Yaatree was in a foul mood

Shockwave’s latest experimental implants were still settling, the durasteel pinging as it shifted. An assortment of scavenged metal hunks and fibers was spread alongside him, and he sourly picked through the meager scraps. He wasn’t supposed to ingest anything for several more hours, but his tanks pinged insistently, low fuel warning warnings flashing as the integrations ate up his reserves.

Even small movements hurt, the coils of serrated blading scraping harshly against the floor. Yaatree tried to still, but his patience was wearing thin. Shockwave would know if he left the room, he always did… but he hadn’t forbidden Yaatree from exploring, only from disturbing the implants. 

Yaatree flinched inwardly, remembering how his fussing had inadvertently pulled out some delicate circuitry, and the many welds he’d had to replace it. But really, who would put that many optical sensors on a driller? Yaatree was hardly a stealthy mecha, totally unsuited for surveillance.

If Shockwave wanted to court Soundwave, Yaatree was a poor choice. Even if he was not much bigger than the typical Autobot now, (and therefore the perfect size and age to ping Soundwave’s carrier instincts) he would grow, quickly. 

Yaatree was hardly one for cuddling, anyways, despite what Shockwave insisted to himself when he thought he was alone in the lab.

Peering around the doorway, Yaatree slithered through the cross-corridor and into a smaller lab room he hadn’t been in before. He squirmed under a table, and plucked open a cabinet to rifle through the contents.

Yaatree froze, suddenly aware he wasn’t alone. 

Yaatree turned slowly, blenders chirring as his blades spun uneasily. Faint red optics peered up over the edge of the table. 

Spinflask was not having a good day. 

He’d just wanted a bit of privacy. Duo were lovely, but they were… they were a lot. Energetic, to say the least. He’d wanted some time alone, and had apparently picked entirely the wrong spot for it. Namely, a spot Shockwave frequented. 

And Shockwave was strong enough that, even with Spinflask’s adrenaline spiking enough to have him trying to drive claws through the other’s plating, he could grab Spinflask by the scruff and hold him easily in one servo. All of Spinflask’s adrenaline had only gotten him deemed “interesting” and strapped to a table with a crown of sensors on until he wore himself out. 

Once he’d woken up, he’d found himself on top of a table entirely suited for his alt mode, fastened to the table by a leash around his ankle. There was an IV dripping energon into his systems, another cube nearby, and a short list of tasks and supplies in front of him. It was probably not wise to upset his captor, so he did as was implied-slash-ordered, loading up his internal rack and spinning everything as was specified. 

He could do this. It wasn’t exactly fun, working for an unknown purpose, but he could do it. Wasn’t difficult or particularly distressing. He could just… do this. Hopefully Duo would come to rescue him, but… that wasn’t really a reasonable expectation, was it? He… probably wasn’t worth the trouble of getting into Shockwave’s lab, after all, even if they knew where he was. Which they didn’t. 

So… he could work with this. Could be worse, after all. 

And then a thing came into the room, and it was worse. Spinflask hunched himself into the smallest ball possible on top of the table, optics nervously locked on… whatever that was, and waited to see if it would leave. 

It did not leave. 

It noticed him. 

Slag. 

Not knowing what else to do, Spinflask offered the thing a tiny wave, then tucked his servos up with the rest of himself and tried to look uninteresting. And not edible.