Yeager Chronicles: After Extinction

20: Cade

For a first, in a while, Cade actually slept in his bed, rested and prepared for the mission at hand: go to the landing site and figure out who's there. He couldn't help but feel a little excited at the whole ordeal. How much chance could it be that that ship carried that one important mech? He wasn't sure but one thing he could be sure of was that this was the most optimistic he's been. Part of him knew he shouldn't get his hopes up so high, especially so early in the morning.

He showered but skipped the shave, it was only enough to wake him up. There wasn't any coffee so it was the only natural way to wake up. He didn't care about that and only made sure he was ready.

Hound tapped at his bedroom window, something he had grown accustomed to. He didn't even care that he was only in his boxers. "Ya 'bout ready?" The former Wrecker stood there, kind of watching Cade and kind of looking about his room from the angle he was at. Cade pulled his pants over his hip and buttoned them. "Almost. When I'm dressed I'll be ready to go." He threw over plain black long sleeve shirt. "How about you guys? All ready?" Cade asked as his head popped out, quietly eyeing the cigar-bullet-thing Hound had between his lips. Did robots have lips? He digressed.

Slightly green optics narrowed at him. "Bumblebee went into town, said that he'd be back before we leave." Cade nodded, grabbing his sneakers, faded from gray to a dirty almost brown gray. It's not like he's gone shoe shopping in awhile, there wasn't really a point to it. Not for him. If they still fit, he'd wear 'em. "Did he say what he was doing?" He fluffed up his hair, long strands slipped between his hands to fall back onto his face. Had his hair really grown that long? So it had, as it would seem.

Hound hummed but did not answer right away, looking behind him a moment, catching a glimpse of Drift and Crosshairs, never, however, catching what they were saying. "Kid don't talk much, especially since the Tessa thing happened," he explained, looking back to the human. Cade sighed, double checking his pants and quietly found his fly down. He knew that Tessa had overreacted but that didn't stop her. She didn't want anything to do with them, even him, she wanted nothing to do with him. He hadn't talked to her since. Shane had said that she's cooled down but that didn't make him rush to her.

That reminded him, Shane was still at the house. Even if it had been a few weeks, perhaps a month since the whole ordeal. They three needed to make amends to each other and when that's done, make good with the other bots. She hadn't exactly been kind. Cade wasn't sure what brought any of it about, why she had gotten so... just rude. A part of him wanted to apologize for her behavior but he knew that he didn't have a good reason to write it off, so he didn't. "I don't get it Hound. She wasn't ever like that," his voice lowered as he approached the window. "Like this. She was so sweet," he clarified. His fingers digging into the curtains, soft and barely touched, sun bleached blue. Or maybe that was the light from Hound's optics that made the blue stand out. Either way, that didn't really matter.

"People change, Cade. Even those you love most," the Wrecker sounded sad, dull, like there was something like resignation in his tone. He must know the feeling personally, Cade mused.

Behind them, the brightening morning, Bumblebee's lights cut through the dark. "There's Bee," Cade caught himself saying aloud. Hound turned back only enough to give the scout a sidelong glance. "Everyone's 'ere, might aswell get rollin'." Cade took the hint, grabbing the bag he readied himself with for the journey. (Even if it wasn't such a long one, may aswell be prepared for whatever may come.) And walked out of his room and down the stairs.

The lights down on floor level were not on, in a word, odd. Lucky Charms almost always had to have half the house lit up in the morning: a year-round Christmas tree. Except, this was a house. Not his house but it's not like Cade cared that much either way if he was here or not. Since what happened five years ago, running from the CIA and the whole thing in China, he grew on him. Not to mention he told Cade the truth about Tessa being booted from campus. (Cade was still quite steamed about that, but at least the truth came out. Even if it wasn't from her.)