Angsty
"Hate me. Hate me like I hate you."
Static. Pain. Cold. His sensors were all feeding him information he could not process. He didn't know how long he'd been laying there, or where he was exactly. He tried to make some sense of the thoughts crossing his processor, but it was too difficult. They were scrambled, messy. There was this one file, one thought nagging at the back of his head, though, that was making it hard for him to focus on the rest of them. He tried to reach for it, but as soon as he did, it recoiled back away from him, leaving him feeling empty. Feeling numb.
He found enough strength to power up one of his optics –the only one that still functioned-, and struggled to focus it on what was before him. There were shapes. Purple. Black. Silver. Orange. He couldn't quite pinpoint what it was that he was seeing. He only saw the shapes and colors.
And static. His optic was obviously glitching.
There it was again, that thought nagging at him. He tried to reach for it again, and when he did he felt as if he was falling into something cold, sticky, and he couldn't figure out which was the way up and which one the way down. He feared he would be trapped in that horrible nightmare of a place unless he hurried up and found his way out of there. Just a little more… just… a little…
There! He had it. He had it. But he was trapped. He was trapped in that dark, cold place. There was nothing. It was just him and that thought, that thing that had condemned him to that torture. He knew he would only remember, he would only understand why he was there if he opened that file, if he relived that memory… but he was afraid. He didn't know what it was, but he knew it was something awful, something so terrible that would make it impossible for him to get out of that place. That would make him realize he deserved to be stuck there.
He needed to know.
He opened it.
"Talk? Is that what we need? Because I think what we need is you to stop following me around!"
-czzzzth—
It was broken. The file was broken. There were only parts of it that were safe enough to be retrieved.
"…what they did to you-I can't imagine what it was like… taking you apart, bonding you with that human. None of us could ever imagine what you had to go through but-it changed you."
"NO! You don't get to do this! This has nothing to do with any of this! This has nothing to do with now! I told you-I told all of you- I never wanted to talk about that again. I told you. What they did… don't ever bring this up again. Ever!"
More static. He remembered that day now. He could remember some parts of it. He knew that crimson mech had attempted to talk to him, and he'd shut him out. Sideswipe. His spark supplied him that name, and his processor told him it was right. But, why was he shutting him out like that? Why was that mech trying to make him talk?
Even before he turned his attention back to the file he knew that conversation hadn't ended that day. He hadn't left him alone. He had followed him. He had sought him out again.
"I told you to leave me alone!"
A black hand closed around his wrist, and he instinctively whirled around, slamming his fist hard on the other mech's face-plates.
The mech –Sideswipe- staggered backwards a few steps, releasing his wrist as if it burned. "The slag is wrong with you?! Why do you always do this?! I don't—for Primus' sake, I don't understand you! You don't have to do this alone, you don't—"
He was blinded by the rage, by the pain. He lunged forwards, throwing another punch to the red mech's face with a furious growl. The fist collided with Sideswipe's face, which made the mech hiss in pain, frame tense and bracing for a fight that never came.
"Hate me. Hate me like I hate you."
He didn't stay to see the effect his words had on the crimson mech after he spat that vile lie. He knew it was over then. He knew it right from the moment in which a horrible, numbing pain erupted in his spark. And when the pain vanished, he found himself to be alone within his spark.
His mind, however, was another story.
The shapes and colors were now easily recognizable. He even wished he could be back to that dark nothing he had been caught in only a few breems ago. Breems? Cycles? Orns? He didn't know.
It didn't matter.
An antenna twitched somewhere to his left. A pincer clicked annoyingly against his plating to his right. He felt the vibrations travelling through what was left of his plating and realized that he couldn't even feel disgust anymore. Not even now, that he was buried among the remains of those… bugs. His optic was powering down, and he didn't even feel the need to stop it. What was the point? There was nothing to see. There was no one there to come looking for him. There had only ever been one mech to bother with him… and he wasn't there anymore. They weren't coming back. He didn't expect them to. He didn't want them to. Sometimes when things were broken, they were meant to stay that way. Like that bridge he had blown up in an attempt to give the others a chance to escape. Like the bugs scattered over and around him. Like his own body, the one he'd been so proud of once. They were broken.
Sunstreaker was broken. He was trapped. Trapped in that horrible place. Trapped in a prison of his own making.
And it was a prison that had no way out. No way out because he had convinced himself he didn't deserve one. His treason had brought them all here, and even though he did regret it, it was all for the wrong reasons. He didn't want them to come back looking for him. They were better off hating him.
Especially Sideswipe.
His brother… Primus. His brother had risked so many things for him. He had stood up for him even though all Sunstreaker had ever done was shut him out, bring him down. At least now he was free of the burden he was. And even though in any other occasion Sideswipe would have realized he was not dead, he wouldn't be able to this time. Not after that fight where they had blocked each other out from their sparks.
Sunstreaker was alone. Absolutely, entirely alone.