[Transformers] Dear Lies - Part Two
Feb. 28th, 2012 11:29 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dracoqueen22Title: Dear Lies
Characters: Jazz/Ratchet, Wheeljack, Others
Rating: NC-17
Genre: Angst, Horror
Warnings: dubcon, noncon, bondage, tactile and pnp interfacing, attempted forced spark merge
Summary: G1. It starts, as horrors are known to do, with the little things.
Other Notes: Very dark. Very twisted. Very read-at-your-own-risk.
Written for Competition Fun's Love Abounds contest. Originally posted here.
Part One
A ping to Teletraan 1 informs him that Jazz is in his personal quarters, which is a good thing as Ratchet doesn't want to make this confrontation public. Standing outside the door, Ratchet hesitates, but the tracker in his subspace spurs him to ping Jazz for entrance.
Unsurprisingly, he's immediately granted entry, and Ratchet steps inside, greeted by the strains of a piece of music from Cybertron. A pang of homesickness grabs his spark like a vise. Earth is decent, but it'll never the same as home to him.
“Ratch!” Jazz greets, turning the music down to a more tolerable level. “Thought ya were on shift?”
“Something came up,” Ratchet replies, and his optics wander around the room before settling on his lover. “Jazz, we need to talk.”
The saboteur tilts his head. “Sure. What about?”
Before he can convince himself otherwise, Ratchet pulls the transmitter out of his subspace and tips the tiny thing into his palm. He holds it out.
“This,” he says. “What is it, Jazz?”
To his credit, Jazz doesn't betray an ounce of surprise or guilt. He’s too good for that. And maybe that worries Ratchet more than anything.
“A transmitter.”
“I know that,” the medic snaps and forces a ventilation to calm himself. His famous temper will do him no good here. “Why was it on me?”
Jazz rises to his pedes, plucking the tracker from Ratchet's palm and examining it. “How else was I supposed to keep an optic on you?”
“Keep an...”
Words fail him, and all he can do is splutter. He can only make staticky noises as seconds stretch to minutes.
“You've been watching me?” he manages to demand sometime later.
Jazz just looks at him. Visor bright but unreadable.
“Do ya want ta sparkbond?”
The frank question throws Ratchet off guard.
“I... What?” He shakes his head. “No. No, I don't want to sparkbond.” He stares at his lover like he’s a complete stranger. “Have you lost your Primus-be-damned mind?”
Jazz's visor doesn't so much as flicker. His smile doesn’t even twitch.
“Then yeah, I was watching ya.” He shrugs like he hasn’t a care in the world. “Can't trust anybot these days. I'm surprised ya found it.”
He almost sounds proud, too. As if it were just a game and he’d wanted to see how long it would take Ratchet to play.
The medic resets his audials, only because he's certain they must be glitching. This conversation isn't going at all the way he thought it would. Isn’t going at all like sanity should.
“Wheeljack helped me,” he admits. “But that's not the point, Jazz.”
The Porsche frowns a bit then, but it isn’t quite directed at Ratchet.
“Ya know, I don't think ya should spend so much time with Wheeljack. Mech is after yer affections,” Jazz replies, tapping his chin as he shifts his weight to one hip. “Bad enough I gotta watch out fer the other ones, too.”
Ratchet's mouth works soundlessly. “You... He's bonded to Prowl!” He makes a gesture that means everything and nothing. “To your best friend! And… What do you mean the other ones?”
The saboteur's shoulders lift in another dismissing shrug, but he ignores the last part entirely.
“That doesn't stop him from spendin' too much time with ya.” Jazz tilts his head thoughtfully. “Mebbe I better warn Prowler, too.”
Bewilderment battles with anger, which is too busy fighting shock while a hint of fear creeps up behind. Why isn't Jazz getting this?
“Wheeljack is not after me, and he's certainly not cheating on Prowl!” Ratchet snaps, patience reaching its limit. “What the frag is wrong with you?”
Jazz pauses and looks at him. “Nothing. Why?”
He’s honestly puzzled. Like Ratchet isn’t making any sense at all. Like this conversation is about nothing stranger than their usual banter.
Ratchet sighs then. He’s suddenly very, very tired.
That’s it. He’s had it with this. With them. He can't do this anymore. It's too much. It’s all too much.
“Jazz... I'm not… I’m not doing this anymore,” he murmurs and gazes right into the saboteur’s visor. “You're a great mech, but you need something from me I can't give.”
“What're ya sayin', Ratch?”
There's a strange tone to Jazz's vocalizer. Almost but not quite disbelief.
His shoulders sag and he lowers his hands. “I'm saying that this is over. Our relationship is over. You need to find someone who needs you. I don't think I'm that bot.”
Jazz stares. He’s surprised. But he really shouldn’t be.
“Are ya serious?”
He takes a step closer. Ratchet takes a step back.
“Yes, I am.” Ratchet moves closer to the door. “I'm sorry, Jazz. But it's over.”
He leaves before he can convince himself to stay. Before he can go back to trying to understand. Before the look Jazz gives his back persuades him to change his mind.
He leaves before he'll let himself admit it's a mistake. Before he can truly wonder if it isn’t.
o0o0o
Ratchet onlines the next morning feeling out of sorts and off balance. It's logically improbable for his world to feel so different so soon, and yet, it does. He's starting to second guess himself already. Maybe he overreacted?
“Good mornin'!”
Ratchet nearly leaps out of his plating, and he does slide off his berth with a loud slap of pedes on floor. Jazz is standing there, smiling, holding out a cube of energon.
“Recharge well?”
For a moment, Ratchet wonders if he's been trapped in some sort of memory purge. He looks at Jazz. Checks his memory files. Rechecks them. Runs a quick self-diagnostic just to be sure.
“What are you doing here?” he finally asks.
Jazz pushes the cube of energon toward him again. “I brought you some energon.”
“Why?”
“Because I knew you'd need it. You do every mornin'.” Jazz tilts his helm, looking more confused by this reaction than the bewilderment Ratchet himself feels. “That's what lovers do.”
Ratchet retreats a step before he can convince himself there's no danger to be had here. “I ended things yesterday, Jazz.”
The mech waves a dismissing hand. “Ya didn't mean it.”
“I... what?”
His vocalizer fritzes on the last syllable, his incredulity making his words too sharp. Yet, a part of him wonders... had he not been firm enough? His decision must have seemed to come from nowhere considering how long they'd been together. Not too long by their standards but long enough.
“Ya didn't mean it,” Jazz repeats and finally sets the energon aside on Ratchet's desk. “Besides, I can tell ya miss me.”
Part of him wants to scream out “No, I don't you psychopath.” Another part of him remembers how long it had taken him to fall into recharge last night. How echoing and empty his quarters had seemed, despite the fact Jazz only shared them two nights out of seven.
“I miss a lot of things that aren't good for me,” Ratchet hisses. “That doesn't mean I want them back!”
“Ya were just angry. Ya always say things ya don't mean in a fit of temper.” Jazz's visor flickers amusement at him. “I mean, ya haven't actually turned Sideswipe into a toaster yet, have ya?”
For the second time in as many days, Ratchet splutters.
“This and that are two different things, Jazz! I meant it. We're over. Don't bring me anymore energon and don't sneak into my quarters.”
Jazz actually has the gall to look offended. “I wasn't sneaking.”
“Out!” Ratchet points toward his door, insides a knotted mess of emotions he can't possibly sort with Jazz standing right there in front of him. “Right now!”
An audible rev of Jazz's engine is all the indication Ratchet has of the saboteur's own irritation.
“Fine. But we're not done.”
“Yes, we are!” Ratchet's argument, however, is spat at a closed door.
Of all the stubborn, delusional--
Primus! Ratchet throws up his hands, stomping over to his desk and snatching up the energon. He downs it in three quick gulps before it occurs to him that he's doing exactly what Jazz wants. Letting the bot take care of him.
A growl of irritation escapes him, and he turns, whipping the empty cube at his closed door. It shatters into bits, raining down upon the floor. He stares at the broken pieces for several long moments, vents echoing in his room, before he moves to clean up the mess he made.
It's only then that he notices his hands are trembling.
o0o0o
Ratchet has never considered himself a coward. But it's no coincidence that he all but runs to the rec room at the end of his shift, glancing over his shoulder uneasily as though Jazz is going to pop out from around the corner with a cube of energon. After all, that has been the routine. Ratchet gets off shift; Jazz brings him energon and takes him to either of their quarters.
Primus! Why hadn't he noticed it before?
He steps into the rec room and it feels a bit odder than it did before. Like he should have someone latched onto his side. There's a crowd of mechs spread around the room and it's almost too much.
It's also exactly what Ratchet needs. He needs company. He needs to stop acting so slagging paranoid.
“Ratchet!” Bluestreak notices him lingering in the doorway. Beaming, he bounces over to the medic with all the exuberance of a youngling, though it's been vorns since he's had his majority. “Wow! Feels like I haven't seen you in while. You look tired still. Not getting enough recharge? Where's Jazz?”
For the sake of his sanity, Ratchet ignores the last question. “I'm permanently tired, Bluestreak,” he answers, and heads for the dispenser, Bluestreak on his heels. “How's your arm?”
The sniper rolls his shoulder, optics bright. “Better than before it got slagged, I promise.” Some of his enthusiasm dies a bit, concern overriding his good humor. “Maybe you should ask Prime if you can take a vacation? I mean, I'm sure 'Jack and Hoist and Grapple and Perceptor can take care of us for a few weeks. And if I ask nicely, I'll bet Sides won't prank anyone so you can relax for a bit, too.”
“Sideswipe not prank anyone? Primus forbid!” Ratchet actually manages a light chuckle, taking his cube and stepping out of the way, following Bluestreak toward the group of mechs he'd been chatting with earlier. “That would be too good to be true.”
Bluestreak laughs. “Prowl would be pretty happy, too. He'd think it a vacation for himself as well.” His doorwings lift perkily. “Hi, Jazz! We were just talking about you!”
Ratchet stiffens, plating clamped tight to his frame. He almost doesn't want to turn around, but he can already feel Jazz's gaze burning into the back of his helm. And he's not a coward.
The saboteur slides up beside him, taking the cube from Ratchet's hand and replacing it with another, like so many times before. “Really? I hope it was only good things,” Jazz replies with a playful flash of his visor. Then he turns to Ratchet, sliding a palm down his arm. “Was lookin' fer ya, lover. Ya must've left the medbay early.”
Bluestreak chuckles, clapping Ratchet on the shoulder. “Guess that's my cue to leave, huh? Wouldn't want to get in between two lovebots. Unless you want me to, of course.”
He leaves them with a teasing flutter of his doorwings that would have enticed any other mech, the twins especially. Ratchet watches him go with no small hint of longing, if only because Bluestreak would be a nicely shaped buffer between he and Jazz.
Jazz who is actually doing a fair approximation of a feline-like growl with his vocalizer.
“Stop that,” Ratchet hisses in a low tone, whirling on his former lover. He pushes the cube Jazz had given him back toward the saboteur. “We're not together anymore!”
“Ya need me, Ratch,” Jazz says, trying to push the energon back toward Ratchet. “Ya need someone ta take care of ya and I'm the perfect bot. Ya can't deny that.”
“I already have!” Ratchet forces a systems check, trying to rein in his temper. “Look, Jazz, it was good while it lasted, but it's over. I'm done. We're done. You have to understand that.”
Jazz's lips form a thin line of obstinance. “No.” He shoves the energon toward Ratchet and then lets it go, forcing Ratchet to catch it or spill it over the floor. “This isn't over.”
“It is!” Ratchet snaps, his patience reaching its limit. He spins on a pede, heading for the door, for the moment not caring that the other mechs will notice.
Ratchet has a temper. Everyone knows this. And he hopes that it is what they will all assume.
He can't shake the sensation, however, of Jazz's visor on his back plating, watching him leave, and he doesn't fail to notice that he's still carrying the cube Jazz gave him, which he now has no choice but to consume.
o0o0o
Recharge becomes frag near impossible.
Ratchet finds himself laying on his berth, staring at the ceiling, wondering where he'd gone so wrong. He starts taking on extra shifts, if only to exhaust himself until a forced shutdown becomes necessary.
Jazz is making this harder than it needs to be.
Ratchet has never been a fan of making his personal affairs public. He feels no need to announce to the gossip mill that he and Jazz have ended their relationship. Which makes things rather awkward when Jazz continues to act like nothing has changed. Bringing him energon while he's in the medbay, knowing Ratchet won't make a scene and refuse. Offering to give Ratchet the Cybertronian version of a massage courtesy of his magnetic pulses. Genuinely being nice and cheerful and the all-around fun mech that everyone loves and adores.
Genuinely being the mech that Ratchet fell for in the first place. If it weren't for the fact that Jazz's stubborn refusal to accept the termination of their relationship is so slaggin' creepy, Ratchet would’ve regretted his choice. There is still a part of his spark that does regret his decision. A part of him that remembers many, many nights of pleasant recharge, playful interfacing, intelligent conversation, and simply connecting with another mech on such a level.
At least Jazz hasn't crept into his quarters without permission since that first day. Which makes Ratchet wonder if perhaps he had overreacted. And Wheeljack has been no help on the matter, preferring to defer to whatever Ratchet wants for himself. Easy for the slagger to say. He's got Prowl, and that bot wouldn't know an irrational action if it jumped up and punched him in the face.
Whereas Jazz is the verifiable king of the unexpected and illogical.
Sighing, Ratchet keys in the code to his quarters, preparing himself for another long night of staring at his ceiling, contemplating why on Cybertron Grapple had chosen such an awful color for the Ark. He'll be glitching soon if he keeps this up. He hasn't had a full defrag cycle since he made Jazz leave.
The lights are low, and Ratchet sends a ping to the systems. As his quarters brighten, Ratchet resets his optics and then his sensors, too.
Maybe he's glitching already.
Because there's nothing here. His berth is folded back up into the wall. His desk has been swept clean. His shelves are empty. The room has been dusted, cleaned, and polished. Like no one has ever occupied it since they crash-landed here on Earth.
Silently, Ratchet turns around and leaves. He stands outside of his quarters and looks at the door. His name isn't exactly on it, but his title is. Chief Medical Officer. Definitely his room then. For a moment there, he thought perhaps he'd entered the wrong room using his overrides while in a slagged-circuit fog.
He goes back into his quarters. They are still empty of all his personal possessions. Something is not right.
Ratchet brings up the current shift schedule and then comms Red Alert.
--This may sound like a trick of Sideswipe proportions, but I have reason to believe that I've been robbed. --
It sounds ridiculous even to him, and Ratchet winces as he says it.
--Nonsense.-- Red Alert uses his familiar, practical tone. A sure sign that Ratchet was right about how he sounded --Jazz informed me that you two agree to cohabitate. All of your belongings have been shifted to his quarters per your agreement.--
Ratchet's entire frame goes still.
--I see. Thank you, Red Alert.--
He waits until the line has completely closed before letting the growl escape his vocalizer. He never thought Jazz would go this far. Had he been that misunderstood? Had he not been clear?
Whirling on his heel, Ratchet strides from his quarters, making a beeline for Jazz's. The schedule indicates that Jazz should be on base and his next shift isn't for another few hours. He had better be in his quarters because Ratchet is ending this. Today. With no room for misinterpretation or error or confusion.
Three doors down the hall, Ratchet doesn't bother with the politeness of a gentle ping. He raises his hand and pounds on the door, at the same time sending a barrage of demanding pings at the stubborn saboteur. There is no verbal acknowledgment, but the door does open, and Ratchet storms inside without any ceremony.
Sure enough, Jazz is in the middle of unpacking a box of Ratchet's belongings, carefully setting them out on a shelf that has been cleared. He looks up as the medic enters, smiling, cheerfully oblivious to the stormcloud of fury spitting fire in all directions.
“What the slag do you think you are doing?” Ratchet demands, stomping across the room and snatching the box from the saboteur's hands. His belongings rattle and clank inside, precious mementos all that he has left of Cybertron.
“I thought it would be easier if I just took care o' all this fer ya,” Jazz replies with a shrug and reaches for the box again. “I was tryin' ta be thoughtful.”
Ratchet's fingers grip the box so tightly that the metal crumples. “We're not together anymore! I don't want to move in with you, Jazz! I don't want any of this!”
Seemingly realizing that Ratchet's not going to give up the box, Jazz reaches for the items already on the shelf, casually rearranging them. His voice is even, reasonable. His words aren’t.
“Ya say that now, but I know ya don't mean it. We're meant ta be together, Ratch. Ya just don't see it yet.”
A flutter of unease tugs at Ratchet's spark at Jazz's rather frank tone. He takes a step backward, still holding the box.
“Jazz, I do mean it. I'm absolutely serious. We're over. We have been for weeks. And nothing's going to change that. Nothing.”
Jazz stills, going so very motionless that for a moment Ratchet wonders if the saboteur's pumps are even working. Like the truth is finally hitting home, penetrating through whatever mulish block he's set on his processor. His hand drops from the shelf, and he half-turns, visor a bare glow as he looks at Ratchet.
“Nothing?” he repeats, and his vocal tones are softer than Ratchet would expect. Not exactly broken or disappointed but shuddering somewhere in between.
Another cautious step backward takes Ratchet closer to the door. “Yes,” Ratchet confirms and performs a systems check because this kind of unease in his spark is certainly unwarranted. “I'm sorry. But that’s the way it must be.”
He waits, but Jazz says nothing else. It's eerily silent in the room, and Ratchet suspects that now is the time to beat a hasty exit. Perhaps he'll even comm Blaster or Bluestreak once he leaves. Surely, Jazz will need some comfort, and either of the aforementioned mechs will be willing to provide it. And afterward, Ratchet will comm Wheeljack. The need to lose himself in a batch of high grade has suddenly become overwhelming.
“Nothing?” Ratchet hears Jazz repeat yet again, as though stuck on an infinite loop. “Ya see, Ratch, that's where yer wrong.”
Something cold drops into Ratchet's spark. He turns, battle systems suddenly screaming into bright alerts, and all he sees is a black-white blur before his world fades to nothing.
o0o0o
Ratchet onlines with a cloudiness in his processor and a distinct sense of unease. Half of his systems remain muted to him, some of his motor functions off-line and his external sensors tuned down. His comm systems are out as well, and there's another person connected to his systems. He can feel the alien entity rifling through his coding and systems, blithely applying blocks and dancing through firewalls.
A bit more clarity cuts through the fog, and Ratchet lurches, battle systems telling him to flee, fight, get away. There's a dull clank as his frame refuses to obey his commands. His legs aren't listening to his commands at all, and his wrists have been bound to the berth above him. There's also a noticeable weight on his hips.
Finally, Ratchet's optics online. It takes a perilously long time for his vision to sharpen, but he doesn't need the black-white blob to focus to know that it's Jazz. It's Jazz paging through his command codes, and it's Jazz who has plugged into him.
In all likelihood, Jazz is also the one who cuffed him down to the berth as well. There can't possibly be any other perpetrators.
The saboteur is humming, Ratchet belatedly realizes as his audials are the last thing to start functioning. He's humming, and one hand is gently stroking over the windshield on Ratchet's chassis, a finger tracing the seam of his chestplate.
“Jazz,” Ratchet says, vocalizer fritzing and glitched. “What are you doing?”
He has to be calm because panicking is not going to help him. No matter how frenzied his spark is right now, twisting and churning inside him.
For a moment, Jazz says nothing, his fingers drumming an off rhythm on Ratchet's plating. Then he straightens, both palms flat on Ratchet's abdominal armor.
“Do ya know what I was before th' war, Ratch?”
Okay. Better to play this game with Jazz. Better to let him talk while Ratchet figures how the Pit he's going to get out of this.
“Your file says you were a systems analyst,” Ratchet hedges and glances to the right.
They are still in Jazz's quarters, no surprise there. He sees his internal weaponry sitting on an end table. Jazz must have removed it all when he was unconscious.
Jazz smiles. “Yeah, somethin' like that. I was a hacker. Systems Analyst is just a euphemism the Enforcers cooked up for those in their employ.”
Ratchet casually checks the restriants on his wrist again. Magnetic cuffs, he thinks. Hard to tell since Jazz took his fraggin' scanners offline, too.
“Hacker?”
“I was paid ta break codes. Ta punch through firewalls no one else could. Ta get inta places with all the best securities.” Jazz's hands continue a soft caress over Ratchet's plating, easily stimulating all the sensitive areas he's grown to recognize over their period as lovers. “Prowl's the only one who knows. He caught me. Gave me a choice. Work with them or get slagged. It's pretty obvious which one I picked, isn't it?”
Ratchet shifts his optics back to Jazz. “Why are you telling me this?”
“Because I love ya, Ratch. Always have. Always will.” He confesses so boldly, as though
It’s no difficult thing for him to admit. “I can't have ya leavin' me,” he adds, and one hand returns to Ratchet's chassis, a finger dragging down the nearly invisible seam in his chestplate. “Ya don't understand. I want ya ta understand. So I'm gonna show ya.”
For the first time, Ratchet admits to himself that it is fear and not just apprehension clawing at his spark. Surely, Jazz wouldn't do this.
“Show me?”
Jazz's smile is softer this time. Gentle and full of affection. Also, quite possibly tinged with insanity, but Ratchet may be biased in thinking this. He leans forward, both hands cupping Ratchet's helm, thumbs stroking over his cheek.
“We're gonna sparkbond. Ya'll belong to me forever. Just the way things're meant ta be.” His engine gives a soft purr of anticipation. “Then, I'll never have ta worry about ya leavin' me again.”
Yes, it seems… Jazz really would do this. There is nothing but determination in his visor and his voice.
Frantically, Ratchet starts shoring up the defenses around the commands for his critical systems – namely his spark and processor protocols. He uses all the firewalls he has in his arsenal, the ones Perceptor has given him, one Wheeljack created himself, and even one Prowl had devised in that scheming, logical processor of his.
Ratchet's starting to run hot. He can feel the heat in his plating. But nonetheless, a sensation of icy-cold starts to run through his lines, and he knows that's only an imagined sensation brought upon by his sudden fear.
“Jazz. You can't do this.”
If he's pleading, close to begging, no one else has to know. Spark bonding is permanent! Ratchet is nowhere near ready to make that kind of commitment, especially without his consent!
Jazz leans closer still, lips brushing over Ratchet's chevron, before he draws back again. Ratchet can’t see his optics, and for once, he’s glad.
“It's not a matter of can't,” Jazz declares then. “I have ta. I can't let ya leave me.”
The datastream that is Jazz's presence within Ratchet's systems suddenly starts to actively rifle through Ratchet's coding once again. He heads unerringly toward Ratchet's spark chamber protocols, slicing as easily through most of the medic’s firewalls as though they were mere suggestions rather than layers and layers of protective commands.
“Jazz!” Ratchet hisses and starts to struggle in earnest as much as his limited mobility will allow him. He lurches his upper body upward, straining at the magnetic cuffs. “Stop!”
His words and actions have no effect. Jazz simply shifts his weight, pinning Ratchet down firmly, leaving little room for the medic to leverage him off. He says nothing either, awareness obviously turning inward as his datastream balks at Ratchet's last defense – Prowl's protocols.
“Prowler's work, huh?” Jazz says with an amused, approving chuckle. “He's good; there's no doubt. But not as good as me.”
“Jazz, please don't do this.” Ratchet's vents kick on with a panicked whirr, sucking in air to dispel the heat clouding up his frame. His thoughts feel so slagging slow and sluggish from whatever Jazz must have uploaded to him. “Please.”
Jazz cups Ratchet's cheek with one hand and makes a shushing noise. “It's okay, Ratch. Promise. This's gonna make everythin' better. Ya'll see.” He pauses, and then, his smile brightens. “Got it.”
His announcement is accompanied by the telltale click of Ratchet's chestplate cracking open, completely without his permission. The soft glow of his spark starts to illuminate the room, and Jazz gently coaxes Ratchet's plating to completely split. His fingers gently stroke over the thinner, translucent material of Ratchet's spark chamber, the last yet meager line of defense.
Jazz's visor brightens, and he strokes the chamber lovingly.
“C'mon. Open up fer me pretty.”
As if Ratchet has any choice with Jazz jacked into his systems, overriding any commands Ratchet might personally send and turning his firewalls to useless dead code.
Ratchet's vocalizer spits static. Jazz doesn't listen, deactivating the last barrier and commanding the casing to slide aside. Ratchet's spark flutters, energies surging through the opening, eager as they spill over Jazz's talented fingers. Pleasure teases itself over Ratchet's circuits, and he shudders. If from fear or unwanted desire, he can’t be sure.
“See?” Jazz purrs, dipping deeper, caressing the inner corona of Ratchet's spark. “Yer spark knows better than yer processor about these things.”
Ratchet's frame arches toward Jazz, autonomic systems eager for more of the pleasure-inducing touch. “Involuntary reaction, you glitch,” he manages to grit out, straining at the magnetic cuffs again. Heat pulses across his circuits, static energy crackling across his frame.
The saboteur makes a humming noise of content. “All I want is fer us ta be together,” Jazz says, and his vocal tones take on a measure of hurt of all things.
Horror wars with arousal as Jazz's chestplate splits open, the blue-white of his spark illuminating the space between them. It would be beautiful to Ratchet's optics, if he weren't so repulsed by Jazz's actions.
The saboteur leans closer, casing sliding aside to let the energies of his spark spill out, impatient tendrils licking out, brushing over the very edges of Ratchet's own spark. In that brief moment of contact, Ratchet gets a glimpse of Jazz's feelings for him.
Love. Or obsession rather. The desire to possess. That there is no cruel intent does not make this any easier to bear.
At the first gentle pulse of Jazz's spark, Ratchet tries to resist. He thinks of all sorts of unpleasant things, anything to keep the exchange of energies from beginning. Anything to forestall the pleasure Jazz's fingers are wringing from his plating and the incredible sensation of near spark-to-spark contact. Primus! Ratchet can't remember the last time he merged for sheer pleasure. Surely before they ever left Cybertron.
“C'mon, Ratch,” Jazz murmurs at him, his soothing tones doing little to calm the increasingly frantic medic. “Don't be like that. I don't want ta hurt ya.”
“Then stop!” Ratchet all but shouts, the last syllable crackling with static.
It hurts; it truly does, to resist the call of Jazz's spark. His memory core is being unhelpful, dragging up vidfiles of past merges and the unimaginable pleasure that can be had.
It won't be so bad, a part of him whispers. Jazz would be devoted.
But it's not what Ratchet wants!
“Ya know I won't do that,” Jazz replies without a hint of regret. Determination lights his visor. “Yer goin' to be mine, Ratch. Mine and no one else's.”
An interface cable snakes out of Jazz's open chassis, heading straight for the port in Ratchet's own frame, to one side of his spark chamber. A one-way connection isn't enough to initiate the bond, but that won't stop Jazz. He simply breezes through Ratchet's systems like he has the rest of them, triggering Ratchet's own interface cable to link into Jazz's interface port.
Arousal and pleasure slam into Ratchet's systems. He writhes on the berth, trapped between the solid frame beneath him, and Jazz's weight above. It feels so fragging good, for all the revulsion that swamps his thoughts, and he's nothing but a bundle of contradictions. He wants to beg for more. He wants to beg for Jazz to stop.
Jazz presses closer, the outer edges of their sparks coming into terrible contact, and an onslaught of pleasure-pain sends a hot charge through Ratchet's circuits. He keens, frame lurching upward. His resistance is crumbling. Jazz is still talking to him, crooning, encouraging. He pulses love and possession into the half-merge, trying to coax Ratchet into letting him in. Into making it easier.
He can do it. He can force it. Too many years in Spec Ops means there are a lot of things Jazz can do and has done before. Forced spark merges are only a drop in the bucket.
He's not going to stop. No matter how much Ratchet begs. No one is coming to rescue him. No one knows he needs to be rescued.
Ratchet knows what he has to do. What other choice does he have?
Ratchet keens again; this time out of sheer grief. Jazz is his ally, companion, loyal friend. The affection is still there, hard to ignore.
He onlines his optics, wondering when he'd offlined them, and sees Jazz over him. Their spark energies lashing together, starting to pulse in sync. Their interface connections are exchanging data at a rapid rate. Ratchet's going to lose his chance. It'll be too late.
“Jazz. Stop. Please.”
His former lover's answer is to pulse harder with his spark, bring them closer together. Until the taste of Jazz is all that Ratchet knows, both with spark and data cables.
Resignation swamps Ratchet from head to toe. He grits his denta, a shudder wracking through his frame.
He has no choice.
With what little control over his own body Ratchet has left, he taps into his emergency protocols. Ones he created for himself long, long ago, when Megatron first put out that capture order on all high-ranked medics and scientists of the Autobot army. Perceptor and Wheeljack have it, too. He’s been planning to load it into First Aid and Skyfire as well. It's a contingency plan. A last resort on the possibility of capture by the enemy.
They’ve told no one else. Not even Prowl. Not even Prime.
It's a virus. It won't kill. But it's almost a fate worse than deactivation.
With Jazz connected to Ratchet as he is and completely open to the medic, he's defenseless to it. Ratchet might not have the hacker experience to break through Jazz's firewalls and take over his motor functions – even with his medical overrides. He doesn’t need it; this virus will do all the work for him. It's the most insidious thing Ratchet has ever seen. It's more Decepticon than Autobot.
It's the only option he has left.
Between one pulse of pleasure and the next, Ratchet uploads the virus and hides the action by easing back on his resistance. He moans, letting himself feel the pleasure, letting some of the heat suffusing his frame make his circuits tingle. It isn't even pretend because it does feel good.
He only needs half a minute, perhaps less, before the virus is so rooted Jazz will either be forced to stop in order to counter it or will be unable to do anything to remove it.
Half a minute, however, may still be too long. Jazz is as skilled in the berth as he is everywhere else. He knows Ratchet's frame too well. Knows how to make him cry out with pleasure, how to set his circuits ablaze. The charge in his frame translates to brilliant arcs of static that leap between his and Jazz's frame. Their spark energies twine and weave together.
Ratchet moans, a sound that is in no way reminiscent of pleasure. Is it too late?
Above him, Jazz suddenly goes very still. His visor dims.
“Ratchet?”
His tone is uncertain, wavering.
Sick to his very spark, Ratchet turns his head. “You didn't give me a choice, Jazz.”
Disbelief and betrayal pour from Jazz's spark, twisting Ratchet's own emotions until he's seeded with guilt.
“Ya... this... Why can't I stop it?”
“I can't even stop it,” Ratchet says, unable to hide his misery.
Jazz's hand slams into the berth, and he tries to pull back, cables snapping taut between them. “What's it doin'? Ratch?”
Fear. For the first time, Ratchet hears fear in Jazz's voice.
Jazz's free hand starts clawing at his own open chest as though he can rip the intangible virus out by his fingers alone.
“I don't understand,” he cries, voice approaching a keen. “This's s'posed ta be a good thing! Yer supposed ta love me!”
His terror and agony transmits across the link between them, chasing away the pleasure, infecting Ratchet's own systems. He grits his denta, turns off his audials, but it doesn't help. He can still feel Jazz's panic and confusion.
Jazz shrieks, loud enough that Ratchet can feel the vibration, and then his weight shifts. He jerks backward, snapping cables from their ports, their sparks breaking apart so quickly that a violent, stab of pain slams into Ratchet. He jerks on the berth, mouth opening in a pained scream of his own. Too much, too much, too much--
His world turns black all over again.
o0o0o
Ratchet onlines with none of the muzziness of the last time he came to awareness. His thoughts are clear, his motor functions are his own again, and there are no foreign entities leafing through his processes.
There is, however, a strut-deep fatigue that he just can't escape. He's achy in all the wrong places, his spark is twinging with off-rhythm pulses of discomfort. There's a lingering sense of loneliness hovering over everything. He's aching from more than just physical loss, though Ratchet can't place a name to it.
His proximity sensors register the presence of another mech. One who is approaching slowly, like one might a grounded Seeker.
“You're online,” Hoist observes.
“I feel like slag,” the medic grumps and tries to get up from the berth, but his arms and legs won't rise. They've been secured down. “What the frag?”
Hoist steps into Ratchet's view, reaching for the restraints on his right wrist. “You fought us. When we tried to pull you away from Jazz.”
That doesn't make any sense. Then again, Ratchet can't remember anything beyond Jazz's betrayed confusion and his own horrified regret. He remembers Jazz jerking away from him, battling against the malignant virus. After that?
Nothing.
Ratchet's spark gives another lurching pulse of agony. The loneliness returns again, clawing at his energies. The urge to keen rises within Ratchet, but he forces it down, locking it behind medical protocols. His spark feels like it's reaching, straining for something, but there's nothing there.
“My spark...”
Hoist pats him on the shoulder and moves to Ratchet's other side, undoing that restraint as well. “The feeling will pass in time. It's a residual effect. Consequence of the--”
“--interrupted bond,” Ratchet finishes. “I know.”
He slumps against the berth. Jazz had very nearly succeeded.
“Jazz?” he manages to ask.
From the end of the berth where Hoist is removing the leg straps, the engineer glances to his left. At another berth. Ratchet follows his gaze. He almost wishes he didn’t.
Jazz is lying there, motionless and obviously offline. He has been repaired, cleaned, and polished. Much like Ratchet himself has.
“He's not deactivated. But he's not the same anymore.” Hoist unlatches the last strap, which gives Ratchet room to sit up. “My scanners indicate that his memory core's been wiped clean. He's practically a sparkling. At least in mind.” His optics are too blue and worried. “What happened, Ratchet?”
What happened?
Ratchet's head dips, the memories too fresh. His spark aches, calling to finish the incomplete bond rather than keep the pain of it slowly dissolving. He can still feel the echoes of Jazz's shock and despair, the utter desolation. His fingers curl around the edge of the berth, tightening until it dents.
“I didn't have a choice,” Ratchet whispers at last. “He didn't give me any other choice.”
Hoist puts a hand on Ratchet's shoulder but hastily removes it when Ratchet flinches away. “What did you do?”
“I think that explanations can wait, Hoist.” Optimus Prime's voice cuts into the tension-filled atmosphere, the door sliding shut behind him.
Ratchet's scanners hadn't even sensed Optimus approach. But now, his spark does, lurching toward the calming presence of their Prime, eager to be soothed. Healed even.
“At least until his spark is not so damaged,” Optimus adds, coming to a halt near to Ratchet's berth but not close enough to touch. His gaze is unreadable, expression hidden behind his battle mask.
Damaged? Yes. Ratchet can agree to that. Broken, too. He feels strained, too large for his frame, and part of him wants nothing more than to collapse back into recharge. Another part of him wants to leap off the berth, cross the floor, and join Jazz on his. He's torn in too many directions, spark churning indecisively within him.
Ratchet's shoulders slump. “I don't know what to say, Prime.”
“Right now, you need say nothing,” Optimus replies with his unfailing calm and patience. “This matter will be looked into, and the circumstances will be investigated. But for now, rest. Rest and recover.”
He sounds tired then. Tired and very sad. Ratchet doesn’t blame him.
“If such a thing is even possible.”
Ratchet shutters his optics then. He doesn’t look at Hoist. Or at his Prime. Certainly not at Jazz.
He just keeps them offline and looks at nothing. Says nothing. Feels nothing.
Or at least, he wishes he didn’t.
****
a/n: Yes, there will be a sequel to this. There are too many loose ends that need to be tied up and I enjoy exploring aftermath.
Characters: Jazz/Ratchet, Wheeljack, Others
Rating: NC-17
Genre: Angst, Horror
Warnings: dubcon, noncon, bondage, tactile and pnp interfacing, attempted forced spark merge
Summary: G1. It starts, as horrors are known to do, with the little things.
Other Notes: Very dark. Very twisted. Very read-at-your-own-risk.
Written for Competition Fun's Love Abounds contest. Originally posted here.
Part One
A ping to Teletraan 1 informs him that Jazz is in his personal quarters, which is a good thing as Ratchet doesn't want to make this confrontation public. Standing outside the door, Ratchet hesitates, but the tracker in his subspace spurs him to ping Jazz for entrance.
Unsurprisingly, he's immediately granted entry, and Ratchet steps inside, greeted by the strains of a piece of music from Cybertron. A pang of homesickness grabs his spark like a vise. Earth is decent, but it'll never the same as home to him.
“Ratch!” Jazz greets, turning the music down to a more tolerable level. “Thought ya were on shift?”
“Something came up,” Ratchet replies, and his optics wander around the room before settling on his lover. “Jazz, we need to talk.”
The saboteur tilts his head. “Sure. What about?”
Before he can convince himself otherwise, Ratchet pulls the transmitter out of his subspace and tips the tiny thing into his palm. He holds it out.
“This,” he says. “What is it, Jazz?”
To his credit, Jazz doesn't betray an ounce of surprise or guilt. He’s too good for that. And maybe that worries Ratchet more than anything.
“A transmitter.”
“I know that,” the medic snaps and forces a ventilation to calm himself. His famous temper will do him no good here. “Why was it on me?”
Jazz rises to his pedes, plucking the tracker from Ratchet's palm and examining it. “How else was I supposed to keep an optic on you?”
“Keep an...”
Words fail him, and all he can do is splutter. He can only make staticky noises as seconds stretch to minutes.
“You've been watching me?” he manages to demand sometime later.
Jazz just looks at him. Visor bright but unreadable.
“Do ya want ta sparkbond?”
The frank question throws Ratchet off guard.
“I... What?” He shakes his head. “No. No, I don't want to sparkbond.” He stares at his lover like he’s a complete stranger. “Have you lost your Primus-be-damned mind?”
Jazz's visor doesn't so much as flicker. His smile doesn’t even twitch.
“Then yeah, I was watching ya.” He shrugs like he hasn’t a care in the world. “Can't trust anybot these days. I'm surprised ya found it.”
He almost sounds proud, too. As if it were just a game and he’d wanted to see how long it would take Ratchet to play.
The medic resets his audials, only because he's certain they must be glitching. This conversation isn't going at all the way he thought it would. Isn’t going at all like sanity should.
“Wheeljack helped me,” he admits. “But that's not the point, Jazz.”
The Porsche frowns a bit then, but it isn’t quite directed at Ratchet.
“Ya know, I don't think ya should spend so much time with Wheeljack. Mech is after yer affections,” Jazz replies, tapping his chin as he shifts his weight to one hip. “Bad enough I gotta watch out fer the other ones, too.”
Ratchet's mouth works soundlessly. “You... He's bonded to Prowl!” He makes a gesture that means everything and nothing. “To your best friend! And… What do you mean the other ones?”
The saboteur's shoulders lift in another dismissing shrug, but he ignores the last part entirely.
“That doesn't stop him from spendin' too much time with ya.” Jazz tilts his head thoughtfully. “Mebbe I better warn Prowler, too.”
Bewilderment battles with anger, which is too busy fighting shock while a hint of fear creeps up behind. Why isn't Jazz getting this?
“Wheeljack is not after me, and he's certainly not cheating on Prowl!” Ratchet snaps, patience reaching its limit. “What the frag is wrong with you?”
Jazz pauses and looks at him. “Nothing. Why?”
He’s honestly puzzled. Like Ratchet isn’t making any sense at all. Like this conversation is about nothing stranger than their usual banter.
Ratchet sighs then. He’s suddenly very, very tired.
That’s it. He’s had it with this. With them. He can't do this anymore. It's too much. It’s all too much.
“Jazz... I'm not… I’m not doing this anymore,” he murmurs and gazes right into the saboteur’s visor. “You're a great mech, but you need something from me I can't give.”
“What're ya sayin', Ratch?”
There's a strange tone to Jazz's vocalizer. Almost but not quite disbelief.
His shoulders sag and he lowers his hands. “I'm saying that this is over. Our relationship is over. You need to find someone who needs you. I don't think I'm that bot.”
Jazz stares. He’s surprised. But he really shouldn’t be.
“Are ya serious?”
He takes a step closer. Ratchet takes a step back.
“Yes, I am.” Ratchet moves closer to the door. “I'm sorry, Jazz. But it's over.”
He leaves before he can convince himself to stay. Before he can go back to trying to understand. Before the look Jazz gives his back persuades him to change his mind.
He leaves before he'll let himself admit it's a mistake. Before he can truly wonder if it isn’t.
Ratchet onlines the next morning feeling out of sorts and off balance. It's logically improbable for his world to feel so different so soon, and yet, it does. He's starting to second guess himself already. Maybe he overreacted?
“Good mornin'!”
Ratchet nearly leaps out of his plating, and he does slide off his berth with a loud slap of pedes on floor. Jazz is standing there, smiling, holding out a cube of energon.
“Recharge well?”
For a moment, Ratchet wonders if he's been trapped in some sort of memory purge. He looks at Jazz. Checks his memory files. Rechecks them. Runs a quick self-diagnostic just to be sure.
“What are you doing here?” he finally asks.
Jazz pushes the cube of energon toward him again. “I brought you some energon.”
“Why?”
“Because I knew you'd need it. You do every mornin'.” Jazz tilts his helm, looking more confused by this reaction than the bewilderment Ratchet himself feels. “That's what lovers do.”
Ratchet retreats a step before he can convince himself there's no danger to be had here. “I ended things yesterday, Jazz.”
The mech waves a dismissing hand. “Ya didn't mean it.”
“I... what?”
His vocalizer fritzes on the last syllable, his incredulity making his words too sharp. Yet, a part of him wonders... had he not been firm enough? His decision must have seemed to come from nowhere considering how long they'd been together. Not too long by their standards but long enough.
“Ya didn't mean it,” Jazz repeats and finally sets the energon aside on Ratchet's desk. “Besides, I can tell ya miss me.”
Part of him wants to scream out “No, I don't you psychopath.” Another part of him remembers how long it had taken him to fall into recharge last night. How echoing and empty his quarters had seemed, despite the fact Jazz only shared them two nights out of seven.
“I miss a lot of things that aren't good for me,” Ratchet hisses. “That doesn't mean I want them back!”
“Ya were just angry. Ya always say things ya don't mean in a fit of temper.” Jazz's visor flickers amusement at him. “I mean, ya haven't actually turned Sideswipe into a toaster yet, have ya?”
For the second time in as many days, Ratchet splutters.
“This and that are two different things, Jazz! I meant it. We're over. Don't bring me anymore energon and don't sneak into my quarters.”
Jazz actually has the gall to look offended. “I wasn't sneaking.”
“Out!” Ratchet points toward his door, insides a knotted mess of emotions he can't possibly sort with Jazz standing right there in front of him. “Right now!”
An audible rev of Jazz's engine is all the indication Ratchet has of the saboteur's own irritation.
“Fine. But we're not done.”
“Yes, we are!” Ratchet's argument, however, is spat at a closed door.
Of all the stubborn, delusional--
Primus! Ratchet throws up his hands, stomping over to his desk and snatching up the energon. He downs it in three quick gulps before it occurs to him that he's doing exactly what Jazz wants. Letting the bot take care of him.
A growl of irritation escapes him, and he turns, whipping the empty cube at his closed door. It shatters into bits, raining down upon the floor. He stares at the broken pieces for several long moments, vents echoing in his room, before he moves to clean up the mess he made.
It's only then that he notices his hands are trembling.
Ratchet has never considered himself a coward. But it's no coincidence that he all but runs to the rec room at the end of his shift, glancing over his shoulder uneasily as though Jazz is going to pop out from around the corner with a cube of energon. After all, that has been the routine. Ratchet gets off shift; Jazz brings him energon and takes him to either of their quarters.
Primus! Why hadn't he noticed it before?
He steps into the rec room and it feels a bit odder than it did before. Like he should have someone latched onto his side. There's a crowd of mechs spread around the room and it's almost too much.
It's also exactly what Ratchet needs. He needs company. He needs to stop acting so slagging paranoid.
“Ratchet!” Bluestreak notices him lingering in the doorway. Beaming, he bounces over to the medic with all the exuberance of a youngling, though it's been vorns since he's had his majority. “Wow! Feels like I haven't seen you in while. You look tired still. Not getting enough recharge? Where's Jazz?”
For the sake of his sanity, Ratchet ignores the last question. “I'm permanently tired, Bluestreak,” he answers, and heads for the dispenser, Bluestreak on his heels. “How's your arm?”
The sniper rolls his shoulder, optics bright. “Better than before it got slagged, I promise.” Some of his enthusiasm dies a bit, concern overriding his good humor. “Maybe you should ask Prime if you can take a vacation? I mean, I'm sure 'Jack and Hoist and Grapple and Perceptor can take care of us for a few weeks. And if I ask nicely, I'll bet Sides won't prank anyone so you can relax for a bit, too.”
“Sideswipe not prank anyone? Primus forbid!” Ratchet actually manages a light chuckle, taking his cube and stepping out of the way, following Bluestreak toward the group of mechs he'd been chatting with earlier. “That would be too good to be true.”
Bluestreak laughs. “Prowl would be pretty happy, too. He'd think it a vacation for himself as well.” His doorwings lift perkily. “Hi, Jazz! We were just talking about you!”
Ratchet stiffens, plating clamped tight to his frame. He almost doesn't want to turn around, but he can already feel Jazz's gaze burning into the back of his helm. And he's not a coward.
The saboteur slides up beside him, taking the cube from Ratchet's hand and replacing it with another, like so many times before. “Really? I hope it was only good things,” Jazz replies with a playful flash of his visor. Then he turns to Ratchet, sliding a palm down his arm. “Was lookin' fer ya, lover. Ya must've left the medbay early.”
Bluestreak chuckles, clapping Ratchet on the shoulder. “Guess that's my cue to leave, huh? Wouldn't want to get in between two lovebots. Unless you want me to, of course.”
He leaves them with a teasing flutter of his doorwings that would have enticed any other mech, the twins especially. Ratchet watches him go with no small hint of longing, if only because Bluestreak would be a nicely shaped buffer between he and Jazz.
Jazz who is actually doing a fair approximation of a feline-like growl with his vocalizer.
“Stop that,” Ratchet hisses in a low tone, whirling on his former lover. He pushes the cube Jazz had given him back toward the saboteur. “We're not together anymore!”
“Ya need me, Ratch,” Jazz says, trying to push the energon back toward Ratchet. “Ya need someone ta take care of ya and I'm the perfect bot. Ya can't deny that.”
“I already have!” Ratchet forces a systems check, trying to rein in his temper. “Look, Jazz, it was good while it lasted, but it's over. I'm done. We're done. You have to understand that.”
Jazz's lips form a thin line of obstinance. “No.” He shoves the energon toward Ratchet and then lets it go, forcing Ratchet to catch it or spill it over the floor. “This isn't over.”
“It is!” Ratchet snaps, his patience reaching its limit. He spins on a pede, heading for the door, for the moment not caring that the other mechs will notice.
Ratchet has a temper. Everyone knows this. And he hopes that it is what they will all assume.
He can't shake the sensation, however, of Jazz's visor on his back plating, watching him leave, and he doesn't fail to notice that he's still carrying the cube Jazz gave him, which he now has no choice but to consume.
Recharge becomes frag near impossible.
Ratchet finds himself laying on his berth, staring at the ceiling, wondering where he'd gone so wrong. He starts taking on extra shifts, if only to exhaust himself until a forced shutdown becomes necessary.
Jazz is making this harder than it needs to be.
Ratchet has never been a fan of making his personal affairs public. He feels no need to announce to the gossip mill that he and Jazz have ended their relationship. Which makes things rather awkward when Jazz continues to act like nothing has changed. Bringing him energon while he's in the medbay, knowing Ratchet won't make a scene and refuse. Offering to give Ratchet the Cybertronian version of a massage courtesy of his magnetic pulses. Genuinely being nice and cheerful and the all-around fun mech that everyone loves and adores.
Genuinely being the mech that Ratchet fell for in the first place. If it weren't for the fact that Jazz's stubborn refusal to accept the termination of their relationship is so slaggin' creepy, Ratchet would’ve regretted his choice. There is still a part of his spark that does regret his decision. A part of him that remembers many, many nights of pleasant recharge, playful interfacing, intelligent conversation, and simply connecting with another mech on such a level.
At least Jazz hasn't crept into his quarters without permission since that first day. Which makes Ratchet wonder if perhaps he had overreacted. And Wheeljack has been no help on the matter, preferring to defer to whatever Ratchet wants for himself. Easy for the slagger to say. He's got Prowl, and that bot wouldn't know an irrational action if it jumped up and punched him in the face.
Whereas Jazz is the verifiable king of the unexpected and illogical.
Sighing, Ratchet keys in the code to his quarters, preparing himself for another long night of staring at his ceiling, contemplating why on Cybertron Grapple had chosen such an awful color for the Ark. He'll be glitching soon if he keeps this up. He hasn't had a full defrag cycle since he made Jazz leave.
The lights are low, and Ratchet sends a ping to the systems. As his quarters brighten, Ratchet resets his optics and then his sensors, too.
Maybe he's glitching already.
Because there's nothing here. His berth is folded back up into the wall. His desk has been swept clean. His shelves are empty. The room has been dusted, cleaned, and polished. Like no one has ever occupied it since they crash-landed here on Earth.
Silently, Ratchet turns around and leaves. He stands outside of his quarters and looks at the door. His name isn't exactly on it, but his title is. Chief Medical Officer. Definitely his room then. For a moment there, he thought perhaps he'd entered the wrong room using his overrides while in a slagged-circuit fog.
He goes back into his quarters. They are still empty of all his personal possessions. Something is not right.
Ratchet brings up the current shift schedule and then comms Red Alert.
--This may sound like a trick of Sideswipe proportions, but I have reason to believe that I've been robbed. --
It sounds ridiculous even to him, and Ratchet winces as he says it.
--Nonsense.-- Red Alert uses his familiar, practical tone. A sure sign that Ratchet was right about how he sounded --Jazz informed me that you two agree to cohabitate. All of your belongings have been shifted to his quarters per your agreement.--
Ratchet's entire frame goes still.
--I see. Thank you, Red Alert.--
He waits until the line has completely closed before letting the growl escape his vocalizer. He never thought Jazz would go this far. Had he been that misunderstood? Had he not been clear?
Whirling on his heel, Ratchet strides from his quarters, making a beeline for Jazz's. The schedule indicates that Jazz should be on base and his next shift isn't for another few hours. He had better be in his quarters because Ratchet is ending this. Today. With no room for misinterpretation or error or confusion.
Three doors down the hall, Ratchet doesn't bother with the politeness of a gentle ping. He raises his hand and pounds on the door, at the same time sending a barrage of demanding pings at the stubborn saboteur. There is no verbal acknowledgment, but the door does open, and Ratchet storms inside without any ceremony.
Sure enough, Jazz is in the middle of unpacking a box of Ratchet's belongings, carefully setting them out on a shelf that has been cleared. He looks up as the medic enters, smiling, cheerfully oblivious to the stormcloud of fury spitting fire in all directions.
“What the slag do you think you are doing?” Ratchet demands, stomping across the room and snatching the box from the saboteur's hands. His belongings rattle and clank inside, precious mementos all that he has left of Cybertron.
“I thought it would be easier if I just took care o' all this fer ya,” Jazz replies with a shrug and reaches for the box again. “I was tryin' ta be thoughtful.”
Ratchet's fingers grip the box so tightly that the metal crumples. “We're not together anymore! I don't want to move in with you, Jazz! I don't want any of this!”
Seemingly realizing that Ratchet's not going to give up the box, Jazz reaches for the items already on the shelf, casually rearranging them. His voice is even, reasonable. His words aren’t.
“Ya say that now, but I know ya don't mean it. We're meant ta be together, Ratch. Ya just don't see it yet.”
A flutter of unease tugs at Ratchet's spark at Jazz's rather frank tone. He takes a step backward, still holding the box.
“Jazz, I do mean it. I'm absolutely serious. We're over. We have been for weeks. And nothing's going to change that. Nothing.”
Jazz stills, going so very motionless that for a moment Ratchet wonders if the saboteur's pumps are even working. Like the truth is finally hitting home, penetrating through whatever mulish block he's set on his processor. His hand drops from the shelf, and he half-turns, visor a bare glow as he looks at Ratchet.
“Nothing?” he repeats, and his vocal tones are softer than Ratchet would expect. Not exactly broken or disappointed but shuddering somewhere in between.
Another cautious step backward takes Ratchet closer to the door. “Yes,” Ratchet confirms and performs a systems check because this kind of unease in his spark is certainly unwarranted. “I'm sorry. But that’s the way it must be.”
He waits, but Jazz says nothing else. It's eerily silent in the room, and Ratchet suspects that now is the time to beat a hasty exit. Perhaps he'll even comm Blaster or Bluestreak once he leaves. Surely, Jazz will need some comfort, and either of the aforementioned mechs will be willing to provide it. And afterward, Ratchet will comm Wheeljack. The need to lose himself in a batch of high grade has suddenly become overwhelming.
“Nothing?” Ratchet hears Jazz repeat yet again, as though stuck on an infinite loop. “Ya see, Ratch, that's where yer wrong.”
Something cold drops into Ratchet's spark. He turns, battle systems suddenly screaming into bright alerts, and all he sees is a black-white blur before his world fades to nothing.
Ratchet onlines with a cloudiness in his processor and a distinct sense of unease. Half of his systems remain muted to him, some of his motor functions off-line and his external sensors tuned down. His comm systems are out as well, and there's another person connected to his systems. He can feel the alien entity rifling through his coding and systems, blithely applying blocks and dancing through firewalls.
A bit more clarity cuts through the fog, and Ratchet lurches, battle systems telling him to flee, fight, get away. There's a dull clank as his frame refuses to obey his commands. His legs aren't listening to his commands at all, and his wrists have been bound to the berth above him. There's also a noticeable weight on his hips.
Finally, Ratchet's optics online. It takes a perilously long time for his vision to sharpen, but he doesn't need the black-white blob to focus to know that it's Jazz. It's Jazz paging through his command codes, and it's Jazz who has plugged into him.
In all likelihood, Jazz is also the one who cuffed him down to the berth as well. There can't possibly be any other perpetrators.
The saboteur is humming, Ratchet belatedly realizes as his audials are the last thing to start functioning. He's humming, and one hand is gently stroking over the windshield on Ratchet's chassis, a finger tracing the seam of his chestplate.
“Jazz,” Ratchet says, vocalizer fritzing and glitched. “What are you doing?”
He has to be calm because panicking is not going to help him. No matter how frenzied his spark is right now, twisting and churning inside him.
For a moment, Jazz says nothing, his fingers drumming an off rhythm on Ratchet's plating. Then he straightens, both palms flat on Ratchet's abdominal armor.
“Do ya know what I was before th' war, Ratch?”
Okay. Better to play this game with Jazz. Better to let him talk while Ratchet figures how the Pit he's going to get out of this.
“Your file says you were a systems analyst,” Ratchet hedges and glances to the right.
They are still in Jazz's quarters, no surprise there. He sees his internal weaponry sitting on an end table. Jazz must have removed it all when he was unconscious.
Jazz smiles. “Yeah, somethin' like that. I was a hacker. Systems Analyst is just a euphemism the Enforcers cooked up for those in their employ.”
Ratchet casually checks the restriants on his wrist again. Magnetic cuffs, he thinks. Hard to tell since Jazz took his fraggin' scanners offline, too.
“Hacker?”
“I was paid ta break codes. Ta punch through firewalls no one else could. Ta get inta places with all the best securities.” Jazz's hands continue a soft caress over Ratchet's plating, easily stimulating all the sensitive areas he's grown to recognize over their period as lovers. “Prowl's the only one who knows. He caught me. Gave me a choice. Work with them or get slagged. It's pretty obvious which one I picked, isn't it?”
Ratchet shifts his optics back to Jazz. “Why are you telling me this?”
“Because I love ya, Ratch. Always have. Always will.” He confesses so boldly, as though
It’s no difficult thing for him to admit. “I can't have ya leavin' me,” he adds, and one hand returns to Ratchet's chassis, a finger dragging down the nearly invisible seam in his chestplate. “Ya don't understand. I want ya ta understand. So I'm gonna show ya.”
For the first time, Ratchet admits to himself that it is fear and not just apprehension clawing at his spark. Surely, Jazz wouldn't do this.
“Show me?”
Jazz's smile is softer this time. Gentle and full of affection. Also, quite possibly tinged with insanity, but Ratchet may be biased in thinking this. He leans forward, both hands cupping Ratchet's helm, thumbs stroking over his cheek.
“We're gonna sparkbond. Ya'll belong to me forever. Just the way things're meant ta be.” His engine gives a soft purr of anticipation. “Then, I'll never have ta worry about ya leavin' me again.”
Yes, it seems… Jazz really would do this. There is nothing but determination in his visor and his voice.
Frantically, Ratchet starts shoring up the defenses around the commands for his critical systems – namely his spark and processor protocols. He uses all the firewalls he has in his arsenal, the ones Perceptor has given him, one Wheeljack created himself, and even one Prowl had devised in that scheming, logical processor of his.
Ratchet's starting to run hot. He can feel the heat in his plating. But nonetheless, a sensation of icy-cold starts to run through his lines, and he knows that's only an imagined sensation brought upon by his sudden fear.
“Jazz. You can't do this.”
If he's pleading, close to begging, no one else has to know. Spark bonding is permanent! Ratchet is nowhere near ready to make that kind of commitment, especially without his consent!
Jazz leans closer still, lips brushing over Ratchet's chevron, before he draws back again. Ratchet can’t see his optics, and for once, he’s glad.
“It's not a matter of can't,” Jazz declares then. “I have ta. I can't let ya leave me.”
The datastream that is Jazz's presence within Ratchet's systems suddenly starts to actively rifle through Ratchet's coding once again. He heads unerringly toward Ratchet's spark chamber protocols, slicing as easily through most of the medic’s firewalls as though they were mere suggestions rather than layers and layers of protective commands.
“Jazz!” Ratchet hisses and starts to struggle in earnest as much as his limited mobility will allow him. He lurches his upper body upward, straining at the magnetic cuffs. “Stop!”
His words and actions have no effect. Jazz simply shifts his weight, pinning Ratchet down firmly, leaving little room for the medic to leverage him off. He says nothing either, awareness obviously turning inward as his datastream balks at Ratchet's last defense – Prowl's protocols.
“Prowler's work, huh?” Jazz says with an amused, approving chuckle. “He's good; there's no doubt. But not as good as me.”
“Jazz, please don't do this.” Ratchet's vents kick on with a panicked whirr, sucking in air to dispel the heat clouding up his frame. His thoughts feel so slagging slow and sluggish from whatever Jazz must have uploaded to him. “Please.”
Jazz cups Ratchet's cheek with one hand and makes a shushing noise. “It's okay, Ratch. Promise. This's gonna make everythin' better. Ya'll see.” He pauses, and then, his smile brightens. “Got it.”
His announcement is accompanied by the telltale click of Ratchet's chestplate cracking open, completely without his permission. The soft glow of his spark starts to illuminate the room, and Jazz gently coaxes Ratchet's plating to completely split. His fingers gently stroke over the thinner, translucent material of Ratchet's spark chamber, the last yet meager line of defense.
Jazz's visor brightens, and he strokes the chamber lovingly.
“C'mon. Open up fer me pretty.”
As if Ratchet has any choice with Jazz jacked into his systems, overriding any commands Ratchet might personally send and turning his firewalls to useless dead code.
Ratchet's vocalizer spits static. Jazz doesn't listen, deactivating the last barrier and commanding the casing to slide aside. Ratchet's spark flutters, energies surging through the opening, eager as they spill over Jazz's talented fingers. Pleasure teases itself over Ratchet's circuits, and he shudders. If from fear or unwanted desire, he can’t be sure.
“See?” Jazz purrs, dipping deeper, caressing the inner corona of Ratchet's spark. “Yer spark knows better than yer processor about these things.”
Ratchet's frame arches toward Jazz, autonomic systems eager for more of the pleasure-inducing touch. “Involuntary reaction, you glitch,” he manages to grit out, straining at the magnetic cuffs again. Heat pulses across his circuits, static energy crackling across his frame.
The saboteur makes a humming noise of content. “All I want is fer us ta be together,” Jazz says, and his vocal tones take on a measure of hurt of all things.
Horror wars with arousal as Jazz's chestplate splits open, the blue-white of his spark illuminating the space between them. It would be beautiful to Ratchet's optics, if he weren't so repulsed by Jazz's actions.
The saboteur leans closer, casing sliding aside to let the energies of his spark spill out, impatient tendrils licking out, brushing over the very edges of Ratchet's own spark. In that brief moment of contact, Ratchet gets a glimpse of Jazz's feelings for him.
Love. Or obsession rather. The desire to possess. That there is no cruel intent does not make this any easier to bear.
At the first gentle pulse of Jazz's spark, Ratchet tries to resist. He thinks of all sorts of unpleasant things, anything to keep the exchange of energies from beginning. Anything to forestall the pleasure Jazz's fingers are wringing from his plating and the incredible sensation of near spark-to-spark contact. Primus! Ratchet can't remember the last time he merged for sheer pleasure. Surely before they ever left Cybertron.
“C'mon, Ratch,” Jazz murmurs at him, his soothing tones doing little to calm the increasingly frantic medic. “Don't be like that. I don't want ta hurt ya.”
“Then stop!” Ratchet all but shouts, the last syllable crackling with static.
It hurts; it truly does, to resist the call of Jazz's spark. His memory core is being unhelpful, dragging up vidfiles of past merges and the unimaginable pleasure that can be had.
It won't be so bad, a part of him whispers. Jazz would be devoted.
But it's not what Ratchet wants!
“Ya know I won't do that,” Jazz replies without a hint of regret. Determination lights his visor. “Yer goin' to be mine, Ratch. Mine and no one else's.”
An interface cable snakes out of Jazz's open chassis, heading straight for the port in Ratchet's own frame, to one side of his spark chamber. A one-way connection isn't enough to initiate the bond, but that won't stop Jazz. He simply breezes through Ratchet's systems like he has the rest of them, triggering Ratchet's own interface cable to link into Jazz's interface port.
Arousal and pleasure slam into Ratchet's systems. He writhes on the berth, trapped between the solid frame beneath him, and Jazz's weight above. It feels so fragging good, for all the revulsion that swamps his thoughts, and he's nothing but a bundle of contradictions. He wants to beg for more. He wants to beg for Jazz to stop.
Jazz presses closer, the outer edges of their sparks coming into terrible contact, and an onslaught of pleasure-pain sends a hot charge through Ratchet's circuits. He keens, frame lurching upward. His resistance is crumbling. Jazz is still talking to him, crooning, encouraging. He pulses love and possession into the half-merge, trying to coax Ratchet into letting him in. Into making it easier.
He can do it. He can force it. Too many years in Spec Ops means there are a lot of things Jazz can do and has done before. Forced spark merges are only a drop in the bucket.
He's not going to stop. No matter how much Ratchet begs. No one is coming to rescue him. No one knows he needs to be rescued.
Ratchet knows what he has to do. What other choice does he have?
Ratchet keens again; this time out of sheer grief. Jazz is his ally, companion, loyal friend. The affection is still there, hard to ignore.
He onlines his optics, wondering when he'd offlined them, and sees Jazz over him. Their spark energies lashing together, starting to pulse in sync. Their interface connections are exchanging data at a rapid rate. Ratchet's going to lose his chance. It'll be too late.
“Jazz. Stop. Please.”
His former lover's answer is to pulse harder with his spark, bring them closer together. Until the taste of Jazz is all that Ratchet knows, both with spark and data cables.
Resignation swamps Ratchet from head to toe. He grits his denta, a shudder wracking through his frame.
He has no choice.
With what little control over his own body Ratchet has left, he taps into his emergency protocols. Ones he created for himself long, long ago, when Megatron first put out that capture order on all high-ranked medics and scientists of the Autobot army. Perceptor and Wheeljack have it, too. He’s been planning to load it into First Aid and Skyfire as well. It's a contingency plan. A last resort on the possibility of capture by the enemy.
They’ve told no one else. Not even Prowl. Not even Prime.
It's a virus. It won't kill. But it's almost a fate worse than deactivation.
With Jazz connected to Ratchet as he is and completely open to the medic, he's defenseless to it. Ratchet might not have the hacker experience to break through Jazz's firewalls and take over his motor functions – even with his medical overrides. He doesn’t need it; this virus will do all the work for him. It's the most insidious thing Ratchet has ever seen. It's more Decepticon than Autobot.
It's the only option he has left.
Between one pulse of pleasure and the next, Ratchet uploads the virus and hides the action by easing back on his resistance. He moans, letting himself feel the pleasure, letting some of the heat suffusing his frame make his circuits tingle. It isn't even pretend because it does feel good.
He only needs half a minute, perhaps less, before the virus is so rooted Jazz will either be forced to stop in order to counter it or will be unable to do anything to remove it.
Half a minute, however, may still be too long. Jazz is as skilled in the berth as he is everywhere else. He knows Ratchet's frame too well. Knows how to make him cry out with pleasure, how to set his circuits ablaze. The charge in his frame translates to brilliant arcs of static that leap between his and Jazz's frame. Their spark energies twine and weave together.
Ratchet moans, a sound that is in no way reminiscent of pleasure. Is it too late?
Above him, Jazz suddenly goes very still. His visor dims.
“Ratchet?”
His tone is uncertain, wavering.
Sick to his very spark, Ratchet turns his head. “You didn't give me a choice, Jazz.”
Disbelief and betrayal pour from Jazz's spark, twisting Ratchet's own emotions until he's seeded with guilt.
“Ya... this... Why can't I stop it?”
“I can't even stop it,” Ratchet says, unable to hide his misery.
Jazz's hand slams into the berth, and he tries to pull back, cables snapping taut between them. “What's it doin'? Ratch?”
Fear. For the first time, Ratchet hears fear in Jazz's voice.
Jazz's free hand starts clawing at his own open chest as though he can rip the intangible virus out by his fingers alone.
“I don't understand,” he cries, voice approaching a keen. “This's s'posed ta be a good thing! Yer supposed ta love me!”
His terror and agony transmits across the link between them, chasing away the pleasure, infecting Ratchet's own systems. He grits his denta, turns off his audials, but it doesn't help. He can still feel Jazz's panic and confusion.
Jazz shrieks, loud enough that Ratchet can feel the vibration, and then his weight shifts. He jerks backward, snapping cables from their ports, their sparks breaking apart so quickly that a violent, stab of pain slams into Ratchet. He jerks on the berth, mouth opening in a pained scream of his own. Too much, too much, too much--
His world turns black all over again.
Ratchet onlines with none of the muzziness of the last time he came to awareness. His thoughts are clear, his motor functions are his own again, and there are no foreign entities leafing through his processes.
There is, however, a strut-deep fatigue that he just can't escape. He's achy in all the wrong places, his spark is twinging with off-rhythm pulses of discomfort. There's a lingering sense of loneliness hovering over everything. He's aching from more than just physical loss, though Ratchet can't place a name to it.
His proximity sensors register the presence of another mech. One who is approaching slowly, like one might a grounded Seeker.
“You're online,” Hoist observes.
“I feel like slag,” the medic grumps and tries to get up from the berth, but his arms and legs won't rise. They've been secured down. “What the frag?”
Hoist steps into Ratchet's view, reaching for the restraints on his right wrist. “You fought us. When we tried to pull you away from Jazz.”
That doesn't make any sense. Then again, Ratchet can't remember anything beyond Jazz's betrayed confusion and his own horrified regret. He remembers Jazz jerking away from him, battling against the malignant virus. After that?
Nothing.
Ratchet's spark gives another lurching pulse of agony. The loneliness returns again, clawing at his energies. The urge to keen rises within Ratchet, but he forces it down, locking it behind medical protocols. His spark feels like it's reaching, straining for something, but there's nothing there.
“My spark...”
Hoist pats him on the shoulder and moves to Ratchet's other side, undoing that restraint as well. “The feeling will pass in time. It's a residual effect. Consequence of the--”
“--interrupted bond,” Ratchet finishes. “I know.”
He slumps against the berth. Jazz had very nearly succeeded.
“Jazz?” he manages to ask.
From the end of the berth where Hoist is removing the leg straps, the engineer glances to his left. At another berth. Ratchet follows his gaze. He almost wishes he didn’t.
Jazz is lying there, motionless and obviously offline. He has been repaired, cleaned, and polished. Much like Ratchet himself has.
“He's not deactivated. But he's not the same anymore.” Hoist unlatches the last strap, which gives Ratchet room to sit up. “My scanners indicate that his memory core's been wiped clean. He's practically a sparkling. At least in mind.” His optics are too blue and worried. “What happened, Ratchet?”
What happened?
Ratchet's head dips, the memories too fresh. His spark aches, calling to finish the incomplete bond rather than keep the pain of it slowly dissolving. He can still feel the echoes of Jazz's shock and despair, the utter desolation. His fingers curl around the edge of the berth, tightening until it dents.
“I didn't have a choice,” Ratchet whispers at last. “He didn't give me any other choice.”
Hoist puts a hand on Ratchet's shoulder but hastily removes it when Ratchet flinches away. “What did you do?”
“I think that explanations can wait, Hoist.” Optimus Prime's voice cuts into the tension-filled atmosphere, the door sliding shut behind him.
Ratchet's scanners hadn't even sensed Optimus approach. But now, his spark does, lurching toward the calming presence of their Prime, eager to be soothed. Healed even.
“At least until his spark is not so damaged,” Optimus adds, coming to a halt near to Ratchet's berth but not close enough to touch. His gaze is unreadable, expression hidden behind his battle mask.
Damaged? Yes. Ratchet can agree to that. Broken, too. He feels strained, too large for his frame, and part of him wants nothing more than to collapse back into recharge. Another part of him wants to leap off the berth, cross the floor, and join Jazz on his. He's torn in too many directions, spark churning indecisively within him.
Ratchet's shoulders slump. “I don't know what to say, Prime.”
“Right now, you need say nothing,” Optimus replies with his unfailing calm and patience. “This matter will be looked into, and the circumstances will be investigated. But for now, rest. Rest and recover.”
He sounds tired then. Tired and very sad. Ratchet doesn’t blame him.
“If such a thing is even possible.”
Ratchet shutters his optics then. He doesn’t look at Hoist. Or at his Prime. Certainly not at Jazz.
He just keeps them offline and looks at nothing. Says nothing. Feels nothing.
Or at least, he wishes he didn’t.
a/n: Yes, there will be a sequel to this. There are too many loose ends that need to be tied up and I enjoy exploring aftermath.
