[IDW] Lost and Lonely Space 04/12

Deadlock can’t recharge. 

It’s not so much that he’s trying to, but that he’d said he was going to do it, and by Primus, he’s going to recharge. But he can’t. The anger sparks too brightly, leaves him jittery. His abdomen aches, and while he’s suffered pain before, it’s different in the midst of battle. Energon rush and emotion can forestall any discomfort. 

Not so much now with only his thoughts to distract him, and the knowledge of Ratchet there in the bridge, sanctimonious and disappointed. His disappointment shouldn’t matter. Doesn’t matter. 

Except where it does. 

Deadlock growls and slings an arm over his optics, letting the other rest on his abdomen, as if he can keep his internals where they belong by willpower alone. Not that there’s any concern of his bits falling out. Ratchet’s a good medic. The hasty repairs will hold, and Deadlock can feel his self-repair chugging away, bolstered by the medical grade cube he’d downed earlier. 

He doesn’t like how easily Ratchet claws beneath his plating, getting to the core of everything he’s shoved down and buried. Ratchet’s verbal attacks had been like precision missiles, and Deadlock’s still reeling. He’s furious and ashamed, and he wants this stupid shuttle to find a stupid space station as soon as possible, so he can drop Ratchet off and fly away, hopefully never to see the ghost from his past again. 

It’s not right. It’s not fair. 

It was supposed to be an easy mission. A way for him to frag off from Turmoil for a while, and try to wheedle his way back to Megatron’s side where he belonged. Megatron’s the one who gave him a designation and a purpose. Megatron did more for him than Ratchet. 

That’s the truth Deadlock clings to. 

He doesn’t recharge. He stares at the ceiling, measuring rust stains on the metal, and he doesn’t rise until the ship alerts him. 

His abdomen still aches, but it’s a dull pain. So long as he doesn’t go into battle, he should be fine. Rising makes him a bit dizzy, but he shakes it off. Can’t afford to show weakness in front of Ratchet. 

Doesn’t want to let the medic think, for a moment, he needs to be saved. 

Ratchet’s still at the console when Deadlock emerges, slumped in the pilot’s seat, his head braced on his propped arm. He might be dozing, but he startles when he senses Deadlock, and sits up as if trying to pretend he hadn’t been resting. He must have gotten up at some point, though, because Deadlock’s life fluids have been wiped from the chair and the back of Ratchet’s aft. 

“I take it we’re almost there?” he asks, curt. 

“Yeah.” Deadlock drops his hand from his midsection. He’ll have to be more wary of that unconscious action. “So out of my seat. I’m driving.” 

Ratchet snorts, but he heaves himself out of the chair and drops into the navigator’s instead. “You sure you can do this?” 

“You mean, can a leaker actually pilot a ship through an asteroid field?” Deadlock asks, his tone sour. He eases into the chair, grimacing at the unwelcoming hard surface of it. These ships weren’t built for comfort. “I guess we’ll see.” 

Ratchet scrubs a hand down his face. “Is that how it’s going to be from now on?” 

“I don’t know what you mean.” Deadlock plugs into the console, lets the ship feed him system stats and frame updates. It’s going to be hard enough to steer through an asteroid field or two. With the damage they sustained in their escape, it’s only going to be more difficult. 

He flips the steering into manual and places his hands on the controls. The ship kicks a little as it switches gears, and in front of them, the first ring of random asteroids looms like drifting death. A treble of unease ripples through his spark, but he swallows it down. 

“If you’re waiting for an apology–”

“I know better than to hold a vent.” Deadlock flicks his wrist as the restraints strap around his frame. “Buckle up. I’m not going to be responsible if you take another tumble.” 

“Nice of you to care,” Ratchet mutters as the snick-click of the restraints wrapping around him echoes in the bridge. His fingers clamp on the arm of the chair, joints creaking, betraying his unease. “Try not to get us killed.” 

Proximity alerts quietly beep, a preemptive warning. The ship rattles. 

Deadlock grunts. “This is your last chance to pick a safer route,” he says as they zoom past one of the smaller asteroids on the outermost layer of the first ring. 

Ratchet snorts. “Just get us out of here.” 

“Sir, yes, sir,” Deadlock sneers. 

He punches the accelerator. They plunge into the first belt, and Deadlock’s focuses on the various proximity alerts from the ship’s exterior sensors. He relies on instinct more than skill, pushing the ship to the limits. It twists and turns, ducks and spins, occasionally throttling back and surging forward to avoid the slow-moving but unpredictable obstacles. 

Less than ten minutes after they’d entered, they break through on the far end, with a few moments to catch their vents in the empty space between one ring and the next. The second belt, however, is three times as wide and twice as dense, with the asteroids moving faster and in tighter clumps. 

Deadlock works his intake, swallowing over a lump. His hands flex around the controls. He’s far from a coward, but he doesn’t want to enter that belt. Not that turning back is an option either. 

He fires up the thrusters, pushing forward, cleaving into the cluttered space without waiting for Ratchet to offer a comment. He immerses himself in the onboard nav, bats Drift away from mooning at Ratchet, and does his best to keep them alive. 

Luck, as always, is not on his side. 

He twists to avoid a small, fast-moving asteroid when another one appears out of nowhere, clipping one of the wings. The whole ship jutters. Lights flash in alarm. He spins, grip tightening on the controls, vents stalling. 

Two more lurch at him out of the dark, and Deadlock dives below them, one skating across the top of the ship. A large form looms, and he has to throw them into a sideways spin to avoid it, proximity sensors screeching. He’s too slow to react, jerking them out of the way of another drifting stone, catching the tail end of it along their underside. 

Something pings the hull. He never even saw it. He hears, however, the crump of metal bending inward. 

He can’t go back. There’s only forward, and now they’re surrounded on all sides, large, slow-moving masses, and small asteroids like bullets, pinging against the hull. Deadlock’s spark stammers fear. 

He can only track so many. The ships AI helps, compensates, but he’s hitting more than he’s avoiding. This is a bad idea. This is a terrible, awful, bad idea. They’re going to die out here. His fingers ache, and his shoulders screech when he wrenches the controls, as if that’ll help them avoid the collisions better. 

Ratchet’s voice cuts through the fear like a beacon. Like so long ago, when Drift had been seizing, processor melting under the influence of the Syk, and not sure whether he cared that he died like this, trapped in pleasure, or rusting away to ignorance in the gutter. 

“Rust you!” Ratchet fumbles at the console, the wild swings of the ship making it hard for him to find purchase with his cable. 

He’s trying to plug in. 

Silly Autobot. The ship’s not going to allow that. 

Boom!

They’re sent into a wild spin, and they bounce off a smaller asteroid, the system shrieking warnings so fast Deadlock can’t read them. 

“Let me in!” Ratchet snarls as he jams his cable into the port. 

Deadlock registers him knocking at the firewall door, requesting access, not even bothering with politeness, but full on banging. 

“Damn it, Deadlock. Let me help!” Ratchet shouts as another small asteroid pings the side of the craft. There’s an ominous creak. 

The ship screams damage at him. They’re halfway through. They can’t turn back. They can only move forward. Somewhere, past the shifting mass of danger, is freedom. 

They aren’t going to make it. 

“Deadlock!”

He grants Ratchet access, and hopes he’s not making a mistake. Ratchet surges into the system, extending his awareness into everything, and Deadlock braces, waiting for him to take over. Instead, Ratchet offers himself as a buffer, inviting Deadlock to lean on him, to share his perceptions. 

There’s no time to consider the ramifications. 

Deadlock accepts. 

The world explodes into possibilities. Perimeter sensors sharpen, allowing him a faster reaction time. His world narrows to pinpoint precision, and he whips the controls, sending the ship into a tight spin, narrowly avoiding a collision with a rapidly approaching asteroid. 

Warnings scream and flash. The ship creaks, straining against the weight of the inertia. The world turns upside down. Ratchet vents heavily next to him. Deadlock grimaces under the strain of his own systems, can feel the tug on Ratchet’s.

Two-thirds of the way through now. He glimpses open space before another asteroid whirls into his path. He dives, down and down, skidding up under a large obstacle, the top of the ship skating the bottom in a jarring screech. 

He pulls back, curves around another, starts to climb again, toward what is relatively up, not that there’s such a thing in space. 

Crash!

Something small, but too fast for the sensors to register, slams into a stabilizing wing, shearing it in half. The ship shrieks at him as the wing goes flying off into space. 

Deadlock snarls a curse as he fights through the chaos. Smaller asteroids plink against the hull as he struggles to avoid the larger ones, spinning and dancing in front of him. The ship wobbles, steering nearly impossible, and his grip on the controls is so tight, his knuckles ache from the effort. 

Two asteroids collide in front of him and send a smaller piece shearing off in their direction. Deadlock jerks the controls to avoid it, and the perimeter sensors flash, too late for him to react. A large asteroid slams into their rear, taking out two of the three thrusters. 

They drop, spinning wildly. 

Deadlock yanks on the controls, denta gritted, processor aching from the hundreds of possibilities streaming through his cortex. He leans on Ratchet as much as he can, hearing the medic hiss at the effort, as the ship twirls. It falls, as much as one can fall, belching smoke and pieces of the hull flying off, impacting passing asteroids. 

Deadlock pulls hard, and the ship abruptly curves, narrowly avoiding a collision with an asteroid of the same size, one that would have blasted them to bits. A smaller one slams into the port-side. A stabilizing wing crumples, denting inward, caving in the hull. Integrity warnings flash yellow through the cockpit. 

For a brief moment, he glimpses a free path out of the field, achingly close. And then a large asteroid drifts in the way, eclipsing the line to freedom, on a direct path to intercept. 

Realization strikes Deadlock in the same moment it hits Ratchet. He braces for impact, pouring all his might into softening the crash as much as possible. Maybe they’ll survive. Maybe they’ll get lucky. 

The restraints tighten around his armor. His joints creak and struts ache. 

The surface of the asteroid rushes up to meet them, pockmarked with impacts from thousands of years of drifting. Other bits of metal glitter on the surface – possible prior crashes – and it’s only a small consolation that they won’t be the first to meet their demise here. 

The ship nosedives, and at the last minute, Deadlock punches the accelerator and jerks on the controls. The remaining rear thruster sputters and burns, but gives them just enough boost the belly of the ship skates over the surface, catching on rocky rises to slow it’s inertia. Metal screeches and groans, and more bits fall off the ship. Deadlock and Ratchet jostle inside the ship, the restraints creaking, lashing tight around them. 

Deadlock yanks back, and pops the landing gears, trying to bring them to a halt. The struts make a horrendous noise as they dig into the planet’s surface. 

The hull creaks. Something crashes. The windshield splinters. 

There’s a near, but distant boom as one of the stabilizing thrusters bursts into flames. Grit flies up and rains down, pinging against the windshield and the hull. Smoke billows into the narrow space of the cockpit as electricity crackles over the console, which starts spitting sparks at them. One of the storage compartments pops open, sending odds and ends bouncing around the interior. 

Ratchet hisses as a large crate slams into his right shoulder, and the distinct pop of it slipping out of socket makes Deadlock cringe. A grating rumble echoes through the interior, more grit spilling up and over the windshield. 

The ship howls like a wounded animal, scraping, grinding, bits shearing off, flinging away behind them, until it comes to a sudden, jerking halt. Deadlock tosses around in the chair, the restraints creaking to hold him in place. Ratchet hisses again, his dislocated shoulder flopping around before he grabs his arm with his other hand. 

Noise fill the compartment. The console spits sparks. Deadlock can’t see anything through a windshield covered in detritus. His audials ring from the emergency alerts, until he peels his fingers free from the controls and flicks off the auditory system. 

Silence. Save for the minutiae of noise from the wrecked ship. The lights flash, and Deadlock spares another burst of effort to switch off the visual system, casting the interior of the ship in dim. The emergency lights along the bottom stay lit, and there’s a faint glow from the flickering console. 

Deadlock wheezes, peels his other hand free. 

They’re alive. They survived. Their ship is wrecked, and they’ve crash-landed on an asteroid floating aimlessly in the middle of a treacherous belt, but they’re alive. 

“Ratchet?” Deadlock’s voice is thick with static. “You alive over there?” 

“Course I am.” 

“Just checking.” 

Deadlock disengages the restraints and slides a bit forward in the seat as a result. The ship must be canted at an angle. 

Good to know. 

He carefully pokes the ship’s internal system for a status update and cringes when a steady stream of damage slices into his cortex. Well, that’s not good. 

“This was a terrible idea,” Ratchet grunts. His own restraints click off, slithering back into their slots. He clutches his injured shoulder, his vents as raspy as Deadlock’s own. 

“It was your idea,” Deadlock reminds him. 

The system pings with an organized damage review, and Deadlock’s jaw drops. One stabilizing wing is gone, lost to space, the other severely damaged with a long crack running through it. Two of the three rear thrusters are offline, and the landing gears sheared off at some point back. There are cracks in the transteel of the windscreen, he could probably see them if it wasn’t for the dirt. 

The integrity of the hull is at a measly forty percent. The communications array is flat-out gone, and Deadlock bets all they’ll find is an empty bracket. The control console is only fifty percent functional, with the other fifty percent being what’s currently smoking and crackling. 

They are, in a word, fragged. 

He disconnects from the system to stop the internal screaming and is rewarded with blissful silence. An odd silence, actually, because the background hum of Ratchet’s connection is gone, too, and he hadn’t realized until this moment how comforting it was. That pinpoint focus and perception vanishes, and if Deadlock weren’t sitting, he’d have staggered from the loss. 

Well. Won’t be doing that again, thank you very much. 

Ratchet tucks his dislocated arm against his abdomen and disconnects from the console. His movements are slow, aching, and only then does Deadlock catch sight of his back.

There’s a wound there, crusted over with dried energon, probably incurred in their desperate flight from the Penta base. Ratchet had said nothing, and Deadlock hadn’t noticed. But the crash must have torn the tentative seal because it’s seeping in sluggish rivulets down Ratchet’s back, far too awkwardly placed for Ratchet to tend to it himself. 

“You’re hurt,” Deadlock says, before he remembers he’s not supposed to care. 

“Which must come as a shock since we crash-landed in the middle of an asteroid belt,” Ratchet drawls. “How fragged are we?” 

“Fragged.” Deadlock leverages himself to his feet, his internals aching from the force of the impact. At least his welds remain strong. “Come on. Let me help you with that shoulder.” 

Ratchet rolls his neck until he can look up at Deadlock. “Why?” 

“Because you need two working arms,” Deadlock snaps, anger flushing through his lines, helping to chase out the lingering jitteriness. 

Ratchet’s field thrums beneath Deadlock’s perception, and a flush of shame permeates it. He awkwardly hauls himself to his feet, cupping his dislocated arm, and edges around the chair so he’s in reach. 

“Get it over with,” he says, and lets his arm dangle, free hand gripping the back of the chair. 

Any mech worth his coolant who’s managed to survive the war knows how to pop a joint back into place. 

Deadlock grips his arm, careful and gentle. “You want me to count?” 

“Just do it,” Ratchet snarls through gritted teeth. 

Deadlock flexes his grip, reading the rise and fall of Ratchet’s field, the flickering of his attention. “I could distract you with a kiss,” he says. 

Ratchet startles. “Wha–”

Pop. 

Ratchet almost jerks free of his grip as Deadlock twists and pulls in a quick motion, slotting the joint back into place. Ratchet sucks in a vent. His field wavers, face going a pale, and his grip on the chair tightens. 

“Thanks,” he hisses out. 

“I owed you one,” Deadlock replies with a lift of one shoulder. He turns away, staring into the mess that is the latter half of the ship. 

Supplies from the storage compartment scatter across the floor. Something has broken open, spilling its contents in a wet arc glinting in the ocher glow of the emergency runners. The compartment door swings lazily in the ship’s tilt. Smoke cloaks the air with a dull haze. 

Ratchet steps up beside him, fingers slipping up under his own armor to massage at the bruised joint. “What a mess.” 

“Mmm.” Deadlock glances at his shoulder, where the impact of the object left a long scrape. “What hit you?” 

Ratchet winces and kicks at a metal crate, forcing it into view. The red and white stripes and familiar symbol stares up at them mockingly. 

Deadlock stares back. Ratchet does, too. 

Despite it all, Deadlock laughs. He laughs until the ache in his abdomen turns the laughter into a raspy sound, and the force of Ratchet’s glare reaches fusion cannon levels. 

“It’s not funny,” he says, but his lips twitch like he’s swallowing his own amusement. 

“It’s ironic,” Deadlock snorts. 

Ratchet had been struck by the ship’s spare medkit. 

Ratchet growls and crouches, scooping up the medkit and tucking it under his arm. “If we didn’t need it, I’d chuck it out the cargo door.” 

“Where it would then land right outside the ship.” Deadlock’s lips curl, and it takes all he has to swallow his amusement before the twitch on Ratchet’s face turns further thunderous. “Points for the sentiment though.” 

He frowns at the mess. The medkit’s not the only thing to have been expunged from the storage compartment. There’s a few rolls of static mesh, a polishing kit – the oil is what’s currently leaking over the floor, spare blaster cartridges which look to be in desperate need of charging, and tiny tubes of energon flavor rolling around underfoot. 

The mess will keep. 

Deadlock gingerly wades through it and searches the dim for the access panel to the rear bay. The panel is dull, nonfunctional, so he punches through the emergency release and yanks it free. A grating, grinding noise precedes the doors as they open, only to pause halfway. Air whooshes out, sucked into the empty vacuum of space.

Deadlock waits. 

Click-click-click goes the sliding mechanism visibly, and then it honks loud enough for Drift to feel the vibrations underfoot. A small light above the rear bay doors starts to blink. The sign next to it reads ‘maintenance needed’. 

Well. You don’t say. 

Deadlock sighs and slips into the narrow gap, bracing his back against one side and shoving his palm against the other. He bears down, throwing his weight in both directions, scraping open the door by several more inches. Not fully open, but just enough both he and his significantly wider medic sorta-ally can get through. 

Ratchet follows him without comment. They step out onto a sandy, rocky surface, colored in shades of gray and pale brown, the evidence of their crash streaking behind them in a black and blue line. Spilled energon. Scorched earth. Bits and pieces of the hull and their ship scattered like so much detritus. 

The air reeks of smoke and flame. 

Deadlock hustles far enough that he can turn back and look at the ship. His spark tightens into a small ball. One thruster is a smoking, blackened pit. A second one is dinged, but potentially salvageable. The third appears, from the outside, to be fully functional. 

Ratchet’s field spikes with outrage. Deadlock’s a bit relieved he can’t hear the curses the medic must be spewing. He’s not stupid. He can see the reality of their situation. 

Deadlock breaks into a light jog, circling wide around the ship. He counts more pieces missing from the hull than the hull has managed to keep, baring circuitry and bits to the elements. The communications array isn’t damaged, it’s simply gone, snapped off as though it had never existed. The windshield is indeed cracked, and the nose of the ship is half-buried in the sandy morass. 

One stabilizing wing is missing, sheared off at the base, a jagged rent that speaks of a collision. The other is bent, plating stretched and threatening to tear. The anterior thrusters are buried in the dirt and so they must be choked with detritus. 

There’s no way this ship is going to fly again. 

He circles back to Ratchet, ready to deliver a grim prognosis. The medic hasn’t moved from the few steps he’d taken outside the rear bay. He’s staring at the ship, his expression running the gamut from anger to despair. His uninjured hand curls into light fists at his side, his armor tightly compacted. 

“We’re stuck here,” he says on a narrow-comm beam, flat, his optics not even bothering to acknowledge Deadlock. 

“Looks like,” Deadlock replies on the same narrow-bond. Lucky they’re so close, they don’t have to exchange any kind of permissions. “Don’t think we can get her running again. But if we’re lucky, we can manage to rig some type of SOS.” 

Ratchet snorts and half-turns to Deadlock, his optics as flat as his tone. “And who’s going to pick it up, all the way out here?” 

Deadlock rolls his shoulders. “Before we crashed, I saw how close we were to the exit. The waystation isn’t far. If we get a strong enough signal, someone will pick it up.” He trudges back toward the rear hatch. “Whether or not they’ll care, I don’t know.” 

“Great.” Ratchet slogs after him, his steps slow and measured. “Stuck forever on an asteroid with a Decepticon. What a wonderful vacation.” 

“Oh, we’ll rust to death long before it becomes forever,” Deadlock says. 

“I don’t know which is better.” 

Deadlock snorts and waits for Ratchet to enter before he attempts to wedge the door shut. Metal resists at first, and it’s not until Ratchet takes up the other side that they are able to force the doors back into place. Magnetics lock, and the pressure system hisses as atmosphere returns to the compartment. 

It’s not much protection, but it’s better than being caught unaware by something that may or may not live on this asteroid. Deadlock’s heard the stories of organic dwellers. He doesn’t want to be anything’s meal. 

“You might bleed out first,” Deadlock says aloud, with a pointed look to the wound still seeping on Ratchet’s back. It seems to be worse the more he moves. 

“I’m fine.” 

“No. You’re not.” He scoops the medkit out of the open storage compartment, where Ratchet had made the barest amount of effort to put it back. He kicks a smaller crate toward the medic, who stares at him with thinly narrowed optics. “You’re all I got right now, and I’m not being picked up by Autobots with their dead CMO. Sit.” 

Ratchet stares at him, grumbles subvocally, and sits down with all the grace of a petulant sparkling. “Do you have any idea what you’re doing?” 

“I’m still alive, aren’t I?” Deadlock rolls his optics. “I think a simple patch job is within my skillset. So sorry that all you’ve got is a leaker to help you out.” 

Ratchet’s jaw sets. “Stop calling yourself that.” 

“Isn’t it true?” Deadlock’s tone is far from innocent, but he has to admit, he loves the spike of shame and regret that fills Ratchet’s field whenever he points it out. Feels like a tiny victory every time. “Or maybe it’s the part where I’m also a murderer. Not that it’s hypocritical of you to think so or anything.” 

He slips behind Ratchet and eyes the wound. It looks like a sharpened projectile had slid through his armor plates at an angle. It’s a graze, a deep one, but at least the projectile hadn’t lodged in him. Deadlock suspects Ratchet would have spoken up if that were the case. 

“We’re going to be stuck here for who knows how much longer. Together,” Ratchet says, resignation thick in his tone. “Perhaps we can manage to be civil to each other.” 

Deadlock dampens a mesh cloth with cleanser and dabs at the streaks of dried energon, all the better to see the wound. “You started it,” he says. 

“Fair enough.” Ratchet tilts his head and slumps forward, elbows braced on his knees and making it easier for Deadlock to tend the injury. “I will refrain from remarking on your Decepticon background.” 

Deadlock laughs and tosses the dirty mesh cloth over his shoulder. “Wow. That sounds like it hurts. Kind of you to offer though.” He peers at the gradual seep of energon. There’s a few nicked lines, but nothing a squirt of temporary sealant can’t handle. 

Ratchet sighs. 

“Look,” Deadlock says. “I’m just saying. We’re not friends. We’re not allies. This truce is pitslag. We’re enemies. It’s in our nature.” He slaps static mesh over the sealant, keeping it in place. There’s an ugly gray patch on Ratchet’s back now, but it’s better than the alternative. 

“You know, there was a time Cybertron wasn’t divided in two factions,” Ratchet says. He tries to reach back, touch the static mesh, but can’t quite manage. He drops his hand instead. “Even Megatron and Optimus were friends once.” 

Deadlock snorts and steps back, dumping santizer on his hands to wash off the tackiness of Ratchet’s energon. “Look how well that worked out.” 

“If you recall, Megatron was the one who opted to try and kill Optimus rather than take his hand.” Ratchet rises, joints creaking, and half-turns to look at Deadlock, his expression twisted with distaste. 

Deadlock tilts his head. “Yeah, and if you had any idea the kind of slag we’ve had to endure, you wouldn’t have trusted someone with that badge on their chestplate either.” He pokes Ratchet’s Autobot brand pointedly. “You Autobots wear it with pride. But all we can see is a symbol of slavery.” 

Ratchet glares. “The Senate corrupted what this stands for. We’re trying to reclaim it.” 

“You can’t take something that noxious and pretend you’re turning it into something good.” Deadlock slams the medkit shut and shoves it into the compartment where it belonged. “Doesn’t work that way.” 

“And you can’t pretend your intentions are honorable when your actions reflect a desire for power at any cost,” Ratchet argues. 

Deadlock twists his jaw. He points his back to Ratchet and crouches, focusing long and hard at the mess covering the floor. “You should recharge,” he says, because if he keeps going with this, he’ll strike Ratchet, and that isn’t going to help either of them. “We’ve got a lot of work to do.” 

He expects protests. Accusations. A long-suffering sigh of irritation. He expects Ratchet to push the issue, to remind him of his faults, his failures, of how awful the Decepticons are. 

Ratchet says nothing. He stomps past Deadlock, coming within inches of their armor brushing, and closes himself in the small recharge chamber. At least that door still functions. It’s the only privacy they have. 

They don’t have a proper washrack. It’s a small thing, barely big enough for one, and all it does is use the same solvent over and over again, running it through a reprocessing cycle after every use. At some point, it can’t possibly function as a cleaner, can it? 

Deadlock grits his denta and starts cleaning up the mess the crash caused. He might as well, if they’re going to survive here for the foreseeable future. It’s a bit like something out of a night purge, but like the Pit he’s going to lie down and wait to offline. 

He’s survived much, much worse things than this. 

[IDW] Lost and Lonely Space 03/12

Ratchet doesn’t know what’s worse. 

That when Deadlock slumps in the chair, clearly unconscious, Ratchet doesn’t hesitate to rush to his aid. Or that he’s worried about the notorious Decepticon and actually cares to make sure he survives this. 

Or maybe he’s thinking too hard. 

Ratchet glances at the console, confirms there’s some kind of auto-navigation system activated, and hurriedly unbuckles Deadlock from the seat. He has to disconnect the Decepticon from the console, and it angrily blats at him, but stays their course. Whatever their course is. 

There’s a pool of energon on the chair and the floor beneath Deadlock. There’s a hole in his back, his side, his abdomen. The wounds are ragged and burned, and a sickly, poisonous stench rises from the blastershot in his back. Damn the Pentas and their propensity to test new weapons tech on a near-constant basis. 

Ratchet hauls Deadlock up, throws him over a shoulder, and sloughs him back to the tiny compartment that serves as a recharge room in this shuttle. There’s really not much here, but it’s the only place Ratchet can lay out the Decepticon that’s not the floor. From that point, it’s rote. 

If there’s one thing Ratchet still remembers how to do, it’s being a medic. He cleans and welds and patches and growls when he realizes he’s going to have to put Deadlock through a fluid flush in order to clear his system of whatever the Pentas pumped into him. 

Ratchet doesn’t think too hard about what he’s doing. He throws a mesh over the Decepticon badge on Deadlock’s chestplate. He knows it’s there, but at least it doesn’t stare back at him. 

“We’ve gotta stop meeting like this, kid,” Ratchet sighs as he works and works, only occasionally glancing out the windshield to make sure they aren’t in danger of colliding with anything, out here in the emptiness of space. 

He doesn’t know why he’s giving it all to save the spark of a single Decepticon, one who intended to buy him from the Pentas no less. He just knows that he can’t not, and before the war, before having to choose between one patient and the next, saving sparks is what he did. Saving sparks had been his purpose. 

It should have been his only purpose. 

Hours later, Deadlock is stable, and Ratchet stumbles out of the small compartment. He slumps against a cabinet, blinks out of his medic haze, and focuses on himself for the first time. He chugs one of the cubes of energon from their stock, and addresses the damage to his own frame. Thankfully minor, but he can’t just ignore it. 

He keeps his sensors trained on Deadlock, not only because he’s a bit concerned about what other effects the poison might have, but also because Deadlock probably won’t online feeling friendly. Ratchet wants some advance notice before he gets a blaster to the face. He had, after all, pointed a weapon at Deadlock before their rapid exodus from the trading station. 

Ratchet stares at his reflection in a shiny panel and fingers the collar around his neck. There’s no obvious mechanism to disengage it. Given the tiny device that had activated a large bomb, he’s loathe to just snap it off. It might be the last thing he ever does. 

He pushes off the cabinet and staggers back into the bridge. He drops into the pilot’s chair and stares blankly at the console. Exhaustion tugs at every line, every strut, but he can’t offline here. Someone on this ship needs to be alert, and right now, it’s certainly not Deadlock. 

Ratchet frowns. Where are they even? There’s nothing out the windshield but stars. The ship seems to be moving forward, probably set to auto-pilot, but there’s no destination set in the nav. At least, not one Ratchet can see anyway. He tries poking at the console, flicking a few switches, pressing a few buttons, but nothing responds. 

The whole thing’s been locked. 

Frag. Damn distrusting Decepticons. 

“That’s pointless, you know. It’s only going to recognize me.” 

Ratchet glances over his shoulder. Deadlock slumps in the doorway of the recharge room, leaning heavily on the frame, one arm slung across his abdomen. His optics are dim, and even from here, Ratchet can detect the raggedness of his ventilations. But he’ll live. 

“I noticed,” Ratchet replies and swivels back to the console. He shifts, and grimaces. Damn. He’d forgotten about the spill of energon from Deadlock’s wound. “You should be in the berth.” 

“Yeah. That’s not gonna happen.” Deadlock drags himself forward, free hand using the wall and equipment to stabilize himself. “Get the frag out of my chair.” 

Ratchet slants him a sideways look. “You could be politer to the mech who saved your spark.” 

“Cause you did it out of the kindness of your spark?” Deadlock snorts. “It was self-preservation. You don’t get kudos for that.” He grips the back of the second chair and glares. “Out.” 

Ratchet leans back and folds his arms over his chassis. “If you think you’re capable of making me, you’re welcome to try.” 

Deadlock rolls his optics and slumps into the navigator’s chair, still holding his abdomen. It probably hurts, but Ratchet doesn’t have the pain chips to spare, and besides, Deadlock’s likely a masochist anyway. Most Decepticons are. 

“What the frag are you doing out here anyway?” 

Ratchet swivels back around in the chair, relaxing as much as he can with a deadly Decepticon next to him. And the tackiness of drying energon beneath his aft. “I’m on vacation.” 

“Seriously.” 

“I am serious.” 

Deadlock barks a laugh, only to hiss and curl inward when he does it. “Frag, that hurts,” he mutters, and tips his head back against the chair, rolling his face toward Ratchet. “And your idea of a vacation is ending up with the Pentas?” 

“That wasn’t part of the plan.” 

“Yeah, they never are.” Deadlock lurches upright and withdraws a cable with his free hand, shaking a little before he manages to connect to the console. “You’re not getting out of here without me, so don’t go thinking about killing me in my recharge.” 

Ratchet chuffs a vent. “If I wanted to kill you, I wouldn’t have bothered saving your spark.” He points an accusing finger at Deadlock. “If there’s anyone who ought to be worried about getting offed in their recharge, it’s me.” 

“If I wanted you dead, it would’ve been easier to leave you to the Pentas,” Deadlock says with a side-eye. 

The console powers up, switches flickering to life, and the background hum cycles up into a background rumble. The HUD display flashes into view as does the holo-nav map, not that peering at it does Ratchet any good. He has no idea where they are. 

“Then we’ve established neither of us is going to kill the other. Good to know.” Ratchet drops his elbow onto the arm of the chair and props his chin on his knuckles. “So is this a thing Decepticons do now? Buy Cybertronians for spare parts?” 

“Better us than them.” Deadlock flicks several more switches, and the holomap spins around in a dizzying manner, struggling to pinpoint their location. 

Ratchet doesn’t look at it or Deadlock. Instead, he stares out the windshield at the stars because they’re all he can see. No planets or moons, just stars for lightyears around. It’s as much disconcerting as it is comforting. 

He’d forgotten how very empty space could be. 

“Oh, yes. How noble of you,” Ratchet drawls. “Thank you for saving me from a horrible fate. Truly, I ought to give you a medal.” 

“If you’d have been Neutral, you’d have been given the opportunity to join us,” Deadlock points out. 

Ratchet lifts his orbital ridges and rolls his gaze toward Deadlock. “And if I’d said no?” 

Deadlock doesn’t dignify that with an answer. He pretends full focus on the holomap and whatever his fingers are doing, while the other continues to cup his abdomen. Ratchet’s done a great job with the patch. No energon’s leaking through, so it must be a subconscious gesture, to protect what’s considered a weakness. 

“Yeah, that’s what I thought,” Ratchet says with a snort. He slumps a little further in the chair and cycles a ventilation. 

Silence descends, tense though it is. Ratchet’s relieved they haven’t started shooting each other yet. Then again, in a space this small, it wouldn’t be wise for anyone hoping to survive. A single stray shot could take out the nav-comp or the auto-pilot or the steering system or anything of import. 

This unspoken truce is all they have to keep themselves alive right now. 

“How long you been on vacation anyway?” Deadlock asks, and there’s something snide in his tone, something that ruffles Ratchet’s plating. “You’re Prime’s CMO, and there’s no chatter about you being missing.” 

“Because I’m not.” Ratchet hauls himself out of the chair with a creak of hydraulics that shouldn’t feel as old as they do. Thank Primus he’d seen a small washrack in his earlier poking around. “They might not know exactly where I am, but I’m not missing. Or at least, I won’t be, given the fact I’m going to miss my check in soon.” 

He rummages through their meager supplies and produces a cube of low-grade for Deadlock. They’ll have to be frugal, unless they catch an orbit around a sun to process some solar grade. It’s another reason not to fight. 

Deadlock shakes his head. “It still doesn’t make any sense. A vacation in the middle of a war? Can you imagine Shockwave taking one?” He makes a derisive noise. 

Ratchet grinds his denta and counts backwards from ten. He stands between the two chairs and shoves the cube into Deadlock’s face. “It wasn’t my idea.” 

He doesn’t get a thank you. 

“But getting captured by space pirates was part of the plan?” 

“Of course not!” 

Deadlock snatches the cube and flicks it open with one thumb. “Autobots,” he snorts. “You’re lucky I’m the one who found you. I’d have taken you to Megatron. You’d have been a prisoner.” 

“Or worse.” Ratchet drops back down in the chair. It squeaks ominously beneath him. The shuttle continues to drift aimlessly. He eyes the communication console and wonders if he can hack it. 

Deadlock tips his head back and guzzles the energon in the space of two vents before he tosses the empty cube over his shoulder. It clatters somewhere against the far wall. “Worse is what those pirates would have sold you to. Trust me.” 

Ratchet grimaces. “If it’s not obvious by now, I don’t.” 

Deadlock’s head rolls toward him, optics narrowed to amber-red slits. “Want I should find their nearest hideaway and drop you off? Let you try your luck with them again?” 

“Want me to accidentally nick a central line and see how quickly you bleed out?” Ratchet retorts with a raised orbital ridge. 

The air crackles between them. Their fields clash, angry and bitter more than anything else, which Ratchet’s glad for. He doesn’t want Deadlock to sense the guilt layered beneath it. 

If he’d only done more, perhaps Drift wouldn’t have become… this. 

“What’s the plan?” Ratchet asks, once the silence drags on too long, and they’re accomplishing nothing by sitting here glaring at one another. 

Deadlock shifts to face forward, fingers flying across the console. His clamped armor and withdrawn field reflect the tension vibrating between them. The holomap stills from the rapid cycling and zooms inward, focusing on a single, blinking icon. 

“We’re here,” he points out. 

Ratchet squints. “In the middle of nothing.” 

“Yep.” 

“Frag.” There’s really no other word to use. They’re in an escape shuttle, for Primus’ sake. It doesn’t have nearly the range of a full-fledged ship. And no doubt they’d used all they had for that one jump. 

“Yep,” Deadlock pops the glyph and taps a few more keys, causing the holo-nav to swirl across the stars and focus on a cluster of bright icons. “The absolute closest point of neutrality is the waystation in the Hyades Cluster. There’s an asteroid belt or two in the way, but it’s a few weeks journey if we’re lucky. Death if we’re not.” He shrugs. 

Asteroid belt. Fan-fragging-tastic. That’s not going to be difficult to pilot through or anything. They’re in a shuttle. It’s a boat with all the maneuverability of a tank. 

Ratchet braces an elbow on the chair and leans closer to the map. “What else?” 

Two taps and the image smears off to the left. “The Sol System is over this way.” Deadlock’s tone is perfectly bland, bored even. “That’s a couple months at the limping pace we’ve got – the quantum engine’s all outta juice by the way – but it’s a clear path if you don’t count the estrix.” 

“The what?” Ratchet frowns, racking his processor, but unable to find any data on anything similar to the weird garble of syllables Deadlock had just spat out. 

“Estrix,” Deadlock repeats, and his forehead crinkles. “Huge spacefaring energon-suckers?” 

Ratchet gives him a blank look because he’s never heard of the estrix and strongly suspects Deadlock is making them up. 

“Like a scraplet only ten times bigger and hungrier?” Deadlock continues, making a vague gesture with his free hand, his forehead lines growing deeper and deeper, his voice inching into incredulous. 

Ratchet waits for him to get to the point. 

Deadlock mutters a curse and turns back to the console. “Well, they exist. I guess Autobots are too homebody to realize there are more dangerous things out in the universe than a handful of Decepticons.” He snorts. “Anyway, Estrix are mean. They’re the size of the average mech, and when they’re out of juice, they go into stasis until they smell some fresh meat. We’d be easy pickings for ‘em.” 

Ratchet glares at the holo-map. “Then it’s not a clear path.” 

“Depends on what kind of chances you want to take.” Deadlock shrugs, his tires bobbing, but the motion is far from casual. Pain leaks into his field. 

Ratchet considers the pain chips in his medkit, but they only have so many, and he’s not feeling that charitable yet. He stares at the map again, searching for something, anything that’s a viable option. He spies a bright, spiral cluster, off to the far right. 

“What about that?” he asks, pointing. 

“Electronic deadzone,” Deadlock says, sounding bored. “Nothing that requires a circuit functions there, including us. It’s not even a bit of an option.” 

Ratchet spits out a curse before he can swallow it down. “How the fragging frag did we end up so far from everything?” he demands, fist making a light tap on the arm of the chair. 

Deadlock leans back in his chair, cupping his midsection. “I didn’t have time to chart a course. The warp drive dropped us in the nearest exit, and that’s all the charge it has. Pit, we’re lucky we even know where we are.” 

“Lucky,” Ratchet repeats, and kicks out a foot, narrowly missing the bottom of the console. “Some fragging vacation.” Stuck on a tiny emergency shuttle with an angry Decepticon. Oh, yeah. This is real relaxing. 

Deadlock has the audacity to laugh, though he follows it with a vented hiss. “Ain’t it though?” The smile on his lips is far from friendly. “Looks like it’s you and me, Autobot. Stuck in this tugboat together, trying not to kill each other. Fun, fun.” 

Fun. 

Not bloody likely. 

Ratchet glares at the holomap, the blinking icon that is their ship in the middle of nothing, and their complete lack of options. They could be rational or they could be reckless. 

Ratchet gnaws on his bottom lip, indecision warring within him. He eyes Deadlock. “How skilled are you at piloting this thing?” 

“I get by.” 

Ratchet stares at the holo-map, at safety that is within reach but a long time away, or a great risk that’ll get him to safety a lot faster. “Skilled enough to get through an asteroid field or two?” 

Deadlock lifts an orbital ridge, lip curled in a sneer. “That eager to get away from me already? And here I thought we were becoming friends.” 

“Don’t be an idiot,” Ratchet says, flattening his tone as much as he can manage. “Can you do it or not?” 

Deadlock rolls his shoulders. “I can give it a try. If that’s the action you think is best.” 

Ratchet sits back in the chair and sets his jaw. “I think this vacation is a bust, and we need to get back where we belong. Before I kill you.” Or vice versa. 

“Aye captain,” Deadlock drawls and throws out a sarcastic salute. He tilts his head. “But before we can go anywhere, that’s gotta come off.” His free hand points right at Ratchet’s intake. 

He touches the collar. “You have the key?” 

“I have a key,” Deadlock says, and fishes around in his subspace, pulling out a small rectangular object and giving it a wiggle. “That there collar is a Penta tracking device and bomb, the latter of which is just enough to take off your head, if they feel so inclined.” 

Well, at least he’d been right to be cautious. 

Ratchet folds his arms over his chassis. “Then why are you willing to take it off? Seems to me that’s something you could hold over my head?” 

Literally. 

“Because I’m not interested in some stray Penta ship picking up on its signal, and figuring out who’s to blame for that trading frag-up.” Deadlock rolls his optics and shifts in the chair, finally lifting the hand over his abdomen to gesture to Ratchet. “So come here so I can take that off you.” He pats his lap pointedly. 

Ratchet’s lip curls. “No thanks.” 

“You’d rather have a bomb around your neck?” Deadlock asks. 

“I’d rather not have to debase myself for a bit of freedom,” Ratchet snaps. 

Deadlock rolls his optics and heaves himself out of the chair, moving toward Ratchet’s. “Only a mech who’s never had to bite and claw his way toward an ounce of it would say that.” He touches the rectangular remote to the collar around Ratchet’s neck, and it abruptly disengages with a flash of heat against Ratchet’s plating. “Must’ve been nice.” 

Ratchet eases the collar off his neck. “Is it still active?” 

“Not while it’s unlatched.” 

He tucks the collar-slash-bomb into his subspace. One never knows when something could be useful, especially given that they are floating in the middle of empty space. “Is that what the Decepticons mean for you? Freedom?” 

“I don’t think that’s any of your business,” Deadlock says, his tone tight, losing that antagonizing flavor. 

Ratchet looks up at him, into amber-red optics that are narrow slits of warning. “So I’m just supposed to pretend I don’t know who you used to be? And what you could’ve been?” 

“I was a leaker on the streets, and you saved my spark to make yourself feel better about it,” Deadlock bites out, and anger flashes in his field, but not quick enough to disguise the shame broiling thick and black beneath it. “There’s nothing to pretend because the past doesn’t matter.” 

Ratchet twists his jaw. “The past always matters. It’s what shapes us. We’re not strangers, Drift.” He uses the mech’s former designation pointedly. Just because he’d let Megatron rename him into this creature, doesn’t mean the mech he used to be has vanished. 

Deadlock’s ventilations audibly crackle. “Aren’t we?” he demands, and it’s with a flexing of fingers into loose fists. “You didn’t save anything back then. You just sent me back out into nothing. I needed saving then, I don’t fragging need it now.”

“Right,” Ratchet drawls. “Because turning into a killer courtesy of the Decepticons is an improvement.”

“I’m fighting for something. There’s a difference,” Deadlock bites out, his tone edged with a growl, his field aggressively filling the small compartment. “And since you became a pawn for the Autobots, I don’t think you have any room to talk.” He pauses, tilts his head, grinning with sharpened denta. “Then again, you’ve always been the Senate’s pawn, haven’t you?”

Ratchet stands, because like frag Deadlock is going to take that tone with him while he’s sitting down like an errant new-spark. “I’m no one’s pawn. I chose the Autobots because it was the right thing to do. Because your boss and his army were tearing their way through everyone and someone had to stop him before he destroyed everything.” 

“Yeah, you did a swell job of that,” Deadlock snaps. “Don’t act like the Autobots are free of sin. You’ve destroyed as much as we have.” 

“For lack of a better word – you started it. Megatron chose violence, and when diplomacy failed, we responded in kind.” 

“Diplomacy. Right.” Deadlock snorts and his field contracts again, sharp and hot and bitter. “It must have been easy for you, living in your tower, to look down on us and decide what we should have done to save ourselves. It’s easy to judge when you already have it all, isn’t it?”

Ratchet chuffs a vent. “That’s an excuse. You wanted this. Megatron wanted this. Violence and death and power, that’s what it’s about. Because if it wasn’t, you wouldn’t have felt the need to pretend to be someone you’re not. You wouldn’t have to hide behind ‘Deadlock’.” He rolls his optics. “You talk about freedom, and then you let Megatron give you a chain, because you hate yourself, you hate who you are, Drift. And that’s no one’s fault but your own.” 

Fury rages in Deadlock’s field. It has a tangible presence against Ratchet’s armor, and he almost reels in the face of it. 

He shoves a finger at Ratchet and hisses, “Don’t call me that. Drift is dead. That useless leaker is dead. And that’s the way he’s going to stay.” He whirls around, stomping past the two seats on the bridge. “I’m going to recharge. I’ll get the alert when we get close to the first belt. Until then, leave me the frag alone.” 

The door to the recharge room rattles shut with a definitive clang that does nothing to dispel the heat of Ratchet’s glare. He’s angry and he’s disappointed, and he’s not sure who both of those emotions are meant for first. He slumps back down into the chair, scrubbing his face with his palm, the taste of Deadlock’s shame and outrage heavy on the edge of his field. 

The ship chugs steadily onward. Ratchet can’t call the pace brisk. At best, they are trudging toward their destination. Maybe they can make it through the rings of asteroid belts to rejoin their factions on the other side. More likely, it’ll get them killed. 

Honestly, Ratchet doesn’t know which is worse. 

[IDW] Lost and Lonely Space 02/12

Frag. 

It’s the first thought that enters Deadlock’s head when he sees the captive the Pentas have to trade. Of all the Autobots he expected them to acquire, Ratchet is not one of them. What the frag is he doing out here? Why isn’t he at Optimus Prime’s side like usual? There isn’t even any news on the Decepticon network about Ratchet being missing. 

Frag, frag, frag. 

The Pentas have no clue the value of their prisoner. But Deadlock’s not stupid. His fellow Cons know good and well who that red and white mech with medic brands stamped on his shoulders is. 

On the crate to Deadlock’s left, Falchion perks up. “Well, when they said they had an Autobot for trade, I didn’t expect it to be such a high-value target.” He slides off the crate and nudges Deadlock with an elbow. “Boss is going to be happy about this, isn’t he?” 

Deadlock shrugs off the elbow and glares. “I don’t care what makes Turmoil happy.” He slides his attention toward the approaching Pentas and their cargo. 

Ratchet, at least, doesn’t look harmed. He’s not restrained, save for the slave collar around his neck. If there’s recognition in his optics, Deadlock can’t see it. But then, he supposes a high-value medic wouldn’t remember the leaker he once saved in the Dead End. Probably had saved more of those in his ledger than are worth counting. 

“That’s not what I hear,” Scorch snickers. 

Deadlock glares at him and doesn’t dignify that with a response. He’s aware of the rumors. Decepticons like to chatter like a gaggle of younglings before their first training day. Instead, he focuses his attention on the two Pentas, barely sparing Ratchet a glance. 

“You’re late,” he says, even as he has to tilt his head back to look into their eyes. He fragging hates tall organics. Isn’t there some kind of cosmic law where organics shouldn’t get so large?

The Penta on the left, a pale yellow in comparison to his bright magenta partner, snorts a wet sound. “You’re early,” it retorts in that mechanized, fake voice Deadlock has always hated. Universal translators have no personality to them. 

“Caught you a good one there,” Falchion pipes up. “How’d you manage that?” 

Deadlock grinds his denta as the two Penta exchange glances. Unicron save him from rookies who don’t know the first thing about bargaining with space pirates. 

He punches Falchion in the side of the head, hard enough to make a point and cause him to stagger, but not so hard he becomes deadweight. He sends a narrow beamed comm “shut it, you moron,” and Falchion hisses, rubbing his head, optics narrowed in anger. 

He doesn’t retaliate. Which is wise of him. Probably because his gaze drops to the hand Deadlock rests on the handle of his blaster. Warning. Reminder. 

“Good one?” Magenta Penta echoes, and its grip on Ratchet’s upper arm tightens, making his plating creak. Ratchet winces, but says nothing. In fact, all he’s doing is staring at Deadlock. “How good?” 

“It doesn’t matter. We already agreed on a price,” Deadlock growls.

Yellow Penta sneers, showing off rows of serrated teeth. “Decepticons not trick us.” He gives Ratchet’s arm a shake. “This one worth more to others?” 

“It’s not a trick if we didn’t know your cargo in the first place,” Deadlock snaps, his armor bristling. To his right, Scorch slides off the crate with an intimidating clomp of his massive feet. “Now we brought your trade. Give us our merchandise.” 

Magenta Penta ignores him and grabs Ratchet’s face, forcing Ratchet to look up at him. “You worth something?” 

“Depends on who you ask,” Ratchet says, with more verve then Deadlock would have expected for a mech who’s been captured and is about to be sold to the opposing army. “In fact, if the Autobots knew you had me, you might have yourself a good old-fashioned bidding war. Could come out rich by the end.” 

Deadlock’s engine growls. Ratchet, you idiot. You have no idea what you’re bargaining with. 

“That so?” Magenta Penta says, and his lips curl into a broad, frightening smirk. He tilts his head and eyes Deadlock narrowly. “The price is double.” 

Falchion snarls and stomps forward, but Deadlock slams a palm on his chest and shoves him back. He hisses a warning at the idiot rookie who’s going to get them killed. Primus, but Turmoil owes him for sending him off with this greenhorn. 

“No,” Deadlock says, and draws a blaster with his free hand, fingers resting on the hilt. “We had an agreement. You are bound by your word.” 

Yellow Penta laughs. “Doesn’t work the way you think it does, Cybertronian,” he says. “You’re on our turf. It goes how we say it goes.” 

Falchion growls, and the blaster on his shoulder whirrs to life, humming with restrained charge. Scorch’s hands start to glow, armor shifting and clicking aside to form the weapons installed on his frame. 

“Double,” Magenta says. It sounds like a challenge. 

Fine. If that’s the way they want to play it, Deadlock has no issues with taking the hard way. 

Deadlock lifts his chin. “No.” 

He lifts a hand and fires, not with the blaster he’d readied, but with the other, the one they aren’t prepared for. Two shots, crackling darkly through the air and slamming into Yellow’s shoulder, making him loosen his grip on Ratchet. 

“Betrayers!” Magenta snarls, and the docking bay abruptly drops into half-light, emergency beacons flashing and sirens screeching a warning. 

It all goes to the Pit. 

Falchion and Scorch are his subordinates and technically, his responsibility. But when the shooting starts, Deadlock only has optics for Ratchet, who finally stirs, yanking free of Yellow’s grip and lashing out at Magenta with a kick that would make any Decepticon proud. 

Crunch goes Yellow’s nearest knee, and he howls as it crumples beneath him. 

A stray shot sends Falchion spinning backward, his abdomen smoking, his frame writhing in agony. Deadlock’s heard stories about the weird and deadly weapons the Pentas tend to carry. If they survive this, Shockwave will be delighted to know the rumors are true. He’ll probably want one to study. 

Priorities. 

Scorch snarls and darts forward, tackling Magenta as if the Penta isn’t twice his size and twicely armed – literally and figuratively. They grapple, rolling around the floor, and Ratchet tries to make a break for it, but not back toward the corridor and the trading base. He runs for Deadlock’s ship like he thinks he’s going to steal it. 

Yellow’s not down. 

His primary snaps out, long and gangly, wrapping around Ratchet’s ankle. Down Ratchet goes, clattering to the floor, and he whips around to his back, kicking at the hand hauling him back. 

Deadlock fires, taking out one of Yellow’s eyes, and it splatters organic goo everywhere. Deadlock fires again, misses, but only because he’s twisting to avoid Yellow’s return fire, the purple-crackling energy whizzing past him, exploding where it slams into a wall, lighting the bay with bright charge. 

Scorch yelps, and there’s a wet, sickening crunch. Deadlock can’t tell if its bone or strut. Ratchet suddenly has a blaster, and he’s firing at Yellow, hitting him in the shoulder and the chest, but the energy smacks against Yellow’s chest armor and fizzles into nothing. 

He kicks again, breaks Yellow’s wrist, and the Penta growls as his hand goes limp and Ratchet tears himself free. He scrambles to his feet and takes off again, and this time, Deadlock intercepts before Yellow can give chase. He kicks, high and hard, foot snapping against Yellow’s face. 

It crunches beneath his foot, green blood like ichor spattering out. Yellow rears back and Deadlock fires, one-two-three pulls of the trigger, until the Penta’s head is a pulpy mass. The corpse goes limp, dropping like a wet sack. 

Something smacks against his back, and Deadlock staggers forward to catch his balance. He manages to spin around, but not soon enough to avoid the blastershot that slams into his abdomen. He has a moment of panic, before he realizes it’s not the same type of weapon as what had taken down Falchion. 

He’s just brimming with luck today. 

It does hurt, however, and Deadlock grits his denta against a surge of electric fire racing through his lines. Magenta’s dragging himself to his feet, mouth bloody, spitting out a gob of broken teeth. He swipes the back of his hand over his mouth, blaster dangling from his fingers, but the other primary hand grips tight around something. 

“The General will hear of this,” he says, voice gurgling. 

Deadlock’s vision drops to Magenta’s belly, where a hilt protrudes, blood welling up around it. Scorch isn’t moving behind him. Well, at least he’d been good for something. 

“The General can kiss my aft,” Deadlock snarls, and he fires again, and again and again, backing toward his ship as he squeezes the trigger. He tracks Ratchet’s rapid flight toward the open cargo door. 

Deadlock winds through the cargo he’d brought for trade, only briefly mourning their loss. Turmoil will have his head for leaving it behind. Well, Turmoil can kiss his aft, too. Deadlock rather likes living, and the loss of cargo is a fair trade for his life. 

He gives Scorch and Falchion a passing glance, but their biolights are dim and their paint greying. They’re dead and no more use to him. They can rot here like the rest of the dead no one else seems to care about. 

Deadlock twists to avoid Magenta’s next fire, and returns volley, though his shots go wide and high. Magenta’s slumping, blood pooling around his feet, empty hand cupping his abdomen, the other still clenched tight. He’s sagging toward the floor, spitting up blood and teeth. His clenched fist lifts as Deadlock backs onto the ramp.

“Cybertronian scum,” Magent gurgles, and his fingers open, one by one by one, until a small cylindrical object drops from them, blinking blue in the dim. 

Frag. 

Deadlock breaks into a full dash, storming into his ship as though his spark depends on it, because it does. Ratchet’s staggering ahead of him, panting, looking around like he can’t figure out which way is the bridge. Deadlock catches up, grabs the back of his collar and hauls him to the adjoining corridor and the emergency exits. 

“What the–”

“There’s no time!” Deadlock snarls and shoves him toward the nearest shuttle, his elbow slamming into the emergency release as a loud, ominous rumble starts up from outside the ship. 

Sirens sound as the door cycles open, and Deadlock yanks Ratchet inside with him. He smacks the panel to close the door and hustles it to the bridge, throwing himself into the chair and powering up the shuttle as quickly as possible. Another ominous rumble shakes the shuttle, and alarms scream. 

“Get in the damn chair!” Deadlock orders as the thrusters roar to life, restraints leaping out of the chair to wrap around his frame. 

His cable snakes out, notching into the panel as readings and alerts stream into his cortex once it recognizes his permissions. He flicks switches, and the engine hums through the compartment, docking clamps releasing as the countdown to launch begins. 

Frag the countdown. There’s no fragging time. 

Deadlock punches the emergency release, reaching up to flick the switch to do so. 

Click. “Let me go,” Ratchet demands. 

There’s a blaster pointed at Deadlock’s head. He ignores it. 

“We don’t have fragging time for this,” he says, and punches the accelerator. 

The shuttle launches itself off the side of his ship as the distinct whomp of a massive explosion slams into the back end. 

Ratchet tumbles backward, blaster flying from his fingers, and there’s a stream of curses and thuds and crashes. He’ll survive so Deadlock focuses on steering them away from the massive ball of fire rising behind them. Trust the Pentas to be crazy enough to blow up a portion of their trading station just to prove a point. 

Afts. 

Deadlock shoves the accelerator forward, throwing them into maximum thrust, as a wave of crackling fire radiates from his back and into the rest of his frame. He vaguely remembers absorbing a blow there, but he can’t think about that right now. The blast nips at their heels, threatening to consume them, and open space is their only refuge. 

Curses mutter behind him as the shuttle rattles into range of a jump, and Deadlock only calculates for a half-second before he decides the risk is worth it. He doesn’t have time to plot a course. All he can do is pick the first open drop and hope it doesn’t put them somewhere even more dangerous. 

“Hold on to something!” he shouts and flips the switch. 

He doesn’t pray. Primus isn’t listening anyway. 

The entire shuttle lurches as the last reaching arms of the blast grab hold of the rear thrusters and bites down, tearing into metal. For a moment, the shuttle wobbles, and Deadlock feels the grip of the wormhole slipping away. He punches the accelerator again, giving it a rapid burn, and the shuttle leaps forward, diving into the swirling vortex with the last echoes of the blast chasing after it.

He takes half a vent to mourn the loss of his ship. He really liked that ship. It meant freedom from Turmoil, to a certain extent. It meant freedom from a lot of things. 

He’s going to miss that ship. 

The shuttle drops out of quantum space and blasts into a new corner of the galaxy, the last tendrils of an explosion chasing after it. A shudder runs through the small ship, and warnings stream loudly through the bridge, until Deadlock slams the mute button so he can hear himself think. He has no idea where they are, the GPS rapidly click-clicking as it tries to pinpoint their location. 

His back hurts. His side burns. 

He can’t seem to feel his feet, and that’s not a good sign. 

Damage reports stream across the cable connection and through his cortex. The rear thrusters are damaged. One of the stabilizing wings has been bent. They’re mobile, but repairs will have to be made eventually. 

“What… the frag… was that?” Ratchet snarls from somewhere in the back of the shuttle, and the sound of him clambering to his feet is a distant noise compared to the ringing in Deadlock’s audials. 

“That was me saving your aft,” Deadlock says. Shaking fingers flip several switches as he throttles down to a more meandering pace. “Try and be a little grateful.” 

“Grateful?” Ratchet echoes. He stomps toward the bridge, his field preceding him like a violent, buzzing thing. 

Or maybe that’s the buzzing in Deadlock’s cortex. He’s not sure anymore. He tilts his head, left and right, but that doesn’t seem to help. If anything, that makes him dizzier. 

“You almost killed me!” 

Ratchet’s voice makes Deadlock wince. He presses a hand to his abdomen and looks down, sees the energon staining his palm, and then realizes he’s sitting in a pool of it. 

Well. 

That’s not good. 

“You were almost dead anyway,” Deadlock snaps, or slurs rather. 

His vision goes staticky on the edges. He slumps in the chair and something crackles wetly in his vents. Deadlock groans, coughs up energon, and strains trembling fingers toward the auto-pilot. 

It’s the last thing he manages to do before he tastes the grey. He hears the dull buzz of a voice, hands on his armor, and then he doesn’t feel much else. 

[SG] Firewall

He wasn’t dead. 

That was the first thought to cross Drift’s mind as he slowly surfaced from a condensed, dark fog. Sight. Sound. Sensation. All were distant to him, sensors slowly trickling in with feedback. 

He didn’t hurt. He was cradled in something warm and comfortable. His system fed him updates in a glacially slow pattern. Repaired? Yes. Safe? Debatable. Assumable. The circumstances of his demise suggested he shouldn’t be awake at all. 

Sensation began to trickle in. Sounds, that of vents, the low hum of machinery, the steady beep of a sparkrate machine, and much, much further out, the distant noise of something buzzing and… screaming. 

Alarm bells rang in the back of Drift’s mind. He forced his optics to online, reset them twice to clear the static, and looked up at a dull gray ceiling, scraped and slashed and dented. Naked lights gleamed down at him. 

He didn’t recognize this ceiling. 

He tried to rise, and realized he couldn’t. Not only did his limbs feel as though they were weighted down, but something brought his wrists and ankles up short. Something like manacles. 

Drift rolled his head to the side, confirming his suspicions. He was shackled to the berth, at wrist and ankle and… neck. 

A cold flush of fear ran down his spinal strut, but it was quickly whisked away into a simmering, background heat. It was odd, but the more he tried to ruminate on it, the more his thoughts floated away. He couldn’t seem to stay focused. 

His vision wavered for a moment. 

Drift unshuttered his optics, cycled a ventilation, and opened them again. He glanced around the room. There was enough equipment around him to confirm he was in a medical bay rather than a torture room or a prison cell. A line ran from a nearby machine into his wrist ports, one on either side. Liquid flowed into his frame, and he thought one might be energon, but he didn’t recognize the other. 

It didn’t make sense. 

He last remembered being in a shuttle, fleeing from an Autobot battle cruiser. He’d had half a dozen Autobots with him. They’d been shot down, spinning out of space with a lack of hull integrity, on fire, and crashing toward certain death. The uninhabited moon had rushed up to meet them, and Drift had enough time to spit out a prayer to Primus before they struck. 

He’d thought that was the end. It should have been his end. 

He was alone in the room. There were no windows, and only a single, solid door. He was surrounded by numerous machines, some of which were connected to him, others which were dark and silent. 

Had the rest of his crew survived?

Drift cycled his optics, and the world spun. His tank rippled, threatening to purge. His spark flickered with fear. Why did he feel so disconnected and uncontrolled? 

Where was he…?

The sparkrate monitor surged to life. What had been a steadying beep suddenly became a shrill scream. Drift startled, whipping his gaze toward the machine. It blinked obnoxiously back at him, still shrieking, louder and louder. 

Someone… someone had alarmed him? 

The door opened. 

Drift’s gaze darted toward it. Someone stepped inside. A mech. Drift saw the Autobot badge first, before he recognized anything else, and the heat in his lines briefly ebbed in the wake of a flush of ice. 

No. 

No, he knew this Autobot. 

The memory of this Autobot rose at the back of his processor, tiny flashes of fright and repressed images. The shrill buzz of a hacksaw. The cracking open of his chestplate without permission or anesthesia. The possessive gleam in bright blue optics. The promise of a better life if only he’d give in…

Waking up later to shouting in the outer chamber. Tearing lines from his frame. Fleeing out a back door missing several plates of armor and only the belongings he could see and carry, dripping energon from torn lines. Finding out much, much too late that a name had been scored into his spark chamber in an acid he couldn’t afford to fix. 

He’d lived, and he’d wondered – even then – if that was the more terrible option. 

Panic spiked through his lines. Drift tugged against his restraints, spark strobing a flash of fear. It rose up, choking his intake, and the nausea gripped him, threatened to freeze him in place. 

No. Not this one. Not again. 

“Oh, good. You’re awake!” Ratchet declared, his optics bright with glee and something a bit too close to mania for Drift’s comfort. Even back then, his offers of repairs and safety, freedom and protection, had come with a frenzied edge. 

Gasket had warned him not to go to the free clinic. But he’d been so desperate. He’d been in pain, and he hadn’t the creds to go elsewhere. 

What else was an addict to do?

The ice in his lines turned warm again, melting the chill, flushing them through with heat. The spike of anxiety shifted as quickly as it arrived, from panic to arousal. Unwanted thoughts bubbled up, applying a wave of confusion to everything else attacking his spinning processor. 

Want him. Frag him. Have me. Take me. 

His valve clenched, lubricant slicking his walls. 

Drift moaned, a sickly sound, as the need started to crowd the back of his mind. He tugged ineffectually at his bonds, wanting to escape, and wanting to throw himself at Ratchet all at the same time. 

What was happening to him? 

“I was starting to think I’d have to wait another full cycle before I’d get to see those pretty optics of yours,” Ratchet continued as he all but bounced to Drift’s berthside, leaning over to peer at his face. “Yes, so pretty.” 

Drift would have cringed if he could. He cycled through a number of questions, his glossa sweeping over his dry lips. “Why am I here?” 

A pale finger swept over the side of his face, a soft caress that had no business here. “Because it’s where you belong,” Ratchet murmured, and the tip of his fingers traced the curve of Drift’s mouth before dragging along his bottom lip. “With me.” 

Drift cringed internally while the rest of him seemed to curl toward Ratchet in need. “No,” he moaned, but it seemed to be ignored. 

“You’re my little Decepticon,” Ratchet crooned as his finger dragged down the underside of Drift’s chin and continued further, tracing his intake, his chestplate, avoiding his badge. “I put my claim on you.” He tapped Drift’s chassis, right over his spark chamber, the mark he’d been unable to scrape away, even after joining the Autobots. 

Ratchet didn’t pause too long. His finger moved on. 

Down, down, down. Over Drift’s chest, his belly, his abdomen. It paused over his groin, tracing the seam of his interface array, leaving a line of tingles in his wake. 

“Eons ago, to be fair,” Ratchet said with a tilt of his head, the slow curl of his smile growing and growing, bearing the brilliant white of his denta. “You’re lucky, too. Wheeljack almost beat me to you.” 

Drift didn’t know which was worse. 

He licked his lips, which felt as dry as the deserts of Raetaen. “My team?” he asked, his vocals emerging as a croak. 

He wanted to panic. He thought he should be panic. But something kept taking the panic and locking it away, leaving him with a vague sense of unease, clinging to the little bit of rationale he had left. 

Ratchet rolled his shoulders, and his fingers slipped away, grabbing a nearby datapad instead. A cable dangled from it, and Drift realized too slowly it was connected to a port in his side. His medical port, no less. What was it feeding him? 

“Dead,” Ratchet said, his tone shy of mournful. “A shame really. I had so many ideas…” He trailed off, something flickering in his optics as he sighed with regret. “I could have used the little one.” 

He glanced at the datapad before setting it back down. “That’s all right. I still have you.” 

A warm weight fell on Drift’s abdomen. 

Drift stilled as Ratchet’s palm slid down, over his array, and only then did he realize his panels were already open. He didn’t remember when it happened, as he was reasonably sure they’d been closed a moment ago. 

Now, he was acutely aware of the air tickling his naked equipment. His spike remained recessed, thankfully, but his valve was bare. A light brush of contact swept around the damp rim of it, teasing the sensitive derma. 

Drift quailed. 

“What are you doing?” he demanded, nausea twisting and churning in his belly, threatening the purge to rise once more. 

He tried to twist his hips away, and succeeded, but almost immediately, they surged back toward Ratchet’s fingers, as if he didn’t have complete control of his frame. His subconscious and his conscious battled over what he wanted. A pulse of need rippled through his lines, and his valve clenched, lubricant seeping out in a slow trickle. 

“I would have thought that were obvious,” Ratchet said as he slipped a finger into Drift’s valve, curling it just right to apply a firm pressure to the large, internal node directly inside his rim. 

Drift stifled a moan. His backstrut arched, pleasure licking up his spinal strut in bright bursts. He dragged in a panting breath, thoughts spinning, valve cycling down on Ratchet’s finger. 

No, two. He’d inserted another already and palpated inside Drift’s valve, gracing every node within reach. His thumb applied a light, circling pressure to Drift’s anterior node, smearing it with his own lubricant. 

“Why?” Drift gasped, head lolling back, more pleasure bursting through his lines, faster than he could fight. 

Nausea gripped his tanks. They roiled, while the pleasure twisted and coiled inside of him, threatening to swallow him whole. Purge rose up in his intake, then burned back down again before it spilled, as though that was beyond his control as well. 

“Because you’re mine,” Ratchet murmured. His free hand rested on Drift’s belly, sliding up and down, smoothly, soothingly, like Drift were a pet who needed reassurance. “You’re my special project. We’re going to have so much fun.” 

A third finger slipped into him, the noise of lubricant squelching around Ratchet’s fingers too loud in the medbay room. The rapid increasing beats of the spark monitor were shrill announcements in Drift’s audials. He panted, dragging in faster vent after faster vent, hips twisting and churning, riding Ratchet’s fingers. 

It felt… it felt good. He wanted more. 

He didn’t. 

But his frame demanded more. Drift whined and shuttered his optics, clamping his mouth shut. He gnawed on his glossa, bit it harder and harder, trying to focus on the pain more than anything else. 

The ecstasy chased it away. 

“Don’t fight it, pet,” Ratchet said, his voice coming from a distance and also, right in Drift’s ear, like a haunting lullaby he wanted to follow. “Give yourself to me.” 

Drift whimpered. 

His entire frame drew taut and snapped. He overloaded, thighs shaking, valve clamping down, rippling on Ratchet’s fingers as though trying to milk them for the transfluid they didn’t have. Lubricant flooded from his valve, dampening the berth beneath his aft. He could smell his overload in the air, a vile stink of ozone and hot lubricant. 

“That’s it,” Ratchet crooned, still fingering him, still rubbing over and over his anterior node, pushing the pleasure to the point of irritation. “Give it all to me.” 

“No…” Drift protested, his vents coming in sharper bursts, dizziness attacking the edges of his awareness. 

The spark monitor shrieked at them. 

Need clawed through his lines. He was sated. He’d overloaded. His valve clung to Ratchet’s fingers, gently massaging his nodes, extending his pleasure. But there was something in the pit of his tank, something that craved more. 

“Wonderful,” Ratchet said, his voice thick with praise. His fingers withdrew, dripping with Drift’s lubricant. 

Drift forced his optics open, his visual feed tainted by a haze. He watched Ratchet examine his fingers, head tilting left and right as though the sight of Drift’s lubricant fascinated him. He brought his hand closer, giving his fingers a tentative sniff, and a low growl rose in the medic’s engine. 

“This is an excellent start.” Ratchet grinned down at him, triumph glowing his optics. His free hand reached for one of the machines connected to Drift’s frame. “We’ll continue later.” 

Unconsciousness claimed Drift before he could get out a single word. 

~

He wasn’t in a prison cell. 

He onlined again, and his circumstances hadn’t changed. He was still in the medbay, still shackled to the berth, still attached to various bits of equipment and fluid lines. 

His panels remained open. Try as he might, he couldn’t convince them to close. His spike and valve were bare, his spike recessed, his valve twitching with every caress of cold air. The puddle beneath his aft was gone, the sticky lubricant wiped away as though someone had lovingly bathed him. 

The lights in the room were dimmed as if for recharge. The spark monitor beeped a constant rhythm. There was a tray near his left hip, and instruments on it occasionally gleamed, but he couldn’t make out what they were. 

He was alone. 

It didn’t last. 

The door opened, the lights brightened, and Drift squinted as his optics cycled down to avoid the glare. Ratchet came inside, a spring in his step, a grin on his face. Drift’s spark dropped down into his tank, the cold, gripping fear pushing at the back of his processor. 

“Did you have a nice stasis nap?” Ratchet asked as he all but bounced to Drift’s left side. He picked up the datapad plugged into Drift’s system, his finger sweeping over the screen. 

“How long was I out?” Drift demanded, and his vocals came out raspy as if from disuse. His mouth was dry and sticky. 

Arousal hummed at him on a subconscious level. He shifted on the berth, heat rising in his frame, valve beginning to slick as though the mere sight of Ratchet was enough to arouse him. 

“A few hours.” Ratchet tucked the datapad back by Drift’s hip and pulled the rolling tray closer, fingers dancing over the gathered instruments. “You are very beautiful, pet. But I think a little decoration is order. Perfection can always be improved.” 

He picked up something, but Drift had no idea what kind of device it was. Ratchet’s free hand moved between Drift’s thighs, and he cringed as he felt the cool brush of fingertips over his valve rim. Ratchet stroked him, humming in his intake, teasing his nub while arousal twisted and curled in Drift’s belly. 

He couldn’t move away this time. Sometime during his rest, restraining bands had been pulled across his frame. They pinned him down at the belly, across his hips, at his upper thighs, keeping his lower half immobile. 

Drift eyed the device in Ratchet’s hand and panic strobed through his spark. “What are you going to do to me?” 

“Not kill you, so don’t worry about that.” Ratchet’s fingertip rubbed over Drift’s anterior node in steadying circles, varying the speed and pressure, causing a wave of heat to flood Drift’s frame. “You are my pet now, and I take very, very good of my pets.” He licked his lips. 

Dread pooled in Drift’s belly. His tanks clenched as purge threatened to rise in his intake. His full tanks, he realized belatedly. One of the fluid lines in his arm must have been feeding him a steady drip of energon. 

He also noticed Ratchet didn’t answer the question. 

Lubricant trickled from his valve. Ratchet dipped his finger in the slick, swirled it around his rim, and then touched the tip of his recessed spike with it. 

“But I think I’m a fair mech, and I want my pets to be happy. So I’ll give you a choice.” Ratchet rubbed the pad of his finger over Drift’s spikehead, teasing the transfluid slit. 

Drift’s vents caught in his intake. Nausea warred with arousal. 

“Don’t,” Drift said, and it came out weak. Like he couldn’t get the refusal past a lump in his intake. 

“Spike or valve?” Ratchet asked as if he hadn’t heard Drift speak.

Drift shook his head, his frame starting to tremble. “I don’t…” 

“Both it is!” Ratchet declared. He continued to rub at the head of Drift’s spike, coaxing it from its sheath, until it emerged, half-pressurized, into Ratchet’s palm. 

“I’ll start with your spike first,” Ratchet said as he squeezed and pinched and rubbed Drift’s spikehead, sending surges of pleasure through his sensory net. 

Drift jerked, brought up short by the restraints. His hands curled into fists. His vents came in sharper bursts as his groin pulsed fire, feeding need into his lines. 

Ratchet cradled Drift’s spike with one hand. The other held a device, and this he brought closer. It gleamed in the bright lights, and Drift still had no idea what it was. 

“What is that?” he demanded. 

Ratchet didn’t answer. He was focused, intent on Drift’s spike, gripping it firm in one hand and bringing the head of it into range of the device. 

Drift panicked. The sparkrate monitor beeped faster, a cadence throbbing in his audials. He trembled, and wasn’t sure if it was from fear, or the unwanted arousal threading his lines. 

He watched, wide-opticked, as Ratchet fitted the head of his spike into the instrument. As he eased some thin, slick piece of metal into Drift’s transfluid slit. There was a sharp, immediate pinch, and if Drift hadn’t been restrained, he’d have jerked. 

Dull pain radiated through his groin. His spike sent damage warnings straight to his processor on a high alert. The device made a dull thunking noise and then Ratchet removed it. Drift’s spike throbbed, half with pleasure, half with the hot-white ache of a recent injury. 

There, in the head of his spike, a ring of metal winked back at him. It was a polished, dark gray shade, a perfect complement to his armor’s underlayer. 

“Beautiful,” Ratchet breathed. He flicked his finger over the ring, making it flop back and forth in Drift’s spike. “I knew this would suit you.” 

Pain radiated outward. It stung, even more so with the flick of Ratchet’s finger. Drift’s vents stuttered. His mouth moved, but he couldn’t seem to make any words emerge. They were strangled in his intake, his rapid vents overriding them. Lights danced in his optics, and it had nothing to do with the surgical brightness overhead. 

“Now for the rest!” Ratchet declared, gleeful.

Fingers brushed over Drift’s valve. He whined, tried to twist away, the medberth creaking beneath him without effect. His fans shrilled, spinning too fast. His spike throbbed and throbbed, the tiniest droplets of energon welling up around the ring. 

Ratchet refitted the piercing device with another ring and fondled Drift’s valve. He stroked the rim and the folds, he circled the nub over and over again, until Drift couldn’t decide if it was pleasure or pain. He pinched Drift’s nub, and Drift jerked, a gasp tearing from his intake. 

“You’re beautifully responsive, pet,” Ratchet said. “This will make you even more so.” He pinched Drift’s main node between two fingers, the pressure making Drift go taut with conflicting sensation. 

“Don’t,” Drift begged. 

Ratchet gave no sign he’d heard. He aimed the piercing instrument at Drift’s valve, fitted his nub around the pincers of it, wiggling a little to get the perfect angle. There was a moment of tense waiting, a sob caught in Drift’s intake, before a dull thunk echoed in the medroom. 

Pain lanced through Drift’s valve. He tasted energon as he bit his glossa, a hot slice of agony rippling through his groin, through his anterior node reawakening the throbbing fire in his spike. Optical fluid welled up around his optics, and he squeezed his shutters closed. Burning heat took up residence in his groin, specifically around his nub. 

Even more so when Ratchet plucked at the ring, giving it a wiggle. He hummed appreciatively. “Oh yes, quite lovely.” 

The tugs pulled on something deep within Drift’s array. His valve gave another squeeze of lubricant, his sparkrate increasing as arousal pushed a faster beat through his lines. The searing heat of the piercing morphed into the heat of pleasure, mingling with little spikes of pain. As if something deep within him was sucking in the pain, stirring it up, and spitting it back out as pleasure instead, muddying up the translation along the way. 

He honestly couldn’t tell the difference. 

“One more!” Ratchet declared. 

Drift moaned. 

There was a pressure at the caudal edge of his valve, where a smaller node was inset. Ratchet pinched it between thumb and forefinger, and Drift didn’t even have time to brace himself. The dull thunk preceded the flash of pain, and inexplicably, overload surged through him. 

He arched, twisting as little as he could in his bonds, a whining moan slipping from his intake. His processor spun. Lubricant spilled from his valve, dampening the berth beneath him again, soaking the new piercing, making his aft sticky. 

The piercing device returned to the tray with a clatter. Fingers petted over his swollen valve, which throbbed to the rapid beat of his spark, and felt hot and tender. 

Drift peeled his optics open. Ratchet loomed over him, hands moving over his frame, tugging on the ring around his spike, fondling the rings in his external valve nodes. Each piercing seemed to be connected to something deep in his groin, like a direct line to a pleasure nexus, because ecstasy swelled in him all over again. 

“Ssstop,” Drift slurred. It felt like the strength and energy were draining from him, slipping out through the pleasure building and building in his groin. 

Ratchet’s touches increased in earnest. He was focused on Drift’s array, fingers tugging and stroking and pulling, slicking themselves in Drift’s lubricant, painting streaks of it over his inner thighs and over his swollen spike and valve. 

Drift’s hips twitched in the tiniest of motions he was allowed, rocking into Ratchet’s touch, hunger in his belly for release. It was there. He wouldn’t have to reach for it. It would consume him whether he wanted it or not. 

It took him, spike and valve at once, nodes throbbing around their new metal decorations, spike pulsing across the ring adorning the slit. Transfluid spattered down, decorating his groin, the smell of ozone nauseatingly thick in the air. 

Drift gasped, vision streaking static around the edges. He tried to hold on to consciousness, but it slipped out of his grasp, and he slipped under once more. 

The embrace of dark was a welcome relief. 

~

Drift woke with a cry of pleasure on his lips, heat and fiery ecstasy ripping through his frame, arching away from the medberth beneath him, his thighs trembling. 

His optical shutters snapped open, the rest of his senses slower to follow. His entire frame rattled, and his head lolled about as he struggled to determine what was happening to him. His processor spun, the world around him streaks of heat and color and sound. 

Something was buzzing. Vibrating. A low drone. Slick, wet noises. Moist and quick and slow. Creaking, like cables tensing and a medberth rattling. A smell on his glossa, lubricant and ozone and transfluid. 

He was still on the medberth. He was still in the medbay. His hands were still shackled to the berth to either side of his head. His legs had been adjusted, feet pushed up, ankles bound to his thighs. Something forced his legs wide open, at the knees, baring his array.

Sensation slicked over his array. 

Drift rolled his gaze downward, struggling to focus, spying Ratchet between his legs. 

“There you are, pretty,” Ratchet purred, his lips shiny, glossa sweeping over them to lick it away. 

Shiny with lubricant. Drift’s lubricant. 

He bent forward, licked Drift’s valve, suckled on his anterior nub, tugging on the piercing with his teeth. Another shot of pleasure stole Drift’s vents. He gasped, wriggling in his bonds, unable to twist away, the berth creaking beneath him. 

Something prodded at his aft port, firm and slick, nudging inside, stretching the narrower rim of it. Something that buzzed and vibrated, sending a broader drone of pleasure through Drift’s sensor net. 

“Wh-wh-wh–” He stammered, unable to get out the question as Ratchet sucked hard on his anterior node and overload washed through his frame. 

His fans whirred so fast they screamed. His vents roared. Condensation gathered on his frame. His system warned him of overheating. 

“It’s a reward,” Ratchet said, and licked him, lapping up lubricant, slurping it noisily. 

Something pressed deeper into Drift’s aft. The buzzing intensified. 

“You’re such a good pet,” Ratchet murmured. His head dipped, denta tugging on the ring around Drift’s lower exterior node. 

He gasped, backstrut arching, processor twirling. His vision streaked static, his thighs shook so hard his cables ached. His optics rolled into the back of his head as he threw his head back, intake bared, struggling to catch his vents. 

A palm smoothed over his spike. He was hard, aching, dribbling from the tip. The ring gleamed at him. Ratchet gripped him, stroked him, firm and squeezing and perfect, like he already knew how Drift liked to be touched. 

He gasped, overloading within moments, a thin stream spurting from his spike. Drift gulped in several desperate draughts of air, warm and humid, his head spinning and spinning. 

Ratchet squeezed and worked him, as if milking him for every last drop. His mouth dropped back to Drift’s valve, licking and slurping and sucking on him with abandon. His field pushed at Drift’s, hot and sticky and tangling around his as if laying claim. 

The buzzing intensified, the vibrations harsh and angry against his sensitive nodes. Drift tossed his head back, a garbled shriek tearing from his intake to match the sharp throb of his groin as another overload stole his body. Torn from him violently, like a physical blow. 

His head spun. He couldn’t ventilate. His groin ached, and he wanted to twist away, but he couldn’t. Ratchet’s palm on his spike continued, squeezing and pumping, lubricant making it slick, but still painful. Drift didn’t know how he was still pressurized and leaking, but he was. 

Ratchet pinned his anterior node between his lips and denta. He tugged on the ring, sucked hard, and it burned. It seared like fire. It was more pain than pleasure, but somehow, it didn’t leave him be. It kept building and building. Lost in translation, pain went through a filter and emerged as ecstasy. 

“S-s-stop,” Drift moaned, his vocalizer crackling. “Please.” 

If Ratchet heard his pleas, he didn’t acknowledge them. He kept going, plunging something in and out of Drift’s aft, something that buzzed and stretched. Lips and denta devoured his valve, suckling hard on every node. Fingers gripped and tugged on his spike, his full groin swollen and throbbing, one big ball of confused arousal and agony. 

Another overload stripped him raw. He wanted to scream, but all he managed was a crackle of static. His entire frame seized, frozen, trapped in pleasure. 

He sank back into the dark. 

~

Either his chronometer was broken or deactivated. Drift couldn’t be sure anymore. He was certain time passed, judging by the fact he oscillated between consciousness and recharge. 

He didn’t know how long it had been. 

Rescue wasn’t coming. The Decepticons must have assumed he was dead. The way his shuttle crashed, no one could have survived. 

He was in the spark of the Autobot fleet. Everyone knew Ratchet was never far from Optimus Prime. If Drift was here with Ratchet, then he was definitely on Ark-One, the spearhead of the Autobot fleet. 

There was no rescue to be had. 

There was no escape. 

There was only this. There was only whatever Ratchet wanted from him, or death. And knowing Ratchet, death wasn’t much of an escape. 

He’d seen the shambling half-lives on the battlefield. Things that were dead but not. Things that bled weird, tainted energon, and kept going until you cut them into small enough pieces. Terrifying abominations of mechs torn apart and welded back together, mechs that couldn’t possibly transform. 

Drift didn’t want to become one of those monsters. 

He didn’t know if it was a mercy Ratchet wanted something different from him. The pleasure and the pain, mingling and twisting together. Waking to Ratchet touching him, prodding him, applying pleasure and twisting it with agony. 

He emerged from recharge hating Ratchet, searching with his optics for a way out. He tested his restraints. He eyed his surroundings. Every time he woke in a different position, he looked for weaknesses, anything he could work to his advantage. 

By the time he fell back into the darkness, he was confused. Dizzy. Drowning in pleasure. Craving more of it. Craving enough he was willing to beg Ratchet for release. Anything to cross that threshold and keep going, again and again and again and–

It got harder and harder to remember who he was. 

It got even harder to remember he was supposed to hate it. 

There was a fuzziness in his processor, and it got worse every time he onlined. Like a slow web was being strung between Then and Now, separating what he knew, from what he was becoming. 

He hated Ratchet. 

He wanted to be closer to Ratchet. 

He wanted to kill Ratchet. 

He wanted to draw Ratchet into his mouth and suck him dry. 

How long had he been here? Did it even matter? His tanks were never empty. His fluids were filled and drained and replenished on a schedule only the wealthy had ever enjoyed. His armor was always gleaming and polished. Whatever Ratchet harmed, he fixed. He was full of praise. 

Ratchet hurt, and he healed. 

Drift forgot there was supposed to be a difference between the two. 

~

Drift tried to go inward. To focus on something other than the fingers and the false spike pushing and prodding into his valve. He wanted to ignore the thick, nauseating scent of lubricant and arousal, the noise of fans spinning, and the steady drone of Ratchet’s voice.

It was probably meant to be reassuring. All it managed to do was ensure there was a continuous curdle of dread in Drift’s tanks.

Dread and the disorientating sensation of arousal that wouldn’t leave him be. It choked his lines and clogged his sensory net. It made him rock down and push up into Ratchet’s touch, his nodes throbbing and his valve spilling pulse after pulse of lubricant. His spike was pressurized and had been since Ratchet first began, however long ago it was.

Drift wasn’t sure. He tried not to watch his chronometer, tried not to watch time ticking away from him. Tried not to think about the impossibility of escape.

Protests burbled on his glossa, and were swallowed just as quickly. They wouldn’t be heeded. Why waste the energy?

Four fingers plunged into him, stretching the limits of his rim, which ached and burned, but yielded to the stretch. Drift wanted to quail away from it, but there was a shout in the back of his processor which demanded more, more, more.

“Whatever you want, pet,” Ratchet said, with glee in his voice.

It took that long for Drift to realize he must have moaned the last request aloud, and Ratchet had heard him. He’d taken the inadvertent plea for genuine desire.

Four fingers withdrew. Something else replaced them. Something that was thicker, broader, coming to a rough point.

Drift looked down, down the length of his angled frame, down at what he’d been attempting to avoid. Ratchet sat between his thighs, propped on a stool, Drift spread wide to accommodate him. His optics were aglow with lust, and he watched avidly as he eased his fingers into Drift’s valve. 

All of them. Four fingers and a thumb, drawn to an uneven conical point. Drift’s valve made an obscene noise as they slipped inside, his rim stretching, possibly tearing, burning like fire. 

Drift squirmed, but Ratchet’s free hand gripped his hip, kept him in place. He sucked in air through his denta, stars dancing behind his optical feed, as Ratchet’s hand moved deeper, catching at the widest point and stalling. His rim tugged and tugged against a catch on Ratchet’s plating. 

Lubricant made a moist, wet sound. Ratchet licked his lips, vents harsh and ragged, his field so hot and heavy with lust it overpowered Drift, knocking him for a loop. His own rose up to defend him, and was again barreled over by the onslaught. He swore he could taste the lust on his glossa. 

Ratchet pushed forward, applying a steady pressure, and then the widest part of his hand slipped inside. The rest went smoother. Bottom half of his palm. His wrist. A section of his lower arm. More of his arm. Midway to elbow. 

Ratchet paused. 

Drift panted. A thin whine peeled out of his throat. He felt impaled, stretched wide, valve throbbing and aching. Dizzy, his head lolled. His vents came in short gasps. Ratchet’s fingers moved inside of him, fingers palpating his inner nodes. 

Ratchet’s hand left his hip and flattened over his belly, fingers splayed wide, as though he could feel the bulge of his hand inside Drift’s valve. Within Drift, his fingers drew together in a tight fist, a thick bulge of plating. 

He started to move. 

Drift keened. 

Backstrut arching, armor clattering, thighs jerking in their restraints. Out. In. Out. Deeper. Grind, grind, grind against his ceiling node. 

Release ripped through his frame. Drift jerked and went taut, electric fire leaping out from under his plating, too sharp to be pleasureful. Searing, like the splash of a slag pit if you’re not too careful. 

Ratchet twisted his arm and ground, ground, ground his knuckles on Drift’s ceiling node. Again and again. Drift thrashed, writhing, another overload sweeping over him before he could cycle down from the first. His processor spun. He couldn’t catch a vent. 

It took him too long to realize the thin, whining sound came from his own intake. 

Lubricant dribbled out around Ratchet’s arm. Drift’s valve cycled tighter and tighter, grasping to Ratchet’s arm plating for node clusters that weren’t there. Need still twisted in his abdomen, roared through his lines. He’d overloaded twice and still wanted more. Wanted another. 

There was no going inward. There was no getting away from it. There was nothing but the strain of his frame, desperately seeking that next release. 

“Please,” Drift moaned, and not even he knew what it meant. His legs shook. His valve rippled, tried to suck Ratchet’s hand deeper, tried to feed pleasure from it. 

“Another?” Ratchet slowly slid his arm in and out, in and out. He leaned down, tip of his glossa wrapping around the ring in Drift’s anterior node and giving it a tug. 

Drift arched, caught on the edge, not quite tipping over. 

“Please,” he begged. “Please.” 

Ratchet’s field flooded with approval, washing over Drift, and something within him relaxed at the feeling of it. Ratchet was proud of him. Ratchet was pleased. 

The overload when it came this time was suffused with warmth. It washed over him like a slow, rolling tide, dragging him beneath the waves.

Ratchet’s approval followed him under. 

~

It was the first time he wasn’t shackled to the medberth. 

A thrill ran through Drift at the change. He slid to the floor and padded to the door. It didn’t open to him – locked, of course. 

Drift poked around the room. 

Previous days there had been trays of instruments, toys, equipment. This day, it was barren. No tables or trays. The cabinets had been emptied. It was desolate, all of the extra equipment removed. 

How long had he been in recharge? 

Where was Ratchet? 

Drift nibbled on his bottom lip and absently, his hand drifted down to his groin. His spike peeped from his sheath, and the gleam of the ring piercing the head of it caught his optic. He pinched it between thumb and forefinger, shivering as a little surge of pleasure coiled in his groin. 

He hadn’t had much opportunity to explore his new piercings. 

His fingers ventured lower, tentatively brushing over the rings through his nodes. They swelled at his touch, thickening with arousal, and Drift shivered again. He swallowed thickly, heat flushing through his lines. 

His valve slicked. 

Only then did he realize he didn’t have any panels. What should have been there to protect and conceal his array from prying optics, wasn’t. He couldn’t close his panels, couldn’t hide himself. He had no dignity, no privacy. 

Then again, he supposed he didn’t need it. Pets didn’t need privacy. 

A strange thought that. He was a free mech, but… not. He had a master. He had an owner. He was not his own.

Drift frowned, fingers on his valve, head tilting. There was a jarring dissonance in his processor. Lines drawn between two certainties were frayed or missing. 

No, he didn’t belong to Ratchet, right? He was his own mech. He was a Decepticon. He was Drift. He was important to Megatron, to the war. He wasn’t owned by an Autobot. He was… 

He was…

Drift licked his lips. He tugged on the ring around his caudal node, felt lubricant slick his fingertips and drip down, sliding toward his aft port. 

He needed to be filled, was what he was. 

Where was Ratchet? 

Drift looked up, toward the door, yearning. Why was he alone? Ratchet never left him alone so long before. Usually, he’d come back within moments of Drift waking. But here he was, unfettered, alone in the room, for longer. Or was it? His chronometer was broken, so he wasn’t sure anymore. 

The door opened. 

Drift’s attention snapped toward it. His thighs slicked with lubricant. A whimper tightened in his intake. He tugged on his anterior node ring. 

Ratchet stepped inside, and Drift licked his lips. 

“Morning, pet,” Ratchet said. 

Drift went to him, because there was a gnawing deep inside his belly that demanded he do so. He went to Ratchet, and he whined when Ratchet held his chin and bent to kiss him, soft and sweet. 

“Look at you, ready and eager,” Ratchet crooned. His free hand dipped between Drift’s thighs, coming up wet with lubricant. “I’m so happy to see that.” He slid a finger through the ring in Drift’s node and gave it a tug. 

Drift moaned. He swayed where he stood. 

He didn’t want this. He knew he didn’t want this. Shouldn’t want this. 

He couldn’t bring himself to move away. 

“You’re going to bend over the berth for me, aren’t you?” Ratchet asked as he tugged, tugged, tugged on the ring, and arousal twisted and coiled in Drift’s groin. 

His vents surged, drawing in thick draughts of air. “No,” Drift moaned, but it was weak, so weak. 

Ratchet chuckled. “Yes, you are.” He nipped Drift’s lip and tugged hard on the ring, sending a lance of pain through Drift’s groin. 

His knees buckled. Ratchet’s grip on his chin kept him mostly upright. 

“You’re going to bend over the berth.” 

Drift swallowed thickly. “Yes,” he whispered. 

“Good pet.” Ratchet patted him on the cheek and let him go. 

Drift turned and wobbled toward the medberth. Fire flashed in his groin with every step, the ring jostling through his node. But he bent over the berth, aft up, legs spread, letting the berth take most of his weight. His spike bumped against the side of the berth, and Drift couldn’t resist humping forward, rubbing the head of it over the soft fabric. It caught the piercing in delicious little tugs. 

Drift moaned, humped again, loving the delightful curl of pleasure winding through his spike. 

Ratchet’s hand landed on his lower back, rubbing up and down. The other prodded between Drift’s thighs, petting his valve before shifting. Lubricant-wet fingers circled Drift’s aft panel. 

“Open,” he said. 

Drift’s spark quailed with anxiety. It never occurred to him to disobey. 

Slick fingers circled his aft port before two of them plunged inside, briefly stretching and slicking him. Drift grunted, clutching at the covers, elbows tucked beneath him. 

“I should pierce you here as well,” Ratchet commented, almost offhand, as he rubbed the small panel separating Drift’s aft port from his valve. “You don’t need a cover here anyway.” 

No. Stop. Don’t. Words he thought but didn’t voice. He ground his denta, swallowed a moan, and tensed when Ratchet’s fingers vanished and a blunt pressure aimed at his aft port. Too little lubricant, hardly any stretching. This was going to hurt. 

But pain. Pain was expected. Pain was part of it. Pain meant pleasure, and pleasure was a good thing. Pleasure was release and overloads and sweet oblivion. 

Drift canted his hips upward, rising on the tips of his feet, presenting himself. 

Ratchet purred approval. “Good pet,” he said, and thrust, quick and deep, filling Drift immediately. 

Fire ripped through his aft port. Drift’s backstrut arched, and he thought he might scream, but it caught in his intake. His vents turned ragged. His knees buckled and without the berth, he might have collapsed. As it was, he went limp across it, dragging back with Ratchet’s retreat, and shoving forward with his harsh, claiming thrusts. 

Ratchet hissed with pleasure. “Perfect,” he said through his denta. “Just as I knew you’d be.” He thrust again, and again, harder and deeper, but no faster. Each stroke buried him to the hilt, and each withdraw barely counted as such before he plunged inside again. 

Drift moaned, an aching sound, because it hurt, it burned, but arousal twisted and coiled inside of him regardless. His valve rippled on nothing. His spike spat lubricant against the side of the berth. His port walls fluttered around the invasion, urging Ratchet deeper. 

“Please,” he begged, hands clawing the berth cover, backstrut arched, trying to crawl away from Ratchet while his frame simultaneously pushed backward, into each deep thrust. 

“Please what?” Ratchet asked. 

Drift was torn. 

Please stop. Please don’t stop. Harder. Stop. More. None. 

He fisted the cover until it tore, rutted forward, grinding his spike against the edge of the berth, the piercing catching and rubbing against it. His aft throbbed, aching and sore and hot, like fire, from no preparation and too little lubricant. 

He tried to speak, but the words wouldn’t come out. He choked on static and swallowed down the cries. 

He didn’t want this. He hated this. He needed this. He hated that he needed this. 

Ratchet smoothed his hands down, gripped Drift’s hips, yanked him hard into each thrust, pushed him back into the berth, banging him between two hard surfaces. He’d have scratches and dents. Ratchet would buff them out later. Clean him and wax him. 

What Ratchet broke, Ratchet fixed. He was a good master. 

No. 

Drift didn’t want that. He wanted. 

Escape. He wanted to escape. There was no escape. He couldn’t escape. He shouldn’t escape. He was where he was supposed to be. 

Oh, Primus. It felt good. It felt so good. 

Drift moaned. He didn’t know what kind of flavor it was. He bit into the berth to muffle his cries as Ratchet plunged into him again. And again. And again. Grinding deep, grinding hard, making him rut against the berth, soaking it with his pre-spill. 

His valve clenched on nothing. Drift craved to be filled. He wanted more, but he bit down on his glossa so as not to ask for it. He didn’t want to give Ratchet the satisfaction. He still had his pride. He was still himself. 

He was still a Decepticon. 

He was still Drift. 

He told himself this, even as he overloaded on Ratchet’s spike and spilled his transfluid against the side of the berth. Even as the pleasure stripped away his thoughts, leaving him with a desperate need for more. 

Ratchet couldn’t have him. 

He was still Drift. 

~

Warmth surrounded him, embraced him. 

Drift hummed as he onlined, sensation gradually trickling in, the scent of cleanser and oil tickling his nasal sensors. His optical shutters fluttered open. 

He was in an oil bath. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d been in something so luxurious. Someone was kindly rubbing a soft cloth over his frame, cleaning his nooks and crannies, while their free hand fondled his groin, teasing the head of his half-pressurized spike and occasionally dipping down to rub over his valve. 

Drift sighed a moan. 

Lips pressed a kiss to his nearest finial. “There you are,” Ratchet crooned, and Drift’s insides tightened with want. “I have a surprise for you, pet.” 

“A surprise?” Drift echoed. Distantly, there might have been something he was supposed to remember. Something about this situation that wasn’t quite right. 

It was there and gone again, like a wisp of smoke, when Ratchet cupped his valve and tugged on his caudal node piercing. Drift whimpered and rolled his hips against Ratchet’s palm, arousal threading a hungry need through his sensory net. 

“Oh, yes,” Ratchet breathed into his audial and went back to rubbing on Drift’s spike, coaxing it from his sheath, one finger looped into the piercing and giving it a little tug. “I want to feel this today. I want to feel you inside me, pet. I want to make you mine.” 

Drift leaned back against Ratchet, tucking his head into the crook of Ratchet’s neck. “I want that, too.” He licked his lips, rocking up into the tunnel of Ratchet’s fist, already imagining the tight heat of the medic around him. 

“Do you?” Ratchet’s other hand stopped cleaning him. It pressed flat to his chestplate, one digit tracing the seam concealing his spark chamber. 

Drift shivered, remembering what Ratchet had last done for him. The pleasure and the pain. The shocking agony washing away in the wake of pure bliss. It was reclamation, hot vents on a mark ages old, and pleasure usurping all else. 

A whine rose in his intake. 

“Yes, yes I do!” He clutched at Ratchet’s arms, drawing in heavy pants through vents that weren’t covered by the rich oil. “Oh, please, Ratchet. Please can I serve you?” 

A tiny voice whispered at the back of his processor. It was a language he didn’t know. It drifted away, smoke on the battlefield, gone in the wake of a hot pulse of need through his frame. 

Ratchet chuckled, the sound rolling through Drift’s audial. “I will grant you that boon, my pretty, pretty pet.” 

His hands vanished. 

Drift whimpered at the loss, scrabbling for him. But Ratchet dumped Drift from his lap, and Drift nearly plunged face first into the oil. He came up sputtering, struggling to get his feet beneath him. He wiped oil from his optics as Ratchet emerged from the bath with much more grace, oil dripping down his frame. 

Want surged through Drift’s lines. His discomfort didn’t matter. Only what Ratchet wanted from him. 

Ratchet crooked a finger. 

Drift scrambled to follow. 

Dignity! 

The word, screamed at him, made Drift reduce his haste. He cocked his head. The voice almost sounded familiar. The shout was a noise of desperation. It reminded him of something… something from a long time ago. 

“Drift!” 

Ratchet’s shout sounded much louder, much more important. 

Drift hastened to obey. 

He dripped oil as he followed Ratchet’s equally damp footsteps into an adjoining room. It was more like a lounge, with a few long and padded benches spread in the small space. 

Ratchet stood near one of them, and the moment Drift got into reach, Ratchet grabbed him by the jaw and pulled him into a kiss. Drift moaned, melting against Ratchet’s mouth, clutching to Ratchet’s side. His fully pressurized spike brushed over Ratchet’s upper thighs, need clawing from the pit of his belly to the twirl of his spark. 

“You are such a good pet,” Ratchet said against his lips. He bit down on Drift’s bottom lip, hard enough to draw energon. 

It stung, but less so when Ratchet licked away the bite, leaving his lip plump and swollen. 

“Lay down,” Ratchet said and gave Drift a little push toward the nearest lounge. 

He obeyed quickly. That voice at the back of his head shouted at him. It was like fists beating against a thick wall of transteel, a shadow moving on the other side of it. Drift side-eyed the strange presence, but then Ratchet was straddling him, Drift’s spike shadowed in the vee of his thighs. 

His valve was open. 

Drift’s optics widened. His hands rested on Ratchet’s hips as he hungrily eyed the dripping valve on display for him. Biolights blinked and fluttered. Swollen valve lips begged to be touched. Licked. Tasted. Worshiped. 

Drift’s mouth filled with lubricant. He wanted to lick Ratchet. He wanted Ratchet to sit on his face, smother him until he gasped for a ventilation. He wanted Ratchet to ride his mouth. He wanted Ratchet to take whatever he desired, so long as it came from Drift. 

He unconsciously bucked, the head of his spike gracing those swollen, dripping folds. Oh, he wanted inside. He wanted to taste Ratchet’s valve with his spike. 

Ratchet’s fingers wrapped around his wrists. Drew his hands up, held them together, pinned them over his head. He sank down, hips rolling over Drift’s spike, painting it in lubricant. 

His free hand drew a cable. The end of it was dull from repeated use. 

“Open your port,” Ratchet demanded. 

Drift obeyed. His dorsal panel snapped open, revealing his main cabling port, the most direct access he had to his systems short of a processor plug. 

“Good pet.” Ratchet’s approval washed over him. 

Drift moaned and writhed beneath him. He waited, expectant, until Ratchet plugged into him, and almost immediately, the medic’s presence butted up against his firewalls, demanding permission. 

“Let me in, pet,” Ratchet said. 

Don’t! 

The scream made Drift jerk. His optics snapped wide. For a moment, he tugged on Ratchet’s hold, but the fingers tightened in warning. His wrist armor creaked at the sudden pressure. The pain sucked air into his vents. 

Don’t!

The voice shrieked at him, panicked and desperate and terrified. For a moment, something broke through the dark, shadowy place Drift didn’t want to poke. There was an inkling of clarity, the tiniest glowing ember. If he touched it, maybe that feeling of wrongness would be explained. 

Maybe–

Ratchet sank down on top of him, taking his spike in one fell swoop. Pleasure rocketed through him and Drift’s backstrut arched, processor going static-white with ecstasy. 

The voice vanished, erased. 

Drift relented, and Ratchet stormed inside of him. 

“Yes,” Ratchet hissed as he rose and fell on Drift’s spike, riding him with abandon, taking him in harsh drops, grinding down on Drift as if he were a toy for Ratchet’s amusement alone. 

Because he was. 

He took Drift’s spike, and he plundered Drift’s processor, filling him out until Drift felt claimed within and without. The voice was gone. The presence was gone. The tiny bit of light winked and snuffed out, surrendering to the black. 

Drift gasped like he’d emerged from drowning. He planted his feet on the lounge and started thrusting up into Ratchet, seeking his release with single-minded intensity, seeking to pleasure Ratchet as he best knew how. 

“Good pet,” Ratchet praised. “Good.” He left the cable connecting them, swaying with their movements. His palm flattened on Drift’s chestplate, over his spark seam. “One last thing, pet. Open for me.” 

It never occurred to him to disobey. 

What Ratchet wanted, Drift would give. 

His chestplate split down the seam, a y-shape, and slide aside, revealing his spark casing. He spiraled it open without Ratchet having to ask, until the medic’s hand could dip into his chest, press into the first layer of his spark corona. 

A moan caught in Drift’s intake. He tossed his head back, hip juttering up into Ratchet, ecstasy rattling through him. 

“Your spark is in my hand,” Ratchet said, his optics aglow as he pushed his fingers deeper, into the secondary layer, and the pleasure started to edge into pain. “But you’ll let me do whatever I want, won’t you, pet?” 

“Yes,” Drift moaned. He shuddered, feeling as though he was going to rattle through his armor. 

Ratchet chuckled, the sound of it rolling through Drift’s audials. He sank down on Drift and rested there, rocking his hips, stirring Drift’s spike within him. His fingers sank further, into the tertiary layer, nearly touching the very core of Drift. 

“If I wanted this, I could have it, couldn’t I, pet?” Ratchet asked, and his valve clamped tight, rippling around Drift’s spike, milking him. 

Agony clutched his chassis, his spark, stole his vents. But his hips kept pumping upward, kept grinding against Ratchet’s valve ceiling, ecstasy coiling and tightening in his groin. Release was a nanite’s breadth away. 

“Yours,” Drift gasped out. 

“Yes,” Ratchet purred, and his fingers curled around the edges of the core of him, casting shadows from the light of Drift’s spark over his face. “Yes, you are.” 

Ratchet squeezed. 

Drift convulsed. 

Charge surged and spat across his body in an electric wave. He didn’t so much overload as he shattered, spike spurting, body seizing. He only distantly felt Ratchet overloading on top of him, valve spooling down tight. The rest was ecstasy, boiling up and through him, whiting out all else. 

It hurt. It didn’t. It felt good. It didn’t. 

There wasn’t a difference anymore. 

Ratchet flexed his fingers, and Drift gasped, thrashing beneath Ratchet, darkness creeping around the edges. 

The voice was silent. It had nothing left to say. 

“Good pet,” Ratchet purred, kissing him, swallowing down the sound of Drift’s sobs. He hadn’t realized he was weeping until then. 

He thought he’d lost something. It might have been important once. It wasn’t anymore. There wasn’t anything that could possibly be important. 

There was only Ratchet. 

And then there was nothing at all. 

~

Drift onlined slowly, luxuriously. A soft sound left his lips as he stretched and rolled over in his berth, pulling himself off the plush surface. He fought back a yawn, rolling his neck to stretch out the kinks. He felt good, achy, but in the pleasant way. 

He slipped down from the berth, feet hitting the floor as he glanced around. The room had changed, he realized belatedly. He wasn’t in his room in the medbay anymore. These better resembled personal quarters. They were far more plush, stocked, and had personal items scattered about. 

Ratchet’s private quarters, he surmised. 

There were two doors. Drift cocked his head as he examined them from afar. Ratchet had left no clue as to his whereabouts. It was odd to wake without Ratchet, and his spark screamed at him to find the medic as soon as possible. He needed to be wherever Ratchet was. 

There was a distant sound of shrieking. 

Drift’s lips curved and he turned toward the door where the sound seemed to be coming from. It opened without him having to press a single button – perhaps it was keyed to his spark. The screaming became louder, and he stepped through it into the medbay. A back entrance then. 

Drift followed the screaming down a short hall, passing several medrooms. They were of no interest to him, so he didn’t look inside. He only cared about Ratchet. 

He’d left a puddle behind him, he’d realized. Lubricant slowly gathered in his valve, dripping down. Without a panel, there was nothing to catch it. His spike peeped out of the sheath, not fully extended, but enough. He reached down, absently rubbing his palm over the rounded tip, giving the ring a little tug. 

He swallowed a low groan. Primus, that felt good. 

He made himself stop. It was up to Ratchet if he’d get more. 

“I don’t want it!” 

“If you didn’t want a new arm, you shouldn’t have destroyed the old one.” 

Drift’s spark perked. A small smile curved his lips as he caught Ratchet’s voice, and he rounded the corner to find another hallway, this one with two operating rooms, one to each side of the corridor, before it continued on. One was dark, the door closed. The other was brightly lit, the door open. 

Ratchet and some other mech were inside. The room looked very similar. Almost like the room Drift had spent so much of his time in recently, except flipflopped. He glanced back across the hall. Was that his old room?

No matter. 

Drift slipped into the operating theater as sparks flew up from the mech on the table. He screamed, another long and thin wail, before he abruptly went still and quiet, optics dim. 

Not dead, judging by the field Drift could still detect. 

Pah. What a wimp. 

Ratchet, however. 

Drift’s spark sped up in rhythm. His spike pressurized further as more lubricant slicked the inside of his thighs. 

Ratchet was amazing. His fingers moved with such dexterity and skill. Drift flushed as he remembered how they moved inside of him, touching all of his nodes, bringing him to overload so easily. He could bring pain, too, with the same amount of ease. But pain was also good. Pain made him feel. 

Pain was ecstasy. 

Drift’s engine purred. 

He pressed to Ratchet’s back, wrapping his arms around the broad medic, his palms splaying over Ratchet’s belly. One slid slowly down, to Ratchet’s groin, circling over his closed panel. His half-pressurized spike grazed over Ratchet’s warm, sending another surge of want up Drift’s spinal strut. 

“Hello, my pet,” Ratchet purred, delight and appreciation in his tone. “Recharge well?” 

“Lonely,” Drift replied. He nuzzled Ratchet’s backstrut before sliding around, tucking himself under Ratchet’s arm. “Missed you.” He rocked against Ratchet, letting a needy noise rise in his intake. 

Ratchet chuckled, but it wasn’t an angry sound. He patted Drift on the aft. “Don’t worry. I’ll pay you attention soon enough.” 

“Now?” Drift asked, his fingers flirting over Ratchet’s panel, feeling the heat beneath. His mouth filled with lubricant. “I could lick you?” He dropped his vocals into a deeper register. “You could hurt me.” 

Ratchet flicked off the welder with his free hand and gave Drift more of his attention. The hand on Drift’s aft reached down, pressing between his thighs, drawing fingers over his valve, slicking them with lubricant. 

Drift moaned and rocked down on them, but they were gone too quickly. Ratchet took his hand back and painted Drift’s lips with his own lubricant. 

“I will,” Ratchet promised as Drift licked his lips, then Ratchet’s fingers clean, savoring the taste of his own slick. “But later, pet. I’ve got to finish this first.” 

Drift sucked on Ratchet’s fingers, cleaning every nook and cranny of his own lubricant. He let him slide free with a pop, and Ratchet stroked his mouth again before taking his hand back. 

“But my, you are a tempting pet. I did a very good job with you.” Ratchet activated the welder again, using both hands now to guide it to his patient’s open shoulder joint. 

Drift peered around Ratchet’s frame at the mech on the surgery table, curiosity tilting his head. “Who’s that?”

“No one important,” Ratchet said brightly. 

No, Drift supposed he wouldn’t be. The mech had a Decepticon badge on his chest. In a past life, Drift might have recognized him. Runa-something maybe. It didn’t matter. He was Ratchet’s now. Not to keep, because that’s what Drift was for, but to experiment on for sure. 

Drift rubbed a palm over his own chestplate. He had an Autobot badge, he realized. He didn’t think he had it yesterday. Ratchet must have given it to him last night. He’d finally earned it. 

The thought filled Drift with pride. He leaned against Ratchet, content to watch as the medic methodically worked on his new experiment. Absently, Drift traced the new badge on his chest. 

He was an Autobot now. But more than that, he belonged to Ratchet. 

Drift smiled. 

***

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