[IDW] Walking the Wire 05/11
Aug. 12th, 2018 07:34 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dracoqueen22Title: Walking the Wire 5/11
Universe: IDW MTMTE Season Two, Hot to Trot sequel, Between the Lines series
Characters: Ratchet/Megatron, Rodimus, Ultra Magnus, Rung, Ravage, Bluestreak, Perceptor
Rating: M
Enticements: Sticky Sex, BDSM themes, Bondage, Dom/Sub Themes, BDSM Education, Trust Issues, Angst, Vampires/Energy Eaters, mentions of torture, canon-typical violence, the LL always finds trouble
Description: What Megatron and Ratchet are to each other is a matter up for debate, one that gets a little tangled when the Lost Light stumbles into an unexpected complication.
Commission for Larry Draws
Chapter Five
“You seem to like Turpentine, so we’ll stick with that,” Ratchet said as he circled around Megatron, his pace slow and careful. Predatory.
He held the flog in one hand. The tip of it tapped lightly against the side of his leg. It made a barely audible sound, but he noticed Megatron’s hands clench and unclench to the slow rhythm.
Megatron was large, so Ratchet had him on his knees, a foam mat beneath for his comfort. He wasn’t here to punish Megatron. They were here to explore. He wanted Megatron as comfortable as possible, all else considered.
“Unless you want something else,” Ratchet added.
Megatron shook his head. He was staring at the floor, not meeting Ratchet’s gaze, but his glossa ran over his lips.
“Turpentine will do,” he said. His vents briefly rattled.
“And you will use it,” Ratchet said. He stood behind Megatron, and the tip of the flog touched Megatron’s aft. Not a strike, just a caress.
Nevertheless, a shudder ran across Megatron’s armor in a wave of shiny, gray metal. His engine rumbled, not with distress at least.
“I will use it,” Megatron said. His hands curled again.
His wrists were bound. They lay in his lap, fingers tangled together. Ratchet finally found a use for the magnacuffs. A small chain connected the cuffs to a metal loop Ratchet had welded into the floor. It wasn’t strong enough to restrain an actual prisoner. It would only stop Megatron from swinging at Ratchet in a blind panic. The tug was a reminder.
“I believe you.” Ratchet paced around Megatron again, tapping the flog against his side. His field slipped out, tasting Megatron’s.
There was anticipation there. A hot, thready line of arousal beneath. A wisp of anxiety, too. That came as no surprise. Trying a new kink for the first time always came with a special brand of disquiet.
“I am going to ask you a question, and you will answer honestly,” Ratchet said. He reached out with the flog, gliding the tip of it gently along Megatron’s armor, letting him feel sensation, like a tickle.
Megatron shivered. “Yes.”
Not even a fight, an argument, a sarcastic retort. Just agreement.
Primus, he was good at this.
Ratchet moved behind Megatron, stroking the tip of the flog up and down Megatron’s spinal strut, a light touch was sure to excite each and every node on his sensory net. Priming him, so to speak, for the harsher strikes to come.
“I will strike your back,” Ratchet said, keeping his tone to a careful cadence, one Megatron seemed to track. “I will strike your aft. Your thighs. Is there any part you wish for me to avoid?”
Megatron ventilated, the sound of it off-rhythm and shuddering. “No.”
“You’re sure?” Ratchet lightly dragged the tip of the flog over Megatron’s back, down his spinal strut, to his hips and then over his aft. “If you change your mind, you know what to say.”
“Turpentine,” Megatron breathed, and his armor flexed, seams lengthening, giving Ratchet peeks at the cables beneath, and the charge crawling through them. Heat puffed off Megatron in growing waves.
“That’s right.”
Ratchet rested the flog against Megatron’s aft, the flat of it measured against an armor plate.
“Hold still.”
A low sound rose out of Megatron’s intake. Not quite a whimper, nor a moan, it still fed arousal into Ratchet’s systems. Made him lick his lips as heat flushed his lines.
He tightened his grip on the flog, making the supple, organic material whisper a creak. And then he flicked his hand back and struck.
Schwip!
The flog snapped against Megatron’s armor, sharp and quick, the blow meant more to startle than hurt. Megatron jerked, but otherwise made no noise.
Ratchet patiently waited, dragging the tip of the flog up and down Megatron’s back. Part of the play was in the anticipation, in letting the sub imagine when the next blow would come.
The warm up was the easiest. Ratchet fell into a rhythm, a pattern, light strikes up and down Megatron’s back and aft and thighs. He knew they didn’t hurt. He’d measured his strength on purpose. It was all meant to sensitize.
Megatron started moving in place, rocking on his knees, arching into each blow. His ventilations quickened. His field stuttered and sang, reaching out for Ratchet. Otherwise, he didn’t make a sound.
At least, not until Ratchet’s next strike crossed over three others, firmer than before. A noise squeaked out of Megatron’s intake. He sucked air through his denta.
Ratchet paused, listening, waiting for a request to wait, to stop, for the one word that would have him throw the flog aside.
“Don’t,” Megatron said, ventilations haggard, his shoulders drifting down, armor seams gaping even further. “Don’t stop.”
Ratchet teased Megatron with his field, dragging swirls of it along Megatron’s armor, leaving heat in its wake. “Be still,” he repeated.
He struck again.
And again.
Crisscrossing his earlier marks. Harder strikes over areas of armor he had yet to touch. Lighter taps against those bared cables, enough to make Megatron jerk and audibly moan, for the chains to rattle, for him to surge back toward Ratchet in silent request. There was a click and the scent of lubricant filled the air.
Ratchet need only look, to see Megatron’s valve had bared itself. But not, curiously, his spike. He imagined Megatron was swollen, folds dripping, nodes blinking to the same tune as his biolights, desperate for a touch.
He swung, the flog snapping against Megatron’s aft, square in the center of three other marks, and Megatron’s backstrut arched. He groaned, long and low, charge crawling over his armor. His field burst with hunger, with pain and pleasure mixed, and the air throbbed with it.
Ratchet swallowed thickly, his ventilations quickening. “More?” he asked as he lightly tapped the flog over every bared seam, little flicks that barely qualified as pain.
He heard nothing but the rasp of Megatron’s ventilations. The creak of his armor.
“Megatron?”
Worry crept in. He hadn’t got a response, and Megatron had hunched inward, dragging in gasping breaths from his mouth. His field still rang, hot and heavy with need, and lubricant pooled beneath his aft.
Ratchet leaned closer. “Megatron?” he repeated, a bit more firmly this time, and then he rested his free hand between Megatron’s shoulders, and against the base of Megatron’s neck.
He meant to calm, to ground Megatron with the gentle touch. He was unprepared for the way Megatron abruptly snapped upright, his wrists tugging harsh on the chain and snapping it free of the loop in an instant. His optics went coal-fire crimson, and a sound, a guttural, terrifying sound yanked out of his intake.
Ratchet hurriedly danced back, fearing a wild swing. Megatron’s field lashed out, but he did not. Terror and panic sliced razor-sharp through the air. Megatron tucked his wrists against his abdomen; he sucked air through his denta. He panted as though he’d been sent through a wringer, and then he spoke, and Ratchet almost couldn’t believe his audials.
“Turpentine,” he whispered, with the air of someone who’d been defeated.
Ratchet’s spark ached at the sight. He tossed the flog away, pointedly making it clatter as it struck the cabinet door. He wanted Megatron to audibly understand Ratchet had set it aside before he perceived it as a weapon.
“It’s okay,” Ratchet said, careful to keep his voice low. He crept around until he stood in front of Megatron, keeping his hands in view. “The flog is gone.”
Megatron drew in a deep, heavy breath. His armor clamped so tightly, Ratchet feared he’d overheat. “It was not… the flog,” he admitted, and his optics shuttered, his face turning away from Ratchet as if ashamed.
“All right.” Ratchet slipped to his knees, inching closer. “Do you want me to take off the cuffs?”
“It wasn’t them either.” But Megatron offered his wrists, and Ratchet removed the cuffs, tossing them far away as well.
Ratchet rested his hands over Megatron’s, pulling them close so he could examine Megatron’s wrists for damage. There was some minor scratching to his paint, but nothing that wouldn’t be gone soon.
“My neck,” Megatron said after a moment, and his shoulders hunched further. It had the effect of making him seem smaller, fragile. “You asked me if I had any hard stops, and I must insist from now on, that you don’t touch my neck.”
“Done.”
Megatron looked up at him, and suddenly, he looked centuries younger. There was surprise in his face, and vulnerability, too. “That easily?”
“Of course.” Ratchet inched closer, until their knees touched. He was too old to be on the floor like this, but the taste of that terror in Megatron’s field still had his own spark pounding in his chassis. “Trust and respect, remember?”
Megatron stared at him, seeing without seeing. A shiver started up in his armor, barely loosening the plates from their tight clamp.
“You don’t even have to tell me why. That’s not important. Unless you want to talk about it, I mean.” Though Ratchet had his suspicions, given what Chromedome had told him about Megatron’s reaction when Optimus offered his services. “I respect your boundary. You trust that I’ll keep it.”
“I see.” Megatron’s lips curved downward, not quite a frown, more an expression of someone who found a concept difficult to understand.
Ratchet stroked Megatron’s wrists. “Just your neck?” he prompted. “Was there anything else I should avoid in the future?”
Megatron shook his head. “I… enjoyed the pain,” he admitted and his gaze slunk away, shame bleeding into the edges of a field already choppy with other emotions. “Until that point, to clarify.”
“Are you sure? There was a moment you were unresponsive.” Ratchet squeezed Megatron’s wrists and tucked his hands back against his lap. He rose, keeping his movements slow and careful. “I’m just going to check the marks on your back.”
“It was intense. Surprisingly so,” Megatron said. “I was unprepared for the conflict in my dermal net, where I recognized I was receiving pain, but it kept turning into liquid splashes of pleasure through my sensory lines.”
The honesty was refreshing, Ratchet had to admit. He continued to telegraph his movements as he moved behind Megatron, examining the welts and marks in Megatron’s armor. Nothing had cut deeply. There were a few inflamed areas, but a night of recharge should soothe those over.
It was a textbook flogging. Ratchet hadn’t lost his touch.
“I would not be averse to experiencing it again,” Megatron added. “Only without the panic.”
“I will not touch your neck like that again,” Ratchet promised. He rested his hands gently on Megaron’s shoulders, closer to his arms than his clavicle. “Come on. Let’s get you up and into the berth.”
Confusion fluttered in Megatron’s field. “We’re done? But I thought--”
“Sometimes, partners can continue after a safe word has been spoken. It depends on the circumstances. I don’t think it’s a good idea right now,” Ratchet said. “You might disagree, but you’re not the only one who gets to say ‘no’.”
Megatron shook his head and slowly, like he had to remember how to work his limbs, climbed to his feet. He wavered unsteadily, and Ratchet gripped his elbow to keep him upright.
“I don’t disagree.”
“Good.” Ratchet carefully pulled Megatron to the berth and helped him climb on top of it.
Megatron’s limbs didn’t seem to want to obey him, which wasn’t uncommon when a session like that was disrupted in such a way. No doubt Megatron’s synapses were still operating in a state of confusion. He flopped onto the berth, onto his belly – protecting his spark, Ratchet noticed. He took an obnoxious amount of space as he usually did.
Ratchet shifted away, intending to grab a few things, but Megatron’s hand snapped out, fingers coiling around his wrist. “Where are you going?” he asked, and he might have meant it as a demand, but it came out plaintive instead.
Ratchet cursed himself. He should have known better.
“Nowhere.” He modulated his vocals to be soothing.
The mess could keep. He’d tidy in the morning. The lights could be dimmed remotely, and it wouldn’t hurt the flog or cuffs to sit on the ground. If anyone barged in and got an opticful, they deserved it.
Ratchet climbed onto the berth, though he was far too keyed up to recharge now, and quickly found himself with a blanket of former warlord. Megatron tucked himself up against Ratchet’s side, pillowing his head on Ratchet’s chassis, slinging a leg over Ratchet’s. Trapping him in place.
Ratchet froze. This was… well, this was quite intimate. Normally, when they ended up sharing a berth, it was in whatever exhausted position they flopped into after a night of endless fragging. Or they lay back to back as though they were two soldiers guarding one another in a foxhole.
“I have shift in the morning,” Megatron murmured against his chassis, ex-vents leaving a brief fog over Ratchet’s windshield.
“I’ll wake you,” Ratchet promised. His free arm – the other was trapped beneath Megatron’s bulk – curved over Megatron’s chassis. He stroked gray plating, and felt Megatron relax beneath his touch.
His field clung to Ratchet’s like a limpet’s, however, and seemed determined to match him, pulse for pulse, as if Megatron found solid ground in Ratchet. Megatron vented out, his hand hooked on Ratchet’s side.
Ratchet kept petting him, his thoughts a whirl. That had not gone as he’d expected. He’d assumed Megatron would treat tonight’s session like he had all the others – with a certain measure of condescension. Instead, he’d fully surrendered to it, and then, used his safe word.
That was probably what had surprised Ratchet the most.
Now he had a vulnerable murderous warlord cuddling him for comfort, and Ratchet’s spark was doing queer things in his chassis. Things like affection which had no place here in a relationship that wasn’t.
Megatron trusted him to abide by the safe word. Megatron trusted he wouldn’t overstep this important boundary in the future.
Megatron trusted him.
Guilt clawed out of the pit of Ratchet’s tank and settled in his spark, pulsing ice through his lines. It took effort to keep it out of his field so Megatron wouldn’t detect it.
He’d lectured Megatron over and over about the importance of trust, and here he was, lying to Megatron. A lie by omission perhaps, but still a lie. He let Megatron believe the fool’s energon kept him weak and pliant. He fed the foul mixture to Megatron every day. He lied, over and over, and he’d have to continue to lie.
Optimus’ orders were absolute, no matter how Ratchet disagreed with them. Optimus was right. Megatron was a threat. Megatron was dangerous. But perhaps he was sincere about changing. This was his opportunity to do so.
How would he react to know the fool’s energon was a farce?
How could Ratchet be such a hypocrite?
But he couldn’t tell Megatron the truth. Not without both defying Optimus and potentially putting the crew’s life in jeopardy.
He couldn’t keep lying either. Not to someone who shared his berth. Especially not to someone he was now engaging in domination and submission play with. It was a matter of trust. Megatron trusted him, and Ratchet betrayed that trust every time he handed over a cube of Fool’s Energon.
More than that, how could he in good conscience, continue a relationship with a mech he was required to lie to? How could he be with someone he didn’t trust in turn? Ratchet wanted to believe in Megatron, but the rational side of him was certain Megatron’s motivations were suspect, and his presence on the Lost Light was all part of some larger plan.
It was a moral quandary of the worst sort.
It meant Ratchet had to make a decision. He wasn’t sure where to even start. He needed an outside opinion. Someone else’s advice.
There was only one person on the ship he trusted to be discreet.
It would have to be Rung.
~
Megatron was gone when Ratchet awoke in the morning. He wasn’t sure which was more surprising, that Megatron had crept out or Ratchet hadn’t even noticed. Then again, he’d said he had a morning shift, so perhaps it wasn’t embarrassment or shame that had him pulling a disappearing act.
Ratchet leveraged himself out of the berth feeling the years and the mileage on his creaking frame. He downed both coolant and energon in equal measures. He had to be on shift soon, too, but he had enough time to visit Rung, if Rung had time for him anyway.
He did.
“Ratchet, what a pleasant surprise,” Rung said as he gestured for Ratchet to come inside.
Coming to visit Rung was always like coming home. Rung’s field was full of warm acceptance, and it greeted Ratchet’s with a bump of affection. There was nothing angry about Rung, nothing difficult. He was uncomplicated, and he was one of Ratchet’s oldest friends, especially to have survived the war.
“Though I take it this isn’t a social call?”
Ratchet grunted. “No, but I really should do that more often.” He slung his arm over Rung’s shoulders and tugged the small therapist into a side-embrace. “Though from what I hear, you don’t want for visitors.”
Rung’s field blushed like a coy untouched, but Ratchet knew good and well there was fire and steel beneath it. “I have my fair share,” he said as he returned the embrace. “Though I hear rumor you do as well.”
“I should have known I couldn’t keep a secret from you.” Ratchet dropped down into the patient couch, his backstrut aching. He sprawled his arms across the back of it, tipping his head to look at the ceiling. “I need advice.”
“So I gathered.” Rung sat behind his desk and placed his elbows on top, lacing his fingers together. “Of a personal sort then. You’ve taken a rather controversial lover, I hear.”
Ratchet snorted. “Controversial,” he repeated. “That’s a delicate way of putting it.” He shuttered his optics and cycled a loud, full vent. “I am in over my head, Rung.”
“It happens to the best of us. What can I do for you, Ratchet?” Rung, at least, didn’t seem to judge Ratchet for his poor decision-making when it came to interface partners.
He should have just taken Bluestreak up on the offer the sniper made when he first came onto the ship. But like didn’t necessarily call to like, and Ratchet knew he and Blue would end up where they’d always been – grating against each other, one dom to another. He adored Bluestreak, he truly did. But it wasn’t a relationship that could last longer than an intermittent night or two.
“I need you to tell me the truth.” Ratchet palmed his face. “The truth I don’t want to hear.”
“All right.” He heard Rung cycle a long ventilation, felt the gentle wave of his field. “If you want to continue as you are, you have to tell Megatron the truth.”
Damn it.
“I can’t do that!” Ratchet snapped and jerked upright, directing a glare at one of his oldest friends. “I have orders.”
“We’re no longer at war, Ratchet. Your orders are whatever you accept them to be.” Rung’s voice was quiet, but there was chastisement in it. He leaned back, removing his glasses to clean them. It was an action that appeared nonchalant, but Ratchet knew better.
“But that’s not what has you drowning in guilt, is it?”
Ratchet chewed on the inside of his cheek. “Controversial,” he said, and it was with a ragged ventilation. “The moment I realize something deeper is growing, I realize exactly who I’ve invited into my berth.”
“And you think it’s a betrayal.”
“How can it not be?” Ratchet rocketed to his feet and started to pace, his spark whirling and churning in his chamber. “This would be the time most people say ‘I’ve lost count of how many mechs died’ but I haven’t! I can tell you their names, all the Autobots who died in my medbay because of Megatron’s war. How am I not betraying their memory?”
“That is the question, isn’t it?” Rung’s tone was mild. “Do you feel Megatron is insincere?”
It was the very same question he had asked himself before.
Ratchet rubbed at his forehead with two fingers. “I don’t know.”
“Then ask yourself this: if he were sincere, would it still feel like a betrayal?”
Ratchet skidded to a halt, his heels clicking together. “No,” he admitted, and vented a sigh. “And yes.”
Wanting to change now didn’t excuse his behavior in the past. Working to create a better future was a good start, so long as he was sincere. If Megatron was sincere, then yes, some of the guilt would ease. Ratchet would find it a lot easier to forgive himself. Maybe he wouldn’t dream about the dead haunting him.
He could point out, ‘look, wars aren’t won by victory, but by forgiveness after defeat’. It was all well and good to say the Decepticons were defeated, but if nothing changed, they’d eventually end up back where they were. And Ratchet was tired.
None of that mattered, however, because Ratchet couldn’t be certain of Megatron’s motivations. He could ask, but he couldn’t trust the answer he’d get. He wanted to. Oh, it would be so much simpler if he could take everything Megatron said and did at face value.
He had centuries of war behind him as proof that with Megatron, nothing was ever as it seemed.
“Do you think his feelings for you are sincere?” Rung asked, the soft query somehow feeling like a punch to the abdomen, for all the reality it delivered.
Ratchet hadn’t even considered that. He’d been so consumed by whether or not Megatron was going to betray the Autobots and the Lost Light, he’d not spared a thought as to whether or not Megatron would betray him.
Realization poured over him like a spray of liquid nitrogen. He’d never considered that a concern. In the long run, Ratchet was worthless to any plan Megatron might have. He’d never betray Optimus, he wasn’t a bargaining chip, and he wouldn’t join the Decepticons for any reason. There was no logical ground for Megatron to begin a relationship with Ratchet save for the obvious one.
He wanted to.
And Ratchet, frag himself to the Pit and back, wanted Megatron, too. He even trusted the former warlord and mass murderer’s feelings for him. He believed Megatron was sincere about that much.
It floored him.
It made him sway, dizzily, and Ratchet had to catch himself.
“Ratchet?” Rung sounded worried. There was a hiss of ancient hydraulics as he rose, perhaps intending to circle around the desk.
“It never occurred to me to think otherwise,” Ratchet said, barely above a whisper. He looked up at one of his oldest, dearest friends. “He’s with me because he wants to be. And I’m with him...”
“Because you want to be,” Rung finished for him, the smallest of smiles on his lips. Tension eased out of his frame, the concern in his field stroking gently over Ratchet’s, soothing him.
Ratchet dragged a hand down his face. “That… it’s just… it only makes the decision harder.”
“Does it?”
Ratchet’s shoulders sagged. He dropped his hands. “No.” He slumped back into the couch, head tipping back.
Rung circled around the desk and sat next to him, resting a hand on his thigh. “You already know what you need to do.”
Sadly, he did.
Ratchet curled an arm over Rung’s shoulders, tucking the therapist against him. “Why couldn’t I have fallen for you?” he sighed, a purely rhetorical question, of course.
Rung chuckled and patted him on the thigh. “Because I’m not the kind of challenge you need.”
“Would be easier if you were,” he muttered, and let himself soak in Rung’s stabilizing field. A thought occurred to him. “Though you know, Bluestreak--”
“Hush you little matchmaking busybody. I’m perfectly capable of finding a berthmate on my own.” Rung sounded amused at least. “Besides, he was my patient for far too long.”
“Just saying.” Ratchet grinned and shuttered his optics, drawing on Rung’s field to give him the courage he needed, to do what he had to do.
It was why he’d come here. He trusted Rung to give him the honest answers, even if he didn’t want to hear them.
It was a hard choice, but Ratchet had long been familiar with hard choices.
This part or that part. This injury or that injury. Save the flickering spark, or fix the broken leg so the mech could rejoin the battle. Both of them dying, in the end, because it was war – brutal and bloody and unforgiving.
Ratchet sighed and hid behind his palm.
Curse his conscience.
****
Universe: IDW MTMTE Season Two, Hot to Trot sequel, Between the Lines series
Characters: Ratchet/Megatron, Rodimus, Ultra Magnus, Rung, Ravage, Bluestreak, Perceptor
Rating: M
Enticements: Sticky Sex, BDSM themes, Bondage, Dom/Sub Themes, BDSM Education, Trust Issues, Angst, Vampires/Energy Eaters, mentions of torture, canon-typical violence, the LL always finds trouble
Description: What Megatron and Ratchet are to each other is a matter up for debate, one that gets a little tangled when the Lost Light stumbles into an unexpected complication.
Commission for Larry Draws
“You seem to like Turpentine, so we’ll stick with that,” Ratchet said as he circled around Megatron, his pace slow and careful. Predatory.
He held the flog in one hand. The tip of it tapped lightly against the side of his leg. It made a barely audible sound, but he noticed Megatron’s hands clench and unclench to the slow rhythm.
Megatron was large, so Ratchet had him on his knees, a foam mat beneath for his comfort. He wasn’t here to punish Megatron. They were here to explore. He wanted Megatron as comfortable as possible, all else considered.
“Unless you want something else,” Ratchet added.
Megatron shook his head. He was staring at the floor, not meeting Ratchet’s gaze, but his glossa ran over his lips.
“Turpentine will do,” he said. His vents briefly rattled.
“And you will use it,” Ratchet said. He stood behind Megatron, and the tip of the flog touched Megatron’s aft. Not a strike, just a caress.
Nevertheless, a shudder ran across Megatron’s armor in a wave of shiny, gray metal. His engine rumbled, not with distress at least.
“I will use it,” Megatron said. His hands curled again.
His wrists were bound. They lay in his lap, fingers tangled together. Ratchet finally found a use for the magnacuffs. A small chain connected the cuffs to a metal loop Ratchet had welded into the floor. It wasn’t strong enough to restrain an actual prisoner. It would only stop Megatron from swinging at Ratchet in a blind panic. The tug was a reminder.
“I believe you.” Ratchet paced around Megatron again, tapping the flog against his side. His field slipped out, tasting Megatron’s.
There was anticipation there. A hot, thready line of arousal beneath. A wisp of anxiety, too. That came as no surprise. Trying a new kink for the first time always came with a special brand of disquiet.
“I am going to ask you a question, and you will answer honestly,” Ratchet said. He reached out with the flog, gliding the tip of it gently along Megatron’s armor, letting him feel sensation, like a tickle.
Megatron shivered. “Yes.”
Not even a fight, an argument, a sarcastic retort. Just agreement.
Primus, he was good at this.
Ratchet moved behind Megatron, stroking the tip of the flog up and down Megatron’s spinal strut, a light touch was sure to excite each and every node on his sensory net. Priming him, so to speak, for the harsher strikes to come.
“I will strike your back,” Ratchet said, keeping his tone to a careful cadence, one Megatron seemed to track. “I will strike your aft. Your thighs. Is there any part you wish for me to avoid?”
Megatron ventilated, the sound of it off-rhythm and shuddering. “No.”
“You’re sure?” Ratchet lightly dragged the tip of the flog over Megatron’s back, down his spinal strut, to his hips and then over his aft. “If you change your mind, you know what to say.”
“Turpentine,” Megatron breathed, and his armor flexed, seams lengthening, giving Ratchet peeks at the cables beneath, and the charge crawling through them. Heat puffed off Megatron in growing waves.
“That’s right.”
Ratchet rested the flog against Megatron’s aft, the flat of it measured against an armor plate.
“Hold still.”
A low sound rose out of Megatron’s intake. Not quite a whimper, nor a moan, it still fed arousal into Ratchet’s systems. Made him lick his lips as heat flushed his lines.
He tightened his grip on the flog, making the supple, organic material whisper a creak. And then he flicked his hand back and struck.
Schwip!
The flog snapped against Megatron’s armor, sharp and quick, the blow meant more to startle than hurt. Megatron jerked, but otherwise made no noise.
Ratchet patiently waited, dragging the tip of the flog up and down Megatron’s back. Part of the play was in the anticipation, in letting the sub imagine when the next blow would come.
The warm up was the easiest. Ratchet fell into a rhythm, a pattern, light strikes up and down Megatron’s back and aft and thighs. He knew they didn’t hurt. He’d measured his strength on purpose. It was all meant to sensitize.
Megatron started moving in place, rocking on his knees, arching into each blow. His ventilations quickened. His field stuttered and sang, reaching out for Ratchet. Otherwise, he didn’t make a sound.
At least, not until Ratchet’s next strike crossed over three others, firmer than before. A noise squeaked out of Megatron’s intake. He sucked air through his denta.
Ratchet paused, listening, waiting for a request to wait, to stop, for the one word that would have him throw the flog aside.
“Don’t,” Megatron said, ventilations haggard, his shoulders drifting down, armor seams gaping even further. “Don’t stop.”
Ratchet teased Megatron with his field, dragging swirls of it along Megatron’s armor, leaving heat in its wake. “Be still,” he repeated.
He struck again.
And again.
Crisscrossing his earlier marks. Harder strikes over areas of armor he had yet to touch. Lighter taps against those bared cables, enough to make Megatron jerk and audibly moan, for the chains to rattle, for him to surge back toward Ratchet in silent request. There was a click and the scent of lubricant filled the air.
Ratchet need only look, to see Megatron’s valve had bared itself. But not, curiously, his spike. He imagined Megatron was swollen, folds dripping, nodes blinking to the same tune as his biolights, desperate for a touch.
He swung, the flog snapping against Megatron’s aft, square in the center of three other marks, and Megatron’s backstrut arched. He groaned, long and low, charge crawling over his armor. His field burst with hunger, with pain and pleasure mixed, and the air throbbed with it.
Ratchet swallowed thickly, his ventilations quickening. “More?” he asked as he lightly tapped the flog over every bared seam, little flicks that barely qualified as pain.
He heard nothing but the rasp of Megatron’s ventilations. The creak of his armor.
“Megatron?”
Worry crept in. He hadn’t got a response, and Megatron had hunched inward, dragging in gasping breaths from his mouth. His field still rang, hot and heavy with need, and lubricant pooled beneath his aft.
Ratchet leaned closer. “Megatron?” he repeated, a bit more firmly this time, and then he rested his free hand between Megatron’s shoulders, and against the base of Megatron’s neck.
He meant to calm, to ground Megatron with the gentle touch. He was unprepared for the way Megatron abruptly snapped upright, his wrists tugging harsh on the chain and snapping it free of the loop in an instant. His optics went coal-fire crimson, and a sound, a guttural, terrifying sound yanked out of his intake.
Ratchet hurriedly danced back, fearing a wild swing. Megatron’s field lashed out, but he did not. Terror and panic sliced razor-sharp through the air. Megatron tucked his wrists against his abdomen; he sucked air through his denta. He panted as though he’d been sent through a wringer, and then he spoke, and Ratchet almost couldn’t believe his audials.
“Turpentine,” he whispered, with the air of someone who’d been defeated.
Ratchet’s spark ached at the sight. He tossed the flog away, pointedly making it clatter as it struck the cabinet door. He wanted Megatron to audibly understand Ratchet had set it aside before he perceived it as a weapon.
“It’s okay,” Ratchet said, careful to keep his voice low. He crept around until he stood in front of Megatron, keeping his hands in view. “The flog is gone.”
Megatron drew in a deep, heavy breath. His armor clamped so tightly, Ratchet feared he’d overheat. “It was not… the flog,” he admitted, and his optics shuttered, his face turning away from Ratchet as if ashamed.
“All right.” Ratchet slipped to his knees, inching closer. “Do you want me to take off the cuffs?”
“It wasn’t them either.” But Megatron offered his wrists, and Ratchet removed the cuffs, tossing them far away as well.
Ratchet rested his hands over Megatron’s, pulling them close so he could examine Megatron’s wrists for damage. There was some minor scratching to his paint, but nothing that wouldn’t be gone soon.
“My neck,” Megatron said after a moment, and his shoulders hunched further. It had the effect of making him seem smaller, fragile. “You asked me if I had any hard stops, and I must insist from now on, that you don’t touch my neck.”
“Done.”
Megatron looked up at him, and suddenly, he looked centuries younger. There was surprise in his face, and vulnerability, too. “That easily?”
“Of course.” Ratchet inched closer, until their knees touched. He was too old to be on the floor like this, but the taste of that terror in Megatron’s field still had his own spark pounding in his chassis. “Trust and respect, remember?”
Megatron stared at him, seeing without seeing. A shiver started up in his armor, barely loosening the plates from their tight clamp.
“You don’t even have to tell me why. That’s not important. Unless you want to talk about it, I mean.” Though Ratchet had his suspicions, given what Chromedome had told him about Megatron’s reaction when Optimus offered his services. “I respect your boundary. You trust that I’ll keep it.”
“I see.” Megatron’s lips curved downward, not quite a frown, more an expression of someone who found a concept difficult to understand.
Ratchet stroked Megatron’s wrists. “Just your neck?” he prompted. “Was there anything else I should avoid in the future?”
Megatron shook his head. “I… enjoyed the pain,” he admitted and his gaze slunk away, shame bleeding into the edges of a field already choppy with other emotions. “Until that point, to clarify.”
“Are you sure? There was a moment you were unresponsive.” Ratchet squeezed Megatron’s wrists and tucked his hands back against his lap. He rose, keeping his movements slow and careful. “I’m just going to check the marks on your back.”
“It was intense. Surprisingly so,” Megatron said. “I was unprepared for the conflict in my dermal net, where I recognized I was receiving pain, but it kept turning into liquid splashes of pleasure through my sensory lines.”
The honesty was refreshing, Ratchet had to admit. He continued to telegraph his movements as he moved behind Megatron, examining the welts and marks in Megatron’s armor. Nothing had cut deeply. There were a few inflamed areas, but a night of recharge should soothe those over.
It was a textbook flogging. Ratchet hadn’t lost his touch.
“I would not be averse to experiencing it again,” Megatron added. “Only without the panic.”
“I will not touch your neck like that again,” Ratchet promised. He rested his hands gently on Megaron’s shoulders, closer to his arms than his clavicle. “Come on. Let’s get you up and into the berth.”
Confusion fluttered in Megatron’s field. “We’re done? But I thought--”
“Sometimes, partners can continue after a safe word has been spoken. It depends on the circumstances. I don’t think it’s a good idea right now,” Ratchet said. “You might disagree, but you’re not the only one who gets to say ‘no’.”
Megatron shook his head and slowly, like he had to remember how to work his limbs, climbed to his feet. He wavered unsteadily, and Ratchet gripped his elbow to keep him upright.
“I don’t disagree.”
“Good.” Ratchet carefully pulled Megatron to the berth and helped him climb on top of it.
Megatron’s limbs didn’t seem to want to obey him, which wasn’t uncommon when a session like that was disrupted in such a way. No doubt Megatron’s synapses were still operating in a state of confusion. He flopped onto the berth, onto his belly – protecting his spark, Ratchet noticed. He took an obnoxious amount of space as he usually did.
Ratchet shifted away, intending to grab a few things, but Megatron’s hand snapped out, fingers coiling around his wrist. “Where are you going?” he asked, and he might have meant it as a demand, but it came out plaintive instead.
Ratchet cursed himself. He should have known better.
“Nowhere.” He modulated his vocals to be soothing.
The mess could keep. He’d tidy in the morning. The lights could be dimmed remotely, and it wouldn’t hurt the flog or cuffs to sit on the ground. If anyone barged in and got an opticful, they deserved it.
Ratchet climbed onto the berth, though he was far too keyed up to recharge now, and quickly found himself with a blanket of former warlord. Megatron tucked himself up against Ratchet’s side, pillowing his head on Ratchet’s chassis, slinging a leg over Ratchet’s. Trapping him in place.
Ratchet froze. This was… well, this was quite intimate. Normally, when they ended up sharing a berth, it was in whatever exhausted position they flopped into after a night of endless fragging. Or they lay back to back as though they were two soldiers guarding one another in a foxhole.
“I have shift in the morning,” Megatron murmured against his chassis, ex-vents leaving a brief fog over Ratchet’s windshield.
“I’ll wake you,” Ratchet promised. His free arm – the other was trapped beneath Megatron’s bulk – curved over Megatron’s chassis. He stroked gray plating, and felt Megatron relax beneath his touch.
His field clung to Ratchet’s like a limpet’s, however, and seemed determined to match him, pulse for pulse, as if Megatron found solid ground in Ratchet. Megatron vented out, his hand hooked on Ratchet’s side.
Ratchet kept petting him, his thoughts a whirl. That had not gone as he’d expected. He’d assumed Megatron would treat tonight’s session like he had all the others – with a certain measure of condescension. Instead, he’d fully surrendered to it, and then, used his safe word.
That was probably what had surprised Ratchet the most.
Now he had a vulnerable murderous warlord cuddling him for comfort, and Ratchet’s spark was doing queer things in his chassis. Things like affection which had no place here in a relationship that wasn’t.
Megatron trusted him to abide by the safe word. Megatron trusted he wouldn’t overstep this important boundary in the future.
Megatron trusted him.
Guilt clawed out of the pit of Ratchet’s tank and settled in his spark, pulsing ice through his lines. It took effort to keep it out of his field so Megatron wouldn’t detect it.
He’d lectured Megatron over and over about the importance of trust, and here he was, lying to Megatron. A lie by omission perhaps, but still a lie. He let Megatron believe the fool’s energon kept him weak and pliant. He fed the foul mixture to Megatron every day. He lied, over and over, and he’d have to continue to lie.
Optimus’ orders were absolute, no matter how Ratchet disagreed with them. Optimus was right. Megatron was a threat. Megatron was dangerous. But perhaps he was sincere about changing. This was his opportunity to do so.
How would he react to know the fool’s energon was a farce?
How could Ratchet be such a hypocrite?
But he couldn’t tell Megatron the truth. Not without both defying Optimus and potentially putting the crew’s life in jeopardy.
He couldn’t keep lying either. Not to someone who shared his berth. Especially not to someone he was now engaging in domination and submission play with. It was a matter of trust. Megatron trusted him, and Ratchet betrayed that trust every time he handed over a cube of Fool’s Energon.
More than that, how could he in good conscience, continue a relationship with a mech he was required to lie to? How could he be with someone he didn’t trust in turn? Ratchet wanted to believe in Megatron, but the rational side of him was certain Megatron’s motivations were suspect, and his presence on the Lost Light was all part of some larger plan.
It was a moral quandary of the worst sort.
It meant Ratchet had to make a decision. He wasn’t sure where to even start. He needed an outside opinion. Someone else’s advice.
There was only one person on the ship he trusted to be discreet.
It would have to be Rung.
Megatron was gone when Ratchet awoke in the morning. He wasn’t sure which was more surprising, that Megatron had crept out or Ratchet hadn’t even noticed. Then again, he’d said he had a morning shift, so perhaps it wasn’t embarrassment or shame that had him pulling a disappearing act.
Ratchet leveraged himself out of the berth feeling the years and the mileage on his creaking frame. He downed both coolant and energon in equal measures. He had to be on shift soon, too, but he had enough time to visit Rung, if Rung had time for him anyway.
He did.
“Ratchet, what a pleasant surprise,” Rung said as he gestured for Ratchet to come inside.
Coming to visit Rung was always like coming home. Rung’s field was full of warm acceptance, and it greeted Ratchet’s with a bump of affection. There was nothing angry about Rung, nothing difficult. He was uncomplicated, and he was one of Ratchet’s oldest friends, especially to have survived the war.
“Though I take it this isn’t a social call?”
Ratchet grunted. “No, but I really should do that more often.” He slung his arm over Rung’s shoulders and tugged the small therapist into a side-embrace. “Though from what I hear, you don’t want for visitors.”
Rung’s field blushed like a coy untouched, but Ratchet knew good and well there was fire and steel beneath it. “I have my fair share,” he said as he returned the embrace. “Though I hear rumor you do as well.”
“I should have known I couldn’t keep a secret from you.” Ratchet dropped down into the patient couch, his backstrut aching. He sprawled his arms across the back of it, tipping his head to look at the ceiling. “I need advice.”
“So I gathered.” Rung sat behind his desk and placed his elbows on top, lacing his fingers together. “Of a personal sort then. You’ve taken a rather controversial lover, I hear.”
Ratchet snorted. “Controversial,” he repeated. “That’s a delicate way of putting it.” He shuttered his optics and cycled a loud, full vent. “I am in over my head, Rung.”
“It happens to the best of us. What can I do for you, Ratchet?” Rung, at least, didn’t seem to judge Ratchet for his poor decision-making when it came to interface partners.
He should have just taken Bluestreak up on the offer the sniper made when he first came onto the ship. But like didn’t necessarily call to like, and Ratchet knew he and Blue would end up where they’d always been – grating against each other, one dom to another. He adored Bluestreak, he truly did. But it wasn’t a relationship that could last longer than an intermittent night or two.
“I need you to tell me the truth.” Ratchet palmed his face. “The truth I don’t want to hear.”
“All right.” He heard Rung cycle a long ventilation, felt the gentle wave of his field. “If you want to continue as you are, you have to tell Megatron the truth.”
Damn it.
“I can’t do that!” Ratchet snapped and jerked upright, directing a glare at one of his oldest friends. “I have orders.”
“We’re no longer at war, Ratchet. Your orders are whatever you accept them to be.” Rung’s voice was quiet, but there was chastisement in it. He leaned back, removing his glasses to clean them. It was an action that appeared nonchalant, but Ratchet knew better.
“But that’s not what has you drowning in guilt, is it?”
Ratchet chewed on the inside of his cheek. “Controversial,” he said, and it was with a ragged ventilation. “The moment I realize something deeper is growing, I realize exactly who I’ve invited into my berth.”
“And you think it’s a betrayal.”
“How can it not be?” Ratchet rocketed to his feet and started to pace, his spark whirling and churning in his chamber. “This would be the time most people say ‘I’ve lost count of how many mechs died’ but I haven’t! I can tell you their names, all the Autobots who died in my medbay because of Megatron’s war. How am I not betraying their memory?”
“That is the question, isn’t it?” Rung’s tone was mild. “Do you feel Megatron is insincere?”
It was the very same question he had asked himself before.
Ratchet rubbed at his forehead with two fingers. “I don’t know.”
“Then ask yourself this: if he were sincere, would it still feel like a betrayal?”
Ratchet skidded to a halt, his heels clicking together. “No,” he admitted, and vented a sigh. “And yes.”
Wanting to change now didn’t excuse his behavior in the past. Working to create a better future was a good start, so long as he was sincere. If Megatron was sincere, then yes, some of the guilt would ease. Ratchet would find it a lot easier to forgive himself. Maybe he wouldn’t dream about the dead haunting him.
He could point out, ‘look, wars aren’t won by victory, but by forgiveness after defeat’. It was all well and good to say the Decepticons were defeated, but if nothing changed, they’d eventually end up back where they were. And Ratchet was tired.
None of that mattered, however, because Ratchet couldn’t be certain of Megatron’s motivations. He could ask, but he couldn’t trust the answer he’d get. He wanted to. Oh, it would be so much simpler if he could take everything Megatron said and did at face value.
He had centuries of war behind him as proof that with Megatron, nothing was ever as it seemed.
“Do you think his feelings for you are sincere?” Rung asked, the soft query somehow feeling like a punch to the abdomen, for all the reality it delivered.
Ratchet hadn’t even considered that. He’d been so consumed by whether or not Megatron was going to betray the Autobots and the Lost Light, he’d not spared a thought as to whether or not Megatron would betray him.
Realization poured over him like a spray of liquid nitrogen. He’d never considered that a concern. In the long run, Ratchet was worthless to any plan Megatron might have. He’d never betray Optimus, he wasn’t a bargaining chip, and he wouldn’t join the Decepticons for any reason. There was no logical ground for Megatron to begin a relationship with Ratchet save for the obvious one.
He wanted to.
And Ratchet, frag himself to the Pit and back, wanted Megatron, too. He even trusted the former warlord and mass murderer’s feelings for him. He believed Megatron was sincere about that much.
It floored him.
It made him sway, dizzily, and Ratchet had to catch himself.
“Ratchet?” Rung sounded worried. There was a hiss of ancient hydraulics as he rose, perhaps intending to circle around the desk.
“It never occurred to me to think otherwise,” Ratchet said, barely above a whisper. He looked up at one of his oldest, dearest friends. “He’s with me because he wants to be. And I’m with him...”
“Because you want to be,” Rung finished for him, the smallest of smiles on his lips. Tension eased out of his frame, the concern in his field stroking gently over Ratchet’s, soothing him.
Ratchet dragged a hand down his face. “That… it’s just… it only makes the decision harder.”
“Does it?”
Ratchet’s shoulders sagged. He dropped his hands. “No.” He slumped back into the couch, head tipping back.
Rung circled around the desk and sat next to him, resting a hand on his thigh. “You already know what you need to do.”
Sadly, he did.
Ratchet curled an arm over Rung’s shoulders, tucking the therapist against him. “Why couldn’t I have fallen for you?” he sighed, a purely rhetorical question, of course.
Rung chuckled and patted him on the thigh. “Because I’m not the kind of challenge you need.”
“Would be easier if you were,” he muttered, and let himself soak in Rung’s stabilizing field. A thought occurred to him. “Though you know, Bluestreak--”
“Hush you little matchmaking busybody. I’m perfectly capable of finding a berthmate on my own.” Rung sounded amused at least. “Besides, he was my patient for far too long.”
“Just saying.” Ratchet grinned and shuttered his optics, drawing on Rung’s field to give him the courage he needed, to do what he had to do.
It was why he’d come here. He trusted Rung to give him the honest answers, even if he didn’t want to hear them.
It was a hard choice, but Ratchet had long been familiar with hard choices.
This part or that part. This injury or that injury. Save the flickering spark, or fix the broken leg so the mech could rejoin the battle. Both of them dying, in the end, because it was war – brutal and bloody and unforgiving.
Ratchet sighed and hid behind his palm.
Curse his conscience.
