CHAPTER NINE
The Sands Of Time
***
Angelina's P.O.V:
The most upsetting thing I have ever seen, and this includes things I saw back in the ghettos, was the lifeless bodies of two robots and two young kids lying there, and the beings who grieved for them when the battle was over, under the red skies that now stained Egypt.
Bumblebee, Jetfire and Jetstorm grieved for Shooting Star. Bumblebee had lost his only daughter, and the Jet-Twins had lost their spark-mate, before she'd even fully understood why they all cared so much about each other.
Starscream and Blitzwing grieved for Honey Bee. Starscream had lost his only daughter, and Blitzwing, his spark-mate.
But, I think Bumblebee also grieved for Honey Bee, and Starscream grieved for Shooting Star. It was strange, that way, kind of bitter-sweet.
But mostly bitter.
There were those who grieved for Bianca, and the sparkling who had never gotten to see the light of day.
There were even those who grieved for Wasp, namely one Moondancer, who cried into the chest-plate of her twin sister.
My own special twin friends, Skids and Mudflap, were unusually quiet, and I was sitting on Mudflap's shoulder.
"Mudflap," I whispered. "Can you get a radio broadcast sent out to every single radio in the world?"
He knew what I meant, and a few seconds later said: "Ya're on air."
I nodded, took a deep breath, and said: "Everyone, dis is Angelina, speakin' ta ya all the way from Egypt, ya'll. Somethin' just happened…a battle 'tween good and evil. The good side won…but we lost important members of our own side, beings that we'll grieve for, for eternity…I gotta sing this song. For them."
Skids suddenly started playing the backing track to the song through his own speakers, broadcasting the message to every radio in the world.
There's a woman crying out tonight, her world has changed, she asks God why,
Her only son has died and now her daughter cries, she can't sleep at night…
I sung the whole song from start to finish, not my usual kind of scene, but it was fitting.
I didn't really care about copyright just then. We could deal with that later.
And then, just when I thought nothing else could go wrong, Kelsi came running out of a little three-walled, roofless hut that had somehow survived the battle, yelling for Ironhide.
Ironhide caught her in his hands, and held her up so that they were eye-to-optic. "What's happened, Kelsi?"
I couldn't help but wonder if, when she was older, Kelsi would be Iornhide's girl. It was a strange thing to wonder, very strange indeed.
Kelsi couldn't answer, but just pointed to the hut.
Curious, some of us went to see what was going on.
Ratchet and Sky, in their holoforms, met us outside of the hut, and let us in a few at a time.
Kelsi and me went in first, along with Ironhide, Arcee and prowl, all in their holoforms.
Zikya was lying in Wheeljack's holoform's arms, sobbing over something she was holding in her arms.
I heard Arcee suddenly say: "Still-born." And my heart just about got wrenched in two.
"He never…even…had a chance!" Zikya sobbed. She couldn't find anything happy about this situation, which scared me stiff.
Everything was sliding downhill, really fast.
And I didn't know if there was an uphill struggle coming up next…or if we'd just fallen into the endless chasm below.
