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The passage of day and night had ceased to mean anything on Cybertron centuries ago. Shockwave kept track of it regardless, as he kept track of everything.
It was well into the evening now, late enough to be considered early, early morning. Certainly no time to be receiving a ping over his personal frequency. But the sender had proven time and time again to be unpredictable, and a few moments after he sent a return ping a brief message followed.
[ Meet me on the roof? ]
The domed section of Decepticon HQ was not perfectly so all around; a flat area cut into sections of the reinforced glass, used primarily as a takeoff and landing point for Seekers but wide and durable enough to support the likes of Astrotrain. If Shockwave ever saw fit to tear his focus away from the monitors, he’d need only look up and see the platform himself from the command center. He did so now, optic scanning the upper deck for the femme he felt certain was already there.
Sure enough, a figure of light green stood at the side pane of the roof’s indent, already looking down as if she’d been waiting to see how long it took him to notice. Once she caught his optic, she grinned and waved as if being spotted in enemy territory were the most casual thing in the world.
So much for keeping track of everything.
The only way a grounder could have reached that point from the outside would have been to scale the entire length of the building- and since she didn’t appear ready to collapse from exhaustion, he ruled that out. No, she had somehow snuck through the upper levels of the tower- including the command center, though exactly how she’d done so eluded him- undetected, unscathed, and completely untroubled.
Moonracer pointed over her shoulder with her thumb and began to speak. The distance would have made it difficult for him to understand what she was saying even without the roof serving as a barrier; with it, hearing her at all was impossible. But from the way her lips moved, he guessed she was saying something along the lines of, Are you coming up here or what?
By the time he joined her on the platform, she had moved to sit nearer to the edge.
“Every time you make your way around without trouble,” he started as he walked over, “I am required to reassess security measures.”
She raised an optic ridge at the statement- she was aware that, as the sole high-ranking Decepticon left to manage Cybertron, he wasn’t required to do anything- but her smile never faltered.
“Sorry,” she told him, and despite all the mischief in her expression it sounded like she meant it. “Couldn’t sleep.”
She patted the space at her side, inviting him to sit next to her.
He remained motionless, hesitating. Not for the first time since these interactions began, he wondered why he allowed them to continue. At best these meetings were a distraction from his duties, at worst they were outright treason. Not to mention her sheer persistence in the matter was cause to be suspicious. Even a sharpshooter like her would be hard-pressed to kill him alone- but gaining his trust, luring him out to places like this so her teammates could bleed the energon stores dry or wreak any form of havoc on his base… that was more plausible.
And yet…
Megatron had left Shockwave alone in charge of monitoring the entire planet, with a handful of Seekers and a sizeable amount of drones at his command. Although they performed their jobs as expected, the former group was hardly inclined to converse with him off-duty and the latter was barely capable of it at all. The isolation had grown disconcerting, even for him.
Not to mention if this was truly an act on Moonracer’s part, she could give Starscream a run for his shanix when it came to bold-faced lies. Despite all the reasons she had to be otherwise, she seemed to genuinely enjoy his company. Even before the war started, he couldn’t recall a time when he’d felt wanted merely for his own sake. Not for his purpose, or his usefulness. Just for himself.
Shockwave stepped forward and took a seat.
Moonracer leaned against him, as she had taken to doing lately, but said nothing more. During their first few meetings she tended to fill silences with questions or other awkward attempts at conversation, and whatever he didn’t outright ignore he answered with guarded words. As they went on, however, they had adapted to each other’s cues and boundaries; Moonracer grew to appreciate the lapses in speaking, and Shockwave learned to offer up his own thoughts once he was no longer pushed to. Now, they could read each other’s moods and act accordingly, as easily as reading figures off a monitor.
A part of him wondered if she synched up this effortlessly with any members of her team. He would have to ask.
Perhaps not yet, though. For now, it was enough to sit out in the quiet, the two of them nestled between the stars above and the wreckage below. He felt… not happy, exactly, but content. Comfortable.
They stayed like that for some time, before Moonracer broke the silence.
“I’ve been kinda curious about something.”
She tapped at the side of his chassis.
“Usually,” she began, her words slow as she considered them carefully, “you’re still able to hear a bot’s sparkpulse through their armor, if you’re up close enough. I’ve had to split medic duty with Greenlight, so I know that’s the case for everyone on my team. Even Chromia, and her armor’s as tough as Ironhide’s. But your frame’s way more reinforced on the top half. Would someone be able to hear your spark under all that?”
Shockwave stared at her, flickering his optic once at the strangeness of her question. It was either a poorly-concealed attempt to gauge his armor integrity, or an even worse-concealed attempt at flirting. And while he could have outright avoided engaging the former, the mere possibility of the latter was… perplexing.
He didn’t know how to answer, so he settled on the truth.
“I wouldn’t know. It was never something I cared to learn.”
Moonracer hummed and nodded, like she’d expected as much, but her grin wavered as if she were disappointed regardless. He studied her face for a moment, and to the surprise of both of them he spoke again.
“You can… listen for yourself, I suppose.”
She brightened back up at his offer. He turned so that she could better reach the front of his chest, and she laid her helm to it, focused on catching the pulse that lay underneath. Shockwave’s audial fins pricked at the contact.
“I can kinda hear it!” She pressed the side of her face more firmly against his chassis, her expression turning wistful. “It’s nice, actually. Reminds me of part of a song I listened to all the time before.”
“Does it now?”
“Yeah,” she said, pulling back from his chestplate to sit up again. “I don’t remember the title, but it went something like...”
Moonracer vocalized a melody, singing without words as one did when they recalled the tune moreso than the lyrics. Hers was a voice that was clearly untrained, but pleasant to hear nonetheless. It had a soothing effect on him, and when she stopped to speak again he almost wished she had continued.
“Something like that, at least,” she shrugged. “It’s been a while since I’ve heard it. Or… heard any music, really.”
A thought occurred to him at that, of the computers down in the command center. Files stored away from a bygone era, dormant and undisturbed. Data he had ultimately deemed trivial, but was unintrusive enough to avoid being purged from the system.
“We could browse the media archives, if you’d like. There’s a good chance the song you’re speaking of will be preserved there.”
“Could we? I’d love to!” She leaned forward as she spoke, optics gleaming at the idea. “If we find it, it’s gonna make a lot more sense when you hear it. It’s one of those songs that makes you wanna grab a partner and dance. Ah- I’m guessing you’re not much of a dancer, though?”
He tilted his head at her. “How astute of you to realize.”
Moonracer nodded back as if to say, fair enough. “I’d offer to teach you a little, but…” she trailed off before chuckling and resting a servo on the back of her helm. “Well, I’m not very good at it either. We could still try though! I won’t laugh if you won’t.”
She stood, extending her other hand to him before adding, “Our secret.”
Shockwave took her servo in his and allowed her to help him to his pedes, eyeing her with intense curiosity. This was starting to sound more and more like a date.
“We can search the archives,” he told her, “but I won’t promise any dancing.”
He could tell by her grin and the glint in her optics that she took that as a challenge.
As he followed her back into the dome, he pondered how far she would go to persuade him- and, briefly, how far she’d even need to before he’d agree. Were it anyone else, it would be out of the question entirely. He was not one to falter in the face of peer pressure.
But he’d give in for her. Just her.