Transformers re-Prime-d (Season 1)

Partners

            She was crying. In every sense of the word, she was crying. That's where I found her. Her knees, pulled up to her chest, her hands covering her eyes, she was sobbing. That's the first sound I noticed. Her weakness in breath. Energon leaked through the cracks between her fingers, rolled down her hands, and welled up in a puddle beneath her. It was a perfect blue. Sobbing true: perfect blue.

I was silent. I didn't know how to act, or react. The door closed behind me and I couldn't do much but stare. Megatron's words returned to me. I had to work. I-I couldn't shirk my responsibilities. Not again.

I walked to the monitor and brought up today's plan. Training first, then lab, then back here for sleep. Food would be redelivered tomorrow. But, feeding schedules usually didn't matter, they never did. She wouldn't eat. Her crying lost most of its noise. I looked over at her from behind the terminal, behind the metal bars. She was shaking: trembling. Her chest cavity rose and fell in stressed tremors. It seemed as if her optics' waterfall had run dry. She was silent now. Her energy was gone. Energy she would need in her training session later.

"You need to eat," I said.

Silence.

"I'm not putting up with your insubordination. Eat."

Her arms were trembling. She wiped her face of excess energon and opened her mouth as if to say something. She had not spoken in awhile.

I picked up the last cup of energon she refused to acknowledge, opened the gate, and walked up to her. I towered over her. I stretched out the cup to her. I needed to ensure that she ate. I would not fail Megatron again.

"Eat."

She did not move. Her crimson eyes were fixed on something in the distance.

"Eat," I said.

She turned her head to look at me. Her optics were a dull, low-light red. She did not reach out her hand, not even for the measly units needed to take the cup.

"A cup so close, and you can't take it? Pathetic."

She turned her head away from me. Her chest contracted. More energon fell from her optics. She wiped away each drop as it fell, but she grew tired quickly. She covered her face. Her heavy breathing turned into sobbing. 'What caused this' I thought to myself, 'was it the word pathetic?' She seemed fine until then. I stood there for some time. This wasn't like before. Something about her didn't seem the same. Nothing about the situation made any sense. I didn't know what to do.

"Stop crying," I said.

She did not.

"Stop it," I said, "Take the energon and drink."

She sobbed through her hands, into her knees.

Something was different. My approach wasn't working. Something in her, maybe it was the puddle that leaked from her, or the vulnerability of it all, but something I saw, something in her optics maybe, something clicked in me that hadn't before. I cared for her. Maybe that was it. I wasn't sure. But, two things were: the first was that she was in pain, and the second was that I couldn't fail Megatron. But, I didn't know how to connect the two. I only knew what I was instructed to know. And what I was instructed to know wasn't much help. But, what else could I do? I needed to get her to eat: To reach out her arm and take the cup.