Disclaimer: Hasbro and Takara-Tomy own Transformers. I just like hounding their giant robots.
Warning: I felt mushy, so have ashortfluff with plot before we get back to the twenty other plots
"Waiting Room Ambience"
It wasn't bad, dropping back into stasis. The pain melted away. Just like her house was around her. Cypress stumbled around the mental representation of her house in time to see the couch disintegrate into powder. One of her hands was breaking out into her jagged protoform markings.
Cypress took a moment to lean against what was left of a bookcase. Everything was quiet.
It wouldn't be long now.
Rilo nosed at her sneakers. The dog never came inside the house in her head. Cy watched him sniff around until they made eye contact.
The brindle dog pixelated slightly and wagged his tail. "You won't remember this, but I'm proud of you. You'll be a great 'former… Though, I wish you could stay this small forever."
Cypress felt the ghost of a muzzle on her cheek after the audio file. And just like that he was gone too. The broken analog television screen sparked and spat out a sluggish flow of amber.
"You could have said that earlier, Rilo." She said to the empty house, "You could have told V too." Cypress conjured a crowbar. She could feel the strut-deep scream rising in her. "Could have said what was wrong with me. Maybe-"
She let out a slow breath and strapped the makeshift weapon to her back. Because there was no sense in going postal and creating a whole team of fractured minds. Cypress mopped at the liquid trailing down her cheeks, coolant this time.
Cypress poked her head out of the open front door—right into a bombed-out metal wasteland.
The EM said it was Bee's space, but this didn't look like him at all.
It wasn't a long walk… She took longer making sure there wasn't a mutant slinking around the next corner and trying to quiet her sniffling. Space could bend, and flesh could mask and become metal. There was probably such a thing as mental guard dogs.
There was an old radio crackling, though. It was either a trap or the destination. Gradually, the crunch of metal turned into grass then pulverized sand-metal. There weren't any singular, defining landmarks. Bits were transplanted from everywhere, Earth, Cybertron, and other places she hadn't been to make a patchwork landscape.
Bumblebee didn't have a fixed home. What he did remember was an old warzone.
If her mind was alleged "a mess", what did this mean for a 'former?
Cypress spotted Bee trying to shut off the very human-designed pocket radio. Framed against an open sky, for the first time he looked as small as his namesake. His wings weren't even up.
There would only be one chance to ease him into full stasis. Cypress inhaled and prepared to put on the best show of confidence she could.
~o~o~o~o~o~
The over-loud "Sup!" from Cypress took a vorn off of Bumblebee's spark.
He reshuffled his plating, "You're supposed to be resting."
"Don't tell me what to do, babe. It's for your own good," she mimed back.
"What'd you call…" Bee finally looked up, only to be optic level with the human version of Cy crouched beside him. Bumblebee decided not to bring up the dark patches under her eyes. If they were back, it couldn't mean anything good. She always got sick hanging around their team. Around him.
"Babe. It's a pet name, but not literally."
"I know that. If you're not calling names, you're dead. What's your favorite type of mecha?"
"I'm not an imposter."
"Exactly what an imposter would say."
"Mecha are weird. Kaiju every day."
Bee relaxed, "Good, you're real and in the wrong helm."
"Yes… but one good turn deserves another." Cypress sat down hard and nestled into his side, "You shouldn't be alone; you hate it here."
"Well. I'm here." Bee kicked one leg out and maneuvered her into his lap.
He kept fiddling with the radio, trying to shut it off. The last thing he wanted was to ruin his favorite tracks by hearing them as he blacked out. Worse, it was coming in fits and spurts of lyrics.
Cypress looked between his digits and grinned at the low tones of an old country song.
"Jeanne used to love this stuff…" Cypress smiled, "Marci's old biker friend. She taught me how to do twist braids. You like George Strait too?"
"Yeah, I like collecting good songs."
"Did the wifi cut off halfway through? They sound damaged."
"That's the highlight reel of the parts I like."
"Ohh. So you listen to music."
"That's how music works, Cy." It came out flat and irritated.
Cypress' face squished in a half-sparked scowl, "No, lyrics. You hear them and what they mean. That's special."
It was a habit borne out of hanging out with Jazz and talking to Prowl too much. Listening and analyzing at the same time. "It's a curse."
"It's perceptive. But you're listening to Linkin Park and country music. That is two types of emotionally heavy, you good?"
"Fine."
"Yeah, you're a liar." She started counting off subjects on her fingers, "In touch with your inner self…And you play the accordion badly." Cypress snorted.
"So?"
"That's hot. How many kids do you want?"
The radio finally screeched into static, then off. Laughter erupted between them.
"I'm serious, mech. I don't mind 'em. They're like high adults and young enough to be cutely stupid."
"Oh. My. God."
"What? They are."
It was ridiculous. He needed that.
"Okay then, one."
"Blood, scavenged, or you wanna surprise adopt?"
"You don't call it scavenging…I don't care," He settled his helm onto hers.
"Does it bother you when I call you names?"
"Only when it takes me three cycles to find the reference. Seriously, what are you doing here, though? You'll get fragmented."
Cypress gestured to the blurring edges of the area around them, "Trying to make sure that happens. You're halfway under." She stretched, rubbing her jacket into his grill, before flipping over to straddle. "It's like that falling sensation before recharge, scary at first but it's over quick. You'll be fine."
Bumblebee traced an older scar along her jawline. How do you tell someone you want their whole spark when the communication barrier is this big? Eukarian hardware, human OS vs. standard hybrid Cybertronian.
She understood but humans didn't have a word or practice that exactly matched merging. He doubted asking to open her chestplates again would go over well. It was never the right time for anything.
"I'm gonna take you on an actual date."
"What, like a human one?"
"Yeah."
"Where? You're not supposed to eat organic stuff."
"Hasn't stopped me before and we don't have to eat. It's gonna be random. I don't know where we're heading next."
"Wanna go back to the club?"
"Let's see the sights around it."
The "if we get out of here" still loomed over the conversation.
"What would you do back on Cybertron for a date?"
"The same thing, going to hangouts. A lot of meeting the relatives later on."
"If that's so, this has been the longest date ever. You're crazy."
"Crazy serious."
"Fine. One condition. If we get back to Earth we're going to Waffle Den. It's mostly grease anyway, " she chirped, "It's a chain of trucker's hangouts; gas, lots of drifters and traffic. No one will notice if you're a little out of the ordinary. Or."
"Or?"
"A national park, you can be yourself. No suits or mass shifting."
"I thought you liked human mode?"
"I like you, dumbaft. You're not only your Pretender skin. I don't want you to stress your systems out when you're supposed to be relaxing. "
He ran a servo through her braids, "Ok. Where do you really want to go?"
"The beach, we don't have to wait either. It's here. If we get back to Earth, I'll show you what snow is like."
"I want to go back to the creek bed…"
"Target practice meant that much to you?"
"You do. I haven't felt this strongly about anyone– before."
Everything flickered and it took him a klik to refocus. Cypress squeezed his servo, "I love you too."
Bumblebee coughed, "You-" She hadn't read her back already, had she?
Cypress shrugged, "I mean it. I do. I thought it was obvious. I say slag and it never comes out right. But yeah. Haven't had time to research dating customs and everyone has weird advice–"
Bumblebee let her ramble for a bit, patchy Cy-Stan and all.
"But I've seen a lot of people come through the woods. You're the only one that makes me feel safe."
He started to say it wasn't a hard bar to clear. Cypress wasn't smiling though. Her fingers gripped onto his plating, hesitantly, ready to bolt. Slag, she meant it.
Bee settled his arms around her waist, "I love you too."
He didn't expect the hard neck hug.
"I'm sorry I punched you in the face that time."
Bee snorted, "You still remember that?"
"I thought you were tweaking out and I was about to become a statistic."
Bee's helm bobbed in a nod that turned into an actual stasis nod.
"Time to go?"
"Yeah," he caught her arm, "I didn't mean to pull a blaster on you."
"It's ok. If was in an alien's kitchen at tazer-point, I would too. Go to sleep."
"You're good scary, I like that."
That earned him a forehelm kiss.
"You too."
~o~o~o~o~o~
Cypress waited until Bee had started to drift before sliding back into her space. The markings had spread to her clothes, the ceiling was peppered with stars, and very different canid waited for her.
Not a dog. Not a coyote. Not a wolf. Not even fully mechanical either. But some fusion of all.
"Will you listen to me now?" Cypress flinched at her own voice coming from the canid.
"Sure."
"I want out. Please."
"I know."
"I'm not bad." It took on a mode that resembled her bipedal one, "You lock up bad things and I'm not."
Cypress leaned her head against the bristles of…well, herself.
"I know you're not. I'm scared too. We'll go together."
"And you'll be good this time. No more attacking." It wasn't a question. "I know things." The closer she got the clearer her speech became, "You haven't listened to me since you were six."
Cypress folded her arms. "Because I hate waking up on the floor after you try 'talking to computers'. What is so important anyway?"
Other-her gestured to a series of scattered sketches and pictures where the couch was. Every last one of them was coated in static and turning to dust. Other-her held up a disintegrated line of code, "I know we were made to forget things."
"You stopped it?"
"Yeah?! Thing was messing us up."
"Thank you."
A shrug from Other-her, "We won't remember anything that was lost though."
"Good enough."
"What now?"
Other-her grinned, fussing with a tablet, "Aren't you tired of looking like a pup?"
Cypress sat up a little taller. That was the draw of being a Transformer, wasn't it? If they worked together she worked on herself…
"What'd you have in mind?"
(Pluto Projector–Rex Orange County)
(Here With Me - d4vd)
