Challenge Response- Wild Card Prompt: Online Gaming
War Is But A Game
Author: Thalanee
Prompt: Online Gaming
Verse: AU
Rating: pg13
Warnings: character death (Of a sort), crack, kissing
Disclaimer: Transformers don’t belong to me, I only wish they did.
Summary: The war has been going on for a long time, but what is the story behind it? (I suck at summaries)
Author’s Notes: I don’t know if this has been done before, so I’m just going to try it out. Have I already mentioned that my mind works in twisted ways? XD
And I actually love Starscream, I don’t know why, I just do ;P
Breem: about a minute
Jour: hour equivalent (about eight Earth hours)
Cycle: day
Decacycle: week, ten cycles
XXXXX
Jazz cursed to himself.
He knew what he had to do. If he didn’t Ratchet and the human boy carrying the Allspark would pay the price for his reluctance and that was unacceptable. He couldn’t let that happen. Everything they had done to get to this point in the war would have been for nothing.
So the silver saboteur drew the Decepticon Lord’s attention to him, firing at him, clawing at his wiring, when Megatron grabbed him and held him over his head in a firm grasp. “Ya want a piece of meh?” he yelled taunting. As soon as the words left his mouth he knew that had been a bad idea.
“No, I want two!”
Then the world turned black…
And in the quiet corner of a bar a dark silver mech with a glowing azure visor cursed roundly. He had died. Again. Prowl would be so pissed.
When the game “The Great War: Generation 1” had appeared, many Cybertronians had opened an account and started to play as part of one of the two available factions, Autobots or Decepticons. Despite the title of the game, it was actually a pretty benign affair, almost never had a character actually died, most players went on treasure hunts for parts they needed, had competitions with the other side in little fights or simply tried to out-strategize each other.
Another reason the game was so popular was that it included not only the Cybertronian system, but also other planets their race had come into contact with over time, especially a planet called Earth and its human inhabitants they now were in close contact with.
While the majority of the population only played very sparingly, there were other players who used the game as a meeting place, when their friends were away or even at work. Jazz was one such a mech and he had even first met the other half to his spark there. Their first meeting in the real world had resulted in Jazz’s most favourite memory: his spontaneous but truly wonderful bonding to Prowl, a Praxian enforcer.
Right now though, Jazz was grumbling into the cube of high grade he had ordered some time age, because he had managed to get himself killed again. Did I say, hardly anyone ever died? That still meant some characters had died, especially since the game had been upgraded and was now called “The Great War: In Search Of The Allspark”, which Jazz had been playing after his performance in the bar up until a jour ago…
“Let me guess, you died.”
Jazz looked up to see who dared interrupt his moping, but his black mood was at once forgotten when he realized who it was. He grinned broadly, maneuvering so that Prowl, who was in the process of sitting down, ended up sitting in the silver mech’s lap and was soon engulfed in a hug.
“I shall take that as a yes.” Golden optics twinkled in amusement, even though the face accentuated by the ruby chevron did not betray his emotions. Jazz lovingly hugged the black and white frame with the barely there red and gold highlights closer, pressing a kiss to one of the gorgeous white doorwings.
“Got ripped in half by Megatron!” he boasted proudly.
“That beats the last time.” The enforcer countered smugly.
“Certainly beats yours the first time we played.” Jazz continued on despite the golden optics narrowed at him. “Tha first mechs ever ta die in the game, because they managed ta crash their shuttle. ‘Hide’s still sore about it!”
“We didn’t crash the shuttle.” Prowl primly pointed out. “The game matrix glitched and generated some npc-Cons who shot us in the backs.”
“So ya say.” Jazz pressed a loving kiss to Prowl’s nose. He just couldn’t help himself. Kissing Prowl was one of his favourite pastimes. Besides the enforcer never complained. “The other’s say when they’re gonna meet us?”
“Ironhide called to excuse himself, Ratchet and Wheeljack. Wheeljack exploded his lab again, he has assured us the damage is only superficial, but Ratchet wants to look in on him after they’re finished. Ironhide will accompany him to make sure our beloved medic will not take out his frustration on Wheeljack in a manner more drastic than usual.”
Jazz snorted. “Heh, did we ever find out how ‘Jack made things go boom in the game even if they weren’t supposed to at all?”
“I have long since stopped to question Wheeljack’s strange abilities. Starscream, Megatron and Orion will be joining us as soon as they have finished their latest game, Sunstreaker has locked himself in his studio to finish his latest masterpiece and Sideswipe will join him later. So it will only be us officers.” Prowl didn’t notice but he had started to purr as a result of his bonded’s ministrations, doorwings flapping lazily and nuzzling the silver mech’s neck with his nose.
Jazz couldn’t help but compare Prowl to the Earth felines called cats: it was hard to get his attention, but if he petted him just the right way Jazz soon found himself with a lapful of purring, strutless Prowl determined to cuddle no matter where they were and what they were doing (surprising for a mech as stoic and controlled as Prowl, but who was Jazz to complain?).
“The two of you have no shame at all, do you?” A smooth, familiar voice interrupted them, as the tall figure of a red, white and blue flier sat down at their table.
“Nope, none at all.” Jazz sounded very pleased while answering Starscream’s question. The brilliant scientist was one of their closest friends. They had spent many an evening over highgrade and philosophical and scientific discussions that tended to soon leave Jazz sitting both baffled and amused as he watched Star and Prowl bicker back and forth.
“You are here already? I was under the impression you were going to stay until the end.” Prowl cocked his head looking slightly confused. Jazz had to keep himself from kissing Prowl again. In his opinion a confused Prowl was a sexy Prowl… oh, what the pit he thought, kissing Prowl’s chevron.
“I got out early.”
The pair shared a look. They had heard that phrase before… “Ya died.”
“Yes, I did, happy now? I can’t believe it, the three of us manage to die regularly, while no one else hardly ever does! Do you know that after you died, both Megs and Orion died and came back to life, because of an Allspark-shard and the matrix of leadership respectively?!”
“Being the leader of your faction is bound to have some perks. Mayhap they will both stop complaining now.” Prowl shook his head. In every game they had played, Orion and Megatron always ended up as leaders of the opposing factions. Someone here had a twisted sense of humor…
“So how did ya die?” Jazz needled.
Starscream took a sip from his newly arrived cube and muttered something suspiciously sounding like “explosion” and “squishy”.
“Death by human?!” Jazz shrieked, laughing loudly. “That beats ya death by crashin’ ya own shuttle, Sparkles!” The laughing soon turned to a yelp as an empty cube hit his head, getting chucked into that direction (memo: what possessed you to let Starscream and Ratchet meet in the real world?), and the slightly clawed finger of Prowl poking somewhere sensitive.
“Continue in this vein and you won’t be getting any tonight.”
“Aw, come on, Prowler, Ah didn’t mean that.”
“Sure you did, and now you gotta pay the price.” Starscream interjected. In this manner they bickered back and forth, in better humor once Jazz bribed his way back into his friend’s and lover’s good graces with a cube and a deep kiss (complete with retching sounds in the background courtesy of the flier).
Soon their attention was drawn by a familiar complaint in an also very familiar voice. “You killed me again! You know, for someone who is supposed to be the leader of the more peace-loving faction, you do that quite often, brother dearest.”
“You will never let me live this down, will you, Megatron?” Orion sighed as the two brothers placed themselves on the free chairs next to Jazz and Starscream (Prowl was still on Jazz’s lap and made no move to get up).
“Why should I? It’s too much fun to tease you.”
“I don’t understand how I ended up as Prime again, anyway. I created my character as a dockworker, for Primus sake!”
Star had to keep from laughing, as he opened a comm. line to everyone but the still ranting Orion. :: Are we ever going to tell him that Jazz and Soundwave hacked the server and manipulated it so he’ll always be Optimus Prime whether he wants it or not?::
:: And ruin all our fun?:: Prowl shot back
::Nope.:: Jazz agreed.
::Even at the danger of sounding like e five vorn old repeating myself, why should we?::
XXTwo jours and several cubes laterXX
“So you heard ‘bout that new extension coming up? It’s a complete new world, sometime after the Great War, the Cons are still there, but only a small group of bots knows and they have to do their best to stop the Cons while stranded on Earth. Wanna play?” Jazz asked giddily.
“I am somewhat tired of dying all the time.”
“Come on, Prowl, I’m constantly dying too and I’m going to play, TC and Warp will too after sitting the last one out.”
“Don’t make me beg, Sparkles, ya know Ah will.”
Prowl threw his mate a look. How the singer even managed to look like a kicked puppy with a visor on was anyone’s guess. Sighing, he relented. “Alright, I will.”
“So, will the two of us. Won’t we, Optimus?”
The look the red and blue Orion shot at his older brother could have killed. “I won’t be Prime, this time. I’ll start as a repair bot, I think.”
“Whatever.” Megatron snickered. “You’ll always be Prime, I’ll always be the Con leader and they,” he gestured at the loving couple and the scientist glaring at them, “will always end up dying. That’s part of the fun, brother dearest.”
“Yeah, it is! Just think, another tragic love story between me an’ Prowler.” Jazz had odd tastes in entertainment sometimes. Then he blurted out a question he had been meaning to ask since he had managed to die for the fifth time (Prowl had died two times) ever since he started to play. “How come on of us always ends up dead anyway?”
The answer came from every bot at the table besides Jazz and Prowl, perfectly in synch. “So the rest of us don’t have to watch the two of you get lovey-dovey all the time.”
The End
Author’s Notes: Brick me now…
The ending isn’t quite right, I feel… tell me what you think ^^
Author: Thalanee
Prompt: Online Gaming
Verse: AU
Rating: pg13
Warnings: character death (Of a sort), crack, kissing
Disclaimer: Transformers don’t belong to me, I only wish they did.
Summary: The war has been going on for a long time, but what is the story behind it? (I suck at summaries)
Author’s Notes: I don’t know if this has been done before, so I’m just going to try it out. Have I already mentioned that my mind works in twisted ways? XD
And I actually love Starscream, I don’t know why, I just do ;P
Breem: about a minute
Jour: hour equivalent (about eight Earth hours)
Cycle: day
Decacycle: week, ten cycles
XXXXX
Jazz cursed to himself.
He knew what he had to do. If he didn’t Ratchet and the human boy carrying the Allspark would pay the price for his reluctance and that was unacceptable. He couldn’t let that happen. Everything they had done to get to this point in the war would have been for nothing.
So the silver saboteur drew the Decepticon Lord’s attention to him, firing at him, clawing at his wiring, when Megatron grabbed him and held him over his head in a firm grasp. “Ya want a piece of meh?” he yelled taunting. As soon as the words left his mouth he knew that had been a bad idea.
“No, I want two!”
Then the world turned black…
And in the quiet corner of a bar a dark silver mech with a glowing azure visor cursed roundly. He had died. Again. Prowl would be so pissed.
When the game “The Great War: Generation 1” had appeared, many Cybertronians had opened an account and started to play as part of one of the two available factions, Autobots or Decepticons. Despite the title of the game, it was actually a pretty benign affair, almost never had a character actually died, most players went on treasure hunts for parts they needed, had competitions with the other side in little fights or simply tried to out-strategize each other.
Another reason the game was so popular was that it included not only the Cybertronian system, but also other planets their race had come into contact with over time, especially a planet called Earth and its human inhabitants they now were in close contact with.
While the majority of the population only played very sparingly, there were other players who used the game as a meeting place, when their friends were away or even at work. Jazz was one such a mech and he had even first met the other half to his spark there. Their first meeting in the real world had resulted in Jazz’s most favourite memory: his spontaneous but truly wonderful bonding to Prowl, a Praxian enforcer.
Right now though, Jazz was grumbling into the cube of high grade he had ordered some time age, because he had managed to get himself killed again. Did I say, hardly anyone ever died? That still meant some characters had died, especially since the game had been upgraded and was now called “The Great War: In Search Of The Allspark”, which Jazz had been playing after his performance in the bar up until a jour ago…
“Let me guess, you died.”
Jazz looked up to see who dared interrupt his moping, but his black mood was at once forgotten when he realized who it was. He grinned broadly, maneuvering so that Prowl, who was in the process of sitting down, ended up sitting in the silver mech’s lap and was soon engulfed in a hug.
“I shall take that as a yes.” Golden optics twinkled in amusement, even though the face accentuated by the ruby chevron did not betray his emotions. Jazz lovingly hugged the black and white frame with the barely there red and gold highlights closer, pressing a kiss to one of the gorgeous white doorwings.
“Got ripped in half by Megatron!” he boasted proudly.
“That beats the last time.” The enforcer countered smugly.
“Certainly beats yours the first time we played.” Jazz continued on despite the golden optics narrowed at him. “Tha first mechs ever ta die in the game, because they managed ta crash their shuttle. ‘Hide’s still sore about it!”
“We didn’t crash the shuttle.” Prowl primly pointed out. “The game matrix glitched and generated some npc-Cons who shot us in the backs.”
“So ya say.” Jazz pressed a loving kiss to Prowl’s nose. He just couldn’t help himself. Kissing Prowl was one of his favourite pastimes. Besides the enforcer never complained. “The other’s say when they’re gonna meet us?”
“Ironhide called to excuse himself, Ratchet and Wheeljack. Wheeljack exploded his lab again, he has assured us the damage is only superficial, but Ratchet wants to look in on him after they’re finished. Ironhide will accompany him to make sure our beloved medic will not take out his frustration on Wheeljack in a manner more drastic than usual.”
Jazz snorted. “Heh, did we ever find out how ‘Jack made things go boom in the game even if they weren’t supposed to at all?”
“I have long since stopped to question Wheeljack’s strange abilities. Starscream, Megatron and Orion will be joining us as soon as they have finished their latest game, Sunstreaker has locked himself in his studio to finish his latest masterpiece and Sideswipe will join him later. So it will only be us officers.” Prowl didn’t notice but he had started to purr as a result of his bonded’s ministrations, doorwings flapping lazily and nuzzling the silver mech’s neck with his nose.
Jazz couldn’t help but compare Prowl to the Earth felines called cats: it was hard to get his attention, but if he petted him just the right way Jazz soon found himself with a lapful of purring, strutless Prowl determined to cuddle no matter where they were and what they were doing (surprising for a mech as stoic and controlled as Prowl, but who was Jazz to complain?).
“The two of you have no shame at all, do you?” A smooth, familiar voice interrupted them, as the tall figure of a red, white and blue flier sat down at their table.
“Nope, none at all.” Jazz sounded very pleased while answering Starscream’s question. The brilliant scientist was one of their closest friends. They had spent many an evening over highgrade and philosophical and scientific discussions that tended to soon leave Jazz sitting both baffled and amused as he watched Star and Prowl bicker back and forth.
“You are here already? I was under the impression you were going to stay until the end.” Prowl cocked his head looking slightly confused. Jazz had to keep himself from kissing Prowl again. In his opinion a confused Prowl was a sexy Prowl… oh, what the pit he thought, kissing Prowl’s chevron.
“I got out early.”
The pair shared a look. They had heard that phrase before… “Ya died.”
“Yes, I did, happy now? I can’t believe it, the three of us manage to die regularly, while no one else hardly ever does! Do you know that after you died, both Megs and Orion died and came back to life, because of an Allspark-shard and the matrix of leadership respectively?!”
“Being the leader of your faction is bound to have some perks. Mayhap they will both stop complaining now.” Prowl shook his head. In every game they had played, Orion and Megatron always ended up as leaders of the opposing factions. Someone here had a twisted sense of humor…
“So how did ya die?” Jazz needled.
Starscream took a sip from his newly arrived cube and muttered something suspiciously sounding like “explosion” and “squishy”.
“Death by human?!” Jazz shrieked, laughing loudly. “That beats ya death by crashin’ ya own shuttle, Sparkles!” The laughing soon turned to a yelp as an empty cube hit his head, getting chucked into that direction (memo: what possessed you to let Starscream and Ratchet meet in the real world?), and the slightly clawed finger of Prowl poking somewhere sensitive.
“Continue in this vein and you won’t be getting any tonight.”
“Aw, come on, Prowler, Ah didn’t mean that.”
“Sure you did, and now you gotta pay the price.” Starscream interjected. In this manner they bickered back and forth, in better humor once Jazz bribed his way back into his friend’s and lover’s good graces with a cube and a deep kiss (complete with retching sounds in the background courtesy of the flier).
Soon their attention was drawn by a familiar complaint in an also very familiar voice. “You killed me again! You know, for someone who is supposed to be the leader of the more peace-loving faction, you do that quite often, brother dearest.”
“You will never let me live this down, will you, Megatron?” Orion sighed as the two brothers placed themselves on the free chairs next to Jazz and Starscream (Prowl was still on Jazz’s lap and made no move to get up).
“Why should I? It’s too much fun to tease you.”
“I don’t understand how I ended up as Prime again, anyway. I created my character as a dockworker, for Primus sake!”
Star had to keep from laughing, as he opened a comm. line to everyone but the still ranting Orion. :: Are we ever going to tell him that Jazz and Soundwave hacked the server and manipulated it so he’ll always be Optimus Prime whether he wants it or not?::
:: And ruin all our fun?:: Prowl shot back
::Nope.:: Jazz agreed.
::Even at the danger of sounding like e five vorn old repeating myself, why should we?::
XXTwo jours and several cubes laterXX
“So you heard ‘bout that new extension coming up? It’s a complete new world, sometime after the Great War, the Cons are still there, but only a small group of bots knows and they have to do their best to stop the Cons while stranded on Earth. Wanna play?” Jazz asked giddily.
“I am somewhat tired of dying all the time.”
“Come on, Prowl, I’m constantly dying too and I’m going to play, TC and Warp will too after sitting the last one out.”
“Don’t make me beg, Sparkles, ya know Ah will.”
Prowl threw his mate a look. How the singer even managed to look like a kicked puppy with a visor on was anyone’s guess. Sighing, he relented. “Alright, I will.”
“So, will the two of us. Won’t we, Optimus?”
The look the red and blue Orion shot at his older brother could have killed. “I won’t be Prime, this time. I’ll start as a repair bot, I think.”
“Whatever.” Megatron snickered. “You’ll always be Prime, I’ll always be the Con leader and they,” he gestured at the loving couple and the scientist glaring at them, “will always end up dying. That’s part of the fun, brother dearest.”
“Yeah, it is! Just think, another tragic love story between me an’ Prowler.” Jazz had odd tastes in entertainment sometimes. Then he blurted out a question he had been meaning to ask since he had managed to die for the fifth time (Prowl had died two times) ever since he started to play. “How come on of us always ends up dead anyway?”
The answer came from every bot at the table besides Jazz and Prowl, perfectly in synch. “So the rest of us don’t have to watch the two of you get lovey-dovey all the time.”
The End
Author’s Notes: Brick me now…
The ending isn’t quite right, I feel… tell me what you think ^^