A resounding crash made Silverstorm look up, his arms and legs shaking as he paused in his exercises. There was a shout of rage, and Red Alert's angry voice slashed into the shocked silence.
"You idiot! You fragging idiot! Do you know how long it took us to make those? And you just broke half of them! Can't you do anything right?"
Blurr responded, his voice high with stress as his words tumbled over each other. "I'm sorry, Red! I didn't mean to drop it! I just thought I could do it a bit faster and I didn't see that box! I'll pick them up!"
"Forget it, Blurr! Go 'help' somebody else!"
The implication on the word "help" was bitter and sarcastic, and there was a ringing silence. Mirage and Pipes stood on either side of Silverstorm, ready to catch him if he fell for the thousandth time, and they were frozen in surprise. After a few moments, Blurr hurried past the open medbay door, his posture stiff and his head down. Silverstorm automatically took a step forward to run after the blue bot, but his muscle cables protested at once. He folded, and two sets of strong arms caught him.
"Easy, Prime," Mirage said, his face tense.
Pipes and Mirage helped Silverstorm back into his berth. Ultra Magnus frowned as he stared at the door. He didn't say anything, but he was clearly worried about Blurr. Pipes poured a quarter cube of medical grade energon for Silverstorm.
"Good session," he said, but his optics dashed uneasily toward the doorway.
"Raj?" Silverstorm asked softly.
Mirage nodded. "I'll find him."
"Bring him here when you do. I need to talk to him."
Silverstorm took the energon cube, sipping on the semi-bitter energon. Things with Blurr had been going downhill since his surgery with Primus. During the days when Silverstorm was in surgery, he began acting erratically. Even now he seemed distracted, anxious, nervous, and he was always shifty when he was forced to visit Silverstorm in the medical bay. His clumsiness was at an all time high. Something was wrong, but the Prime hadn't gotten a chance to talk to him. It was time, past time, to talk to him.
As time ticked away, Silverstorm grew antsy. He wanted to go after Blurr himself, but his current state of weakness meant he was stuck in the medbay. He whiled away the time by continuing a fun comedy story that Mirage had recommended. Every few minutes, he looked up at the doorway to see if Mirage was back yet, but nothing appeared. He slid down to lay flat on his back and continued reading, but he was physically exhausted from his exercises. Before he knew it, he dozed off, floating in a haze of half-awake thoughts.
"Silverstorm?"
The Prime jerked awake. He shuttered his optics several times before Mirage came into focus. Blurr stood slightly behind him, his blue optics dashing around.
"Raj, Blurr," Silverstorm croaked.
He tried to push himself up, but his quivering arms wouldn't hold his weight. Mirage helped him to sit up then stood back. He glanced over at Ultra Magnus, who swung his legs over the side of the berth.
"I need to stretch and get some exercise," he said. "Raj? Help me?"
Mirage immediately went over and grasped Ultra Magnus's arm and they headed out into the cool, starry day. Silverstorm shifted to get into a more comfortable position. Blurr stood stiffly, his fingers digging into the armor on his arms. He wouldn't look at Silverstorm, his expression tight.
"You okay?" Silverstorm asked gently.
Blurr shrugged a shoulder, his foot tapping on the floor to expend the excess energy that constantly seemed to flood through his body.
"Sit down?"
The blue youngling took a step back and shook his head.
"Are you okay?" Silverstorm repeated, a bit more forcefully.
"No," Blurr spat, looking up angrily.
"What's wrong?"
Blurr didn't answer, but his expression pinched. He was clearly upset. But what was wrong?
"Is this about what happened with Red?" Silverstorm asked, changing tactics.
Blurr scowled, scuffing his foot over the floor. "I didn't mean to drop the box. He was just moving so slow!" He paused and looked down, bitterness flashing across his face. "Everybody moves too slow," he muttered.
"It must be frustrating," Silverstorm said.
"Don't pretend you understand. Nobody does," Blurr said, stomping his foot.
"But I do. My original species is incredibly slow in certain ways. Like talking and thinking. It was so aggravating to talk to them in my native tongue and realize that they were lightyears behind where I was."
That caught Blurr's attention. He shifted forward. "Really?"
Silverstorm smiled. "Yeah. It was strange. In some ways, they moved faster; with much shorter lifespans there was more to stuff into their short days. But in other ways, they were maddeningly slow. It drove me up a wall when they trudged across a room when I could flash over in less than a second."
Blurr hesitated then moved to sit in the chair beside Silverstorm's berth. He was perched on the edge of his seat, ready to spring up at a moment's notice. He still gripped his arms, and his optics were tinged with white.
"It is frustrating," he murmured. "So frustrating to see the world move so slowly when you know you can move faster, but society doesn't want you to move faster. It wants you to slow down, and it will do anything to make sure you do."
Silverstorm frowned. "What do you mean, Blurr?"
Blurr shivered then held up a hand. He stared at it, as if he saw something else.
"They thought something was wrong with me," he finally said, his voice slower than Silverstorm had ever heard it. It was a soft, even cadence, almost practiced, like a performance. "My protector said there was nothing wrong with me. He was adamant. But they didn't listen. After one too many accidents, the community petitioned for help from those higher in command. It reached the Council. They summoned me to see if things were as bad as the petition claimed."
He paused and lowered his hand, placing both in his lap as he sat up tall and proper. His optics stared straight ahead at the wall, but Silverstorm knew he was seeing something in the past. "My protector grew nervous, and since the Council appointment was so far ahead, he took me and began to train me. He insisted there was nothing wrong with me, but he said that if I didn't pass the inspection, bad things might happen. He taught me to pretend to be calm and collected. He taught me to be slow and careful."
Blurr paused and his face twisted. "It wasn't enough. I couldn't pretend well enough," he rasped. He began to shake. "They took me away from him after I failed, told me he wasn't taking care of me properly. I was only allowed to see him once every few weeks after that. They told me there was something wrong with me. And they gave me to the doctors."
The youngling's optics were bright white. His voice began to speed up to its normal pace then beyond that, his words crisp and precise but very, very fast. "They told me that they would fix what was wrong with me. They took me into a bright room with lots of lights and a table. There were tools and a machine with tubes. They lashed me to the table, and the cables were very tight on my wrists and ankles. Then they drove big needles into my wrists and neck."
Blurr looked frantically at Silverstorm. "Have you ever had your tubes pressure-cleared? I know why Primus doesn't like it, but at least we give him breaks. They did it again and again and again day after day after day to fix me. They didn't understand why it wasn't working. They began to blame me for not being fixed. But the more they did it, the faster I talked, the clumsier I got. They grew angry at me and began to try other things to fix me.
"They put me under and began to operate on my spark, trying to pull out the strands that were wrong. When that didn't work, they stopped caring and left me awake to see what my reactions were. They figured the bad parts of me would make me scream louder, and they pulled and stretched out parts of my spark, trying to make me better, trying to slow me down, trying to make me normal."
Blurr paused, his breathing so quick that Silverstorm was worried that he would chill his spark and pass out. Then he intook a long, deep breath and settled back.
"And then the wall exploded," he murmured, his voice back to the slow pace. A grim smile played on his face. "The remaining doctors fled the ruins and left me locked up in my little room after a surgery. I had been locked up for ages, and I didn't even know there was a war going on." He paused and offlined his optics tiredly. "Luckily the Autobots found me instead of the Cons."
Silverstorm sat in the silence that filled the room after the story, thinking over what Blurr had said.
"You were a sparkling when you faced the Council, weren't you?" Silverstorm asked uneasily.
"Yeah. I was. But something was wrong. I was wrong. And they had to fix me."
Silverstorm frowned. "There is nothing wrong with you, Blurr."
Blurr looked into his lap, his optics flickering with uncertainty. "That's the last thing Sparkler said to me. But it's hard to believe."
"Sparkler was your protector?" Silverstorm asked.
"Yeah. The last time I saw him, he was worried and his optics were dim. He was tired, so tired, and I was aching from another surgery. I didn't like to whine in front of him, but I broke down that day and asked what was wrong with me. He grasped my chin and looked at me. He said to me that there was nothing wrong with me, but that the doctors and the Council were wrong. He said that the Council was funding the doctors to help even out society, to take away things they didn't like, but just because a few old, stupid, stuffy mechs didn't like something didn't mean that it was wrong. He said that he was talking with somebody on the outside who would get me out and we would go home and be happy and safe and the doctors would never touch me again."
Blurr's vocalizer spit static and he let out a soft whine. "When the Autobots pulled me out, they were shocked at what they found in the computers, about what they did to me. I found out the Council was destroyed and all the members were dead from a Decepticon bomb blast. I was treated by this nice medic and then given into the care of Ultra Magnus and sent into the mines. Before I left, the medic found out what had happened to Sparkler. He had gotten the spark sickness from stress and had wasted away. He died three days before I was let out. I still miss him."
"I'm so sorry, Blurr," Silverstorm said. He reached his shaking hand over to place it gently on Blurr's cheek. It took effort to hold his arm up, but he didn't care.
"I never told any of the other younglings about what they did to me. I thought if I didn't that they wouldn't think there was something wrong with me. And they didn't for a long time."
"There's nothing wrong with you," Silverstorm said forcefully. "If you don't believe me, believe Sparkler. There is nothing wrong with being a bit faster than average, with being hyper and clumsy. Yes, there are problems that come up, but everybody has problems. What matters is trying to come up with solutions."
"You mean fixing me," Blurr asked dully.
"No. I mean helping you to adapt. There's nothing wrong with you personally. But you've got to admit there are some issues that you face because of your speed. If we work together, all of us, we can help you to be more thoughtful and slower when you need to be, and we can help the others see that sometimes your speed is a great thing. Does that sound okay?"
Blurr hesitated, reaching up to place his hand over Silverstorm's. "Do you really mean that?"
"I do," Silverstorm said.
With a long, shaky sigh, Blurr relaxed back in his chair. Silverstorm pulled his hand back and rested it in his lap. Blurr looked carefully at his Prime.
"I'm sorry I haven't been visiting," Blurr said. "I don't like seeing you so weak. It makes me wonder if that's what Sparkler went through. And with all the slag the doctors did, I don't like medical procedures."
"The Aerialbots don't like medical procedures either," Silverstorm said.
"I know. Slingshot told me," Blurr said. "I just don't like to admit it. But I do trust Pipes. And that nice medic that helped me afterwards."
"Do you remember his name?" Silverstorm asked curiously.
"Ratcher?" Blurr asked, making a face.
"Ratchet?" Silverstorm gasped.
"That's it. Why? Do you know him?"
"Yes! He's with Optimus and his team. He should be coming home soon."
Blurr smiled. "I hope I get to talk with him again."
"I'm sure you will. He's a good mech."
There was a gentle knock at the doorframe. Mirage and Ultra Magnus stood there, and Ultra Magnus looked ready to collapse.
"Is everything okay?"
Blurr leaped up and rushed over to help Ultra Magnus to lie down.
"It will be," Blurr said cheerfully. He turned to smile at Silverstorm. "Thanks."
"I'll talk to Red after I rest a little," Silverstorm promised. "And then you and I will talk to everybody. Okay?"
"Have a good rest, Prime," Blurr said, then turned and practically skipped out the door.
Mirage helped Silverstorm to lie back before plopping into the chair. "Everything okay?"
"It will be," Silverstorm murmured.
"Good. You should recharge or Pipes will jump down your throat."
The advice was unneeded, as Silverstorm dozed off as Mirage was speaking. Ultra Magnus chuckled then picked up a datapad to look over. Mirage smiled.
"It will be okay, won't it?" he mused quietly to himself.