#gladiator megatron

• Know you’re supposed to wear the coveralls, but you feel like you’re melting and you haven’t even started the session, yet. As alien as you are to each other, you doubt he cares about how much skin you’re showing anyway. Though, if the rumors are true, hand washing him is going to be seen as an intimacy. Something partners do for each other, so a declaration that you’re interested. Which isn’t untrue. “It was my way of reclaiming my autonomy,” he says and you shimmy out of your coveralls, straightening and feeling cooler dressed in your tank top and shorts. Surprised at his answer, you study that serious face. Because you understand that urge. Your first tattoo wasn’t because you had a wild hair or felt rebellious. It was because you needed to prove your body was no one else’s. Fingers finding the ink at the inside of your wrist, you blow out a breath. ‘Because it’s something you chose that can’t be taken away. Your way of proving it’s your body,’ you mutter and his optics narrow. “Yes,” he finally says, sounding surprised as he meets your eyes.

• Wasn’t expecting understanding and he rumbles softly. Studying the colorful markings on your skin as you tug your foot coverings back on, he reaches for the barrel of energon on your cart, prying the lid off with a servo. Has he ever had access to this much energon at once? Or even seen this much? So used to the constant, dull ache of hunger. Of never having enough. Tipping it up, he watches you mix up soap for him. Apparently set on washing him. Courting him like he’s a desirable mech worth having as a conjunx. Remembers Terminus’s smile and the way the other mech had cradled his human to his chassis as a different ache spreads through him. “Can you mass shift for me? It’s a lot easier to be one on one that way,” you say giving him a once over and his servos flex on the barrel as he drains it. But it’s not like anything as soft as you look could hurt him even if he did mass shift. Compared to him, you look disturbingly fragile.

• He’s rumbling softly, but he mass shifts for you anyway. And he’s still much bigger than you are as you grab his hand and he just stares at your hand on him. He’s not exactly what you expected you decide as you tug on his hand and he clears his vents, allowing you to tug him toward your cart. Watching him sit on the cart, his red optics are suspicious as you carry your bucket closer. Can’t help but want to know the story behind that comment of his even as you balk at the thought of having to share your own. Whoever made him feel like that, like a thing to be used, they’re why he looks so angry. You’re sure of that and you get it. Because that had been you for the longest time. Finding your soapy rag, you swing a leg across to straddle his lap and he freezes, growling. But he doesn’t immediately shove you off of him. Sliding the soapy rag over the mesh of his neck, you’re aware of him frowning down at you.

• What are you doing? Sitting in his lap and running soft, wet hands over him. Do you expect him to reciprocate? To touch you? “I’m not what you think I am,” he growls and you glance up at him before smiling faintly. ‘What do you think I think you are?’ You ask and he can scent you when he vents, alien but not unpleasant. No one’s ever touched him like this before. Gently. Doesn’t know what to do with gentle as his spike stirs behind his modesty plating. “I have nothing. No shanix. I can’t give you any of kind of social standing,” he says and you wrinkle your nose, hands sliding down his chassis. ‘Well, I have no idea what shanix is and I don’t really give a damn about social standing,’ you reply and he lays a hand on your hip, disconcerted by how warm you are, by the faint buzz of your unguarded field. Pressing his palm more firmly against you, it’s illicit to be able to feel your emotions washing into him. How can you trust him that much when you don’t even know him? Optics hooding as your hands keep stroking over him, he rumbles, aching to let his spike pressurize and embarrassed by that urge. One gentle touch and it feels like his control is unraveling. And on top of that, you’re alien. “What do you give a damn about?” He asks despite himself and you huff out a startled laugh, the sound sinking into him. ‘Living. Enjoying myself with good company,’ you say, eyes wicked as your hands slide lower and he grunts when you stroke along the seams of his modesty plating. ‘What about you?’ You ask, tone scandalously teasing like you know exactly what you’re doing. Optics narrowing, his servos flex against you, feeling the way your flesh gives. What would it be like to give in? To claim you as alien and strange as you are. It’s obscene to even consider it, but at the same time, your form is strangely Cybertronian. Familiar. And that’s so odd to him. How could they have found organic life so different from their own, but still so similar? “Are you mine?” He growls and your eyes flash with heat, your scent shifting.

• Hurrying through the base and trying to avoid huge peds, you glance at your dossier. At the Megatron variant you’ve been assigned. Because usually, this guy is always problematic from what you’ve heard. This one, though? He looks angry; his helm, his face, and frame decorated with markings and his lip curled to flash denta. He’s also handsome. But then, you’d signed up because of the rumors. Because you’d been curious about the aliens. Ever since they’d arrived you’ve been fascinated with the Cybertronians. And all that anger on his face? The rebellion? It’s so fascinating. He’s fascinating.

• Sees so many Cybertronians with humans. Doesn’t know what to make of any of this. Because it’s what he’d imagined minus the organics. What he’d been fighting for. Peace and equality. No senate and no more castes. No more being trapped or judged by your altmode. It feels like a dream and he doesn’t quite trust it. “Sir!” Looking around, he rumbles as he spots familiar faces and so many new faces. “Sir?” Hesitating, he looks down and there’s a human staring breathlessly up at him with a smile. Rumbling as he slides his ped away from you, he frowns down at you. You’ve got your covering half off around your waist, the thinner covering underneath baring your arms and the designs covering them. And it’s still so strange how Cybertronian your people look. What are the odds of finding another sentient race so similar to their own? “Hi, I’ve been looking for you. I’m yours,” you say, offering him your name, but his processor is caught on that ‘I’m yours.’

• Didn’t mean to say it like that, but you’d gotten flustered and the words a bit mixed up. He’s just frowning seriously down at you, too. Do those markings mean something? They must to him since you haven’t really seen any other aliens with markings like his. They make him seem wilder, more feral somehow. Temptingly dangerous. Flustered, you know yourself well enough to know that the bad boy, rebel image he has going is all just tailor made to draw you in. Get you in trouble. “Is that so?” He growls and that deep, rumbling voice is just the cherry on top of the inappropriate thought sundae that you’re now enjoying. ‘If you want me to be,’ you answer.

• Are you flirting with him? Remembers the way Terminus had been possessively cradling the human he’d been carrying. The way he’d seen several other Cybertronians interacting with these organics. Is that what’s going on? Some kind of interspecies meetup to find conjunxes? Even more lost, he watches your eyes give him a slow once over. Like you find him desirable and that thought is so foreign to him. So used to being looked down on because of his frame, his altmode. Barely noticed. Had been put to work in the mines right after coming online and knew he’d die in those same mines. Knew it. But then Terminus had been killed in front of him for daring to question a mech from an upper caste and everything had changed. He’d started pushing back. Started taking what he wanted. Making them hear him, see him. Isn’t used to being seen without giving someone a reason to notice him, though. “How about a bath? Some energon while we get to know each other,” you say and he vents softly, rumbling as his lips twitch.

• Smoothing a hand against his chassis, you feel the hum of his internal systems, his plating warm under your palm. Alive. Drawing your hand away, you frown at the glowing stuff on your fingertips. His blood. And a big servo touches the back of your hand as he growls softly, his attention on your stained fingers as he vents and his head comes up suddenly. Skin prickling as his rumbling shifts into an aggressive growling, you look over at the stranger lingering in the doorway.

• Optics narrowing as he takes in the stranger, it takes him a klik to notice the second bot lingering just behind the first mech. “You don’t look much like a medic,” he growls, servos curling around you as you chirp uncertainly. Picking up on his suspicion maybe. Because the bot in front of him? His paint’s too pristine, too colorful and extravagant. ‘Oh no. I never cared much for getting my hands dirty,’ the stranger says, studying him in a way that has his plating lifting. Like he’s a thing, not a person. ‘I just wanted to meet the fighter that’s causing such a stir. The lowly mining bot who claimed the name of a Prime like he had every right.’

• Watching the blue mech standing behind the one that’s talking step forward and hold out a container, your mech doesn’t make any move to take it. Just rumbling a low warning as the stranger growls nonsense, hands moving as he talks. And the blue one opens the container to make you suck in a breath. “Hey!” You yelp. There’s other stuff in there, but that’s your freaking underwear you’d been wearing when you’d gotten abducted, beamed up, whatever on top of the pile. “Those are mine!” You seethe and your mech rumbles something at the stranger who gestures at you with a smile that makes your skin crawl.

• “I’d like us to be friends,” the mech says and he cups his hands around you as you gesture angrily, chirping loudly. Excited about what’s in the box. “You can think of this as a goodwill gesture. Food and water for your little pet. Coverings, too. I imagine it’s probably cold down here and your little organic looks so fragile.” Optics narrowing even as he wants to reach for the container, he presses you against his chassis and your chirping falters to a sullen sounding warbling. ‘And what do you gain from our friendship?’ He demands as you squirm against the palm of his hand. Hearing the veiled threat behind the mech’s smile. Knows this has to be one of the aristocracy and hates him for that alone. “Do you know the lower castes adore you? But a mech like me? They’ll never love me. Never trust me. You, though? They’ll follow you to the Pit and back.” Staring at this stranger, he thinks of Terminus, expression belligerent as he’d dared to question a higher caste mech. Remembering what had happened as hate twists through him. Maybe this mech had nothing to do with that. With what happened to Terminus. But he’s still one of them. One of the privileged who’s never felt the ache of an empty tank, who’s never been afraid. One of the mechs that watches the fights from up high and cheers for every brutal, senseless death because they don’t see fellow Cybertronians. Only animals.

• Roaring in pain when a blade sinks into the back of his leg, splitting his plating and biting into the joint of his knee, he goes down. And swings his mace back, feeling it connect with a satisfying crunch as his last opponent screams. Head turning, he uses the mace to push himself up, feeling energon slicking his leg as he leans heavily on the weapon. Limping forward as his opponent tries to drag himself away, he can hear the other mech gasping that he yields. Venting raggedly, his servos clench on the handle of his mace. Not even surprised when the other mech lashes out frantically. Desperately trying to bring him down. Sidestepping, he brings the mace down on the other mech’s head, optics shuttering at the wet crack.

• The roar that swells through the arena makes you wince, hands covering your ears. They’re chanting again, peds coming down in rhythmic thumps above you and you wonder if it’s over. Searching for your mech when the little guy finally moves his hand, your breath catches. He’s broken and battered, covered in something luminous as he lifts a gore covered mace over his head. And his head turns, optics finding you. Staring before he’s throwing his head back with a roar at the cheering crowds. Your relief that he’s survived is short lived though as you notice the bodies strewn about his peds. Reminding you that he’s dangerous. A monster. But he’s your best bet at surviving. You need a monster in this place.

• Limping across the arena floor, his optics narrow. Hadn’t told the twins to not let you watch, but he wishes he had. The horror on your uncannily Cybertronian features hurts. Will you be scared of him now? Cower from his touch? Reaching out his hand, he takes you from the twins and can feel the frantic, too-quick beating of your heart against his servos. But you don’t resist or try to get away. “Report to medical,” one of the guards demands and his plating lifts as he cradles you against his chassis.

• Looking up at him as he growls softly, those red optics study you. A big servo brushes your cheek as he walks, his pace slow and pained. Hurt. The glowing alien blood all over him not only his opponents’ apparently and it scares you. What happens to you if his wounds are fatal? Awkwardly patting his chassis to get his attention, he glances down at you and you touch his chassis again. “Don’t die on me, okay?” Know he can’t understand you, but without him? Your life expectancy goes to zero and you know it. Need him.

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