#driftclonus

“Are you satisfied?” Cyclonus asks, his voice far too smooth and unbothered, which kicks a fresh ember into Drift’s already white-hot hatred. “Had your fill? Or shall I beat it back into your thick skull again, just to be sure?”

“Fuck you,” Drift snarls, his voice a feathered wheeze, “Decepticon swill,”

Cyclonus has the audacity to sigh, heavy and resigned as if he were handling a disagreeable sparkling and not a repugnant ex-Con. “I assumed violence was more your language. Perhaps not. Then I shall be crueler. Are these teeth that snap at me those of the repentant Drift, or the hateful Deadlock?”

Drift’s eyes round in shock, and for a moment he’s speechless. Cyclonus tilts his head in consideration, leans forward more so the fortified joints of Drift’s inner elbows groan under the new weight. “Ah. I see. So that’s what this is,”

Drift barely scrapes enough of himself back together to sputter ineffectively, “What are you talking about?”

“Don’t be dense, Drift. Or should I be saying Deadlock? You certainly froth and snap as if you are him, once again. Or were you ever not?” Cyclonus’s eyes glint, bright under the shadow his brow casts over them, and he tilts his head down to regard Drift uncompromisingly. (In this space of a moment Drift understands, profoundly and with perhaps an inkling of fear, exactly why Galvatron had chosen Cyclonus as his second in command. Drift is an insect fastened to a cork board for display, a lowly animal cowed under the jaws of a more successful predator, a simple cog held in the unflinching grasp of something larger, hotter, and made to smelt him.)

Drift’s silence is laced thickly with surprise. Cyclonus lets him stew in it for a moment, then cuts him down further with words alone. “Here is what I’ve gathered. You’re free to speak otherwise if it’s incorrect.” Drift would laugh, if he could. “We both share a unique and terrible history as former high ranking Decepticons now defected to our enemy. We are traitors to our kin, and prisoners without physical shackles under an Autobot warden. You may think yourself free of your past as you hide behind a new banner, but to them, you will always be a Decepticon.” Cyclonus taps the Autobot insignia etched into Drift’s chest, and Drift flinches as if he’d been stabbed. The bearings in his elbow joints groan with the movement, and he hisses in real pain. Cyclonus’s weight is unyielding, uncompromising. His words are a reflection, an extension.

“You hate me not because I am a Decepticon, but I remind you of everything you are attempting so fiercely to forget. I do not doubt the sanctity and centeredness your spirituality has afforded you, or impugn your connection to Primus. But I am a reminder of your past. To you, I am a reflection. To you, I am you. To you, I am Deadlock,”

Drift cuts his visual feed, as if it would save him from Cyclonus’s vicious words. His ruthlessly precise deconstruction of the insecurities Drift has been running from his whole life. But Cyclonus’s voice is a steady timber that slices down to the protoform, rakes across the weak mesh there and leaves Drift lesser in its wake.

“And this is the root of our misunderstanding. I bear no ill will to you, Drift. I am certain enough of myself that your presence does not delude me as mine does you. I felt fit to ignore you. You refused such an avenue. You project a fierce hatred upon me because such indirection is simpler than confronting that you are only hating yourself.”

“Stop,” Drift manages. His voice is weak, it’s hollow and pathetic to his own audials. “Just stop,”

“No,” Cyclonus says. Drift feels the heat of his breath against his jaw, even with his optics powered down, can feel the shift in Cyclonus’s weight on his chest and elbow joints to know Cyclonus is bare inches from his own face, now turned away in shame. “You call yourself a Spectralist. You claim yourself a holy mech. But you refuse to address such a destructive line of self denial. Do not shy from this, Drift. Deadlock is not some lurking ghost from the Pit come to lead you astray. Conflict and inner turmoil are to be expected. But do not foist such burdens onto me. I am not Deadlock, and neither are you.”

Finally, finally, Cyclonus pulls away. The heat against Drift’s face leaves, frigid cold rushing to fill its space, and the pressure on his joints lift. Drift’s proximity sensors clock Cyclonus as still standing above him, even though his feet are planted away from Drift’s sides.

“If you are still interested in matters of carnality, I have no qualms fulfilling such needs,” Cyclonus says. Shame takes a different hue in Drift now, and inwardly he withers at his earlier advances. “I would say to save the embarrassment, as I do not think of you any lesser for wanting sex, but I’d prefer different circumstances. You may fight me again, if so desired. I can take you in that manner, even. But come to me looking for Cyclonus, not Deadlock.”