Transformers ( Bayverse ) - I Bleed Into Darkness

11 - Civility

        Fay froze as she spotted him sitting at the table. Just Optimus. Charlie wasn’t here today. The sight of him waiting for her alone made her scowl. She turned on her heel and stormed out of the room, brushing past bodies headed in the opposite direction as she trudged back to her bedroom. She closed the door once she was inside. She couldn’t lock the damn thing, but she doubted Optimus would be able to find her bedroom, anyway.

        If he was able to get out of the visiting area unsupervised. And how likely would that be? Fay huffed, crossing her arms as she sat on the bed and the mattress gave a slight groan from it’s aging state. Of course, it couldn’t be all that hard. Optimus had gotten out before, and so had Charlie. ‘Stupid lax security . . .’ She thought bitterly, immediately getting back up from the bed, pacing around the small room.

        ‘They can’t be that dumb . . . They can’t be that blind . . . Can they . . . ?’ She bit at a nail, a terrible habit she’d had as a child, and had kicked successfully, staying away from it for years, but now . . . She couldn’t help herself . . . She didn’t know what to think or do. She couldn’t face Optimus. She just couldn’t. And why not? She didn’t know, but the thought of him caused her anxiety.

        She groaned, rubbing her hands over her arms, even though the temperatures outside were well above eighty, and those inside were at a modest sixty-seven. Everything was a mess. The only reason she’d gone to the visiting space every day was to see Charlie, lord knew her mother didn’t have the decency to show up.

        ‘Because she’s not your real mom,’ Fay reminded herself bitterly, shaking her head. ‘Her job is done. She handed you off to the aliens and kept her hands clean. She doesn’t have any reason to keep showing up anymore.’ She sighed, pausing in the room, staring out the sealed window. She wanted so terribly for everything to go back to what they were when she was innocent. When the world didn’t feel so broken.

        ‘When I wasn’t such an outcast . . . When I didn’t call into question everyone’s motives . . . When Harvey was still here . . . When Harvey was my father . . .’ It felt almost wrong to think of him as ‘Dad’ anymore when he was so obviously just an adoptive parent. One that wasn’t alive anymore. But he’d loved her, hadn’t he? That much was still true, right? She wasn’t sure if she could take it if he hadn’t actually loved her. She wasn’t sure what she would think about herself or, anything, for that matter, for the rest of her life.

        He had to have cared for her. He’d known all his life and he’d cared. ‘Right?’ Fay bit her lip, not entirely sure what to think about that. It wasn’t exactly like she could just ask him. But he’d played with her as a child. He’d gotten her toys like Legos and Lincoln Logs and he’d played with her, building things with her and helping stretch her mind. He spent more time with her than Cynthia did, actually. It wasn’t just late-night stargazing, her father had actually seemed to neglect Jaxson in favor of her, but Jaxson didn’t seem to mind, either.

        ~~~

        “Show me how to make a bridge, Fair. How do you make a bridge with what you’ve got here?” He’d prodded her at five years old and she frowned, eyebrows etching together as she examined the Legos in front of her, the bits of plastic that would interlock so well if she just figured out a sturdy way to build a bridge. She began to pout.

        “Daddy I don’t-.”

        “You do know, Fair. I know you do. You’re far too bright to just not know. You’re a smart girl. And one day you’re going to change the world.”

        She blinked, giving a small nod and turning back to the building blocks, her mind turning over and over as she began to work. Her father left for a short while, coming back to two entirely different structures. She looked up at him, blue eyes meeting blue, hers quite a bit brighter than they had been.