Sorry for the way long wait. Writer's block sucks and I've started my novel! YAY! Of course, I'm probably going to dump it and start over. Again. Beginnings are the worst for me, if you haven't noticed from the stories I write on here. All I'm going to say is, the antagonist finally has motive and her brother has a personality. Oh joy. I'm so excited, it's so great, SQUEELS!
Deep breaths. Breath. Okay.
I've gotten two requests for what to happen in this story, and loving them both, I did my best. To 'human needs love' and 'TXVR6', I tried and I hope this is what you were expecting.
Hope you like it.
"It's a hundred a month, utilities are on you." The man looked my ID over. If I ever actually meet Wheeljack, I'll have to tell him I love him. That card, Bee made it the same way he makes his holoform, and it checks out completely.
"Done." I grinned, pulling out another magic card. This one, however is real. Or, it's a replica of a real cared. We decided Will wouldn't mind too much.
"Alright, looks good here." he handed both back and I put them in my pocket, then took the keys. "Next month's rent is the end of the month. Have any problems, come back up here and ask for James Dallas."
"Will do." I agreed, turning to walk out. The road was somewhat quiet, and it looked like this hill was half the town.
"You got it?" Bee asked, starting the engine. I nodded, dropping the keys on his dash.
"We're all booked for a month. I hope we don't need to stay that long though." He pulled out and turned to roll down the hill. "And if we need any help, we just need to return here and ask for one James Dallas."
"Great." we could both joke around, but it feels like we're going through motions. We were both on edge, and even though we lost our persuers a day and sevral states ago, the danger was not all behind. We had to stay under the radar, which isn't very easy. Being in the middle of some woods is the first place they're going to look. So, we stopped in some no-name town half-way through the country.
I admired our chosen safe house. Not thirty yards from the chinese resaurant Lucky Garden, where the trees were only just dense enough for Bee to transform and not be seen from the road, was a mini-trailer park. Or what used to be one. Now, it's more like one big overgrown garden. And I'm sure I know why this trailer went so cheap.
We pulled up in the back, just in case. I got out, and waited for him to transform before moving closer. He leaned against the side of the home, helping me up onto his knee. I mirrored his position, crossing my legs and looking right back. So here we sat, in the itchy grass of the uncut midwest, in the middle of the day, without word from anyone on the siduation. And let me tell you, it is not great to sit here knowing nothing but the tech the government currently has. Not good at all.
"Are you alright, Sam?" Bee asked, worriedly. I looked at him in confusion. For all that's happened, I thought I was holding up pretty well.
"Yeah, why?"
To answer, he did the equivillant of raising an arm to show what he held, bringing it to light when I hadn't even noticed him reach for it. My own uneasiness.
"I'm fine. Come on, you're uptight too." I stated pointedly. He nodded, giving in to that. "Besides, we should be fine here, right? And, for whatever reason no one checked in with us last night, it won't happen tonight. We should just, relax."
About four minutes went by before he spoke up.
"And how do you sugest we 'relax'?" he demanded skeptically.
"I don't know, I haven't 'relaxed' in over two decades. I assumed you knew what how to."
Another quiet minute before, an arteficial calmness started to come over me.
"How's that?" he questioned me and I realized it's from the link. I wasn't sure how I felt about that, though. It felt too fake, too forced.
I pulled out the picture viewer out of habit and the fake emotion crumbled under Bumblebee's recognition.
"Oh, it's in great shape." he complimented. I nodded and switched it on, going to one picture in perticular. The image showed Skids pinned below Mudflap, and they'd both stopped mid-fight to wave at us.
"That's relaxing." I mused.
"Here." He offered to take it. I handed it over and remembered that even though my signal was the only it would recognize from the sensory pad on the bottom, most of the Autobots could acess it. How do you think the pictures got on there in the first place?
He must be uploading more images, because when he handed it back, I was met with a new image when I turned it on. I was there, in that brainless moment when I practically passed out on Optimus's front seat. Was he there? Or did Optimus somehow take that from that angle?
I switched to the next. which was even more recent. Our reunition, then, with everyone else. the last of the new ones, however, didn't belong. It was a picture of Earth. It was so far away, the entire planet fit into one holographic picture. It was receding even smaller, I'm sure, when he was looking at the real thing.
"My last glimps at the planet." Bee explained. "I decided to keep that one." I nodded, quickly moving on. But, I knew what he meant. Even know, when I've been with them for a little while again and it's obvious it's not going to be over soon, the memory of my own last glimps of anything Cyberonian, save for the picture device and whatever useless leftovers found around the base, was still vivid in my own memories.
"What's happened since then?" I asked, wanting to change the subject.
"The Decepticons have gone quiet. Every once in a while, they attack, but it's like they're avoiding battle as much as we are." he mused. I turned the picture viewer off and held it in my hands. "So we've gone on the offensive. Just a couple months ago, we've tracked them to one of their primary bases. We found readings of extensive energon resivours, and before we found the Nemesis on it's way here, we were making plans to raid it."
"How much energon? I thought that was rare by now." Without the Allspark.
"Enough to bring dozens of sparklings to age, and run the Ark for three times as long as we've been gone." I whistled, the fact I was the only human that meant anything to was not lost to me.
"How'd they get so much?"
"It's likely they've been hoarding it for centuries. Optimus says that there's no way they would have let us find it. It was probably a diversion, that they let it slip. To lead us away from Earth."
"They weren't counting on you being in the neighborhood, hu?" I smiled. He was here in the solar system the entire time, keeping an eye on the area. "Why are they hoarding so much energon?"
"I don't know that one." he admitted. "That's two mysteries. Why do they have that much energon, and why are they here? Maybe they're related? You may not have been public, but you have been here on Earth. Have you noticed anything Cybertronian come up at all? Anything that would have made the Decepticons notice the planet once more?"
I sighed and rubbed my neck. Bee was immediatly aware my answer was negative, but I answered anyways.
"Well, you realize, my only contact with anything beyond the trees around the base for the last two decades is Will. And, we didn't really talk about current events. I couldn't even tell you who the president is right now, or what wars the world has gotten in. Honestly, if you asked me a couple days ago if Mexico had taken over Texas, I couldn't tell you 'no'."
"Surely you didn't confine yourself that completely. Sam, that couldn't have been good for you." he fretted. Yes, my social skills are probably a little lax, considering I haven't spoken this much in forever, and most of the time I've been sitting back listening to everyone else talk. Put me back into high school and I wouldn't last an hour.
"I wasn't exactly in the mood to associate with the human species, though. Or, probably, in the proper mental health." I shifted nervously. He was staring at me like he was trying to read my thoughts, which is pretty darn close. He was pretty much scannin everything, everywhere, on my side of the link. I sat patiently for a minute, he was positive he'd find some crack in my composition.
"Bee, I'm fine." I insisted, trying to slow him down a bit, but, on this non-phisical level that connected our life forces, he passed right through me. I blinked, and he stopped.
"So for the last twenty years, You've done nothing but stared at the same walls? And you're going to tell me that didn't effect you at all?"
"Well, I've lost twenty years of my life in a stalemate, but, it's over, isn't it?" I pointed out. If one thing I learned, the last is over, so however much you loved or hated it, it isn't coming back, and it isn't a part of the now.
"Something must have happened during this time, other wise you would have just, faded. Tell me, what have you been doing all this time?" he insisted. He was getting pushy, and for some reason, I was getting irritated. I kno it's mine, because when Bee felt it, he backed off immediatly, but still waited for an answer.
"Not much. Looking back now, when day and night blended and I sat for hours, that's probably because this link was stretched too far, before it got a chance to actually be there." I decided. Actually, I wonder if the days when I couldnt muscle bring myself to move a muscle he was farther away, as opposed to the days when I found myself wandering to the Lennox house for human interaction. "I don't think the isolation bothered me at all. It was my choice, after all."
"That's terrible. I thought you at least kept on a life. This link was a terrible mistake, if it put you through this much." he shook his head. I felt my own heartbeat pick up, getting more irritated.
"What did you expect, for me to keep going through my old life, and when it was obvious I wasn't aging, move and start over again?" I demanded.
"No, the link was stretched for me too. I tried to get permission to return to Earth for you, but Prime wouldn't let any of us return. They had security so tight we couldn't send a single transmission in. And I knew the spark pain would be worse for you, because you didn't know what it was, but I tried not to think about it. I am so sorry, Sam." he insisted. I could feel his genuine sorrow and concern, but his regret made me more angry. I'm not sure why.
"For the last twenty years, I lived. Okay? Nothing else really matters. If it weren't for this link, you know I might not even be alive. Somehow, I doubt the government would just forget about me."
"Sam?" he started to probe over the link again, fully aware something was bothering me. I locked my jaw and waited, partially curious to see if he could figure it out.
Then, suddenly, he poked somewhere he shouldn't have and I yawned.
"You're tierd." he accused.
"Am not." I crossed my arms childishly. But, through the link, he poked again and I resisted another yawn.
"Yes, you are." he insisted pointedly. "We've had arough fourty-eight hours, and this isn't a subject that agrees with you." Alright, so maybe someone that not only has acess to your emotions directly, but also trained to be your guardian is not the best person to argue about what you're feeling with.
"It's only, what-"
"Nine-thirty. A perfectly acceptable hour for you to recharge."
There was a moment of silence before I voiced something we were both worried about.
"What if Prime hails?"
A longer silence followed and we shared an understanding. He isn't going to. He didn't last night.
"I'm staying up. I can go nearly twice as long as you without recharging if I have to. I'm not a scout for nothing." he urged, offering a hand to me. Last night, I slept in the back seat in a parking lot. The night before, I slept over his spark. And the night before that, I slept on the Lennox's lawn. Three completely different nights, and now there's a fourth to add.
I didn't climb over to his palm.
"I'm not tierd." I insisted. I can't sleep now, not here in some no-name town when we have no idea what's going on or what to do.
"We'll figure it out in the morning." Bee insisted, scooping me up now. I groaned, feeling far to anxious and, bluntly put, terrified of what's going to happen. My mind calmed over and Bee paused silently. "I know you're refusing to talk to me about the last couple of years. And you aren't getting away with it tomorrow."
"Whatever." I sighed, stubbornly insisting that I didn't need to sleep. He poked at my drowsiness again, and exerimenting, he fueled it. Obviously he cheated, because I was out immediatly. Out, but not blacked out. He was far too gentle about it, and I slept with vivid dreams.
I was sitting in the abandoned medical bay, of all places. It's deathly silent, and it felt like walls were crushing me. My own mind once again a jumbled mess. By some unknown force, I was compelled to close my eyes. I wnt to see this place like it was before. Ratchet, behind the berth, waving whatever tool he happened to have at whoever stood in the door way. Lights on the walls, one from the ceiling shining on his work like a spot light. Paint held firm and there was that eternal acidic smell mixed with warmth.
But, when I closed my eyes, the only memory I had to replace where I stood was no different than if I opened my eyes. Near phisical pain struck through me as I realized, I can't remember them. They're leaving me again. Where is that always present sense of hesitency and fear when I step in here to 'bother Ratchet while he works'?
I opened my eyes, I don't even know where I am any more.
Backing up fearfully and emotionlessly, I ran from the enormous room. Down the halls, around the corners, dead end after dead end.
I'm lost. In my own home, I'm lost. Where am I? Why did my feet bring me to this room, instead of the outdoors? Why can I not escape this base?
Base? This is a base. The NEST base. Where the Autobots lived.
I felt pain, this is Bumblebee's room. Despite how I miss them all, for some reason, it's Bumblebee that I keep crawling back to.
Closing my eyes to remember spending he night here, watching a movie with my best friend... What movie? Where was the screen? Where did we sit? Who was I with?
No! I can't remember, I've only regained my memories to lose them again! How long has it been since I ran from the other room? What room was it? Hours?
My eyes opened to sunlight, and just like the time I'd just spent in the last, I found my muscles unable to move an inch more. I laid frozen with the ever fading memory of the Autobots there on the top of my mind.
"Sam." The fading memory, yet here I lay on Bumblebee's lap, with him waiting there attentivly in the link, wanting to cosol me from whatever nightmare I'd had.
"You wanted to know about my ime alone on the base?" I spoke quietly, still unnerved. I couldn't move from my laying position to even realize where exactly I laid.
He didn't answer verbally, but I could feel his encouragment.
"I was in a cycle, driving myself mad and coming to my sense to remember everything only to go mad again. It was imposible to get over, every time as terrifying as the last. Near the end, I think because you guys were on your way here, I stayed sane a bit longer. But I knew I'd lose it all over again."
Silence. I could hear children shouting far off. I vaguely remembered there being some memorial park across the street from the Chinese reteraunt. There's really nothing to get up for, so the fact I didn't want to get up bothered neither of us.
"Bee?" I shifted a bit to look up at him. It hit me that before, my just laying here would have been weird. I sat on his knee sometimes, on his shoulder more often, but this would have never happened. But now, probably because of the link, neither of us gave it a second thought. Well, except for my noting it now.
"Hmm?" he wirred. That's right, I'd had a question. I had to retrace my train of thought, revercing my actions to help. Now that I couldn't actually see my position again, I remembered what had originally sparked my notice.
"Are you alright?" I was picking up on an something unfamiliar from him. It wasn't a negative something, so I didn't stress about it too much.
"You know with this link, things aren't going to be the same as they were before." He must have been thinking along the same lines as me. Honestly, I was content to sit here. I felt oddly in place; such a contradiction to my nightmare. One I accepted greatfully.
"I know it." I sighed, probably too relaxed for our siduation. But I couldn't help it. Maybe Bee's lulling me to keep me calm, so there's no repeats of last night. I do hate fighting with my best friend, even though it was more of a bad-attitude-Sam-knows-whats-guardian siduation than an arguem-
I felt a pressure on the back of my neck that moved down swiftly and lightly, lifting half-way down my back.
For a moment, I was just in shock. Bumblebee was inspecting and watching me, waiting for a reaction. He hadn't been thinking along the lines I had at all!
Blinking, I remembered when he first told me about the link, subconciously made, never would have done it on purpose without my permission, all the stuff I'd tuned out while I was drunk on their being back.
The pressure returned and repeated itself, Bumblebee's hesitency fading the longer I laid there unblinking.
"Bee?" my voice was shaky, and a thousand thoughts went through my head. What the slag? Where did this come from? Stop! Why? Let me up. Wait a minute here. After evrything we're going through right now, you're going to go like that on me? I didn't even have a clue that he would ever even think like that.
The pressure on my back went a third time. I snapped out of it and shook my head, pushing myself up.
"What on Earth is going through your mind right now? I'm getting down-" that good mood I'd been in after waking from that nightmare to the comfort of my best friend's presence was completely. I just don't understand how he could ever...
"Stop." Bee pleaded, reaching out to me, with the same hand he just pet me with. Wait, am I still in a nightmare? This is completely out of character for him.
I flinched away and he pulled back. I moved to climb down.
"Stop." he insisted again. This time, there was power behind is word. Or rather, simultaniously, his half of the link gave a swift and tight squeeze and I lost all motor controls. My widened to realize what he'd just done as he shifted me back to the same comfortable position as before. His hand ran down my back once more and I was still immobile. I couldn't even speak, though that may be from the shock.
His hand ran down my spine in a constant rythm, and I noticed that unfamiliar something I'd picked up on him earlier seemed contented now. But my position laying here on his lap was no longer a thing that deserved no thought... Or is it?
I couldn't move or resist, so I was left to lay there, but it felt no more awkward than before. Out of curiosity, I closed my eyes to consentrate. What was it I had thought earlier? About this probably having to do with the link? Primus, Bee was giving me a warning when he said things wouldn't be the same.
I took a deep breath and relaxed against me will, but very much so free of his. Wait, I can move again. He was hesitent again, waiting for my reaction at my newfound freedom again. My only thought was, Optimus would be so mad if he knew what Bee just did.
Of course, by now, I didn't do anything about it. I probably wanted to get up less than I had ealier. This is definitially the link making me enjoy this, and it's probably the link making him do it. Probably... I couldn't get rid of that seedling of doubt.
"Bee?" I spoke up again. He got real worried, even though surely he knows I'm butter right now. He stopped stroking my back. If I try to escape again, he isn't going to stop me this time. "What's going on?"
"I'm sorry, Sam. I just, whatever you dreampt last night must have been aweful, and, I was just thinking about how I'm not going to let somethinng like that happen again because... well, because you're my human now." he admitted, obviously apologizing only for freaking me out. I can see where he's going with that though.
"Let's not tell the others about that."
To make sure we're all on the same page, Sam has not completely recovered from the last twenty years, even though there is a dramatic improvement. So while Bumblebee is sitting there freaking out at actually hearing how lonely his human was, Sam has the lingering effects of several mental breakdowns. So, even with Bumblebee there with him, you can't expect Sam to act like it never happened. They can try, but you can't erase those twenty years. Not to mention the link itself is sort of like a rubber band stretched way out for way too long, then suddenly the ends are brought closer. It'll heal, but it's still a little lose and weak.
And the little thing when Sam woke up, well, all I have to justify that is the link again. It is a pet link, and it's going to change their personalities. At different speeds, depending on how willing they are. Therefore, Bumblebee got to that point a little faster than Sam, though he wasn't far behind. And, come on. I got the idea when my dog fell asleep on my lap, and I couldn't help but to abandon my story for a few minutes and pet her.
The next chapter won't take as long, I promise. New tablet, longer writing hours, and thus quicker chapters. I'm actually also working on one for After Cybertron. Also, I know where this is going, and personally, I think it's a big twist you'll enjoy.
R&R