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“What is this, Tarn?”
Pharma’s optics narrowed suspiciously as they roamed over the table. He was already unsettled and irritated at having been summoned so abruptly to attend to the leader of the DJD, when they’d had an appointment scheduled in two days’ time. No, Tarn had insisted; two days was too long. It had to be tonight. No, his t-cog hadn’t burnt out sooner than anticipated, although thank you very much for the implication that he was irresponsible with them, dear Doctor. There was another matter. A delicate matter. One that required Pharma’s… personalattentions.
Pharma had shuddered as the voice on the other end of the secure line had dropped teasingly low for a moment. Tarn couldn’t manipulate sparks over comm. lines – otherwise, the war would have been over with a single call to Optimus Prime’s office – but it was sometimes difficult to remember that when those rich, deep tones were purring in Pharma’s ear.
There had already been hints that something was different when Pharma had shown up at the DJD base. Usually, at least a few of Tarn’s goons would be loitering around. When Pharma’s little arrangement with the DJD leader had begun, the others would often take pleasure in trying to intimidate Pharma during his visits. Pharma would have none of it. When Helex had burbled the acid in his tank as Pharma passed by, hoping to make the doctor jump, Pharma had rolled his optics and suggested that Helex’s drainage filter sounded a little clogged, and could do with a clean. (He’d been right, as well, to Helex’s embarrassment and Pharma’s quiet glee.) Kaon’s sinister snapping of electricity had been met with Pharma growling his engines right back. When Tesarus had loomed casually over him, grinning and starting up the whirring blades in his stomach, Pharma had simply crossed his arms and remarked, “Do you ever clean those things, you great walking file-shredder? They smell of death, and not in the attractive way.” Tesarus had been so taken aback that his blades had stalled. But it wasn’t until Vos had muttered a threat at him in the Primal Vernacular – and Pharma had spat back an eloquent curse in the same language – that the DJD had thrown up their collective hands (all thirteen of them, if you counted Tesarus’s and Helex’s extra appendages) and given up on trying to scare Pharma. Pharma would never admit that it had taken him weeks of studying the ancient language between shifts before he’d been sure enough of his pronunciation to even try, but it had all been worthwhile.
Since then, however, while the threats had stopped, the tendency for the DJD to be hanging around the base during his visits had only increased. They seemed fascinated by the Autobot medic who was so impervious to the menace of the most feared Decepticons in existence. Tarn either didn’t notice the way his minions would make excuses to drop in on his private meetings with Pharma, or found it amusing. Pharma rather suspected it was the latter.
Tonight, though, three of the four seemed to have made themselves scarce. Kaon alone had greeted Pharma at the entrance, and the electric chair had been on his best behaviour as he’d led Pharma through the base, holding the interior doors open and ushering him through with a little bow. Pharma had frowned at him, but Kaon had tilted his head and smiled innocently, giving nothing away. Scoffing, Pharma had made to turn left, towards the med bay… only to have Kaon step in front of him.
“Tarn has requested you join him in his quarters this evening,” he’d said in that soft rasp, like the whisper of an electric current.
Pharma’s brow had furrowed. “Is he really too ill even to reach the med bay?” A faint prickle of concern had started to work its way through his irritation.
“You’ll have to ask him that. This way, please, Doctor.” And he’d led the medic into a dimly lit corridor, deeper than Pharma had ever been inside the base. It had dead-ended in a double-reinforced door. Kaon had tapped the door chime and discreetly vanished; Pharma had glanced around for him in vain, then steeled himself as the door had scraped open.
He’d been expecting to find a deathly ill Tarn curled up shivering on his berth, or perhaps trying to staunch the flow of energon from a dozen battle wounds… and if Pharma was entirely honest, he’d rather been looking forward to it. The fearsome Tarn reduced to meekly following the orders of the all-knowing healer? Pharma could get behind that idea.
This… this was not what he had been expecting.
Tarn was the picture of health. In fact, he looked better than usual. The deep purple finish had clearly been polished, not until it shone brightly (which wouldn’t have suited him), but enough to give it a silky, lustrous look. And laid out in front of him –
Tarn answered Pharma’s question. “Surely you’re familiar with the concept of food, Doctor.” Even behind the mask, the smile in his voice was unmistakable. “From a medical standpoint, if nothing else.”
There was a table in the centre of the room, decked out with half a dozen forms of energon. Delicate slices of condensed fuel were arrayed in petals on one plate. The next held plump, perfectly shaped energon sweets, with artful drizzles of icing. Still another plate had a huge crystal of what Pharma recognised as raw Vosian Special Concentrate, a form of fuel so expensive that he’d only ever seen it served in tiny pebbles, and then only at the best parties. The depths of the crystal danced with subtle lights that had never been visible in the smaller portions. There were liquid forms of energon, too, arranged in pretty bottles, their colours ranging from almost pink to the rich purple of Tarn’s armour. The heady smell of engex mingled with the sweet scent of the desserts.
Pharma was abruptly aware of the grind of metal on metal, deep in his empty fuel tanks. How long had it been since he’d eaten? He’d been too busy to interrupt his last shift, and the one before…
The way those red optics studied him, it was as if Tarn could simply peel back the plating and read Pharma’s processor. One massive hand unfolded, gesturing Pharma to the chair opposite Tarn.
He’d rarely been so tempted by anything in his life, but Pharma stubbornly remained standing. “Are you telling me,” he asked icily, “that you summoned me here out of the blue, with no notice… to have dinnerwith you?”
Tarn lounged back in his chair. “Well, I’m pleased to see that the idea has not entirely escaped you.”
Pharma crossed his arms and drew himself up to his full height, wings flicking in irritation. “That’s it. This may come as a surprise to you, Tarn, but outside of our arrangement, you do not, in fact, own my time. I will replace your t-cogs and fix up your henchmen and even act as your personal physician, but I will not be dragged over here on a whim like some kind of – plaything!”
They froze for a moment like that, blue optics burning into red. Pharma set his jaw, hoping that Tarn’s finely tuned audials couldn’t make out how fast his spark was whirring. He’d gone too far, and he knew it. Tarn was not a mech who was quick to anger, but when he did get angry, he was capable of things that made the rest of the DJD look like a litter of adorable turbofox pups. Still, there was nothing to do now but brazen it out. Even if his pride had let him take back what he’d just said, he knew Tarn wouldn’t.
The Decepticon’s optics flared hotly behind the mask. Then they dimmed, flickering down over Pharma’s tense form.
“Pharma.” The name came out in a slow, relishing purr, just a touch deeper than it should have been; Tarn barely skating the edge of using his gift. It made Pharma’s spark jump in his chest, tendrils of energy trying to snake out of him and reach for that voice. It didn’t hurt – if anything, it felt like a caress. But Pharma still trembled, anticipating the moment when Tarn would dip his voice lower.
It never came.
Instead, Tarn actually dropped his gaze, running a suddenly weary hand over his mask. When he spoke again, his voice was back into its normal range.
“My apologies, Doctor. It appears I was mistaken.”
“About what?” Pharma’s voice faltered.
“I had hoped you might find this a pleasant surprise. Frontline rations must get dull for a mech who once enjoyed the pleasures of Iacon high society.”
“What, so you decided to recreate them for me? Without even a word about how decadent and oppressive Iacon high society was?” Pharma tried to pour his usual sarcasm into the words, but his spark wasn’t in it. He was too taken aback by Tarn’s apology. “You’re a strange Decepticon, Tarn.”
“Appropriate enough.” The voice was wry. “You’re a rather unusual Autobot. Well. Despite the fact that the invitation could have been more…”
“Of an actual invitation?”
“… delicate, it still stands. I would –” The Decepticon only hesitated for a fraction of a second, but it was still bizarre to see Tarn at a loss for words. “That is, Helex would be most disappointed if you didn’t sample his creations. He’s quite outdone himself.”
Pharma felt a strange stab of affection for Tarn for finding such a diplomatic excuse for both of them. “Well,” he grumbled, “I suppose it wouldn’t do to upset Helex. He’d probably pout and avoid his checkups like an overgrown sparkling.” He sank into the chair across from Tarn, and immediately helped himself to a glass of the strongest high grade on the table.
Tarn lifted his glass to drink, and Pharma found himself watching with interest, wondering whether he was about to see the face behind the Decepticon brand at last. However, Tarn simply unlatched the very base of the mask and drew the high grade up behind it in a practiced motion. Pharma was puzzled by his own disappointment. He’d had Tarn sliced open on the operating table in front of him; he knew every inch of the mech’s circuitry. Why was the thought of seeing his face suddenly so intriguing?
He grimaced, and lifted his own glass in a mock toast. The first sip surged through his depleted fuel lines like fire. Tipping his head back, he took a long, greedy swallow, savouring the mix of flavours he hadn’t encountered since the early days of the war. Either Tarn had a secret stock of vintage high grade somewhere – which wouldn’t entirely surprise Pharma, to be honest – or Helex was more of a master chemist than he’d realised… although that would still require someone on the DJD to have sufficient knowledge of fine energon to tell him whether he’d gotten it right.
Not for the first time, he wondered about Tarn: where the mech had come from, what his background was. With that elegant accent, he almost certainly didn’t hail from the rough city he was named after. Asking was out of the question, though. Everything they couldn’t talk about – the war, the past – hung thick in the air between them.
Instead, Pharma cast his optics over the extensive collection of datapads lining the shelves, the names of the volumes etched along their sides. Tarn followed his gaze to a matched set at one end, clearly of an older make than the other datapads, but in good repair. “Ah. Yes. Are you familiar with Nightrain of Vos, Doctor?”
“The Golden Age poet?” Pharma nodded distractedly. “I read some of his work long ago, when I was a trainee. Rather sentimental for my taste, but some of his imagery was quite… striking.” His cooling fans spun a little higher at the memory of the more blatantly erotic verses, and he glanced over to see whether Tarn had noticed. Those dim red optics gave nothing away. “To be honest, I thought you’d have shelves of Megatron’s speeches and nothing else.”
Tarn swiveled and pointed to the wall opposite, where at least three shelves’ worth of datapads bore the Decepticon leader’s name and various dates. Pharma snorted with laughter, but quickly choked it down.
“But Lord Megatron freed our processors, as well as our frames,” Tarn murmured, sipping his energon. “It would be a disgrace to the Cause –” Pharma could practically hear the capital letter – “if we did not use them to their fullest potential.”
“And reading dirty love poetry is your fullest potential?”
“I read everything,” Tarn said lightly.
Pharma drained his glass, and moved to refill it, but Tarn was there before him, pouring him a generous portion. “I suppose that yours is a dull posting, when you’re not slicing up traitors and Autobots,” Pharma mused.
Tarn laughed, a surprisingly pleasant sound. “I imagine I could say exactly the same of yours.”
Pharma glanced at him sharply.
Then, after a moment, he grinned.
***
His dinner with one of the most dangerous mecha alive had been spent talking about, of all things, poetry. From Nightrain they’d moved on to the Golden Age in general, and from there to more contemporary works. War poets. Pharma wasn’t familiar with those on the Decepticon side, and while Tarn knew the names of several Autobots who still composed – Tarn knew everyone’s name, regardless of faction – he’d never seen the actual verses Pharma looked up and copied to a datapad for him.
Pharma stretched luxuriously, surveying the remains of their dinner. He hadn’t felt properly full like this since before coming to Delphi. The high grade was going to his processor, as well, leaving him hot and languid, slouched back in his chair as he listened to Tarn read.
Ultimately, the trail of their conversation had led back to the ancient poet, and Tarn, in a fit of nostalgia, had pulled one of the datapads off the shelf. He was deep into his favourite poem, rolling each word around slowly, as if tasting it. One of Pharma’s long legs tapped gently against the table, keeping time.
The verse was an ode to flight… and, more specifically, to fliers. Nightrain spent half of his poems rhapsodising about the beauty of his fellow Seekers, and this one was no exception. The section Tarn was reading was a loving catalogue of every detail of the subject’s wings. As he read, Tarn kept lifting his optics and staring brazenly at Pharma’s own wings, which twitched under the attention.
If Tarn’s normal voice sometimes gave Pharma shivers, it was nothing compared to the melodious voice he used in recitation. It was like a physical thing, rolling rich and dark and liquid over Pharma’s plating, insinuating itself into the gaps of his armour and raking over his circuitry. There was no compulsion in it this time. It didn’t touch Pharma’s spark; it just burned through his fuel lines like high grade, leaving him dizzy.
And bold.
Without saying a word, Pharma rose from his chair and circled the table. Tarn broke off in surprise when he drew near. Pharma dropped to the floor with a kind of strutless grace, tucking his legs under himself, and leaned his head against Tarn’s thigh. After a moment of stunned silence from Tarn, Pharma lifted one hand and circled his fingers in an imperious little “keep going” gesture.
There was a muffled sound that could have been a laugh from behind that mask. Tarn dropped one hand to Pharma’s shoulder, then slowly drew it up to stroke the medic’s helm. Broad, clever fingertips rubbed the ends of Pharma’s chevron as Tarn resumed reading.
Pharma had seen the aftermath of the DJD’s work before, the inventively gruesome damage done by the hands that were touching him so gently. The thought was far more exciting than it should have been. Tarn’s powerful engine thrummed through the plating under his cheek, and he nuzzled against it, purring his own engine in a higher counterpoint. Tarn reached another lyrical description of wings, and his hand moved to pet the edge of Pharma’s wing where it lay against his thigh. For a grounder, Tarn had an instinct for exactly where to touch a set of wings, running his fingers teasingly over flight sensors. Pharma arched up into the caress, his vents hitching.
Tarn read the last lines of the poem… no, not read, Pharma realised, glancing up. The datapad lay forgotten in the DJD leader’s lap as he stared into the distance, reciting the ending from memory. In the poem, Nightrain’s lover departed for the horizon on those beautiful wings, leaving him alone.
Tarn’s fingers tightened briefly on Pharma’s wing, almost to the point of pain, and then let go.
Pharma lolled against his leg. “You know…” He reached up without looking, playing skilled fingertips over the inside of Tarn’s thigh. “Good imagery or not, he really was a bit of a pretentious aft, wasn’t he?”
That got a soft chuckle. “You are incorrigible, Doctor.” Tarn cupped Pharma’s cheek, grazing his thumb over the plating.
“Says the mech who faked a medical emergency to trick me into going on a date with him.”
“Now, I never said it was a medical emergency. Only that it required your particular touch.” The last word was emphasised as Tarn’s fingertips slipped under his collar fairing to stroke the cables of his throat. Tarn’s voice took on a faux-innocent tone. “Why Pharma, did I worry you?”
“You disappointed me,” Pharma snapped, folding his arms… but he folded them over the top of Tarn’s knee, so that the motion drew his body flush against the Decepticon’s leg. “I was quite looking forward to the sight of you lying feverish on your berth, helpless and begging me –”
He didn’t quite realise what he was saying until Tarn’s enginegrowled, and he tilted Pharma’s face up towards him, sliding his huge thumb over the doctor’s lower lip. Pharma’s spark was pulsing wildly, heat snaking down his back struts, as he met the red optics that were watching him ravenously.
Smirking internally, Pharma parted his lips, as if he were going to suck on Tarn’s finger; then he pulled back abruptly and, using Tarn’s leg for leverage, vaulted up to perch in his lap. Tarn was clearly taken aback, but not so much so that he didn’t immediately grab the opportunity to wrap his arms around Pharma’s waist, as the jet stretched up and kissed the join between Tarn’s neck and shoulder. The kiss was open-mouthed, Pharma’s tongue sneaking out to lap at a neck cable. Tarn’s engine stuttered, the vibrations of it shaking through Pharma’s frame.
Tarn’s hands deftly turned Pharma and settled him so that Pharma was straddling one massive leg, his wings splayed against Tarn’s chest. They stayed like that, snuggled together in a lazy heap of heated plating, until Pharma lost track of time. Tarn’s fingers were carefully exploring his cockpit and shoulder vents, as Pharma reached up to stroke his treads, and continued to press messy kisses against Tarn’s neck, his chest, the edges of his mask.
Pharma half-expected Tarn to push things further, but it didn’t matter. There was something delicious about the slow, deliberate touches that left him more relaxed than he could remember feeling. It was late when Tarn, with evident reluctance, stood up, catching Pharma around the waist and setting him on his feet.
Pharma made a show of dusting himself off. “Well. I suppose you have an early morning tomorrow. All that torture isn’t going to just commit itself.”
“And you can’t risk your little nest of sweet, innocent Autobots wondering where you’ve gone,” Tarn murmured, leaning close to Pharma’s audial. “But, Doctor? I do hope you don’t have too many evening shifts booked.” His voice dropped to a whisper, and Pharma’s optics dimmed at the warm ventilation brushing his cheek. “I feel a few more medical emergencies coming on.”