A/N: There's an end somewhere in sight but it's sort of dragged out longer than I had expected *cough*. Rest assured, though, that there is an ending planned and we're slowly (if somewhat unsteadily) working our way towards that. We're at least halfway through the fic now, I'd say! ;)
Sunset arrived on Diego Garcia with the swiftness that always followed when you were as close to the equator as the NEST base was. That fact wasn't what had made William Lennox curse when his mind finally cleared up enough to be able to focus on something other than the nagging drive to do something. It was the fact that it wasn't until shadows clawed their way up the hangar walls and fading sunlight stained the clouds red and yellow and orange that Will actually noticed that evening had arrived... and looking back, he would be able to pinpoint that as the exact moment when he realised that he was inescapably, irrevocably entwined in the Seeker programming and that pretending anything else would be a waste of time at best and potentially fatal at worst.
However much he'd had on his mind, he should not have been able to miss something as blatantly obvious as a sunset. Granted, it wasn't that sunset was important in any way as anything more than a mental reminder of what time it was – it was the fact that he had been able to miss it in the first place. If he could overlook a sunset right in front of his pointed, alien nose, only Primus knew what else his processors would be able to overlook in a moment of distraction, and that was what had made whatever alien version he had of adrenaline kick in and his non-existent stomach tie into a knot. He had missed the sunsets often enough as a human, but that had been indoors and buried in paperwork. This had been outside. Talking with Ratchet, sure, but the medic wasn't exactly wide enough to block a whole evening sky from view, and nobody sane would be stupid enough to insinuate that, either.
The fact that he hadn't noticed a thing until he had managed to convince Ratchet that a spark-merge with Ironhide wasn't a completely brain-dead idea wasn't lost on him, either, and the sudden clarity of mind that had followed the medic's reluctant agreement was more chilling than reassuring.
He had thought he had been clear-headed, he really had. He had thought he had been clear-headed but it wasn't until that hazy and almost obsessive focus on the idea was gone that he realised how influenced by Seeker-programming his mind had really been... and if he was able to completely fail to notice something like that, too, it didn't bode well for his general attention-span at all.
He was used to having his life depend on his observation skills in the field and the ability to spot a threat before it spotted him or his men. What Seeker-programming was doing to his mind was slowly but steadily making those skills unreliable at best and utterly useless in the worst-case scenario that Will had the sinking feeling was the most likely outcome of the whole thing.
Feeling vaguely pissed about the whole thing, Will offered a muttered curse at letting himself get distracted like that, pushed aside the gnawing fear that it might happen again, and offered every mental oath he knew that he would slagging well keep a better eye on things in the future, programming and voices in his head be damned.
A flare of annoyance with himself surged across the newly-formed bond and was gone again before Will could shield it properly and he sighed even as he saw Ratchet give him a Look and a silent demand for details and Primus help both human and Seeker if the medic actually had to ask.
"Seeker stuff," Will offered in half apology and half explanation. "I can't even say it has the attention-span of a goldfish, can I? It's got great focus, after all - if you can overlook the fact that it ignores everything else that goes on around it."
The Seeker didn't feel as insulted about that as Will had expected - unimportant-indifference-irrelevant the Seeker sent by way of explanation - and maybe it was a matter of adapting to each other or maybe it was because it was growing up and had enough self-awareness to know that it was true and not mind, either, because it considered it a useful ability.
"The ability to remain intently focused to the exclusion of all else is a rather Seeker-ish trait," Ratchet agreed quietly and a clearly deliberate feeling of calm followed through their bond. "It has helped them survive as a breed. If you consider it for a moment, the purpose will be clear."
Flight, the Seeker murmured before he could ask, a surge of memories of spinning in freefall and skimming the sea with mere feet to spare, and it was all that was needed to make it click and sudden understanding settle with the human part. Seekers were fast, faster than most human aircrafts, and the stunts they pulled off for nothing more than the sheer thrill of it defied anything a human jet would be able to handle. They were neither heavily armoured nor heavily armed for something of their size and relied on their speed and skills in combat rather than raw firepower and when he thought of it from the Seeker's perspective, that single-minded ability to focus made perfect sense.
Flight, the Seeker repeated with an echo of pride in the words and there was nothing in that one word that Will could argue about.
The tunnel vision that freaked the every-loving slag out of the Ranger was a life-saving necessity to a Seeker. You didn't hesitate or allow yourself to get distracted when you were going at Mach three through a canyon. You trusted your instinct and you lived, or you hesitated or let your attention wander and removed your faulty self from the breed. It only made sense if it carried over in their behaviour outside of flying, too, and looking at it from that point of view his lack of attention over the course of that conversation made perfect sense - tunnel vision brought on by Seeker programming that had been well aware of the importance of the conversation and decided to give him the best odds possible by removing any outside distractions. It hadn't been the Seeker's fault that the human side wasn't familiar with that sort of programming and decided to freak about something the Seeker considered perfectly normal.
"Oh, for fuck's sake," Will muttered and rubbed a clawed hand against his face. "At this rate I'm going to be useless on the ground."
Another item on the long, long list of things to bring up with Primus whenever he got the chance and at the rate things were going, it would probably be sooner rather than later. He fragging well wasn't going to just roll over and submit but if his mind could be that taken over by Seeker-programming without the human part ever noticing while it was going on, it really didn't bode well for his state of mind when he finally ran into the 'Con Seekers. The stronger the Seeker-influence...
... the stronger the programming that says I can't just shoot Starscream out of the sky. Frag it all to the Pit.
"I need..." Will trailed off, rubbed his face again as he tried to get his thoughts back under control and find some way to express the emotions circling his mind. Need to get away, need to get a grip, need to-
- Needed to something, and the words didn't make sense to him, and his processors wouldn't cooperate, and something must have seeped through his shields or maybe he was just that predictable, because Ratchet only nodded.
"Jolt and Mikaela will have the test dummy finished by tonight. You will be able to assist the NEST team in testing it out in flight tomorrow."
Because right now he needed to get away from Cybertronians and Seeker-influences, needed to be reminded of what that other half of him was and where it had come from, and maybe being around human brothers in arms would be enough to do that and maybe it wouldn't, but he would at the very least give it a serious try. The less he thought like a Seeker when the ambush hit, the better for all of them. The NEST team... he needed to work with his NEST team and get them imprinted on his flighty little interfaced-obsessed mind. NEST... and Sarah, and Annabelle.
Something stirred in the back of his mind, an instinctive response as Seeker-programming confirmed that it was still aware of its mates' locations – Ironhide on the shooting range and Sarah...
One, two seconds, and the Seeker snarled its frustration and made Will wince and be grateful it had only made that sound in his head and not actually voiced that near-screech out loud.
She's human, he pointed out. 'Hide couldn't feel me when I was human, either.
We are Seeker, the presence snarled back and managed to put a truly impressive range of insults and ego in those three words.
Another mental tug on the one-side bond with Sarah followed and failed, and Will could almost feel the Seeker's optics narrow as it dredged through never-used bits of programming with all the grace and virtue of the newly-created, inexperienced, impatient Seeker that it was.
Something flicked through his processors – symbols and glyphs and things he couldn't even begin to understand – and he felt it draw their strength too late to do anything but brace himself as the Seeker snarled its displeasure out loud and a soundless shockwave of raw energy tore itself from their body.
He felt more than heard Ratchet's sharp wince over their bond as the mech got the energy-burst at near point blank, felt the world spin and his strength drained-
- And as the shockwave rolled across the island, his mental map of Diego Garcia lit up like a Christmas tree. Autobots, humans; anything sufficiently advanced to be even reasonably sentient, and Ratchet was a minor sun lighting up the world beside him, glowing points of blue-spark and pink-Energon and red-blood as programming sorted through the staggering amounts of inputs it had just received and Will desperately tried to stay on his feet as the world only slowly stopped spinning at that dizzying pace.
Silence for a long moment, the questioning feel of both Ratchet and Ironhide's attention focused on him, and then he felt an echo of Ratchet's mental firm, shooing gesture at Ironhide before only the medic's presence remained.
Another moment, then two, and whatever-he-had-for-a-stomach settled slightly again – enough, at least, for Will to bring optics back online that he hadn't even been aware of offlining in the first place, and then Ratchet took a cautious step closer.
"William?"
The Christmas-lights of a map in his head had turned down the overwhelming brightness a little, too, but not enough that actual sound didn't make him flinch slightly, however low and cautious it might be.
"Can Seekers puke?" Because slightly-less-nauseous or not, he still felt like he was about to purge his tanks or whatever the hell they called it when it was a Cybertronian doing the hurling. His own voice almost made him twitch as well but it would probably still be better than trying to focus any sort of coherent thought in his processors as it was, and whatever the Seeker had done, his body did not appreciate it.
Ratchet paused. "Do you really wish to know, given your current state?"
Point, there, and Will subconsciously shuddered as the dizziness slowly – slowly – faded. "Not really." This time, he was the one to pause as he tried to sort out what the Seeker had done – and whatever it was, it had affected both of them, because the Seeker sounded strangely muted as it responded, miserable, little murmurs that sounded as pathetic as he felt. "It did a normal little 'keep tag on the mates' thing and couldn't pick up Sarah. She's human so she can't have a real bond with it. It didn't take that too well. I think it tried to scan for her because I just picked up on every single sentient being on the whole fragging island, human, Autobot, and otherwise."
"Ours scanners are not intended to be able to identify one human among thousands without a tracker of some sort to mark them," Ratchet said carefully – still on edge from the shockwave, maybe, or just making sure he wouldn't rattle Will enough to put the tank-purging theory to the test, and either reason was fine with Will as long as it meant no sudden, sharp sounds.
"Yeah, well, I don't think anyone told bird-brain," Will muttered and rubbed what would have been his temple when he had still been human and felt a headache take over bit by bit where the nausea had been. "Because she's on one of the beaches with Anna and 'Bee."
Well, he assumed that second presence to be Annabelle, at least, but it was significantly smaller than Sarah and the Seeker had responded to it as well with a flicker of recognition so Will would put good money on that guess being right. Sarah, at least, there was no doubt about. Her presence didn't light up in the same blinding way that Ratchet or Ironhide did at the insane level the scan had been set at but it was still impossible to mistake for anything but mate and lit up like a minor sun against the rest of the humans on base. Brighter than the blue-spark he had recognised as Bumblebee, at least, and all but drowning out the wisp of light right next to it that he assumed was Sam, if Ratchet had put Jolt and Mikaela to work.
Cooling fans kicked in to lower the temperature that for once had nothing to do with arousal and another - mercifully weaker - wave of nausea followed as faint vibrations from the fans were enough to unsettle him again. Ratchet took another cautious step closer and brought up a scanner, then lowered it again long moments later.
"I would recommend against attempting that again. Your core temperature rose sharply and your Energon reserves dropped by four percent. Your scanners weren't meant to handle that sort of strain."
Recommend against attempting that again.
Understatement of the fragging decade, Will decided, and the headache - or processor-ache, or PCU-ache, or whatever the proper term was for the vice that was crunching the inside of his skull - was steadily getting worse, and all he wanted was to find somewhere nice and flat and be unconscious for a few days. Frag recharge. Out cold was the way to go.
"Yeah, I got that part of it," he rasped as the vice tightened another notch. "Fever and hangover. Got it. Not doing that again."
Ratchet nodded and then his optics dimmed for a moment in what Will had long since learned to recognise as a sign of silent communication over some comm-line or another. "Optimus," he said by way of explanation. "The effects of your scan were felt base-wide by Cybertronians. I let him know that it was a controlled test of your capabilities and that we underestimated your Seeker's ability to override its safety protocols."
The ghost of something against his bond with Ironhide, restless impatience slipping through even what Will knew to be Ironhide's considerable mental shields, but his body had settled down enough that it didn't bring on a new wave of nausea, at least. "'Hide's not happy."
"He did not get the same effects of it that I received but it still affected him," Ratchet confirmed, then continued with an undercurrent of a distinct threat aimed at the black mech in question. "I also told him to keep his wretched cannons out of this matter and refrain from putting your systems under any more stress."
"I think it slipped through on accident," Will defended him. "It wasn't much, just... 'Hide."
Ratchet made an unimpressed sound. "He should have more control than that."
Someone was definitely going to get their aft chewed out, no doubt about that, but his head hurt too much to be able to muster much more in way of defence of his mate before even Seeker-programming conceded to the superior power that was a thoroughly annoyed Ratchet and settled down again in the back of his mind with a morose feeling.
It took several more long moments before his processors managed to start up again and made him frown slightly as he realised something else.
"How about Sarah?" he asked. "You said base-wide with the Autobots. She's human but she shows up a lot clearer than, say, 'Bee does it in my head. Not as bright as you or 'Hide, but... you think she might...?" A small gesture with his hand followed, trying to explain what his processor couldn't work up the energy to put into words, and Ratchet frowned slightly.
"Interesting question." Blue optics dimmed, for a lot longer that time, and then lit up slowly again as the medic refocused on Will with an intent look that neither human nor Seeker was entirely comfortable with. "It scanned specifically for her?"
"... I guess?" Will frowned as he tried to make sense of what little his tired, morose Seeker was able to give in way of explanation amidst the still-building headache from the stunt it had pulled. "She was the one it wanted to find. It focused on her but I'm not sure if it did it to the exclusion of everyone else. I don't think it's got the focus for that, to be honest. I picked up on a lot more humans than her, at least, I just couldn't identify them the same way as Sarah." He paused and watched the medic frown as well and he had been around enough medics in his career to know that a frown was never good news. "Ratchet?"
"Bumblebee reports that she felt something at the time of your scan," Ratchet finally said. "Samuel was within twenty feet of her and felt nothing. It would appear it has more control of itself when necessary than we assumed... or that your prior connection as humans had a role in the effects of the scan."
Frag.
Sudden panic forced its way through the vice and the haze of pain for long enough to make his processors actually focus. "Is she okay? Both of them?" Because frag it all to the Pit, that blast had been enough to make Ratchet wince and every human on base show up on his mental little map, and if that had been focused on-
"She is well. I will see to her later, to ensure a human doctor unfamiliar with your build wouldn't miss something vital on accident, but she is perfectly well. It was faint enough that she first thought it to be nothing more than her imagination. Her – your – young one felt nothing at all, it seemed. She is well, William. She is perfectly unharmed. They both are."
Low, confident, soothing, and it doubtlessly wasn't the first time the medic had needed to talk down some concerned relative or another and Will's intakes made a shuddering sound as all strength left him again and the headache returned with a vengeance.
There was something else nagging him and however much he didn't want to ask, the Seeker was pretty much out for the count and the programming that came with it all but knocked out cold by the Seeker's little stunt, and he would probably never be as clear-headed again as he was now.
"I'll apologise to her tomorrow." He paused, tried to find a way to put it to make it all make sense, and the sighed in resignation. "About 'Hide... how can you be sure it's me who wants this? I'm not even sure any more, these days. Whenever I think I've got it under control, it shows right back up. When I think I've finally got a clear head, it turns out I'm just so far under Seeker-control that I don't even notice the programming affecting my head in the first place. I'm scared, Ratchet, and I can't even work up a good panic about it because the programming just takes a look at it and decides there's nothing to panic about because it's really just improving my stupid little human ideas for me and I should be grateful for it instead. How the hell do I know it's not just programming that's telling me to find a good, strong mate and roll over and take it and get to breeding? I like him, Ratchet. I liked him even when I was human, even if that was as a comrade in arms. I want to do this right and not because the voices in my head told me to."
He almost expected Ratchet to use that bond to take a closer look at the situation and kept a hard grip on the desperate relief he felt when it became clear that the medic had no intentions of that – it could have been useful, maybe, but his head hurt too much to even consider how much worse it would get if he got the full effects of a bond to join the headache... and never mind that Ratchet might have ended up with a mirroring headache from poking around with the bond in the first place.
"Have you changed your mind?" the medic asked quietly and the anger Will had almost expected from him never materialised – anger at his indecisiveness, maybe, anger at hearing him second-guess a decision he had sounded so sure about, but it never showed and Will shuttered his optics for a moment.
"I... no," he said and meant it even as fear settled in between images of spark-mate and strength and gleaming, black metal that almost shimmered in the unearthly glow of twin cannons. "I'm worried. Scratch that, I'm scared out of my fragging mind about this. I don't know if it's me or the Seeker who wants this. I don't know-"
-What would happen if we caved, if Optimus had to take the shot, if we ended up dead from sheer Seeker-related stupidity, and he slowly cycled air through his systems until he was calm enough to cut off that train of thought before it went any further. "I worry. Period."
"Ironhide is a competent mech," Ratchet pointed out. "His level of common sense was never awe-inspiring and he has been known to cause more destruction than most Decepticons can ever dream of, but he has survived nonetheless. He has lost spark-merged mates before, William. Not many, and never easily, but he has survived. The story of a spark-merged mate following the other into deactivation is all very romantic, I'm certain, but the fact remains that a strong mech surrounded by trusted companions or other mates will survive. The loss will be felt but will rarely be enough to bring about an offlining by itself. This is his choice to make and if he decides to agree, he will have done so with first-hand experience of the potential consequences of it." He paused to allow Will's much-tried processors to catch up with his words, then he continued with a slight bit of amusement in his voice. "In any case, your Seeker is still too young and impulsive to be able to argue coherently for something it firmly desires, much less argue logically for it at that. If you did not agree with its choice of Ironhide as spark-merged mate to a fairly large degree, you would not have been able to argue your case so strongly. Seeker programming may have driven you to bring up the option much sooner than might otherwise have been the case but there was far more human than Seeker arguing for a spark-merge. Bonds may lie at times but not one as new as ours. Can I be certain about the human influence? No. But the feeling you gave off was far more human than Seeker. Influenced by instincts, certainly, but it was still your own decision."
Which... made sense. Possibly. Or maybe it was just the Seeker programming affecting him again, and at the rate things were going, he'd be a paranoid lunatic in one month flat. Less, if he spent too much time thinking about programming versus personality and human free will, and a change of subject was definitely in order.
"So what do I do now?" Will asked with a sigh. How the frag did giant, alien robots go about it? Go pull up a rosebush and ask him out? Offer him high-grade? A wax? The spark-cage from a dead Decepticon?
"What is your Seeker half's suggestion?" Ratchet's vaguely amused tone suggested he had some pretty good ideas and Will almost kept from groaning at the images he got in response to that, tired, miserable Seeker and headache or not.
"Whack him over the head and drag him off by his non-existent hair, caveman style? It's a Seeker, Ratchet. It's a bird-brain running on basic programming, not Casanova, you fragging well know that."
"It simply makes my task easier when I know what I have to work with," Ratchet corrected him with deceptive mildness that probably covered for more than a little amusement behind those carefully maintained shields. "Although no, I don't recommend following that particular course of action. For one, Ironhide outclasses most Seekers – and certainly you – by several magnitudes in regards to ground-based combat. The more culturally acceptable version was a mating flight... and still is, I suppose, even if it is rarely used these days."
Which made sense, too, and it was a testament to just how miserable the Seeker felt that the images that accompanied the words – glorious sweeps against clouds and death-defying spins and claiming the sky itself for mate and the glory and awesomeness that was a Seeker – was enough to draw a soundless whimper from the thing as it shuddered and curled up in its misery, and invited Will to join it as another wave of nausea followed.
Something had obviously shown on his face because Ratchet merely held out a hand. "It can wait, William. Recharge before you get into any more trouble. Doctor's orders."
And with a careful, careful nod of agreement, Will accepted the outstretched hand and followed Ratchet back to the hanger and the blissful, blessed oblivion of unconsciousness.