They Called Him Huffer [Transformers G1]
Title: They Called Him Huffer
Disclaimer: I, in no way, shape, or form, own the Transformers© franchise or the characters it contains. All publicly recognizable characters are copyrighted to Hasbro, and the respective artists/writers/et cetera. No infringement intended.
Fandom: Transformers
Continuity: Generation One (G1) cartoon-movie-verse, during the Decepticon blitz of Autobot city.
Characters: Huffer
Warnings: character death
Summary: The cosmos had it out for Huffer, and that was the long and short of it.
Author's Note: I am not at all that certain of my Huffer voice in this. It feels fairly on, but I’d really appreciate anyone pointing out otherwise/showing where my fail has shone through. Criticism encouraged, technical points preferable. Sorry for killing the flist with double fic posting.
By the way, I found out what a huffer was. And I laughed for like, half an hour.
--
It wasn't what he expected, but then...
System compromised. Repair compromised. Shutdown imminent.
... Huffer’s lot in life had always been pegged.
Oh, some would say it was all about freedom of choice and all that blah-de-dah slag, but he knew better. The cosmos had it out for Huffer, and that was the long and short of it. From the onset, the very first flashing moments of life when his body had activated and consciousness has cascaded through his mind, his fate had been utterly, intractably sealed. Nothing lasted for him, no. He was dragged from horrid place to horrid place - first his, ah, occupation as, well… well, right there was a prime example! Cybertronians got no choice in their lives! Everything was preprogrammed, packaged nice and neat and all pre-determined before any spark even got a decent howdy-do. Function, personality baseline, basic understanding; nothing was left to chance.
It was in his fragging name, for Iacon’s sake! And much as he tried to shake it off, sometimes he still got the odd urge, when looking at aircraft and, inevitably, their thrusters, but, by Primus’s aft, he had fought it. Had fled his function, and learned the art of architecture, had had his optics opened to a whole world beyond his shoddy little going-nowhere home in Yuss.
That had been the high times. The glory days. Ah, slag, it still kind of hurt to think about it, the Golden Age. Something as beautiful as Cybertron had to be fleeting, the barest flash of light in the dismal nothingness some called ‘the universe’. That was the lot of life - everything good had to be taken away, snatched right out from under your hub before you even really got a chance to appreciate it.
In the early part of the war, it had been bearable - even if the buildings went down one by one, and cities were, by slow measures, demolished, it had always seemed… worthwhile. Fixable. It was still Cybertron, after all. Still home.
So he loved his planet of origin. Weld him to a wall, but you couldn’t change it, no matter how the others ridiculed him for it. The gem of the cosmos, the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen in his altogether disappointing life - and of course he couldn’t be on his beloved Cybertron for the end. Oh, no. Instead, he got this slapdash excuse of a city and the lousy excuse for a mudball planet to be his send-off to the great beyond.
‘Autobot City’ indeed. What substandard workmanship! He’d found more quality of design on what passed for a Mecannibal’s aft-region. Who knew what was keeping the blasted thing together in the first place - engine grease and hope, that’s what. Give him the lowest graded scrap from good old Cybertron over this rust-ridden junk any cycle. Would rather have stayed in the Ark - where the airborne pheromones still faintly tasted of home - than this strange amalgamation of Autobot and human aesthetics. Bad stuff, Earthian steel. Couldn’t trust the stuff.
And the ‘Cons showing up just when it was most fragging inconvenient, causing trouble. Always raising some ruckus when a spark just wanted to settle down and sulk or make a fragging roadblock in the middle of nowhere because Primus knew why.
That stupid slagging thing was going to be the end of him, he had known it the moment Prime had propositioned him for the project. Well, he probably knew it, even though he didn’t really remember really knowing it.
Little wonder that, by the time he had managed to clamber down from that fragging rock - no thanks to that menace Hot Rod - that was a kid that was going nowhere, fast - he and Kup and some upstarts had been working on, the front doors had been closed. The others had already fled, leaving him by his lonesome to make his way down, almost completely unaware of what was at hand.
When he realized the air was all but choked with Decepticons, he, naturally, did the sensible thing - he bolted for the backdoor like his servos were on fire. Had taken the longer route to give himself more distance between the epicenter of the attack, the section that hadn’t exactly been, ah, completed to the Cybertronian building standards (not that much was).
And then, of course, the fragging roof supports had given out on him and crushed his legs and a good three-fourths of his torso, missing by the barest of margins his spark chamber. Couldn’t get a good death, couldn’t get a fast one - squished like a fragging Insecticon under second-rate steel, marinating in his own slagging energon. What rotten luck. At least he’d had the good sense to dampen out all his sensors, rerouting all his systems to preserving his cognitive functions - it was a limited ploy, but all he had to hold on to if he wanted to get out. And he was doing a sight better than most of these tread-stripped frontliners, always wailing on about this dent and that tear instead of doing the smart thing and just turning the fragging sensors off. Primus save him from slagging clunkers.
Though he really wouldn’t mind one of the over-clocked fraggers right now, to haul him off to the med bay, and thus to Ratchet’s tender mercies.
Something very like dread formed a cold lurching sensation in his spark, pulled at him. He hadn’t checked his diagnostic program since the initial pulverization; after all, he could see the slagging damage himself. And he couldn’t be that far along yet. Surely he hadn’t been here that long - though it was rather problematic to determine the time with his chronometer shorn off with most of his body.
He worried at his lower lip anxiously, and, with great trepidation, pulled up the report.
Shutdown imminent. System failure. Shutdown imminent. System failure.
… That wasn’t at all encouraging. He really wished that would stop.
But, then, when had the universe ever deemed to grant any wish he made?
Shutting off the diagnostic program, Huffer nervously tapped the ground with his fingers, optics drifting uselessly across the mostly empty expanse of discolored firmament, only the barest wisps of multicolored smoke permeating the sky to break up the monotony. Had to think of something else, keep himself occupied until someone showed up to help him. He grasped futilely at cheery thoughts, pulling at his small reserve of fond memories, searching for something he could latch onto. Nothing terribly impressive there. Nothing really enough to keep him from…
Huffer strained his audios, craning back his head as far as he could as he scanned the immediate area for some sign of rescue. There was still fighting going on - he could hear it clearly enough, though it was clear on the other side of the compound. No point in hollering for help, then, with that racket. He set his head back on the ground, staring up at that ugly, ugly sky that, at some point or another, he had gotten kind of used to. Felt fear, real fear, prickle along his spark chamber, the one place he couldn’t just shut off.
“Not like this,” he grunted. “Ratchet’ll be along to patch me… up.” The empty pep talk fell on emptier air; he knew with a terrible certainty that he had passed the point of no return some while back. He was in a veritable sea of energon, now, probably more than seventy-percent or so that his build-type could hold at capacity, if not more. Was barely holding on to his consciousness, clinging on for all he was worth to make it last as long as he could. Didn’t want to go, especially not like this. Wanted to go home. Just wanted to see home one more time.
Hurt to think about it.
Shutdown commencing.
His visual feed began to dissolve, in slow particle measures, it seemed, to darken, static-snow overlaying the input. The garish blue went Dead-End grey, amazingly finding a way to become even more repulsive to Huffer’s aesthetic sensibilities. The last layer of his vision failed, his spark ebbing, guttering-
… commencing…
-His last power-down-
… commencing…
-On this stupid fragging dirtball.
… finalizing…
His lot in life had alwa-
…