dracoqueen22 (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
dracoqueen22) wrote2012-10-30 11:50 am
dracoqueen22) wrote2012-10-30 11:50 am
Entry tags:
[Transformers] Ficlets
a/n: Every once in a while, I whip out the old mp3 player, put my tracks on shuffle, and write whatever comes to me. Some of it is awesome. Some of it mediocre. And some of it useless. :)
These three are the best of the lot when I was recently struck by musical whimsy. They've not been beta'ed so grammatical mistakes are mine and mine alone. Enjoy!
Universe: Transformers Prime
Characters: Jazz, Shockwave
Inspiration: “Dance with the Devil,” Breaking Benjamin
“What an interesting predicament we find ourselves in,” Jazz says, holding his blaster steady despite the trembling of his frame.
A single optic stares back at him, cold and unyielding. “State your purpose, Autobot.”
“You mean, it's not obvious?” Jazz slides a step to the right, ignoring the stabs of pain from his left knee and the gurgle of his hydraulics. “I'm disappointed, mech. Don't ya know who I am?”
“Your designation is of no consequence to me.”
There isn't so much of a twitch to serve as warning, but Jazz reads the intent in his opponent's unwavering gaze nonetheless. The blast fills the corridor and Jazz throws himself to the side to avoid it, feeling the edge of the heatwave score against his dorsal plating.
He winces, hits the ground on his right shoulder, and rolls back onto his pedes.
“State your purpose, Autobot,” Shockwave repeats with a menacing step forward, cannon raised toward Jazz once more. “If your answer proves satisfactory, I might make this painless.”
Jazz forces out a laugh, and behind his visor, searches valiantly for an escape route. “Hardly incentive, Shockwave. Most evil villains have better threats than that, ya know.”
The sharp whine of that massive cannon charging for another strong blast fills the narrow hallway. “That was no threat, Autobot.”
Does nothing break the mech's calm? Primus, it's like trying to get a rise out of Prowl!
Jazz slides another pace backward, ignoring the energon plopping freely from the gash in his arm. He's only got to stall Shockwave just a bit longer. What's taking them so long anyway! Did his timer malfunction? Frag Perceptor if it did!
“An invitation then?” Jazz suggests with a smirk and throws himself into another clumsy dive and roll to avoid Shockwave's second shot. This time, Jazz manages to squeeze off a round of his own, though it misses by several microns and Shockwave doesn't so much as flinch. “Afraid I'll have to decline. Interfactional romances are frowned upon.”
The sound of pedesteps echoes from around the curve of the hall. Frag it. Shockwave's reinforcements are answering their master's call.
Jazz, mech, you've gotten yourself into quite the rusted gear here.
Shockwave's optic flashes, cannon giving another fierce whine of charge. “I will give you one final chance, Autobot. State your purpose. Otherwise I shall be forced to acquire it through alternate means.”
Jazz's fuel pump stutters. Frag no. He knows all bout Shockwave's little processor-hacking device and he wants nothing of it. No, thank you.
“As fun as that sounds,” Jazz says, and in the distance, he hears a low, continuous rumble. Finally! He smirks. “I think that's my cue.”
Alert sirens wail into existence, screaming their warnings at a noxious pitch. Lights flash in alternating bands of crimson and ocher. A monotonous voice announces that the infrastructure has been damaged and critical supports are malfunctioning.
Good times.
Emotion suddenly flares into Shockwave's energy field, which batters at Jazz as though it holds tangible razorblades.
“What have you done?” the Decepticon scientist demands, hand whipping through the air in express shock.
“Nothing much.” Jazz pulls up a mental schematic of this not-so-secret-anymore laboratory, tracing all routes, anything that might get him the scrap out of here. “A bomb here. A crossed wire there. I say you've got three breems before this compound becomes a hole in the ground. Too bad, so sad.”
Fury bleeds from Shockwave's energy field before he can whip it back into shape. “You ignorant pile of scrap!”
The scientist doesn't bother with ceremony anymore. He lifts his arm, aims and fires, heat and pressure filling the narrow corridor.
Jazz scrambles to avoid the powerful blasts, laughing at the sight of Shockwave's infamous reserve vanishing in the wake of screeching alarms and a monotone countdown suggesting evacuation.
Primus, you touch a mech's questionable experiments and suddenly he goes off the deep end.
“I'd apologize but I'm not sorry,” Jazz says, using a small stack of supply crates for a temporary cover. “And I'd love to stay and chat but, you know, Autobots to see, Decepticons to scrap, labs to sabotage. Fun times.”
He senses heat, energy crackling through the air, and Jazz throws himself to the left, barely avoiding Shockwave's next round. It clips his fully-functional leg, scoring plating with the sharp stench of burnt metal and Jazz scrambles to his pedes, hissing as pain radiates everywhere.
“There is no escape, Autobot.”
A subroutine flashes brightly at him. Schematics zoom in and highlight for good measure. Escape route located.
“On the contrary, Shockey, I've just found my out.” Jazz whips his blaster toward the Decepticon and aims a series of rounds at Shockwave, more distractions than anything else, and throws his battered frame toward the trash chute he's found.
“By the way,” Jazz adds as Shockwave flails to avoid the blasterfire. “My designation's not Autobot. It's Jazz. Have a nice orn!”
With a cheerful wave, Jazz dives into the disposal chute, thanking Primus and anyone else that'll listen that he can fit, just as cannon fire erupts into the corridor behind him.
That Shockwave. He never could take a joke.
Universe: Bayverse
Characters: OptimusxSideswipe
Inspiration: “Your Guardian Angel,” Red Jumpsuit Apparatus
“You're not recharging again.”
Optimus cycles his optics, pulling himself from a fugue to acknowledge his subordinate. “Should you not be on patrol?”
“I traded with Jolt,” Sideswipe answers and in the following silence, closes the distance between them, rolling up to stand on Optimus' other side.
He says nothing else, at first, and Optimus savors the quiet. He returns his gaze to the starlit night, broken by a scatter of light clouds, but for the most part, dark and speckled. Here, out beyond human civilization, there is little to obscure the view. Optimus prefers it this way.
He wonders, many times, if he stares hard enough, focuses with all his power, he might catch a glimpse of Cybertron. The Cybertron that was, at any rate.
Light traveling as it does often gives the illusion of traveling back in time, reversing the chronometer. And tonight, like many other nights, Optimus would give anything for the power to return to the past. The future has become too difficult to bear.
“It's a pain incomparable to anything else,” Sideswipe says, his soft vocals spilling into the companionable quiet. “That hole in your spark... nothing helps.”
Optimus dips his helm, offlining his optics. Of course. Sideswipe would understand. He is, most likely, the only Autobot who will ever understand.
“After vorns at odds, it should be easier to bear,” Optimus admits, hands pulling into slow, trembling fists at his sides before he unfurls his fingers.
Sideswipe's energy field tentatively reaches out, offering... Optimus isn't sure what to call it. Commiseration? Comfort? Understanding?
“You can't hate half of your spark,” Sideswipe retorts with a heavy, bitter tone that Optimus knows all too well. “No matter how deep the betrayal.”
Optimus onlines his optics, looking down at his soldier. “You have changed, Sideswipe.”
The warrior's lipplates quirk into a wry grin. “Haven't we all?” he asks before the smile melts away into sobriety. “I can help, Prime. I understand.”
“Sunstreaker.”
Bright blue optics dim, a hand lifting to touch his chassis, gesturing to the spark behind his chestplates. “I felt it when he offlined though I don't know how or why. I probably never will.”
Optimus extends his own energy field without fully considering it. “Then allow me to offer comfort as well.”
A grated laugh escapes from Sideswipe's vocalizer, but he turns toward Optimus nonetheless. “Same old Prime. Unable to accept it for your own sake.”
One hand traces the near-invisible seam of Sideswipe's chestplates, which part a micron, causing a sliver of light to spill into the starlit night between them. “I won't ever feel whole again.”
Optimus folds himself down, a necessity considering their height difference, his energy field wrapping around Sideswipe with tangible weight. Offering. Inviting.
Sideswipe accepts, folding into Optimus' embrace, nuzzling his faceplate against Optimus' with a light crackle of static dancing between them.
“You can grieve with me, Optimus,” Sideswipe murmurs as Optimus triggers his own chestplates to part, windshields moving up and aside. “I won't ever tell.”
Shuttering his optics, Optimus wraps his arms around Sideswipe, holding the warrior to his chassis. He surrenders himself to the eager pull of a broken spark, as fractured and aching as his own. Their frames come together in shared grief that no other Autobot can fathom and there's a small comfort in that knowledge.
And for the first time since the battle in Mission City, since the ruin that was Chicago, Optimus keens for his loss. For the brother he offlined because he had no other choice.
Universe: G1
Characters: JazzxWheeljack, Ratchet
Inspiration: “Telling the World,” Taio Cruz
The moment Jazz steps into the rec room, music pouring from his speakers, Wheeljack knows he should have run when he first had the chance. What was he thinking? Hiding in plain sight? When has that ever helped!
He swings his gaze back toward Ratchet, indicators flashing a desperate plea for assistance.
“Oh, no,” Ratchet says, shaking with mirth. “You've made your berth. Best lie in it.”
“But--”
A hand clamps on Wheeljack's shoulder, spinning him around in his chair, coming optics to, well, bumper with the very mech he should have run from ten seconds ago.
“My love,” Jazz says, visor bright with mischief, music pulsing a happy, infectious beat. “Can I have this dance?”
Jazz's arms wave widely, open invitation, his pedes skipping a cheerful rhythm that matches the music. He grins and extends a hand to the mortified engineer, wriggling his fingers expectantly.
Wheeljack's grip on the seat of his chair might better be described as 'death-like.'
Seriously? Wheeljack has no rhythm. This is a well-established fact. He's a disaster on the dance floor, always has been. Just like singing. For the sake of all audials present, Wheeljack has been more or less banned from singing in public.
“Jazz--”
“Just one?” the saboteur interrupts, twitching his fingers again. His vocals shift into a purr few mechs have ever been able to resist, much less Wheeljack with his willpower made of swiss cheese. “Don't break my spark, darling.”
“Yeah, Jack! Go for it!” Someone in the crowd of amused onlookers encourages.
Wheeljack makes a note to put something unpleasant in that mech's energon. Just as soon as he identifies the perpetrator.
“C'mon!” Someone else adds.
“You can do it!” And that is definitely Bluestreak, adding on a cheerful giggle.
“Cut a rug!” Had to be Blaster.
“Yeah,” Ratchet drawls from behind Wheeljack and he just knows that the medic is smirking from audial to audial. “Break a leg.”
Wheeljack sighs, knowing he's been beaten, a sigh of good humor. “You're incorrigible,” he says as he takes Jazz's hand.
He yelps as the saboteur yanks him to his pedes and immediately spins him to the pulsing beat, Jazz's inherent grace making up for Wheeljack's clumsiness.
“It's all a part of my charm,” Jazz purrs, half of his visor dimming in a wink. “Now let me see ya groove, partner.”
a/n: Might see more of these little random ficlets pop up here and there. They're helpful for getting me out of a writing funk. :)
These three are the best of the lot when I was recently struck by musical whimsy. They've not been beta'ed so grammatical mistakes are mine and mine alone. Enjoy!
Universe: Transformers Prime
Characters: Jazz, Shockwave
Inspiration: “Dance with the Devil,” Breaking Benjamin
“What an interesting predicament we find ourselves in,” Jazz says, holding his blaster steady despite the trembling of his frame.
A single optic stares back at him, cold and unyielding. “State your purpose, Autobot.”
“You mean, it's not obvious?” Jazz slides a step to the right, ignoring the stabs of pain from his left knee and the gurgle of his hydraulics. “I'm disappointed, mech. Don't ya know who I am?”
“Your designation is of no consequence to me.”
There isn't so much of a twitch to serve as warning, but Jazz reads the intent in his opponent's unwavering gaze nonetheless. The blast fills the corridor and Jazz throws himself to the side to avoid it, feeling the edge of the heatwave score against his dorsal plating.
He winces, hits the ground on his right shoulder, and rolls back onto his pedes.
“State your purpose, Autobot,” Shockwave repeats with a menacing step forward, cannon raised toward Jazz once more. “If your answer proves satisfactory, I might make this painless.”
Jazz forces out a laugh, and behind his visor, searches valiantly for an escape route. “Hardly incentive, Shockwave. Most evil villains have better threats than that, ya know.”
The sharp whine of that massive cannon charging for another strong blast fills the narrow hallway. “That was no threat, Autobot.”
Does nothing break the mech's calm? Primus, it's like trying to get a rise out of Prowl!
Jazz slides another pace backward, ignoring the energon plopping freely from the gash in his arm. He's only got to stall Shockwave just a bit longer. What's taking them so long anyway! Did his timer malfunction? Frag Perceptor if it did!
“An invitation then?” Jazz suggests with a smirk and throws himself into another clumsy dive and roll to avoid Shockwave's second shot. This time, Jazz manages to squeeze off a round of his own, though it misses by several microns and Shockwave doesn't so much as flinch. “Afraid I'll have to decline. Interfactional romances are frowned upon.”
The sound of pedesteps echoes from around the curve of the hall. Frag it. Shockwave's reinforcements are answering their master's call.
Jazz, mech, you've gotten yourself into quite the rusted gear here.
Shockwave's optic flashes, cannon giving another fierce whine of charge. “I will give you one final chance, Autobot. State your purpose. Otherwise I shall be forced to acquire it through alternate means.”
Jazz's fuel pump stutters. Frag no. He knows all bout Shockwave's little processor-hacking device and he wants nothing of it. No, thank you.
“As fun as that sounds,” Jazz says, and in the distance, he hears a low, continuous rumble. Finally! He smirks. “I think that's my cue.”
Alert sirens wail into existence, screaming their warnings at a noxious pitch. Lights flash in alternating bands of crimson and ocher. A monotonous voice announces that the infrastructure has been damaged and critical supports are malfunctioning.
Good times.
Emotion suddenly flares into Shockwave's energy field, which batters at Jazz as though it holds tangible razorblades.
“What have you done?” the Decepticon scientist demands, hand whipping through the air in express shock.
“Nothing much.” Jazz pulls up a mental schematic of this not-so-secret-anymore laboratory, tracing all routes, anything that might get him the scrap out of here. “A bomb here. A crossed wire there. I say you've got three breems before this compound becomes a hole in the ground. Too bad, so sad.”
Fury bleeds from Shockwave's energy field before he can whip it back into shape. “You ignorant pile of scrap!”
The scientist doesn't bother with ceremony anymore. He lifts his arm, aims and fires, heat and pressure filling the narrow corridor.
Jazz scrambles to avoid the powerful blasts, laughing at the sight of Shockwave's infamous reserve vanishing in the wake of screeching alarms and a monotone countdown suggesting evacuation.
Primus, you touch a mech's questionable experiments and suddenly he goes off the deep end.
“I'd apologize but I'm not sorry,” Jazz says, using a small stack of supply crates for a temporary cover. “And I'd love to stay and chat but, you know, Autobots to see, Decepticons to scrap, labs to sabotage. Fun times.”
He senses heat, energy crackling through the air, and Jazz throws himself to the left, barely avoiding Shockwave's next round. It clips his fully-functional leg, scoring plating with the sharp stench of burnt metal and Jazz scrambles to his pedes, hissing as pain radiates everywhere.
“There is no escape, Autobot.”
A subroutine flashes brightly at him. Schematics zoom in and highlight for good measure. Escape route located.
“On the contrary, Shockey, I've just found my out.” Jazz whips his blaster toward the Decepticon and aims a series of rounds at Shockwave, more distractions than anything else, and throws his battered frame toward the trash chute he's found.
“By the way,” Jazz adds as Shockwave flails to avoid the blasterfire. “My designation's not Autobot. It's Jazz. Have a nice orn!”
With a cheerful wave, Jazz dives into the disposal chute, thanking Primus and anyone else that'll listen that he can fit, just as cannon fire erupts into the corridor behind him.
That Shockwave. He never could take a joke.
Universe: Bayverse
Characters: OptimusxSideswipe
Inspiration: “Your Guardian Angel,” Red Jumpsuit Apparatus
“You're not recharging again.”
Optimus cycles his optics, pulling himself from a fugue to acknowledge his subordinate. “Should you not be on patrol?”
“I traded with Jolt,” Sideswipe answers and in the following silence, closes the distance between them, rolling up to stand on Optimus' other side.
He says nothing else, at first, and Optimus savors the quiet. He returns his gaze to the starlit night, broken by a scatter of light clouds, but for the most part, dark and speckled. Here, out beyond human civilization, there is little to obscure the view. Optimus prefers it this way.
He wonders, many times, if he stares hard enough, focuses with all his power, he might catch a glimpse of Cybertron. The Cybertron that was, at any rate.
Light traveling as it does often gives the illusion of traveling back in time, reversing the chronometer. And tonight, like many other nights, Optimus would give anything for the power to return to the past. The future has become too difficult to bear.
“It's a pain incomparable to anything else,” Sideswipe says, his soft vocals spilling into the companionable quiet. “That hole in your spark... nothing helps.”
Optimus dips his helm, offlining his optics. Of course. Sideswipe would understand. He is, most likely, the only Autobot who will ever understand.
“After vorns at odds, it should be easier to bear,” Optimus admits, hands pulling into slow, trembling fists at his sides before he unfurls his fingers.
Sideswipe's energy field tentatively reaches out, offering... Optimus isn't sure what to call it. Commiseration? Comfort? Understanding?
“You can't hate half of your spark,” Sideswipe retorts with a heavy, bitter tone that Optimus knows all too well. “No matter how deep the betrayal.”
Optimus onlines his optics, looking down at his soldier. “You have changed, Sideswipe.”
The warrior's lipplates quirk into a wry grin. “Haven't we all?” he asks before the smile melts away into sobriety. “I can help, Prime. I understand.”
“Sunstreaker.”
Bright blue optics dim, a hand lifting to touch his chassis, gesturing to the spark behind his chestplates. “I felt it when he offlined though I don't know how or why. I probably never will.”
Optimus extends his own energy field without fully considering it. “Then allow me to offer comfort as well.”
A grated laugh escapes from Sideswipe's vocalizer, but he turns toward Optimus nonetheless. “Same old Prime. Unable to accept it for your own sake.”
One hand traces the near-invisible seam of Sideswipe's chestplates, which part a micron, causing a sliver of light to spill into the starlit night between them. “I won't ever feel whole again.”
Optimus folds himself down, a necessity considering their height difference, his energy field wrapping around Sideswipe with tangible weight. Offering. Inviting.
Sideswipe accepts, folding into Optimus' embrace, nuzzling his faceplate against Optimus' with a light crackle of static dancing between them.
“You can grieve with me, Optimus,” Sideswipe murmurs as Optimus triggers his own chestplates to part, windshields moving up and aside. “I won't ever tell.”
Shuttering his optics, Optimus wraps his arms around Sideswipe, holding the warrior to his chassis. He surrenders himself to the eager pull of a broken spark, as fractured and aching as his own. Their frames come together in shared grief that no other Autobot can fathom and there's a small comfort in that knowledge.
And for the first time since the battle in Mission City, since the ruin that was Chicago, Optimus keens for his loss. For the brother he offlined because he had no other choice.
Universe: G1
Characters: JazzxWheeljack, Ratchet
Inspiration: “Telling the World,” Taio Cruz
The moment Jazz steps into the rec room, music pouring from his speakers, Wheeljack knows he should have run when he first had the chance. What was he thinking? Hiding in plain sight? When has that ever helped!
He swings his gaze back toward Ratchet, indicators flashing a desperate plea for assistance.
“Oh, no,” Ratchet says, shaking with mirth. “You've made your berth. Best lie in it.”
“But--”
A hand clamps on Wheeljack's shoulder, spinning him around in his chair, coming optics to, well, bumper with the very mech he should have run from ten seconds ago.
“My love,” Jazz says, visor bright with mischief, music pulsing a happy, infectious beat. “Can I have this dance?”
Jazz's arms wave widely, open invitation, his pedes skipping a cheerful rhythm that matches the music. He grins and extends a hand to the mortified engineer, wriggling his fingers expectantly.
Wheeljack's grip on the seat of his chair might better be described as 'death-like.'
Seriously? Wheeljack has no rhythm. This is a well-established fact. He's a disaster on the dance floor, always has been. Just like singing. For the sake of all audials present, Wheeljack has been more or less banned from singing in public.
“Jazz--”
“Just one?” the saboteur interrupts, twitching his fingers again. His vocals shift into a purr few mechs have ever been able to resist, much less Wheeljack with his willpower made of swiss cheese. “Don't break my spark, darling.”
“Yeah, Jack! Go for it!” Someone in the crowd of amused onlookers encourages.
Wheeljack makes a note to put something unpleasant in that mech's energon. Just as soon as he identifies the perpetrator.
“C'mon!” Someone else adds.
“You can do it!” And that is definitely Bluestreak, adding on a cheerful giggle.
“Cut a rug!” Had to be Blaster.
“Yeah,” Ratchet drawls from behind Wheeljack and he just knows that the medic is smirking from audial to audial. “Break a leg.”
Wheeljack sighs, knowing he's been beaten, a sigh of good humor. “You're incorrigible,” he says as he takes Jazz's hand.
He yelps as the saboteur yanks him to his pedes and immediately spins him to the pulsing beat, Jazz's inherent grace making up for Wheeljack's clumsiness.
“It's all a part of my charm,” Jazz purrs, half of his visor dimming in a wink. “Now let me see ya groove, partner.”
a/n: Might see more of these little random ficlets pop up here and there. They're helpful for getting me out of a writing funk. :)