Forlorn Hope 7: Coping Mechanism

[niyazi-a.livejournal.com]

PG-13
IDW/G1 Forlorn Hope AU
Sixshot, Terrorcons
Implied pnp, crack.

Yeah, a light moment in all of this angst? I just can't seem to write gestalts without it coming out at least a little bit cracky.
ch 1: Forlorn Hope
ch 2: Relapse
ch 3: Transgression
ch 4: First
ch 5: Rescue
ch 6: Half Truths and Shadows

 

Sixshot growled. Stupid. He glowered at the nav-system, as though it were at fault.  Got soft. Got weak. Let yourself…change.  Let him get to you.

Him.

Sixshot’s systems flared just at the thought, just at the memory, just at the name: Jetfire.  His module signaled its readiness for an interface that was now, forever, gone beyond reach.  He’d never see Jetfire again.  Too dangerous. 

He filed a hard ‘no kill’ order.  He owed the Autobot that much. For the repairs, he lied to himself. He tried not to think of anything else.  Not soft sentimentality. No.  He was not soft. He was not weak.  Jetfire would most likely die, but a debt of some kind of honor made Sixshot determine that it would not be at his hands.

His hands worked the shuttle’s controls competently, with a long-practiced familiarity. How many control systems had he mastered? How many vehicles had he driven or flown? 

How many deaths had happened at these hands? 

But they still felt new and clumsy and unpracticed, glossing over Jetfire’s frame.  The palms tingled with want, imagining the feel of the systems-warmed armor, the smooth planes and clean edges, the sleek finish.  He curled them more tightly around the ship’s controls, trying to block the sensory-memory. 

Behind his mask he scowled at the nav comp, which sputtered, glitching, unwilling to plot a course outside of known Autobot space for anyone who did not have ‘proper Autobot identification codes.’ 

If he’d brought Jetfire…?

No.  Insanity. Worse than usual, Sixshot, he castigated himself.  The whole thing seemed to shred like a dream, a delusion written on a scrim.  Right.  What? Take him with you? As some sort of…bizarre concubine?  A prisoner?  Sixshot didn’t deal in prisoners.  And others would want to see his prisoner: Banzaitron, at the very least. 

No.  Unworkable.  Sixshot traveled alone. Did everything alone.  That was…some fluke.  Some fevered side-effect.  Some attempt to pry under his plating, to get to him, perhaps some attempt to suborn him, or sabotage, take advantage of the weakness the Reapers had wrought.

No. Not Jetfire.  Sixshot had spent his entire life spotting enemies for their strengths and weaknesses. And Jetfire…was not a betrayer. He did not have it in him.  It wasn’t that he thought the jet lacked the courage, or the intelligence, to design a trap.  But now that the heat of combat had cooled, his suspicion seemed…ridiculous.  Even so, though, he could not play out an alternate scenario, could not figure a different way it could have ended: neither he with Jetfire, nor Jetfire with him.

Which was, Sixshot thought, not the same as saying Jetfire was not a threat.

Best this way.  Best a clean break, the way he’d left the Terrorcons after Mumu Obscura.  Stop before…ideas could coalesce, futures begin to try to form. You don’t have a future, Sixshot. 

He snarled in frustration—from his thoughts, from his thwarted desires, and from the recalcitrant nav comp—slamming a hand on the console.  The screens blanked, flickered, and came back on. And the nav lock was gone.

Sixshot snorted. Ironic: he’d solved most of his problems with physical force. He didn’t think it would solve this one.

[***]

The Terrorcons’ quarters were at the far end of the landbase.  For what most of the Decepticons deemed ‘obvious reasons’.  Really, ‘obvious reason’: Blot.  The other Terrorcons had gotten used to him—Hun-Grr had decided that his olfactory sensors had just short circuited on the ‘Blot-reek’ relays, and they’d gotten to actually kind of like their relative isolation. 

So it was a bit of a surprise to hear heavy footfalls approaching down the long, untenanted corridor.  Blot and Sinnertwin looked up from where they had been playing a game, Hun-Grr lifted his head away from the datapad’s latest materiel requests, Rippersnapper sitting up from where he had flopped on the floor. 

Cutthroat stuck his head out from his recharge room. “Awright, Blot. What’d you do?”

Blot’s face went wide and blank. “Do? I didn’t do anything! Well, I mean, not that I know of, beyond the things I did.  That I know I did. But I didn’t do anything I didn’t…,” the optics began to cross in confusion, “…know…I…did?”

“Stop talking,” Hun-Grr snapped.

“I was just, you know, talking?”

“Your talking hurts my cortex,” Rippersnapper muttered.  “Stop with the words.”

“Oh. Okay. I’ll just be quiet. I mean, I was just kind of—“

“Shut it.”  Sinnertwin gave Blot that Look of his.  The one with bonus optics.

Blot subsided, head shrinking back.

The footfalls grew nearer. Hun-Grr could feel the tension rising in him, in all of them.  There was a reason their visitor was coming in person, and not comming. And it couldn’t be good.  Although, it had better be a good reason. Just not a…oh frag.  Hun-Grr glowered at Blot. Bad enough the smell—why did Blot’s Stupid have to be contagious, too?

The door whooshed open.

“Sixshot!”  Hun-Grr jumped to his feet, datapad clattering to the ground.  “I, uh, we…uh…how are you?” There, that sounded good, right? 

Or maybe not.  Sixshot stopped, his optics running a circuit of the room.  He seemed to be weighing each of the Terrorcons in turn. His optics stopped on Hun-Grr. “You.”

“Me?” Wait. Was that good?  Was it bad? Was Sixshot mad at him? Did Sixshot even get mad?

Sixshot moved, grabbing Hun-Grr by the wrist, and walking past him, dragging Hun-Grr along with him, back to the recharge rooms.  He paused by Cutthroat’s open door, jerking a thumb. “Out.”

“Out?”  Cutthroat blinked. 

“Yeah,” Hun-Grr said, guessing blindly. “Uhhh, Sixshot and I need to, ummm, talk. In private.”  He tried not to get his hopes up.  You know. Berth. Privacy. Sixshot…!

Sixshot just stared at Cutthroat, until the Terrorcon quailed back, and then sidled from the doorframe. “Yeah. I’ll, uhh, just…go root Sinnertwin on or something,” Cutthroat mumbled. 

“Yeah, you do tha--whoa!”

The door closed between Hun-Grr and the rest of the rec room.  The other four Terrorcons blinked at each other. 

“What the frag’s that about?” Rippersnapper said, finally.

“You don’t think?”  Sinnertwin lay his game controller down, edging toward the wall separating them from Cutthroat’s room.

“Do I want to think? Hun-Grr’s always telling me it’s bad when I think,” Blot mused.  The others glared at him, but he pushed on. “HEY! Maybe they’re ‘facing!”

“Thanks, Private First Class of the Obvious,” Rippersnapper said. 

“Instead of yammering, we could listen in and find out,” Sinnertwin said.  “Thin spot in the wall right here.” 

Cutthroat gave him a ‘how, exactly, do you know that?’ look. Sinnertwin shrugged, grinning maliciously, before tilting his head to the wall. 

They gathered.  Well, of course.  It was their team leader. And Sixshot. Alone. In a room. With a berth.  And, you know, maybe they’d need to bust in there and rescue him or something.  Or…not.

The sounds were muffled—Hun-Grr’s voice, punctuated by the deeper voice, shorter words, of SIxshot, and then a bunch of bumps and yelps and finally long droning sounds, rising and falling, faster, reaching a sort of wild crescendo with an “OH PRI--!” in what was unmistakably Hun-Grr’s voice.

“I,” Rippersnapper said, in the sudden silence, “Am so jealous.” 

[***]

The Terrorcons had settled themselves around Cutthroat’s door, determined not to miss what to them was the big moment. Well, not counting the like…eighteen other big moments that had happened while they were eavesdropping.  But the big moment when the door opened and they came back out. And they’d have no way of denying that the others KNEW.  Oh yes. 

Finally, they heard movement inside.  Sinnertwin elbowed Rippersnapper awake. “Come on!” he hissed. “You do not want to miss this.” 

They tensed, grins spreading across their faces, anticipating Hun-Grr’s mortification and, well, just wanting to look at the mech who could do that eighteen times in a night. Sixshot. Whoa.  Eighteenshot. 

The door opened, and Hun-Grr sagged against the frame, clutching his helm, knee servos a bit wobbly. Rippersnapper chortled. Oh this would be fodder for…ages to come.

“Hey,” Blot blurted. “Where’s Sixshot? Didn’t he go in there with Hun-Grr last night?” 

The others blinked. Where…was Sixshot? 

Cutthroat dodged into the room, scanning.  He turned back around, optics wide with surprise. “Sixshot is not here.” 

“Not here,” Hun-Grr mumbled, vaguely. “Think he, uhhh, finally got enough?”  He slid slowly down the doorframe, cheek rasping along the metal.

“Wh-where’s Sixshot?” Blot asked.

Rippersnapper snorted. “He’s Sixshot, for frag’s sake.” As if that explained everything. The others nodded, awed. In a way, it did.

“And he broke my sharkticon sculpture!” Cutthroat howled.

“Get you….’nother one,” Hun-Grr said, puddling on the floor. 

“That’s not the point! He broke my stuff! And,” and a devious glint crossed Cutthroat’s optics, like a flash of lightning, “I know just how he can repay me.” 

Next: Kiss

Comments

[niyazi-a.livejournal.com]

I know. It's terrible, but I just can't write them all serious. :C