Chapter Text
Walking
“I’m sorry”, Silverbolt mumbles for the umpteenth time, self-loathing and embarrassment rolling heavily through his energy field, but Skyfire simply shakes his helm, tightening his arms around him, and keeps on walking.
Waltz
“I don’t care what either of you did, ‘Bolt, you both need to stop dancing around the subject and fix this before it costs you more than a few days of sulking.”
Wishes
“Let’s go for a flight”, Silverbolt proposes all of a sudden, springing out of his seat, and there’s an excited, hopeful glint in his optics Skyfire is sure wasn’t there a few minutes ago that makes it impossible for him to do anything but accept.
Wonder
“It’s so beautiful”, Skyfire’s younger counterpart breathes, stretching his sensors as far as they will go, spinning and circling around the fond, amused presence of his guardians, for the first time in his life feeling infinitesimal and loving every klik of it –and outside their joined minds, tucked into his side, Silverbolt smiles and pushes one of his own memories in return.
Worry
“It scares me sometimes”, Silverbolt admits, voice tight and small as he attempts to hold as much of Skyfire as his arms can circle, “when I realise I wouldn’t be able to help you if anything went wrong.”
Whimsy
The jet looks so embarrassed, so clearly frustrated at his own mistakes that Skyfire finds himself reaching out towards a set of scratches and commenting as casually as he can, “These look like the Trifid Nebula”, if only to see Silverbolt’s face scrunch up in confusion and then burst into a bright, surprised laugh.
Waste/Wasteland
“I’m sorry”, he is saying, but the words are nothing compared to the comfort and concern that envelop him when Silverbolt wraps his arms around him, somehow managing to keep him in one piece even as he stands horrified and heartbroken in the middle of the wrecked remains of the Science Academy.
Whiskey and rum
“Can I just ask, what in the world were you drunk on when you decided it was a good idea to lock your brother and his best friend in an honest to Primus supply closet?!”
War
“Yield”, Silverbolt grins down at him, holding down Skyfire’s hands above his head with one of his own while he straddles him, the aftershocks of laughter still in the shuttle’s systems shaking him like the gentlest earthquake in the world.
Weddings
“Er”, Skyfire says eloquently, staring at the frozen Aerialbots in slowly-sinking shock and something that may probably turn into amusement –or maybe hysteria, it’s quite hard to tell– at a later point, “Silverbolt, do I want to know why your brother is wearing a giant white dress?”
Birthday
Skyfire only manages to say “I just thought you’d like it, and since you are technically Earth-born, I assumed–” before getting a sudden armful of happy, cuddling Aerialbot, but he is definitely not going to complain about Silverbolt’s reaction.
Blessing
“What do you mean ‘He’ll do’, you glitch?!”, Slingshot snarls indignantly, and only Silverbolt’s alarmed hold on his frame and the awareness that his gestalt will be heavily disappointed of him if he breaks the tentative truce between Autobots and Decepticons manage to stop him from punching Starscream’s ugly smirking face.
Bias
“I’d say I agree with you”, Skyfire smiles ruefully, except the intent look in his optics and the teasing way in which he trails his hand down the new shape of Silverbolt’s wings tells the younger jet his partner isn’t feeling very sorry at all, “but I kind of like this, too.”
Burning
Skyfire has developed what Smokescreen assessed to be a ‘justifiable’ aversion to cold temperatures, but watching Ratchet work on Silverbolt’s unconscious, scorched form he has never hated anything as much as he suddenly hates fire.
Breathing
Warm lips ghost over his wings, not-quite-kissing their way up, up, up to the back of his neck, and when gentle sharp teeth close on the sensitive cables hidden there his breath comes out in a hitching sigh.
Breaking
It’s been a surprisingly quiet afternoon –even by their standards and considering the awkward fact that two of them have been pointedly ignoring each other for almost a week– when Slingshot suddenly can’t take it anymore and turns to Silverbolt with an embarrassed, pained expression, all but pleading to his brother: “I give up, okay, you win, just stop thinking about bringing your boyfriend for the night so slagging loud, will you?!”
Belief
“I don’t think I’m going like whatever this turns out to be”, Skyfire says warily, eyeing their expressions –from Fireflight’s excited grin to Skydive’s barely-there tilt of the lips and Silverbolt’s small, mischievous smile– with the feeling that a bunch of smirking Aerialbots cannot bode well, and deciding the fact that they even got his lover involved into it can only bode worse.
Balloon
“What was that word I needed...”, Skyfire faux-muses, Silverbolt shaking under him with barely restrained laughter and flicking his optics between Skyfire’s face and the water balloon he got from one of his downed brothers.
Balcony
“Yield!”, Fireflight gleefully shrieks as he dives down from the window, dropping at least a dozen ‘bombs’ on both his brother and Skyfire, leaving them laughing like younglings and soaked to their struts.
Bane
Silverbolt should probably feel guilty or embarrassed about the whole thing, but the look on Prowl’s face when he discovers that, for once, he and Skyfire were also part of what the twins have already dubbed the ‘Epic Aerial Water Balloon Carnage’ only makes him want to start laughing all over again.
Quiet
“Hush”, Silverbolt says, pleased-warm and slightly embarrassed at the sappiness of his own actions, and Skyfire only smiles up at him as Silverbolt keeps on tracing glyphs of love and promise into his plating.
Quirks
“You are so weird”, Silverbolt laughs the fifth time Skyfire kisses him immediately after he swallows another Energon confection, making a deep, pleased noise as he chases the flavour into Silverbolt’s mouth.
Question
Silverbolt’s not sure why Skyfire seems to ignore the fact that he’s never said no to his soft inquiries of ‘Can you stay the night?’, but he hopes one day Skyfire will trust him enough to stop feeling the need to ask for it every time.
Quarrel
“No, Starscream”, Silverbolt says, hard and sudden as he fragging looms over the Decepticon Seeker, and Air Raid seriously didn’t think his brother had it in him, but slag if it doesn’t send a chill down his backstruts when Silverbolt continues, voice deceptively level and eyes as cold and unforgiving as the Arctic winds, “because this time, I will not let you hurt him again.”
Quitting
“I can’t do this anymore”, Skyfire groans, throwing his head back in despair and pushing his controller into someone’s –probably Air Raid’s– hands, ignoring the mostly-gentle teasing from Silverbolt’s brothers and taking comfort in the fact that, based on his lover’s amused look and the delicate fingers that brush softly over his wings, being –or rather, not being– good at videogames is not going to be an indispensable requisite for this relationship.
Jump
“You want to what out of my alt-mode?!”, Silverbolt exclaims in horror, and only Skyfire’s quick reflexes and steadying hands on his back keep him from falling over and accidentally squishing the humans to an earlier death than they apparently wish for.
Jester
“Primus, just– stop, I don’t even want to know–”, Skyfire laughs, covering Silverbolt’s mouth with his hand in a desperate –though somewhat half-sparked– attempt to stop him from spouting any more of those cheesy human science pick-up lines, and feels him grin against his palm.
Jousting
“Do you mind?”, Skyfire snaps, all but shoving the smirking ex-Con a good metre away from any point of contact and stationing himself like a barricade between Silverbolt and his –Primus help him– unwanted admirer, wings high and sharp and glaring at Motormaster with such hatred Silverbolt thinks, a bit hysterically, that given a few minutes more Skyfire may just manage to turn death-by-glower into a successful murder method.
Jewel
“Awww, but you’re just gorgeous, aren’t you, you pretty little thing?”, Air Raid coos, and in his still-dazed state Silverbolt doesn’t know what’s weirder –the fact that Wheeljack somehow managed to turn his bonded back into his sparkling self, or that Air Raid is so easily fawning over Skyfire, adorably wide sapphire blue optics or not.
Just
“I wish you didn’t have to go”, he murmurs into his plating, a delicate caress of air against his sensor net, the words like quiet murder to his spark, and he closes his eyes and tightens his arms around his lover, wishing it was really as simple a matter as wanting.
Smirk
“Turnabout is fair”, Skyfire says, pleased, optics mischievous and intense, looking down at Silverbolt’s tied-up frame with such heat that the younger jet can’t do anything but sigh his name in a hitched little breath at the first faint caress of Skyfire’s fingers on his plating.
Sorrow
“I will not leave the Autobots, Starscream, and I will not leave him”, Skyfire says fiercely, uncertain of where exactly he found the courage to finally say these words, but determined to clear this once and for all, “not for you, and not for anything or anyone else, and you better accept this if you hope for us to be friends ever again.”
Stupidity
“I’ll give it to you”, Starscream glares at Silverbolt with what seems to be half hatred and half grudging respect, a little loud to let himself be heard over Ratchet’s work on welding his arm sealed again, “you helped him get some manifolds, at least.”
Serenade
“You are home”, Silverbolt sings softly, laying on his side stroking gentle fingers over Skyfire’s lax face, hoping the words may keep the nightmares at bay.
Sarcasm
“Yes, Slingshot, I did not answer your comms. because I was having wild, loud, extremely kinky sex with my boyfriend”, Silverbolt replies flatly, not even bothering to look up from his datapad to watch his wingmate sputter indignantly.
Sordid
“Out of all the books ever written on Cybertron, all the epics and sonnets you could be reading, you go and chose a romance novel”, Skyfire shakes his head, chuckling and bending down to kiss Silverbolt’s rueful smile.
Soliloquy
“Look, mech, the way you and ‘Bolt have been fluttering around each other, I think we all pretty much know what you’re about to tell us, so cut to the point, will you?”, Air Raid tells him, looking almost bored, except the minute tell-tale upwards sweep of his wings makes Skyfire aware of the current of amusement running underneath the jet’s words, the small expressions of happiness on the faces of the remaining Aerialbots behind him, and for the first time since he decided to tell Silverbolt’s gestalt about his intentions towards their brother, he feels himself relaxing.
Sojourn
The first thing Silverbolt says, lying down on a medical berth and staring at the ceiling with a slightly dazed expression, is, “If I ever get out of here, we are never hosting a dancing competition in the Aerie again, no matter how much high-grade Slings and ‘Dive slip on my energon, okay?”
Share
He has never deliberately disobeyed any orders from his superiors, and even though he knows, spark and processors, that he was right in doing what he did, the only thing that keeps him from going insane that night by himself on the brig is the ghost tide of feelings and sensations from both his brothers and his bondmate, holding him together even as he feels like breaking down.
Solitary
Skyfire doesn’t think many other things have hurt him as much as the second Silverbolt turns a tight, closed-off look on him and says, uncharacteristically sparse, “I’d like to be alone now, if you don’t mind.”
Nowhere
It shifts abruptly, the atmosphere turning upside down before he even has a chance of asking what is wrong, and somehow the touches turn frantic in a way that has nothing to do with passion and everything with desperation, Skyfire’s optics wild and anguished as Silverbolt drags his face down to cup between his hands, heartbroken and infinitely tender, promising “I’m here, Skyfire, I’m okay, it’s going to be fine” over and over, until the anxiety simmers down and his lover seems at least close to believing it.
Neutral
“Ohhh, no– no, no way, I am not getting into this”, Slingshot declares as soon as Silverbolt turns to him, supposedly looking for support but clearly just wanting someone else to shout at, if Skyfire’s irritated wing flicker is any indication.
Nuance
There’s an entire language to wings, be it for Seekers, Praxians or Aerial frames, but what fascinates Silverbolt are the subtle meanings hidden in the smaller, more delicate gestures of Skyfire’s hands.
Near
That night, just as he curls around Silverbolt, arms circling his waist and a hand tracing small, slow circles on the curve of a wing, he realises with a startled sort of tranquillity that he could end every day of the rest of his life this way, and call himself happy.
Natural
“I think it fits you”, Silverbolt says, all sweet tones and earnest optics, but a single raised optic ridge from Skyfire’s sand-and-algae-covered face is enough to break his guileless expression into peals of laughter.
Horizon
That night he looks up at the dark, starry sky and doesn't have to wonder whether Silverbolt realises he's thinking about him– a mere thought across their newly–formed bond suffices, and suddenly his lover is an almost tangible presence around him, inside him, enveloping him from the very core and to the tip of his wings, and he laughs breathlessly to himself, thinks back through the link, ‘I love you, too’.
Valiant
He cuts off his engines and lets himself fall, coming close enough to the ground he almost thinks he's not going to make it this time, but somehow manages to fire his thrusters and glide upwards again, feeling breathless and terrified that the flight’s still not over, elated at the brief glimpse of Skyfire's expression he catches as he gains altitude, and his love for his chosen mate soars as high as he is right now as he thinks, drunk on emotion, 'This is for you; this is how much you mean to me'.
Virtuous
“That is not fair at all”, Silverbolt groans, but Skyfire simply revs his engines again, the vibrations spreading a slow, deliciously torturous heat throughout Silverbolt's frame, and there’s a smile in his lips when Silverbolt pulls him close into another kiss.
Victory
“Pinned you”, Silverbolt sings teasingly as he holds him –yet again– against the floor, knees braced at Skyfire’s sides and that sweet, intoxicating smile of his stretching across his lips.
Defeat
“Is this going to become recurrent behaviour?”, Skyfire asks mildly, but even as he says the words Silverbolt can see the smile that is threatening to escape him and feel Skyfire's hands sliding easily to his hips, making absolutely no attempt to change their position.
(Bonus: Forever
“Yes”, he whispers, optics bright with emotion, and the smile that lights Skyfire’s face as they hold each other close could bring each and every star in the universe to shame.)