Err…this last bit gets kind of…well.
Talk of a major Disaster, death and recovery efforts so be careful because for first responders that is not always pretty.
Sometimes no one wins.
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The twins stared.
Shuttered their optics.
Stared some more.
Then they turned to Ratchet as if asking if Optimus Prime had really just crashed in the med bay floor.
Ratchet sighed. It was to be expected.
Many, many mega-vorns had passed since the tragedy that took the youth sectors of Cybertron and alongside it all the sparklings and younglings of their race. Neither Autobot nor Decepticon had wanted the death of the young ones and so all the sparklings and younglings they could find had been moved to the youth sectors so they could be safe and away from any battles. The youth sectors had been a sort of Neutral Ground where both factions would act to ensure the No Violence rule. Young were treasured and precious to all Cybertronians and both Autobot and Decepticon would and had reacted to keep the youth sectors safe from all harm over the course of the war, even working together to achieve this in cases where it was necessary.
They had not counted on the damage to Cybertron itself being an issue.
The war had ravaged much of their planet at this point, destroying much of things they should never had touched to begin with. The end result was the equivalent of what humans called an 'earthquake' that had completely devastated the youth sector. Nothing and no one had been left standing.
Ratchet would remember the twisted and broken bodies of the little ones for the rest of his life, alongside the bodies of the adults that had tried to shield or prevent the destruction for the young. It was complete and utter destruction. He had looked for survivors anyway, praying for anyone to have survived the devastation.
No one had.
That loss had destroyed many a mech and femme in both factions not only because it was a horrifying loss, but because Sires and Carriers alike had placed their own little ones in the sectors because they should have been safe.
It hadn't been, and those who had little ones of their own had felt their terror and pain as they off-lined in the destruction. The 'earthquake' had been sudden and violent. Any subtle tremors in the ground would have been put off as another battle somewhere outside the youth sectors- it had happened before, battles so large and powerful that even far from the sectors as the battles were the ground had shaken under pede. The fact that Cybertron had never before suffered from an 'earthquake' meant that no one knew what was about to happen until it had been much too late as the ground ripped open under-pede and buildings collapsed, as the smelting pit that should have been a safe distance away from the sectors used for disposal ruptured and the Cybertronian equivalent of lava was flung in all directions.
The mechs that had died because of the smelt had been the worst, Ratchet remembered. Always- always- it had been because the adult had been trapped by the buildings or destroyed landscape, either the land impassible or their frames broken in the chaos so entirely they could not escape…but the worst had been the sparklings.
Too little, not strong enough to get out, incapable of flight…the sparklings caught in the burning smelt…
Ratchet would never forget as both Autobot and Decepticon alike worked beside each other, faction loyalties and views set aside as they franticly prayed and hoped that there would be survivors somewhere in the mess…
Sometimes they would find a bot or youngling who hadn't died immediately…but the injuries had always been too severe, or the bot in question would simply stop, their spark no longer wishing to continue on in the face of so much violent loss the likes of which the younglings had never seen, shielded from the war as they were, and so it didn't…
It had been such a blow to both sides the war had stopped for a vorn as they mourned. There had been bots that had dropped their factions after this disaster- becoming Neutrals so that they would not have to fight again beyond defending themselves.
Bumblebee had been the last of the sparklings, surviving the destruction only because he had not been present at the sight, but many cities over, a little scraplet fierce and determined to survive, born outside of the sectors and on his way there when the destruction happened. He had lost his creators on the journey over, and was a vicious creative little mech in his quest to survive without creators to guide him, and the knowledge the sectors were gone as the outcry traveled across the sectors and into the cities. Ratchet was sure the time Bumblebee was on his own had certainly helped him to develop the skills that would make him such an excellent Spy and Scout.
Optimus had been the one to find and take in the little mech, the one that formed a Guardian Bond with him, and raised him as his own until the little mech had entered his adult frame and chosen to follow Optimus in the war.
It had been over 60 mega-vorns since Bumblebee had entered his adult frame, the only sparkling to be found after the destruction of the sectors despite how both factions had searched.
Bee had been considered a sparkling and then a youngling for millions of mega-vorns when the time was added together. Cybertronians had not started actually counting the mega-vorns since a sparkling was born until Bumblebee entered his adult frame and so was no longer considered a sparkling or youngling.
It had been 60 mega-vorns, almost five million Earth years, since the scout had been considered an adult and the last sparkling of Cybertron.
If the bots were to count the time that Bee had lived as a youngling and sparkling when considering how long a sparkling- an honest new life- had been born to the Cybertronian race…it would be billions more Earth years, mega-vorns upon mega-vorns, a truly incomprehensible time to humans and a long time to even a Cybertronian since a sparkling had graced their presence.
Until now.
It was no surprise the Prime had crashed at the sight of the little seeker.
Shadowstrike was an impossibility. Not only was he a sparkling, but a sparkling found on Earth eons after the Cybertronian race had thought their children wiped from existence, and impossibly young at the same time, the equivalent of a minutes old newborn when comparing Human and Cybertronian life-cycles.
Shadowstrike was a miracle, what the humans would call a 'castle in the air', and he would be so, so cherished as the first sign of life continuing on in eons. Ratchet expected many crashes to happen in the future- Optimus was just the first in a soon to be long line.
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We will be back to out regularly scheduled fluff next chapter. I have NO IDEA what happened here- Ratchet grabbed the reins, yanked them away and hit me in the face with a wrench every time I went 'WHAT ARE YOU DOING' and tried to take them back.
He wanted to explain exactly how big a deal it was that a sparkling even existed at all and how cherished Shadowstrike will be. Like. This is huge to Cybertronians as a whole.