shadow_vector | Time's Winged Chariot

PG
IDW
Wing/Drift
no warnings, except canon
for

tf_rare_pairing prompt: Wing/Drift I've seen all your demons.

Silence seemed to fill the space between them, palpable, filling in the echoes of Drift’s fist hitting the wall. He wanted to startle Wing, scare him. Because this was…stupid. Beyond stupid.

He glowered, blue optics narrowed into blades of light. “Going to get yourself killed,” he snapped.

“Yes,” Wing said, patiently.

“No.”

A soft laugh. “You don’t always,” Wing said, reaching out to take Drift’s hand, “have to automatically disagree with me.”

Drift glowered, as Wing’s hands wrapped over his fist, the Knight’s fingers stroking over his battered knuckles. His hands were made for violence and pain: he barely felt the punch. Wing’s hands, though, were made for something else: gentleness, kindness. He could see the difference, right there in front of him, in the glossy black of Wing’s hand and the scratched, marred, dented armor of his own hand. It was there, right in front of them, and Wing couldn’t see it.

“It’s stupid. You don’t need to do this.” He jerked his hand from Wing’s, rejecting the gentle touch.

“I know.” The serenity was disturbing.

“No. You don’t know. This isn’t some stupid game, Wing. This isn’t a sparring match. You’re going to get killed.” How could he not see that much at least? Drift hadn’t asked him to volunteer, hadn’t wanted any of this to happen. Everything had spiraled out of his control.

Again. Just like in the gutters, just like with Gasket.

And just like then, someone was going to die, who didn’t deserve it.

“I know, Drift.” A smile, like the curve of sunlight over the horizon. “But I am giving my life for my city and for my friend.”

“I’m not your friend.” He felt his brow furrow, anger washing over him like fire. “I….caused this. All of it.” His betrayal. He could have gone with Lockdown right then, let the City, defended and underground, take its chances on being undiscovered. It wouldn’t have been perfect but…Wing. Wing would have lived.

Wing sighed, as though sad that Drift still didn’t understand something. “Events unfold the way they’re meant to, Drift. It does no good assigning blame.”

“Good. You’re going to die for this ‘good’.” He was getting sick of that word.

“Good and right often make heavy demands on us,” Wing said. “It’s how we improve ourselves.”

“You’ll be dead, Wing. You can’t improve from dead!” Drift’s hands were shaking, balled into tight fists again, anger that had no outlet, swimming around inside him.

“No,” Wing said. “I can’t. But what better can I do?”

“You can…,” Drift threw his hands in the air, stalking around the room. He’d never felt more trapped than now, never more ensnared by forces larger than him. “I don’t know. You can live, for one thing.”

“Drift.” Wing’s optics were gold and soft, like sunlight after rain. “Thank you.”

“For what?!” Wing was…infuriating. Was he even in the same room? Were they having the same conversation?

“For caring, Drift.”

Drift’s fury squelched, like flame in oxygen, his mouth dropping open. It felt like the heat of his anger was blasted away, leaving him stripped, exposed.

Wing’s smile bloomed. “I am proud that you will let me fight beside you, and for your freedom.”

…but not at this cost, Drift thought, staring down at his hands. Ugly hands, that had never done anything beautiful, had never built, only broken. “…I don’t want this,” he said, hearing his voice, the small, almost scared voice of the Drift he thought he’d buried in the gutters, the one who felt powerless and weak.

Wing stepped closer, cupping Drift’s chin with one hand, tipping it up to meet his own. “I know, Drift. But it must be exhausting to fight reality.”

It was. But fighting was what he did: it was all he was good for, all he’d ever been good for.

Wing leaned in, and Drift started back, at the almost electric brush of Wing’s mouth on his. Drift had betrayed Wing with those lip plates, and here Wing was, brushing his own mouth against them, almost tenderly. He couldn’t move, almost paralyzed, torn between wanting to flinch back, away from the wrongness, the unworthiness, and wanting to lean forward, into the kiss so freely offered, at a moment when time itself was becoming precious. “Wing. You can’t…,” You can’t do this. You can’t want me. You can’t possibly mean this.

“I can. I do.” The words, passed between them like breath. “I’ve seen your darkness, Drift, all of it. And I’ve seen your light.” He paused, catching Drift’s hand, holding it up between them, splaying its fingers and laying it on his chassis. Drift could feel the velvet pulse of the spark chamber against his palm, steady and trusting, stable and calm while he was agitated, in a thresher of emotion. “Light is always stronger.”

“This isn’t time for one of your philosophical metaphors,” Drift said, but the hostility in his voice was blunted by the fact that time was racing to its end for both of them.

Wing gave a solemn nod, the smile all the more painfully beautiful as it faded, like an old rose, petals still lush and rich. “You’re right, Drift.” And Drift wanted nothing more than to be wrong this time. The gold optics tilted up to his, alive with emotion, something stirring in their depths. “No more metaphors,” Wing said, the words a mere whisper, serving only to call attention to the plush, beautiful mouth that spoke them. Drift swore he could see the words trembling there, on the lipplates, before Wing spoke, lingering there like pure dew.

And he caught Wing, his one hand crushed between them, his other fierce on Wing’s flightpanels, pulling him close, his mouth, clumsy but worshipful, on Wing’s silvered lipplates. He could feel—they both could—time galloping on, bearing them on its back like a wild thing lurching and out of control, and he clung to the kiss, clung to the moment without hope, the moment without a future, determined, with all the force of his being, to let, at least this once, when it was too late, when he was losing all he ever could have had, the light win.

Time's Winged Chariot

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