Shattered Shenanigans

38: Little Talks

After cooling down in mutual silence, they decided not to resume their sparring session. "Why were you out here again to begin with?" Optimus asked as they walked out.

"Was thinking." He said.

"About?"

"You." He said flatly, well that was rather direct of him. "And that bauble in your chest."

"What of it?"

"It represents a corrupt lineage of primes-"

"I-"

"Nova, Zeta, Sentinel. Our oppressors, and you accepted it gladly." He continued. "I know the matrix they carried was fake-"

"No, I know what you mean." Optimus nodded, "Then why did you want it?"

"Cybertronians were suffering, I wanted to change that and if I had to sacrifice my own ideals, then so be it." He states.

"And power-"

"And power." He admitted with a laugh.

"When I got it-"

"When you got it, I saw a mech that outranked me a caste, a mech that had used me as a tool. A tool to my superius whims, that's all I was." He let out miserably.

"Hardly!" Optimus protested, "I would gladly give up the matrix if it meant ending the war on equal terms."

To that Megatron nodded slowly.

"Would I get my old frame back too?" Optimus asked himself although he hadn't meant to verbalise it.

"I wouldn't mind." Megatron said as he walked into a berthroom, Optimus followed. "Hrmm?"

"Oh this isn't my room-"

"Keen on a sleepover are you?" Megatron teased.

"Bit too old for that aren't we?" Optimus laughed.

Megatron cast him a confused look.

"Aren't we?" Optimus asked, now confused. Scrap, did he make one of those jokes no one understands?

"Erm?"

"The thing newbuilds do, you know, sleepovers?" Optimus asked, "To play games, have fun?"

"If having fun means sex-" Megatron started, "Though newbuilds would be a bit young for-"

"You never had a sleepover as a newbuild?" Optimus asked, incredulous.

"Again, I would have been a bit young." Megatron added with a confused panic. "I didn't take you for a-"

"Oh Primus is was straight to the mines after your reformatting, you didn't get any mentors, playmates-"

"Oh that's what you mean. No. No we did not." Megatron shook his helm.

"So sleepover for you means interface-"

"If that's what you want to take away from this-"

"You want to interface?" Optimus asked before slapping himself internally. Tactless piece of-

"Um, I-ahh Goodnight." He said and closed the door. Optimus stood their for a good five seconds, oh that went well! Spared himself the embarrassment. Kind of.

He wondered over a few steps to his own shared room and walked in. He caught Ratchet sitting up, looking less guilty than he should have been.

"What are you doing up-" Optimus started.

"Optimus the walls are thin." Ratchet let out quickly and they proceeded to stare at one another.

"You can stay up a little longer." Optimus stated, feeling this was a fair trade as he went to power down.

"Ah ha." Ratchet said, seeming to agree.

-

-

Waking up, Optimus opened his optics after trying (and failing) to ignore Ratchet tapping on his datapad. He decided against mentioning it.

"Awake?" Ratchet asked, not looking up from his datapad.

"Mmm." Optimus mumbled as he got up, wondering if the bots at their base had finished making adjustments to the Ground bridge. Or had they also been recharging? Were they in different time zones?

Then Knockout almost bust the door down, and as if summoned by his thoughts- "Your bots are on call, they finished!" Knockout said as Ratchet jumped up and speed-walked past Knockout. "I brought high grade-" He started and Ratchet took a few steps back to take it.

"Mmm!" He let out pleased as he departed, already taking a sip.

"Good enough." Knockout said, feeling it was a adequate 'thank you'. "Want one?" He asked Optimus as he stood up.

"Sure." Optimus started and took it, not like he was going to drink it though. "Thank you."

"You're welcome." Knockout said as they walked to the main room. Ratchet was already chattering away.

"Alright, you'll need our coordinates, they-" He cut himself of quickly, realising Megatron was in the room (along with everyone else).

"Go on." He grinned, someone had also given him a cube of high grade.

"-Are the same as usual." Ratchet grumbled, narrowing his optics.

"Mmm yea, got it." Wheeljack said, "Had you got the necessary energon reserves?" He asked.

"We have plenty." Megatronus stated.

"Alright, we'll get it prepped, you-where's Soundwave?" Wheeljack started.

"He's troubleshooting." Ratchet said, "We'll get prepped too. Did you receive the check list I sent?"

"Yep." Wheeljack let out, disinterested.

"It's another story if he's going to read it." Arcee grumbled while reading, it seemed she was tasked with it.

"Aww, you're about to leave?" Knockout started, "I though it might be a bit-"

"Give it half an hour or so." Soundwave started as Ratchet said yes.

"So we have time to exchange goodbies?" Dreadwing asked. The sentence of which Optimus was mildly surprised by.

"Argh." Ratchet said, and surprisingly so did Starscream.

Megatronus cast him a look.

"I don't like fuzzy conversations." He grumbled. "Mildly awkward. Dunno what to say." He mumbled under his venting. Optimus could relate.

"Alright, check back in half an hour." Soundwave started, "It's safest to cut coms in the mean time."

"Awww-" Bumblebee started just as the coms went silent.

"I don't see what he's complaining about, we'll be there soon." Ratchet shrugged and took another sip of his cube.

"You going to drink that?" Megatron asked Optimus, coming out of nowhere, he must have just finished his.

"Oh, no. Here." Optimus said and handed it to him.

"Still confused by the colour." He muttered.

"I'd have thought you were used to it?"

"Not for high grade." Megatron muttered. "Should cut back on it honestly." He mumbled, mostly to himself.

"The high grade?"

Megatron snorted mid sip. "No dark energon."

Optimus nodded in agreement and refocused his attention on the others.

"Well, I wish I could say it was nice meeting you all but-" Ratchet paused before straightening up. "Well it wasn't terrible?" He really seemed to be reflecting on his experiences. "Huh."

"Well that's nice of you?" Breakdown started, they had all expected something else from him.

"Love you too, 'sunshine'." Knockout teased.

"Hmpf!" Ratchet started as the Predacon jumped from Soundwave to him.