Weekly Request Response - Staring in the Dark
TITLE: Staring in the Dark
CONTINUITY: Transformers: Animated
RATING: K+
SUMMARY: For a bot like Optimus, forgiving and forgetting are the same: easier said than done, but necessary. He tries to. He really does. It's not healthy, to remember to the point of obsession, but he does.
INSPIRED BY: TFRarePairing’s Weekly Request Prompt on LiveJournal
PROMPT: Optimus/Blackarachnia - Lost but not forgotten
DISCLAIMER: Transformers: Animated is property of Hasbro.
He wishes he could forget.
He tries to. He really does. It's not healthy, to remember to the point of obsession, but he does.
He was successful. Once. A prolonged stasis that lasted fifty stellar cycles did not allow for dreams. Or memory. No consciousness, really.
Did it?
For the time being, he decides not to meditate upon it, simply lighting a Praxian lantern.
Bots would purchase these by the dozens during times of peace, say prayers to Primus, write a name upon the lantern and light it, then set it free. Many believed the lanterns carried sorrow away, little by little, and also believed the lanterns went to find the recently offlined, to guide them to the Allspark.
It comforts him a little, to do something to honor her, but he knows that even if he were to obtain every Praxian lantern, light them all, and set them loose, they would not carry away the guilt in his spark.
He wishes he could forget.
He looks out, onto the city of Iacon. He stands upon a building, high above the lights and sounds, away from other optics and audio receptors.
He was reunited with her in a similar place; on a roof in Detroit city of Earth.
And fully realized his error. Realized what happened when he tried to forget. Tried to forget about her.
Had he not tried to forget, he would’ve sent a search party after her. Maybe even hijacked a ship to go back to Archa Seven. Scoured the entire planet for her shell.
Instead, he tried to forget. The mistake cost him not one, but two friendships. And one thousand long, painful stellar cycles.
When his ship went beaming towards Earth, he thought he could finally be free of the awful memory.
And then, after fifty stellar cycles, he woke up to a new world, new responsibilities, and a new friend. And he remembered.
The memory slams back in his faceplates orbital cycles after.
And he tried to forget.
This lantern’s light is yellow, the color of her old paintjob. He remembers so many good things about her. Her laughter. Her passion for knowledge and other bots. Her curiosity and intelligence. Her love of history. The way she stood up for the ‘lower’ bots.
Inhaling to cool his circulatory wiring, he remembers how she felt against him. Her warm embraces and the presses of her vocal labi to his faceplates.
There was a time she accidentally wounded herself in a practice spar with her friend Chromia. One of her stabilizing servos had been twisted, and while crutches would’ve been sufficient, he had offered to carry her whenever needed, if the pain became too much.
She took up his offer, and with a jab to his spark, he remembers her support servos around his chassis as he carried her. To her classes, to her job, to her home.
And their talks. How they could talk. Their conversations could carry for cycles. About their friends. And bots they didn’t like. About successful classmates, and hardworking teaching units. About Sentinel, and Ultra Magnus, and old mech Kup, and how they were doing. About planets they wanted to visit and goals they wanted to achieve.
And he lost that.
He figured he had a good reason to forget. When he lost Elita-1 to a vengeful, bitter Decepticon known as Blackarachnia. He should’ve started to forget then.
He wishes he could forget.
And when he lost her on Dinobot Island, he should’ve let her go.
Never. He had tried for a thousand stellar cycles, but still he didn’t let her go. The memories came to back, this time to torment him and twist the guilt deeper into his spark.
When he and his crew returned to Cybertron, he tried high-grade for the first time in his life.
Even the fire of the liquid could not burn away his errors.
All it gave him was an overcharged stagger home to softly weep, then come offline the next solar cycle to a pounding in his processor.
Jazz had covered his aft that day, ordering him to go home and recharge while the saboteur would take care of things.
No arguing ensued.
So this solar cycle, he decides to go mourn her instead of getting overcharged. He climbs to the highest building he can see, Praxian lantern in servo, and….
….well.
“I’m so sorry. I’ll never forget what I’ve done, how everything that went wrong was my fault. More importantly, though, I’ll never forget you, Elita. Because no matter your faction, or your friends, or what happens to us from here on out, you will always be Elita-1 to me. Many will remember the bad, but I’ll remember the good. Always.”
He knows she’s gone now. But he feels her, online, somewhere. Maybe one with the Allspark, as all bots eventually become.
And this lightens his spark.
If only a little.
So he releases the Praxian lantern, hoping the yellow light will find another yellow being and bring to her his apologies. His sorrow. His memory.
Watching the lantern drift farther and farther away, he suddenly feels alone. He lost none of the heaviness in his spark. She only adds to it.
It’s times like this. It’s always times like this;
He wishes he could forget.