dracoqueen22 | [TFP] Event Horizon Origins

a/n: This is my reasoning behind why Knock Out doesn't have a visible Decepticon brand. (Or if he does, I haven't managed to spot it yet).

Not beta'ed so if you spot a mistake, I won't be offended if you point it out.

Title: Weakness
Characters: Knock Out, Breakdown, Streetwise
Continuity: Event Horizon verse, TF:Prime, pre-season one
Rating: T
Description: The past is weakness; Knock Out learns this lesson the hard way.

It's his first mission as a legitimate Decepticon, the purple brand on his plating still stinging and smoldering. The weight of a blaster in his hands is unfamiliar, unwieldy. The mechs on either side of him are strangers with crimson optics and battle-hardened sneers. Their paint jobs are a mess of dings, scrapes, and dents.

Knock Out's knowledge is limited. He has instinct and reflex, but no practical experience. If he survives this, Flatline has agreed to take him on as medic's apprentice. Like his genitor, though Flatline doesn't know it. Better if Knock Out doesn't make it common knowledge that his origins are Autobot. Worse, that his origins are fostered.

This is his first mission, but who could have guessed it would go so wrong. That they'd barely escape with the energy converter only to come head to head with an Autobot defense team when the Autobots aren't supposed to be within megamiles of this abandoned base.

And who could have expected that there would be a familiar face among those Autobots, or at least, familiar to Knock Out, who was admittedly cloistered while living in Uraya. This familiar face makes Knock Out hesitate, finger cramped on the trigger of his blaster. His spark pulses in friendly greeting, while alarm races through his circuits.

Newly blue optics stare at Knock Out in utter surprise – once upon a time, those optics had been green, like the rest of his brothers. Like Hot Spot.

“Knock Out!” Streetwise greets with a tone of relief and happiness, optics flashing. “You're alive! You're...” His words trail off as he notices that Knock Out is not alone. That he has fresh brands on his shoulders and Decepticons at his side.

“You know the Autobot?” Knock Out's companion demands, voice ripe with suspicion, his blaster raised to fire at Streetwise and his Autobots. Their two teams are at an uneasy standstill, violence on a hair trigger.

Knock Out's universe boils down to a choice, one he knew he'd have to face sooner or later. He hadn't realized it would be now.

I'm not ready for this.

He lifts his blaster, aim unsteady, yet intending to incapacitate. He chose the Decepticons for a reason. He had known it could come to this.

“Yes,” Knock Out says, with far more bravado than he actually feels, tanks churning. “Get out of our way, Streetwise.” Don't make me do this.

“Not happening, 'Con!” one of the Autobots snarls and takes a step forward with murderous intent.

Streetwise half-turns, a bare movement, maybe to stop his companion. Maybe not.

Knock Out's finger twitches. He fires and Streetwise goes down, frame twitching and smoke rising from the wound.

Knock Out stares, spark spinning in his frame. His fingers relax around his weapon, which tumbles to the debris-strewn street. Around him, an exchange of blaster fire turns the atmosphere to noise and heat. Someone shouts “for the glory of the Decepticons” and dying cries ring in Knock Out's audials. He can't seem to muster the energy to reach for his blaster again, not even when a shot goes stray, clipping his plating, scoring it right near his new brand.

His team wins. It's hardly a contest. They outnumber the Autobots and outpower them, too. They escape with acquired converter well in hand.

Flatline agrees to take Knock Out on as his apprentice the very next orn. Somehow, the accomplishment feels hollow. All Knock Out can remember is the smoking hole in Streetwise's chassis.

Later, when he's elbows deep in a Seeker moaning about a bent wing, Knock Out hears the official report. He sees the purloined Autobot casualty list. He learns that his team had done their job well, that not a single one of the Autobots had survived.

He realized that his very first kill as a Decepticon had been a mech he once called friend. No, more than that. Family. Streetwise and his brothers had been family.

This is the cost of his loyalty.

He stares in the mirror, frowning at the Decepticon brand burned into his dark red plating. Megatron has never required that his Decepticons wear visible markers of their faction. Knock Out accepted the brands because he wanted to prove something, to himself maybe. To put his choice as something set in duryllium. Unchangeable.

Knock Out reaches up, grabbing the armor of his shoulder and yanking it off. He stifles a cry of pain as sensory lines snap from the abrupt motion. He turns the panel over and over in his fingers, contemplating the brand.

What would he do, he wonders, if he came faceplate to faceplate with his own genitor or his own creator? Could he pull the trigger then? Is that how far he's willing to take this?

“There're easier ways to do that, you know,” Breakdown says from where he's sitting on the other side of the room, watching Knock Out.

The medic-in-training frowns and turns, tossing the panel to his friend. The closest mech he has to family right now. “Buff that out for me.”

Breakdown lifts an orbital ridge. “You turning Bot?”

Knock Out's optics redirect to the mirror, staring at his other shoulder. He'll have to fix that panel, too. “I'll never be an Autobot.” His statement is firm, unrelenting. It's the bitter truth.

But he'll be fragged if he loses himself that easily. Megatron can't have his total loyalty, not just yet.

The price is still too high.

****
a/n: This was originally written as a flash fiction and I added a good page and a half to it. I hope it feels a bit more complete now.

I've got three more Origins pieces in the works: Mirage, First Aid, and another SideswipexFirst Aid. But first to finish the bigbang fic.

I love feedback!