I'm here

Chapter 5

Jazz had never realized how beautiful the organic forest was until now. The lush green leaves, the sturdy trunks of the the trees and the colorful flowers that littered the very ground he treaded upon. Curious organic animals would come out and stare at them, their fluffy and feathery bodies were beautiful to look at. He took care not to tread on anything delicate as he trekked through this green world.

"Makes me wish we had stuff like this back home," chuckled Jazz, taking it all in.

He looked over his shoulder and his smile sank. Sideswipe was not appreciating the beautiful organic forest at all, he was cowering behind Jazz and desperately trying to hide in between his door wings. Jazz could understand why but he insisted that Sideswipe had nothing to fear as long as he was around with his enhanced Decepticon sensor.

"Trust me kid, ain't nothin' gonna harm you out here," promised Jazz.

Sideswipe only managed an "uh-huh" as he stuck close to the veteran.

They continued towards where Jazz had landed his shuttle, deep in the forest where humans rarely walked. Jazz didn't really have a choice on where he docked it but he knew that Sideswipe was wishing that he had parked it closer. The young mech was dripping with coolant and his optics focused on Jazz's back as if he was trying to ignore the world around him. He looked like he was going to purge.

"So that was an interesting thing we watched last night," said Jazz, hoping a conversation would help lighten the mood.

"Uh-huh," mumbled Sideswipe.

"I mean I thought we had terrible actors back home but these organics took it to whole new level," laughed Jazz.

"Uh-huh," mumbled Sideswipe yet again.

"I didn't understand why that female had to keep sayin' oh at the start of every sentence, it was funny for a while but did that get annoyin' fast or what?" Jazz laughed again, last nights memories filling him with funny thoughts.

"Uh-huh," mumbled Sideswipe once more.

"And that one bad guy? Primus I've seen better bad guys on sparkling shows," said Jazz with a snort, "how did he talk? I'ma gonna get yous-"

"SHUT UP!"

Jazz almost jumped out of his armor as Sideswipe's loud voice rung in his audios and nearly popped them. Nearby birds fled into the sky and the organic critters fled from the scene as quick as lightning. Turning around he stared at the young mech with concerned optics, wondering why he made that sudden outburst. Sideswipe just stood heaving slow and hard, his face paler than usual and his little winglets trembled and drooped. He looked terribly ill and appeared ready to fall over at any moment with the way he was swaying.

In a situation like this one would ask "are you ok?" Jazz hated it when 'Bots asked that question to those who were clearly not ok. It was a terrible excuse of an ice breaker and Jazz knew asking it here would be pointless for he knew exactly how Sideswipe felt, and it was obvious that he wasn't ok. "We're almost there, it's just a little further," he promised.

Sideswipe nodded, his frame rattling as he shook even more. "I'm s-sorry," he croaked.

"It's fine," said Jazz, "I can understand that being out here is hard for you. Let's just keep goin', the sooner we get there the sooner we can head back."

Jazz took a step forward but noticed Sideswipe hadn't moved. Staring down at his legs he could tell that they were frozen in place. Walking back over to the young mech Jazz slowly reached out to him and curled his hand around Sideswipe's, taking a gentle hold of it. "C'mon," he said gently, giving him a little tug. Sideswipe started to move again but kept his head down.