Protect

[niyazi-a.livejournal.com]

PG
IDW: mid-Drift series, issue 1
Wing, Drift, aliens
spoilers for issue one. First line of alien’s dialogue and some actions issue 1
tformers100 Table: Talent Prompt: Protect

 

Wing had opened the entire first rank of cells before he realized Drift wasn’t with him. Hadn’t he explained the plan well? Drift was supposed to keep them back while Wing freed the captives.  Then, they’d go for the ship.  Where had he gone?    

The choice was no choice.  The prisoners, alas, would be no worse off than they were before, just…unsaved.  Drift, however, would get himself injured, possibly killed, and it would all be Wing’s fault. 

Wing spun on his heel, dashing off with one last apologetic glance at the captives still in their force-barrier cells, tossing something about the freed ones freeing the others before racing after the strange Cybertronian.  My fault. My fault.  It seemed to pulse through his systems, echo through his footfalls as his toeplates dug into the tan soil.  The ship.  Drift must have gone after the ship.  Wing pounded toward the far side of the small canyon.  Please don’t be too late. Please don’t be captured. Or dead.

He skidded around the corner just as one of the taller, thinner aliens ordered one of the larger enforcers to flip over what Wing initially took for a pile of scrap metal.  No.  Oh, no.  Purple energon splattered the frame, obscuring its original color, darkening the ground beneath in a large puddle.

Wing felt as if…as if something had burst a hole in his chassis, a soundless sound, like a hiccup, bursting from his vocalizer.  He couldn’t imagine the pain Drift was in.  My fault, my fault. Every last bit of it.

“Well, well,” Wing heard the words float over to him, the lean alien stacking its hands on its hips. “A Decepticon.”  It leaned over. “How…interesting.”

Wing shuddered at the tone, at what it implied.  No. He had to stop this. No matter the cost or risk to himself. 

The alien straightened, his head whipping back toward the bank of cells, eyes unfocused the way they did when one was concentrating on a mission communication.  “What? Escape! Preposterous!”  He turned to the enforcer, waving at Drift’s form. “Take him to a cell, and notify me when—if—he becomes functional. He may prove useful.” 

The enforcer nodded, scraping Drift’s battered form off the ground, the legs dangling limp, nerveless.  Wing hated the hesitation he must use, to wait for the right moment. Always the right moment to attack. It was the hardest lesson to learn with the blades—not just the physical motions of attack, the how;  but that strange, uncanny sense of when. 

The enforcer lugged the frame as though it weighed nearly nothing, grunting things Wing guessed were curses, glaring in dismay as the purple drops trickled down his legs.  Every klik of waiting was an added agony  for that, for the dimness in the optics, the cracked and brittle metal. 

And finally, the enforcer was alone, and distracted, juggling Drift’s limp body as he tried to punch in a code to open one of the cells. 

Wing dashed up behind, within striking distance. “Give him to me,” he said, “And I’ll let you live.” 

The enforcer turned, clumsy for all his strength, to find a pair of blue blades, one aimed at his throat, the other for the joint of an elbow.  His eyes went to pinpricks, hostile.  He straightened his elbows, Drift’s body dropping heavily to the ground.  A distraction, and Wing knew it, forcing himself not to look down, not to try to gauge Drift’s status.

The enforcer swung one fist at Wing’s head, the mass whizzing over Wing’s head as he ducked under, stabbing up one blade to bite into the wrist.  The alien howled, stomping in pain and anger, recoiling for another blow, this one vertical, straight down from overhead. 

Wing dodged again, this time swiping in for a hamstring.  Grim work, but effective.  Better than killing for all the pain it caused—disabling, neutralizing.  The enforcer staggered to one knee, blood welling out from the cut, his face livid.  One hand clawed for Drift’s downed form, as if to make a weapon or shield of it.  Wing darted in, driving down with his blade, severing the hand, his audios blanking from the agonized roar from the enforcer. 

“Yield,” Wing said.  “Or I finish the task.”

The enforcer snarled, swiping wildly with his stump, flinging the liquid in Wing’s face, pushing up on his one good leg to try to barrel into Wing. 

Wing sidestepped. That, then, was the enforcer’s choice. Wing swung in again, this time bringing both plasma blades down in a parallel arc, slicing deeply into  the neck.  He had to hurry.  The captives he’d freed would not occupy the others forever.  He hadn’t intended that the beings he’d freed become a distraction, a combat tactic, but that’s what they’d become. He had to honor their sacrifice by making good use of it.

Blood boiled from the wound, the alien pawing wildly at the air, as if to catch the blood and force it somehow back inside the wound, toppling over with force enough to shake the ground.  But Wing had already turned, knowing a death blow when he saw one, dropping to one knee by Drift’s damaged frame.

“Drift,” he said, quietly, desperately, not letting his optics roam, not letting his processor speculate, but concentrating on gathering the limbs, pulling Drift against him. “I’m sorry.  I’ll make it right, as right as I can. Please,” he risked a look into the shattered red optics, “please don’t die.” 

He fired his engines, leaping into the air, his wings spreading to slice the night’s coolness, clutching Drift to his chest, arms pressing the shoulders against his, the hips under his.  After a moment, he flipped, so that gravity assisted keeping Drift’s weight on top of him, instead of sliding the slippery energon-slick mass from his grasp.  He tore through the night, aware he was shredding the rules of his people, the rules that had kept them safe and hidden. Hidden and safe, as though the two words were merely synonyms.

Perhaps they’re not, he thought. 

And they would resist, would not even want to look at Drift, much less repair him.  Wing would make them understand.  This was his fault, and he had a debt deeper than honor to Drift.  “Don’t worry,” he murmured into the battered helm. “I’ll make them understand.” It was the force of an oath, witnessed only by the night.  You are mine, he thought, the dark air wrapping around them like a blanket of stars. I endangered you, I saved you.  I will protect you.  Always. I’ll make them understand.

The stars above him seemed to glimmer, knowingly.

 

Comments

[gatekat.livejournal.com]

A very good expansion of the comic. I can picture it flawlessly as extra panels in the scene.

[chibirisuchan.livejournal.com]

Is this how Drift ended up with Wing in the first place? It would fit, I think. :D Some mechs and their knight in shining armor complexes...

(and now I can just see Wing trying the 'he followed me home *cough* okay with a lot of help and maybe I was kind of carrying him but anyhow, can I keep him?' line on Dai Atlas. Who, at least in my head, is very good at the Skeptical Eyebrowing. XDDDD)

[anavidbookworm.livejournal.com]

This was lovely. You captured Wings pure spirit perfectly. Only he could take responsibility for Drifts decisions even before they really knew each other.