Yes. It has been. Way too long. But LOOK! INSPIRATION IS BACK AND THERE IS MORE FOR YOU! And and and and! I made up for it! With SMUT!

So please review and I hope this story isn't dead for you guys x.x I'm a horrible author. At any rate, I hope you guys enjoy and thanks to all of you who have stuck with me thus far! And I apologize this chapter is shorter than the rest, but... Inspiration has been... blergh. But now I have a premise for the next chapter! THE FEMMES ARE VISITING!

Warnings: Smut of the sticky variety.

Enjoy~

Chapter 11: The Start of… Something.

Smokescreen stood nervously outside of Jazz's office. He had been told, courtesy of Patch, that the TIC was hardly ever in there, but he figured he might as well give it a try. The meeting only joors before had left him confused and slightly off his game. Something that Ratchet had managed to help him with if he were merely talking with the medic. But the medic was on leave and was currently raging about it somewhere else in the large ship called the Ark.

Steeling his nerves, Smokescreen forced his doorwings stiff on his back and knocked sharply on the door. He wasn't really sure why he felt the need to be so… formal with the black and white mech suddenly. They had talked before the meeting just fine, Jazz coming down to visit him in the medbay a few times as he was recovering. He supposed it was the whole finding out he was Third in Command of the entire Autobot Armed Forces. That was a little intimidating.

The door slid aside, revealing stacks of haphazardly stacked datapads and a small layer of dust indicating the office wasn't used much. Jazz was there this time though, leaning back in his desk chair, pedes up on his desk. Almost, but not quite, relaxed.

"Smokey!" The voice was full of friendly comradee, the accent setting him at ease suddenly. This was a mech he could associate easily as 'friend'. "Wha'cha need, mech?"

With a small nervous smile, Smokescreen looked at the visored Saboteur. "I'd like to know what I need to do to be an Autobot."

"Primus Sideswipe!" Sunstreaker hissed, digits digging into the mesh of the bottom bunk of their berth.

Sideswipe grinned around his brother's spike, working his way down again, holding Sunstreaker's hips still. His brother had a tendency to lose control at the most inconvenient of times. Sunstreaker whined, as his brother pulled off with a deep sucking motion and then swallowed him to the hilt again. His optical feed bled to white as he cried out, overload consuming him. Sideswipe swallowed everything given to him before letting the spent spike fall from his mouth. Then his own panel was snapping aside, offering some release to the pressure that had been built behind the plating. He moved up, pushing his twin to his back, hooking his legs over his arms and entering his slick valve in almost the same motion.

Sunstreaker yelped, nearly bent in half by his brother and his valve convulsing over his brother's spike. Sideswipe groaned, starting a brutal pounding pace. Sunstreaker's hands shot to his brother's face, dragging him down for a fierce kiss. Sideswipe growled, thrusting harder and faster into his twin's body, spike claiming the little used valve with intense movements.

It wasn't long until Sunstreaker's valve clamped like a vice on his brother's spike and Sideswipe shouted his own release as he unloaded in deep inside his brother. They lay there panting, cooling fans roaring to pool cooler air into their internals.

"Feeling better?" Sideswipe asked with a breathless chuckle. "Know I am."

"Mmmm…" Sunstreaker groaned, pushing at the red frame. "Yeah, now get off."

"So much for the afterglow." Was the surly reply as Sideswipe lifted off Sunstreaker, hissing with post-pleasure as his spike slipped from his brother's valve. He collapsed to the golden mech's side and immediately curled against him. Sunstreaker humored his twin's cuddling with an arm around his waist.

They lay in content silence until Sideswipe rolled on top of his brother to get to the other side of the berth which prompted a loud series of curses and protests from Sunstreaker about his paint. "So I hear that Smokescreen is a 'Bot now."

"What do I care?" Sunstreaker grumbled, inspecting his frame from any blemishes that weren't the result of their coupling. "We all saw it coming."

"He sure spends a lot of time in the medbay…"

"Course. He has post checkups. Sides, even I know fragging with a Praxian's doorwings means extensive care."

"He was completely cleared two orns ago. And he and Ratchet get energon together… a lot."

"Ratchet's his own mech. He can decide who he gets energon with…" Sunstreaker replied, but there was a strained note to it this time around. "Why do we care?"

Sideswipe pouted at his brother, scratching at the drying fluid on his abdominal plates. "Come on, we save his life and the possibility of 'Con enslavement and all we get is a thank you."

Sunstreaker rolled his optics. "Don't tell me you were really hoping for that kiss."

Sideswipe huffed. "I'm being serious Sunny."

"So am I. So I ask again. Why do we care?" The golden warrior frowned at the ceiling before reaching over to whack at Sideswipe's back. "And don't call me Sunny."

"Whatever." Sideswipe grumbled. He couldn't really say why he was bothered by Smokescreen's obvious interest in the medic. For all he knew, it was a trauma thing. Actually, it most likely was. Yet the idea of the former prisoner sitting and laughing with their medic in the medbay, probably sitting close enough to touch if they wanted to, Smokescreen's servo resting on a white thigh, moving for a crimson hip – "OW! The frag was that for!?"

"Stop thinking about it!" Sunstreaker snarled, pushing his brother off of the end of the berth, ignoring the loud protests and curses. "I'm going to clean up and then get energon. Fantasize by yourself."

"I wasn't fantasizing!"

"Uh-huh, which was why you replaced Smokescreen's image with one of yourself -"

"That's disgusting!"

"Whatever glitchface, you were totally thinking it."

"Was not you yellow pansied aft!"

"YOU-" Sunstreaker launched himself at his brother with a roar.

The fight was on.

"Hi!"

Ratchet looked up into the friendly faceplates of Patch and he scooted over a bit to give his friend some room at his table. The rec room was crowded today, the soldiers deciding that the best way to welcome a new Autobot into the ranks was to throw a party. Well, at least while he was on the Ark. There was still a chance Smokescreen would be transferred, though pending his own healing phase and the impressions he'd managed to leave on even the command staff was quickly pointing to him staying.

Despite his ordeal, the orange and blue mech fit right in and charmed many of his fellow crewmates with a well placed smile and a friendly joke. Many were happy to have him aboard. Not just because he was a mech easy to know, but because he was chuck full of entertainment.

Nobody had ever blatantly started a gambling book and gotten away with it.

"Credit for your thoughts?"

Ratchet glanced at his friend again, a smile on Patch's face. "What?"

"You have that faraway thinking look." His fellow medic nudged him with his shoulder. "What's up?"

Ratchet frowned and sat back, swirling his ration in his hand. "Smokescreen."

"Ah-ha! I knew you'd been spending extra time with him, but I never expected it to progress so quickly."

The white and red medico gave him a blank stare. "What?"

"You. And Smokescreen."

Ratchet groaned, letting his helm fall against the wall as he stared at the ceiling like it was the source of all his angst.. "Primus! Not you too! It's not what any of you think!"

"Then enlighten me."

"It's just that… He's been through a world shattering traumatic event. Something that affected him personally. Hiding information for an Autobot only to come out the other side and realize the information he's holding is worthless. Out of date. And yet…" He gestured wordlessly to the laughing Praxian three tables away, chatting with a mech called Tracks. They seemed to hit it off pretty well and even a few of those irritating minibots were enjoying the chatter.

His companion hummed and leaned back with Ratchet, staring at the scene himself. The contrast of the laughing, brightly smiling mech as opposed to the terrified near invalid was a huge contrast and one only command and they as his medics knew of. Yes, he could see what Ratchet meant. "I see your point." He told his friend softly.

"Glad I'm not the only one."

"Perhaps…" Patch said gently, laying a hand on Ratchet's arm. "He needs more than just comrades. Maybe he needs a friend."

Ratchet grunted and nothing more was said for the rest of his break.

"Being kind of quiet, aint'cha doc?"

Ratchet growled, never taking his optics from the tear in Ironhide's chest armor, making sure to keep his welding straight. It wouldn't be the first time Ironhide (or many others) came out with a jagged weld because they'd seen fit to aggravate their CMO. Patch was seeing to some new trainees and Overscore had been transferred shortly after Smokescreen and Ratchet's incarceration. Nobody really missed him. Least of all the Twins.

"Ya ignoring meh, Doc-bot?" That was definitely amusement in Ironhide's drawl.

"My name is not 'Doc'." The medic replied testily. Seriously, was it a game to test his temper?

"Oh, right, sorreh Hatchet."

Apparently it was.

Ratchet quickly finished with the weld before finally turning his full glare on one of only three mechs who didn't flinch under it. In fact, the red mech was smiling. Broadly. "If there's something you want to say, spit. It. Out." He growled, throwing his dirtied tools in a wash bin that one of the trainees was working at getting emptied. He heard the groan at more work being thrust upon them, but was too busy trying to make lasers spring from his optics just to zap that annoyingly 'I know something' grin from Ironhide's face.

"Ah said yer bein' awful quiet."

"Uh huh." Ratchet was unimpressed, hands on hips and one optic ridge quirked above unamused optics and a sharp scowl.

"Normally yer threatenin' something vital fer doin' somethin' as stupid as lettin' a trainin' drone run ya through. So…" Ironhide sat up and leaned forward. "What's on yer mind?"

"Nothing." The medic grunted.

"Nothin?" Now it was Ironhide's turn to raise an optic ridge. "Ah'm not convinced."

"Nothing that concerns you, nor is it something that will keep me from doing my job." His tone clearly said drop it. Ironhide's expression clearly said he wouldn't.

"Come on, Ratch." The Weapons Master sighed. "Ah'm yer friend. And ya look like ya need ta unburden ta somebot."

"You're not going to just let it go, are you?"

"Nope."

Didn't thing so. Ratchet thought with a sigh and he moved to clean up his station. While the trainees or medic aides normally handled the grunt tasks such as these, Ratchet took it as a convenient excuse to not have to move onto his paperwork and to talk to Ironhide. The white and red mech would never admit it, but he really did need someone to talk to. "It's about Smokescreen."

Ironhide stared at him a moment before grunting. "Huh, would have thought this was about the Twins." Ratchet shot him a questioning look, but he waved it off. "Nevermind. What about the kid?"

Ratchet gave an aggravated sigh. He would harass Ironhide later for the meaning to his assumption. "He's older than Prowl, Hide."

"And Ah'm older than half the fraggin' army. Yer all kids, far as Ah'm concerned. Now don't avoid the question."

"Yeah, yeah. Old timer." He grinned at Ironhide's shrug, the bigger mech letting the jab roll off his shoulders. He sighed again. "I'm not sure he's ready for battle of any kind."

"Nobot's ever ready, Ratch. But what in particular? Physically, he checks out."

"Yes, physically. Mentally, I'm worried. Then again, I'm not the psychiatrist, he is."

"Yer worried his ordeal has more lastin' effects then he'd like us ta think."

Ratchet nodded as the fear was renamed for Ironhide after the brief talk with Patch in the rec room. "I don't want him flipping out in the middle of a battle where it could cost him his life. Or relapsing when I don't have the resources to get to him!"

"Kid's really wound himself into yer spark, there." The red mech mused thoughtfully.

"Puh-lease." Ratchet snorted. "I'm his doctor, I'm supposed to worry."

"But not ta this degree." Ironhide sighed as well. "Ratch, Ah'll test 'im mahself. And if I think there's a problem, Ah'll bring it up ta Prahm." He watched Ratchet relax hyst a little before he also said, "You need ta focus on more important things. Like not avoidin' yer star patients."

Ratchet tensed immediately. "I'm not avoiding anybody."

His old friend grinned. "Ah'm callin' pitscrap. Ya don't even talk ta the twins outside of an injury when before ya were at each other's necks like Megatron and Starscream." The glare he received would have had a lesser mech wanting the floor to swallow them. " Oh, don't give meh that look, medic, ya know Ah'm right no matter how disturbin' the imagery."

And he was, frag him. Ever since his apology he just felt so awkward about seeing them. And it wasn't really the apology. It was Sideswipe's comment. He'd honestly been tempted to take him up on that offer of a kiss, despite the fact he knew the red mech had been teasing. As soon as he'd realized that, he'd hightailed it back to his quarters to get some recharge and hopefully stop thinking such ridiculous things. Because it had to have been recharge deprivation. Only it wasn't. And now he could hardly look at their faces, let alone look at them in the optic.

"Ah think yer fixatin' on this Smokescreen dilemma ta avoid the real problem. And that problem consists of you needin' a gppd fraggin'. Probably from the - "

The sudden voice jerked him from his sullen silence and his glare became even deadlier, cobalt blue glinting almost Sunstreaker ice as Ratchet interrupted. "Finish that sentence, Ironhide and I will not only weld your mouthplates shut, I will grind your vocalizer into scrap and sent it to the smelter."

Ironhide held up his servos. "Alright, Ah'll drop it, but frag it Ratch ya gotta do somethin'. Ah ain't ever seen Sideswipe mope so much." The mech stood and stretched. "And no worries, Ratchet. Ah'll look inta Smokey's thing fer ya."

Ratchet watched him go with a gimlet optic until his 'old friend' (he wasn't sure he was hospitable enough to call him a comrade let alone friend at the moment) left, the doors swishing shut on him and two aides who had followed him out, their shifts ended. The medic shook his helm and caught a few curious eavesdroppers and they all flinched when it became clear they were caught.

"What the frag are you all looking at? Get back to work!"

They did just that and Ratchet watched them a few moments longer before turning back to his own work, grumbling and raging to himself. A good frag with the twins. HA! As if that would ever happen.

So why did it sound like such a good idea?

Reviews? Please?