Strategic seduction

[niyazi-a.livejournal.com]

NC-17
Bayverse
Grindor/OC, Barricade, Blackout
sticky pnp, xeno

For the flesh_and_steel  monthly challenge. I kinda...cheated. Since the theme was 'firsts'.  Yeah. I'd already done like first kiss, first argument, etc with most of the others, so.... .__.  

It was one of those…you know…kind of awkward conversations that Blackout normally tried to avoid. But he was kind of caught a bit, well, red-handed by Grindor in the washracks as he took a good cleansing brush to his module and…yeah. Things got even more awkward from there.

“You…,”  Grindor shook his head. “I must be mishearing you. I thought I heard you say you’d interfaced with a xeno.” 

“I…uh…did.  The females are kind of awesome.”  Blackout tilted his module under the cleansing spray, rinsing it down.  He liked Rachel and Barricade had never expressed any sort of concerns about xenophagic contagion, but…copter couldn’t be too careful.

Grindor gaped. “You know what? I think maybe dying kind of fried your circuits.”

Blackout bristled.  “Yeah?  You know what? I don’t care what you think.” Okay, not his best retort, but…he was a little exposed at the moment.

“Maybe it’s not me you should care about. But you are making us copters look bad.”

Blackout retorted, “Yeah?  Don’t know why you’re so upset.  Normally you’re the one that’s all honked no one can tell us apart.  This way, I’m the Xeno Copter and you can be Prejudiced Copter.”

“P-prejudiced? I am NOT prejudiced!”  Grindor’s rotors twitched.  “I’m the normal one.” 

Blackout scoffed, hitting the ‘off’ panel for the cleanser taps.  “Normal.”  He shrugged, turning to face his frame-mate, optics challenging. He jabbed a finger on Grindor’s windscreen. “Small. Minded.”  Whoa.  Well, he didn’t like being called weird and stuff.  And he hadn’t worked alongside Grindor for how many megacycles without finding a few buttons to push. 

Grindor goggled, his fists clenching. “Am not.”

“Coward.”

“Am NOT!” 

Blackout shrugged, his rotors echoing the move.  “Suuuuure.” 

Grindor seethed at him audibly for a long moment. “Fine.”

“Fine?”

“Give me yours.”

“Uhhh, it doesn’t work like that.” More like: oh heeeell no.  Blackout was a little possessive of Rachel. His xeno.  Sure, Barricade had shared his but…Blackout didn’t want to. 

“Whatever. Get me one.  If you can do it, so can I.”

“Get you one?”

Grindor shrugged. “Yeah. Whatever. Order one through their internet or something.” His optics narrowed. “Make mine more aesthetically pleasing than yours.”

What? No way.  Blackout stiffened. “They don’t make xenos more attractive than mine.”  That, and the fact Rachel thought he was, like, totally hot.  Which made her even MORE awesome.  He thought, briefly, what Rachel would think of Grindor.  No.  She wouldn’t like him. Because Grindor was a jerk. And she liked Blackout for more than his hot rotary frame.  He was sure of it. Uhhhh, maybe he should like…get her some flowers or something.  Just to make sure. 

“Right.  They saved the most attractive human on the planet. Just for you.” 

“Errr, just saying that that’s not how you get them. You don’t like…order them from Ebay.”

Grindor growled. “Fine. How did you get yours then?” 

Uhhh, yeah. Not Blackout’s most illustrious victory. “I…met her.”

“Met her…how?”

Blackout tried to busy himself with a drying cloth.  “I, uhhh, well, Barricade arranged it.”

“Barricade?”  The distaste in his voice was almost palpable. Whew, Blackout thought.  Solved. 

“Yeah. Barricade’s got like…connections.”

He could see Grindor Thinking Too Hard about this.  It kind of made him happy.  “Right. Fine. I’ll get my own. And she’ll be way better than yours.” 

[***]

Finding a xeno was…harder than it looked, Grindor discovered. A lot of the females he could find online were…unsuitable. First, he’d had to research what constituted attractiveness to humans.  Which actually made a sense he could respect—most of it had to do with symmetry and mathematical proportion.  Then he had to find females suitable for his requirements—adult-frame, and of sufficient intelligence. 

He finally narrowed down to one within their operational zone.  Right.  The battlefield: chosen.  The enemy: studied.  Strategy: about to be employed. 

To:  Marascience

From: cybercopter

Subject: Wooing

You have met my selection criteria: I would like to interface with you. Please respond with a time and location when you will be available.

 

He froze.  Too obvious?  Not obvious enough?  Creepy?  Frag.  He deleted it.  Cursed again. What was he going to say? Did females appreciate directness?  He knows he would.  He deleted the subject line as well.  Right. This is a strategy problem.  If this were an actual battlefield, would a direct assault work against an unknown enemy?  No. 

Deception would.  He typed again. Subject:  Ten ways helicopters defy the odds. 

Yes, he thought back. Intriguing. Scientific. Coptery.

***

He was immensely gratified to get a response the next morning. “LOL,” it said.  “I love helicopters!” 

His capacitor raced. Ha! He hadn’t even touched her and she was in love.  Well, at least with his alt. This was too easy.  He began thinking about charging for this. But next? Wait. He should find out more about her.  Particularly, he thought, her love of helicopters.

“What’s your favorite thing about them?” he shot back.

A few hours later, he got a curt response with something that said, simply, ‘AIM handle’ and a name.  Huh.  He didn’t have an aim handle. He had no idea what that was.  Which meant it must be some kind of test.  She was testing him to see what he knew about helicopters! The cheeky thing! 

Fine.  Grindor could master their lingo—he had the Internet! He hit a search engine. Oh.  OHHHHH. She wanted to talk to him in realtime.  Interesting, he thought.  A new challenge.  A change in battlefield requiring a new tactical skillset. His optics narrowed at the screen. We shall see who will win this round, Mara. I am so up for this.

***

It took…solar cycles, but Cybercopter, he decided, was acquitting himself well.  Mara had revealed her job (he already knew this—her job as an engineer was part of his selection criteria), her relationship status (he had no idea what that meant but all systems seemed primed for success), her favorite movies (which he dug up because a good tactician studies his enemies), and other vital information. Meanwhile, he had revealed that he flew helicopters.  Military, he’d responded, when asked.  Which got a strange ‘rowr’ response.  Well, she’d kept talking to him, so, he guessed it was positive. And the military had extra benefits: when she’d asked him his opinion on this Avatar movie, and he hadn’t answered promptly (desperately scouring IMDB), she’d suggested maybe he was deployed and hadn’t seen it. 

He was, however, getting a little frustrated.  Because despite all of Cybercopter’s successes, the topic of interfacing had not come up, once.  And he had no idea how to bring it up. Or if they simply had not yet reached a stage in their interactions where interfacing came in.

He resorted, vaguely, he hoped, to…urgh…Barricade. As an information source only, though. Good tacticians did seek out expertise. And if there was an expert in perversion, it was the irritating Science Officer.

“So, uh, Barricade,” he said, completely conversationally, of course (despite the fact that he had never voluntarily talked to Barricade before), “I hear you have a xeno.”

Barricade blinked. Well, yes, a little unsubtle, Grindor thought, but Barricade should be used to that by now. “I…do.” The optics slitted, carefully. “You going to call me a pervert, Grindor?  Because…got a few ways of convincing you.”

What? Eww. No thanks.  “I’m just…doing research.  You know.  Our enemies and all.”

Barricade’s optics were wary. “Riiiiiiiight.”

Grindor glared at him, his rotors flaring.  “So. How did you come to interface with yours?” 

Barricade gave a snicker, but answered simply enough. “Just more or less told her I wanted to.”

That seemed sufficiently straightforward. “How did you introduce the topic?”

Barricade shifted. “Uhhh, I was…showing signs.”

Hrm. Hard to pull off on IM.  Perhaps Blackout’s experience would be better? “And Blackout?”

Another sly look from the smaller set of optics. “Blackout…needed help.  We more or less arranged that for him. Like.  Threw the willing xeno at him.” 

Well, that figured.  “Not surprised.” Also, though, not helpful.  He gave a discontented sigh.

“Why are you really asking?”

“None of your business!”  Grindor’s rotors slicked.

Barricade grinned. “I think you just told me.  Need any help?”

“No,” Grindor seethed. “I’ve got it all entirely under control. ENTIRELY.”

Except of course, he didn’t.  But two solars later Mara said, “Too bad you never come around here. :C  Could go out for coffee or something.”

Escalation! His tactical systems purred.  “I…could be,” he shot back.

It took ten rounds of volleys of text (why hadn’t these irritating humans evolved databurst technology yet?) but he finally got her to agree to meet him in a local park.  “Look for the silver copter,” he told her, signing off before she could reply.  Suitably enigmatic, he thought.  Oh yes. You do not escalate on Grindor without return fire.

***

Mara ran her hands down over the flowery cotton skirt she was wearing—why?  Seriously. She was so not a skirt girl.  But Cybercopter, or whoever he was, had said he was going to be here and, right. And her friends kept telling her she needed to be more spontaneous.  To get out of her rut. It was stupid.  Like she thought anything would happen?  There were so many delays in his chats with her that she knew he must be chatting to a lot of girls. So. This was stupid. 

And he was so not going to bring a helicopter.  So.  Stop being such a girl. You’re so not a teenager any more.  Actual full time job.  Actual student loans you’re still paying on.  Cool stuff like that…? Never happens to people like you. 

Still, she couldn’t help her heart from racing as she wandered through the mostly empty park. He’d said to look for a silver helicopter—he must have meant like a pin or a badge or something.  So she scanned the chests of everyone walking by.  Which weren’t that many people—mostly joggers and other health-obsessed people out for their early morning runs.  The dew glistened on the emerald green lawns, dark on the reddish mulch around the trees. Birds fluted from branches over the fading ‘fwap fwap’s of sneakers on the running trail.   Where was he?

Mara moved down the path into the clearing that used to have the old tennis courts.  And there.  Oh my god.  A silver copter. Not a little badge or pin or anything.  But…whoa. 

“Cybercopter?”  Yeah, it just now struck her she didn’t know his real name. Wow, Mara, you should just hand back that Ivy League degree, because when it comes to, you know, common sense? You are devoid of it. 

“Mara.”  The voice seemed to come from the helicopter.  Which was…gorgeous. She’d only ever seen pictures of Sikorskies.  Or in movies. This close? Never.  She wanted to touch it. Maybe sit inside one. Pretend to fly. Oh!  God! Maybe he’d take her flying.  Maybe he’d let her.  Where…was he? 

“Where are you?” 

“Your garments are attractive,” the voice blurted.   

What? 

“I mean, that they are well suited to your proportions and the colors complement your, erm…dermal enamel.”

Okay. This…was getting weird.

“Uhhh, thanks?”  She took a step back.  Maybe she didn’t want to touch the helicopter that badly. She clutched her purse to her chest—as if it were any sort of protection.  The cool dew suddenly felt frigid against her bare, sandalled toes.

“Mara!” The voice sounded desperate. “I would like to converse with you.”

“Yeah. Uh…,” her heart was skipping a few beats it was racing so fast. “Look, I just forgot—I mean, I just remembered I’ve got something to do. Right now. Which I like…forgot.”  She started retreating in earnest.

“Please? Don’t go!”  And suddenly the copter seemed…to explode or something, metal parts bursting out of their sleek frame, sliding, readjusting, moving…into a bipedal shape. That was…huge.  The whole process froze Mara in her tracks, her eyes and brain mesmerized by the transformation. 

The thing stood there, awkwardly, in front of her.  Long rotors hung down his back from a giant engine mounted between his shoulders.  She could see exposed actuators and pistons, and the rubberized mesh of fluid cables snaking down his limbs.  Red lights—eyes? she guessed—gleamed down at her. He was…fascinating. She could look at him endlessly. “Mara?” he said, quietly.  

“You? You’re Cybercopter?” Well, she had to admit the name made sense.  At least…more than anything else right now.

“Designation’s actually Grindor,” he said.  There was a rush of movement—servos firing, cables shifting—as the giant…robot she guessed settled to one knee.  He still completely towered over her, the rotor engine blocking out the early sunlight.

“Mara,” she said. Why? She had no idea.  It just seemed like the thing to say. 

“I…uhhhh…desire to interface with you.”

What?  “You mean like…have sex with?”  Oh god this was freaky. And…why was she suddenly really turned on? 

The red optics dimmed briefly. “Yes.  That’s the appropriate translation.”

“Why?”

“Is such an answer required to escalate to the next stage?”

“Well, uhh, no.  Guess I’m just curious?” Escalate?

The copter eased back, mollified. She was fascinated at the alien architecture of his face.  “Curiosity is an admirable trait, Mara.”  The head tilted. “I desire to interface with you because you are attractive and intelligent superlatively. And, because I am proving something to that idiot Blackout.”  He stiffened, his rotors rustling, as though he was having second thoughts about saying that last part aloud.  “Now. Your turn.”

“My turn?” 

“Do you want to interface with me?”

“What? I…kind of?”  Kind of. Right.  Holy hell, girl, your panties are a bit damp just at the thought of it and you don’t even know how to do it. 

He nodded. “That’s  sufficient for consent, I think.” He bent lower, one huge hand resting, splayed on the ground next to her.  “How do you humans begin this interfacing ritual?”

“We uhhh…normally kiss?”

Another dimming of the optics.  They brightened. “Oral contact. That should be feasible.”  He hunched, his head over hers.  “You may initiate.”

Mara didn’t know if she should run like hell or just…give in.  But her hands were dying to touch the complicated plates of his face.  Were they warm?  Did they feel as polished as they looked?   She reached up, fingers tentatively stroking the broad planes of his cheekplates, curling under the armor around the inverted wedge that was about where his mouth should be.  She tugged down, gently, bringing him lower, brushing her lips over the apex.  He made a surprised sound, the hand beside her on the ground gouging into the soil. The tight angle widened, a bit, and she felt something probe out, flicking against her own lips. Oh my god this was so ridiculously hot.  Her fingers clutched over his head. 

He pulled away. “Sufficient?”

Mara blinked.  Uhhh.  “I guess?” 

“Good.”  One hand came up and curled—gingerly—around her shoulder. It stroked along her body, exploring her back, curling around to her front.  She stood rock still, shivering suddenly.  His touch was…really hot.  Exploratory.  As if afraid he’d break her.  Well. It was probably a valid concern. He tapped under her left breast.  “Your access hatch is well hidden.”

“Uhhh, that’s not where we keep it.”

The face above her seemed to frown. “I…knew that.”

She couldn’t repress the grin. “Sure.” 

“It’s immaterial,” he said, stiffly. “Mara: I desire to interface with you.  Please reveal your access port.” 

The grin grew.  This robot was…ridiculous.  But he was also hot. And his awkwardness was…adorable.  To think she’d thought he was some worldly military pilot with a girl in every zip code.  “Here?” 

The head lifted, scanning the park.  She could hear a series of clicks and buzzes.  “The park is sufficiently isolated. We shall not be disturbed.”  He bent down, clumsily bumping his mouth against hers for a moment. “Access port?”  There was something in his voice—a sort of tight rawness—that actually made her think he was pretty turned on. Well, that made two of them. 

“This,” she said, reaching up under her skirt—oh Mara, this is SO not why you wore a skirt today!—to tug down her panties, “is weird.”

“I concur,” Grindor said, his optics focused on the flimsy cotton in her hands. “That armor is insufficient protection for vital equipment.” 

“Probably,” she agreed.  “Let’s see yours, then.”

The copter rocked back, the silvery crest over his optics furrowing.  Like he’d just now realized he had to put up too.  His hand went to a panel tucked under his cockpit bell, and he popped out with the side of one thumb, a metallic…thing attached to two cables.  “Module,” he said.  He hesitated, and then held it out to her.  “You, uhhh, may initiate this as well.”

He has…no idea what he’s doing, Mara realized.  For some reason that thought just…melted her insides. She took the cool shaft of metal.  It was surprisingly heavy.  She ran her hands over its smooth contours, around the series of what looked like indicator lights.  The copter shuddered over her.  Was this…turning him on?  She glanced around, worriedly.  Then again, if anyone stumbled across them, they’d probably be more stunned at the giant sentient copter bot than her.  Still, she kept her skirt as demurely down as she could, reaching up under it with the module thing as she lay herself on the damp grass.  Grindor bent over her, optics studying her.  How the hell this would work? She had no idea. But one thing he’d been adamant about—even if a bit fuzzy on the details—was that this could be done.  And this was the only way she could think of how. 

“Oh!” Grindor gasped as she pushed the module in.  “Warmer than expected.”

“Is that bad?”  Not like she could do anything about it.  Except, like…die.  Which thought she did NOT want to introduce.

“No. Just…whoa.”  For some reason the ‘whoa’ struck her as amazingly funny and super hot.  Like she’d finally driven him out of his uptight mode. He made a tight sound and then it was her turn to ‘oh!’ in surprise as a burst of something ran through her. Not like electricity or sound, but some sort of wave/pulse thing.  It rippled through her entire body.  She went limp with pleasure. Oh. My.

“Painful?” Grindor asked.

“No,” she managed.  Oh heck no.  She shivered as another burst of the…whatever ran through her, eyes floating closed.  “God,” she breathed.

“Grindor,” the copter said.  “Please correct designation.”

God he was so cheesy!! She looked up at his entirely 100% serious face.  Mara started laughing. Grindor shuddered, his hands clawing into the ground as the rhythm of her laughter collided with the pulse of his datastream. She wanted to kiss him again, but the bulges of his cockpit got in the way. She had to settle for clutching her fingers around the heavy metal plates of his armor. She felt one of his hands shift, clumps of dew-damp grass falling on her as he stroked down her body, trailing dirt and grass along her skirt and blouse.  She had a vague thought that she’d probably care about that—later—but right now the cool metal hand squeezing and exploring her shape, combined with the rising tempo of the pulse of the module within her….she…didn’t care much about anything.

He made a strange, garbled noise, his whole frame jerking, the rotors along his back flaring outward with a sharp snap. Oh. My. God!  Mara’s body went rigid as she felt one final burst from his module, and a hot hard rush of fluid. Her fingers hooked into claws, grabbing at the metal, her body curling around the bulge of his cockpit, a sudden sweat gleaming over her skin. 

She flopped back down, limp, gasping for breath.  Over her, the robot seemed…frozen. His optics were…dead.  Oh god. What if he’d, like…shorted out or something? His hand was still grabbing her—squeezing at her hip.  She’d be here until someone found them. And then…how the hell was she going to explain this? 

This had been a very bad idea. The worst idea she’d ever had.  What had she been thinking? Oh right. She hadn’t.  She’d been all ‘spontaneous.’ And now.  Oh. Oh no. 

With a groan, the hulk of metal above her started to move again. The optics brightened. “Ac—acceptable?” He loosened his fingers from her haunch.  “I am unversed in your anatomical requirements.”  The crest over his optics seemed to lower, in concern. 

“Yes,” she said, solemnly, fighting a giggle fit with just about everything she had in her.  That she wasn’t going to be trapped here until the park rangers found her. That she had just…oh my god…had sex with a helicopter.  That she’d just…had sex in a public place.  Period. 

“Can I ask the obvious question?”

The copter’s face shifted into something like a frown. “I…uh, don’t know what the ‘obvious’ question is,” he admitted, finally.

Oh dear god.  Mara just wanted to box him up and take him home. “Oh, right. Sorry. The question is really…well, why me?”

Grindor shifted back onto his shins, one hand probing delicately under her skirt—taking care, she noticed, not to raise it indecently—for his module.  “Well, you are aesthetically pleasing. Financially self-sufficient.  Significantly intelligent.  And no prior criminal record.”  He hesitated at the look on her face. “They seem like reasonable selection criteria!” he said, defensively.

“They do,” she agreed.  Oh this was just too much. Too weird, too hot, too funny. “Do you meet those criteria?”

He bridled. “Well. I…uh…think so?” His optics darted around, nervously, rotors fluttering.  God he was adorable! For…a three-story-tall robot, that is.  “Are you…willing to consider a continuation? At some…future time?”

Wow. That was blunt.  But also kind of sweet.  “Maybe not in the park.”

“That is not a no.”

“No it’s not.”  She grinned.  Spontaneity? Maybe it worked sometimes.

 

Comments

[katsuko]

This was ridiculously adorable and hot all at once. It's an awesome combination... and Grindor is a pretty hot and adorably awkward coptor. I totally get why Mara decided to go with the spontaneity of the whole thing ♥

[femme4jack.livejournal.com]

*flails* Adorable and hot and you are my xeno goddess.

[kamiraptor.livejournal.com]

Lol, this was deliciously awkward. XD

What does Mara look like? All we know is she's attractive! Personally I'm picturing a young woman similar to America Ferrera... what's your take???

(That's supposed to be a subtle hint to write more Grindor and Mara ;) )

[sasuke-emosauce.livejournal.com]

Lucky girl. :D

[anontfwriter.livejournal.com]

Adorably hot. Go Grindor!

[flamekaat.livejournal.com]

YAY GRINDOR! Now he's in on it too lol. If you figure out how to have Megs get in on this(being all Xeno) and it not be a rescue fic or a snuff fic I will faint.

[aniay.livejournal.com]

Mmmmmmmmm that was some yummy antepathic-xeno-pron so it made me all mushy and gooey. Oh how I adore your sticky-pnp verse... and this little piece... adorable and cute and ofc hot.

[ithilgwath.livejournal.com]

“Yeah. Barricade’s got like…connections.”

'cuz Barricade's the love guru. *nods*

but oh man... Grindor's whole... emailing and thinking and tactical planning and... ah! YES. He cracked me up.

And then... I concur with Mara. He. was. adorable. heee~