Chapter Text
The sad and terrible truth was that it had to happen. The sadder and more terrible truth was that it was utterly preventable.
The issue with ceasefires is that they are insidious; a pretty rock hiding a poisonous bug. Led into a false sense of security, one palms the rock, perhaps intending to pocket it or maybe to skip it on a nearby lake, and quickly finds that they can do neither, too occupied rushing towards the nearest hospital.
And that is where Optimus finds himself, rushing towards the medbay with no thought but his own survival. He'd lifted the rock, out of curiosity or perhaps desperation, and now he is stung.
"It was bound to happen," Ratchet tells him, one medical cable attached to Optimus's helm port. "Perhaps you should consider this less of a surrender and more a political victory."
"I would prefer not to think of it at all," replies Optimus. It is not entirely a lie, but it is one in part. He quite enjoys imagining it, replaying it, has been doing so nonstop since he'd woken up in Megatron's bed.
"Well, he didn't give you a virus." Ratchet disconnects.
"This is a disaster," Optimus declares. "If one bot caught me outside his quarters-"
"You had a late-night request for a change to some inane treaty condition," finishes Ratchet. "It's not like anyone found you panel-less in his foyer."
"This is a delicate situation. My objectivity cannot be called into question." Optimus sighs, rubs his tired optics with one hand. It is a fraught ceasefire, one he's barely kept together. Truthfully, they'd have gone back to killing each other months ago if the humans had been any less of a threat. Such stupidity, to risk it all for a frag he can hardly remember. But the rock had been so tempting, the idea of skipping it so tantalizing.
"No more engex for me," Optimus decides.
Ratchet rolls his optics. "You hardly have any in your stream. Like it or not this was all you. If you are afraid of consequences, you best handle this. Unless you'd like it to happen again?"
"I don't. I won't." And Optimus believes his own words, truly. Because he's already palmed the rock, already felt it heavy in his pocket. His curiosity is sated.
And anyway, there are more important things to worry about. Like finding enough energon to keep the troops moving, like organizing interfactional scouting teams that won't murder each other, like avoiding Megatron's gaze at every planning meeting. He keeps himself busy, and out of Megatron's bed.
He does not keep himself out of the 7th floor storage closet.
They are supposed to be touring the construction area, damaged by a human designed explosive drone. But Bonecrusher gets called away and it's just the two of them and Megatron makes the sly observation that the security cameras have been blown to smithereens and the closet door would keep them out of view of any returning Constructicons.
It becomes a habit.
"The issue is that I have no trust in him whatsoever," Optimus complains. Ratchet nods sympathetically. "He's a tyrannical leader, a cruel mech, and he'll stab us in the back the moment the humans let up."
"You sound like Prowl," Ratchet remarks. He's scanning Optimus, just like he does every time. In case Megatron snuck something into Optimus- in preparation, perhaps, for the return of the war.
"The other day he told me that it made no sense to pinpoint the MECH agents from regular humans, that we ought to bring out the WorldSweepers and be done with it." Optimus had nearly slapped him, but resolved simply to a terse talking to on the lower bridge. He'd learned the best way to get through to Megatron is to not stop talking; if he pauses, Megatron would certainly fill the silence with some horrific, genocidal proposition. Or an invitation to interface.
"Be that as it may, I don't believe it's necessary to come here every time." Ratchet disconnects from Optimus's medical port. "For one, it seems he isn't giving you anything, purposefully or not. For another, I don't need to know exactly how sexually active you are. It's not the kind of information I particularly care to have."
"I think Primus must be laughing at me." Optimus slides off the medical berth, brushing imaginary medbay dirt from his plating.
"Well, you could always ask the Matrix," replies Ratchet. "I'm sure if the Creator had an opinion, he'd let you know."
The Matrix reports nothing, but Ratchet's atheistic scorn shouldn't be taken too seriously.
"You know," says Megatron one afternoon, having come down from his post-overload haze and now sitting slumped on a large tool chest. "We should consider fixing the light fixture." The closet circuitry had been damaged by the explosion and now flickers dimly.
"You are sitting on the tools," Optimus points out. Megatron looks down, then nods.
Optimus leaves first -they stagger their exits- but when he returns next the light is strong and steady.
And so, inevitable and utterly preventable, their affair continues. Two months later, their closet -and it is theirs, now- is furnished with cleaning rags, a buffer, two work-pads filled with propositions they really ought to be reading, a small stack of energon cubes, and two cans of paint, red and blue.
"Hold still," Megatron orders, spraying a thin line of brilliant red over one particularly obvious claw mark on Optimus's back. "Quit squirming or next time I'll hand you a cape."
Optimus scowls. "You will do no such thing. This is entirely your own fault."
"You like it," Megatron taunts. Optimus, faced with plenty of memory as evidence, cannot deny the accusation. It does little to fade the bitterness of his current position, sitting on the cold floor of an abandoned storage closet, elbows propped on a crate like a sparkling eager to peer over the treats counter. Megatron resumes spraying. Optimus shivers.
The repairs of the neighboring corridor are quietly postponed.
The most upsetting aspect of it all, at least in Optimus's mind, is that if Megatron is the rock then pleasure is the venomous bug, and Optimus has been bitten. His defenses are down. He's even grown to enjoy Megatron's infernal smirking. His circuits have been devastated, his self-preservation skills neutered.
"Nothing has been devastated save your dignity," replies Ratchet. "And that is an interesting choice of words. Nuetered. I'd say no-one in this situation has been neutered, and perhaps that's the problem."
"He brought me rust sticks," Optimus complains. "Where did he even get them?"
"One of the neutrals opened a confectionery." Ratchet flicks through the results on a nearby screen. "You would have noticed, if you spent less time on the 7th floor."
Optimus huffs.
Afterwards, Megatron likes to talk. Megatron likes to talk all the time- useful during the war, when Optimus needed to stall for time. Not so useful when he's trying desperately to avoid being sucked into Megatron like a black hole. And that's what it's morphed into now, isn't it? A deadly game of attraction, and Optimus is just barely maintaining orbit.
Megatron likes to talk about disarming things, domestic things. The new confectionary shop. An Agatha Christie novel's plot, and how he had figured out the criminal (the actress) before the big reveal. The energon supply room's new cameras and how Soundwave had to install them. Disarming things, meant to lower Optimus's guard until something escapes his mouth.
It's a shame his battlemask gets in the way of certain activities, or he’d have kept it shut and prevented his own fall into casual conversation with the universe’s worst dictator.
"Have you considered the possibility that Megatron likes you?" Ratchet asks, attached to Optimus by medical cable. "Perhaps the Lord of the Decepticons isn't locking himself in a random storage closet with you for some nefarious plot. Maybe this is just as terrible a predicament for him as it is for you."
Optimus considers Ratchet's words. "It is embarrassing," he admits. "I find it hard to believe he would do something so undignified, should other options be present."
"Exactly," Ratchet crows. "And you are perfectly clean. Again."
"Of course," Optimus continues, "there may be no other option with as advantageous a potential gain."
Ratchet disconnects. "Sure. Though such a plan would be underestimating your abilities to 'turn the tables', if you will."
Optimus has, of course, already considered this. "Sadly, my skills at seductive information gathering are under-developed."
He had tried, in the beginning, to 'turn the tables'. He'd asked Megatron, while he had the mech pinned against a wall, if he thought there was any chance of Starscream's latest weapon being completed earlier than the Decepticons had claimed. Megatron had onlined one lazy optic just to squint it, then replied that Optimus really ought to move faster, slaggit. He hadn't tried again.
On Optimus's part, though, he doesn't tell Megatron anything. Nothing important, that is. But after months of Megatron's talking, he learns to talk back. Helps the post-overload glow, Megatron says. Optimus isn't so sure of the benefits of conversation in that regard, but it is mildly refreshing.
"I'm glad you have someone other than me to talk to about your illicit sex life," Ratchet says at this. Optimus ignores him.
Optimus tells Megatron things as utterly pointless as what Megatron tells him. Like what Prowl is going to report during the next dual command meeting (the human drones are running on prototype energon), like the topping he prefers on battle rations (nothing, save your toppings for something worth ingesting).
They have set meeting times, now- 1.5 hours before high council, when everyone assumes they are preparing. Megatron jokes that the closet has ‘open hours’. Optimus doesn’t laugh, per say, but he huffs, and that’s as much of a concession as Megatron requires.
They have a schedule, and they talk, and it is as unnerving as it is pleasant, or perhaps it is unnerving because it is pleasant. Despite himself, Optimus allows it all to get a little too casual, a little too relaxing. Megatron is charming, even when he’s talking about nonsense, and he’s a good listener, but only when Optimus is talking about nonsense.
Optimus blames it all on nonsense.