Author's Note: Sheesh, been a while, hasn't it? My apologies to anyone actually following the story for the delay. I've not been keeping too well recently, and combined with my habitual laziness…well, you do the maths. Suffice to say this has been a long time coming, and hopefully the end of the series (and the next series I'm working on) shouldn't have such huge gaps. Thank you.
Tailfeathers
It had been a week since his breakdown, and Silverbolt wasn't feeling any better. If anything, the added concern of Nightscream's sudden disappearance had landed squarely on his shoulders, despite Rattrap and Botanica's assurances.
He curled up defensively, aware that there was really no way to protect himself in this situation, but not caring.
Not caring...that seemed to be his running theme in the last few months, he thought bitterly. Once upon a time he had cared too much, felt too deeply, loved too absolutely, and now...nothing. No laughter to see him through the darkest times of his life, no underlying common bond with his comrades, no boundless optimism to keep his hopes up and, most importantly to his way of thinking, no short-tempered, trigger-happy, sarcastic black widow spider to love, worship and obsess over.
Everyone needs something to devote themselves to...
He groaned, shifting to glare at the clock.
Midnight.
Some part of his brain idly informed him that this was the witching hour, where life and death sneakily switched places and impossible dreams became probable realities. That particular part of his mind then promptly turned its back on him, in favour of reminiscing about sunny days, poetry, and tooth-decayingly sweet romance.
That information had no bearing on him now. The sense of magic and wonder he'd once held were as dead as Optimus and Rhinox. And at least they had had some lasting effect, some lingering memory. Innocence lost only left a void.
He knew he should stop this. Rattrap, Botanica and Cheetor had enough on their minds without worrying about a moody avian. The Maximal Council were getting more and more insistent, pressuring them into roles and jobs that they didn't want for the purposes of saving face and getting potential political rivals out of the way. It was only a matter of time before they got nasty. If Silverbolt had had any idealistic views of the Maximal "code of honour" left by now, they would have been shattered to pieces by the people meant to uphold them- as it was, the last year had done the job for them.
Amongst other things.
The file on Arthurian Legends lay open where Rattrap had last noted it, other, less interesting files scattered on the floor nearby, casualties of Silverbolt's half-hearted attempts to keep his mind off of his problems. He'd finally given up when a sudden mood swing had resulted in him flattening a file on the economic system. No great loss, but he'd hurt his foot.
A creak at the door merely prompted a disgruntled "Please go away!" as he returned to brooding...
"Well, that's friendly. So glad to see I've been missed."
His fluid pump froze mid-beat as he turned toward the door...and the figure leaning against it.
"Typical. I leave you alone for five minutes and you go and wreck yourself. Bravo, Bowser."
_________________________________________________________
A ghost could have shown up at his door to devour his spark and he would've been less surprised. Yet there she was, large as life and twice as real, glaring at him with familiar ferocity.
Once upon a time, that wouldn't have fazed Silverbolt. Once upon a time, he could read the face of his lady love like a book, and take the appropriate course of action to avoid an explosion of volcanic proportions. Once upon a time.
But that time was as dead as the legends Silverbolt loved so much. He was at a complete loss as to how to deal with the angry Amazonian in the doorway.
He was pretty certain, however, that that particular expression on her face did not bode well...Tight lips and ever-so-slightly-narrowed-eyes usually spelled "trouble" in one form or another. His spark, already dim from weeks of self-hatred, guilt and grief, began to flicker despondently from its trademark gold to standard pale blue.
This is the end, he thought, miserably. At least I get to say I'm sorry.
And goodbye.
"Aren't you even going to say hello?" she demanded, seemingly unaware of his (painfully obvious) distress.
"Hello," he whispered softly, praying that he could hold back any disgraceful show of emotion until he was alone once more.
"Where did you go?"
It was a carefully considered, neutral question. "Where have you been?" would have betrayed his anxiety. Avoiding the matter entirely would have been impolite, sullen.
He felt as if he walked a tightrope. If he behaved in the same manner he'd been behaving for weeks, there was every possibility of her storming out of the room - probably his life - without a backward glance. The memory of the horrible feeling that had crept up his spine as he read the hastily scribbled farewell note still haunted him. Breaking down, on the other hand, would be a blow to both his pride and his love for Blackarachnia. He couldn't let her waste her time and affection on him out of mere pity.
It was rather like trying to get a timid animal to step closer to you, he supposed. But Blackarachnia was no fluffy bunny rabbit.
She shrugged. "Just went on a trip. That allowed?"
He remained silent.
______________________________________________________-
Blackarachnia was every bit as confused as Silverbolt. She'd silently, painstakingly, planned her tactics for this meeting on the trip home. She'd rehearsed them over and over again on her way upstairs.
She wouldn't let him get to her. She wouldn't be a doormat. Nightscream had given her a brief summary of what had happened in her absence. Despite Nightscream's concern, she was fairly sure that Silverbolt would revert to his glacial state the instant she walked in.
She'd run in expecting to hit a wall, and had found only a paper screen. Silverbolt seemed to give way to her aggression, leaving her charging into thin air.
Like he expects it. Like he thinks he deserves it.
He does. Look what he put me through.
You haven't conveniently forgotten the Beast Wars have you? How long to you think this can go on, one trying to put the other through hell? Something...someone, has to give.
She didn't want it to be her though.
"Nightscream said you haven't been looking too well," she said, trying to sound nonchalant. "What's the matter?"
Unlike Silverbolt, Blackarachnia hadn't lost the ability to "read" her partner. He opened his mouth to say something...then thought better of it. He wouldn't stop fidgeting. He would meet her eyes for a moment...then quickly look away.
C'mon, 'Bolt, spit it out.
"No, I...I had a bit of an episode. Things just seemed too...I couldn't cope with...Well, I just had too much time to think about what Megatron did to me," he finally managed, talking hurriedly and quietly.
She was annoyed at first. Wonderful. If I were to name a third person in our relationship, Megatron would have been at the bottom of the list.
Then she realised that she had felt this way - worried, confused, angry - once before. And for all time had changed and her memories had been damaged, this memory stood out, as vivid as the day it had occurred.
___________________________________________________
"Rhinox, where's Silverbolt?"
She got along pretty well with Rhinox, relatively speaking. Considering he'd blasted her more than a few times, she thought she was fairly civil to him. At least he wasn't ignoring her, treating her like a liability, making snide comments about her or having stupid crushes on her. Rhinox was all right.
"Hmmm..." he'd replied, looking up from the console. "He and Cheetor trailed in here about an hour back." He nodded to the CR chamber, set for a lengthy reconstruction. The said reconstruction was Cheetor - even from here, she could see the unfortunate cat had been pounded. "Wrong end of a Pred attack. Silverbolt's in his - your - quarters, resting up."
She nodded - her equivalent of thanks - and turned to go.
"Blackarachnia, you might want to check on him. He was adamant that Cheetor get patched up first, but I can't see how Silverbolt could have escaped unscathed."
She bristled. "What, we only have one R chamber now?"
Rhinox pointed. One chamber was obviously in the middle of repairs. The other contained Depth Charge.
"Great, now I'm a nurse," she grumbled, striding out.
"You love him, really." Rhinox's voice followed her out.
She hid a smile. Fair enough.
----------------------------------------------------------
"Hey, Bowser, still awake in there?"
The light was dim in their quarters, which surprised her. Usually she had to hit her insomniac lover over the head with something before he'd turn off the damn light. Him and his fairy-tales...
She liked it when they sat up and talked, though she'd never admit it. He was fond of relating legends to her, sometimes getting so caught up in the stories that they seemed real. It was nice, to lie in the dark and talk about knights and damsels and unicorns.
Another little secret she kept from him. A girl had to have a few, after all.
Usually, her voice would provoke a response, even when he'd been sleeping, but now he didn't stir.
"Jojo?" She knelt beside the bed and tapped him on the shoulder.
To her relief, he shuddered, yawned and turned to face her.
"Good evening, my lady."
The usual sappiness brought a smile to her face, but a nagging worry came to the back of her mind. Silverbolt wasn't his usual gushing self.
"You all right, Bowser? The rhino said you'd had a fight."
"Nothing too serious." He moved over to make room for her on the bed. "Megatron, Tarantulas, Inferno and Quickstrike. I think we just surprised them. Cheetor's worse than I am. I just feel a little tired, that's all."
She'd scrambled up beside him, folding her arms on the pillows. "You sure? You look as if you've been eaten alive."
He smiled that reassuring smile of his. "I'm sure. I'll be fine in the morning." He kissed her lightly on the cheek. "Good night, beloved."
Less worried, she settled in for a night's sleep...although she noticed the thud as his head hit the pillow was louder than normal...
___________________________________________________
She'd woken up the next morning, just before dawn. She immediately knew something was up - Silverbolt's breathing was far too shallow. She'd thrown the covers aside to find the bed covered with silver blood.
Mech fluid. Silverbolt's. Megatron's hit had been more of a puncture, doing little external damage but trashing Silverbolt's internal systems.
Later, she'd be stunned as to how calm she was. She'd used the cover to stem the bleeding, then ran into the control room, shouting for Rhinox and scaring the living daylights out of a (dozing) Rattrap, on early morning monitor duty. When the technician emerged, she'd explained the situation as quickly and calmly as she could.
Then she'd broken down.
Silverbolt had to be manually repaired - the CR chambers could fix almost any external damage, but beyond mending the circuitry torn when a Transformer lost a limb...they were nearly useless for internal, precision work.
It had been the longest day of her life - and, she was pretty sure, the longest of Rhinox's too.
The only good thing that had come of it was that Rattrap finally seemed to accept her. She hadn't cried - she'd never cried, not in front of anyone - but she had, as Rattrap put it, "royally freaked out." She couldn't even remember what she'd said, except to wax lyrical on how Depth Charge had access to a chamber when he had only minor damage, he wasn't even a proper part of the unit, hadn't anyone thought to check up on Silverbolt before he went to their quarters...
It was the revelation that she actually had feelings that had won Rattrap over. The mix of worry for Silverbolt, anger at him for not telling her how badly hurt he was...and fear that he wouldn't get better.
It was the same cocktail of emotions that had hit her full force just now. With Silverbolt watching her with the "victim unto his tormentor" look, she didn't know which way to jump.
Giving up on her detached air, she sighed, walked over and flopped onto the bed, startling Silverbolt who quickly moved his leg out of the way.
She turned her head slightly to regard the dour samurai. Except he wasn't quite so dour now, just...confused. Wary.
And something else too. Something...she couldn't quite pin down what it was.
The fact that it wasn't contempt, however, was heartening.
What the slag. If she got straight to the point now, she'd either get a result quicker or at least the heartache would be over sooner.
"That all you got to say to me, Bowser?"
She had to lean close to hear his response.
"Far from it."
_________________________________________________
What do you do, when you're given an opportunity that's so perfect that you're not quite sure how to take it?
The thought flitted across Silverbolt's mind as he stared at Blackarachnia, gazing intently at him as she waited for an answer. There was so much - too much - to say. Where did he start?
"What do you want me to tell you?"
The question escaped him before he even had time to process what he was saying. But then, wasn't that almost instinctive?
He was a straightforward creature by nature, even if that honesty had taken a darker turn in recent times. Blackarachnia's tendency to be ambiguous had always confused him, so he'd found that the best approach was to ask her exactly what she meant. Better to be thought slightly dim than risk offending the black widow.
She sighed in response...then noted, not without amusement, that Silverbolt retained a tendency to tilt his head to the one side when asking a question.
Wasn't that ironic? So much had changed, but that silly little gesture, that small mannerism, was still there.
Jetstorm had done it as well, at times, she realized with a twinge.
"Tell me what the slag you're thinking, Silverbolt. Why are you being like this?" Her decision to stay calm quickly disintegrated, her quicksilver traits taking over. "You told me nothing was irreversible. You told me that good always won out, no matter how much you resisted it. And I believed you!" She stopped short of clenching her fists, vaguely aware that that was a little too melodramatic for her tastes. She paused to catch her breath. "So tell me Silverbolt - when was I wrong? Then, for trusting you? Or now, for doubting you?"
"How am I supposed to tell you when even I don't know?"
"Don't give me that, Featherduster. You always know. I wouldn't have put up with all that "Maximal goodness" drivel if it had come from anyone but you."
She had moved intimidatingly close now, green eyes fierce...Beautiful and terrifying, a glorious danger...
Green-eyed monster...Where had he heard that phrase?
_________________________________________________________
Rattrap had seldom seen Silverbolt in as bad a mood as this. Come to think of, it, he'd never seen Silverbolt in a bad mood.
"Hey, Fuzz and Feathers," he called, leaning out of his quarters as the Fuzor stormed by like a small hurricane.
Silverbolt pivoted around, relaxing slightly when he recognised the speaker. "What is it, Rattrap?"
"Ya wander by looking like yer gonna eat someone alive and you wonder why I'm concerned? What's up?"
Silverbolt grumbled something under his breath...Trying to work out what he actually said (and trying not to laugh at the sight of an eight foot tall puppy with ruffled feathers in the middle of a mood swing) he caught one word:
"Cheetor."
He might have guessed. Rattrap may have been incredibly fond of Silverbolt as a friend, but even he had to admit that the perfect knight had one, teeny little flaw.
Jealousy.
He couldn't see the bird-dog flying into a jealous rage like some bad Cybertronian soap opera, but it lurked nearby, none the less. Violence wasn't Silverbolt's style, but quietly bubbling resentment was.
With a sigh, he gestured for Silverbolt to come in - if he spoke to him here, no doubt the devil herself would come swanning by.
Entering the room, Silverbolt picked his way nervously over Rattrap's floor, praying that there wasn't anything particularly vile cluttering up the place.
Rattrap, by contrast, just bulldozed his way through, eventually perching on a chair. Seeing Silverbolt's face, he sniggered. "I'm a hoarder, 'Bolt. I like to keep things, but there ain't nothing here that'll bite."
Slightly reassured by Rattrap, and more reassured by his nose, which hadn't picked up on any dubious smells, he sat.
"So, what's got your feathers ruffled this time? The kiddo been hittin' on your girl again?"
Silverbolt grumbled, nodded and sighed.
"I know I make entirely too large an issue over Cheetor's…infatuation with my lady," he admitted to his friend. "It's just rather hard to dismiss such behaviour when an adolescent male Maximal is looking at the person you prize most in life as if…as if…"
"…As if he was a starving man and she was an Energon fix?" Rattrap finished helpfully.
Silverbolt gave him a droll look. "Well, in not so many words."
Rattrap leaned back in his chair, tilting it to such an angle that Silverbolt could see him falling out of the window behind him.
" 'Bolt, you can't arrest a kid fer bein' a kid. Kids have crushes all the time. I used ta have the hots for one of the officers at the academy – slag, I still say she was one of the most beautiful 'bots I ever clapped eyes on…"
"What happened?"
"Her hubby caught me lookin' at her "inappropriately." Took my pals two hours to get me out of the trash compactor."
Perhaps not the best example to use.
"Anyways, 'Bolt, I ain't tellin' ya nothing you don't know already. Don't worry about it. As far as I can tell, Legs is perfectly capable of whackin' him over the head herself without any help from the peanut gallery…" Rattrap paused to dodge the pillow Silverbolt aimed at him. "Just think of it this way – coupla years from now,he'll be embarrassed at the thought. He'll be blushing every time someone mentions it. So mention it as often as possible and get yer own back."
For all he tried to stay dignified, Silverbolt could only laugh.
Rattrap grinned his trademark rogue smile. "See? Just laugh it off. Yer only goin' to do damage to you and the Pred if ya get bitten by the green-eyed monster. Believe me, I'd know…"
Flashing back to that conversation, Silverbolt idly wondered just how Rattrap had known…but his attention was quickly drawn to the increasing irritable black widow slumped over his bed, looking up at him with eyes that would have had a herd of enraged rhinos tiptoeing quietly back to where they came from.
"Well?"
"I don't know," he told her, dejectedly. 'I don't know what you're asking, I don't know what you want to hear. I don't know if you came to say goodbye or what this conversation is going to lead you. I don't know what I can possibly say that isn't going to end in you walking out the door and not coming back."
His words came out in a garbled rush, but she caught the gist of it.
"Do you want me to leave?" she ventured.
"No!"
"Well," she retorted mildly. "That's something then, isn't it?"
How long was she going to torture him, he wondered?
In another flash of mood change, Blackarachnia was suddenly perched on his lap, arm around his neck.
"You said…When I said I'd been through hell to get you back, you jumped me…"
He winced. Yes, he remembered that. Disgraceful behaviour, especially considering whom he'd attacked. Worse, he'd felt no remorse at the time.
"You can't expect me to understand when you never tell me. I'm a lady of many talents, Silverbolt, but I am not psychic." Seeing Silverbolt back down like a scared cub, she amended "All right, I admit I'm hardly forthcoming about myself. But you used to tell me everything, 'Bolt."
More past tense. Used to, was, once, then, way back…He was sick of past tense.
"What the…?"
"Optimus, what's happening?"
"Rattrap? Rattrap, are you all right?"
"Silverbolt? Wake up, numbskull!"
"Everybody just CALM DOWN!" Optimus's voice momentarily quelled the chaos within the small shuttle. Checking quickly out of the shattered windscreen, he took a brief headcount. "Everybody still here?"
One, two, three, four, five (semi-conscious), and himself. Six.
The Vehicons drew closer.
Silverbolt came around, groggy and hurt. "Ouch."
Blackarachnia's face came into focus, relief and panic jostling for room on her face. "C'mon Bowser," she muttered, "No time for lounging around."
He managed a weak smile, but the quaver in her voice set his own fluid pump racing, and not in the way it usually did either.
He moved on pure fear, allowing Blackarachnia to haul him to his feet.
They'd been lucky to get this brief minute's reprieve.
"Boss monkey…" Rattrap. Not rude or obnoxious, but quietly terrified. "Company…"
The world exploded in a fireball haze, scattering the six maximals. Silverbolt looked around desperately.
"Blackarachnia!"
There she was, off to his right. He set off at full speed, but his awkward, blocky body wasn't build for sprinting. He moved to spread his wings, but they crashed against the city walls. He couldn't take off – couldn't get the straight run, the drop or the pause he needed to gather himself into the air. Vehicon fire lanced nearby, the greenish light scarring the ground…
Drawing closer to the group, he yelped in surprise as one of the beams found its mark – Optimus. The Maximal's body began to twist and change…until a silverback gorilla, almost completely indistinguishable from the real thing, stood in his place.
Even as chivalrous an individual as Silverbolt had a healthy dose of self preservation. Glancing back, he saw that Optimus had managed to make his way into the shadows – so he kept running.
Dodge left, dodge right. Run faster. Another beam – Rattrap. And another. Cheetor.
Keep running.
And then…he tripped.
It was the stupidest thing – his talon caught the ground and he stumbled. He didn't even fall, just lost the rhythm of his pace for a few, brief, disastrous seconds.
It was all the time the vehicons needed to gain ground.
He started running once again, but…
Agony ripped his body apart – he'd been hit.
Information swan through his brain…The green light devolved Transformers. Silverbolt had nothing to devolve to. Worse, out of the edge of his vision, he could see Blackarachnia too, had fallen victim…This could be it. He couldn't fight off this foe.
"Beloved!"
His voice, strained with pain, echoed across the bedlam. She must've heard! Why didn't she glance around?
"BLACKARACHNIA!"
The black widow scuttled off into the darkness of the metropolis, never looking back, never answering.
Body convulsing in hellish spasms, bereft of his teammates, abandoned by his lover, the last thing Silverbolt, the knight of the Beast Wars, the perfect Maximal…the last thing he felt was despair.
And then there was nothing.
There would be nothing for quite some time.
________________________________________________________________
He didn't realize that he was crying yet again… until Blackarachnia, snuggled against him in a seriously uncharacteristic show of affection and helplessness, pawing like a puppy at his tears.
_______________________________________________________________
"I forgot my lover."
The arachnid Maximal couldn't quite get her head around the enormity of her discoveries at the terminal. The result was a kind of dull stupor, with the single, glaringly obvious and supremely painful fact that Silverbolt was gone blaring through her mind like a jammed record.
Cheetor shuffled nervously. He still couldn't recall everything in the way that Blackarachnia plainly did, but he remembered enough to know that he hadn't liked Silverbolt. Along with the fact that, unfortunately, one of the few things he could recall was his huge and rather embarrassing crush on Blackarachnia, it meant that being stuck alone in base with her was one of the last things he wanted right now.
"C'mon, Legs. We'll get him back. And Rhinox too. You'll see."
"You don't get it, do you, Pussycat?" she said flatly. There was no malice or even mischief in her voice – she was stating the facts. "Silverbolt isn't here. He's not here because I didn't help him."
"Legs, none of the rest of us did or cou…"
"THE REST OF YOU DIDN'T LOVE HIM!"
Her screech echoed around the chamber, making Cheetor's fur stand on end. It was strangely…liberating. Mind more in focus, she continued more rationally.
"Do you know…Do you know what would have happened if I hadn't had those flashes? If I hadn't gone to find out what I did?"
I wouldn't be confronted with an emotionally unstable female black widow? thought Cheetor…but he kept quiet.
"I could have gone the rest of my life without knowing he ever existed," she continued, monotone. "We could've won this war and I might've met someone else. Everything he did for me, everything we did together…obliterated. Gone. Wiped out of existence. Like Silverbolt had never been there in the first place."
He might not have liked Silverbolt much, but the thought of being so utterly forgotten, by a person who'd once adored you…Cheetor shivered so much he sprawled on the floor to hide his trembling. A void. Nothingness where you had been…He stopped thinking about it abruptly, his panic spinning his imagination into wild, disturbing cartwheels.
Blackarachnia was so engrossed in her own thoughts that she didn't even notice. "He played the knight in shining armour for me, and I abandoned him. Some love affair," she spat, bitterly.
"You couldn't have done anything," Cheetor murmured. "None of us could…"
None of this memory wiping thing made sense. They'd utterly forgotten the most basic and crucial details about the Beast Wars, yet a glimpse – one slagging nanosecond of comparatively irrelevant info! - had hurled Blackarahnia into a brooding depression as unpleasant possibilities presented themselves. In technicolour.
Realizing that nothing he could say would make a difference, and that anything he did say was likely to worsen her temper, the feline slipped silently out of the base, leaving Blackarachnia to her thoughts.
Had he lingered a second longer, he might have heard a whispered, almost tearful apology.
"I'm sorry, Jojo. I'm so slaggin' sorry…"
In the vastness of Cybertron, the little, cliché words went unheard.
_________________________________________________________
"It's almost funny, really…" Blackarachnia thought aloud, tracing patterns on Silverbolt's arm much as she had over a year before.
Silverbolt jerked out of his semi-daze to give her a wounded look.
"Not like that!" she responded as if stung, sliding out of his arms. "Nothing about this is laughable…" She quieted. "S'just…when I tried to hurt you, each and every time it failed. I never hurt you when I meant to. 'Least, I don't think I did." She gave a lopsided smile. "Only times I ever hurt you were when I wasn't trying."
It gave the condor pause for thought. That incident where she ran away from the Maximal base, thinking she would be forcibly reprogrammed. The upgrade that went horribly wrong. What he remembered as her abandonment of him.
She hadn't meant to hurt him, not one of those times. He'd kissed her after she'd shot him, her insults had been water off a duck's back to him, because for all her actions he'd known she'd never truly meant to hurt him.
But when she was truly, completely innocent of any malice, she'd cut him to the quick. Love's cruelest joke had had a field day with them.
" "You always hurt the one you love," " he remembered, causing Blackarachnia to look up once more.
"Did you mean to hurt me?" she challenged, her initial anger making a reappearance.
He was stunned by the accusation. How could she think...?
Then he had time to consider his feelings, and answered honestly.
"I…don't know."
She was asleep. They were all asleep.
Silverbolt wasn't. Staring intensely into the darkness of the underground cavern at night, he would have looked disturbed to anyone who had seen him.
But no-one was there.
Having been resurrected, and then plunged immediately into a battle that had been particularly painful for him, he had had little time to think.
Perhaps he should have been grateful for that fact. In the silence of the night, unpleasant images played and replayed in his head. The complete and all-consuming shame as he'd awoken from the dazed nightmare of being Jetstorm. To survey his own body and find that of a carrion eater, a giant vulture. To have been so angry as to actually attack the one person who might have provided some stability, some sanity, let alone the fact that she loved him. Completely losing his temper and becoming half crazed in a futile assault on Megatron. And then, the killing stroke, to infect his entire team – his friends! – with a rage virus that brought to light things better left buried.
It had not been a good day.
Why did she bother rescuing me, he wondered. Better that she should have killed me.
In the mayhem that was his mind, suddenly Blackarachnia was the cause of all his misery. As Jetstorm he didn't have to worry – it was difficult enough to think coherently, let alone stop a mind that was no longer his own. Emotions – the thrill of the chase and joy of the kill, accompanied by the panic and resistance as the psychotic Vehicon pursued Blackarachnia – were all too clear, but analysing them? Impossible.
Now, in full control of mind and body once more, all he could see was a world that mocked and tortured him. A lover who had dragged him from blissful oblivion. A team that viewed him with nothing short of pity.
The pain was cathartic. He reveled in bleak apathy, letting it cloak him. This was easier. This was easier than trying to make amends, easier than facing an all too painful past, easier than trying to re-ignite a dangerously floundering love affair…just easier.
As long as he kept thinking inwards, he'd never have to look at the world again…
And still the part of him that was still true to himself shrieked its outrage. It protested again and again, reminding him of love, of friends, of every goddam positive thing it could think of. Of Blackarachnia.
But it was all her fault.
She'd abandoned him…
The dark memory came and went in an eyeblink. Quietly filing it under the small list of things he would forever keep to himself, he drifted back into the present.
The sky was changing colour. A greyish dawn was wandering into the shadows of the half-metal, half-organic city as the sun attempted to clamber into the sky.
Had they been here that long?
Blackarachnia was in danger of dozing off. Every diode and nerve in her body demanded a decent recharge for once, before it crashed.
But she had things to do.
"It's all very well sitting and reminiscing, Bowser," she informed him tiredly, "but it's getting us nowhere." We're still back where we slaggin' started, she thought, with me not knowing which way to jump.
Silverbolt rallied himself. Enough.
He pulled her close again, a little surprised when there was no resistance.
"I'm broken," he told her flatly. "I'm battered and I'm scarred and I don't know if I'll ever be the Maximal I was in the Beast Wars. I don't know if I'll ever be the same person you fell in love with…if I can flatter myself to think that…
"Feathers, don't be stupid. I don't throw myself around like an idiot for just anyone."
A smile made a furtive dash across his face. "Quite." He resumed his sobriety. "I'm not pure or good or heroic. I'm dark and damaged. Or, to put it in Cheetor's words, "the bot's seriously screwed up." " He sighed. "If I stay with you…you're trapped by all my problems. That's not fair."
There was an icy pause.
"So…it's over. Just like that."
"No." He surprised himself by suddenly turning in on his words, wondering why he did so.
He realized why quickly.
"I don't want you to walk out. I don't want you to leave me, I don't want you to stop loving me. If you ever met someone else, I cannot guarantee that he would not suffer a gruesome accident." The un-Silverboltlike quip produced a startled bark of laughter from the black widow. He hugged her fiercely. "I want you to stay with me, despite my abysmal behaviour of months past. I…I just don't think it's the healthiest thing for you to do.
Blackarachnia tilted her head upwards to survey him. "And what about what I want? Does it get a look in?"
He began to stutter a reply…
"Shut up, Featherhead." Settling herself more comfortably, she continued. "I know you're screwed up. We all are. None of us will be winning any prizes for being well-adjusted individuals in the near future. You don't go through two wars, torture, death, oblivion and, in your case, enslavement and come back to a world of sunshine and roses. Can't be done. No matter how strong you are." She caught hold of his chin (hardly a difficult task) and tilted his face to look her directly in the eyes. "But if you're strong, you'll recover."
"I'm too badly scarred…"
"You'll survive."
"I'll be a burden to you…"
"I'll take my chances."
What could he say, in the face of such adamancy? "You really are the most amazing woman I have ever met…"
"I'm one of only three women you know personally," she retorted bluntly. "And don't go looking around if you know what's good for you." She quieted. "So you know my stance. You're a complete and utter moron and I love you. Question is, what about you?"
Simultaneously defeated and victorious, Silverbolt could only reply truthfully. "I love you. More than anything."
He didn't have time to continue before she dragged him in for a kiss.
"It's not over, you know," Blackarachnia informed Silverbolt, lounging together in the coldly bright room. "We still have a bunch of power-hungry maniacs on our backs, and a team with enough issues to keep every shrink on Cybertron in mansions for the rest of their lives."
"I know." It didn't seem to matter so much now, though. The chilling, yet still comforting, darkness in his spark still lingered, its presence still very much in evidence…but he could fight it now. 'There's a long way to go…"
"But we'll survive. Always have before," she shrugged. "And always will."
Silverbolt glanced out of the window once more. "Things have changed though," he told her with a stab of regret. "I don't think either of us will ever be who we were before…"
She gave him a wry look. "Shouldn't you be glad that I don't have to shoot you any more? And anyway," she settled once more, "I'll bet you anything that within two months you'll be driving me up the wall with your romantic, heroic drivel.
And I'll be loving every nano of it, but damned if I tell you that…"I hope you're right…"
"Are you implying that I'm ever wrong?" she retorted.
"No, dear," was the meek response.
She smirked. And life goes on.
The morning outside the window was not in the least romantic. It was grey and indecisive, unsure of whether to brighten or darken.
But it was still dawn.
With no intention of getting up anytime soon, Blackarachnia wrapped her arms around Silverbolt – armour slightly tarnished, but still her Silverbolt.
And chanced to look down, with her head over his shoulder.
Some things change. But little trivialities, silly, stupid things, have a tendancy to stay the same…
The ensuing burst of laughter prompted a slightly wounded response from Silverbolt.
"What?"
Through laughter that was humour, relief, hope and hysterics mixed in together, she could only choke out one word:
"Tailfeathers."