XVII - Legacy

My striped wings flared up. "No!" I spat, unable to believe that Oliver was able to entertain such an idea for even a moment.

His mother almost spewed her coffee across the countertop, "Oliver! The Cybertronians are not your playmates! You have Will and Tony for that!"

"Tony doesn't even know about all of this," her son shot back.

"And what about Will?"

"He thinks this is a good idea too," Oliver said firmly from the seat next to me.

She looked to me dubiously, "Seven?"

I crossed my arms, "Oh, now you're siding with him too? You humans are so predictable." I grumbled.

"C'mon, Sev, please! We can go right now, you can stay in your jet mode the entire time… just please don't use your missiles."

"Don't tempt me." I frowned at him.

His eyes brightened, "Is that a yes?"

"No."

A thoughtful look floated across his features, "You know, you never did tell us why you came here."

"Yes I did!" I protested indignantly. "It is because everyone back at the base is insufferable! Starscream this, Starscream that!" I glowered at the countertop, not realizing my wings were down until the human laid a hand on my shoulder plate. I flicked them in a halfhearted signal for him to back off. Get a hold of yourself, I thought angrily.

"Seven, are you alright?" Oliver's mother asked in a soft tone, reaching her hand out across the counter and laying it on my servo. I flinched backwards in surprise, instinctively jerking away from her touch.

Her son forced me to meet his gaze, "If you help us, we'll try to help you. And it'll take your mind off Scream–"

"Fine." I conceded with a huff.

The human beamed at me, racing off. A minute later he ran back down the stairs, dressed for school and carrying what appeared to be a remote control. "To keep up appearances," he explained hurriedly. His mom smiled at me warmly, a look full of reassurance and gratefulness that it made me want to purge. It felt so unfamiliar that it was to the point of being uncomfortable. I'd begun to regret this.

I didn't know how Oliver had managed to talk me into getting into the trunk of their car. But here I was, in my jet mode in the claustrophobic, stuffy, hot compartment that jostled so much with every bump in the road I had to clench my denta. Slowly the car ground to a halt, the brakes squealing in protest. A second later the hatch to the trunk clicked and I was met with blinding sunlight only obscured by a person's silhouette. As my optics adjusted, I saw it was Oliver.

"C'mon," he said excitedly, "I can't wait!" The human made to hoist me up out of the trunk but I yelped.

"Not the wings!" I barked.

He shushed me and adjusted his grip, "Normal planes don't talk."

I smirked, "'Normal' planes are far inferior than I."

Oliver's mother waved at him as he slammed the trunk shut, "Good luck!" and drove off. As her car pulled away, I finally got a good look at my surroundings, besides Oliver's chest. Primus, the things I tolerated for these two were going to send me over the edge one day. To my left, in front of the human was a large throng of kids with a few adults mixed in, most looking to be roughly Oliver's age. A few of them were toying with model cars, staging mock races, making them do circles in the dirt and such. The renegade dust plumes were evidence enough that they had been occupying themselves in this way for a while. He was right: I certainly didn't see any form of plane—jet or otherwise. To prove his point even more, as we got closer to the crowd, whispers followed us and we began to draw stares. Behind us was the school, sprawling outward in a sea of grass halted only by a little black river of the paved road.

Will suddenly burst out of the crowd, grinning at Oliver. "Dude, where'd you find that!?" His eyes suddenly widened as they fell on my striped wings, "Wait, is that…"

Oliver smirked knowingly, "The one and only."

Will pretended to whisper to his friend but I knew it was directed at me, "Well, I wouldn't say 'only.' Sev, I don't want to know what blackmail he used to convince you, but this is awesome!" In reply, I raised my flaps in a manner that could almost be described as haughty by an onlooker. He laughed. The crowd of children had begun to feel constricting as they closed in on us, shooting Oliver eager and jealous questions similar to Will's.

"Is that a Viper?" Some kid asked from the growing crowd.

"No, it's a Falcon!" Another corrected. I could identify the speaker this time, a high-voiced kid wearing black-rimmed glasses.

"They're the same thing!" a third pointed out from farther away, followed by an audible groan.

"Where'd you get it?"

"How much was it?"

"I want one!"

"Looks so fast!"

Suddenly another kid pushed through the crowd, looking slightly familiar. Will pounced on him. "Tony! What gives, we haven't seen you in forever!"

The other boy looked Hispanic, a contrast to Will and Oliver who both were Caucasian. He wore a blue shirt with black stripes (or was it black with blue stripes?) and khaki shorts. He tried to fend Will off without success. "My family and I were on a trip down in Australia, remember? And no, we didn't see any penguins."

Will pouted, "You owe me five bucks."

My thruster sputtered impatiently. Oliver jumped at the noise and sudden burst of heat, looking to the nearest teacher, getting the message. "Hey, when is the contest starting?"

I bit my glossa so hard it stung, Contest? There never was any mention of a "contest"! This is far from what I agreed to! But I managed to hold my glossa and instead allowed my flaps to flare up with a metallic snap!

The teacher looked impressed, stepping forwards. "Did you make that yourself?"

Oliver shrugged, improvising on the spot. "Yeah, but it was like reading from an IKEA manual. He's full of glitches and whatnot." My thruster sputtered in annoyance.

"He?" The teacher asked skeptically. Will shot Oliver a nervous look, while Tony simply was confused.

The human blanched, "I mean–we call 'him' Seven because, well, he took that many tries to put together!" Will shot him a look, nice save.

Tony rolled his eyes, "You know that ships are usually referred to as females, right?"

Will and Oliver exchanged a look and burst out laughing.

I couldn't help but snarl to myself. Oliver hid it with a fake cough and gave his friend a look, "So are we starting or what?" He tossed Will the remote, setting me on the ground. I blasted my thruster but stayed in one spot. "See, glitches!" He pointed dramatically at me. It was all I could do to keep myself from transforming and screaming at him. This had been a horrible idea. Will handed the remote back to him.

A few kids shook their heads, muttering about how they thought "it" wouldn't even fly. Oh, if they only knew. At the Cybertron War Academy, Starscream had graduated at the top of his class, and I had in turn, inherited that skill.

Another teacher stepped forwards, "Ready, racers?"

The kids let out a cheer so loud that I jumped badly, but no one appeared to notice except for Tony, who was eyeing me with a funny look on his face. I opted to ignore him. Roughly two dozen unique remote-controlled cars lined up on either side of me, ranging in quality from having bits of metal poking out and being wrapped in duct tape to the point where I couldn't tell whether they had come from a store or not. There was no questioning that I fell into the latter category.

The same teacher began walking down the line of kids and their cars, rattling off team names. He paused when he reached Will and Oliver, "And you two…"

Will piped up, "Team Scream!" Oliver broke out into a fit of laughter, doubling over. Tony gave them a funny look not unlike the one I had received.

Finally, the teacher had made it to the end of the line. "On your marks… get set… GO!"

I blasted my thruster, spiraling up into the sky and grinned. This might not be so bad after all.

I emerged from a fog of endless grey, feeling like I was floating but at the same time, my pedes were on the ground. Wherever that was. But it was strange, because the one of the last things I could remember was the fact that my right leg had ceased to function.

An invisible wind blew through, whisking the fog away. The Earth appeared beneath me and a strange, shadowy ship above me that didn't look familiar in the least. I watched a group of equally shadowy figures battle amongst themselves. Each time I tried to discern what the ship looked like exactly, it blurred even more until it was a shapeless splotch hovering above a blue-and-green marble in the void of space. When I drew my attention away, it sharpened again in my peripherals.

On the other hand, the figures were different enough to be classified as individuals, but I couldn't see any features that looked familiar. If I looked at them the wrong way, they seemed to flicker and disappear. When they spoke, it came out in a garbled tongue but somehow sounded like English at the same time. Except the words they said made no sense, such as "charts," or "rocket," and "below." But this didn't feel any more out of the ordinary than if I was having a normal conversation with someone. In fact, it seemed to be expected. But this whole situation felt so wrong.

I floated closer as the fight ensued for a few minutes, watching the hazy figures trade blows. They all appeared to be roughly the same in size, flickering and moving like shadows come to life. Suddenly my gaze shifted to one that was hanging back at the fringe of the fight. Another figure strode towards it, its shape rippling as I got too close. The shadow that had hung back suddenly ran towards it and began sweeping its sword—that's what I thought it was—at the other. The figure raised its arm, and the one with the sword staggered and fell.

All the others were melee fighting, every time the figures met it was as if they became one being, fused where the other's fist had connected. Then they broke apart and continued, apparently blind to the effects. For a brief moment, some part of me wondered what exactly I was witnessing. As soon as I thought I had almost made sense of it, time seemed to skip a step. The figures displaced, seeming as though to teleport a few seconds into the future. I suddenly found myself unable to even remember what it was that I was thinking about in the first place.

I had lost track of who was who in the pair, until one ran away and then dove off the ship, out of sight. The scene seemed to split in front of my optics, folding in upon itself, then back out again. It was as if time had skipped again, but this time it was a longer period than just a few seconds. I wasn't sure, because the same figure was falling down to the ground below. Suddenly an abrupt, blinding white light silenced everything, followed by a gentle, azure glow, folding into different shades around me.

The next thing I felt was the warm, slightly rough surface of the med berth under me, certain my helm was splitting. Someone was in the fuzzy background was yelling and I was freezing. My insides had been reformatted, fitted with malware and then microwaved. I vaguely remembered having a quilt, which was long since gone. The dream had left a bad taste in my mouth. The worst part was that the more I tried to remember it, the details grew hazier and hazier until I could hardly remember what it even had been about.

I coughed sharply around some sort of obstruction in my mouth, struggling to move. What looked like Ratchet's helm appeared above me for a brief moment before vanishing again. Something cold, three somethings suddenly appeared over my wrists and left ankle. I assumed one had sprung over my right as well, whatever they were. Hard and very solid.

I was scared. I couldn't figure out what was happening. When I forced my weak limbs to move, they were restrained by those somethings over my limbs. I tried to speak, but I gagged, feeling a different something still in my mouth. Maybe even down my throat. I swore my insides were melting and fusing together beneath it, and that if that thing wasn't in my mouth, I'd be coughing up more than my own energon.

Then, through distorted vision I saw someone—at this point I couldn't hope to know who—lean over me with concerned optics, holding something in their servo. I pushed against the restraints, trying my best to snarl around the whatever-it-was in my mouth. The bot's optics looked much sadder now and he leaned over, saying something I couldn't hear. I cautiously watched him, and an idea suddenly dawned on me. Morse.

I began to tap a finger against the berth in a jerky rhythm that made his optics widen: Dot, dot, dot, dot. Pause. Dot. Pause. Dot, dash, dot, dot. Pause. Dot, dash, dash, dot. Longer pause. Dash, dash. Pause. Dot. Over and over again, until he grabbed my servo, stopping me. I couldn't resist.

HELP ME

He squeezed my servo, "We tried, Starscream."

To say that Seven had outshone them all was like comparing the sun to the moon. From the moment he shot off the ground, the contest was over as far as I was concerned. I struggled to keep up the show with my remote controller; anticipating the unpredictable jet's next moves was a chore.

I could tell from the way he dove into steep turns and corkscrews that would make you dizzy to watch that he was loving every second of this. He leveled out and I fumbled with my controller for a second. A few kids glanced at me, then focused back on navigating their non-autonomous vehicles.

"You got this," Will offered an encouraging smile.

"Who're you talking to, the jet?" I whispered back, shooting him a glance. My eyes flickered over to Tony, who stood with his hands buried in his pockets, watching Seven.

"How did you guys manage to build that?" He finally asked.

Will covered smoothly for me, "Oh, my dad knows a guy who's a mechanic–"

Suddenly someone off to my right hurled a rock at Seven. I couldn't see who, but I had a suspicion. The jet didn't need to avoid it, it fell at least five feet short of his tail wings. But he came to a halt, spinning around in the air to see who did it. Whispers broke out in the throng of kids.

Then two stones suddenly found themselves flying on a direct path to Seven. The jet clearly was unamused. He dodged the first, and flicked the second off his nose cone. A few of the kids next to me shot me worried glances, Will and Tony included. They thought I was showing off.

"C'mon Sev," Will muttered, warily eyeing the jet floating above us.

I nervously fiddled with the controls on the remote. There wasn't anything I could do, really, except watch and hope he didn't do anything rash. The jet had a hot temper, and if he lost his cool… well, I didn't want anyone getting hit by a missile. Not to mention that I didn't want to guess at his present mental state, what with everything going on around Starscream.

A kid wearing aviator sunglasses pushed through the crowd over to us, "Ha! Oliver and Will are cheating!" The boy shouted over the heads of the other students, who all had stopped to watch.

"Snitch!" Will growled under his breath.

The kid pulled off his sunglasses, flicking his wrist so they snapped closed. His clothes were expensive but not very nice, showing that his family had a lot of money that he evidently didn't care about. Every school had a what I called "that kid," which others called a bully, and this was ours. The others backed up, forming a tight circle around the four of us. I drew myself up, showing him I wasn't to be intimidated. A few more whispers swept through the crowd.

He stepped up close to me, pretending not to notice. "You know, cheating's dope." He slapped the controller out of my hands. Seven was still flying above us, stock still in a way that a jet from our planet would've found impossible, watching the scene unfold. No one had noticed yet. The kid bent down, making a big show of picking up a mid-sized rock. I glared at him. He smirked, hanging the sunglasses on the front of his jacket. Where were the teachers when you actually needed one? The kid then hurled the rock up at Seven, who swooped to dodge it, apparently seeing it coming.

"What's your problem?" Tony asked in an innocent manner that screamed sarcasm like bloody murder.

The kid didn't answer, gently depositing his sunglasses down next to his scuffed Adidas.

Will snatched them up then offered them to the kid. He reached out just as my friend dropped them, making sure it was obvious it wasn't on accident. "Oops, sorry." Then he stomped on them, "Whoa, my bad." He grinned, stepping back to reveal a pair of mangled, formerly expensive sunglasses. A few kids in the crowd guffawed at that.

The bully picked up another fist-sized rock and threw it at Seven. The jet remained motionless. This time it connected with his fuselage, letting out a loud clang that made me wince. He entered a spiral, causing Will and I to gasp in shock.

"No!" I shouted, sprinting over to where the jet would fall.

The kid laughed, "Real nice plane you got there." Will and Tony ran along beside me, scuffing their shoes in the gravelly dirt.

I stopped, giving him a sideways look over my shoulder. "That plane could whoop your–"

"Seven!" Will exclaimed, watching the jet with a worried expression. I skidded to a stop, arms wide to rescue him from the unforgiving ground beneath my feet. I just hoped his wings wouldn't shear my arms off. I was rather attached to them.

But then, somewhat impossibly, Seven slowed enough that I only grunted when I caught him. I didn't even stagger when my arms wrapped around his wings.

I bent down, pretending to look for damage on his plating, "Are you okay?" I hissed.

His tone didn't sound pained as I had expected. In fact, it carried an undercurrent of fury so strong that I was astonished it hadn't drowned his reason. "I am fine. Now get that fragging human out of my sights from here before I relieve him of his head," he snarled viciously. On that note, he shot up out of my grasp and over our heads, blowing my hair into my eyes. Then the jet shot down once again and began to chase the bully.

The kid gasped in surprise and horror, bolting away. Everyone else was cheering, "Se-ven! Se-ven! Se-ven!" Will let out a loud whoop and pumped his fist. I grinned, cheering along with the rest of them.

Will then turned to me, a grin still etched into his features. "Dude, if we don't get an A+ I'm taking the school and all its staff to court!"

I punched him playfully, "Get a lawyer."

"Get a life." He shot back amiably.

Tony was the one that dragged me down out of my euphoria. "Oliver?"

"Yeah?"

"Where'd the remote go?" He wondered, having a façade of innocence that tried to mask suspicion that went for miles.

I blanched, my eyes falling on where it rested. A good distance away on the ground, not having moved an inch from where the kid had whacked it out of my hands.

Reading my expression, Tony stepped in front of me. He looked as imposing as a scrawny kid with curly hair could. "Spill."

I steeled myself, "No."

"Did you buy it somewhere?" He pressed. Out of nowhere, Seven banked over us and landed at my feet. I noticed with a smirk that the bully was long gone, and the crowd of kids had dispersed, losing interest.

"He's one of a kind."

Tony took a deep breath, pinching the bridge of his nose, "Please stop referring to it as a 'he,' it's just a stupid jet. Last time I checked, planes don't have genders." Seven's engine began to whine loudly and his thruster sputtered, spitting out tongues of flame. He was shuddering too, it probably was taking all his willpower not to transform. But I knew it was slipping fast. Tony waved at it, "See what I mean? That thing's got issues, man. I feel bad for that poor mechanic–"

That pushed the jet over the edge. He shot forward, sweeping Tony's feet out from under him, then up into the sky and back down again. His engine screamed over the wind, missiles at the ready.

"SEVEN, STOP!" I yelled with all the force I could muster. He halted in midair, his nose cone feet away from Tony's face. My friend watched him in terror. Will kicked a rock, chased after it, then kicked it again, cursing under his breath all the while.

"What is your flipping malfunction!?" I snapped, stalking over to the jet who bobbed in the air, not doing or saying anything. "Is your processor glitching! You could've killed him!"

Will glanced up, "Yeah, do you have any idea how much paperwork we'd have to do if you did?" He chuckled to himself, his generally pleasant demeanor returning.

The jet shuddered, then zoomed off and vanished around the backside of our school into the courtyard. I sprinted after him, shoving a few kids that were in my way. The remote laid forgotten a ways behind me.

I transformed, landing on a cobblestone pathway in a garden surrounded by a wall of tall, well-kempt hedges on all sides. The only thing that moved was a startled flock of birds. The school's courtyard, I realized.

"I'll tell you what my malfunction is, Oliver." I snarled, picking up a rock and hurled it through the hedge. "The only bot I've ever felt like family to is on his fragging deathbed!" That slagging human had no idea what he was talking about, how dare he insult me like that! But that wasn't the only thing making my servos itch. I felt so useless! No one had asked me to do anything in I didn't know how long, so I had become a babysitter for the humans. I threw another rock. And everyone was moaning over Starscream, while I watched on the sidelines. I didn't care that I was being selfish. I wanted Starscream back, the healthy, sarcastic, witty, arrogant one; not the one clinging to life back at base. I wanted him back as much as everyone else, maybe more. No, definitely more. I threw another rock just as Oliver ran through a gate and into the courtyard where I stood. He yelped, ducking to avoid it.

"What was that for!"

"I missed," I pointed out in case he had failed to notice.

He rolled his eyes, "Seriously, what's with you? You almost kill my friend and then zip off!"

"Go ask Starscream, I'm sure he can tell you." I spat.

"Dumb question, right." He sighed, combing his fingers through his hair. "But I didn't ask how Starscream's doing, I asked about Seven."

It was my turn to sigh. "I just… it's complicated. With you humans, the other Autobots, MECH, Starscream…"

"I see what you mean."

I was surprised, "You do?"

"Yeah. Want to go back to base?"

I tugged the ground bridge remote out of my thigh plating, more than glad that the conversation was over. "Be my guest."

"You said you didn't have that!" He exclaimed, seeing it.

"Did I?" I said innocently, activating it.

"I'll go grab Will," Oliver grumbled.

"No thanks, I'll grab him." Said Will, who walked through the gate, tugging on the shirt he was wearing.

I rolled my optics in exasperation, "Humans."

"Robots." He smirked.

"Eavesdropping is rude, you know." I bristled.

He walked through the bridge, waving me away. Oliver followed. I waited a moment, unsure of why I was hesitant in the first place. Shaking my helm, I trailed after them and into the swirling vortex. My tank plummeted to my pedes when I stepped through into the base.

What have I done?