#it probably seems like i’m being extremely dramatic abt this and maybe i am but this is my home

[thetriggeredhappy]

yo whats good @engiespyweek this is a day late but like dont worry abt it

day 2: hurt / comfort

(warnings for injury, specifically from burns. takes place around Robots Time)

-

Back before the robots, they were expected to work regular hours. Normal days. Practically a nine-to-five, plus a couple of hours most days, but never too long after sundown—and unless they had a mission off-base, they’d get weekends off. It was the most organized war any of them had ever been a part of, to be honest. And it was taxing, sure, the pain and bloodshed, but at least according to Scout it still beat working in food service.

And it wasn’t even all that scary half the time—before the robots, the team was invincible in most senses of the word. It would take some extremely particular situations to kill them, situations they were rarely anywhere near. A doctor on staff, bars in town and a full liquor cabinet on base, a pay grade that few of them even dreamed of, it was a good place to be in their lives. They considered themselves lucky, most days.

But that was before the robots.

The sun was setting over wherever the hell they were. They were going on their second day here, which was usually about how long they spent in one place before they had to move again, following some fickle change of the wind to intercept the next few waves of automatons.

They were exhausted. They didn’t have breaks, truth be told, and only sometimes got to sleep—mostly on the drive to their next destination, sometimes woken up during the night by the distant metallic clanging that functioned as the trumpets of war. Modern era, and all.

Medic was truly running on his last legs. He half operated his infirmary out of the back of one of the trucks they used to transport their equipment, not seeing reason to bother unpacking most days. Soldier was in a tizzy himself, constantly checking and rechecking their supplies, inventory being the only job left out of the multitude he’d had on base before and therefore being one he did near-constantly, and his consensus seemed to be that they were running low on... well, everything. Raiding abandoned warehouses for ammunition and guns just wasn’t cutting it anymore. They’d started to send some of the mercs out hunting for scrap metal when they had the time, and the Engineer was left to work practically around the clock trying to feed it to dispensers and restock to have at least enough to be prepared for battle, and Heavy tended to take over when he absolutely needed to sleep.

But then there were the mercenaries who didn’t have much to do but sit and stew. Sniper mostly took to perching alone somewhere he could watch for the distant dust clouds kicked up by the tanks. Scout ran laps around the perimeter of wherever they were posted up, and on a couple of occasions the two of them were the only warning the team got before the robots showed up. Pyro fretted, for the most part, would sweep by the busy members of the team with something to eat and a supportive pat on the arm. But even then, it was obvious the rest were going stir-crazy. Wanted to help, to take some of the weight back, to help share the load if they could.

This was about the only way Spy could help.

Engineer was having trouble keeping his eyes open, but the fatigue fought against his need to eat the tin full of... something. Meat, some kind of sauce. Spy had cooked it, since they apparently had a stove squirreled away somewhere in this particular warehouse, rations, and the team needed something ‘real’ to eat by his measure. The Engineer managed to keep awake, keep shoveling food into his mouth. Distantly, he understood that it tasted very good, and it overcame the nausea he’d been increasingly plagued with ever since all of this started.

The food was one comfort. The warm weight of Spy leaned against his back was another, the man leaned against him as he ate. Outside there was a particularly vibrant sunset happening, that was a third one, the way the light poured through the window briefly driving away a sort of bone-deep paranoia about darkness. About fear. Apparently that was one reason his father always tried to work with the big garage door of the shop open—being in the sun from time to time was important for all types of health. Or, as Spy put it, he needed to get out of his terrible little machinery lair from time to time or else one day the team would find he’d begun transforming into some sort of mole man.

It made him laugh. He missed laughing, he realized.

Once he had some food in his system, some calm, some time to sit in a position other than bent over a drafting table—and, hell, maybe the sun helped too—he started feeling remarkably more like a human being, started relaxing in increments. Started noticing little things. Dust mites lingering in the last light up above their heads. Distant talking, the distinctive laugh of Demo, Soldier barking something in reply. The sound of Spy taking a pull from his cigarette, quiet enough that he’d only really hear it this close. Quiet motion, like fiddling almost, which struck him as odd. Spy wasn’t much for fiddling and fidgeting. Broad, sweeping, dramatic gestures, those he did every time he got a good excuse—but not fidgeting. It was enough to draw his head up from where it was hanging, casting eyes back over his shoulder.

Spy wasn’t looking at him, apparently focused. “What’re you up to, there?” he asked, suddenly made aware of how rough his throat was. Probably from the near-constant full-volume shouting followed by stretches of silence he got up to these days.

“Simple first aid,” Spy said entirely too casually. So casually, in fact, that it took the Engineer a few seconds to realize what he’d even said.

“What?” he asked, turning more fully to look at Spy, at which point he blanched.

Spy had shed his jacket and rolled his sleeves up neatly a short way past his elbows and taken off his gloves and watch, and appeared to be almost done cleaning up and bandaging his left arm, having not started yet on the right one. All up and down his visible skin, and in particular across his palms and wrist, there were a series of mild to severe burns, speckles of dark red and black patching up his forearms, and the Engineer could immediately identify them as being electrical burns, not heat ones.

“How the hell did that happen?” he asked, deeply startled.

A huff of a laugh from Spy. “Mon ami, I go onto the battlefield and am expected to attack mechanical men with a metal blade,” he said, a note of amusement in his voice. “Electrocution is par for the course, I’m afraid.”

“You really oughta... find some way around that,” the Engineer said carefully. “Rubber hilt, or...”

“Most often I can only even tell I’ve caused enough damage to take down any given robot when the shock happens,” Spy shrugged. “It is not terribly painful, especially compared to gunfire. They simply begin to stack up after a while.”

A careful nod from the Engineer, even if it didn’t quite sit right with him. “Want me to help treat those?” he asked, nodding at where Spy was clearly having a bit of difficulty with bandaging his wrist one-handed.

“Our medical supplies are being too regularly depleted even besides superfluous healing of minor injuries, and as much as I would appreciate a moment sat beside one of your dispensers, I’m afraid it would not be very much in the spirit of teamwork to accept your offer, Laborer. If the remainder of our dreary little group is not allowed to accost the dispenser unnecessarily, neither am I, oui?” Spy asked, tone light.

That was one thing he’d started to learn about Spy, especially as of late. Lying and stealing were things he was well acquainted with, but never for something he considered important. To get on other people’s nerves, to get information maybe, but not something important on a whim. Getting on everyone’s nerves was a different beast than intentionally sabotaging them.

“Well,” the Engineer said, still not quite feeling right about it all. “If not that, I can at least lend a hand with wrapping those up. I know a thing or two about getting shocked. Ain’t a fun predicament to be in.”

Only a moment’s hesitation before Spy shrugged, turning to face him, and the Engineer picked up the salve and bandaging and set to work.

This was more his element. Practical problems. Practical solutions. None of the overarching dread, the waiting for the next disaster, the not quite knowing what to do with himself in the miliseconds before the next chore, the next job, the next drive. Just wrapping a wound. Just fixing a problem.

Distantly, there was the sound of something clattering, Demo cheering. The sun was now out of view, and he heard the sound of lights buzzing to life across the area. The light was getting low, and cold was starting to settle into place, more than welcome after yet another sweltering desert day. The smell of hot metal and sweat faded with each breeze that passed through, leaving only the smell of chilly night air, fresh and welcome. By the time it got dim enough to start making him squint to see properly, and he started to wonder whether he should just push through or get a light from somewhere, he realized he was done.

But instead of a twitchiness, an itch to find something else, the urge to keep moving and to find the next thing he needed to work on, he just felt satisfied. Clean bandages, neat wrappings. A vast improvement over before. And when he looked up to see how Spy felt about it all, the man was smiling, just a little, just enough to see even in how dim the room was.

“...What’s the smirk about?” he asked, feeling a bit embarrassed, as if he was missing something.

“Nothing,” Spy said easily, “I suppose I’m just glad you seem to be feeling better.”

A pause, during which the Engineer realized Spy was right. The tension was gone, the ache in his head was fading into a simple weight, and the nausea had settled into nothingness, leaving him relaxed, steady. He blinked.

“Apologies if I’ve overstepped my boundaries,” Spy said after a few moments of that stunned silence, searching his face. “It’s just that for the last several weeks you’ve been stomping around with the third most sour expression I’ve ever seen on you, and it seemed as though nobody else was going to bother stepping in any time soon. I thought that perhaps food and fresh air and polite company may remedy things somewhat, and you seemed determined to only interact with us when you deem it productive.”

“You burned yourself just to get me to sit in one place for a while?” he asked, taken aback.

“Oh, no, non, these burns are truly fairly standard by now,” Spy waved off easily, carefully pulling back on his gloves and watch over the bandages, “I simply prefer to tend to them on my own, the majority of the time. Non, simply a convenient excuse to need your help.”

A pause. “Of all the ridiculous things,” he marveled, blinking at Spy.

In the darkness, he could only barely make out the way Spy’s mouth ticked up into a smirk, watching as he rolled his sleeves back down neatly and reached for his suit jacket. “Well, believe it or not, Laborer, I have been known to stoop to such lows as doing what you call ‘ridiculous things’,” he said, doing his jacket up in an easy motion in the same moment that he rose to his feet, “when I find them to be the only way I can possibly break through to ridiculous men.”

He only had time to sputter over the comment for a second before a gloved hand found his chin, tilting his head up just enough for Spy to lay a kiss soundly to either cheek, and only had time to sputter over that for a second before Spy was snickering and cloaking, a puff of smoke in his wake as he disappeared into the increasing night.

His face felt hot, and he felt that restless energy again, but for an entirely different reason than before, because he wasn’t positive, but he was fairly sure cheek kissing was the sort of thing you greeted someone with when you only meant it in a friendly sort of way, and his brain was far too scrambled to remember it properly just then.

Well. Now he had something to think about besides the robots, at least. Damn shame it couldn’t be a nice, neat, practical problem, but despite his best efforts, he really couldn’t find it in him to mind.

Oh, damn it all.

#engiespyweek21 #engiespy #napoleon complex #tf2 #team fortress 2 #shut up me #my fanfiction #here's hoping this formats right fingers cross

[tfw-no-tennis]

mtmte liveblog issues 4&5

its delphi time babey

I'm sorry but drift & co look like such fuckin nerds on their scooter things on the cover lmaooo

oh god. seeing the first page just reminded me of how horribly confused i was for this whole little arc the first time i read it. i was like ok, who are all these new characters, and also why does everyone look so similar

anyways now i now what's going on. i love first aid

love the running continuity of rung being the literal only psychologist on cybertron (except for fr*id but that's later). no wonder everyone's fucked up they all have to share a single therapist 

ok i find it extremely funny that first aid was demoted from doctor to nurse, as if that's a thing that happens EVER - I mean it'd be one thing if first aid was a nurse practitioner (which i doubt is a position that exists here), at least that demotion would make sense, but like...the doctors i work with don't know how to do most nurse stuff (like BP, cathing, vaccinations, hell even using some of the thermometers - that's all stuff nurses/etc do), so demoting one to a nurse would be a disaster (just like promoting a really good nurse to a doctor would be a bad idea). anyways i know I'm being pedantic but it Be like that when you work in the medical field and read something that has medicine-related stuff in it

i love swerve giving ratchet the tiniest free drink ever lmaooo

is that skids being a rowdy drunk in the bg lmaoooo

unironically i love medical statistics. keep it comin

i love magnus’s giant sternal chestpiece thing. its like a bird’s sternum but without the massive pec muscles attached 

i love magnus and rodimus’s dynamic so much

oh pipes....im so sorry but this fun space adventure is going to be not so much fun for you

ratchets ideologies are certainly interesting, and i liked seeing how they changed over the course of the story

drift: why would i be SCARED of the DJD, I've got a SWORD, two swords even,

hvbhajkhfbsdjkf pipes really said ‘oi, you two - what's this, then?’ that's the most british fucking thing, that's literally something i say when I'm doing an overexaggerated british accent, oh my god,

PIPES IS SUCH A TINY DUMBASS. ILY SIR BUT WHAT ARE YOU DOING

aaaand now you're covered in dead bodies, pipes. look at your life, look at your choices

drift epic sword moments

drift confirmed for the kinda weird guy who has katanas that he uses to like, cut up fruit and water bottles in his backyard while rodimus films him

‘i thought i heard...bickering’ lmaooooo

ah, so its covid

this arc is how i feel working in healthcare lmaooo especially now that i probably have covid 

so rewind condensed the entire war into an 11 second long cringe compilation. nice

seeing the mechanical stuff past tailgate’s visor is so cool

poor tailgate, this guy is getting slammed with history from multiple sides. and like, bias is inevitable in ANY sort of recounting of events, especially controversial historical events, so poor tg just kinda has to take it all in and decide who to listen to 

that’s...not really how immunity works, guys. also, you shouldn't be exposed to so much disease with proper ppe usage

is there even such thing as ppe in the transformers universe?? there are fluid- and contact-transmitted illnesses, so there SHOULD be

is there even OSHA in this universe??????? unbelievable 

first aid, holding a giant fucking claw clamp: we haven't tried EVERYTHING............

first aid read a human wikihow article on how to jumpstart a car and took notes 

i love tailgate’s ‘mom says its my turn on the xbox’ pose 

tailgate has a point - he’s from pre-war times, where things weren't as grey so of course he would try to divide the two sides into ‘good guys’ and ‘bad guys’

CYCLONUS BE NICE DONT HIT UR FUTURE HUSBAND

go get some character development and then maybe you'll feel better

seeing the word quarantine is making me twitchy w/my possible month-long complete isolation quarantine on the horizon

drift pulling his swords on pipes and ratchet pushing down drift’s arms...lmao

poor pipes...even tho this is completely his fault, its still rough

also jesus, pharma and ratchet look so goddamn similar, reading this was so confusing the first time around 

drifts idea of subduing pipes involves turning into a cool car and also posing with his sword

also. never gonna be over drift’s massive thighs. jesus man

ooof now drift has the rona. ouch 

poor drift, his covid realization is getting overshadowed by pharma being flung around

first aid bustin thru w/the epic medical nipple clamps and some Big Boi Backup

ok that's an epic pre-beatdown speech from fort max right there, daym 

im just gonna continue on w/issue 5 now for continuity’s sake. yay!

the cover of tailgate in magnus’s autobot school is so cute

and we open with an incredible shot of fort max str8 up ripping a guy in half. i mean, to be fair, he DID just give an epic speech about how much he was gonna do that, and he certainly followed thru

yeahhhhh, fort max is not doing so well atm

when he puts that dudes head in his chest vent thing and then snaps it shut....man 

also i fucking LOVE when their faces are shaded all in black w/only the eyes/mouth fully drawn...fantastic stuff

ratchet: phew i am not equipped to deal w/this level of Fucked Up Mental Trauma. u good m8?

ratchet is already writing up a referral to rung for fort max as this is happening

drift is just laying on the ground dying like, oh hey yeahh I'm still here too 

i fucking love when punctuation is drawn in story - like here where first aid has a little ? over his head....fav

ratchet holding drifts hand ;_; 

ok tbh ambulon having switched sides 10 yrs ago is wild bc like, 10 years is barely any time for these guys, especially in a war that lasted 4 million years. that would be like a human switching sides in a war like, 3 months before it ends. probably. i sense some math bs, I'm just extrapolating here

all that mexican standoff shit is going down and first aid is just like But That's None Of My Business

ah so ambulon is an asymptomatic carrier 

and there's first aid with the save! iconic

pharma calling ratchet ‘buddy’ hbvakjdsbfhkasdf

ooooh i love that they figured it out - and i love that twist, that transforming is what triggers the start of symptoms. remember when drift turned into a cool car? yep

s/o to Ambulon Transformers for helping me in my medical terminology courses, bc now ill always remember: Leg(tm)

also this explanation makes a ton more sense (in universe, at least) than the whole ‘i guess we as medical staff have been exposed to enough Germz that we’re more immune to this or something’ theory 

ah, i love the meaningless (to me) alien robot medical jargon 

drift and ratchet hhhhhhhhh

‘I'm too wide’ fort max L O R G E

also once again drift is forgotten in favor of a bunch of other dramatic stuff happening vbhjksdfbjhskdf

godddd i love tailgates little flashbacks where we see how Important and Special he is, complete with his ‘bomb disposal’ arm label...augh its so good! 

and tailgate’s autopedia page even reflects his lies! like, did tailgate go edit that first thing upon waking up??? seriously, I'm fascinated by tailgate’s meticulous dedication to his fake life

also the fact that ultra magnus believes everything he read on autopedia is amazing lmao

ultra magnus: you think somebody would just go on the internet and tell lies? 

fuckgin love magnus’s long ass name/title placard 

tailgate hvbahjkdfbjhaskf i mean, he’s gotten the abridged version of everything else, of course he would assume that’d be the case here too...but not on magnus’s watch

magnus cant even say ‘fun’ hvukdasdbjfkjsadf i love my uptight law dad

love rung implying that upon questioning, he would easily divulge a patient’s name and maybe even information about said patient’s treatment while under him....love the disregard for patient confidentiality and hipaa in general 

not that hipaa seems to exist here, at least not in a fully realized form 

also i mean the above genuinely, i think rung’s tendency towards at least slight malpractice is very interesting 

poor red alert....super bad luck that HE was the guy to get roped up in that overlord business 

I'm glad that, at the very least, red alert was able to prove that he was Actually hearing something to rung, rather than get brushed off completely 

god magnus and tailgate’s interactions are golden 

also tg is much more sarcastic/quippy than anyone gives him credit for tbh

‘thought warfare,’ ultra magnus says with complete seriousness. god i fucking love this comic

now i can tell pharma apart from ratchet bc pharma has let his true Petty Bitch nature emerge and you can see it in his expressions

the whole ‘tarn is addicted to transforming’ thing didn't really go anywhere, right? i feel like i noticed that on my second readthru as well 

also pharma is such an interesting character given the context of him like, trying to strike a bargain w/the djd to keep them from destroying delphi, but that arrangement inevitably kinda making him lose it as the situation escalates. he’s also just really entertaining bc i feel like he kins the joker or st and probably gets into really heated arguments w/people on twitter about just abt anything

‘sound bomb’ i love this comic

another important facet of pharma’s character becomes clear around this time as well - how he’s really into ratchet. i also choose to read them as awful exes tbh, it makes their dynamic even more entertaining

‘killmaster, with the wand’ is one of my favorite running remarks lmao

also, was killmaster even a character before mtmte? or, if he was, was he an important one? it would crack me up the most if he literally didn't exist at all, but any way you spin it is still funny 

ratchet’s tiny humansona facing off against pharma is wild

‘I'm miles from anyone i truly care about’ brutal, ratchet, drift is dying like 2 floors away (im p sure)

SUDDENLY DRIFT IS HERE, ACTUALLY 

oh don't worry first aid, that sure isn't the last we’ll be seeing of pharma 

so like, did first aid save everyone by posting that data log to his wreckers fan blog or something? lmao love it 

i love the pretty fucked up reveal of ratchet having stolen pharma’s hands. like, damn dude. 

and that wraps up the delphi arc! our first true ‘arc’ of mtmte, and a fantastic one at that. short and snappy and fresh, with some very clever writing and cool new characters, and a lot of great plot threads to be picked up later. plus, we got to see the beginnings of drift and ratchet’s whole thing (and ratchet and pharmas whole thing). and the lost light gets some much needed extra medical staff, so everyone wins! 

well, we’ll see how fort max feels about this all pretty soon.....

#lj rereads mtmte #love me some delphi

[lochnessbian]

the inherent nostalgic ache of walking after a summer rain in the bay area bc it’s so fucked up what even just a decade of climate change has done to this state

#i remember being a kid and going to whatever summer care thing my parents could find while they worked #and it would be like 9 am and i’d be wearing a sweater and hat and we’d watch the mist swirl in the eucalyptus #and i didn’t appreciate it then… i don’t like the cold or rain even now #but i’d trade anything for more days like that now #bc now summer is months and months of dry heat and sleeping on a bare mattress bc we can’t rly afford ac #and then there’s the fire season and that’s just like #devastating every year #it probably seems like i’m being extremely dramatic abt this and maybe i am but this is my home #and seeing it change like this as i’ve grown up and knowing exactly what’s happening and being powerless to stop it #makes me so fucking angry!!! and i’ll bet u can substitute ur part of the world here too i know things have gotten worse all over #fucking sucks. i miss the rain

[tearofaeons]

GUSH TO ME ABT BATTER ~Neko-Shinigxmi

Oh you mean, gush about my darling?? the light of my life? of course! @neko-shinigxmi​

First than anything! I love how stoic and expressionless he is (i find it very relatable). He generally doesn’t make a big deal out of things, for example,I’m 99% sure if someone tried to kill him he would simply go: “ok i guess you die d l ” beat absolute crap out of that person, and then return home, bathed in blood like:

“Hello,

I have Arrived.”

(I mean, does that not sound like something he would do?? i think it does.)

I really like that about him, because i do needlessly worry a lot about things that often don’t matter, so seeing him so calm and unperturbed, evenwhen scary things happen makes me feel.. alright. Like huh, maybe things aren’t that bad… maybe i can do this…

Despite being a no nonsense, down-to-earth kind of guy, he is still kind of hmm dramatic? he acts like he’s part of a play in a theater. it’s almost funny:

“It’s not a question of choice; you’re the monstrous master of this horrible factory. I’m here to make you atone for your sins.”

“You demented child of evil. The last grain of sand has fallen through the hourglass of your life.”

“I’m the one who’s going to purify the world. And you’re the pest that eats away this land. Prepare yourself.”

He says all of these things….. with a straight face, unironically. How am i not supposed to love him!? he’s making this really hard!! ;v;

And let’s not forget about that very emotional scene where Jeffphet was telling Pablo about how he killed his brother and Batter was just like:

“Whatever”

SKDJSKJDSJ my dude!! you can’t say those things!! actually, he often says things that he probably shouldn’t say, but i don’t think it’s intentional, i feel he’s simply not really good with social related situations and you know what, same. Big mood.

By law, i also have to mention that I DIE EVERYTIME he does that  ‘ :u ‘ thing, you know

THE THING !!!!!!! AHH HEART EYES!! 💖v💖

He might be expresionless but he likes to add a bit of :U to his life, you know? sdksjdk

Sometimes i feel it would be nice to sit down with him and listen him talk about baseball or whatever new thing he learned and is interested on, or even the other way around. Him listening to my problems, and helping me go through difficult things. He seems like a really good listener…. and he probably is... ugh!! c’:

I think another thing that makes him interesting to me is how we don’t know what he is (human? monster?). This is not a Canon fact, but my Batter has a very odd body language, i don’t know how to explain it, but let’s say someone pretending to be a human for the first time is probably not really good at it, you know? And well, i find that extremely adorable.

It’s cool how he can probably bend and alter his body to point of being nightmare fuel, like this:

From 1 to 10 how silly am i for wanting to hold his gigantic hands.

And yea! basically, i just want him to be happy! idk man! :‘v

fghggngn ;v; why am i such an emotional potato??

#WORDS CAN'T DESCRIBE #how much i love him #aeon destroys engilsh #he's fantastic ok #i know he destroyed the world but-- #OK WAIT #WHY DO I ALWAYS SAY THAT ABOUT MY FAVES #aeon destroys english #somebody stop me #long post