Day Underground

[niyazi-a.livejournal.com]

NC-17
IDW prewar AU
Perceptor, Deadlock
sticky, headcanon  continuation of this
ravynfyre gave me a prompt. It was supposed to be a quick bootycall fun cracky fic. I..failed abjecty.



A day off. It was a delightful and almost frightening prospect, Perceptor thought to himself, as the lift door opened to his floor in the housing complex. At one level, he loved his job at the biomedical lab, and hated missing a day—what if they needed him? What if some discovery was made and he was not there for it? But at the same time, a whole day, no responsibilities, no obligations? It was almost…dizzying to contemplate. He’d already called in a delivery order for dinner, so he had that to look forward to, already, the whole day taking on a bit of a festival glow.

“Perhaps,” he said to himself, “I can catch up on my journal reading. Or try that new café. Or that gallery with the new sculptor’s work.” He wasn’t much of a highbrow fan of fine arts, but he knew they were important, and he found trying to figure out how and why to be just as satisfying as if he actually understood the art pieces.

Odd, the supply closet door was open. He shook his head. His neighbors were nice mechs, but sometimes, a little sloppy. Still, they didn’t work in a lab, and so hadn’t gotten ingrained in their programming the sort of compulsive neatness he had.
He coded the keypad outside his rooms, and as he stepped in, a shadow seemed to rush upon him, and he felt a hard hand push against his shoulders, shoving him over the threshold. “What…?” He turned to face the black hollow eye of a gun, hovering less than a handspan from his face.

“Don’t scream,” the gruff voice said. “Don’t make a sound.”

“But, that’s an entirely appropriate response, I should think, to having a weapon thrust in one’s face,” Perceptor stammered, his hands coming up, empty and helpless.

A snarl, the face on the far side of the gun flattened, and the scowl snapped some memory into place in Perceptor’s cortex. The Decepticon, from the hoverbus. Decacycles ago. But…how?

You gave him your comm card, Perceptor. It had your address. He shook his head, frustrated by his own lack of forethought. Of course.

“You’re injured,” he said, his optics landing on the mech’s left shoulder, sparking dully, dripping energon and reeking of scorched insulation.

“I’m fine,” the mech said. Deadlock, he’d said his name was. Perceptor remembered the gold swells of the cheek armor, the beautiful but angry mouth. He hadn’t been able to forget the mech for days, something about the energy that seemed to boil off him had haunted Perceptor.

“Why are you here? And can you please put the gun down?”

The gun wavered, lowering to his chassis. Well, it was something. Progress, at any rate. “Safe house got busted. Need a place to stay.”

And you chose…here? Perceptor stopped himself from saying that aloud. Deadlock didn’t look in the mood to have his decisions questioned. “Of course you can stay here,” he said, instead. “Though, it’s hardly luxurious.” He looked around his apartment for the first time with a stranger’s gaze: stacks of datatracks, a small, utilitarian energon dispenser, the walls nearly bare.
Deadlock shrugged. “Not one for luxury.” The shrug set another wave of sparks from his injured shoulder, and try as he might, Deadlock couldn’t quite mask the wince of pain.

“Please,” Perceptor said. “I’m not a repair tech, but I can do something to help. It doesn’t look like you’ve even had basic first aid.”

“Haven’t,” Deadlock scowled. “On the run for two days.”

Two days? Two days in pain, the wound leaking and sparking. Perceptor couldn’t even imagine it.

Deadlock gave another shrug, but this time controlling it to one side. “Been hurt worse.”

“That doesn’t mean that this shouldn’t be looked at, though,” Perceptor pushed. “Just a basic cleaning, seal off the leak at least?” He had no idea why he was offering other than as something to occupy his nervous hands.

A long, hostile glare, trying to spot some malign motive. “…all right.”

Perceptor nodded, lowering his hands. “I…uh, the repair kit is in the maintenance facility.”

Deadlock gestured with the gun. “Go get it. No funny stuff.”

I assure you, Perceptor thought, funny is the last thing on my mind. He nodded, aware of the blank eye of the gun on him as he ducked into the facility, snatching the repair kit from a cabinet. He returned, holding it out for inspection. Deadlock gave a gruff nod, jerking his chin to the small table by the energon dispenser.

“It would help if you sat,” Perceptor said. Deadlock was taller than he was, and if he was going to do this, he wanted to do it right, not go groping in blind.

Deadlock glared at him for another long moment before hooking one of the stools with a foot, dropping onto it, turning the injured shoulder closer to Perceptor. “Don’t try anything.”

“Only what I’ve said,” Perceptor said. “Just clean it out and seal the lines.”

The red optics bobbed in a nod, as though this were a huge allowance. Perceptor got to work, opening the kit, and reaching for a rag to start cleaning the wound. “Some of this,” he said, “needs to soak off, and it’s gummed a few of the gears.”

“Doesn’t matter.”

“It does matter,” Perceptor insisted. Deadlock might have a gun, but he knew engineering. “But not now, if you aren’t comfortable with me doing it.”

“Comfortable,” Deadlock sneered.

“Comfortable trusting me.”

“Trusting you enough to let you do this,” Deadlock countered.

“True.” What else could he say? Besides, the repair was more important. He found two cut lines, one hydraulic fluid, one energon, and scraped the half-clotted gunk free, ignoring the small hiss of pain, before reaching in with the black gum of hose patching. He twisted two snapped wires together, splicing with a small filament from his kit, and wrapping it in insulation tape, focusing on the mechanisms, and trying his best to ignore the gun he knew was still aimed at his belly.

He lowered part of the charred armor housing back into place. “That’s all I can do right now.”

Deadlock gave him a sour look, before rotating the shoulder in a circle, seeming almost surprised at the way the joint didn’t protest. This is where a normal mech might say thank you, Perceptor thought, something almost like a smile flitting over his face as Deadlock merely grunted.

He moved to the sink, despite Deadlock’s twitch, and began cleaning the tools he had used, wringing out the filthy rag. He was brimming with questions. “Why here? Why me?”

“You said anything,” Deadlock said, his voice that wall of hostility again, but this time, it seemed brittle somehow. And Perceptor remembered: he’d told the hostile Decepticon on the hoverbus to contact him if he needed…anything. He hadn’t been thinking of anything like this, however.

“Yes, well….this wasn’t quite what I’d meant,” Perceptor said, reaching for a new rag to dry off the tools. “And I certainly didn’t mean at gunpoint.”

“Don’t get to set the terms,” Deadlock’s voice was muffled, and when Perceptor glanced over his shoulder, the white helm was turned, inspecting his repairs.

“No, I suppose not.” Perceptor laughed. “It’s my first time being held hostage, I suppose. I’m not sure of the rules.”

“Not a hostage. Just need a place to stay.” Perceptor couldn’t see the real distinction, but it seemed important to Deadlock.

“Well, if you’re going to be here a while,” Perceptor said, moving to stow the tools back under their loops in the repair kit, “You might want to trust me enough to put away the gun?” Because it did make him nervous, his voice nearly squeaking every time he let his gaze drop to that baleful muzzle.

“Cool under pressure, aren’t you?” Deadlock said, and his optics tilted to Perceptor, measuring.

Perceptor laughed. “No, actually. I find it a bit terrifying, really. But more, I guess, sad that you aren’t able to trust someone unless you’re holding them at gunpoint.”

The mouth snapped open, then shut, abruptly. “Need it, where I’m from.”

“Not while you’re here,” Perceptor said. He gave a sheepish shrug. “I’ve never killed anything in my life—well, except a conversation. I…I don’t even know how to use one of those things,” he said, gesturing at the gun.

The mouth flattened, the lip plates pressing together, and suddenly, the gun disappeared, clicking into its holster at Deadlock’s hip. The mech seemed almost unsure what to do with his hands, laying them, after a moment, awkwardly on the table.

Perceptor sighed with relief, his shoulders loosening from tension, his scope relaxing against its mount. “There. Now we can maybe talk and figure this ou---“

A chime at the door interrupted him. Oh frag. His food!

Deadlock’s optics blazed, giving a cry of betrayal, his hand snatching for his gun.

“No!” Perceptor said, holding his hands between them like a shield, like they’d do any good. “Please. It’s dinner. It’s just food.”

“Food.” The optics were a blade of red.

“I ordered it on my way home. Delivery.”

“Delivery. Someone just…brings you food.” That uncertain edge to the voice, as if he’d never even heard of such a thing. Another window in to the life he must lead, Perceptor thought.

“Well, yes, I mean, you—er, I—need to pay them, but yes, they bring the food to your address.”

Another chime, more impatient. Perceptor shifted on his feet. “I should…get that.” Asking for permission.

Deadlock snarled, pushing off the chair to hide behind the door, where he wouldn’t be seen. Close enough to a yes, Perceptor thought, or…hoped. He opened the door, managing a tight smile, fishing in his storage for his credit band. “Sorry,” he mumbled. “I was…distracted.”

The delivery mech gave a laugh, the same mech as last time, his backtray filled with bundles. “Another week, another distraction, eh?” A scan of the band. A crinkle as he handed over the parcel. Perceptor shot a look to where Deadlock loured in the corner.
“Yes. A-another distraction.”

“Must be really exciting, huh?”

Deadlock twitched in the corner, his fingers clenching over the gun. “Oh, not really.” His life was never exciting. Except now, and Perceptor discovered he didn’t like excitement all that much. “Thank you, though, and I’m sorry to keep you waiting.”

“No problem!” Another laugh and then the darkness as the door closed again.

Perceptor turned, holding out the wrapped parcel. “See? Just food.”

“You didn’t signal him.” Deadlock took the packet, moving it to the table, stowing the gun to open the seal on the packet.

“Of course not. All that would have done is gotten me—and likely him—killed.” In place of fear, matter of fact. Logic had kept him alive with Deadlock this long: the mech seemed to respond to it.

Deadlock grunted some sort of assent, before stepping back. Apparently the packet of food had been inspected and was—unsurprisingly—food, energon crisps fresh from the crisper, little containers of sauces. Deadlock gestured. “All right. Eat.”
The energon crisps were warm and the smell of them filled the room and Perceptor found himself, suddenly, famished. “You can have some,” he said, cautiously.

Deadlock stepped back, as if offended. “No.”

“You can.” Perceptor moved the packet between them. Deadlock had no qualms about threatening to kill him; the idea that he’d balk at taking his food seemed preposterous.

“Yours.”

“I can share.”

Deadlock took another step back. “Not mine.”

Perceptor studied him for a long moment, trying to figure the mech out. “They’re getting cold,” he said, quietly, making a line in the sand. He wouldn’t eat, unless Deadlock did as well.

Deadlock gave a sound of frustration, snatching at a chip and cramming it in his mouth. His optics dimmed, savoring it, and only then did Perceptor realize how long it had probably been since Deadlock had eaten. Two days on the run, he’d said, right? And it seemed like some time before that, as well. He turned to his dispenser, so that the other mech could eat, without him watching, filling two cubes of liquid fuel, When he turned back, Deadlock had divided the chips ruthlessly in half, two precisely even portions, with one more chip in Perceptor’s pile. For some reason, that touched Perceptor, the strange, stiff honor behind the gesture, and he set the cubes down on the table.

“I’m surprised you didn’t check them for poison,” he said, mildly.

“Thought about it.” It wasn’t a joke. He wondered if Deadlock even knew how to laugh.

Perceptor grinned, though, and snapped open the sauce containers. Deadlock watched, warily, as he dipped one crisp in a container, and then awkwardly followed suit. “I wonder, Deadlock. If you spend all this time thinking about ways not to be killed, you must have precious little energy to think of anything else.”

“Bout right,” Deadlock said.

“That doesn’t seem like much of a life.”

A snort, as he reached for another chip. “That’s been my whole life. This time, least it’s for a reason.”

“You believe in the cause, then?” Perceptor’s optics slid over the purple insignia on the chassis.

A fervid light in the optics. “Yes.”

“Why?” He fought to keep his tone neutral, not challenging, merely curious.

“Because this,” Deadlock waved a hand, “has to change.”

“My apartment?” Perhaps deliberately obtuse.

“Fact that you have this. Others have nothing.” He glared down at the pile of chips in front of him.

“But I work,” Perceptor said. “I had an education, got a position. I earned these things.”

“I didn’t.”

“But you could have.” He felt a twinge—arguing with the mech, whose guns were only a hand’s reach away.

“No.” A hard flash of the night-sight red optics. “I couldn’t. Not in the gutters.”

Perceptor blinked, looking at the chip in his own hand. It seemed impossible. No education? No jobs? But Deadlock, for all his roughness, hadn’t lied to Perceptor, and didn’t seem like the type. “I-I’m sorry.”

“I’m not,” Deadlock said, his voice truculent. “Made me what I am. Made me strong.”

It was in Perceptor’s vocal queue to point out that ‘strong’ Deadlock was currently in Perceptor’s apartment, eating Perceptor’s food after having his wound looked at by Perceptor. But Deadlock did still, after all, have a gun. And he understood what Deadlock meant: Deadlock had survived, in ways and places that would have left Perceptor agape and helpless.

“But,” he said instead, “You don’t like it. You don’t want other mechs to go through it.” He remembered dimly from their conversation on the hoverbus, ages ago.

“Doesn’t matter what I like,” Deadlock muttered, mouth twisting. “World never asked after my liking.”

“It does matter. Or it should.”

Deadlock stuffed another chip in his mouth through a ferocious frown. It was almost comical, but Perceptor fought the laugh.

“Can you even ask yourself that, though?” Perceptor pushed one of the sauce cartons closer to the other mech. “I mean, can you answer that question yourself?”

“Want everything…different.” A sort of uncomfortable shrug, the optics tilted, dark.

“Have to be a bit more precise than that,” Perceptor said.

A strange look crossed Deadlock’s face, and for a moment Perceptor thought the other mech was going to lunge forward and strike him. The mech turned, moving as if to stand, and then buckled in half, barely catching himself on one hand—his injured shoulder’s hand.

Perceptor bolted to his feet, just as he heard a wet splatter on the floor as the other mech’s tanks purged. “Deadlock!” He dropped to his knees, one anxious hand on the good shoulder. “Deadlock. I didn’t…the food is fine.” If Deadlock thought he’d poisoned him…? He kept a nervous optic on the hands, afraid they’d go for the gun.

The shoulders heaved, the rib struts shuddering as Deadlock voided the tank again. “Waste,” Deadlock said, his voice ragged and unsteady, staring at the puddle of energon, half-chewed chips. It was enough to turn Perceptor’s own tank, the sight of it. But Deadlock looked nearly in tears.

“Waste?”

“Energon. Wasted.” The brow clouded beneath the helm, almost angry. At himself, Perceptor realized.

He stood to snatch a cleansing cloth, mopping it up quickly. “Not a waste. I have more energon. I can get more.” He replaced his hand, gingerly, on the shoulder. “How—how long has it been since you last fueled?”

A long silence. “Couple of days.” The mouth set, refusing to get any more precise.

Perceptor nodded. “Too much. Too rich and too soon. I’m sorry. I should have guessed.” The energon chips were just too much for a starved system. He edged forward, helping Deadlock rise to his feet, and pretending not to notice how much of the other mech’s weight rested on his shoulder. “You need to lie down.”

He waited for an argument. He expected an argument. Deadlock merely nodded, carefully, letting himself be led into the back room.

Deadlock did, though, balk in the doorway, spotting the single berth. “No.”

“It’s a berth. A medical grade one, even.” He’d bought it on a close-out from a hospital, out of sheer convenience. With a medical berth, he could postpone—almost indefinitely—professional maintenance. A luxury he didn’t feel up to very often.

“Your berth.”

“My apartment,” Perceptor countered. “That didn’t stop you.”

Deadlock went rigid against him, and Perceptor felt a bit bad for pushing the point. He hadn’t meant it to hurt, much. In fact, he realized that all the fear he’d felt was gone, replaced by worry. Deadlock wasn’t that awful. He was hurt and scared, and a little lonely. That was all. “Come on,” he said. “It will help.” He stepped forward, and though Deadlock tried to resist, found himself tugged forward into the room.

He managed to prod the larger Decepticon onto the berth simply by not asking for permission, stretching the long legs out, pushing the shoulders down. He did hesitate over the access panel, but steeled himself. He was trying to help and if Deadlock wouldn’t see that, that was his problem.

The fact that Deadlock could make it his problem he deliberately shoved aside.

“What are you doing?” Deadlock tried to struggle up to one elbow.

“Medical berth,” Perceptor said. He held up three small colored hoses. “Coolant, hydraulic fluid, and fuel line detergent. I’m not going to ask when the last time you had a systems flush.” He didn’t need to. The corroded linecaps told him all he needed to know. He flicked out a few of his microtools, prying them open.

“Don’t need one. I’m fine.”

Perceptor looked up. “Your systems are running several degrees too hot, your coolant is—“ a quick glance down at the bluish goo oozing from the cap, “sludge, and you cannot process highly refined energon. That is not ‘fine’.”

Deadlock blinked. “Still functional.” But the voice was half-hearted, a resistance he was making for his own sake. And he lifted his arm out of the way, so Perceptor had clearer access. He shivered as Perceptor hooked the coolant hose up, fresh blue liquid pumping the old sludge out of the lines.

Perceptor hooked up the other hoses, a set to drain, a set to inflow, and then turned to the fast-recharge plug. He frowned, standing abruptly, reaching into a cabinet. “I know I have a spare or two around here,” he mumbled to himself, pawing in a drawer. “State of that charger is simply…unconscionable.”

“What?” Deadlock, shifting gingerly on the berth.

“Your fast recharge plug. It’s…,”

“It works.” The austere face folded into a scowl.

“Barely. The cabling is frayed, the copper filaments are…well past their stress point, and the connector is loose. Inefficient if nothing else.” It was easier to talk with his back turned, engrossed in rummaging through the drawer. Ah, there it was. He pulled out a sleek black replacement, holding it aloft. “Better.” He turned, dropping down to knees by the berth, bending to the task of replacing the frayed, battered cable, stripping away the frayed insulation, before cutting the wires. He shifted his primary optical feed to his scope, giving him finer control.

“Why are you doing this?”

“Because…for one thing, because I can,” Perceptor said. “I can’t fix everything wrong in the world but this? This I can fix.” He gave a tentative smile as he worked. He could feel that surge of resistance, almost like a wave over the mech’s EM field, and felt it subside, petering out, leaving behind a froth of uncertainty. “There,” he said. “That didn’t take long at all now, did it?” He flashed a relentless smile at Deadlock, flicking his fingers to rehouse his tools, before taking the berth’s charger and fitting it into the socket in the new recharge plug.

Another shiver, and a gasp, as the current began flowing through Deadlock’s power lines. Perceptor could smell the tang of ionizing air over the EM field. “Power down,” he said, standing up, moving to the door, switching his vid feed back to standard.

“You?” A half question, the voice strangely drowsy and, Perceptor thought, almost meek.

“I have a couch.” He flashed one last, shy smile over the mech, who lay almost rigidly obediently along the berth, hoses slowly working through his lines, red optics dimmed and rapt. He couldn’t give Deadlock a perfect world, but he could share some of his.

[***]

Perceptor thought about leaving. He thought about running to the police station down the road, hiding there while they came and got Deadlock. A dangerous Decepticon, obviously wanted by the law. There might even be a reward.

But…he couldn’t bring himself to do it. The mech hadn’t harmed him, beyond a few scares, and the longer he spoke with Deadlock the harder it was to see him as an evil Decepticon. He could only dimly recall the terror he’d felt on the hoverbus. He became real, and his cause became…almost just. And Perceptor found he couldn’t betray that.

After all, he rationalized, it would only convince Deadlock that he was right all along in his hate.

He was still turning this over in his cortex, when he heard a scuffling from his room. Deadlock, he knew immediately, trying to free himself from the berth. He rolled off his couch, making it to the door of the berthroom just as he heard a soft curse.

“Let me,” Perceptor said. “It’s difficult to do yourself the first time.”

“Done enough,” Deadlock said, but he let his hands get batted aside.

Perceptor simply shook his head. “And how are you feeling?” He kept his tone brisk, professional, cursing himself for not having the foresight to unclip the guns from the dark thighs.

“Fine.” A stubbornness in his voice.

Perceptor had to push it. “Better than last night.”

“Yes.” The mouth was flat, harsh.

“Good.” Perceptor finished unhooking the mech, carefully coiling and stowing the hoses. “I’ll get you some energon.”

“No.”

“Yes.” A mild amusement in Perceptor’s voice. “You need to be able to eat, Deadlock.”

“Be fine.” He clamped a hand over his access hatch, closing it.

“Yes.” Perceptor rose. “You will. After you have some energon.” He marched to his energon dispenser, returning with a dilute cube and thrusting it in Deadlock’s hands as the mech squirmed to a seated position. The battered dark hands curled reflexively around the cube, red optics glaring up at him. The scowl darkened as he raised it to his mouth, taking a cautious sip. Perceptor waited, watching, almost laughing at the feral hesitation. He could practically feel Deadlock waiting, sensing in his own body, testing the flow of the energon into his tank. “See?”

“Fine,” Deadlock repeated, refusing to budge. It was…almost endearing, really, and Perceptor couldn’t resist a playful pet on the
shoulder, the thumb flirting with the gold swell of his cheek armor.

Deadlock stiffened, and one hand clamped hard over Perceptor’s green wrist. “What was that?”

“I…just…,” and suddenly Deadlock was a Decepticon again, bitter and hard and dangerous. “I just touched your shoulder.”

“Why.”

“Because. I…er.” Perceptor rubbed the back of his helm with his free hand. “That’s what you do?” It was a harmless touch of affection, wasn’t it? He twitched with regret. What did he know about it, anyway? He was just a labmech. He was hardly some romantic hero.

“Do.” The red optics raked over Perceptor’s smaller frame, and suddenly Perceptor’s trapped wrist got jerked, hard, and he found himself tumbled over the darker frame, and a mouth, still tingling sweet with new-frame grade energon, pushed against his. Two hands scraped down his back, cupping the back of his pelvic frame, jerking him down and against Deadlock’s. He didn’t have a chance to protest, and wasn’t entirely sure that he wanted to: there was something strangely arousing in the contained violence. Or, if Perceptor were blunt, there was something arousing in being wanted. It hadn’t happened very often for him, and certainly never with quite this much…force.

He managed to squirm, tearing his mouth from the kiss, one palm flat on the other’s chassis, fingers, he realized, brushing the purple insignia. “Deadlock,” he began, voice scratchy and raw, and then abruptly found himself on his side, thrown off Deadlock.

“Fine,” Deadlock snarled, sitting up, turning to drop his feet into the ground. The broad flares of his shoulder strutwork seemed to tense, angling down. Perceptor struggled up, confused.

“What’s fine?” Why did he feel there was a huge conversation under that one word ‘fine’?

“Just…go away.” The backstruts shifted, somehow more alive and expressive than Deadlock’s face.

“Where? This is my apartment.” He realized right away that was the wrong thing to say, even as the last word was leaving his vocalizer. He wanted to snatch the words out of the air.

“Yes.” The word was somehow full of venom, scorching the air between them. And Deadlock shoved himself to his feet, hands clawing at the air as his newly charged balance gyros tried to calibrate their newly refined axes. “Yours.”

Perceptor scrambled off the berth. “I didn’t mean—you’re not leaving, are you?”

“Why not?” A flash of the red optics, flaring as he wobbled.

“Because you can barely walk?” Logic, running away with Perceptor’s self-preservation again.

Deadlock gave a warning growl, hands adjusting the pistols on his hipskirting. “Can walk fine.”

“Deadlock. Please.”

The courtesy seemed to stop him, faltering. “What.”

“You don’t have to leave.” He tried to block the larger mech’s path, but Deadlock had been armored up from Perceptor’s own light civilian plating.

The mech stopped, looking down at him. “Don’t belong here. Taken enough of your…stuff.”

“I’ve given it to you freely,” Perceptor said.

“You’re crazy,” Deadlock muttered. “Crashed into your place, held you hostage. Should be happy I’m leaving.”

He should be. But he wasn’t. The longer he talked to the Decepticon the more he was certain that under the violence, the hardness, the scowl, there was something alive and…almost fragile. “Where to?” It seemed a logical question.

“Doesn’t matter. I’ll find somewhere.” He moved again, enough to bump his chestplate against Perceptor’s shoulder. Not enough to push by, but enough to hint.

“Why not here?”

“In your way.” Another bump of the armor, but again, not enough to shove Perceptor aside. Perceptor wondered at the restraint.

“I’m in your way,” Perceptor countered, quietly.

“What do you want from me?” Anger, but something also almost like fear in the voice, someone who didn’t have much to give, fearing to part with what little he had.

“Show me your world,” Perceptor said. He had no idea where the words came from, and no idea he wanted to see it, until he spoke. But suddenly it felt like the key to everything. He would understand Deadlock if he saw the world around him, the way you understood quarks by studying their effects on the particles nearby.

“You don’t want that.” The brow lowered over the red optics.

“I do.”

The red optics raked over his frame, the mouth twitching as though in some intense calculation. “All right,” he said, finally, his hands resquaring the pistols on his hips. “Let’s go.”

[***]

They left Perceptor’s building through an exit Perceptor had never seen: down a service corridor, through endless downward staircases, and he winced to think of Deadlock winding his way up these same endless stairs, in the dank, stifled air, with that injured shoulder. They exited into a subbasement, lined with pipes, the service tunnels under the building. Perceptor had been down here, once, lost, when he’d arrived home overcharged and hit the wrong button on the turbolift.

It reeked, of old, rancid, filthy oil, of the orange stink of rust. Light seemed to filter dustily down from the fixtures, somehow heavy and dim. Perceptor found himself hurrying after Deadlock, who navigated the tunnel, ducking under a rough lintel where someone had broken through the foundation into a wider tunnel outside, and into an absolute warren of twisting wires, pipes and lines.

“Where are we going?” he asked, and the words seemed to make almost no impression in the thick dead air.

Deadlock didn’t turn. “My world. Where I came from. That’s what you wanted to see, right?” And then the helm did turn, the catlike finial carving an arc in the dimness, and he caught a glimpse of that sharp, predator’s smile. He felt a pang of fear, which he pushed aside. No. If Deadlock meant him harm, he could have done it at leisure, in privacy, in Perceptor’s apartment.

They descended, sometimes through stairwells and battered lifts that seemed to groan under even their meager weight, their grav-gyros unbalanced and hypercompensating, and sometimes through checkpoints where Security mechs glowered, but backed down, at the purple symbol on Deadlock’s chassis.

Light faded. No, that wasn’t quite accurate. It retreated, huddling near to the bulbs, and Perceptor found himself dependent on Deadlock’s headlamps to cut the path in front of them into swathes of high-contrast shapes.

Some, he didn’t realize until he’d almost passed them, were other mechs, singly or in pairs, in power-conservation mode. One or two, only, moved, red or orange optics tracking them, or scuttling back as though facing a threat.

The light bounced, and then Deadlock turned, swinging illumination like a blade in an arc back to Perceptor. “Gap,” the mech said, gesturing down at a hole between them, holding out a hand, almost chivalrously, to help him jump over. It seemed to yawn blackly, even in the darkness, sullenly defying the power of Deadlock’s lamps, and Perceptor got a whiff of vile corrosion, liquescence and some musty dampness as he crossed.

“We’re not going down there,” he said, with some relief.

“No. Not that far.” The head tilted, red optics spiraled wide to the darkness, and Perceptor realized that the headlamps were for his benefit, that without him, Deadlock would be merely a shadow padding among these shadows, another pair of wary red optics in the gloom. A snort of something that might have been laughter. “Hid down there for a while, though.” He turned, gesturing onward, and they went, deeper into these unknown places.

Perceptor gave up trying to track where they were going: his navigational systems were flummoxed by the electromagnetic crosscurrents of the powerful electric cables. He’d simply have to trust Deadlock to bring him back.

Simply. His hands quivered at the word.

“Here.” Deadlock stopped, almost abruptly, at an intersection of two tunnels, crossing at an off-angle, one vertically tilted. Two
lights seemed to rain amber down upon the stained pavement. Several mechs shifted, twisting away, slipping surreptitiously up into the shadow tunnels. “Syk dealers.” He gestured across the horizontal tunnel. The shadows seemed to recede and hiss, as if threatened. “Cheap fix for those in the trade. Helps ‘em forget what they’re going to do.”
“Syk.” Perceptor had heard about syk, but as a plot device in late night holodramas. It seemed strange that it was real. He almost asked ‘what trade’, when a lean, silver and green mech slipped up beside him, giving him a false-sweet smile.

“Not interested,” Deadlock snarled. “He’s not buying.”

The smile twisted, rebounding to a barbed smirk. “I wasn’t aware he was already…taken.”

“Lot you’re not aware of,” Deadlock said, his optics hard, drilling into the other.

The green mech tossed his head, attempting to dismiss the open threat. “Don’t need this.”

“No. You don’t.” Deadlock glared at the mech until the shoulders disappeared up the tunnel. Then the mech set his shoulders, like a shrug, gesturing Perceptor to follow. Perceptor stepped a bit closer, risking a curious glance up the tunnel, catching a spangled set of optics, mismatched, off-luminescent, curious, hostile, hiding everything, wondering where it led, bumping into Deadlock’s shoulder. The mech reached back, hooking his hand through Perceptor’s arm, his other hand floating over his other gun.

Perceptor walked on until the knot of silent optics faded behind them. “We can go back, now?”

Deadlock shook his head. “You wanted to see.” He tightened his hand on Perceptor’s arm. There was an almost ruthless enjoyment in his tone, as though he liked Perceptor’s discomfort.

“That place. That hole, back there. Why were you hiding?”

A hitch in the ventilation, and a long, measured glance before the head turned away, back into the gloom of the tunnels, ramping slowly downward. “Why does anyone hide? Was afraid.” It was at once an evasion and an admission.

Perceptor knew enough not to follow up. “Can I ask where we’re going?”

“You’ll see.”

Deadlock led him down another corridor, before cutting his headlamps, darkness plunging over them. He looked up both ends of it before dropping to one knee, palms sliding over the surface of the tunnel wall. A sharp nod, and the wall, which, even in the light of his lamps had seemed a stained, smeared, half corroded plane, separated, a small panel coming off in his hands. He jerked his helm. “Get in.”

Perceptor hesitated: a dozen plots, badly derived from late-night vids, raced through his cortex, each and every dismissed for sheer outrageousness. If nothing else, Perceptor scolded himself as he ducked into the dark opening, you are too unimportant for anything that dramatic.

He scooted in, Deadlock backing in with him, pausing to replace the hatch, his headlamps still off. It was strangely intimate, and a little frightening, the floor gritty beneath Perceptor’s palms, his hips bumping into masses of cables and jagged metals.
A soft laugh, the red optics sharp, amused. “One of my boltholes,” Deadlock said.

“Boltholes.”

“Place to hide from Security. Other mechs. When you had energon, not safe to eat it where others can see you.” The optics tilted, the gaze revolving around the narrow space. “Same thing with recharge.”

“Recharge? You recharged in here?” It didn’t seem possible: crowded, cramped, filthy. A far cry, not even an echo of that cry, from Perceptor’s spacious medical berth.

“Big enough,” Deadlock said. And then the red optics moved forward, suddenly, and Perceptor felt the mouth on his again, pushing in past his ‘o’ of surprise. Perceptor let his shoulders be pushed backwards, Deadlock on top of him, the uneven ground cold and hard, but Deadlock above him warm, wanting. A deft twist and Deadlock’s pelvic frame slipped between his knees, resting on his. Perceptor felt his body thrill, again, to the touches, to the EM field against his, the body, hard, strange, on his.

The mouth pulled away from the kiss, red optics over his, one of the powerful shoulders by Perceptor’s head, the other hand light on his scope. “See. Big enough.”

Deadlock moved to pull away, but, perhaps emboldened by the darkness, its comforting curtain, Perceptor’s hands caught at the shoulders, pulling the mech back into a kiss. The mouth was hard for a moment, startled, before softening, glossa pushing in, that growl vibrating against Perceptor, sending quivers of arousal through his frame, despite the darkness, despite the dirt, the smell, the cramped space.

The growl turned into a laugh, a strange, almost rusty sound, as Deadlock pulled away. “Not here,” Deadlock whispered, pushing back to his knees, pulling Perceptor along with him. “Not done yet.”

Perceptor shivered with want, fingers brushing his tingling lipplates as he rolled forward. Deadlock sat back, his backstruts against the outer wall. “Tell you here, while it’s…safe.” A wry crack to his voice—no place down here seemed safe. “Gasket. First friend I ever had.” And Perceptor could feel, suddenly, another presence in the darkness: Deadlock and Gasket, here, together, possibly just as they had been tangled on the floor. Deadlock didn’t use the label ‘friend’ lightly—the voice faded out for a klik. “Got killed. Long story. Unimportant story. It ended…,” a sigh, words coming with difficulty, “everything.”

“Everything?” Perceptor edged closer.

“Of that whole…thing.” Deadlock shifted, struggling with his own past, his own lack of words, the metal grating in the darkness. “Let’s go.”

[***]

“Here,” Deadlock said, his voice almost hushed and reverent. They’d taken a ramp up, and dimly, above, Perceptor could see daylight. It was a small plaza, near a nook that might at one time have held a small shop, but the glass was broken out, and all that was left was the rust-chewed stubs of old pipes.

Deadlock moved, slowly, bending to rest his palm on a spot on the pavement. “Here’s where he fell.” There was no sign Perceptor could see—the whole surface was uniformly mottled and stained and dented. But Deadlock could see it clearly, as though his hand was resting on Gasket’s fallen frame. Perceptor stood back, taking in the image of Deadlock, on one knee, palm flat on the filthy ground, head bowed in mourning, and he wondered how he ever could have feared this mech. Not that he doubted Deadlock’s violence. Merely that there was something under it , some suffering deeper than anything Perceptor had known, that called for compassion more than fear.

“I’m sorry. He meant a great deal to you.” Anyone could see that.

“He was a fool,” Deadlock said, pushing the frown back onto his face, standing up, like a mask, a role, snapping back into place. “He was naïve, and optimistic.” The mask slipped. “But that’s no reason to be killed.”

Perceptor scuffled, unhappily, feeling the mech’s pain, but completely at a loss how to heal it. If anything even could. “No,” he said, finally, agreeing. And the idea that a mech had been killed, for no reason, bothered him. He saw Security Forces every day. They nodded at him companionably, waved him through check lines, some seeming almost apologetic at the new security measures.
He couldn’t imagine them…shooting anyone. Whereas Deadlock? Easily enough, even now.

The mech slipped one hand into his storage, pulling out a small package pod. Perceptor recognized it from the maintenance stores: an anticorrosive. Deadlock turned, tossing it into the ruined building, and gestured Perceptor to follow him, leaving the plaza.

“What…?”

Deadlock shook his head. “Corrosion. Problem down here.” And that was all. But by this point Perceptor had figured enough of Deadlock’s telegraphic style and the strange mix of hostility and generosity: he had left the packet for another mech to find, a little windfall from someone who had little enough to give. Perceptor wanted to ask if he’d ever stumbled across anything that way, but the gesture touched him, almost like a squeeze under his throat, so he followed, meekly, up the corridor, trailing Deadlock’s path, until they emerged, through a basement, into an alley on the street level. An actual street, with lighting, and clean corners, and swept pavements, stores glittering and traffic bustling.

Deadlock pointed. “Your place. That way.” Another point. “Nearest hoverbus platform.” He seemed to know the city better than Perceptor did. Of course. He moved in it, widely, while Perceptor merely did his rounds to work and back. He wondered which of them could truly claim to own the city, and he feared it would not be him.

Perceptor tilted his head, his hand reaching for, clutching at the heavily armored forearm. “You’re not coming?”

A shake of the head. “Taken enough.”

Perceptor paused, then pushed ahead anyway. It had worked before. “No. At least let me take another look at your shoulder.”

“It’s fine,” Deadlock said, twitching the shoulder back, as though he could hide it from view.

“No.” Perceptor tried a glare. Compared to Deadlock’s it was laughable. “We can get some parts while we’re out to fix it completely.” He gave a shrug. “I am an engineer. It’s not quite the same, but I’m more than competent at this.” He’d seen enough last night—the systems that required a medical tech were fine: the injury was purely mechanical.

Deadlock wavered: Perceptor could feel him wavering, but the idea of a complete repair proved too much. “All right.” It was the least gracious and yet most wonderful acceptance Perceptor could ever remember hearing. He started moving, as though if he stayed still the Decepticon might change his mind, already muttering a list of parts they’d need.

The mech glowered, as they bustled through shops, as Perceptor mumbled his way through bin after bin. He grabbed one gyro, thrusting it into Perceptor’s hands. “Good enough.”

Perceptor shook his head, adamant. “You see, this one has a dent in the anterior flange. Do you want to be repaired correctly?” He placed it back in the bin.

The mouthplates ground together, as he retrieved the gyro, holding it out. “Can afford this one.”

“You’re not paying,” Perceptor said, bluntly, turning toward the rack of new parts, fingers walking through a rack of vacuum packaged parts till he found the right size.

“You’re not,” Deadlock said.

“I am.” The smaller scientist planted his hands on his hips. “Do not argue with me. I am in charge of your repairs.” He gave a sheepish smile, probably undermining his authority. “Besides. I don’t buy anything, really. I’d rather do this with my money than anything else.” Which was true. All his salary, just piling up in the bank. It wasn’t much: he was hardly rich, but even so, he couldn’t think of anything to spend it on, other than the odd luxury take-out dinner or perhaps a treat to a new cine-vid. “I take pride in my work, Deadlock,” he said, into the red glare. “You will not deny me that pleasure.”

That made the red gaze falter, the mouth open in surprise. And Perceptor took shameless advantage, thrusting the gyro into the mech’s hands, turning to rifle through another rack for rotating struts and mounting brackets.

“Don’t understand how you think,” Deadlock managed, as Perceptor wheeled him around to another section, for some cans of fluids.

“You don’t have to.” Perceptor said, flatly. “And I could say the same of you. But we either try, or…,” he shrugged. “Remain distant.”

[***]

Deadlock had fallen into a deep recharge, after the repairs and another meal. It seemed that he could walk for mechanometers, but simple luxuries like enough to eat and some maintentance exhausted him. He sprawled on the couch, his head cradled on Perceptor’s lap, legs thrown over the far arm, while a history program glowed in the screen in front of them.

Poor Deadlock. He’d insisted on watching the program, determined to see this education for himself, only to drop into recharge halfway through.

Perceptor grinned down at him, risking one hand on the mech’s shoulder. In recharge, the frown, the hostility, fell away, and Deadlock was…really, just striking, the lines of his face austere but beautiful, the sweeps of his helm fascinating, so much different than Perceptor’s own streamlined model. And the system hummed against his, engine idling with an unfamiliar contentment. Not too rich this time, Perceptor thought. He’d carefully monitored the content and saturation of the energon he pressed into Deadlock’s hand.

He risked a touch, his free hand skimming over the helm. Deadlock gave a soft sigh, almost a grunt, twisting into the hand on his finial. Perceptor pushed on, skimming his hand down the helm, the other stroking over the broad chassis.

The optics onlined, suddenly, red orbs flicking on and wide, and for a klik Deadlock seemed confused, almost frightened. He caught Perceptor’s gaze, optics lidded and strange, and moved, hauling himself off the narrow thighs, pulling Perceptor into another kiss, this one almost tender, inviting. Perceptor’s own systems raced, giving a telltale rev. Deadlock’s mouth pulled into a smile against his, the broad shoulders turning to him, and somehow managing to scoop him up, mouths still joined, and stretch him over the couch, tugging him down and then laying his body against Perceptor’s.

It was like being in the bolthole again, only this time, they were lit with the flickering colors from the vid screen, the gentle murmur of the narrator’s voice like a soft, droning melody. And this time Percepter wasn’t going to let him pull away. He kept one hand around the back of the white helm, another gliding down the backstruts, daring themselves to flirt with Deadlock’s pelvic armor. The body ground against him, and he felt an urgent heat build between them.

“Should…stop,” Deadlock muttered, trying to pull away.

“No,” Perceptor said, aware of the clumsiness of his movement, but trying nonetheless, curling his own pelvic armor against the mech on top of him. The pastel lights of the holovid carved Deadlock’s face into soft intriguing shapes.

“You don’t want me,” Deadlock said.

“I do.” More than he’d wanted anyone.

“Only going to hurt you.”

“That’s my business,” Perceptor said, almost shocked at his own boldness. He knew he wasn’t going to get another chance at this. And it made him desperate, but perhaps that’s what Deadlock needed. Desperate and unambiguous and sincere. “Please.”
Deadlock seemed to quiver above him, his resolve breaking in slow pieces, his mouth seeming restless, unable to settle on an emotion, while his hand slipped between them. Perceptor stilled, feeling a hand on his interface hatch. It had been…so long. He gasped as the cool air struck his components, then the contrast with the warm fingers, rough and gentle, knowing little touches.

Deadlock was more gentle than he’d have thought, his hand tracing a light little circle along the valve’s covered rim, enough that Perceptor found himself quivering and clutching at the broad shoulders, his valve building heat, tingling with want, before the cover even retracted. He couldn’t even concentrate on the kiss: his entire awareness was for those fingers, flirting with his valve, teasing at the rim, flicking inside. Above him, Deadlock’s mouth curled into a grin, optics hungry, feeding on the open, bald desire on Perceptor’s face.

“Please,” Perceptor repeated feeling a wash of warm liquid from his valve, the calipers rippling.

“Later. This, now.” The hand continued its teasing touches, and Perceptor found himself writhing on the couch, lost in the red optics, his entire body trembling.

He arched up, chassis banging into the harder, heavier body above him, mouth open in a soundless cry as the overload grabbed him, racing like fire through his circuits, and he could only dimly hear Deadlock chuckling above him.

The larger mech waited until he sagged down to the couch again, and the fingers gave one last teasing sweep, a farewell. And then a shift of weight, and he felt the presence of a spike against him, erect, slick with lubricant. His hands dipped to the dark hips, tugging at Deadlock, tipping himself up, offering. Deadlock gave him one last, odd glance he didn’t understand, before pushing forward.

The spike filled him, and Perceptor clutched over the hips, keeping Deadlock against him for a long moment. They both panted at each other, before Deadlock gave a growl and began thrusting, sharp, long motions, into the valve.

He wasn’t gentle, this time, and the spike slammed into Perceptor’s body, like some force or storm, power and violence and lust all tangled up. The growl continued, the optics feral and wide, one hand beside Perceptor gripping into the couch, the arm a straight, bracing bar. Deadlock tossed his head back, optics almost going blank and distant, his body driving against Perceptor’s, force and mass and violence against his lighter armor.

And Perceptor was lost in it, tossed in the sensation, the emotion, the need. He didn’t want to be unlost, wanted to stay in this half-moored, half-awake state, torn from his body, from his narrow life, and its narrow responsibilities. This was a mech who had led a hard, rough life, and it showed in everything he did, even this, and his hardness was a shock, a welcome one, to Perceptor’s mind, his body. He wanted to stay here forever.

It couldn’t happen, of course. Soon, before either of them wanted, the overload savaged over both of them, Deadlock arching up as though clawed in the back by some great beast, his transfluid a hot shock against Perceptor’s sensitized valve.

Perceptor keened, his valve, his fingers, clinging to Deadlock, his mouth finding the other’s, burying his cry in a hard kiss.
They fell, there, together, tangled on the couch, their EM fields, their circuitry throbbing with that pleasant, delicious ache that held Perceptor floating above his body, distant and intimate all at once. And he let it carry him, floating and rocking, into a deep, swathed recharge.

[***]

Perceptor awoke, alone, his frame cooled, on his couch. The vid had been shut down, and his whole tiny apartment seemed to resound, filled with silence. Compared to the bolthole Deadlock had shown him, it felt spacious, almost wasteful. He didn’t need to move to know that he was alone: Deadlock was gone, slipped out into the darkness of the night, back to his gutter, back to another safe house, back to his war.

And Perceptor was alone and it struck him what he had done: abetted a fugitive, provided aid and comfort to a known criminal. Been seen with one, in the lower circle shops, in the gutters below.

But he had learned, and understood and for all the questions he hadn’t asked, he had dozens more that would go unanswered. Questions for Deadlock, questions of his past, and questions about how the world he lived in could let such a world as he had only glimpsed in the gutters exist, let such suffering continue. Questions about why he allowed himself to believe the easy answers when it came to the world he lived in, when he never accepted the easy answer in science.

So many questions, like birds without roosts, flapping around wildly as his internal chrono chimed: It was time to get ready for work.

And he wondered, as he made his way down his corridor, onto the street, to the hoverbus platform, if he was being watched, from a distance, with the same kinds of questions rustling behind a red pair of optics.

The thought was a delicious hurt over his spark, more powerful, more sustaining, than the slowing throb of his ebbing interface systems.

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