Work Text:
Bluestreak and Hound worked very hard.
Running a guiding business really did feel like a dream job, but it was also a lot of hard work. To begin with, they spent a large amount of time apart: as soon as Hound returned from a sightseeing tour, Bluestreak would take off with a hunting group. Even when they had a larger group that they took out together, they were still “on the clock” and needed to think about their customers before themselves. (They both occasionally marveled that even bots who had survived the war were somehow clueless when it came to camping in the wild outback.)
Fortunately, the guiding season didn’t last an entire vorn. After the calm season, but before the rust storms started, there was a lull in both the weather and their schedules. Most mechs were wary about wandering too far from a city right before the storm season started, and that left Bluestreak and Hound with a fairly empty schedule.
After a few vorn, they’d picked up on the pattern. A few vorn after that, they started to depend on it. They, too, preferred to stay around their property during the storm season, fixing things up and relaxing. But before the storms started, they liked to go camping: just the two of them, with no one to worry about except themselves.
It had become a bit of a tradition. They arranged for a neighbour to look after their zap ponies, and then headed out to an area on the reformatted Cybertron that they hadn’t yet visited. Their excursions usually lasted about a deca-cycle, giving them plenty of time to fully explore an area. The trips were not entirely for leisure: they used them to scout places for possible future tours that they could offer to customers. But the trips were done on their own schedule, and they answered to no one but each other.
Hound loved these trips.
Their latest vacation took them to the Tesk Crater. Hound had been there twice during the war, but now after hundreds of vorn the crater was once again overgrown with crystals. On a clear day you could see all the way across the depression, but when they arrived the winds had whipped the dust up and the edges of the crater faded away on either side.
It was an easy drive to the base of the crater, where they set up their camp. They spent the rest of the day and much of the next exploring, making notes of interesting sights they could show customers. Sheltered from the wind, the crystals at the bottom of the deep basin grew large and thick. Scattered amongst the crystals, strange rock and metal formations jutted from the floor of the crater. They caught sight of the herd of wild zap ponies that lived at the bottom of the crater, and glitch mice and razor snakes crossed their path here and there. Skreehawks circled overhead, and they even saw a wingdrill perched atop a crystal, surveyed the ground beneath it.
They both agreed it was gorgeous, and a place they'd love to return to again. Bluestreak was especially taken with the way that the sunlight lit the edges of the crater at sunrise and sunset, turning them ablaze with reflected light. Hound, in turn, was taken with the way Bluestreak’s optics shone when he smiled up at the glittering cliffs.
After Hound prepared their fuel on the second night, they settled into their familiar routines as they sat by the generator. Bluestreak leaned back against their trailer’s wheel, while Hound sat in one of their portable chairs. They both had their fuel, and datapads with stuff to read, and blankets, and the stars spattered out over the sky above them.
This was one of Hound’s favourite times when they were out camping together. Hound especially liked when he could feel Bluestreak’s contentment in his field. When he had something engrossing to read, Bluestreak’s inner demons quieted and finally allowed him to relax. Hound treasured the relaxed smile on his partner’s lips as the flickering light from the generator played over his beautiful features. It reminded him of how lucky he was to have Bluestreak at his side for so long. He watched Bluestreak read for a moment longer before looking down at his own datapad.
Hound was so engrossed in his own reading (an adventure story set in Cybertron’s outback during the Golden Age) that he missed the change in the sound of Bluestreak’s engine. But when he felt a crawling unease creep over him, Hound looked up.
A frown twisted Bluestreak’s face as he stared at his datapad, and his door wings twitched at irregular intervals. But the agitation in his field was the true giveaway that Bluestreak’s contentment had evaporated. Hound had been with Bluestreak long enough to recognise the signs that Bluestreak was waging a battle inside his processor against the horrific memories that he lived with constantly.
Hound knew through vorn of experience watching Bluestreak work through his memory leaks that the best way to help him was to draw his attention away from whatever was bothering him. “Are you all right, Blue?” he asked quietly, expecting the jolt of surprise in the Praxian’s door wings as he looked up at Hound.
Bluestreak’s expression swiftly changed from unease to surprise to one of chagrin. “Oh... Yeah. I’m all right.” He smiled, but Hound noted that the light from his smile didn’t quite reach his optics. “Sorry. I guess I was doing it again, huh?”
Hound set his data pad down and stood up, crossing to kneel in front of Bluestreak. He rested his hands on Bluestreak’s knees and looked at him evenly, projecting as much calm and acceptance in his field as he could. “Nothing to be sorry about, remember?” he said. When Bluestreak nodded and Hound felt him relax slightly, he added, “I’m just glad to have caught you before it got too bad.” He glanced down at the datapad in Bluestreak’s hand. “What are you reading?”
With a last glance at the datapad, Bluestreak turned it off and shoved it at Hound. “Here. I’m regretting bringing it now.” When Hound took the datapad, Bluestreak said, “It was just a short article about New Praxus. I’m not sure why it bothered me so much... Maybe it was the picture they used.” Bluestreak rubbed his face, suddenly looking very tired. “Can you... Maybe if you just delete the article, I can read the rest of the stuff on there without seeing it.”
Hound flicked on the datapad. The article that Bluestreak had been reading was on the screen, alongside a photo of three smiling mechs standing in front of a sign that read “New Praxus Crystal Gardens.” He quickly skimmed the article: it talked about how the rebuilding of New Praxus was nearly complete, and highlighted some of the attractions that were being recreated. A few taps of his digits later, and the article was deleted.
“There. It’s gone,” Hound said before placing the pad on the ground beside him. “Did you want to talk about it?” he asked gently, brushing his digits against Bluestreak’s.
Bluestreak drew in a stuttering vent before gripping Hound’s hand in his. “I want to go visit Prowl and Jazz,” he said after making a visible effort to steady his vocalizer. Hound felt his own spark twist in sympathy at seeing the evidence of Bluestreak’s mental struggle. “I want to see the new city. I want to... I want to move on, you know?” He closed his optics and leaned his helm back against the trailer. His field shifted from anxiety to frustration. “I thought I was getting better, but knowing that there’s a new version of Praxus out there makes me feel like it... like it just happened. Over three million vorn and I’m still wading through the same slag.”
Hound shifted closer until he straddled one of Bluestreak’s legs. Grabbing his sparkmate’s hands, Hound gave them a squeeze. “There’s no deadline for visiting Prowl and Jazz. There’s no hurry.” Bluestreak’s optics cracked open, and Hound smiled at the cobalt light gleaming through his optical shutters. “We can do it when you feel up to it, and we don’t have to go a moment before then.”
Opening his optics fully, Bluestreak stared at Hound for a moment. His field felt turbulent, but Hound knew that was usual when he was working through the noise in his processor. “We promised them we’d go see them,” Bluesteak said quietly.
“And they said they’d be happy to have us any time,” Hound reminded Bluestreak. “Prowl even said that he’d understand if it took hundreds of vorn before you felt ready.” When Bluestreak gave him a half nod, Hound shook his hands gently. “I know you haven’t been to see Beacon in a while.”
At the mention of his therapist, Bluestreak smiled. “No. I haven’t. I was getting better, remember?” He gave another nod, more sure this time, and glanced down at the datapad. “But going to see him might be smart. I'll make an appointment once we get home again.” Then he lunged forward to plant a quick kiss on Hound’s lips. “You’re always full of good ideas.”
Hound returned the kiss and then sat back a bit. “If you want a different distraction... I brought Primes and Drones.” When Bluestreak’s optics brightened, Hound added, “If you want to go visit Prowl and Jazz, it couldn’t hurt to brush up on Prowl’s favourite game.”
Bluestreak laughed. “That sounds like another good idea,” he said. As Hound rose to get the game board, Bluestreak shifted so he was sitting closer to the glowing generator. Bluestreak grinned up at Hound. “Maybe you’ll even beat me this time.”