[TF] Blank Spaces
May. 30th, 2019 06:18 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dracoqueen22Title: Blank Spaces
Universe: Transformers AU, Mastermind series
Characters: Bluestreak/Soundwave
Rated: M
Enticements: BDSM themes, sensory deprivation play, bondage, safeword use, aftercare
Description: Bluestreak and Soundwave’s relationship hits a stumbling block when exploring a new kink reveals that something very important is missing between them.
Written as a reward for February Patrons.
"Are you comfortable?"
"Yes, sir."
"Good."
Soundwave cycled a ventilation, slow and steady, sinking deeper and deeper into himself. He was as comfortable as he could be, kneeling on the floor, his weight resting on his heels. Ropes draped down from hooks in the ceiling, and Bluestreak had bound his arms to them so that they hung away from his frame. The bindings were loose, more to keep Soundwave from touching than to restrict him.
The ropes wound around his arms in a delicate latticework. They were a glossy black against his armor, and the sight of them sent quiet thrills through Soundwave's systems. He kept turning his head to admire the weave, and he hoped Bluestreak had taken pictures as well. He’d like to see the full design later.
"Your safe word is usually..."
"Whirlwind."
"Correct." Bluestreak stood in front of him, Soundwave's visual feed lining up with Bluestreak's mid-section so he tipped his head back to look at his master. "But today we're trying something new. I want you to use the color system. Do you know what it is?"
Bluestreak's fingers traced the knotted lines of rope, and Soundwave watched them for several ventilations before a pop of Bluestreak's field reminded him to answer.
"Yes," Soundwave said. He licked his lips, intake working. "Green for go, yellow for wait or pause, red for stop."
"That's right." Bluestreak smiled. He stroked the side of Soundwave's face, his fingers trailing lightly across Soundwave's cheek until they found his lips.
Soundwave shivered, lips parting obediently as Bluestreak stroked the bottom with his thumb, his optics bright and affectionate, his field pulsing a ready hungry.
"You can still call ‘whirlwind’ anytime you want, but I'm going to keep checking on you with the color system for this session, all right?" he asked.
Soundwave moved to nod, corrected, made to answer 'yes', then corrected again. "Green," he said.
Bluestreak's field bloomed with approval. "Primus, you're perfect," he murmured, and bent down, brushing his lips over Soundwave's in a delicate kiss that sent his sensor net ablaze with want.
He pulled back and Soundwave strained toward him, the kiss not nearly enough to sate him. He reached the end of the restraints on his arms and came up short. Bluestreak smiled at him, his thumb gently stroking Soundwave's lips. They tingled where Bluestreak touched him.
"Are you ready to begin?"
"Yes, sir," Soundwave murmured, his glossa flicking out to taste the tip of Bluestreak's thumb. "Green."
Approval fluttered through Bluestreak’s field, and Soundwave soaked it in. His spark warmed, leaning into the approval like a flower might toward the sun.
"Then dim your visor for me," Bluestreak said. He dipped his hand into his subspace and produced a strip of thick, dark cloth. "I'm going to blindfold you as well, but I want to see how well you control yourself, too. Is that all right?"
Soundwave’s answer was to obey, his visual feed going dark as he dimmed his visor. Immediately, his perceptions shifted to sound and sensor. He read Bluestreak around him, the comfort of his field bright on Soundwave's radar, and the steady background buzz of the comm network waited to be acknowledged.
He sank into it, tracked Bluestreak leaning forward, the soft whisper of cloth against his face and the firm knot of it against the back of his head. Bluestreak's fingers brushed his dermal net as he adjusted and tweaked and settled the blindfold to his satisfaction.
"How's that?"
"Green," Soundwave murmured.
"Good."
Another kiss, as delicate as the last, though a tad bit wetter as Bluestreak's glossa dipped at the seam of his lips, tasting him. He hummed, and the gentle vibration sent a wave of sensation over Soundwave's sensornet. His audials tingled.
"I know you can still see me, for lack of a better word," Bluestreak murmured. He dragged his fingers over Soundwave's clavicular strut, his field a warm press of affection and building arousal. "Just like I know it's not something easily turned off. But I did some research. I know it can be blocked temporarily. So I went to Wheeljack."
Bluestreak stepped back, and the shape of him wavered. He grabbed something from a nearby table, something which had been covered by a cloth earlier, and brought the box within Soundwave's sensor range. Not that he could divine what it was without use of his actual visual feed.
"Four switches," Bluestreak explained. "Each to block the four different signals you can read. Comms. Fields. Transmissions. Processing."
Soundwave groaned softly. Blocking all of those feeds would bring him near-absolute silence. It sounded like bliss.
"Once these are all activated, the only thing you'll be able to hear is what comes through your audials, and you won't be able to sense anything," Bluestreak finished. His field fell over Soundwave, stroking him as though it had physical weight. "I'll start with comms first."
Click.
Soundwave's comm system went quiet. The noise of a dozen different conversations transmitting in the background went dark. When he tried to dial out, he received gray fuzz as an answer. Everything was static.
Soundwave sank further into his frame, filling out the parameters of it, settling into his struts as he acknowledged the solidity of his armor. He cycled a ventilation, ease suffusing through his system. He hadn't realized how much the comm traffic made him on edge until it was gone.
"Color?"
"Green." Soundwave licked his lips and savored the quiet. "Another."
Click.
A second section of his sensory processing suite went dark. More ambient noise dropped to silence as the background buzz of various transmissions, including the human radio and satellite signals, vanished.
Soundwave groaned, and his plating opened to allow more ventilation as he sank comfortably into his frame and pose. It was like a weight off his shoulders, and a shiver of pleasure raced through his armor. Had he ever felt this unburdened before?
"Color?"
Soundwave's head dipped a little as he savored the sensation, the near-quiet, the press of warmth of Bluestreak's field. Bluestreak touched him, and a low moan resonated in Soundwave's chassis as the pleasure flooded his sensory net in a long, rippling wave. It seemed all the more present, without the distraction of background chatter.
"Soundwave?"
"Green," Soundwave rasped. "Sir."
"Very good."
Bluestreak's field flickered with intent before his lips brushed over Soundwave's forehead. He traced Soundwave's seams in slow, lingering drags of his fingertips, and charge spilled out from beneath, licking at his hand. Soundwave shivered.
“May I continue?” Bluestreak asked, a murmur whispering over Soundwave’s audial in a brush of warm ex-vent and soft lips.
“Yes, sir.” Soundwave’s spark fluttered and another wave of delight swept through his frame. “Green.”
Click.
It was sharper this time. More obvious. A dull silence at the forward edge of his senses, the place where he shunted all feedback from a mech’s surface thoughts. Soundwave made it a point to ignore those unless he was interrogating someone.
The humans would have called it ‘mind-reading’. It wasn’t so mystical as that. Soundwave’s senses were uniquely attuned to picking up the electrical currents flashing through a mech’s processor, darting between different thought-pathways and carrying information. He could tune into them, much like he could tune into any kind of wave, both consciously and unconsciously.
Their absence was a delicious silence. Like an itch behind his armor he’d eased. Or a scraplet once nesting in his hydraulics, finally ferreted out and dispatched.
“Color?”
“Green,” Soundwave said. He leaned toward Bluestreak’s field, as much as the ropes would allow, yearning for touch, for anything.
Bluestreak cupped his head, thumb stroking his cheek. His field started at the top and drizzled down, enveloping Soundwave in a warm blanket of safety. He ex-vented noisily, and his fans spun with a whirr.
“I can tell,” Bluestreak murmured, his field twist-tangling with Soundwave’s, pulsing pleasure into him as surely as if it were physical touch.
Arousal throbbed heavy in Soundwave’s lines, dragging him toward the floor, solidifying him in his frame. For once, he didn’t feel as much outside it, as he felt present within it, and the sensation was as terrifying as it was freeing.
Was this how other mechs felt? To have their awareness be focused so inward because they were incapable of extending it outward?
How weightless it must seem.
“There’s one more,” Bluestreak said, his fingers stroking over the bridge of Soundwave’s nasal structure, brushing over his cheeks, down his intake cables, a lingering tingle in his wake.
“Green,” Soundwave said. He would have been embarrassed by the yearning in his voice, if it hadn’t been for the understanding and approval in Bluestreak’s field.
This was what he’d been searching for.
Click.
Everything went still.
The world around him halted, like someone had pressed pause. He could hear, dimly, Bluestreak’s ventilations, the soft whirrs and creaks of shifting gears and hydraulics. The lights buzzed, barely audible. Bluestreak’s upstairs neighbor had a heavy tread. Outside, two mechs were involved in a collision, and their angry voices were loud enough to be heard, though the words were a drone.
Silence.
It was eerily silent.
And he felt.
He felt Bluestreak’s hands on him, both hands now, palms caressing his armor, fingertips gliding through his seams, painting charge along his sensors like a master artist. He felt Bluestreak’s ex-vents, puffing over him in little wisps of heat.
Bluestreak was there. He knew Bluestreak was there. Could feel Bluestreak’s touches, could hear him talking, could hear his frame running, but Soundwave didn’t actually know it. He couldn’t feel anything.
No.
Lies.
He felt, but he didn’t feel. He didn’t sense. Where there was noise, there was silence, and Soundwave was alone in his head.
Alone in his head, and he tried to reach for Bluestreak to understand him, but there was nothing. No field. No processor hum. No comms to tap. Not that he would. No, never. Soundwave knew boundaries. Anything he picked up was unconscious.
But fields. Fields were open. Fields were permission. Fields were truth.
Bluestreak shifted, his hydraulics hissed, and his hands vanished. Soundwave’s visor flickered on, desperate to find him again, but the black of the blindfold turned the world into hazy shapes. The sound of his own system was impossibly loud. Too fast ventilating. Click-click-click of his cooling fans, and the rush of his energon through his lines, and his spark, pulse-pulse-pulsing. Too fast.
He was alone. Alone.
A hand on his upper back, and Soundwave startled because he hadn’t known it was coming. He couldn’t see Bluestreak, couldn’t sense him, couldn’t hear him, not properly. Bluestreak’s voice was a dull drone, turning to background noise, and the more Soundwave tried to hear him, the more the silence drowned him out.
Ice flushed through his lines, and a hard knot settled in his tanks. Soundwave tried to swallow, but his intake seized and his vents stalled. He didn’t know where Bluestreak was; he didn’t know Bluestreak’s intentions. Bluestreak could hurt him, and he wouldn’t know. He’d have no warning, no flash of field or processor thought.
All he had was a naked trust, and it was too much. It was more than Soundwave had ever given anyone, and it was too much to ask.
His fans spun faster. Out of the silence, their whine sounded like the shriek of incoming artillery. It was noise, and it was silence, and there was warmth against his face. Warmth and pressure, delicate, but then firm. Sharp.
“--ndwave. Soundwave!”
He tried to jerk his head away, but the grip was relentless. It took two attempts to get his vocalizer to work -- it kept stalling, kept grinding, too loud for the quiet.
“Whirlwind,” he stuttered, and disappointment drowned him. He’d failed. He’d failed his master in more ways than he could count. “Red, red, red, re--”
“Shhh. It’s okay. I hear you. What do you need? What first?” Bluestreak’s voice filtered into the silence, like a beacon of noise through the static.
Soundwave’s mouth moved, but his vocalizer seized. He didn’t deserve the peace. He’d failed.
Warmth brushed his face. A hand cupped his cheek. The blindfold shifted against his plating, soft but grating, sensation Soundwave could cling to. A beautiful, quiet sound.
“I’m going to take this off.”
The dark cloth lifted away.
Soundwave cringed, anticipating bright, searing light. He met, instead, a soft, comfortable dim, with even Bluestreak’s biolights a bare, colorful glow to his visual feed.
He was good at this.
Soundwave reset his visor twice. Bluestreak cupped his face, and the warmth of his hands grounded Soundwave. He lowered his gaze, unwilling to meet Bluestreak’s optics, more unwilling to see the buzz of disappointment.
A shiver rattled his armor.
“I’m going to unbind your arms,” Bluestreak said. His thumbs stroked Soundwave’s cheek, under the bottom edge of his visor. “I’m not going anywhere, but I’m going to lower your arms, all right?”
“Yes, sir.” He barely managed a whisper.
Bluestreak was quick and efficient. He tugged the quick releases and slowly lowered Soundwave’s arms, leaving the ropes wrapped around his armor, but the ends tucked into the weaved designs. They wouldn’t impede his movement, but they, too, grounded him in his frame.
It was still too loud in this silence.
“The dampeners,” Soundwave whispered. He sank further inside himself, letting Bluestreak manipulate his limbs as he pleased. The knot of warmth within him slowly filled with shards of ice. His frame was too heavy.
He didn’t feel grounded. He felt… he felt chained in place.
“All at once or gradually?”
Soundwave lowered his head further. “Gradually.”
Bluestreak rested his hands on Soundwave’s shoulders. His palms stroked down, over theoven ropes woven around Soundwave’s arms, before sliding up again.
“Blaster told me I should start with your comms and then add the other perceptions one by one. Was he right?”
A flash of anger burst through Soundwave’s spark before he swallowed it down. He’d failed. He had no right to be angry. Instead, he nodded, and his battlemask slid shut, protecting his mouth.
Soundwave froze.
He waited for the chastisement. He’d broken one of Bluestreak’s golden rules.
Nothing.
Bluestreak kept a hand on his arm, and the other lifted away. A dull click echoed in the room and then a part of Soundwave came to life. His sensors lit up like fireworks as the background babble of comm traffic came bursting into his receptors.
Soundwave cycled a ventilation. He relaxed by a fraction of a degree, his armor opening to allow airflow. He hadn’t realized he’d been clamped tight, protectively, his defensive protocols struggling to online.
His other sensors came back online gradually, one by one, with his field reading capabilities brimming to life last. Soundwave had become whole again, and the world was much too loud and much too noisy.
It was comforting for the chaos. It was as silent as he’d learned to live.
A wash of concern and apology flooded over him, coming from Bluestreak, finally breaking through the influx of backlogged noise. Soundwave sank into his frame, against the floor, relaxation suffusing every locked cable and tightened hydraulic.
His peripheral sensors flashed. Soundwave snagged Bluestreak’s arm as he moved by, carrying the dampener device in his other hand.
“Apologies,” Soundwave said, daring to lift his head. He would not be a coward.
Bluestreak frowned down at him. “For what?” The dampener vanished, perhaps to subspace, as he turned fully toward Soundwave.
This was the hardest part.
“Failing.” His vocalizer blat static, but he forced out the word.
“Oh, no, Soundwave. Not at all. I’m proud of you.” Bluestreak stepped firmly into Soundwave’s space, and Soundwave immediately wrapped his arms around his lover, pressing his guarded face to Bluestreak’s abdomen. “You used your safe word. You asked me to stop. I couldn't be happier. You have nothing to apologize for.”
Soundwave disagreed. He swallowed the argument down. It was not up to him to decide what his master wanted. He could read Bluestreak’s sincerity. Bluestreak’s pride was genuine. He wasn’t angry.
No. He was angry, but it wasn’t directed at Soundwave, it was directed internally. There, on the wisps of his projecting thoughts, Bluestreak berated himself for failing Soundwave.
He’d have to correct that. But later. He felt too shaken at the moment.
Bluestreak embraced him, arms over his shoulders, fingers stroking his head and upper back, anyplace he could reach. Soundwave pressed against him, soaking in Bluestreak’s field, the emotions buried in it. He lost himself in the noise, controlled as it was.
He thought he’d missed silence. He’d been wrong.
“Are you ready to talk about it?” Bluestreak asked.
“Negative.”
“All right.” Bluestreak kept stroking him, his field falling and rising around Soundwave with a rhythmic pattern as soothing as the touch of his fingers.
He didn’t chastise Soundwave for relapsing into his prefered vocal patterns. There wasn’t so much as a hint of irritation about it in his field.
Soundwave wasn’t sure how long passed. He lost himself in the noise, only allowing a percentage of his awareness to focus on Bluestreak, and another percentage to acknowledge the worried pings of his cassettes.
He had to reassure them and order them not to burst in and interrupt. Signal dampeners aside, they’d sensed his panic through their tertiary spark connection. Ravage was the most rational of them.
The course of these games never ran smoothly, Soundwave reminded them. He was here by choice. Bluestreak had done nothing wrong.
All of the errors had been from Soundwave.
“Soundwave.” Bluestreak cupped his face and tilted Soundwave to look at him. “We need to talk. Are you with me?”
He cycled a ventilation. He steadied himself. He nodded.
“Good.”
Bluestreak coaxed Soundwave up to his feet, though his legs and knees protested the shift, his hydraulics creaking noisily. He staggered to the couch and dropped down into it, with Bluestreak sitting aft on the table in front of him. Something Soundwave knew Jazz was forbidden to do.
Amusement made an appearance, however brief.
Bluestreak took his hands, rubbed his thumbs over Soundwave’s palms. “Talk to me,” he said, and though it was a request, there was an edge to his tone. An edge Soundwave respected.
He worked his intake. “The silence,” Soundwave said, haltingly. Deep inside, where it stung his pride the most, he cringed. “It’s too much.”
Bluestreak absorbed his words. He nodded and held Soundwave’s gaze. “Would you rather keep all of the senses in the future, or would you enjoy a limited sensation restriction?”
“It was good until the last.” It had been nice, to not have the weight of all the noise bearing down on him. But when it was all gone, when he couldn’t feel Bluestreak anymore, he’d stepped over a line and right into panic.
Until that moment, Soundwave hadn’t realized how much he depended on knowing someone to handle being around them. It was disconcerting. It was weakness.
“I see.” Bluestreak hummed, his field shifting to one of concentration. He absently rubbed Soundwave’s palms, little waves of concern buffeting Soundwave’s receptors.
Guilt tugged hard at Soundwave’s spark.
“Soundwave can’t… trust without knowing Bluestreak,” he explained, trying to put it into words Bluestreak could understand without the context of experience.
Blaster would get it. But like the Pit would Soundwave go to him for advice.
Bluestreak, however, was intelligent and insightful all on his own. “You only trust me because you can read my intentions through my field.”
“Affirmative.”
“Soundwave, that’s…” Bluestreak sighed, and a flicker of disappointment shot through his field before it was gone again. He squeezed Soundwave’s hands. “That’s not sustainable. You don’t actually trust me.”
“Trust--”
“No.” Bluestreak shook his head and caught Soundwave’s gaze. “Trust is as much faith as it is based on action. I trust you because I have faith in your intentions. I can put effort into reading your field if I want, but most of the time, I don’t. Understand?”
He did.
The hard part was in acknowledging it. Trusting without confirmation was terrifying. Soundwave had spent his entire life knowing who he could and couldn’t trust in an instant. Trusting on faith alone was an anathema concept.
“I’m not saying that we’re done if you can’t trust me right away,” Bluestreak continued, still rubbing his fingers over Soundwave’s palms. “But it will change how we play our games. And I won’t restrict that particular perception again, not until you’re ready. I can wait until you trust me. We have time.”
Soundwave dipped his head. “Apologies,” he murmured.
“No, no need to apologize.” Bluestreak cupped his cheek, warm and reassuring in his field. “It’s not something that can be demanded. I want it freely given. I want to earn it otherwise it means nothing to me. And if you don’t think I could ever earn it, well, we’ll cross that bridge when we get to it, I guess.”
“Explain.”
Bluestreak sighed and dropped his hand back to Soundwave’s, tangling their fingers together. “Well, that depends on what you want out of this. But I’m a firm believer in trust being one of the most important things for a successful relationship. Without it, we won’t survive. Eventually, we’ll fall apart.”
Soundwave did not want that.
He liked Bluestreak. He adored Bluestreak. He was fully invested in what they were building here. He wanted to keep it.
Soundwave swallowed over a lump in his throat. “I will try,” he said, and consciously slid his battlemask aside, baring his vulnerabilities back to Bluestreak. “It’s new.”
“I know.” Bluestreak smiled at him, warm and affectionate, his door panels twitching in a show of relieved relaxation. “We can work on it together.”
Soundwave leaned forward and kissed Bluestreak, gentle and careful, but it felt like a lot more than a kiss. He wasn’t even entirely sure why, save that the urge was there, and he’d followed it through, and he could read the affection in Bluestreak’s field.
He wanted to keep this.
The least he could do was try.
*
Universe: Transformers AU, Mastermind series
Characters: Bluestreak/Soundwave
Rated: M
Enticements: BDSM themes, sensory deprivation play, bondage, safeword use, aftercare
Description: Bluestreak and Soundwave’s relationship hits a stumbling block when exploring a new kink reveals that something very important is missing between them.
Written as a reward for February Patrons.
"Are you comfortable?"
"Yes, sir."
"Good."
Soundwave cycled a ventilation, slow and steady, sinking deeper and deeper into himself. He was as comfortable as he could be, kneeling on the floor, his weight resting on his heels. Ropes draped down from hooks in the ceiling, and Bluestreak had bound his arms to them so that they hung away from his frame. The bindings were loose, more to keep Soundwave from touching than to restrict him.
The ropes wound around his arms in a delicate latticework. They were a glossy black against his armor, and the sight of them sent quiet thrills through Soundwave's systems. He kept turning his head to admire the weave, and he hoped Bluestreak had taken pictures as well. He’d like to see the full design later.
"Your safe word is usually..."
"Whirlwind."
"Correct." Bluestreak stood in front of him, Soundwave's visual feed lining up with Bluestreak's mid-section so he tipped his head back to look at his master. "But today we're trying something new. I want you to use the color system. Do you know what it is?"
Bluestreak's fingers traced the knotted lines of rope, and Soundwave watched them for several ventilations before a pop of Bluestreak's field reminded him to answer.
"Yes," Soundwave said. He licked his lips, intake working. "Green for go, yellow for wait or pause, red for stop."
"That's right." Bluestreak smiled. He stroked the side of Soundwave's face, his fingers trailing lightly across Soundwave's cheek until they found his lips.
Soundwave shivered, lips parting obediently as Bluestreak stroked the bottom with his thumb, his optics bright and affectionate, his field pulsing a ready hungry.
"You can still call ‘whirlwind’ anytime you want, but I'm going to keep checking on you with the color system for this session, all right?" he asked.
Soundwave moved to nod, corrected, made to answer 'yes', then corrected again. "Green," he said.
Bluestreak's field bloomed with approval. "Primus, you're perfect," he murmured, and bent down, brushing his lips over Soundwave's in a delicate kiss that sent his sensor net ablaze with want.
He pulled back and Soundwave strained toward him, the kiss not nearly enough to sate him. He reached the end of the restraints on his arms and came up short. Bluestreak smiled at him, his thumb gently stroking Soundwave's lips. They tingled where Bluestreak touched him.
"Are you ready to begin?"
"Yes, sir," Soundwave murmured, his glossa flicking out to taste the tip of Bluestreak's thumb. "Green."
Approval fluttered through Bluestreak’s field, and Soundwave soaked it in. His spark warmed, leaning into the approval like a flower might toward the sun.
"Then dim your visor for me," Bluestreak said. He dipped his hand into his subspace and produced a strip of thick, dark cloth. "I'm going to blindfold you as well, but I want to see how well you control yourself, too. Is that all right?"
Soundwave’s answer was to obey, his visual feed going dark as he dimmed his visor. Immediately, his perceptions shifted to sound and sensor. He read Bluestreak around him, the comfort of his field bright on Soundwave's radar, and the steady background buzz of the comm network waited to be acknowledged.
He sank into it, tracked Bluestreak leaning forward, the soft whisper of cloth against his face and the firm knot of it against the back of his head. Bluestreak's fingers brushed his dermal net as he adjusted and tweaked and settled the blindfold to his satisfaction.
"How's that?"
"Green," Soundwave murmured.
"Good."
Another kiss, as delicate as the last, though a tad bit wetter as Bluestreak's glossa dipped at the seam of his lips, tasting him. He hummed, and the gentle vibration sent a wave of sensation over Soundwave's sensornet. His audials tingled.
"I know you can still see me, for lack of a better word," Bluestreak murmured. He dragged his fingers over Soundwave's clavicular strut, his field a warm press of affection and building arousal. "Just like I know it's not something easily turned off. But I did some research. I know it can be blocked temporarily. So I went to Wheeljack."
Bluestreak stepped back, and the shape of him wavered. He grabbed something from a nearby table, something which had been covered by a cloth earlier, and brought the box within Soundwave's sensor range. Not that he could divine what it was without use of his actual visual feed.
"Four switches," Bluestreak explained. "Each to block the four different signals you can read. Comms. Fields. Transmissions. Processing."
Soundwave groaned softly. Blocking all of those feeds would bring him near-absolute silence. It sounded like bliss.
"Once these are all activated, the only thing you'll be able to hear is what comes through your audials, and you won't be able to sense anything," Bluestreak finished. His field fell over Soundwave, stroking him as though it had physical weight. "I'll start with comms first."
Click.
Soundwave's comm system went quiet. The noise of a dozen different conversations transmitting in the background went dark. When he tried to dial out, he received gray fuzz as an answer. Everything was static.
Soundwave sank further into his frame, filling out the parameters of it, settling into his struts as he acknowledged the solidity of his armor. He cycled a ventilation, ease suffusing through his system. He hadn't realized how much the comm traffic made him on edge until it was gone.
"Color?"
"Green." Soundwave licked his lips and savored the quiet. "Another."
Click.
A second section of his sensory processing suite went dark. More ambient noise dropped to silence as the background buzz of various transmissions, including the human radio and satellite signals, vanished.
Soundwave groaned, and his plating opened to allow more ventilation as he sank comfortably into his frame and pose. It was like a weight off his shoulders, and a shiver of pleasure raced through his armor. Had he ever felt this unburdened before?
"Color?"
Soundwave's head dipped a little as he savored the sensation, the near-quiet, the press of warmth of Bluestreak's field. Bluestreak touched him, and a low moan resonated in Soundwave's chassis as the pleasure flooded his sensory net in a long, rippling wave. It seemed all the more present, without the distraction of background chatter.
"Soundwave?"
"Green," Soundwave rasped. "Sir."
"Very good."
Bluestreak's field flickered with intent before his lips brushed over Soundwave's forehead. He traced Soundwave's seams in slow, lingering drags of his fingertips, and charge spilled out from beneath, licking at his hand. Soundwave shivered.
“May I continue?” Bluestreak asked, a murmur whispering over Soundwave’s audial in a brush of warm ex-vent and soft lips.
“Yes, sir.” Soundwave’s spark fluttered and another wave of delight swept through his frame. “Green.”
Click.
It was sharper this time. More obvious. A dull silence at the forward edge of his senses, the place where he shunted all feedback from a mech’s surface thoughts. Soundwave made it a point to ignore those unless he was interrogating someone.
The humans would have called it ‘mind-reading’. It wasn’t so mystical as that. Soundwave’s senses were uniquely attuned to picking up the electrical currents flashing through a mech’s processor, darting between different thought-pathways and carrying information. He could tune into them, much like he could tune into any kind of wave, both consciously and unconsciously.
Their absence was a delicious silence. Like an itch behind his armor he’d eased. Or a scraplet once nesting in his hydraulics, finally ferreted out and dispatched.
“Color?”
“Green,” Soundwave said. He leaned toward Bluestreak’s field, as much as the ropes would allow, yearning for touch, for anything.
Bluestreak cupped his head, thumb stroking his cheek. His field started at the top and drizzled down, enveloping Soundwave in a warm blanket of safety. He ex-vented noisily, and his fans spun with a whirr.
“I can tell,” Bluestreak murmured, his field twist-tangling with Soundwave’s, pulsing pleasure into him as surely as if it were physical touch.
Arousal throbbed heavy in Soundwave’s lines, dragging him toward the floor, solidifying him in his frame. For once, he didn’t feel as much outside it, as he felt present within it, and the sensation was as terrifying as it was freeing.
Was this how other mechs felt? To have their awareness be focused so inward because they were incapable of extending it outward?
How weightless it must seem.
“There’s one more,” Bluestreak said, his fingers stroking over the bridge of Soundwave’s nasal structure, brushing over his cheeks, down his intake cables, a lingering tingle in his wake.
“Green,” Soundwave said. He would have been embarrassed by the yearning in his voice, if it hadn’t been for the understanding and approval in Bluestreak’s field.
This was what he’d been searching for.
Click.
Everything went still.
The world around him halted, like someone had pressed pause. He could hear, dimly, Bluestreak’s ventilations, the soft whirrs and creaks of shifting gears and hydraulics. The lights buzzed, barely audible. Bluestreak’s upstairs neighbor had a heavy tread. Outside, two mechs were involved in a collision, and their angry voices were loud enough to be heard, though the words were a drone.
Silence.
It was eerily silent.
And he felt.
He felt Bluestreak’s hands on him, both hands now, palms caressing his armor, fingertips gliding through his seams, painting charge along his sensors like a master artist. He felt Bluestreak’s ex-vents, puffing over him in little wisps of heat.
Bluestreak was there. He knew Bluestreak was there. Could feel Bluestreak’s touches, could hear him talking, could hear his frame running, but Soundwave didn’t actually know it. He couldn’t feel anything.
No.
Lies.
He felt, but he didn’t feel. He didn’t sense. Where there was noise, there was silence, and Soundwave was alone in his head.
Alone in his head, and he tried to reach for Bluestreak to understand him, but there was nothing. No field. No processor hum. No comms to tap. Not that he would. No, never. Soundwave knew boundaries. Anything he picked up was unconscious.
But fields. Fields were open. Fields were permission. Fields were truth.
Bluestreak shifted, his hydraulics hissed, and his hands vanished. Soundwave’s visor flickered on, desperate to find him again, but the black of the blindfold turned the world into hazy shapes. The sound of his own system was impossibly loud. Too fast ventilating. Click-click-click of his cooling fans, and the rush of his energon through his lines, and his spark, pulse-pulse-pulsing. Too fast.
He was alone. Alone.
A hand on his upper back, and Soundwave startled because he hadn’t known it was coming. He couldn’t see Bluestreak, couldn’t sense him, couldn’t hear him, not properly. Bluestreak’s voice was a dull drone, turning to background noise, and the more Soundwave tried to hear him, the more the silence drowned him out.
Ice flushed through his lines, and a hard knot settled in his tanks. Soundwave tried to swallow, but his intake seized and his vents stalled. He didn’t know where Bluestreak was; he didn’t know Bluestreak’s intentions. Bluestreak could hurt him, and he wouldn’t know. He’d have no warning, no flash of field or processor thought.
All he had was a naked trust, and it was too much. It was more than Soundwave had ever given anyone, and it was too much to ask.
His fans spun faster. Out of the silence, their whine sounded like the shriek of incoming artillery. It was noise, and it was silence, and there was warmth against his face. Warmth and pressure, delicate, but then firm. Sharp.
“--ndwave. Soundwave!”
He tried to jerk his head away, but the grip was relentless. It took two attempts to get his vocalizer to work -- it kept stalling, kept grinding, too loud for the quiet.
“Whirlwind,” he stuttered, and disappointment drowned him. He’d failed. He’d failed his master in more ways than he could count. “Red, red, red, re--”
“Shhh. It’s okay. I hear you. What do you need? What first?” Bluestreak’s voice filtered into the silence, like a beacon of noise through the static.
Soundwave’s mouth moved, but his vocalizer seized. He didn’t deserve the peace. He’d failed.
Warmth brushed his face. A hand cupped his cheek. The blindfold shifted against his plating, soft but grating, sensation Soundwave could cling to. A beautiful, quiet sound.
“I’m going to take this off.”
The dark cloth lifted away.
Soundwave cringed, anticipating bright, searing light. He met, instead, a soft, comfortable dim, with even Bluestreak’s biolights a bare, colorful glow to his visual feed.
He was good at this.
Soundwave reset his visor twice. Bluestreak cupped his face, and the warmth of his hands grounded Soundwave. He lowered his gaze, unwilling to meet Bluestreak’s optics, more unwilling to see the buzz of disappointment.
A shiver rattled his armor.
“I’m going to unbind your arms,” Bluestreak said. His thumbs stroked Soundwave’s cheek, under the bottom edge of his visor. “I’m not going anywhere, but I’m going to lower your arms, all right?”
“Yes, sir.” He barely managed a whisper.
Bluestreak was quick and efficient. He tugged the quick releases and slowly lowered Soundwave’s arms, leaving the ropes wrapped around his armor, but the ends tucked into the weaved designs. They wouldn’t impede his movement, but they, too, grounded him in his frame.
It was still too loud in this silence.
“The dampeners,” Soundwave whispered. He sank further inside himself, letting Bluestreak manipulate his limbs as he pleased. The knot of warmth within him slowly filled with shards of ice. His frame was too heavy.
He didn’t feel grounded. He felt… he felt chained in place.
“All at once or gradually?”
Soundwave lowered his head further. “Gradually.”
Bluestreak rested his hands on Soundwave’s shoulders. His palms stroked down, over theoven ropes woven around Soundwave’s arms, before sliding up again.
“Blaster told me I should start with your comms and then add the other perceptions one by one. Was he right?”
A flash of anger burst through Soundwave’s spark before he swallowed it down. He’d failed. He had no right to be angry. Instead, he nodded, and his battlemask slid shut, protecting his mouth.
Soundwave froze.
He waited for the chastisement. He’d broken one of Bluestreak’s golden rules.
Nothing.
Bluestreak kept a hand on his arm, and the other lifted away. A dull click echoed in the room and then a part of Soundwave came to life. His sensors lit up like fireworks as the background babble of comm traffic came bursting into his receptors.
Soundwave cycled a ventilation. He relaxed by a fraction of a degree, his armor opening to allow airflow. He hadn’t realized he’d been clamped tight, protectively, his defensive protocols struggling to online.
His other sensors came back online gradually, one by one, with his field reading capabilities brimming to life last. Soundwave had become whole again, and the world was much too loud and much too noisy.
It was comforting for the chaos. It was as silent as he’d learned to live.
A wash of concern and apology flooded over him, coming from Bluestreak, finally breaking through the influx of backlogged noise. Soundwave sank into his frame, against the floor, relaxation suffusing every locked cable and tightened hydraulic.
His peripheral sensors flashed. Soundwave snagged Bluestreak’s arm as he moved by, carrying the dampener device in his other hand.
“Apologies,” Soundwave said, daring to lift his head. He would not be a coward.
Bluestreak frowned down at him. “For what?” The dampener vanished, perhaps to subspace, as he turned fully toward Soundwave.
This was the hardest part.
“Failing.” His vocalizer blat static, but he forced out the word.
“Oh, no, Soundwave. Not at all. I’m proud of you.” Bluestreak stepped firmly into Soundwave’s space, and Soundwave immediately wrapped his arms around his lover, pressing his guarded face to Bluestreak’s abdomen. “You used your safe word. You asked me to stop. I couldn't be happier. You have nothing to apologize for.”
Soundwave disagreed. He swallowed the argument down. It was not up to him to decide what his master wanted. He could read Bluestreak’s sincerity. Bluestreak’s pride was genuine. He wasn’t angry.
No. He was angry, but it wasn’t directed at Soundwave, it was directed internally. There, on the wisps of his projecting thoughts, Bluestreak berated himself for failing Soundwave.
He’d have to correct that. But later. He felt too shaken at the moment.
Bluestreak embraced him, arms over his shoulders, fingers stroking his head and upper back, anyplace he could reach. Soundwave pressed against him, soaking in Bluestreak’s field, the emotions buried in it. He lost himself in the noise, controlled as it was.
He thought he’d missed silence. He’d been wrong.
“Are you ready to talk about it?” Bluestreak asked.
“Negative.”
“All right.” Bluestreak kept stroking him, his field falling and rising around Soundwave with a rhythmic pattern as soothing as the touch of his fingers.
He didn’t chastise Soundwave for relapsing into his prefered vocal patterns. There wasn’t so much as a hint of irritation about it in his field.
Soundwave wasn’t sure how long passed. He lost himself in the noise, only allowing a percentage of his awareness to focus on Bluestreak, and another percentage to acknowledge the worried pings of his cassettes.
He had to reassure them and order them not to burst in and interrupt. Signal dampeners aside, they’d sensed his panic through their tertiary spark connection. Ravage was the most rational of them.
The course of these games never ran smoothly, Soundwave reminded them. He was here by choice. Bluestreak had done nothing wrong.
All of the errors had been from Soundwave.
“Soundwave.” Bluestreak cupped his face and tilted Soundwave to look at him. “We need to talk. Are you with me?”
He cycled a ventilation. He steadied himself. He nodded.
“Good.”
Bluestreak coaxed Soundwave up to his feet, though his legs and knees protested the shift, his hydraulics creaking noisily. He staggered to the couch and dropped down into it, with Bluestreak sitting aft on the table in front of him. Something Soundwave knew Jazz was forbidden to do.
Amusement made an appearance, however brief.
Bluestreak took his hands, rubbed his thumbs over Soundwave’s palms. “Talk to me,” he said, and though it was a request, there was an edge to his tone. An edge Soundwave respected.
He worked his intake. “The silence,” Soundwave said, haltingly. Deep inside, where it stung his pride the most, he cringed. “It’s too much.”
Bluestreak absorbed his words. He nodded and held Soundwave’s gaze. “Would you rather keep all of the senses in the future, or would you enjoy a limited sensation restriction?”
“It was good until the last.” It had been nice, to not have the weight of all the noise bearing down on him. But when it was all gone, when he couldn’t feel Bluestreak anymore, he’d stepped over a line and right into panic.
Until that moment, Soundwave hadn’t realized how much he depended on knowing someone to handle being around them. It was disconcerting. It was weakness.
“I see.” Bluestreak hummed, his field shifting to one of concentration. He absently rubbed Soundwave’s palms, little waves of concern buffeting Soundwave’s receptors.
Guilt tugged hard at Soundwave’s spark.
“Soundwave can’t… trust without knowing Bluestreak,” he explained, trying to put it into words Bluestreak could understand without the context of experience.
Blaster would get it. But like the Pit would Soundwave go to him for advice.
Bluestreak, however, was intelligent and insightful all on his own. “You only trust me because you can read my intentions through my field.”
“Affirmative.”
“Soundwave, that’s…” Bluestreak sighed, and a flicker of disappointment shot through his field before it was gone again. He squeezed Soundwave’s hands. “That’s not sustainable. You don’t actually trust me.”
“Trust--”
“No.” Bluestreak shook his head and caught Soundwave’s gaze. “Trust is as much faith as it is based on action. I trust you because I have faith in your intentions. I can put effort into reading your field if I want, but most of the time, I don’t. Understand?”
He did.
The hard part was in acknowledging it. Trusting without confirmation was terrifying. Soundwave had spent his entire life knowing who he could and couldn’t trust in an instant. Trusting on faith alone was an anathema concept.
“I’m not saying that we’re done if you can’t trust me right away,” Bluestreak continued, still rubbing his fingers over Soundwave’s palms. “But it will change how we play our games. And I won’t restrict that particular perception again, not until you’re ready. I can wait until you trust me. We have time.”
Soundwave dipped his head. “Apologies,” he murmured.
“No, no need to apologize.” Bluestreak cupped his cheek, warm and reassuring in his field. “It’s not something that can be demanded. I want it freely given. I want to earn it otherwise it means nothing to me. And if you don’t think I could ever earn it, well, we’ll cross that bridge when we get to it, I guess.”
“Explain.”
Bluestreak sighed and dropped his hand back to Soundwave’s, tangling their fingers together. “Well, that depends on what you want out of this. But I’m a firm believer in trust being one of the most important things for a successful relationship. Without it, we won’t survive. Eventually, we’ll fall apart.”
Soundwave did not want that.
He liked Bluestreak. He adored Bluestreak. He was fully invested in what they were building here. He wanted to keep it.
Soundwave swallowed over a lump in his throat. “I will try,” he said, and consciously slid his battlemask aside, baring his vulnerabilities back to Bluestreak. “It’s new.”
“I know.” Bluestreak smiled at him, warm and affectionate, his door panels twitching in a show of relieved relaxation. “We can work on it together.”
Soundwave leaned forward and kissed Bluestreak, gentle and careful, but it felt like a lot more than a kiss. He wasn’t even entirely sure why, save that the urge was there, and he’d followed it through, and he could read the affection in Bluestreak’s field.
He wanted to keep this.
The least he could do was try.
