#tactile interfacing

Foolishly, Bumblebee had thought perhaps he was used to all of Statscream’s antics. After all, there isn’t much a mech can hide from a ghost whom became inextricably bound to their spark even if they didn’t talk to themselves when they were alone. Occasionally, Starscream would surprise him or others one way or another, but he’d been behaving oddly well as of late. And that in itself was a warning sign, but Bumblebee was simply too exhausted from trying to help rebuild Cybertron to notice in time.

Not until Starscream unexpectedly scooped Bumblebee up while he was in the middle of talking shop with someone and threw the minibot over his shoulder. Too stunned to react at first, that gave Starscream enough time to bring him back to their apartment and place him in the wash rack. Just as Bumblebee finally shook himself out and opened his intake to ask what the hell the seeker was doing, Starscream shoved a cube of energon in his hands.

“Refuel, then take a solvent bath,” Starscream ordered with a pointed glare, “Your joints are creaking so loudly, I’m surprised the grime in them hasn’t slowed down your movement.”

Bee bawked at the other, the need to defend himself bubbling up.

“Screamer, what-“

“I won’t take no for an answer on this,” Starscream crossed his servos over his cockpit, never taking his sharp optics off the minibot, “You’ve been burying yourself in work and refusing to take basic care of your frame and I’m sick of it.”

“Who says I’m not taking care of myself? And why does that matter to you?”

“Oh please. No one needs to outright say it to see it,” he pushed the cube further into Bee’s chassis, “Now fix it or I will.”

Tired and frustrated, Bumblebee was more than ready to call his bluff.

“You will, huh? ‘Starscream forcing me to take care of myself’, that’ll be the day.”

The two stood in opposition, pinning each other with their own unique glares, until Starscream growled his engine and once again picked Bumblebee up like he weighed nothing. Bee yelped, then began squirming and pushing against the other to perhaps salvage some of his dignity and get his pedes back under him. Starscream, however, was much stronger than he looked and when he decided on something, he wasn’t an easy mech to dissuade unless he persuaded himself out of something.

“Star, let me- slag it all, let me go!” Bee demanded, kicking the scheming seeker lightly in hopes of dislodging himself, “I don’t need you to care for me like some newforge!”

Starscream scoffed, “You certainly aren’t doing a good job if you’re truly trying to convince me you can look after yourself.”

Bumblebee groaned obnoxiously, trying a new tactic of being annoying enough that the seeker would eventually give up. In his struggle, Bee hardly realized Starscream was gathering items until they were back in the wash rack. Starscream then proceeded to mechhandle him with his servos above his helm and tied his wrists together. Bumblebee, confused and more than a little suspicious, sputtered and floundered harder.

“What the frag are you-?”

Starscream curtly shushed him and continued wrapping the cord along his outstretched arms, down his chassis, and finally tying it off securely behind Bumblebee’s lower back strut. Being maneuvered and flipped around with so little effort on Starscream’s part, while irritating on the surface, did something to the minibot. So much so that he had to forcibly stifle his engine so it didn’t start revving uncontrollably.

When Starscream was satisfied with his work, he hummed in approval and lifted Bumblebee again only to tie his bound servos to an elevated bar in the wash rack usually used to make sure a larger mech with heightened heel struts didn’t accidentally slip when getting in or out. Now though, Starscream used it as a secure spot to keep Bumblebee upright and elevated as he grabbed one of the items he had gathered beforehand.

“Is that… your special cleanser?”

“It’s not ‘special’,” Starscream scoffed as he activated the shower and set it to warm, “While it is meant for flight frames, you won’t spontaneously melt if a grounder uses it.”

When the solvent was adequately warm enough, Starscream detached the nozzle from the wall and began slowly working around Bumblebee’s whole frame. It was pleasantly warm rather than the blisteringly hot temperature Starscream preferred and as the solvent reached into his seams and eased the aches in his protoform, Bumblebee found himself relaxing despite the compromising position he was in.

No sane mech, dead or alive, would trust Starscream enough to allow themselves to be tied up and strung up like a decoration, but likely no one in the universe had ever experienced being pampered by him— not even Bumblebee himself, really. It was very strange, but he certainly wasn’t about to complain because he knew Starscream would simply huff and leave him here to struggle with releasing himself. He was notoriously petty like that.

Slowly, ever so slowly, Bumblebee fully relaxed in the other’s hold, optics shuttering and humming in appreciation as precise servos scrubbed along dull plating and snuck into sore seams. His aching protoform practically sang in relief as the strain and stress melted off him. Primus’s core, Starscream’s talon-like digits worked wonders when they weren’t being used to gut someone.

Just as Bumblebee was starting to slip into a short recharge, Starscream’s digits began massaging into the connective joints of his door wings and sent an overwhelming jolt of sensory feedback exploding like flares behind his optics. Against his own volition, a whiny gasp escaped him, his wings twitching as they adjusted to the new data of Starscream’s talons dancing in places they’d never been before.

Sure, the two had interfaced on random occasion— whenever they found the rare time alone to have a quickie, which only ever lasted a few short kliks before they would have to go their separate ways again— but they had both agreed without words that the wings were off limits in most circumstances. The only time that rule had been explicitly put on hold was when Starscream needed to recalibrate his sensor net and reluctantly allowed Bumblebee to assist by placing the lightest of touches across his wings to help his system fully adjust.

Even then, in a rather inconsequential and almost clinical setting, Starscream had clearly struggled to mute his infamously loud vocalizer with every fleeting touch. Afterward, neither had mentioned it.

But now, Bumblebee was beginning to fully understand why the seeker had had such trouble quieting himself at the time. The unfamiliar sensation of well-kept claws tracing along untouched ball joints and gently rubbing the cleanser into his seams were indeed overwhelming, but certainly not in an unpleasant way.

In honesty, he was doing rather well at not completely embarrassing himself until Starscream plucked at a particularly weak wire and spontaneously threw the minibot into a power surge of an overload that sent electricity visibly crackling across his plating, the light near blinding and only intensified by the solvent, and ended just as suddenly. Going limp in the overcomplicated bonds, Bee groaned long and low as his systems slowly recovered from the peak in charge.

“You… you overloaded? Just from that?”

Rather than his usual teasing tone or even a possibly disgusted sneer, Starscream sounded completely taken aback in disbelief. Bumblebee groaned again, more exasperated this time, because he knew for a fact that the other was never going to let him live this down. Overloading from just a few firm caresses like a newbuild, how the hell did he let that happen?

“Look, my wings’re… more sensitive than I remember,” he struggled to reset his voice box, the power surge having knocked a lot of his unnecessary functions offline, “I jus’ didn’t expect you-“

Bumblebee was cut off by a moan, spurred on by the more purposeful light scratches that traced from his door hinges to the tips of his wings. Still reeling from an unexpected tactile overload, Bee was left twitching and tugging on his restraints as his frame did its level best to free itself and… well, he wasn’t entirely sure whether he was trying to get away from the new ministrations or lean further into them. Like he so often did, he found himself at the mercy of Starscream’s machinations and having little clue as to what he was going to do next.

A not so quiet part of himself hoped the seeker would dig deep into his seams and pull on some more wires. Perhaps he could convince Starscream to use his intake, let his notorious silver glossa press against the delicate cables that kept Bumblebee’s wings attached to his struts, maybe even get him to start biting-

Moaning at the new fantasies flooding his processor, he somehow almost forgot that Starscream still had him under cruel but calculated servos. That is until Starscream so kindly reminded him with a pinch to one of his door wing mounts and pulled a yelp from him.

“Well, I certainly can’t leave this be without a thorough inspection, now can I?~” Starscream purred, the gears obviously turning in his helm, “You should consider yourself lucky; I’m the best mech to have around for wing care.~”

Ratchet loathed asking for help when it came to anything medical related. It made him feel incompetent and almost useless when he did even though, logically, he knew that was a foolish thought. Of everyone on the team, he was likely one of the most important mecha they had— if Optimus was to be believed and Ratchet trusted him with his very spark.

Yet asking for help still gave him trouble. It was like pulling a digit from the mouth of a starving scraplet. Yes, he had learned from the ‘synth-en’ incident, but old habits die hard and as an apprentice, he was expected to already know how to do most things or to figure it out on his own if not.

Unfortunately, there simply wasn’t any feasible way for him to clean and adjust the tiny inner workings of his servos. If there were, he would have already done so without any fanfare. But he couldn’t, so he was forced to not only ask for someone else’s assistance, but to ask for it from one of the only mecha in the universe who could seemingly blow things up better than he could build them.

“Take it easy doc, I ain’t gonna hurt you.”

“Pain isn’t my biggest concern at the moment,” Ratchet grit out, trying not to fidget now that his servos were strapped down to the small tool table, “I’m far more worried about you damaging any delicate components. We don’t exactly have many spare parts lying around.”

“Relax,” Wheeljack assured so helpfully, “I’ve been rewiring explosives for centuries now, this can’t be that much harder.”

Ratchet wanted to point out that this was, in fact, much harder than just defusing a bomb, but decided he’d be better off not falling for the Wrecker’s bait to banter. The less talking there was, the less likely Wheeljack would be to accidentally misalign something. Ratchet needed his hands to do anything around the base and he wasn’t looking to lose that because of someone else’s lack of focus.

Taking apart and cleaning his first servo went well enough with Ratchet’s guidance and vigilant watch over the other’s actions, but recalibrating his sensors presented some trouble. His digits were jerky and the responses from them were noticeably delayed, which was not a good thing to see from a medic.

“Spark’s sake, what did you do?” he groaned, though he knew he couldn’t truly be mad at Wheeljack because he had done everything Ratchet had told him to.

“Nothing ‘cept what you said,” Wheeljack hummed, taking another look at the small components through the magnifying lens attached to a tiny forceps tool, “Hmm, maybe your neurological impulse signals just haven’t fully recalibrated.”

“Oh please,” Ratchet scoffed, fighting the urge to roll his optics, “And since when do you have knowledge about the intricacies of the neural net?”

Wheeljack shrugged slightly, putting down the forceps and picking up an unused brush, “Next to nothing, but I’ve heard delays can happen after maintenance.”

“Where have you-“

Ratchet was immediately interrupted by a startled yelp as Wheeljack gently ran the brush through extremely sensitive gears and instantly sent strange signals from his servos straight to his processor, sending bright stars across his vision. When his optics cleared, Ratchet had to reset his vocalizer— when had it short circuited?— and took a monumental amount of effort to look the Wrecker in the eye again.

To Wheeljack’s credit, he at least had the mind to look surprised, but that quickly faded when he realized Ratchet wasn’t hurt. Anything but hurt, really.

“Well then-“

“Not. A. Word,” Ratchet ordered, though his vocalizer was full of static and minimized any threat, “To anyone. Understood?”

Wheeljack chuckled knowingly, coaxing the layers of plating Ratchet’s servo to resettle back into place with numerous clicks and a hiss.

“Hey, ain’t gotta worry about me saying anything doc,” he assured, though his slag-eating smirk said otherwise, “But we still have your other servo to spiff up.”