Progress

[niyazi-a.livejournal.com]

NC-17
IDW, mid Megatron Origin
Mirage/Megatron
sticky, dub/non/some kind of hard to qualify consent issue. OH and if you like fanon Mirage? Steer clear of this one.
Note: Roman gladiators were often solicited for sexual favors. Clench has a tidy business for his Arena fighters.

 

Megatron winced. The repair techs were the best—allegedly—Clench could find. They definitely were better than the ones he’d had the misfortune of encountering in the mines. Still, that did not mean they took special care to be gentle.

The tech saw his grimace. “Maybe next time try harder not to get half your leg blown off, hey?”

“It wasn’t by choice.” A lucky hit. Or unlucky: Megatron had made that mech pay dearly for it, fighting, even as he’d staggered in pain.

“Yeah. Lucky you’re a big name, or you’d be waitin’ over there with the other limb replacements.” He gestured with a tool toward the floor, disabled gladiators, slumped in puddles of energon. Waiting, patiently or not, it didn’t matter. They were second string.

Megatron didn’t know how he felt about that. He fought hard, harder than most. He won. Did that make him better?

Whatever answer he might have come up with was cut short by the arrival of Clench. The Arena owner stood in the doorway, optics scouring the scene, nodding, as though ticking off a roster. His gaze lighted on Megatron. He came over. “Estimate on finishing the repairs?”

The tech shrugged. “Semi-cycle for the basics. Wouldn’t send him back into combat without some functionality runs.”

“Those can wait.” Gold optics came, finally, to Megatron’s face. “Got a job for you.”

Megatron frowned. “I do enough.”

Clench let his optics rake down the damaged frame. “Repairs are expensive. Especially the kind you rate.”

Megatron looked down at his leg, the repair tech carefully soldering in the new circuits, tiny blue sparks scattering from the small torch. “What kind of job?”

“Does it matter?” Clench cocked his head. “It’s an easy job. He asked for you, specifically.”

“Me. Why?”

A sharp laugh. “Because he likes what you can do.”

Megatron shook his head. “I’m not a thug. Fighting in the Arena—they take the same chances I do. They know what can happen.” His optics flicked to the damaged mechs, squatting along the room’s edges.

Clench shook his head. “Nothing like that.” He handed over a small tablet. “Nav guide. Take you there and back. Trackable.” A hint of a barb in the last word: we’ll be checking up on you. The dark head turned to the tech. “He’ll need a bolt as well.”

“Bolt.” Megatron pushed up to sitting as the tech nodded, laying down the torch. The tech headed off to a supply cabinet.

“Relax,” Clench said. “Look on the navvie. You’re going uplevel. Way uplevel. Bolt’s just your pass.” He shrugged. “No good if you get stopped by the level guards, right?” Another too pointed comment.

Yes, Megatron remembered the level guards, controlling access as though the gates to upper levels were the gates to paradise.

No one ever guarded the entries down.

He shifted, uncomfortably, but held his left wrist out as the tech came back, a small black device in his hands. The guard reached for his drill, and in a matter of moments had punched the bolt through Megatron’s armor. The bolt sat, a small lump, on the top of his wrist. Megatron flexed his wrist experimentally. The bolt didn’t impede movement. Didn’t even register as weight, really. So why did it make him feel…burdened?

“On?” Clench asked the tech. The tech nodded. “Good. Give him a good polish and wax before you—you know what? Never mind.” He exchanged some look Megatron didn’t understand with the techie. “Client likes ‘em a little dirty.”

[***]

Megatron followed the navvie with an obedience that grated, but the address on the tablet was high in the upper levels, and he’d never, he admitted, have navigated the level gates, the tramways, and the paths without its help. In a mine, he had an uncanny sense of direction, but above ground, he was useless, as though too much air and light—and it was airier and lighter the farther up he went—blinded him.

Other mechs kept away from him, their gazes ranging from wary to curious, the level guards checking and double checking the bolt. His stained, besmirched armor got more and more out of place as he went, and he could feel their optics burn against him as he turned away. Those same gazes slipped, as if greased, when he turned. He felt something almost like relief when the navvie beeped that he’d arrived, the lift doors opening to a vestibule larger than the barracks he’d recharged in in the mines.

The floor was polished to a gloss and rang like bells at his footsteps, different tones per tile, the walls inlaid with some exotic pearly mineral. On the far end, metal beads of various sizes rolled down a slight incline. Megatron stepped closer to investigate. There seemed to be no purpose to it, just…beads of gold and silver and gunmetal rolling down the slope. Odd.

Motion caught his gaze, and he whirled, seeing only his own reflection on the floor. From that angle he looked massive, imposing, and the shine on the floor was sharp enough that he could see the dents and scrapes on his legs, the spattering of energon.

He didn’t fit in here. He didn’t belong. It was obvious, even to him.

“Ah,” a voice, like silk, from one of the doorways. “You’ve arrived.”

Megatron turned. A blue mech, smaller than he was, armor polished to a fine sheen, almost chatoyant, something Megatron had never seen before. It made his movements fascinating to watch, light seeming to melt into him as he moved.

“Do you like that?” The blue mech moved closer, hips swaying. “I find it soothing.”

Soothing. Megatron gave an uncertain nod. He could feel the blue optics studying him, blue from blue, as though the whole color was energy and movement.

“Come,” the mech said. “You must be tired.”

Megatron was about to demur—he’d fought more tired than this. He’d mined more tired than this. But the blue mech turned, with a coy toss of his head, and headed back to the doorway he’d come from. Megatron followed, ducking under the lintel, feeling clumsier, bulkier than he had ever felt before.

The mech turned, gesturing for him to take a seat. The room seemed, like the other one, almost as if it had no other function than to serve as a setting for the living sapphire jewel of the mech in front of him. If the first room was dazzling and confusing, this was a dozen times moreso: different colored lights played across one corner of the room, in the center of a table in front of him was a bowl carved from solid energon, the deep, almost blue-purple kind. Megatron tilted his head, stretching one hand over the bowl, staggered by how much it must have cost. Energon…and made into some ornament? It defied all sense and logic.

“You like that?” The mech stepped closer, holding out a silicate cup holding purified energon, so pure it was nearly clear. Megatron could smell the fumes, tart and potent, even as he took it in his hand.

“Interesting,” Megatron managed. He turned, as if prompted, to take the seat on the near side of the table. It was not scaled to his height: his knees jutted up higher than his hips. The mech smiled, and the absurdity of his posture scalded Megatron. He took a sip—a gulp, really—of his energon. It burned its way down his intake, peppery and sharp.

“I suppose I should introduce myself.” The mech smiled. “Mirage. Perhaps you’ve seen me.”

Megatron shook his head. Mirage did not seem like he’d do well in the circles Megatron knew.

The smile sharpened. “I’ve seen you fight.” His optics grazed a smear of energon down Megatron’s forearm, as
Megatron shifted the cup between his hands, careful to calibrate down so as not to shatter the fragile substance. “You’re very good.”

“High penalty for failure,” Megatron muttered. Worse than just waiting squatted along the walls in the repair fac.

“I imagine,” Mirage said, leaning back, resting one ankle on the opposite knee. He took a delicate sip of his own drink. “How did you get into that,” his optics flickered in something like a wink, “line of work?”

Megatron felt something bristle inside him. Needlessly defensive, he thought. Too much time in the Arena, to be snarling at shadows and innocent curiosity. “Not by choice,” he said, guardedly.

“Really?” Mirage leaned closer. “Because you’re very good at it. A natural.” Another skim of the optics over his armor. Megatron stiffened, too well aware of his own battered, dented, stained frame, next to Mirage’s sleek polish.

Megatron fought a twitch. “I don’t think anyone’s a natural at killing.” He balked, memory washing over him: the mining outpost, how quickly, how easily it had come to him. Almost an accident. No. It was an accident. He had not enjoyed it. Still didn’t.

“Well, I’d hope not,” Mirage said, a chiming laugh ringing around the room. “Danger to an orderly society.” He studied Megatron over the rim of his glass. “You’re not drinking. Do you not like it?”

Megatron gulped a large swallow. “Fine,” he murmured. “It’s fine.” His optics skated around the room, the purified, too-potent energon blazing over his systems, fuzzing and sharpening the edges of objects. He didn’t like this. The mech had too many advantages. That’s not how you won a fight. Time, he thought, to take the initiative. “Why am I here?”

A sleek smile Megatron couldn’t read. “Why, to have a good time. Of course.”

Not the answer he’d been expecting. Even less when Mirage suddenly leaned forward, running two elegant fingers up his forearm, the tapered digits light and skimming over Megatron’s heavy armor. As though he had a right.

“Are you having a good time?” Mirage purred up at him, and suddenly the bright blue optics were right in front of his, under his guard, and then the mouth, warm and soft, closed over his. Megatron started backward, jerking away from the contact. He pushed to his feet, bumping against Mirage in his haste, his hands trying desperately not to crush the fragile glass in his hand.

“Playing shy, are you?” Mirage laughed, that sweet crystalline chime. “Really. You don’t need to for me. I know what I paid for.”

“What did you pay for?” Megatron’s voice, hard, optics blazing.

“You.” A hand, glossing over his hip. “For the night.”

The realization struck Megatron like a hammer. Clench. Had sold him. Not a job. Not an errand. Him. His fists clenched. “There’s been a misunderstanding,” he said, dentae gritted. He pushed past Mirage, heading toward the door.

The blue mech stumbled back, barely catching himself from falling. The blue-purple bowl of crystal energon rocked on the table as he caught at it for balance. “The misunderstanding is yours.” The voice was brittle, now. Still crystalline, but like a sliver now, fine and sharp enough to cut.

Megatron paused in the doorway. “I’ll talk to Clench. You’ll get your money back.” His mouth flattened in distaste.

The voice, even colder. “It’s not about the money, Megatron.”

“I’m not for sale.”

“Rather ironic scruples, don’t you think?”

Megatron whirled. “No. I don’t think they are.”

The blue optics tilted. “You hurt—you kill—others. You inflict pain, but don’t give pleasure.” A smirk. “A little odd, don’t you think?”

Words failed Megatron. He felt this was abhorrent, knew it on a level that his entire frame revolted at the thought, but the reasons, the explanations, wouldn’t come. “None of your concern,” he said, turning back toward the door, hand reaching for the navvie.

Mirage barked out an alphanumeric string and Megatron felt a burn along his left wrist, as though something smoldered. It spread up his arm, swiftly, like wildfire over his frame, and he barely had time to turn, red optics blazing with outrage and fury, before his entire mobility system locked down.

The blue mech sidled over, even his strides silky and elegant. “You don’t understand,” he said. “I bought you. For the night.” A hand, again, up his thigh, fingertips flirting at the gap where it joined the pelvic frame.

Megatron felt his core heat rise, the touches sending feathery waves over his sensornet. The lockdown was to his mobility only; his sensory systems worked fine. It was the bolt. The damn bolt. He felt a cold fury build in him. Clench. He’d thought the Arena owner was unscrupulous. He wasn’t aware—had been too naïve—to know how deep that went.

The other hand joined the first, coming around the front, cupping Megatron’s pelvic span, sliding underneath to the interface panel. “It’s all right that you’re angry,” Mirage murmured, leaning forward to lick the bevel of Megatron’s chest plate. “I do like it a little rough.”

Megatron growled, his vocalizer expelling the last of its charge in the emotion. Mirage purred. “That’s what I like to hear, you know. Nice to find a mech with a little…spirit.”

Spirit. Spirit was the last thing Megatron would call it. Fury, mortification, outrage, violation, violence.

“Now,” Mirage said, reaching up, pulling himself onto his toes to kiss Megatron’s frozen mouth, “I’m going to release you. And you’re going to behave.” A statement of fact, not a question, or request. As if he simply…ordered the universe. No fear, no concern. Completely assured of his control. Megatron had never felt
that self-assured, even after a victory. In Megatron’s world, it could all fall apart at any instant. Risk,
death, defeat were always lurking in the shadows of the future. Mirage, like this room, seemed immune to shadows.

Megatron couldn’t say anything, having expended the charge in his vocalizer in that rash growl. He had no choice but to hang, frozen, in his fury until Mirage stepped back, optics giving a hungry scrape down Megatron’s frame, and drawled the release code.

Charge burst across the capacitor gaps, prickling Megatron’s frame back to stinging life. His ventilation system gave a sharp inward gasp of cooling air, his vocalizer hissing static. His optics blazed red rage.

Mirage’s matching gaze was quenchingly blue and cold. “I can, of course, simply lock you down until the time I paid for is up.” He cocked his head. “I could have fun with you that way.” He jutted his lower lip, contemplating. “It’s not too late. I could invite some friends over. Enjoy our new sculpture.”
Megatron felt his own mouthplates grind together. He had no doubt—not anymore, not with what he’d seen and been through—that Mirage would do that. And he, reduced to an object, a decoration, a…humorous piece, like some social commentary made real. Entertainment for the rich.

It cast his role as a gladiator into an entirely new light, one that cut ugly and unflattering shadows.

He strode to Mirage, his large hands clamping over the gracile shoulders. He snarled down at the smug face turned up to him. “This what you want?” He squeezed at the shoulders, hauling Mirage closer, smashing their mouths together. Mirage squirmed as Megatron pushed in farther, past the lipplates, glossa forcing, invading. Mirage’s engine revved, the sound lust made audible. Mirage’s hands cupped forward around his elbows.

Megatron tore his mouth away, his own interface systems booting on, his spike signaling readiness. Mirage gave a throaty laugh, burying his face, warm from the contact, in Megatron’s collar armor, hooking an ankle around Megatron’s heavy greave. “That’s more like it,” Mirage murmured, his armor sending silky contacts against Megatron’s.

I’m in control, Megatron thought, knowing it was a lie. Mirage was, and beyond him, Clench. And before Clench, the Company. All and each had manipulated him, convincing him, in their own way, that he was content, that he wanted the pittance they handed him. They had dictated his desires to him.

And he was helpless against it.

Mirage’s hand slipped down between them, fingertips raking over the interface hatch, his murmur rolling into a fierce, edged laugh. The laughter riled Megatron—as the hatch slipped open, his spike stabbed into Mirage’s hand. Megatron hauled the smaller mech up off his feet, sweeping him down to the beautifully polished floor. He could see the reflection of his own face as he loomed over Mirage, his own hand raking down the satiny armor, hand roughly spreading to part the thighs. He saw the snarl of anger, the hunted optics, staring up at him from the polished floor, even as Mirage squirmed on the ground beneath him.

He tore his gaze to the cool blue optics, the smirk edged with lust, and he drove his spike into the valve wanting nothing more than to blunt the edge of it. The smaller hands clutched at his shoulders, legs hooking around him, a hiss gritting from the vocalizer.

“This what you want?” Megatron growled, shoving his spike up to its base in the smaller valve, feeling the lining stretch around it. “This?” He jerked his hips forward.

“Yes!” Mirage cried out, the optics going blue and distant, seeing, but not seeing. “More.”

More and more. More productivity, more efficiency, more profit. It all snapped into sharp clarity to Megatron: Mirage, the whole system, manipulating, using, twisting.

Megatron growled, one palm slapping on the ground to support his weight. His optics flew to the black lump of the bolt. Such a small device to render him so powerless. Then again, he thought, thrusting into the eager body beneath him, in the mines, it hadn’t even taken that much. He’d had no interference-bolt then to keep him obedient, complacent.

“Progress,” he muttered, darkly. This is progress. They recognize the need to control you, to shut you down at their whim. You’re dangerous.

And…you’re wanted. Desired. Alluring. Power in its rawest form, naked attraction.

He gave himself to it, to the sensations, to the power he wielded, watching Mirage’s optics grow glossy with a rising tide of desire, desire he was unable to find release for in anyone or anything else. And as the blue frame began vibrating, juddering through an overload that Megatron plowed through, driving him straight through into another, Megatron felt a smirk bloom on his face, a hard ecstasy that left the release of his body as a secondary thing. And he knew, the greatest knowledge, that there was more than one way to be a weapon. More than one way to tear down this system, to defy the bolts and laws and notions of ownership.

He knew, and as his own body burst into a white hot release, fueled by the too-pure energon coursing through his intake systems, he determined he would make them know, too.

And he would not let them forget.

 

Comments

[mmouse15.livejournal.com]

Damn, this is twisted. It really fits, too. That bolt is an amazing invention, small and deadly. I really like how smart Megatron is, too.

[femme4jack.livejournal.com]

This was amazing. A quagmire of consent and power issues, and a deliciously nasty Mirage. Am fascinating with Megatron's thought process here, and really like the characterization. So intelligent.