Arkvander didn't even look up from the metal he was welding. "My goodwill expired when you marched out that door," he reminded her.
Lyra's shoulders drooped and she sighed.
"Fine. Recharge, then get out. What happened?"
The plug felt amazing sliding into her port, like an addict's first taste of junk in forever. "You're right, I never know when to shut up."
He still did not allow his visor to flicker. He DID nod his head in encouragement.
Once she'd told him, he turned off the machine and shook his head. "Why did you come back here?"
"Is that really how you're going to treat me, after what you said?"
All he had to do was twist his mouth wryly.
It had been amazing but short, and in the end, his minicon put her tiny foot down and demanded what little there had been to end immediately. He called said minicon "the wife" - his anthropological semester stay on Paradron had taught him all sorts of cultural phrases to appropriate- and that should have tipped off Lyra but instead she chose to ignore it. The minicon got to stay and she had to disappear. He was right again; she shouldn't even be here.
All hope that he would come over and hold her or touch her cheek or even stand within three feet of her died when he started walking away from her to check the stairwell to make sure that "the wife" wasn't eavesdropping. "What are you going to do now?"
It was hard to roll out, but the explosions behind them were a sufficient motivator.
"ARGH!" Mirage's scream was real enough that she hesitated to turn around; if he'd been shot, she was in someone's crosshairs for certain and stopping would mean death. Devotion won out and she slowed her pace to see that debris had put a giant dent in him. "KEEP GOING!" he yelled.
Go where? In front of them was an army. Behind them the Decepticons assigned to blow up the towers around them were getting the job done as thoroughly as possible. There was smoke. And noise. And confusion. And panic.
The only thing that they could do was get away from the city and hope for the best, and when the smoke got so thick they couldn't see anything they went invisible. Then the unthinkable happened.
"Oasis! I'm-" He flickered, flashed, and came back corporeal. "I can't go back!"
"Back?" Oh, no... he couldn't change!
They had to get away. Somewhere. ANYWHERE!
All she could spot was the dump. It was stacked with bodies of the fallen from other battles, rotten and stinking and rusty. It was the only shelter she saw. "Over here! There has to be a cargo holder in here somewhere!"
The stench was unbearable. If she had any contents in her fuel tank they would have been evacuated by now. But it seemed like the best place to hide from more recent death and destruction.
A closed-bed carrier lay, doors ripped off, but far back enough and in an unlit area. Would anyone find them? Oasis didn't know. Mirage could barely transform, hobbling next to her as she first climbed up inside, then pulled him in. They crept into the back, dark and unknown, and listened to the sound of explosions around them.
She shook herself back online - when? what time is it? - and carefully crawled out, aware of the lack of noise. Not pin-drop silent, but the bombs and firing had pushed one side far enough away that it sounded like the war had passed, like a waning train. As she crawled back to Mirage, she saw his optics in the dark, blue and fearful.
"What do we do now?" he whispered frantically.
Even if their comfortable penthouse home no longer existed, another must. Friends or family or neighbors must have survived. They might be hiding nearby as well.
"We find an ally."