Alone
By Shadeless
Fireflight sat in the full rec room. Around him Autobots were chatting, refuelling, or simply being noisy.
He felt alone.
It was a first for him. Since his creation he had always had the feeling of his brothers in the back of his mind, he just realized. He didn't like this. Loneliness. He couldn't even tell someone, who would understand? They would simply tell him that the other Aerialbots would be fine in no time, that he shouldn't be worried. He wasn't worried. He knew they would be OK, at least that much he still felt.
Sneering, he got up, to flee the room, the others, the feeling of being abandoned in a full room. He collided with Sunstreaker. Just what he needed. At least a fight would leave him in the same predicament as his brothers, too far gone to care that their connection was strained. His straying thoughts returned to the present when he noticed that he was still online, much to his surprise and dismay. The yellow Lamborghini was watching him with an odd expression on his face plates. It could be murdurous intent. After all he had left a nice streak of paint on his chest. Nice paint job, always so sparkling…
He needed to stop doing that. Fazing out was what had nearly cost him his gestalt mates. His back tensed. Luckily, or not, for him Sunstreaker seemed to take no offense at being ignored twice in as many minutes. Or the scratch in his paint, for that matter. He gestured towards the table. "That place occupied?"
Anger bubbled in Fireflights spark. "Of course not. As you very well know."
Instead of dismembering him, the twin dropped into the seat. "Good."
Slumping back into his own, the flyer gaped at him. Then his thoughts started wandering again. To the color of the walls (why orange?), the glittering of someones paint on the other side of the room, his brothers in the med bay, his unchangeable flighty mind that wouldn't stay focused onthetaskathandforslagssake – A black hand waving in front of his face plates startled him out of his mental ranting. "You still in there?"
Fireflight was tired, of it all, perhaps for the first time in his short life. "Why are you here?"
Making a show of making himself comfortable, Sunstreaker looked at him innocently. Well, as innocently as he could. "What do you mean?"
"You never sit with me. Or anyone else. You glare at them 'til they run for it. Apart from Sideswipe. Where is he?" He hadn't noticed the red twin was missing. Normally he was near his brother, at least if the yellow one took one of his seldom attempts at being social.
Sunstreaker shrugged. "Med bay."
He winced at his own insensibility. He should pay more attention to his surroundings. Like incoming enemy fliers. "Oh."
"Jet judo. The usual." He sounded completely untouched. Completely? No, there was something…
They sat in silence for the next minutes, Fireflights bumbling thoughts centering on the yellow puzzle sitting at his table. "Sunstreaker? Why are you talking to me?"
Dark blue optics regarded him. They weren't usually so dark… "You looked like you could use the company."
"The room is full."
"And you are alone."
It wasn't a question. Baffled, the Aerialbot looked at the other like he never had before. Sunstreaker, antisocial, vain glitch; one of the twin terrors; always ready to kick your aft if you so much as glanced at his paint job in the wrong way; ridiculed by half the army; feared by most of the rest… Had a brother. Only one. Who got into trouble more often than not.
How often did one of them end up in the med bay alone? Fireflight had never counted, but he remembered many, many times… "Do you – want some energon?" The other nodded.
He got two rations. They sat in silence. Around them the ruckus went on. Talking, laughing, teasing. None of them noticed the two, apart for the occasional odd glance. How little they saw, knew about them, in these hours. Shivering the flyer asked himself whether Sunstreaker felt like this all the time. Unseen, unnoticed, no one understanding because no one could – apart from his brother.
Sometime, between them, without him knowing how, or why, or when, the cold feeling in his spark dimmed.
They were alone.
But they were alone together.