Twisted Cogs | | Bayverse | | Book 2

Chapter 10 | | Otherworldly | |

"We fear what's beyond our lives because we can't see it. But I see peace."

★☆★☆★☆★☆★

Toby Hills awoke to nothing. She had expected to at least feel the sand between her fingers, or the heat of the sun on her back, maybe even the ripped fabric of her shirt, but there was nothing. It was unexpected and strange, for she knew she was dead, and here she was breathing.

It would be hard to explain to someone who has not experienced this, as she could feel and yet she could not, she could see but still was blind, and her ears rang with silent white noise that she could not process. She was alive but not. She sat somewhere in the middle.

Even stranger, when she went to run her digits through her hair, she found soft flesh in the place of metal. Shock had frozen her muscles, eyes wide as she stares at her now fleshy appendage. When her muscles eventually relax, she shouts in surprise, taking in every detail of her skin. Every freckle, every burn mark and every hair, even running her thumb over the jagged scar across her fingers that she had earnt when she dropped a metal sheet as a child.

That had been a while ago, or was it? Maybe it was only a few seconds past. Time has no sense here, making each moment feel both milliseconds short and hours long. It's like a void, but filled with white light instead of blinding darkness.

Seeing nothing beyond the infinite white expanse of the area, the young woman starts walking, somehow finding herself already on her feet.

Her bare feet stride across the barren void, stepping on nothing as she wanders aimlessly. The clothes she wore during the battle have been replaced with a simple, faded blue outfit, just a t-shirt and trousers. There is no change in colour nor feeling, just the oddly warm atmosphere clouding her usually sharp sight.

A... sound comes to play in her ears, a gentle and soft, yet regal and authoritative voice speaking no louder than a whisper. It grows in volume as she walks, and she no longer thinks of it as a trick of silence. Distinct words can be made out, along with the company of a second voice.

Then she comes across a sort of screen, though more alike to a hologram. White fog rolls over the edges of the projected image and around her feet as she watches, curious and entranced by the unfolding scene.

Twelve giants—they make Optimus look small—surround a tiny figure, a boy in shredded clothes. Dirt smudges his cheeks and a tight bandage of fabric clubs his hand, which he uses to block the bright glare behind his peers.

"We have been watching you a long, long time," one of the giants mutters with a voice like the wind.

"You have fought for Optimus, our last descendent, with courage and with sacrifice," another says, bold in their words. "The virtues of a leader."

"But," the boy hesitates, intimidated but at ease, "why am I here?"

Toby blinks, that voice belongs to none other than Samuel Witwicky. It seems as though he has suffered a similar fate, and is no less as confused as she is.

"Samuel James Witwicky," a femme steps forward to address him directly, "my brothers and I have come to an agreement. You are a leader that has risked more than your life to serve our last descendent. And we have decided that you are worthy of our secret."

The young woman breathes a long inhalation in her realisation. He's standing before the Primes.

"The Matrix of Leadership is not found, it is earnt," the Primes speak in unison, sending a shiver down her spine. "Return now to Optimus, and unite the Matrix with his spark."