Chapter Text
The heat from Megatron’s frame pulses like a spark against his plating, a hammering, bitter warmth that mirrors his own turbulence. Orion’s spark plummets into his tanks like a fallen birdbot, his chassis is a spring coiled too tight.
Megatron stares, meeting the full force of Orion’s glare. His dentae peek through a slight part in his dermas, frame tensed and wary, each vent too deliberate and careful to be nothing but barely held back displeasure.
Orion clenches his jaw, swallowing back his boiling frustration and renewed anger.
He wants to sweep that angry heat away — to douse it, drown it beneath the cold sea. The glinting water winks at him, reflecting a mocking, fiery orange. The sun burns at it’s horizon.
Orion lifts — tries to lift his arms. “Why have you been avoiding me?” he demands. “You started so suddenly, I don’t– What happened?”
Even as he speaks, Megatron’s optics drop to his servos. The cast keeps his arm too still and a single wrong movement has pain burst like an explosion against his side — one he fails to hide, wincing — dammit, his servos won’t listen to him.
“Are you alright?” he tries to ask, but his digits fumble like glass wobbling at a table’s edge. His pounding spark might be enough to send it over. “H-Have I done something wrong? Please, tell me what happened.”
‘What– Why are you hiding from me?’ chokes in his vocalizer, freezes on his words.
Megatron glances between his servos and his mouth, brows furrowing. His servos unclench, the heat faintly dissipates, but only in favor of his silent confusion.
Orion searches Megatron’s face for any semblance of understanding — perhaps a glimmer in his optic, or a huff, or bared dentae, but his dimming red gaze falls onto the nonsensical words of his servos.
All at once, the tension in Orion’s face falls. His brows slowly rise and his mouth goes slack, optics cycling impossibly wide to ease the insistent sting behind them. The vent trying to pull through his tightened intake is a bolted chain, catching until it shudders. His sparks twists like it’s attempting to claw itself into a supernova, his frame pulls close in a pathetic hunch.
The raft bobs as Megatron slowly sits up.
“I-” To his horror, his voice cracks into white static, and for a moment, nothing more than another ragged vent passes through his intake. Staring down at his knees, his vision swims in liquid fire. Droplets of sea spray land on his frame, quietly sizzling before disappearing into thin air.
“I… I don’t understand, Megatron.” His crackling voice wavers. His aching, useless servos are faltering. “And I know you cannot either, and it is cruel to put the blame on you, but I can’t understand anything.”
Orion can’t bring himself to look at Megatron’s face when his own is burning so. His silence is telling.
A merciless, selfish servo grasps Orion’s spark, but it’s not enough for him to stop talking into nothing.
“I’m trying my best– but you haven’t spoken to me in days, Megatron, and I don’t understand why. Please. Tell me.”
“I’m sorry,” he mumbles, shaky and soft in the face of more silence. “Megatron, I’m sorry. I’ll fix it. I can’t- I-I don’t- I don’t want-”
Orion’s voice cuts out. He tries to speak, but his frame’s odd sense of self-preservation doesn’t allow him — if he were to say anything more, his voice would break.
His plating burns. Desperate alarms pop up on his HUD, warning for an overheat and a command to turn on his cooling fans. He overrides them.
His vision and spark spin like a planet trapped in a black hole’s violent orbit.
‘I’m worried,’ he thinks desperately behind his frozen vocalizer. ‘I’m lonely. I’m afraid. I want to be selfish. I want to go home. I want to see my family. My friends. I want you to talk to me. I want to see you. I don’t want to feel like this. I want you to stay. I want you to stay with me!’
A soft buzz of static echoes in the silence, and to his horror, Orion realizes it’s coming from him.
“I…” A processor ache thunders within his helm. His optics glitch.
‘Please- say something!’
Stiffening, his gaze flickers up.
Megatron stares down with wide optics, expression caught between shock and something like horror — and still silent all the same.
Orion’s jaw goes tight again, dermas pressed. His servos clench, the plating on his shoulders rattling with the force of it. He wants to hit something, to shout, scream, anything, but he remains still, pain bleeding like a seism from every scrap of his frame, his mind a stampede, thoughts trampling over each other and his processor. He knows the static is quiet, but it roars in his audials. His optic cables feel strained. He just wants to take them out and put them aside like a datapad to recharge.
Rest.
He wants– needs to rest.
Orion lifts his right arm — weighted like he’s dragging it through a pool of tar — managing a single word he knows Megatron understands.
“Why?” he signs.
Megatron glances away.
‘Please tell me.’ “Why?” he tries, again and again and again until his servo trembles so hard, his digits can’t form a proper fist. ‘Why won’t you say anything?!’
Orion buries his face into his servo, pressing his knuckles harshly into the painful tension over his optic — if only to hide the pinpricks in their shutters, and holding back a hideous, humiliating noise from his vocalizer.
‘You promised. You promised, you promised- why would you promise? Why? Why would you say that? Why did you promise?’
His spark races, helm dizzy.
The boat rocks with Megatron’s movements again. His silver plating lines pretty and sardonic with sunlight gold, the plane of a sharp claw dipping into his vision, painfully open and worried.
Even that glint, that reach is too much for the ache in both his helm and spark. Orion dims his optics, taking a deep invent that shudders him to the core.
Like a key forced into a lock, the dam of his field breaks, a terrible medley of agony stripping his soft, foolish spark bare. Orion ducks his helm onto his knee, as if that could possibly be enough to hide him away over the boundless, unending expanse of ocean.
His field conceals nothing — the growing pain from his injuries, the discomfort affecting his meager, unhelpful recharge, the incessant worry over communication, understanding, and direction, his fear if he would ever truly return home, missing everything about it, his loneliness when Megatron began avoiding him and leaving him with the others, all who were wonderful, of course, but all looked upon him as something other than a friend he needed. Every bit of anxiety, exhaustion, frustration, and so, so much hurt floods from a bottle filled to bursting.
Megatron’s servo flinches, disappearing from his vision as it curls into a fist.
Orion swallows and offlines his optics with a soft, tired sigh.
For the first time in a long while, albeit hurt and hopeless, something in Orion’s spark eases, and he begins to pull his field away.
It’s pure weariness that he doesn’t flinch when large servos touch the span of his upper arms. Megatron’s digits are gentle against his worn plating, tentative when he tries to hold him.
It’s a punch to the mesh, a blade twisting in his tanks, confusion ramping as Megatron leans closer — too worried, too gentle, too tender.
‘Wha…-’ His intake feels dry. ‘What? But I… What- Why are you-?’ Then shakier, ‘Please don’t-’
Orion’s spark stops when a low croon reaches his audials. He keeps his helm low, vent held tight, and optics shut even as they begin to prickle anew, unwilling to let the illusion break.
Megatron makes another noise, lightly tugs at his arms, asking to look up. Orion doesn’t think he can. His frame is heavy on his struts, lubricant beads at his heated optics, and if he moves, he knows he’ll start shaking again. Megatron’s digit taps at his plating.
Unresponsive as he is, Megatron’s talon moves to trace over his arm instead. It’s a slight, almost ticklish scratch, drawing a glyph-like pattern against him. It takes him a klik — optics spiraling wide and processor lagging to wonder if he felt that right — but Megatron repeats it, delicately shaping them into a slow “Orion?”
His exhaustion abandons itself for surprise, ignoring the lurch of pain when his helm shoots up. “When did you…?” Orion vents before promptly cutting himself off, optics widening as he meets Megatron’s own startled, unexpectedly close faceplate.
Megatron stares, optics cycling once before he suddenly releases him, nearly yanking his arms back while he sucks in a sharp vent. With a thick swallow, his gaze darts over Orion’s face almost… almost nervously.
Confusion continues to simmer in his mind, barely overshadowed by the surprised jump of his spark.
Megatron’s servos come up, stealing his attention — the first time they’ve spoken in what feels like too long. “I,” he starts, and quickly falters. “It was not– I was going to… I learned– was– I didn’t…- You. You are…” his servos trail off into gibberish.
The hopeful pulse plunges. ‘Oh.’
Then Megatron releases a heavy vent and finally signs: “I do not know. I can’t.”
“Because of me?” Orion asks quietly.
Megatron looks torn — doesn’t meet his optics.
“… I see.”
He attempts to wrack his thoughts through his processor ache, trying to think of what he could have done. Had he done something rude? Something idle he hadn’t realized? Annoyed him? Hurt him? Or did it have to do with his field…? And just now… Orion winces, guilt stabbing him over his arrogance and carelessness.
‘I’ve become too burdensome,’ sits on his glossa like a nail driven through.
He attempts to apologize, but Megatron reaches out and stops his servo before he can even start forming the glyph. He shakes his helm, a flash of something that could have been guilt, shame, or pity crossing his faceplates. The look Orion returns is pained and tired.
Megatron’s servo tightens in some comfort. It envelops his own fully, warm under the budding chilly night. Orion’s optics shutter. Unreasonable as he knew it was, he missed the weight, the warmth, the textured scratches in his palms, more than he could say — which is why he immediately mourns the loss when Megatron lets go.
And it doesn’t clarify his confusion in the slightest.
Victim to his increasing processor ache, Orion’s optic glitches again. Megatron catches the sparks, worry creasing his brow.
“You are not upset with me,” Orion signs firmly instead.
Megatron nods.
“But something has been troubling you lately.”
He nods again.
“And it has to do with me.”
Another nod, but slower.
“Because you were avoiding me,” he says with certainty.
He doesn’t nod this time, offering a guilty bow of his helm instead.
“And you do not want to tell me what is wrong?”
Megatron stares at his servos for a moment, before his optics hesitantly return to his face. “I… I want to,” he replies.
Orion’s optics widen. “But you can’t?”
Megatron nods once more. “I can’t,” he repeats. “Not safe.”
A frown pulls at Orion’s dermas. ‘Not safe…?’ He regrets it immediately when a wave of pain temporarily blinds him, servo coming up to grasp his helm. He sucks in a sharp vent through his dentae, shuttering the optic beginning to glitch relentlessly. When he comes to, the worried look is back. Megatron points at the darkened water, questioning.
‘No,’ his thoughts blurt angrily, but Orion agrees with a faint shake of his helm. “Stay,” he mumbles, dropping his servo to grab the space just short of Megatron’s. “Please.”
Nothing but silence responds, but the raft doesn’t rock. Megatron’s plating mirrors starry speckles once more. It’s fitting for a mech like him, a name that reflects the stars. A rumble makes him glance up blearily.
“Forgive me,” Megatron signs, dulled optics, warm and regretful, “for hurting you. I acted a coward.”
Despite himself, Orion’s faceplates form a small smile. “Just talk to me next time,” he teases. “Or else I’ll have you dragged out again.”
Megatron frowns and shakes his helm.
Orion huffs a laugh before sighing, helm lolling onto his shoulder. “Thank you,” he adds quietly.
“Rest,” Megatron signs instead, letting his engine purr a lullaby.
His frame takes it as a command, it seems. Vision darkening, he doesn’t feel his fall’s landing.
🌊
When he wakes up, deliriousness terrifies him. The cold dark of the night renders him blind, panic and terror raising a screaming blizzard inside his frame.
For a moment, he wonders if he’s dreamt everything — a cruel hallucination conjured up by his desperate mind for his own closure, or support for his sleep-deprived, outrageously anxious state — if Megatron truly decided to stay in the end.
Fortunately, pain makes a great reminder — as does gaining awareness of one’s surroundings.
His shoulder twinges, nothing more than a pinch, but it has his optic fully online and very aware that he isn’t alone. Mermecha have returned to swim around them, spanned wide as they do nightly.
And Megatron is still here. With him. Beneath him, actually.
‘When had that happened?’
Collapsed over his frame, Orion’s broken arm fits perfectly in the space between Megatron’s chest and torso, cushioning it comfortably — and lying on his front means that neither his hips nor his shoulders dig into the boat’s flooring.
Megatron runs warm, plating hot as a furnace, and comfortable as a recharge blanketed by the sun. His chassis rumbles beneath him in a quiet snore. The pulse of his spark is faint, but a steady turn. Orion can count the rhythm of each orbit. His own spark soars like a jet, like it’s attempting to reach for Megatron’s, right through their transformation seams.
‘… Maybe I am still a little delirious.’
He turns further up to take in Megatron’s faceplate. This may be the first time Orion has seen him sleeping on his back, he thinks. His helm rests on it’s side, his left servo lying beside it’s back. His red optics are completely offline, deep in recharge. Parted dermas expose the shape of his dentae.
They’re fascinating. Dentae can tell so much story and history; of how a mechanism’s survival, their adaptations, modifications, their beauty standards. But dentae that sharp must have certainly been something to work around. Orion doubted they could express themselves like surface mecha did in that way — avoiding biting their cheek, tongue, or dermas.
Orion watches a moment longer, absorbing the shape of Megatron’s dermas. Were those little scars because of a fight or because of his own dentae? Or… Or perhaps someone else’s?
‘Find out yourself,’ urges a whisper, invading his thoughts.
Optics cycling wide and startled, Orion’s vent hitches. He bursts into heat like a fired kiln, faceplates coloring in what he’s sure is vibrant even in the dark night. Alarm crawls down his backstrut in a wave of pinpricks — and to his greater horror — a thrilled rush makes his spark pulse hard enough to thud against it’s casing.
Somehow, Orion’s thoughts manage to splutter. He tries to cut them off, hiding himself from his own embarrassment by burying his face into Megatron’s chassis. Then Megatron grunts.
Orion freezes. His spark hammers like a metalworker even as he tries to curl into himself, feigning sleep and begging for it to calm down.
Megatron shifts, turning his helm to the other side and pressing the back of his left servo to his forehelm. His right servo gropes at the air for a moment before he, still deep in recharge, Orion realizes, lifts it to rest on the small of his back.
Clenching his own servo, Orion buries his flushed faceplates deeper when the gentle touch, the light scrape of his claws against the tender metal sends a delighted shiver through his frame.
‘… Definitely still delirious,’ he thinks amid his fluster, resigning to count the turns of Megatron’s spark — servo heavy on his plating — until it lulls him back to sleep.
🌊
It is unexpectedly late when Orion wakes up again, proven by the light blinding him the breem he tries to online his optics. The sky is a blue too bright. Orion pushes himself into a sitting position, optics screwed tight as he tries to rub the sensitivity away. It still takes a moment to adjust as he cycles through his grogginess. When he finally does, he stretches a single arm over his helm with a relaxed groan.
By the Primes, that might’ve been the most refreshing recharge he’s had in cycles.
Orion looks around. Beneath the sun, the water glimmers like crystal shards, filled with mermecha bouncing and chatting with each other happily. They’ve given the raft a wide berth. A few notice him, simply offering him waves, but otherwise, no one really seems to pay attention to him. Neither him nor…
He glances down.
Megatron is still out like a light, as slumped as silicone caught in a heatwave, and a single massive arm tossed over his face. ‘To avoid dealing with the sun,’ Orion presumes with no small hint of amusement and more than a little envy. But knowing Megatron, resting so far into the day, and this deeply at that… Whatever was on his mind must have been affecting him more deeply than Orion realized.
Guilt stirs for a moment, before something more content and firm silences it.
‘It’s good he’s getting this rest,’ Orion hums, tearing his gaze away. ‘I am sure we both needed it.’
Turning behind him, he catches another sponge crystal precariously shoved behind the refinement unit, sloshing energon apparent underneath the sun’s rays. And right beside it is a curious pile of plates, an unmoving stack balanced mischievously on Megatron’s tail. Who else’s courtesy could it be but that of the twins?
His spark warms and swells, overwhelmed with a torrent of affection for them both. His thoughts idly wonder just how long ago they’d set it up, and how long it’s stood strong.
Finally, Orion’s optic land onto the pair of datapads. His first one — the one to have joined him since the beginning of this ridiculous journey — has remained relatively untouched for far too long. He gives it an apologetic look, awkwardly gesturing towards Megatron.
‘When it’s time,’ Orion promises silent as he reaches for the other datapad. He had been thinking of scrolling through this one anyway — see how far he’d come with both his teachings and his never-to-be-revealed notes and research. He was very overdue from updating them.
Beneath him, Megatron suddenly huffs, making a tiny noise through his pressed dermas before he returns to his slow, rhythmic vents.
Orion slowly cycles his optics. Megatron’s soft purr reverberates against his legs. He wants to blame the beating sunlight for the heat suddenly blooming within him, the shivers prickling against the small of his back, but his processor brings up the startlingly vivid memory of his impulse’s voice. Echoing in his mind, Orion’s optics automatically drop to it’s target.
He swallows, attempting to wet his dry intake — and in watching the bridge of his olfactory press against his arm, the barest whisps of steam escaping his scarred dermas, the languid rise and fall of his chassis, Orion realizes that this position is incredibly compromising.
Grimacing, he forces his optics away and onto his datapad, choking on his shame as he swings his leg off the straddle it has on Megatron’s tail.
‘What is wrong with you?’ his thoughts reprimand. ‘This is asinine — why would I- why would you even say that? After humiliating yourself as you have?’
Orion chews on his dermas and immediately regrets it. ‘Stop. Stop thinking about it.’
Careful to rock the boat as little as he can, he tucks himself into the crevice between Megatron’s arm and his torso instead — and tries not to slam the datapad into his face.
In trying to mute his mind, he does eventually settle, scrolling through the datapad’s barrage of scribbles with deep and ever-growing fondness. However, even with the distraction and quiet chuckles they pull from him, he is, frustratingly, still left with too much processor space.
Worry finds it’s way back into it, a familiar pulsing waveform in the back of his mind. Admittedly, it has ebbed away into something far smaller. He had greatly missed Megatron’s friendship and warmth- Primus, his mere presence, even completely out of it, has Orion’s mind and spark more willing to relax — and that in turn, it makes him nervous.
Over the past few days, Orion had stewed in the depths of his own thoughts like boiling tar, until the self-centered loneliness and longing became it’s own agony — but would it have been the same if Rumble and Frenzy never followed him? If he never came across the sea creature or suffered the loss of his arm, would it have hurt nearly as much? Was this simply some superficial lack of control over his feelings?
His tanks twist at the thought, nauseated.
‘Perhaps I am a little too reliant on him,’ Orion thinks with a grim sigh. ‘Maybe it’ll lessen once we’re closer to shore…’
‘And gain some proper autonomy,’ another part of his processor grumbles.
Glancing at the blue, empty sky, Orion wonders if he should send out a comm. They’ve been over the water for a while and traveling nonstop (something Orion had greatly wanted to understand the workings of were his mind and servo not so preoccupied). Obviously, he had yet to see any land, but they must have closed some distance by now. It couldn’t hurt to try.
Orion pulls up the comm code at the top of his list: Starscream’s. Immediately, a “no signal” flashes behind his optics. Orion frowns — feels a jolt in his chassis.
Okay, that’s not unreasonable. Cybertronians had their connection limits. Knowing Starscream, he had likely moved further inland, and both Iacon and Vos were very far. Orion tries again, first with Alpha Trion, then Jazz, Elita, Ratchet, all to receive the same message.
Venting slowly, he looks to his barren inbox. The most recent remnants are all those comms from Starscream, a barrage of worry and panic that suddenly cuts off.
In hindsight, he should have realized earlier — the silence staring back at him. His cold servo grips the datapad. ‘What… what happened? What is going on? It should have worked by now, so why isn’t it? Have I strayed too far to-? Or-’
Megatron grumbles something raspy, soft, and staticky.
It startles Orion hard enough that the datapad slips from his digits, falling flat against his scuffed windshield.
He swivels his helm to look up, ignoring the uncomfortable spasm in his neck as Megatron stirs online. Letting a single optic appear, he gives a scathing glare vaguely in the sun’s direction, muttering something irritated to himself. He shades his optics before his gaze falls onto Orion, still reclined comfortably beside his arm.
Digits fidgeting with the datapad, he greets him with a small, tentative smile. “Good morning?”
Megatron's optics are bright under his servo's shadow, cycling slowly and searching his face with a scowl.
‘Please don’t leave,’ his thoughts plead too quickly. Orion prays his dejected spark, cringe, or shame don’t show on his faceplates, and instead, turns his smile into an apologetic one. He tries to squirm away to sit up and give him space, already mourning the loss of warmth and mentally hitting himself in the helm over it.
Megatron promptly drops his arm back, hiding his face once again. Despite himself, Orion chuckles.
“Not a morning mech, are we?” he teases with more affection than he means to. Defiant and what could have been endearingly immature, Megatron digs a sharp digit into a seam above his hip with flawless precision, pulling out a strangled yelp and a purely instinctive slap from Orion.
Appalled horror immediately clamps on him like an alloygator’s bite, an apology already flying halfway out of his mouth. Megatron effectively cuts him off — his arm briefly flexes, almost hesitant, before he wraps it around Orion’s side, soothing the jab with an apologetic rub. And even with that frown still on his face, Megatron, decidedly, does not leave.
‘…oh.’
Orion’s gaze falls away, his frame flickering with soft heat. His spark, heavy and slow, beats a bold, joyous drum. His helm dips as his servos gingerly reach for the fallen datapad — hiding the smile lighting up his face.
With one more glance and a quiet, relieved sigh, Orion leaves Megatron to sulk before he returns to the datapad, scrolling through it. He settles in, leaning against Megatron’s chassis, content.
But for the moment, Orion finds himself distracted.
It’s difficult to focus on the datapad with the combination of his thought’s excessive revelry, Megatron’s presence, the sudden hyper-awareness of the reason why, and the reappearing alarm his empty inbox and the lack of cell-signal brings. He wants to ask, perhaps Megatron will know — the root of “leader” must account for something, right? — why he is yet to receive one, or where they could possibly be if they have already been traveling for officially ten cycles?
Instead, Orion bites his glossa, silences his vocalizer, grips onto the datapad a little tighter.
After his mortifying breakdown — to expose himself in such an insensitive, brazen, and forceful manner? — Primus, he far from wanted to ask Megatron anything ever again. Frankly, thinking on it now, he was genuinely regretting all his functioning to lead to this point. And besides, following his desires might ruin the fragile peace they’ve made, and as delighted Orion is to have him willing and simply near, to be even more burdensome floods him with leaden guilt.
He should have taken to what Alpha Trion had taught him time and time again.
‘Be patient,’ Orion reminds himself stiffly. ‘By the Primes, what have I done? I should have been patient.’
Stifling a sigh, he glances at Megatron once more. With the only thing pulling his dermas down now being the scars at their corners, he otherwise seems at peace, completely unaffected by any of the things running through his mind. Orion would think him asleep if Megatron didn’t startle him by suddenly pausing, pulling away the arm over his optics as he lifts his helm. His faceplates return to that pinched frown when he catches sight of his tail — or rather, evidence of the twin’s mischievousness left on his tail.
A surprised laugh spills from his vocalizer, once again, at Megatron’s expense. His returning grumble is low and annoyed, whereas his servo twitching against Orion’s waist immediately has him alarmed and twisting away from those sharp, violently accurate digits with an echoing clang!
“Ah-aah! Do not!” Orion scolds, his servo attempting to scramble for leverage even as he keeps his hold on the datapad, his voice pitched a little too high and crackling with static to be either comfortable or natural.
A smirk plays on Megatron’s dermas, but his digits relax with an acquiescing, forgiving pat. Orion’s own immaturity manages to come through in a pout. ‘Absolutely none of my inner turmoil. What a tease.’ Megatron simply, albeit incredibly smugly, pats his side again. With one more considering glance, he decides to leave the plate pile where it is and turns his attention elsewhere.
Orion can’t exactly move away with Megatron’s arm holding him in place and even less so when his arm wraps around him fully to point at the datapad, brow raised in question. Caught off guard and not entirely sure what to think, Orion looks at the datapad, cycling his optics. His drawings of crystals glow on it’s screen.
It takes him a moment too long to realize they’re Praxian crystals — ones Megatron had not yet seen.
Orion brightens instantly, urging the datapad into Megatron’s servo as he squirms free from his heavy arm —only to pull himself higher. Properly seated and leaning onto his shoulder, Orion returns Megatron's servo to where it was before enthusiastically reaching for the datapad.
“Right! You were not here for this! Although I am a little surprised that no one has told you, considering how social everyone seems. I’ve talked to the pod a lot over the past few days so there is a lot to cover, but you may scroll through it, if you like. Or perhaps I can show you…”
Orion catches himself, trailing off and bringing a hesitant servo to cover his intake. “Ah… My apologies, I did not mean to-” Glancing, his vocalizer cuts short.
Megatron stares up at him, optics faintly dimmed, and a small, but unbearably fond smile on his face. Orion’s spark tightens.
“I… I don’t understand,” he murmurs, muffled behind his servo. “Why do you look at me like that?” ‘After…’
Megatron gives him a questioning, clueless look, followed by a trill. His thumb strokes a gentle path on his thigh, but his palm makes an insistent press. Under his attention, Orion finds a sudden spark of something eager and sheepish blooming within, burning him from the inside out. He turns away, hiding his warm, growing embarrassment, and taps the datapad instead.
“Do you want me to teach you?” Orion enunciates it, slow and nervous, clumsy with his servo. After a moment, Megatron smiles and nods.
“I do,” he replies.
Orion releases a vent, or maybe a laugh — something relieved, excited, and unsure all at once. “Alright,” he huffs with a smile that surprises even him.
‘…Thank you.’