Work Text:
Deadlock, newly Drift, never felt quite so much like a petrorabbit among the turbofoxes as he did standing in the cargo bay of the Wrecker flagship, with big bruisers and ‘Con-killers like Springer and Whirl eyeing him up like, well, like a ‘Con. He shifted his weight, resting it on one foot and cocking a hip, shocked anew when the frame glided into the new position almost before he’d thought about it, without a single stuck gear or stiff servo to impede the movement. It was unnerving, more than anything. He’d never in his life moved like this; not after any of his upgrades, not after the finest frame that Megatron could get for him. Not even off the assembly line, number two hundred and fifty one out of two hundred and fifty and full of cut corners and other people’s negligence, had his frame felt so freshly oiled and responsive. It was like - it felt like the Circle of Light had given him a work of art rather than a frame refit. He was afraid he was going to get it dirty.
The Wreckers were going about their business, sort of, preparing the ship for takeoff, but Drift could feel their optics on him as they moved around him, and Roadbuster wasn’t even subtle as he leant in close to Perceptor to say... something , about him. Kup had held off assigning him too many duties in the running of the ship, so as not to rub their noses in it, he’d admitted, but Drift hated just standing around looking pretty like this; always had.
“...ucky we came when we did, kid.” There was Kup, coming up the entry ramp now, trailed by a brightly coloured speed frame at his heels, gesturing angrily about something Drift hadn’t heard. The ramp slowly raised itself behind them.
“Spare me!” The little mech… exploded, yes, that was the word, exploded, throwing his arms up in an expansively violent gesture, on tip-toe so he could lean right into Kup’s face. He had a bright, rich red frame with yellow accents and a yellow spoiler, flared out and quivering at the tips like Starscream’s wings always had, just before challenging Megatron. “You think I don’t know that?”
“Seems like you don’t, Hot Rod,” Kup replied, gazing down at the enraged face in front of him impassively. “Seems like you have some kind of death wish, to me, Hot Rod, wandering about alone on the Outer Rim like that when I know for a fact you got the brief about Bludgeon and crew being out a-hunting.”
Hot Rod huffed, crossing his arms. The yellow spoiler stayed upright, quivering at the tips. “You got something to say about it?”
“Yeah,” Kup said, staring him down without a flinch, “that you never used to be this stupid .”
“Oh, I’m stupid?” Hot Rod asked incredulously, recoiling slightly. “ I’m stupid? What do you call that ?” He jabbed an accusing hand in Drift’s direction.
Drift froze up, his oil-soft joints sliding up smoothly into battle-ready without him even thinking about it, his hand darting to his now non-existent holster and being met only with the hilt of his new blade.
“That’s Drift.” Kup sighed, as if dealing with an unruly youngling. “He’s new.”
“ Drift ?”
“Looking forward to working with you,” Drift called over, waving a hand in greeting. The other stayed on his hilt; a habit of a lifetime that was proving impossible to break. Hot Rod’s scowl did not lift. He gave Drift a quick once-over with a distinctly unimpressed look in his optic that immediately got Drift’s back up, his plating fluffing outward.
“Seriously?” Hot Rod looked back up at Kup, scowling.
Drift knew how it went from here - he’d lost count of the amount of times he’d heard everything Hot Rod was about to say. ‘I’m not working with a Decepticon’, he’d say, or ‘people like you belong in Garrus-9’, or maybe even a simple ‘get fragged’. He was tired of hearing it. He’d known, okay, that it would be hard to be there, perhaps the hardest thing he’d ever have to do, but this was a different kind of hard. The slow chipping away at his spirit, it got to him - other mechs around him repeating everything he said to himself during a long, slow night cycle when recharge was a little slow in coming. He’d stand there smiling placidly and take it and then repeat it to himself over and over when he meditated the next day. He could take whatever Hot Rod dished out - he was an expert, after all - but somehow through all the uncomfortable and borderline hostile introductions Kup had made for him he’d never given up the hope that the next mech might be different.
“What the frag, Kup?” Hot Rod demanded. “What in the pit is going on here? I thought you knew better than this!”
“Drift is a fine soldier-”
“He’s a ‘Con is what he is!” Hot Rod didn’t let Kup reply. “You really think that just because he’s put a sword on instead of a pistol he’s changed? Maybe it’s you that’s got stupid.”
Kup was a great mech; a fine soldier and a commander of vision, and he’d shown Drift mercy when his team around him were baying for energon, when he would have been in his rights to separate him from his spark right there and then and have done with it, and Drift couldn’t stand to see him spoken to like this. His spark felt all hot and full and angry, his hand curling and uncurling around the hilt of his blade.
“Don’t talk to Kup like that,” he said quietly.
Hot Rod heard him anyway.
“You got something to say?” He snapped, whirling round to face Drift. “Say it.”
“I said-” Drift spoke louder, barely able to hear himself over the roaring in his audials “-don’t talk to Kup like that.”
“I’ll talk to Kup how I like, thanks,” Hot Rod sneered, “he’s my commander. As in not yours .”
Drift took a step forward, the pounding of his energon louder, his plating flaring out wide and threatening.
“Then you should show him some respect,” he said. Hot Rod took his own step forward, his plating rippling too, his spoiler standing to attention.
“Drift!” Kup barked. “Not that I’m not touched, but-”
“You going to make me?” Hot Rod asked, backed with a low, throttling growl of his engine. He was never going to win that one. Drift revved his larger engine right back. “You going to get that big sword out and make me show respect, Deadlock? Go on! Show everyone what you’re like!”
“Hot Rod.” Kup tried the little speedster this time. “This is saying a lot more about you than it is about him.”
“If it was up to me,” Drift said, through a curled lip, “I’d throw you out the nearest airlock, and it would not be hard , but it’s up to Kup .”
“As if!” Hot Rod snorted.
A tiny little voice in the back of his processor was telling him to ‘ pause before the action and feel your spark pulse, appreciating the flow of energon through your processor and frame’ , to ‘ count each pulse and ask yourself whether the action is worth disrupting such beautiful equilibrium’ , that sounded a lot like Wing, but Primus did it feel good to ignore it for once, to follow the thought through to its natural conclusion, to the violence, to defend himself and his commander, to do what he was best at .
“I’d cut you down to size in a spark-pulse if he gave me the go ahead,” Drift growled, “except it looks like someone already did.”
Hot Rod yelled wordlessly in rage and lunged at him, and Drift drew his sword, his energon singing with satisfaction in his lines, all his struts and servos aligned in service of his truest purpose. Hot Rod ducked under the blade, going for the legs, and Drift was about to whirl when Hot Rod was snatched out of the air right in front of him. His blade stopped mid-air, quivering.
“Springer!” Kup barked. “Remove Hot Rod from the situation!”
“Yes, sir,” Springer acknowledged, holding Hot Rod with his arms hooked underneath his armpits. Hot Rod’s legs dangled off the floor. He aimed an angry kick in Drift’s direction anyway.
“Get the frag off me, Springer!” Hot Rod spat.
“Are you going to just go and get yourself sliced in half if I do, though?” Springer asked.
“Yes,” Hot Rod growled.
“Leave it,” came a sharp command from Drift’s side, and he turned to see Kup, resting a warning hand atop his blade. He suddenly felt very ashamed.
“You’re going to regret this, Kup!” Hot Rod near-shrieked, as Springer carried him out of the hangar. “He’s a ‘Con! They don’t change! You can’t trust him! ”
Each desperate phrase spat at him felt like Hot Rod actually had slipped under his guard and struck him; one to the abdomen there, another to the ankle struts, ‘you can’t trust him’ a slap in the face. As Springer and Hot Rod disappeared further into the ship Kup let go of his blade and it slowly dropped to his side, all his aggression suddenly halted in its tracks. The hangar was totally silent - even Whirl had nothing to say. Drift could feel their optics on him. His plating fluttered like he was trying to dislodge something physical.
“Drift, I’m…” Kup tried to say.
“It’s fine,” Drift said shortly.
“Oh, Drift .” The look in his optics was unbearably fond. Drift had to look away.
“I’m not made of glass, Kup,” Drift insisted. “If I couldn’t handle a couple of accusations thrown my way I would never have put this badge on.” The fact he still couldn’t meet Kup’s gaze was immaterial.
“From him , though,” Kup said. “It’s not like him. If I’d known he’d react like that I would have…” he sighed “...I don’t know, Drift. Kept you apart for longer.”
“I’m sorry,” Drift said. He hilted his blade again, the soft singing of metal against metal sliding back home the signal to his stressed and raging systems to stand down; there would be no more violence today.
“ You’re sorry?” Kup asked.
“I provoked him,” Drift admitted quietly. “I promised Wing I wouldn’t be that mech anymore, but I drew my sword almost as soon as he confronted me. I…” he broke off, flaring his vents and cycling in as he waited for his vocaliser to stabilise. “It’s really hard, Kup.”
“I know, Drift.” Kup gripped his shoulder firmly, giving it a companionable squeeze, rocking him slightly back and forth in the way he might when interacting with Springer or Roadbuster after a battle. Drift’s hand went up to hold him there.
“I knew it would be,” Drift said. “I knew, but...”
He squeezed Kup’s hand.
“I’ll talk to him,” Kup promised.
“You don’t have to,” Drift protested. Kup sighed.
“I will,” he said, “because that’s my job while you’re under my command, alright?” He shook Drift’s shoulder once more, then let go, slipping his hand out from under Drift’s and leaving him holding onto his own bare shoulder. Somehow, it felt a little cold. “He won’t bother you for the rest of the night.”
“I… thank you,” Drift said helplessly. He let his hand fall from his shoulder, slowly.
“You going to be alright if I leave?” Kup asked him. “I don’t want to leave Springer with him too long.”
“...Yes?” Drift answered after a moment of thought, then winced. It had come out more like a question than anything. Kup peered closely at his faceplates, and Drift glanced away, avoiding direct optic contact.
“Are you sure?” Kup pressed.
“Yes!” Drift insisted. “I’ll head back to my hab.”
“Get your processor right,” Kup agreed. “Good idea.” He patted Drift once more on the shoulder, a quick and companionable tap-tap that Drift had almost come to rely on, and headed out.
“Perceptor - you have the bridge.” He tossed out an order as he walked out of the hangar, given almost offhandedly with the unshakeable confidence of a true sparked leader. Perceptor nodded, before his optics slid involuntarily back to rest on Drift.
They were all still looking at him. His plating crawled with it, and he felt a fierce and sudden longing for the trusty armour of Deadlock, who had been a mech that thrived on the attention of others whether positive or negative. Drift’s plating clamped tightly down around his internal mechanisms. That mech seemed like another being entirely, now.
Finally, Whirl broke the silence.
“Wow,” he crowed. “That was awesome.” Drift sighed.
“Shut the fuck up, Whirl,” he said.
-
Now flare your plating, letting the cool air flow over your internal mechanisms. Feel it whisking away the heat of your anger. Let it replace rage and fear with tranquility and contentment.
Drift flared his plating, both hands on the Great Sword resting in his lap. He felt the air flow, running briefly with the rush of his energon towards his engine before breaking off into an eddying swirl across his abdomen, but he struggled to shut down the part of his processor that wouldn’t stop worrying over the Hot Rod problem.
Show everyone what you’re like , Hot Rod had said, and Drift had . He’d withstood so much anger in his short time with the Autobots, ignored so many hostile glances and casual sneers by retreating to that little section of his processor he kept everything Wing had taught him in, and for it to have stopped working was frightening.
Appreciate your frame, appreciate that you’re alive. No, not like that, Drift.
He smiled.
Appreciate the miracles of engineering that make you possible. The well-oiled struts that let you pounce, and fight; the speed of your processor; the spark at the centre of it all.
He ran a gentle finger along the blade of the great sword, feeling his own EM field buzz against and displace the limited field the sword projected. He took another deep invent, feeling the air flow underneath the seams of his armour, cooling sensitive inner systems, like Wing had taught him to.
What would Wing say? Would he be proud, if he saw him right now? When he swallowed back down the biting retorts that came so naturally, he did it for Wing. When he stayed his new blade, wishing for hot metal and gunpowder at his fingertips instead, he did that for Wing, too. Would he see how desperately he was trying to be good?
The air against his stressed systems was nice, he thought, and now he’d taken the time to notice the way his frame handled his energon - especially in this beautiful new body - it was pretty cool, but none of it added up to that tranquility and sureness of purpose Wing had possessed.
The rage was still there, the urge to bite and snap and attack and ask questions later, or never; every time someone spoke to him like he was the dirt they’d scrape out of their treads he wanted to deal with it the Decepticon way. All he wanted was Wing, there, so he could ask does it ever get easier , but he had the horrible sinking feeling, clenching at his spark in the night and the quiet, that it never did , and he’d be stuck in this limbo of half Drift-half Deadlock forever, and—
“Um.” A voice broke through the cycling self-loathing, and Drift onlined his optics. His hand tightened on the hilt of the Great Sword.
“Hi,” said Hot Rod sheepishly, shifting his weight lightly from foot to foot. The tension in his frame would have been visible from orbit.
“...hi?” Drift said warily.
“Yeahhhhhhhhhh,” the little racer said. His optics danced about, darting briefly over Drift’s face and his blade resting in his lap before settling somewhere to the left of the tip of his finial. “Listen, Kup said I should…”
“I don’t want to hear it if you’re only saying it because Kup told you to,” Drift said sharply. Hot Rod’s optics flickered briefly back to his face again, before bouncing off like a magnet from an opposing pole.
“I’m not!” Hot Rod protested, his hands fluttering nervously by his sides. “I mean, he did tell me to, but he was right!”
“Say it to my face, then,” Drift challenged.
Hot Rod nodded, visibly steeling himself. He took a deep invent, flaring all his plating out at once before tucking it back in close against his frame again, locking his trembling seams down flat. His spoiler perked up and stood at attention in a way that - although he’d never seen that particular angle on Starscream - made Drift sure that Hot Rod must have learnt at least some wing language at some point in his functioning. Taking another steadying invent, he shuttered his optics for just a moment. When he onlined them again, he was looking Drift in the eye.
“I’m sorry,” he said, “I let my feelings get the better of me and cloud my judgement before I knew you.” He shuffled on his feet, adjusting his stance, but didn’t let his gaze drop. “Everyone deserves a second chance, and it sounds like you’ve claimed yours.”
“Oh,” Drift said, genuinely taken aback.
Hot Rod looked at him hopefully.
“I… thank you?” Drift offered. Hot Rod smiled gratefully. It lit up his whole face.
“I promise I’m not usually like that,” he said, “it’s just- there was a double agent in my squad, and…” He broke off, his expression going sharp and painful at the edges.
“You don’t have to explain,” Drift insisted hurriedly. “The fact that you wanted to apologise…” and this time Drift found himself avoiding Hot Rod’s gaze, almost uncomfortable with such expressive faceplates “...it means a lot.”
“Good,” Hot Rod said, the relief palpable in his voice.
“So, uh, thanks,” Drift said awkwardly.
“Yeah,” Hot Rod replied.
They stared at each other. Hot Rod’s optics were very blue.
“I’m sorry too!” Drift blurted out.
“What for?” Hot Rod frowned.
“You might have started it but, well...” Drift looked down at the blade still lying across his lap - Wing’s blade, that he’d sworn to treat with respect— “... I was ready to finish it. I don’t want to be that mech anymore.”
Hot Rod snorted.
“You were just trying to stop me from bad-mouthing Kup, that’s not bad,” he said, dismissing Drift’s concerns out of hand. “Nobody would blame you for that.”
Drift just looked at him; couldn’t do anything else. He really looked like he meant it, too, with his big blue optics wide and beguiling and honest. Drift wondered how he’d even made it through the war, with his every thought written across his faceplates like that. Any Decepticon worth their oil would have had that beaten out of them within the first century. Of course, he thought ruefully, the underlying rage inherent in ‘Con culture was probably one of those great glaring signs he was on the wrong side that he should have noticed before he’d spent four million years as a violent mercenary, but they always said hindsight was a glitch.
“I’m guessing you haven’t had the opportunity to observe a lot of Decepticon defectors in their natural environment,” Drift said.
“Huh?” Hot Rod asked.
“Look around you,” Drift said softly. “ Look .” He offlined his optics, already knowing what Hot Rod would see; Roadbuster taking his shift on comms, his optics darting between the controls and Drift and Hot Rod’s conversation; Springer standing by a bundle of wires protruding from an open door panel with his arms folded, not even pretending to look at it. Drift often wondered if they thought he didn’t notice they stationed an extra crew member in the hangar when he was there, or if they just didn’t care.
When he looked back up at Hot Rod, the little racer looked stricken.
“That’s not fair,” he exclaimed. “You’re just sitting here!”
“It’s fair,” Drift said. “I’ve killed a lot of people.”
“So have I,” Hot Rod retorted. “So has Roadbuster; so has Springer.”
“That’s different,” Drift said automatically.
“Is it?” Hot Rod asked.
“I…” Drift started, and then stopped. It was different, he knew it was different. Only, in the face of Hot Rod’s immediate and instinctual denial, he wasn’t quite sure why. He sneaked a glance at Springer, over by the door, studying him and Hot Rod interacting with shameless hostility. Springer had been just as big a name to the Decepticons as Deadlock had been to the Autobots.
“It’s different,” Drift insisted. Hot Rod smiled sadly down at him.
“Okay,” he said gently, “okay,” and Drift, energon rushing faster through his lines at the simple compassion in Hot Rod’s bright optics, had to glance away.
The blade resting across his lap glinted too, as if in agreement - but what would either of them know? As if they had been there in the dark with him, taking joy in the energon he spilled; as if they had ever been in the face of Megatron’s steel-edge fury and smouldering approval; seen the cities burn beneath their feet.
“Okay, come on, no,” said Hot Rod, shifting in his upper peripheral and sinking down onto his knees in front of Drift. “Hold on, let me just…”
He leant to the side on one hand, shuffling his legs underneath himself and round until he was sat with his legs folded in lotus, mirroring Drift.
“... aaaand there,” he announced, with a satisfied little wiggle. “So, what are we doing down here?”
“Down here?” said Drift. “I’m meditating.”
“Oh, cool,” said Hot Rod. “How does it work?”
Drift just stared at him, not quite parsing what he meant.
“I mean,” Hot Rod tried again, “do you just-” he offlined his optics and made a complicated gesture with his hands in front of his chest, humming lowly, “-like that?” He onlined his left optic to take a peek at Drift’s reaction.
“You want to… meditate with me?” Drift asked. None of the other wreckers had asked what he was doing when he took up his place in the hangar and laid his blade over his lap, not the first time or any of the other times after that.
“Yeah!” Hot Rod grinned enthusiastically, and Drift couldn’t help but smile in return. The contrast between Hot Rod’s genuine excitement and Deadlock’s first halting - and if he was honest, openly hostile - lessons with Wing was so blatant it would have been called ‘thematically obvious’ by any network serial critic worth his oil. He hoped he didn’t disappoint.
“I’ve never led meditation before,” Drift admitted, all in a nervous rush.
Hot Rod made a great show of looking over both shoulders before leaning in conspiratorially. As if drawn by a magnetic attraction, Drift couldn’t help but lean in to meet him.
“I’ve never learnt meditation before,” he confessed, very seriously. “I won’t tell if you won’t?”
Hastily stifling a giggle, Drift sat back and tried to school his faceplates into at least some semblance of Circle of Light tranquility.
“That is… acceptable,” he intoned.
“Awesome,” Hot Rod agreed. “Do your thing.”
From their very first lesson together, despite Deadlock’s snarling, spitting resistance, Wing’s teaching had done nothing less than change his life. Drift wasn’t sure if his ‘thing’ was going to be anywhere near the same aerodrome as that.
“Alright,” Drift said, “alright. I’ll do my thing.”
What was his thing?
“Loving it so far,” Hot Rod said, after a moment. Drift winced.
“I’ll start with the same question my teacher asked me,” he decided. “What is meditation?”
Fuck you , Deadlock had said.
“Uh, it’s like humming and stuff,” Hot Rod said, his face screwed up in thought. “You sit and concentrate for ages - or do you not think of anything? - and then it makes you… something. I don’t know. Calmer?”
“Nice!” Drift praised, and Hot Rod beamed. “You pretty much have the gist of it. When I meditate, I’m looking to clear my mind and refocus on my goals, but you can do a lot with it. Some traditions might hum or chant or include gestures, but I don’t want to restrain my practice right now. That gesture you did-” Drift repeated it, drawing his open palms across his chest “-is Clavis Aurea. I could not even begin to guess where you learnt it.”
“Guy in my home city used to do it in my direction every time I came through his repair shop.” Hot Rod shrugged, and Drift tried and failed to swallow a smile.
“Must be a ward against evil.” Drift pretended to look thoughtful.
“Hey!” Hot Rod protested, but his optics sparkled with a mirth that let Drift know he wasn’t serious.
“It does me the most good when I meditate straight after battle,” Drift explained. “I find it so, so hard to switch out of that mindset-”
“Oh, yeah, I get that.”
“-so what I do when we get back to the ship is head straight for my quarters and spend some time taking care of my weaponry, cleaning the blade and focusing on my systems until I feel they’re working steadily enough for me to come back out.”
“It’s a beautiful blade,” Hot Rod mused, looking down at the Great Sword lain across Drift’s lap, but making no move to reach out and touch. “Why, though? I mean, why use a sword? You were always a gunner, before.” He winced, before hurriedly backtracking. “I mean, if you don’t mind me mentioning the uh, the before …”
“I don’t mind,” Drift said. “I did do it, after all.”
“Sorry,” Hot Rod said sheepishly. Drift smiled back, almost unable to help it.
“Not necessary,” he promised. “I use a sword because it’s harder, that’s all. It reminds me that killing shouldn’t be easy.”
“...right,” Hot Rod said softly after a moment.
“The one on my lap was my teacher’s blade.” He brushed a gentle thumb along the flat of it, fondly.
“Your meditation teacher?”
“Among other things,” said Drift. “Holding it, I feel connected to him and everything he taught me, so I tend to centre my meditation around it. You can use anything, really. I know of traditions that use rocks and crystals, an organic sect that will only meditate in the deepest heart of their forests. Wing even told me about an old tradition he’d heard of that believed one could only reach true enlightenment fifty feet above the ground.”
“And Wing, he was your..?” Hot Rod asked hesitantly.
“He taught me everything,” Drift confirmed, still smiling fondly. Wing had been so expressive as he described the Somnium Caelum and their struggles to reach the sky, so clearly in his element imparting knowledge, even to Deadlock - who had been determinedly pretending not to be interested at the time. “He was an amazing teacher. So patient.”
“I’m sorry,” Hot Rod said, reaching over to pat him consolingly on the knee, his blue optics open and sad. “He sounds like a great mech.”
“He was ,” Drift said emphatically. He reached a hand out and clasped Hot Rod’s, holding it against his plating. Hot Rod blinked up at him, probably wondering why he was stuck leant over and holding onto Drift’s knee. Drift hurriedly let go.
“Er, thank you,” he said awkwardly.
“Of course,” Hot Rod replied gently. So gently. Drift wondered, not for the first time or the last, what could have happened to his squad to turn this endlessly kind mech into the snarling and raging Hot Rod that he’d met last night, but he knew he didn’t have the right to ask.
“So, uh, what makes you want to meditate?” he wondered instead.
“Uh,” Hot Rod shuffled a bit, shifting his position. “Don’t really know. I guess… what you said about calming down after battle sounded appealing? Yeah, I’d like to calm down.” He rubbed at the back of his neck awkwardly. “I’ve never been good at that.”
“I was pretty bad at it when I first started,” Drift said. “Of course, that was because I was being made to be there, but I think I’ve got just the thing for you. Just… hold on oooooooone second…”
He held up a finger to wait and reached into his subspace with the other hand, grasping past his sword care kit and a spare cube of medical grade for his crystal collection.
“There!” he announced as he located and produced it for Hot Rod’s perusal. Hot Rod looked politely bemused. What was he…?
Drift removed the wrappings.
“Oh!” Hot Rod leaned right in, immediately interested. “Shiny!”
“There’s a few traditions that’ll use crystals as focus objects,” Drift explained, holding one up for Hot Rod’s examination. Hot Rod immediately took it, holding it up close to his optics and turning it over and over in his hands, feeling the contours of its edges and surfaces. “That that you’re holding right there - ah, please don’t lick it -”
Hot Rod froze, with his tongue hovering a couple of centimeters above the surface of the rock.
“Thank you,” Drift said. “Anyway, it’s a chunk of Feldspar from the surface of Theophany, where Wing taught me everything he… well, he taught me everything.”
“It’s… nice,” Hot Rod decided, looking up from his thorough examination that had so nearly involved taste. “I guess I expected I wouldn’t really feel anything, you know, but I like it? I couldn’t even tell you why, really.”
“Never underestimate the power that memories can give an object,” Drift told him. “When I hold it, I think about what learning feels like; having knowledge imparted on you by a passionate expert and having your understanding of the universe and your place in it changed in response. You might like to think about the same thing in your life. Who have you learnt from?”
Hot Rod looked suddenly panicked, turning a wide-eyed gaze on him.
“You don’t have to answer right now.” Drift chuckled. “I’m not intending to quiz you.”
Hot Rod relaxed visibly, his plating flaring and resettling.
“You said learnt and my processor went blank like I’ve never learnt anything in my life,” he babbled, all in a relieved rush. “Kup would probably say I haven’t.”
“Well, Kup is a wise mech,” Drift agreed.
“Cannot believe I apologised to you,” Hot Rod huffed. “You’re kinda mean.”
“Stop setting me up so well, then.” Drift grinned, and Hot Rod smiled back, Drift’s spark getting bigger with every mirthful inch further it stretched across his face until it was beating against his chestplates to get out.
“So… what now?” Hot Rod wondered, tossing the rock up and catching it in one hand. Drift winced internally, restraining himself from reaching out for it. It would not do to take away his trust like that. It would not feel good.
“I have this Feldspar, you have your sword, what do we do now?”
“Now,” said Drift, “we simply exist.”
“What the frag does that mean?” Hot Rod grumbled.
“You just sort of… sit with it, and let your thoughts flow where they may. You might want to offline your optics, you might want to keep them on.”
Hot Rod’s optics immediately went dark. Drift smiled, and followed suit. He didn’t need to be looking at Wing’s blade to know its every plane and edge as intimately as the workings of his own processor.
“The outside world doesn’t matter,” he continued. “Today your only concern is you. Feel the flow of your energon through your lines. Feel the air against your plating, and the minute adjustments your frame makes to keep you comfortable. Feel the working of your processor and the pulse of your spark keeping you alive. Inhabit this moment.”
Hot Rod’s plating flared and resettled audibly, and Drift repressed a smile. Thinking about nothing but how your frame felt always sent you twitching when you weren’t used to it.
“Now, think about the object in your hand,” he said. “Turn it over in your hands and think about the journey it took to get to where it is right now - the magma crystallising into rock, the explosion that loosened this chunk from the surface of Theophany and left it in my possession. Think about the journey you took to get here. What made you?”
Drift left the question hanging in the air between them. He wondered who had made Hot Rod; who out there had contributed to the kind of mech so determined not to let whatever betrayal he had gone through become a part of him? Were they still out there?
The mechs who had built Drift from the ground up had always shown a regrettable tendency to die on him - with one notable, infamous exception. Gasket, who had taught him to survive, caught in the crossfire of police brutality. Megatron, who had taught him to kill, still waging his terrible war on the galaxy. Wing, who had taught him to live again, cut down in front of him. He hoped his destiny as Hot Rod’s teacher wouldn’t take him down a similar road.
He onlined a single optic again and just about caught a glimpse of Hot Rod’s winking off again. Holding onto the Theophany Feldspar with a death grip, tension was evident throughout his frame.
“You know, you don’t have to-” Drift began.
“I can do it!” Hot Rod snapped, and gripped the rock harder. Drift sat back and grinned, already so, so fond. He couldn’t help but find Hot Rod’s determination charming, no matter how counterproductive it was for a mech trying to meditate.
His optics offline again, he half-relaxed, fully cognizant of the fact that he would not be reaching that meditative state he was striving for in this session with so much of his processor occupied by Hot Rod’s progress.
Hot Rod did not reach the meditative state while they sat there either, although Drift had not really expected him to on the first try. Every so often, he would shuffle about on his aft, trying to get comfortable, or huff, or flex some panel or other on his frame that was not providing him the ventilation it should have been. Drift found himself hyper-aware of his meditation partner’s systems as he sat with him, sensing the heat of his working engine ticking up ever so slightly as he passed through determination into frustration, and eventually lowering again as he hit boredom.
At one point, he quite shamelessly abandoned his revue entirely, instead watching the microexpressions that flitted across Hot Rod’s face as he concentrated, lost his train of thought and then hurriedly refocused himself again and again.
Despite his determination, Hot Rod was twitching and flexing his plating approximately once every twenty seconds by the time the shift pattern was over and Springer called out to him to come and help him in engineering.
What he actually said was ‘Rod, get off your aft,’ but Hot Rod’s optics flashed on and he chirped ‘coming!’ perfectly cheerily anyway, as if Springer had politely invited him for fine energon.
Turning back to face Drift, he shrugged, apologetic.
“Thanks,” he said, “really. That was…”
He stalled, mouth opening and closing aimlessly.
“Not for you, huh?” Drift ventured.
“ No .” Hot Rod deflated with a sigh of relief. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s fine, honestly.” Drift waved it off. “It’s not for everyone.”
“I really did try, I promise,” Hot Rod insisted. “I’ve always been terrible sitting still. Kup always says it’s like I’ve been hitting the rocket fuel.”
He groaned suddenly, burying his face in his hands.
“I was really trying,” he said quietly into his cupped palms.
“Hey, hey, it’s okay,” Drift promised. The hands moved, until Hot Rod was peeking out from between two fingers. “Sitting and concentrating just isn’t for you. That’s cool - we can try some exercises next time instead. I’ve got some great sword forms I could show you.”
“Sword forms?” Hot Rod perked up, his hands dropping into his lap and his optics going wide.
“I mean-” Drift paused, struck shy “-if you want there to be a next time?” He cringed.
“I’d like that.” Hot Rod beamed, and Drift felt the answering smile spread across his face without even thinking about it.
“Hot Rod!” Springer barked, making them both jump. Funny; Drift had forgotten he was there. He was usually hyper-aware of where the bulky triple-changer was at all times - old habits die hard - but today watching the microexpressions flitting across Hot Rod’s faceplates had absorbed all his attention.
Hot Rod rolled his optics as he got to his feet, and Drift hid a chuckle behind his hand as Springer glared at the pair of them like he knew he was laughing anyway.
“Coming, Springer,” Hot Rod grumbled. “You alright by yourself, Drift?”
“I think I’ll head to my hab in a moment,” Drift replied, taken aback but pleased nonetheless to be asked.
“Cool,” Hot Rod said as he turned to go. “Oh, by the way,” he suggested, almost as an afterthought, “want to go for a drive next time we’re planetside?”
“Oh! Uh… yes! Yes, I’d like that!” Drift babbled, finding himself quite flustered by the offer.
“You a racer?”
“I have been known to race, yes.” Drift glanced down, almost shyly. His current alt-mode was much faster than Deadlock’s heavier frame had been, but he still couldn’t help but be a little intimidated by that spoiler.
“Well then,” Hot Rod said, and Drift looked up just in time to catch another glimpse of that jewel-bright smile. “Race you.”
Drift found he wanted to do nothing more.