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“Ok, here’s what’s gonna happen,” announced Bulkhead as he suddenly grabbed a crate and sat down across from where Starscream was standing in the control room, the Seeker raising a brow as the Wrecker set something on the ground between them. A small huffed laugh drew the former Con’s attention to the railing where Miko was leaning over it, her expression a concerning mixture of amused and stern. “You,” the green Autobot continued, drawing the Seeker’s attention as he pointed at him firmly, “are going to sit down, play a game, and have a fun afternoon, no injuries, no sadness.”
Starscream’s wings flared as he sputtered, offended despite himself, “ Excuse me? What’s that supposed to mean? I’m perfectly capable of having ‘fun’ and I do not get that many injuries!”
Miko openly snickered at his defensive remark, leaning further over the yellow bar and commenting, “Yeah, sure, Screams. Every time you step out of the base something terrible happens to you, dude! I think you’re cursed.”
“Not every time!” the Seeker shot back, voice just barely not a screech. Then he thought about it, searching for irrefutable proof that he has managed to accomplish something with no injuries, physical or otherwise. He bit his lip when he realized he was coming up irritatingly short on examples. That patrol had ended with him being shot, that one ended up with him practically face to face with Megatron for Primus' sake, even when wandering around with Ratchet and perching on billboards his joy had been interrupted when he had seen that cursed Megaburger sign and had torn it up out of a spite that he couldn’t deny had been at least partially fuelled by unpleasant memories. Maybe he did, somewhat, have a bit of a track record of being accident prone. (Story of his life, it seemed like, one bad thing after the other.)
Miko and Bulkhead shared a look as the flier’s silence had dragged on for just a bit too long.
With an annoyed growl, Starscream came up with the brilliant retort of, “Whatever!” He crossed his arms, asking bitterly, “Just what is your big idea for a ‘fun’ ‘Starscream safe’ afternoon, since you seem to find the need to coddle such a poor delicate Seeker as myself.”
Bulkhead’s stern expression wavered into a frown, and he replied softly, “Aw, c’mon buddy, no one said that . You’ve just had to go through so much slag since you became an Autobot, I thought you’d want a chance to relax.”
Starscream threw his hands in the air frustratedly, “Then why did you phrase it like this was some sort of intervention?!”
The Wrecker drew up his shoulders self-consciously, muttering, “It was supposed to kinda sorta be a joke.”
“Well you have a terrible sense of humor,” replied Starscream dryly, re-crossing his arms at his second-favorite Autobot.
Bulkhead sighed, then said, “Ok, yeah, sure, wasn’t funny. But, it also kinda is an intervention,” the Wrecker said this with a smile that was somehow kind, lighthearted, and serious all at once, “A fun intervention.”
“A fun-tervention!” exclaimed Miko from the balcony with an excited point at her incredibly clever portmanteau.
Bulkhead looked up at the human with an approving nod, the two sharing a brief high-five before he turned back to the Seeker in front of him, “Sooo, d’ya wanna play a game?” He grinned, spreading his arms over the board in front of him. Starscream observed it critically, his arms dropping to his sides as he contemplated the idea.
“Perhaps. What were you thinking of?” He stepped closer, scanning over the board and its pieces, admittedly intrigued when it didn’t look like the handful of Cybertronian games he knew. (And could beat anyone in, thank you for asking!)
Bulkhead grimaced for a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it moment, then, grinning widely in a way that seemed very suspicious to the Seeker, gestured down at the game again and replied, “Chess! It’s a human board game.”
Starscream’s gaze flickered up to Miko, then back to the game in question. He sat down across from Bulkhead, absently picking up one of the pieces and turning it over in his hand, before holding it up near the girl, quirking a brow when the piece was taller than she was. “A human game?” he asked skeptically, “And you just happened to have one in a Cybertronian scale?”
The human girl flicked a hand dismissively, then nodded, replying eagerly, “You can find it super easy on the internet. Human-sized chess is a whole thing . RAD, right?!”
Starscream’s questioning brow raise remained, this time over the seemingly endless confusion that was the human race. Why make a board game bigger than yourself ? He shook his head, knowing he wasn’t going to get to the bottom of that any time soon, and then agreed slowly, “Alright,” setting the piece back in the place it came from. “So. How do you play this ‘chess’?”
The Wrecker explained the rules, surprisingly haltingly for him being the one to explain it to the Seeker, but Starscream followed well anyway. It was conceptually simple. Each piece had its specific movement and the player was to optimize their placement to corner their opponent. As he learned how it worked, he couldn’t help grinning as he looked over the board with new understanding, visualizing trajectories and possibilities with each piece. A game of spatial reasoning and strategy? It seemed like this game had been practically invented for the scheming Seeker.
“Alright, alright, I understand!” he urged, waving an impatient hand at where the green Autobot had started a stammering explanation of various niche rules that Starscream was fairly certain he’d have no need for, “Let us play! I believe you said white goes first?” The pieces in front of Starscream were white, so he picked up a pawn and considered it for his first move.
And considered.
And then considered some more.
He picked up each piece in turn, looking at the board and analysing the possible results of each move, his tactical suite usually used for missile launching displaying helpful guidelines of both his moves, and the possible moves of his opponent. The board was basically covered with lines since it was the first move, so at last he blinked the display away, and, with a shrug, moved the pawn in front of his king forward.
Bulkhead frowned at the board, his turn taking significantly less long as he moved a piece at random.
Starscream grinned at the options presented to him, already well at work on a plan of attack as he moved another piece.
Gameplay passed back and forth, and within a few turns Starscream was fully locked in on the game. Nothing short of Megatron himself showing up in the base could have interrupted his full concentration on the board in front of him as he cornered and captured Bulkhead’s pieces, grinning widely all the while. Each new move was a new opportunity, and Starscream relished in the tactical planning. Scheming had always been one of his main sources of stress relief outside of flying; planning the minute details, considering every possibility, getting every factor under his control. Since joining the Bots, with no more need for detailed assassination plans (which was a nice change in its own way), he hadn't had any chance to scheme in a while. But this chess! Skills he hadn't had a chance to use in awhile flared to life and he threw himself into the game eagerly. Quicker than he would like, he had Bulkhead’s king cornered and helpless.
“CHECKMATE!” he exclaimed excitedly, his wings perked happily, shaking the board slightly as he leaned over to slam his final piece down. Bulkhead groaned, and leaned his head into his hand, but he didn’t look too disappointed. In fact, he was smiling gently at the Seeker as he flicked his king over. From up above, there was a small click as Miko took a picture of the scene.
“You got me,” the Wrecker sighed, not sounding too beat up over the fact.
Starscream froze for just a moment, blinking as his tunnel vision faded along with the high of his victory and he actually registered the room around him again. With a quick shake of his head and wings to clear his processor, he settled back, looking at his opponent across the board.“Better luck next time, Bulk!” gloated Starscream good-naturedly as the Wrecker cleaned up the board. “That was almost too easy to be considered a victory. Do you need my help next time, maybe?” He grinned widely, his hands pressed flat against each other eagerly.
Bulkhead pointedly rolled his optics, but he was smiling, too. “Ah, maybe.” He gave a disgruntled huff as a piece rolled away from him, and he had to get on his knees to grab at it. He muttered offhandedly, “Not really that big on chess, so.” He stood back up to find that Starscream was levelling him with an intense and confused gaze.
“You don’t like chess?” asked the Seeker curiously.
“Ah,” stammered Bulkhead, playing with the retrieved piece in his hand awkwardly before setting it down. “Nah, not really,” he admitted, rubbing his hand on the back of his head.
“Chess is considered like universally a boring nerdy game,” chimed in Miko with her two cents from the human area, “Not a thing for us cool Wreckers!”
“ Ignoring the implied insult that I am not cool,” said Starscream, looking between his friend and the tidied up board, “Why show me this game if you don’t like playing it?”
“Cause I thought it’d be something you’d like,” answered Bulkhead plainly with a shrug.
Starscream’s wings flickered in surprise at the earnest response. Of course, he probably shouldn’t have been surprised. Ever since they had become friends, the Wrecker had been nothing but kind. Playing a game he found slightly boring was the least that he had done for the Seeker. That still didn’t mean Starscream was the best at being on the receiving end of such nice gestures, so he stammered, his wings flapping awkwardly for a moment before he replied simply, “Well. Thank you. I… did enjoy it.”
“Knew you’d like it,” remarked Bulkhead proudly.
“Yes. Though it’d be nice to have more of a challenge. No offense,” he quickly added, optics darting nervously to his friend.
Bulkhead simply laughed, “It’s alright. I know I’m not that good at it. If you want a real competition you should try playing Raf. That kid is freaky good.” As he said this, he picked up the board and the crate of pieces and held them in Starscream’s direction, the silver mech simply staring at them a moment before Bulkhead pushed the items a bit closer.
“What? What are you giving these to me for? I don’t know where they go, if you’re wanting me to put them away,” said Starscream, moving a half step away.
“Umm, we got this for you . So you can put it wherever you want,” answered the Wrecker, once again pushing the board and pieces towards Starscream, this time the Seeker’s hands simply accepting them in surprise. He looked down at the game, then up at his friend, then down at the game again, his optics squinted in thought.
“What, don’t you like it?” asked Miko, her purposefully cheerful demeanor hardly covering up an undercurrent of disappointment in her voice, revealing that she had more to do with this than just being an observer.
“I do!” Starscream hastily responded, not wanting to be the bot to make Miko upset, “I just, um,” he muttered to the side, “haven’t had a present in awhile…”
“Ok this is supposed to be an angst-free adventure,” interrupted Bulkhead, throwing an arm companionably over the flier’s shoulder, “You’re welcome for the gift. Put it in your room, or wherever. Or,” he grinned slightly viciously, surprising the Seeker, “You could play Miko?”
“Euuch!” the girl made an exaggerated sound of disgust, “And bore me to death?” she exclaimed melodramatically, throwing a hand over her forehead and falling backwards onto the couch. She pointed up vaguely into the air as she said, “No offense, Screamer, but chess is lame.”
“Offense somewhat taken,” retorted Starscream, but as Miko looked up worriedly, the Seeker was smirking, and from what little of his wing language she’d picked up on, they weren’t set back in anger or flared in hurt, so he was just being sassy for the sake of it, so she just rolled her eyes. Staring down at the game in his hands eagerly, already thinking about his next opportunity to play, he snarked, “You’re missing out, Miko. But I guess I can play against a superior human.”
The girl blew a raspberry, prompting a befuddled, and slightly disgusted, look from the Seeker. “You humans never cease to confuse. But you can at least make a halfway decent strategy game.”
Miko scoffed, but she was smiling.