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Quickstrike wasn’t a morning person. She never had been and never would be. Her normal shift was starting soon, so she forced her optics online. The flyer stretched and opened up her schedule for the day, freezing in place when she saw it. She reloaded the message, thinking she had to have seen it wrong. But no, it was still there. Her whole schedule was wide open except for a small two hour block at midday labeled: Heir sitting duty .
One more reload just in case, just to make sure it wasn’t some mistake or typo. Soundwave didn’t make those, but you never knew. It was still there. Quickstrike sat up, drawing her legs in and stared at her schedule. It was so rare that anyone outside of Command got to watch Megatron’s twins. If they weren’t with the Warlord or Soundwave, then they were with one of the Command Trine. Breakdown and Knock Out were also allowed to watch them on occasion.
The schedule still didn’t change when she refreshed it for a third time. Okay, so it was definitely happening then. Quickstrike tried to think if she’d done anything of note and her processor brought up nothing. She had gotten to meet them one time while on monitor duty when they were with Soundwave. They’d seemed really interested in what she did; although, she only got to tell them she was a flyer before Soundwave’s cassettes had drawn their attention away from her.
Now she would have a whole two hours with them. Quickstrike froze at the realization. Two hours with two younglings. She had no idea what they liked or how to keep them entertained. It had been so long since she’d done anything with sparklings and she doubted Megatron would be too happy about her leaving his sparklings on the ground while she showed off her flying skills. So, she needed a plan. She needed to figure out what sparklings liked.
With that in mind, she hopped off her berth to get ready. At least she had an hour or so until she needed to pick them up, which left time for planning and brainstorming activities. Maybe something with paint? Or puzzles. Those were solid ideas as far as Quickstrike was concerned. She just needed to find everything and be ready. Then again, they might already have stuff and she would only have to keep an optic on them.
Quickstrike sighed, she wasn’t sure what to do and it wasn’t like she had all the time in the world to prepare for her time with the twins. She really hoped they would have things to do because at the moment, Quickstrike had nothing. She left the habsuite to grab her morning ration, thinking about other activities. There had to be some sparkling games or something, but it was difficult to come up with ideas when she didn’t know anything about them.
Well, that wasn’t entirely true. They loved Megatron and Soundwave, everyone knew that. They pulled pranks with all of Soundwave’s cassettes, and they had a weird relationship with Starscream. He was the only one who never got pranked.
Quickstrike hadn’t come up with any more ideas by the time her shift rolled around. She walked into the command center and tried not to fidget or look anywhere near as nervous as she felt. One twin, Seacrystal, was perched on Megatron’s shoulders, gripping the side of his helmet and a shoulder spine while the other, Snowdrift, was being cradled against the large mech’s chest. Quickstike walked up to the dias they were on and quietly cleared her throat.
“Quickstrike, reporting for duty, Lord Megatron,” She said.
The Warlord shifted so he could give her a once over. The twins however, stared at her with wide optics. “Good, you have them for the next two hours while I hold a command meeting. If it goes long, Soundwave will send you a message.”
“Of course, sir,” she replied.
Megatron nodded and knelt down. He placed the white sparkling on the ground first and waited for the dark blue sparkling to climb off his shoulder. He looked over the two of them and frowned. “Behave yourselves.”
He got matching grins. “Of course!”
“We always behave.”
Megatron made a noncommittal noise at them before standing up. “Off you go then, and don’t cause too much trouble.”
Both cheered before running down the steps and stopping just shy of running into her legs. “Are you a flyer?” “What do you do?” “What’s your name?” “Can we go outside?”
Quickstrike blinked at them, barely able to keep up with all the questions suddenly thrown at her. A loud engine revved and the twins immediately went quiet. They gave her a guilty look before both offered quiet apologies. Quickstrike tried to stifle her laughter at their expressions and smiled down at them.
“Why don’t we go somewhere else for now? I’ll answer your questions while we walk, but only one at a time, alright?”
“Okay,” they both chirped and followed her out.
“What’s your name?” Seacrystal asked, grabbing her servo and looking up at her with big optics.
“And what’s your alt mode?” Snowdrift asked and grabbed her other servo.
“I’m Quickstrike and I’m a stealth bomber.” She grinned at both of them.
“You’re a flyer!” Snow exclaimed and started to run in front of her, tugging her servo and leading her down another hallway, Seacrystal following his lead.
“I am,” Quickstrike said, both proud and utterly confused as she was dragged after them.
“Can you take us flying?” Snow asked, turning big optics on her.
“Pleeeeease,” Sea echoed.
Quickstrike nibbled on her lower lip. There weren’t any rules attached to the assignment aside from a note from Soundwave that said: NO GLITTER. So flying was probably alright. Still, she sent a short message to Commander Starscream asking for a few hours of free flight time with Megatron’s heirs.
“Sure,” she said. “That should be fine. I’d enjoy going for a flight. You know, I used to be a stunt flyer before the war.”
Somehow both pairs of optics got bigger. She grinned at them. An approval message came through with a small note to have fun and a location marker of where she could fly. Excitement shot through her at the realization she’d be able to fly for fun for two whole hours .
They practically raced to the main flight hanger, where Quickstrike transformed and waited for the twins to make themselves comfortable in her cockpit. She took off, quickly gaining altitude and speed. The twins pressed their faces to her glass and looked out at the landscape zooming by below them.
Quickstrike made sure to start off flying steady, wondering how used to being in the air they were, cataloguing what stunts she would be able to do with them. They were quiet and content to gaze out her cockpit glass on the way, occasionally pointing things out to each other.
“Can you go a little faster?” Snowdrift asked, staring at her main console.
“Sure! I’m holding back until we get to the designated area, then we can fly super fast and, if you both want, I can show you some of my old stunts?”
“We’d love that!” Seacrystal said. He sat up a bit, little nubs where his doorwings would eventually develop wiggling. Snowdrift nodded along with his brother, but his attention was suddenly taken by the buttons and switches on Quickstrike’s dash.
“Do all of these work? Or are they for show?” Snow asked, helm cocked to the side.
“Some work, why?” She asked, suddenly feeling a little uneasy. There really wasn’t a reason to ask that. At least she didn’t think there was.
“Oh, Starscream’s are all for show now, but he won’t let us touch them.” Seacrystal explained as his twin reached toward Quickstrike’s dash.
She couldn’t see exactly what was going on, but her internal sensors picked up the movement easily enough. “Really? And what do you want to play when he’s flying you around?”
“The buttons just look fun to press,” Snow explained with a shrug, optics still locked onto the button he was reaching for.
The femme didn’t see any reason to tell them no. There was only one button that they needed to stay away from and it was only there because it had to be added when she’d gotten upgraded to be a stealth bomber. Neither twin were looking at that particular button and she doubted they’d find it before getting bored of playing with the buttons and toggles closest to them. She’d heard somewhere that sparklings had short attention spans, so she wasn’t too worried.
Snow poked the button carefully, aware that it was technically a part of her frame and waited for something to happen. When nothing did, Sea pressed one near him. Quickstrike had to temporarily cut off her vocalizer and internal speakers to keep from giggling. It didn’t tickle, there weren’t really any sensors on her actual dash, but the twins’ actions themselves were funny. They never pressed one at the same time and they managed to keep track of which they’d tried and which they hadn’t.
She’d almost expected them to go at the buttons all at once, not this careful exploration. “Having fun?” She asked.
“Yup!” Sea answered.
Snow looked around, peering out the cockpit glass for a second. “Are we in the designated area yet?”
Quickstrike checked her positioning. “Yup! We got here a minute ago. Why?”
She couldn’t see his face, but the way his field flared with excitement/anticipation/mischief was the only warning she got before Snowdrift lunged forward and pressed the tiny grey button at the top of her dash. Quickstrike jolted a bit, too shocked to initiate her own lockdown codes and barely managed to remember to speed up as her entire cache of bombs were released. Both Sea and Snow twisted around to watch the trail of explosions and rising smoke behind them.
They made tiny noises of awe as Quickstrike attempted to get herself under control again. She looped back around, slowing down and dropping in altitude a bit. The twins’ fields fluttered happily as she flew over the line. Both pressed themselves against her glass again to get a look at the destruction on the empty landscape. Quickstrike released a relieved sigh to herself that nothing had been damaged.
“Now I know why you're not allowed to touch buttons when you’re with Starscream.” She said, letting out a quiet chuckle. She could tell they were both grinning from their EM fields.
“Yup! And it was actually because of a flight we took with Skywarp!” Snow proclaimed, turning back around to sit properly.
“Starscream forbade us after that from touching any buttons in Seekers.” Sea continued.
“But you aren’t a Seeker so it was okay as long as we got permission first!” Snow finished.
“I guess that’s true.” Quickstrike dropped altitude suddenly and then rose quickly, listening to the burst of giggles it got out of the twins. “Well, I guess it’s fine so long as we aren’t around anyone that could get hurt. Don’t press that button again this flight though, you dropped all the bombs I have.” Quickstrike warned, but let her field reach out to the twins so they would know no one was in trouble.
“So,” Sea hedged. Quickstrike’s sensors tracked his helm turning toward his twin.
“You mentioned stunt flying?” Snow asked.
“I did. Want me to show you some of my old moves?”
“Yes please!” They said together.
“Alright, hold on you two.”
~~~
Quickstrike was exhausted. She hadn’t flown like that in a while just for fun. She slowed down when they approached the hanger, embarrassment making her extra cautious now. Especially since Megatron was waiting for them by the doors leading into the base.
Once she landed, she popped her cockpit, waiting until the twins were both on the ground before transforming back to root mode. She watched them take off towards their carrier, shouting out high pitched greetings to him. Quickstrike followed slowly, grinning openly when she watched Sea and Snow collide with Megatron’s shin’s and immediately start climbing up them. Megatron grinned down at his sparklings before looking back at the femme.
“So, how were they for you?” He asked.
“They were good,” Quickstrike replied, wondering how she was supposed to bring up the one incident. Granted, it hadn’t been her full payload, but still, it was a waste of ammunition that shouldn’t have happened.
“We found the bomb button!” Snow chirped as he snagged a hold on Megatron’s knee.
“It was so much fun!” Sea grinned up at Megatron as he hauled himself up Megatron’s hip plating.
“Is that so?” He asked, looking down at them before peering back at Quickstrike.
Energon rushed to her cheeks. “Snowdrift found the manual release button in my cockpit.” She scratched at her collar faring and gave the Warlord a weak grin.
“Well, it could’ve been worse. They stalled Starscream’s engine the first time he took them flying.”
“Did not!” They both yelled. It was obvious they were trying to figure out how to get from Megatron’s hip plating up to his shoulders, but there wasn’t much they could grab onto around his chest.
“You did,” Megatron chuckled at them, carefully peeling them off his plating and settling one on each of his shoulder pauldrons. “Thank you for watching them today. I’m glad I can entrust them to your care.”
And with that, the Warlord turned and walked out of the hangar. Snowdrift and Seacrystal waved at her as they left and she grinned and waved back. Well, it sounded like she’d be on the sparkling sitting rotation now, which wasn’t a bad place to be. Quickstrike left the hangar feeling lighter than she had in a while, and was already making plans on what she could replace her normal payload with. Maybe some kind of glitter or paint bomb would work.