He comes out just when he thinks it's safe, a puppy all too eager to chew off his leash.
Lucks never been on his side, but he had been so confidently misinformed this time.
He mistakes a blink for a wink and a shaky breath for a sturdy wish.
Five years it takes to build up this courage, he's been lurking in the muddy depths all this time, hiding behind his girlfriends and his last shred of far from potent normalcy.
The goal is achieved, before he realizes the fateful consequences.
He had never realized his best friend would break his heart.
The first words are jumbled and confused, a puzzle waiting to be solved by caring love and gentle hands.
His intentions become clear and his hopes all too obvious in the second swarm of pointless, heartfelt words.
He hadn't realized the muddy depths had been the safest place to be.
He hadn't realized that somewhere in the water he lost his self-preservation and sanity.
He hadn't been expecting to be pushed back into the waves of impossibility and drowned.
"I believe that would be a conflict of interest."
The words are poison, dripping with venom, laced with injections of a darkness soon to come.
He means well, of course. He always does.
"It is not feasible. I wouldn't want to let my feelings get in the way of my duty. I care for you too much. Can't you see that's why I'm doing this?"
He hadn't realized that he had died that night until a few months later.
He doesn't react, because he's finally the stoic deer caught in headlights they all want him to be.
He just stands there for a little bit.
He nods ten minutes later and they drive home in silence occupied by despair and regrets.
He walks into his room, embodiment of a tarnished soul with a rusty heart. Couldn't they see that maybe it just needed a little cleaning, and then maybe it could go back to being gold like it used to?
He waits and waits, his heart gets blacker and blacker, and he cries slowly, slowly.
He punches the wall a few minutes later, not hard of course, because he had never been strong. It starts to bleed really bad, though, and he has half a mind to put a bandage on it but then a new thought occurs to him.
I have a new favorite color, he thinks, for the first time in five years.
He just watches his new favorite color drip down his knuckles onto the carpet so the yellow will stay away for just a little while longer.
Ten attempts to talk about it are turned down, none of them by the one he actually wants to talk to.
He flies up into the sky of hope and tries to make a home up there so he can be safe again.
He teeters on the edge for a moment too long while building his nest.
Then, the sky deserts him too.
He goes through the motions so they don't make good on their threat to force him into therapy.
The motions are good hygiene, good manners, and good ethics.
The motions can't stop his mind's wheels from turning to his best friend.
The motion makes him feel like he has no importance, like he always has to listen to other people.
The motions start to make the wheels spin faster.
Look what you've ruined, he overhears them saying to his best friend one night.
I'm just trying to protect him, comes a hoarse reply that sounds rather raw for a robot.
Raw like his heart which his best friend kept pouring salt onto, tearing his stupid wound apart in agony?
He leaves, not wanting to hear any more, but then again they had never noticed him in the first place.
Hurray, hurray, they convince themselves, he's starting to heal and move on!
He must have been going through the motions better than he thought.
They are so surprised- well, not really- when they awake one pure summer morning and he isn't there.
He had called Mikayla for the first time in ages that night, desperate enough to turn to his wicked witch who he wanted to blame so badly because she had been the first to desert him.
She promptly turns into his fairy godmother, pumpkin carriage and all, when she tells him yes, I still live in Tranquility, and yes, I'll pick you up.
He's had so much practice at being quiet he's able to go to his room without waking his parents.
They would know tomorrow, of course, because they would get a phone call.
And so his parents would come in and exchange concerns and leave wondering just when he had painted the walls in his room red.
They come for him bright and early in the morning, just as he had suspected.
He wakes up and looks outside his window.
The bright yellow startles him and he steps away and stares intently at the walls, trying to forget the sight.
Red is his savior, his solstice now.
I made such a mistake, he tells his leader. I think I feel the same way. I have for such a long time. Why have I been denying it? He asks.
But the closest thing he had ever had to a father just glares at him.
I think is nowhere near good enough, he replies, something he had never seen before on his features… disappointment.
He notices that his favorite color seems to be red.
In a futile effort to make him smile, he turns into red with black stripes.
When the boy sees it, he lets out an anguished yell and sobs into his teasing leather.
Nowhere is safe now.
The yellow comes out of hiding a moment too late and a dollar too short.
He tells him how wrong he had been that night.
But it's too late, because he who he had fallen in love with was gone now, damaged beyond repair as he just stares into the distance and laughs a shallow, haunting laugh.
It was all his fault- one life destroyed, the one he had sworn to protect.
There's a new addition at the base- a decent sized swimming pool, outside so everyone can all be in close company.
They hadn't realized he was drowning until a soldier is performing CPR on him.
His guardian fails again- it's lost it's shock value by now, though.
He's still alive, because luckily someone had noticed in time.
He wished after that he could stop relying on luck.
They all knew he had truly died quite a while ago, so no one is particularly excited he's alive.
Maybe it would be better another way, but life is not reversible.
He thinks he's better off gone, too, and everyone knows it, because the only thing left even vaguely resembling him was his body, which didn't look exactly the same- hair he's too lazy to cut, clothes he's often too lazy to wash, stubble he's too disinterested in to shave.
His heart just… gives out without warning two months later.
No one is shocked and no one can pretend to be.
They all grieve for the boy they used to know while he finds the murky depths again.
He had come out just when he thought it was safe.
He had not known after that it never would be again.
AN: Update Oct 2: Er... I said to expect a part two but I don't think that's gonna happen and if it does it won't happen for three months at the very least. Things don't always have happy endings. The world would be boring if they always did!
I don't completely adhere to proper grammar for the sake of my style in the story.
So the ending should probably be longer, and I'm sure this would be better if I spent more time on it but I got lazy. I wrote this for myself because I enjoyed writing it and I'm not sure if other people will like it but I figured I should post it anyway. I am really curious as to whether people like this and my writing in this style. Please review! Criticism appreciated! Even if you just say "c00l" it's much appreciated. xD I wrote the whole thing around the line, "he comes out just when he thinks it's safe", which was inspired by Shark Week. :O
Diclaimer: I don't own Transformers. Actually I do. Because, you know, a human can own giant robot aliens. ;)