#the potential for further development is like a distant glimmer in the sky. there but very difficult to reach.

[deiscension]

﹄ ◇ ; @voidfragments / WHAT'S SHI QINGXUAN THINKING?

💭 qr had his turn now sqx gets to drag him in return

      ⌜◈⌟    ▌ ──  '𝙄 𝙢𝙞𝙜𝙝𝙩 𝙛𝙚𝙚𝙡 𝙨𝙤𝙧𝙧𝙮 𝙛𝙤𝙧 𝙝𝙞𝙢 𝙞𝙛 𝙝𝙚 𝙬𝙚𝙧𝙚𝙣'𝙩 𝙨𝙤 𝙫𝙞𝙡𝙚. How miserable does someone's life have to be for them to become a rampaging ghost and make it everyone else's problem? Has he no shame? Were I his ancestor, I'd be rattling around in my grave if I found out he was running the mortal realm amok. And in such a tacky manner too! I mean really, bodies strung up in trees, creepy green lights, eating innocent people-- what's the point of it all? Aiyah! Well, I'm not scared of him. Just... a little grossed out.'

     Or, perhaps more succinctly: 

     It can't be that bad-- EWWWWWWWW YOU LIVE LIKE THIS!?

[webcricket]

Looking Glass

Chapter 10 - Friction Effect

Pairing: CastielXAU!Reader

Word Count: 1886

Summary: The heat of day breaks as Cas struggles with uncertainty to make a move toward broadening his relationship with the reader. (Warning - in the event this “bothers” you as much as it bothers a certain angel - for a skinny dipping reader.)

Miss a chapter? Have a Masterlist Link!

It’s not the ocean – although, the cold water flows refreshing and free around flesh salted by heat and kissed to a polished luster by the sunny exertion of an afternoon amble; nor does the torpid humidity of the Kansas dusk hanging overhead in the guise of a hazy purple, wispy grey-streaked, star-pricked blanket hold the same guileless promise as that long ago unblemished blue sky of a summer day at the beach. There’s something profounder than innocence prevailing here – a charged potential building between atmospheric particles signaling the sort of lightning strike that heralds a heaven-sent bone-drenching downpour of relief after an unrelenting drought. The electrifying thrill pertains to someone you ceased hoping existed as your world burned, funneling you and every other isolated soul surviving in it toward a fiery finale.

When you break upward in an effervescent breathless burst from the pond’s cooling liquid embrace, airy liberated laughter sputtering through rivulets wetting your smiling mien, the unexpected renewal of hope waits for you on the shoreline. With eyes encompassing the eternal blue of a sky unfurling into the depths of forever – even at this distance, the luminosity contained therein shining brilliant in defiance of the enveloping darkness – hope dons the charmingly cut contours of a man shrouded in a trench coat. No, not a man – an angel; though, that’s not how you define him. You understand now an angel is what he is, not who. This distinction in your reasoning, too, arises entirely unforeseen given an accumulation of harrowing experiences involving the mercilessness of his kind up to and including the singular sadism directed at you by his counterpart in your world; the disparity makes all the difference in your heart’s racing reaction to the image of him standing sentinel.

Appearing equally startled under the circumstances, the crinkle of confusion contorting his brow as he peers between you and the collected mass of crumpled clothing cradled in his arms reveals nothing sinister. He’s not like them; and certainly, nothing like the other him – he’s unlike anyone you’ve ever known. It’s not fear exciting your pulse at the sight of him in all his, at present anyway, categorically un-angelic glory – it’s unbounded affection; it’s a yearning for more.

Stone still at the pebbled margin of the rainwater reservoir used in times past for irrigation, in these latter years by Dean as an ersatz fishing hole, in humming perpetuity as a mosquito den of iniquity, and most recently by you as a pool, Castiel stares out, struck speechless, to where you swim in what he personally deems an oversized manmade puddle; your grinning mug bobs above the water amid broadening ripples.

Accounting for the number and intimate nature of the discarded garments he gathered in his advance toward the sound of gleeful splashing – the pleasant scent and residual warmth of you clinging to the fabric clutched in his fingers – he suspects you’ve removed all of your attire to inhibit the effects of friction hindering your impromptu plunge. Judging by the decorum defying response of his vessel to the awareness of your bared flesh concealed beneath the inky surface, it occurs to him you’re not alone in harboring corporal concerns involving the concept of friction – your less begets his desire for more.

More than purely empirical mimicry of a pornographic pizza man. More than the biological satisfaction of momentarily weak submission to a reaper’s lustful lures when overwhelmed by the physically sensational circumstances of the human condition’s reflexive need for connection in a lonely world. This full-fledged and yet totally confounding want of more with you, and what more means, restrains him from making a move toward attaining it. He nurses serious doubts whatever blundering version of more he has to offer you is less than enough to content a soul too special to possibly reciprocate fond feelings for the undeserving likes of a fallen angel.

Interrupting his inner lambasting, limbs wildly whirling to wave whilst staying afloat, you shout, “Come on, get in! The water’s fine!”

“I’ll, uh, watch from here,” he stammers. Self-conscious of the immediate influence of your proposal on further inciting the involuntary flush afflicting his physical form, never more aware than in this moment of the rough rub and restriction of layers of material covering almost every inch of his hide, gulping against the growing constriction of the shirt collar and tie cinched around his throat, he adds in a tone firmer in conviction than necessary, “Watch over your clothes I mean.” He exhales a flustered sigh at the dubious sound of the excuse to his own ears.

You glide deeper into the water in an eddy of giggles.

Ever the pragmatist, his glance drops to your castoff clothes as his thoughts drift to wondering what you’ll wear when you emerge from your drenching dip. Fingering the thin white cotton of your t-shirt, he divines it will surely turn translucent when soaked through and stick to the supple curves of your body – a development that will do nothing to quell other rapidly escalating developments transpiring in his wantonly dissenting vessel. There’s little time for him to dwell on planning a defense against the eventuality of the reversal of your submersion; in the periphery of his vision, he witnesses you rise in a cascade of clear water, bare feet and resplendently wet figure proceeding to pick a graceful path toward him over the rounded rocks.

The heat of his furtive gape steeps into your already saturated skin. His visibly quivering confidence as he tries and fails to redirect his regard captivates you. You’d have thought an angel would be unmoved by nudity. After all, he beheld the creation of humankind, observed Adam and Eve before the venom of modesty tainted the blood rushing through their veins – a shyness sustained still in their descendants; a shyness you increasingly remember in yourself as you close the distance to him. Your exhibition of boldness wavers in the demure crossing of your arms over your breast and sex.

His discomfiture dissipates upon seeing your insecurity. Stooping to place your clothes in a neat pile, he shrugs off his coat, strides forward, and wraps it hurriedly around your shoulders. Knowing full well there is no one save a smattering of lightning bugs engrossed in their own luminescent conversation, he scans the stretch of shore for unwelcome onlookers as he snugs the sagging material taut to shield against exposure and dry you.

“Thank you.” Licking at several stray droplets of water wending over your upper lip, you avoid his gaze by looking straight up at the mushrooming clouds refracting ghostly golden glimmers of distant lightning. Booming echoes muffled through the trees, thunder rumbles somewhere far off. The air, absent the departed breeze of day and stagnant with calm ahead of the oncoming storm, swells oppressively thicker between you. “Is it always like this?” you ask.

Your inquiry, of course, refers to the sultry weather; the angel’s dazed intellect, however, distracts metaphorically to acknowledge in his seemingly endless, and multiply resurrected existence, that no, it’s never been like this for him with anyone else – angel, human, or otherwise. No one before you succeeded in awakening this ache of irrepressible want within him – a longing and desire to not only care for you and protect you, but to ensure your happiness by pleasing you in every way conceivable. It’s a feeling so foreign to celestial custom he has no idea where, in a tidal wave of sentiments ranging from a humble declaration of devotion to an impiously reverent show of passion, to begin.

“Cas?” In the silence, you peer into his pensive features.

His concentration resides somewhere between here and the center of the universe as he endeavors to determine what to do next; if he has the right, considering what you’ve been through because of him, to do anything at all without knowing for certain it’s also what you want. He resolves his attention on your searching eyes, his focus falters to the soft temptation of your questioningly parted lips.

The entranced flicker of his blues does not escape your notice; your tongue darts to dampen your lips in enticement. The subtle strain etched in the lines of his face as if he’s holding back prompts you to prod, “What were you thinking about just now . . . when you got quiet?” What you want to know is why he hasn’t laid siege to your mouth when all signs point to a kiss.

He has several specific answers: The distance of separation he must cross rounded up to the nearest hundredth of a millimeter in order to caress the pink petals of your lips with his pouting ones to feel the swift rise of life surging thereon beneath the delicate tissue. The inopportuneness of the approaching storm, which he calculates will douse you both in rain in 2 minutes and 8 seconds, well before you could make it back to the shelter of the bunker. The radiant warmth of your flesh beneath his fingers where they encircle your upper arms helping to secure his coat from slipping off your frame. How, although the themes of free will and choice continually preoccupy his existence, actually choosing never gets easier. How the brightening cloudbursts of lighting reflected in the beads of water amassed on your brow pale in comparison to the vibrancy of beauty originating within your soul. And whether, like the pearlescent raised scar crowning the bend of your knee that he knew existed based on a memory laid bare to him while healing you days ago and then literally as you rose out of the water tonight, an injury that grieved you for weeks but with which you associate the happy memory of learning to peddle your bike at age 6 without training wheels, you could one day rewrite the painful scars of what he did to you with similar happiness.

He shares none of this rich and poignant introspection with you; instead, formality of his demeanor stiffening, Adams apple undulating beneath the scruff prickling his neck to swallow his conflict of indecisiveness, he defaults in his uncertainty to stating an entirely innocuous and impersonal fact to deflect the pressure mounting in his heart. “Are you aware that the human body is made up of, on average, approximately 60% water? I’ve always thought it’s why humans feel so at ease submerging themselves in a treacherous element powerful enough to have helped hew the very planet.”

“Oh.” You utter the ambiguous, vaguely disappointed, vowel sound aloud – perhaps you read his unspoken cues wrong. “That’s, uh . . . interesting.”

He realizes although he doesn’t know what the right thing to do is, this was definitely the wrong thing to say.

In inclement intervention of the awkwardness, thunder cracks and growls overhead. A single fat cold raindrop splatters your cheek. Innumerable of its drizzling kin follow as the clouds unburden themselves of moisture a solid half minute before the angel anticipated. Bending to pick up your water-logged clothes before they wash away in the deluge, your heel slips.

Atropos, sister of fate, being no friend of the angel’s, he’s a dozen or so seconds too late to alter his choice. Routed, he snakes an arm around your waist for support and steers you toward the canopied cover of the tree line.

Next: Ch. 11 - Under Your Spell

[earthstellar]

uh oh here I go writing again, because oh god I love this 

The First Night 

Alpha Trion had raced to the edges of Iacon, with a sense of urgency and hope that he had not dared to feel since the loss of Solus Prime. 

There was no beacon or marker, no ping or coordinates-- Instead, there had been an insistent tugging in his spark, small flares and flickers like small power surges, which had nearly inspired him to seek medical aid. Nothing lives forever. 

But it had not been his time yet; Another duty had been bestowed upon him. 

In his alt-mode, few bots recognised him, as the last time he had needed to utilise such speed was long before any of the current citizens of Iacon had ever been forged. 

Grateful for his unintentional disguise, Alpha Trion took roads that no others knew still existed, flashes of potential futures and possible outcomes consuming his peripheral vision in the way they so often did. 

This was no time to allow for distraction. Only one outcome would be acceptable. He followed the persistent tugging of his spark, steering in a near-meditative state. 

The borders of the city were approaching, the glimmering towers of government and influence drifting further behind him like embers wafting away from an open fire, the dual moons of Cybertron hanging large in the sky overhead as they framed the stars above. 

A short distance beyond the circular road which formed the outer edge of Iacon’s city-state territory, his spark stopped flaring. 

Stopping so instantly as to nearly defy physics, he returned to his root mode and began to walk. Slowly, carefully, so that he might be seen. 

But it was Alpha Trion who spotted the Thirteenth Prime, undeniably and irrefutably, his spark forged by Primus, entirely unique. 

In the shape of a young Cybertronian, so young as to still be missing sections of basic protective plating which had not yet developed around his protoform, Thirteen looked up at him with optics which still held the inquisitive gaze of his previous life. 

And with the dirt-covered, primal aggression of a feral sparkling, Thirteen proceeded to trill in confusion before growling in defensive rage, fuelled only by the instinctive urge to fight for survival. 

A trait that Onyx Prime had insisted be added to the Well, so that their people may not succumb to predators in their infancy. Alpha Trion had questioned this logic at the time, and continued to do so in the present moment, as while it did indeed make their sparklings more intimidating to the turbofoxes which tended to linger around hot spots in more distant regions of Cybertron, it unfortunately also presented certain... difficulties. 

Carefully picking up the struggling, filthy youngling as it squirmed violently in his servos, he could not resist holding Thirteen’s reincarnation to his chestplate, allowing his spark to hopefully soothe the small Prime. 

Instead, Alpha Trion listened to the gentle clicking and tapping noises as Thirteen attempted to gnaw at the edges of his armour for the duration of the long, careful journey back to the Archives. 

It was painless, but it raised one of many new and pressing concerns: Were there any medics in Iacon who specialised in denta repairs for sparklings? 

---

Alpha Trion would not ever regret having followed his spark. Not in this regard; It was too important to possibly have ignored. 

However, it was becoming clear that there would be interesting challenges to contend with, between the current time and any one of the multitudes of futures he could see. 

He had always been better at determining potential events, rather than sorting out immediate ones. 

At the moment, the little Thirteen was exhausted.

Upon returning with a feral sparkling, he had surely given his staff a severe fright, and perhaps had proceeded to demand too much of them when seeking to arrange an immediate fitting of sparkling armour. 

It had made him oddly nervous, seeing protoform exposed. 

(Is this the anxiety Solus had sometimes felt over the beings she herself had created? She would laugh at him, now.)

It was purely coincidence that Remedy hadn’t yet entered recharge, having stayed up late to finish some near-overdue paperwork; He had agreed to send along one of the favoured doctors at Iacon Medical to see to Thirteen’s needs. 

While the corruption of the Council disgusted and exhausted Alpha Trion, on this singular occasion, it had been beneficial: Taking advantage of his respected position and utilising his public image as a doddering mystic, it was far easier than it should have been to pass Thirteen off as a rescued sparkling adopted by a faltering old mech, simply looking to raise an apprentice and perhaps to fill a void.

It was not honest, which Thirteen would not appreciate. But it was the best Alpha Trion could do, to ensure the best possible future would come to fruition. 

Although it took far longer than expected, largely owing to Thirteen’s abnormal resistance to sedation (which seemed to try the patience of the poor medic who so skilfully worked around a flurry of enraged sparkling claws), eventually before the night was over Thirteen had been cleaned and fitted with a suitable custom set of armour.

He would grow out of it soon, but the helm design was special, and those features would be retained at least in part for the rest of his life. Alpha Trion had specified designs as close to Thirteen’s original appearance as possible; Continuity is of great importance to a storyteller, and far be it from him to change the design Primus himself had granted Thirteen so long ago. 

Once the good doctor had left, somewhat exhausted himself but rather pleased with his handiwork (and soothed additionally with the knowledge that Alpha Trion would indeed be praising his skills to Remedy directly at the first opportunity to do so), finally the two of them had the Archives to themselves. 

Alpha Trion had long dismissed his staff, after the initial furor, and even knowing that in his current form Thirteen wouldn’t be able to hold a discussion for quite some time, it brought him great reassurance to once again have another Prime in his study. 

Reassurance, and a great deal of difficulty. 

Although Thirteen had finally fallen into recharge, seemingly warmed by his new armour, the medic had informed Alpha Trion that it was absolutely necessary to ensure the little sparkling’s fuel didn’t fall below 80% for the first few cycles after the armour had been fitted, to ensure the nanites had enough energy to fully integrate with the youngling’s frame. 

Fair and logical guidance, which Alpha Trion would have no issue with following to the letter for the sake of Thirteen’s wellbeing--

--However, the moment the sparkling had heard the pouring of energon, it was as though any sign of exhaustion vanished, his small frame once again possessed by an instinctual need for fuel. 

Sitting on one of the stools used to reach the higher-placed data pads on his personal shelves, Alpha Trion took hold of the sparkling, who immediately began to struggle and grab at nearly anything in sight that may get him closer to the energon. 

Careful not to allow any to splash on his records, Alpha Trion allowed his processor to sift through potential outcomes: In one short-term future, his desk is smeared in energon-- And so is Thirteen. 

In another, Thirteen is asleep, but he himself is soaked in energon and covered in grooves from sparkling scratches along his plating, various records strewn about and dotted in energon as well. 

In yet another, they are both soaked in energon, but the records (and his desk) are unscathed, and Thirteen is asleep. 

Sighing, long accustomed to having no choice but to choose the least-harmful outcome, Alpha Trion allowed Thirteen to grab his beard in little fists, as he gently kicked away a box of data pads that had yet to be labelled and classified so that they were out of range of any stray energon. 

It had been a long night, would be a longer day, and it would be a longer time still until Thirteen would ever recall his identity, his rightful title...

...A title that he could not be given now, at this stage. Not publicly. 

As the sparkling jostled the energon cube nearly completely out of Alpha Trion’s grip, eventually reaching over far enough to shove his entire fist into the energon and bring it to his faceplate, trilling happilly and licking it off his tiny digits between little growls, Alpha Trion took the opportunity to begin considering a designation for the reincarnated Prime.

---

In the morning, Alpha Trion was awoken by Indexa, one of his senior archivists, who had (to her great shock) stumbled onto quite the scene.

In the short-term future that had occurred in this reality, the records and his desk had thankfully been spared, but he himself was soaked with energon-- And so was Thirteen, who was currently sleeping whilst curled into a small defensive ball against Alpha Trion’s side, balanced between the older mech and the wall of data pads behind them. 

Desperately not wanting to awaken the small Prime, Alpha Trion would need to apologise to Indexa later for his rather informal appearance-- There was simply no reward to be gained if sitting upright resulted in more sparkling fury. 

“Good morning, Indexa. I would assume you are seeking the updated directory containing the revised historical geographical data of the Tetrahexian region. I am afraid I must disappoint you, as I was rather occupied last evening. Instead of the answers you seek, I have a query for you.” 

“Y-Yes? Alpha Trion, sir? I am happy to assist if I can...” She spoke softly, something Alpha Trion was immensely grateful for. 

“Do you, by any chance, happen to have any experience with sparklings?” 

“I, ah, no, sir. I’m afraid not. We do have a rather comprehensive listing of youngling rearing resources, however...” 

“Of course. Leave it to an archivist to forget to check the archives; In my old age, I must be slipping.” 

“May I... Ask you something, sir?” 

“It is only fair, Indexa. Please do; What is knowledge worth, if it is not shared?” 

“Thank you, sir. I was... unaware, that you had a sparkling. Not to overstep, sir; I only wish to know what accommodations will need to be made.”

Ah, Indexa. Ever practical. And very curious, underneath her immense restraint. It was why Alpha Trion liked her. She had an uncanny ability to always remind him of things he may not have considered, while he was busy considering so much else. Old age, indeed. 

“It is a recent development, yes; I am sure your colleagues will be regaling you with their experiences here last night, or perhaps, complaining to you about it. Either way, please contact CMO Remedy at Iacon Medical and inform him that the doctor he sent to attend to our rather particular emergent needs last night has done fine work, and that I request he send the same doctor to us in the future.”

“Yes, sir. Anything else?” 

“Please also inform him that the sparkling has been assigned a designation: Orion Pax.” 

--

EDIT: Now here on AO3, which is where I probably should have posted this in the first place, but tbh I wrote this whole thing in the Tumblr text post window so like, idk 

I’ve been obsessing over little transformer bitlets, particularly @robotspacealien ‘s baby Orion design (and related posts).