Worry

[niyazi-a.livejournal.com]

PG
Bayverse, Sky and Ground AU
Barricade, Thundercracker, Skywarp, Starscream
no warnings
After Megatron's challenge, they regroup.

Barricade shook his head. “We can do it.” Skywarp had arguing for the last half cycle with him, throwing up ridiculous plans.  And Barricade hated to admit it, but Thundercracker had been right: Skywarp did not think things through.  Running away would solve nothing.  Attempting to assassinate Megatron would solve nothing.  Tearing Thrust’s armor plating away and drilling slowly through his protoform would solve nothing. Though…Barricade could argue for some cathartic appeal in the latter. 

Thundercracker had slumped onto the berth, staring at the wall as if he could make the whole thing go away if he just stared hard enough.  Starscream had snatched a datapad, poring over the Seeker laws Thrust had used, looking up occasionally.  But even then, his optics were distant, his mouth working quietly, turning a phrase over in his processor, trying to tease or tug it into a loophole. 

Leaving Skywarp, rage and despair roiling off him, and Barricade.

“We can do it,” Barricade repeated, as if he could wear Skywarp down through repetition, like some kind of erosion. “I want to do it.” And…he did, he realized. To prove to Megatron, prove to them, prove to himself that he was good enough.  He’d been the weak one, literally, metaphorically, for too long.  He would stand up. He would prove that Skywarp’s choice wasn’t in vain, that he deserved the honor.

He would.

[***]

Skywarp frowned. Didn’t Barricade understand? They were bonded.  All of them bonded through him. If he died…they’d die.  They’d known the risk.  He thought Barricade did, too. It was a sacred thing, and of course, he trusted Barricade, but….

“It’s too risky. You know they’ll try something.”

“Megatron wouldn’t be so petty as to sabotage an entire mission,” Barricade countered.  His feet were posed aggressively, tension thrumming through his frame and the bond, a high buzzing orange wire. 

“Would he?” Starscream said, faintly. “His vanity has been injured.”

Thundercracker growled, staring at the wall.  He’d put nothing past Megatron. Barricade subsided—he would put nothing past Soundwave, either. “Well…we could be on the watch for it?”  He winced, hearing how lame it was. 

Skywarp stood up, pacing, trying to channel his inner restlessness into motion.  Thundercracker tracked him, dully. Barricade stood, hands dangling loose and helpless down at his sides.   Skywarp could feel the grounder’s own emotions writhing together, twining with his.  He stopped, turned.  They could both feel it.

“There has to be a way,” Skywarp said. “Has to.” He turned, almost desperately, to Starscream.

Starscream tipped his head. “It does not specify that the fighting needs to be aerial,” he said, slowly.

“What?” Thundercracker turned to face him. Skywarp felt a faint echo from their bond, through Barricade.

Starscream looked down at the datapad again, and then back up. “The law does not say that must be aerial combat.” 

“It makes some kind of sense,” Skywarp said, uneasily.  Not every battle had an aerial component. And the Academy had insisted—though Thundercracker, he recalled, had vehemently resisted—that they be competent and familiar with both aerial and ground combat.

Skywarp felt a bubble of something like hope, but he couldn’t tell if it was his or Barricade’s. And he didn’t care whose it was. 

Thundercracker’s optics measured Barricade’s frame. “Can he?” The blue face curled into a dubious sneer. All the bluster he had thrown at Megatron had pulverized and blown away. It was real now, and Thundercracker knew the cost.

Barricade’s temper flared. “Can.”  He flexed his talons into claws. 

“It’s a risk,” Skywarp said, warily, knowing that Barricade resented his protectiveness but…not knowing how to be any other way. 

“It is a risk any time any of us go into combat,” Starscream said, reasonably.  He’d obviously decided on Barricade’s side. Skywarp rounded on him, all of his restlessness and suppressed emotion boiling up.

“How dare you,” he hissed, stepping so close to Starscream that his foreknees rang against Starscream’s.  “Do you know what might happen?”

Starscream blinked.  Skywarp was too close to him for him to be able to stand up—he was forced to lean back, merely to try to meet Skywarp’s outraged face.  “I know,” he said, quietly. 

Skywarp pointed a long finger back at where Barricade stood. “He could die!”

“Any of us could, any time we go out,” Starscream said. 

“You, especially,” Thundercracker said.  He moved closer, hands opening and closing warily, unsure if he should intervene.  “You know you get…reckless.”

Skywarp’s mouth worked, chewing on the truth.  He felt Barricade’s pain spiraling through him, loving Skywarp, but hating the concern.  But…I can’t help it, Skywarp thought.  I can’t do this any other way.  “I…I can keep an optic on him.” Yielding…as much as he could. Compromise.  They’d fight—together.  Maybe it would be a good thing.  He could feel how much Barricade needed it.  

“You can’t,” Thundercracker countered, an edge in his voice, the old edge Skywarp remembered. It sounded like bad memories hissing at him from the past.  He didn’t need to say anything more.  Skywarp felt himself curl in, like a blackening leaf, his anger fighting with his helplessness and frustration. Thundercracker leaned in. “He has the same worries every time you go into combat.  Every time.”  Thundercracker’s optics blazed, intense, transfixing Skywarp’s.  Daring, tempting defiance. “Now, if you trust him as much as he trusts you….show it.” Thundercracker’s voice cracked like a whip—Skywarp flinched, unable to meet Barricade’s gaze, staring, suddenly, at the berth, numbly at the datapad on Starscream’s thigh.

They were all staring at him, waiting for him. As though he had the power to judge, to decide.  He wasn’t ready for that.  He wasn’t a leader. He couldn’t think things through. He couldn’t separate himself from his emotions.  But they were ceding to him. 

No, not ceding to him—waiting for him to acknowledge reality.  He turned to Barricade, hoping for some reprieve.  And saw four red optics, burning with an intensity that Skywarp…understood, that blazed through his memories to another time, of shadow and joy, of tremulous insecurity.

“…be careful,” he said, quietly.  Starscream  had told him this before: he'd always tried to lead Barricade, control him, make his decisions for him. As though he, who had made such a wreck of his own life, had any right or ability to dictate to anyone else.  As though his vision were clearer, his hands cleaner. “Please.” 

 

Comments

[linnet-melody.livejournal.com]

*worries with everyone!* Ohhhh, you can do it! Don't let Megs get to you!

I wish I wasn't so short, I'd cuddle something other than their kneecaps.

[albinocthulhu.livejournal.com]

I'm rooting for these four in every way.

[shanfiction73.livejournal.com]

I hope they realize soon that they are not acting as a team - they need to start playing to their strengths. They are not all Aerial or Ground force and they should not be thinking that way. I expect better from the thinkers of the team (Barricade and Starscream). But they are kind of shocked right now, so I'll give them a few (dozen) more chapters to figure it out. :)

[ithilgwath.livejournal.com]

I'm still somewhat worried for them... yet at the same time I'm bouncing in my seat going "Yes, YES! Barricade's here to kick butt and chew gum! An' Starscream hid all the gum."