(@quibble-auk I know your busy, but I got a worm. Maybe this makes sense, its some deep thoughts for the Swap au)
Tw. angst, child death, overall pain. No comfort.
Saturnstrider’s spark was screaming. It was crying out and sobbing in his chest. Anyone who could hear, heard it.
Even chained and back in shreds, a perfect specimen. His helm was a bright red, soft golden accents and horns that had gored many. He had a strong jaw, scarred and broken now. He was a handsome mech, as most gladiators were. Vicious, cruel and animalistic.
Brought to his knees by a round faced servant. A soft pastel yellow, orange lovely plating. She had been a wonderful ornament to her house, sweet and as loyal as anything could be. Maybe her sweetness is what captivated the gladiator. Those small hands, pressed softly to his scarred cheeks
Made him more than an attention seeking gladiator with a smirk.
He made her feel safe, protected, like she was more than a centerpiece.
Now he wished she had slapped him when he offered his berth. Told him he would never be enough for someone like her.
Instead she had kissed him, showed him a softer part of himself he had never grasped.
Now his dearest Cloudspinner was dead. Torn apart. Gone. He felt it in the whole of his chest.
Another wave of rage tore through him, then it mixed with the utter greif rolling in him. A roar of a dead man scorched his throat, because he knew he had not just failed his stubborn loving wife.
Saturnstrider had failed his newspark.
He had never wanted a child, and killed many of them. Ripped the screaming children apart. They were weak. Mistakes. Sent to die in the way of the pits. Its just how it was, he felt nothing for them. The disfigured needed to prove their worth, just like everyone else. If you failed you died. Simple
Then Cloudspinner whispered she felt a stir. She had been shaking with fear and happiness, an odd combination. Like many of his mate’s emotions, things that came in odd pairs.
Saturn had been shell shocked, happiness is not what came to him. Fear. Fear because he knew he had just allowed them to cross a line.
Cloe had been hopeful, passionately so. Saturn however, did his best to maybe persuade her to kill it, he knew there were ways. She had given him a look so full of betrayal he had fallen to his knees.
“We can’t keep it, they won't let you keep it.”
“They. My sparkling isn’t an animal, there like you and me.”
Her bright round optics were sharp with clarity, but her voice shook with hurt. “You don’t want a family with me.”
His chest had tightened, cinching with tension. He wanted her, so desperately. She was his. Would be till he died.
“So the little spark within me, they arn’t me, arn’t yours?”
No. It was a threat to what they were, if the masters found out about their union. It would be a hell for them both.
But in the end, she wanted it.
She shared the soft flares she felt with him, caused by the little spark that was gaining, and his systems locked with a protective instinct that shook him to his core.
He didn’t want it. Didn’t want the kid.
But Cloud desperately wanted it, and soon Saturn was overturned.
He had dreams so soft it made him weak, of small sparklings fitting in his claws. Of being out of this hell he called home.
Hope grew with the tiny spark, and before he knew it he was almost excited to see the little thing.
Then he woke up. Woke up when his love never came back.
When his master came in holding a bundle that was too small, too soon.
They had taken her sparkling from her too soon, they had hurt her. Rage rattled him, burned him from the inside. Utter and complete.
He needed to find her, he needed to protect her from that snake that owned them both.
That reptile that held his sparkling.
The thing had the gall to hold the baby close to his chest, like they were his.
Like he had not ripped them away from their mother too soon, another mind numbing wave of rage tore through him. Torrent had maybe crippled Saturnstrider’s child, had defiled his mate.
He had hurt what was his.
Was hurting what was his.
The chains had buckled, ripping from the wall as an animalistic snarl tore from his throat. He had almost gotten there in time. Two more seconds and he would have ripped Torrent apart, slowly painted the room with that piece of slag’s insides. Got his sparkling. Got to see their face.
But Torrent activated Saturn’s primus forsaken programs, and he writhed. Agony wracking him with every movement. Numbing his externals. Past the pain a sob cut through the fog.
His sparkling was calling for comfort, expressing fear in pained churrups. Torrent wasn’t holding him right. Cloe had taught him how to hold them, you never crushed them to your plating.
Torrent was hurting them.
Saturn had fought as the programs doubled down. His vision shaking with pain, the need to get to Torrent pinned beneath his BCP codes.
Torrent had been smiling.
The snake never let him see his sparkling.
