Honing the Blade

[niyazi-a.livejournal.com]

NC-17
IDW/G1
Wing/Drift
sticky
for chibirisuchan 's prompt which I am too lazy to dig up right now. 

“You’ll be staying in here, with me,” Wing said.  He coded open a door, ushering Drift in.  The room was large and open, spotlessly clean.  Armor and datapads lay in neat stacks on shelves near the small, solitary berth, and to the right, the room opened out onto a small semi-circular balcony, open to the city’s sprawl. 

“You live here.” Drift stood, awkward, in the middle of the room.  It was neat, but it still was…someone else’s.  Wing’s.  It smelled like him, felt like him. And Drift…had nothing.  Not even the guns he’d swiped from the guards.

“Yes,” Wing said, crossing to a far wall’s empty bracket, fingers fumbling with the attachments of his Great Sword.  “We can, uh, get a separate berth tomorrow.  Tonight you can recharge there, and I’ll…,” he looked around and then shrugged, “find a comfy spot on the floor.”

“I’ll take the floor,” Drift said. He’d recharged on worse than bare floor before.

Wing tilted his head over his shoulder, uncertain. “Are you sure?”

Drift shrugged.  He moved to the balcony, hearing Wing rustling behind him, trying not to feel like an intruder.  He had to get out of here.  There was a war to fight, a war to win.  And not down here buried underground.

He stepped through the arch, onto the small terrace. Below him, around him, above him, the city shimmered as if alive, crisscrossed, even at this late hour, with roads and bridges, passageways and tunnels.  It was like Kaon…as he’d never seen it. As he’d imagined it would look, staring up from the black depths, where it all seemed as unreachable and alien and cold as space itself. It was breathtaking, beautiful…and he hated it.  Hated it for not having it.  He turned back, disgusted with himself as much as the city, turning in to see Wing kneeling on the floor before the bracket, the Great Sword, naked of its sheath, across his thighs. 

He watched as Wing bowed his head, his palms closing on the blue jewel, golden optics dimming. The mouth seemed to move, tracing unheard words.

“What are you doing?” Drift asked, blunt, cold.  Religious nonsense.  Ridiculous.  A den of madness, this city, buries so far underground it had gone warped, wrong.

Wing raised one hand, one finger, and stayed that way for a long moment, the lips continuing to move. Then, with a final sort of nod, Wing looked up, the smile already lighting his face. “The Knight’s creed,” he explained. “Every time we lay our sword aside, we must recite the creed.” 

“Every time,” Drift said. “Waste.”

Wing tilted his head. “It’s never a waste to remember why you fight, Drift.”

Drift turned away.

[***]

A decacycle had passed, and Drift was thoroughly sick of the city and of Wing.  Particularly, how easily Wing could defeat him. He hated being made to feel like a fool as much as feeling weak, and though Wing didn’t go out of his way to humiliate him—not the way Turmoil would have—Wing didn’t need to.  Just the easy way he dodged Drift’s attacks, the tripping laughter, the effortless way he could turn it around and pin Drift, was enough. 

But he would learn.  He had determined to learn, to best Wing. And he knew enough to respect Wing and his ability, as much as he hated it.  And Wing, for his part, was doing his best to teach him, despite it not being in his best interests. Teach me so I can defeat you with your lessons.  Stupid. No wonder this city could survive only underground.

Probably thought, Drift considered, that he’d somehow convince me to stay.  No. I’ll take what he can teach and bring it back to the Decepticons.  Maybe it will give us the edge. Maybe it will make the difference.

He slumped onto the berth, exhausted.  And there was Wing, with his sword, and his silly ritual, kneeling on the ground. Idiot, he thought, and dropped back, letting the berth take the weight of his backstruts, letting his optics unfocus on the ceiling. 

A presence next to him.  He focused his optics to see Wing’s golden ones smiling down at him.  “Are you well, Drift?”

“Fine.”  The voice was flat.

Wing looked concerned. “I need to practice.  Would you…mind?” 

Drift sat up. Practice?  He saw Wing’s hand curled over the scabbard of his Great Sword. Oh right. Probably some mystical slag about the sword and no one seeing it.  “I’ll leave.”

“No, oh no.” Wing’s optics contracted. “That…that wasn’t what I meant. You can stay. I just didn’t want you to be bored.”

A half dozen sharp retorts collided in Drift’s vocalizer, but he fought them down.  He’d been worse than bored—Wing acted like bored was the worst thing that could ever happen. Just as he’d thought, Wing was weak. “I can handle it,” he said, wryly.

“Thank you,” Wing said, the smile reblooming on his face, and before either of them could think, Wing’s free hand gave Drift’s a grateful squeeze. Wing stood up, abruptly, embarrassed, stammering something like an apology. 

Drift sat up, rubbing the spot on his wrist idly, perplexed.  But by then, Wing had drawn his sword, laying the sheath aside, and was setting himself in some formal ready position, the sword in both hands, jewel held at optic level as he cycled a long, slow, in-vent.  Probably, Drift thought, praying again. His stupid creed. 

Wing burst from stillness so quickly that Drift’s optics lost tracking, the sword seeming to turn into a silver flash of light, slashing downwards, then effortlessly upwards to one side, Wing’s feet pivoting effortlessly to shift the weight.  Drift jerked back, surprised, but kept himself quiet, forced himself still, as Wing seemed to dance with the light flashing from the blade, an effortless intricate series of movements that Drift could hardly name. Parries, slashes, quick jabs, evasions, over and over, the long blade moving swiftly, a liquid extension of his own system. 

It was…something Drift could not even summon a name for.  Elegant, beautiful, powerful, flawless.  What he did, what he was good at doing, himself, was mere raw butchery compared to this. Time seemed to cease, an endless moment of Wing’s movement.

And then Wing stopped, in the same formal position as before, and Drift would swear in the same location as before, as suddenly still and motionless as if he’d never moved at all. Wing bowed his white helm for a moment, and then straightened.  He smiled shyly, meeting Drift’s gaze, and went in that instant, jarringly, from the fierce sword wielder to…Wing.

“I hope that didn’t bother you,” Wing said. 

“No,” Drift said, and this time, he said nothing as Wing knelt before the sword’s bracket, whispering through his ritual.

[***]

Drift said nothing, settling himself on the berth as Wing moved to the bracket.  He was still tired and stiff from their latest sparring, but had found a strange…enjoyment now in watching Wing go through his ritual. Maybe, he thought, he didn’t want to think, he enjoyed the chance to look at Wing, at the unfamiliar geometry of his armor, without being watched back.

This time, Wing drew out a small box from below the bracket, taking items out of it with a quiet reverence. Another ritual.  “What are you doing?”

A silence, while Wing kept working, but Drift could tell the jet was waiting for a break in some needlessly-chained series of movements.  A pause, and Wing’s helm came up. “Honing the blade,” he said, softly. 

Drift flung a surly retort at the broad backspan.  “Ridiculous weapons.  Archaic.”  But he could hear his own resistance in his words, half-seduced by Wing’s effortless grace. 

The helm tilted. “Perhaps.  But it is my weapon. It is what I know.”  The head turned, and Drift saw a flash of amber, “Besides.  Even your guns require maintenance, yes?”

“Yes, but we don’t turn it into some…stupid ritual. It’s combat, not a religion.”

“That’s your distinction to make,” Wing said mildly, settling himself cross-legged on the floor.  The Great Sword rested behind his greaves. He reached for a small grey stone.  “But your weapon keeps you alive, even in your ‘combat’.  Why not show it some proper respect?”

Drift subsided, answerless.  And he watched, as Wing rubbed the grey stone in short, even, back and forth strokes, up and down the length of the blade.  The sound was hypnotic, like white noise, and the firing of actuators in Wing’s shoulders and arms was somehow, despite being repetitive, fascinating.  Drift found himself leaning forward, peering over Wing’s shoulder. 

Wing looked up, a smile beginning to play over his face. “Would you like to try, Drift?”

Drift jerked back, but there was no mockery on the face, nothing but an honest offer.  He shrugged. “Why not?”

Wing grinned.  “That’s the spirit,” he said. He rocked to his knees, placing the Great Sword gently in the bracket. Drift could see the entire edge glowing silver, new and keen. 

Wing rose, moving to another small chest, and came back with pair of short swords, just barely longer than his forearm.  “Practice swords,” he announced, with something almost like a wink. “In more ways than one.” 

He tapped the ground next to him, beckoning Drift down beside him, laying one of the blades across Drift’s lap. “The key,” he said, reaching for the whetstone, “is not to try to sharpen the edge.  That ruins it.  You want to reveal the blade instead, and the edge will show itself.”

Drift looked dubious.  More pseudo-spiritual nonsense.  But still, the sword was a strangely soothing presence on his legs, lighter than Wing’s big sword, but cool and steady.  Wing grinned. “The blade’s very old and very dull. There’s…not much harm you can to do it, Drift.” 

Drift looked at the weapon.  It was, after all, a weapon.  He could turn it against Wing, could attack the other mech right now.  Maybe he’d win.  Maybe he’d escape.  But he realized, as his fingers traced the haft, that…he didn’t want to.  And he didn’t quite know why.

Wing knelt beside him, handing the whetstone.  It was warm from friction and, Drift thought, suddenly, contact with Wing’s hand.  For some reason that...mattered.   “Down the blade,” Wing instructed, his voice soft. “Slow, even, back and forth strokes.” 

It had looked so easy when Wing had done it, but now, Drift found himself looking between the sword and the stone, hesitant to begin.  With the base, he thought. He lay the whetstone against the metal and pushed, feeling the resistance of the metal like velvet under his fingers, slow and sensuous.  He drew the stone back, pushed again, picking up, or trying to, Wing’s gentle, even rhythm. 

He felt Wing’s gaze on his hands, on the sword, and he suddenly felt—acutely—the vibration of the push-pull of the whetstone across the metal resonating up his thighs. 

“Even strokes,” Wing said, laying his hand on top of Drift’s.

“They are,” Drift argued. 

Wing leaned over, taking the stone from Drift’s fingers. “Put your hand on top of mine.”  He waited.  Drift complied, uncertain.  His palm tingled over the back of Wing’s hand, resting his fingers along Wing’s. He pushed along the blade, back and forth, barely pressing. “Like this,” he murmured, shifting his position to get closer, letting Drift’s hand ride over his, back and forth, back and forth, the actuators firing with an elegant precision.  “You were doing this,” he changed the motion, heavy on the push, light on the pullback.  “You feel it now?”  His optics, a handspan from Drift’s flicked over. 

Yes.  He felt it.  And more than that, he felt the vibrations, a silky smooth oscillation, running up his thighs like a sort of current, firing on a trill of desire he had never felt before—acute, sweet and sharp.  He tore his hand away, unsettled, bumping the stone from Wing’s hand.

“Sorry,” he muttered.

“An apology?” Wing teased, grinning, reaching for the stone, and returning it to Drift. 

A proper retort failed Drift: he took the stone and began again, trying to equalize the pressure between the strokes. It was…harder than it looked. Everything Wing did, everything Wing made seem so easy, was like this, though. 

They said nothing for a long time, the soft schuss of the whetstone the only sound between them, each stroke sending a trill of desire through Drift as he worked his way up the blade, slowly, painstakingly, doing what Wing had said: revealing the blade, letting the edge show itself. It was a kind of sensuality he’d never felt, and when he looked up, he saw Wing’s optics, heavy lidded with a drowsy contentment, watching as Drift stroked the blade with the whetstone like a caress. And it struck Drift that…Wing felt it, too, and that this was something Wing knew, this intimate touch.

Wing noticed the cessation of motion, looking up, his glossa flicking from his mouth, in an involuntary lick of desire. Their optics met, something heavy and electric between them, Wing searching Drift’s face for some sign, some permission. Drift pulled back, and Wing dropped his gaze to the blade. 

“Y-yes,” Wing said.  “We wetsand it next. To pull out the fine grit.” He turned away, toward his supplies, and Drift’s optics fed like starving things on Wing’s backframe, the sinuous curve of his spinal struts as he twisted over and returned, the restless shift of his wings that told Drift all he wanted to know about Wing’s own composure. Drift’s ventilations cycled deeper, struggling for control.  He…wanted. 

When Wing turned around, his usual smile was in place, if a little uneven, as he placed the bowls of water and sand in front of Drift.  He dipped a small bit of cloth in the water, then the sand, and moved to behind Drift’s shoulder, reaching over to show him this stroke—instead of short back-and-forth, this was a series of long, slow draws down the blade, slick and smooth.  His cheek armor brushed Drift’s and Drift, in an agony of desire, tipped his own face over, tilting in for a surreptitious nuzzle, just to feel the silky warmth of the metal under his cheek. A strange sound, like a whimper, from Wing’s throat. 

“Wetsand,” Wing said, unevenly, clawing for self-control. 

“Yes,” Drift murmured, unaccustomed to the gravelly softness in his own voice. 

“And then we wet the blade again,” Wing pulled away, reluctant, breathless.  Drift’s optics grazed the hip that rose near his shoulder, Wing reaching for the bowl of water. He wanted to nuzzle against that, too, or slide his hand under the lean, white thigh, thumb tracing up the armor seam, and feel Wing’s body shudder with surprised desire. He forced himself still, Wing moving back on his haunches.

“You wet,” Wing said, pausing to cycle a vent of air, warm and shivering against Drift’s side, “the blade.” He tipped the bowl, but his hands shook, and the bowl overtipped, and instead of a small trickle of water,  the whole contents spilled on the blade, on Drift’s inner thigh. 

Drift gasped at the sudden cool contact, the water finding interstices in his armor, sliding down and through, dripping like cold sparks on his cables and actuators, exquisite, intense. 

“I’m sorry,” Wing blurted, his usual cocky demeanor abandoning him entirely, dropping the bowl,  patting automatically, without thinking, at Drift’s wet thigh. He froze, abruptly, at the intimacy of the contact, looking up, his optics keen with embarrassment. 

Drift could hold himself back no longer, one hand tugging the bright helm toward him, leaning back on his other hand.  Wing’s hands came up to his shoulders, their mouths joining in a strangely gentle, curious kiss, neither knowing what would happen.  Wing’s optics closed, giving over to the sensation of his mouthplates against Drift’s. 

Wing pulled way, after a long moment, his crest against Drift’s, his ventilation sharp and shallow.  “I’m sorry,” he breathed, barely audible, but before Drift could respond, ask what the frag he was apologizing for, he  dropped his head, his mouth shy and eager on Drift’s chassis, his hands pushing at Drift’s shoulders, tilting him back against the ground. 

Drift shivered as Wing’s hands joined his mouth, exploring, feeling, caressing Drift’s battered armor, nuzzling into each nick and dent like each was some treasure, his sensors prickling with current as Wing’s glossa flicked against him, working his way down to Drift’s spread thighs, the sword a bar between them. 

Wing shifted back, the white folds of his wings hunching over his spinal struts as he moved, jumping over the pelvic span which almost burned for the touch of his mouth, to the thigh armor, licking and nipping at the spilled water.  Drift merely…watched, hissing with want, as the ornate helm dipped lower, as Wing’s lust-dimmed optics glowed over his body, the mouth insistent, longing against him, warm against the cold water. 

Wing looked up the length of Drift’s frame, optics importunate.  “Please?” he asked, one hand riding up Drift’s thigh, hovering over the interface hatch. 

Drift growled with lust, tearing at his interface hatch as his only answer. 

Wing bent lower, optics closed, concentrated, blissful, as he nuzzled against Drift’s equipment covers, as if he’d wanted this for a long time.  Wing’s naked desire staggered Drift, that he could be so wanted, so desired, after all he had done and been. 

He gasped as Wing freed his spike from its housing, covering it with his mouth, his glossa swirling over the complicated shape, sending hot spikes of sensation over Drift’s sensor net.  His hands balled into fists, the sensation almost too intense, too much, verging on pain.  And Wing’s expression was quiet bliss, as though there was no degradation, no force, no imbalance of power.  Drift’s spike surged with memories, but this, this was sweeter, more powerful, intoxicating. 

Wing shifted, bring his weight to one hand, moving the sword from between them, and Drift’s thighs felt the tingling pressure of Wing’s chassis against them, between them, the bulk of Wing’s shoulder panels pushing against Drift’s stabilizing gyros.  All the while, Wing’s mouth worked along the spike, gentle, insistent, coaxing.  Drift could stand no more, hold back no longer, his whole frame tense, taut.

“Wing,” he croaked, helpless, a warning, on the very last verge of control, his hand catching behind the shoulder, trying to haul the jet off him, end the impossible delicious torment on his spike. 

Wing twisted down, evading, as easily as he dodged Drift in combat, one hand reaching below his chin, circling the valve cover.

The stimulus of the light touch pushed Drift over the edge.  He jolted: the overload detonated over his sensornet, white and red and burning hot, leaving him shuddering in pleasure, as if immolated. 

Wing stilled on top of him, letting the fluid fill his mouth, not moving, not daring to do a thing to prevent Drift from surfing the very crest of his overload.

The shudders lessened, Drift wrung out from desire, and then, and only then, did Wing move, swallowing in one short, neat gesture, his glossa flirting a sweet farewell to the spike as he pulled away, optics glowing, incandescent and sated as he turned his face to Drift. 

Drift ex-vented, sharply, curling to grab the shoulders, pulling Wing up the length of his frame, their armor sliding over each other, without words, without thoughts, pulling Wing in the circle of his arms, twining his legs through Wing’s, bending his mouth for the mouth that met him, redolent with the tang of his own fluid. 

“Why?” he asked, his voice still rough, uncertain, Wing’s mouth chasing the kiss, giving it up with reluctance. He couldn’t even find words for the rest of the question.

Wing smiled, wriggling upward to plant a kiss on Drift’s crest, wrapping his arms around the helm, pulling it against his chassis.  “I wanted to give,” Wing murmured, “And you needed to receive.”  And it made all the sense in the world. 

Epilogue:

Drift woke up, hours later, hearing a soft, sussurus sound. They had somehow climbed to the narrow berth at some point, curled together, limbs entwined, ventilations synchronized and gentle.   He remembered that enough to feel the cold and empty space beside him.

He rolled his head over, scanning behind him. 

There.  Wing sat before the Great Sword’s empty bracket, his optics limned at lowlight, bent over the blade.  The whetstone murmured over the steel, short, absolutely even strokes.  Hypnotizing to watch.

In the darkness, the motion cast sparks as well as curls of metal, little scintillants of blue scattering on Wing’s white thighs before dying out. And Wing’s face bore an expression of rapture, as though he were feeling the strokes on the blade itself. 

Drift rolled to his feet. Not as smoothly as Wing, not as soundlessly as Turmoil. 

The optics brightened a bit.  “I didn’t finish,” Wing said.  “I didn’t want to bother you.”

Bother me, bore me…Wing worried far too much about how Drift felt.  Always.  Drift dropped to his knees next to Wing.  He said nothing, gesturing Wing to continue.

Wing’s gaze jumped from Drift to his blade, a small smile curving on his mouth.  Drift could not take his optics off the mouth for a long moment, a shiver of memory about what it had done to him running through his frame.

Wing’s hands moved on the blade again, drawing Drift’s gaze, the whetstone whispering over the metal, back and forth, smooth, even strokes, his other hand gliding down the blade’s far side, supporting it, bracing it, thumb curved over the already silver-honed edge.  Back and forth, back and forth, little cascades of sparks, the tempo even, measured, stable, and it seemed to eat right through Drift’s armor, resonate against his inner systems, vibrating right down to his interface array.  And he found himself staring at Wing’s hands, wondering, wanting to know, what those hands would do together on him, sliding over his body.

He shivered, catching Wing’s gaze. The smile quirked a bit brighter, the edges quirking, growing a bit sly.  “All right, Drift?” Wing murmured, and the pitch of his voice was like warm oil poured over Drift’s frame. 

“Fine,” Drift managed, shifting on his heels. 

Wing nodded, bowing his head back to his task, but Drift could not escape the unmistakable thought that Wing was watching him, enjoying his discomfiture.  The honing continued, the whetstone kissing its way up the blade, Wing bending with it, forward, closer to Drift.  Drift could feel the edges of Wing’s EM field, throbbing against him, and it struck him that Wing was aching for him, as well, teasing him, trying to goad him into action. 

Wing tipped forward, concentrating on smaller, quick, elegant strokes on the angled point of the blade. He bent over, the back of his neck exposed, vulnerable.  Drift’s systems howled with need. On purpose? By chance?  After a moment it didn’t matter: It was an opportunity, and Drift would have never survived Cybertron if he’d been in the habit of passing up opportunities.

He rolled forward, no match for Wing’s grace, but serviceable enough, sinking his dentae into one of the cables in the back of Wing’s neck.  It felt…feral,  possessive, and utterly, purely right. 

Wing stiffened, gasping, his hands stopping their motion.  He bowed his head lower, exposing more of his neck to Drift’s touch, giving in, offering.  Drift gave a soft growl, one hand moving to the white folded wings. 

“I think I’m done here,” Wing said, weakly, holding his head rigidly still, his hands moving the Great Sword to the ground, shivering at Drift’s touch.

Still biting the fuel line, Drift nodded, his mouth curling into a smile, feeling Wing’s shuddering surrender.

 

 

Comments

[chibirisuchan.livejournal.com]

purrrRRRRRRRRRRrrrrr! ^_____^ *rolls around happily in all the sensory details omg* Sword-dancing! Sword-petting! ...and then sword-caressing, and then sword-caressing, and sparks of all sorts.

Heh, Drift, no wonder you're having instances of "strange arousal no wait he means enjoyment." Anybody who knows how to manipulate metal that well is going to have some substantial advantages in the handling-a-mech's-*cough*-equipment field!

*purrrRRRRrrrrrs all over* ^____^

[niyazi-a.livejournal.com]

Poor Drift, taken down by the cute pacifist. ^_^

(And yeah, I think part of my blade kink is showing here! o_O) Glad you liked!

[sasuke-emosauce.livejournal.com]

^ What she said.

[niyazi-a.livejournal.com]

Glad you liked: It was really fun (and kind of hot) to write!

[risamitsukai.livejournal.com]

The erotic tension in this was just... wow. I could actually feel my face heating up as I was reading this.

His cheek armor brushed Drift’s and Drift, in an agony of desire, tipped his own face over, tilting in for a surreptitious nuzzle, just to feel the silky warmth of the metal under his cheek. A strange sound, like a whimper, from Wing’s throat.

alfkgsdkvhjs oh my god, I can just SEE this, and it's killing meeeee

[niyazi-a.livejournal.com]

Thank you! For a while I worried this took a bit too long to get to, you know, the goods, but it really did need to be there.