28 Twins, LWA-style: 15/28
I hope to start posting these on ff.net soon >:d.
For those of you just tuning in, these are side-stories to Living With Autobots that focus on Sideswipe and Sunstreaker, since I can't fit all of their backstory into LWA proper. They're short(er) stories, not meant to be as polished as LWA, and not necessarily written in chronological order (though that is how I will present them on ff.net). Aaaaand that's about it! Carry on!
Title: 28 Twins 15/28: Wrong Twin
Rating: PG13, for Cybertronian swearing
Characters: Sideswipe, Sunstreaker, Red Alert, Inferno
Summary: Sideswipe misjudges a situation, and Inferno fails at being specific.
Author's notes: For red_wasabi89's prompt "what happens when you get blamed for something your brother did (and he let you take the heat!)."
Sideswipe was on the hunt already. Not even a joor out of the medbay after fleeing Kaon. Sunstreaker could only attempt to drown his exasperation in the cube he currently held. It wasn't that he faulted his brother for wanting to find a femme for the night, but Sideswipe just had to take the most direct approach possible. That may have worked (most of the time) in Kaon, but Sunstreaker had a feeling the Autobots would not appreciate it so much.
He could feel the excited static charge coming from his brother's armor. -Primus, you're not even within arm's reach of a femme. Calm down.-
-You just need to get overloaded.-
-What I need is for you to stop getting my armor charged up.-
-You don't have to sit so close to me.-
-I'm on the other fragging side of the table. You need to calm down.-
Sideswipe merely snorted in reply. His blue optics scanned those individuals present in the rec room. It was a nice room, Sunstreaker gave the Autobots that. A little more sparse than the one in Kaon, but comfortable enough. Less high-grade though.
At least he had a cube now. He took a swig from it. -So who is your lucky victim tonight?-
Sideswipe looked around the room again. -That one.-
Sunstreaker glanced at the femme his brother indicated. She was a large femme, perhaps the same size class as themselves, with shadowy red armor that was heavier than that of a typical femme. Sunstreaker had seen her around the base on a few occasions and he had the vague impression that she held a rank of some importance. But he knew for a fact the minor detail of... -She's taken.-
The red warrior beside him squinted at the femme. -She's not bonded. Her spark's normal.-
Sunstreaker gave a small shrug, turning his attention back to his cube. -She's taken.-
-You're wrong.-
-Don't say I didn't warn you.- 'As always.'
*****
When Inferno was upset, it was best to stay out of his way.
Unfortunately for Red Alert, Inferno was his closest friend, and it was his responsibility to help his friend when he was upset. But despite their lifetime of friendship, Red Alert still flinched as the much-larger mech stormed into the officer's lounge.
Red slowly turned from the data pad he was reading. "Something wrong?" he asked cautiously.
Inferno huffed. "Now what would make you think that?" he asked, voice dripping with sarcasm.
"Your stomping about, for one."
"That was a rhetorical question, Red."
"So what is it?"
"Those bastard haroon!" Inferno spat as he paced the length of the room, whirled around, and started back. His heavy footsteps made the floor tremble.
The security officer grimaced. 'I told Prime those two would be more trouble then they're worth, but did he listen to me? Of course not.' Sure, the Autobots needed mechs suited for battle, but those brothers...there was something off about them.
It sounded as if the Autobots would soon be finding out exactly what was so off. "What happened?"
Inferno didn't slow as he stomped by. "One of them was harassing Firestar."
"Hmm." Red quirked an optic ridge.
"Don't 'hmm' me," Inferno growled. "I know what you're thinking. I wouldn't tolerate them harassing any femme."
"Of course you wouldn't. I'm sure Firestar can take care of things herself," the smaller mech said, trying to calm his friend. The stomping was starting to get to him. 'As much as I would dearly love to see those two--'
"I threw the slagger across the room."
"Ah." 'Well, there you have it. Too bad I missed that. I'll have to check the video archive when I'm back on duty.'
Inferno was waving his arms emphatically as he continued his pacing. "He wouldn't leave her alone! And then his brother showed up!"
"And you threw him too?"
"No, he had enough processor power to leave things well enough alone. But it doesn't faze them, Red! Physical threats." This obviously irritated Inferno, and his own size and strength were his more imposing traits.
"I don't suppose it would," Red said evenly, as he tracked his friend's progress back down the room. "They're gladiators."
"I'm going to kill that fragger."
"As much as I'd enjoy seeing that, I highly doubt Optimus would."
That earned the security director a low growl.
Red sighed softly. "So, you done ranting?"
"Yes."
"Good." Red relaxed a bit in his chair. "May I finish reading?" He waved the datapad slightly.
"Can you do me a favor?"
The smaller mech closed his optics, trying to suppress the delighted grin that threatened to spread across his face. "I was hoping you'd say that."
*****
'There you are.' At the soft notification, Red Alert swung his view through the several security cameras displayed on his HUD. Yes, the gold kaonex was in one of the smaller hallways. Alone.
Going through with this would probably earn him more than a few strikes against his name in Prowl's books. But Red was not afraid of extracting a little revenge on behalf of his friend. What would Prowl do, toss him in a cell? Pointless, seeing as Red had been the one to code the security on those cells.
He input a tiny string of code, and the blast door at the end of the hall dropped. He watched through the camera as the warrior pressed the engage button on the door's control panel. The mech was not pleased when nothing happened.
Red dropped the blast door behind the gladiator, mere paces from where he stood.
The gold warrior was definitely not pleased.
Satisfied for now, Red cut all input from the security panel in that little section of the hallway, save for the visual feed, which he pushed aside to a corner of his HUD. Let the mech sit in there for a while. His brother was off-base on an assignment with Ironhide, nowhere he could interfere with things, which would give the gold mech plenty of time to cool his thrusters. Perhaps after this, he would be a little less apt to go after Autobot femmes.
*****
To say that the gold gladiator was fragged off about being confined for Primus-knew-how-long (Red knew exactly how long) was an understatement. He was pacing the shortened hallway like a caged beast, armor plates along his back and shoulders shifting in small displays of rage. Every so often, he would rake his claws along the wall.
Red brought the image to the front of his HUD again, turning all the feeds on. He could heard the gladiator snarling to himself, words Red couldn't quite understand and probably didn't want to. |Had enough?| he said through the intercom.
The mech was at the security panel more quickly than Red thought possible. "You Pit-slagging bastard! Let me out!"
|How about you stop swearing at superior officers, and I'll consider it?|
"You have no right to keep me in here!"
|You have no right to harass femmes.|
The gold mech was silent for a beat, optics dimming slightly, as if he was confused. Then his face plates twitched back into the rage that had covered his visage earlier, and his voice dropped into a truly frightening growl. "Let me out."
|Why should I?|
"I need to...see my brother."
That, Red Alert did not want to happen just yet. Ironhide had figured out very quickly that the only punishment the two gladiators understood was separation from one another. |He's not available right now,| Red said glibly.
"Isn't he."
|So you can just stay right there until he is.|
The mech's mouth twitched, as if he was going to say something.
Red Alert briefly saw the warrior's forearm reforming itself, then he found himself looking into the barrel of a heavy-duty cannon.
A powerful burst of energy shot through the camera and into his HUD. Sparks blinded him, burning into his face. Hissing in pain, Red Alert jerked back from his console, frantically tearing the connection cables from his mask, instantly severing himself from the data streams. Red pushed his mask back as he curled up on his seat, a hand pressed to the left side of his face. "Primus...slagging Pits..." He pushed at his mask again, but the left side refused to retract properly. 'Well frag it all. That's going to be fun to repair.'
"Whoa, Red...what's wrong?" Blaster called in from the doorway to the security room.
"Blaster. Thank Primus. Can you cover for me?" 'Ow, Primus...think he got my optic too.'
"Sure. What happened?"
"Nothing," said the security director as he shakily rose from his seat.
"Uh-huh." The larger mech settled himself into his own chair. "You are going to the medbay to take care of that 'nothing,' right?"
"Of course," Red snapped.
Blaster raised a hand in a placating gesture. "Okay, okay. Primus, I was just making sure. No need to get snippy."
*****
Sunstreaker lay in his berth, hands behind his head, legs crossed, waiting. Just waiting. And he would wait for as long as it took.
It was late at night when he finally felt his brother's presence enter the next room, faint but most definitely there. Sideswipe was obviously trying to shield his spark signature from his brother. It never worked.
The gold mech was up immediately, stalking across his room to the door he and Sideswipe had so very legally installed between their quarters. He had it opened before Sideswipe could reach it to engage the lock. For a brief moment, they froze in place, Sunstreaker looming ominously, Sideswipe half-crouched, ready to run. But he had nowhere to run.
Sunstreaker lunged at his brother, catching him around his torso in a vicious tackle. They slammed into the far wall with a loud clang.
"What...what the hell, Sunny?" Sideswipe struggled to extricate himself from his twin's hold.
"I told you to stay the frag away from that femme!" Sunstreaker was trying to twist his brother around into an immobilizing face-down hold position.
Sideswipe also knew how to execute that hold...and how to break out of it. Which he did with ease. "The frag are you talking about?"
The gold warrior had lost the hold on his brother, but he still had him pinned to the floor. "What did you do to her?"
"Nothing!"
"Don't lie to me." In warning, Sunstreaker raised the hooked blades along his forearms.
Sideswipe's struggles increased. "I didn't do anything!"
"That's not what I hear." Sunstreaker was snarling with ire.
The red mech finally managed to slip free of Sunstreaker's grasp and backed himself across the room, away from his brother. With how small the room was, that didn't put much distance between them. "Okay, I went after her, you were right, her giant slagger of a spark-puppy blew a fuse. Happy?"
Sunstreaker's reply was a roaring battle cry as he once again went after his twin. hss-PING. With one swipe of his bladed arm, he sent a piece of Sideswipe's armor flying across the room.
"FRAGGING PITS, SUNNY. What's wrong with you?"
"I'll tell you what's wrong." Sunstreaker's armor was bristling in his rage. "Me being punished for your inability to control your disgusting spark-lust behavior, that's what!"
In the confines of the room, Sideswipe was only barely able to dodge the golden claws that came at his face. "Oh, that was you?" he said non-committally.
Sunstreaker suddenly froze. "You...knew that glitch-bastard had me trapped."
Sideswipe sneered back at him. "Hey, I wasn't about to skip away from my assignment to take your place. Consider us even for--"
He was not able to dodge the point-blank cannon blast that sent him through the wall of his room and into the corridor beyond.
*****
First Aid was, frankly, terrified of the gladiators. But as he was the medic on duty at this time of the night, he did not have the option of getting Ratchet to deal with the one who had just walked into the medbay.
Sideswipe took one look at the junior medic and his current patient, Red Alert, and painfully marched himself down to the far end of the medbay. He settled himself onto one of the tables there and crossed his arms over his chest, as if trying to hide what appeared to be a weapons blast to his midsection.
"Don't be so excited to see me," Sideswipe muttered.
"I'll be there in a moment," First Aid replied. Red Alert only scowled as the medic continued working on his helm.
For a few breems, there was an uneasy silence between the three mechs.
"So," Sideswipe said at last, addressing Red Alert. "What're you in here for?"
"Your brother," the security director growled. "You?"
"My brother."
First Aid clicked to himself. "Ratchet's going to have a field day with that mech."
For those of you just tuning in, these are side-stories to Living With Autobots that focus on Sideswipe and Sunstreaker, since I can't fit all of their backstory into LWA proper. They're short(er) stories, not meant to be as polished as LWA, and not necessarily written in chronological order (though that is how I will present them on ff.net). Aaaaand that's about it! Carry on!
Title: 28 Twins 15/28: Wrong Twin
Rating: PG13, for Cybertronian swearing
Characters: Sideswipe, Sunstreaker, Red Alert, Inferno
Summary: Sideswipe misjudges a situation, and Inferno fails at being specific.
Author's notes: For red_wasabi89's prompt "what happens when you get blamed for something your brother did (and he let you take the heat!)."
Sideswipe was on the hunt already. Not even a joor out of the medbay after fleeing Kaon. Sunstreaker could only attempt to drown his exasperation in the cube he currently held. It wasn't that he faulted his brother for wanting to find a femme for the night, but Sideswipe just had to take the most direct approach possible. That may have worked (most of the time) in Kaon, but Sunstreaker had a feeling the Autobots would not appreciate it so much.
He could feel the excited static charge coming from his brother's armor. -Primus, you're not even within arm's reach of a femme. Calm down.-
-You just need to get overloaded.-
-What I need is for you to stop getting my armor charged up.-
-You don't have to sit so close to me.-
-I'm on the other fragging side of the table. You need to calm down.-
Sideswipe merely snorted in reply. His blue optics scanned those individuals present in the rec room. It was a nice room, Sunstreaker gave the Autobots that. A little more sparse than the one in Kaon, but comfortable enough. Less high-grade though.
At least he had a cube now. He took a swig from it. -So who is your lucky victim tonight?-
Sideswipe looked around the room again. -That one.-
Sunstreaker glanced at the femme his brother indicated. She was a large femme, perhaps the same size class as themselves, with shadowy red armor that was heavier than that of a typical femme. Sunstreaker had seen her around the base on a few occasions and he had the vague impression that she held a rank of some importance. But he knew for a fact the minor detail of... -She's taken.-
The red warrior beside him squinted at the femme. -She's not bonded. Her spark's normal.-
Sunstreaker gave a small shrug, turning his attention back to his cube. -She's taken.-
-You're wrong.-
-Don't say I didn't warn you.- 'As always.'
*****
When Inferno was upset, it was best to stay out of his way.
Unfortunately for Red Alert, Inferno was his closest friend, and it was his responsibility to help his friend when he was upset. But despite their lifetime of friendship, Red Alert still flinched as the much-larger mech stormed into the officer's lounge.
Red slowly turned from the data pad he was reading. "Something wrong?" he asked cautiously.
Inferno huffed. "Now what would make you think that?" he asked, voice dripping with sarcasm.
"Your stomping about, for one."
"That was a rhetorical question, Red."
"So what is it?"
"Those bastard haroon!" Inferno spat as he paced the length of the room, whirled around, and started back. His heavy footsteps made the floor tremble.
The security officer grimaced. 'I told Prime those two would be more trouble then they're worth, but did he listen to me? Of course not.' Sure, the Autobots needed mechs suited for battle, but those brothers...there was something off about them.
It sounded as if the Autobots would soon be finding out exactly what was so off. "What happened?"
Inferno didn't slow as he stomped by. "One of them was harassing Firestar."
"Hmm." Red quirked an optic ridge.
"Don't 'hmm' me," Inferno growled. "I know what you're thinking. I wouldn't tolerate them harassing any femme."
"Of course you wouldn't. I'm sure Firestar can take care of things herself," the smaller mech said, trying to calm his friend. The stomping was starting to get to him. 'As much as I would dearly love to see those two--'
"I threw the slagger across the room."
"Ah." 'Well, there you have it. Too bad I missed that. I'll have to check the video archive when I'm back on duty.'
Inferno was waving his arms emphatically as he continued his pacing. "He wouldn't leave her alone! And then his brother showed up!"
"And you threw him too?"
"No, he had enough processor power to leave things well enough alone. But it doesn't faze them, Red! Physical threats." This obviously irritated Inferno, and his own size and strength were his more imposing traits.
"I don't suppose it would," Red said evenly, as he tracked his friend's progress back down the room. "They're gladiators."
"I'm going to kill that fragger."
"As much as I'd enjoy seeing that, I highly doubt Optimus would."
That earned the security director a low growl.
Red sighed softly. "So, you done ranting?"
"Yes."
"Good." Red relaxed a bit in his chair. "May I finish reading?" He waved the datapad slightly.
"Can you do me a favor?"
The smaller mech closed his optics, trying to suppress the delighted grin that threatened to spread across his face. "I was hoping you'd say that."
*****
'There you are.' At the soft notification, Red Alert swung his view through the several security cameras displayed on his HUD. Yes, the gold kaonex was in one of the smaller hallways. Alone.
Going through with this would probably earn him more than a few strikes against his name in Prowl's books. But Red was not afraid of extracting a little revenge on behalf of his friend. What would Prowl do, toss him in a cell? Pointless, seeing as Red had been the one to code the security on those cells.
He input a tiny string of code, and the blast door at the end of the hall dropped. He watched through the camera as the warrior pressed the engage button on the door's control panel. The mech was not pleased when nothing happened.
Red dropped the blast door behind the gladiator, mere paces from where he stood.
The gold warrior was definitely not pleased.
Satisfied for now, Red cut all input from the security panel in that little section of the hallway, save for the visual feed, which he pushed aside to a corner of his HUD. Let the mech sit in there for a while. His brother was off-base on an assignment with Ironhide, nowhere he could interfere with things, which would give the gold mech plenty of time to cool his thrusters. Perhaps after this, he would be a little less apt to go after Autobot femmes.
*****
To say that the gold gladiator was fragged off about being confined for Primus-knew-how-long (Red knew exactly how long) was an understatement. He was pacing the shortened hallway like a caged beast, armor plates along his back and shoulders shifting in small displays of rage. Every so often, he would rake his claws along the wall.
Red brought the image to the front of his HUD again, turning all the feeds on. He could heard the gladiator snarling to himself, words Red couldn't quite understand and probably didn't want to. |Had enough?| he said through the intercom.
The mech was at the security panel more quickly than Red thought possible. "You Pit-slagging bastard! Let me out!"
|How about you stop swearing at superior officers, and I'll consider it?|
"You have no right to keep me in here!"
|You have no right to harass femmes.|
The gold mech was silent for a beat, optics dimming slightly, as if he was confused. Then his face plates twitched back into the rage that had covered his visage earlier, and his voice dropped into a truly frightening growl. "Let me out."
|Why should I?|
"I need to...see my brother."
That, Red Alert did not want to happen just yet. Ironhide had figured out very quickly that the only punishment the two gladiators understood was separation from one another. |He's not available right now,| Red said glibly.
"Isn't he."
|So you can just stay right there until he is.|
The mech's mouth twitched, as if he was going to say something.
Red Alert briefly saw the warrior's forearm reforming itself, then he found himself looking into the barrel of a heavy-duty cannon.
A powerful burst of energy shot through the camera and into his HUD. Sparks blinded him, burning into his face. Hissing in pain, Red Alert jerked back from his console, frantically tearing the connection cables from his mask, instantly severing himself from the data streams. Red pushed his mask back as he curled up on his seat, a hand pressed to the left side of his face. "Primus...slagging Pits..." He pushed at his mask again, but the left side refused to retract properly. 'Well frag it all. That's going to be fun to repair.'
"Whoa, Red...what's wrong?" Blaster called in from the doorway to the security room.
"Blaster. Thank Primus. Can you cover for me?" 'Ow, Primus...think he got my optic too.'
"Sure. What happened?"
"Nothing," said the security director as he shakily rose from his seat.
"Uh-huh." The larger mech settled himself into his own chair. "You are going to the medbay to take care of that 'nothing,' right?"
"Of course," Red snapped.
Blaster raised a hand in a placating gesture. "Okay, okay. Primus, I was just making sure. No need to get snippy."
*****
Sunstreaker lay in his berth, hands behind his head, legs crossed, waiting. Just waiting. And he would wait for as long as it took.
It was late at night when he finally felt his brother's presence enter the next room, faint but most definitely there. Sideswipe was obviously trying to shield his spark signature from his brother. It never worked.
The gold mech was up immediately, stalking across his room to the door he and Sideswipe had so very legally installed between their quarters. He had it opened before Sideswipe could reach it to engage the lock. For a brief moment, they froze in place, Sunstreaker looming ominously, Sideswipe half-crouched, ready to run. But he had nowhere to run.
Sunstreaker lunged at his brother, catching him around his torso in a vicious tackle. They slammed into the far wall with a loud clang.
"What...what the hell, Sunny?" Sideswipe struggled to extricate himself from his twin's hold.
"I told you to stay the frag away from that femme!" Sunstreaker was trying to twist his brother around into an immobilizing face-down hold position.
Sideswipe also knew how to execute that hold...and how to break out of it. Which he did with ease. "The frag are you talking about?"
The gold warrior had lost the hold on his brother, but he still had him pinned to the floor. "What did you do to her?"
"Nothing!"
"Don't lie to me." In warning, Sunstreaker raised the hooked blades along his forearms.
Sideswipe's struggles increased. "I didn't do anything!"
"That's not what I hear." Sunstreaker was snarling with ire.
The red mech finally managed to slip free of Sunstreaker's grasp and backed himself across the room, away from his brother. With how small the room was, that didn't put much distance between them. "Okay, I went after her, you were right, her giant slagger of a spark-puppy blew a fuse. Happy?"
Sunstreaker's reply was a roaring battle cry as he once again went after his twin. hss-PING. With one swipe of his bladed arm, he sent a piece of Sideswipe's armor flying across the room.
"FRAGGING PITS, SUNNY. What's wrong with you?"
"I'll tell you what's wrong." Sunstreaker's armor was bristling in his rage. "Me being punished for your inability to control your disgusting spark-lust behavior, that's what!"
In the confines of the room, Sideswipe was only barely able to dodge the golden claws that came at his face. "Oh, that was you?" he said non-committally.
Sunstreaker suddenly froze. "You...knew that glitch-bastard had me trapped."
Sideswipe sneered back at him. "Hey, I wasn't about to skip away from my assignment to take your place. Consider us even for--"
He was not able to dodge the point-blank cannon blast that sent him through the wall of his room and into the corridor beyond.
*****
First Aid was, frankly, terrified of the gladiators. But as he was the medic on duty at this time of the night, he did not have the option of getting Ratchet to deal with the one who had just walked into the medbay.
Sideswipe took one look at the junior medic and his current patient, Red Alert, and painfully marched himself down to the far end of the medbay. He settled himself onto one of the tables there and crossed his arms over his chest, as if trying to hide what appeared to be a weapons blast to his midsection.
"Don't be so excited to see me," Sideswipe muttered.
"I'll be there in a moment," First Aid replied. Red Alert only scowled as the medic continued working on his helm.
For a few breems, there was an uneasy silence between the three mechs.
"So," Sideswipe said at last, addressing Red Alert. "What're you in here for?"
"Your brother," the security director growled. "You?"
"My brother."
First Aid clicked to himself. "Ratchet's going to have a field day with that mech."