The tragic tale of Shiny and Slag-for-chips
[Prompt response for 'Love, is it worth it?' on tf_ic_prompts. Set in the Dysfunction AU. Content advice: non-explicit dark themes - including, but not limited to, abduction, slavery and implied noncon]
Love, is it worth it?
That’s an... interesting question.
I'm gonna answer this by sharing something with you. Something that happened back on Cybertron, way before I got put in the box.
...
Knew these two mechs once. They were attached, in the conventional sense of the word. They ‘faced a lot, got all morose when they were apart, that kind of thing. Exclusive, too.
One of them did something dumb. Let's call him Slag-for-chips, 'cause that's what he had. He double-crossed us. He got away with a pit-load of cash, and a few more exotic items. Very saleable exotic items.
He left his mate in Praxus. Sly little thing. Nice alt - all gleaming chrome with these slick blue accents. Can't remember his name. Used to call him Shiny. It fit well. It's what he was, in the beginning anyway.
So, Shiny changed his designation when Slag-for-chips skipped out, but he didn't bother getting a repaint, let alone a remodel. I mean, who would, looking like that?
Useful fault, vanity. Made him easier to find.
It took me all of three cycles to track him down. Never been to Praxus before. Nice place; shame what happened to it. Brought him back to Kaon, obviously. Dumb fragger purged all over my instruments on the flight back home. Not so pleasant.
Got him back for it though.
We kept him for a long while. Our double-crossing thief had jumped planet, taken a space bridge out to some scrappy sector where the Quintessons were busy fragging around with stuff they really shouldn't have been fragging around with. Fabric of space and time stuff. Not my thing.
Good for him though. Put him way out of our range, and it wasn't the kind of place any of us had a burning desire to visit.
But that didn't matter, because the stupid heap of scrap hadn't taken Shiny with him.
And Shiny stayed with us. He was far from happy about it, but hey, who cares, right? Frag, he was fun. Had these little flange things on his spoiler in root mode... And those antennae...
Anyway. We made a few vids of him, after a while. When he wasn't quite so shiny any more. We gave Slag-for-chips a bit of time to work out that Shiny wasn't in Praxus any more, then we sent out the footage.
Not just to Slag-for-chips, no. He'd changed his comm freq - we had no way of getting in touch with him directly. So, we hooked up with an agent on some scrap-forsaken rock covered in primitive organics, and paid them to send the vids on an open channel to everyone in the sector.
Heh, got our money's worth there.
Before you ask, the vids didn't have me in, I'm not stupid. Didn't have anything in that could trace them back to Cybertron, let alone back to us.
But Slag-for-chips knew. There was no mistaking his mate, even with the damage.
He must have dug himself in good out there, 'cause it took him the better part of a vorn to get back to Kaon. I'd kinda got bored of Shiny by then, but we kept him online for the leverage. Just.
Slag-for-chips came crawling back. Literally - on his knees. And how he'd changed. It wasn't only his comm freq he'd altered. He'd had a remodel - different alt mode, different paintjob. He'd got an upgrade from grounder to airframe, and not one of those dumb-aft flying car deelies like Tracks. Looked sleek, a bit scuffed, but very nice.
Kept his optics though. And there was nothing he could have done about his energy signature. Even with the changes, there was no question it was him.
Now, I don't care about money. It has its uses, sure, but it's not what I'd call essential.
I care about people.
Take that how you want.
So, Slag-for-chips came crawling on back. Wanted to swap himself for Shiny. Wanted to buy our forgiveness with the remains of our stolen loot, offered us his own labour for a set term. As exclusive as him and Shiny had been.
What Swindle might have called a sweet deal, had he been there.
Unfortunately for Slag-for-chips, he didn't have the first idea about hostage situations. Because when he came crawling back, he came in person. He lost what advantage he might otherwise have had as soon as he set foot in that office.
Took him a breem or so of quick talking to work it out. But that moment of realisation, that was priceless.
It was worth everything we lost, every last credit.
That said, we got it all back - the loot, the guns, everything. With Shiny around, Slag-for-chips told us everything we wanted to know, and then some. You see, he didn't feel like he could deny us, when his every lie, his every moment of hesitation was taken out on Shiny.
Turns out Slag-for-chips was wrapped up in far more than we'd given him credit for. Gave us some useful dirt on a lot of other mechs - chasing up those leads was a lot of fun.
But in the end, he ran out of intel. As he was, he had nothing left to give. Tragic.
Like I said, I care about people. I couldn’t leave him like that.
I killed Shiny in front of him. The look on his face, hah! Fraggin' hilarious. He should have got a mask with his upgrade, stupid slagger. Would at least have saved him his dignity.
He should have known better than to hope.
With Shiny gone, I thought about taking him offline, but it seemed too easy. In the end, I decided to keep him around.
His new alt was useful. I had him reprogrammed, though, obviously. Couldn’t risk him causing trouble.
Got his personality component reformatted; didn’t wipe his databanks, but replaced them. He was hardly more than a drone after that. Only knew what we told him, what we gave him… I had his interesting functions retained along with his more useful ones, but he lost his appeal for me when he lost his memories. He never screamed any more after that, never complained. Dull, really.
Not sure what happened to him in the end, I might have sold him on to Swindle.
Ha, he could still be out there, rusting away in some bunker in Kaon. Wonder if he's still online.
But yeah, in conclusion - sure, love's worth it. It makes my life a whole lot easier.
Love, is it worth it?
That’s an... interesting question.
I'm gonna answer this by sharing something with you. Something that happened back on Cybertron, way before I got put in the box.
...
Knew these two mechs once. They were attached, in the conventional sense of the word. They ‘faced a lot, got all morose when they were apart, that kind of thing. Exclusive, too.
One of them did something dumb. Let's call him Slag-for-chips, 'cause that's what he had. He double-crossed us. He got away with a pit-load of cash, and a few more exotic items. Very saleable exotic items.
He left his mate in Praxus. Sly little thing. Nice alt - all gleaming chrome with these slick blue accents. Can't remember his name. Used to call him Shiny. It fit well. It's what he was, in the beginning anyway.
So, Shiny changed his designation when Slag-for-chips skipped out, but he didn't bother getting a repaint, let alone a remodel. I mean, who would, looking like that?
Useful fault, vanity. Made him easier to find.
It took me all of three cycles to track him down. Never been to Praxus before. Nice place; shame what happened to it. Brought him back to Kaon, obviously. Dumb fragger purged all over my instruments on the flight back home. Not so pleasant.
Got him back for it though.
We kept him for a long while. Our double-crossing thief had jumped planet, taken a space bridge out to some scrappy sector where the Quintessons were busy fragging around with stuff they really shouldn't have been fragging around with. Fabric of space and time stuff. Not my thing.
Good for him though. Put him way out of our range, and it wasn't the kind of place any of us had a burning desire to visit.
But that didn't matter, because the stupid heap of scrap hadn't taken Shiny with him.
And Shiny stayed with us. He was far from happy about it, but hey, who cares, right? Frag, he was fun. Had these little flange things on his spoiler in root mode... And those antennae...
Anyway. We made a few vids of him, after a while. When he wasn't quite so shiny any more. We gave Slag-for-chips a bit of time to work out that Shiny wasn't in Praxus any more, then we sent out the footage.
Not just to Slag-for-chips, no. He'd changed his comm freq - we had no way of getting in touch with him directly. So, we hooked up with an agent on some scrap-forsaken rock covered in primitive organics, and paid them to send the vids on an open channel to everyone in the sector.
Heh, got our money's worth there.
Before you ask, the vids didn't have me in, I'm not stupid. Didn't have anything in that could trace them back to Cybertron, let alone back to us.
But Slag-for-chips knew. There was no mistaking his mate, even with the damage.
He must have dug himself in good out there, 'cause it took him the better part of a vorn to get back to Kaon. I'd kinda got bored of Shiny by then, but we kept him online for the leverage. Just.
Slag-for-chips came crawling back. Literally - on his knees. And how he'd changed. It wasn't only his comm freq he'd altered. He'd had a remodel - different alt mode, different paintjob. He'd got an upgrade from grounder to airframe, and not one of those dumb-aft flying car deelies like Tracks. Looked sleek, a bit scuffed, but very nice.
Kept his optics though. And there was nothing he could have done about his energy signature. Even with the changes, there was no question it was him.
Now, I don't care about money. It has its uses, sure, but it's not what I'd call essential.
I care about people.
Take that how you want.
So, Slag-for-chips came crawling on back. Wanted to swap himself for Shiny. Wanted to buy our forgiveness with the remains of our stolen loot, offered us his own labour for a set term. As exclusive as him and Shiny had been.
What Swindle might have called a sweet deal, had he been there.
Unfortunately for Slag-for-chips, he didn't have the first idea about hostage situations. Because when he came crawling back, he came in person. He lost what advantage he might otherwise have had as soon as he set foot in that office.
Took him a breem or so of quick talking to work it out. But that moment of realisation, that was priceless.
It was worth everything we lost, every last credit.
That said, we got it all back - the loot, the guns, everything. With Shiny around, Slag-for-chips told us everything we wanted to know, and then some. You see, he didn't feel like he could deny us, when his every lie, his every moment of hesitation was taken out on Shiny.
Turns out Slag-for-chips was wrapped up in far more than we'd given him credit for. Gave us some useful dirt on a lot of other mechs - chasing up those leads was a lot of fun.
But in the end, he ran out of intel. As he was, he had nothing left to give. Tragic.
Like I said, I care about people. I couldn’t leave him like that.
I killed Shiny in front of him. The look on his face, hah! Fraggin' hilarious. He should have got a mask with his upgrade, stupid slagger. Would at least have saved him his dignity.
He should have known better than to hope.
With Shiny gone, I thought about taking him offline, but it seemed too easy. In the end, I decided to keep him around.
His new alt was useful. I had him reprogrammed, though, obviously. Couldn’t risk him causing trouble.
Got his personality component reformatted; didn’t wipe his databanks, but replaced them. He was hardly more than a drone after that. Only knew what we told him, what we gave him… I had his interesting functions retained along with his more useful ones, but he lost his appeal for me when he lost his memories. He never screamed any more after that, never complained. Dull, really.
Not sure what happened to him in the end, I might have sold him on to Swindle.
Ha, he could still be out there, rusting away in some bunker in Kaon. Wonder if he's still online.
But yeah, in conclusion - sure, love's worth it. It makes my life a whole lot easier.