Drinking Energon Dead End

[dragoness_e]

Wildrider drags Dead End out for some "local Cybertronian culture", aka "drunk & disorderly". In the process, they discover that the Stunticons have acquired a certain reputation, and that some people just don't sympathize with your psychosis. All this, and Duskwing, too.

Dead and Drunk

aka Energon-drinking Dead End

It was Wildrider's fault, really. It was Wildrider who told Dead End, "Hey, you like local culture? I got some culture for ya!" and all but dragged him down some of the darkest, grungiest underlevels of Polyhex that he could find. Dead End wondered how the walls could be so rusted and still hold the weight of the levels above them; he concluded that the grunge and silt that held the floor together must have merged with the walls, too. Dead End also suspected that some of the larger, gooier blobs clinging to cracks and ledges had grown there.

"So, how much did Spinshaper's friends pay you to lure me into a back alley?" Dead End finally asked sardonically.

"Chill out, Deadster! We're almost there!" Wildrider said, almost bouncing along.

Wildrider was correct; two more turns and they found themselves at a bar--a mere hole-in-the-wall at first glance, but upon stepping over the comatose bot on the doorstep, they found themselves in a large and busy pub. A very large gray armored mech of some kind glowered at them from beside the door, but said nothing.

First impression: this was not an officer's bar. No arrogant, well-polished fliers strutted across the floor, holding drinks and debating art, tactics and politics--though Dead End thought he spotted someone with wings over at the bar. This was a ground-pounder's bar, a grunt's hang-out, filled with mechs engaged in the serious business of drinking, arguing loudly, and fighting.

"Ah, culture," muttered Dead End.

Second impression: dark red and black finish, brightly polished, attracted attention. There was a ripple of shifting attention as those near the door and not otherwise occupied turned to look at the newcomers. The glances were not hostile, but they were cool, measuring.

"Come on!" Wildrider waved an arm at the bar. "They got some decent mid-grade here, and not for those optic-ripping prices like up top. Get some decent brawls here, too."

"More culture," muttered Dead End. "Why did I come along again?"

Wildrider clapped him on the back. "Because you wanted to get smashed and mope in the corner about the pointlessness of life." He guffawed heartily.

"I can do that without getting intoxicated," Dead End replied. "Or getting dragged into a venue where I'm more likely to get caught up in a pointless fight and have my fuel pump forcibly removed by some overgrown tank mech in a bad mood. That's if whatever contaminants are in the local excuse for high-grade don't corrode my fuel system and slowly kill me."

"Trust me, it's more fun this way," Wildrider said. "'Cause when you're shitfaced, you simply don't give a frag."

"'Shitfaced'? Where the frag are you from?" snarled a stocky, very boxy olive drab and brown mech sitting at a nearby table. Multiple arm and leg wheels marked him as a transport of some type. Sitting with him was a big dark blue mech Dead End thought he recognized.

"One picks up the most interesting linguistic terms on Earth," Dead End answered. "Hello, Hammerbolt!" he said to the dark blue mech.

Hammerbolt--for it was the big blue tank mech himself--looked up at Dead End, optics brightening. "Hey, you're that other journalist guy from Shadowlight! The one I didn't nearly have to toss out for provoking artists." He stood up and gave Dead End a hearty slap on the shoulder. "Guys, this guy is one of Megatron's lads from Earth. He's all right!"

"You served with Megatron?" The short brown transport mech said in a loud, nasal voice. "You shine like an officer, but you got wheels, so you can't be a real ranker."

"Hey, who're your friends, buddy?" Wildrider asks, optics bright with interest.

"You already know Hammerbolt, and I'm Casque. I'm with Logistics, and Hammerbolt here is Ground Security--usually escorts my convoys. Who the frag are you?" said the brown transport.

"I'm Dead End, and this is my teammate Wildrider. We're with--" Dead End's visor dimmed as he thought--

"Yeah, I can never remember where the slag they put us in the command structure neither," Wildrider said, laughing. "While you're figuring it out, I'm gonna find us some drinks!" He dove into the crowd, heading in the general direction of the bar.

"He's right. All that matters is that we take orders from Megatron; Motormaster handles our mission assignments," Dead End shrugged.

"Motormaster?" There was a sudden coolness in Casque's tone. Hammerbolt shifted uneasily. Casque quickly finished his drink and put it down. "Slag. You're Stunticons, aren't you?"

Dead End tilted his head slight. "Yes, why?"

"N-nothing, just curious." Casque pushed his stool back, like he was ready to bolt for the nearest exit. Hammerbolt seemed in a sudden hurry to finish his drink.

The big blue tank mech glanced at his friend Casque. "We have to get back to barracks--late duty shift." He rose from his stool, ready to leave.

"Ah. Well, then, I shan't keep you." Dead End watched as the two mechs left abruptly, then turned to find Wildrider.

Dead End suddenly had no trouble pushing through the crowd; mechs almost shied away from the dark red Stunticon. It only took him a moment to find Wildrider still at the bar, getting their drinks.

"What's up, buddy?" Wildrider said, handing Dead End his drink. "Your friends want drinks, too?"

Dead End shook his head. "They left very suddenly. Perhaps I am overly imaginative, but as soon as they heard I was a Stunticon, they seemed afraid of me."

The patrons seated next to Wildrider at the bar suddenly discovered better seats on the other side of the bar, or the room. Wildrider glanced around. "Uh, Dead End buddy, might be better not to let that particular cat out of the bag next time."

Dead End's optics flickered. "Why not?"

"Well, after we scrapped that artist and his buddies who tried to gank you two in the alley, word got around. Seems these homeworld grunts are scared stiff of artists--and here Motormaster turns one of the real psycho artists into, heh, an abstract arrangement of parts, and the rest of us make his buddies into embedded wall decorations--heh." Wildrider laughed and handed Dead End a cylinder of glowing blue energon. "Figure it--Stunticons scrap artists, and they're terrified of artists. What's that make us?"

"Critics."

Wildrider laughed so hard he nearly choked on his energon. "Which was why they tried to scrap you in the first place!"

"The whole thing was so pointless. So they didn't like what we wrote about their so-called 'art'--now they're spending any profits from the exhibition getting major body repairs done. A high price for a tender ego; in the end, they will all be forgotten and their art yet more of the long-decayed detritus underfoot." Dead End somberly noted that his glass was empty and shoved it across to the bartender. The bartender, a small red and gray mech, nodded and refilled the glass.

The only patron who hadn't moved away from Dead End and Wildrider, a large dark blue and purple Seeker jet, turned to look at them. Ruby optics glowed in a gray face. "Not afraid of them getting revenge?" he asked.

Dead End shrugged. "Does it matter? I'll die sooner or later--of decay if nothing else gets me." He tossed his drink down.

Wildrider looked over Dead End's shoulder at the jet. "Dude, I've met Autobots tougher than them!" He laughed maniacally. "I'm on the same team with Motormaster, jetboy! Only mech scarier is Megatron himself!"

The dark blue Seeker scowled. "Yeah, I had an attitude like that once." He picked up an energon cube and sipped at it, like he planned to nurse the one cube all night.

Dead End looked thoughtful and leaned his elbows against the bar. It steadied him; he felt less like he might fall off his barstool. "I was cornered by Sunstreaker and Sideswipe once."

The Seeker lowered his cube to the bar. "Sunstreaker? The Autobot gladiator?" The dark blue jet mech looked intently at Dead End, ruby optics bright with interest.

"Is that what he was? Before my time," Dead End said, vaguely aware that he was babbling around his point. "My point being--" His visor dimmed as he tried to recall his point again, "saying that we've met tougher Autobots is not to take said artist's combat skills lightly--it is a statement of fact."

Shouts and loud crashing of metal on metal broke out behind them.

Wildrider clapped Dead End on the shoulder and said, "Deadster, you're well on your way to achieving your goal of getting seriously smashed--I'm going to have some fun while you and jetboy bore each other." With that, he spun around and dove into the fledgling brawl in the middle of the floor.

"How'd you beat him?" The jet asked.

"The first time, I tricked him--and tore off his bumper while getting him into a multi-Autobot pile-up." Dead End chuckled at the memory. "The second time, he and Sideswipe beat the slag out of me--took the rest of us to get them off me."

Dead End looked at his glass. "'S empty again. A metaphor for my life--empty and gone before it can be appreciated." He pushed the glass over to the bartender for a refill.

The tall jet peered at him quizzically. "You don't look dead to me."

Dead End tugged his visor off and peered at the jet with two bright violet optics. "But I will be soon enough. Next battle, or some unfortunate encounter in a back alley, or perhaps just some pointless, stupid thing like being in the wrong place when another shuttle gets shot down..." Dead End's engine made a little coughing sigh.

The dark blue Seeker stared at him blankly for several minutes. The bartender passed by, wiping up the counter, and discreetly refilled Dead End's glass again. He paused in front of the Seeker.

"Got enough to keep you happy?" he said, pointing at the Seeker's energon cube. The little red and gray mech seemed nervous.

"'m fine, Cartwheel," answered the Seeker distractedly. He was still staring at Dead End. Finally he spoke. "Let me get this straight: you're mopin' about dying an' havin' a short life an' such and you ain't even dead yet? You're fucked up, you know that?"

Dead End's head jerked up like Motormaster had just screamed in his audials. That was Earth slang--human slang! There was something familiar about this Seeker, from the nasal accent to the wing-shape--yes, an Earth jet alt-mode! "What did you say?" he shot back.

The big blue and purple jet leaned forward. "I said, 'you're fucked up'". He smirked.

"You've been on Earth!" Dead End said accusingly.

"Yeah, what about it?" the jet responded, non-plussed at the dark red Stunticon's reaction.

"But I don't know you..." Dead End trailed off. He felt like he was stuck in a memory loop of some kind; he'd thought all this before. But where? Unfortunately, his central processor was not operating at anything like its usual efficiency. He stuck his visor up on his forehead, like it was a pair of sunglasses. "You look familiar, though."

The Seeker peered intently at Dead End. "I've seen you before, too."

"Where?" Dead End asked muzzily, certain that the blue high-grade had corroded his cerebro-circuitry and that he was now sinking slowly into zombie-dom.

"I'm not sure." The dark blue jet mech frowned. "Not recently, or I'd remember you for sure. Not too long ago, or I wouldn't remember you at all." He shook his head in exasperation. "Must have been when I was all messed up."

Dead End looked at his once-again empty glass. "I'm messed up." He shoved it at the bartender. "I don't think I made your acquaintance while intoxicated, sir."

"You are now, 'cause you're shitfaced," the Seeker said, snickering.

"Smashed."

"Drunk out of your gourd."

"Plotzed."

"Over-energized," continued the jet.

"Four sheets to the wind."

"Sloshed."

"Inebriated," said Dead End.

"Tanked," concluded the Seeker.

Dead End stared blankly at the dark blue jet. "Did I say 'intoxicated' already?"

"Think so."

"Conceded, I am thoroughly intoxicated," Dead End exposited. "However, I can not be said to make your acquaintance if I do not even know your name."

"'m Duskwing," the Seeker said, looking a bit wobbly himself. The energon cube was substantially lower than it had been, though Dead End could not recall seeing Duskwing drink from it for some time. "An' you are?"

"Dead End, which is a fair description of my life," he said, holding up his glass of blue energon.

"You drive down blind alleys a lot?"

"'s what my life, everyone's life comes to. A dead end. We're all dead at the end," the Stunticon tried to explain.

"Uhh... and?" Duskwing looked confused.

Dead End's optics flickered. "That's it. Everybody dies. So what's the point of anything? You'll just be dead anyway."

"Yeah, but there's this interval between coming online, and dead. Staring at the wall for that whole time is boring," Duskwing pointed out.

Dead End looked at his glass suspiciously; it was empty again. He pushed it at the bartender, who seemed nervous about getting near either of them. "Hey! Just because I'm a Stunticon doesn't mean I'm a psychotic serial killer!" Dead End snapped at the little red and gray mech. "Though in all fairness, I am psychotically depressed and I am one of Megatron's own professional team of killers--I'm just not serial about it. And it's all pointless anyway."

"Hey! Go easy on the little guy, he offers me drinks," Duskwing said, his ailerons twitching oddly. As he spoke, Cartwheel refilled Dead End's glass.

"You're kinda stuck on this whole 'pointless' thing, aren't you?" the jet mech asked, leaning back on his stool.

"It's the first thing that hits me when I come online after recharge--there's no reason to bother, it's all so very pointless. We come online, we do a bunch of things that don't matter, we die, rust, and are forgotten." Dead End stared suspiciously at his glass; it was already down by a third. "If I could just figure out where the stuff is going..."

"I bet you get bored easy, with everything being pointless," said Duskwing.

"You have no idea. Everything is so tedious--even our missions are stupid and pointless most of the time. It used to get interesting once in a while when Starscream would mutiny, but he stopped doing that--he just uses sarcasm these days." Dead End swirled the blue stuff in his glass, watching the play of light and color. "I just read my books and wish it was all over."

Duskwing looked at Dead End, a hint of frustration in his voice and face. "Why does anything got to have a point? So it's pointless! So what? Do it because it's more fun than watching paint dry."

Dead End slammed his glass down angrily. "But without a point, without a purpose, everything is the equivalent of watching paint dry! It's just killing time until you die!"

The ongoing series of crashes behind them died down and Wildrider staggered up to the bar, as unscratched and shiny as ever. "Deadster, old buddy, you are seriously smashed," he said, wobbling unsteadily. "I think you've had enough."

"Hey, buzz off! We're havin' a con-conservation--uh, talk, here!" Duskwing snapped at Wildrider.

"Stick a crankshaft up your afterburner and rotate, flyboy!" Wildrider swung a punch at Duskwing, who leaned back and slid off his stool. Wildrider staggered forward and tried to tackle the big Seeker, but missed and crashed to the floor. To Dead End's somewhat drink-fuddled senses, it looked like Wildrider fell through Duskwing's legs.

Duskwing jumped back, dodging Wildrider's grab from the floor; Wildrider hauled himself slowly to his feet, swaying as if caught in a strong wind. The dark blue Seeker lunged past Wildrider, bumping him in passing--or so Dead End assumed, it actually looked like one of his wings and and arm passed through Wildrider--and Wildrider fell to the floor with a crash. This time, he didn't get up.

"Oops," said Duskwing, looking down. "Your friend's really had enough. He just passed out."

Dead End looked suspiciously at Duskwing, then knelt down to check Wildrider--and nearly fell over. "I'm still somewhat under the influence myself," he announced. "Wildrider, are you dead?" Wildrider's optics were dimmed, but his engine was still running. "You're right, he's out of it."

"I think we should go home," Dead End said. "But he's too offline to drive, and I'm too drive to drink." He swayed like Wildrider had.

"'An' if anyone catches you in an alley, you're toast," the Seeker concluded.

Dead End's optics lit up. "Why yes, we could die just getting back to barracks. No doubt someone will ambush us for spare parts. Especially considering all the artists we've annoyed. We shall end up as part of someone's sculpture. How droll!"

Duskwing gave him a dirty look that Dead End failed to notice. "I remember where I saw you!" He smirked evilly. "Come on, I know a place you can crash until you can walk straight and fight." The Seeker tossed his head and wove deftly through the crowd; Dead End picked up Wildrider and followed after, much less deftly.

# # #

"Hey, Slog!"

Duskwing's nasal New Yorker tones were not exactly what Slog wanted to hear waking him up from a deep recharge, but he'd gotten used to it.

"The middle of my recharge, I was in," Slog said with some acerbity.

"Yeah, well, just wanted to let you know that the two guys in the gallery aren't materials, they're just guests, sorta. They're just, like, recharging. Sorta. Later." The sense of Duskwing's presence vanished.

"Duskwing!"

# # #

"DEAD END, WILDRIDER, IF YOU TWO SLAGGERS DON'T ANSWER YOUR COMMS RIGHT SLAGGING NOW, I'M GOING TO SLAGGING TRACK YOU DOWN AND RIP YOUR FRAGGING TIRES OFF ONE AT A SLAGGING TIME!"

As usual, Dead End woke up to Motormaster's dulcet tones cooing in his audials--or at least, his receiver. As much less usual, he woke up to a massive throbbing hangover--it felt like every cylinder was running subtly out of sync with the others, and that his body had been worked over by both Breakdown's vibes and Motormaster's fists.

Wildrider groaned beside him. "Uh, was that Motormaster or Megatron that stomped on me last night?" Dead End heard Wildrider groan again and turn over---

"YAAAAHH! Where the freakin' hell are we?" Wildrider screamed. "They thought we were dead and sent us to the spare parts bin!"

Dead End finally decided to activate his optics. He found himself looking up at a very gruesome and familiar sculpture--'Stupidity in Blue'. "So your name was Duskwing," he murmured to himself, and carefully hauled himself to his feet.

"Much worse. We're in an art gallery--"

"My gallery, this is," said the short brown and black mech standing off to one side. A yellow visor glowed, and two long, sharp chisel blades extended from his wrists. He tapped one of them impatiently against his leg.

"An explanation for two drunken Stunticons in my gallery, I would like to hear," said Slog.

Dead End's engine sighed; he knew it was going to be a very long day.

-- FIN --

Comments

[navigatorsghost.livejournal.com]

Yay, more Duskwing! ^_^

Also, *much* yay for the ending. What a way to wake up...