Title: The third sequence

Rating: T

Verse: Bayverse

Genre: drama

Characters: Jazz, Sideswipe

Warnings: swearwords, cars transforming affectionately

Summary: The idea came from a kinkmeme prompt over Lj, which asked for transformation itself to be the way that giant robots get affectionate to each other. I found the idea interesting, because transformers usually have their transforming ability underused in fics, so I decided to try it. I could only guess a rating, but because it is after all only a detailed description of transforming itself, I thought that T/pg13 is more than enough. Ohh, and I gave Sides back his red colour and Lamborghini alt form. :-)

The third sequence

"Sunny will come one orn, Sides."

"I hope. It's been too long."

"But you can feel him, right?"

"Only that he's alive. Nothing else."

"He is tough. As long as he lives, he'll come."

"Like Prowl. Doesn't make it easier to wait."

The answer to the sub-vocalized conversation was only a small ex-vent, the Cybertronian version of a sad sigh. The silvery Solstice and the red Lamborghini stood side by side in the dark hangar, supposedly powered down for recharge. But Sideswipe's field was far from being in the proper mood for defrag. It whipped around his frame, like a windblown dress, coloured with hazy emotions of sadness, incompleteness, missing and Jazz couldn't help but feel it. The red warrior never showed it while they had work to do and a war to fight, but since it was over and Sentinel gone, he alternated between pranking sprees and bouts of depression.

Jazz was determined to help him in the latter. He needed it too, since his death and resurrection; Cybertronians are hard to deactivate for good but his end came closer than the saboteur dared to think of it. Since Prowl was as far in unknown part of space as Sunstreaker, Jazz saw nothing bad with a little interface. Hence the juggling of schedules until it was only the two of them in the hangar, supposedly for an eight joor of recharge.

The side door of the Solstice moved, smaller than usual plates lifted and rotated around unseen axles. The outermost silver plate hesitantly touched the Lamborghini, slid on the shiny crimson surface without scratching it, just making the proximity sensors jump. Sideswipe shuddered a little. He hasn't felt that kind of a touch since… since they left Sunstreaker on Cybertron. He tentatively flexed his field a bit, colouring it with cautious acceptance. He liked Jazz, the smaller saboteur's nature was similar to his own, maybe even more devil-may-care in his actions. No, the red warrior had no objection against what the silvery officer had in processor…

"Are you sure we should do it here? NEST surveys all hangars I think."

"I heard Optimus asking Will to turn off the cameras while we recharge."

"And they did?"

"If not, it's their problem. Since when do you care?"

"Since the last lecture of Optimus about how to behave around the fleshies?"

"Never known you to be affected by lectures. Prowl will glitch if he hears that."

"You know, I almost wish he'd be around to glitch."

"Yeah. I know. Me too."

The small plate skimmed the Lamborghini's door and slid upwards to the glass. It wasn't glass of course and the sensitive transparent plasteel trembled at the barely there touch. The top part folded down onto the inquisitive silver plate, which slid on, pursued by the red door mirror. The Lamborghini's door scissored up, breaking up while moving, encompassing the silvery plate of the Solstice, capturing it, transforming around, into an appendage that had no similarity to Sideswipe's root mood servos whatsoever.

It was something they never told to the Humans, because most of them seemed quite prudish for the open-minded Cybertronians. Not that they lied, no, Optimus couldn't do that anyway. Just omitted some facts. True, they had had the Cube and all sparks came from It. But they were social species and feeling good had nothing to do with newsparks. The third transformation sequence broke their parts down to far more than was needed for everyday forms, revealed far more sensors that could be stimulated and inner parts that were sensitive and displaying them took trust.

Trust that signified closeness, emotions, connections. Revealing one's self and inner parts to another via transforming together and connecting through it. Commingling fields, exchanging data packets, sometimes even parts assured them that they cared about each other. It was just a bit more how Humans defined friendship but it encompassed the lover concept too.

Jazz folded down even more plates from his side to commingle them with the red ones from the Lambo twin. The slide of the plates as they flirted with each other, the quiet clangs of axles and soft creaks of the hinges as they worked to keep up movement was almost fluid, a strange sight from solid metals. Sensors flared and tubes contracted as they were stimulated, their fields fast warming up towards arousal and lust.

Or it would be such a sight if any light shone on the two. The two cars, standing almost unmoving side by side would have made for a strange sight if there were anyone to observe it. The closer sides were like melted and the smaller than usual parts made a fascinating combo of red and silver plates, black and chrome inner parts and the purplish glow of the rarely exposed energon tubes. From up close, a hypothetical observer could have seen that their sides looked melted, because the tiny parts were all in motion, flirting, touching, sliding on each other, creating a movement than was almost a dance.

"Jazz…!' – a small, silver plate ventured across the seats, that growled and tried to catch the intruder in their not exactly leather-like grasp.

"Sides…!" – the silver plate shook with mirth as it rubbed against the gearbox that captured it in a sudden, viselike grip, the clang clearly audible in the silence of the hangar, that so far was only broken by the surprisingly soft sounds of living metal sliding on similarly feeling plates.

"In a hurry?" – the radio growled as it folded down on the captured and writhing silvery door-mirror. The sound waves have always been Jazz's weakness and the small mirror shuddered in ecstasy as the voice box lavished its audible attentions on it. Jazz decided that he could use more of it and sent even more parts into Sideswipe's interior. He loved the feel of the red twin's voice on his parts and it has been far too long.

"Not if you… ahh… do this…" – the Lamborghini looked like it was imploding inwards from the roof down, capturing the silvery parts within its crimson embrace.

Small sparks flew when parts met in a knocking embrace, lighting up the underside of their frames. In the middle of the cavalcade of parts, energon lines rubbed against each other, eliciting a staticky, wordless sound from their radios. Slowly the two cars drew closer as the pace of the movement brisked up and started to draw more and more of their frames into it. The doors started the play but soon the growing mass of swirling, sliding, slanging parts included the nearer tires too, eliciting even more crackling moans. The rubberlike material wasn't sensitive but the axles and the hub far more so and the dancing plates swarmed around them to rub against them and envelop them in their grasp.

The moving parts warmed up, the two fields become intertwined and the first cable to plug from the Solstice electric system into one of the Lamborghini's port shook the two cars that, by this time hardly even resembled to anything Earthly. Only the front part of the red car and the back of the silver was unmoving yet, the rest of the two Cybertronians mixed and matched in the middle, transformation seams and cogs in a constant movement.

The charge and the data packets that flew over the connection and back heated them up even more than the frantic movements and the constant rubbing, petting and stroking of parts. Their cooling systems, that tried to remain outside the coupling so far did their best to keep the temperature under the dangerous levels. More and more cables plugged in from both cars, while some fought a dominance battle, intertwining in the air, whipping around like crazy tentacles.

The silver Solstice's parts were more adventurous, stretching out into the other car's interior, while the red plates clamped down on them, surrounded them and then proceeded to lavish attention to the captive plates and parts. Jazz didn't mind Sideswipe dictating the tempo and the movements, he was far more satisfied to care. His engine growled louder and louder as the transformation movement demanded more and more power. The dedicated processor worked overtime following and directing the crazy movements, reading the overwhelmed sensors' data, drawing all processing power that he possessed.

"Slag, Jazz that is… ahhh…" – Sideswipe gasped as a few cables curled themselves around his camshaft. – "…do that again…FRAG!"

"Ticklish, much…?" – the breathy voice of Jazz sounded from somewhere the Lamborghini's engine block, causing it to hitch and almost stall.

"You have .. unghhh… no shame" – The red twin retaliated by his other door coming apart and reassembling itself over the Solstice's front grill with a shrill squeak.

"And you do…?" – Jazz couldn't keep himself quiet, even if he wanted to. Sides were creative, he thought, as a thick, throbbing, energon-filled tube slid slowly around his headlight. It was as ecstatic as it was dangerous and the swirl of the red and silver plates slowed down for a few kliks to properly admire the move, before swarming over, to feel the thrum of Sideswipe's life-force – and protect it unconsciously.

Although the constant movement of parts looked chaotic, there was a system to it, shorter sequences that fitted around each other's similar moves. It helped that their parts were of similar size, so the transformation software and the dedicated processor didn't have to concern itself with size adjustments as well. It was enough to deal with this way too.

Their charge grew until even the plates surfaces crackled with it, the thousands of tiny connecting surfaces exchanging it constantly, making up for the larger packages that the cables shunted over. The silence of the hangar was long gone, their voices and sound dispelling the quiet, although they were too far gone to notice it. The grinding of parts and the crackling charge was stronger by the klik.

A single, silvery plate, the one that started the whole thing suddenly stopped, just shy of touching a sturdy, well-protected compartment in front of it. The icosahedral chamber was almost surrounded by cables and tubes connecting to it and its walls throbbed with a silent, strong thrum. The wires closed up in front of the silvery plate, caressing it with charge but not letting it go further. The surrounding red platelets held the silvery adventurer in their grasp, slowly drawing it backwards.

Jazz understood, even in the haze of his impending overload. He withdrew the small plate after petting the cables back, in a silent understanding. Sparks were serious business and they only agreed to some comfort interface, however good it was or seriously they both took it. Instead he reiterated with some movement around the thick energon line and the fine-tuned engine block, bringing Sideswipe up to speed too.

The two cars by this time resembled nothing like cars any more. Neither were their root modes identifiable, albeit a servo or two sometimes became visible in the twirling mass of parts in the darkness of the hangar. Lights sometimes flashed of flickered, providing minute illumination that they didn't need. Sparks fell from colliding parts like stars shooting through the nighttime sky.

The whirlpool of parts suddenly speeded up, the charge visibly crawled across the surfaces. The two vocalizers spewed static and the lights stroboscoped through the spectrum and into the ultraviolet. The red and silver plates drew closer and closer, the parts creaking as the space among them lessened. Cables tightened over shafts, nuts screwed themselves onto bolts with strength that surpassed anything that Earth metals could stand.

The mass of parts danced and wrestled victoriously, gloriously, devoid of higher thoughts. Processors gave way to circuit instincts as the software functions with their safeties were overridden. Sensors cried out as impossible sensations forced themselves on their sensitive nodes. The charge grew, until they couldn't hold it any more and it exploded, scorching the cables and wires over, leaving a tingling sensation on the plates and parts that – after a nanoklik of total standstill exploded outward.

A flying nut pinged off a nearby hangar wall, circling slowly on the ground and slowing down, it fell over. Vents wheezed, cycling desperately and dispelling scorching hot air from the still intertwined frames. A red plate moved, slowly, like it didn't really want to. Another followed, releasing the silvery mirror it clutched to with some others. The movement became faster, the different coloured parts finding their proper alignment, crawling back into the space they occupied before.

In mere breems there were two sleek, fast, dangerous cars standing side by side again, only the still overworked vents and the slight crackle of the cooling plates showing that something happened. The air smelled ozone and oil and the barely perceivable smell of metallic shavings.

"I think it's yours, Sides." – the silver Solstice's radio gasped still breathlessly. A real servo rose from it, holding a pair of nuts out to the red Lamborghini, which slightly rocked on its tires before answering.

"Yeah, right." – a front tire lifted, spitting a nut on the Solstice, which grabbed it out of the air, chucking the one in his servo back. With a little shuffling and some partial transformations, they fitted their parts back to their place before settling down again, mirrors just touching in the darkness.

"Thanks, Jazz." – the red Lambo subvocalized suddenly.

"Yer welcome, Sides. I needed it too." – The Solstice rocked once on its wheels, rubbing the silvery mirror onto the red one, affectionate, like Jazz usually was after an interface.

"You know, now I can truly believe that Sunny will come one orn."

"Glad to hear that." – the Solstice couldn't smile, but the voice conveyed it instead.

"Doesn't mean we can't mix parts again… if you want it too…?"

"Sure I do!"