Birds sang, insects chirped. In general, the loud sounds of the forest tore me from a semi-wonderful sleep. I grumbled irritated and was about to get up when the tug of two arms wrapped around mine stopped me. Anna had done that in her sleep with a constricting grip. Lovely, note the sarcasm.
She was resting peacefully on my side, a gently smile gracing her lips. It would a rude action to move her from underneath my wing. I also didn't feel any kind of danger nearby. What could be the harm of resting for an extra few minutes? Both the bot or human weren't up yet and if something did happen, my energy was at a good enough level.
A huge sigh of relief escaped me. I settled carefully next to the kid and closed my eyes. Anna shifted slightly in her spot, causing me stiffen. She stopped moving and had shuffled a little closer to me.
Kid, I'm now debating whether or not keeping you. Those Decepticons could've already started the process that Jasper does. That reminds me, I haven't asked her if she was tested on while there. She did seem somewhat traumatized. Luckily, that had passed and she was doing much better under my watch and care.
In the end of this, I'll be alone again and Anna will be back with her friends and family. Sunstreaker will be returned to the military with his brother and the others like him.
When the sun was rising higher in the sky, I knew we needed to get going, Staying in one spot for over a day can let to trouble, big trouble. I unhinged Anna's arms from around my own and stood up. "No," Anna groaned and reached out to my leg.
Before she could, I took a few extra steps back and stretched out all of my limbs. "Come on, kid. It's time to wake up and taste the sunshine," I ushered and strolled over to where the basket was. The wrappers from the food and medical supplies were shoved in it. Once we get on the road, I needed to find a trash can to throw this away in. Ha, a monster knows better to leave trash than most of the humans on this planet.
Anna rolled onto her other side to face away from me and curled up into a ball. Well, let's see if the tin can is a morning person. I created a small ball of snow and chucked it at his head. The ball went splat against his face and sprinkled down to rest on varies places of his yellow armor.
His blue eyes immediately light up and locked onto me. A snarl made its way one to his face. Sunstreaker looked like he wanted to kill me right then and there but knew better. "What was that for?" he grounded out and tried to get to his wheeled feet. Main word: tried.
More of that blue substance dribbled down his armor, less in quantity this time. "We need to head out. We've been here long enough," I stated as an idea came to mind. "You keep leaking that blue stuff. Any way I can help?" If we were to speed this along, the bot needed to get better because I'm not carrying them again.
"You didn't have to throw a snowball at me," he grumbled and knew there was nothing he could do. "Also, it's called energon. If you can push my hip gear back into place and weld my cut energon lines back together, then you can help." Sarcasm was thick in his voice.
Sounded easy enough. "Alright, I can do that. Just tell me what to do." His brows furrowed as shock washed over his face. I raised a brow in return. "What? I said I can help. What's wrong with that?"
"I was being sarcastic. Fine, I'll let you try but one false move and I'll squish you like the bug you are." The yellow robot was trying to act threatening but in his state, he couldn't do anything to hurt me if he tried.
Sunstreaker scooted off of the tree and lied down for easier access. "So what do you want me to do? Your hip thingy or the energy lines?" The word he used wasn't energy but it was on the lines of that.
"Energon lines," he corrected. "Do my left hip gear first, if you can." To me, that sounded like a challenge and the way he said too aided my thought. I padded over to where he was and inspected the hip joint.
Wires sparked and were torn. This gave me the opportunity to see where this hip gear was. Kind of like a human, a ball joint had been dislocated from it should have been sat. A lot of force would be needed to push it back into place. I had an idea on fixing it but didn't know it if would work. I gently rested my hand on the yellow plating but got the most massive shock in my life.
I reeled back as a tingling feeling ran up my arm and settled in the middle of my chest. Our eyes locked onto each other the moment after and anger grew in mine. Here I am, trying to help him, and he has the audacity to shock the living daylights out of me. "Why in the hell would you do that?!" I snarled, ready to lunge on him.
Sunstreaker scoffed and shook his head like he was innocent. "I didn't do that! You did," he shouted back and rested on his elbows.
"Uh-huh, I totally believe you… Not! You're the giant being made of metal. You have a higher chance of collecting electricity." I think. Metals are good conductors if I remember correctly from my limited knowledge of science.
"You humans can also conduct electricity too. Ratchet goes on and on about that slag when he has the chance."
My anger was quickly dwindling, surprisingly, the longer our eyes bored into each other. Internally I want to stay mad at him but another part of my brain just brushed it off and I did. I took a huge breath and tuck away the rest of my anger as energy. "We don't have time to argue so, I have an idea but I don't know if you're going to like it."
"What is it?" His own inner rage sounded like it was leaving him too.
"To push your joint back into place, I need a lot of force. Luckily, it's popped out with the joint above. I can fly up, do a dive, and just use that momentum to push it back," I explained. Sunstreaker grumbled lowly a few words that I couldn't understand.
"Fine, do it." With permission, I took off into the sky a good couple hundred feet above him before going into a dive. My eyes were trained on his thigh, the place I would land hard on.
At the last second, I threw all of my weight down to have my feet below me. All of the collected momentum came in handy as my talons slammed into the plating.
A loud pop could be heard. Sunstreaker's body jerked the moment after and he grabbed at his head to stop himself from swatting me. Sunstreaker shouted in pain. The noise of both the pop and yell woke up the tired girl. She sprung up from her spot and snapped her gaze over to us. Worry pooled in her eyes.
I hop off of his leg and wait for him to settle down. "What did you do to him?" she questioned with concern laced in her voice. Anna stood to her feet and treaded carefully over to him.
"His hip had been popped out of place, I popped it back in for him. It'll help quicken our pace if he can walk properly and not stumble over his feet," I explained and stopped her before she could get too close to him. "Don't. He's in pain." Or that's what it seemed to be. Could his kind feel pain like us humans? By the looks of it, they can. An alien race that was pretty similar to us. Strange.
Anna sorrowfully gazed up at me and hugged my waist. "Thank you for helping him." Why does she keep thanking me for doing my job? I shrugged my shoulders and walked up to him after she let me go.
The hip gear thingy had been pushed back into place thankfully. More of the energon stuff leaked from the disturbed wound. "So on the wires and energon lines, what should I do to?" I questioned and stared intently at the glowing blue liquid. It lightly burned my nose like gasoline would. Did it have the same prosperities as it?
"When you weld lines and wires back together, make sure there is no energon near it. Energon is highly explosive." So the sparking that is happening isn't good, fantastic. "Also, don't touch any energon, it's toxic for humans." My scales are thick, I'll be fine.
I gently grabbed a loose line with energon on it. A tiny burning sensation started in my hand the moment after but nothing worse than that happened. I summoned water to wash away any of the blue liquid away before getting down to business.
Heat swelled in my hand as I concentrated on welding together wires and energon lines. Off to the side, Anna sat with an ice bottle filled with water in her hand. It was the best I could do at the moment when she got thirsty and needed something to drink.
"So after I fix you up, would you be able to transform and drive for the remainder of the trip?" I spoke up and moved away from his mostly fixed hip. Other places on his body needed the same treatment.
"It would take a couple of days for my hip to heal before I could transform. I'm also in need of energon from how much I have lost."
"So no on a quicker travel, awesome." I hop up onto his chest and start working there. "I don't have any of that stuff and I can only create more water. You're out of luck from me."
"Fossil fuel, gas, whatever it's called will suffice me until we reach the base."
"Okay, I can do that once I finish up welding up your wires and lines." Stupid robot, slowing down this entire mission and shocking me. But the kid wants to keep him and sure is adamant about it.
None of the work I was doing was time efficient in any way shape or form but it got him to where he could walk with a slight limp. Anna was in his grasp as we trekked along the forest floor, on our way to a military base. Fun, isn't it?
The sun was already on its way down when we started our trip. Now it was below the trees, about to touch the horizon. Tonight though, we weren't going to stop. We needed to reach Alabama or Mississippi within two days to keep this rolling along smoothly.
With me not needing as much sleep as a normal human would and Sunstreaker needing barely any, we were trucking along. Anna stayed with her robotic friend most of the time unless she wanted to stretch her legs. Well she had to be carefully about her leg, which was doing much better.
It became a day and night cycle of nearly straight walking. Four days had passed. I had gone out again and stole the two of us some food when all of us needed to rest. My legs burned from the amount of walking as I used my wings as the main transport. Flying was quicker than walking but neither the human or robot had a way to fly. So, I was stuck to walking next to Sunstreaker for most of the trip.
His hip had yet to be healed enough for him to transform due to how much traveling we had been doing. That was both of our faults. Since we could continue go on longer than before, we did so.
The kid snuggled up to my side as we sat by the small fire, a Go-gurt in her hand. She asked if she could request anything and that was one of things. The other snack she wanted was Capri Suns. "How much longer until we get back my daddy?" she mumbled sleepy.
I patted top of her head sweetly and gazed up at Sunstreaker. "Depends on when Sunstreaker can transform. Walking takes much longer than driving. Two days of driving at most. For walking, twenty or so days but we'll be there earlier than thst, I promise." I squeezed her hand reassuringly and took another bite of an apple.
Sunstreaker had something on his mind. That got me thinking. When he shocked me, that buzz/tingling feeling never left. It still sat in the middle of my chest, to the right of my heart. I scoffed a plume of smoke. "Whoa," Anna said in awe and watched the smoke slowly float up. "What was that?" A curious child, sometimes good, sometimes fatal. People learn with curiosity though.
"Smoke, my dear. I can breathe fire but rarely due since I can create it by hand," I explained and let fire dance between my fingers. Anna reached out to touch it, amazed, but I dismissed the fire before she could. "Fire burns, no touchy-touchy."
Anna pushed her bottom lip out and gazed up at me. "No, kid. I told you. If you don't stop, I'll leave you on the ground and go sleep in a tree." Her pout disappeared and she looked down at the ground. I felt a little guilty and pulled her more into my side. "You're injured enough. You don't need burn marks on your hands to add to the list of wounds."
"I understand," she mumbled meekly and soaked up the heat my body natural gave up. "Do you have a family? Are they like you? Do you have any kids or siblings?" she fired off random questions out of nowhere. Where did that come from?
Guilt sprang up at the thought of those I cared about most. A family broken up and fighting over stupid things that didn't matter. All of us were far from normal, that was for sure. "Uh, k-id," my voice broke as tears threatened to fall," let's not talk about that."
Thankfully, she dropped it reluctantly, oblivious to my tone of voice. The heel of my hand rubbed against the middle of my chest. Someone was staring at me. I snapped my gaze to the feeling and noticed Sunstreaker was boring his glowing eyes into me. What was his problem?
I wiped away the tears after tearing my gaze away from him. The fire was dimming slightly from my emotions getting a little out hand. Since it was my 'creation', I had a connection with it still even though it had its own fuel source. My powers were a bit confusing, even to me. It was based on emotion and energy though. If I got emotional, then the feeling it was connected to was affected to.
The kid yawned tired and signaled it was time for sleep. I lied down on my stomach and drew the energy from the fire out. Couldn't have the forest burn down because of me. Anna snuggled up closer to me and easily slipped off into sleep. Lucky her.
"Why don't you want to talk about your family?" Sunstreaker's voice nearly caused me to jerk and wake the girl. Did he seriously want to poke that wasp nest?
A growl rumbled in my chest. "Because I don't want to. Easy enough answer," I grounded out between clenched teeth. "Do you want to talk about your brother?"
His silence answered me. I knew what his thought had to be: fair enough.
The whirling and other mechanical noises coming from his went quiet a good thirty minutes later after our short conversation. A hum came from him, the only sound that told me he was still alive.
With nothing seeming wrong or buzzing danger, I carefully drifted off. This nap was deserved after being up for the past thirty-four or so hours. My watch was gone and I could only guess.