They were working together to dismantle a decommissioned reactor core (fuel rods unfortunately long removed) when the distillers finally broached the topic. They were in the company of humans so much of the time. This was truly the first opportunity since Seaspray and Beachcomber had come to their own agreement on courting preferences.

Hound was using his sensors to detect minute deposits of the rare isotopes left over from reactor slagging, directing Beachcomber to the pockets he located. Trailbreaker was slicing off small sections of the radioactive core for Seaspray to dissolve and absorb even as he shielded the temporary breach they had created in the cocooning concrete.

"So, have both of you siphoned Bumblebee?" Beachcomber began conversationally, though Hound doubted he was anything but casual, considering the signals the little mech had been giving over the previous month and year. He was pretty sure he knew what was coming. He and Trailbreaker had contemplated the matter rather thoroughly during their discrete, well-shielded merges.

"I have," Hound replied with calculated ease. "With so many mecha on base, though, he finds it most efficient to simply let Ratchet harvest the synthegon and process it for others as needed beyond his cadre. Not that he says no if someone asks to siphon directly. But I partnered with him on a mission prior to your arrival, and... I was curious."

Beachcomber hummed his understanding of that. There were very few on base who weren't curious, though some were bolder than others in expressing it.

"Trailbreaker?" Seaspray asked, taking a slice of the reactor core from the grey mech. Tiny plates of armor on his hands flexed and cilia-like nanite injectors emerged to quickly begin eating away at the material.

"No. I have the mod, but I've never activated it. My systems burn through fuel so quickly, and it just seemed like a lot to ask of him when he's already fuelling his cadre. I already feel bad having to get extra rations."

"You don't need to apologize for your systems!" Seaspray objected. "You're amazing. I've never seen shield generators like yours. I'm... I'm actually surprised that they built you without a dedicated distiller. It would have made a lot of sense."

Trailbreaker flicked his armor in a slightly embarrassed gesture, examining the core to determine the location of his next slice. "Never really thought about it," he admitted. "I'd never even met a distiller before Bumblebee, and I didn't even realize he was one for quite a while. Just thought he was another spec ops minibot, with an unusually powerful field."

"Bumblebee is a different design than us," Beachcomber explained. "He was engineered multi-purpose. Distilling is his subfunction, rather than his primary. So even though he has the unusually large spark, it's supporting a bunch of systems that a distiller normally wouldn't have, like weapons, energy shielding, and a scout-class sensor suite."

"How does that impact his distiller function?" Hound asked, feeling frankly curious. Siphoning Bumblebee had been an amazing way to interface, and the synthegon was on par with some of the best high grade he'd ever tried when he'd been a guardian and guide for Towerling hunts.

"He only has two basic distillation tanks, and doesn't have nearly the same suite of collection apparati that we have," Seaspray explained. "It allows him to produce a fairly rich and system-cleansing synthegon, but he is limited in the types of raw materials he can collect."

"How many distillation tanks do the two of you have?" Trailbreaker asked, forgetting for the moment to slice the core.

"I have eleven, eight of which are devoted to synthegon and three to producing other fluids and materials," Beachcomber said, clearly pleased with himself.

"Primus! Eleven?" Hound exclaimed.

"Seaspray has even more," Beachcomber said with a hint of smugness. "His spark is the largest that can function in a minibot frame."

The thickness of the submarine's barrel shaped chest suddenly made more sense.

"Twenty-five tanks. I was engineered for a massive hydroformer - underwater miner and transport," Seaspray said with obvious pride. "About the same size as an Omega-class shuttle."

"Would you consider partnering with another Omega-class, then, like Skyfire?" Trailbreaker asked in a slightly cautious tone, wondering if that was the source of the multitude of mixed signals he seemed to be receiving from the hydroformer.

Even half-anticipating the answer, the bluntness took Trailbreaker by surprise.

"I want to partner with you, if you're willing. Partnering with you would mean that you could devote more of my resources to the other Autobots, if you chose to." Seaspray finished subsuming the slice he had been working on and deliberately shut his apertures, folding down his armor. He turned his full attention to Trailbreaker. Beachcomber and Hound looked on, no longer even pretending to work in the suddenly thick environment. "I could barely keep up with Oceanus," he rushed on, "and we even considered having him bond with a second Distiller if one became available. As it was, Sandstone and some of the other big mechs still shared resources with him, sometimes."

Trailbreaker had to reinitialize his vocalizer before he could speak. "So... what is it exactly that you are proposing?" he asked cautiously.

"A courting phase," Seaspray explained, moving deliberately into Trailbreaker's field space and enmeshing their fields so he could share the desire and willingness that came with his words. "A set period of time in which I grant you unrestricted siphoning privileges... in exchange for unbonded guardian status on your part. You will have the right to share any excess synthegon or any other materials I provide you - even take on extra storage tanks if you wish. While under your protection, my systems will respond to any fuel and materials requests your systems send me, whether intended for you or for others."

"And after that?" Trailbreaker asked, his own field fluctuating with flares of desire and more tightly reined reticence.

"If we both are willing, we would initiate an Aegis-Distiller bond," Seaspray explained, pinging both Trailbreaker and Hound with a condensed data packet that outlined the unusual form of bonding. "As you can see, I would formally join the remainder of your cadre as an unbonded member, similar to the coding the newly onlined have with their mentor's cadre. You would need to take on some Aegis-specific additions to your guardian protocols, which you will want to look carefully at. It is a rather... extreme form of guardian bonding."

Hound and Trailbreaker were quiet as they digested the packet.

"You mentioned a specific length of time. How long?" Hound finally asked, his own field cautiously extending to include Beachcomber as if in an unspoken question. The flare of Beachcomber's field was a quick and welcome response.

"However long we agree to," Seaspray explained. "The typical length of time for unbonded Distillers was a vorn... but we can consider a shorter or longer courting period if you'd like. My only request is that it..." he paused and looked at Beachcomber, realizing he was getting ahead of things.

"Be the same length as our courting period," Beachcomber explained, looking straight at Hound and flaring his field again. "Ditto on everything Seaspray said. I would like to grant you siphoning privileges and initiate courting, yesterday if possible," he said with obvious static on his vocalizer.

"Beachcomber's tanks are... we are going to need to report to base and unload tomorrow if you need time to decide. Which is fine," he added, giving Beachcomber a slight warning glare. "We gave ourselves a full month to consider making this proposition. You can't be expected to decide overnight."

"Longer, actually," Beachcomber added sheepishly. "Seaspray took nearly a year paddling around in the Pacific before he would even consider the courting options I'd been proposing."

"Well, you said you pretty much had your processors set on Hound the moment you met him, so you didn't take much time," Seaspray teased.

They suddenly realized that they were being stared at with frank puzzlement.

"Just gonna say it," Hound started after a brief burst of comms with Trailbreaker. "Y'all act like bonded cadre, in every sense we can tell. We've got no objections to widening ours. We were originally six, and know for sure that we lost at least three of those early in the war. Maybe four if we ever learn what happened to Mirage," he added with a flare of pure grief in his field that had Trailbreaker quickly crossing over to him to put his hands on his bonded's shoulders in support.

"If you were any mechs other than Distillers, we'd already be courting you to merge cadres. Why aren't we just doing that?" Trailbreaker finished for him.

Seaspray and Beachcomber both slumped a little, their fields tightening reflexively at the question.

"Now don't be that way," Hound said, raising his hand and flaring his field widely to entice them both back. "It's just a question. We need to understand this if we're going forward."

"I know," Beachcomber explained. "It's just... not easy to explain because you are coded so differently. We distillers function best when - imprinted I guess you could say - on the spark of one mech. We were created to nurture and provide for a single Aegis. We were on a mostly empty colony world. We could go entire solar cycles without seeing any Cybertronian other than our Aegis. We're just not coded for the kind of wider bondwebs that are normal for you. It would feel..."

"Chaotic, stressful," Seaspray supplied. "I can't even imagine the pressure on my systems if I was trying to constantly care for and provide for the needs of an entire cadre. It just feels... totally different when doing that for one mech, even if he is actually passing on the needs of others to my systems." Seaspray explained, moving closer to Trailbreaker in an almost unconscious fashion, needing the security of that field again.

"We want to be a cadre with both of you," Beachcomber added, "and any others you are bonded with or choose to bond with in the future. Just... in the distiller way."

"And it won't bother you that Trailbreaker and I are interfacing regularly with others, even outside of cadre? Ours was never a closed system," Hound warned.

Both distiller's shook their helms vigorously in the negative, human gestures already firmly a part of their non-verbal repertoire. "It wouldn't even occur to us to do anything but support that," Beachcomber said.

"We are coded to care for and support your needs," Seaspray added. "You are coded for wider bondwebs and casual interfacing. It creates the social cohesiveness most mecha need. We share in that through you-"

"-but sharing in it directly is stressful for you, because of your caretaker coding," Trailbreaker finished, dropping his hands from Hound's shoulders and kneeling, deliberately reaching out to bring Seaspray close, feeling the shiver that ran through the little mech's frame as he did.

"Yes," Seaspray almost moaned.

"But there's more to it," Hound noted, crouching and likewise pulling Beachcomber close, shifting the smaller mech so his back was resting against to his abdomen. "You need an individual who is coded to protect you."

"We... we are small," Beachcomber admitted, his frame trembling at the contact, spark and field surging as his systems overrode his command that his channel remain shut. His armor remained in place, but beneath that thin plate, the aperture of his channel had fully spiraled open. "We're far more vulnerable than even the minibots who never had war mods. Almost all of our system resources are devoted to our distiller function. Even our scientific functions are really just a subsidiary."

"We were upset at first, by how Bumblebee's creators coded him," Seaspray added, leaning his helm against Trailbreaker's chest plates. "But he really is a different frameclass. He has the means to defend himself. And he only produces one form of synthegon. It isn't distilled to the specific requirements of an Aegis, just to the general needs of his cadre, or pretty much any mech."

"Would you... want that, too?" Hound asked, carefully keeping any tone of judgment out of his vocalizer as his hands ran up and down the smooth, thin armor scales on Beachcomber's chest, feeling the spin of the spark beneath with his scout-class sensors.

"We want to be what we are," Beachcomber said shakily, vocalizer glitching. "We want to be that for you, and still help the other Autobots, but through you. We... we both examined the distillers who were held by the Decepticons before they were put in long-term stasis. We just..."

He couldn't finish. Hound encircled him tightly with his thickly armored arms. "They were coded like you are, yet had entire companies of mechs siphoning them... raping them."

Beachcomber nodded, sinking into the support behind him.

A soothing hum emanating from deep in Hound's chassis as he gathered Beachcomber closer. He had seen some of the visuals of the small mechs recovered from Decepticon outposts, stripped of even their minimal armor, limbs crushed, channel apertures no longer able to properly close. Their exposed protoforms had been distended in places and collapsed in others from the constant stress on their tanks.

"I'm not sure you can even begin to understand what that was doing to their systems and coding," Seaspray explained, his voice slightly muffled as he spoke into Trailbreaker's plating. "Distillers like us can't accept a siphon outside of bond without initiating courting protocols. So they were... their systems had to meet every one of those 'Con's needs, mechs who weren't their partners, weren't protecting them... mechs who were violating them, over and over again."

"No one is going to do that to you," Trailbreaker assured him, resting his helm against the one below his. "I would protect you even if I wasn't courting or bonded with you. Do you understand that?"

"You are a shielding specialist. You are an Aegis in the purest sense of the word," Seaspray agreed. "I want you... I want to make you even better at what you do, not just so you can protect me."

Trailbreaker tightened his grip around the small mech. "I accept your proposal to court. Hound and I don't need to discuss it further - we already have, extensively. We just needed to be sure we fully understood. We'll make sure the rest of our cadre understands - if Mirage does return to us or we widen our bondweb. And, for what it's worth, I already initiated guardian protocols for both of you, the first time the humans were crawling all over you with their ridiculous scanning equipment. Hound did as well."

"I'm sorry we can't do this the way... the way you both would prefer," Beachcomber said, shifting to face Hound, reaching up to touch one of his broad cheek spars.

"Now don't you go apologizing for your function and coding. It clearly suits both of your sparks," Hound said firmly, resting his hand very deliberately on the armor above Beachcomber's dorsal channel. "Now... are we going to be able to finish up this reactor today, or should we seal it back up and find a quiet spot to relieve some of the pressure in your tanks? I shorted out the humans' cameras as soon as things got cozy in here, but I'm pretty sure their security types are going to start screaming if I don't reinitialize them soon."

Beachcomber's entire frame was vibrating with need. "Let's reseal this place and get out of here. Tell the humans... tell them Seaspray and I need to unload our tanks before we can finish. It's true enough."

"Like this?" Trailbreaker asked, leaning his back against the canyon wall, his legs stretched in front of him.

"Perfect," Seaspray said, climbing up onto Trailbreaker's broad lap, his back to the bigger mech's thick-armored chest. His fins moved to the side and shrank inward to allow his dorsal arch to rest against Trailbreaker's ventral plates. It was not a neat fit. They had no coding yet to guide their components in the intricate jigsaw that would interlock armor and bring bare protometal into intimate contact.

Trailbreaker brought an arm around the smaller mech, a single blunt finger tracing the components of Seaspray's chest and collar plating. "So... how does this work?" he asked, gentle and uncertain. He knew the basics of the siphoning procedure, but that knowledge seemed vastly inadequate now.

Seaspray vibrated slightly, his frame already hot and his field flushed with need, but he remained firmly in control. "How about I initialize your siphoning system to my specs? It'll make things easier." He slid his interface cable into Trailbreaker's hand.

"Stay connected... guide me through this?" Trailbreaker asked, rolling the sensitive connector pins between his fingers. "I'm afraid I'll hurt you," he admitted.

"YES... no... I mean of course!" Seaspray arched back into the source of that stimulation, his vocalizer already static-laced with his growing charge. "You won't hurt me, Trailbreaker. I'll be with you every step of the way."

Trailbreaker was vividly aware of just how small and unshielded Seaspray was. He was going to be penetrating deep into the Distiller's protometal, to tanks that rested within the extra-large chamber housing the oversized spark that powered the final distillation process. It was an intensely physical process, and Trailbreaker's bulky warrior frame was not engineered for anything approaching gentleness. The memory files of the rescued Distillers haunted him as he contemplated what he was about to do.

Something of his trepidation must have showed in his field.

"I'm safe with you," Seaspray assured the big mech again, his field radiating sincerity as he tipped his helm up and back enough to look up at the warm, ruby visor. The digits of one of his spindly-fingered hands wrapped the interface cable beneath Trailbreaker's own blunt fingers, urging it toward the shielding mech's thoracic port. Smoothly, both mechs guided the connectors in.

A tremor ran through Trailbreaker's frame as he felt the foreign but welcome presence on the periphery of his awareness, pulsing with need... and something more... like a flowing, liquid-feeling trust swirling with commitment to his well being. It was easy to lower his defenses to that presence; he needed to show vulnerability to someone who would be so vulnerable to him.

::You feel so good,:: Seaspray assured him directly through the connection, his soothing mental touch easing more deeply into Trailbreaker's systems, knowing exactly where to go. Trailbreaker monitored with fascination as Seaspray deftly adjusted the coding there. How was the smaller mech processing so calmly? It contrasted with the hot, vibrating frame he was holding to himself.

::I'm not. Just blocking most of my feedback. This first cycle, it will be intense enough just with your own sensory input.::

::Understood,:: Trailbreaker replied. He did not want to risk anything that could potentially lose him control.

::Relax. I'm made for this,:: Seaspray again assured him, sending a final burst of code that initialized the siphoning system.

Trailbreaker felt the components come online, his HUD informing him of the obvious fact that a Series 11 Colonial Hydroformer Distillation Unit was currently in the proper docking position, and would he like to initiate that procedure? A secondary script informed him that the Distillation Unit had both a dorsal and sternal channel, but that a position shift would be required to siphon the latter.

"Two?" Trailbreaker queried, intensely curious at the configuration. Why would a mech coded so stringently for dyadic bonds have a frame that could accommodate two siphons?

Seaspray laughed. "Two siphons - from one very large mech." He unblocked just enough to share the memory of a perfect, tight fit, surrounded by a mass of pearlescent protometal as he docked beneath enclosing armor. Trailbreaker groaned at the vivid flashes of recollection: blossoming open to the two siphons, the sensation as they slowly delved their way within the most vulnerable and sensitive parts of his frame.

"Primus almighty, Seaspray," Trailbreaker groaned, charge rocketing through his systems at the sensory spill from that memory. Inadequacy colored the forefront of his emotive stream. He could not, would not ever be the kind of partner Seaspray had been originally built for.

Seaspray's touch was suddenly in his processors, easing and soothing. ::You are just right for me in all the ways that matter. I want you... want to share with you. Please. You are unique. 'Apples and oranges', as the humans would say.::

Trailbreaker sank into that assurance, allowing it to overcome his hesitation as he signaled his siphon to activate. His arms tightened reflexively around the smaller mech as he strengthened the bubble of defensive shielding already set in place.

First there was a simple signal, a burst of code from his siphoning unit directed at Seaspray's dorsal channel and the tanks deep within. The smaller mech vented as his armor shifted in response, just below spark-level on his dorsal ridge. Tiny scales of plating moved aside and away in a myriad of incremental shifts. Already initialized to Seaspray's configuration, the armor midway up Trailbreaker's ventrum simultaneously did the same, shifting and interlocking with the smaller mech's plating until protometal met protometal in a wash of charge and tingling pleasure. Heat radiated from Seaspray's wide-open channel.

Trailbreaker could not help but to push against that silken silver, charge racing between them as pleasure nodes lit and sent fire throughout their frames. Protometal-contact was a rare luxury in wartime. Trailbreaker could indulge in that pleasure with somewhat greater frequency- he had the means to protect his lovers, at least when fuel was not scarce. But even for him, this was exquisite. He could have lost himself in those sensations were he not so keenly aware that more was coming, the allure of the unknown.

Seaspray shook, his legs clamping down on the lap he straddled, his hands gripping Trailbreaker's arms, digging into the seams of his armor.

The smooth hydraulic sound of the siphon emerging from deep within was enough to hone Trailbreaker's focus. Components sought one another in polarized attraction, the solid outer layer of his siphon socketing Seaspray's aperture with an audible snick. Trailbreaker's vocalizer shorted in a burst of static, and Seaspray let out a small keen - both channel and siphon were sensitive, the metal skin of the components thin and marvelously sensor-dense.

So much... too much, especially at the first rush of heat and aroma flooding the open channel, giving Trailbreaker his first taste of what lay within. Something deep within his coding roared to life, demanding to rush in and plunder what was so willingly offered.

It was so new, so startling and primal he almost backed away.

Seaspray was suddenly there again, though his presence was far less calm than before. Trailbreaker had the impression of deeply coded urges driving the Distiller every bit as much. ::Slow. It's a normal feeling. Just... go slow. So much better for us both.::

Trailbreaker gave a static hiss of acknowledgment, taking a klik to collect himself. He steadied himself on the sound of his and Seaspray's fans, the suck and push of atmosphere from their hard working ventilations, synchronizing with one another. Their fields fell into concordance, docked frames behaving as a single unit. The sensory input eased a little as they became accustomed to the connection. Trailbreaker began queuing up the commands to initiate the next step.

Seaspray quickly interjected a dazed glyph, a request to pause. ::What's wrong?:: Trailbreaker transmitted, instantly halting the process.

::Potent:: Seaspray warned, his glyphs bit fuzzy and erratic. ::I...it will be potent. Especially this first time. Slow... go slow or you'll end up offline while you fuel. Don't want to miss anything... want to be together. Set... set your siphoning rate now,:: he added, gaining coherence. ::Five SMVs with each suction burst, three nanokliks between. Then a full rest for five kliks every thirty SMVs.::

Trailbreaker flashed a desperately grateful glyph at the guidance, his newly initialized system taking the instructions easily, though he still triple checked the settings before proceeding. He vented twice, then signaled the inner layer of his siphon to engage, rumbling deeply as he first broached Seaspray's aperture and starbursts of pleasure informed him just how sensor-rich the inner portions of his siphon were.

The channel around him contracted tightly at first, then blossomed open. The Distiller gave desperate sounding trills accompanied by grateful glyphs that urged him onward, seemingly in contradiction to all the earlier warnings to go slow. Trailbreaker forced himself to be cautious, despite the urging. Slowly, slowly he inched his way in, the semi-liquid protometal of his siphon thickly flowing into the smaller mech, who continued to trill and warble, limbs twitching. It was a sensation unlike anything Trailbreaker had ever felt. He gave a low, throbbing groan as his charge blazed, relays broadcasting the dizzying array of sensations - EM, heat, exquisite pressure, intermingled with olfactory and even gustatory bursts. He could taste Seaspray... taste the dizzying fumes of the fuel awaited him within his lover.

Seaspray convulsed in his lap and around his siphon ::All for you,:: Seaspray urged, glyphs adorned with pleading and promise.

It did not take long to go deeper than anyone other than a medic should be in another's inner workings, yet it felt so perfect, so right. So much heat, and incendiary pleasure of protometal components merging, and then finally, he reached the perimeter of Seaspray's tank chamber. He could feel the smaller mech's spark, cycling just above - a waveform of warmth so close it felt like he was up against the chamber itself. His tip nudged against the rim of the small access port, the valve already irised open to one of the tanks that had shifted into place.

Through the sensors of his siphon he could smell the ozone surges of spark flare from just above, taste the energies that powered the Distiller's small frame, all that overabundance diverted to the process that transformed ordinary materials into something unfathomably pure and rich. Coronal tendrils of that energy enveloped the tanks that held the final distillation, enveloped him. And despite pleasure that flooded him, Trailbreaker was struck both by the profound vulnerability, and the shadow of such miraculous engineering.

He increased the power to his shielding bubble by a factor of thirty percent.

A quick molecular shift and the siphon hardened into a tube, tightly merged with the surrounding channel as though they were now a single mechanism. Their coupling washed charge to and fro between their frames. Tiny spines flowered open on his siphon's tip, locking onto the waiting tap.

"Oh Primus, Seaspray, oh slag... so good," Trailbreaker murmured, hands splayed out across the small mech's ventrum, exerting gentle pressure as though he could possibly press deeper, sink more of himself into this union.

Seaspray was beyond words; even partially blocked their hardline connection was bleeding impressions of luminous pleasure and phosphorescent need. Trailbreaker tightened his grip incrementally, desperately thankful he had already adjusted the siphoning rate as he initiated the suction bursts. Stuttered liquid blazes of power, heat, and burning pleasure rushed through his siphon into his ventrum, straight to his spark. The synthegon- no, energon, his sensors insisted, blindingly pure and potent - hit every system at once, tripping him into a massive, system-wide overload.

….

Trailbreaker's systems reset with a groan deep from his chassis, plasma lightning still dancing over both his and Seaspray's frames. His chronometer showed that he had four kliks of the rest cycle before suction began again. Primus. How many cycles would there be?

Seaspray was still offline. Trailbreaker wished he could somehow hold him even more closely, safe within his own armor as Oceanus had. So much power and vulnerability, wrapped in such a small frame.

It was... like fuelling from the AllSpark itself, or at least how Trailbreaker envisioned those long gone sacramental rites. Only a Prime's systems and spark were capable of withstanding the purity of energon sourced directly from the AllSpark. That energon had needed to be diluted and processed before it was distributed to the masses for ordinary, or even ritual use. Injuries and wartime neglect of his systems had fragmented so many of his memories of that time, but from what he could remember, that fuel was far more powerful and purifying than anything he'd had since.

Until now.

Mirage had shared memory files of the rare distillations he'd indulged in as an alphamech, spiced, aged, and perfectly balanced. Seaspray's was purer, far more potent... sweet beyond Trailbreaker's ability to articulate. It was a revelation. Trailbreaker would never, ever call what Seaspray produced 'synthegon'. The dichotomy felt false, even sacrilegious. This was energon more pure than he'd ever been blessed to receive before, as if the Distiller's spark were itself a conduit of the AllSpark.

How the Pit was it possible this mech had chosen Trailbreaker, of all mechs, to be his intended Aegis? He should bond with the Prime himself.

But no, Seaspray had chosen him, had proposed to court and then bond with him, with fidelity protocols alien to Trailbreaker's coding. His to protect, to safeguard against abuse or misuse. His to steward, a generous font of resources to share, but never to take for granted.

A sacred trust; one of which Trailbreaker was far from worthy. Somehow, he vowed, somehow he would rise to meet it.

He could just begin to fathom what Oceanus and Sandstone felt when the Decepticons had arrived to plunder Aqueous of its most valuable resources - the lengths the two must have gone to in order to keep the two Distillers safe and hidden!

Trailbreaker felt the affectionate scan he had become so accustomed to over the previous month as Seaspray reset with a croon of contentment. Very shortly the fire would resume.

"Mmm," the little mech warbled drunkenly. "Thirty SMVs and you're already running so much more efficiently." Seaspray's spindly fingers ran sensuously over the arms that wrapped him.

Trailbreaker rumbled in agreement as he ran an internal diagnostic, his own digits tracing Seaspray's lower ventral seams. The miniscule amount of rare fuel had purified the remainder of his synthegon, allowing it to conduct his spark's power to all of his systems with a noticeable improvement. He could feel the difference, like he was suddenly lighter, emerging from a pocket of heavy gravity.

"You are beyond any glyphs I have in my linguistic files," Trailbreaker murmured into the smaller mech's helm, retracting his mask to place his mouth components against it as though he could fuel in that way, too. Seaspray reached back, caressing one of Trailbreaker's cranial ridges.

"Won't be as intense this time... can ride the sensations more," Seaspray promised just as Trailbreaker's siphon reactivated. This time it did feel slower, and the large mech found he could just barely process beyond the raw fire of each burst. His gustatory sensors cataloged each rare isotope and precious compound Seaspray had added. He hadn't realized how desperate his systems were for exactly what Seaspray was providing until the elements were eagerly absorbed from his energon conduits. Overload the second time was more like a tsunami than the previous concussive blast - just as inevitable, but something he could ride for a brief moment, before the flood overwhelmed him.

Each cycle that followed was gentler than the last. On the fourth, Seaspray was able to share his own sensations without tripping either of them offline. On the sixth, Trailbreaker's cable finally crossed the Distiller's own to complete the feedback loop. He slowed the final two cycles down to a languorous pace so they could float together amid the sensations, a lazy wash of bliss intermingled.

Hound was lounging in Sol's warm rays, a recharging Beachcomber sprawled across his lower extremities, arms wrapped around his abdominal plates when he felt a questioning stir through the mostly blocked bond. He extended a lazy invitation, and soon his bondmate was making his way toward them, reeling slightly. Trailbreaker lowered himself to the ground, cradling his small lover to himself. Like Hound, Trailbreaker's field was flush with unheard of power levels. It was gluttonous... glorious.

Seaspray had not stirred in transit. The two Distillers recharged far less often due to their constant excess charge, but apparently being siphoned put them under deeply. Hound reached over and gently stroked Seaspray as Trailbreaker settled the recharging Distiller onto his lap. Bonded and coded as they were, Hound and Trailbreaker's protective impulses and affection could not help but to extend in full measure to both Distillers.

Hound fully unblocked his end of the bond, and was met with a flood of overwhelmed awe, gratitude and trepidation. 'Gobsmacked' was an appropriate word - the humans had such delightful ways to describe befuddled states. Hound was little calmer, though he'd had more time to adjust to his newly fueled state.

"Primus," Trailbreaker murmured, leaning over to rest his helm against Hound's with a quiet thunk.

"I know," Hound said, chuckling.

They had blocked the bond this first time, both out of respect for their new lovers and also to allow the one to guard without distraction while the other siphoned. Seaspray and Beachcomber had assured them it wasn't necessary, but it had just seemed the right thing to do. There was still the chance of an odd Decepticon around who refused to follow Megatron back to Cybertron, and there were likely Seekers included in that category. While the remote, narrow canyon they had chosen was quite sheltered, vigilance was still critical.

Hound and Beachcomber had coupled first, the amphibious mech's systems having been more stressed. Trailbreaker and Seaspray had been out of sight, but not sensor range while Hound and Beachcomber consummated their courting agreement, a memory file he had tagged, carefully partitioned and duplicated to prevent its corruption. The flush of raw power in Hound's systems sent a shiver of remembered pleasure through his newly efficient systems.

Hound's sensor net, set to an automatic cycle, had done the guarding while Seaspray and Trailbreaker had taken their turn. It was a good thing multiprocessing streams were not an issue for him, as he had spent that time in near hysterical laughter with Beachcomber, sharing memories that may not have been nearly as funny had he not been so overcharged. They had laughed equally as hard at how loud his normally quiet bondmate was being around the canyon's bend. Not that Hound had been any quieter. Then in the middle of the laughter, Beachcomber had abruptly gone offline, though he had fortunately warned Hound earlier it was likely to happen.

That had made Hound laugh even harder.

No wonder there was so little wildlife currently around to observe. Fine biologist he was, scaring the natives.

Hound enjoyed these wild places the most, but he did look forward to coupling in the security of base, so he and Trailbreaker could share in the way that felt so natural to them, even if they couldn't share these particular lovers in a more physical manner.

"Spray has two channels," Trailbreaker offered, obviously knowing the direction of Hound's processing. "Can you imagine..."

"Slag, but that would be good. No rules against fantasy," Hound said, knowing precisely what images the two would share the next time they interfaced.

There were no stipulations against the sharing of memories with other lovers, either, though Hound somehow doubted that he would do so outside of cadre, with careful protocols to keep those memories locked within their own bondweb. While Hound trusted his fellow Autobots with his very spark, he suddenly was not as sure he could trust them as fully with the spark that had been entrusted to him. Memories tended to circulate. They were the unselfish glue that bound their faction together. Yet, even among the Autobots, there were mecha whose social coding could use an overhaul and became obsessed about experiencing firsthand what had been given in memory.

Then there was that most dire possibility. Rape was rare, but not unheard of among his faction mates, a symptom of processors brutally fragmented by war, in Hound's opinion. The line that had separated Autobots from Decepticons had become far too thin, especially in the dark years that had followed Prime's departure to search for the AllSpark.

Hound knew he would deactivate any Autobot who tried as surely as he would a Decepticon. The brutal certainty of that fact disturbed him enough that Trailbreaker sent a soothing impulse across their bond frequency, wrapping a broad arm around an equally broad shoulder.

"What have we gotten ourselves into?" Hound murmured.

"Something overwhelming... and wonderful," Trailbreaker said quietly, his glyphs heavy with meaning as his free arm caressed Seaspray's all-too-thin plating.

A vorn of courting, they had agreed. Eighty three short revolutions around Earth's sun. Hound could feel the overwhelmed certitude in Trailbreaker, echoing his own. They could not imagine any reality that would keep them from shielding the powerful-vulnerable Distillers for the remainder of their functioning. It would be a new, strange kind of web to weave within their cadre, but it felt right both to their coding and their protective sparks.

Their war had long ago lost any sense of purpose beyond survival. But now, here, in these two Distillers, and in this tiny watery world, brimming with life, they finally had something worth shielding.

end

Additional Notes:

Glossary:
Aegis - "shield", term used by Distillers to describe the individual mech they bond with and set their systems to provide energon and other important substances for. Preferably a mech with Guardian coding and a highly protective nature.
Cadre - The closest equivalent to family for Cybertronians. A grouping of mechs who share a web of bonds. Some cadres are created and onlined together, others form out of shared functioning and experience. used in place of cohort for this fic in a rather lame attempt to be anon
Distiller - particular frametype engineered for Cybertron's outer colonies. A small, minibot frame with a spark the size of a far larger mech who has the capability of internally creating/distilling energon and other substances vital to Cybertronian functioning. Distillers traditionally were coded to bond with and care for the needs of one large colonial mech who in turn protected and cared for their smaller partner. Distillers enabled colonies to be completely self sufficient, with little or no contact with Cybertron (something highly desirable to mecha with a colonial nature). While other means of 'synthegon' distillation exist, none came closer to AllSpark sourced energon than Distillers because they use pure spark energy for the process.
SMV - Standard Micro Volumetric (approx 1 deciliter)
Synthegon- general term for energon not sourced by the AllSpark. The difference in the terms is indicated by minor glyph signifiers, and when speaking to humans, the term 'energon' would likely be used for both substances.

nanoklik= 1 second
klik=1.2 minutes
breem=8.3 minutes
orn=13 days (a Cybertronian day)
vorn=83 Earth years (a Cybertronian year)

In addition to Synaltern's wide open prompt, I was inspired by the "Truly Alien Sex" prompt from the kinkmeme on livejournal. I wanted to try to find a way to play with penetration kink that was not sticky and felt distinctly alien (not that I don't enjoy sticky, just wanted to try for something different). I was also inspired by another kinkmeme prompt I can no longer find that referenced non-poly mechs within a poly culture. Finally, I used the TF100 Earth table.

Hound and Trailbreaker did not appear in the live action movies, but were characters in the 2007 movie PSP game. I went in a different direction for their characterizations than what is described in the TF Wiki, leaning more on G1 for my references.

The reference to Trailbreaker's red visor comes from the 3-D trading card game (the one with the adorkable little head sticking out the camper shell of his alt!) and this fan artwork ( digitalcitizen . ca /2009 /06 /28 /transformers-wallpapers-collection-3-1280-x-1024-pixels-and-other-sizes /1280x1024-trailbreaker-2 /), (unable to find proper artists attribution at the time of writing). Trailbreaker's alt is a gunmetal grey Ford Superduty with an extra-large camper shell.

Hound's mechform looks something very much like Jamie Egerton's gorgeous artwork ( jamie - egerton . deviantart dot com /gallery /# /d2iuk5f - you'll have to decipher that one because this site is getting better at stripping links), but with the larger alt than the traditional jeep (I wanted him big!). He transforms into an AM General Humvee M1123 with a green camo pattern. Both Trailbreaker and Hound are roughly the same height as Movieverse Ironhide, with Trailbreaker the bulkier of the two.

Beachcomber and Seaspray's Distiller frametype is unique to this fic and was not based consciously on anything I was aware of in canon, though I realized while writing that there are some distinct similarities to canon Mini-cons from the Unicron Trilogy (no matter what you come up with in this fandom, it is somehow already canon). Both Distillers stand about nine feet tall, though Seaspray is much more barrel chested and stocky. Beachcomber's alt is a Gibbs/Lockhead Martin Military High Speed Amphibious Vehicle (www . gizmag dot com /go /7061 /picture /32958 /). Seaspray is a single-passenger submarine with a hydrofoil mode for skimming along the top of the water. His alt looks like this XS100TrioAlpha personal submarine concept by Guillermo Sureda (www . sureda /Portfolio /Transportation /XS100DuoBeta /XS100DuoBeta-LARGE .jpg), but is configured for only one passenger. Both Beachcomber and Seaspray have long, spindly digits both for digging into rocks and sediment for raw materials.

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