Donut always knew when Simmons woke up, because the mechanisms in his stomach would make a high pitched whine when he started to move. He'd shift around for a bit, popping his joints with a sound so loud it almost seemed painful. He'd crack the knuckles on his human hand and flex his robotic one. the whirring sounds dimming as everything locked into place.

Usually at this point Lopez's would flicker awake. Unplugging himself from the wall, he would always greet them in Spanish before promptly leaving. Simmons would check his watch and run his fingers through his hair wiping away any remaining tiredness from his face before leaning out of bed and addressing Donut softly.

"You up yet?" Donut would lean over the edge of his bunk and smile down with a nod.

"Ok good." They both would take a moment to enjoy the mornings silence before the day.

Grif would have noticed the sounds of them waking up by now and would start to move in bed, rolling closer to the wall as if he could somehow escape the inevitable. Donut would watch him folding up before the barrage of angry wake-ups came his way.

Some morning's Sarge would come in and scream at him to wake up, other times Simmons would throw things at him and threaten to cut his food rations until he agreed to get out of bed.

Donut would laugh while he got dressed and make remarks that made Simmons red in the face and Grif angry. They would be able to hear Lopez above them, already on the top of the base keeping watch as the three of them grabbed whatever food they could and tried to figure out where Sarge wanted them that morning.

They would bicker amongst themselves and muscled their way through the rations. Sarge yelling, Grif cursing, Simmons trying to be productive and Donut laughing.

It wasn't like that anymore, now there was only silence.

While he waited for relocation they had sent Donut to live at a training academy. They apologized for any inconvenience and placed him his own room. The lack of sound was the thing that got him at first.

When he sneezed it echoed off the walls. When he lay still in bed there was a humming in his ears where he knew other people breathing should be. He missed his friends, the bad food, the jokes, but in the end the thing he missed most was knowing they were there even when he couldn't see them.

Some mornings he would wake up before his alarm and lay in bed with his eyes closed. He found that if he tried hard enough, Donut could hear the sounds of Simmons shifting in the bunk beneath him. He would sometimes lean over, just to check, but he was always greeted with the floor and the prospect of another day miles away from the people he has spent so much time with.

Miles away from the people he loved with no knowledge of where they might have ended up or what trouble they could be in. Out of concern and a burning to hear their voices he began listening to the radio while he fell asleep at night. Hoping someday he would hear a familiar sound at the other end.