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A/N: Companion story to "Children of Megatron." This is to answer a few questions regarding Ellie's relationship with Soundwave. Hope you enjoy it. As always, please let me know what I did wrong or right. Tracy
Connections
He had learned the planets' multitude of languages, including distinct dialects and accents, solar orbits ago. Years, he corrected himself. These human creatures called them years. If anything, Soundwave thought, he was good at his job, and his job was to learn all about the inhabitants on this wretched rock so that he was better able to spy on them.
He was hanging in space doing little more than monitoring the planets' conversations through the satellite he was plugged into when it hit him; pain. His legs were crushed, his left arm was pinned and there was a burning sensation running into his left optic and audial. The pain was not his own, he realized, but rather that from a spark connection. Alarmed, he located each of his symbiotes through his link with them and determined that they were not suffering any damages. So, what was this?
He attempted to access the memory files of the other that had connected with him and became confused; there were no data files. Desperate now, he explored what he could of the other's mind and was shocked by what he found; it was a human.
How was this even possible? He had no hypothesis, so he delved further into the other's mind and was able to access enough memories to determine he was in the head of a youngling femme.
Who was she? How had they connected? He was determined that he would find out, so he allowed himself to sink further into her mind and just experience what was happening to her now.
The burning sensation; he analyzed it and realized it was cold when it first touched her face, only to begin burning as it sat. Acid. She had to be having acid dripped on her. What did she see? It was useless, nothing but blurs and smears of color. It was probably from a combination of both the damage to her optic and the liquid humans expelled from them when in pain, tears.
What did she hear? Wailing. She was crying, which he expected given her apparent age and current pain level, but what else? A voice; "Yes?
"As far as I can see there are two people trapped in the car. It looks like a mother and baby.
"No, the mother is dead. The baby . . . Oh God! The baby is crying! She's still alive! Hurry! The tanker truck has a corrosive sticker on it and something is leaking through the roof onto her. Please hurry!
"No! I can't pull her out! Her legs, oh shit! They're crushed between the back of the seat and her car seat. I can't get the seatbelt off!"
He hacked into the emergency response phone conversations in America and Canada,
given the caller's language and accent, and searched for any references to car accidents involving tanker trucks transporting corrosive materials and entrapment. Fortunately, there was only one at that particular moment, so he flagged the information in his processors and compared the part of the conversation the femme youngling was able to hear with the nine-one-one operator's questions. They matched.
He further accessed the call log to determine which emergency response unit was deployed and was able to extrapolate what hospital they would most likely transport her to. Acknowledging that he could do no more for the youngling from where he was, and couldn't get to her in a timely enough fashion to actually help, he focused on strengthening the connection between them and trying to take the brunt of the pain onto himself.
Soundwave refused to examine his motives right then. Later, he would assign his actions to his role as a creator of his minicons. It was hardwired into every creator to protect their spawn, so that was what he was trying to do; protect a youngling that had some sort of spark connection with him.
He watched through her optics as a blur moved in front of her line of sight and heard it make soothing sounds, placing something malleable around her pinned arm and over her face to stop the acid from causing further damage.
"We can't lift the tanker off! Can you get the car seat out?" he heard someone ask the blur in front of her.
"No. Even if I could, both her legs are crushed and her arm is pinned," the blur replied.
"Got the call from the doc; amputate," another voice ordered.
"What?" the blur asked in horror.
"If you don't we're going to lose her! We've got gas leaking and an explosion imminent. Do it now!" the authority's voice ordered.
He felt the youngling's hand grab on to the blur in fear as he leaned away from her for a second. "Don't go!" she cried.
Soundwave felt his very spark break in sympathy at the utter terror in that voice.
"Shh baby. I'm not going anywhere," the blur soothed as he pulled something apart in front of her.
"Now, this is going to make you sleepy," he warned as he pricked her with a sharp implement.
Soundwave felt the cold sensation invade the young femme's lines through their link and heard her cry out. Then, the unmistakable sound of a high powered blade cycling preceded the breeze it generated as it approached her left arm.
"Primus no!" the spymaster mouthed in the silence of space. He couldn't let her endure that, so he reached through their link and sent her into a deep recharge just as the blade touched her arm.
As the youngling slipped into her unconscious state, the link between them severed and left him alone again in space. He refused to dwell on that and focused instead on following the femme's progress throughout her ordeal. He needed to make certain she would be safe. The records indicating she would be placed in the care of her uncle eased his spark. After all, it was hardwired into all mechs to care for the younglings of kin.