(no subject)

[akisawana]

The worst part about being assigned to Skywarp was that Thundercracker didn’t get to see Starscream as often as he’d like. He only got to see Starscream after the Minister came home, and as for privacy…well, Skywarp spent plenty of time in recharge, true, but it was at once too much time and too light recharge, and either way guilt cooled both of them too much. Skywarp’s time was near, and then the couple would have all the time in the world.
And truthfully, with Skywarp curled under his wing like the little adelfos he never had, heavy weight against his arm, time didn’t seem to matter. He may have agreed to this for Starscream’s sake -he could no more tell Starscream no than stop the planet from wandering- but Skywarp had his own magnetic hypnotism, and Thundercracker didn’t regret a single choice he’d made.
Well, maybe letting Skywarp use him as a backrest. Slagger was heavy.
Still, he didn’t push him off until Starscream burst through the door, dropped a stack of energon cubes on the table, fell onto his favorite stool and said, “We need to talk.”
“Mrphl,” Skywarp said, lifting his head from Thundercracker’s shoulder, still half in standby. Starscream tossed him an energon cube, glowing bright enough to be a landing light.
“Wake up,” Starscream said, rather crossly. “You need to be part of this.”
“Part of what?” Thundercracker asked, accepting a regular cube from Starscream.
“Decisions must be made!”
“No,” Skywarp said, flopping painfully back against Thundercracker. Painful for Thundercracker, at any rate.
“And when those avegi come, where exactly are you going to put them?”
“In my cockpit, same as my enkyos,” Skywarp flicked his optics off.
“I don’t think they’ll all fit,” Thundercracker put in dryly.
“We’ll turn the study into a nursery,” Starscream said. “I’m getting seven cradles delivered.”
Thundercracker thought that was rather optimistic, but refrained from saying anything. “I’m not moving the desk.”
“No, I need you to pick up the energon. And dispensers. And some toys. Nipii need toys, don’t they?”
“Who said we’re staying here?” Skywarp asked.
“Do you have anywhere else to go?” Starscream snapped. “What else do they need, I can’t think of anything. If you do, get that too.”
“Do you have anywhere you’d rather be?” Thundercracker asked, more gently. “I’m sure Megatron could arrange for something, if you wanted to be closer to him.”
“Nonsense. They’re staying here,” Starscream declared. “Megatron can get his shiny aft over here when he wants to see them and don’t make that face Skywarp.”
“So when you said decisions needed to be made,” Thundercracker began, and Starscream was giving him that look, thank Primus for Skywarp, “what you meant was you’d made decisions.”
“And then there’s the emergency paperwork,” Starscream said, producing a datapad. “You need to name someone to take them, if you die.” Skywarp’s flinch was audible against Thundercracker. “Oh, don’t be like that,” Starscream said. “It’s just a formality. It doesn’t matter if you put us or Megatron down. Just do it before the next time you see Ratchet or he’ll grind his gears at you.”
“He’s not so scary,” Skywarp said, because as much as Thundercracker had come to love him, he was an idiot.
“Just do it, or they’ll put your nosokos down.” Starscream sighed, and rubbed between his optics. He was getting a processor ache, Thundercracker could tell, and he wondered how much work Starscream had put into this already. Cradles were easy enough to come by, but most mechs produced their own nipios-grade energon. He and Starscream were due to visit Ratchet soon and get their own filters installed. Still, a single nipios could take energon from two or even three adults, and Skywarp was expecting seven.
“Novalight wouldn’t be that bad, though,” Skywarp hedged.
“I suppose if one of them is also an outlier, he can teleport out of the closet she locks him in,” Starscream said. “The important part, because you’re not going to die, is whoever you name will be notified when they detach.”
“That wasn’t part of the exorcism.” Skywarp curled in a little closer to Thundercracker, who put an arm around him, not fully understanding the significance of that. It didn’t sound good. “And anyways, you don’t know she still goes to church.”
“You want to take that risk?” Starscream demanded.
“Megatron wouldn’t let anything happen to them, would he?”
Starscream made a rude noise. “Right, because our most noble Lord High Protector is all about throwing the rules out in favor of his whims of the moment.”
“Hey, it’s not a big deal,” Thundercracker said, sliding a hand up Skywarp’s wing. “Just put us down, or Megatron, or your nosokos if you want.”
“Novalight is not an option,” Starscream said, squeezing his cube until it squeaked. Skywarp backed away from him, ending up half in Thundercracker’s lap. Thundercracker’s own retreat was cut off by the arm of the couch.
“What’s so bad about your nosokos, Skywarp?”
“She exorcises helpless tekni,” Starscream spat. “There’s no scientific evidence for demons, and even if there was, do you know what an exorcism is?”
“She didn’t…she wasn’t part of the ritual,” Skywarp said, turning towards Thundercracker and away from Starscream.
“She didn’t stop it,” Starscream argued, as if it was the same thing.
Skywarp closed his optics, not before Thundercracker saw the ghost of old pain. “She thought they were helping me,” he said. “That I was possessed by a demon.”
“And that the solution was to beat you until it vacated?”
Skywarp didn’t say anything, just leaned his head against Thundercracker’s shoulder. Starscream snorted and looked at the ceiling. “I know she won’t lock them in a closet,” he said. “Novalight knows right from wrong.”
“I’d say not beating tekni nor locking them up is pretty basic stuff,” Thundercracker said dryly, soothing the sting of his words with a hand between Skywarp’s intakes.
“She’s never laid a hand on her own,” Skywarp said. “Novalight was a good trefos to me and she’s a good trefos to her kids and she’d be a good trefos to my embers.”
“Right,” Starscream sneered. “Because you’re such a well-adjusted person.” Skywarp pressed against Thundercracker, who had to hug him to keep him from toppling onto the floor. “Tell me, are any of hers planning to go to college? Is higher education still a sin? That’s probably for the best, saves them from having to pick a major. You have a hard enough time picking out a movie, let alone what will determine your job for the rest of your life.” Starscream snapped his vocalizer off with a sharp click.
Skywarp was vibrating against Thundercracker’s chest, and he stroked Skywarp’s head until the tremors stopped. “She doesn’t know any better,” Skywarp mumbled. “She never had you.” Megatron should be here, in Thundercracker’s place. But Thundercracker stood in for Megatron a lot lately.
Starscream sighed, and Thundercracker cursed Skywarp’s weight, wishing someone else was here so he could go to Starscream. But he was trapped, and Starscream looked at him, and he saw that Starscream saw, and he smiled a little, for it was better to get this over with quickly. “It would almost be a moot point, since of course you’ll be around to take care of them,” Starscream began. He kept saying it, even though nobody had ever had seven embers at once and survived. No one had ever had more than three, that Thundercracker had ever heard of. It was enough to make him hold Skywarp when he should be taking care of Starscream, enough that Starscream humored Skywarp on almost everything. Skywarp was going to die, and these precious avegi would be all that was left of Starscream’s best friend, who he called adelfos.
“And we’ll help,” Thundercracker added. Skywarp had wormed his way into Thundercracker’s spark as well, tucked between his trefos and his old wingmates. All three gone now, and Skywarp soon to follow.
“But if you leave it blank, they’ll notify your next of kin when the avegi detach,” Starscream finished. “And that’s her. Do you want to do that to her? She hasn’t heard from you for meta-cycles.”
“Did you have a fight?” Thundercracker asked softly, when Skywarp didn’t say anything. “With her?”
“I had to stop talking to her. She was getting in trouble because I’m a prostitute.” Skywarp sat back and scrubbed his hand over his face. “They were gonna take her tekni.”
“Apostate,” Starscream corrected. He set his drink down and leaned forwards. “If you want to find her again, I’ll help you, but a government notice won’t do her any favors. When do you see Ratchet next?”
“Two days out,” Thundercracker said, tilting his head. Starscream nodded behind Skywarp’s back; he’d explain later. “So you can fill it out later.”
Skywarp turned around, in Thundercracker’s embrace still, and looked at the pad. “You guys or Megatron?”
“Is there someone else you had in mind?” Thundercracker asked.
Skywarp shook his head and tucked away the form. “Who else could I trust?”
“Hey,” Starscream said, sliding to his knees on the floor in front of them. He reached up and took Skywarp’s face in his hands, pressed their foreheads together. “It doesn’t matter what you put down, I’m going to take care of them and you.”
“I owe you,” Skywarp said. “So much already.”
“Damn straight.” Starscream stood up and returned to his chair. “And I intend to collect with interest. Now, have you thought about colors?”
“Put that away, fill it out later.” Starscream waved at the datapad. “If you want to put us down, put us down. If you want Megatron, he already said he’d do it. So you don’t have to ask either of us. Now put it away and drink your energon.”
Skywarp did, and Thundercracker followed Starscream’s lead and didn’t say anything. Such a major decision would of course overwhelm Skywarp, and he’d need some time to sort himself out. Thundercracker hoped Skywarp would choose them, but didn’t dare share that thought. It was too close to wishing him dead.
“I didn’t order sparganii,” Starscream continued. “Have you thought about colors at all?”
“Um,” Skywarp said. Thundercracker sighed.
“You figured you’d get whatever was cheapest, didn’t you?”
Skywarp shrugged. “Well, it’s a bit harder than a movie.”

Skywarp onlined his optics at the touch from Thundercracker on his shoulder. “Hey, Starscream,” he said.
“Not talking to you still,” Starscream replied. “Get off my sieziegos’ lap and stop existing. I only want to deal with adults today.”
“He filled it out,” Thundercracker said softly, muting the television. “We filed it over the cortext.”
Starscream sat down on Thundercracker’s other side. “Good. Who did you put down?”
“You and I for guardians,” Thundercracker answered for him as Starscream pushed Skywarp away with his foot. “Me alone for medical proxy.” Starscream snorted and settled his feet in Thundercracker’s lap for rubbing. Skywarp relocated to Thundercracker’s shoulder. “In case you don’t get there right away.”
Skywarp dragged one of Starscream’s feet into his own lap. He watched Thundercracker closely, but there didn’t seem to be a pattern to it. Starscream sighed happily and leaned against the table leg. “I’ve been looking at cradles,” he said. “But from what I’m told, they won’t be spending much time in the nursery. It’ll be for storage more than anything else.”
Thundercracker rolled one of Starscream’s toes between his fingers. “Where will they be all day then”
“In here, probably. We can put a rolling cradle or two over there.” Starscream pointed at the couch. “They won’t be able to watch television until well after the point they no longer need to be held constantly and fed every two hours.”
Thundercracker shrugged. “Better than staring at a blank wall all day,” he said.
Starscream nodded at him. “They’re quite distractible, but the television will be too far away. At least until they’re old enough to understand eating fixes hunger.”
Skywarp knew that, from sitting with Novalight and watching soap operas at far too early in the morning. They had spent hours discussing who had interfaced with who, simply so there was something to talk about besides mori. Even the unchanged, who held reproduction as a sacrament, believed that a new enkyos had to have something to think about besides his mori, from time to time, or go mad. “I never said we were going to stay here,” Skywarp spoke up. Under his hands, Starscream’s toes curled.
“Of course you are. Don’t be silly.”
Thundercracker bumped Skywarp with an elbow. “You are more than welcome to stay. Seven embers, you’re going to need help too. I’ll do it if you show me how.”
“I could always,” Skywarp started, but Starscream interrupted him with a glare.
“Could always what? Go back to Megatron, with a thousand people coming and going at all hours of the night?”
“I could get my own place,” Skywarp said. He didn’t really want to. He wanted to stay here, with Thundercracker who was terrible at video games and Starscream who monopolized the remote. Where there was a really comfortable couch and windows big enough to take off from and the little shop down the street with the best gummies. “It’s not like when I left my genei.” His genei, like all unchanged, had not given their nipii even the most basic upgrades. When Skywarp had walked away from that way of life, he didn’t have a comm. suite or a RFID set or any of the little things so common, it was assumed everyone had one. He had to live with Starscream at first, he didn’t have the physical ability to get a job or rent an apartment of his own, or even shop at any store that didn’t accept cash.
“Do you remember when you first moved in here,” Starscream said after a minute, taking his feet back and folding them under his body.
Skywarp nodded. “Yeah. I owe you a lot.” Too much to ever pay back, almost as much as he owed his embers.
“Specifically,” Starscream said, “you owe me your firstborn. Plus your second-born, as interest.”
In between them, Thundercracker put both hands over his face. “I don’t like where this is going.”
Starscream ignored him. “Now, I don’t have time to raise tekni, so you’ll be the live-in nanny. So you might as well bring the other five along. Too, it’s not fair to separate them from their nosoki. The issue is closed. What color padding should we get?”
“Starscream,” Skywarp began. He wasn’t sure how to thank his friend, how to acknowledge the gift of safety for his embers.
“The issue is closed. What color padding should we get?”

The doorbell rang, and Thundercracker hit the pause button. Not that it mattered; Skywarp’s mechanocat had shot his turbomoose down so many times Skywarp was starting to question Thundercracker’s legendary military prowess. Starscream wasn’t exactly known for his honesty, after all.
“I’ll get it,” Thundercracker said, totally unnecessary. Whatever Starscream said, Skywarp still felt weird about answering the door or calling this place home. Even though Starscream had kept his room just how he left it, (a mess) even though Thundercracker insisted on Skywarp’s opinions as they rearranged things to fit the seven incoming bitlets, Skywarp still didn’t feel quite at home.
But this place was better than home. This place was safe. There was no closet filled with memories, no stains of his own energon on the floor. Only safety, only joy, unlike even Megatron’s office where Shockwave had told him about the walkaways, the bed where he’d lost one precious ember, the room where they’d threatened to extinguish his embers and the ceiling he’d first seen when he’d woken, amazed that the building was still standing when everything else was in ruins.
Skywarp shook his head and exited out of the game. Thundercracker was coming back, with someone else’s footsteps behind him. “He’s in here,” Thundercracker said, smiling though his wings were distinctly unhappy.
And then Megatron came in behind him and all Skywarp could think about was how to get in his arms without tripping over his own feet.
He didn’t quite make it, but Megatron caught him, and held him close, and kissed him, and that was all that mattered for a long moment.
When he came back down to Cybertron, Thundercracker had disappeared as neatly as if he was a teleporter himself, leaving behind two cubes of energon and a plate of goodies. Skywarp grinned, and towed Megatron over to the couch. Megatron smiled as Skywarp curled into his side, and stroked down the purple stripe on his wing. “How have you been?” Megatron asked.
Skywarp shrugged. “Busy,” he said, which was true. He was very busy when he was awake. Once the mori came, how much time would he have to embarrass Thundercracker in video games? “We have a lot to get done still.”
“I’m sorry I can’t spare more time,” Megatron said. “The Rock Lords are challenging our ownership of several key planets, and I fear we may have to resort to military action.”
Skywarp didn’t know why that would be so bad, but Megatron knew far more about war than he did. “Well, thank you for keeping me and my bitlets safe from metal-mining aliens who would strip the plating from our armor and melt it down to please their false gods,” he said with a kiss.
“Where did that come from?” Megatron reached for the bowl of goodies on the table.
Skywarp grinned. “There’s this game where you go to school with aliens because, honestly I wasn’t really paying all that much attention but I saved a guy from being eaten by the school nurse. I kind of wish I didn’t because he’s a jerk.”
Megatron fed Skywarp a few of the goodies, only the colors he knew Skywarp liked, and shook his head. “I will never understand your games.”
“This one’s weird even by video game standards,” Skywarp said. “I just rescued my alien suitor.”
“Don’t you usually have to rescue your suitor, though?”
Skywarp shrugged. “I’ve never had to rescue my boyfriend from my insane math teacher who bleaches himself and is attempting to steal his liver, which Thundercracker says is kind of like a filter and removing it is fatal to most aliens.”
“So it is,” Megatron said. One of his hands came up to rest over the heat of Skywarp’s foundry, the other fed the Seeker more green goodies.
“What’s wrong?” Skywarp asked, tipping his head up to look at Megatron.
Megatron didn’t bother to deny it. “One of the mechs rescued from Jhiaxus passed into the Well this morning,” he said. “From laying avegi.”
“Oh,” Skywarp said, wrapping both his hands around Megatron’s larger one.
“He was carrying five avegi. Only five,” Megatron said with a tap on Skywarp’s chest. Skywarp let himself be pulled closer, sitting on Megatron rather than next to him.
Skywarp thought some of the mechs that Jhiaxus had kept might have gone through more than one round of “treatment,” but he didn’t say anything, just let Megatron feed him his energon, thick and gross and radioactive.
He drank it slowly, letting Megatron control it, letting Megatron lean him back against a broad silver chest. Megatron sat the cube down when it was half empty. Skywarp wished he wouldn’t have; he much preferred to drink the stuff in one gulp, as quickly as possible, to avoid the taste. But he didn’t say anything, instead asking, “Did he have a timing belt?”
“I don’t think so,” Megatron said, running a thumb around the edges of Skywarp’s cockpit. “What is that?”
“It’s a thing the unchanged used to use,” Skywarp said. “It does…something, makes detaching easier.”
“No, he wasn’t one of the unchanged,” Megatron said, lifting the cube to Skywarp’s lips again.
With his talk not even close to desperately empty, it rebelled against the thick oily dreck. Skywarp forced it down anyways, nestling in the contours of Megatron’s armour. “That’s why,” he said, once Megatron had taken the now-empty cube away again. “Ambulon was telling me, some mods can pull on your spark a lot, and that’s part of why unchanged can split so many times. Because not having mods is kind of their whole….thing.” Skywarp waved his hand in a circle.
“You upgraded yourself,” Megatron said, touching the side of Skywarp’s head where his radio was installed.
Skywarp tilted into Megatron’s hand. “Not that many. Not really even enough to get by. I was going to but you have to wait in between, so. I’ll do it later.”
Megatron nodded thoughtfully, then rested his head against the back of Skywarp’s neck. “Will that be enough to make a difference, I wonder.”
“Yes,” Skywarp said firmly, and then he reassured Megatron that he was healthy and strong the best way he could, until cooling metal ticked under his cheek and Megatron stopped running his hands over Skywarp like he’d never touch him again.

The Rusty Taco was a good place to meet someone, busy and bright, with high booths and clear sightlines. Thundercracker sat on the outside edge of the bench and toyed with the straw in his cube. The lazily swirling glitter caught the light and cast faint rainbows on the tabletop, on Skywarp’s hands, on his untouched cube glowing with anti-emetic radiation.
Novalight was late, an hour and more.
The door opened for the thirty-second time since they’d sat down, and Skywarp lifted his head to dully scan the faces of those that came in. Then he blinked, his optics flashing off and on as they rebooted. He stood up as quickly as he was able, and waved frantically. Thundercracker followed his gaze and saw a Seeker, blue and black with a pair of pink wingstripes, stop in surprise. Recognition lit up her face, and she hurried over to where they were sitting. Skywarp teleported out of the booth and right into her arms, laughing. She hugged him, and they stood in a silent embrace everyone else pretended not to see.
And then Skywarp towed her over to where Thundercracker was sitting. “TC, this is my nosokos. Nova, this is TC.” He felt the cold tingle of a recognition scan wash over him, even as he scanned her himself. She was carrying no weapons and a vrefos in her cockpit, which was painted over.
“Hello,” Novalight said, as Skywarp ushered her across the table from them. She didn’t say anything about the rifles Thundercracker had mounted on his arms, or the larger one folded and stowed on his back, or the bombs or the soldier mods. Skywarp grinned, and warped back into his seat.
“TC’s cool,” he said, taking a swig from his cube. Thundercracker was faintly surprised he’d managed two jumps, short as they had been. He could feel Skywarp’s arm trembling with fatigue as he set the cube down. Skywarp didn’t explain Thundercracker’s weapons further, and Novalight didn’t ask. “Remember Starscream? Lived behind us? Yeah, this is his sieziegos.”
“I remember Starscream,” Novalight said. Her voice had the same raspy sexiness Starscream’s did, that Thundercracker secretly envied. She tilted her head, giving Skywarp a look that reminded him of Slipstream, for some reason, and not because they were both femmes.
“Anyways, my tin roof rusted,” Skywarp announced. The waiter, unnoticed by the siblings, gave Thundercracker a weak smile. He shrugged in return. He didn’t know, he was just there to scrape Skywarp off the floor and shoot rogue science thugs.
“Oh, congratulations!” Novalight reached across the table, grabbed Skywarp’s hand and squeezed. “When does he detach? Who donated, do I know him? How do you feel? Is he sucking you dry? Is that why you look like congealed scrap?”
“I’m fine, I’m fine,” Skywarp said, laughing a little. “Ratchet wants to detach them early, around the twenty-second.”
“Them?” Novalight squeezed Skywarp’s hands. “Twins?”
“More,” Skywarp grinned.
“Triplets?”
“More.”
Thundercracker facepalmed. “Seven,” he said, trying to not completely kill the excitement. No-one had been this excited about Skywarp’s embers save Skywarp himself.
“Seven?” Novalight grinned. “You’ll beat me in one fell swoop.”
“How many do you have now?” Skywarp asked.
“I have five,” she said, releasing one of his hands to touch her cockpit. “So how are you feeling?”
Thundercracker tuned them out and resumed his scanning of the restaurant. It was busy, so it would be hard to overhear -but it was also easy for someone to slip in amongst the crowd. The waiter came back to take Novalight’s order, and when he returned he brought a refill for Thundercracker, and, surprisingly, Skywarp. This was the most Skywarp had eaten without a fuss in days, and Thundercracker hoped nobody would regret that later.
Halfway through the fourth round, Skywarp poked Thundercracker. “You don’t mind, do you, TC?”
Thundercracker decided the person near the door wasn’t a threat, and turned to the black Seeker. “Don’t mind what?” he asked cautiously.
“Nova said she’d get me a timing belt, can she mail it to your house?”
Thundercracker had never heard of a timing belt before, and his eyes narrowed in suspicion. “What does it do? It better not be another paint bomb.”
“I’ll leave that out,” Novalight promised solemnly. “It makes detaching safer with the power of prayer.”
“Sure, okay,” Thundercracker said. “As long as it doesn’t explode, you can send all the useless trinkets to my address you want to.” If Skywarp wanted to waste time and hope on things that couldn’t possibly have an effect, well, who was Thundercracker to argue.
“It’s not useless,” Novalight said. “I’m not sure how it works, but it does.”
“Totally,” Skywarp agreed.
“If you say so.” Thundercracker didn’t believe them, but it wasn’t his place. Starscream’s, maybe, or Megatron’s, or Ratchet’s, but not his.
“It truly does,” Novalight insisted. “How many people do you know die when their spark splits? One in five, one in seven?”
“That sounds about right,” Thundercracker said. “And the more embers they kindle, the more dangerous it gets.” His own trefos was one of them who’d split his spark too many times to maintain cohesion, without a vrefos ever surviving. Vrefi died even more often than their pedii.
“Didn’t you ever wonder how the unchanged had such huge families?”
“Comparative religion is not my field of study,” Thundercracker said. “That would be acoustic engineering.”
“Most people we knew growing up had about twelve,” Skywarp said. “And no doctors.”
“I don’t know how the timing belt works,” Novalight repeated. “But it does. My sieziegos’ adelfos has split his spark ten times already, twice with twins. Take it to your doctor, have him examine it. What do you have to lose?”
“Whatever,” said Thundercracker, not interested in any hocus-pocus but even less interested in an argument. “Just no paint bombs.”
Novalight began to warn Skywarp about detachment then, and Skywarp to tell her about what a doctor was like. Thundercracker stopped listening in a hurry. Only when the restaurant began to fill for the dinner rush and the waiter to wipe down the tables nearby aggressively did Thundercracker poked Skywarp. “Time to go, Sparky.”
Skywarp, in the middle of a story about Hot Rod, pouted at him. “C’mon TC,” he said. “I don’t wanna.”
“I need to go home and prepare dinner.” Novalight stood up. “It was nice meeting you, Thundercracker.”
“It was good to meet you too,” he said. “I’ll go pay while you two say goodbye.” He paid for their rounds, and for Novalight’s, and since they had sat at the table for so long, he tipped double and more. Novalight was gone when he went back, Skywarp leaning against the table heavily.
Thundercracker offered him an arm to lean on as they made their way to the taxi stand. Even with three cubes in him, Skywarp was in no shape to fly. “Did that go as well as you hoped?”
“Better,” Skywarp said. “Can I see her again?”
“Of course.” Thundercracker shook his head. “Why wouldn’t you?”
“You don’t mind, really?” It was a little sad how Skywarp’s face lit up like that, and not cute at all.
“Skywarp. Idiot. What else am I supposed to be doing aside from hauling your heavy aft around?”
Skywarp shrugged. “If you don’t mind.”
Thundercracker sighed, and resisted the urge to roll his eyes. Skywarp, as Starscream frequently reminded him, did enough things to be a pain in the neck that he could be given a pass on what he couldn’t help. And then Starscream gave him a list of things Skywarp couldn’t help. “I don’t mind,” he said. “In fact, the more you see her, the more I get out of the house. Now let’s go home and see if Starscream wants to watch a movie.”

Ambulon appreciated how Skywarp was always early to his appointments. The medic didn’t have any other patients, not when he was stuck in legal limbo. Ultra Magnus was waiting until all the vrefi were born and rogimed before he finalized the charges, and Skywarp was the last one still carrying. If he died, or any of the avegi didn’t boot up once they detached, Ultra Magnus wanted to add those murder charges as well.
Not that Skywarp was officially Ambulon’s patient; he was Ratchet’s, with First Aid consulting as an expert on high-risk forging. Ambulon was there at Skywarp’s request, and he had a feeling that it was strictly off the record. But it gave him something to do, the check-ins every deca-cycle ticking down the time left until he stood trial for what he let happen. And Ultra Magnus was making sure Ambulon would be able to see this through.
Skywarp was going to die. There were no two ways around it; nobody in recorded history had split their spark seven times at once and survived. The vrefi might live, might, if everything went perfectly -the other mech rescued from Jhiaxus who hadn’t terminated his embers had ended up with five viable avegi.
That mech hadn’t survived the birth. Skywarp wouldn’t either.
It was obvious, in Ratchet’s kindness and First Aid’s quietness, in Thundercracker’s gentleness and Megatron’s absence. It was obvious in the cracks running through Skywarp’s toes from too much walking, the loose plates on his back where protoform was receding, flowing in to cradle his spark. It was obvious, and nobody mentioned it, as if silence would prevent it from happening. If they hoped enough, prayed hard enough, thought enough happy thoughts, Skywarp would live against all odds, logic, laws of the universe.
Ambulon hated the idea. It was too close to how he was raised, to the dark side of the unchanged. The idea that if -no, when- Skywarp died, it would be because someone hadn’t been pure enough of spark, hadn’t wanted it enough. The idea that bad things only happened to mechs who deserved it.
But he wouldn’t say anything. Not because he was a coward, but because he wasn’t cruel enough. Everyone knew, but nobody mentioned it because not everyone knew. Skywarp thought he could do this. Skywarp thought that if everything went perfectly, if nobody made a mistake, then he would be okay, would hold his avegi as they rogimed into tiny, perfect maridi. Skywarp had faith in Primus, yes, more than Ambulon himself, but he also had a deep, unshakable faith in science. He believed, with an almost charming naivety, that Ratchet could fix anything.
“Doctors are awesome,” he had told Ambulon once, when Ambulon had reattached the plates on the back of his hand and given him some oxy-ferrous for the pain. He’d been a little out of it in Jhiaxus’ lab, in that twilight realm of utter unconscious honesty. “Doctor’s don’t care I’m an abomination and an apostate.”
Skywarp was doing his part. He drank the energon they prescribed for him, stayed well within the limits Ratchet had set. He didn’t complain, came to every appointment. Came early, even.
That had more to do with Thundercracker, though. The blue Seeker may have been half-bodyguard to Jhiaxus’ former subject, but he was also half-nursemaid. Not that Ambulon had ever heard a word of complaint out of the soldier, who moved Skywarp through the final deca-cycles with brisk military efficiency. Skywarp chatted easily about the preparations they had made for seven tekni, the video games they had beaten in their last days of freedom. And around the edges of his words Ambulon saw how Thundercracker planned for every contingency, everything from seven cold avegi to Skywarp collapsing on the subway.
Skywarp hadn’t been able to fly for a long time now.
But they were always early, and they were early now, Skywarp smiling as he lifted himself up on the medberth. He leaned forward and clasped his hands around his knees. “I got a timing belt,” he announced. “From my nosokos.”
“A what?” Ratchet asked as he plugged the leads into the port Skywarp offered.
“A timing belt,” Skywarp repeated, producing the hardware from his cockpit. “It, um, it’s how you don’t die. Ambulon, help?”
“It’s not a belt,” Ambulon said, taking it from Skywarp. “This end goes into the spark casing and the other end picks up the ember’s rate of spin. Then it speeds up or slows down the pedio spark to the same rate.”
“Well, that sounds dangerous and borderline suicidal.” Ratchet said, not looking up from the scanner. His face was almost entirely blank, with the faint rise of optic ridges that meant the numbers were better than expected, and fainter frown that said they were still too low for hope.
Thundercracker, leaning against the wall and out of the way, folded his arms. The light flashing off his arm-mounted rifles caught Ambulon’s optic, and Ratchet’s too. Skywarp tilted his head. “But everyone uses them.”
“Have you ever seen a spark spin so fast it collapses?” Ratchet asked, coiling the scanner’s leads.
“It shrinks the splines, helps them reticulate faster,” Ambulon said. “I’ve used them before. With some modifications, it might be useful here …Skywarp, can we borrow this?”
“Sure!” Skywarp chirped as he laid back to let Ratchet scan the embers. “Don’t lose it, I promised Novalight I’d give it back.” Above him Ratchet made a noise, slightly unhappy, very annoyed. Skywarp yawned, his systems stuttering in exhaustion. “If you’re going to be doing that counting thing, I’m just gonna take a nap,” he said. “Slipstream’s coming over later for,” he trailed off as he slipped into recharge, exhausted from the simple trip over.
Ambulon turned the timing belt over in his hands. It wouldn’t take much to double Skywarp’s odds of survival, and Ambulon did have a lot of free time these days. Perhaps he could borrow some books from Ratchet. Perhaps First Aid would have some ideas.
Perhaps, Skywarp had a chance.

“Tomorrow is the big day,” Megatron said, sitting on the edge of the bed where Skywarp lay.
“Yeah,” Skywarp said, lifting one shoulder in a half shrug, optics dim. “I can’t wait to meet them.”
“Have you everything ready?” Megatron remembered the deca-cycles of preparation before Hot Rod and Galvatron had been born, and the frantic dash afterwards for everything they had forgotten.
“Starscream says yes.” Skywarp grinned. “He ordered so much stuff off the cortext. I tried telling him that at first all we’ll really need is cradles and bottles and sparangi, but what do I know?” He paused, and Megatron took his hand. “I only helped my nosokos with her first one. I only have five adelfi. I only put together ten boxes at least for my family.”
“Surely your embers deserve more than the bare minimum.”
“Yeah, I know,” Skywarp’s optics shuttered entirely. The embers drained so much from him, the doctors feared to let him carry beyond tomorrow. But they were so small still, and the connection would be strong, the wounds from their removal terrible. Megatron had never known any birth so close save his nosokos’ twins, and that had been as textbook perfect as all Primes. “It’s just so different from what I’m used to.”
“Look at me,” Megatron ordered, cupping the side of Skywarp’s face. “You will be an excellent trefos.” He didn’t know what else to say, so he poured all his conviction into that one sentence Skywarp didn’t say anything in return, but he did reach up and lay his hand over Megatron’s. “You should rest while you can,” Megatron continued, half out of true concern for his pallakos.
“When do you have to go?”
Megatron hesitated. “I will still be here when you wake,” he lied. He lay down next to the Seeker, like they used to, long ago.

Starscream didn’t look up when Thundercracker dropped to his knees in front of him and laid his head in his lap. He kept reading the report on the Rock Lords’ latest movement until Thundercracker lifted a hand, burning with suppressed emotion, to trace the swirl of a tattoo on Starscream’s thigh. Only when Thundercracker sighed and turned his head, resting it on Starscream’s knee instead of hiding, did Starscream put aside the datapad and reach for a blue wing.
Thundercracker sighed again as Starscream stroked down the edge. “Turn around,” Starscream ordered, voice low, and Thundercracker obeyed without question. He was so tense he was vibrating, and Starscream couldn’t blame him, exactly, but something was going to snap if he didn’t relax.
Starscream set to work without a word, soothing the tension from Thundercracker’s wings until Thundercracker slumped back against his legs. “Skywarp recharging?” Starscream asked, moving to Thundercracker’s neck. The cables there were wound tight, and Starscream worked his fingers under plating to ease some slack in.
“Yes.” Thundercracker let his head fall back and shuttered his optics. “Went down easily enough.”
“Will he stay down?” Starscream stroked down to Thundercracker’s shoulders, as far as he could reach with war-class armor protecting the delicate joints in his way.
“He’s tired.” Thundercracker shrugged and leaned forward, balancing on the balls of his feet and giving Starscream more access to his back. The plating was designed to withstand laserfire and acid pellets and Thundercracker’s own sonic weaponry. There wasn’t much Starscream could do, but he did what he could, and then simply stroked his palms over the broad planes of his much more sensitive wings. “He’s real tired,” Thundercracker repeated, slowly.
“That’ll change after tomorrow,” Starscream said, concentrating on following each tiny scratch in the finish. He really should break out the wax, but it was all the way in the washroom, and he wasn’t about to leave Thundercracker to get it. He might need to make a detour under the shower. “Less of a drain on his spark.”
“If he has one, after tomorrow.” Thundercracker’s voice was bitter, bitter and rumbling like ungreased gears. But it was Thundercracker’s voice and he loved hearing it. That meant Thundercracker was here, within earshot, and coherent, and most importantly alive.
“He will,” Starscream said, reassuring himself just as much. “You’re the one that keeps telling me how strong he is.”
Thundercracker shrugged, his wings flexing under Starscream’s hands. “What’s it you always say? The laws of physics are immutable?”
“Sparks don’t always play by the rules.”
“Wouldn’t put money on him seeing the next dawn.” Thundercracker slumped back against Starscream’s legs.
“And when is that, exactly?”
“Figure of speech.”
Starscream slid his hands forward, finding Thundercracker’s chest. “There’ll be avegi for us to take care of.”
Thundercracker tipped his head back into Starscream’s lap, eyes dark. “It’s too early. They’re all going to die. How can you believe otherwise?”
“Simple.” Starscream joined him on the floor, pulling him into his lap. “We have done everything possible, prepared for every eventuality. Science will save them.”
“And when we recycle our adelfos and his mori?” Thundercracker asked, voice heavy with old pain. He’d been at too many vrefos funerals, Starscream knew, before they met.
Starscream didn’t say anything. He’d done what he could to save Skywarp, and what Thundercracker needed right now was silent company. And Thundercracker needed to be okay the next day, so he could sit with a recovering Skywarp while Starscream tended the avegi.
Until then, he’d let Thundercracker lean on him as much as he needed.

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