Of The Spark And Heart
Part 1
Chapter 4 (3 pt. 2)
It wasn't long when Sol's wheels touched government ground. He would repeatedly look back at Fera, checking that she wasn't dead. She kept an arm over her middle for the entire time from the station to the base, her forehead laid atop the wheel. Trying to move fast, Solas darted through the park and to the small grove of trees that sat in the center of it.
The side of the bolder that held the entrance to the base opened up and two sliding metal doors lifted, allowing Sol to speed down the dim halls. The lights couldn't keep up with his pace, flashing on after he was already five ahead. He came to the main entrance and skidded to a stop, cutting a turn to stop his alt form. Soldiers in the room looked to him in surprise, surprised about his flashy entrance. Sol threw open his door and Fera glanced up, looking weakly to the exit. Just under her mandible point, known to the humans as a 'chin', was her hand over a large red spot. It struck him that it was blood, the energon of mankind.
Fera leaned out of the car, barely getting her legs up over the side. She slipped out, a soft moan escaping her lips. Her body fell in a heap to the ground outside of Sol's cabin, her arm still beside her tank cavity. Sol quickly entered the command of his form code into his processor and his body began to shift and change. He soon stood in his bipedal mode, his body bent over Fera as he hovered his terminal joints over her weak body. Suddenly, Solas' hand closed and he snapped his cranial unit up at the stunned men around them. "Get the medic!" he commanded, shocked that the trained beings would be just standing there like frightened cyberdats.
-A cyberdat was a small creature, particularly found in the waste systems of the Cybertronians, or chewing on the piles of scrap in the heapyards. They would freeze if cornered, their bodies locked in fear of anything and anyone. On earth, a compairison to these would be a sewer rat.-
Soldiers that had faster instincts were the first to run out of the room, leaving the other, slower men to face the confused and frustrated Autobot. It all made no sense. What did they not understand about 'get help'?
"Solas, what in the name of Primus is going on in here?" Sol's cranial unit turned towards the sound and he found Ratchet leisurely pacing into the room. Ratchet noticed the small female under Sol and he jumped into his medical programming, nearly striding the length of the space to come closer.
"I told Prime I wasn't ready for this! I told him, but he wouldn't listen!" Sol yelled in anger, throwing himself to his sole pads. He lifted his arms and let his hands fall atop his helmet. "Slag Sol, you've been protecting her for only one day! What happened?" Ratchet demanded as he got down close to Fera. Sol let his terminal joints fall and he stared down at the female. "She's been attacked by one of her own kind, it was absolutely sickening Ratchet. I didn't know humans were so fragile!" he exclaimed.
To make matters worse, the worry-stricken female medic of the facility came running into the room with some of her comrades and they went straight to Fera. Ratchet backed off, but kept a close distance just in case. "Well, now you do. And it seems that it only took Fera's safety to prove that to you." Ratchet stated in a serious, dark tone. Sol gave a groan and whipped around, putting his spinal support to the medics. "Miss Lennox, we are the doctors here at the base, can you understand me?" the small, high voice of the female medic asked. Sol paused, letting his faceplates move to aim his audio receptors towards Fera and the others. Quiet. "Ok, well can you tell me what happened to you?" she went on. This time, Sol did turn back around, seeing Fera lain on her spinal support. The doctor was trying to move Fera's hand from her side, the red now a large stain in her clothing. Sol's CPU became doused in guilt, seeing the young one suffer was confusing and painful at the same time.
This wasn't what he was trained to do. He wasn't careful or graceful, or experienced. He was a warrior. There was nothing stopping him from making the mistake of crushing the youngling beneath his sole pads. An unusual pulse echoed in his spark and Solas raised an arm to place his hand over it.
The doctors around Fera were now placing her on a sort of berth on wheels, their retreating steps hurrying her down a separate, smaller hall towards the human medical facility. "What happened to her?" Ratchet started again, breaking the silence. There was an odd edge to his vocal processor that Sol felt was almost like blame. His frustrations finally building, Sol threw his arms into the air. "Like I said, she was attacked! She wouldn't tell me how she was hurt, or where, and I couldn't do anything." he began to pace the room and he kept his teal optics low.
"She is a stubborn one, but I'm sure you have more impact on her well-being than you realize." Ratchet insisted, catching Sol's moving glance. "I didn't sign up for this Ratchet. Maybe Prime will realize that I'm no Guardian now." He stopped pacing, his terminal joints opening and closing. "That isn't how he will see it. He'll think that this was a learning experience; that you will know better for next time. Fera is alive because of you, even if she was hurt in the process. Humans are cruel, sometimes psychologically insane creatures that do things for reasons we don't understand." Ratchet went on, coming closer. "Now your incapability to help Fera came from your inexperience with the humans. Don't feel this is your fault." he lifted a hand to place on Sol's shoulderbolt, but Sol jerked away.
Ratchet's terminal joints stayed hovering there for a few sparkbeats before he dropped the limb. "This is wrong. Optimus was wrong. I'm no Guardian. I never was." Sol murmured softly. Every word he spoke he saw as the truth. But Ratchet was Ratchet, and he would believe what he believed. Nothing Solas would say would change his CPU. Besides, he wasn't the one Solas needed to talk to at the click.
So before the know-it-all mech could say anything, Sol turned on his sole pads and stormed out of the room. This wasn't right from the start. Today's events proved that his thoughts were true and that Fera would be safer with Bumblebee. Down the hall Solas went, on a mission to face his peer. His loud steps echoed down the boring stone walls and he snorted at them, caught up in his temper. Anything to keep his mind off his mistake. His legs moved him quickly down the right and then the left of the path, his terminal joints clenched the entire time.
The large metal doors met Sol's view and he came up to the front, pounding on the surface. An Autobot symbol over the doors split in half and the room inside unveiled. It was a good sized space, consisting of all concrete walls and floors with both human and Cybertronian technology sitting up against the perimeter of the room. There was a long L-shaped desk attached to the center of the room, holding a large hologram projector and a haphazardous pile of different electronic compads Wheeljack had made for the 'Bots. Optimus was standing in the room, facing his spinal support to the door. One hand was wrapped around his chassis, the other arm setting terminal joints against his mandible point. A hologram of the Missouri area projected before him, the blinking lights of the Autobots and the arriving newcomer flashing.
Optimus turned towards the sound of the opening door, the terminal links on his point coming off his faceplates in interest. "Solas, what is the matter?" he wondered. Solas' body settled in a wide stance at the door, his shoulderbolts hunched in anger.
"I warned you I wasn't ready for this." he growled lowly.
It would have been so easy to blame Optimus for even putting Sol in charge of Fera in the first place, but Sol knew he was the only true one to blame. Even then however, he couldn't help the sparkling-like grudge he held in motion for his leader. Optimus' arms fell from his chassis, his body turning in concern towards Sol. "I don't understand." he said, causing the irritation to build once more in Sol. How could he not know?
Sol came right up to the Prime and looked into his optics hotly. "Fera was attacked today, and I couldn't get there in time to keep her safe." he spoke blandly, almost with a venomous tone. Most of this anger that Sol was directing towards his leader had no better place than on himself. Optimus' faceplates moved to a solid mask of unemotional stature. "What is her condition?" he inquired flatly. Sol moved away, unable to hold the gaze. It was just so...calm and even. He couldn't comprehend how someone could be so dispassionate at such events. "She's alive. But I don't know what her full status is. The medics took her away." Sol walked the room to the large chair that Prime had pushed aside. Sol lifted his terminal joints and set them on the back of the chair, his other hand on his hipbolt.
Sadly, his cranial unit hung. There was no explaining what he felt. Was it anger? Or guilt? Or was it something like worry?
It struck hard on Sol that it might have been all. His CPU was overloading with all the information and conflicting things he felt. He was just so mixed up inside himself and he didn't even know if he could hold something like this against his leader. There was no doubt he knew it would happen, he could feel it coming. Just not so...soon. The human was better off with Bee. Not a rooky giant who could possibly transform and crush her when he felt such sudden emotions.
"The most important thing is that she is alive Solas. No matter the event that transpired today, she is alive. Do not allow yourself to place doubt in your spark that you could have done better." Optimus could be heard as he approached Sol, a reassuring hand set on his shoulderbolt. "Maybe it is time I explain to you just why it is I have you protecting her." he suggested. Sol turned, dislodging Optimus' hand. "Yes, that would be a start." Sol agreed curtly.
Optimus turned back to face his hologram once more and Sol noticed that the blinking signal was coming closer, almost a mile out of the base limits. A small device on Optimus' arm brace went off, a shrill beep splitting the quiet. Optimus lifted a terminal joint and clicked it off. "They are in the city." he noted in a hard voice. Sol came up next to the Prime and wondered just who maybe the signal was coming from. Moving on, the hologram turned off and Optimus looked down on the smaller mech. "You remember your experiences in the sciences of Cybertronian life cycles?" he asked rhetorically. Sol nodded, crossed his arms. "Yes, but how does Fera fit into this?" he demanded.
"Around 4 million years ago, when the Cosmos crash landed into earth, it carried inside it yours and your comrade's studies. It also held inside it a stationary spark chamber and spark essence, evidently in the crash vault." Optimus turned to Sol, who said nothing. He didn't think he was liking where this was going. "In that essence, was the chemical makeup of organic capability. The crash vault somehow opened and the contents inside became buried deep within the mountain. Thus, millions of years later it was discovered by human archaeologists." he moved his hand towards a compad and he picked it up, pressing a few keys before handing it to Sol, who studied it in confusion. "All it says here is that the found artifact in the mountain had been sent to lab and would be studied in full." he found, looking back up.
Optimus nodded, picking up another pad. "Yes, however the 'artifact' of the mountain was instead placed under government control, seeing as it was found to be far from human. The tools they used to study the object were unable to decipher exactly what the object was, so they resulted to locking away the Cybertronian device. Of course, when I and my comrades eventually found it, we were granted ownership of it as the government was unable to trust anyone other." Sol looked over the new pad that Optimus had given him and he scanned over the contents. "The study was discontinued. But why would they give us the artifact back if they didn't understand what we would do with it?"
"We had agreed to alliance ourselves with them, giving our protection over the country. Under our grounds, they agreed, allowing us the return of the device and any other Cybertronian object considered unaggressive." Optimus waited for Sol to place the compads back on the desktop and the mech gained a skeptical look on his faceplates. "And your point of all this is?" he urged, trying to finally understand. Optimus looked over at a screen by the wall and Solas followed his optics' direction. "That device they returned was the Stone of Primus. It has the ability to revive or even create a spark in Cybertronians." he said simply.
All of Solas' past anger, frustration, and petty blame melted away. He stared at the screen, his optics widening.
Optimus strode past Sol and the shocked mech followed him. Across the screen was all the information attained about the Stone. There was little to read, since no one understood how to activate the object or even where it had come from. Legend had it that the stone was Primus' own original spark, used to begin the race of the Cybertronians. Primus himself seeming to perish in the feud between himself and his disciple Unicron, a fierce and ambitious mech. It would go down in history that Unicron was only stopped after Primus sacrificed his body to capture and imprison him, saving both Cybertron and its future.
Each of the original Council he had created during this time however fell one by one, slowly destroyed over insolent fighting and arguing over control. Eventually, the modern Council was formed. They see everything now as being from and connected to the AllSpark. The Stone of Primus on the other hand was of equal value to the Spark itself, being the only other way to revive life or create it without the need of two Cybertronians or the AllSpark. However, ever since the beginning of the Cybertronian race, none had even come close to finding out how to control or even activate the power. Its tales of power slowly faded to myth before anyone could truly witness its capbilities.
Sol had been on the more involved team in studying life cycles when every so often the mention would come up of the Stone. But it would be dismissed as soon as it came up, being said as only a legend.
Now, it was known that it was no legend. The wars must have led the lasting Autobots to bring the hidden artifact to Earth in an attempt at keeping it safe. Somehow, the Lennox family must have gotten it. Sol wondered why until the truth hit him. Humans were nothing to the Decepticons, just bothersome bugs that were usually ignored. Perfect for hiding Cybertron's greatest secret. "The Stone of Primus was given to Captain Lennox and then bestowed upon his daughter Fera. The Decepticons still have no knowing of the Stone's location here on Earth, or that it has been discovered. And we plan on protecting that fact." Optimus informed him, seeing the smaller mech's shocked expression. Sol pressed a key on the dashboard and another file came up. Not much more information was on it. "Fera has no knowing of this?" Sol inquired looking up.
There was a shaking of the leader's cranial unit and Sol stood straight back from the array of command keys. "That is why you chose me, because I knew most about the Stone." Sol realized. Optimus looked to him from the screen and nodded slowly. "And because of your experiences in the field of battle. You may not be the most careful of us, but I know you would understand the situation better than any. A human female involved in this significant of a situation couldn't be handled by Bumblebee. He is far too young and he bares almost no knowledge of the Stone of Primus."
Sol could only stand there in silence. It was now clear why Optimus did what he did, but there was still more questions. More room for knowledge and understanding. But there was no time. Not while Sol fought the urge to go to Fera and apologize for everything that had happened. She had a responsibility far beyond her. And with that, she'd been entrusted with the possible future of his entire race. It made him want to place her in a large metal box and lock her away. The future of his race... He didn't understand the true importance of everything. The fembots were too far and in-between to go to for sparklings. The time needed for the sparkling creation would also difficult with the war still in affect. It was too dangerous.
Fera's safety equaled the survival of his race. Simple as that.
At that moment, the door behind Sol slid open and both he and Prime turned towards the entrance. The silver body of Sideswipe was in the full of the doorframe, both hands locked onto the edges. His cooling vents were at full capacity, their whirring, humming sound resonating throughout the room. "Optimus!" he exclaimed, finding the two immediately. Sideswipe let go of the doorframe and Sol turned fully towards the 'Bot. "It's the newcomer...it's an Autobot..." he paused, trying to allow his vents to catch up. Optimus and Sol started forward without a word, following behind the swifter mech. Their sole pads moved quickly throughout the halls of the base, smaller human soldiers moving below in a hurried fashion. They already knew.
Sideswipe was first to reach the lobby, with Sol following behind, and Optimus appearing last. The other Autobots of the base were all gathered into the space, standing around the form of a sleek, black and pink Citroen Survolt. The small human lettering on the bottom side of the vehicle stated the model.
The car had led a blotted line of glowing blue energon in its wake, signifying it was indeed Cybertronian. Optimus joined his comrades in the crowd and looked down upon the arrival. The familiar sounds of a conversion shaft met the audio receptors of Solas and the Survolt started to take shape. He narrowed his optics in an attempt to recognize the shape as two sole pads balanced them. They finalized their reformation, their plates settling into place and a black and pink helmet shifting up and over the new set of faceplates.
It was a fembot, the sparkling-able reproducers of the Cybertronians. Sol was shocked, hardly ever seeing the race in his cycle. Her faceplates were partially shaded by the vizor on her helmet and the mask on her face hid her expression. However it was immediately removed, allowing pain and all its glory to show through. There was a deep, gushing slash on her abdominal area, soon being covered by a firm arm. She was by far one of the most intimidating yet beautiful Cybertronians he had ever seen.
Between the lights on her chassis was the Autobot symbol, held proudly front and center. Her form slowly slouched, one black and pink-braced arm trying to put pressure on her flowing wound. Optimus slipped through the crowd before him, coming to the ailing fembot before anyone could react. She noticed him before her and a relieved look came over her. However, she came forward only to fall into his arms, her weakness clear.
"Rethalia?" Optimus asked in both shock and concern.
Rethalia. Rethalia Prime. Optimus' sparkmate.
Rethalia desperately clung to her sparkmate, forcing herself to look up into his optics. "We were attacked...while on the Hope..." she paused as her elbow joint sparked, causing her to wince. Her cooling systems were wheezing at the speed and damage that had taken. Her body was scratched and dented, obviously roughly handled. Optimus Prime leaned close, trying to comfort her. "They're gone...all of them." Rethalia suddenly had a horrified edge to her vocal tone and she made a soft sobbing sound close to Optimus' chassis plating. "Metallooper, Boltstreak, Windripper, all of them..." she shuddered and her optics flicked on and off. Optimus held firm to the failing fembot before he suddenly lifted her into his arms, not showing any sign of strain or stress from the weight. "Ratchet, get the medbay ready immediately!" he bellowed. The room was still caught in shocked silence, unable to react fully from the events before them.
Ratchet however was already on the move, separating the group of Autobots to allow Prime and his sparkmate through. Rethalia's slender terminal links clamped tight to Optimus' form, her weakened state almost putting her into forced recharge. Her usually vivid optic were now dimmer as they flickered. She obviously couldn't speak, her lip plates just left partially open.
Hopefully it wouldn't be restoration, or worse, a full wipe. Sol turned towards his retreating peers and he followed close behind, not hesitating when Ratchet opened the medbay doors and he led Optimus inside. Sol slipped through as well, watching as Optimus gently laid his sparkmate across the flat observation platform. The large mech drew back, grim concern overtaking every part of him.
Ratchet grabbed his toolcart and went straight to work, opening her wristbracers and sticking in an IV of freshly supplied energon into one of the main veins. Sol leaned back on the wall, unbelieving and partially numb. He had heard of this fembot around base, but he had never seen her. Optimus was in even larger shock, his nervous demeanor so unusual of him. Rethalia's chassis was then clipped open, Ratchet's optics scanning the damaged wiring and piecing. He fixed a few wires and parts, moving to her more damaged midsection. He removed the half that appeared damaged the most and then snapped open the other savable half. He froze cold.
Both Optimus and Sol looked up at Ratchet's expression, uncertain yet worried all the same. "Primus..." Ratchet whispered. Optimus came forward and Rethalia reached out, suddenly grabbing his hand in hers. As the Prime looked down on his sparkmate, Sol craned his neck to get a better look.
"Optimus, there's a sparkling here." Ratchet stated simply.
The large mech nearly fell on his aft, the wall being the only thing that supported him. His optics were wide and his arm was limp. One of his hands were still locked in Rethalia's grasp as she seemed to refuse release of him. She didn't react the same way as her bonded, instead having solid determination in her expression.
"Whatever you do, I want you to save her. If it comes down to it, save her." Rethalia said in a tone far stronger than she appeared.
Ratchet just stood before suddenly coming to his senses by her strong gaze. He nodded, returning to his focused state. Optimus was still in shock, his once limp limb coming over to lay atop the one Rethalia held so dearly.
Sol was speechless, completely overwhelmed. A sparkling? Now?
Ratchet went quickly to work, salvaging everything he could. He finally stopped, closing the panels of Rethalia's working parts. "She'll need an energon transfer from you Optimus. She's lost a lot of it and until the processor in the lower levels can produce more, she and your sparkling could be in serious danger." he reported, setting aside the badly damaged metal slips. Optimus just nodded, now standing. He looked like he would never allow his hands to leave Rethalia's. There was no telling what he was processing, or what he was feeling at the moment. The only emotion that had come from him was when Rethalia's optics went black. He jumped and grasped her hand, saying her name. But Ratchet assured him that she was only recharging, lucky that she had come when she did. The wound wouldn't kill her, and their sparkling was safe. For now.
Sol's spinal support slid down the wall as he sat on the floor, a hand on his cranial unit.
Rethalia was holding; supporting life.
He was just as shocked and worried as Optimus was, yet he was overjoyed at the same time. The Stone of Primus. A new sparkling by two Primes, who was a rare, precious fembot nonetheless. Could this earth day get anymore eventful?
Thank you everyone who has decided to read my fanfic, I'm so grateful for all the wonderful views I've received! This is my first ever fanfic and I was a little nervous about how it would turn out. But hopefully, you guys will read on and I'll continue to entertain you! Please be patient with me if I suddenly stop adding new chapters, because I actually have around 25 of these things written out :) But it takes me a little while to edit them and get them posted, so I may become a little lazy... But I promise if you're nice, you get a cookie! :D