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redthedragonDoing It Right (3673 words) by Red Dragon
Fandom: Transformers Generation One
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Vortex & Original Cybertronian Character (Transformers)
Characters: Vortex (Transformers), Original Cybertronian Character(s), Kickback (Transformers)
Additional Tags: Interrogation, Scheming, Board Games
Summary: Vortex's job is interrogation. He may enjoy torture, but sometimes - when the problems are real, and the intel will actually matter to him - sometimes he has to cut the crap and actually get some information out of someone. And everyone except High Command knows torture doesn't actually work.
Read on Ao3
“Hey,” Vortex said. Voice friendly, talking slow. He sat down with his thighs open and his hands on them, no weapons. Claws safely transformed away. Miserable slow work, but it was what would work. “I don’t know what they told you, but you can relax. I’m not gonna hurt you.”
The Autobot scout - a little two-wheeled moped thing by the name of Scoot, who clearly hadn’t had the good fortune of getting to change his name - stared at Vortex like he thought Vortex was going to bite him. Fair enough, that. If he were anyone else and this were anytime else, Vortex probably would. But they actually needed to know where the Autobots were taking that particular shipment, given it was full of serious high-powered munitions, and no petty disloya—ah, indiscretions—in his interrogations would be worth getting himself and Brawl and Swindle all blown up next time they went outside. So he’d have to actually do this right, which meant he’d have to play nice.
Not that Scoot knew that.
“I know you’ve probably heard stories,” Vortex continued, when Scoot didn’t say anything. “Bad ones. But believe me, you can’t believe everything you hear.”
Scoot shivered, then managed a brave glare. He sat up very straight. “I know who you are,” he said, and the way his voice quivered would’ve been cute if it wasn’t completely counterproductive right now. “I won’t give in, no matter what you do to me."
“That’s what I’m saying,” Vortex said, leaning forward. Scoot shrank back against the seat Vortex had kindly provided him as though he were trying to stay out of Vortex’s range, even though Vortex wasn’t gonna grab him and he’d literally just said so. “I’m not gonna do anything to you. I’m just here to talk.”
Scoot tensed like Vortex was going to hit him, and then shuffled around like he didn’t know what to do with himself when absolutely no blow came. The cuffs—not even stasis cuffs, normal ones, that didn’t hurt or anything—jangled in his lap. “Well I’m not going to tell you anything.”
“That’s fine,” Vortex said, modulating his voice in the vein of a gentle, encouraging note. Positive. All nice-like and pleasant. “All I need you to do is listen, then.”
Vortex slammed his fist into the side of the wall again. A third time for good measure.
“If you’re having trouble, we could always take a crack at it«crack at it»,” Kickback croaked, appearing as though he’d been summoned from a dark hallway. Of course. Vortex wasn’t the only one to come down here for a little alone time. “You seem frustrated «frustrated».”
“If I thought Bombshell would be any use, I’d have told him already,” Vortex said. “Everything’s going according to plan, anyway. If you’re here to talk about trading jobs, you’re gonna want to take that up with Onslaught.” And I don’t have the time or patience to be entertaining politics right now. Buzz off.
Kickback knew how to play stupid games, so there was no way he didn’t catch the dismissal. Go talk to my boss, get off my back. The insecticon didn’t scowl or anything, though. His processors clicked as he watched Vortex with undisguised amusement.
He’d made himself enemies among the bugs, had he? That was news to Vortex. “Look. Do you have something to say to me?”
“It’s merely… interesting,«interesting»,” Kickback said, “to see you so heated, Vortex, «Vortex». When you have a plaything all to yourself, «yourself».”
“I’m trying something new,” Vortex said, because admitting that he’d been using disproven tactics for his own entertainment would probably go over like a leaden balloon. And then, out of nothing but pique: “Bombshell would understand, but I don’t think you spend enough time doing my job to know anything specific. There’s a reason Soundwave has me doing this.”
Kickback’s clicking took on a decidedly irritated note. “I see, «I see»...”
Vortex shrugged, flexing his fingers. Okay, well, at least he could sit still now. “I gotta get back to it. Have fun lurking down here, or whatever it is you and yours do when the rest of us aren’t looking.”
“Be careful, we might extend you an invitation, «invitation»,” Kickback said.
Hm. Maybe this wasn’t meant to be a threat at all. Or maybe, because it was the bugs, it could’ve been half threat, half a game, the same way Vortex himself liked to play it. Either way, he had scrap to get back to and he wasn’t screwing around with this one. “Don’t threaten me with a good time,” he said, and turned off down the path bac to the brig. Hopefully he didn’t scare the fucking Autobot.
"I brought you a cube,” Vortex said, opening the door. The Autobot cringed away from the light like he’d done every time Vortex showed his faceplates around the brig. Scoot, his name was Scoot, Vortex had to remember that or else he’d screw up the rapport-building process. Couldn’t be having that. “It’s not a full ration. I’m sorry for that. The faction’s on power-saving procedures, so I had to pull this out of my own energon allotment. I know you’re gonna be going hungry, but this is better than nothing.”
“Is,” Scoot said, slow, “it poisoned?”
Vortex didn’t dignify that with a response. He let himself into Scoot’s cell while he took his faceplate down. He waited until Scoot was making optical contact before taking a sip. “If you don’t want it, I’ll drink it. But I wouldn’t turn energon down if I were you.”
He set the cube down, and then turned his back to pull his own seat out and set it across from the table. He could hear, behind him, the quiet scrape of glass on metal as Scoot picked it up. Perfect.
“If I don’t drink this,” Scoot said. “What are you going to do to me?”
“Nothing,” Vortex said. “I told you. I don’t want to hurt you, I’m not gonna do anything to you. All I want to do is get you situated. My job really isn’t what you think it is.”
“You torture people,” Scoot said. “I know you torture people. I’m a scout, I’m not stupid. I saw what you did to Jazz.”
Jazz had practically done that to himself. Vortex was still pretty sure the spy had wanted Vortex to work him over. It was a really good play for the Autobots, optics-wise; half the governments Megatron was trying to work with flipped out about Decepticon punitive codes and “prisoners’ rights” (an oxymoron, as far as Vortex was concerned) and the “Geneva Conventions” (whatever those were), and all the while Vortex let himself bask in the knowledge that he’d gotten what Onslaught wanted out of that. But naturally the Autobots had eaten it all up, given it had happened in basically the exact way they’d thought it did.
“They don’t want us doing that any more,” Vortex lied.
Scoot, to his credit, didn’t look convinced by that, but he did take a sip of the energon. “Wait, this isn’t low-grade.”
“I told you, I took it out of my own ration,” Vortex said, forcing artificial patience into his voice. “It’s the same midgrade the rest of us are drinking. If it’s good enough for the officers, I figure it’s good enough for you.”
Scoot dropped his gaze to the cube, then back to Vortex. “What’s your angle?”
“I told you,” Vortex said. “I only want to talk to you.” He couldn't hammer that too hard, or he'd clam up about important information, but… “We’re just hanging onto you and the other two you were brought in with until Soundwave can secure some kind of deal to trade you back for. Last I heard, High Command wanted guns. But I'm not really at liberty to tell you too much about that.”
Scoot narrowed his optics and then took another sip of the cube. “Appreciate the fuel."
“I was hoping you would,” Vortex said. “I gotta stick around down here anyway, ‘cuz part of the function they got me working is guard duty. And I know that will bore me half to death. I figure, you do me a favor, I'll do you one - d’you maybe wanna play checkers?”
“If that's a favor, can you let me go after?”
Vortex fought the urge to scowl, even though that was exactly what he’d wanted the Autobot to say. Rapport, it was about rapport. If he was comfortable enough to ask major favors, mech to mech, he wouldn't think so hard about little things like only-maybe-classified information. Didn't make it any less annoying.
“I don't know if I’ll be able to swing that one,” Vortex said. “I’ll see if I can get Swindle to help out. He’s good at negotiating. But I can't promise anything.”
Scoot stared at Vortex, and then suddenly hushed his voice. “Can you say that? Don't they have cameras in here?”
They did, and Vortex could only say it because he was lying. A camera wouldn't matter on that, anyway, not to Vortex. For him it came down to code. But he could say whatever he wanted to a prisoner, because he could only go against orders in such small ways as it hardly mattered, and Soundwave knew it. “Maybe that's a concern for other mecha,” Vortex said. “But trust me when I tell you that Soundwave is too busy to monitor us. I’m trusted here, so if nothing starts looking strange, I can get away with almost anything. All the way up to, you know, almost treason. As long as it just looks like we’re having a conversation. You understand, right?”
“Wait,” Scoot said.
“I’ll get out the checkerboard while you process,” Vortex said kindly. Fragging moron. Take the fucking hint, swallow the fucking hook.
It wasn't like he was being subtle! He was being so obvious that if he were anyone else he would be worried about a neat little visit to one of his own cells. But it had been a good few hundred years since Vortex had bothered talking circles around anyone. Hopefully his reputation would make it work. That and the way he’d sell the Decepticons down the river the second he got a chance, even though as far as he could tell that chance was never fragging coming.
They played checkers. It was fine.
Scoot was okay. Pretty decent, really. But Vortex was spoiled for checkers. He’d been playing with Onslaught for probably as long as the scout had been alive. Still, Vortex carefully made sure he lost; nearly all the processing power he expended on the game he spent keeping the score tilted toward himself but only by the kind of odds Swindle wouldn't be willing to bet on. Never less than forty-sixty, never more than seventy-thirty; the sweet spot where he wouldn't feel like Vortex was letting him win but he wouldn't think he was too outmatched. And all the while Vortex coaxed him into speaking, running his vocalizer with useless tidbits and true nonsense.
“... And that's what it was like to online in Kaon,” Vorted finished with a smile. “Now you, you tell me about something. Where did you online?”
“Roundabout Tagan Factorials,” Scoot said, their words flowing a little bit more freely. “I think, anyway. I don't remember very well. It wasn't really important. They built me and then shipped me out to Luna Two maybe an hour after my cohort onlined. Built for the war, you know?"
“Yeah,” Vortex said, fighting the urge to shake him until he shrieked. This was so boring. Maybe he could drive this around to the weapons shipment—no, it was still too early and Scoot would catch on too fast. Damn it. He had to say something, though. He covered for his moment of thought by moving one of his pieces to a different square. “They built me for evacuations. Taking off and landing vertically so I could get between buildings.”
“Ohhh,” Scoot said. “That makes sense. You’re really not like I thought you would be.”
“Like I said,” Vortex said, leaning over toward him slightly. “You can’t believe everything you hear. You shouldn’t put your piece there, I’m going to triple-jump you if you do.”
“Oh,” Scoot said, pulling his chip back a square. “Oh! Shit, thanks, ‘Tex. I didn’t even see that.”
Forcing the smile to look natural and pleasant felt like grinding gears, but Vortex made it happen.
“What happened to your hand?” Scoot asked, when Vortex came back.
“Jammed it in a door,” Vortex said, because I got so annoyed with this that I punched Brawl until he hit me back probably wouldn’t go over well. “The motion sensors here kind of suck.”
“Huh. I would’ve thought you’d have better technology than all that.”
Vortex sighed, letting his rotors clatter dramatically. “I told you, the whole faction’s on low power. Cutting the energy to the doors saves energon best used elsewhere.”
“I guess,” Scoot said.
“It’s only down here and in the storage bays, anyway,” Vortex said, with a shrug. “You’re not gonna catch anyone unawares in the command center. But who gives a damn if something’s broken down here? The ship is already falling apart.”
“Huh,” Scoot said, but less suspicious. Vortex really had to stop forgetting he was a scout, that he’d seen parts of the Nemesis more times than once. If Scoot thought he was lying to him, then Vortex was in trouble. But hopefully it just came over like a frustrated mech complaining about his job.
“They’ve got me on guard duty again,” Vortex said, instead of sticking with that one, “and I’ll be here for another two hours minimum. Covering for Swindle. You know how it is with teammates.”
“Oh, don’t even get me started,” Scoot said. “Every time they put me on assignment with Skate I remember why they split us up in the first place.”
“Yeah, so you get it,” Vortex said. “This recent assignment was with Skate, right?” Who named these guys? Scoot and Skate? Ridiculous. The sooner they picked a better set, the better.
“Ugh, yeah. He got away, though, you said?”
“Yeah, he got away.” In fact, everyone else in Scoot’s team had gotten away. Vortex early on had decided, for some inexplicable reason, that he wanted to tell Scoot otherwise, and now of course he was paying for it; but thinking that the mission had been a complete failure would hopefully mean that Scoot was a little looser-lipped with the parameters of what they were doing. And he was! Vortex had gotten a destination out of him already, which was more than they’d had before. But he still hadn’t let slip just what was in those boxes.
“Good,” Scoot said. “I was worried about him. He’s terrified of being captured. But this is—none of this is how I expected it to be. We’re just sitting here.”
“Your commanders have all the reason in the world to make us sound horrible,” Vortex pointed out. “But, ah, I don’t want to talk about—faction politics. Not really my place. What about—”
“Wait,” Scoot said. “But who else is better to talk about faction politics with? I don’t get to talk with Decepticons much.”
“I don’t want to talk about faction politics,” Vortex stressed.
“You said it wasn’t your place,” Scoot said.
“That either. The more I talk about, the more I’m likely to get in trouble. Do you understand? I don’t want to talk about faction politics.”
“Oh, scrap, right,” Scoot said. “Almost forgot. No one ever really talks about you being… you know.”
“Yeah, I noticed,” Vortex said, because come on. “Anyway. Point is, let’s talk about something else. I don’t know, it’s been a while since they had me transport anything but I’d imagine it’d be different for you, since you’re a car and all. Was it a pain to haul something so heavy?”
Scoot picked up one of his white checker pieces and set it down two squares away from where it came from. “Heavy as all get-out, yeah. I hate doing transport missions. And they had to secure it really well so we had to drive as careful as we could to avoid jostling it."
Vortex snatched up four of the white pieces and set his single black circle down at the edge of the board. “King me.”
“I didn’t even see that,” Scoot said, stacking another piece on top of Vortex’s.
“Yeah, I know you didn’t,” said Vortex. “They didn’t let you drive fast?”
“Apparently it was explosive if jostled, or something.”
“Ugh, that’s ridiculous,” Vortex said. “Maybe Starscream’s already blown it up in his stupid face, then.”
“I’ll hope so,” Scoot said. “It sounds scary. I don’t like handling anything Wheeljack’s designed. You jumped four of mine in one go?"
“You lined it up for me,” Vortex said. “It’s your move now.”
“Hm,” Scoot said, and moved a piece toward the outer wall. “You’re better at this game than I am.”
“Not that much better,” Vortex lied. “If you start paying more attention, I think you’ll be just as good as I am very soon.”
“Appreciate the vote of confidence,” Scoot said.
“Anyway you’re not going to want to move there,” Vortex said. “Or I’m going to double jump you while I take my king out.”
“Where even is there to go from here?” Scoot said.
Vortex shrugged. “Not there. You said Wheeljack made it?”
“I assume, anyway,” Scoot said. “Who else is making volatile fuels on this planet?” A brief pause. “How about this move?”
“Not much better, but better,” Vortex said, picking up two other pieces instead. “I wouldn’t want to transport anything Wheeljack made, but definitely not some experimental fuel or something.”
“Experimental weaponry, either,” Scoot said, shuddering dramatically. “I really do hope Starscream blows that thing up in his face, because I don’t even want to think about your side having kinetic explosives. Not that I mean you personally, of course.”
“Kinetic explosives?” Vortex repeated. “Sorry, look, they don’t let me into the science labs. What does that even mean?”
“I don’t know,” Scoot said. “That’s what they told me it was. Sort of, like… you throw them, and nothing happens, and then they hit something and then they explode really dramatically."
“What, like a weird grenade?” Everyone had impact grenades. That was nothing.
“Apparently there’s something different about these ones. Maybe it’s the fuel. I don’t know,” Scoot said. “Either way, I didn’t like carrying them. How does this move look?”
Vortex looked down at the game board, not bothering to keep the facade up now that he had what he needed. “Oh, Scoot. You’re so screwed.”
“I’m getting better, though?” Scoot said. “Right? You said I was getting better?”
“No, I lied,” Vortex said, scooping up the pieces. “You’re pathetic at checkers. How you could be that bad at calculating probabilities is beyond me.”
“Hey, we weren’t done playing,” Scoot said. “What are you doing?”
“Do you have any idea how long I’ve been waiting to hear you say that?” Vortex said, putting the game supplies back in his subspace. He transformed his claws out while he did it, trusting the snap-click of panels opening and closing to cover the sound. “You’re a fucking idiot and it still took me the better part of two days to get it out of you. Your commanders would probably be very proud if you hadn’t fucked it up at the end.”
“What—what are you talking about?” Scoot said.
“And I have been just,” Vortex said, “so bored.”
“Oh,” Scoot said. “Scrap.”
“Ha. Yeah,” Vortex said. “This isn’t going to end well for you. I'll give you a chance to cooperate, since I spent this long being all friendly. Open your primary access ports or I'll cut them open.”
Vortex washed the shards of glass out from under his claws in the sink outside the brig as he wrapped up his report. Onslaught would appreciate his self-control even if he didn’t like that Vortex would go back to entertaining himself with the Autobot now. He sent it off without much of a care, instead focusing on getting dried energon out of the seam between his thumb and the rest of his hand. Experience suggested that if he had any chips of metal in there, they’d stick around for ages and his mobility would decrease until he got someone to clean it out with a steel-wired brush. Better to wash it out now before they got worked in too deep.
The comm from Onslaught came as a surprise. A video comm, too, not even a message. Vortex opened it reflexively, and found himself staring into the dour visage of his team commander.
“You said,” Onslaught said, without preamble, “that we have to worry about some new kind of impact grenade? What was the exact wording that the prisoner used?”
“Kinetic explosive,” Vortex rattled off, after a quick look at his drives. “But the Autobot didn’t seem to know what they did, either, or what made them new. Only that they were extremely volatile to the point of making transport difficult and that they were, let me quote here, ‘you throw them, and nothing happens, and then they hit something and they explode’, whatever the frag that’s meant to mean.”
“Hm,” Onslaught said. “Thank you, Vortex.”
“I worked hard for this one,” Vortex said. “And I did hack him to confirm everything.”
“Did you learn anything new?”
“Well, he’s an Autobot scout, so his drives were pretty fragmented by the time I got into them,” Vortex said, which was why he’d done it like this in the first place. “But I’m pretty confident that that’s all he knew.”
“Hm,” Onslaught said again. "Good work, ‘Tex. I’ll speak with you later.”
“Thanks,” Vortex started, but Onslaught was already cutting the comm.
Okay. Vortex shrugged after a moment and went back to washing his hands. He really did need to get those seams clean.
