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soundwave_ascendantOnce they were behind closed doors, Soundwave turned around and looked out the window. “I need you to stand up for yourself at your full size,” he said roughly, not looking at Megatron, arms crossed across the door of his chest.
Megatron frowned, but he did as requested. “Why?”
Soundwave could move fast when he wanted to. And he wanted to. His fist connected with Megatron’s jaw in a sparkbeat. Megatron hadn’t expected that consciously, but he felt that he should have, because he certainly deserved it. So he slammed right into the door and looked up at Soundwave, who was glowering over him.
“That’s why,” Soundwave growled, with something like satisfaction. “I didn’t want to break your neck.”
Megatron’s instinct was to come up fighting, but he didn’t. “Why not?”
“I promised Ravage I wouldn’t. And Loki would kill me.” There was still hot shimmery air coming out of Soundwave’s vents. “You put her poetry online. You made her go and dance on the Vis Vitalis. Those parasites attacked her. I can’t believe you did that to her! You tarted her up and sent her to dance with the Autobots—” Soundwave began to sputter. “You know how she was treated in the Senate!”
“I do know.” Megatron scowled. “But she didn’t want the revolution to end, and I’m done with it. I fucked it all up. You know that. You both tried to talk me out of it. Are you going to put yourself at the front of this thing so she can win our war? I don’t think so!” He rolled his optics. “You need someone to serve. So serve her.”
Soundwave glared at him. “Always. Even before you.”
“The Pit you did. You knew how she felt about Galvatron, and you knew how Galvatron felt about people like her. That’s how desperate you were not to lead. Then you sent her to kill me! How is that serving her?”
“You betrayed us both,” Soundwave hissed. “Galvatron wasn’t the only person who called her one of your whores, nor wondered among themselves why I whored her out to you for so little return.”
“I would have killed anyone who dared to say that in my presence.” Megatron frowned, and pulled himself up to his feet. “And pardoned you for doing likewise. Did you really not know that?”
Soundwave turned again, and looked out the window. “By the time you were so far gone that people would actually dare to say that out loud? No. I didn’t.”
Megatron rested his hand, lightly, on Soundwave’s shoulder. “I would have.”
“I have done so,” Soundwave said bitterly. “I will do it again. But I don’t think it makes me look strong. What would make me look strong is if I could laugh at those words, and I can’t.”
“I’m glad you have done right by her now,” Megatron said. “If you had not come back, and we had found you dead…I would have married her myself.”
“I know!” Soundwave slugged him again, from the other side, without any telegraphed motion; but Megatron didn’t fall, this time. “You bought a house with her! I can forgive her for not telling me, because she said she thought the Autobots would have confiscated and sold it by now. She didn’t know you had signed it over to her until the tax bill came!”
“This is because of the tax bill?” Megatron’s jaw hurt but he still couldn’t help laughing. “Loki and I will figure it out if you two are strapped—”
“It is not because of the tax bill! You bought a house. With my conjunx.”
“She wasn’t, then. Although she should have been. I am sure that she told you why.” Megatron put his hand back on Soundwave’s shoulder and waited to see if he’d push it away. He didn’t. “You know we needed a place to be alone together so we could work on some things. And you know that one of the things we were working on, then, was trying to find and save you.”
“And if she had been—would you still have tried to take her with you when you left us all?” Soundwave stared directly into his optics. “You’ve had Terminus, Orion, me, Starscream and his trine, and I don’t even know who else…and I’ve been part of that, but you are very well aware that there’s been no-one else for me but her. Not really. The rest of it was fun, but…Ravage is my love.”
Megatron can also hear the words he doesn’t say, because Soundwave doesn’t want to say the words, but his mind is very loud and can’t stop saying them: I thought you loved me, too. Even if I can’t pop your spike just by snapping my hips.
Megatron sighed. “Let me be very clear about this one thing, Soundwave.”
Soundwave said nothing, but he didn’t look away. Megatron knew he could hear his thoughts, but he wanted the words spoken, and out of his mouth, where Soundwave couldn’t pretend to himself that he had imagined them, hoped for them, feared them.
“I have never stopped loving you,” Megatron said firmly. “I hate what our movement became. But I certainly never blamed you for that. You have always been true to our deepest ideals. I know I disappointed you so badly that you wanted me dead, and for that I am truly sorry, but I think you were that disappointed long before I took the Autobrand and gave you the space to admit it.”
“Shut up,” Soundwave said, and looked away, no longer meeting his optics.
“Soundwave.” Megatron shrugged. “There was a time when we were all in love. All four of us.”
“No,” Soundwave said quietly. “I tried to tell you. He didn’t love any of us the way you believed he did. And he struggled to love Ravage at all. Or didn’t you wonder why, when he wasn’t with you, he was almost always with me, and left you with her? He could bring himself to see that she was kind. He could bring himself to see that she was wise. He could bring himself to let her touch him, when we were all together. But he never wanted her for her own sake, and after his mind didn’t change when he got to know her, it was hard for me to want him, which was why the two of us stopped coming to bed with you two. I could forgive him for not desiring her; that sort of thing can’t be forced. But they were barely even friends. I don’t believe it was entirely because of her form, but that was certainly part of it, and whatever else it was, if he didn’t care for her, he didn’t deserve any one of us. Neither of us ever liked him as much as you did. Ravage thought he’d come around. I never did. Not when he was always so amazed that she is brilliant.”
Megatron winced. How could anyone miss that?
Soundwave smiled and answered the question he hadn’t asked. “You were an idiot. It wasn’t the first or the last time.”
Megatron ex-vented, red-faced with shame. “Guilty as charged.”
“That’s not funny,” Soundwave grumbled. “Not anymore.”
Megatron started to say that it was, a little bit; come on—but then it hit him right in the frontal sphere of his brain module that Soundwave had dreaded his execution almost as much as Ravage and Loki had, and then, before Soundwave knew it this time, he had removed Soundwave’s blast mask and his mouth was on Soundwave’s.
He half expected to be slugged again.
It didn’t happen. Soundwave arched into Megatron's arms and opened his mouth to Megatron's glossa, trilling with pleasure deep in his throat despite his faulty vocalisers. A cable was wrapping itself around Megatron's wrist and he opened his wrist panel to let it plug in. Megatron dove into the Vast that was Soundwave’s mind without hesitation.
Megatron kept expecting Soundwave to pull away, but he didn't. Soundwave was open to him and surprisingly, very aroused.
If you wanted to spike me, you should've told Ravage, and given me a chance to tell Loki..." Not that Megatron wanted to stop, because he very much did not. What he wanted was to show Soundwave exactly how much he loved him and had missed their former physical and emotional intimacy.
We can’t. You know what I demanded of her, and what I promised her in return. And even if it weren’t for that, we’re Destron now, and you are not.
And yet. My glossa is still in your mouth. And I can feel the heat behind your pelvic panel.
Irrelevant! Why did you hurt her like that? And expose her?
Megatron struggled for words, because this too was something he needed to say out loud. “The only way she’s getting this is if she takes it for herself, which she is doing, now. I don’t want it. She does. And you will only give her this if she’s willing to take it, so I pushed her out of your loving shadow and into the rest of the universe. I put her writing on the web and I took her attention deflectors and I made her dance—with them, not for them—so that people would actually see her as we do. Would know that she’s not just a saboteur and assassin. Would know she’s a poet and a moral philosopher. Would see her be loving and friendly. I would do it again, Soundwave.”
“Of course you would.” Soundwave winced, and Megatron felt it in his own face. Soundwave’s cable was still plugged into his arm, and Megatron was still surrounded by the wildly streaming synaesthetic sensorium that he hadn’t realised he’d missed so much. “You almost never regret what you’ve done.”
“You know that’s not true anymore.” Megatron brushed his lips against Soundwave’s cheek. His other arm was around Soundwave’s shoulders, and Soundwave’s other arm was around his waist, and they were leaning together, sliding down the wall toward the floor. “She got angry, but she didn’t break. She’s stronger than you think she is.”
Soundwave couldn’t deny that. Instead, he closed his eyes, and let his head rest on Megatron’s shoulder and chest. “If she had broken, you would be dead. I’m not Starscream, you know.” He shuddered. “Even Ratbat didn’t break her, you aft. Broke her valve callipers twice, tore up her aft exhaust one time, and once he even broke a spinal strut because she hid from him in the Micronus Shrine, but he never broke her. You came pretty close to it though, telling her in that closet that none of the things we did was worth slag, same night she found the dead fox. She doesn’t break from pain. She breaks from hopelessness.”
Megatron groaned at the enormity of it, in Soundwave’s mind. Mostly because he knew that Soundwave’s sense of Ravage’s pain had come from Ravage herself.
“She forgave you for that though. She might be a little mad that it took Loki to make you see she was right. But she forgave you anyway, so I did, too.”
“Then what,” said Megatron, airlessly.
“You could have explained to her that she needed to get out of her comfort zone if she wanted to lead a revolution. You could have let her go to that dance looking more like herself and less like one of her posters. You could have sat down with her and asked her to choose what you published. You could have…asked for her consent, you self-righteous old afthelm.” Soundwave snorted. “Some of those things you posted were meant only for me to see. If I believed in a god, I would thank that god for Esmeral, who had the guts to take some of the really intimate stuff down even before she heard from Ravage or Misfire. What was the hurry? I was the one who was desperate to have her back, not you!”
Megatron was wavering on the abyss again. But not so closely that the question didn’t make him wonder. Where had the urgency come from?
“I was afraid that if I didn’t get her off the ship,” he finally said, “someone would kill her. Ratchet was very afraid of that, too.”
“Then you should have just contacted me.” Soundwave rolled his optics. “I could ask her if she wants us both to take you back—and I could let you go on kissing me until my spike aches for your mouth, but I don’t trust you with her anymore. She deserved a chance to consent to your fragged-up notion of leadership training. Part of being a leader that she could use help with is expecting her people to respect her. Maybe you ought to try helping with that. She can be out in public just fine when I’m standing behind her and everyone knows I will kill for her.”
He shook his head. “There were times in the past when I hated the way you handled her. Letting her barter herself so you’d not do some horrible thing you’d come up with in one of your rages. But she always knew that she could say no. And she always knew, and I always knew, that if she did say no, you would actually stop. Until you did that. She deserved a chance to consent to that. How can I trust you with her, after that?”
Megatron felt himself again on the edge of the abyss. It would be easy to let go. But he’d promised Loki, and the children, and Ravage, that he wouldn’t go in.
“No,” Soundwave said quietly. “That would just make everything worse, you afthelm. You have to live with this. Like we do. I’m tired of this fragging cowardice. Of course you want to die when you think about all the ugly scrap that you’ve done, and made people who love you do. But that would be easy. And if you want my help, or hers, in making amends, you don’t get to have it that easy. You have to tell her you know what you did to her and ask her forgiveness. And someday—when her hold on Destron, and mine, is secure, you must let it be known that you were the one who opened her spark chamber up and poured her innermost energon out on the Big Conversation, without her knowledge, let alone her consent.”
“Does she feel like this?” Megatron finally asked, feeling himself a collection of atoms and molecules, held together by fraying Will, unsure he could hold himself solid. But Soundwave was holding him solid.
“No,” Soundwave said after a moment. “She might when she gets used to being treated like a ruler who is worthy of respect, though, and she will handle it better if you have already apologised.”
Megatron groaned. He needed to be hurt, but he didn’t deserve it.
“I do still love you, though sometimes I’ve no idea why.” Soundwave jolted him with a shock through the cable plugged into his wrist, and while it wasn’t a thing like an overload, it did knock Megatron out of the spiral of pain and remorse he was riding.
“You didn’t have to do that.” Megatron looked up at him in wonder.
“I don’t have to do anything.” Soundwave grinned a little. “I’m the Lord Protector now. But she’s Destron. So I’m her Lord Protector. So I ask you now. Can I trust you with her? If you ever do anything like that again to her, Loki may stop me from killing you outright, but I’ll still find a way to make you wish you were dead.”
“I know,” Megatron said. “For a minute there, you already did. But it isn’t fear of you that will stop me. You love her more, but I do love her. Can I trust you? You ordered her to kill me. I don’t care that you wanted me dead. Most of the people I care about have at some point. But I was furious with you for sending her. I shouldn’t have tried to take her from you, but I didn’t only do it because I wanted her for myself. I didn’t think she was safe with you either.”
Soundwave nodded, his face dark with energon flush and guilt. “That’s one of the reasons I choose to forgive you for this, above and beyond still loving you. That was worse than anything you did to her. None of the wounds that you, she and Galvatron dealt to my pride could ever excuse it. She knows that I would never violate her will again, and by some miracle, she trusts me still. I don’t expect you to accept that, because it’s her nature to yield in love. But I’ll make you the vow that I’m asking of you.”
Megatron replied by releasing the cable in his own arm; Soundwave opened the corresponding port, and kissed him again with exquisite, maddening gentleness.
“Soundwave, you know that I never want to hurt her again—”
Soundwave shut him up with another kiss. “We all have sharp edges. Ravi-brightspark has some of the sharpest. Pain is inevitable when sharp things embrace one another, but it’s not mistreatment as long as it isn’t intentional, and we all look after the wounds we inflict on each other by accident.”
Megatron thought about it for a moment. “That’s fair.”
Soundwave shrugged. “You’ll hurt Loki, too. And he’ll hurt you. But as long as you respect one another, the love will survive. As ours has done.”
Megatron opened his chest plating. Soundwave stared at him for a moment, because he knew that Megatron knew he only spark-merged with Ravage. But this was a vow, not a bonding; he bared his own spark.
“I will never again enforce my will upon Ravage of Stanix, who is your conjunx, and my amica, unless she consents to it joyfully and without reservation,” Megatron said, from the centre of his spark and throughout his whole body and field, aloud and within his mind.
Soundwave had to laugh softly at the reservation.
“I will never again enforce my will upon Ravage of Stanix, who is your amica, and my conjunx, unless she consents to it joyfully and without reservation,” Soundwave said, and though he could not completely shut down all his parallel processes, Megatron could feel it rise up from his spark and out of his mind through his words.
After their plates closed, Soundwave gave Megatron a little smirk. “Don’t get ahead of yourself. I don’t deny that I was being selfish when I asked her not to lie with you again. But she freely agreed to that, and she likes it.”
“I don’t doubt it.” Megatron smiled, a little ruefully. He’d noticed Ravage preening when Soundwave made a point of showing everyone around that she was with him. “I’m not sure I’m ready to have her again. Or even that she wants me back, in that way.”
Soundwave quirked a smile. “I do think I have to let her be selfish, too, which is why I won’t have you without her consent.”
“I’m happy to concentrate my attentions upon my new love,” Megatron replied. “But that means you really ought to stop teasing me.”
“Call it my petty revenge, if you like.” Soundwave looked down at their bound arms. “I don’t see you pulling away. You haven’t even updated your encryption.”
“Apparently seidr does not require key exchanges.”
Soundwave laughed. “Some Autobot captain you are. The Decepticon Lord Protector is under your plate. And he’s me. What would Lord Hot Rod say?”
“If he could see your face right now, and feel your field? I bet he’d ask to be let in,” said Megatron unrepentantly. “Would you let him?”
Soundwave made a disgusted face and rolled his optics. “No, no and frag you, but no. Please tell me he’s not on my ‘face-chain now.”
Megatron laughed out loud. “I have no idea, but if he is, it’s not through me.”
Megatron tilted his head down to look up at Soundwave. “Loki and I are very happy, but don’t think I haven’t missed being wrapped in your mind. You’re right that Ravage has a physical hold on me that you don’t. But you get under my plate in a different way, especially when you take your damned blast mask off and you smirk like that. It reminds me of how lost I get in your head. You make me delirious. I’m so overwhelmed that all I can do is lie there and feel the whole universe pouring right through you.”
Soundwave beamed at him, and took his visor off, golden eyes shining. “Tempter,” he said with a snort.
“Always.” Megatron chuckled, and then shook his head. “I’m amazed that people think anyone tops you.”
“I like to be underestimated. It’s a very effective strategy.” Soundwave shrugged. “And Ravi can top me, but you know her. She rarely wants that. Especially not with me. She needs to be cared for, and that is very much my kink.” He sighed. “You don’t understand why I choose not to lead. But I don’t think you have any idea what I would be like if I didn’t give someone the chance to put brakes on me.”
“I can guess.” Megatron winced: on his own accord, this time.
“She gave me permission to be her protector, personally,” Soundwave said. “I should have protected her more, in the past. Whether or not I stay selfish, forever…I will always protect her, now. I won’t let her barter herself. I won’t let her get overwhelmed with what other people want and get caught up in the moment and do things I know she’ll regret.”
Megatron nodded. “I made someone else a similar promise.” He didn’t say who. They both knew, but it wasn’t Soundwave’s business.
“That’s good. Make sure that you keep it.” Soundwave kissed his cheek, then vented into his ear: “That was the second thing that needed to heal. I needed to know that you actually do want me, that you know we come as a pair, and you care how I feel, whether or not we’re fragging each other.”
Megatron closed his optics. He was not going to cry.
“Yes, you are,” said Soundwave, and kissed his cheeks until he did, gentle but also relentless.
Megatron clung to him, weeping. “I never meant to hurt you. I don’t know what was wrong with me. I’d look at you after things got bad and I couldn’t. I knew you must be furious. I couldn’t face you, let alone…‘face you. And when I left, I wanted you both to come with me. But I was sure you didn’t love me anymore, and I wasn’t really even sure you still loved her, after what you asked her to do.”
Soundwave nuzzled his face. “I should’ve insisted. I should’ve told you to remember she was mine, and to give her up if you couldn’t let me in. I was afraid of you, too. And that will not happen again. I will not be afraid of you ever again. Not for my sake or hers.”
Megatron choked back a sob. “No. No, it won’t. I lost my honour completely, and I let her throw her pride away. And yours. I’m sorry.”
Soundwave lifted their bound wrists and kissed the back of Megatron’s hand. “You really were out of your mind if you ever thought I’d pledge myself to any Prime, but especially not to Optimus. Did you know he tried to blackmail me?”
Megatron couldn’t help laughing, even though he was crying. “Of course he did. What did you do?”
“I told him that I was willing to bet I had more dirt on him than he had on me. And reminded him that he used to like those whole-brain overloads, too. I think he deleted some of those memories. Or maybe assumed that I would’ve done that, because they are painful. I told him I’d saved everything, behind the kind of firewall only Ravi builds.”
“You’re the absolute worst,” Megatron said, with sincere admiration. “Are we at peace?”
“We are,” said Soundwave. “But you do have more amends to make. For one thing, Ravi and Glit. Her relationship with her brother’s never recovered from the position you put her in and the place you sent him.”
Megatron groaned. “His kid loves Loki’s kids, and I’m not allowed to be in the room with his kid if neither Loki nor the housekeeper’s there.”
Soundwave just laughed. “You deserve that. Suck it up for the sake of the newsparks.”
Megatron frowned, but he did as requested. “Why?”
Soundwave could move fast when he wanted to. And he wanted to. His fist connected with Megatron’s jaw in a sparkbeat. Megatron hadn’t expected that consciously, but he felt that he should have, because he certainly deserved it. So he slammed right into the door and looked up at Soundwave, who was glowering over him.
“That’s why,” Soundwave growled, with something like satisfaction. “I didn’t want to break your neck.”
Megatron’s instinct was to come up fighting, but he didn’t. “Why not?”
“I promised Ravage I wouldn’t. And Loki would kill me.” There was still hot shimmery air coming out of Soundwave’s vents. “You put her poetry online. You made her go and dance on the Vis Vitalis. Those parasites attacked her. I can’t believe you did that to her! You tarted her up and sent her to dance with the Autobots—” Soundwave began to sputter. “You know how she was treated in the Senate!”
“I do know.” Megatron scowled. “But she didn’t want the revolution to end, and I’m done with it. I fucked it all up. You know that. You both tried to talk me out of it. Are you going to put yourself at the front of this thing so she can win our war? I don’t think so!” He rolled his optics. “You need someone to serve. So serve her.”
Soundwave glared at him. “Always. Even before you.”
“The Pit you did. You knew how she felt about Galvatron, and you knew how Galvatron felt about people like her. That’s how desperate you were not to lead. Then you sent her to kill me! How is that serving her?”
“You betrayed us both,” Soundwave hissed. “Galvatron wasn’t the only person who called her one of your whores, nor wondered among themselves why I whored her out to you for so little return.”
“I would have killed anyone who dared to say that in my presence.” Megatron frowned, and pulled himself up to his feet. “And pardoned you for doing likewise. Did you really not know that?”
Soundwave turned again, and looked out the window. “By the time you were so far gone that people would actually dare to say that out loud? No. I didn’t.”
Megatron rested his hand, lightly, on Soundwave’s shoulder. “I would have.”
“I have done so,” Soundwave said bitterly. “I will do it again. But I don’t think it makes me look strong. What would make me look strong is if I could laugh at those words, and I can’t.”
“I’m glad you have done right by her now,” Megatron said. “If you had not come back, and we had found you dead…I would have married her myself.”
“I know!” Soundwave slugged him again, from the other side, without any telegraphed motion; but Megatron didn’t fall, this time. “You bought a house with her! I can forgive her for not telling me, because she said she thought the Autobots would have confiscated and sold it by now. She didn’t know you had signed it over to her until the tax bill came!”
“This is because of the tax bill?” Megatron’s jaw hurt but he still couldn’t help laughing. “Loki and I will figure it out if you two are strapped—”
“It is not because of the tax bill! You bought a house. With my conjunx.”
“She wasn’t, then. Although she should have been. I am sure that she told you why.” Megatron put his hand back on Soundwave’s shoulder and waited to see if he’d push it away. He didn’t. “You know we needed a place to be alone together so we could work on some things. And you know that one of the things we were working on, then, was trying to find and save you.”
“And if she had been—would you still have tried to take her with you when you left us all?” Soundwave stared directly into his optics. “You’ve had Terminus, Orion, me, Starscream and his trine, and I don’t even know who else…and I’ve been part of that, but you are very well aware that there’s been no-one else for me but her. Not really. The rest of it was fun, but…Ravage is my love.”
Megatron can also hear the words he doesn’t say, because Soundwave doesn’t want to say the words, but his mind is very loud and can’t stop saying them: I thought you loved me, too. Even if I can’t pop your spike just by snapping my hips.
Megatron sighed. “Let me be very clear about this one thing, Soundwave.”
Soundwave said nothing, but he didn’t look away. Megatron knew he could hear his thoughts, but he wanted the words spoken, and out of his mouth, where Soundwave couldn’t pretend to himself that he had imagined them, hoped for them, feared them.
“I have never stopped loving you,” Megatron said firmly. “I hate what our movement became. But I certainly never blamed you for that. You have always been true to our deepest ideals. I know I disappointed you so badly that you wanted me dead, and for that I am truly sorry, but I think you were that disappointed long before I took the Autobrand and gave you the space to admit it.”
“Shut up,” Soundwave said, and looked away, no longer meeting his optics.
“Soundwave.” Megatron shrugged. “There was a time when we were all in love. All four of us.”
“No,” Soundwave said quietly. “I tried to tell you. He didn’t love any of us the way you believed he did. And he struggled to love Ravage at all. Or didn’t you wonder why, when he wasn’t with you, he was almost always with me, and left you with her? He could bring himself to see that she was kind. He could bring himself to see that she was wise. He could bring himself to let her touch him, when we were all together. But he never wanted her for her own sake, and after his mind didn’t change when he got to know her, it was hard for me to want him, which was why the two of us stopped coming to bed with you two. I could forgive him for not desiring her; that sort of thing can’t be forced. But they were barely even friends. I don’t believe it was entirely because of her form, but that was certainly part of it, and whatever else it was, if he didn’t care for her, he didn’t deserve any one of us. Neither of us ever liked him as much as you did. Ravage thought he’d come around. I never did. Not when he was always so amazed that she is brilliant.”
Megatron winced. How could anyone miss that?
Soundwave smiled and answered the question he hadn’t asked. “You were an idiot. It wasn’t the first or the last time.”
Megatron ex-vented, red-faced with shame. “Guilty as charged.”
“That’s not funny,” Soundwave grumbled. “Not anymore.”
Megatron started to say that it was, a little bit; come on—but then it hit him right in the frontal sphere of his brain module that Soundwave had dreaded his execution almost as much as Ravage and Loki had, and then, before Soundwave knew it this time, he had removed Soundwave’s blast mask and his mouth was on Soundwave’s.
He half expected to be slugged again.
It didn’t happen. Soundwave arched into Megatron's arms and opened his mouth to Megatron's glossa, trilling with pleasure deep in his throat despite his faulty vocalisers. A cable was wrapping itself around Megatron's wrist and he opened his wrist panel to let it plug in. Megatron dove into the Vast that was Soundwave’s mind without hesitation.
Megatron kept expecting Soundwave to pull away, but he didn't. Soundwave was open to him and surprisingly, very aroused.
If you wanted to spike me, you should've told Ravage, and given me a chance to tell Loki..." Not that Megatron wanted to stop, because he very much did not. What he wanted was to show Soundwave exactly how much he loved him and had missed their former physical and emotional intimacy.
We can’t. You know what I demanded of her, and what I promised her in return. And even if it weren’t for that, we’re Destron now, and you are not.
And yet. My glossa is still in your mouth. And I can feel the heat behind your pelvic panel.
Irrelevant! Why did you hurt her like that? And expose her?
Megatron struggled for words, because this too was something he needed to say out loud. “The only way she’s getting this is if she takes it for herself, which she is doing, now. I don’t want it. She does. And you will only give her this if she’s willing to take it, so I pushed her out of your loving shadow and into the rest of the universe. I put her writing on the web and I took her attention deflectors and I made her dance—with them, not for them—so that people would actually see her as we do. Would know that she’s not just a saboteur and assassin. Would know she’s a poet and a moral philosopher. Would see her be loving and friendly. I would do it again, Soundwave.”
“Of course you would.” Soundwave winced, and Megatron felt it in his own face. Soundwave’s cable was still plugged into his arm, and Megatron was still surrounded by the wildly streaming synaesthetic sensorium that he hadn’t realised he’d missed so much. “You almost never regret what you’ve done.”
“You know that’s not true anymore.” Megatron brushed his lips against Soundwave’s cheek. His other arm was around Soundwave’s shoulders, and Soundwave’s other arm was around his waist, and they were leaning together, sliding down the wall toward the floor. “She got angry, but she didn’t break. She’s stronger than you think she is.”
Soundwave couldn’t deny that. Instead, he closed his eyes, and let his head rest on Megatron’s shoulder and chest. “If she had broken, you would be dead. I’m not Starscream, you know.” He shuddered. “Even Ratbat didn’t break her, you aft. Broke her valve callipers twice, tore up her aft exhaust one time, and once he even broke a spinal strut because she hid from him in the Micronus Shrine, but he never broke her. You came pretty close to it though, telling her in that closet that none of the things we did was worth slag, same night she found the dead fox. She doesn’t break from pain. She breaks from hopelessness.”
Megatron groaned at the enormity of it, in Soundwave’s mind. Mostly because he knew that Soundwave’s sense of Ravage’s pain had come from Ravage herself.
“She forgave you for that though. She might be a little mad that it took Loki to make you see she was right. But she forgave you anyway, so I did, too.”
“Then what,” said Megatron, airlessly.
“You could have explained to her that she needed to get out of her comfort zone if she wanted to lead a revolution. You could have let her go to that dance looking more like herself and less like one of her posters. You could have sat down with her and asked her to choose what you published. You could have…asked for her consent, you self-righteous old afthelm.” Soundwave snorted. “Some of those things you posted were meant only for me to see. If I believed in a god, I would thank that god for Esmeral, who had the guts to take some of the really intimate stuff down even before she heard from Ravage or Misfire. What was the hurry? I was the one who was desperate to have her back, not you!”
Megatron was wavering on the abyss again. But not so closely that the question didn’t make him wonder. Where had the urgency come from?
“I was afraid that if I didn’t get her off the ship,” he finally said, “someone would kill her. Ratchet was very afraid of that, too.”
“Then you should have just contacted me.” Soundwave rolled his optics. “I could ask her if she wants us both to take you back—and I could let you go on kissing me until my spike aches for your mouth, but I don’t trust you with her anymore. She deserved a chance to consent to your fragged-up notion of leadership training. Part of being a leader that she could use help with is expecting her people to respect her. Maybe you ought to try helping with that. She can be out in public just fine when I’m standing behind her and everyone knows I will kill for her.”
He shook his head. “There were times in the past when I hated the way you handled her. Letting her barter herself so you’d not do some horrible thing you’d come up with in one of your rages. But she always knew that she could say no. And she always knew, and I always knew, that if she did say no, you would actually stop. Until you did that. She deserved a chance to consent to that. How can I trust you with her, after that?”
Megatron felt himself again on the edge of the abyss. It would be easy to let go. But he’d promised Loki, and the children, and Ravage, that he wouldn’t go in.
“No,” Soundwave said quietly. “That would just make everything worse, you afthelm. You have to live with this. Like we do. I’m tired of this fragging cowardice. Of course you want to die when you think about all the ugly scrap that you’ve done, and made people who love you do. But that would be easy. And if you want my help, or hers, in making amends, you don’t get to have it that easy. You have to tell her you know what you did to her and ask her forgiveness. And someday—when her hold on Destron, and mine, is secure, you must let it be known that you were the one who opened her spark chamber up and poured her innermost energon out on the Big Conversation, without her knowledge, let alone her consent.”
“Does she feel like this?” Megatron finally asked, feeling himself a collection of atoms and molecules, held together by fraying Will, unsure he could hold himself solid. But Soundwave was holding him solid.
“No,” Soundwave said after a moment. “She might when she gets used to being treated like a ruler who is worthy of respect, though, and she will handle it better if you have already apologised.”
Megatron groaned. He needed to be hurt, but he didn’t deserve it.
“I do still love you, though sometimes I’ve no idea why.” Soundwave jolted him with a shock through the cable plugged into his wrist, and while it wasn’t a thing like an overload, it did knock Megatron out of the spiral of pain and remorse he was riding.
“You didn’t have to do that.” Megatron looked up at him in wonder.
“I don’t have to do anything.” Soundwave grinned a little. “I’m the Lord Protector now. But she’s Destron. So I’m her Lord Protector. So I ask you now. Can I trust you with her? If you ever do anything like that again to her, Loki may stop me from killing you outright, but I’ll still find a way to make you wish you were dead.”
“I know,” Megatron said. “For a minute there, you already did. But it isn’t fear of you that will stop me. You love her more, but I do love her. Can I trust you? You ordered her to kill me. I don’t care that you wanted me dead. Most of the people I care about have at some point. But I was furious with you for sending her. I shouldn’t have tried to take her from you, but I didn’t only do it because I wanted her for myself. I didn’t think she was safe with you either.”
Soundwave nodded, his face dark with energon flush and guilt. “That’s one of the reasons I choose to forgive you for this, above and beyond still loving you. That was worse than anything you did to her. None of the wounds that you, she and Galvatron dealt to my pride could ever excuse it. She knows that I would never violate her will again, and by some miracle, she trusts me still. I don’t expect you to accept that, because it’s her nature to yield in love. But I’ll make you the vow that I’m asking of you.”
Megatron replied by releasing the cable in his own arm; Soundwave opened the corresponding port, and kissed him again with exquisite, maddening gentleness.
“Soundwave, you know that I never want to hurt her again—”
Soundwave shut him up with another kiss. “We all have sharp edges. Ravi-brightspark has some of the sharpest. Pain is inevitable when sharp things embrace one another, but it’s not mistreatment as long as it isn’t intentional, and we all look after the wounds we inflict on each other by accident.”
Megatron thought about it for a moment. “That’s fair.”
Soundwave shrugged. “You’ll hurt Loki, too. And he’ll hurt you. But as long as you respect one another, the love will survive. As ours has done.”
Megatron opened his chest plating. Soundwave stared at him for a moment, because he knew that Megatron knew he only spark-merged with Ravage. But this was a vow, not a bonding; he bared his own spark.
“I will never again enforce my will upon Ravage of Stanix, who is your conjunx, and my amica, unless she consents to it joyfully and without reservation,” Megatron said, from the centre of his spark and throughout his whole body and field, aloud and within his mind.
Soundwave had to laugh softly at the reservation.
“I will never again enforce my will upon Ravage of Stanix, who is your amica, and my conjunx, unless she consents to it joyfully and without reservation,” Soundwave said, and though he could not completely shut down all his parallel processes, Megatron could feel it rise up from his spark and out of his mind through his words.
After their plates closed, Soundwave gave Megatron a little smirk. “Don’t get ahead of yourself. I don’t deny that I was being selfish when I asked her not to lie with you again. But she freely agreed to that, and she likes it.”
“I don’t doubt it.” Megatron smiled, a little ruefully. He’d noticed Ravage preening when Soundwave made a point of showing everyone around that she was with him. “I’m not sure I’m ready to have her again. Or even that she wants me back, in that way.”
Soundwave quirked a smile. “I do think I have to let her be selfish, too, which is why I won’t have you without her consent.”
“I’m happy to concentrate my attentions upon my new love,” Megatron replied. “But that means you really ought to stop teasing me.”
“Call it my petty revenge, if you like.” Soundwave looked down at their bound arms. “I don’t see you pulling away. You haven’t even updated your encryption.”
“Apparently seidr does not require key exchanges.”
Soundwave laughed. “Some Autobot captain you are. The Decepticon Lord Protector is under your plate. And he’s me. What would Lord Hot Rod say?”
“If he could see your face right now, and feel your field? I bet he’d ask to be let in,” said Megatron unrepentantly. “Would you let him?”
Soundwave made a disgusted face and rolled his optics. “No, no and frag you, but no. Please tell me he’s not on my ‘face-chain now.”
Megatron laughed out loud. “I have no idea, but if he is, it’s not through me.”
Megatron tilted his head down to look up at Soundwave. “Loki and I are very happy, but don’t think I haven’t missed being wrapped in your mind. You’re right that Ravage has a physical hold on me that you don’t. But you get under my plate in a different way, especially when you take your damned blast mask off and you smirk like that. It reminds me of how lost I get in your head. You make me delirious. I’m so overwhelmed that all I can do is lie there and feel the whole universe pouring right through you.”
Soundwave beamed at him, and took his visor off, golden eyes shining. “Tempter,” he said with a snort.
“Always.” Megatron chuckled, and then shook his head. “I’m amazed that people think anyone tops you.”
“I like to be underestimated. It’s a very effective strategy.” Soundwave shrugged. “And Ravi can top me, but you know her. She rarely wants that. Especially not with me. She needs to be cared for, and that is very much my kink.” He sighed. “You don’t understand why I choose not to lead. But I don’t think you have any idea what I would be like if I didn’t give someone the chance to put brakes on me.”
“I can guess.” Megatron winced: on his own accord, this time.
“She gave me permission to be her protector, personally,” Soundwave said. “I should have protected her more, in the past. Whether or not I stay selfish, forever…I will always protect her, now. I won’t let her barter herself. I won’t let her get overwhelmed with what other people want and get caught up in the moment and do things I know she’ll regret.”
Megatron nodded. “I made someone else a similar promise.” He didn’t say who. They both knew, but it wasn’t Soundwave’s business.
“That’s good. Make sure that you keep it.” Soundwave kissed his cheek, then vented into his ear: “That was the second thing that needed to heal. I needed to know that you actually do want me, that you know we come as a pair, and you care how I feel, whether or not we’re fragging each other.”
Megatron closed his optics. He was not going to cry.
“Yes, you are,” said Soundwave, and kissed his cheeks until he did, gentle but also relentless.
Megatron clung to him, weeping. “I never meant to hurt you. I don’t know what was wrong with me. I’d look at you after things got bad and I couldn’t. I knew you must be furious. I couldn’t face you, let alone…‘face you. And when I left, I wanted you both to come with me. But I was sure you didn’t love me anymore, and I wasn’t really even sure you still loved her, after what you asked her to do.”
Soundwave nuzzled his face. “I should’ve insisted. I should’ve told you to remember she was mine, and to give her up if you couldn’t let me in. I was afraid of you, too. And that will not happen again. I will not be afraid of you ever again. Not for my sake or hers.”
Megatron choked back a sob. “No. No, it won’t. I lost my honour completely, and I let her throw her pride away. And yours. I’m sorry.”
Soundwave lifted their bound wrists and kissed the back of Megatron’s hand. “You really were out of your mind if you ever thought I’d pledge myself to any Prime, but especially not to Optimus. Did you know he tried to blackmail me?”
Megatron couldn’t help laughing, even though he was crying. “Of course he did. What did you do?”
“I told him that I was willing to bet I had more dirt on him than he had on me. And reminded him that he used to like those whole-brain overloads, too. I think he deleted some of those memories. Or maybe assumed that I would’ve done that, because they are painful. I told him I’d saved everything, behind the kind of firewall only Ravi builds.”
“You’re the absolute worst,” Megatron said, with sincere admiration. “Are we at peace?”
“We are,” said Soundwave. “But you do have more amends to make. For one thing, Ravi and Glit. Her relationship with her brother’s never recovered from the position you put her in and the place you sent him.”
Megatron groaned. “His kid loves Loki’s kids, and I’m not allowed to be in the room with his kid if neither Loki nor the housekeeper’s there.”
Soundwave just laughed. “You deserve that. Suck it up for the sake of the newsparks.”
