Chapter Text
The insistent pinging of alerts on his HUD forced Cosmos to online.
Which was an instant mistake because it felt like every sensor and pain receptor was on fire. He had no idea why because— oh look at that, one of those alerts was for a corruption of his short term memory files.
He let out a burst of high pitched static as his spark gave a particularly painful throb, feeling as if he was both being stretched too thin and being squeezed so hard that he was afraid his spark was going to fizzle out. He shifted his plating in pain, trying to alleviate the tightness he was feeling, as static makes its way out of his vocalizer again in a panicked whine when his spark fluttered weakly. In all of his vorns of practicing mass displacement, all those millions of horns in war, he never felt this kind of pain before.
“Cosmos! You're awake! Good, ok, you have to stay with me buddy, do you hear me?” A voice broke through the fear rushing around in his processor. It sounded small, familiar and organic, and… it sounded like it was coming from inside his hull? Slowly onlining his optics, and then quickly adjusting some settings because the glare of the sun above them, he realized he was in the middle of a field. The organic vegetation was flattened all around him from some sort of impact, probably his, since he realized at that moment he was in his alt mode. The shuttle former shifted his view inward and was surprised to see the owner of the voice.
“…Marissa?” Cosmos’ voice was weak, laced with static. “What are… why are you…?” His processor kept stalling, the corruption to his memory files making him confused as to why Marissa was with him, and not Thundercraker like normal, and why he was in so much pain. Since he was in his alt mode, they must have been flying and crashed some how, but for the life of him, he could’t figure out why. Or why his spark felt like it was trying to stretch itself out when he was still minibot sized. He had stopped doing mass displacement… right?
“Cosmos, it’s ok I'm here, we’re both ok. I read your diagnostic report on your console and besides a rattled processor and some dents you should be fine. You had something called a spark surge, which was probably caused by the crash, but it seemed to work itself out so that your reports are reading stable.” She seemed relieved to hear him talking, even if it wasn’t in full sentences. He must have been out for a while. “What is the last thing you remember Cosmos?”
The bot thought for a few kliks, filtering back on his memory files for his latest complete file. “I was… with Soundwave, on the Sanctuary. We were… relaxing? He got a call from Jetfire,” His voice was becoming more steady as he continued. “He was needed down on Earth for a…. a consolation? You guys found something, and wanted to know if Decepticons had any information on it.” He frowned, pausing as he thought. “I came along.”
A jolt went through him. Of course he came along, the Conjunx Endure spark-bond between them was too new to be stretched so thin by long distance before it settled. That would be why his spark hurt so much now, Soundwave isn't anywhere near him, and the weak bond was looking for it’s other half.
“Thats good,” Marissa patted his console comfortingly, “Now what else?”
Cosmos stalled. There were more corrupt files and nothing was correcting them. So, he decided to guess and hoped anything cleared up. “I… It was that… device, right? That… thing started to spark and, um, someone yelled to run?” There was the impression in his mind that he was in a room with other bots, and humans, but the details were glitching from away from his grasp. “I, think I grabbed you, because… you were close to me? And shifted to fly us away, but.” He paused again, “But there was a sharp pain and bright light and… and I onlined here.” He gave a rattle of his platting, shaking out some stiffness and ignoring the twinge of pain from his spark. “Marissa, where are we? This isn’t where the device was?”
Marissa shook her head, hair falling out from her normally neat bun. “No, sorry Cosmos, I don’t know where we are. I was kinda hoping you could tell me.”
His processor gave another confused whirl. It looked like they were still on Earth, so why would he know where they were on her planet?
Oh, right, GPS. Duh.
It took a few seconds, and he had to work around the warnings popping up on his HUD about the damage to his haul and to his processor, not to mention the searing pain still radiating from his spark, but he managed to boot up his GPS.
He blanched, “Why would we be in Kansas?” At least that explained why his spark hurt so much, Soundwave would be near the country’s capital, which was basically on the other side of the continent.
“I have no idea Cosmos, why would that device transport us anywhere?” She sounded exasperated.
“You think the artifact did this?”
“What else would transport us across the country!” She snapped, temper flaring for a moment before she steepled her hands in front of her mouth and took a deep breath, eyes screwed shut.
Cosmos was a little hurt at being snapped at, and tried not to take it to spark. Instead, he used the silence to try and move certain aspects of his alt-mode, seeing if he was still flight capable. Thrusters were still functional which was good, but the com-links were down. Didn’t really matter, Soundwave would be able to hear his voice and locate them anyway. His landing gear was wrecked, and there while there wasn’t any breaches to his haul, the dents would cause problems if he tired to handle the pressure of leaving the atmosphere. His energy levels weren't bad either, a nice 83%. Soundwave would probably have a cube for him anyway when he showed up with the rescue crew just to top him off. Since fuel was more common and the ration had lessened, Soundwave didn’t like his bots to be under 80%.
With all that in mind he let out a short S.O.S data burst in Neo-Cybex into the airwaves. He made sure the sound wouldn’t be heard inside his haul, as he knew that sometimes their spoken language irritated human audials since most of it was too high to be comfortably heard in their hearing range. These glyphs had reassuring and loving sub-glyphs attached, those specifically for Conjunxs and Amicas, and were specifically asking for Soundwave, as well as giving his location, and a report of only minor damage. Hopefully hearing that will calm any anxiety his Conjunx has over the pain in their spark-bond. He remembered that Ratchet had told him once that his pain threshold for spark related pain was way too high, and what would be uncomfortable for him, would bring other bots to their knees. So if he was in pain, Soundwave must think he was dying. Oh wait-!
“Are you ok, Marissa? I forgot to ask but you're not injured or anything right? Do we need to find you a human medic?” He turned his focus inward again to see that Marissa had flopped into his command chair, and was now massaging her temples and muttering to herself.
Her eyes peeled open, “I’m fine Cosmos, thanks for asking though. Just tired and hungry as hell. I was supposed to go out for lunch after Soundwave was briefed, and I skipped breakfast because of all the hassle the device created.” She heaved a great sigh, pulling and twisting her fallen hair back into the little bun on the top of her head. “I really regret telling TC I couldn’t take a break to try his attempt at human cooking now.”
Cosmos snickered. Once Brainstorm’s holomatter upgrades made it to Cybertron, a lot of bots on the planet were excited to play around with it. He remembered the videos Marissa sent to Soundwave of TC’s holomatter form just sitting on the floor hugging his dog and crying. Cosmos wasn’t the biggest fan of human physical aesthetics, but he liked how his looked with it’s tight red curls and warm dark skin. He even managed to make it share the same round shape of his root-mode, and dress it in green clothes that matched his colour scheme. Soundwave even made one after a whole week of pestering from his Cassettes— a human with head wrappings that covered the entirety of it’s face, and smartly dressed blue suit. They couldn’t really do anything with them on the colony mind you, but it was fun to use them when they visited Earth on the rare occasion. He personally enjoyed the feeling of human blankets.
“Should we go find you somewhere to refuel? I don’t know much about Kansas, but I'm sure there is a human town nearby where we can find you something?”
Something about what he said made Marissa smile. She stood up and gave his command chair a fond pat. “Yeah, lets go, we can contact the base on our way to get food.”
Cosmos popped open his haul door, letting Marissa leave. “Already called for Soundwave, or any near by Cybertronians, so someone should hear me and pick us up soon. My com-links are down though, so I can’t contact anyone on base to confirm pickup.”
He changed his view outward just in time to see Marissa stretch. “Huh, knocked out your communication, but nothing else? That’s odd…” She started to fiddle with her own communication device and was frowning at whatever was on the screen.
Cosmos transformed and winced at the jarring noise of some of his dented frame pieces dragging against some of his inner components. The transformation wasn't that painful, but a flare up of pain burst from his spark at the movement, which made him a little uneasy on his pedes. Primus, he hoped Soundwave got here soon, if the pain bursts were all like this he didn't know how much more he could stand. Being hurt and away from other Cybertronians didn’t really help either. He knew he wasn’t really alone, but he wasn’t very close with Marissa and really didn’t like how the bond felt so thin. He felt lonely.
Deep vents, Cosmos, take deep vents and just vent through the pain and the feelings. You can make an appointment with Rest-Q when you get back. Maybe even agree to see that therapist he’s been recommending. Remember, you’ll see everyone again shortly and the pain isn’t any worse than what you’ve already dealt with, if you can survive millennia of prolonged mass displacement, millennia of war, you can survive a little stretched Conjunx bond for a breem…
“You ok, Cosmos? You're breathing a little heavy.” Marissa peered up at him, balanced on one leg as she swung the other one in the air. Human stretches looked so weird, if he didn’t know any better he would have thought her leg was just hanging by its cables with how easily it swung back and forth.
He ducked his head a little and shrugged, “Just miss my Conjunx. Anyway, I’m pulling up a list of nearby human refuelling establishments, how do you feel about…. ‘Big Mario’s Big Slices?’ Or ‘Ring-a-Wing? They're both about ten kilometres east of here. Both have about four-ish out of five stars on Google, but ‘Ring-a-Wing’ has a review that just says: “Their hot sauce fucked me up, I can’t taste anymore” and then rated it five stars.” He looked down at Marissa who was smiling up at him. “Honestly I think you should try that, it sounds exciting! Thundercracker was telling me all about how you humans eat anything, even if it’s dangerous for your bodies, just for kicks. So I think you’ll enjoy the experience.”
She laughed at that. “Well if he’s going around saying stuff like that, I’m glad I skipped out on his cooking then!” She walked up to him and patted one of his legs. “Sure, I haven’t had hot wings in ages. Just letting you know they're messy, so we’re gonna eat there cause I don't even want to think about cleaning wing sauce out of your upholstery.” She teased, laughing out loud even more when he gave a full frame shutter at the thought and leaned away from her hand.
He was about to retort, when a brilliant swirl of green and blue light opened up in front of them and out stepped a group of unfamiliar bots, weapons drawn and ready to fight.
Cosmos jumped with a startled noise, millennia of war ingrained in his processor made him pull out his blaster and ready it before he fully comprehended the situation. He stepped in front of Marissa, hoping to shield her from any oncoming attacks. Nothing good ever came from a random space portal.
It was once the bright light of the space portal died out that he realized he did know someone from the party. He quickly lowered the blaster and tried to stand a little taller out of reflex. “Oh, Optimus, you came! I didn’t expect you to come yourself sir, or from a portal?” He quickly looked at the other bots again, not seeing his Conjunx or any of the Cassettes among them, which was odd. Maybe Soundwave was hurt, but that didn’t explain why none of the Cassettes didn’t tag along to inform him. He didn’t know the other bots, but to be fair he didn’t normally spend a lot of time around his kind either and with their weird frame types they could be from the colonies or of Trypticon’s brood or something. The smooth streamline looks some of them were wearing were common with bots from Velocitron, he knew at least. “Umm, is everything ok back at base? I don’t see-“
The smallest bot stepped closer to him, pointing his wrist blaster towards his face. “Shut it ‘Con! We heard your transmission, we know you're working for the Decepticon Communications Division. So you can drop your fake Autobot act and tell us who you really are and what your mission is!” He snarled in his face, and it was only thanks to his wartime protocols that Cosmos didn’t reset his optics and audials after that nonsense he just heard.
“Excuse me? Look, I don’t know who you are or what game your playing at but I don’t like being called a Deception. Sure I live on the Sanctuary, but that doesn't mean I’ve converted.” He huffed angrily. If this bot said anything about his Conjunx he was gonna ‘throw hands’ as Swerve would say. Soundwave wasn’t anything like he was during the war, none of them were anymore, and if some mechs couldn’t handle the fact that the war was over and Soundwave’s band of ‘Cons were different from what they were used to, then they were going to have a problem.
He sent a ‘aren’t you going to do anything?’ look at Prime before ruffling his plating in annoyance as he only got a calculating stare back. The movement dislodged the little bits of earth vegetation and gravel from under his armour that didn't fall out during transformation earlier. The other minibot didn’t do anything more than snarl angrily.
“Look,” Cosmos continued, “We’ve had a long morning, and my spark hurts so I wanna see my Conjunx, and Marissa is hungry so can’t we all just head back to base and I’ll take that nap I’ve wanted to take since I got on Earth and we can forget this whole event ever happened.”
There was a small twang as Marissa gave his pede a slap with her gun. “Watch it Cosmos! You're getting dirt all over me!”
He stepped a little further away from her, but not letting her be in firing range from the crazy minibot. “Oops, sorry.”
“A human! The ‘Con’s got a human!” A yellow bot chirped in Neo-Cybex, the glyphs displaying disbelief, confusion, suspicion, and concern towards Marissa. His door wings twitched as he tried to get a better glimpse of her, which showed that he was either young or a civilian as he wasn’t in complete control of his reactions like other war veterans. Though, all the bots in this group seemed startled that a human was hiding behind him in the first place, optics wide as if they all were shocked. Cosmos missed seeing the Prime’s optics narrow in thought, as he gave his engine a threatening rumble of annoyance at the yellow bot.
“I’m not a ‘Con! This is the last time I'm coming to Earth if all you bots stationed here are delusional and mean!”
“Oh my God, enough!” Marisa snapped. “Our communication lines are down, and that device left us disoriented and we need to check in with Jetfire to see why or how the hell that thing transported us here! To do that we need to get back to base!” She stormed past the safety of Cosmos bulk and snarled at the blue minibot. “Move aside!” When the blue bot did nothing more than blink in surprise at Marissa, she gave an irritated growl, sounding like that dog Thundercracker carried around. “I said MOVE! I don’t care who you are, or what you do, but I won’t have you threatening diplomatic ambassadors on my planet in front of me! So get out of our way or I will find a way to remove you from my path!”
With that, the blue minibot gave a startled look over to Prime, and once he got a nod, moved back behind the taller bot with the rest of the group, looking shell shocked. The rest of the group also looked alarmed, probably not used to having someone so small boss them around. Which meant they probably weren’t from Earth or been here long. Definitely not any of Trypticon’s newsparks if they didn’t know Marissa. If anyone was able to get bots moving, it was the human that once called Prime an idiot to his face and routinely had to deal with Starscream's and Elita-One’s scathing personalities.
Prime stepped forward that stern, calculating stare snuffing out any annoyance Cosmos was feeling before and the green mini felt his struts stiffen on reflex. Faint panic pushed through the rest of the pain in his spark as the Prime walked closer. The Prime towered over him, since he was back to his natural minibot size and Cosmos now stood just past his hips. Still, there was no hostility in the Prime’s field, just firm contemplation, even with a human barking at him. He looked down to address Marissa.
“I believe there may be some miscommunication happening, complicating this situation tenfold on both of our sides.” His voice was a calm, even rumble, and Cosmos was a little weirded out. In all the time he worked with the Prime, he never sounded this calm, this even.
Marissa gave another sound of annoyance, and dragged her hands down her face. “Ok, yeah, I can see there is an issue here.” She clapped her hands together, “Ok! Prime, what happened after the device went off? Cosmos and I were transported here across the country, but what about the base? Are the scientists ok? Did Jetfire have anything to say about what happened?”
Some confusion seemed to clear from the Prime’s optics. “Ah, I think I can see what is happening here. You say you were involved with a device, some sort of artifact that transported you to this area? Correct?”
Cosmos nodded dumbly, his spark sinking a little and he didn’t quite know why. “Correct.” Marissa snapped, folding her arms and staring Optimus down.
“And you know who I am?”
“Of course we know who you are? You're Optimus Prime? The chosen Prime, the true heir to the Matrix of leadership, blah blah blah. We literally saw each other on Cybertron about two Earth weeks ago? You were with Ironhide, Chromia, and Windblade at McCadam’s, and Windblade came over to buy me and Sky-Byte a drink while we were waiting for Soundwave’s meeting with Blurr to be over? You were pretending to ignore me the entire time” What was going on? His spark throbbed and Cosmos winced as he tried not to rub at his chest. Primus, he wished Soundwave was here. He’d know why Prime suddenly lost his processor, and he would make the pain go away.
“You annexed my planet for our ‘protection’ and now I have to deal with this insanity every day of my life because it’s associated with you Cybertronians and all the drama you create!” Marisa threw her hands into the air. “Of course we know you, Optimus! Stop asking stupid questions and tell me what happened to my base and what I need to do for damage control!”
“Very well, I will get to the point then.” He gave a rough rumble. “I am of the firm belief that you are no longer on your version of ‘Earth’ anymore, and this device you speak of sent you to our ‘Earth.’” At this he looked Cosmos square in the optics, “A world where we have never met, this device was never uncovered, Cybertron has fallen into ruin, and our civil war has not yet ended. We have been fighting the Decepticons for millennia now, and our forces on both fractions are spread thin throughout the known universe. Our people are on the brink of extinction, and are not publicly known to your people.” He spoke this last part down to Marissa. “The crimes you say I committed towards your people have never happened here, on this Earth, and I can tell you that they never will come to pass. I believe in the free will and rights of all sentient beings, and conquering a planet such as this, especially with living beings who act as our allies, is something I will never do.” This last part was spoken with such finality, such calm reassurance that you could feel the weight of the words in the air.
The green minibot stared at the Prime. Was he serious, another dimension? His optics flickered over the taller mech, taking in every detail that now looked off: weird kibble placement, different frame shapes, and now that he noticed, his optic components were different too- there was no translucent protective lens. Cosmos rubbed at his chest absently as he leaned to peer around the Prime at the group standing behind him. He could see now, that all of their frames weren’t just strange colonist fashions, but strange because they belonged to a whole separate dimension.
“You’re kidding me.” Marissa stared up at Optimus, eyes hard.
“I am afraid not, Miss Marissa of Earth. However, if you are both truly willing to aid the Autobots while you reside in this world, we will offer you sanctuary for the time being.”
“Optimus! Your not just gonna let them come back to base with us! They could be lying!” The big green bot exclaimed.
The smaller yellow bot glared up at his green friend. “We’ve dealt with dimension stuff before, we could help them! If they're trapped in our universe we should help them anyway, it’s the Autobot thing to do!”
Cosmos frowned, while he really didn't like these bots, and still felt uneasy around Optimus, they didn’t have a lot of options. He couldn’t reveal himself to humans here, and he knew his alt mode was strange and alien-like to humans so hiding without help wasn't the best option. And until he got fixed, he couldn't just putter around the atmosphere either, not that he would want to leave Marissa alone on the planet. He looked down at the female human and saw that she was looking up at him too. She motioned for him to bend down and pick her up, so he did, placing her on his rounded shoulder.
“What are you thinking, Cosmos. Should we trust them?” She sat down, placing one foot on his collar and one hand gripping the fin on his shoulder for support. They both watched as the Prime’s companions argued amongst themselves on wether or not they should be allowed near their base. The Prime looked on in an almost fond exasperation.
“I don’t know, I’ve never been in this situation before.” He rubbed at his chest again, “I remember once, when Cliffjumper got wasted off high-grade and started telling these wild stories about how he once jumped dimensions where the Autobots were evil and the Decepticons were good and everyone swapped paint colours. Apparently Thundercracker was a real eyesore, painted his frame every colour of the rainbow and then some. ” Marissa turned and look at him weirdly. “Yeah, that’s what we all thought. But these guys don't seem evil.” He hummed, “Or ugly, honestly. But for real? I’ll go along with you for whatever you choose. Doesn’t seem like we got any other options but to follow them, though.”
Marissa sighed, “Yeah, the way that blue one is acting, they’d prefer us to be prisoners than guests.” She gave a snort, not fazed at all by their distrust.
With that she sat up a litter straighter and waved at the Prime, getting his attention. Once he looked over the other bots quieted down, waiting for their response.
Marissa looked him square on. “We’ve decided to come with you, Optimus Prime. Thank you for your hospitality and hopefully we’ll be gone before you know it.
Optimus nodded, “Then we welcome you both to our base.” He must have opened a com-link cause the next words weren’t spoken to them. “Ratchet, open the ground bridge to our coordinates, and we are bringing guests.”
____________
The little drone watched as the glow of the ground bridge faded. It was quite a ways from the crash site so it wouldn’t be noticed unless it was focused on, but close enough for visual and audio input on the Autobot conversation. A ground bridge opened up before it and it wasted no time gliding into the portal.
Once on the other side, it flew in a neat circle and docked itself onto the chassis of its master.
The silent bot made no sound or movement except for the drumming of spindly digits on the control panel. Their visor flashed with the sped up recordings the drone made. They were, of course, watching live, however the repeated information made it easier to pick up on details they passed over before.
How curious.
This was not the outcome Soundwave predicted when he sent out one little investigation over an Autobot coded message left on the airwaves for himself, signed with overly familiar glyphs. A messaged that came shortly after a large, random, brief, and untraceable energy spike. However, he also didn’t know what to truly expect either.
But an Autobot and it’s pet human from another dimension? An Autobot that registered with parts of his own spark frequency, something he could feel every time the Autobot winced or rubbed at it’s chest. It was like a pull, a light fuzz of static, that seemed to draw him towards this little, green, spaceship. Something that started after that energy spike opened and a UFO streaked through the sky near the Nemesis. It was nothing like he had ever felt with another bot before, and not exactly like his bond with his drones either.
Even more curious.
His visor cleared, and he went back to typing on the console keys, as if nothing was amiss.
He would have to hunt down this little spaceship before he left. It wouldn’t do to have potential weaknesses laying about in the open like this.
__________
Cosmos didn’t know what to expect when they walked through the ground bridge, but a human army base wasn’t it.
“I thought you guys said the humans didn’t know you were here?” Cosmos asked, glancing around.
“Only the human army of this country, and some human friends! We’re supposed to be hush hush to only a few, but got discovered.” The yellow bot was definitely young, as he practically bounced around Cosmos. “You’ll like the human children! They’re really fun and know a lot of games and are surprisingly helpful on missions!”
Cosmos gave the bot a side opticed look. He decided not to translate what the bot was saying to Marissa, he didn’t really know her stance on human children being involved with Cybertronians. He knew that the Wreckers had their own young human companion, and that Ratchet, Bumblebee, and Sunstreaker all worked with human children too, even if it didn’t turn out for the best.
Instead he just gave an attempted smile and a murmured, “I’m sure I will, they sound great.” Marissa didn’t comment, instead just looking around the base, so Cosmos decided to follow her lead.
The place wasn’t very big, so far at least, and knowing humans he figured it wasn't going to be much larger. He wondered if there were separate rooms where all the bots recharged, or if they all slept in their alt modes in this main hanger. It seemed… cozy. Especially since he was used to the vast openness of deep space; the Lost Light, which was large enough to fit hundreds of bots with still more space so it didn’t feel crowded; or the Sanctuary, which was not so empty any more but still felt bigger because of all the open windows. There wasn’t a window in sight here, and suddenly Cosmos was starting to feel slightly claustrophobic.
“Stop doing that, Cosmos, you're starting to rub your paint off.” Marissa chided him, slapping a hand down on his shoulder.
“Huh? Oh,” he looked down at his hand, and saw he was rubbing at his chest again, and she was right, he was starting to leave paint transfers on his chest, short red stripes along the green. “Oops.”
A white and red bot stomped over towards them, a device held in his hand like he didn’t know if he wanted to throw it or stab them with it. “Is there something wrong with your chest? Who knows what damage inter-dimensional travel could cause to the spark.” He grumbled, waving the device up and down the minibot’s frame. “By the Allspark! Your spark readings are off the charts! How are you not in stasis lock by now?!” He looked horrified and hurriedly guided, but mostly shoved, Cosmos towards the little medbay berth stationed by the consoles.
“You mentioned that your spark was hurting before, did you not?” Prime rumbled worriedly nearby, watching the medic bully his newest patient.
“He said he was experiencing spark pain and you didn’t automatically bring him here? Optimus, I expected you not to act this foolish!” The medic snapped and glared at the bigger bot.
“They could have been spies! They could still be spies! They shouldn’t be here, Ratchet!” The blue minibot hissed angrily, stubbornly watching them from where the ground bridge closed.
“Your name is Ratchet?” Cosmos asked changing the subject because he really didn’t want to get into that again. He reached an arm up to gently move Marissa away onto some empty berth space. He quickly eyed up the medic. He certainly seemed like Ratchet— grumpy, pushy, and in complete control over everybot now that there was a medical emergency. He never saw Ratchet in an Earth alt, but it looked like this was close enough to the appearance he was familiar with, just with the strange frame details these bots had.
“I am. Autobot CMO and Prime’s personal medic.” He huffed, eyeing Marissa briefly, before huffing again and tapping Cosmos’ wrist port. “Open up I need to see your diagnostics.” Once he plugged in and began shifting through the information he began mumbling to himself.
The younger yellow bot perked up, walking closer towards the small medbay without actually stepping in for fear of getting in Ratchet’s way. “Did you know Ratchet from where your from?” He chirped.
Cosmos wondered if the yellow bot only knew Neo-Cybex, or had something wrong with his language cortex like Rest-Q. “I did. He was my medic aboard the Lost Light.” Cosmos grinned behind his mask, eyeing the medic out of the corner of his optic. “He ran the medbay with an iron fist and spent the entire time either drinking at Swerve’s, or chasing Rodimus and Drift around threatening to lock them in medical induced stasis if they try racing down the hallways ‘one more time!’” He mimicked Ratchet’s irritated grumble, which got a laugh out of the yellow bot and Marissa.
“God, Rodimus was a handful and I’ve only met him a couple of times.” She laughed, “I don’t pity his command staff at all.” She snickered, probably imagining the stress Megatron, Ultra Magnus, Drift, and Ratchet had combined when dealing with the energetic Prime and his heroic grandeur.
He noticed that the rest of the bots looked confused, and saw the large green one mouth “Rodimus?” at the smaller blue bot. Oh, right. Rodimus might still be Hot Rod here. Hum, he might have to talk to Marissa about that later.
As he was thinking about the younger Prime, he remembered when Soundwave had sent word to Ravage that he would like him to swing by Jupiter for the Bonding ceremony. Rodimus immediately invited himself, and the whole several hundred members of the Lost Light crew. He flew the entire Lost Light over and tried to give a Prime’s blessing for the union, something that was considered a grand and valuable gesture to Autobots. Honestly, Cosmos was touched when he found out, as it was a tradition and a status symbol that upper class bots had before the war, and something he kinda wanted.
But, the whole ordeal caused a huge argument between Soundwave and Rodimus, as he didn’t understand why Soundwave would rather die than allow anything “upperclass pre-war” into his Decepticon Bonding. Or why he didn’t want Megatron within a solar system of the Sanctuary, let alone there for his personal Bonding ceremony. They eventually settled for allowing Rodimus to give them a gift, something he acquired during their travels and one of his ridiculous Rodimus Stars in place of the Prime’s blessing. Megatron was also banned from setting foot onto the Sanctuary, but the little shuttleformer knew Rewind was recording the whole thing to show his captain later.
Cosmos had actually missed the entire argument because he with Ratchet aboard the Lost Light, as the medic wanted to do a check up to make sure Cosmos’ spark was stable and strong enough to form a Conjunx bond. Which it was, his new medic Rest-Q had made sure of that, but Ratchet was never comfortable leaving other bots in charge of anyone he considered “his patients” and wanted to double check. He basically told him what Rest-Q had said: that they had to play it safe and stay close for almost the entire settling period, and then some, to ensure proper spark health.
Cosmos frowned a little at that memory. He supposed that travelling to another dimension would go against Ratchet’s and Rest-Q’s orders. He hoped that whatever damage his spark got from this wasn’t too bad. Actually, could the stress of this early separation kill him if he stayed here long enough? He suppressed a shudder, what a chilling thought.
The medic spoke up, breaking through his thoughts. “Hmm, it seems you're right, I was your medic. All of your recent medical records have either my signature signing them off or some ‘Elite Guard field medic,’ named Rest-Q.”
There was a touch of disbelief in his tone at the title. Maybe because the Elite Guards didn’t exist during the war here, like back at home? Cosmos knew that the position had been recreated by Starscream early on during his reign. Except now, they protected not only governmental figures, but acted as more experienced police forces for the general public as well. Not to mention that anyone could join their ranks, not just the elite classes or whoever threw enough shanix at them like it was pre-war. Most Cybertronians shied away from applying for the jobs and even protested the positions at first, but they were a hit with a lot of the colonists, which made a lot of mechs more comfortable with the diversity within the government and its policing forces.
The medic continued. “And there are some very believable comments.”
He glared at Cosmos then, and the minibot shrunk into himself at the intensity. “What a stupid thing you did! Continuous, long-term, mass displacement?! With an illegal HUD modification for your spark readings! Then you engaged in a Conjunx Bonding ceremony not even a century into your recovery? I’m surprised your spark hasn’t shattered by now with how you’ve been mistreating yourself! No wonder you're in pain, I’ve seen bots die from this sort of thing from only doing it for a few years, let alone the multiple millennia you’ve been doing it for!” He shouted this last bit, angrily waving his servos in the air and scaring away the young yellow bot from the area.
Cosmos gave a weak chuckle, “You said almost the exact same thing last time you found out.”
The medic harrumphed. “Then I’m glad my title as ‘the mech with the only common sense in the galaxy’ is still in play wherever you're from.”
The small blue mech narrowed his eyes suspiciously. A safe distance away from the angry medic mind you, but also still looking like they were one wrong movement away from leaping at him and tearing out his fuel pump. “How to we know that those medical files aren’t tampered with?”
Ratchet rolled his optics and disconnected from Cosmos’ port and spoke before the affronted green mini could speak. “Please, I know tampered med files when I see them. Everything in those files are something I would recommend if he was a patient here. Which would require vast and specialized knowledge of spark function and theory, which is as rare as a fresh energy well in Cybertron’s Pits these days.” He gave a snort, and eyed Cosmos’ chest.
He opened some drawers and fiddled with something before pulling out a syringe full of light blue liquid. “This is energon laced with a very powerful -but temporary- pain blocker. It should help with the residual spark fluxes and ease some stress without permanently altering your pain receptors, which I would not recommend with your condition. Now, give me a fuel line.”
Cosmos eyed the suspicious liquid. “Why is it blue?” Energon wasn’t normally blue, unless it was treated with something else, and he knew from personal experience that pain blocking nanites didn’t effect the colour that much.
That got several deadpan stares. “…Cause it’s energon?” Ratchet made a swipe for the minibot’s arm which was dodged at the last second.
“No, energon is pink.”
“What?!” Ratchet boggled, placing the syringe on a nearby trolly. “What do you mean it’s pink?”
Marissa gave a hum as she regarded all of this. “Energon is pink in our universe. Trust me, I’ve seen enough of it.” She tilted her head and looked thoughtful for a moment, “Though I did have a conversation with Aileron that Camian energon was a different colour for some reason.”
Cosmos ignored the strange looks they were getting from the other bots. “Here, let me show you.” The shuttlecraft shifted some of the frame panels away from one of his arms, exposing the wires and energon lines. The bright pink liquid coursed through the major lines into micro lines that disappeared into the circuitry.
All the bots were crowded around to see the strange energon. Ratchet was muttering to himself, scanning the exposed lines and even going as far as using a clean syringe to take a small sample. Cosmos frowned at the action but didn’t really mind, he knew it was best to just let the doctor do his own thing and complaining would only make it worse.
“I don’t know about all of you, but this is more than enough evidence to prove he’s not from this world.” Ratchet’s voice sounded distant, focused mostly on the syringe, tilting it this way and that.
After that things seemed to ease up. Ratchet shooed the other bots away from his makeshift medbay and began to gather the needed supplies to pull at dents and weld minor tears on his new patient.
Sensing that it he was no longer going to be shot at any suspicious movements, Cosmos relaxed. He reached into his subspace and pulled out his medication container and handed it over to Ratchet for inspection. “Here, this is the stuff my medic gave me for my spark.” He pointed at the bottle with the green sticker, “Those ones are for pain, if you’re really worried. How much should I take?”
Ratchet popped open the bottle to look at the pills inside. He pulled one out, eyed it, then read the prescription, humming. “Take two. That would be the same dosage I was going to give you.”
The medic handed over the two pills and Cosmos popped them in dry, making Ratchet frown. The bot went back to investigating the other pills in the case, muttering at some of the ingredients he saw. “Benjisidrine?! How do you have this? The major ingredient used to create this drug ran out at the end of the golden age!”
Cosmos shrugged helplessly. “I don’t know? If it’s not on Cybertron, then it must come from the colonies? Or we traded it from an organic one?” He looked down at Marissa who looked like she was thinking, “I know we aren’t on good terms with the Galactic Council, but I think we’re finally off their banned trading list?”
“Incredible,” Optimus rumbled from nearby, where he was still listening in on the conversation. “That is a momentous feat, as I can only imagine the destruction to the organic worlds of your universe committed by Cybertronians during the civil war must be equal to ours.” He looked upset, as if he himself was to blame for the war in two separate universes. “Your leader must be an invaluable diplomat.”
Cosmos grimaced at that, and Marissa gave a sharp peel of sarcastic laughter. Their reactions startled the other two bots, confusion being broadcasted onto their fields and faces.
“Oh my god, ‘an invaluable diplomat,’” Marissa gave a chuckle. “No, I spoke to the Council on behalf of Earth, as a Cybertronian organic colony, which helped. Some of the other colonies were on good term with organics too, so I don’t think our ‘invaluable’ leader St—“ Cosmos nudged her, shaking his helm. Marissa frowned up at him, continuing, “Our ‘invaluable’ leader… did much work. The speech he gave was nice, but I honestly doubt he wrote it himself, and you could tell he didn’t really believe what he was saying. Much too kind and sympathetic towards organics for anything genuine.” She huffed, rolling her eyes.
Optimus and Ratchet shared a glance, looking a little uneasy at the blatant omission, but letting the moment pass. Ratchet returned Cosmos’ medication and set to work on repair. Optimus didn’t go anywhere, watching over the small group and acting as a buffer between them and the rest of his team.
Marissa watched Ratchet work silence for a while before getting bored and turned to the other Autobots that were talking amongst themselves.
“So, we never did get a proper introduction. My name is Marissa Faireborn, I work on behalf of the UN as Earth’s first interstellar ambassador and hold a seat on Cyberton’s Council of Worlds.” She quirked a smile, it was a little mean. “Which basically means I don’t let your kind bully us around for our energon resources.”
The baffled looks the bots gave her made Cosmos chuckle a little. It was hard to believe that a human bossed anyone their size around, but he had seen her verbally tear down the most terrifying Cybertronian leaders he knew.
He waved his free hand at the others, “Cosmos of the Manganese Mountains. I was an Autobot spy and I guess I work as a secretary and consultant now.” That last bit was mostly just him talking to him self. He didn’t really have a function on the Sanctuary besides helping Soundwave, taking calls, offering an Autobot view on how to deal with something, and monitoring minor stuff.
The yellow bot gave welcoming chirps and waved at Marissa. “I know you can’t understand me, but I’m Bumblebee, Autobot scout! Nice to meet you.”
That made Cosmos jerk, causing Ratchet to complain. “You're Bumblebee?!” Cosmos was floored. He looked so different here, and he was alive—!
Marissa looked just as surprised as Cosmos. “Bumblebee! But—“ She closed her mouth, and stared hard at him. No doubt she was thinking all the same things as Cosmos, and both knew better than to say what they were thinking. “Sorry, it’s just, you look so different here.” She said instead.
Bumblebee gave an excited whirl, door wings flapping away. “You know me?” His tone indicated a happy question while he pointed to himself.
“Yeah, I met you once or twice. And the bot I take care of as a refugee on Earth used to talk about you a lot as well, apparently you were friends.” Before you died, left unsaid. “You are a lot shorter where we’re from, and rounder.”
This younger version of Bee just gave a happy whirl, before gesturing to the larger green bot. “Go on! Introduce yourself, Bulk!”
The bigger green bot shuffled his pedes for a moment, before giving a short wave, a more awkward greeting than his friend’s. “Name’s Bulkhead, I’m part of the Autobot task force called ‘The Wreckers.’” He motioned at all of the bots in the room. “All of us now are part of Team Prime stationed here at Earth, though. Oh, and he’s not here, and he might honestly not show up while you're here, but there is another Wrecker on Earth too, my buddy Wheeljack.”
Marissa gave a little head tilt at that last bit of information, but just gave a firm nod and a, “Nice too meet you, Bulkhead.”
Cosmos was worrying about the implication of Wheeljack being a part of that violent group. Did he manage to weaponize his explosions and become some sort of battle scientist? Preceptor in his Wrecker mode was terrifying enough, but the thought of Wheeljack as anything near as cold an calculating really worried him. And why wasn’t he with the rest of the team here?
The smallest bot spoke up next. “Name’s Arcee, and I don’t care who you guys are, but if I catch you even talking with the ‘Cons here—” She made a threatening gesture, mostly directed at Cosmos. Unfortunately for her, Cosmos lived with ‘Cons so the threat didn’t faze him.
He sat up straighter though, ignoring Ratchet barking at him to stay still. “Arcee? You look so different here! You were basically my commander back in our world. Right hand to the Prime, and our toughest warrior!” He smiled a little, not that it would be shown except for the curving of his optic band.
That soften her for a moment, but that steel was back in her optics. Now her personality made sense, she wasn’t just angry and defensive, it was just Arcee, smaller but still holding that same fierceness that she carried back at home. He wondered if Aileron was in this universe, it would be nice if this one would be softened by love too. Much less snappish than she was before. Bumblebee mentioned something about human children being around, and Cosmos wondered if this Arcee was just as soft towards these children like his Arcee was with Trypticon’s brood.
After the introductions the air felt a little lighter. Bumblebee offered to take Marissa out to get some human food so she wouldn’t have to go hungry, and was delighted to find out that Marissa did actually understand Neo-Cybex. Optimus said he would give their human representative an update on the situation to see what they can do to make Marissa’s stay in the base easier. After fixing his minor wounds, Ratchet got started on studying Cosmos’ energon.
“I need to make sure our energon won’t have a bad reaction on you. With how delicate your spark is right now, I don’t want to add any new stressors that might worsen its condition.” He then just started typing onto a console and waved the shuttle off. “Go see Arcee or Bulkhead about syncing to our comm. systems.”
He was very, clearly being dismissed, so Cosmos just hopped off the table and stretched out his cables. The pleasant burn of his freshly repaired struts being stretched and hydraulics hissing with released pressure sent tingles up and down his sensor network.
His spark protesting with needle like pricks of pain wasn’t so welcome. He rubbed at his chest again. Primus, he hoped Soundwave was ok, could he even feel him? Cosmos tried to tug on bond, to let Soundwave know he was still there, but he couldn’t feel his Conjunx. What he did feel felt like static, a light fuzzy buzz of tingling sensors that covered his entire spark like a thin bubble. Like an out of range radio in deep space.
It felt like being alone.
“Hey little guy,” a large servo reached out and grasped Cosmos’ own, startling him out of his thoughts. He looked up and saw, uh, Bulkhead was it? The bigger green bot had this confused but sad look on his face as he held the smaller servo gently. “You ok? You started digging at your chest again. Didn’t seem to hear us when we called out to you.”
Startled, he looked around, and saw that Ratchet was eyeing him again, like he was going to strap Cosmos on the berth and reexamine him. Optimus was over by Arcee, both looked a little concerned as well, the former more than the latter. Cosmos avoided their gazes and saw the mess he was making of his paint job on his chest. Scrap, he couldn’t keep it cool for five whole breems before he made this team think he was a loose cannon. You got to keep it together Cosmos he hissed at himself, you’ll see Soundwave again, stop acting like a lovesick newspark! He’s probably working on getting you back right now, and not bemoaning over this like an idiot like you are.
Before he could explain himself, Bulkhead pulled on his servo and dragged him towards one of the hallways. “Let’s get you all set up. I’m sure I have some spare green paint around, and I'm sure Bee wouldn’t mind if we stole and mixed some of his yellow paint to try and match your colour.” The smile he gave him was a little more comforting. “Then we’ll get you set up into the system and clear you out a spare room too sleep in. Do you need a berth or do you prefer to sleep in your alt-mode?” He faltered a little bit, “Not that I think you’re gonna be here long, but just for the short term, yeah?”
Cosmos gave the servo a companionable squeeze before letting go and following behind the big bot. “Yeah, I’m sure we’ll be out of your circuits before you know it. I’m sure our scientist Jetfire is doing everything he can to get us back home.”
____________________
Its been three weeks and Cosmos was going to strangle Jetfire when he saw him again and demand what took so long. Like, it took less than a second to blast them into this alternate dimension, it surely shouldn’t be so hard to get them back?
But no, he had to sit here for several weeks doing nothing but twiddling his thumbs, wondering why it was taking them so long to get them home. Really, if Wheeljack and Jetfire couldn’t figure something out after a day or so, they hopefully would contact the Lost Light and get Preceptor and Brainstorm’s opinions, which should speed up the process? From things he heard, isn’t this sort of thing something the two scientists deal with on a regular basis? Especially Brainstorm, that bot was a few screws short of becoming a mad scientist.
Marissa, unfortunately, seemed to be having a stressful time in this word. While Cosmos thought of this little trip as something of a depressing holiday- so used to the mishaps of the Lost Light and Sanctuary- Marissa saw it as extra work to be done.
Shortly after they settled down in the Autobot base, a “human delegate” named William Fowler blew in, huffing up a storm and ranting about how annoying it was that there was another Autobot he had to “take care of.” Marissa didn’t like that, but let the man take control seeing as this was “his” Earth.
Cosmos personally didn’t like that he had to explain to Fowler that no, he wasn’t a Decepticon because he could fly. That, no, he can’t actually just change his alt-mode to be something with a less conspicuous shape, that’s not how that works. He was a shuttle former: he needs an alt that is capable of easy space travel, also something small and rounded to fit his natural frame shape. Earth doesn’t have anything like that in this universe, so he’s gonna stick to his Cybertronian alt, he doesn’t care what you think or how much trouble that might cause the small human.
She seemed to take personal offence at Fowler heckling someone she considered “her alien robot,” something Cosmos found flattering. He didn’t know if it was because they were from the same universe, or if it was because he was Conjunxed with Soundwave. A bot who tried his best at appeasing the small human female by doing things like paperwork she asked of him, or letting her borrow vital crew members, and his own Cassettes, off the Sanctuary so they could be actors for human films just because she asked. Or maybe it was because he and Soundwave actually read Thundercracker’s scripts and were mechs he called friends and visited the Sanctuary every once in a while to find 'inspiration' for his new script. Cosmos found that humans were very social creatures, and trusted and liked others based on the opinions of their friends, so maybe it was because the pair were nice to Thundercracker that this protective streak ran through her for himself.
Anyway, this lead her to completely dress Fowler down, claiming he was absolutely incompetent and a disgrace to any human army and government. Letting human children do the work of grown humans, not fully understanding how the aliens inhabiting his planet function, not acquiring better anti-Decepticon forces, and how she could run his department better deaf and blind with her hands tied behind her back. Optimus actually had to stop that fight before it got physical. Cosmos just smiled under his mask and enjoyed the show.
The human children showed up the second day both he and Marissa were trapped in this strange universe. She already knew about them, as apparently Bumblebee had already warned her, and calmed her down about the idea as they got food for her the day before.
Once the kids saw him, they flocked to them like heat seeking missiles and haven’t let go of him since. Apparently Autobots don’t fly for some reason in this universe let alone designed for space travel, so the kids were all excited to go on flying trips. Which they also haven't stopped asking him for since he took them out once on a short fly in the desert area surrounding the base. They didn’t go very fast or very high, as Bumblebee demanded he go with them, mostly to keep an eye on things, but he made up for the boring flight by doing some air tricks.
Actually, handling the kids at first made him a little uneasy, since he didn’t know what he could tell them and what he couldn’t and the fact that they always walked too close to his pedes. But, once he started to treat them with the same mentality he had with Soundwave’s bunch- small, loud, annoying, never where you last saw them, like to hang off you/use your body as a perch- Cosmos found that he ended up enjoying their company a lot. It helped that they all lost their collective minds when he showed them he had a hard light, human, holomatter form they could actually interact with. Unlike the soft light projections the Team Prime used here.
One of the reasons he hadn’t taken the kids out for a real flying trip was that Ratchet isn’t too keen on letting him out of the base for long periods of time, but not for the reasons the others have. The others are worried about Cosmos blowing their cover with his Cybertronian alt mode, and how freaked out humans are about aliens in circular ships already. So Cosmos has been “encouraged” to stay close to the base and fly low to the ground in uninhabited areas so he won’t be as visible when he does need to fly. ‘Cause every bot knows how bad it is for fliers mental health to be grounded.
No, Ratchet has been trying to keep Cosmos in the base as much as possible because he hasn’t found a way to make this world’s energon safe for him yet.
The longer Cosmos is trapped here, the lower his fuel gauge gets. He has another cube in his subspace - a habit from the war days where he wouldn’t know how long he would be in space for. However, he is a shuttleformer, which means he is fairly fuel efficient. Especially compared to the heavy duty or racing grounder frames that made up Team Prime. Neither of these facts help with the knowledge that he could go into stasis-lock within an Earthen year if he doesn't exert himself too much, doesn't find another energy source, or doesn’t make it back home.
Little trips to the planet’s atmosphere only shorten that already narrow timeframe. So less taxing flying trips until then.
So for the past three weeks the grounded shuttleformer has been helping Ratchet around the base: manning the ground bridge, cleaning the main area, organizing the Med bay, keeping the children entertained when they couldn't go on missions, and doing maintenance throughout the base because they still haven’t properly fixed things after they had a scraplet infestation? Honestly, it felt like he was almost back on the Sanctuary with the tasks he was given, and he kinda welcomed them.
Marissa was busy too. She was the one that mostly worked with Ratchet on ideas on how to get them home, or offering Fowler training or ideas on how he can improve his department against Decepticon attacks or the MECH terrorist group. She spent a lot of nights coming back into their shared room, and flopping onto her little berth and complaining about how incompetent Fowler’s soldiers are and all the drills she ran that day. She was also collaborating with Optimus and helping his team with missions they go on, something about ancient Cybertronian artifacts that might help get them home or just not be a good idea to let Decepticons get a hold of.
But Cosmos knows how badly being separated from her team is effecting her. During their second week in universe hopping, she could barely sleep at night. She kept tossing and turning and all the rustling was keeping Cosmos awake. Not that he was wanting to recharge. He spent most of the nights tugging on his spark bond and pretending he’s feeling someone tug back through the static.
“Cosmos, are you awake?” The hushed whisper in the darkness broke through his depressive introspection.
He brightened his optics and peered down at the little human berth in the corner of the room. From the light of his optics, he could see Marissa was tightly wrapping her berth coverings around herself. She looked tired, the bruises under her eyes looked even more harsh in the blue light. Her skin, from what he could see, looked even more pale than normal, something that broadcasted “poor health” in both humans and Cybertronians. Maybe she should see Team Prime’s human medic? The other human woman seemed nice enough and seemed to know what she was doing when the children got minor scrapes and bruises. Maybe she would know of something to get Marissa to go to sleep.
“What’s up?” Cosmos replied in an equally hushed tone.
The woman shifted around on her berth until she was sitting upright. Her bare legs were crossed and she quickly rearranged the coverings to, well, cover her exposed legs. She tightened her grip on the cloth and looked up at him pleadingly.
“I really can’t sleep. I keep thinking of home, and how worried everyone must be, and what Thundercracker must be doing.”
She looked away, pausing and taking a deep breath. Cosmos stayed quite, just watching her. This was the first time in two weeks that she's even mentioned any feelings about missing home. He had mostly spent their nights together complaining about missing his new family, the bots aboard the station, and his Conjunx. He knew she needed support right now, so he just listened and waited for her to organize her thoughts.
“He calls me every day, you know? When we’re apart? Talks about his day and his silly stories and his dog—“ Her voice gave a small hitch, and Cosmos sat up realizing she was in actual distress. “— I just keep thinking about his big, dumb face, all sad. He’s lost so much, and doesn’t really have anyone besides me that he spends a lot of time with. And I didn’t realize it until now— now that he's gone— that I miss the big blue idiot.”
Cosmos got up and crouched near her, scooping her up in her cloth bundle and just holding her close to his spark. She leaned into his warm plating, shaking a little with emotions. He ran a digit up and down her back in a motion he’d seen Thundercracker do with his dog. He gave his engine a little rumble, something that would help to calm down a Cybertronian, and would maybe work with humans too.
“I keep expecting my cell to ring, and it’s gonna be his dumb, happy voice telling me about something cute Buster did, or asking for help understanding a human custom for his writing, or—“ She shuddered, leaning into Cosmos even more and he gave his engine a deeper rumble. “I don't know, how his visit with Skywarp went or something. But it doesn’t, and he’s not here, and I don’t know why that’s bothering me!”
She took a heaving breath and Cosmos cooed, chirping at her and holding her close to feel the vibrations from his chassis, trying to comfort her like he would with Soundwave. His Conjunx wasn’t good with emotions either, and sometimes would have these little breakdowns when everything he bottled up would spill over.
They sat there for a while, Cosmos just chirping comforting sounds at her as she tried to gather her bearings. After she seemed to calm down a little more he spoke, “Hey, why don’t we go for a fly? I find new scenery always calms me down, maybe it’ll help you?”
She gave a little wet sniff, “Sure, why not.” She didn’t sound really into the idea, but went along with it anyway.
Cosmos gathered the extra berth paddings and coverings and swaddled her in them, carrying her out of the room. In the main hanger, Ratchet was alone, grumbling to himself over whatever was on the console. When he heard the mini’s pedesteps he looked up, frowning.
“You two are supposed to be in bed.” He gave them both a critical look, and Cosmos felt the fuzzy sensation of a light medical scan being run over his frame. Marissa bundled up deeper in her covers, probably not wanting Ratchet seeing her so vulnerable.
The mini shrugged, “We couldn’t sleep, I figured a short flight around the base might help. Maybe seeing some stars. Spent so much time in space that it’s weird being cooped up underground. Marissa didn’t want me going alone.”
Ratchet huffed, turning back to his console, satisfied with whatever answers he got. “Well she's right, you never know what or who is out there. Make it a short flight, and don’t stray too far from base! If you’re not back in two hours I’ll come out and bring you back myself, and you do NOT want me doing that. Do I make myself clear?” He gave the mini a sharp look as he walked past him towards the main entry hatch.
Cosmos nodded, “Absolutely crystal!” With that he sped up a little down the long hallway. He could just hear Ratchet’s mutterings about “young, antsy, flight frames— going to make me go grey” when Marissa spoke up from her cocoon.
“Cosmos, thanks for covering for me.”
The mini just shrugged, “Don’t worry about it. I’m more than used to bots that can’t handle feelings, so I know that bringing attention to it makes it worse. And Ratchet is the kinda bot that would definitely bring attention to it.” He lifted Marissa to peer at her covered face. “If you don’t want to talk about what you’re going through it’s ok. But, you have been listening to me whine since we got here, so I’ll always have an open audial for you if you need it.”
She reached a hand out through the covers and gave a quick pat on his mask. “Thanks, Cosmos.”
By then they exited the base. In a quick motion, careful not to pull on any of her coverings, Cosmos shifted around her and shot off into the air.
That night he did about thirty minutes of flying and spent the other hour and a half just sitting on one of the large rock formations staring at the stars and listening to Marissa. They chatted for a while, Marissa psychoanalyzing herself and Cosmos giving her some examples of Cybertronian concepts to help her theories, before she past out. She was curled up on Cosmos’ chassis, bundled up in her blankets and stealing his frame warmth like some type of cyber-cat.
As Cosmos starred up into the stars- stars that looked so similar here compared to his version of Earth- he could almost forget he wasn’t in the same universe anymore. Just the constant buzzing of his spark reminding him of how far away he really was.
He tugged at his spark bond again, pushing all his lonely feelings and longing at that staticky haze. He was beginning to feel numb, the lack of response, the lack of feeling from that bond was beginning to mess with his processor. Ever since he was bonded, ever since Soundwave offered him a space aboard the Sanctuary really, he hated being alone. He never liked being alone to begin with, but now that he had a taste of that comfort, of that companionship and adoration that was now a constant in his spark, he loathed being alone again. He would kill just to feel that—
He gave a startled gasp when he felt the bond pull in his chest. It was more like a yank, a definite confirmation of forceful static telling him that someone was there.
“Wah…Cosmos? What’s going on?” Marissa sat up, wide awake again and looking around to see what startled her companion.
Ignoring her, he quickly tugged again. Hope, love, and wonderment being pushed from his side toward that tug. Was Soundwave here? Did they manage to hop dimensions to rescue them?
He waited a minute, but when nothing seemed to be returning he started to fret. Did he dream the feeling? The static around his spark didn’t feel any different, maybe it was just a spark flux that made it feel different? He felt himself sag a little more into the rock beneath him, disappointed.
“Cosmos?” Marissa called again, confused.
“Sorry, I just realized that— that it’s about time we head back to the others. I had an alarm set and I must have been dozing a little when it went off.” For some reason, he didn’t want to tell her about the pull. Afraid that he might have just imagined it and not wanting to make a big deal out of nothing.
She gave a yawn and a little pat on his frame. “That’s ok, we better head back anyway.”
Once they got back to base, he settled Marissa and her things back onto her berth, and stepped out for a moment to talk to Ratchet. The old medic was still at the console, typing and muttering equations to himself. Cosmos felt a little bad for interrupting again, but the memory of that pull made him step up to the other bot.
“Hey Ratchet, how would we know if the bots from our universe came here?” Cosmos began to rub at his chassis again, a tick he did when he normally thought about his Conjunx bond, or was experiencing spark pain again. It was that motion that caught Ratchet’s optic and made him turn around to face the smaller bot.
“Well, when you arrived there was a big spike in energy, almost like an energon blast reading. Shortly after that, we caught your broadcast signal with your co-ordinates. I imagine, when these bots of yours come to our world looking for you, that same blast of energy will happen again. I have several monitors running, hooked up to notice and give an alarm to any type of similar energy spike going off. So far we haven’t gotten anything of worth back yet.” He eyed Cosmos’ chest, running another medical scan. “Why, did you feel something?”
Cosmos shrugged, feeling embarrassed. “No, well, maybe? I thought, briefly while we were out, that the other side of the bond pulled back? I’ve been trying to pull and send information through since we got here, but all I’ve felt has been static. So maybe I’m just, I don’t know, going a little crazy from the lack of response and imagined it or something.”
Ratchet stepped over and placed a servo on the one Cosmos was using to rub at his chest in his distress. The paint had been rubbed off again, and the grey base metal was peaking through the green and red streaks. Ratchet looked tired, but sympathetic.
“The Conjunx bond is a powerful thing. Something that connects bots so deeply that their sparks become one, and are so intertwined that they can never really break apart. Even if one bot is on the other side of the universe, even if one dies.” His voice was soft, and Cosmos stared, enraptured.
“Parts of their spark will always be with you, even if a new bond is formed,” The medic’s voice sounded a little troubled at that, a little guilty. Cosmos’ mind flashed to the last time he saw Chromedome aboard the Lost Light, how he was with this new-not-dead Rewind. “You will be together again as one in the Well of Sparks. So I would trust the bond, maybe that bot of your’s is getting close to coming to our world.”
Cosmos wasn’t a very religious mech— and honestly hearing Ratchet talk about the Well of Sparks as if it was real was super weird— but he did feel comforted by this little speech.
He thanked Ratchet and went back to his berthroom, and for the first time in two weeks, he fell asleep easily.
_______
Soundwave felt another wave of frustration wash through him as there was another tug at his spark.
That little spaceship, the Autobot from another universe, was calling for him again. Pathetic emotions seeped into his spark from the bond that had somehow formed. Longing, loneliness, love.
Disgusting. As if he would ever love an Autobot, or even entertain the idea of willingly bonding with one.
It had been twenty-three Earth day rotations since that little spaceship had shown up. At first the sudden bond between them was interesting, a little puzzle to figure out. Now though, it was an annoyance. Every rotation, sometimes several times a rotation, the little spaceship would tug and pull and push his pathetic emotions into his spark for attention. Distracting the Decepticon TIC from whatever important tasks he was doing to actually run this warship and her crew.
Currently, he was forced to listen to Starscream prattle on about some flagrant lie and ego boost, something he had tuned out a while ago. He really didn’t know or care about what the seeker was talking about, and the only reason he hadn’t physically left was because he knew Starscream would just follow him until he felt like his point was made.
So this meant the tug at his spark couldn’t have come at a worse time. Starscream, true to his glitch-rat like nature, could sniff out the moment he had let any type of emotional weakness slip into his field.
The seeker paused in his speech and stared at Soundwave. Was there was a flicker of fear in his optics, why—? Oh. How nice, he must have thought that Soundwave was frustrated at him. How annoying that his emotional response was caught, but maybe he could get the seeker to frag off for a while.
“Soundwave, are you quite alright?” The seeker fluttered his wings nervously, but stood his ground. How droll.
Soundwave tilted his helm and decided to walk away from the SIC, not wanting to deal with the Autobot bond with him around.
In retaliation, something petty and beneath him to even acknowledge the bond even existed, he gave a sharp, disciplinal tug on the bond. He made sure no emotions leaked through, not wanting the Autobot to think he was worth prying any personal response out of him.
Unfortunately but really not unexpected, Starscream followed him down the hall, still prattling on about something worthless.
“—I’m just saying, perhaps you are overworked, Soundwave! Not to say you are becoming sloppy in your efforts, no no! Just, everybot needs some time to de-stress, and maybe it will be good to shoulder off some of the responsibilities you carry onto other, equally capable bots, hmm? Why, I can think of some jobs that I would be more than willing to—“
Starscream cut himself off and jerked in surprise as Soundwave’s steps faltered for a brief moment.
Soundwave meanwhile, just had his entire spark flooded with love and adoration and so much emotion that even Laserbeak was feeling embarrassed on behalf of her host at the display. The overwhelming rush of emotions shocked him into stalling his processor for a klik, just letting that warmth wash all over him. It felt a little nic— no.
Nip that train of thought right in the aft. He, Soundwave, Third in Command of the Decepticon armies, head of Communications and Special Operations Divisions, and Lord Megatron’s most trusted ally, was not growing soft towards this pest of an Autobot.
He continued walking, maybe a little faster to try and shake Starscream. He really wanted the seeker gone so he can have his emotional turmoil in peace.
Starscream followed still, a little slower, definitely more cautious. “…Perhaps you should see Knockout, my friend. While I admit, he is not the best medic we could have gotten, he is quite capable enough to do a quick medical scan to make sure everything is running… smoothly.”
Soundwave stopped and turned to face the SIC, ignoring the recoil the seeker gave in return at the sudden movement. He stared down the bot for a moment, enjoying seeing his wings nervously twitch as the silence lingered.
Humm, maybe the glitch-rat did have something of value to say. He would borrow one of Knockout’s medical scanners and see if this Autobot bond was infecting him more than he thought.
He inclined his helm towards Starscream in thanks, then turned away and continued down the hall.
This time, thankfully, Starscream didn’t follow him.