Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Maybe it was the way the mountain range casted shadows of jagged teeth though your bedroom window. Or perhaps it was the muted twinkles of the decade-long hobby you'd made out of collecting geodes. Or, maybe, just maybe - and this was a stretch, but - you were bored. Jasper, Nevada wasn't exactly the most magical place in the world, after all.

Whatever it was, you regretted it.

The spirit of vigor had nested itself within your heart late into the devils hour, and like a man possessed, you had thrown together your old rock-climbing gear and set out to explore the outdoors for the first time in God-knows. It whispered sweet nothings into your gullible ear, driving you forward in spite of better judgement;

Sleep is for the weak.

Some lie that was.

A late-night geology escapade was the last thing you needed after finally settling down into your rickety old country-side homestead, but then again, it was Jasper, fucking Nevada. Wasn't much else but rocks. Maybe the occasional tumbleweed.
Luckily for you, that was your métier. By that, you meant rocks, and by rocks, you did NOT mean sprawled on the uneven floor of a ravine long run dry, clutching an injured leg to your chest as you seethed with pain, but here you were anyway. The affliction was mild, think of it as getting hit in the shin with a brick covered in bubble-wrap and delicately slathered with velvety bath foam. That is to say, it's a damp, dull, but still very obtrusive pain, spreading out along your lower half like a spidery-web of fuck you.

This was a terrible idea, you were sure of that from the moment you stepped foot-one out of the safety of your domicile, but that inkling was merely reinforced after you lost anchorage of foot-two on the lip of the rocks you had been scaling, and now that you have time to sit and think over your current state of affairs, you were thrice certain that this was a terrible idea. Much like the rocks you so adored, you had shelved this hobby for a reason. The revelation drew from you a dry laugh birthed from cynical agony.

But your wallowing could wait, as your eyes - flitting across the coarse crags and rugged ledges - suddenly caught sight of something... glowing?

It was nestled within a narrow crevice that gradually got wider as it twisted to the left, tucked behind an intrusive rock that jutted forward, obscuring the point of interest almost entirely. Had it not been for the otherworldly glimmer emanating from it, you'd have overlooked it, lock, stock, and barrel.

It beckoned you closer, drawing you in with its non-sentient charms. You sucked in an unsteady breath, struggling upright and onto your feet, very much ignoring the pins-and-needles throbbing happening in your ankle.

The glow only seemed to get brighter as you closed the distance, and as you bent down, you could see a brilliant dazzle dance across the smooth, reflective surface. It looked somewhat akin to a wizard's staff, except mechanized and with pieces ranging from the width of a hair to the girth of your upper thigh slotting together in an arrangement both beautiful and complex. The only logical course of action now - you reasoned - would be to take it. It had been a while since you added to your collection of weird shit, but damn was this a fine specimen.

As you wrapped your fingers around the angular beauty - and with an effortful tug, broke the exotic cudgel free from its rocky prison - it suddenly sparked to life. Bearings gave way to rigorized movement, pinions turning with lifelike fluidity as the crown of the staff morphed from a localized prong to a roadmap of tines branched outward, thinning at the bottom, bulbous at the middle, before coming to frame a spherical ancillary. It resembled a clockwork flower, blossoming outward in a display of motorized splendor, lighting up with a whir as the soft glow bloomed into a cerulean smolder at your touch.

It was an exhilarating experience.

Hands gripped firmly around the spindle, you held it up with a triumphant heave, the movement so poised you felt imbued with the power of Merlin himself.

Good grace of God, this was a brilliant idea.

Evidently, said "God" did not appreciate his namesake being used in such a manner, as a sudden thunderous BOOM shook you from your eloquent victory bask.

You were tossed right on your ass, staff clattering beside you. Fuck, this was an earthquake, wasn't it?*

Nevermind, not so brilliant!

The entire cave shook as you scrambled to secure your cargo, because damn you if you didn't come out alive with the only thing that made this mistake of a trip worth it.

Another deafening boom reverberated throughout the cavernous gash in the side of the earth, the world rattling around you as you grit your teeth and squeezed your eyes shut, bracing in the only way you knew how as the tremors rapid-fired with less trigger discipline than a 12-year-old with a semi-automatic. Once, then twice, then once again.

In defiance, or maybe as a result of, the violent shudders brought you back to a much simpler time, the natural disasters exhibit of your local children's museum. You faintly recalled the morbidly dubbed "Earthquake Machine"; a small box no bigger than half a house, decorated with all intent to resemble an old historic bank. It worked just as you imagined, you walked inside, the entrance slammed shut, and you were stuck for the next 3-4 minutes inside a makeshift que, or maybe sitting on a bench, with however many people entered with you, being rattled as sounds of destruction played from the dingy overhead speakers, cheap lamplights flickering on and off to really immerse you in the dollar store experience you paid for on top of the $15 entrance fee.

In the throes of your muddled recollection, you made sure to note that no matter how rickety the ride got, the area of exposure for the synthesized earthquake never moved, it started beneath your feet and stayed beneath your feet. Your earthquake, however, seemed to originate in front of you, from somewhere beyond the cave - at least, at first. Then it got nastier. Each rumble closer (and louder) than the last, and it wasn't a cantankerous roar from below, it was steady, a rhythm; a heartbeat, almost. Or, worse yet, footsteps.

Holy fuck, was it moving?

What the fuck kind of an earthquake MOVES?!

Your brain was hollering at you, equal parts "GET UP AND GO!" and "BEG GOD FOR FORGIVENESS." Your muscles, however, couldn't seem to decide which option they were most privy to, haven chosen an unlisted third alternative; try and die mode.
You were petrified, stuck in your inky black self-conducted isolation chamber, as unmoving as the rocks you're pretty sure are about to bury you. Although that analogy didn't exactly work considering the amount of shaking the cave around you was doing.

Or.. did do. Did it finally stop?

The sudden stillness became painfully apparent, replaced by an unearthly thrum that seemed to waver before you. Whilst the earsplitting tremors from before proliferated the world encompassing, this pulsating murmur seeped into your bones, dying the marrow black with a fear of the unknown. Although the quaking ceased, you weren't so sure you liked the proxy.

Braving your horror, you opted for a quavery breath and the uncertain crack of eyelids, wincing as a deep purple light permeated your retinas and evoked a few, fluttery blinks. That's when it happened.

Your heart skipped a beat. In fact, you had half the mind to bet that it stopped beating altogether. What the fuck kind of an earthquake moves?

Apparently, one that isn't an earthquake at all.

Before you stood a massive, 8 meter tall behemoth, scintillating violet biolights running in thin strips up and down the body, radiating an ominous faint Byzantium glimmer. Despite the hulking size, it had a deliciously slender figure, one enough to make even the most Nymph-like models envious; broad chest with a criminally slender waist, gracile hips that end in long and willowy double-jointed legs that could put a baby deer to shame, gunmetal gray in color with mauve highlights that just worked to accentuate its mystifying complexion even more, on top of the voided screen in place of its face, and you're starting to sound weird now, aren't you?

Your questionable appreciation for this bizarre entity could wait, however, as it seemed it had endeavors that went beyond simultaneously captivating you and scaring the god-fearing shit out of you. It made a grab at you, lithe fingers outstretched. Instinctively, you rolled to the side (muscles be damned), narrowly escaping the seize of the metal beast.

Unfortunately, your "totally clutch" body-swerve wasn't enough to deter it, as it rebounded and raised its servos, before slamming down its second grabbing apparatus and effectively caging you beneath it. You tried to steel your nerves and embody the ferocity of the lioness you desperately needed to be, but the coughing fit you were sent into by the sudden up-chuck of dust, dirt, and gravel stifled what pathetic little you had left in ways of "ferocity."

What the fuck were you thinking, trying to intimidate a goddamn metal leviathan?!

It made another grab, except this time it hit home because instead of your face, the alkaline phalanges enveloped the gleaming staff cradled protectively in your arms and began to tug.
Which wasn't fair in the slightest because this thing was 20x your size and probably possessed the same accretion of strength and you had gone through too much shit just to get this mystical bad-boy stolen from you and quite frankly, FINDERS KEEPERS, BITCH!

With a sudden surge of indignation, you gripped the handle of the staff and drove it upward, the mordant tip piercing right through this faceless-fuck's hand in a move that left even you slightly impressed.

Your alien assailant recoiled with what you assumed was pain, if the symphonic rattling of metal plating and pained shudders were anything short of a calling-card. Strangely, though - well, as "strange" as a run-in with what your shit-brained mind could only rationalize as Robo-Jesus could get - the reaction was deathly silent. It lacked the definitive screams of pain, or any signs of palpable anguish beyond physical aversion. Could he (yes, he, because apparently now you were assigning gendered terms to Goliath-sized metal dickheads) even talk?

If you weren't currently staring into the face (face notwithstanding) of an impossibly imposing, looming, lucifer-lives-within-him very possible outsourced weapon of mass destruction sent from Hell to personally fuck you up, you'd perhaps chuckle. Laugh, even.

What kind of inextricably advanced, cognizant wretch lacked the ability to talk?

Your moment of humorous tour de force was short lived, however, as the self-aware pylon finally regained his bearings and blind-sided you with what appeared to be a serpentine, segmented violet-biolight-bedazzled tentacle and what the fuck? because that's ALSO not FAIR since not only did he have the advantage of being bigger, stronger, and arguably more agile than you, he had dexterous fucking tentacles withal and oh god, now you're in the air.

With a scream, you were hoisted unceremoniously 13 feet off the ground by the cybernetic clapper claw of Mr. Visor Vigilante, now dangling by the ankle. You'd like to tell yourself it was because of the mind-bending G-forces that you lost purchase on your outerworld trophy, and NOT because the cold sweat you had broken out with had given you a chronic case of "butterfingers". Be what it may, your beloved laurels fell out of your hands, and into the awaiting ones of Metal-Alloy-Asshole. The pained flinch the contact with the still-open wound elicited was almost enough to make up for the fact that he just committed the Brobdingnagian mech version of battery and mugging. Almost.

Speaking of hands, you were grasped tightly in the other flat palm of said giant mech, who spared you but a nonplussed, cursory glance, before enclosing his nimble digits around you like some kind of mutant vegetable strainer.

Coercing an exasperated sigh from your desiccated trachea, you admitted defeat and swallowed your pride. Pride that tasted noticeably acidic, pride that seemed - in spite of the adage - to be traveling up your throat instead of down, pride that you suddenly realized a little bit too late wasn't actually pride but rather bile because you now found yourself haphazardly sticking your head over the side of his servo and retching up the half-digested remnants of your dinner. It wasn't until after you finished your unflattering belching session that you noticed just how pants-shittingly high off the ground you were, whereupon you started dry-heaving like a cat choking on a hairball.

With no intent to vomit up your lunch in addition, you recede back into the grasp of your robot aggressor, finding his cage-like hold on you far preferable to contemplating death by splatter.

You had not an iota of what he planned to do with you nor where he planned to take you, but you'd be damn right to assume neither would evoke a desirable outcome. Thus began your glorious escape assay...

Otherwise, wildly thrashing and kicking and screaming your little human lungs out in a desperate last-ditch attempt to persuade him that you just ''weren't worth the hassle'' and drop you.
Well, maybe not drop you, but the picture was apparent.
Unfortunately, "Gigantor" seemed deadset on dragging you both kicking and screaming along with him.

In the middle of your throes, you noticed his visor light up and depict what you vaguely made out to be a diagram of some extraterrestrial calibration device, a polygonal mock-up of Earth, and a set of coordinates. Your coordinates. Or, more accurately, his coordinates, because evidently the universe still intended to fuck you sideways and do so with the revelational bitch-slap that was "Sweet Jesus this really WAS a massive alien, and he was currently contacting his equally massive alien MOTHERSHIP to come pick him up so he could probably probe you with his slightly-less-massive alien tech."

Or so you thought, because instead of a cinematic saucer descending from the skies as you had expected, there was a sudden rift in the air. Pellucid in nature but definitely tangible.

That was all you received in the way of warning before reality itself split in two with the ease of sundering fabric. Oscillating rings of light extending inward in a hallway-esque fashion erupted from the lesion, which lead you to the conclusion that this was some kind of manual wormhole.
Lord almighty, this guy could teleport.

And the manner that your captor glimpsed at you from the corner of his reflective eyeshade seemed to suggest he was expecting this sight to paralyze you into placid compliance.

However, massive alien master-race that has made child's-play out of quantum travel BE DAMNED because this display of outerworldly dominance purely motivated you to kick and scream HARDER.

Despite your valiant efforts (and much to his displeasure), your malicious jellyfish man didn't seem much dissuaded. If anything, the ruckus impelled him to shift gear into 6th; now striding into the domesticated portal.

Of that, not even a lifetimes' worth of cheesy sci-fi flics could prepare you for what came next, as - apparently - teleportation not only boasted fast travel, but also the molecular displacement of your fucking stomach.
It was an utterly gut-wrenching feeling, like being slammed into by a semi-truck of nausea.

Before you could upheave for the second time that night, though, you found yourself abruptly thrust ere a stupefied audience of ~2 other mechs, their scarlet optics gleaming at you scrutinizingly.

Owing to your instincts, you shied away - curling into the palm of the one responsible for presenting you so outwardly.

"Soundwave, what - pray tell,—"

The largest of the two cast his gaze upward, and if you weren't certain that your captor - or 'Soundwave' as he was so reprovingly dubbed thee by whom you're now going to call Asshole-Automaton #2 - had nothing to show as far as having a face goes, you'd be damn well sure he'd have Asshole-Automaton #2 optic sized holes burned right through it.

"— is this?"

The lilt in his voice was critical, with bands of muddled light glinting off his sizable shark-tooths and directly into your retinas as he spoke.

Before your Soundwave replied (that is, assuming he even could), the slightly shorter but just as bulky Asshole-Automaton #3 piped up, cold and calculating,

"It appears that Lieutenant Soundwave has provided us with an organic lifeform, native to this planet."

Asshole-Automaton #2 let out a bristled sigh amid clenched fangs. "Yes, Shockwave. I can see that. But the question still stands as to why."

"If I may, Lord Megatron-"

The, ironically, only robotic sounding robot on this entire vessel broached;

"It would be illogical to go without thoroughly analyzing the indigenous life... No matter how organic." He lingered on the word, almost as if tasting it, before spitting it out with disinterested ire.

You make a quick mental note that if you were to vomit again, you'd do so on his pedes.

Just as Shockwave finished droning about the potential of scientific conquest regarding yourself, you could've sworn you noticed a slight twitch of the digits entrapping you. In some laughably desperate corner of your mind, the prospect of this being a Freudian sign that your metal carrier subconsciously desired to protect you from whatever possibly inhumane and definitely inaliene experiment this robotic B. F. Skinner wanted to make you a vassal for, appeared.

But only for a moment. You shooed that musing to the very back of your cerebrum, - or rather, what remained of it - not wanting to dwell on the implications.

Thankfully, the universe decided to throw you a bone and grant you something else to mull over:

"Shockwave, ever the maverick. But, I must ask, if the research of these organics was imperative to our objective, would we not have already invested resources into such an endeavor?" Megatron professed, bestowing his predatory gaze upon the one-eyed oddity.

Well, okay, maybe you won't "mull over" this one.

"Fleshlings are useless to us, a young and immature species. We are to focus our efforts on Prime and his team, alone. Have I made myself clear?"

Despite Shockwave's distinct lack of a.. well, face to emote with, there was a second-long flash of something that you could vaguely make out to be disappointment within his singular optic. Alas, it was gone as soon as it appeared, leaving you wondering if the suffix "Wave" was always somehow related to facelessness and you, in your infinite stupidity, managed to forget.

Your "adjunct: lack of a face = appendix: wave" theory could wait, though, as your eyes were caught by the unoccupied servo of Silent-Shithead, which gestured towards the floor. You noticed almost instantly - blotches of blue liquid, a trail that led right to the pedes of Soundwave. Another droplet splattered to the floor, drawing your scrupulous stare to the fluid trickling from the still-gaping wound.

The other two came to the same spontaneous realization, a rapt hum arising from the indigo cyclops, his thin antennae perking up with interest.

Of the peanut gallery, Megatron spoke first, "How curious. You allowed yourself to be wounded by it? I cannot recall a time where you were so reckless, especially to be scathed by such a... lackluster little thing. Perhaps they truly are special."

You felt an involuntary shiver rattle through your figure as Megatron bent down to your level, blood-red, vulturine optics boring caustic holes into your very soul. Reflexively, you blenched, messily scrabbling to put as much distance between yourself and the bot who seemed hellbent on murdering you with his eyes.

His derma curled up in an irreverent sneer as he snorted out a half-formed bout of laughter.

Your face scrunched up with distaste as your senses were assaulted by the repugnant stench of o-zone and rot his out-venting exuded. Patently, you now had to account for not only the danger of being stepped on or otherwise crushed, but also the apparent yuck factor of Mega-Douche's million-year-old robot respiration.

"Or, perhaps not." He stood to his full height, making a dismissive wave with his left servo. You made the premature decision to brandish your middle finger and thumb to him in a crude gesture you hoped was not universal, lest you wished to unleash upon yourself what was most probably the Pandora's box of cybernetic horrors.

Thankfully, all it got you was the barely invested furrow of an all too well-defined robot brow. Seems these computerized cocksuckers aren't as omnipotent as they'd like you to believe. And maybe, just maybe, you'd get out of this shit-show alive.

"Shockwave, I entrust you with the immediate disposal of this vermin. And.. make it quick."

Or, maybe not.

Chapter Text

For what it’s worth, you had no intent to end up betwixt the hands of Death himself, mechanized and scaled to the size of a townhouse for your viewing pleasure. You also had no intent on becoming the next less-than-legal scientific endeavor of the one-eyed Einstein before you, so with a writhing gut and the neural-tissue soup that is your brain now, you reasoned the order for your immediate extermination best be seen through.

As you sucked in a breath that very well could've been your last, a shrill beep sounded from behind the synergistic medico doyenne and his far-too angular lord, whose velvet red optics would've still been singing 2-foot holes into your forehead had it not been for the fortuitous interruption.

"My lord—" A distressed voice crackled over the intercom, catching the vulture-eyed attention of said 'Lord' and his technophilic maven.

"Speak," Megatron drawled, turning on his metal heel to stride up to what appeared to you as the giant alien equivalent of a soundboard, pulling up the transmission with the twist of an auxiliary channel. A holo-screen materialized above, allowing your curious eyes to gaze upon the audio-visualization of a panicked foot-soldier. With a buzz, the transmission continued.

"We have retrieved the artifact you tasked us with unearthing, however...."

"Go on." He goaded.

"We're under attack by the Autobots... Our defenses have been... compromised-" An ear-splitting bellow thundered over the transmitter, followed by the sound of revving engines.

You could make out a secondary voice, muffled and distorted by the extraterrestrial pandæmonium. It sounded low and timbre, with an air of authoritative justice. Whoever it was, big M seemed to recognize, as his optics widened for a split second, before narrowing into a glare so incandescent that you could practically feel the fire raging behind those scarlet pools. He scowled.

"Optimus Prime," He rumbled, the name unfamiliar to you, but judging by the sheer potency of venom that dripped with each syllable he spat from those Great-White jaws, you could infer that whomever it was, was his opposition.
You hadn't a second to ruminate over the implications of there being multiple factions of giant space robots on your humble blue marble however, as Megatron growled out an order so superlative it sent shivers down your spine.

"Shockwave, contact Starscream and have him gather his armada. You are to secure the artifact quickly and efficiently, and I will deal with Optimus Prime myself. Soundwave," Megatron dismissed the transmission with the wave of his servo, the holo-screen disintegrating in a spectacle of blue. He turned to his chief surveillance officer.

"Open a groundbridge to the relayed coordinates," He paused, his gaze falling upon your form, pathetic and cowering between the slender digits of your abhorrent steward. An expression of xenophobic repulsion crossed his face, causing you to scrunch your nose up in a self-righteous frown.

For the record, you didn't think he was that visually appealing, either.

"And in the meantime, dispose of this filth in Shockwave's stead, will you?"

Your faceless ferryman synthesizes a replica of the very portal you were unceremoniously dragged through mere minutes earlier, a gateway for Asshole-Automaton #1 and #2, and a moment later, a 3rd you had yet to plaster an unflattering nickname to the face of. He held himself high and haughty, grumbling in a voice halfway between quasi-British royalty and sniveling cartoon villain about "beauty-sleep" and "recharge".

Despite your recent misfortunes and current adversity, it brought you a humorous sense of cosmic comfort, knowing that insomnia was a trial of tribulation both humans and otherworldly mechs suffered from. This one must've been the 'Starscream' mentioned before, and this monicker surely fit, considering the unholy caterwaul he let out at the tail end of the groundbridge, followed by a stray shot of bluish blur that erupted from the plasmaic portal, colliding with the wall and leaving behind a blackened blemish, smoke arising in plumes from the residual scorch mark. Soundwave took this as his initiative to close the path through time and space.

"What the fuck?" You breathed, because, really, what. the. fuck.

Lamentably, "What the fuck" turned into "Where the fuck" as your ever-so generous cortège Soundwave turned heel and tread down the corridor, and due to the sheer avoirdupois of his pede-plummets, you became victim of what was less of a saunter and more of what was a violent staccato.

You could only suck in a sharp breath through clenched teeth and eyes screwed shut, digging whatever was left of the nails you've just about chewed off into the palm of his servo, which you hoped had caused him at least some amount of discomfort, no matter how miniscule. If this really was your final hour, you'd prefer to not get tossed like a fucking salad, thank you very much.
Antecedently, you had been too preoccupied drumming up a bratty fervor to focus on the jostle his stride brought about - that, and the fact-of-the-matter being; turns out, soft, malleable earth was much better at absorbing and redistributing vibration than these reverberant, ever-expansive metal hallways. If only you had been made aware of the difference between being held by giant alien mechs and being carried by them; pre-abduction. Y'know, before your world experienced the rough equivalent of being plunged into a paint-shaker.

Somewhere between your delirium tremens and his thunderous footsteps' fortissimo andante, you caught wind of a half-baked thought brewing in your thoroughly done undone brain.

Just how was he going to kill you?
You desperately hoped these mile-tall cloud kidnappers had at least some concept of quietus euthanasia. You weren't sure if they knew what pain even was, though, if your earlier attempts at causing some to "not-so-Jolly-and-even-less-so-Green Giant" Soundwave weren't to be ignored.
And from that well of thought sprung forth a leak of thinking - if they were capable of complex speech and thought, had their own social hierarchy, and have somehow made quantum mechanics their bitch, what else did this foreign race have to offer?

You never considered yourself much of a xenoanthropologist, but you couldn't deny yourself the very human urge to get curious about things (besides, you needed the reprieve. going over each and every way to die on an alien warship wasn't exactly the most favorable thing in the universe).

Did they have homes? Robo-bills and taxes and rent and loans and mortgages to pay? Robo-pets? Mecha Sparky's and Turbo Fluffy's that they had to feed twice a day? Progenitors? Husbands and wives and little robo-children to go back to when all was said and done?

The prospect of "family" sent a woefully domestic torrent of pang and twinge through your aching body. What you wouldn't give to be home right now, curled up on the couch and swaddled in blankets with a freshly brewed mug of any beverage of your choosing nearby, perhaps face-timing a close friend, chatting about this "crazy insane" dream you had last night, of getting "abducted" by some "wacky no-face mecha-alien."

But you didn't have that, you didn't have an out-of-left-field dream. You didn't have a funny story to tell your closest friend-group over an early-morning phone call, voice still nasally as you worked to clear all that somnial phlegm from your throat.
All you had was the cold kiss of unearthly metal against your fingertips.

Right, because a close encounter of the fourth kind wasn't enough, now you needed to feel painfully homesick.

Also, you were gifted the privilege of having your "Where the fuck" finally evolve into a "Who the fuck" as the violent-staccato-saunter shifted to a violent-staccato-promenade.

You and your Charon were intercepted by a flame-red bot with a physique so shiny it could make even the most vainglorious car-owners weep from jaundiced eyes. Decked out in steel-belted radials and firestorm decals, from the swivel of his hips you were given the sudden impression that maybe you ended up on the set for some intergalactic porno instead of being dragged to your untimely demise.

If looks could kill, you'd have been set ablaze.

His wine-red optics flitted from his carefully tapered talons to the reflective screen of Soundwave, then to you. Whatever alien greeting that had initially formed on his glossa died at this yielding, and a wicked smirk crawled up his face with all the pleasantries of creeping ivy. He eyed you with a look that seemed more fit for a voguish schoolgirl who just uncovered the next bit of juicy drama than a 20-foot-tall murder machine.
You surmised this one has a proclivity for gossiping.

"Let me guess," He began, directing his flippant gaze back to the impassive Soundwave. His voice was smooth and impish, speaking with an egotistical drawl and just a hint of attitude.
Pithy bastard.

He continued, "One of Primes'? Now, I don't mean to pry, but wouldn't it be within our interest to use this thing as a bargaining chip?"

If not for the barely masked vitriolicsm of how he presented the word, he spoke it so casually you wouldn't have even thought twice about how he just referred to you as a "thing".

Well, okay, apparently this dude has his doctorate in being a judgmental asshole.

Unsurprisingly, Soundwave was also growing impatient with Dr. Dickheads brusque antics, and – not so unsurprisingly – actually issued him a response.
"Dispose of this filth... will you?"

You blinked.
The voice that spoke was not Soundwaves, but rather Megatrons. Or more accurately, a recording of Megatrons - spliced together to form a rudimentary rejoinder so cut-to-the-chase and unassuming you damn near missed the fact that your (not?) so Silent Shithead just synthesized a verbal reply. A verbal reply. Using another bots voice!
You made a quick mental note to never say anything embarrassing ever to this guy in the short time you have left on this earth, because apparently your captor not only possessed an arsenal of grabby-tentacles, was huge, and had no face, he also spoke in canaried antiphons. Just to put the shit-covered cherry on top of this metaphorical dick-cake you were being forced to eat right now.

Nevertheless, rather than this having the intended effect of quelling the red mechs dragooning, it merely stoked the embers of his curiosity into a fully-fledged flame. His smirk bloomed into a sneer, his ogling returning to you for what you had to guess was the sole purpose of making your skin crawl.

"I see. If that's the case," He clasped his claws together with a brimming sense of joy so fetid it was practically dripping with sadistic zeal.

"May I watch?"

Fucking voyeur.

Fucking voyeur, fucking robots, fucking all of this in general. Especially fucking Soundwave. Fuck him for kidnapping you, fuck him for even bringing you here, fuck him for being so disgustingly mouthwatering, fuck him hard for the way he pulled you closer to his chassis and away from the invasive eyes of Not-So-Little-Red-Riding-Hood, and most of all fuck your brain for even daring to think that, maybe, possibly, this is him being protective over you.

He's going to kill me, he's going to kill me and he's going to let that crimson cocksucker watch.

You had to tell yourself, because a good dose of bitching is always an effective remedy for traitorous xenophilic thoughts. And also, being addled again, because now there were two giant mechs striding down the corridor, side-to-side, with you stuck in the middle of the dodecaphony like the hapless jelly in a shakey, godawful PB&J sandwich.

Sorry, did you say shakey? Because what you actually meant was that it's a 9 on the Richter scale and it's falling into the FUCKING OCEAN!

Oh yeah, and fuck dying. Fuck it with more vigor than the universe was using to fuck you with right now. Fuck just rolling over and accepting death.

Sure, you were fine with it earlier, but that was when the only alternative was becoming their fleshy little lab rat. But now you're practically pissing your fleshy little not-so-lab-rat pants with two psychopathic robots watching you with morbid curiosity, and you would prefer to keep at least some level of dignity.

Even if that meant breaking every bone in your body, because you struggled to your feet and rather easily – (no) thanks to the mind-numbing trembling happening all around you – pitched yourself right out of Soundwave's grasp and to the floor below.

You instinctively held out your arms and scrunched your eyes shut, bracing for impact. An impact that never came as you, rather painfully, jolted to a complete stop mid-air.

Well, if you didn't have brain damage before, you most certainly do now.

Cracking open your eyes and craning your gaze upward, the first thing that you see is flickering violet bands and articulated metal claws clasped around your waist, the same bands that decorated Soundwave's goDDAMN TENTACLES.

"WHAT THE FUCK?!" You screamed, because, really, what. the. fuck.

"Oouh, this one is feisty." The red mech snickered patronizingly, ripping a growl of frustration straight from your throat.

That is IT!

You reached up and, with all the strength you could muster, grabbed onto one of the claws and pushed upward, effectively causing the delicate machinery to snap. Soundwave reflexively released you, recoiling with what you hoped was the worst pain imaginable. Fortunately, you were unhanded from a far lesser height than you initially dropped from, so your landing earned you only a mild sting and definite bruising. Unfortunately, Soundwave recovered from the mangling of his hand-mandibles far sooner than you had expected him to, forcing you to rabidly scramble out of the line of fire as Soundwave lunged for you.

You involuntarily squealed with terror as the loud bang of metal colliding with metal resounded right behind you, causing you a great deal of stumbling around for a few seconds before you could properly break into a sprint. You're pretty sure you looked like an infant learning how to walk for the first time, but like Hell you were gonna admit that.

This was for your dignity, after all.

Then again, what did a giant robot care for dignity's sake? Absolutely nothing in Soundwave's case - at least not for yours. Not least because rather than try and chase you down - although you were sure he'd have no trouble doing that if he really wanted to - he manually retracted the plating around his chassis and released an oblique, diagonal bird that whirled to life with a chitter and a chirrup. You concluded this had to be a distension of himself, rather than a trained pet, since it began to doggedly pursue you without so much as a single utterance from its sentient docking port. Or maybe he just spoke on a frequency you couldn't hear, one personalized for him and his abomination-to-aviation, one designated to fucking your shit.

Whatever the answer may be, you certainly didn't have plans to stick around and ask the mech; pushing your muscles into overdrive and high tailing it as far away as your little fleshy legs could carry you.

Speaking of dignity, or moreover pride in this case, you had entered with the inherent assumption that you were the main character of whatever action-packed sci-fi novel this hellscape was. Because, simply put, only main characters or those important to the plot had crazy alien shit happen to them, right? Only main characters were thrown into the gaping maw of danger and peril and made it out alive. Although that begged the question;
What part of the Hero's Journey included turning into Ellen Ripley?

"Ohoho, sending Laserbeak after them, are we?" Begun the lurid voice of the gaudy red mech from earlier, Doctor-go-fuck-yourself-alot. "You know, that thing hasn't been the same after the accident, aren't you worried it'll malfunction?"

They were within earshot now, which wasn't good, but that was - unfortunately - the least of your concerns at the moment. You could outmaneuver them, but you couldn't outmaneuver Soundwave's pet - Laserbeak, was it? Personally, you thought "Little Bitch Face" was a far better name for the thing. Or maybe "Major Inconvenience Bird", since - as if it had been summoned - rounded the corner and let out a shriek so shrill you could practically feel your eardrums turning into cochlear mush.

You had been spotted. Wonderful.

The jig was up and your only option now was to run and pray it didn't have guns like everything else in this god-forsaken ship did. But, tragically, it seems the gods did not look down at you with mercy that day... in fact you reckoned they were currently up in their pantheon, crowding around their DTV (Divine Television), ambrosia-laced popcorn in hand, and laughing their glorious asses off at your predicament.

You were being shot at by a bird, a fucking bird! A bird that wasn't a real bird but acted and sounded (vaguely) like a real bird anyway, but with the addition of GUNS! Laser guns, to be exact - red blurrs whizzing past you as you zipped and dashed through and under every obstacle in the path of your mad dash towards freedom - freedom, an exit, something that may or may not even exist. Maybe "Laserbeak" worked perfectly fine.

You didn't look back, you didn't even consider it. You just kept running. You knew the other two bots were hot on your trail. You knew that Soundwave heard and saw everything that Laserbeak heard and saw, because of course he did.

It burned. Everything burned. Your lungs burned from huffing and 'haling every last miniscule molecule of oxygen a ship at this altitude had. Your legs burned from being pushed to their farthest possible limit, and then some. Your muscles burned from being strained. Your eyes burned from the tears welling up in them. You were crying. Why were you crying?

Because of course you were.

Everything hurt and you were crying. Your legs, your muscles, your lungs, your eyes, your face... Wait, your face?

Yes, your face. It hurt because, in sum, in your efforts to avoid getting toasted by the highly concentrated electron beams pelting you like hail, you ran face first into an utterly massive door.

Right. Because of course they had those.

Looking upwards, you spotted the button that presumably activated this door, the button that you were about fifteen & 1/2 ft too short to reach. Of course.

And if there wasn't enough salt in the wound already, the falsetto cheeps of Laserbeak echoed behind you. This was it. You'd be turned into a crisp by Laserbeak, or squished by Soundwave, or maybe you'd get particularly unfortunate and accidentally slip between the gaps of the ships plating and get skewered by its internals - Springtrap style. Or something.

It wasn't exactly like you could evade him any longer. The initial adrenaline rush was long gone, and although you had been firing on all cylinders, your body's metaphorical cars' metaphorical engines were all but kaput at this point. Besides, even if you find your way out of this hell-maze, you'd still be stuck tens of miles above the ground. If only you could fly.

Wait a minute.

A pink cloud of cotton candy swept over your pity parade and began to rain streamers and confetti as a brilliant idea struck you - you decided to pay no mind to how the last "brilliant idea" got you here in the first place - and grinned devilishly to yourself. You quickly found camouflage within the recesses of one of the many structural ribs running upside the walls, hiding behind the macabre obstructions and biding your time as your avi-mecha-fauna pursuer drew close. It was clear as day that he'd find you here, in fact, you were counting on it.

There. Right there. There he was, chirping obnoxiously as he scanned the area. Chirping obnoxiously as he hovered closer to the ground to get a better look at things. Chirping obnoxiously as he entered your line of sight. Screaming obnoxiously as you suddenly pounced like a predator poised, leaping from your unlikely cache to find brutal purchase atop the fucker.

He squawked with alarm - alerting his owner, no doubt - and fired his lasers with wild abandon out of sheer instinct. Perfect.

You gripped one of his jutting plates and tugged, shifting your full weight to the tail-end of the cybernetic bird and offsetting his propulsion, tipping him up and up and up until finally a stray shot hit its - or rather your - target. The padlock to the door short-circuited with a sizzle and a snap and a splendor of sparks.

No longer finding use in riding your robot rodeo companion, you let go and eased yourself off of one of his slanted plates, onto the floor, and watching with sadistic glee as he veered akimbo into the wall and knocked himself offline.

Concurrently, gears grinded and with a resounding clunk, the door lifted and began to retreat into the ceiling notch overhead, sending a thrush of cool - almost freezing - air biting across your flesh. Your spent lungs greedily sucked in several mouthfuls of the oxygen-rich draft.

Yeah, you weren't Ellen Ripley after all.

In fact, Ellen Ripley didn't have shit on you.

"Oh, would you look at that!" Came a voice behind you. "The little thing did our job for us. How sweet."

Spinning on your heel to face the source head-on, your eyes - now watering from the frigid zephyr and blinding light of the outside world - were thrice more assaulted by a garish red paintjob and rhythmically pulsing biolights as Soundwave docked with his now out-of-order Laserbeak. The cacophony of colors and noises and sounds and smells drove your systems into a kamikaze dive bomb straight into the tremorous sea of sensory overload.

You wish you could disagree, but he was right. All you had done - despite your valiant struggles to shake your pursuers, despite your second wind of sudden heroics, despite your strategic manhandling of Bird-Bitch and the manipulation of his mechanics - was deliver yourself from point A to point right-where-they-wanted-you B. You had just gifted yourself, the mouse, right into the grinning maw of the cat who hunts you. This was useless.

This was useless and you were an idiot. You were a useless idiot who now writhed in the constrictive grasp of Lieutenant Soundwave, who - unlike you - learns from his mistakes.

His grip was killer and your lungs screamed out with agony, ribs nearly buckling under the pressure. In this moment, you were hopelessly reminded of just how fragile humans could be.

"Wait! WAIT!" You cried, although you were almost certain your voice was swept away with the thrush of air pelting you. To emphasize your contesting, you freed an arm from his hold and banged noisily, repetitively, on the metal plating of his servo.

"Really?" Scoffed the red mech, hand on his hip as he keeled over in a manner kindred a swan-dive, every curve of his accentuated with deadly precision as the sun glinted off his armor to personally shine right into your fucking eyes. "Now you're begging for your life? Would've served you better before you made us go on this dynametal duck chase around the ship. At least then I was curious, now I'm just pissed off! In fact, Soundwave, give it here-"

You felt your heart drop to the pit of your stomach as, with a snarl, his razor-edged claws shot forward with all intent to wrench you from Soundwave and flay you alive.

"NO!" You squealed, throwing your one liberated arm over your head out of pure, animalistic instinct and reeling as far into yourself as you could - eyes drawn shut. It was a futile sentiment, akin to a child ducking under the covers of their bed at the first sight of danger. However, this time, the monsters weren't imaginary.

But rather than the squish and snap of bones breaking, and flesh being severed, the tell-tale screech of rigid metal being forcefully bent beneath a greater force sliced through the air and invaded your ear drums. Curiosity betrayed fear, and you couldn't resist the temptation to crack open an eyelid and take a peek at the scene.

Soundwave had caught his comrade's servo by the wrist with one of his tentacles - the tether-y feeler coiled in loops and made taut by a rough yank! The red mech's alloy armor was twisted and malformed, the tinted window panel being half-way ripped from its sill with a loud pop, and what looked shockingly like a cars rear-view mirror was completely crushed. The mangled remains dangled from the wound, connected by a mess of thin wires which seemed ready to give at any moment.

You hadn't noticed it before, but this particular giant mecha bore attributes strikingly similar to an Earth car.
Ew. Why? Stop that. Stop getting even weirder than you already are, you alien freaks. You thought fiercely, casting a disparaging glare between the two - as if you could beam the mental machination into their minds with just your eyeballs.

Covering one ear and awkwardly shielding the other by nestling it into your shoulder, you protected your delicate hearing from the grating shriek of Dr. Dramatic, who wrenched his gnarled servo away and cradled it to his chassis with a horrified expression.

You were flooded by a surge of righteous satisfaction, although it was rather dampened by the impending doom laid before you currently, seeming more like a final kick-in-the-shin as opposed to a triumphant last laugh.

"You could have just said 'no.'" Pouted the second mech, his vocalizer crackling with a whine. But, as he noticed your eyes on him, his demeanor shifted from an injured animal licking its wounds to pure rage. He bristled, snarling at you in a primal tongue.

"Get on with it already, Soundwave."

Soundwave needed no further urging.

His coil retracted into a compartment that quickly slid shut and he paced a few steps forward, toward the yawning cusp of the ship's stern.

Oh, shit.

"No," You begun to plead, looking over your shoulder to offer him a desperate look. "No, no no, no, please."

You could feel the scrutiny of glowing red eyes biting into the back of your skull, swirling with delight and anticipation.

Righteous satisfaction turned to gelid dread. All color drained from your face. Your heart slammed against your aching ribcage like a drum, lungs drawing in superficial gulps of air - anything, everything, just to keep breathing. Winded begs falling from your trembling lips like a beseeching waterfall - you kept choking on the cascades of liquid panic. A symphony of pure terror.

But - ultimately - for naught.

The all-consuming sky stretched beyond you. A gaping cerulean maw, frothing with billows of tumbling clouds. Exhaling fresh currents, buffeting your body with seethes of hunger. Calling you. Beckoning you. Dragging you closer.

"Please-!"

"Buh-Bye."

And then....

You were falling.