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Ficlet Name

Change for the Better

Summary

Cyclonus is having a rough day, for all the wrong reasons.

Pairing

Cyclonus & Tailgate

Warnings

Besides a pun-y title that my boyfriend helped me coin, none.

2,184 Words

Cyclonus made his way down the hall to monitor duty. He hated this menial assignment, but Rodimus only trusted him enough for this, and he knew janitorial or sanitation were jobs below him. Funny how he felt that way. He was quite fond of a certain waste disposal bot, even if he wasn't fulfilling his assigned duty on this ship. Tailgate was actually on the ship's maintenance team as a tool carrier. Despite being-

Ting

Uh. Cyclonus looked down and lifted a pede, quietly hoping he hadn't just stepped on anything particularly important. It was a coin. Odd. The mechs that wander this area don't generally tend to leave money sitting around. Their loss. He picked up the coin and subspaced it to add to his savings later. Anyway, to continue his train of thought, despite being small and generally pretty weak, Tailgate's alt mode engine had surprising heft, and his small size allowed him access to very tight spaces. He could carry tools around with ease on his trailer, and he was slowly learning the maintenance craft from-

Tink

What in the-? Another coin on the floor? Cyclonus picked it up and walked into the monitor room, thinking nothing more of the coins. At least until another one was thrown at him, clinking off his armor and landing on the floor. Yes, well, perhaps someone was playing a prank on him. Cyclonus had more patience than that. Tossing coins at his feet were not going to phase him. He ignored the coin this time and sat at his console, shifting datapads and throwing out an energon cube someone had carelessly left.

Three more coins clinked harmlessly off his armor in the next breem, and at least twenty in the next three hours. Always aimed towards his lower half. Perhaps whoever had been throwing them was further away, or avoided the upper half to give the illusion of being further.

No. This was not war, and they did not think like tacticians. This was a stupid little gag meant to aggravate him. It succeeded, apparently, because he had hardly paid attention to the monitors the last two hours, evident by Ultra Magnus walking in to chastise him.

"Cyclonus. There has been a gaseous water leak in the washracks on Chamber 6, level 2B for the last breem. I have been notified that the area is under surveillance of your console for the last 4 hours. Is there an excusable reason why you did not report this disturbance to maintenance immediately?"

"No. I hadn't noticed. I will watch more carefully."

"You'd best." Ultra Magnus turned and stepped on one of the coins Cyclonus had been pointedly ignoring. "And for peace's sake, Cyclonus - clean up your console. I would expect better of even you." The enormous mech left the warrior there to seethe. This cycle was a nightmare. Cyclonus turned back to his console and suppressed a sigh as another coin clinked against his leg. He made a mental list of mechs that would feel pleasure out of bothering him incessantly.

Well, that would be just about the entire ship. He attempted to narrow it down to those who would take the effort. About half the ship. Those would have the patience for this? Those that had the funds to throw at him? Okay, he thought, let's try with the first mech that comes to mind, expanding, and then narrowing it down.

Whirl.

No, that sounded like exactly the mech that would try a stupid stunt like this one. Cyclonus hid the sneer on his face as he heard Whirl chatting animatedly to-well, to anyone who happened to be listening. Something about being assigned monitor duty as a punishment when the rest of them had it as a job - and what a slagged job it was. He had to agree with that one. As much as Cyclonus loved staring into space, he preferred the literal, rather than the figurative. He could strangle him when the shift was over.

Cyclonus tried to focus on the monitors, he really did. But the coins kept trailing further up his chassis, and eventually started to clink against his helm. He had one breem left of his shift and he could escape, and Magnus could find Whirl's bleeding corpse somewhere creative. Just as he started to find peace in imagining Whirl's lifeless form, a coin went right through the holes in his cheeks and onto his tongue. Oh, but that was just it. He had had well enough of this little game.

"Whirl, if you do not stop using those abhorrent little pincers to throw currency at me in some detestable attempt to provoke a reaction, you will find you don't have any hands at all."

He turned to find the room devoid of any sign of Whirl. Apparently he had finished his shift and left seconds ago. Another coin clinked right off his helm.

Cyclonus was being followed by those little coins. Every turn of the corner and there was a new coin to find, except he couldn't pinpoint exactly who was doing it. There was no recurring mech to find around each corner, no connections, no lingering heat signatures. This was infuriating and -as much as he hated to admit it- a clever way to break him down into an absolute fury. But it wouldn't work. Not as long as Swerve was still serving Engex.

Finally he reached the bar, made a beeline for a booth and sat down. Swerve ran over almost immediately - Cyclonus was frightening and intimidating, but he was a customer. "Hey Cyc-y! Cyclonus! Good ol' mono-horned mech himself! The staring-out-windows champion of-" Cyclonus gave him the most wicked, most enraged look he could muster. Apparently it was effective, as Swerve's vocalizer turned to static for a moment, and had to be reset a few times before it would obey him once more. He should do that more often.

"Uh-I mean, what can I get you today?"

"Absolutely anything that you haven't watered down. Anything strong."

"Fixin' to get overcharged kinda strong?"

"'Fixin' to forget this entire cycle ever happened."

"Oh, I've got just the thing!" Swerve ran off as quickly as possible and began to mix something together at the bar. Good. A mix of potent engex sounded good. A coin clinked off his remaining horn, and another off his fingers. The annoying little motormouth ran back over with a large glass full of a foul looking Engex mixture. It was a deep red in hue and it smelled like it could kill a mech. Good. Exceptional.

"Uh, Cyclonus - that drink costs a little more than that." Swerve was looking down at the two coins that had clinked off his head and gathered together on the table as if to spite him by their continued existence as closely and thoroughly as possible. "No, that's not your payment. Put this on my tab." Swerve shrugged and turned to leave. Well, at least he knew they were real and he wasn't going through some psychotic breakdown and imagining these coins everywhere. He lifted the drink and a coin clattered on the table, having stuck to the bottom of the glass through condensation. Another coin was tossed at him, missed, and landed in his drink. Oh, for slag's sake.

"Swerve."

"Ohslag. I mean uh, yes, Cyclonus? Is there something wrong with your drink? I mean I'm not saying there should be -or could be- or is! But if there w-"

"Is there a prank going on that I should be aware of?"

"Not that I know of, why, did you wake up glued to your berth? Not that, uh, that was planned or anything. I mean it was, but we figured, we'd have our optics torn out before we got close to your berth, since you're a war sleeper and-"

"Is there any reason anyone you know on board would relentlessly throw coins at a mech for hours at a time?" That seemed to catch him off guard. "Coins?"

"Yes, I have been finding seemingly stray coins everywhere I go. Everywhere."

"Well, I'm kinda jealous, actually. I wish I had someone throwing money at me. Besides, don't you know that every time you find a stray coin, someone you love is thinking about you?" Swerve turned and walked away when Cyclonus straightened up and went silent. Oh. That's not so bad. There was only one mech that fit that description on this entire ship, and that wasn't a terrible thought at all.

Cyclonus fished the coin from his drink and continued the next hour drinking that abomination Swerve called a 'strong drink.' Swerve wouldn't know a strong drink if it struck him across the face, but this one wasn't...completely regrettable, as far as drinks go. It would still take a few more to get him overcharged yet, and he decided that no, he would rather not forget this whole day. Cyclonus stood, dropped his payment near Swerve, and left before the minibot decided to talk his audials into malfunctioning. As he made his way back to his hab suite, it had dawned on him that the coins had stopped. He hadn't had one tossed at him in the last hour. Blissful. He keyed the door to the hab suite open, and immediately his little roommate jumped in surprise and turned himself so Cyclonus couldn't see whatever it was he had been fiddling with.

"Tailgate, what are you hiding?"

"Oh, nothing. Say, did you hear there was a broken water heater pipe in one of the washracks in chamber 6? I wasn't there to repair it but-" Tailgate squealed as Cyclonus grabbed him by his hood and lifted him up to reveal...a coin clutch.

"I-I was just...c-counting my money! For no reason! Yeah! No reason at all. None whatsoever...say, how was your shift today? A-and could you put me down maybe?"

Cyclonus dropped Tailgate on the floor, and almost immediately felt bad about it. Damn it. Damn this insignificant little wreck of a minibot.

"Ow."

The warrior lifted the minibot up again, sat on his own berth, the one with a better view of the window, and plunked his roommate in his lap. Tailgate was used to this and rested against Cyclonus's chest, peacefully listening to his intakes, the thrum of his engine, and the beating of his spark. "I only meant the be-"

"Hush." Cyclonus placed one arm around his minibot's waist, his servo settling to gently stroking a bundle of wires inbetween a transformation seam, perfectly comfortable to just relax in silence and enjoy the end of his day in the light of good intentions, even if the majority of his day had been spoiled by them.

Earlier

"Hey, Tailgate. Tailgate, hey."

Tailgate pointedly ignored him. If he could just get to their quarters and lock him out, perhaps he wouldn't be stuffed into an air vent or shoved into an energon dispenser today. "I got somethin' you might wanna hear about. And no, it ain't my day, which was just lovely, thanks for asking. It's about Cyclonus."

Tailgate stopped walking and turned around. "What, Whirl? I am not looking to get shoved into anything small, compact, smelly, slimy, sticky, or otherwise gross or uncomfortable. What do you want?"

"I just wanted you to have these. I had this idea y'know - when you find a stray coin, it means that someone you love is thinkin' about you. I trust you know what to do." Whirl dropped...a bag of coins into Tailgate's hand. Whirl was giving him money to express his feelings to Cyclonus? What the slag? "Whirl this sounds like a load of- of hooey. What do you know about feelings and stuff? How do I know you're not making this up?"

"No way! I know lots about feelings. See, right now, I'm hurt. By your accusations. This is my hurt-by-your-accusations face. Ask Rung, he knows!"

Tailgate sighed and looked over at Rung's office door. Fine. He could ask Rung a stupid question if it meant Whirl left him alone. He lifted his arm as far as it could reach, to the door's auto-open switch, and stepped inside. "Excuse me Rung, Whirl was just telling me that when you find a stray coin it means someone you love is thinking about you. Have you ever heard that?"

Rung put down a stack of files and turned to Tailgate. "I think I have, yes. It's a funny little superstition, but nothing more. Something to make people smile, that's all. It's not a fact." Oh.

"Oh. Thanks, Rung!" Tailgate closed the door and turned to Whirl, but Whirl was sprinting down the hallway cackling. Oh well. If everyone knew that, then what's the harm? Cyclonus would be so surprised! He might even smile!