Chapter Text
D-16 sat perched up on a bar stool.
An amplifier beeped green on his left, reflecting on the bass guitar in his lap and scattering weakly into the dimly lit room.
The only source of light came from behind Shockwave, through an open window. It fell on the drummer’s pauldrons and illuminated the purple paint in a mix of bluish yellows. They danced and distorted when he raised his arms.
D-16 rested his thumb on a pick-up and readied his left servo on the fretboard.
Drumsticks met each other with three tiny clicks.
The amplifier revved, hard, but the harsh, grating riff coming from the electric guitar was anything but in tune with the count. It stopped as abruptly as it had started.
D-16 glanced up at the mech in front of him with concern.
“I’m- uhh, sorry, guys, I’m not sure what just happened.”
“Again?” Blitzwing bemoaned.
“Really sorry.” Breakdown nervously chuckled and held up his servo. He thinned his mouth. “Sorry.”
Shockwave’s pauldrons sagged. He narrowed his single optic. “This is the fifth time we’re starting over.”
Breakdown looked down, carefully stepping over the cords to reach the amplifier. The pick between his lips muffled the words. “I said I’m sorry. I’m just- a bit distracted. It’s nothin’.”
“Then why don’t you get your helm out of your tailpipe and play?” Shockwave chastised and rapidly whacked the snares, then sounded the kick-drum.
Breakdown took the pick out of his mouth and glared, still trying to regulate the tuner. “Shut up, show-off. I’m struggling.”
Shockwave narrowed his optic even more. He extended his arm and crashed the cymbals until they almost deafened the entire room. The golden plate shook and swayed around its pole.
“Okay, okay, hold on.” D-16 sighed and caught the cymbal with his free servo. He held onto it tightly and squinted at him over the plate. “Shockwave, calm down. Breakdown, It’s alright. Let’s just take a minute.”
Blitzwing brought the black strap of his warlock over his helm and stabilized the instrument on the floor. “Smoke break!” he announced, digging out a half-empty cy-gar from his subspace.
Shockwave flicked his finials in exasperation. He brought down his drumsticks on the snare with a loud thud. “You people don’t even want to practice.”
“I want nothing more-“ Blitzwing said as he took a long drag and blew it back out as an uneven ring, “than to practice.”
“Yeah, sure, we can totally see that,” Shockwave deadpanned. “This is why we get no gigs. You, all of you-“ He circled the rest of the room with his digit. “Procrastinate all through the session.”
Blitzwing tapped his heel against the rod under his chair. “We don’t get gigs because no one wants to hear hardcore in this posh little city,” he mumbled, “Gods, I miss Kaon. You’d crank the whammy and the crowd went wild. These people just want to hear watered-down strumming.”
He kicked up his peds on the amp labeled bass in unintelligible Neocybex and leaned back, still rolling smoke rings out of his mouth. D-16 managed to unplug his guitar after the third tug. He shooed Blitzwing’s peds away.
A ticking noise cut through the silent room.
Someone finally remembered to turn off the metronome.
“I don’t think this gig deficit’s our fault, but why are we not discussing that competition Soundwave mentioned?” Breakdown asked. “It could be a good chance for us. Media coverage and slag, y’know.”
Shockwave scrambled off his chair. “Unfortunately, there are sparklings in this band who don’t have the time,” he said, walking up to the only window in the studio.
Shockwave hated the smell of cigarettes more than anything, even if he barely possessed olfactory sensors.
D-16 groaned. “First of all, I am not a sparkling, Shockwave, and I’m sitting right here.” He hugged his guitar, cheekplate resting on the headstock. “How many times do I have to say this? I’ve got exams coming up.”
Breakdown grabbed the cy-gar from Blitzwing’s servos. The latter shrieked louder than a turbo-hyena. Breakdown held it where he couldn’t reach and inhaled greedily. “Those exams are like, five stellar-cycles away, Dee. You have a whole semester to study.”
“I know, but it’s not that easy to miss classes for no reason.” D-16 gripped the neck and let his thumb hover over the fretboard lazily. “I don’t want them slapping those stupid externals on me.”
Breakdown opened his mouth to reply, but Blitzwing dug in his armor seams and almost made him choke on the smoke. A quiet voice silenced them both.
“Get an official leave,” Soundwave spoke softly.
Every helm turned towards him. He was still pressing random keys on his muted piano.
Ravage peacefully sprawled over the control panel. Their chaotic rehearsals never really bothered him, unlike Laserbeak, who liked to retreat into Soundwave’s chestplates as soon as he heard the high-pitched noises coming from Blitzwing’s unhinged persona.
“Submit a notice,” he said.
Blitzwing was practically draped over Breakdown by now. Breakdown kept talking, paying no attention to his suffering. “Yeah, dude, if you just get permission you won’t have to worry about externals.” He slapped an intruding servo away. “Blitzwing, you’re not even smoking you’re just playing with it. Back off.”
“But it’s mine.”
“Not anymore, it’s not.”
D-16 turned to Soundwave with a sigh, trying and failing to tune the bickering idiots out. “Ratchet hates when students miss the practicals because they’re important.”
“Have you ever missed one?” Shockwave asked. He was still staring at the colorful city outside. Muffled sirens and unintelligible voices rushed in through the open window.
“No, not really.” He shook his helm. “But the semester just started. It’s been half a month.”
“I don’t get what the problem is. Your professor can survive not seeing you in class at least once in his life.”
Blitzwing perked back up, suddenly interested. “It’s going to be pretty long though, won’t it? The competition thing.” He swayed his long peds back and forth. “Right, Soundwave?”
“The contest is part of a week-long festival,” Soundwave supplied.
Blitzwing jumped up from Breakdown’s lap to slap Dee’s shoulder.
D-16 hissed with pain and flinched away. He clutched onto his armor. It burned. “Glitch, that engraving’s new! Stop punching it.”
Blitzwing grimaced and quickly pulled his servo away. “Whatever. Dude,” he went on, “you’re trading a week of high-grade and music for what? Another practice won’t have you welding anyone back together in a minute. You and that Ratchet have got to chill.”
Breakdown chuckled. Blitzwing brought his servo down to high-five him.
Soundwave kept tapping his digits across the keyboard, dutifully rehearsing his sets. “I do not recommend drinking as much high-grade as you did last stellar-cycle in Petrex, Blitzwing.”
Blitzwing put on his best offended look at Soundwave’s words. The expression quickly dissolved into pure acidic glee. “You’re so right, I should be working on breaking that record.”
Breakdown barked a laugh. “You keep that up your fuel-pump’s going to fail, miserably.”
“If I’m honest, I don’t understand how it’s still pumping,” D-16 began. He leaned his guitar against a wall. “His thirst for engex transcends medical science-“
“Hold that thought, Dee, what’s the vorn?”
“It’s-“ D-16 glanced at the upper right part of his HUD, “a vorn to 24.”
Breakdown scrunched his nasal ridge at the answer. He began to stretch his peds. “I don’t know about y’all but I’ve got an insanely early shift tomorrow.”
Shockwave turned his helm. His feed lashed out in annoyance. “Oh, he comes here, manages to mess up every single note and now he wants to dip. Wonderful.”
“Hey, what’s your problem, Shock?”
Shockwave placed his elbow-joints on the windowsill. He clasped his servos and leaned. “My problem is that you don’t practice the tabs we give you. Then you manage to torture all of us.”
Soundwave took his digits off the keys. That was cue enough for Ravage to jump off the warm control panel and land on his lap.
“Arguing over this is futile. We haven’t been practicing often enough for the past few stellar-cycles. It’s only natural to make mistakes,” he said, picking up a datapad from a tabletop and gently tapping Shockwave’s snare. “Better if we pack up for today.”
Shockwave took it with a nod.
“See, thank you. That was Soundwave-speak for get out of my fragging studio and go home.” Breakdown nudged Blitzwing’s stabilizer. “Look alive, glitch.”
Blitzwing glanced up to find D-16 sorting through the jacks with much fervor. He smirked. “Someone’s excited to go home.”
D-16 swiftly rolled the handful of jacks up and crammed them back into the bag. “I’ve got classes tomorrow.”
Blitzwing flicked his wings once. “So glad I dropped out.”
“Dropping out and being thrown out isn’t the same thing, Blitzwing,” Breakdown muttered, focused on scratching off weird spots on his strat’s pickguard.
“I wasn’t thrown out, I escaped military academy.” He waved a digit around to emphasize it. “And I’m proud of it.”
D-16 groaned. He gave the room one last look-over for his things. “Shockwave’s notes are the only thing keeping me alive,” he said. “You’re a life-saver, you know, I could kiss your optic.”
“Don’t mention it,” Shockwave muttered, scrolling through the file of notes Soundwave had given him.
D-16 threw the bag over his pauldron and inched towards the door. “Ready to bounce?”
“Yeah, just a klik.” Blitzwing dropped the cy-gar into his subspace and picked his bag up from the floor.
Breakdown moved past D-16 and grabbed the door handle, muttering something to himself with two digits at his audial. The door creaked open.
Dee turned to wave them goodbye, but Shockwave was so engulfed by the datapad he didn’t look up. Soundwave held up his servo and flashed his visor. D-16 smiled back.
The expression left his faceplates once they were out, taking the stairs to the main platform.
Already colorful golden walls were covered in tags and other graffiti. D-16 reached for the railing and quickly retreated his servo, feeling the four layers of dust on it.
“No, that’s what I told him,” Breakdown said, still talking on the comms, now louder. “No? I haven’t asked Swindle. I’m not gonna ask him for anything.”
D-16 walked behind him. He stared down at the silver polished steps. Then he took a cy-garette from his subspace and pulled. The air inside the stairwell was still. The smoke didn’t disperse. He tried to wave it away.
Breakdown kept talking.
“Yeah? Well, I told you he’d pimp you out and you didn’t listen. That’s on you.”
D-16 saw Blitzwing crane his neck to look at Breakdown. “Is that Motormaster?” He half-whispered.
Breakdown shook his helm. “Dude, tell him to frag off, I don’t care. I don’t work for dealers.”
He took his digits off his audial and turned back to Blitzwing. “It’s Dead End,” he mouthed. “I get what you’re saying, just don’t involve me. Blitzwing says hi by the way.”
A digit tapped his shoulderpad. Breakdown glanced up at D-16. “Yeah, and Dee does, too,” he said.
D-16 tuned him out after that, turning the volume of his audial jacks up to maximum capacity. He refocused solely on the riffs and the drums and the current of smoke methodically entering his throat.
He didn’t pick his helm up until Blitzwing stepped out of the apartment complex.
“Okay, frag off now, go recharge. For real this time,” Breakdown finally chided and hung up. He had been trying to wrap up the conversation for the last two floors.
The high-rise outside hung from the sky like stalactites. The rest of the sleeper giants sloped upward from the core.
Fliers had completely taken over the upper half of Iacon. They flew through buildings and roads, barely missing them.
From where D-16 was standing, the rest of the population, chained to the surface, looked like rats navigating a massive, city-wide experiment.
“I think I’m gonna depart from right here,” Blitzwing informed. His wings twitched and his engines crackled, puffing out steam.
He adjusted his bag and transformed. They watched him dive into interchanging structures with a barrel roll, then they moved.
Breakdown cracked his digits almost instinctually. He took a vent.
“So… train?”
D-16 looked around for a klik. “I think I’d like to walk,” he said.
Breakdown raised his eyebrows-digits.
“Yeah, the- uh, the academy dorms are closer to the studio than my old place was. It’s actually on the way to your crossing. So… it’s not far.”
“Oh, I see. Same road then. Mind if I tag along?”
“I don’t mind,” D-16 replied, shutting off the music in his audials. “I’ll show you the academy too.” He smiled.
Breakdown smiled back.
A downward slope connected the platform with the main road. Breakdown reset his vocalizer and spoke as they walked beneath an overpass.
“What else? How have you been holding up?”
D-16 vented. “I’m doing fine. The studies are going well and, well, I am fine.”
Breakdown hummed. “And how’s campus?”
“Kind of intense, actually.” He fumbled with the seam of his bag. “It’s hard to adjust. It’s like you showed up to a party where everybody already knows each other and you’re the complete stranger.” He chuckled and whispered. “With social anxiety.”
“Yeah, that sounds awful.” Breakdown said, puffing air out of his nose. “And your classmates? You knew some of them before, didn’t you?”
“Yes, but it’s not only the med students in the dorms, it’s practically everyone. I mean, I’m paired with a bot from social studies.” He snorted and readjusted his bag. “Just dropping by for classes is one thing, but actually living there is- it’s just, hard. At least for me.”
“It’s the beginning of the semester, mech, chill out. Everything’s gonna turn out just fine.” He threw his arm over Dee’s pauldron. “Trust old Breakdown.”
D-16 grinned. “You’re not that much older than me.”
“I’ve graduated. If that counts,” Breakdown said, his fanged dentae peeking through.
“Fine,” he said, “I guess it does.”
Breakdown made way for some heavy loader. Harsh signals and the revving of engines came from the road on their left.
D-16 glanced at neon signs up front. He peered into a shop window. It was a frame modification facility. The next one was a high-grade store. His optics landed on his faceplates in the glass. Peaceful, glossy yellow gazed back at him.
“How are you, though? You seemed distant today,” he murmured.
Breakdown sighed. “Don’t worry about me, Dee. My life always sorts itself out.”
“You sure?”
Breakdown looked down. He shrugged and wiped at his faceplates with a palm. “Of course.”
“By the way, you have to think about that festival thing. Seriously,” he suddenly said.
D-16 vented. His derma grazed his lips, then he swallowed. His mouthplates quirked up in a small smile.
“I’ll try my best,” he replied.
It still took Blitzwing an entire chord of arguing and convincing to make D-16 agree.
He hated having to contact anyone he didn't know, especially the office, but even Soundwave asked. He could have ignored Blitzwing forever but he couldn't have turned down his best friend and the rest of the band. It was clear that Breakdown wanted to go too, at least to get away from lower Iacon for a while.
Soundwave had made all the necessary adjustments and registrations, the only thing left was D-16's end of the bargain. It had to be completed.
So he stood outside the headmaster’s office with his back to the wall, arms crossed, optics focused on the little doodles and etchings on the opposite side of the corridor. The wall was a grayish-silver, somewhat semi-reflective, doomed victim of permanent markers since the beginning of the universe.
Thrust was here, D-16 read as he shuffled from one ped to the other again. Almost half a vorn had passed.
He had tried pacing, but something about the way the corridor camera stared at him, judging, made him freeze up against the wall. At least it caught no noise. D-16 switched through the music on his audial jacks. He vented. Nothing sounded appealing when he was overwhelmed.
Some bot approached and stopped two steps away from him.
D-16 clanked his helm against the wall once and refocused his gaze on the writings. Some of them read designations of bots he didn’t know. Some he did know or had heard of.
The rest were either obscenities or straight-up gibberish.
He turned and tapped his knuckle and thumb against his thigh in a rhythm. Then he glanced at the newcomer. He didn't recognize him.
The mech in question looked up from a datapad, probably sensing the stare. He eyed D-16, then he motioned his helm towards his shoulder pad.
“I like your tat,” he said.
D-16 clamped his mouth shut. Then he smiled, awkwardly. It was the idiotic kind of smile, he realized.
“Uh, heh, thank you.”
The mech smiled too. “Fan of Megatronus?”
His voice was low and calm. Possibly way more than Dee's was in the moment.
“Yeah.” D-16 chuckled. “A big one.”
“He was pretty amazing,” the mech replied, “greatest bassist Iacon knew for sure.”
D-16 stared at him like he had met Megatronus himself. “You’re into metal?” he asked, with barely concealed enthusiasm.
The mech shrugged and nodded. His helm was blue just like his optics. There were spiked rings tightly worn around his horn-like finials. He held out his servo. Both of his arm-plates were covered in symmetric tribal engravings.
“Orion Pax, by the way,” he said.
D-16 took the offered servo in his own. “D-16, it’s a pleasure.”
Orion's arm came down to his side. He put one of his peds up against the wall and crossed his arms. “So you like the classics," he observed.
“Yeah, I was just listening to the Thirteen, actually.” D-16 motioned to the control panel on his wrist.
There was a slight hint of mischief in Orion’s optics as he smiled and squinted. “Favorite album?”
D-16’s brain module short-circuited for an astro-second. “It has to be the self-titled one," he said once he managed to recover. "The riffs are just banger upon banger, the lyrics are insanely catchy and the solos are- art. It’s art.”
Orion Pax pointed his digit. “I like that. Good choice. I’m into the last one myself, y’know. They broke up, but at least they went out with a bang.”
“Solid. That album has some phenomenal drum-work. I love it.” D-16 nodded along. “Have you heard of Megatronus’ side-project with Maximo? It’s great.”
Orion Pax considered it and shook his helm. “I don’t think so. I’ll give it a listen.” He smiled. “You really are a big fan.”
D-16 looked down to his peds and beamed. “Yeah, he’s kind of an inspiration.”
“I get it. That’s how I feel about Solus. She was one of the best thrashers, ever.” Orion chuckled, then he turned his helm towards D-16. "You play bass, right?"
D-16 opened his mouth and shut it again. He stared at Orion, stunned. "How'd you know?"
Orion Pax laughed. It was hearty and rich, and, in D-16's honest opinion, dangerously low.
"Seriously, dude, how did you know?"
"You were, uhm-" He pointed at his servo and shook his wrist, thumb sticking out. "My mate constantly does the slap-bass when he's bored. I'd recognize it anywhere."
D-16 looked down at his servo and chuckled. "Sometimes I don't even realize I'm doing it. Good catch." He glanced at Orion again. "Do you play?"
Orion hummed. "I'm on electric."
D-16 tried to keep his magnetic field controlled and his expression somewhat serious. "Cool, cool." He covered his mouth with a fist and reset his vocalizer.
A pair of four-wheelers walked through the hallway. One of them raised his servo at Orion. He acknowledged the mech with a tilt of his helm, then he turned back to D-16 again.
“So what’d you do?” he asked.
“Sorry?”
“Why are you seeing the headmaster?”
D-16 snorted and waved him off with a servo. “Oh, no, it’s nothing like that. I’m here for some permit.”
He heard light shuffling coming from behind the door. There was some talking, then it died down again.
Orion puffed air out of his nose. “I see.”
“Did you-?”
“Nah, not this time." He shook his helm. "I’m here to pick up a form.”
D-16 drew his optic ridges together and chuckled. “Not this time?”
Orion didn’t elaborate. He just smiled. “Are you new? I don’t think I’ve seen you around campus before,” he said.
The door latched open. A femme left the office with some datapads in her servos. She extended one to Orion with a kindhearted smile.
Orion greeted her. He took the datapad with a tiny thank you. The femme went down the corridor in a hurry. D-16 didn’t catch her name.
“I’m not, I’ve been studying here for a few years now. I just recently moved in though,” he replied.
“Which school are you in?” Orion asked as he opened one side of his chest compartment. He put the datapad inside.
“Medical.”
“That’s nice." He glanced between him and the door. "Going in?"
D-16 nodded, finally remembering where he was. He bit at his inner cheek-plates.
Orion tilted his helm. He took a slow step back and smiled. “Then... I guess I’ll see you around."
“Yeah, I hope so. It was nice meeting you," D-16 replied.
Orion Pax took another step and turned. D-16 inched towards the door. He knocked right under the golden sign.
A voice called out for D-16. He opened the door and went in.
By the time he reached the front gate of his building, almost half of the rooms were darkened or covered up with shutters. The practice had been longer than the last one, but at least it had been more productive. They had even managed to sync a new song.
A single guard stood by the entrance. D-16 subspaced his cy-gar once he got close. He nodded to the mech in acknowledgment. The guard just stared.
D-16 fished out his keycode. The door latch came apart and he walked in.
Loud, but muffled, unintelligible sounds came from the room next to his. That dorm liked to play trip hop in ungodly hours. Primus knew what that had meant.
D-16 knocked before entering. A voice from the inside excitedly granted him entry.
Five kliks into sitting down and leaning the bass against a wall, D-16 wanted to have another smoke.
Thirty kliks in, he wanted someone to comm him for a valid reason to go back outside.
A full vorn in, he wanted to tear off his own audials.
He put his faceplate in his servos.
“So, this guy, and this one other mech, who’s like his super-loyal partner in crime- get it? Because they do evil stuff together. So, they are talking scrap about this one guy for some drama that happened before you came to campus. I mean, I’ll definitely tell you about it later, but it’s not really important right now-“
D-16 ran his servo over his helm and squeezed his optics shut. He readjusted in his seat for the fourth time.
B-127 went on to describe exactly the drama he had said wasn’t important for another fifteen kliks. How was he supposed to tell this mech he had CNA basics II to rehearse?
“-and now that you’ve got some much- needed context, I’ll continue. This guy I mentioned, Darkwing, he had a problem with the other guy and since he couldn’t manage it in his own way, because the other guy refused to be provoked, he started harassing him and the academy president. You know her? Yeah, her name’s Elita One. She’s so cool, actually. I was paired with her on a project once. Best day of my life. Anyways-“
D-16 took his peds down from the table and cracked his spinal cord. He thinned his mouth and kept paying the minuscule of attention he had left to spare.
B-127 sat on the edge of his recharge slab and frantically motioned with his servos.
“And, listen, listen, are you listening? Yeah, so this guy just walks right up to Darkwing and he’s like-“ B-127 begun to imitate a lower voice, “I thought your business was with me. And everyone just thinks, oh, they’re gonna have a showdown now, but the other guy just stares and then he leaves. He leaves and Darkwing is glaring, because he failed to provoke him again. Sure, I mean, I’d love to see someone treat him the way he deserves to be treated, but I also think it’s mad respectable that the other guy refused to engage in violence. And the one thing Darkwing loathes is being ignored so it’s the perfect revenge-“
D-16 stared up at the posters on his side of the wall for a while. He looked back down on his abandoned datapad. “Were you there?”
B-127 chuckled, embarrassed. “No, I wasn’t actually. There’s this guy in languages, who’s a friend of a femme who was there in the moment- he told me. Well, the femme told him and then he told me. But really the femme is super reliable, at least, I think she is-“
“Do you know her?”
B-127 paused. He looked to the side. “No,” he said. “I don’t. I’ve never met her.”
D-16 grabbed an energon cube from his desk and popped it in his mouth. “You sound like you know Darkwing well.”
B-127 grimaced. He visibly deflated and D-16 couldn’t help but feel a little bit awful.
“I mean, uh, I do know him. He’s just- he’s not a good person. So, I try to avoid.” He looked down at his digits, fumbling with them nervously. “Unless I can’t.”
D-16 narrowed his eyebrow-digits. He glanced at B-127. “Does he give you trouble?”
“No, not anymore, I guess. He used to, but he probably doesn’t even remember I exist unless I get in front of his faceplates.” B-127 looked back up and finally noticed the datapad on D-16’s desk. Guilt seeped into his field. “Oh, dude, you probably have to study and I’ve been rambling on. I’m so sorry. I just get so excited sometimes-“
“No, it’s fine,” D-16 said. He definitely felt bad now. “It’s fine, I promise.”
“It’s, uhm, it’s so nice to actually have a new dorm-mate and one as cool as you, Dee.” B-127 extended his servos towards him. “I feel like I can talk about anything. Is it- is it okay if I call you Dee?”
“Yeah, no problem.” D-16 chuckled. “You think I’m cool?”
“Dude, everything about you is so cool. Your engravings? Majorly cool. Like I’m deathly afraid of lasers. And you play guitar! Primus. And you’re so smart and, I mean, you’re a medical student, which is also super freaking cool. When you popped in a chord ago I couldn’t believe you were gonna be my dorm-mate, like, if I saw you on campus you’d probably be my hallway friend-crush forever and I’d never have the guts to approach you.”
D-16’s faceplates almost went blue with all the praise. He raised his eyebrow-digits and opened his mouth.
In the short time D-16 had moved to live here, B-127 had gone out of his way to make sure he knew everything there was to know about their campus. He was playing guide, storyteller and advisor at the same time. Even then, he rarely badmouthed anyone who didn’t deserve it.
Bee practically didn’t possess a single bad cell in his entire frame. There was no reason for D-16 to dismiss him for his love of communication alone.
Maybe living with him wouldn’t be so bad.
“Well, uh, you’re a pretty cool guy yourself, if you ask me.”
B-127 leaned forward and beamed. “You think I’m cool?!”
D-16 hummed. “Totally.”
B-127 squeaked. “Dude, this just might be the best semester ever. I think my last dorm-mate hated me. But I only wanted to be his friend, because, like, I don’t have too many friends.” He threw up his servos and sighed, then he smiled again. “Okay, I will, uh, I will let you study now, sorry.“
“Don’t apologize.” D-16 picked up his notes and began to read.
A notification came in from Soundwave. He read it. They were plans concerning the trip they’d take to the competition.
D-16 checked the main group. Blitzwing seemed energized. Breakdown and Shockwave were bickering, again.
He exited the screen and pulled out a stylus from a drawer. D-16 scribbled down some more notes. He paused for a klik and glanced towards the other side of their habsuite, where B-127 sat on his slab and tapped away on his datapad, playing a video game. He had even muted it in respect for D-16.
Sweet, acoustic strumming and distorted notes filled his audials. The vocalist sounded beautiful even when he screamed and growled and cried.
He glanced at the top corner of his HUD after a while. An entire vorn had gone by like it meant nothing. He shut off the datapad and neatly put away in a corner of his desk.
D-16 held up his servo and looked down at his digits. They were scratched in places. The paint had begun to flake off again. They had gone soft from the long break he had taken from practicing.
He glanced at B-127. He had changed positions, now leaning against the wall his berth stood next to. He was watching some holo-movie. Suddenly, D-16 remembered the looks Bee would give the guitar and the posters on his side of the dorm. It spelled out interest, awe. Curiosity.
“Bee?”
B-127 looked up from his screen. He made a noise like a hum.
“Have you ever played an instrument?”
He shook his helm and thinned his mouth. “No, I’ve never even held one,” he said, smiling awkwardly.
D-16 rolled his chair to the wall and grabbed the bag with a smirk. “Then, first time for everything, right?”
B-127 gaped and flared out his feed. It covered the entire room. “No way.” He jumped off the berth in a hurry, dragging his chair to D-16’s desk.
He took the guitar from his servos almost too carefully, like a fragile sparkling he was afraid to hold. B-127 squeaked. D-16 found it kind of endearing. He put the strap over his helm.
“Woah, dude, it’s absolutely massive.”
“It’s a bass. It’s bigger than an electric guitar."
B-127 looked down at the instrument in his lap. He ran his servo over its reflective frame. It hovered over the steel strings for a klik.
“It’s so cool. Teach me to play something.” B-127 looked up, grinning. “Please.”
D-16 reached under his desk, where he had stored his amplifier. He gave the jack to Bee to plug in.
“Give me your left servo,” he said. “Put it here, like that. This is the second fret, see?"
B-127 stared at the fretboard, concentrating. He put his digit loosely on the string.
"Press down well.” D-16 adjusted Bee’s hold on the fretboard and touched his knuckle with a digit. “If you don't press down like it owes you shanix, it won't play."
B-127 giggled. He flattened the strings against the neck.
"Good. Now, hold it tight over there and with your right, pull the string, twice," D-16 explained.
“Like this?”
The amplifier produced a low, resonating sound.
“Exactly! Now, do that again, then take off your left servo and just pull.”
Bee’s faceplates were lit with joy as he worked his digits.
“Next, you take four of your digits, and press them down, one by one, over here.” D-16 pointed at the middle of the bass and touched the nineteenth fret. “It goes nineteen, eighteen, seventeen and sixteen, then clear again. Get it?”
Bee nodded enthusiastically. He went slow and extremely out of tune, but he nailed the strings and frets.
“You’re doing pretty well," D-16 remarked.
Bee chuckled, embarrassed. “I’m probably nowhere close to how it’s played.”
“I mean.” D-16 shrugged. “Everyone starts somewhere. You’re not making any mistakes so far.”
B-127 held onto it for a little longer, then he took off the strap and held the guitar out towards D-16. “Can I see how you play it?”
D-16 muttered a small sure. He took the bass by the neck and turned it around as he pulled it into his lap. He reset his vocalizer. A habit he had, even though D-16 never really sang.
He hit and voiced the strings. It started off low and deep, then gave off a high-pitched chime. D-16 worked his digits and pulled. The riff sounded like it tolled.
He repeated it twice and stopped. He rested his right arm on the main frame.
“So?”
“So?!" Bee swooned. "That was the most amazing thing I’ve ever heard. You are the most amazing mech I’ve ever seen.”
“This song is pretty simple though. If not—“ D-16 grimaced, “the simplest. Did you like the music itself?”
“I did! Actually. It’s really- fun. It’s fun.” Bee’s optics glinted when he spoke.
D-16 could feel the delight rolling off his magnetic field. “Right? It’s metal.”
“Woah," B-127 uttered. It warmed Dee's spark, just by a little.
Maybe living with this bot couldn't be so awful, he thought once again. Maybe living on campus wouldn't stay a painful reminder of... everything for the rest of his academy years.
“You know what?” He smiled and began. “Here’s my comm." His expression grew serious, determined. "If that Darkwing, or anyone else, tries to pull something, you tell me.”
B-127 gaped and stared at the request on his HUD. “That is the nicest thing anyone has ever said to me," he murmured.
D-16 smiled. “Well, we’re friends now." He put his servo on Bee's pauldron. "And this way, when my band plays a gig I’ll be able to send you the details," he said.
B-127’s mouth fell even further. His frame started to shake with excitement and his voice faded into an unintelligible burst of static.
D-16 thought he might have witnessed the mech spontaneously combust.