TF Failsafe Coding AU
The concept of this continuity soup AU is that Warframes, particularly warframes with slave coding can trigger a heat/rut through submitting to a stronger opponent in battle.
It makes them limp and pathetic, unable to activate their weapon systems, just about able to string a sentence together between chirrups of binary, the only hard part of them is their spike so it's easier for the victor to cart them off. They'll just mewl and roll around on their back to present their spikes, a failsafe to deter the victor from just killing them. However, if a mech has been on a winning streak & suddenly looses it forcibly activates.
This is inspired by a Tokyo Ghoul Fanfic Series I've been reading particularly the fic ( https://archiveofourown.org/works/48210463/chapters/121576942 ) I recommend reading that entry even if you're unfamiliar with the source material it's absolutely fantastic. Also this is somewhat inspired by my love of the X-Men & Ajin: Demi-human.
Maybe it was something conjured up by the Quintessons during their occupation to deter more violent troops from killing their coworkers because if they lost they'd become docile for a time & if they won they'd end up sparked, harder to cause trouble that way. The quints also found it's excellent entertainment at parties.
Anyway in the modern day Gladiators have to wear chastity devices because there's no way that the arena masters are giving people a free show, instead if a bot drops into heat they'll be carted out of the arena to a private afterparty for the high society bots to attend.
The managers don't want their star champions to end up sparked & have to take a break from performing.
Sometimes Gladiators can even be rented out to private arenas in Senator's homes or high end nightclubs for Fight & Spike parties where the fight is just an appetizer for the main event of watching some hulking warframe present themselves begging to be touched. Ridden or pounded by the victor, often pumped up on aggression inducing drugs, then turned over to the guests. That's all perfectly legal, in the gladiatorial contracts even, ignore that little detail about most of them signing said contracts under duress. What isn't legal is using these Gladiators as studs for the breeding of trafficked unregistered Outliers.
Which is where our intrepid undercover investigative journalist Orion Pax comes in. He's gotten into one of these parties to investigate the possible links to the disappearances of prominent Outliers & civil rights activists on behalf of Senator Shockwave. His cover is that he's some arm candy secretary picked up from the archives for (senator of your choice who Shockwave is blackmailing to go along with it). Orion sometimes works with fellow independent journalists Jazz & Blaster who primarily travel from city to city, event to event, interviewing interesting people with a political bent (think all gas no breaks / channel 5 the youtube channels if you're familiar but Jazz & Blaster aren't sex pests like the hosts of those channels 💀 if you're not familiar I'd recommend looking up someone reacting to one of their videos don't give the og channels views). They're helping him, monitoring the situation & relating his wire to their police contact Prowl who's been kicked off the missing Outliers case for getting too close to the truth.
Thus sets the scene for Orion to meet Megatron. He's aware of the gladiator of course who wouldn't know the face of the reigning champion of the pit, but seeing clips of his fights is not the same as seeing the mech sprawled back on the dancefloor, hazey optic'd & undulating to show off his spike. Whirring & beeping like a mechanimal. Orion has never seen something so hot before in his life & he hates himself for it. Which is about when the host of the party brings out Starscream who's been legally registered as dead for several months. Makes him ride Megatron until he's sparked up. Of course to make sure he's carrying an Outlier spark that's inherited his abilities the host blows a hole through his processor mid second round. After a few seconds Star jerks back into action, this isn't his first rodeo & he wants to get it over with asap before the host gets bored of boasting about his sales pitch, already starting bidding on Star's unborn bitty, & decides to shoot him again for the spectacle of it all.
Megatron is Distressed his heat partner just died, without any fight response he's working himself into hysterics. His processor is mush, energon & fragments of processor boards splashed across his face, whimpering he can't understand it His Mate just died he felt the death flare in his EM field but he can also feel the body is still moving.
Star absolutely loathes those noises & Megatron's expression because it breaks the immersion of all the training he's been through to see himself as an object because this bot is treating him like a person asking if he's hurt in base binary chirps & it makes him hate himself more. Maybe he's got a scold's bridle on so that he can't speak, he's not nicknamed Screamer for no reason.
Orion attends a few of these parties. He also goes to interview Megatron while he's sober after winning a match. Officially it's because Orion is writing a puff piece about Megatron so they have a conversation dancing around the subject, aware they're being monitored. Orion doesn't realise he's been found out as a mole until he's being dragged into the arena ring at a party. Thrown down in front of a drugged up Megatron, he's completely berserk, unable to be reasoned with, going to rip Orion to pieces. So thinking quickly Orion just surrenders mimicking a warframe's defeat induced heat driven to a fever pitch Megatron frags him until the drugs are out of his system. The party goers love it & want an oncore meanwhile Megs is coming back to his senses, an absolutely wrecked civilian mech underneath him. His handler is screaming at him over internal comms to give the ppl what they want & frag his throat open like he just did to that medalling journalist's valve. Orion just tells him " I'm sorry they're making you do this, I will endure it, don't blame yourself for what they're forcing you to do"
Of course they don't just let Orion go afterwards so now he's a missing person. Jazz, Blaster, & Prowl were tapped into Orion's audio visual feed & saw the whole thing up until Megatron crushed his Audials & Optics while fucking his face until it falls apart.
Orion is now being trafficed with the Outliers, his sensors are limited to tactial & olfactory only, luckily most of the trafficked bots know Sign language & Chirolinguistics so they teach him. Both Star & Orion are sparked up so they're housed together. Being moved from safehouse to safehouse. Star decides to use his own parts to try and repair Orion since even if he ripps out an optic it'll just grow back when he resets. His owner doesn't intervene because he finds it funny & it is keeping Starscream occupied. They are planning to repair Orion after the sparkling is born so they can get a repeat performance. But maybe they subject him to empurata since his face is already smashed.
Not sure what happens from here, maybe Jazz, Blaster, & Co decide to break Megatron out of the arena to help them track down Orion & the missing Outliers via his fledgling Sire bond.
I'm making Blurr an Outlier also, quicksilver type shit. He's fairly well-known by the general public as his disqualification from participating in any sporting events was highly publicised. With his fellow Velocitronians finding it to be highly offensive that he's barred, some more zealous individuals believe Blurr's speed to have been a blessing by their colony's patron Amalgamous Prime. He's lapping up being the civil rights movements' poster child. I'm also making Senator Shockwave Velocitronian royalty, rumoured to be a direct descendant of Amalgamous Prime. It's traditional that the royalty of Velocitron are Conjunx to the winner of the race celebrating their coming of age ceremony, whenever they choose to have that celebration after they reach adulthood is up to them, so Shockwave has postponed his in protest until the cybertronian government would recognise Blurr as the winner. They decide to do some fake dating 'the government is forbidding our love from being recognized in the traditional manner of our people' type shit for the tabloids to lap up & sway public opinion. They're a real celebrity couple.
This makes both of them frequent targets for assassinations & kidnappings. Starscream was a hired guard for Blurr & 'died' in one of these attacks, with the traffickers realising that Star was an Outlier & taking him after watching him wake up from a decapitation. Shockwave goes missing during one of these attempts, carted off to be subjected to empurata, the surgery triggers a mass/shape shifting mutation in him. He breaks out & returns to office hiding the fact that he's now an Outlier himself, maintaining his original form for long periods of time stressing out his body to the point of seizures. Blurr caring for him & helping him hide himself leads them to develop genuine feelings for eachother.
Please send me asks about this au or reblog & add comments please 🥺👉👈
Signed
_ Cu 🐗
