Airachnid felt Optimus leave, actually felt the warm anchor of his spark weaken as the distance between them increased so suddenly, and the shock of that ember going out had her collapsing against a tree. Each vent was a hoarse struggle, her optics burned and her coolant swelled all over her shaking frame. It was like her spark was a fever, or a virus her entire body was trying to force out. In a way, now that it was split open with all her secrets and truths from a life she never lived spilling out in waves of nausea, it was. More than just memories she only half-remembered, more than having everything she'd thought or believed about her life completely drowned out, smudged away into nothing more than faint tendrils she couldn't grasp when before they were the only solid foundation of her entire existence. In the wake of the bond, all that was left was painful, smoldering ruins, so similar to what Megatron had left behind.

"Mama?" Scorpia cowered against her chest, cuddling close to that core of chaos, the only thing that could truly comfort her. But even so, there was something new in how she looked up at her mother. Something guarded and cautious that wasn't there before, but which made tragically perfect sense to Airachnid. Because of course this spark wasn't the same one Scorpia had basked in for five vorns, growing so slowly beside her dead brother. It wasn't the same one that cradled her to sleep every night. The glow was dim, the rhythm of its pulse unfamiliar and strange, wrenched out of its tempo by the past falling like tsunami over it. But it was still her mother's spark. That was all Airachnid was sure of right then, the fact that she was a mother. Anything else terrified her too much to think about.

"I'm fine, darling. I'm... fine." Even as she stroked and mumbled against Scorpia's helm she wanted to dig her claws into her palms, tear through her armour and protoform just to stop it all shaking so much. Elita, Airachnid, wouldn't have been this pathetic. She couldn't even look at her hands without wondering why they weren't plated in pink, why her digits curved into claws that wouldn't stop dripping energon, why her mouth burned with acid on a rising tide of purged energon that clogged the back of her throat. She wanted to hunt, to cry, to kill something and comfort it at the same time. Most of all, she wanted Optimus. She wanted someone to tell her who she was now, after everything she'd seen and felt from the eyes of a femme, of herself, who would have been better off in the Allspark.

"Spider lady?"

Grimlock was usually very easy to hear approaching, but Airachnid hadn't even felt his earthquake steps with how much she was already trembling. She kept her face close to Scorpia, just in case her optics were wet. "Yes, Grimlock?"

But despite appearances, the Dinobot was not easily fooled. He sniffed once before growling deeply, like the predator Airachnid was struggling to keep a leash on in her spark. "You hurt!" he declared, which was true on very many levels. She was hurting, and she caused hurt. So much of it, to so many old friends. The graveyard of once friendly faces flashed in front of her optics, forcing her to squeeze the leaking lids closed and lie through her fangs as always.

"I'm not hurt. I'm... it's complicated. I don't want to talk about it."

Grimlock growled louder, the sound vibrating through her like an accusation. "Did dumb Prime do something?"

"No, dumb Prime didn't... well, he did. But it's not his fault." Airachnid must have snapped to his defense too quickly. Grimlock's lips fell down, instantly covering his denta and he blinked as he tilted his helm.

"You... like dumb Prime?" He had to think about it almost as long as she did, processing and accepting the idea that out of all the mechs in the universe, she was lumped together with the most important one.

"Yes," she admitted, quietly as if it was still a secret she had to keep. "I like him a lot. I... I love him." And that was the only other thing she was sure of being, someone who was in love with a Prime.

Grimlock still had that blank feral gaze trained on her, but even if he didn't know what 'love' meant he could hear what she meant in her voice, no matter how she tried to hide it. His tail flicked only slightly, his eyeridges furrowed and his helm fell low to the ground, as if the realisation weighed his entire body down, or maybe he was just surrendering to it. Airachnid knew the feeling intimately.

"I'd like to be alone for a while, Grimlock. Please," she asked. "Take Scorpia with you."

But the sparkling was refusing to be pulled away from Airachnid's chestplates, clinging tight to the armour with high-pitched groans. "No, Mama!"

It was the first time Airachnid had heard her so distraught, felt her tiny spark so frantically clinging to her mother's despite how shattered it was. "Nooo," Scorpia insisted again, mumbling with rapid vents against her plates, keeping her optics hidden even though Airachnid could feel the thin tracks of coolant shedding from them. Out of everything she'd ever done against Autobots or Decepticons, she'd never felt as guilty peeling her daughter away from her, for her own good.

"You have to go, sweetspark. It's better that you don't see me like this." Scorpia was still trying to grasp for anything that would take her digits, slipping them against the side frames of Airachnid's helm as they sloped down either side of her faceplate and as she gave a sparkbroken kiss to her daughter, one last proof of her love before handing her off to Grimlock.

"Mama..." Even bundled up in the Dinobot's claws, Scorpia kept her servos stretched out towards Airachnid because she just didn't know what else to do with Airachnid couldn't watch her leave, because she knew she couldn't stop herself tearing her right back into her embrace. But soon the earthquakes faded, her spark became numb, and she was as alone as she could wish for. All she had left for company was her own thoughts, and when night came she hadn't even scratched the surface of them.

She hadn't even noticed the time pass until a Ground Bridge opened not too far away, and like a hot iron plunged in water her spark started sizzling and spitting fire. It tugged, pulled, wrenched in her chamber to go to its partner, but her body was too stiff and her will too weak. Optimus had to stumble across her, slashing vines and ferns out of his way with a very new and shiny looking sword. The blade didn't reflect the starlight overhead, rather it seemed to steal their glow for itself, and from her viewpoint it was if Optimus' entire frame was bathed in the light, as if he was some kind of specter coming to take her away. It was hauntingly similar to what she thought of him when they met in The Circle, stumbling in the darkness after a number spent under sweltering lights and crashing into the same clumsy, awkward and achingly charming mech she knew as Orion-

And if she went any further down that line of thought, she'd start crying again.

"You've been busy," she noted, watching Optimus heft the giant thing off his shoulders and place it point-down into the soil, like it weighed nothing more than a twig. Just looking at the thing made her even more exhausted.

"How long have you been here for?" he asked, and the concern drenched her aching spark like a cold balm that she had to shrug off to keep her dignity.

"Since you left," she answered quickly.

"And where is Scorpia?"
"Safe. With Grimlock again."

Optimus didn't say anything for a long few moments, letting the night insects fill the silence, before kneeling down in front of her with the sword forgotten by his side. "Are you alright?"

Those three words, or maybe it was just that voice, tore down every defense she had left, and let the floodgates fly open. "No, Optimus, I'm... how can I possibly be alright?" She hid her face, away from how Optimus' beautiful gaze would soften and tempt her to throw herself against him for all the safety he tried to offer.

"Are you in pain?" If she answered yes, she knew he would tear the island apart if it would somehow cure her. So of course she could only give one answer.

"No. I don't... think so. It's only when I think that things get painful." The night was hot and muggy, and she forced it into her vents as she lifted her helm up. "...What did you see in my spark, Optimus?"
As always, his answer was carefully constructed. "Nothing that it didn't want me to see."

"Or nothing that it thought you didn't want to see?" Airachnid probed, already known no mech, Autobot or Decepticon, would keep on loving a femme knowing every single detail of her two lives.

"I only gave you my own memories of... the past, that which your own spark complemented. I did not look where I knew I had no right to."

Of course he was telling the truth. Airachnid wasn't sure if he was even capable of lying, especially not now that everyone and their grandcarrier knew about the secret he'd been hiding away on this island. And he certainly wasn't capable of forgiving someone whose countless murders he'd seen branded into his spark.

So that left Airachnid with the task of confessing it all to him.

"The bond brought back... everything, Optimus." And that everything started to burn in her optics again, forcing them closed. "Everything from when I was Ariel, when I was Elita... right up to Archa Seven. Right up to... those spiders. And more after that. Things I'm suddenly not proud of, even though... all my life, all Airachnid's life, I mean, I... I was doing what I thought was right. It's like... both halves have been torn apart from each other and when I try to look at where the damage is... it hurts."

Optimus knew when to listen, and he knew when she'd given up on saying anything more. He reached a hand towards her, hovering so lightly on one of her legs. "You're not damaged, Airachnid-"

And then her leg kicked sideways, knocking his touch away from her. "You can't say that. You don't know everything I've done, everything... that's happened to me. Elita would have killed herself before letting herself become something like me!" After all the breems spent sitting and thinking and waiting for an answer, that was the only conclusion she could come to, and hearing it out loud from the crackling wreck of her vocaliser was the breaking point. She fell, to what side she couldn't tell, but Optimus was there to catch her before she met the ground. And once she was in his servos again, there was nothing she could hide. Furious tears and whimpered screams and the keening howls of stranded prey was all she could offer, each vent a stuttered mess that only carried out more sobs. In the weeping, broken cascade of pleas, there was only one that Optimus could understand.

"I dont... I-I don't know... who I'm supposed to be..."

And by the time he knew what to say to her, she was calming down. Slowly, so slowly, the cries subsided into pitched hiccups and shaking sniffles. Optimus still held her, solid and sentinel like his spark, and wiped at the coolant covering her face.

"I know you're hurting, my love. I can feel it. And I would give my whole spark to you if that would soothe your own. But you don't need to know who you are just now. All of this, it's... it's never happened to anyone else."

"Why me, then?" she asked past a choking clog of self-pity. "You have that Matrix, that link to Primus, so... why did he choose me?"

"He rarely speaks to me. But... perhaps this was the only way to spare you. By giving you a second chance on Archa Seven." Optimus held her chin up at a slight tilt, easy for her to break away from, and his smile was so gentle, so beautiful that Airachnid wanted to believe him so badly.

But this beautiful mech, the one who'd followed her to the Allspark across centuries of the deepest despair, deserved the truth. "...I'd rather have just died." She pulled away from his clean warmth and all its naive promises, rising to her peds and finding herself leaning against a much less hospitable tree that was quickly marked with thick gouges; and with Optimus' servos suddenly limp he couldn't bring her back. Airachnid almost thought he'd just left until she heard him speak again, in a tone she could only describe as horrifically sincere.

"I felt much of the same when our bond first broke."

Airachnid thought she'd misheard, or perhaps he had misheard her. She turned her helm back to face him, noting that he hadn't moved at all. "What do you mean, Optimus?"

"The Autobots needed a leader, but... at the time, I didn't believe it should have been me. A Prime that couldn't protect his sparkmate wasn't worthy of the title, or the Matrix." He didn't so much move as drift towards her, until he was by her side and she could feel his EM field turning to ice.

"There was one day... the same day I returned to the Iacon Tower, to an empty berth for the first time with my spark like an open wound that wouldn't stop bleeding. I stood on the highest balcony, looking out at the wasteland I'd turned our planet into... villages razed into nothing more than scorch marks, the ruins of cities, graveyards stretching out on all sides. And I thought... it would be so easy to leave it all behind. To join you in the Allspark, where I thought you'd gone, where you were safe from Megatron. Just one step off the edge... and it all would be over." The confession was so thick, so rusted that Optimus only stopped the tears flowing over his hard-lined face by the force of his willpower. If Airachnid had any more of her spark left intact, it would have been breaking just from listening, knowing that even with Primus on your shoulders it was so easy to feel worthless.

"It wasn't a sudden realisation that stopped me, some message from Primus that pulled me back from that edge," Optimus went on, with a smile struggling despite everything. "It was a soldier bringing me energon. If I'd spent one less nanoklick thinking about it, or that bot had paused on the steps up... I wouldn't be here. On Earth... or with you." This time when Optimus reached out to her, a hand on her shoulder, she didn't flinch away, because his love pouring out was the only thing she was aware of.

"What I'm trying to say is that... time is sometimes the only cure. Time to think and talk and... to love. You're hurting right now, more than anyone else in this galaxy. But it won't last long. The strongest aches always pass eventually... even if they take years. And whoever you choose to be, now or then, won't change how Scorpia adores you... or how I feel about you."

Airachnid almost crumbled all over again when that hand on her shoulder squeezed, forcing the warmth into her, and she had to wreathe her claws through his digits to stay standing. "...Who do you think I am, Optimus?"

"You're the femme I love. That is all that matters to me."

And after all this, Airachnid actually managed to believe it. This time when Optimus held her she never wanted to let go, shrouding herself in the infallible confidence and security of his spark, letting whatever pain was left fade into a gentle numbness. If time was all she needed, no matter how long, if it was spent with Optimus then it wouldn't be wasted.

But if she wanted to spend it with him, there was one more obstacle in the way. Or several of them, most of them much bigger than her.

"Optimus, after last night... I don't know if I can spend one alone. If you'll have me...I'd like to join you with the Autobots."

Optimus stiffened, not in the way she was secretly hoping for. "Are you sure?"

"I have to face them at some point. For better or worse." She was looking up at him, still in the circle of his embrace, watching his optics crease and their light waver ever so slightly.

"But we can wait," he said. "I won't bring you there if you feel at all uncomfortable-"

"I want to go, Optimus," she insisted. "I... I need other voices to get rid of the ones in my head. Even if these ones hate me."

Optimus looked unhappy, opening his mouth only to close it a nanoklick later when he realised it would be pointless to argue her reputation with the Autobots. "Would you like to bring Scorpia with you?"

Airachnid had already decided. "I'm not going to use my child as a shield, Optimus. I don't want to be seen as just a helpless mother by them. Whatever they have to say to me... I want to hear it as Airachnid and Elita. Whichever one they'd rather see me as." Though she could already guess which one they'd find more comfort in. Optimus was the one who knew first hand what they thought of her, what kind of viper nest she was walking into, but if it was as bad as she was expecting then he seemed to think she could handle it.

"If that is what you wish, I will be with you." He kissed her forehelm, making her smile and tingle from such a chaste display, before releasing her and saying something through his comm unit. In that muffled conversation he tried to hide, she heard a name that in all her personal chaos she'd managed to forget.

"Will Arcee be there?" she asked after Optimus clicked off. He looked as uneasy as she felt, but he had good news.

"I have been told she has retired to her quarters for the night."

Airachnid sighed in the humid, all too forgiving night. "Primus only works in small blessings, I see."

xx

This was, uh... quite a heavy chapter, as I'm sure most of you noticed. It hit on a lot of similar thoughts and feelings I had personally while dealing with depression (though luckily I am in recovery right now thanks to therapy), such as lack of identity and not knowing the purpose of existing. So though Airachnid's case is certainly much more severe than mine, I tried to get across that feeling of hopelessness and confusion as well as possible, especially with her being essentially two radically different bots in one body.