The Tangled Web We Weave
If you asked him, Ratchet wouldn’t have been able to tell you when it started. No one could.
It had started small. Perceptor just seemed more subdued. More tired. All his friends passed it off as his horrible sleeping habits finally taking their toll. He simply… started fading.
Maybe it started with Harry and Cybil and their daughter. That was the only event that anyone could think of that may have made it begin.
---
“How did you two find yourselves out here?” Wheeljack asked as he carefully carried the humans into the med bay. “The nearest city’s miles from here.”
“We didn’t come from a city,” Cybil, a blond young woman with tired blue eyes and a police uniform, said.
“Then where’d you come from?”
“From a small town. We’ve been there a while, and it’s sort of disconnected. I guess we got lost,” Harry said quietly, cradling the small baby closer. “We can’t stay here for long. We just need some directions, maybe something to eat and drink. We won’t stay long, I promise…”
“Don’t worry about it!” Wheeljack said cheerfully, putting them down on the med bay berth gently. “It’s not everyday we find humans wondering around aimlessly. Make yourself at home.”
Ratchet looked up confusedly, his optics flickering. “What…?”
Wheeljack grinned, clapping his hands together. “This is Harry, Cybil, and their daughter… what’s your daughter’s name?”
Cybil looked up sharply. “I’m not wi-”
“Her name is Ch-”
Cybil and Harry glanced at each other. “Our… our daughter’s name is Heather,” Cybil said quietly.
Wheeljack nodded, smiling, and turned away. “I’ll just go and get you something to eat and-”
“Wheeljack, Ratchet, I have to t-”
There was a frozen moment. Perceptor stood just inside the doorway, his optics fixed on the three humans, namely the baby, his mouth open slightly, as if he were still meaning to finish his last word.
The humans were staring at him as well, their eyes wide. The baby started shifting in her father's grip, twisting around so that it almost seemed as though she were making eye-contact with the scientist.
You know, if Ratchet didn’t know any better, he would’ve said that that baby smirked at the scientist.
---
What had been really weird about that couple though is that, when they were leaving, Harry told Wheeljack to be careful. He told him to be careful around Perceptor especially.
He wouldn’t elaborate further than that.
But Perceptor had just started getting more and more tired. Everyone had brushed it off at first.
That was when Wheeljack found him on the floor of his quarters one day, passed out from fever.
---
Brawn paced around the med bay, a forcibly irritated scowl on his face. The subtle wringing of his hands would reveal his worry for what it was, however, to anyone who cared to look close enough. But most people in the room were too busy worrying about Perceptor to notice.
“Ratchet, what is wrong with him?” Beachcomber asked, gazing down at his dear friend with one of the most worried frowns anyone had seen him wearing.
“I…” Ratchet slammed his fists against the berth, hanging his head in a rare gesture of defeat and letting out a furious sigh. “I don’t know.”
There was a horrible silence.
“It’s… it’s like someone has set him on fire from the inside. But there’s no fire. There’s no reason for him to be running such a serious fever. And if I try administering anymore coolant, his systems could freeze up and stop working. The best I can do is give him as much coolant as possible and pray. Just pray.”
---
Perceptor didn’t wake up until four weeks afterwards. Everyone was ecstatic, but the mood was dampened when they realized that he wasn’t talking, wasn’t responding save for shifting and looking at people. Sadly, the horror had only just begun.
Ratchet was the first to have a dream.
---
It was very quiet here. Silent.
The wind doesn’t make a sound here. The water doesn’t drip and drizzle. I hear no one speaking. No one singing.
I used to crave silence like this. Now it is suffocating me, driving me slowly insane.
I can feel darkness in this place. I can see it, although… although even I have trouble seeing through this blanket made of fog. This thick sheet that wraps around you and lulls you into the kind of sleep you shall never awaken from.
Why do I always come here?
I’m standing at the edge of a dock overlooking a lake. A large, gray lake. I could fall into it and never come back up. I could fall asleep in the dark waters, becoming part of the silence around me.
Sometimes, I see faces in those waters. I see the face of a woman betrayed by one she loved. I see the face of a teenager taken advantage of by her father. I see the face of a man driven insane. I see the face of a young woman who lost someone she loved dearly. I see the face of a man whose mother did not love him.
Most often though, I see the face of a young girl. A young girl, with her innocence burned away in the fires of reality. I’ve seen that girl before.
I feel sorry for them all. None chose their fates. All are trapped under the churning surface of the lake. All are caged in this quiet little town, a part of the silence.
I could fall into the silence. I could join them. I could sink into the deepest sleep known to mortal kind and stay there forever, wrapped in the blanket of silence.
There are no faces on the surface now, however, I know that they are there. Trapped.
I slowly lower myself to the dock, dipping a foot into the lake. It’s cold, but I could go in. I could go deep within and find out more about the horrors that the faces in the water experienced. I could become one of them.
Silence. I could be one with the silence.
I stand up slowly, the soundless wind washing by gently, caressing me with deceptive tenderness. I spread my arms like wings and tilt forward, watching as I fall down for the water to envelop me completely.
---
Ratchet woke up, immediately standing. Something inside of him was shrieking for him to go to Perceptor. He had only had that sort of feeling once in his life. And when he didn’t respond to it, a mech died.
He was responding to it now.
Before he really realized that he was awake, he was shaking Perceptor gently, whispering his name over and over again. Any other medical professional would have denounced this and said that his patient’s rest was much more important than whatever slagging weird dreams he could cook up, but he would simply tell those professionals to go frag themselves.
Perceptor made a jerking motion, and his optics fluttered open.
“Percy?”
The scientist took a breath, looking up at Ratchet.
“Are you alright? I had a feeling that you…”
Ratchet abruptly stopped himself, shaking his head. “Nothing. It’s gone now. Go to sleep.”
But instead, Perceptor just sat up slowly, taking Ratchet’s hands in his. He blinked quietly, and slowly, as if he were meeting resistance in the air, he reached up and cupped Ratchet’s cheek in one hand gently. “Thank you.” He sat up a little farther, and before Ratchet knew what was happening, Perceptor kissed him sweetly on the forehead. “I was sick. I wasn’t thinking properly. But I am better now.”
Ratchet stared with wide optics, subconsciously savoring the feeling of his friend’s hand, as Perceptor started to undo the medical equipment attached and connected to his armor.
“P-Perceptor… how…? You… you haven’t talked… how are you…?”
Perceptor looked up, smiling gently. “I’m better, old friend. I promise to stay better.” He cocked his head slightly, his optics looking off into space for a moment. “It’s quiet, but there is sound. I think I rather that over complete silence.”
The scientist kissed the medic’s forehead one last time, and before Ratchet could respond, he left the med bay, leaving a vague flowery scent behind and the phantom feeling of his hands.
---
The signs became more subtle. But they were there. Perceptor seemed more tired; he stared off into space more often; it was harder to get his attention, but he was healthy. Those that loved him were willing to turn a blind eye to his little problems if only to maintain the illusion that he was okay. He had always preferred it.
One of the odder things was that he suddenly became much more loving and affectionate. He was mothering the younger Autobots, even the twins. Daring to touch Brawn in a comforting way. He suddenly made a habit of stroking helms, cuddling against close friends when he was sitting with them, even going so far as nuzzling and small affectionate kisses. In all honesty? No one was complaining. The sudden affection was a very welcome reprieve from the mostly hands-off attitude of soldiers. And it reassured his friends that he was still alive and ‘healthy.’
But the nightmares didn’t stop. Ratchet kept on dreaming about that place, that silent place full of grotesque, twisted visions of fear and anger. Of fire. Of hell.
He wasn’t the only one.
---
Wheeljack scrambled over the rocks, not caring about the cuts that they made on his fleshy human hands. He glanced back briefly, letting out a shriek at the creature before he jumped over the rest of the debris.
It latched on to his back.
He let out a scream, twisting and writhing in its grip. Its skin burned through his shirt, burning his back. He got a brief look at its face, and he immediately started struggling harder.
Its face was completely blown away, as if it had held a small bomb to there while it exploded. Its skin was burnt and shriveled, chunks of it missing completely, and whatever it touched burnt away as if by actual fire. One of its legs were twisted grotesquely, dragging along the ground with its foot completely gone, only a ragged, black, shriveled stump left, trailing blood and pus where it walked. Its hands were gone-it seemed as though it, after blowing up its face, let two more bombs explode in its hands-but there were metal claws growing out of the edges of the stumps, ready to latch on to anyone and never let go.
Wheeljack writhed, feeling the fiery skin burning his own. His knees buckled, leaving him sprawled on the ground with the thing on top of him. The claws ripped through his skin, burning and cutting at the same time. He let out one last scream, and felt his vision waver…
Shlick!
The sickening sound of metal slicing cleanly through flesh filled the engineer’s ears, and he felt the thing fall away. Someone pulled him up, and he pulled the clawed arms away from himself, wincing when he pulled away the razor-edged and barbed blades. About three fourths of the population wouldn’t have been able to bear the pain that pulling them out entailed, but Wheeljack was one of the few who could.
What he couldn’t handle, however, was seeing the arms fall limply on the ground…
…with no body following them.
Wheeljack spun around, and he felt sour bile rising in his throat when he saw the monster twisting on the ground, a strangled, high-pitched, awful screech coming from its burnt throat. Its shoulders twitched, no arms connected to it.
“Cutting off its arms is the only way to make it let go. Come on!”
His savior grabbed his wrist, dragging him along. Wheeljack ran with him, but stared back. Before they had gone several yards, the creature let out one last scream before exploding. If he had still been in its clutches, he would have died.
He looked away at the person who saved him. It was a male human, bright blue eyes, messy brown hair, dirt from the world around them smudging his face…
Didn’t take much for Wheeljack to recognize Ratchet.
“Where are we, Ratchet?” Wheeljack asked, barely audible, a plaintive note in his voice.
“I don’t know, ‘Jack.”
They both staggered to a halt, all but collapsing against the wall of an old, decrepit hospital. They both heaved for breath, Wheeljack squeezing Ratchet’s hand nervously. Ratchet returned the pressure reassuringly, running his thumb up and down the back of his friend’s hand.
Then there was a dragging sound.
Ratchet and Wheeljack exchanged glances, and slowly, they turned to look at the door where the sound was coming from.
Ratchet’s breath noticeably caught in his throat. Wheeljack felt like he would be sick again.
It looked vaguely human, with supernaturally long arms that trailed on the ground behind it. Bandages were wrapped around its head, hiding its face from view completely. It had long and thin legs, and it was wearing what looked like the remains of a tattered hospital’s patient uniform. The most horrifying aspect of it, however, was what looked like the result of a half-done surgery or dissection on its chest. It was cut open and its beating heart was in full view. Blood flowed from the huge wounds non-stop, and small streams of red trickled down its long arms, leaving pools and trails on the ground.
The creatures skin shined slightly, looking vaguely metallic, and it gave off soft moans from the lips that must have been under the bandages. They were pained moans. Desperate moans.
Its head spasmed, face twitching violently as if it were having a seizure focused solely on there.
It moved, its arms dragging along behind it and slowly swung its sightless head around, moaning softly.
“What is that?”
The creature snapped its head to face the source of the sound, Wheeljack. It made a groaning sound, and slowly, it raised one of its arms.
“Wheeljack, look out! It’s going to-”
The monster swung its arm, hitting Wheeljack and by extension Ratchet and slamming them into the wall so hard there was an ominous crack that came from both of them.
Wheeljack let out a scream, falling to the ground and ripping at his clothes. The creature’s red-black blood was burning through the cloth and skin it touched like acid, seeping through to the inside of him in only a few short seconds.
Ratchet stood up, staring down at his friend in horror.
“Ratchet, help!”
He blinked slowly, his breath catching in his throat.
“Please, help me!”
He couldn’t save him. He couldn’t save another friend. There was no way…
The creature staggered forward, letting out a groan. The little sound snapped Ratchet out of his daze, and he immediately knelt by his friend, ripping off the hem of his dirty shirt.
The creature took another step towards them.
Ratchet swiped the bunched up cloth over Wheeljack’s rapidly worsening wound, holding his spasming friend down with his other hand. He felt the acidic blood eat through his own hand, but he didn’t react. Only when all of the creature’s blood was wiped away did he throw the cloth, holding his bleeding hand gently.
The creature let out one mighty groan and raised its arm, ready to slam it on the medic.
Ratchet acted before he knew what was happening.
He ripped out his blaster, which was thankfully still with him, and shot the thing in its exposed, grotesque heart.
It let out a horrifying scream, blood pouring out of its wounds double-time. Somehow, within himself, he knew that more creatures exactly like it would be attracted by the scream. The monster let out one last shriek and fell to the ground, its blood running onto the ground and eating through the concrete.
Ratchet heard the sound of soft moaning and dragging from farther inside the hospital. He didn’t need anymore motivation.
He quickly picked up Wheeljack and ran.
That was when he heard another shriek. But he recognized this one. It wasn’t coming from a monster.
It belonged to Perceptor.
Moths flurried around their vision, and Ratchet snapped awake.
---
“Percy, are you sure you’re okay?”
Perceptor looked up, smiling softly. “I’m fine, Ratchet.”
“Because if you’re lying to me…”
Perceptor put a finger on the medic’s lips, smiling. If it were anyone else, Ratchet may have shoved him away. But it wasn’t anyone else. It was Perceptor.
“I’m fine, Ratchet.”
Perceptor kissed the finger over Ratchet’s mouth gently, his lips lightly brushing the medic’s. Ratchet felt his spark melt and flare up in embarrassment at the same time. Perceptor took his finger away and turned around, walking out with one last sweet smile.
---
Ratchet scrambled out of his berth, sprinting out of the room. He slammed open Wheeljack’s door, just to see the engineer sitting up in his berth, breathing heavily.
They looked up at each other, locking gazes. Wheeljack was trembling, one hand over his chest. Slowly, he stood up, staggering towards Ratchet and grabbing his hands tightly.
Wheeljack looked down. “Percy, he was screaming…”
“Come on.”
They both ran out, zipping into Perceptor’s room connecting to the med bay.
Perceptor twisted on his berth, making small cries of fear and pain in his recharge. His hands clenched and coolant gathered on his brow, his vents catching up with air.
“Silent Hill… Silent Hill…”
Ratchet and Wheeljack glanced at each other in panic. Ratchet gently helped Wheeljack sit down and they both started shaking him gently.
“Percy, wake up!”
Perceptor jerked awake with a quiet shout, staring up at the both of them with wide optics. Slowly, he stilled, smiling reassuringly. “Oh! Did I awaken you? My apologies. It was just a bad dream. A very bad dream.”
And no matter what they said, that was all he would admit.
---
“Perceptor, this isn’t normal. This isn’t normal.”
Chick. Chick.
“Percy, stop it. You’re scaring me.”
Chick. Chick.
“Percy!”
Chick. Chick.
Foom!
Perceptor looked down at the little flame on the lighter, holding his finger above it. The metal began to blacken slowly, but he didn’t move it away.
“PERCY! STOP IT!”
Perceptor jumped, jerking his finger away at the sound of Wheeljack’s shriek. He looked up, smiling. “I’m sorry, Wheeljack. I am afraid I didn’t hear you. My apologies.”
Wheeljack just came forward and tugged the lighter away, his optics wide. Perceptor’s small smile didn’t shift.
---
They had lots of incidents like this. Each time, the two specific monsters-Wheeljack and Ratchet came to call them the Explosion Victim and the Patient-always made an appearance, sometimes in huge groups.
Other people sometimes were found having those dreams. Beachcomber, Brawn, Sideswipe, Sunstreaker, even Optimus Prime himself. Each time one of them were pulled into the nightmare, a new monster would manifest itself.
---
“WHAT THE SLAG IS THAT?!” Tracks shouted, backpedaling several steps.
Ratchet and Wheeljack glanced at each other, each backing up to what they deemed a ‘safe’ distance.
This monster, at first glance, was much more visually appealing than most others. It looked a little like a human woman, only its skin was too pale and it had no face. What should have been equipped with lips, a nose, and eyes was smooth and featureless. She had blond hair, modest clothes, and if Spike had been there, he would have felt that she was one of the most beautiful women he had ever met.
Except for her chest.
From the left breast, slowly spreading, was some sort of rotting. Her clothes were slowly being scorched off, beginning in that spot, and her skin was decaying and rotting away.
The monster tilted her head up, giving the impression that she was looking at them. Slowly, she held out her perfect hands, walking forward.
One thing that the Autobots noticed, however, was that the ground that the monster’s feet touched burned and rotted, slowly spreading like a disease.
Tracks’ optics widened, and he backed up again. “WHAT IS THAT?!”
“I am going to call it a Superficial,” Wheeljack said simply, “I think we should run.”
Tracks took one look at the Superficial, and it let out a muffled scream. He spun around with both Ratchet and Wheeljack, and they ran.
---
Ratchet scribbled down a general description of the Silent Screamer and wrote its name quickly.
“Who knew that Blue would have the rotten luck to get trapped by that thing,” Ratchet muttered, carefully looking over the accumulated list of monsters.
“I did! That kid has rotten luck all around.” Wheeljack carefully drew the picture of the creature. It looked vaguely like a human with its arms wrapped around itself, and then with gray skin stretched over its limbs in a natural straitjacket or cocoon. It had one sharp-toothed, black, round hole for a mouth, and it always seemed to be shrieking in anguish, pain, and fear, but no sound ever came from it.
“Who knew something like that could crawl so fast?”
“Or have such a nasty bite?” Wheeljack picked up a new hand, unscrewing his own (which happened to have a suspicious chunk missing) and replacing it. “Is Blue alright?”
“He’s fine. He thinks it’s just another nightmare. Just another nightmare.”
---
Every time, at the end, they heard Perceptor scream. Every time, they would wake up before they found and saved him. Every time, he would refuse to say that it was any more than a ‘bad dream.’
And every time, no one else could acknowledge that the nightmares were dangerous. Even when the wounds sustained in the dreams manifested themselves in the morning. Even when, every morning, the med bay would have at least Ratchet and Wheeljack inside, repairing each other.
Not even when Perceptor began to disappear every morning, gone for hours on end, and reappear later with the signs of recent repairs.
That was when Ratchet and Wheeljack finally found Perceptor before they woke up.
---
“PERCY!”
Perceptor lay huddled on the ground with his arms over his human head. Moths swarmed around him, their brown wings glaring at the hellish world around them. They were eating him. THEY WERE EATING HIM!
“PERCY!”
Perceptor looked up, his eyes so wide that the whites surrounded his cerulean irises completely, and his mouth hung open slightly, blood trickling down from his face. Moths latched on to his skin, chewing it away until a new tiny stream of blood started flowing, making a mask of red.
“Run… run…”
Ratchet was the first to snap out of his stupor. He made to sprint forward, but something held him back. An unseen force, pushing him away.
“Please… run away… leave me…” Perceptor curled up in a ball, swatting away the moths from his face only to have them latch on to his hand. He didn’t seem to care. “I tried to protect you… tried to protect you … tried to close the door… but the Gates of Hell are open to all…”
The moths swarmed and something pushed them away violently. Ratchet fell to the ground, Wheeljack shifting back to roll with the force. “PERCY! Please, please, please…”
Another burst of moths erupted from the left, and Perceptor looked up in horror at where the moths originated. Ratchet and Wheeljack looked to where he was looking reflexively, and they felt their throats close up.
It was tall, over six feet, and it looked vaguely like its arms were wrapped around itself and were held there by an extra layer of gray and light brown skin with the vague image of a skull across its stomach and torso. It looked sort of like the Silent Screamer.
Sharp points, maybe its elbows, were peaking out of the skin and twitching, slowly freeing itself from the natural prison. They twitched, then jerked slightly, ripping through a bit more of the skin and releasing another small part of its arms. Moths blasted from the newly broken skin and flew at Perceptor, the high-pitched squeaks they made and the flutter of their wings deafening.
Perceptor abruptly curled up into a ball again, shrieking. The moths swarmed around him, eating through his clothes and biting into his skin.
“PERCY!”
Ratchet and Wheeljack forced themselves past the force, and something shattered. The moths swarmed violently, practically flaying Perceptor. The medic and engineer shoved past the cloud, wrapping their arms around their friend and shielding him with their body.
Something more shattered, and everything went into darkness.
---
“Percy? Percy? Percy, please, answer us!”
“I’m sorry… I’m sorry…”
“Percy, stop slagging apologizing!”
Myrrh is mine, its bitter perfume, breathes of life and gathering gloom…
“What’s happening? Oh… you’re hurt… you’re hurt really badly…”
“Oh… I found out about it not long ago… she was scared, she was hurt. She didn’t want to do what her mother told her to. So she split herself into thirds, delivering one baby to a trustworthy man and delivering the third back in time to someplace far away. She fooled her mother into thinking that there was only one other. She’s claiming what’s hers, now.”
Sorrowing, sighing, bleeding, dying, sealed in the stone cold tomb…
“Percy, stop talking. You’re bleeding too much.”
“I can’t leave this place… I’ll stay here forever…”
“No you won’t…”
Glorious now behold Her arise, Queen and God and Sacrifice…
“Please… please stay with me… at least a little while… I’m so afraid…”
Alleluia…
“We’ll stay with you. We promise. We’ll stay with you forever.”
Alleluia, Earth to Heaven replies.
---
The Autobots never did find Ratchet, Wheeljack, and Perceptor again. At least for a while. The Ark just woke up one day and they were… gone. The twins, Brawn, Beachcomber, and nearly everyone else in the base tore everything apart to find them. They were nowhere.
It wasn’t until years later a girl named Heather and a man named Douglas were found lost near the Ark and brought in that they even got an inkling as to where they could find their missing medical team.
Brawn, the twins, Beachcomber, and Jazz packed up and went to that place… that place that they had only visited in nightmares they barely remembered from years ago…
This place. This place called Silent Hill.
They haven’t come back yet.
Maybe I’ll let them.
Maybe I’ll set them all free. Maybe I’ll come with them.
Oh, what a tangled web we weave, with both lies and cruelty. How hard it is to find out who is who in my land of hatred and sorrow!
Perceptor has already rejoined with me. Ratchet and Wheeljack have been here, protecting me and loving me like they loved him, for years now. They’re hoping that he will come out again one day. That he won’t have to be scared anymore. Maybe I’ll let him. Maybe I will separate and allow him to see them again.
My name is Alessa.
Look at me. I’m burning.
It had started small. Perceptor just seemed more subdued. More tired. All his friends passed it off as his horrible sleeping habits finally taking their toll. He simply… started fading.
Maybe it started with Harry and Cybil and their daughter. That was the only event that anyone could think of that may have made it begin.
---
“How did you two find yourselves out here?” Wheeljack asked as he carefully carried the humans into the med bay. “The nearest city’s miles from here.”
“We didn’t come from a city,” Cybil, a blond young woman with tired blue eyes and a police uniform, said.
“Then where’d you come from?”
“From a small town. We’ve been there a while, and it’s sort of disconnected. I guess we got lost,” Harry said quietly, cradling the small baby closer. “We can’t stay here for long. We just need some directions, maybe something to eat and drink. We won’t stay long, I promise…”
“Don’t worry about it!” Wheeljack said cheerfully, putting them down on the med bay berth gently. “It’s not everyday we find humans wondering around aimlessly. Make yourself at home.”
Ratchet looked up confusedly, his optics flickering. “What…?”
Wheeljack grinned, clapping his hands together. “This is Harry, Cybil, and their daughter… what’s your daughter’s name?”
Cybil looked up sharply. “I’m not wi-”
“Her name is Ch-”
Cybil and Harry glanced at each other. “Our… our daughter’s name is Heather,” Cybil said quietly.
Wheeljack nodded, smiling, and turned away. “I’ll just go and get you something to eat and-”
“Wheeljack, Ratchet, I have to t-”
There was a frozen moment. Perceptor stood just inside the doorway, his optics fixed on the three humans, namely the baby, his mouth open slightly, as if he were still meaning to finish his last word.
The humans were staring at him as well, their eyes wide. The baby started shifting in her father's grip, twisting around so that it almost seemed as though she were making eye-contact with the scientist.
You know, if Ratchet didn’t know any better, he would’ve said that that baby smirked at the scientist.
---
What had been really weird about that couple though is that, when they were leaving, Harry told Wheeljack to be careful. He told him to be careful around Perceptor especially.
He wouldn’t elaborate further than that.
But Perceptor had just started getting more and more tired. Everyone had brushed it off at first.
That was when Wheeljack found him on the floor of his quarters one day, passed out from fever.
---
Brawn paced around the med bay, a forcibly irritated scowl on his face. The subtle wringing of his hands would reveal his worry for what it was, however, to anyone who cared to look close enough. But most people in the room were too busy worrying about Perceptor to notice.
“Ratchet, what is wrong with him?” Beachcomber asked, gazing down at his dear friend with one of the most worried frowns anyone had seen him wearing.
“I…” Ratchet slammed his fists against the berth, hanging his head in a rare gesture of defeat and letting out a furious sigh. “I don’t know.”
There was a horrible silence.
“It’s… it’s like someone has set him on fire from the inside. But there’s no fire. There’s no reason for him to be running such a serious fever. And if I try administering anymore coolant, his systems could freeze up and stop working. The best I can do is give him as much coolant as possible and pray. Just pray.”
---
Perceptor didn’t wake up until four weeks afterwards. Everyone was ecstatic, but the mood was dampened when they realized that he wasn’t talking, wasn’t responding save for shifting and looking at people. Sadly, the horror had only just begun.
Ratchet was the first to have a dream.
---
It was very quiet here. Silent.
The wind doesn’t make a sound here. The water doesn’t drip and drizzle. I hear no one speaking. No one singing.
I used to crave silence like this. Now it is suffocating me, driving me slowly insane.
I can feel darkness in this place. I can see it, although… although even I have trouble seeing through this blanket made of fog. This thick sheet that wraps around you and lulls you into the kind of sleep you shall never awaken from.
Why do I always come here?
I’m standing at the edge of a dock overlooking a lake. A large, gray lake. I could fall into it and never come back up. I could fall asleep in the dark waters, becoming part of the silence around me.
Sometimes, I see faces in those waters. I see the face of a woman betrayed by one she loved. I see the face of a teenager taken advantage of by her father. I see the face of a man driven insane. I see the face of a young woman who lost someone she loved dearly. I see the face of a man whose mother did not love him.
Most often though, I see the face of a young girl. A young girl, with her innocence burned away in the fires of reality. I’ve seen that girl before.
I feel sorry for them all. None chose their fates. All are trapped under the churning surface of the lake. All are caged in this quiet little town, a part of the silence.
I could fall into the silence. I could join them. I could sink into the deepest sleep known to mortal kind and stay there forever, wrapped in the blanket of silence.
There are no faces on the surface now, however, I know that they are there. Trapped.
I slowly lower myself to the dock, dipping a foot into the lake. It’s cold, but I could go in. I could go deep within and find out more about the horrors that the faces in the water experienced. I could become one of them.
Silence. I could be one with the silence.
I stand up slowly, the soundless wind washing by gently, caressing me with deceptive tenderness. I spread my arms like wings and tilt forward, watching as I fall down for the water to envelop me completely.
---
Ratchet woke up, immediately standing. Something inside of him was shrieking for him to go to Perceptor. He had only had that sort of feeling once in his life. And when he didn’t respond to it, a mech died.
He was responding to it now.
Before he really realized that he was awake, he was shaking Perceptor gently, whispering his name over and over again. Any other medical professional would have denounced this and said that his patient’s rest was much more important than whatever slagging weird dreams he could cook up, but he would simply tell those professionals to go frag themselves.
Perceptor made a jerking motion, and his optics fluttered open.
“Percy?”
The scientist took a breath, looking up at Ratchet.
“Are you alright? I had a feeling that you…”
Ratchet abruptly stopped himself, shaking his head. “Nothing. It’s gone now. Go to sleep.”
But instead, Perceptor just sat up slowly, taking Ratchet’s hands in his. He blinked quietly, and slowly, as if he were meeting resistance in the air, he reached up and cupped Ratchet’s cheek in one hand gently. “Thank you.” He sat up a little farther, and before Ratchet knew what was happening, Perceptor kissed him sweetly on the forehead. “I was sick. I wasn’t thinking properly. But I am better now.”
Ratchet stared with wide optics, subconsciously savoring the feeling of his friend’s hand, as Perceptor started to undo the medical equipment attached and connected to his armor.
“P-Perceptor… how…? You… you haven’t talked… how are you…?”
Perceptor looked up, smiling gently. “I’m better, old friend. I promise to stay better.” He cocked his head slightly, his optics looking off into space for a moment. “It’s quiet, but there is sound. I think I rather that over complete silence.”
The scientist kissed the medic’s forehead one last time, and before Ratchet could respond, he left the med bay, leaving a vague flowery scent behind and the phantom feeling of his hands.
---
The signs became more subtle. But they were there. Perceptor seemed more tired; he stared off into space more often; it was harder to get his attention, but he was healthy. Those that loved him were willing to turn a blind eye to his little problems if only to maintain the illusion that he was okay. He had always preferred it.
One of the odder things was that he suddenly became much more loving and affectionate. He was mothering the younger Autobots, even the twins. Daring to touch Brawn in a comforting way. He suddenly made a habit of stroking helms, cuddling against close friends when he was sitting with them, even going so far as nuzzling and small affectionate kisses. In all honesty? No one was complaining. The sudden affection was a very welcome reprieve from the mostly hands-off attitude of soldiers. And it reassured his friends that he was still alive and ‘healthy.’
But the nightmares didn’t stop. Ratchet kept on dreaming about that place, that silent place full of grotesque, twisted visions of fear and anger. Of fire. Of hell.
He wasn’t the only one.
---
Wheeljack scrambled over the rocks, not caring about the cuts that they made on his fleshy human hands. He glanced back briefly, letting out a shriek at the creature before he jumped over the rest of the debris.
It latched on to his back.
He let out a scream, twisting and writhing in its grip. Its skin burned through his shirt, burning his back. He got a brief look at its face, and he immediately started struggling harder.
Its face was completely blown away, as if it had held a small bomb to there while it exploded. Its skin was burnt and shriveled, chunks of it missing completely, and whatever it touched burnt away as if by actual fire. One of its legs were twisted grotesquely, dragging along the ground with its foot completely gone, only a ragged, black, shriveled stump left, trailing blood and pus where it walked. Its hands were gone-it seemed as though it, after blowing up its face, let two more bombs explode in its hands-but there were metal claws growing out of the edges of the stumps, ready to latch on to anyone and never let go.
Wheeljack writhed, feeling the fiery skin burning his own. His knees buckled, leaving him sprawled on the ground with the thing on top of him. The claws ripped through his skin, burning and cutting at the same time. He let out one last scream, and felt his vision waver…
Shlick!
The sickening sound of metal slicing cleanly through flesh filled the engineer’s ears, and he felt the thing fall away. Someone pulled him up, and he pulled the clawed arms away from himself, wincing when he pulled away the razor-edged and barbed blades. About three fourths of the population wouldn’t have been able to bear the pain that pulling them out entailed, but Wheeljack was one of the few who could.
What he couldn’t handle, however, was seeing the arms fall limply on the ground…
…with no body following them.
Wheeljack spun around, and he felt sour bile rising in his throat when he saw the monster twisting on the ground, a strangled, high-pitched, awful screech coming from its burnt throat. Its shoulders twitched, no arms connected to it.
“Cutting off its arms is the only way to make it let go. Come on!”
His savior grabbed his wrist, dragging him along. Wheeljack ran with him, but stared back. Before they had gone several yards, the creature let out one last scream before exploding. If he had still been in its clutches, he would have died.
He looked away at the person who saved him. It was a male human, bright blue eyes, messy brown hair, dirt from the world around them smudging his face…
Didn’t take much for Wheeljack to recognize Ratchet.
“Where are we, Ratchet?” Wheeljack asked, barely audible, a plaintive note in his voice.
“I don’t know, ‘Jack.”
They both staggered to a halt, all but collapsing against the wall of an old, decrepit hospital. They both heaved for breath, Wheeljack squeezing Ratchet’s hand nervously. Ratchet returned the pressure reassuringly, running his thumb up and down the back of his friend’s hand.
Then there was a dragging sound.
Ratchet and Wheeljack exchanged glances, and slowly, they turned to look at the door where the sound was coming from.
Ratchet’s breath noticeably caught in his throat. Wheeljack felt like he would be sick again.
It looked vaguely human, with supernaturally long arms that trailed on the ground behind it. Bandages were wrapped around its head, hiding its face from view completely. It had long and thin legs, and it was wearing what looked like the remains of a tattered hospital’s patient uniform. The most horrifying aspect of it, however, was what looked like the result of a half-done surgery or dissection on its chest. It was cut open and its beating heart was in full view. Blood flowed from the huge wounds non-stop, and small streams of red trickled down its long arms, leaving pools and trails on the ground.
The creatures skin shined slightly, looking vaguely metallic, and it gave off soft moans from the lips that must have been under the bandages. They were pained moans. Desperate moans.
Its head spasmed, face twitching violently as if it were having a seizure focused solely on there.
It moved, its arms dragging along behind it and slowly swung its sightless head around, moaning softly.
“What is that?”
The creature snapped its head to face the source of the sound, Wheeljack. It made a groaning sound, and slowly, it raised one of its arms.
“Wheeljack, look out! It’s going to-”
The monster swung its arm, hitting Wheeljack and by extension Ratchet and slamming them into the wall so hard there was an ominous crack that came from both of them.
Wheeljack let out a scream, falling to the ground and ripping at his clothes. The creature’s red-black blood was burning through the cloth and skin it touched like acid, seeping through to the inside of him in only a few short seconds.
Ratchet stood up, staring down at his friend in horror.
“Ratchet, help!”
He blinked slowly, his breath catching in his throat.
“Please, help me!”
He couldn’t save him. He couldn’t save another friend. There was no way…
The creature staggered forward, letting out a groan. The little sound snapped Ratchet out of his daze, and he immediately knelt by his friend, ripping off the hem of his dirty shirt.
The creature took another step towards them.
Ratchet swiped the bunched up cloth over Wheeljack’s rapidly worsening wound, holding his spasming friend down with his other hand. He felt the acidic blood eat through his own hand, but he didn’t react. Only when all of the creature’s blood was wiped away did he throw the cloth, holding his bleeding hand gently.
The creature let out one mighty groan and raised its arm, ready to slam it on the medic.
Ratchet acted before he knew what was happening.
He ripped out his blaster, which was thankfully still with him, and shot the thing in its exposed, grotesque heart.
It let out a horrifying scream, blood pouring out of its wounds double-time. Somehow, within himself, he knew that more creatures exactly like it would be attracted by the scream. The monster let out one last shriek and fell to the ground, its blood running onto the ground and eating through the concrete.
Ratchet heard the sound of soft moaning and dragging from farther inside the hospital. He didn’t need anymore motivation.
He quickly picked up Wheeljack and ran.
That was when he heard another shriek. But he recognized this one. It wasn’t coming from a monster.
It belonged to Perceptor.
Moths flurried around their vision, and Ratchet snapped awake.
---
“Percy, are you sure you’re okay?”
Perceptor looked up, smiling softly. “I’m fine, Ratchet.”
“Because if you’re lying to me…”
Perceptor put a finger on the medic’s lips, smiling. If it were anyone else, Ratchet may have shoved him away. But it wasn’t anyone else. It was Perceptor.
“I’m fine, Ratchet.”
Perceptor kissed the finger over Ratchet’s mouth gently, his lips lightly brushing the medic’s. Ratchet felt his spark melt and flare up in embarrassment at the same time. Perceptor took his finger away and turned around, walking out with one last sweet smile.
---
Ratchet scrambled out of his berth, sprinting out of the room. He slammed open Wheeljack’s door, just to see the engineer sitting up in his berth, breathing heavily.
They looked up at each other, locking gazes. Wheeljack was trembling, one hand over his chest. Slowly, he stood up, staggering towards Ratchet and grabbing his hands tightly.
Wheeljack looked down. “Percy, he was screaming…”
“Come on.”
They both ran out, zipping into Perceptor’s room connecting to the med bay.
Perceptor twisted on his berth, making small cries of fear and pain in his recharge. His hands clenched and coolant gathered on his brow, his vents catching up with air.
“Silent Hill… Silent Hill…”
Ratchet and Wheeljack glanced at each other in panic. Ratchet gently helped Wheeljack sit down and they both started shaking him gently.
“Percy, wake up!”
Perceptor jerked awake with a quiet shout, staring up at the both of them with wide optics. Slowly, he stilled, smiling reassuringly. “Oh! Did I awaken you? My apologies. It was just a bad dream. A very bad dream.”
And no matter what they said, that was all he would admit.
---
“Perceptor, this isn’t normal. This isn’t normal.”
Chick. Chick.
“Percy, stop it. You’re scaring me.”
Chick. Chick.
“Percy!”
Chick. Chick.
Foom!
Perceptor looked down at the little flame on the lighter, holding his finger above it. The metal began to blacken slowly, but he didn’t move it away.
“PERCY! STOP IT!”
Perceptor jumped, jerking his finger away at the sound of Wheeljack’s shriek. He looked up, smiling. “I’m sorry, Wheeljack. I am afraid I didn’t hear you. My apologies.”
Wheeljack just came forward and tugged the lighter away, his optics wide. Perceptor’s small smile didn’t shift.
---
They had lots of incidents like this. Each time, the two specific monsters-Wheeljack and Ratchet came to call them the Explosion Victim and the Patient-always made an appearance, sometimes in huge groups.
Other people sometimes were found having those dreams. Beachcomber, Brawn, Sideswipe, Sunstreaker, even Optimus Prime himself. Each time one of them were pulled into the nightmare, a new monster would manifest itself.
---
“WHAT THE SLAG IS THAT?!” Tracks shouted, backpedaling several steps.
Ratchet and Wheeljack glanced at each other, each backing up to what they deemed a ‘safe’ distance.
This monster, at first glance, was much more visually appealing than most others. It looked a little like a human woman, only its skin was too pale and it had no face. What should have been equipped with lips, a nose, and eyes was smooth and featureless. She had blond hair, modest clothes, and if Spike had been there, he would have felt that she was one of the most beautiful women he had ever met.
Except for her chest.
From the left breast, slowly spreading, was some sort of rotting. Her clothes were slowly being scorched off, beginning in that spot, and her skin was decaying and rotting away.
The monster tilted her head up, giving the impression that she was looking at them. Slowly, she held out her perfect hands, walking forward.
One thing that the Autobots noticed, however, was that the ground that the monster’s feet touched burned and rotted, slowly spreading like a disease.
Tracks’ optics widened, and he backed up again. “WHAT IS THAT?!”
“I am going to call it a Superficial,” Wheeljack said simply, “I think we should run.”
Tracks took one look at the Superficial, and it let out a muffled scream. He spun around with both Ratchet and Wheeljack, and they ran.
---
Ratchet scribbled down a general description of the Silent Screamer and wrote its name quickly.
“Who knew that Blue would have the rotten luck to get trapped by that thing,” Ratchet muttered, carefully looking over the accumulated list of monsters.
“I did! That kid has rotten luck all around.” Wheeljack carefully drew the picture of the creature. It looked vaguely like a human with its arms wrapped around itself, and then with gray skin stretched over its limbs in a natural straitjacket or cocoon. It had one sharp-toothed, black, round hole for a mouth, and it always seemed to be shrieking in anguish, pain, and fear, but no sound ever came from it.
“Who knew something like that could crawl so fast?”
“Or have such a nasty bite?” Wheeljack picked up a new hand, unscrewing his own (which happened to have a suspicious chunk missing) and replacing it. “Is Blue alright?”
“He’s fine. He thinks it’s just another nightmare. Just another nightmare.”
---
Every time, at the end, they heard Perceptor scream. Every time, they would wake up before they found and saved him. Every time, he would refuse to say that it was any more than a ‘bad dream.’
And every time, no one else could acknowledge that the nightmares were dangerous. Even when the wounds sustained in the dreams manifested themselves in the morning. Even when, every morning, the med bay would have at least Ratchet and Wheeljack inside, repairing each other.
Not even when Perceptor began to disappear every morning, gone for hours on end, and reappear later with the signs of recent repairs.
That was when Ratchet and Wheeljack finally found Perceptor before they woke up.
---
“PERCY!”
Perceptor lay huddled on the ground with his arms over his human head. Moths swarmed around him, their brown wings glaring at the hellish world around them. They were eating him. THEY WERE EATING HIM!
“PERCY!”
Perceptor looked up, his eyes so wide that the whites surrounded his cerulean irises completely, and his mouth hung open slightly, blood trickling down from his face. Moths latched on to his skin, chewing it away until a new tiny stream of blood started flowing, making a mask of red.
“Run… run…”
Ratchet was the first to snap out of his stupor. He made to sprint forward, but something held him back. An unseen force, pushing him away.
“Please… run away… leave me…” Perceptor curled up in a ball, swatting away the moths from his face only to have them latch on to his hand. He didn’t seem to care. “I tried to protect you… tried to protect you … tried to close the door… but the Gates of Hell are open to all…”
The moths swarmed and something pushed them away violently. Ratchet fell to the ground, Wheeljack shifting back to roll with the force. “PERCY! Please, please, please…”
Another burst of moths erupted from the left, and Perceptor looked up in horror at where the moths originated. Ratchet and Wheeljack looked to where he was looking reflexively, and they felt their throats close up.
It was tall, over six feet, and it looked vaguely like its arms were wrapped around itself and were held there by an extra layer of gray and light brown skin with the vague image of a skull across its stomach and torso. It looked sort of like the Silent Screamer.
Sharp points, maybe its elbows, were peaking out of the skin and twitching, slowly freeing itself from the natural prison. They twitched, then jerked slightly, ripping through a bit more of the skin and releasing another small part of its arms. Moths blasted from the newly broken skin and flew at Perceptor, the high-pitched squeaks they made and the flutter of their wings deafening.
Perceptor abruptly curled up into a ball again, shrieking. The moths swarmed around him, eating through his clothes and biting into his skin.
“PERCY!”
Ratchet and Wheeljack forced themselves past the force, and something shattered. The moths swarmed violently, practically flaying Perceptor. The medic and engineer shoved past the cloud, wrapping their arms around their friend and shielding him with their body.
Something more shattered, and everything went into darkness.
---
“Percy? Percy? Percy, please, answer us!”
“I’m sorry… I’m sorry…”
“Percy, stop slagging apologizing!”
Myrrh is mine, its bitter perfume, breathes of life and gathering gloom…
“What’s happening? Oh… you’re hurt… you’re hurt really badly…”
“Oh… I found out about it not long ago… she was scared, she was hurt. She didn’t want to do what her mother told her to. So she split herself into thirds, delivering one baby to a trustworthy man and delivering the third back in time to someplace far away. She fooled her mother into thinking that there was only one other. She’s claiming what’s hers, now.”
Sorrowing, sighing, bleeding, dying, sealed in the stone cold tomb…
“Percy, stop talking. You’re bleeding too much.”
“I can’t leave this place… I’ll stay here forever…”
“No you won’t…”
Glorious now behold Her arise, Queen and God and Sacrifice…
“Please… please stay with me… at least a little while… I’m so afraid…”
Alleluia…
“We’ll stay with you. We promise. We’ll stay with you forever.”
Alleluia, Earth to Heaven replies.
---
The Autobots never did find Ratchet, Wheeljack, and Perceptor again. At least for a while. The Ark just woke up one day and they were… gone. The twins, Brawn, Beachcomber, and nearly everyone else in the base tore everything apart to find them. They were nowhere.
It wasn’t until years later a girl named Heather and a man named Douglas were found lost near the Ark and brought in that they even got an inkling as to where they could find their missing medical team.
Brawn, the twins, Beachcomber, and Jazz packed up and went to that place… that place that they had only visited in nightmares they barely remembered from years ago…
This place. This place called Silent Hill.
They haven’t come back yet.
Maybe I’ll let them.
Maybe I’ll set them all free. Maybe I’ll come with them.
Oh, what a tangled web we weave, with both lies and cruelty. How hard it is to find out who is who in my land of hatred and sorrow!
Perceptor has already rejoined with me. Ratchet and Wheeljack have been here, protecting me and loving me like they loved him, for years now. They’re hoping that he will come out again one day. That he won’t have to be scared anymore. Maybe I’ll let him. Maybe I will separate and allow him to see them again.
My name is Alessa.
Look at me. I’m burning.