One is Company, Two is a Shadow ++Soundwave x Reader++

12

         "You've been suspicious of the pain for six Earth hours and haven't said a single thing?" Knockout huffed, staring at this optic-less human. It was even creepier now, especially when her eyelids would either be stuck wide open, half closed, one is closed and the other open or both closed and sunken in their sockets. 

         "The pain had been similar to that of a minor headache caused by lack of water or certain nutrients." (Y/N) explained simply, having taken to sitting completely still to ensure she did not fall to her untimely demise. "The pain had disappeared only a half hour prior to the sudden onslaught of pain, so I felt I had adequately cared for my own ailment."

         "Anyone else feel like she sounds like Shockwave?" Breakdown mumbled, continuing on as he went to the back of the lab. Something about missing the word 'logic' or 'logical' in her speech.

         "I cannot draw a comparison between myself and this renowned scientist. But he seems quite intelligent." 

         "I'm sure if he was alive, he'd be flattered," Knockout rolled his optics, "or not. He wasn't known for showing much emotion, if he had any."

         "Everyone has emotion, Knockout. Sometimes they simply forget how to use them."

     The medic wasn't sure why, but the phrase sent a ghost of a shiver up his spinal strut. There could be many layers to this human's reasoning. Was he willing to figure out exactly what she meant? No not quite. But was his curiosity piqued? Absolutely. He wondered if she referred to herself, M.E.C.H., Soundwave or even Shockwave, as he was the current topic. Again, he wasn't quite willing to go down that hypothetical rabbit hole and instead transformed, activated his holographic form and started working on the new optics.

     The time away from his project had left him with just enough of a break to rethink his strategy, but the only dilemma that came up was the power source. Without the lenses screwed into (Y/N)'s skull he was able to poke around, albeit with some mild disgusted phrases and curses. He easily determined how the now broken and useless lenses had been installed, attached to her central processing unit and inevitably made to kill her. Quite an interesting assassination attempt (at least, that's what he concluded it would have been), but thanks to Soundwave's quick thinking (Y/N) was saved.

         "Do you remember any pain when your lenses were first installed?" Though his attention was mostly on the delicate wiring of the small optics, Knockout still wanted to keep his specimen talking, as she was likely to fall into a coma after her earlier episode. She almost didn't wake up until he had shocked her (a mild wattage but a shock nonetheless). He couldn't afford to have her exhaustion be the unraveling of his newly thought-out idea.

         "Some," she admitted, "Mainly when the molten metal was first cooling and the harsh lighting when the lenses were activated."

     Her usual short and to the point answers were frustrating for once, as she was likely to pass out if she didn't continue with her speaking. Knockout usually found excessive speech annoying, unless it was his own, but in this case hearing silence from this human female was very concerning. Her usual long pauses of slow thought were nerve wracking enough.

         "Describe it." He ordered curtly, glancing at the human. 

     Whatever reaction he was hoping for, the surgeon was greatly disappointed as (Y/N)'s usual blank features dominated her mannerisms. But something caught the optic of the ever-watchful Soundwave as he peered from the cameras above. The human woman, sitting straight backed with her human servos tucked neatly in her lap, leaned back. To Knockout it most likely appeared as if she were following the sound of his voice, leaning back as if to look up. But from the camera above, Soundwave saw the natural flight response he observed when taking the imbedded lenses from her easily crushed skull. This reaction was not as obvious and panicked, but clearly some notion of a memory she did not often indulge to tell had resurfaced, and it was still quite raw.

         "I don't understand why this would be important to your work." (Y/N) stated, but even if she was not doing as told, Knockout just wanted her to keep talking. "I'd imagine the same results would come from these new optics."

         "Not unless something goes wrong, or I decide to keep your nerve function completely operational during the process." Knockout for once kept his own chatter to a minimum. "But I'd imagine that procedure will happen very soon either way."

         "I look forward to your findings, Doctor."

     He didn't like the finalized sound as if she had just ended the conversation until his work was done, but frag she was good at keeping her words and conversations minimal. The Decepticon CMO was at a loss for figuring out how to keep this human yacking. Unlike most he had encountered, even while street racing, humans were known to talk, especially if they felt someone was willing to listen to their miseries. This one clearly avoided them if she hadn't already come to terms with whatever horrors she had endured. What horrors a human with such a short life span could possibly see, Knockout was not interested enough to find out, but it couldn't be anything compared to what he and so many others were exposed to.

         "I'm beginning to think you'd rather pass out and fall into stasis." He decided to huff out, knowing (Y/N) was well aware of her current physical state.

         "I can keep myself upright and alert without needing to speak for long durations of time." Was her slow to come but precise answer. It frustrated the medic even more.

         "Perhaps but without you speaking it's a little difficult to determine if you're still in the waking world, so could you please do something to inform me you're not going to pass out and lock yourself in that human equivalent-"

         "A coma. Or comatose state."

     She had interrupted him. 

     What some would find to be rude and rather intolerable Knockout saw as a breakthrough in her thinking and reflex to answer. The medic stared at the eyeless human just across the medical table. He filtered through what his scanners had picked up and deducted that the combination of pressure within her skull and the foreign matter within her brain (the connecting wires from the lenses) were most likely the culprits of her slow thinking. Now he wondered if she'd still hold the ability to give intelligent, well thought out answers. Or would this quicker thinking bring the usual annoying human flaw of jumping to conclusions far too early in a conversation. Granted Cybertronians can be prone to this flaw as well, but years of learning can solve that problem rather efficiently.