Disclaimer: I don't own Transformers, or any bots mentioned in this story. I'm just using them for the purpose of imagination. I'm not sure why, but it feels oddly satisfying to tie up the loose ends of this show.
"We were meant to live for so much more, but we lost ourselves."~Meant to Live, By Switchfoot, one of the songs that made this story.
Surreal:
Blurr wasn't sure exactly how long it took him to get back. It didn't even feel like hurrying this time. Just pure, unadulterated running. He didn't care how fast he went, so long as he was moving. He had forgotten his hunger for motion, forgotten it all after he had been-.
No. His CPU slammed down on that thought. He didn't want those memories to taint the rush, he didn't want to think, much less speak, of the horrors that had occurred over the past number of stellar cycles. A small voice in his logical processor said it would come up eventually, especially after someone saw him, an intelligence agent bot, no less, that had been off the radar for several stellar cycles, looking as though he had just walked out of a history book on the Great War. Suddenly, a thought occurred to him. Would anyone even notice that he had been gone, or had the accident with the spacebridge on Earth made everyone chalk him up for dead? The question made him falter, and he almost missed the next jump to another asteroid, surprisingly feeling no fear as he almost didn't make it. Maybe he was exhausted out of fear. But hollow, dreamlike realization had found a way in.
What if they thought he was dead?
And when he showed up, they'd want to know why, how, he came to be like this. It was not something he wanted to explain. But his running remained steady, still sending him in the direction of his home planet. After all, there really wasn't much of anywhere else he could go, and in some part of his processor, he wondered if he was out of scanner's range of Shockwave's ship, just in case the cyclopean mech had come back. Blurr offlined his optics for a second while in the middle of a leap to another asteroid, a worried look finally crossing the up-until-now pensive faceplate.
Well, if there wasn't enough distance yet, he'd put some more space between him and that cursed flagship. Determination smoothly overrode the concern as he landed easily on the rock, and continued running, this time putting more into the steps.
Coming back onto Cybertron was just as hard as it had been the first time, except that instead of rolling onto his face, Blurr wound up accidentally putting most of his weight onto his right leg, forgetting for a moment that the abuse dealt to his frame wouldn't hold against the force. He was reminded of his present condition by a swift popping of hydraulics and one very pain-filled crack. Letting out a cry of surprise and agony as he fell sideways, seeing flaring spots in front of his one working optic as his helm rammed against the ground. Stupid. The struts in his leg were shot, all because of one dumb mistake. For a klick, he felt like a bird whose wings were clipped, before snapping back into the logical part that Intelligence training had developed.
Yes, his leg was indeed shot, but that did not slagging mean he was immobile. Blurr waited until his optic cleared, looking around to see that he was in some sort of lot. Spare parts, or something of the like, there were many of them on Cybertron. For the most part, he seemed alone. But there was a dull roar somewhere, the cheering of many voices. Who was cheering, and what for? Blurr stumbled his way into a partially upright position, finding a shelf that he had missed to lean on in order to support the off-center stance that was necessary if he didn't want to fall again. Using a combination of shelves and limping staggers, he made it to the entrance of the lot, just in time to see an unfamiliar red and yellow ship at the head of a very excited crowd. Even though he was half-blind, and staring through a sea of helms and servos, he immediately recognized the flash of yellow that stood prominent among white, blue, grey, and green.
Bumblebee?
And the minibot was holding part of a coffin, and inside was a grey form that he once knew in passing, another member of that team that he had so eloquently run into on Earth. The cyberninja Prowl, quite obviously offline. But that wasn't why they were cheering, Blurr discovered as he looked to the left, where Optimus Prime stood, and behind him was Megatron, in stasis cuffs, Lugnut, and, Blurr noted, feeling his processor freeze for long cycle on the sight, Shockwave.
On some distant level, he knew the mech couldn't hurt him. He was in stasis cuffs like the rest, most likely the spy couldn't even see him in the crowd of cheering mechs and femmes. Still, none of it matter once blue met red, and Blurr suddenly felt the fear he had abandoned when freed from the flagship come back in full, paralyzing force. He had to leave, to go somewhere, anywhere that he could get to in order to get away from his tormentor.
Grabbing and stumbling at the walls, and altogether miraculously staying out of the way of the crowd, which still cheered, although this time it felt more like a backdrop roar in Blurr's audios, the powder-blue mech staggered into an offshoot alley, going a few yards inside before his churning tank caught up with him, and he mechanically turned and vomited onto the dingy concrete.
Still though, he went unnoticed. It was almost as though he was offline.
Strolling was a favorite thing for Iacon's resident 'crazy engineer' as he mentally worked some of the bugs in his latest idea, despite the back of his processor telling him that there would be no one to look at this one, given that the last investor had pretty much spread the infamous reputation he had acquired to most others in the city after the intended seller had blown in both their faces. Wheeljack was no stranger to lost limbs, but the fact that the other mech had lost a servo seemed enough proof to him that whatever brains the inventor had, it wasn't worth his habit.
So, although unwanted, he continued to invent, and study up on basic first-aid, considering that trips to the Med Center would have to be limited from now on.
He had been deep in a series of calculations when he saw it while passing an alley. Against the grey and black, it stood out like a sore thumb so much that he wondered why no one else noticed it. A light-blue pede, sticking out from behind a trash bin.
The thing in itself was remarkable to Wheeljack, considering Cybertronian's pedes were not of that kind of design, and the other noteworthy, and very alarming observation, was the mech it was attached to. The stream-lined blue frame was in shredded ruins, marred through with deep slices, scrapes, and wielding scars. The bot himself appeared to be in stasis for what Wheeljack would have bet his processor was a severe lack of energon. Either way, this bot wasn't in the most enviable of positions.
The engineer didn't really give it a moment more of thought as he hefted the other bot's arm over his shoulders before allowing him to lean on him. A muffled, semiconscious groan emitted from the other's vocalizer as he changed positions, the scraping in the right leg implying broken struts. Wheeljack let out a metallic whistle. He'd really been through the mill, this one.
Once he was sure that the blue mech wasn't about to fall, he turned, heading back in the direction of his apartment building.
When Blurr came fully back online, he immediately felt the effects of a severe rehaul on his systems. He was stiff, achy, and felt like he had been offline for a few weeks until someone saw fit to resurrect him, doing a very sloppy job. Even though the previously cracked and useless optic was now working somewhat, his vision out of it was hazed, sort of like seeing through a fogged glass. Either way, the room around him wasn't something he'd expect the Well of Allsparks to look like. After all, when he had suddenly seen the scrawling of a lack of energon in his systems, and a sudden stasis came on as he slumped in the alley. And now he was here, wherever here was.
Once he had established that this was not the Well nor the Pit, the sudden memories of his days as Shockwave's personal knife-sharpener were enough to make him deeply uncomfortable. The silence wasn't helping either. It only furthered his immersion in those Pit-spawn recollections.
"No one will find you, Autobot. No one knows that you are here. You are mine, to do with as I please."
The hiss of the open door almost made him sit up with a gasp, if it weren't for the fact that he felt as stiff as a board, and about as sore as though he had been run through the wood chipper several times. Lucky for him, the bot that had waltzed in on this vulnerable moment was not Shockwave, not even a Decepticon.
Though something about those flashing side panels were oddly familiar.
"You alright?"
"Yeah-just-a-little-sore-and-stiff. Alright,-a-lot. And-I-can't-really-see-out-of-my-right-optic. I'm-guessing-a-full-system-rehaul, -am-I-right?" The speedster winced, already knowing that he had probably lost the other bot a klick after he started. Good thing lack of use and severe wounds battened down more speech.
Oddly enough, while others were left in the dust by Blurr's speedy talk, the other mech seemed to understand it, enough to make a decent conversation partner out of himself.
"Yep, most of your circuits were damaged pretty bad, so I did what I could. Anyhow, it'll take a joor or two for them to be fully integrated, and as for the optic, I can fix that right away. Just relax and don't offline it."
Blurr did as told, despite how unnerved he became once the small pair of picks gently peeled off the protective covering on the new optic, and within moments, he could see properly again, another thing that he wasn't aware how much he missed. He onlined and offlined them, similar to the organic mode of blinking, and then gazed back at the mech, not even knowing how to begin to thank him.
"The name's Wheeljack." The other started, side panels flashy a cheery blue grin.
Several stellar cycles later found Blurr, back to his usual speedy self as he raced through the streets of Iacon on the Autobot version of a morning jog. It had been rough, but little by little and with plenty of backing from the newfound friend he had made in the misfit engineer, he made his way back into the Intelligence Agency.
One thing he hadn't counted on was the inventor learning of exactly how he wound up with his minced state. It had all been timing and circumstance, really.
Wheeljack walked into the living space of his apartment with the things he had been able to grab, nourishment for both his systems and his processor, to find Blurr sitting up on the folding berth, testing his fingers and servos. The bot always did that when he was alone, or thought he was, something Wheeljack wasn't sure he liked. It made him feel as though the speedster was ready to bolt at a moment's notice, something that didn't ring right in the inventor's CPU. There were other habits he noticed that he wasn't sure he thought were normal. For one, sneak up on Blurr, and he jumped a mile, chattering like a chipmunk all the way with a speed that even he couldn't catch. The other was how skittish he was when it came to the rare times when Wheeljack would have someone over. Blurr was something of a ghost then, around but staying out of sight, giving the mech the hint that he didn't want to be noticed. He'd also flinch, wince, or cross his arms in a protective gesture if you approached his general area with a tool, or something sharp. None of it was something that Wheeljack was prone to missing, given that when he was experimenting, he had to be ready at a hair-trigger's notice. He was good at picking up the small details, and he genuinely liked Blurr, who somehow found it in him to attempt to wrap his processor around the multiple inventions and gizmos Wheeljack could crank out. The young bot could also be a tad naïve about the explosive capabilities of these inventions, but was fast enough to survive the first run in with a failed experiment. After a while, Blurr asked what Wheeljack did with all of his inventions.
"Well, not much, actually. No one wants them, 'specially if they're mine. 'S kinda part of the crazy engineer thing." The mech had sheepishly explained, servo scratching the back of helm as his side panels flashed pink in a state of embarrassment. The other bot immediately broke into a high-speed reply of how his inventions were 'kick-aft', even though they blew up, and that they didn't know what they were passing up, all the while looking so firm about it that Wheeljack had to stifle a bark of laughter in spite of himself.
Turns out, Blurr had something to share as well, although it was on the darker aspect of life, and came out in a completely different manner. Wheeljack had had the feeling that the holographic fluxes had been going on for a while, despite the fact that he never heard nor saw anything that really suggested it, other than the fact that Blurr would always fall into recharge after him, and be awake before. It had been a fluke, Wheeljack had been drawn out of recharge by the sound of something hitting to floor, and the quiet peals of frightened whines and clicks, as though he had suddenly been placed in the close proximity of a frightened sparkling. However, the reason became apparent once he wandered out of his room and came across the sight of Blurr, who had fallen off the berth, and was now a shuddering mess on the floor, whimpering and thrashing against nightmarish terrors.
Wheeljack, thinking and acting fast, gripped the nearing hysterical mech by the upper-arms, shaking him lightly to snap him out of it. Thankfully, it didn't take long, but as soon as Blurr's optics onlined and he read the worry and concern in the other mech's face, he just seemed to wilt into a husk, staring at the floor and giving no word of explanation as to what had just occurred.
Neither of them recharged the rest of that orbital cycle, seeing as Blurr obviously did not want to resume the night-terror from where he left off, and Wheeljack didn't have the spark to just abandon the speedster to his demons. However, it wasn't until the sounds of bustling mechs and femmes as they woke up and went about their day began to filter through the windows that Wheeljack began to chink away at the ice.
"Blurr, can I ask you something?"
Silence, then a nod.
Wheeljack took a moment to phrase his question.
"Has..anyone ever hurt you?"
At this, Blurr stiffened as though the engineer had just insulted him, before hesitantly nodding. To Wheeljack's surprise, a word floated out of the previously nonresponsive vocalizer.
"Shockwave."
Even the inventor knew that name, from his days in the Great War. Shockwave had been one of Megatron's most loyal soldiers, and cunning and brutal to boot. But as for the rest of the story, Blurr needed no prompting, it all just sort of slid out, as though it were some virus that needed to be purged from his systems. He had started with a brief skate-over of his run back to Cybertron, meeting up with Longarm, his capture, being taken aboard the Decepticon flagship, all the while hold back against the occasional hiccup his intakes would try to make. He didn't want that to start, all for the reason that it might not stop, and he wanted to get through this now.
"-and-he'd-torture-me,-sometimes-just-for-the-sake-of-doing-it,-I-thought,-and-one-time-he-hacked-me.-For-my-schematics-,so-that-they-could-make-a-Decepticon-like-me,-he-said. He-called-me-a-a-failure." Suddenly the blue bot jerked his head up, locking the inventor's optics with a scared, wide look, for a minute devolving back to the youngling he had been forced to abandon when he was inducted into the Elite Guard, giving in to the phantom fears that permeated his nightmares. That, in some way, Shockwave was right. Though he had no words, for once, to express the trepidation and shame at the deduction, Wheeljack could take the hint.
"Blurr, if anything, I'd say you're the farthest thing from a failure. Shockwave had been fooling even Ultra Magnus for several hundred stellar cycles. Besides, if you managed to get out of there, you are definitely not a failure."
The memory stored itself away as Blurr descended down a hill, letting the exhilaration of the rush take over as he avoided a group of chattering femmes at the bottom.
But of course, recovery didn't stop there. After that, the next-hardest thing was going back to the Intelligence Division and telling the new Prime, Cliffjumper, where he had been, trying to keep the emotions locked out. After all, military reports weren't there for their feeling, they were there to state the facts. He knew, although it had been kept quiet, that some agents had gone to the ship and completely destroyed all of Shockwave's files, including what he had hacked from the speedster. On some level, he would have loved to do it himself. But stronger was his desire to just leave the past in the past, and eventually that won out. He had been reassured in passing by an older agent, named Bluestreak, that they had made sure to slag the ship good. This had left a sense of peace, even slight safety, but Blurr never really felt like the same mech afterward. Sure, he was still fast-talking, speedy Blurr, but something changed, enough for Bumblebee to notice when the two eventually met.
"What's the matter, Zippy?" He had teased, after Blurr had shied from a good-natured punch to the arm. He still saw Bumblebee on occasion, although the yellow bot's own agenda kept him busy enough.
Still though, it wasn't who was on Blurr's processor at the moment. Just as the speedster screeched to a halt in front of a banged-up suburban home, a loud boom echoed through his audios, and he dropped just in time to have the front door go whistling over his helm and land with a loud clang in the road [fortunately, this wasn't a busy street, but he had more pressing things to worry about].
"Wheeljack?-Are-you-okay?!-What-blew-up?" Blurr said into the silence, feeling his spark pound a violent dent in his chassis when the mech he had come to think of as a big brother did not respond. Perhaps this time the 'crazy engineer' hadn't been so lucky. "…Wheeljack?"
"It's open!" The slightly shell-shocked voice declared almost cheerily from the bowels of his house-turned-wrecked-bomb-shelter, forcing the white face plate into a grin as an involuntary laugh escaped. Racing forward, he began to dig Wheeljack out from under the shelf that he had taken cover under.
"I don't wanna live to waste another day/ Underneath the shadow of mistakes I've made/ Cause I feel like I'm breaking inside/ I don't wanna fall, and say I lost it all/ Cause maybe there's a part of me that hit the wall/ Leaving pieces of me behind/ And I feel like I'm breaking inside"~Breaking Inside, by Shinedown.
To clear Wheeljack's situation up, in case it caused any confusion, he was in the Great War when he was much younger, but they were able to tolerate the fact that about 9 in 10 explosions would hit the fan because they needed whoever they could get. However, in the civilian society, Wheeljack isn't so lucky because people don't give so many second chances when it comes to scientific ideas, no matter how brilliant.
And I'm sorry about the jumping around, cause I was trying to make it from the present in the last part but reflecting toward the past. Hope you enjoyed anyhow.