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Dead End clambered up the ladders for what must have been the fifth time in the past five mega-cycles. He wasn’t sure why — it just felt like there was something waiting for him up there, or maybe he was waiting for it . Whichever one it was, Dead End didn’t care.
He made his way to the top of the roof and walked to the opposite edge from where the ladder was, staring out into the sea of black and gray laced with tubes of glittering reds. It was almost pretty, if not for the reminder that Cybertron was doomed.
He didn’t realize that he wasn’t alone until a voice spoke up from behind him.
“What does it look like?” asked a voice that was so unmistakably Perceptor.
Dead End blinked, cycling his optics as he swiveled around. “What?”
Perceptor was right behind him, closer than he had expected. He tried to take a step back, nearly missing the edge where the handrail had crumbled. Perceptor reached out to catch him as he stumbled, pulling him in. Dead End felt his fans kick on softly, his spark spinning quickly from the barely-averted fall to what was most likely going to be his death. He huffed and, after a moment of reluctance, pulled away from Perceptor’s firm grip on his right arm.
“Thanks,” he said after a klik of consideration. For not letting me die, he thought to himself, even though I’m a Decepticon and you’re an Autobot, and you could have passed my death off as an accident. Of course, he didn’t say any of it.
Without another word, the two peered out at the scene once more — well, Perceptor faced the dark that he couldn’t see anyway, and Dead End faced him from his left.
“What does it look like?” repeated Perceptor, his scope only dimly lit and the light at its end softly pulsing. He didn’t acknowledge that Dead End had said anything. “The city.”
Dead End turned to the edge, avoiding the handrail that he expected to be frigid and unpleasant. He shifted uncomfortably. “It’s, uh, mostly dark. There are some tubes that look kind of like giant cables wrapped around the buildings. The cables have these glowy red striped things on them.” Dead End winced for the lack of elegance in his speech, but he wasn’t exactly known for his refined speech, or lack thereof, anyway. Anyone could do it better than he could, so he wasn’t even going to try.
“Thank you,” said Perceptor. Dead End couldn’t tell if it was sincere or out of courtesy. Probably just his stupid manners, he told himself.
“Uh. You’re welcome?” Dead End replied hesitantly, dropping his gaze slightly to the dark void that consumed the lower half of the building. He imagined how it would feel to jump down, just to distract himself from the lapse in conversation.
The silence was unbearable, thought Dead End as he felt his internal temperature raise a degree or so. He searched for anything, anything to break the quiet —
“I had imagined an apocalypse before,” Perceptor said, resting his left hand on the handrail. Dead End wanted to place his own on top of Perceptor’s, then wondered why he was thinking that. “I never thought it would be like this. I hoped I could be prepared. As it turns out, I was not. None of us were.”
Dead End laughed just a bit. “If we were prepared for the world to end, I don’t think it would have happened at all. We would have stopped it before it did.”
There was a smirk in Perceptor’s tone, but Dead End didn’t dare look up. “That is a fair point, though I do believe we can fix this. The world isn’t ending just yet, Dead End. There is no need for the pessimism.”
Dead End slowly moved his head to his right, watching Perceptor speak. He leaned on the handrail — the part of it that wasn’t broken off, obviously — and placed his forearm on the top of the cool metal. It wasn’t terribly cold, as he had assumed — just cool enough to be comfortable.
Perceptor stepped as close to the edge as he could and leaned out into the dark, pressing himself tight to the rail. Dead End had to stop himself from lurching forward, expecting him to topple over the side of the building. Instead, he flinched and reached out, not yet touching Perceptor’s shoulder. He told himself he wasn’t afraid to. He might have been lying. “You’re going to fall off the building.”
Perceptor sighed and took a step back. When he was far enough from the edge, Dead End lowered his hand from where it rested above his plating.
“Of course,” said Perceptor, in a way that almost sounded disappointed. He paused, then turned his scope off entirely. Dead End supposed that it was much like turning his optics off. He should ask Perceptor about that sometime. Sometime, but not now. Now was important, though he didn’t know why yet.
“You know, Dead End,” continued Perceptor, “you might not believe it yet, but I am glad that you are here.” Dead End slowly cycled his fans, filling the quiet. “With me,” Perceptor added after that pause. “I’m glad that you are the person who is with me at the end of the world.”
“I thought you said the world isn’t ending yet. Who’s the pessimist now?” Dead End said wryly, a small grin appearing on his face before he knew it.
“That would still be you, Dead End.” Perceptor was obviously smiling now, his mouth pleasantly curved upward. Dead End didn’t care if Perceptor was making fun of him. All he wanted was for that smile to last forever.
He tried for a quip. “Your perceptiveness is unmatched.”
“Was that a joke?” That amused expression was still evident, so he couldn’t have done too bad.
Dead End grimaced anyway. “Primus. Was it that bad?”
“I thought you didn’t believe in Primus.” Oh, right. Dead End had mentioned that before, hadn’t he? Damn Perceptor and his perfectly accurate memory.
Dead End stumbled over his words. “I believe in whichever’s most convenient. If it’s Primus, so be it.”
“I don’t think that’s how it works.”
“I don’t think I care enough for that to matter.”
Perceptor actually, genuinely laughed. Dead End wanted to drink the sound from Perceptor’s mouth and keep its memory on a shelf in his processor. He smiled instead.
His smile froze when Perceptor took his hand.
He didn’t say anything as Perceptor guided him in turning his palm up and pressed a small, cube-shaped object into it. Perceptor closed Dead End’s fingers around it, slowly and tentatively, and covered the fist with his own hand. He left it there, not yet letting go.
“Uh. What is this?” asked Dead End when he finally found his voice. Calm down, he told himself. Perceptor probably gave something to everyone .
“It’s an energon jelly,” explained Perceptor a little too quickly, slightly tripping over his words so uncharacteristically that it surprised Dead End. “It’s based on the Polyhex, but with an additive to make it less acidic. This brings the pH up to that of the Iacon — 7.5, if you wanted to know — but I didn’t use the Iacon as its base because it’s sweeter, and I didn’t know if you would like that, even though there’s a ninety-two-point-seven-three-six percent chance that you would —”
“Wait, hold on. How do you know I don’t like acidic drinks?” Dead End didn’t remember mentioning anything about his pH preferences to Perceptor. He’d only talked about it once, to Clobber after she had asked him a few orns ago.
Perceptor’s mouth set in place nervously. “I overheard you telling Clobber.”
Oh. Well, that made sense. “Why are you giving this to me now?”
Perceptor fidgeted slightly, tapping his free hand on the handrail. “I thought it would encourage you to … take care of yourself. When I began to scan you last time, I found that your spark signature was weaker than normal, likely due to your prolonged stay in the Loop. It was barely reaching forty percent of the bottom limit for a healthy spark.”
Dead End frowned. “I don’t need you to interfere with my health like that,” he said, more defensively than he intended. He felt as if he were melting, his systems destroying him from the inside. “I’m doing just fine on my own.”
“I don’t mean for it to come off like that,” said Perceptor, his feather-light touch on Dead End’s hand tensing slightly. He bowed his head just barely, as if he was looking away, though he was never looking initially. “I was just …”
“What did you mean, then?” challenged Dead End, white optics burning a bright beam through the dark. “You don’t have to meddle in my business —”
Perceptor’s voice was dangerous and sharp, tight with some emotion that Dead End couldn’t read. “Obviously, I can’t let you take care of your own matters because you’ve disliked the Polyhex’s pH but didn’t do anything about it —”
“Oh, so this is about some slagging drink ?”
“It would have been easy to ask for something less acidic. Besides that, you haven’t been drinking enough energon. Maybe if you liked it better, you would drink the proper amount. You can read your own fuel levels, can’t you?”
Dead End didn’t have anything to say to that. He missed the weight of Perceptor’s hand on his as soon as it left, and he tried not to let the empty feeling bother him. All of a sudden, the air around him felt like a deep, cold lake, dragging him down farther and farther from the surface.
He felt stupid as he left, descending down the ladder and leaving Perceptor behind.
Dead End couldn’t ignore it.
As he stepped by Perceptor without speaking and drank his portion of too-little energon, he almost thought the energon sweet in his subspace weighed down on him heavier and heavier until he could barely hold himself up if he tried. He didn’t feel like trying, though, so he just sat at the bar with dimmed optics and hoped he looked alive.
“Dead End!” Clobber called cheerfully from across the room as she walked toward him. He was sitting at his usual spot at the far left of the bar, right below where the scuffed menu hung from the wall.
Dead End straightened up as much as he could bear and forcibly brightened his optics. “Uh. Hello, Clobber.”
“Are you okay?” Wow, people had been asking about him a lot lately.
“I’m fine,” he mumbled, just as usual. He shook his head tiredly when he noticed his posture slumping again.
Clobber took the seat to his right. “You sure? You’ve been acting a bit off today.”
“Uh-huh …,” he murmured sotto voce. Dead End thought the world might have been spinning around him, and he resisted the urge to just collapse off the stool and see what they all thought. When had he turned his optics off? He couldn’t recall. It felt like the world was whiting out, spreading from the edges of his vision. How could that be? His optics weren’t on.
He thought Clobber said something. “What?” he tried to say.
The white took over.
Dead End awoke slowly, nausea creeping up his throat. No, no, no , he thought, terrified. Not this.
He rolled over onto his elbows and purged his tanks twice into the nearest container, which just happened to be a clean bucket at the base of the berth.
“I had a feeling you would need that,” said Perceptor quietly from the opposite corner of the small room they were in, standing from the nondescript chair he must have found within the titan. Dead End jerked his head upward and stared at him listlessly, frame still fatigued from his time spent unconscious. “I was not trained to be a medic, but I know malnourishment when I see it.”
“Just say ‘I told you so’ and get over with it,” said Dead End weakly, leaning heavily on his left elbow.
“I am not here for that, Dead End.”
Primus, how Dead End wanted Perceptor to say his name again.
Perceptor tilted his head imperceptibly, stopping in his stride toward the berth. “What? Do you need something?”
Dead End must have been mumbling. “Never mind.” He couldn’t say in words what he wanted. He wasn’t sure if even he was ready to know exactly what he wanted, maybe needed.
Perceptor loosely gestured to the small table beside the berth, where there were two glasses of plain energon. “Drink that. It will prevent you from passing out again.”
Dead End swallowed dryly and sat up. He reached for the nearest glass and raised it to his mouth, taking a small sip. “Uh. Thanks.” He looked down into his rippling reflection on the surface of the drink. “For the energon, and …” For not leaving me alone. For not saying ‘I told you so.’ For trying to help me. For everything. He couldn’t bring himself to say any of those things. “… yeah. Thanks.”
“I meant it when I said I was glad that you are here with me,” Perceptor told him. “I will not be letting that time go to waste being spent without you.”
Dead End couldn’t tell if he was lying, but he had a strong feeling that he was not. He took another sip of the energon in his hand. “Of course. Can’t let the team morale get down, right? Hot Rod’s still depressed about Cheetor going into the Allspark or whatever it was that happened, Soundwave’s more irritating than he’s ever been, and Clobber and Whirl don’t know what to do. If I died or something, that wouldn’t go over well.” Probably. As far as he knew, no one really liked him all that much, either. He drank some more energon and placed the cup in his lap.
“I mean it,” Perceptor emphasized again, stepping close to the left of the berth. He seemed to be locked in battle with himself as Dead End looked up at him. “I mean it, Dead End.” His voice was almost pleading now as he brushed a hand over Dead End’s forearm. Dead End didn’t dare look away from his face, vents stalling. “This isn’t only about them.”
“Okay,” said Dead End softly. He understood, or he thought he did, without having to ask for clarification. He understood enough, at least. He knew that for sure.
“Perceptor?” added Dead End after a generous pause, hoping not to startle away the ghost of Perceptor’s touch on his arm. Perceptor’s scope swiveled downward just a bit, and Dead End was entranced by the slow pulse of its light. “I mean that, too.” I didn’t say it until now, but I do. I know what you mean. I wish I could say the same, but I’m afraid. Afraid of what? Maybe I’m afraid of having you. Maybe I’m afraid that once I hope to have you, I won’t be able to stop. Maybe I’m afraid you won’t want the same.
Dead End didn’t say any of his thoughts. He just pushed them to the edges of his processor and tried not to acknowledge them directly.
Dead End didn’t say anything, but he straightened, gently pressing into Perceptor’s hand. Perceptor didn’t pull away, but his mouth tightened at an angle. Dead End wasn’t sure if that was bad or not, but he hoped it wasn’t. He drank the rest of the energon in the first glass and started on the second. Perceptor stayed by his side for it all.
That was probably the first time Dead End had ever authentically thanked Primus for … well, everything that had happened today. Whether he believed in Primus or not wasn’t relevant; it was just convenient.
He didn’t care enough about that for it to matter. It almost felt like he didn’t have to care for anything at all.
He just enjoyed himself.
When Perceptor offered him extra energon at the bar, Dead End didn’t refuse. He was more scared of the consequences than he was bitter about the actual argument.
“One Iacon,” said Dead End, rather than the usual Polyhex he ordered. He knew Perceptor must have noticed — oh, how observant he was — but the bartender said nothing about it.
Perceptor had been right. He did like the Iacon, even more than the Polyhex.
The pH was perfectly within his preferred range, right at the middle, and the sweetness appealed to Dead End more than he cared to admit. He smiled into the soft pink of his beverage, so unlike the bloody reminder of the Polyhex, then caught himself when he looked up and saw Perceptor staring at him. His fans kicked on.
Of course, Perceptor noticed. He must have.
“Oh, that’s a new one!” exclaimed Clobber. “I thought you always got the Polyhex.”
The answer was right there: got, past tense. “I’m just trying the Iacon,” Dead End mumbled caustically, fidgeting with the small sweet in his hands. He still hadn’t tried it.
Clobber remained unaffected by his demeanor. “What’s that? A sweet? Where’d you get one?”
Oh. It seemed that Perceptor really hadn’t given something to everyone, as he had thought at first. Dead End was getting proven incorrect a lot lately.
“It’s, um, a gift,” answered Dead End, his fans seemingly louder than ever. Now he was in for it — Clobber would surely ask, and Dead End didn’t know how to lie very well. He would tell the truth, and that felt like it would take him apart. One little misstep …
But why? He wasn’t sure.
Contrary to his expectations, Clobber didn’t push. She just grinned at him and left as he opened the energon jelly’s wrapper.
Dead End said to himself that he didn’t want to try it, not at the bar with everyone there —
— but he really did want to, so he tried it.
It was better than he was willing to admit.
He never admitted much.