shadow_vector | Teachable Moment

PG-13
IDW
Topspin, Twin Twist, Springer, Kup
for

muffins_of_god's request, kinda. Didn't quite get to the, uh, that part, but it's the set up.

“Speed, this time,” Twin Twist said, his optics meeting his spark-twin’s. Between them, on the table, lay two reassembled AMK-42 combat pistols. “Blindfolded.”

“Heh,” Topspin said, evenly. “Gonna keep at this till you don’t lose, I take it?”

“Wrecker,” Twin Twist retorted.

“Not Wrecker enough,” Springer said, ambling through the armory to stow his own pistol in the rack. “No high grade involved.”

“Springer,” Kup admonished from the doorway. “Do not egg them on.” Primus knew the Jumpstarters really didn’t need to be encouraged. At all.

“I’m not egging anyone,” Springer said. “Just saying that guns and high grade are Wrecker tradition. You remember that one time, you and Impactor—“

“Yeah, maybe they don’t need to hear about that one,” Kup said, abruptly.

Topspin and Twin Twist shared a look. Wait. A story Kup didn’t want anyone to hear? Was the world ending or something?

“What one?” Twin Twist asked, slyly. He always was the blunt one.

“The one that gives bad ideas to mechs who already have enough bad ideas of their own.” Kup fished for a cy-gar, in an obvious evasion.

“Not really doing a great job dissuading interest,” Topspin said. “Just saying. On a sort of interpersonal level.”

“Don’t you two have something better to do than pester your chain of command?” Springer dropped the empty magazine in the charging pod, turning to them.

“Nope,” Twin Twist said, grinning. “Not really.”

“Want to see how fast I can fix that?” Kup glowered.

“I could do it faster!” Twin Twist blurted. Topspin bumped him, unsubtly, with an elbow.

“It’s like you have a deathwish,” Topspin said, shaking his head. “Death by scutwork.” Which was fine with Topspin, except he normally got roped along. Like...starting from the whole 'let's join the Wreckers' thing.

“I’ll cut to the moral of the story,” Springer said, grinning. “Someone,” he tipped the crest of his green helm toward Kup, “didn’t know that Heavy Industrial mechs like Impactor have higher metabolisms.”

“Whoa. Something Kup didn’t know?” Twin Twist did a fairly convincing ‘wide opticked innocence’. At least he thought so. It was enough to get a rise out of Kup, at any rate.

“I was young once, too, you know,” Kup grumbled.

"Once," Springer smirked. "Loooooong time ago. Probably even innocent."

“So?” Topspin considered. “What? He racked up a bar tab on you?” That could get pretty steep. Impactor could toss ‘em back.

“Yeah, that’s it,” Kup said. “Huge tab. End of story." He glowered as Springer choked on a laugh, muttering 'huge tab'. "Now, when was the last time the enviroscrubbers got a good overhaul?”

Twin Twist plonked himself down on the armory bench. “End of story, my aft.”

Recovering himself with a cough, Springer gave an unsympathetic tilt of the head. “Problem with recruiting mechs like this, Kup. They see through you.” He folded his arms over his chassis, grinning.

Kup glared back, trying to come up with some scathing remark. And failing.

Topspin leaned his hip against the table. Oh this was worth it just to watch Kup sputter.

"Soooooooo?" Twin Twist prompted. He scented mischief, the way he could sniff out detcord.

Springer chortled. “Whoever missed on the range had to take a shot of high grade. Little friendly contest.”

Two sets of optics pingponged back to Kup.

…whose own optics never left Springer’s, and spelled out blue murder. “So I made some bad choices.” He lunged forward. Springer leapt back, laughing, keeping the table between them.

“Bad choices. You mean the ‘facing with Impactor?”

Kup roared, one arm swiping across the table. Twin Twist and Topspin scrambled out of the way, each reaching for their recently-reassembled guns. Just…in case. Because Wreckers did everything with guns. Yeah, everything.

“Or!” Springer dodged a spare magazine Kup flung at his head. “Is the bad choice purging your tanks on him halfway through?”

Kup leapt over the table, taking Springer down in a messy tackle and a flail of limbs. Springer hit the ground, hard, thrashing, laughing.

“Which!” Springer crowed, fending off blows, “Impactor took as a challenge.”

"Gonna take you as a fraggin' challenge," Kup reared back, balling a fist.

"Just don't throw up on me like you did Impa--oof!"

Topspin grabbed Twin Twist’s arm, jerking him to the door. Yeah, they both knew where that was gonna go. Besides…they both had an idea.

EPILOGUE

“Don’t even come whining to me when they barf up the day room,” Kup said, hefting his frame off Springer’s, still warm and tingling with the overload.

“Whining? Blurr’ll have done something stupid by then. You know how he loves cleaning.” Springer pushed up to a sitting position, with a shrug. He knew how much he loved watching Blurr suffer. Perks of command: you took 'em where you got 'em.

Sorta like now. “Besides. The high grade’s locked up.”

“Twin Twist is EOD. Take him two kliks to blow the lock. Three if he doesn’t want to blow the whole door off.”

“Good training,” Springer said. “Tactical demo.”

Kup reached for a new cy-gar, settling onto the bench. “You’re awful calm about all this.” Calm maybe wasn’t the right word. Fraggin’ Springer looked…gloating.

Springer shrugged. “Because there is no way in any of this that I lose.” His matrix-blue optics glinted. “You should know by now, old man, I always win.”

Teachable Moment

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