Behind The Scenes

cuz
it's
totally
canon.
Sequel to 1:[link] and 2: [link]

One lingering tap against him in passing, one laughing glance in his direction--it was all Shockwave could do to conceal the color tingeing his faceplate whenever the yellow bot appeared.

This faceplate, this appearance--Longarm--it was not him. Shockwave contained one penetrating red optic and a long, narrow head that boasted no other unnecessary features. They were nothing to a machine; only meaningless attributes that served no relevant purpose. Shockwave was not emotionally inclined, and he most certainly did not express any sentiment that he did feel, at least not through petty facial means. It was in Shockwave’s experience that faceplates were only a liability. He could read them, analyze them, and break them, but he was contentedly faceless--save for his warning-red optic, a beacon for those who dared oppose him and the Decepticon cause.

This mask he wore was a temporary bluff. This faceplate was something necessary of his Autobot façade that, when manipulated in the correct manner, would keep Shockwave inconspicuous while adopting the trust and rank his operation mandated. He was convinced it would take a certain amount of force to muster visible emotion; he never conceived that he would have an issue controlling it. Shockwave had been confident in his ability to do exactly what needed to be done efficiently and effectively.

Had been.

***

“Alright, cogs! Dismissed!”

The raucous Sentinel Minor folded his arms behind his back and departed as his subordinates gathered themselves from the megacycle’s final set of transform-ups. While the others groaned and nursed the aches in their joints, the Autobot Longarm feigned his exhaustion--he had been through his training many stellar cycles ago.

The smaller, green-schemed bot turned his pointed head towards Longarm and another Autobot, Ironhide. “Who’s up for a couple cubes of energon? I could use an overcharge…” His vocal expression was biting and almost as loud as Sentinel’s. While Ironhide nodded in response, Longarm opened his mouth to politely decline; however--

“Hey, can I come, guys?” The interruption was a pleasant pang against Longarm’s audio receptors. A yellow frame around a face of gray, ignorant and delusional; the same mold as the green Wasp standing between them. Weak, obtuse, no immediate threat--he was only of concern due to his dodgy suspicion. Shockwave’s superior deduction processes deemed this only an opportunity to sway all potential suspicion onto a different target; he had not even informed his Lord, so trivial the matter was.

Somewhere a gaffe had been made within his meticulous arrangements. Despite all of Shockwave’s logical prowess, through all of his seamless successes, this minute, seemingly insignificant oil splotch in his path was proving more of an obstacle than he had initially construed.

His internal circuitry seized and the whirring in his audio drowned the rest of Cybertron in an indefinable blur. Playful blue optics met his own false pair and he felt as if his energon had drained into the bottoms of his feet.

This one was called Bumblebee.

“He must be malfunctioning,” Wasp patronized, addressing Ironhide and Longarm rather than the bot at whom he was looking. “There must be some serious glitch with his central processor. He thinks he can come with us. Ha!” Wasp laughed vindictively while Ironhide guffawed out of tune.

Their quarry’s gaze became uncertain by an inch, wavering between Wasp and Longarm. His blue optics pleaded for assistance, welling up and attempting to forge a connection with Longarm, the bot who had aided him before, the one who possibly cared--but Bumblebee was foolish in his assumptions. Longarm could not offer any help here--what was Bumblebee up to? He wanted to keep an eye on the ‘traitor,’ no doubt, but this was the wrong way to go about it, and Longarm was not about to help Bumblebee further both his and Shockwave’s predicaments--and to make this perfectly lucid, Longarm looked away from Bumblebee and towards Wasp.

“I’m afraid I can’t accept, Wasp. I have a few… things to take care of, back in my unit.” Perfect procedure. Longarm carefully avoided allowing his optics to stray as Wasp turned to reply.

“What? You sure?” Wasp gave an inquisitive look, and Longarm nodded curtly in response. “Whatever drives your alt. mode,” he shrugged, turning and leaning in towards Bumblebee. “That doesn’t mean you can come. Stay out of our way, gear-grinder.” With that, Wasp shoved Bumblebee to the side, making way for himself and Ironhide to trudge past, chuckling with their chins in the air. The yellow bot wavered, physically balanced but unable to settle the disparity of what had just happened. Longarm could read it all in the back of his head, Bumblebee’s gaze lingering after Wasp…

“Why didn’t you help me?”

Longarm realized he had not moved, apparently too fascinated with Bumblebee’s recovery from humiliation to register his opportunity to depart. The smaller bot now looked up at him with an injured expression, translucent through every aspect, so pathetically obvious it was impossible to ignore. And he found himself somewhere he had never been before: no words of logic jumped to his mouthplate, nothing feasible manifested at his vocal circuits, nothing turned in his central processor. Finally, he managed to turn away and in the direction of his unit.

“I have prior obligations to take care of,” he muttered and walked off.

***

He was surprised. Logistically, Bumblebee should have followed him. Such behavior was hardwired into Bumblebee’s system: he would put up a fight; he would adamantly search for a sufficient response. Bumblebee was not the type of bot that would lean over and give up.

Longarm entered his assigned bay alone, a small berth consisting of the very crudest necessities a transformer needed for his stay at Autobot boot camp. The provisions were considerably more generous than those provided to Decepticons, which only made for weaker, less resourceful soldiers. The dark walls seemed to ease in around the husky transformer; his large shoulders, constructed of angled treads, barely fit within the space unoccupied by the recharge panel. The scarce illumination tickled Longarm’s pale color scheme with faint purples, and his blue optics were stars too far away to matter.

The metal plating of Longarm’s chassis shifted beneath the stark air, and his wheels churned while his body structure stretched. He manipulated the shadows; the latched component in front of his face snapped and retracted to the sides of his head, arching like horns while his face fell apart. What was left was the red lens, and where it had once been a lifeless feature on his forehead, it was now the only feature of his faceplate. One dim glimmer slithered into its cold, crimson surface, and he was Shockwave.

“Shockwave to Lord Megatron.” He spoke into a servo-held communications device, clutched in his newly revealed claws. The screen flickered to life, and an image of the Decepticon leader illuminated the pointed, purple symbol on Shockwave’s chest.

“Ah, my loyal spy-bot… What news of the Autobots do you have for me?” His voice trickled through the speakers, throaty and articulate.

Initially, Shockwave had not planned to bother his leader with the trivial information of a young bot’s suspicions--no one would believe such a fool, especially one who was so malleable. Things had changed, however, and Shockwave needed direction. The troubles he was experiencing as Longarm only scrambled his central circuitry. “A cadet here has suspicions of a Decepticon spy. He does not believe it is me. Something has led him into thinking it is another cadet. I do not know how long this can go on, my Lord…” Shockwave felt his words tangle just as they were leaving his vocal processor, and speaking to his leader in this way made his confusion more apparent. However stagnant his appearance was, his verbalization was betraying him.

“Someone is on to you?” Lord Megatron sounded disappointed at best. “This must be managed carefully, my spy.” Something in his leader’s voice told Shockwave that he was not being underestimated; Lord Megatron knew that Shockwave had been attempting to handle this. “You must discreetly and completely eliminate any mistrust, Shockwave. Completely eliminate.”

“Longarm?”

Shockwave turned, eye glowing, towards the entrance to his unit sliding open--within the next nanoclik, Shockwave’s line with his leader had been terminated, and the Autobot Longarm was the only occupant of the berth.

Bumblebee peeked through the open threshold. “Hi, Longarm…”

His entrance was too uncanny--he was acting nervous, an unconvincing smile on his faceplate, and by some idea that Shockwave did not understand. Shockwave only knew one other time Bumblebee had acted this way; when Longarm had ’rescued’ him, retrieved his severed legs and in the same moment, he had kissed him… but it conflicted with how Bumblebee’s behavior corresponded with Wasp, and he did not care to calculate much farther than that.

“Hello, Bumblebee. What is it... you want?” He remained as neutral as possible despite his being cornered within his own unit.

“I wanted to talk to you.” Bumblebee frowned. “Why are you ignoring me? ” The tone of Bumblebee’s vocal processor fluctuated, and Shockwave detected confusion and impatience. Longarm was not sure how to respond. How was Shockwave to handle a bot who was emotionally motivated? Shockwave dealt with logic and intelligence. He was not one to get involved in trivial matters. Longarm, however, felt something within his core surging online. “Ever since that kiss… I thought we could be... friends. ” His voice twitched aggressively.

Bumblebee wouldn’t look at Longarm, but Longarm couldn’t take his visual processors off Bumblebee. His smooth helmet, his large optics, his innocent color. He did not know what it was that drew him to the Autobot, or why, how…

“No, Bumblebee.” He sounded more certain than he felt. “That was… a mistake.” He spoke matter-of-factly, a truth for which he was grateful.

“Then why did you do it?” Bumblebee lifted his sore optics and stared at Longarm. “Why did you kiss me?” The intensity of his voice grew with the heat in his syllables. “First Wasp, now you…” He was so shameless in his argument, so demanding, it took Longarm by his vital circuits. Everything he could read in Bumblebee’s faceplate Bumblebee was saying outright, and it surprised him. He was foolish, stupid, crossing lines he couldn‘t back-track. He was fascinating, for one reason or another. “I like you, Longarm.” Utterly shameless, “You… you liked me…” it made the room feel hot and stale and his insides were spinning, “I know you di…” Bumblebee‘s voice faded, and something dawned on his gray features just before he leaned in and kissed him.

Every other inch of Longarm was burning reticently, but his mouthplate was occupied and happy. The electric glow of Longarm’s eyes pasted the same hue over Bumblebee’s head, turned sideways to reach his mouth. There was a minute amount of pressure on his lips, never asking too much. A hand had crawled onto Longarm’s chest, yellow fingers poised and delicate. Needy, the same as the expression around Bumblebee’s closed optics, same as the hint of pink in his cheek. Longarm’s lack of response did not discourage Bumblebee: Longarm felt more pressure against his unmoving mouth plate; there was desperation, but nothing unpleasant.

He felt as if he were the farthest thing from Shockwave. He was no longer cold, unforgiving, relentless, calculating. He was not scrutinizing and malevolent; he was not on a mission under the leader of the Decepticons. He did not experience the familiar pacing of his spark, but rather a strange throbbing that pulsated to the tips of his digits. He was… temperate. By means within him Shockwave had never known, Longarm felt warmth. It wasn’t the whirring in his audios, or the tingle of the nerves along his chassis--he had experienced this the first time, but he hadn’t felt this way. The air seeping through his vents did nothing to affect the heat building; it was fluttery and at the same time, it was heavy; it was numbers that didn’t make sense.

It was his spark. Inspection systems reported the activity within his chassis, but that was all: no cause, no calculations, nothing Shockwave could interpret.

He grabbed Bumblebee’s wrist. A gesture powered by another surprise, something Shockwave didn’t have the time to understand; he pushed forward, offlining his optics and securing his own lips on Bumblebee’s kiss. He felt a muffled noise shift beneath his mouthplate, and their chest plating scraped against each other as they moved together.

“Longarm,” Bumblebee’s voice synthesizer was high-pitched and bright within the compact berth. He had moved his lips away and his optics were glowing.

“Don’t talk, Bumblebee,” he muttered, feeling the wrist within his servo and unwilling to lose it. The lids over his optics felt heavy with steam that should have been pouring from his armature’s vents. He did not know what was going on, what was wrong, and he decided that he did not want to.

“But…” the corner of Bumblebee’s mouth, sodden with a strange contentedness, curled up coyly. “Your mouth guard… It’s…” He looked at Longarm with a face that was both amused and pleading. When Longarm only returned the expression, too occupied with what had just transpired to lend any thought, Bumblebee continued. “Could you move it?”

Shockwave stuttered: where did Bumblebee receive the notion that he could transform his appearance beyond that of his namesake and his alternate mode? “I, uh…”

“I thought maybe you could lower it, or--or something.” Bumblebee’s grin, only a hint of bashfulness in his optics, fed the energy churning within Longarm’s spark. His mental processes were befuddled within these strange events, and he felt like putty beneath Bumblebee’s touch.

“Ah.” Longarm stated, feeling safe enough to promptly lower the component from in front of his mouth.

Bumblebee breathed a chuckle, and his appealing visage neared Longarm once again. Although he was expecting it this time, Longarm still felt as if his internal functions had seized. It was only after Bumblebee’s lips tapped his own that he grasped his feelings, but before he could do so much as return the gesture, Bumblebee was running his hand down Longarm’s front and pressing himself closer, there was something rubbing against the inside of his piston, he felt jumpy, overwhelming tingling sensations--

“Bumblebee.” Longarm had pushed the smaller bot away before he had realized what he was doing. Bumblebee stared up at him wordlessly, then quickly averted his optics.

“I’m sorry Longarm, I shouldn’t have, I should…” he stumbled, blushing furiously and turning away. “Go.”

Longarm did not respond. He gazed at Bumblebee, detecting the bot’s guilt for his impulsiveness. Typical of a young, innocent Autobot. Bumblebee glanced over his shoulder.

“See you tomorrow,” he said, ever hopeful in his remark. Longarm nodded, partially in an attempt to hide the color he felt in his cheeks. This fueled Bumblebee’s parting smile, and after one lingering moment, he disappeared behind the unit’s closing hatch.

He felt something near sympathy for the yellow transformer. Bumblebee’s proceedings had been understandable (and amateur) , but while Shockwave was an older bot, he had never engaged in a romantic relationship. His life had never called for it, never deemed such nonsense as necessary. He was a bona fide Decepticon, something cold and unforgiving. Something only devoted to the goals of his leader, nothing more and nothing less. He was inexperienced when it came to any type of social relationship that didn’t include threats or manipulation; he was wary of friendly advances.

Perhaps this small conflict would make killing Bumblebee easier.


Woo, writing this was tough. Robots are hard D: I wanted to have two different shots as I wanted to show two parts of Longarm/Shockwave. I know I already had surprised-ish Longarm in my last pic, but whatever they're kissing this time. Um, pseudo-screenshot, but a little higher quality?

A very very very veryyy HUUUUGE thanks to these very wonderful people!!:








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