Title: Talk Science To Me.

Author: Rapa-Nuiz dA & .

Rating: T.

Summary: Inferno believes there can't ever be anything between himself and Perceptor; Red Alert is determined to prove him wrong. G1, setbefore the events of Microbots. Perceptor/Inferno, Red Alert/Wheeljack. Slash, don't like, don't read, etc.

Author's Notes: No, I don't really know how a Transmat works, and yes, I do believe Cybertronians can cry. So there. :D

When Perceptor entered the canteen at approximately 01:17am, Inferno unconsciously sat up straighter, squared his shoulders, and tried to look less tired than he had been before. He also stopped re-telling his favourite joke - the one to do with the slagbot and the pneumonic drill - and instead focused his optics diligently on the untouched data-pad before him. It was the list of Ratchet's new "Health and Safety Regulations" (whatever the slag they were, anyway), and before launching into his joke Inferno had been complaining that he couldn't understand a word of them. Now he studied them as though his life depended on it.

Red Alert smirked to himself.

Perceptor was what Grapple referred to as "an odd one". He was quiet - except when something sparked his interest, and then he was verbose - and seemed content to work by himself in his own small lab, toiling away at microchips and mechanical biology, and whatever else he did in there. But every once in a while one of the other Autobots would shuffle their pedes self-consciously and suggest they had seen some small smidge of loneliness in the microscope's optics, and shouldn't they invite him to a staff poker game? So they would try, and Perceptor would just smile gently and thank them and say he was perfectly fine writing his new theory on X, and actually X was very interesting, and wouldn't they like to know more about X? So then the next altruistic suggestion of inviting Perceptor anywhere would result in the suggester himself being asked if he wanted his audials talked off, no, okay then, we won't ask, will we.

Lather, rinse, repeat.

Inferno had always kept quiet on the subject, despite his predilection for joining in where light-sparked ribbing was involved. He would totter meekly along with the others as they crowded into the laboratory, and not-quite look at Perceptor as whoever it was this week asked if he wouldn't like to come and lose a game of poker against Sunstreaker, haha, but the crucial difference came when Perceptor retaliated to the request by talking about X, Y, or Z. Inferno's audials, rather than bleeding or attempting to run away, pricked interestedly, and his optics would finally lock onto the excited scientist, and he would listen. And afterwards, as the others scurried away, guffawing, he would trail along behind them, lost in thought, a sad, faraway look written across his handsome face-plates.

Red Alert had finally worked up the courage to ask him about this peculiar leave from standardised behaviour one night as they patrolled the Ark's home valley. Inferno's engine had stuttered and he had grunted disapprovingly at Red's own peculiar audacity, but after a few more miles he had caved and admitted that Perceptor fascinated him.

"Don't you find him interestin'?" He'd asked, almost shyly. "He's got that lovely voice, and he knows everythin' about everythin'. I love ta hear him talk. Don't you?"

"Not really," Red Alert said.

"That's a shame," said Inferno. "I wish I could be smart like him."

"I don't think I've ever seen the two of you speak," Red Alert skidded to a halt and transformed. He began searching the ground for the exterior camera they'd come outside to fix.

"Naw," Inferno joined his friend in transformation, then perched clumsily on a large boulder and watched Red search. The Lamborghini straightened just in time to catch a subdued expression settle on Inferno's face-plates. "What would we have ta talk 'bout? Guns?" He shrugged, then thrust out one thick, red arm. "Camera's that way, by the way. You stopped a little early."

Since that conversation, Red Alert had been monitoring Inferno's behaviour towards Perceptor, and the results half-amused, half-saddened him. Whenever Perceptor was in the same room, Inferno's voice failed him; whenever on the same mission, his modesty did the same. There were injuries sustained purely to impress (not that Perceptor did) and words left unsaid purely to save embarrassment. Red Alert himself struggled from a deep scar of self-loathing, and he was honestly startled to see that same scar reflected in his brave and gregarious hero-friend. Inferno was a good warrior, and knew it. He was also not too bright, and he knew this, too. So he admired Perceptor from afar, recognising that there could be nothing between them, no common interest - or even common language - that could bind them, and grew more and more depressed each day.

Red Alert was not going to stand by and let this happen. Inferno had been a good friend and mentor to him over the years, and he owed him what felt like a thousand favours. Bringing himself back into the present hour, he waited for Perceptor to fetch a cube of med-grade from the dispenser, then called out to him. "Perceptor - hi. This seat's free if you're stopping."

The scientist looked surprised, then grateful, then nervously friendly as he approached the table. Inferno shot Red Alert a warning glance that quickly vanished under a neutral smile as the microscope joined them.

"Thank you!" Perceptor exclaimed as he sat down. "This is the first break I feel I've had in days. I've been working on a device that will allow...oh." He paused and chuckled self-consciously. "Sorry. You probably don't want to hear about that."

"Sure I do," said Red Alert. He threw Inferno a meaningful look that was answered with another scowl. Both looks went unnoticed by their guest.

"Yeah, hit us up, Perceptor," Inferno muttered.

Perceptor beamed, and launched into an explanation. He called his device the Transmat Reduction Beam, and it would be used to shrink or enlarge objects that required repairing. The basic technology worked around the premise that atoms could be super-energised to become temporarily larger, and Perceptor was pleased to report that he'd managed to shrink a bolt down to the size of an Earth ant for twenty minutes. "Not much of a feat, but still progress," he concluded proudly, noticing with pink-cheek-plated pleasure that both of his table-mates were still listening to him.

Inferno blinked, then frowned. His voice stuttered slightly at the start, but only Red Alert clocked it. "I don't get it," he said. "How does that even work?"

"Oh," Perceptor chuckled, "I couldn't make the science simple enough to explain to you."

Red Alert winced and Inferno looked stung. "Right," the warrior said stiffly. "'Course not," he continued quietly. "Well, uh, if you'll excuse me, I got some paperwork that needs shiftin' before I turn in."

"I can't believe you said that," Red Alert mock-snapped after Inferno had hurried out of the canteen, clutching his data-pad to his chest as though his life depended on it.

Perceptor jerked at the anger in the Security Director's voice. "Wh-what?" He asked. "I just...meant...oh, Primus! No, I didn't mean to imply -"

"Well you did. Poor Inferno." Red Alert carefully laid his sugary concern voice on just thick enough to make Perceptor look uncomfortable. "Bless his spark, he knows he's not the brightest Autobot around, there was no reason to rub it in!"

"I can assure you that wasn't what I meant!" Perceptor replied, and Red Alert was pleased to see the scientist's optics were wide with guilty alarm. "Besides," he continued in a somewhat different, strangled tone, "what does Inferno care what I think about him? I doubt we've ever exchanged so much as a greeting before today!"

Red Alert's expression cooled considerably. "He does care, actually," he said quietly. "He cares a great deal. That's why you've never spoken. He doesn't want to sound stupid in front of you."

Perceptor looked bewildered. "Stupid...?" He echoed. "What? No - Inferno isn't stupid. He's just not a scientist, that's all. I'm sure if he tried to explain how he programmed his own targeting system with all of the variables needed on a battlefield, I wouldn't understand him either, no matter how much he dumbed it down! That's what I meant when I said...why does he care about sounding stupid in front of me?"

Red Alert sighed. "I'm sworn to secrecy," he said. Then he dipped one digit into his low-grade, and drew a simplified picture of a spark on the battered and dented metal of the table that stretched between himself and the scientist.

Perceptor frowned.

Red Alert added an Energy Arrow right through the middle of it.

The frown disappeared, and was replaced by an 'o' of surprise.

"Really?" Perceptor asked softly, after a moment's pause. "This isn't...a trick?"

Red Alert felt relief flood his systems. As much as he had been studying Inferno's frame-language, he had been watching Perceptor's all the more. Inferno was a close friend and had been for years, and could be read like a data-book with little or no effort; Perceptor, on the other servo, with his shy looks and quiet confidence, was a lot harder to pin down. The look of delight on his face-plates when he had been invited to share a table was solely aimed at Inferno. And during his discourse on the Transmat Reduction Beam, his optics had seldom left the fire engine's own; it was as though Red Alert was invisible to the pair of them. Just as he wanted it.

"Why would it be a trick?" Red Alert asked. "I'm not like Brawn or Ironhide or any of the others. Inferno is my best friend, and I owe my life to him several times over. It's in my interests to see him happy." He leant back in his seat and fixed Perceptor with a piercing, hostile gaze. "And if you don't make him happy, Perceptor," he said icily, "I am going to make you very, very unhappy."

Perceptor fought against the urge to gulp and failed. "Of course, Red," he said. "I...I just didn't think anything could ever...so I never approached him."

Red Alert glowered. "You're idiots, the pair of you," he said. "Now go and apologise to Inferno before he feels any more slag about himself than he already does."

Inferno's room was large and messy. Data-pads were strewn everywhere - desk, floor, berth, shelves, cyberfish tank - whilst a collection of guns hung on one wall, and a selection of grenades on the other. Perceptor knew they were all duds without studying them too closely - he had heard others speak of Inferno's gun collection with awe - but they still made him feel nervous as he shuffled past them into the room.

Inferno was sat at his desk with his back to the door. "Go away Red," he grunted thickly. "I'm not in th'mood for pleasantries."

Perceptor cleared his vocal unit. "I'll be sure to tell him when I next see him," he said gently.

Inferno flinched at the sound of his voice, then turned around slowly, revealing face-plates that were slightly damper than they ought to have been. "What're you doin' here?" He asked angrily, swiping at his face with his servos. "Haven't you gotta science project to be gettin' back to?"

"It can wait," Perceptor said earnestly. He knelt down in front of Inferno's chair so that he could peer up into the other mech's miserable, uncertain optics. "I came to apologise for what I said in the canteen. I didn't mean to imply that you were stupid, Inferno, only that you'd need two and a half million years' worth of education to even begin to understand what I was talking about. If it makes you feel any better, Wheeljack doesn't get it either."

"Sure," said Inferno flatly. "But that apology coulda waited 'till the mornin', so...why're you really here?" He felt a flare of unexpected anger hit him like a heatwave. "Ta gloat some more about other stuff I couldn't understand?"

"No," said Perceptor evenly, "I'm here to...to tell you how handsome you are." Anger changed to bewilderment, and he felt empowered by the others' hesitation. "And how incredible you look in the arena of war, with your optics flashing fire and your frame burning with the heat of the battle. And how that flame can turn to compassion when you see one of your friends injured, and how you lighten and brighten any room you're in with your jokes and your laughter. And..." His voice tailed off and he found his own optics fixed on the floor, the fervency of embarrassment wreathing his head. "And how you make me feel whenever I look at you, and how I feel when I tell myself I can never have you, because you're a warrior and I'm a scientist, and things like that don't happen in real life, only in the holo-vids and romance novels Cosmos keeps hidden under his berth, and..." He had to stop. His vents were labouring too heavily under the strain; he was not used to being so open with another. He held friendships with Wheeljack, Ratchet, Hoist and Cosmos; but not affection that ran as deep as this. Now released, it threatened to choke him.

He felt Inferno's continued doubt, and bit back a wave of sudden crushing sadness. "Please," he said, voice thin and brittle under the strain. "Red Alert said it wasn't a trick. He said you really feel this way, too. Please. Just put me out of my misery."

He felt a slight pressure on his scope. Looking up, he saw Inferno was smiling, and momentarily felt his spark sink. Then he focused on what the fire engine was saying. "...So, you think you're too smart for me, and I think I'm too dumb for you," Inferno summarised. "Ain't we a pair." The smile disappeared. "I'm willin' to give this a try if you are, darlin', but I don't think we're gonna have a lot to talk about. I mean, common interests and...stuff."

A pause. Then:

"Perhaps you could teach me the art of war, soldier." Perceptor suggested, trying to sound more confident than he felt. The light blush of his face-plates gave away the nervousness fluttered in his spark-case.

Inferno smiled, and leant forwards. "No," he purred, placing one large digit under Perceptor's chin and bringing their lip-plates within brushing distance. "I want you to talk science to me, scientist." His servos settled on both of Perceptor's upper-arms, and he pulled the scientist flush against his own frame. "All - night - long." He added, almost as an afterthought. He really had to stop spending time with Jazz when the latter was in a singing mood.

Wheeljack put his servos on the back of Red Alert's chair and leant over his berthmate. "Perceptor was late inta the lab today," he said accusingly. "And Perceptor is never late ta anyplace."

"How interesting," said Red Alert, innocently.

"So..." The mechanic pushed the chair hard with his left servo so that it spun around to face him. "I take it my plan of sendin' Perceptor ta the canteen when I knew you two were in there worked brilliantly, eh?"

Red Alert crossed one leg over the other and considered. "No," he said. "If it weren't for me asking him to, Perceptor wouldn't have joined us, so the plan would have failed miserably."

Wheeljack scowled. "But if I hadn'ta sent him in the first place, you couldn'ta invited him to your table, so there." He pouted behind his face-mask, glad Red Alert couldn't see it.

Red Alert smiled, grinned, chuckled, shook his head, then dislodged Wheeljack's servos from his chair and turned to face the control panel again.

"What?" Wheeljack demanded. "What? What's with the grinnin'? What's wrong?"

"Nothing," said Red Alert, happily. "For the first time since we crash-landed here, nothing is wrong. Or going wrong. Or going to be going wrong. It's a lovely feeling."

Wheeljack frowned at Red's back, then gave up his shoulders in a shrug. Sighing, he went back to put up with Perceptor's dreamy expression, and the half-constructed Negavator which sat silently in the laboratory below, the perfect blend of weaponry and science, just waiting to be let out to wreak havoc on the world.