Never let it be said that Mikaela liked to beat around the bush.
Sam croaked incoherently for a moment, then managed to eke out, "What? Why?"
She shook her head, reaching for his hands and squeezing, hard. "I don't know. I couldn't find out more than that. It must be classified or something."
Feeling like someone had just knocked his chair out from under him, he looked from Mikaela to Simmons to Galloway and back again. A disbelieving grin crept across his face, and he huffed out a breathless chuckle.
"What, is missing the first week of school punishable by expulsion or something? Did my parents not foot the bill on time and they decided to put me on probation?"
"Even those two aren't dumb enough not to know how to sign their names to a check," Simmons sneered. Sam rounded on him.
"Hey! You leave me parents out of it! Remember that rule, 'if you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all'? Well, that's what we're going to do here," he motioned to all the occupants of the table with a circular window-washing motion, "Only positive vibes allowed."
"Sam," the feel of a warm body leaning towards him refocused his gaze on Mikaela, "I don't know why they don't want you going back to college, but supposedly they're going to tell us at the debriefing."
Maintaining his upbeat grin with furious determination, he concentrated on trying to breathe around the stone lodged in his chest. Normalcy: college, parties, tests, marriage, kids. Was that too much to ask? Never mind that he'd only saved the world TWICE and all. The floor just kept tilting and tiling away beneath his feet with no indication that it would ever right itself.
"Great, so when is it?"
Eyebrows pulling up in the middle, an uncomprehending blink of fathomless blue eyes, and Mikaela reluctantly dropped his hands. He instantly missed their warmth. Her distrusting posture-- leaning back in her chair, arms crossed over her chest-- clearly indicated that she wasn't buying his act for a moment.
"At ten. They want us to meet in conference room 52 on level 3 so they can pick our brains about what happened and how, precisely, one of the eight wonders of the world ended up a pile of bricks."
"Not to mention, the cat's out of the bag now!" Simmons intoned with a distinctly accusatory air, "Everyone in the world saw that nasty robot piece of work announcing the end of existence on network television! There's going to be hell to pay, that's for sure--" he aimed a predatory glance at a suddenly nervous Galloway, "--and more than a few head are going to roll."
"Why have the debriefing now, then?" Two sets of eyes turned to look at him with expressions that clearly stated when they thought of his IQ, "I mean, why not as soon as everyone was discharged for the infirmary? Why did they wait a few days?"
Simmons took a noisy slurp of coffee. "It's all thanks to you, matrix boy. Those big alien friends of yours insisted that stopping a worldwide outbreak of terror could wait until everyone was absolutely positive that you weren't going to drop dead of a heart attack!"
Uncharacteristic fury flooded him with heat. Hadn't he survived this far? Hadn't he done what they could not, without armor or guns or giant glowing swords? He accepted that, as a human, he was physically (perhaps mentally) inferior to the alien visitors, but assuming he was going to stress himself into a heart attack was downright insulting.
"I'm not that fragile!" He spat.
Galloway gave him a strange look. "Well obviously you weren't enrolled in a medical program, because if you had been you would have realized that anyone who has just suffered a near death experience and been revived via defibrillator is in danger of a post-trauma relapse: i.e, a heart attack."
And just like that, all the air left his rapidly swelling balloon of righteous indignation with a small farting noise.
"Oh."
He blinked, trying to refocus his thoughts, and his gut crammed itself into a hard little knot as his mind circled back to the one problem he didn't want to feel or examine. Optimus' death had hurt like a sudden hole blown through his chest-- he kept walking, kept moving, kept living, but a large part of him ached and sobbed with emptiness (itsallmyfaultitsallmyfault). This, however, conjured a different type of pain. The thought that he would not be able to return to college, get a degree, make something of his life, hurt the way an invisible fist squeezing his insides together might. Only a sliver of dimly realized determination prevented him from being swallowed up by the pain. Maybe it was stubbornness. Maybe it was courage. Maybe it was a rock-headed, foot-planted, tantrum screaming desire to do whatever he wanted to do anyway, government impositions be damned. But whatever the feeling that drove him, it lodged a flinty gleam of will-not-surrender in his eyes that felt dangerously similar to the will-not-die that had only just begun to fade. And if his survival record was anything to go by, that feeling usually caused him to get his way, simply by virtue of refusing to back down.
He swallowed, took a deep breath in through his nose, and spoke, "They may have their reasons for not wanting me to go back to college, but they have no right to stop me. I paid for it, didn't I? Well, my parents did, but that's not the point. You'd think that after all this they'd trust me to take care of myself. Besides, since when did the government take any real interest in one person's well being?" He tried to snicker at his own little anti-government joke, but the attempt fell flat. Though seeing Galloway appear so grievously affronted was enough to bring a tiny smile twitching to life.
"Young man," the politician began, working for a thunderous tone but ending up with something two steps short of nagging, "I don't know what shenanigans you and your alien buddies have gotten up to in the past--"
"Here we go," Mikaela muttered, propping up her chin with one hand.
"And you mind your manners, young lady! --I don't know what rules you've broken in the past, Mr. McWilly, and frankly I don't care. But what we're dealing with here is very serious business! Can you even comprehend the sheer magnitude of what has occurred? Everyone knows your little secret, now, and all those taxpayers whose money is going into funding your friends' globe-trotting romps are going to wonder if it's a worthwhile investment! Not to mention all the foreign nations that are going to question if we plan to turn these alien weapons on them-- they might just launch nuclear missiles on the US as a preemptive strike!" He paused for breath, crouching forward to spear him with a well-manicured finger, "So you damn well better do whatever they tell you to do, because it may just save your own life as well as millions of others!"
Sam stood slowly and picked up his tray, feeling as though he had just been flash frozen in liquid nitrogen. His rib cage wouldn't expand, but suddenly he didn't feel the need to breathe. The dark, empty stare he leveled on the petty-minded man was utterly cold. He hadn't hated Megatron, not even after the evil alien killed Optimus. All he had felt was terror, terror and the animal need to flee from a predator. For a while, he had naively thought he lacked the ability to hate. But now he knew otherwise, and for the barest sliver of an instant he hated Galloway with a passion that frightened him to the core. How DARE the man accuse him on not comprehending the danger when he had never been the target of over a dozen enraged aliens that could each destroy a city without straining a muscle cable, aliens that had sought above all else to crush him into a pulp? He had never heard the sickening crunch of bone as a human was flicked aside like an annoying bug. He had never had to look into the face of evil and defy it, knowing that defiance meant certain death!
There were many things he could have said or done, most of which would have been very gratifying but not very mature. But instead, he stated calmly, "No."
And he turned towards the tray busing station, fully intending to leave without ever looking back. He refused to give the man the satisfaction of seeing him tremble. "Come on, Mikaela. Let's go say hi to Bee and the others."
"Yes, do go skipping off to see your alien friends," Galloway called after him, the elevated tone of his voice causing more than a few heads to swivel in his direction. The hair on the back of Sam's neck began to prickle as the curious stares fell heavily on his wooden form. "And while you're there, inform them that that their days as free agents are numbered!"
Unable to take another step, Sam came to an abrupt stop. His knuckles whitened on the edge of his tray. An anchoring touch brushed his arm as Mikaela pulled up alongside him.
"No problem," he ground out, astonished that his voice remained level and even pleasant, "And while I'm at it, I'll deliver the lace-trimmed invitations to come take over the world to the decepticons."
"The 'decepticons' would not even be an issue if Sector Seven had simply finished what it started with that yellow one--"
Before the words had finished leaving his mouth, a strange buzzing filled Sam's ears and blocked out the riotous noise of the mess hall. Without even being aware of moving, he flung himself around and lunged towards Galloway. The tray in his hands came up, and with every scrap of strength in his body he brought it swinging around and smashed it into the side of the startled man's head. Globs of food splattered their clothes and slopped across the table, the tray following the meal in quick succession as Sam abandoned it in favor of fisting his hands in the front of the man's shirt. Though Galloway had at least three inches and twenty pounds on him, Sam hauled the politician from his chair, toppling it with a clatter, and slammed him into the wall as if he were little more than a sack of flour.
As frantic hands started to grasp his shoulders, pry at his fists, he became aware by parts of a sordid litany pouring from his throat and over his tongue and teeth-- I'll kill you! You hurt him and I'll kill you! I'll kill you, you sorry bastard!
"Sam, stop! Stop!" Mikaela.
Blink. The world came back into focus.
Panting breaths snorted from his nostrils. Icy sweat stood out on his temples, trailed a slick line between his shoulder blades. Little by little his fists unclenched, and suddenly firm, insistent hands were pulling him away, sandwiching him between Mikaela on one side and Simmons on the other. One touch warming, the other repulsive, but he couldn't find the strength to care either way. He was still shaking, still shaking like a leaf, hearing the echoes of metallic screams and fighting the bitter sting of cryo guns to no avail while the gentle, friendly robot continued to thrash and wail, clawing the concrete, but it was so cold and he couldn't reach him and no matter how he fought he wasn't strong enough to stop them, stop the torture, and still the sacrificial lamb screamed--
"If you hurt them, I'll kill you." Calm. So clichéd it was almost silly. Deadly serious. He stared deep into hazel eyes widened with fear and repeated the solemn promise. "I will kill you."
Mikaela was saying something, strong fingers pulling at him, leading him away like she would soothe a snarling dog, but the words dropped through the air without impression, uninteresting as pieces of gravel. He couldn't hear her voice, or feel her touch, or smell the raspberries of her hair. All the world was pounding white static, and he was adrift in its fog. The killing rage had banked, but only just, leaving him with the feeling that his skin would crawl from his bones to escape the pointless nothingness fear and senseless death had striped the world to. Crawling, itching, insatiable need overcame him again, but this time it was the need to get away. There were too many people, too many stares cherishing him, hating him, ignoring him, fearing him.
With a sudden burst of will he wrenched himself away from the grasping cage of hands. He pushed back through the crowd, startled when it yielded to let him pass (black gloved hands restraining, throwing him back-- Bumblebeeee!).
"Sam, wait!"
He whirled and fled.
Metal lined halls narrowed before him, all stark angles and primitive technology that buzzed beneath the fluorescent lights. His pounding footsteps reverberated from the low ceilings-- the snare drum beat to the wild, fluttering rag-time of his heart. Sometime between sprinting from the mess hall and skidding around the first two corners, a giant magnet of unknown design had started up deep in the bowels of the ship. It pulled at his heart and soul like gravity, teasing him at every descending stairwell he passed, calling him down to familiar leather seats and shining blue optics that gazed at him with some emotion he dared not name. But ever the champion of heroic efforts, he resisted the siren song, only running as far as he could without going up or down. When finally he could no longer hear the chorus of voices calling after him he slowed to a walk.
Ketchup and eggs made for an interesting fabric die. Leaning against the wall, he plucked his shirt away from his body and made a few feeble swipes at the leftovers festooning his government-issue clothes (anything to keep from swiping at his eyes-- tears are like the monsters under the bed, pretend they're not there and they'll go away). Quickly realizing his efforts were a lost cause without soap and running water, he struck out to find a washroom (--wash away the blood, wash it away like it never existed--).
Finding a toilet on an air craft carrier was a notoriously difficult undertaking. But luck was on his side, and he gratefully ducked into a bathroom only two hallways away, surprising himself with how giddy the fact that the mirror was not cracked made him. Definitely losing it, Sam. For the most part the bathroom itself could have fit inside the average closet. Only the basic amenities were included: a single stall and a urinal. And a sink.
The water came out of the tap lukewarm. Foggy memories of lectures on using cold water when removing stains came creeping out of the wood work, yet at the moment he could not muster the effort to care. He snatched a handful of paper towels to serve as a rag, shrugged out of his jacket and pulled his shirt up over his head. Oh yeah. Eggs and ketchup made the raunchiest puke-orange this side of the seventies. If he ever saw Miles again, he would have to tell him that for his next tie-dying project.
He pressed his palm into the soap dispenser. No soap. Uselessly rattling it didn't make any spontaneously appear, either. Deciding to hell with it, he plunged his shirt beneath the stream of water and started viciously scrubbing.
His jacket, crumpled on the floor, began to play 'Shake your Groove Thing' not a minute later. He ignored it.
After an eternity the song fell silent, then started up again. Sam kept scrubbing.
Pack-it-all-in-a-mini-cooper-and-send-it-over-a-cliff, lukewarm water alone seemed to do no more than make his shirt wet and unwearable. He needed to find some soap. (needed to run run run-- run boy, death's snapping at your heels!)
Not bothering to ring out his shirt, Sam turned off the water, scooped up his jacket and pulled out the blackberry vibrating like the energizer bunny on crack in his pocket. Another gift from the government. Not that he had had a phone to get trashed in the fight to begin with, but hey, if they were giving away freebies he was more than willing to take them off their hands. He pushed the talk button and held it to his face, flinging open the door to the bathroom and striding back out into the cramped hallway. (no where to run, no where to hide, 'I smell you, boy!'---)
Ignoring the tiny voice that immediately began to speak on the other end, he skipped the customary hellos and gushed cheerfully, "Sorry, Mikaela. I'm a little busy right now, trying to wash my shirt and all. Talk to you later." Without waiting for a response he hung up. And switched the phone off.
Now, where to find a janitor's closet? He tried every door he came to, finding most of them locked and requiring a security clearance key. Those few that opened lead to other hallways or rooms whose function he could not define. At last, however, he happened upon something that might have belonged to the janitor from hell's OCD big brother. It was larger than the bathroom by a long shot, and full of cabinets decorated with hazard tape and requiring a key to access. Those were towards the back, though, probably following the philosophy that a terrorist seeking them would be too lazy to cross the entire room to steal them and simply give up his nefarious plot. A simple floor-to-ceiling metal shelf held recognizable cleaning supplies, though no soap on first glance.
Sam draped his jacket and wet shirt over a shoulder high cabinet and started searching through the multi-colored bottles for a simple thing of soap. Cleanser, WD-40, Borax, Raid, Bleach, Ammonia, Windex, drain cleaner and so many others-- anything, seemingly, but soap. His skin started to crawl again, adopting an eerie paleness in the glow of the single bare bulb overhead. If he concentrated, he could almost imagine wires crawling beneath his flesh. But of course that was silly, because humans didn't have wires crawling under their skin (and cars don't stand up). It was also silly to look at the bottles and imagine them as things other than bottles. Because of course they were only bottles. But this squat green one looked like skids, and this yellow one with a orange label looked like Ratchet, and the blue windex with its white and red label could have been Optimus Prime in a weird game of make believe.
Where was that soap?!
He started pulling bottles from the shelves and letting them fall to the floor. Pinesol. Mr. Clean. Thunk, roll.
"Kitten-calendar-kitten-calendar-" he muttered under his breath, repressing a hysterical giggle.
Jazz. Ironhide. Arcee. RaTchet. Fall from the shelf, fall from grace. Thunk, rattle, roll.
"Kitten-calendar-kitten-calendar-kitten-calendar--"
Optimus. Bumblebee. Bee, Bee, Bee, Bee. All fall down dead.
"Kitten-calendar-kitten-calendar-kitten-ca---"
His phone started ringing, and the moment shattered. Sam froze, standing on tip-toe to clutch another bottle. Two entire shelves had been emptied; the technicolor evidence (all sloshing thankfully restricted to the specified containers) lay scattered around his feet.
He was almost certain he had turned off his phone, which meant that it should have been impossible for anyone to call him. But if living for over a year with a robotic alien had taught him anything, it was that the word 'impossible' usually didn't apply to cybertronians, especially when the subject at hand involved technology. If they could hack the US military computer system with only a few hours of effort, bypassing the 'off' status of a simple phone would be a cake walk.
Like waking up from a particularly twisted nightmare, the world suddenly snapped into focus around him, bringing with it a bewildered embarrassment (when had he taken his shirt off?) and a spark of the trembling awe that comes from stepping out of the path of a runaway bus without realizing it. Pressing his back to the cabinet, Sam slid slowly to the floor, rolling cleaning supplies out of his way as he went. Then he reached up and grabbed his jacket, dragging it over the side and letting it pool in his lap.
"'Shake ya groove thang, shake ya groove thang, yeah yeah!--'"
The vibrating blackberry found its way into his hand. The little device registered an incoming text message. Where there should have been the number of the caller printed on the screen was an incomprehensible string of staticky blocks and glitchy computer symbols. After about thirty repitions of the song he finally managed to gather the courage to accept the message.
BuzzingBee: where r u?
Unable to do more than simply sit there breathing, Sam didn't try to send a response, either to come clean or lie his ass off. Thirty seconds passed, then a minute, and the phone buzzed again. Accept message.
BuzzingBee: where r u?
BuzzingBee: where r u?
BuzzingBee: where r u?
BuzzingBee: come back :(
Hot, writhing guilt rose in his chest and tightened his throat. Fearing even more repetitions of the heart breaking plea, he swiftly reeled off a response.
SamuelW.: hiding
There. Short and sweet, revealing nothing while reassuring his best friend that he wasn't passed out somewhere from a 'post-trauma relapse'. Though he couldn't help but grimace at his lack-luster user name. He supposed there was a price to pay for a free blackberry.
BuzzingBee: why?
He swallowed, blinking back tears.
SamuelW.: need time to think.
For a long while the LED screen glowed up at him quietly, blank but for a garish American flag in the background. Just when he thought Bee might have accepted that for an answer and granted him the requested time, the phone vibrated in his hand and the glitchy symbols returned. He would never admit how glad he was that his friend had not left him alone.
BuzzingBee: think out loud.
SamuelW.: ???
BuzzingBee: talk to me
SamuelW.: i dont know what to talk about
BuzzingBee: why did u run off?
SamuelW.: dont want to talk about it.
SamuelW.: wait, how do u know about that?
BuzzingBee: mikaela came to find us when she couldnt find u. she told us what happened.
SamuelW.: so then u know why i ran off
There was another very long pause, then:
BuzzingBee: if u want to find another car, ill understand. nest gives us some $$ to use, i could buy u a new one
SamuelW.: what?? no, B. i don't want another car. i like having u
BuzzingBee: u r not worried i might be a threat to u?
SamuelW: no, i never thought that. im just mixed up right now, b. real mixed up.
BuzzingBee: thats not what galloway says
This time it was Sam who paused to collect him thoughts-- or rather, paused to unclench his fists so that he could type out a response.
SamuelW: hes a jerk. what has he been telling you?
BuzzingBee: he suggested to u that we r dangerous, and u hit him. maybe ur mixed up mind is afraid hes right.
Every fiber of his being rebelled again of the very idea, but previous experience with having to accept the unacceptable tempered his reflex flare of white-hot denial. Emotion asserted that Galloway was a pompous know-it-all who had his head so far up his rear that he could not comprehend the idea of two beings of unequal strength sharing a balanced friendship. His heart felt no fear around bumblebee. Reason, however, quietly inserted that a healthy respect of his friend's demigod power would not come amiss. It whispered that an alien friend's goals might be very different from a human friend's goals, and that in bonding himself to an alien he was entering into a hitherto unexplored twilight zone where a sign of goodwill might involve saving him from a slow death of old age by tearing his still-beating heart from his chest.
Long buried and ignored instinct told him that a lion was still a lion even if it laid down for a while with the lamb.
BuzzingBee: u have nightmares every night.
Blinking at the apparent non sequitor, it took him a moment to frame a reply.
SamuelW: how do u know that?
BuzzingBee: im ur guardian, sam. i never let u out of my sensor range. ur heartbeat is always much higher than it should b when u r sleeping. elevated heart rate suggests fear. fear is caused by nightmares.
SamuelW: aaand thats not creepy at all
BuzzingBee: what do you dream about?
Sam would have thought the answer was obvious, given how much time they had spent together.
SamuelW: u.
Another stretch of time, waiting.
BuzzingBee: u r my ally. my brother in arms. my friend. i will do anything i need to do to prove myself to u.
SamuelW: ???
BuzzingBee: do u want me to leave and never come back? i can do that.
BuzzingBee: do u want to disappear to another country, start a new life? i can take u there.
BuzzingBee: do u want me to bring u a rock from pluto? i can get it for u
BuzzingBee: do u want me to kill starscream? megatron? soundwave? i will destroy them for u
BuzzingBee: i will do anything not to be the demon in ur nightmares, sam.
No amount of will power could hold back the traitorous drops of moisture that streamed silently down the sides of his nose. It was such a wussy thing to do, but somehow he couldn't bring himself to care. Restrained sobs tore at his chest as he curled himself around the blackberry clenched between his hands, holding onto it like a lifeline. Wonderful, brave, loyal Bee. He didn't deserve to have the alien angel as a friend, not when he had already failed the most crucial test. The one time he had been called upon to protect the ageless robot had ended in disaster. And Bumblebee had become the living sacrifice to take their place. (Wind sucking him down, breaking his grip-- tumbling, falling through the air, nothing to hold onto, then suddenly Bee is there, Bee the guardian angel catching him as he falls-- they stab him with their harpoons, pulling him down with chains, swarming black rats eating him alive, spraying him with poison-- 'he's not fighting back!!'-- a broken voice crying, pleading, wailing, a hand reaching toward him-- save me-- and then the screaming stops and all is still, still as death--)
SamuelW: u got it backwards, B. im not scared of u, im scared for u. u think i like listening to u scream every nite?
BuzzingBee: not ur fault.
Somehow, Bee knew. He always seemed to know, even when he played dumb and pretended that he didn't.
SamuelW: i couldnt save u. i tried. i tried so hard. im sorry.
SamuelW: guess im a lousey sidekick, huh?
BuzzingBee: but u did save me, sam
SamuelW: unless im missing something, they still packed u on ice and carted u away
BuzzingBee: there r other ways to save someone. i have seen and done many terrible things, sam. i have been tortured worse than s7 could have ever hoped to do. when i came to earth, i was dead inside.
Sam had heard about moments like these. Some people called them moments of grace. Sam called it looking up and realizing there were stars. Reading the lines of text shining up at him, Sam knew, knew, that he was standing on the edge of something so very powerful it could not be explained.
BuzzingBee: do u know the most beautiful thing i have ever seen, sam?
SamuelW: i dont know. a supernova or something?
Instead of a text reply, his phone chirruped to indicate the string of glitchy symbols was sending him a picture. With only the faintest hesitation, he opened it.
An image of himself, as seen from an extreme high angle, flooded the tiny screen. Darkness enshrouded most of the scene, save for a faint light touching one side of his face. With an abrupt jolt he recognized the grassy hill he and Mikaela had climbed approaching the transformed Bumblebee for the first time. His own eyes gazed back of him, full of wonder and awe, so bright and--to his slight embarrassment-- innocent.
BuzzingBee: i have known nothing but war all my life. i did not think goodness and mercy existed anywhere in the universe as something other than abstract concepts. u didnt teach me how to fight, but u reminded me what we r all fighting for.
Shrieking, tearing, burning metal. Guns, swords, cannons, fangs. Lies. Hate. Darkness. Death.
Gentle hands lifting him. A reclined seat on a sleepless night. Endless patience to endless questions. Maimed, rising up, fighting back. 'I wish to stay with the boy,' 'I'll take you all on!', 'You are the person I care most about'.
Sam curled even tighter around the shining tether to the alien far below him, laughing and crying all at the same time.
SamuelW: Bee?
BuzzingBee: ?
SamuelW: when we get back, i owe u the wash and wax of a lifetime.
BuzzingBee: X D
Author's note: Alright. I lied. This is going to end up being a very LONG story based on the outline I wrote up this morning. Expect action, adventure, and double helpings of angst all around. And no matter what it may look like, this is NOT a bot!Sam or allspark!Sam story. That theme has been done to death, and I'm sick of it. Sam is just freaking out in this chapter, which is why he's acting all nutso.
And just so I don't have any disappointed readers out there, I will not be continuing with this super-amazing update pace for long. I do have a life, and it's been shouting at me through the window these past three days while I've been so wrapped up in my own little transformers world. So while I will try to update every week (every few days, if possible) don't come pouting if another chapter isn't up the next morning.
And never fear, Optimus WILL feature prominently in the coming story line, but I just had to get this little plot bunny out of the way.