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After the third time in a single day of a chill going up his spine for no good reason, Bumblebee is forced to admit the obvious to himself.
Starscream is staring at him.
Right now they're talking to a delegate from Chyrosaun—well, Bumblebee is talking, Starscream is doing a surprisingly good job of obeying his very strict orders of not— and around the fifth droning tangent over whether or not a techno-organism such as Bumblebee would understand the Chyrosaunian water ducts, he gets that feeling. The feeling that he's been trying to ignore for…maybe too long.
Bumblebee’s not sure how long Starscream’s had this little staring habit, but he's pretty sure it started around the end-of-the-world-that-wasn't. That was certainly a time—one he’s not in any hurry to reminisce on, but one that happened nonetheless. He'd been a bit too occupied then to notice, but he definitely remembers the way Starscream’s eyes were a little too wide after they'd met face to face, both alive at last. Then Starscream went ahead and died; that had been pretty awful for the…cycle, maybe? Two? That he was gone, before stalking up to Bumblebee and demanding to know if at least one person could hear him. A bittersweet laugh at the irony of it all was had then.
Starscream became Bumblebee’s shadow; not in any hurry to reveal himself, he’d tailed Bumblebee for decacycles, getting a front-row seat to the ridiculously stressful first few meetings Bumblebee had endured with the Galactic Council. He’d had a few choice words to say about that whole ordeal—words that, of course, had made Bumblebee look rather insane as he’d laughed himself silly at what looked like an empty pocket of air.
Thankfully, Starscream had acquiesced to Bumblebee’s gentle request (re: demand) to reveal his presence after one too many instances of Starscream making Bumblebee laugh in serious moments. Honestly, he’s not sure why it had taken so long in the first place.
It's easy to excuse the staring during that particular point in time as Starscream directing all attention towards Bumblebee because he's the only one who could receive it, but if he's being honest with himself, that's all that had ever been. An excuse. A neat little gift of denial, wrapped in a bow.
The excuse is much, much harder to accept now that Starscream’s got a body again and he’s still staring. If anything, the staring seems to have gotten worse. It feels like the very nanoklik that Bumblebee turns away, Starscream’s optics are boring into him, so sharp, so laser-focused, that they’re impossible not to notice.
In contrast to Starscream’s focus, it leaves Bumblebee more than a little distracted.
“...Star,” Bumblebee says, a little hesitant, a little exasperated. When he turns to face him, Starscream is the picture of innocence. “Can you, uh…”
Starscream shutters his optics. “Hmm?” he hums, tilting his helm. “Can I what? Remember, I’m to have no part in these sorts of discussions. Windblade’s orders.”
Over Bumblebee’s shoulder, the Chyrosaunian delegate gives a deliberate cough. They’re all more than aware of Bumblebee, Starscream, and Windblade’s deal, and there is not a single member of the council who likes it. Luckily, at least a few of them like Bumblebee, so it’s tolerated well enough. The Chyrosaunian is one of the majority who likes neither the deal nor Bumblebee himself.
Well, since Bumblebee doesn’t really have reputation to lose with this guy…
“Can you stop with the—” He waves his hand, flutters his fingers. Behind him, his wings twitch involuntarily with the subtle airflow. “I can feel you staring. Kinda freaking me out here.”
Starscream, who’s optics had turned piercing somewhere to Bumblebee’s right during the course of that sentence, takes a few kliks to respond. When he does, his optics spiral wide and he rears back. “What?”
Oh. He actually looks—well, Bumblebee had expected him to be a little embarrassed, but it’s rare to see Starscream so blatantly mortified.
It’s such a shock that Bumblebee drops it immediately, muttering a, “Nevermind,” as he turns back to the delegate to continue their extremely boring and more than a little patronizing conversation. Humiliation of his own crawls through his systems, making his vents feel warm and his doorwings flick.
Does Starscream not see it? Can he not tell what he’s doing? No, that can’t be it. He only stares when Bumblebee’s not looking—that can’t be coincidence. It’s the most obvious display of not-wanting-to-be-caught behavior that there is. In fact, when Bumblebee was a ghost, he’d been witness to multiple instances of Starscream’s behind-the-back glares that would smooth out to something perfectly charming the moment anybody else’s optics landed on him. It’s like Starscream can’t help but glare daggers at people.
Primus, does Starscream want to kill him? He did that a lot with people on his kill list.
(“Danger list, Bumblebee,” Starscream had said once, when Bumblebee had gawked about him having a kill list. “I’m not a serial killer. I just like to have a list on hand of those who may need to get…taken care of, should they stand in my way.”
“Oh, yeah,” Bumblebee had replied. “No, y’know, I always alphabetize my kill lists, too.”)
He probably doesn’t want to kill him. They’re friends—they’re more than friends, they’re…they literally haunted each other. Bumblebee’s seen Starscream snore.
Actually, Bumblebee’s also seen Starscream kill someone for less than that, so.
He files away the murder theory as unlikely.
-
And yet it just keeps happening.
Again, and again, and again. That little chill right between his doorwings, a crawling sense of being watched. He’d think he were being stalked were it not so clearly Starscream.
Because it is clear now, it’s obvious, and Bumblebee’s pretty sure that it’s his fault. Apparently, now that he’s pointed it out, Starscream is incapable of pulling back in time. Every time he so much as sneaks a glance out of the corner of his optic, he sees Starscream hovering for a few kliks before pulling back, wide-eyed and guilty. One time, he’d caught Starscream with a hand raised, just slightly—Primus knows what he’d been planning to do with that— and Starscream had quite literally slapped his own hand down.
That’s just kind of pathetic.
It comes to a boiling point when Bumblebee feels a digit brush against the glass of one of his doorwings. The touch has him stiffening so fast that he actually crushes the cube of energon he’d been drawing—because that’s all he’d been doing, getting breakfast— and when he whirls around, Starscream is ramrod straight, all the way on the other side of the room.
“Do you mind?” Bumblebee bursts out, not even bothering with the pretense of asking.
Starscream, meanwhile, appears to be bluescreening. “I, er…”
“Look, I get it, something’s— up with you, I don’t know,” Bumblebee sighs, pinching his nasal ridge. “But I’m a little tired of all the staring. If you want something, tell me. Use your words.”
It’s funny, because Starscream is usually very good at exactly that; both wanting something and using words. In fact, normally when he wants something, he is explicitly, excruciatingly vocal about it, and historically, so vocal that it’s gotten him into quite a bit of trouble. Not naming names, but there’s a reason most of Starscream’s ploys for leadership fell through, and it has to do with his big mouth.
Now, though, he’s clammed up. Completely and utterly silent. Guess it’s unfair for Bumblebee to say that it’s unusual for him—silent, yes. Pain in the aft? Par for the course.
“Star…” Bumblebee takes a step forward. Starscream doesn’t move. “Seriously, what’s going on?”
His jaw works for a few moments. Fingers twitch sporadically at his sides. He looks like he wants to grab something.
Bumblebee’s doorwing itches, the single point of contact sending heat down straight to the hinges, and a theory pops into his processor. A theory that feels so stupid—so ridiculous, that it’s downright inconceivable—that he once again has to seriously question whether or not Starscream is planning to murder him in his own apartment.
(“Not even a single shanix,” Starscream had groused, shoulders slumped, wings drooped low. “She couldn’t save even one for me.”
“To be fair, she didn’t know you were here,” Bumblebee had attempted to placate. “And you didn’t wanna tell her.”
“Small details.” He’d rolled his optics and sighed, so dramatically and overly morose that Bumblebee hadn’t been able to stop the snort of laughter that’d left his mouth. That had earned him quite the glare. “I’m sorry, is this funny to you?”
“No,” he’d replied, grinning.
“You find my desolate bank account funny?"
“I mean, you gotta admit, it is kinda ironic.”
“Ironic?” Starscream had screeched. “She drains my savings, distributes it to the people of Cybertron, and doesn’t use any of it for Iacon’s infrastructure? I was using my finances for the people! How is this ironic?”
Bumblebee had shrugged. “You also bought a high-rise flat and an entire new body. And that crown you commissioned. Plus the engex. The triple-charging recharge slab…”
“Irrelevant.”
He’d gotten a few more jabs in, but in the end, he hadn’t had the spark not to offer up his couch for the taking. They’d already haunted each other for years—what was rooming together just a little longer?)
Bumblebee had been a bit surprised to find that the body he’d been rebuilt in had come equipped with doorwings. Surprised, but not displeased. They were pretty neat; sensitive little things, nothing like a flier’s wings but still able to pick up shifting airflow and currents. His spatial awareness is leagues better than it’s ever been. Unfortunately, they’re also kind of reactive. He remembers the ways that Prowl’s doorwings would flick and flutter, whether he was embarrassed, angry, or happy, and he absolutely remembers the way they’d hike up if somebody touched them. Bumblebee’s own are still poised far too high on his back from the single brush of a finger.
He flicks one doorwing experimentally. Starscream’s optics snap to it like magnets.
“You’re kidding,” Bumblebee says.
“Huh?” Starscream drags his optics back to Bumblebee’s face at the words, but he still looks distracted. There’s no way. There’s no way, but that—and he looks so—
“It’s the wings?” Bumblebee cries, clutching his helm in his hands. “I thought you wanted to kill me! You’re seriously this caught up on my stupid doorwings?”
If Starscream had been mortified before, what Bumblebee’s seeing now is an entirely different level. His optics are so wide and bright that they look like traffic lights, and his wings, which are normally spread wide, confident and relaxed, are drawn tight as a bowstring. His hands are clenched into fists and his lips are quavering with indignance.
“Pre-preposterous,” he sputters, puffing his chest in a mock display of pride. “As if I would ever—as if some grounder’s wings could…could even begin to draw my optics their way…”
“You touched one,” Bumblebee argues. “You literally just tried to grab it.”
“No I didn’t.”
“You did!”
“Did not.”
“I can still feel it!”
“Well—” He presses his lips together before wetting them with his tongue. “Phantom sensations, they’re, yes, very common with wings—should get that checked out, I think, could be a sign of a bigger problem—”
“Star.” Bumblebee crosses the room, closing the distance between them all at once. Starscream bends backwards at the waist, but doesn’t step back. Most likely because if he were to take a single step more, he’d be pressed into the wall, backed into a corner. There’s nothing Starscream hates more than being backed into a corner. “Do you like my wings?”
It’s a bolder question than he’d meant to ask. Bumblebee hopes his expression doesn’t waver the way Starscream’s clearly does.
“I…it’s not…”
“So you don’t like my wings.”
“No—”
“‘Cause I’m gonna be honest, I’m getting real mixed signals here.”
“I—I—” He draws himself up again, tall, powerful, and furious, blatantly enraged with what he must feel is disrespect, but when Bumblebee refuses to back down, chin jutted out and feet planted firm, the fight leaves him. His body sags and his optics dim. The fury mellows to a gentle unease. “You didn’t have them before,” he mutters.
Not news to Bumblebee, but he prefers obvious statements to lies. Besides—now that Starscream’s settling, he can relax his own plating. He finds himself giving a bemused grin. “Yeah?”
“They’re…” Starscream’s optics flicker from side to side, his fingers clenching as he finds his words. It’s gotta say something about Bumblebee, that he’s kind of enjoying the way that Starscream’s been so thoroughly disarmed in this conversation. He’s never seen him so off-kilter. “They’re new,” is what he settles on. “And—I want—”
Good, okay, they’re getting somewhere. An I want statement is good. Bumblebee cocks a brow ridge and asks, “You want…?”
More searching, more long pauses. Starscream’s wings quiver behind him so fast that it makes his plating rattle. “Fliers—we like wings,” he starts. “Seekers especially, we…wings are…” Clench, clench, clench. His hands won’t stay still. Bumblebee finds, oddly enough, that he’s the one who can’t stop staring. “Nice. To touch.”
“Oh.” He’s still a little caught up in the mesmerizing movement of Starscream’s hands to fully process the implications there for a few kliks. When the words circle around for maybe the fourth time, Bumblebee blinks, stalling. “Oh.”
Starscream stiffens. Bumblebee’s quite sure he’s never seen him look this uncomfortable in his life, and Bumblebee was there when he was in prison.
An addendum is added to the theory he’d composed before.
“Is it like…” No backing down now, not when he’s so close. Not when the pieces are finally clicking into place. “Are you—do you think they’re hot?”
The sound of Starscream’s fans clicking on answers that well enough.
“Oh man,” Bumblebee says, grin stretching to an uncontrollable degree. “Oh man. You think I’m hot.”
Apparently deciding to ignore his fans for now, Starscream sighs, crossing his arms tightly across his chassis and shifting his weight until he looks less like a statue and more like a vaguely irritated person. “Go ahead, indulge your ego,” he scoffs.
“So it was the wings, huh? Not my sparkling personality?”
“If not for that personality of yours, you’d be perfect,” Starscream deadpans.
And Bumblebee laughs at that—he laughs until he stops, very abruptly, because he repeats what Starscream said, and it’s. That’s.
Because Starscream was kidding. Bumblebee knows that Starscream is kidding, because he knows him, a fact that will never cease to surprise him. It’s not the fact that he’s kidding that makes Bumblebee pause, though. He’s tossed out so many false potshots at Bumblebee at this point that it’s basically his way of saying hello.
It’s the fact that because he’s kidding, because he’s not being serious, lying, basically, what he’s actually saying is that—
Is that Bumblebee is—
Is that to Starscream, he’s—
“Stop,” Starscream says suddenly. His optics are blanched nearly pink. “Shut up. Don’t.”
“I didn’t say anything!”
“You were thinking something. That’s worse.”
“I can’t just not think,” Bumblebee mutters, then, before Starscream can butt in to take the obvious opening he’d accidentally given him, he continues, “You’re doing a lot of talking and not a lot of touching.”
That gets Starscream reeling. And, notably, his fans kick up a notch. He’ll tuck that away for later. “I can’t just,” he grinds out, “grab your wings. You didn’t say—”
Out of the two of them, Bumblebee would honestly say that, despite his overzealous paranoia and veritable thesis of backup plans, it’s Starscream who is more impulsive. His ambition and opportunistic nature has led him to jumping into some of the worst decisions known to any Cybertronian, maybe even the galaxy in general. Some of those decisions are why he’d ended up in jail in the first place.
Bumblebee, meanwhile, is a scout, trained in observation and tactical processing. Warrior? Sure, he’s that too. And he’s made more than his fair share of impulsive choices. By in large, though, Bumblebee has been trained to value the act of restraint.
Suffice to say, grabbing Starscream’s hand and planting it on his doorwing is not an action he’d consider restrained.
The effect is immediate—for Starscream, whose fingers clench automatically around the wing before flinching back, and for Bumblebee, who is assaulted by a burst of sensation that he’s never quite known before.
Right. Sensitive. The doorwings are sensitive, he knew that, but the touch—the heat—it crackles, spreading like wildfire out to each side and all the way down to the hinges. The airflow is rendered insignificant as his entire world narrows down to the feeling of two fingertips against his plating.
Starscream hisses, trying to pull back, but Bumblebee manages to keep his head on straight enough to hold his grip firm. “S’nice,” he grunts, not entirely sure how true the statement actually is, but it definitely is a lot.
“Hh,” Starscream replies, which isn’t words. His fingers tremble in Bumblebee’s hand.
“Calm down,” Bumblebee murmurs, sensation finally dying down enough to be a pleasant thrum. Once Starscream actually moves, it’ll start up again, but he’s confident in his ability to adjust. “We’re good. I’m good. You can stop with all the staring and just…do whatever.”
His optics are so wide they’re nearly circles behind his lenses. “Whatever?” he echoes.
Dangerous? Yeah, probably. Anything is dangerous when it comes to Starscream. Unfortunately, Bumblebee realized something a long time ago, something that, at the time, had filled him with a deep-seated horror and marginal disgust. Nowadays, it merely leaves him curious as to how it had happened, but fondly resigned.
Bumblebee trusts him.
“Yeah,” he breathes. “Whatever you want.”
This time, he doesn't need to be told twice. Starscream rips his hand out of his grip, leaving his wing cold where it had gotten used to his touch, but his hands don’t stay off Bumblebee for long. Instead, they find his shoulders, pushing him backwards until Bumblebee’s knees hit the back of his couch. He sits down on autopilot—Starscream had been aiming to shove him, which means that he overcompensates, nearly falling on top of him and cracking their helms together. Bumblebee winces at the impact; Starscream doesn’t even seem to have noticed. His optics are hazy, unfocused, as he manhandles Bumblebee until he’s facing the armchair and tilted down, wings arcing towards the ceiling.
Then Starscream finally, finally, plants his hands on the glass.
It’s electric. In fact, it actually hurts, just a little bit, but it’s not pain like a punch, or a shot. Just—there’s so much. So much he’s never felt. Primus, it’s not going to be like this forever, is it? It can’t be. There’s no way; how would anybody with wings function if it was like this anytime someone so much as patted them on the back?
Sensation crawls down the glass and into his seams, diving straight into his wires as Starscream drags his fingers down. It’s funny—even with how overwhelming it is, Bumblebee can still tell that Starscream’s holding back, using only the pads of his fingers instead of the full expanse of his palms. He slides until he hits the edge where glass meets metal, then digs into the gap. It leaves Bumblebee keening—at once, Starscream’s fingers are gone, his weight a distant memory, and Bumblebee huffs out, “Don’t stop, the hell did I say?”
“But you—”
“S’just sensitive,” he groans out. Letting his cheek rest against the armchair, he asks, “Is it always gonna be like this?”
“No.” Tentatively, Starscream’s hands return, full-palm this time, though nothing as heavy as his fingertips had been. “Newly-made wings are always rather sensitive. You’re supposed to stimulate them with flight, but obviously, you grounders can’t do that.” His palms find the door handles, and his thumbs rub circles into the faux keyholes. Bumblebee suppresses a shiver at just how much the simple touch is. “Touch is another way to acclimate.”
“It’s not just for acclimating though, is it,” Bumblebee says, trying to eye Starscream over his shoulder. “You like it.”
“It’s…an attractive feature,” Starscream admits. “But it’s more than that. Bumblebee, I—” He clamps his mouth shut as his hands draw into fists. The tremble is back, though not as prevalent as before.
“Hey,” Bumblebee says, trying for his most reassuring tone. “I said anything goes. Whatever you want, you’ve got.”
Squirming, Starscream protests, “But I—it’s been so long, and I haven’t…and your wings are so new, I—hm.” For a brief, terrible moment, he looks deeply unhappy, lips pressed thin and optics dark.
Still, his hands stay on.
So Bumblebee stays, and he waits, waits until Starscream unravels, until the haze returns and his hands ease back into flat palms. Without seeming to realize it himself, his body tips forward.
Then, with a deep vent, Starscream presses his nose into the hinge of Bumblebee’s right wing, and that. That is.
There aren’t really words to describe how that feels, mostly because he’s pretty sure that he short-circuits as soon as contact is made. The amount of sensory information that explodes from the brush of his lips alone is enough to nearly throw him straight into recharge. An electric current, all-encompassing, running throughout his entire body, down to the tiniest circuit. Like—lightning. He’s been struck by lightning.
Is it too much? He’s not sure. It’s so much, overwhelming to the point that Bumblebee’s not really sure where Starscream is touching anymore, but too much? No, he decides, because Starscream’s gripping the tops of his wings in both hands and straight-up rubbing his helm across them, and it’s so adorably bizarre that he can’t find any reason strong enough to stop. He’s like— nuzzling him. Like a damn cat.
“Is this a— ow,” Bumblebee gasps, as Starscream hooks a finger in a particularly sensitive spot. He gets a soft brush of the thumb as an apology. “Is this a flier thing, or a you thing?”
“Which part?” Starscream slurs. Primus, he sounds drunk. Bumblebee can’t stifle his laugh in time. Not that it matters; at the vibration of his own frame, Starscream merely presses in closer, so close that Bumblebee can feel the weight of his cockpit against his back.
“This part. All the parts.” At Starscream’s unamused silence, Bumblebee sighs, “I dunno, do all fliers cuddle like this?”
“Not cuddling,” Starscream objects. His cheek is fully crushed against the plating right under the glass.
“Sure. Do all fliers do…whatever you call this, then?”
More silence. Not unamused, but not contemplative, either. Bumblebee would almost call it hesitant. “...We are a social species,” he starts slowly. “Cybertronians, I mean.”
“...Okay.” Way to go, topic change. He’d care more, were Starscream’s left ring and pinky finger not hooked in the perfect spot right along the edge of his doorwing. The sensation has calmed just enough to feel good while still being terrifyingly stimulating.
“Touch, and…wing acclimation, it’s…it comes rather naturally to fliers,” he continues, even more slowly.
“Yeah, you said that.”
“Bumblebee,” he murmurs, right in the crook of his hinge. “I am not a very popular mech.”
Oh.
A memory resurfaces—Starscream, lashing out in the hallway, haggard and hateful and more miserable than ever. Because I am alone, he’d screamed. It had felt like a slap in the face. Like an excuse. Justifying cruelty and inaction with loneliness; Bumblebee had been, for the most part, incensed.
Right as he might have been about that, it stands out in his processor as perhaps the only time that Starscream has ever openly admitted to his own isolation. Notably, he hadn’t used the word lonely; it just didn’t take much reading between the lines to hear it.
Bumblebee wonders when the last time someone touched Starscream’s wings was.
“I can,” he murmurs, trying to speak through the thick static that fills his vocalizer as Starscream continues to prod at his hinges with his nose and mouth. When his teeth graze the divot between the hinge and the wing, Bumblebee nearly offlines right then and there. Somehow, though, he manages to stay present, conscious enough to continue with, “I can return the favor.”
“Hm?” Starscream seems too busy lightly biting his hinges to comprehend any words in general, much less Bumblebee’s offer.
“Your wings,” he groans out. Primus, was that his tongue? That’s—kinda gross, but also kinda hot. Bumblebee’s not really in the right state of mind to be differentiating anything. “Don’t think I really get the, uh. I dunno how to do it like this. But I can—”
Starscream’s already shaking his head, fast, adamant. “Just you.”
“You don’t want it?”
“I–” Again, his teeth clack together as he closes himself off. Verbally, at least. He’s still got his nose on Bumblebee’s spine, fingers rubbing lazy circles on the underside of his doorwings now. “Later,” he amends, “if you decide after your bout of insanity here that you’re still open to it.”
“Bout of…Star, I’m not like, humoring you.”
“Mhm.” He’s not listening.
“I’m not.” More lazy stroking, another soft scrape of his teeth. “Star, seriously—hey, let me up. Look at me.”
And Starscream does just that, though based on the way that he drags himself up, optics skirting to the side, it’s not without reluctance. His hands hang heavy at his sides, and Bumblebee finds that already, he misses the warmth.
It needs to be said, though. Ruining the moment? Maybe. But Bumblebee’s tired of this song and dance. Starscream just used his tongue on him. “I like this,” he says, as plainly as possible. “I mean, it’s—it’s weird, for sure, all new to me, but I like it. And I—” He swallows. “I like you, too. So try not to discount this as just, I don’t know, a temporary break in my sanity, or whatever.” Huffing a laugh, he says, “Already got enough of that when you were a ghost.”
“Oh please,” Starscream mutters, very maturely. “At least people weren’t outright accusing you of being insane.”
“Maybe. They definitely thought it, though.”
“Yes, I can see why.”
“Starscream.”
He’s leveled with a glare that has absolutely no heat, filled to the brim with posturing and uncertainty. His body’s pulled taut again, discomfort in every seam. Bumblebee wants nothing more than to pull him back down into rubber.
So, with a desperation not unlike that in which he’d experienced facing down Decepticons on the battlefield, he trusts his gut on not misunderstanding this situation and firmly plants both hands on Starscream’s cheeks. “Star,” he says patiently.
Starscream doesn’t say anything. He’s frozen.
Not for long.
Kissing him is, oddly enough, not nearly as much of a sensory minefield as the wing petting had been. Maybe it’s because there aren’t any extra sensory nets that need acclimating there. Regardless, it’s still dizzying, a high he hadn’t realized he’d been chasing, a face he hadn’t admitted to wanting to kiss. Because that really is it, is the thing. He’s pretty sure he’s wanted Starscream like this, right here between his hands, in his mouth, since death. That pull that he’d felt, that thing that always drew him back no matter how pissed off Starscream could make him—it was for this.
For this, too. He removes one hand from Starscream’s face, traces his fingers along the fine edge of Starscream’s wing. And Starscream, who had, a bit worryingly, been largely unreactive, lets out a keening whine the moment he makes contact.
“I’m not insane,” Bumblebee murmurs into his mouth.
“You must be,” Starscream objects. He pulls his mouth away, and Bumblebee nearly chases it, only for Starscream to rest his forehead against his own. Deft fingers make their way to Bumblebee’s wings again— Primus. Now that the sensors have mostly acclimated, it feels incredible, sending a heady rush straight to Bumblebee’s processor. He’s starting to see the appeal of…whatever it was that Starscream had been doing. Not-cuddling.
Alright, well. He’s lying to himself a little bit there. The appeal had been very much known pretty much the moment Starscream pressed his face into him.
“I like being able to touch you now,” Bumblebee admits. “I couldn’t really touch anyone for…long time.”
“Me neither,” he replies, quieter. Starscream hadn’t been a ghost for nearly as long as Bumblebee had been, but, again. With Starscream, you have to read between the lines. “This is…nice.”
“Yeah?”
“...Yes.”
“Alright,” Bumblebee nods, “Good. ‘Cause I really wanna try all that stuff on you, see if it’s as nice from the other side.”
Predictably, Starscream looks rather embarrassed, as if he’s just now realizing what exactly he’d been doing. “I doubt it’s all that…hn.”
He’s pretty sure that this is an answer to his earlier question— fliers, or Starscream? Wing touching? Probably just a flier thing. This level of wing touching? Bumblebee grins, fighting down the urge to call Starscream something so terrible as cute. “Let me make that call,” he says instead. “For now, though…wanna keep going?”
Starscream perks up a bit. “You’re sure?” he asks, fingers still grazing the glass lightly. “The sensors haven’t begun to overwhelm your overall input?”
“Nope. Whatever you were doing was working pretty great,” he says with a light few taps to Starscream’s own wings. “Now it just feels good.”
Fans begin to whir, and to Bumblebee’s mild surprise, it’s his own, joining the light spin of Starscream’s and helping to regulate the sudden heat. “You’re sure,” Starscream says, pinching the glass between his fingers in a way that leaves Bumblebee lightheaded.
“I can honestly say that I’ve never been more glad that you’re weird,” Bumblebee confirms.
“Rude.” Another pinch, harder. Still good. “Fine. Turn back around then, because I’ve barely gotten started.”
When Bumblebee complies, leaning back down into the armchair, he finds himself ridiculously, irrationally pleased that Starscream is apparently the kind of mech who’d rather touch someone with his face than with his hands or arms. His nose against the hinges, his mouth on the door handles, his cheeks smoothing against his plating…
Starscream is weird, that’s for sure. Bumblebee’s just glad that he finally got doorwings so that he could figure a little more of that out.