over the gestalt link.
"Would you like that, Breakdown?" Vortex cooed again.
Breakdown had no answer, or at least no answer that he managed to get out, and Vortex reached out and trailed soft clawtips over Breakdown's plating. Breakdown shivered.
Motormaster drew one leg up to his chassis, braced himself against the edge of the berth, and kicked Vortex square in the rotary hub. Breakdown squeaked in surprise as Vortex went tumbling right over Breakdown's berth to land in a crumpled heap on the other side.
Scrapper was there in an instant, in a full-on righteous fury which, at Motormaster's gesture, he turned on Vortex. "This is a medbay, not a training bay; if you want to start a fight, you do it outside." A firm hand clenched on Vortex's rotary assembly; Vortex, being Vortex, moaned theatrically. Breakdown squeaked again; Motormaster's components heated slightly in interest; Scrapper was having none of it, and Vortex was thrown out the door.
Motormaster commed whoever had replaced him on bridge duty for the duration of his trip to the medbay. "Somebody put Vortex in the brig."
That was something, at least.