He onlines to an aching frame, an error filled processor, and the sun glaring in his sensitive optics.
Something of a whine claws it's way out of his damaged vocal processor and he has to vent in deeply before forcing himself to sit up. Everything hurts. Every movement is painful, inside and out. His limbs feel as though they're about to come off. His ventilation is labored and raspy with residue smoke and other toxic elements. His low fuel levels mean that it's going to take a while before they get filtered out of him. His armor is sore and crusted over with black, half-smelted plates and there's sharp shrapnel lodged beneath his armor, stabbing and cutting into his protoform underneath. The toxic levels in his ventilation render his systems hypersensitive and his tank unstable. He has to suppress a sudden urge to purge.
His processors are lagging. It's difficult to recall what's happened, where he is, and why he's here. Trying to remember makes his entire helm throb so he discards that and instead resets his optics and looks around. What he finds is a trio of little eyes staring back at him from the house he's apparently collapsed near. It's a human female and two offspring, one considerably younger than the other. The little girl looks remarkably similar to her creator, all except the light brown hair. The little boy differs, with curlier darker brown hair and brown eyes. All three of them continue to stare and he doesn't know what else to do other than to stare back. How did he end up here?
"Stay back, kids," the woman says, holding a hand out to stop her offspring before they can move past her. They're hovering just inside the house and she's standing in front of the open door. There's a natural confidence in her defensive stance that mildly intrigues him. Paternal instinct no doubt.
"Why am I here?"
"You tell me," the woman says, a frown on her lips, "You're the one who came here and passed out in my yard."
He doesn't remember that. Or if he does, his neural systems are still far too frazzled to function properly. That's going to take a while to recover, too. His mind.
What he does vaguely recall are the echoes of explosions ringing his still damaged audio receptors. He remembers the scorching heat of the bombs and the screaming of N.E.S.T. soldiers, his kind and humankind alike. He remembers a pair of wide blue optics, a smaller gray frame clinging to his, a young voice sobbing into his armor. The memory fights to come back but his processors glitch again. He flinches in pain.
"̴I̶ ̷d̸o̶n̵'̶t̴ ̴w̶a̸n̴t̸ ̷t̴o̶ ̷d̶i̵e̶!̷ ̷P̵l̵e̸a̷s̶e̶,̸ ̶C̸r̴o̵s̶s̷h̵a̶i̸r̶s̴,̸ ̸I̸ ̶d̸o̷n̵'̸t̸ ̴w̷a̵n̶t̸ ̴t̴o̸ ̴d̷i̸e̶!̵"̵
Someone utters a distressed noise. It doesn't occur to him that it's himself until he places a servo over his mouth. His tank churns. He wants to purge again. N.E.S.T., gone. Almost all of his comrades, gone. Most of his recent memories, gone.
"You can't stay here."
Ellie swallows the nervous lump in her throat at the way he looks at her. She quickly adds, "I'm sorry, but... you just can't. It's not safe for my kids. I can't harbor you any longer because it's illegal and-"
The Autobot heaves and throws up again. It's significantly less blue liquid that comes out this time and he's mostly dry heaving and gasping in pain. It's almost scary to Ellie how human he looks in this moment. It hadn't ever occurred to her that these things were even capable of being sick. She just hopes that whatever he's expelling isn't going to ruin her lawn later. Or leave traces of him being here, more importantly.
"How long?" The Autobot spits out without looking.
"Have you been here?" Ellie prompts. He nods and she answers, "About a day."
This time he does look at her, confusion very evident in his metallic features. Ellie's surprised by how expressive he is, "Yeah, after you passed out last time you were out all night and this morning."
The Autobot's face scrunches, as if he's got a killer headache. Now that she thinks about it, he probably does. It's not far fetched for Cybertronians to have headaches if they can throw up.
"Did you hear what I said?" Ellie says, just an ounce of boldness filling her, "You need to leave my property. Right now."
The Autobot's gaze turns cold. He snorts and leans forward, "Or what?"
She pulls out her phone, "Or I'll call. Either you leave and I don't say a thing or I'll report you and have you forcibly removed. Your choice."
Threatening an injured Cybertronian isn't the wisest thing to do. She knows that. But her children are her priority and she's not about to let them be in danger because of this Autobot. Deep down she knows she's not going to call anyone. She knows she's dealing with a broken soldier, struggling to come to terms with what he's just experienced. He himself isn't a threat to anyone -but the act of keeping him here is. She hopes he doesn't call her bluff and leaves without conflict.
The Autobot doesn't say or do anything, but the dangerous glint in his glowing eyes is enough of a hint that Ellie's taking a big risk. There's a million different ways he can stop her from calling and they both know it.
"Please leave," she says, "I don't want to call. But I will if I have to."
Her phone abruptly leaves her grasp. Ellie yelps and makes to get her only leverage back when she sees Maddie at her side, hiding the device behind her back. Her daughter jerks away whenever she tries to reach for it.
"Madison!" Ellie whispers, "What are you doing?"
"I won't let you call, Mom," Maddie says, shaking her head, "I won't let you do it."
"He can't stay here, Maddie!"
"Why not?" Maddie points to the Autobot, "Look at him, Mom. He's hurt. He needs help."
Ellie shakes her head, "Maddie we can't help him-"
"We can try," she says, and just like that Ellie is at a loss for words. She sees the determination and compassion in Maddie's eyes and knows her daughter isn't going to make this easy. She's frustrated and proud of her all at once. Ellie glances at the Autobot, who's since curled into himself with his head in his hands, and then meets Maddie's gaze again. She sighs.
"Okay. Okay, he can stay. But!" Ellie cuts her daughter off before she can speak, "I don't want you or Charlie anywhere near that Autobot. I know they're not bad guys, but I don't think he wants to be bothered. I'll... keep him in the garage or something. Keep him hidden. But under no circumstance-"
She stops short when she realizes that Charlie isn't behind her anymore. With panic gripping her Ellie twirls around until she spots her son just mere feet from the Autobot. The little boy is looking up at the titan with big wondrous eyes and the Autobot has taken notice and is staring back down rather uncomfortably.
"Charlie!" Ellie sprints and grabs him before Charlie can get any closer, forcing him to look at her so she can sign with trembling hands, "Stay away from him! I don't want you to get hurt, do you understand?"
Charlie looks down, bringing his little fist to rub a circle on his chest. 'I'm sorry.'
"It's okay, baby, just..." glancing up, Ellie watches as the Autobot groans again and holds his evidently aching head in his hands again. A strange whistling noise keeps emitting from him and it takes her a moment to realize it's his breathing. Or... ventilation, whatever it can be considered. In any case he's wheezing, sparking, throwing up and suffering from severe burns and God knows what other traumas. Ellie has the notion that she's looking at the haunted shell of whoever this Autobot was before surviving DC.
Charlie tugs on her, urging her eyes back to him. With a deep frown he points to the Autobot and signs, 'sad'.
Ellie frowns and holds her son close, putting her fingers to her head and then signing further, "I know. He's sad."
'I want him to feel better,' Charlie signs. He looks up at her with his big doe eyes, 'Are we going to make him feel better?'
With an unsure sigh, she takes one more look at the emotionally distraught Autobot and nods, "We'll try."
"Maddie, help me with this?"
Running over to her mother Maddie readily grabs the other side of the small workbench and helps to move it against the garage wall. Once they set it down Ellie wipes her forehead and takes in a breath, looking for the next thing to move. Their seperate garage has been practically abandoned for years and is filled with boxes and shelves of junk, tools, and parts. Ellie doesn't think she's stepped a foot in it since the divorce.
"Do you think he's going to fit in here, Mom?" Maddie asks. She helps Ellie move the last of the boxes, leaving a large open space in the garage. Ellie places her hands on her hips and bites her lip.
"It's going to be a tight fit, but I think we can make it work," Ellie says. Then again, this is assuming that the Autobot is going to move. He's been in the same spot for two days now. Too weak, too devastated, it's hard to say. Ellie can imagine it's both. But if he's going to stay, he's going to have to be kept hidden. For his sake and their own. Ellie's pretty positive that she's committing a crime that will earn her more time than murder.
Maddie frowns, "I don't understand."
"Understand what, honey?"
"Why are Autobots bad now? Why is everyone afraid of them?" Maddie wanders to the open entrance and looks at the Autobot outside, "They protect us, don't they?"
"Yes, Maddie, but..." Ellie struggles for a suitable explanation. It's hard to do when not even she understands what's going on between the government and the Autobots, "They say the Autobots attacked people. And because of that, people are afraid of them."
"Do you believe that?" Maddie asks earnestly, looking back at her mother.
Ellie clenches her jaw, "No, Maddie. I don't."
Maddie glances outside, "Me neither. He looks too scared to be mean."
After determining that they've made just enough room to accommodate an Autobot, Ellie meanders outside and slowly approaches the Autobot. He sits with his knees pulled up and his eyes are dimmed as if he's entirely off of Earth within his mind. She can still hear the sickly rattling of his ventilation. Ellie sends her daughter back into the safety of the house with her brother before addressing him.
"Hey..." she starts, a little lamely. The Autobot doesn't respond. It doesn't look like he even hears her.
"Hey!" Ellie says, louder this time. This time he jerks and finally snaps out of his daze. When he looks down his glowing blue stare is blank and intense. Ellie has to look away. She swallows thickly and points to the garage, "Garage is cleared out. If we're going to keep you, you're staying hidden. One helicopter will doom us all."
He continues to stare at her and Ellie wonders if he has even heard her at all. But then his gaze slides to the open garage. It's evident that he's not completely there in the head but he seems to understand enough and moves to get up. It takes a while -he gasps and winces with every movement and he's still so weak that he barely has the strength to pull himself up. Ellie is still unsettled by how such a large being can look so exhausted and in pain.
When he makes it to his feet the Autobot doesn't move right away. Instead he looks at her again with an expression that makes her a bit uncomfortable. She doesn't meet his eyes and gestures to the garage again, "Garage, please. Before I change my mind."
He moves finally, with heavy steps and a nasty looking limp. Ellie can hear his scorched plates of armor grind over each other and frowns upon imagining how tender his entire body must feel. She thinks it must be somewhat similar to suffering from third degree burns. She begins to feel more sorry than glad that he barely survived the bombing.
She follows him warily, keeping a fair distance in case he ends up collapsing again. It's a little awkward watching him bend down but the Autobot clambers into the garage easily enough. She waits until the noises die down before she trots inside to see how he's settled. The Autobot sits against the back of the garage, his arms wrapped around himself. It looks like he's already fallen back into the blank, haunted state he was in when he was still in the yard. He shivers just slightly.
"Um... are you cold?" She asks, but the Autobot has taken to continuing his blank stare. She has a feeling that she's not going to get an answer, so she maneuvers to the garage's thermostat and cranks it up. There's no way of telling if he's actually cold, or if he can even get cold, but she figures the warmth may help keep him comfortable in any case.
Once Ellie does that, she glances back to the Autobot to see him actively watching her. It's impossible to tell what he's feeling or thinking but she can see that he's concentrating quite hard on her, as if he's never truly seen her until now. Seeing that she's apparently gotten his full attention for the first time she takes a few steps closer and asks curiously, "What's your name?"
The Autobot says nothing. Ellie gives up trying to ask him anything and decides to explain a few things, "Listen... I'm not sure how long you're going to be here or how long I can afford to keep you, but there's some things I need to lay out for you."
She pauses upon seeing him shift. He's still staring at her so she continues, "My name is Ellie. Ellie Bowens. I have two kids, Madison and Charlie. Madison is twelve years old, Charlie is eight. He's deaf, meaning he can't hear. He was born that way. They are my priority, okay? Their safety comes first before anything else, so even though I chose to take you in, if I have to choose between their lives and yours, I will not hesitate to choose them over you. I'm sorry, that's just how it is."
The Autobot shifts again, but other than that he does and says nothing else. Ellie doesn't think most of that got through to him but she doesn't have the energy to repeat herself. She leans against a nearby box and says softly, "Still, I'm willing to help you. I'll keep you hidden, let you rest and recover. All I ask is that you don't destroy anything, or become a threat to my kids. I'll... check on you later. If there's something you need just let me know, I guess."
She makes it to the garage entrance when she hears the Autobot speak. It's so abrupt that she jumps and doesn't exactly hear what it is he says. Whipping around Ellie furrows her brows and asks, "Uh, sorry. What was that?"
"Fuel," he says with that gravelly voice that she has very rarely heard, "Need... fuel."
"Fuel," she repeats, not entirely sure what he means by that, "Fuel like... gasoline? Is that what you need, gasoline?"
The Autobot gazes at her for a moment. Then slowly, he nods.
"Gas. You need gas," Ellie says. She hesitates for a hair of a minute and then nods to herself, "Right, okay. I'll... see what I can do. Um, I'll be back."
Without meeting his eyes Ellie presses the garage's door button and exits. Once the door slides shut she sighs, pushing back her hair with her hands and holding her hands behind her head, "God, what am I doing..."
Deciding not to ponder on the situation too much Ellie heads back to the house, the Autobot now safely hidden away.
"Mom, you might want to look at this!" Maddie calls from the living room. Ellie has been cutting up carrots for the beef stew and looks up to address her daughter, "What is it?"
Maddie pokes her head around the corner, "The news. They're talking about the Autobots."
The news have been talking about the Autobots the whole weekend, she muses, but she decides to join the kids in the living room anyways. She expects something attune to what she's heard already. Instead however, the headline is something that piques her interest right away.
"...Less than twenty-four hours ago, thousands of files from N.E.S.T.'s database have been leaked into the open internet. As of right now, we have no sources to tell us whether or not this was a deliberate move from the government. These files have been determined to pertain to everything regarding the shut down organization, including but not limited to missions, soldier enlistments, technological innovations, foreign contracts, even reformations made after the major battles of Mission City, Egypt and Chicago. Various users have been reported to have decrypted a set of specialized N.E.S.T. profiles. Profiles that, as it would seem, hold detailed in-depth information and descriptions of every registered Autobot to have served in the branch..."
Ellie tunes out the rest of what the news reporter says. Almost immediately she decides there's some things she needs to look up online later and grabs the remote, "Alright, that's enough news for today."
After dinner Ellie steers her kids upstairs for bed. They have school tomorrow, and the thought of that almost makes it feel like everything is normal. She can almost forget that she's hiding a half-dead Autobot in her garage. Once she ensures that her children are sleeping Ellie returns to the living room and opens her laptop with a goal to find out which Autobot she has.
It isn't hard at all to find a lot of N.E.S.T.'s leaked files. Ellie finds herself scrolling through what feels like endless information on the organization. A lot of it is complex and filled with complicated military code that she doesn't understand, but she also finds countless profiles of every single enlisted N.E.S.T. soldier as well as any associates. It's a little unnerving to look at them, feeling as though she's invading their privacy, so she quickly abandons those in favor of tracking down those special profiles with the Autobots.
It takes a fair amount of digging through potentially sketchy websites but finally Ellie finds what she's looking for. She takes her time searching though the decrypted Autobot profiles, trying to find one that looks like the one in her garage. Going through profile after profile Ellie finds herself deeply intrigued by the diversity of the Autobots. Some are small, others massive, some slimmer and some quite burly looking. All of them have different shapes, sizes, colors, specialties, and undoubtedly posses a wide range of different personalities.
At some point she comes across a particular profile that details an Autobot that makes her laugh a little. He's described as grumpy and cantankerous and apparently has a tendency to throw wrenches.
Another one is a bright red Autobot that can turn invisible.
She finds a female Autobot that's noted to be "every bit as feisty and trigger happy as her mate".
An Autobot that can manipulate electricity.
An Autobot disguised as a police car.
A rather cute yellow Autobot with big blue eyes.
Finally Ellie comes across a red and blue Autobot and halts. Upon further inspection she quickly sees that this still is not her Autobot. She's pretty sure he wouldn't be able to fit in the garage if he's thirty-five feet tall with a semi as his vehicular mode. She doesn't remember seeing smokestacks or extra tires. In some odd sense Ellie is glad it isn't Optimus Prime she's harboring. It would be practically impossible to hide the leader of the Autobots, who is listed as one of the most wanted. She's seen him and William Lennox make public speeches in the past as two iconic N.E.S.T. figures of leadership and vaguely remembers the baritone of his voice. A voice that definitely does not match the Autobot she has.
"Come on," she murmurs as she clicks out of Optimus's profile, "Which one are you..."
She spends a few more minutes flying through the profiles, looking at names as she does. Jazz. Topspin. Arcee. Smokescreen. Red Alert. Wheeljack. Sideswipe. Sunsteaker. Such odd names...
At long last Ellie finds another Autobot with blue and red armor. Twenty-eight feet tall, with a relatively slim but strong build and a war-hardened face. A face that greatly resembles the one in her garage, only there's little to no emotion left in him now. The profiles include intricate measurements and full-body images of the Autobots and this one is no exception. There's no denying this is her Autobot, but it's disturbing looking at him before DC. He's been so badly damaged that his colors are the only thing that tells her this is him. Her eyes immediately fly to his name.
"Crosshairs," she says out loud, "Your name is Crosshairs..."
Not the oddest name she's seen. As she takes her time reading his profile she begins to see that it's a rather fitting name. According to all of this information Crosshairs is, or was, a renowned sharpshooter. Responsible for taking the killing shot on multiple Decepticons on missions and very keen on his weaponry. His accuracy and skill on long range shooting has apparently earned him a title of the leading figure for N.E.S.T.'s sniper unit.
Ellie pauses and blinks to wrap her head around her discovery. Crosshairs, a deadly sharpshooter, the Autobot's Chris Kyle, possessing a number of Decepticon kills, has somehow dropped himself into her property and into her life. And he has thrown up in her yard and is now resting in her garage, burned and in pain and irrevocably traumatized.
Does that make him dangerous? Ellie isn't sure. Aside from their first interaction just a few days ago Crosshairs has done nothing to be a threat. But Ellie has seen enough movies and read enough books to know how soldiers like him who have gone through similar things he has can be very unstable. If he ends up snapping at any time, Ellie would be powerless against him.
But she's already taken him in. The only way she's going to be able to get rid of him is to turn him in, but that's not something she has the heart nor the current will to do. Maybe, he'll only need a few more days to recover and then he'll go away. That's what Ellie wants to hope for, but deep down she knows that Crosshairs is far too gone and is going to take a long time to come back. She's just going to have to tread carefully while having him around and ensure her kids are safe at all times.
Who's she kidding? She put her kids in danger the moment she chose not to call.
While seriously reconsidering her decision, phone in hand, Ellie closes her laptop and bites her lip. She stares at her home screen for a few moments and then sets it down on the table, shaking her head. I can't. If I call, they'll kill him. He doesn't deserve to die.
She wanders to the back door after getting herself ready for bed, staring at the garage. She hadn't been sure if leaving Crosshairs in the dark was a good idea, so she'd left the lights on in their dimmest setting. There's no windows except for the small one on the garage door, so she can't see the Autobot inside. Briefly she wonders what he's doing in there -is he sleeping? Do Cybertronians sleep? Or is he in the same exact place staring distantly as he's always been doing, lost in his own mind?
Ellie turns away. She heads upstairs, shotgun in hand, praying that she won't have to use it anytime soon.
I hope everyone has a good Monday. I know it's not a favorite day of the week, so here's another chapter. I hope it was good. :)
Feedback is always appreciated and loved. See you next week!
