Rebirth
Chapter Fifty
Sunny
In all honesty, Sal had no idea why the little red faced, screaming, football sized raisin was such a big deal. He definitely hadn't been very impressed when Matthew Bishop Donnelly Jr. had decided to totally ruin his parent's wedding party and pop out of Aunt Robin (because he had totally never believed his dad's story about big white birds dropping babies off on doorsteps). Three months later, and the now seven year old was no more impressed by the screaming baby even when his mom and so-called aunt cooed over the baby carrier.
"I still can't believe how much he looks like Matt!"
"I know, right? He may have inherited my hair, but I'm willing to bet that as soon he starts running around outside for most of the day that freckles will start popping up all over his face."
Was this the kind of "woman talk" he had overheard his dad and Uncle Mattie talking about? Because there was no way that squat raisin resembled his uncle.
"His nose kind of does."
Sal huffed and grabbed a new color to add to the drawing he was making of Bluestreak. The voice was nothing new to him. Sunny had been his only friend since he could remember. The mech had been there through all the terrible things he had experienced at that awful group home, gruffly comforting him when he would curl up in his bed all alone at night or when he was locked up in the "Punishment Closet" for drawing on the only paper he could find. Sunny had been the one to encourage him to run away—to find a better life away from the mean people. He wouldn't have been able to survive without Sunny; he would have never found a family without Sunny.
But that didn't mean that Sunny was always right.
He could hear Sunny's rare laugh echo in his ear before a shriek came from the baby carrier. Aunt Robin was instantly there to pick up the squealing baby, and he watched with mama as Robin carefully bounced Baby Raisin in a soothing manner. "Sorry, Ann. It looks like Mattie here is a little hungry. Could I—"
"Of course!" Sal rolled his eyes at how quickly mama jumped up to help Aunt Robin gather a few things and led her out of the room. He had no idea why his aunt always had to leave the room to feed the baby; it wouldn't hurt the baby to eat in front of other people. Even he had never had any qualms doing that.
Mama returned soon after the screaming had come to a stop, and Sal briefly looked up when she sat on the couch behind him. He didn't even tense up when he felt her fingers run through his thick hair and continued to color. "What are we drawing today, Sal?"
"Blue," he answered. He picked up the picture to show to her, slightly puffing up in pride when his mother gushed over the perfect lines and new shading technique that Sunny was starting to teach him. "I wanted to give him a picture to put on his dashboard."
"Oh, he'll love that, Sal," Annalise replied, and Sal felt a rush of warmth flood him at the happy smile she gave him. It made him happy whenever Jaden or Annalise looked at him with so much pride. Like he was their child. "I really like the colors you chose to use. They almost match his!"
Sal hummed in agreement and went back to smudging the red pastel he used for the crest on Bluestreak's forehead, adding a smidge of dark green when Sunny told him to for the shadows. "When's dad getting home?"
"He should be home before supper. Him, Matt, and Bluestreak had to go grab a few things for the café, but he said it shouldn't take them more than a few hours. Why? You getting bored with me?"
Sal dropped his pastel crayon and giggled when he felt a set of a fingers sweep along his side. Sunny snorted at the ticklish assault, but the boy couldn't find it in himself to care. After almost two years of living with the couple, Sal absolutely relished the loving physical contact they bestowed upon him. It was such a stark contrast to what he had been subjected to at a younger age, and he almost craved the warm hugs, gentle kisses, and tickling. He would even slither into the couple's bed some nights just to sleep squished between the two.
"Stop!" he gasped between giggles, halfheartedly attempting to grab the woman's hands.
"Hmmm, not until you admit I'm not boring."
Sal held out for a little longer, wiggling in a poor attempt to escape the relentless assault, until his giggles turned into strangled gasps. "Okay, okay! You're not boring."
"That's what I thought."
"But you're more boring than dad."
The boy yelped at the playful flick he received to the nose, but Annalise continued to grin down at him. "Alright, I'll give you that. Everyone is a little more boring than Jaden."
Sal laughed and focused back on his drawing when he saw Aunt Robin come out of the bathroom, looking a little tired. But Baby Raisin was asleep again, so that made up for his mother's attention being taken away. He kept his eyes on his picture, and only briefly glanced up when Robin jokingly asked his mom when she planned on having a little raisin of her own. The boy rolled his eyes at that, completely missing the yearning glance Annalise gave the baby while she simultaneously answered that it was way too soon after the wedding to be thinking about babies.
Why would his parents need a constantly screaming mass of drool and poop? They already him.
~:0:~
Sal knew that his dad had nightmares. Sometimes he had them too, especially after days when Sunny was really active. But he would often hear the door across the hall open and shut in the middle of the night and then the TV would turn on. He would lay in his bed, wanting to overcome that last hurdle of trust that kept him from following Jaden down the hall to curl up on the couch next to him and comfort him the way the man did when Sal experienced nightmares. Sunny wasn't ready to fully commit though, still not fully convinced that this "family" arrangement was permanent. He insisted that there was only one person they could really trust, but he had gone back to Autobot City with Mr. Prime.
However, that wasn't what jolted Sal awake that morning, only an hour before he had to wake up for school. He was out of bed and in the hall before he even realized where the loud bang had come from and blinked when he barely caught a glimpse of Jaden vanishing into the bathroom. The usual aroma drifting up into the apartment from the café below turned sour when Sal heard the sounds of gaging from the bathroom.
Feet silently padded against the carpeted floor while Sal hurried towards the sound, worry filling him when he heard Jaden softly speaking between gags. He peeked around the doorframe and stepped completely into the cramped bathroom when he saw Annalise kneeling on the floor in front of the toilet, Jaden soothingly rubbing her back. Sal didn't even realize he had made a noise until Jaden's head snapped towards him.
Even if Sunny hadn't taught him how to read faces, Sal would have been able to tell that the strained smile Jaden gave him was fake. "Hey, Sal. Why don't you go on back ta bed? Ya still got an hour 'til school."
Sal stared at him with narrow eyes, and then down at where Annalise was beginning to calm down. She was only half dressed for the day—still wearing her pajama pants beneath her blouse. She must have been awake for a while now…did she eat something bad for breakfast?
"Sal."
Sal backed out of the room, repressing a shiver of fear at the hard edge in Jaden's voice. He tried to be steadfast like Sunny had taught him to be, but there were still some things that triggered his old fears. Jaden was always a happy, soft-spoken man around him, minus the times that somebody was mean to Blue or disrespectful to the nice ladies that worked in the café. Sal didn't want that anger directed towards him.
He could feel Sunny sluggishly "wake up" and fill him with enough calm to stand just outside the bathroom, safely out of sight but still able to hear. "You okay now, Annie?"
"Yeah."
"Ya sure?"
"I'm fine."
Sal heard Jaden release a snort of disbelief before the sink came on. He shuffled closer in an attempt to hear above the rush of water. "…startin' ta get worried."
"It's…small virus."
"…past week?" The water finally cut off, and Sal could hear the full conversation again. "Even if it is a small virus, ya shoulda been better by now! Ah don't know any 'small' virus that'd have ya runnin' ta the bathroom ev'ry mornin' but be fine the rest o' the day. Ah'm just startin' ta worry it might be somthin' worse."
Worse? Sal felt his eyes widen, and Sunny was confused by the new, selfless panic that went through the boy. How had his mother even gotten sick without him noticing? Sure, she had seemed a little more tired lately, but she had a big job at the hospital! She was working with one of the Autobot medics—Ambu-something—to design a new type of prosthesis, and she always came home "complaining" about how much more work it was. That was why she was tired—she wasn't sick.
"Jaden, I'm fine."
"No, you're not. Somethin's goin' on." The bathroom went silent, and Sal could clearly picture the two adults standing in the middle of the room, Jaden now holding Annalise's face between his hands as their foreheads gently touched. He had seen them do it before when one or both became stressed. "Sorry for soundin' snappish. Guess Ah'm takin' the husband role a li'l to seriously, huh? Ah just can't stand seein' ya like this."
"How about a compromise? If I'm still feeling this way by the end of the week, I'll let you drag me to the doctor like you want to."
"Deal."
"Good." Sal almost grinned at the startled yelp he heard from Jaden before he was scrambling back towards his room in an effort to keep from being seen by the man that was promptly kicked out of the bathroom. "Now, get out and let me finish getting ready for work."
Sal flew back under the worn comforter on his bed and waited until he heard his grumbling father retreat to his own bedroom. Once he knew no one was coming to check on him, he poked his head out from under the covers and stared at the clock on his night stand, slowly ticking down the minutes until it was time for him to get up.
Annalise was okay. If she wasn't, she wouldn't be insisting that she was (Sal twitched at the thought, having been in the household long enough to know that the woman would stubbornly push through any ailment). And if Jaden wasn't already dragging her to the hospital, it definitely wasn't anything serious.
At least, he hoped it wasn't.
~:0:~
Over the next week, Sal began to feel a new knot of dread form in the pit of his stomach. His mother's illness didn't get any better during that time, and his body had begun to adjust to the new schedule of Annalise running to the bathroom to vomit. As much as he tried to hide it, Sal knew that Jaden was getting just as worried, but the man did nothing but comment that at least the illness wasn't getting worse.
This new feeling of apprehension was both familiar, yet foreign at the same time. He hadn't felt this nervous in a while; it wasn't required now that he was living with two doting parents. He had never been in a safe enough environment to be able worry about anything beyond his own well-being. Sunny didn't seem as confused by the emotions though. He thought it was okay to feel that way towards Bluestreak and, to a certain extent, Jaden (Sal didn't understand why Sunny's explanation of jazz made him caring for Jaden okay). It was Annalise that threw the mech off, and he insisted that Sal continue to be wary of the woman. She was the only one that Sunny didn't seem to have a clear reading of, and he didn't want the boy to become too attached.
So, that was why Sunny was just as confused as Sal when the first grader came home, after a week of silent worry, to find the nice ladies that worked in the café just grinning, giggling, and happily congratulating the confused boy the moment he stepped into the café. It didn't help that Bluestreak had been stubbornly silent on the way home either, sometimes giggling like the ladies did but insisting that his parents had to tell him the "good news." As long as that "good news" meant that his mom's appointment with the doctor had ended on a positive note, Sal didn't really care about the giggles.
He wasn't expecting to be swept up into a bone crushing hug the moment he entered the apartment. Sal was still a bit small for his age, but it had been a good year since Jaden had been able to sweep him up into a hug so easily, let alone swing him around without some complaint of him getting too big. After a dizzying journey from the door to the living room, Sal was plopped down onto the couch where he was immediately tugged into another hug.
"How was ya day at school?"
Sal frowned at the question. It was normally the first thing that Jaden asked after Bluestreak dropped him off. What wasn't normal was distracted tone in Jaden's voice. "Fine."
"That's good!" Jaden, his blue eyes gleaming with the same joy in his smile, glanced over at Annalise, and Sal looked up at the woman for the first time since entering the apartment. He blinked at the huge smile on her face. He had never seen her smile like that before. "Sal, we got some good news ta share. Ya know Annie's been gettin' sick, right?"
Sal hesitated before nodding. It was pretty obvious now that she was okay, but he hadn't expected them to be this happy about it. Maybe it had been worse than he thought; he'd become a little too complacent now that he had an actual home, but that didn't mean he should let himself become completely ignorant of the things around him. "She's okay?"
If it was possible, Jaden's smile got even bigger, and Annalise gave his shoulders a gentle squeeze. "Mo'e than okay, li'l man. You wanna tell 'im or let me?"
Sal turned to Annalise, who was nodding in answer to Jaden's question. "Well, there's really no other way to say this, but in about six or seven months you're going to have a new brother or sister."
Sal stared at the two adults, both grinning from ear to ear, and quickly searched the apartment for this new "brother or sister" of his. He didn't understand what that had to do with his mother being sick, but he could feel himself automatically feeling possessive of his home. "Where is he?"
Jaden gave a light laugh and reached out to ruffle Sal's dark hair, making the boy automatically reach up to slap his hand away. "He's not actually here yet. Remember how Aunt Robbie an' Uncle Mattie had ta wait a li'l for Mattie Jr.?"
It took him a moment, but the second he realized what Jaden was saying, Sal's indigo eyes widened as he whipped around to see Annalise's hand on her stomach. He turned back to Jaden, who slightly tilted his head at the wide-eyed look on the boy's face. "You're having a baby."
"Yeah," Annalise said, her voice filled with so much joy that Sal felt his stomach twist with a new emotion. He hid it well though as he leaned into her hug. "Isn't this just exciting? Soon you'll be a big brother."
"Exciting" wasn't exactly the word he would use to describe the new pang in his chest.
~:0:~
Sal felt like the last two years of his life was slowly unraveling over the next few months. The initial excitement of a baby died down after the first month, but that didn't keep it from coming back up again. Sal would sit at the dining table every night and listen to his parents go back and forth about it once they had finished listening to his day. Doctor's appointments; what sex the baby could be; when the baby started kicking; buying baby things; putting up new ultrasounds on the refrigerator; baby names; their schedules after the baby was born—the closer the due date became, the more and more it felt like their conversations were dominated by the baby.
The baby was even managing to haunt him outside of the apartment! Robin always asked if he was ready for the baby; Mattie tried to tease him into watching Mattie Jr.; even Bluestreak was giddy about the prospect of the new baby.
Baby, baby, baby. The bigger Annalise's stomach became, the more relevant the topic was.
The baby wasn't even born yet, and Sal could already feel the weight of his/her existence weighing down on him. Everyone seemed so happy. Annalise and Jaden were getting "congratulations" left and right, and people crowded around them to shower them with gifts. There were still three months until Annalise's official due date, and their apartment was already beginning to overflow with diapers, toys, and gender neutral outfits for the baby's first few months of life.
Jealousy warred with fear, and Sal tried to ignore Sunny's insistence to be ready for the worse. He didn't remember ever seeing his parents this happy when they were officially given guardianship of him. There was no big party or happy congratulations; no gifts given to them the first time they became parents.
This baby was becoming more important than him, and it didn't even have a name yet!
"What's the matter, Sal?" Sal jumped at the voice and turned towards the empty seat beside him. Bluestreak slowly inched forward in traffic before stopping again. "You've been really quiet, and I know that traffic's boring, but you've been glaring pretty harshly at that fire hydrant for a while now. So harshly that the dog that lady was just walking looked seriously awkward to stop and pee on it."
Sal wasn't very amused by the Autobot's statement and clutched the book bag in his lap. Once Sal had become comfortable with Bluestreak, the mech had begun to pick him up from school every day while Annalise and Jaden were busy at work. Sal didn't mind; Bluestreak was once Sunny's friend, and he had become Sal's friend too.
Was he going to lose the mech when the baby arrived?
"Man! Something must have happened because traffic is terrible today," Bluestreak continued, sensing that Sal wasn't in the mood to talk. The boy hadn't been in a very talkative mood lately, even less so than usual. "At this rate, we won't be home until supper!"
Sal stared out the window, deciding that Bluestreak was probably right. Traffic tended to be bad on even a good day, but the slow progression of moving only an inch every fifteen minutes was just terrible. Maybe they'd make it a block after, say, an hour of this.
"Ah ha!" Bluestreak exclaimed after a moment of silence. "So that's why traffic's so bad. One of the radio stations is reporting a pretty bad pile-up a few blocks up. Seems like they're having some problems getting it all cleaned up. Thankfully it only appears one person was really hurt because of it." Bluestreak paused. "Hey, would you like to walk to the café from here?"
Sal blinked in honest surprise. Since coming to live with Jaden and Annalise, Sal had never been allowed to venture out on the streets alone. He would say that the two adults were almost paranoid to let him be alone if he had minded the only rule they seemed to enforce with no exceptions. Sure it rankled his ego in a certain way, but he didn't mind because of the literal protectiveness he saw in the two when they warned him to never wander off without an adult. "Mom and dad will get mad."
Bluestreak hummed, and for a moment, Sal thought that the mech was agreeing with him. Then his seatbelt clicked in release, and the door popped open to the sidewalk. "You're probably right, but I think today can be a good exception. I'm not supposed to say anything because I promised Jaden I wouldn't, but I think he'd be okay with it just this once. Besides, it's only two blocks, and despite the rule, we all know you're more than capable of making it those two short blocks. Just tell Jaden I got stuck in non-moving traffic, and he'll understand."
The young boy hesitated before nodding and slowly sliding out of the mech. He shuffled up onto the sidewalk with his backpack clutched in his arms and turned back to look at Bluestreak still stuck in bumper-to-bumper traffic. The disguised vehicle's headlights briefly flashed, and Sal nodded in instinctual agreement.
He allowed himself to become part of the crowd that traversed the sidewalk and soon found himself nearly overwhelmed by the people that towered over him. Once upon a time, he had slipped around people's legs without a second thought, finding his tiny size to be a huge advantage than disadvantage. Now he kind of wished he had Jaden or Annalise's hand to cling to as he was nearly shoved into a sidewalk newsstand.
"You're getting soft, kid."
Sal shook his head and waited with a group at the crosswalk. It had been a few days since Sunny had made himself known. Sal had almost been wondering if his closest friend had decided to leave him for the baby too.
"Never."
That was a relief. At least now he knew that one person would still be there for him when the baby finally came.
The crowds began to thin a little the closer Sal got to the café. He was oddly relieved to see the two sets of tables and chairs his dad had recently put out in front of the café and jogged the rest of the way there. He briefly glanced at the large moving truck that was parked out front before admiring the mural that was still painted on the walls outside the business/apartment complex. He always liked to examine the cityscape for any touchups that may have been needed, finding it the least he could do for the adults that had taken him in off the street and cared for him.
Then he glanced up and immediately frowned at the sight of Jaden standing in front of a big box with the picture of baby bed on it. Of course. The moving truck behind him had the same brand as the furniture store his parents had dragged him to a week ago. They had spent the better part of a whole day picking out baby furniture for their future raisin, and Sal had been forced to miss the art exhibit that Jaden had promised to take him to.
Sal gave a huff and tugged on the strap of his backpack as he resolutely stomped away from the front of the café. You know what? For once, he didn't want to come home from a long day of school to hear about the baby. He didn't care about the baby. He didn't want the little thing to come along and take his only parents away, especially if it was already getting all of their attention now. He would just take a page from his old days of living on the streets and sneak up the fire escape into his room. He had always kept the window unlocked for these types of emergencies. Like when he wanted to avoid old ladies pinching his cheeks for being "adorable," or when dad let somebody who was just horrible at playing an instrument get on his stage that day, or when he was bored and needed something exciting to do, or even when—
Sal's body went completely rigid when he turned the corner that led into the alley behind the apartment. He stared the dumpster situated behind the café and felt his entire stomach drop. Sunny must have felt every ounce of his anger flee in that moment because Sal could vaguely hear the mech trying to get his attention.
However, Sal's eyes were locked on to the sight of the frame of his bed sitting beside the dumpster along with the mismatched dresser and nightstand. Without thinking, Sal dropped his backpack and rushed over to climb up on the nightstand and dresser to peek into the dumpster itself. A strangled cry escaped him when he spotted his comforter peeking out of a full trash bag, and he nearly fell down in his attempt to scramble away from the incriminating evidence he had just found.
He had known this would happen! He had known it the moment they had told him they were having a baby. They didn't want him anymore; they didn't need him anymore. All those promises about him never having to worry about living on the streets again and being alone were all just lies. False promises to keep him there until they could have their own baby. Now they were going to have a real family, and he wasn't supposed to be a part of it.
"Keep it together, kid!" Sal choked on a sob and stubbornly rubbed away the tears that were falling undeterred down his cheeks. "I told you to be ready for this kind of thing to happen. That guy may be Jazz, but I've told you before that the only one we can really trust is Sides. We need to get out of here before the people from the group home get here to take you back. There no way in the fragging pit that I'm letting us get taken back there."
Sal's shattering grief quickly morphed to fear, and he was fleeing from the alley out of instinct. "I…I don't wanna go back!"
"I know, kid. I'm not going let you go back there." Sal felt a rare flash of comfort come from Sunny before it was replaced with a fierce determination. "We need to get to one of dens we set up before finding this place. Remember where the nearest was?"
Sal didn't respond as he shifted his course in the direction he needed to take. Why did this always happen to him? Why couldn't anyone—anyone —just be happy with having him as their child?
He absolutely hated that baby.
~:0:~
Sideswipe sighed as he entered the city limits. That trip cross-country had certainly seemed a lot shorter the first time he had taken it. Of course, he had also been busy playing "bodyguard" to the Prime, and it had been a little more exciting with the others traveling with him, inciting brief races or even the annoying taps on the bumper to spur him to go faster.
That had been the first time he had been able to really relax and enjoy himself since…
Anyway, it had been a few months since the last time he had been to the city. Sideswipe had been taking his promotion to "unofficial" guard of Optimus Prime very seriously during that time and even before, during the months preceding the Prime's very public ousting of the Autobots. It had been a duty that had kept him occupied and unable to think much outside of keeping the Prime from being harmed by the more "outspoken" humans.
However, Sideswipe had found himself promptly dismissed from the role only a short week ago. He hadn't gotten much of an explanation from Optimus other than an unfamiliar glint in the Prime's optics and the insistence that he was allowed to put his guarding ways to use somewhere else. Sideswipe had spent a few days aimlessly wandering around the Autobots' growing city before Ratchet had snarled at him to get his aft to his human charge before the medic whacked him offline.
So, Sideswipe had quickly booked it out of there, wondering what Ratchet could have possibly been talking about. His initial lack of destination had sent him down an empty highway in what he had thought was just a random direction, and after a full day of driving, Sideswipe was forced to acknowledge the pain that still radiated from his spark.
It had already been seven human years—seven years of pain, anger, denial, and grief. He had done a very good job shoving it all away and covering it up with his new duties, but boy, when he finally got alone, it had hit him just as hard as the day he had felt his brother being viciously ripped out of his spark.
He had honestly never expected to live much longer after Sunstreaker died. Split sparks weren't meant to do that. But by some unholy miracle, here he was today—alive and well.
It hurt. It hurt every single day to wake up and feel the searing burn around the empty space that had once been Sunstreaker. To know that his brother would never make it to Earth and witness the end of the war like he had. To see the pity in Ratchet or Prowl's optics when they caught him cringing at the internal pain. To be unable to confide in one of his only friends because his anger had scared him off, just like everybody else.
Now, why had he felt the urge to come here again?
"Sideswipe!"
Sideswipe nearly swerved at the abrupt shout over the open comm. channel. A quick burst of anger surfaced in a sorry attempt to cover the pain the familiar voice inspired, leaving his reply abnormally harsh. "What do you want?"
There was a long pause—long enough to make Sideswipe think that the mech calling him had backed out of the conversation—and the former front-liner felt an immeasurable wave of guilt come over him. How could he continue to be this ugly towards Bluestreak? "Look, Blue—"
"I—I know you hate me, Sides." Sideswipe's flinch caused him to pull over and stop. He didn't want some uncontrollable reaction to lead to an accident that would hurt the unsuspecting humans around him. "I don't blame you, okay? I know I'm the reason why Sunny's gone, and you have every right to hate me. But I'm begging you to forget that for little bit. I screwed up real bad again, and I need your help, if not for my sake, then for Sal's."
Alarm suddenly filled him, and Sideswipe wondered about the automatic reaction he had towards a human child he had literally only met once. "What happened?"
"You're in the city, right? Optimus called ahead and said you were heading this way." Bluestreak paused long enough for Sideswipe to confirm the Prime's statement. "Okay, so me and Sal were stuck in traffic today, and I told him we'd probably be there for a while, so I suggested that he walk the last two blocks it took to get home. I thought it wasn't that far to walk, and he would be happier doing that than just sitting inside my cab waiting for traffic to clear because I didn't even end up getting to the café until about an hour later. But when I pulled up and asked Jaden where Sal was, Jaden said that he was supposed to be with me, and I explained what had happened, and we immediately started searching the area, and we found Sal's backpack lying in the alley behind the apartment, and oh, Sideswipe! I'm the worst kind of Guardian there is because now Sal's been missing for a whole four hours now, and it's all my fault."
Even if Sideswipe hadn't felt awkward in offering comfort, Bluestreak started talking again before he could say a word. "You're probably not surprised at all, huh? 'Blue screwed up again'—that might as well be the tagline that goes along with me now. We've been searching this whole area all day, but we need another pair of sensors out there helping. Sal knows these streets a lot better than we do, and that's not a positive compliment there. He could literally be on the other side of town by now or worst case scenario, he could have been kidnapped. Have you seen what certain humans can do to a kid? It's terrible! And he's all alone, and probably hungry now, and possibly cold, and—"
"I get the picture, Blue." A lot more than Bluestreak realized too. "I just reached the city limits, and I'll keep my sensors open for him."
"Thank you so much, Sideswipe! I've gotta go; Jaden's starting to freak out again."
Sideswipe felt the urge to say something else before the mech disconnected, but what could he say to his once friend at a time like this? "Sorry to be an afthole"? "It wasn't your fault"? "I was a jerk, but I want to be friends again"? It was pretty obvious at this point that he had completed fragged up that relationship, and right now the little kid that had brought him here was in trouble.
Not wanting to believe the worse, Sideswipe began scoping out places that would make a good place to spend the night. While his interaction with Sal at Jaden's wedding had been somewhat limited, he could starkly remember the conversation they had about how Sal had lived on his own before being found by Jaden. The boy had poured out an entire litany of reasons why he had been alone, enough to make Sideswipe's battle-hardened and numbed spark ache. Being left in a dumpster as an infant; jumping from group home to group home; being abandoned time and time again by different sets of "parents"; finally leaving that all behind to fend for himself.
The similarities between their earlier lives and Sal's uncanny personality resemblance to his deceased brother had broken through the resilient anger he had been clinging to for years. He had honestly been upset when the kid had ran off to be with his parents and had wanted to do anything in his power to stay when Prowl had finally informed him it was time to leave. Perhaps Optimus had realized his desire and dismissed him at the earliest convenience even though Sideswipe hadn't even fully noticed it.
Whatever the reason, Sideswipe didn't really care. Halfway through his trip to the big city, he had decided to jump on the ever growing Guardian bandwagon. He realized it was a dangerous thing, becoming so attached to a species that didn't even live for a fraction of his life. But what else could he seriously lose at this point? His brother was gone; his home was gone and that wouldn't change despite all the efforts Optimus had gone through; the one true friend he still had would never be able to forgive the hate and grief filled words he had said. What harm would come to him from protecting a little kid?
It took him an hour or so to finally find said kid, and it was actually by coincidence that he did. Sideswipe didn't have much experience in a busy human city like this one, so once he had finally gotten tired of the barely moving traffic, he had cut down one of the alleyways that he was pretty sure wasn't created for vehicles. But his alt-mode—for all its sleek design—was much tougher than the average vehicle and scraping up against a few dumpsters didn't bother him much.
Traveling through the alleys was how he eventually made it to one of the abandoned apartment complexes hidden away from the average passerby. Spotting the little figure trying to climb through one of the windows on the second floor was just sheer luck.
He didn't make a sound as he silently came to stop below the boy, watching him futilely pull at the plywood nailed across the broken window. Sideswipe didn't say a word when Sal finally gave up and collapsed onto the wobbling fire escape, a sob wrenching from him. The mech's spark twitched at the despair he heard in the tiny cries. "I wanna go back home!"
Sideswipe didn't understand. Sal was obviously very upset with being back on the streets. Why on Earth did he run away when it was apparent he hadn't wanted to? He watched Sal rub away at the tears that fell down his tanned cheeks. "Maybe they won't send us back. Maybe…maybe if we work at the café they'll keep us. We can clean dishes or keep the place clean. They'll keep us then, right?"
Now the mech was far past confused. What was this kid talking about? Who was sending him back? Why did he have to clean to stay at home? Who the heck was this "we" he kept talking about?
Sal whipped around so quickly that Sideswipe paused midway through transforming. There was such a look of utter panic and anguish in the boy's eyes that Sideswipe quickly finished the transformation and plucked the human from the fire escape without a second thought. Sal curled up in his hand as he instinctively rumbled his engine in comfort. It was an action that he hadn't done in many centuries, and he was almost startled by it. His frame hadn't reacted this way since…
A sharp cry from Sal was a thankful distraction, and Sideswipe had to quickly manipulate his hands to keep the boy from falling as he collapsed onto his rumbling chest. "Sides! Sides, you're here! You won't let them take us back to that bad place. We can just go live with the Autobots. They won't mind."
"Slow down!" Sideswipe gently maneuvered his hands so that he could be optic to eye with Sal. The boy's usually dark eyes had become a lighter shade because of the tears that pooled up in them, and the red that surrounded those light irises was a testament to the amount of crying the boy had been doing. "Let's just calm down a little, and I'll call Blue to tell—"
"No!" Sideswipe winced at the feedback the shriek caused, and Sal attempted to scramble up the mech's chest. "You can't tell them where we are! They'll send us back; that's what always happens. They never want us after the baby's born because then they have a real child."
Was there no end to the confusion he would feel tonight? Sure, he had heard that Jaden and his wife were having a baby soon. Bluestreak had gone on a little comm. link rampage the moment he had heard the news, contacting everyone he knew with the happy news. He hadn't been contacted personally, but he had heard about it from both Ratchet and Prowl. But what did any of that have to do with Sal thinking he was being sent away? "I'm sure that's not true, kid."
"They threw my stuff out! They're giving my room to the baby—I saw it! They only care about the baby now; it's all they talk about. Please don't let them take me back, Sides. I promise to be good."
Something was very wrong here. Something was very, very startlingly wrong with this picture. The last time Sideswipe had seen Sal nearly eight months prior, the boy had been happily bragging about his parents' union. He had heard Jaden and Sal laughing together when the wedding reception had abruptly moved to a waiting room in the hospital; he had seen Sal snuggled up to his mother's side while she lovingly petted his hair in his sleep. How could this kid be so easily convinced that his parents were about to abandon him?
"How about….we do this," Sideswipe haltingly said. It might have been a good idea to get some practice with hysterical kids before he had decided to be the Guardian of one. All those times he had passed the kids off to Dino when they started to cry was coming back to haunt him now. "Let's go see your parents—"
"No!"
"Just so we can get your stuff!" Sideswipe quickly added when Sal looked ready to jump from his hands. "We'll talk to them while we're there, and if they say they're going to take you back…then you can come with me, okay? I'm you're Guardian now, and I promise not to let anything bad happen to you. Do you trust me?"
Sideswipe didn't understand the strange shudder that went through the boy or the pained expression that flitted across his face before he nodded. Sideswipe was kind of just relieved that Sal didn't run away the moment he put the kid down to transform. Once the boy was secured in his cab, the Autobot smoothly turned around to navigate back through the maze of alleys he had taken to get here.
Sal clung to the seatbelt wrapped around him for the majority of the ride through the maze, and the moment Sideswipe made it back onto the streets, the exhausted boy finally curled up in the seat. "He says you're the only one I can trust, Sides. But I don't want you to be the only one. I wanted to trust da—Jaden too. And mama, and Blue. I wanna have a real home for once."
Sideswipe didn't get a chance to respond before he felt the boy go limp, already drifting off to sleep. He sighed and made sure he didn't turn too quickly to disturb the sleeping child. "Yeah, me too, kid."
~:0:~
Sal didn't even know he had fallen asleep until a weight across his chest gently squeezed him. "Hey, kid. Time to get up."
For a moment, Sal just wanted to roll over and fall back asleep. He was so tired now; all that running had—
The boy abruptly sat up as the events of the day came spiraling back to him. Finding his stuff in the dumpster; running away as quickly as he could to get away, even to the point of getting himself lost; listening to Sunny relentlessly curse every fiber of the couple he had so desperately wanted to love him. Finding all of his former street homes taken or disturbed; feeling the familiar fear of being alone in the dark in the forever busy city; finally breaking from fear, exhaustion, betrayal, desperate need.
And now he was back to his starting point, staring out at wide eyes at the busy café merely five feet away from him. That wasn't right. Da—Jaden! He had to get used to that because the man wouldn't be his father for much longer—usually closed up around five every day so the others could safely get home before dark.
Sal gripped the seatbelt at the familiar faces he saw through the windows, and the subtle movement beneath him gave him a reminder of who had found him. Sideswipe had come to his rescue—just like Sunny had said he would. Sunny was insisting that he was better off with the silver mech; that Sideswipe would never abandon him like others had before. Even after death—even after being reborn—Sunny knew his brother would never leave him, no matter what form he took.
But Sal still yearned for something more, something that Sunny didn't necessarily want.
"Come on." Sal jumped when he felt a hand on his shoulder and turned to see a strange man smiling at him from the driver's side of the car. He felt a brief wave of panic before noticing the familiar, alien glow to the man's eyes. When Bluestreak disguised himself as "Bryce," he had that same glow; Sunny assured him that the new man had Sideswipe's voice and smile too, and he had a vague memory of the first time he had met Sideswipe. "Remember our agreement? We can't sit out here all night."
Sal glanced back towards the café before desperately turning back to Sideswipe. "I don't need any of my stuff. I'm okay with just leaving."
A sad smile was aimed towards him, and Sideswipe hesitated before pulling the human boy into a comforting hug. Sal latched on to the solid form beneath him. "I know you are, but like I said before, I'm your Guardian now. Guardians take care of their Charges, and sometimes that means pushing them to do things they don't want to do. You've gotta go talk to your parents, kid. They're worried sick about you."
No, they weren't. They had probably spent the whole talking about the baby. That's the only thing they did nowadays. "I just…wanna be with you now."
Sunny liked that idea, and Sal could feel him getting annoyed when Sideswipe gently shook his head. "You say that, but I'm pretty sure you don't really mean it. You told me you wanted a real home; to be able to trust someone other than me. I don't really get how you can trust me so easily, but in order to trust somebody, you've gotta get through stuff like this. Has your dad or mom ever done anything to make you think they were leaving you?"
Sal's immediate answer was yes. They had thrown his stuff away! What other kind of proof did Sideswipe need? But the look on Sideswipe's face made Sal really think. They had been paying so much attention to the baby before it was even born…but Annalise still came to tuck him into bed at night, even when she was feeling sick. And Jaden still helped him with his homework every day after school so they could draw together. And they had taken a day off just to take him to the art festival for not realizing how much time they had spent at the furniture store. Then there were the times that they constantly insisted that Sal would be the best big brother there was; when they always looked to him for the final opinion on baby things; how they did go a few hours not even mentioning the baby and just spending time with him.
But none of that mattered because they had thrown out his things!
"Let's just go talk to them," Sideswipe insisted, seeing Sal wavering between hope and instinctually protecting himself from emotional pain. The door beside Sal opened in an obvious attempt to get the boy moving. "It won't hurt to talk to them."
Yes, it would! He didn't actually want to hear them say they didn't want him anymore now that they had their own baby.
However, Sal was moving anyway, and he awkwardly stood on the sidewalk. Sideswipe was there in an instant, a hand settling on his back to gently guide him into the café. A blur of voices instantly greeted him, and he automatically tensed in preparation for the anger he anticipated for running away. That was always the response he got when he had run away before.
The café went deathly silent, and Sal shifted from one foot to the other, refusing to look up at the stares he could feel bearing down on him. Sunny was just telling him to stand strong and not let anyone see him tremble when a pair of arms was ripping him from the spot he was glued to, and his face was squished into the fabric of a shirt. The movement was so unexpected, that it took him a moment to realize that there were two people holding him and Jaden was practically sobbing in his ear.
"Do you know how scared we were when Blue got home without you? We thought somebody'd done taken you! We were so worried about you, Sal; don't you dare ever do that again, d'ya hear me?"
For the first time since discovering Sunny, Sal chose to completely ignore the mech and lurched forward into the warm hold that both Jaden and Annalise were readily offering. He buried his head into Jaden's shoulder and reached out to grip Annalise's shirt as a flood of uncontrollable tears escaped him. "I wanna stay here! I—I promise I'll be good, and I'll help with the baby or the café. Just don't send me away!"
He sobbed harder when form beneath him went painfully rigid, and he tried to keep Annalise crouching beside him when she shifted away. "Wha—why'd you think we was sendin' ya away?"
"I—I saw all my stuff in the dumpster out back."
Horrible outcomes to all of this were flashing through his head when Jaden didn't immediately deny his statement, and he wanted to yell at Sunny for keeping him from fully bonding with the two adults. If Sunny hadn't been so insistent on him keeping just a tiny part of themselves from connecting with his parents, maybe they wouldn't have thrown his things out. He liked Sides, and he wanted to be with Sides, but he wanted something more than just the one mech, and Sunny had completely ruined it!
Sunny flinched away from the blaming thought and retreated, projecting what felt like anger and remorse. But there was also a tinge of regretful understanding that the boy was far too young to interpret even if he wasn't quickly distracted by Jaden pulling away from him. He whimpered and attempted to cling to the man, but Jaden carefully untangled his fingers from his clothes and stood up.
"Come here."
Sal didn't care for the staring or the quiet murmurs going around the café. He simply clung to the large hand that grasped his and followed Jaden up the stairs to where their apartment was located, Annalise trailing behind them. The apartment looked exactly the same as the last time he had been in it that morning. Some stuff looked a little off, but he figured it must have been moved in order to get his things out of the apartment and move the baby's things in.
He felt a twinge of pain as Jaden silently led him to his former room and resisted when the man went to open the door. His eyelids snapped shut, not wanting to see the new room they had made for the baby, but Jaden gently pushed him in the direction of the room. Another pair of smaller hands landed on his shoulders, and he felt Annalise's rounded stomach nudge against his back with an added nudge from the baby inside her. "Sal, sweetie, we only put the old things in the dumpster. It didn't make any sense for you to have two of each!"
Sal's eyes sprang open, and he stared at the new furniture that had been stuffed into his room. Gone were the creaky bed frame, the second-hand dresser and nightstand, and the squat bookshelf that had overflowed with his art supplies. In its place were a brand new bed with a matching comforter set, a dresser and nightstand in matching light wood, and a broad desk that housed all his sketchbooks, drawing tools, and even a new desk lamp for better lightning. There were even shelves hanging from the empty walls for the things that wouldn't fit on the desk and a small chest at the foot of his bed, which he assumed was where all his toys had been dumped in to.
The room was completely different from how he had left it that morning, and now he wanted to cry for how wrong he and Sunny had been. He looked up at Jaden, barely able to see the man through the tears that blurred his vision, and Jaden gave him a small, sad smile. "This was what ya picked out at the store, right? Why would ya think we were kickin' ya out right after takin' ya furniture shoppin'?"
Because he had completely forgotten when his dad had dragged him to the part of the store that was opposite of the baby stuff. He had been so incredibly angry at the unborn baby for making his parents forget their promise that he hadn't stopped to wonder why Jaden was asking him which bed set he liked the most or which desk he thought would be great for drawing. He hadn't stopped to remember that Jaden and Annalise had never hurt him before; that even with all the talk about the new baby, they had always given the same amount of attention to him. His jealously and his own lack of trust had been what had almost cost him a family—not the baby or Sunny.
Now he wanted to curl and cry over how utterly ridiculous he had been.
"Sal." Sal immediately protested when Annalise attempted to crouch down next to him again, instead leading her over to the bed to sit. He was sure crouching would squish the baby more than it already was. Annalise gave him a grateful smile when he jumped up to sit next to her. "I know that there's been a lot going on lately with the baby, but no matter how busy we may be, you never have to worry about us sending you away. It doesn't matter how you came to us, or how long you've been here, you're our son, and we would never send you away."
"An' if ya feelin' that way, just come talk ta us," Jaden insisted, crouching down in front of both of them. Sal flinched at the visible hurt he saw on Jaden's face. "We get that there's some stuff we still gotta work past. We get that ya might not be ready ta fully trust us as a family. But that don't change the fact that we aint ever gonna give ya up, an' if ya ever feel like we are, just come an' see me an' we can get things straight 'fore ya give me another heart attack an' nearly send ya mom inta early labor."
Sal wanted to protest that he would never feel that way again. Sunny wasn't always right, and he knew that better than ever now. Sunny was just as scared and new to this as he was, and now that Sides was going to be staying with them, maybe he'd finally let Sal take the step he needed to be with the family he wanted. But there was just one small thing he wanted to be sure about. "You won't send me back when the baby gets here?"
"'Course not! Why'd we send his brother away? He's gonna need ya there ta help him later."
For the first time since hearing about the baby, Sal relaxed and gave his parents an honest smile. How could he forget that his parents were different than the other adults that had been in his life?
~:0:~
"Maybe he'll have a big nose like Jaden's."
"I bet he has his mom's hair."
"He better have Jaden's blue eyes. Those things are just too beautiful not to pass on."
"Hey, quiet over there, or I might start thinking my wife has a crush on my best friend."
Sal shook his head at the adults' laughter bouncing off the walls of the small waiting room. Sunny seemed only a tad bit amused by the conversation before focusing back on the coloring book that Sal was slowly working his way through. He had planned to have this done before his new baby brother was born, but the past two months had seen to Sideswipe becoming a very prominent distraction in his life.
However, the first few days had been decidedly…awkward at best. Sideswipe may have gained permission from both Mr. Prime and Jaden to be Sal's full-time Guardian, but there had been another mech in the household to get approved by, and that had been pretty difficult when Bluestreak wouldn't even look Sideswipe in the eye. Sal had watched the two dance around each other the same way dad and mom did when Jaden broke something that had been important to Annalise. Bluestreak had obviously been the guilty party—though Sunny had introduced Sal to a new set of curse words when describing his brother's stupidity—but eventually the two had been caught together long enough for words to be exchanged.
All Sal knew was that Bluestreak had soon returned to his happy, talkative self and barely hesitated to accept Sideswipe's invitation to travel outside the city limits for a quick race whenever boredom would set in.
Now Sal sighed and checked the analog clock hanging above the doors his mom and dad had been escorted through. They had been celebrating Mattie Jr.'s first birthday when Annalise had very subtly pulled Jaden to the side to talk to him. For all her subtlety, Jaden had completely ruined the birthday by freaking out and insisting that Annalise remember the breathing exercises they had learned at the baby classes they went to. Sal had smirked the entire way to the hospital, not because Bluestreak was freaking out just as badly as Jaden or because Sideswipe had been justifiably dented from behind for the offhanded remark he made about Annalise giving birth in the other mech's backseat. He just felt smug over the fact that his baby brother was making up for Mattie Jr.'s rude disruption of his parents' wedding party.
Sal felt a tug on his coloring book and stared at the one year old giving him a drooling smile and dark brown eyes that glittered with a happiness only mastered by young children like him. He glanced over at the adults—still playing their weird game of "Guess Which Features the Baby Will Have"—and promptly yanked the book away from the baby's grasp with a blank stare. This was for his baby brother's room back at home, not for drooling toddlers.
Mattie Jr. toddled away without a fuss, and Sal waited until the baby had managed to get halfway down the hall before turning to the adults. "Aunt Robin? Junior's trying to escape."
He shook his head at the loud laughter from the three men as Robin lurched out of her seat to follow her now squealing son. An angry snap to Mattie sent the man chasing after the escaping baby as well, and Sideswipe and Bluestreak went back to guessing what the new baby would look like. Sal turned the page in his book and was about to start coloring the cartoon-looking picture (much to Sunny's abhorrence), when the double doors on the other side of the room swung open.
Sal stood up at the sight of his dad, and Jaden smiled at him, looking way more tired than Sal felt. Sitting in the waiting room for a few hours must have been a completely different experience than being back there getting the baby out. A small gesture from Jaden sent Sal scurrying over to meet the tired, but ecstatic man and was led through the hall beyond the doors. Jaden was uncharacteristically silent as they turned the first corner and came to a stop in front of a wide window.
The seven year old saw the first baby in the room behind the glass and instantly asked, "Which one is my little brother?"
Jaden chuckled and pointed at the little bed at the end of the row where a new Baby Raisin was kicking and hollering for attention. "That's ya knew baby sister."
"Sister?"
"Yep. That's what happens when ya mama's dead set on not learnin' what the baby is 'fore she's born." Sal took a step back when a nurse went to pick up the baby and brought it over to the window for him to have a closer look. Her face was scrunched up and peeking out of the pink blanket they had wrapped around her, but Sal couldn't help but think she looked less like a raisin than Mattie Jr. had. "Say hi ta ya li'l sis, Cierra Lorraine Robinson."
Sal couldn't wait for a chance to draw a portrait of his new baby sister.
~:0:~
"You think this war is ever gonna end?"
Sunstreaker snorted and continued to smooth out the wax he was using to shine his golden armor. He sneered when a silver form jostled the berth he sat on, disrupting his even swipes. His twin merely smiled at his disgruntlement and repeated the question. "How the frag am I supposed to know?"
"Come on, Sunshine—"
"Don't call me that."
"—just tell me what you feel. Yes, or no."
Indigo optics glared down at Sideswipe before the golden mech sighed in resigned annoyance. "I don't know."
"That's cheating."
"What do you want me to do? Lie and say it will, or say no and seem like the pessimist I am? I don't fragging know if it'll end, and sure as pit don't know if I'll be there to see it happen."
Sideswipe's grin finally slipped, and Sunstreaker could feel how disturbed his statement had left his brother. His spark automatically reached to assure the more happy-go-lucky mech that he was still there and closed his canister of wax to put it away. Once it was out of the way, he rolled up onto the lone berth in the cramped room and shuffled around until was comfortably on his side facing his twin. Sideswipe moved to mimic the position, and two pairs of identical indigo optics stared at each other. "Say it does end someday. What would we do then?"
"We'd go back to Kalis. You'd start painting again, and I'll serve as your business manager. I'd get the paintings sold to the wimpy Neutral nobles that slither back to Cybertron, and we'd be rolling in more credits than we ever had, before or during the war. And then, when we finally get the life we've always wanted, we'll meet these two stellar femmes that can see straight through our rugged good looks and love the mechs we are at our sparks. We'll fool around for a bit until we realize, you know, our femme's 'the One' and get bonded. Really settle down with them and start a little family of Sunnys and Sides."
Sunstreaker stared at the dopey grin his brother had and couldn't even sigh at the fool's dream Sides had himself believing. They always had this same conversation every time they were off-duty together. Sunstreaker knew that even if the war ended, none of that would ever come true. They had never lived any kind of ideal life. The majority of their younger years had been spent as beggers on the streets and later as entertainment in the gladiator pits. Sunstreaker could paint, and Sideswipe could negotiate, but that wouldn't make them anything if they ever had the chance to be known. Nobles were never likely to even look at a type of art that didn't have a big name plastered to it. And who would want a pair of glitched mechs—damaged in the head from injuries in the pits and on the battlefield? One that sent Sunstreaker into uncontrollable rages and Sideswipe angrily snapping at even their closest friends. Not to mention the complete inability for them to bond with anyone because of the split, twin sparks they shared.
It was an impossible dream that even Sideswipe couldn't honestly believe in.
However, Sunstreaker could feel the usual tug deep in his spark, one that practically begged for him to agree. For him to smile and say, "Sure, Sides. Anything's possible." They had been told that Sideswipe had onlined first after their sparks had split from the AllSpark, but sometimes Sunstreaker felt like the "older" sibling. Finding ways that would allow them to survive from day to day, and protecting his brother from the harsher facts of reality. That was why he had to be the surly twin—to let his other half be the one that laughed and joked.
It was a part that he had played for so many centuries now that he barely paused in reaching across the berth and grabbing his brother's hand, giving it a reassuring squeeze that was desperately reciprocated. "Sure, Sides. Anything's possible."
His spark thrummed with false optimistic joy, and he sighed as he leaned forward to butt heads with Sideswipe, relaxing at the gentle sounds of his twin's engine rumbling beside him. His brother no more believed his own lie than Sunstreaker's verbal reassurance. But that was fine because deep down, they both knew that they would always have the other to watch their back. Sometimes, the bond that had ruined their lives was the only good thing in it.
~:0:~
"You may not realize it, but I'm going to live our impossible dream, Sides. And when we finally get to be together again, I'll tell you all about it."
