Nighthawk ran through the forest, breathing in the sweet forest air. She had gotten thinner and faster since she had arrived in the cannibal clan. She had developed a taste for her own kind and she eventually began to crave it. She could hardly remember her life on the Nemesis, which she could not tell if it was a good thing or a bad thing. It was good because she no longer stayed up and cried for Megatron and her daughter, but now that she could hardly remember what either of them looked like, what stopped her from attacking them and eating them? She shuddered and the bush beside her rattled, disturbing a fawn and its mother. She watched the pair bound a safe distance away before the doe bent her head and smoothed the hair between the fawn's ears. The femme growled in jealousy.
"Pretty, are they not?" Stinger landed beside her, watching the doe bound off. "They are native and we admire them almost as much as the furbeasts."
Furbeast was their word for a wolf. Nighthawk nodded and sat by the stream, washing her face in the cool water. "Yes. I do see why you would admire them. They are fast and graceful."
He sat beside her with a thump, watching her. "They remind me of you." He tipped his helm at her, his denta flashing in a grin. "You have gotten better since we first met, Silence."
She nodded and laughed a bit herself. "Yes, well it comes from watching you and your band." She looked away from the cannibal leader, reminding herself once again that she ran away to keep her loved ones safe from her mistakes. If she continued making the same mistakes, she would keep running.
The Earth was only so big. How long would it be before she could no longer run any where except into the arms of the mech she left in the beginning: Silverwing.
She growled at the memory, forcing it down deep into her spark. Stinger was setting a trap nearby and paused to look at her. He knelt by her and sniffed at her face. She shot him a glare, which made him jump back and grin.
"I wondered if you were diseased. Obviously not." He went back to fuss over the snare, then he dusted his hands off and then touched a tree lightly.
She stood and hugged herself, walking slowly to his side. Her spark pulsed for him and she could hardly control herself. She let her helm rest on his shoulder. He wrapped his arm around her and he held her against him. One look at the mech and Nighthawk knew she could be happy with no one else (like the way she felt about Silverwing and Megatron...). She brushed her lips over his and the mech flinched back as if she had bitten him.
He looked down at her in shock, touching his lips before he curiously leaned back to her. Obviously he had not received a kiss before and Nighthawk was happy to give him another and a more valuable gift.
Nighthawk woke up beside Stinger as they laid in the ferns. The band was watching them curiously, chattering and chirping among themselves. Apparently this was not a common sight: their leader collapsed in the ferns with a femme they had only known for a couple weeks or so. Nighthawk lost count of the days after the third sunrise.
Stinger opened an optic slowly, starting to grin up at the mechs. He jumped up and pounced on one of the other mechs, chasing them away from Nighthawk as he howled at the stars above them.
Nighthawk rolled over and sighed, closing her optics. Stinger scooped her up when he returned and laid her in his nest of moss and feathers he had collected. She pressed up against him and fell asleep once more.
The voice in her helm would not shut up that night.
How could you be so stupid to give yourself to another mech? What if you have sparklings? What then? Why don't you ever think before you act?
She shoved the voice down into a box and taped it shut, stowing it in the back of her processor. Stinger held her closer against him and he drifted off to sleep. Nighthawk expected this to be what she would see when she woke up: Stinger's chest. But Unicron or Primus or whoever was watching over her that night had a cruel sense of humor.
Nighthawk woke up to the screams and cries of her band. She jumped out of Stinger's limp arms and blinked up at a towering black mech with large wings.
"No mech survivors! Only femme prizes," he said as he grabbed her.
"Only these two, sir," one of them said, shoving Newt onto her belly. Newt was older than most of the mechs here and she was in charge of cleaning the drones her band caught. No one knew her real name. She just let Stinger affectionately call her Newt and the name stuck.
"Load them up!"
Nighthawk ran to Newt, chirping to her. The older femme looked up and whistled fondly, standing slowly as she let the mechs take her away. Nighthawk had never heard Newt speak before, but everyone seemed to understand her nonetheless.
"Take the young one to my quarters."
Nighthawk snapped her denta close to the mech's digits when he grabbed her face. The mechs around her "ooh"ed and laughed.
"Careful, Deathstrike. She bites."
"Excellent."
Life with Deathstrike was like being Megatron's pet. She was sore almost all the time and she dreaded going to her quarters for the night because the large mech was sure to be following her and would offer no mercy when she begged. He made her beg only for his amusement.
Megatron gave mercy.
She pressed her face into her pillow when Deathstrike was finished with her. He gave a grunt and got off her. The door shut and Nighthawk was alone with the mess. She sat up and looked down at herself. She had been thin, but now she was thinner. Unhealthy. She would surely die if she was not fed more than once every two weeks.
She stood, but the world began to spin and she collapsed on the floor. She laid there until Deathstrike came to her with Energon.
"Get up," he spat.
"I can't. I think I'm sick."
Deathstrike grabbed her and stared at her for a long time. "You aren't sick..."
She looked up at him, dreading the answer. "No..."
"You're carrying."