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Rung's regular practice hours were almost over when his door opened.
Whirl stood on the threshold, silent but for the muted whir of actuators as he turned his head to glance back into the corridor.
Rung tried to hide his surprise. Whirl had never appeared in Rung's office when he wasn't scheduled to be there.
“Please, come in,” he said. He stopped tidying his desk and took a step forward, extending one hand to the helicopter in welcome; he didn’t want to do anything to drive Whirl away. Whirl didn’t reach back, and it was abruptly obvious why -- his right arm was missing from the elbow joint.
This was clearly something urgent, but it was also progress.
“Are you-?”
“I’m fine,” Whirl replied.
He finally stepped inside and let the door closed behind him. He didn’t speak; Rung was left with the impression that his appearance here was something of a surprise to both of them.
“What happened?” Rung approached him.
“I punched Megatron.” Whirl didn't move any further into the room. “His guts are all... space bridge-y.”
Rung wanted to ask him “why” but decided Whirl was either unlikely to answer, or here to talk about it anyway. “Does it hurt?” he asked instead.
“Not really.” Whirl was too still. Rung took another step toward him. Whirl let Rung take a cursory look at the wound to satisfy his concern, then shrugged away.
“Do you want to talk?”
“I dunno,” Whirl said, which was, in Rung's experience, an affirmative. He finally stepped away from the door and roved past Rung into the room. He paused by Rung’s desk, then the visitor's couch. “Talking doesn't do any good. Doesn't do anything.” He sat and somehow managed to look restless despite being motionless.
“But this isn't a social call.” Rung moved to sit across from Whirl.
“Megatron said he protected me!” Whirl spat, abruptly livid. “Back in the day. Ordered his minions not to kill me because I inspired him.” Whirl gave one sharp, furious huff through his ventral intakes. “He said I'd never really been in a fair fight.”
“And that's when you punched him?”
“Yeah.”
Rung nodded. “All right. Is he correct?”
“No! I fought lots of people that weren't Decepticons!” Whirl gestured violently with his remaining claw. “He's lying! Or at least he's- he's full of-”
“He made you angry, though.”
“It wasn't his right to do that! He can't just tell people not to kill me! If they wanna try, let 'em! Who's he to say what's a fair fight or not, anyway? Cause he was a gladiator? Ffff! Like those fights were totally fair.”
“If that's true -- if every Deception you've ever faced has been under orders not to kill you-”
Whirl glared at Rung.
“-are you angry that you're still alive?”
“You think I'd be dead if ol' Bucket-head hadn't told the 'Cons not to kill me? You think I'm weak?” Whirl's stabilizers rose, vibrating, and Rung heard something in his chest click over and begin an ominous ratcheting noise.
“No. I asked if you're angry that you're still alive.”
Whirl settled, optic contracting. “Why would I be mad about that?”
“Because it would mean that you're alive partially because Megatron allowed you to be, not because you earned it.”
Rung got another baleful glare.
“Whirl, there's nothing wrong with being angry about having your free will influenced by someone else without your knowledge. That's a perfectly typical reaction for any autonomous being. I'm worried that you think you should be dead.”
“I don’t think I should be dead.”
Rung leaned forward, hands clasped on his knees. “Okay.”
“No, not okay. Megatron told them not to kill me. That’s it. Beating the scrap out of me was totally fine. You can only die once. But you can almost die a lot of times. And you remember it.” Whirl shifted, drawing his arm across his abdomen, claw resting in his lap. “Yeah, he said he was grateful, keeping the Decepticons from killing me, but he was lying. He was pissed at me. It was revenge. That liar! I got the scrap kicked outta me til I stopped fighting back, til my auto-repair crashed.” He paused. “And yeah, maybe I did want to die a few times. Gotta be better than living when you can’t see and everything’s giving you error messages.”
Rung was quiet for a moment, watching Whirl’s body language. “Do you ever feel like that nowadays?”
Whirl looked up. “Naw.” He shifted, stretching his legs out under Rung’s chair. “He says he was grateful. I think he was humiliated.”
“Humiliated?”
“Yeah. He had all those ideas about changing Cybertron and they didn’t work. Not til I worked him over in Rodion and taught him you can’t just talk, you gotta use force. I made him, he said. And he’s right. I did. It was me.”
“You... blame yourself,” said Rung slowly. “For the war?”
“Sure. I started it. Ask anybody.”
“I’m not interested in their opinions, Whirl. We can discuss your feelings about their perception of you later, if you’d like. Right now, we’re discussing your perception of yourself. Do you believe you started the war?”
Whirl clicked his claws and glanced at the door. He was trying for an impression of impatience, but Rung recognized the fidgeting for what it was - anxiety, fight or flight.
“Whirl.” Rung put a hand on his claw and held it still.
Contact of this sort with Whirl wasn’t without risk. Many empurata survivors didn’t tolerate another person’s hands on whatever poor replacement they’d been forced to accept. They often responded to unsolicited touch with anger, sometimes even with violent outbursts. And Whirl was certainly prone to those if his temper was roused, or if he felt threatened.
But Rung knew Whirl by now and Whirl responded as Rung expected him too: he fell still under Rung’s hand. His claws didn’t unclench, but he stopped the relentless clicking.
“You can’t take on responsibility for the entire war, Whirl.”
No answer, but Whirl’s posture shifted. His claws tightened. Rung’s hand still rested on the apex of one curve, and he could feel it quiver as Whirl increased the pressure of his grip.
Patiently, evenly, Rung said, “You’re angry with me.”
“Masterful observation, doc. You’re really on top of your game today.”
“Why are you angry?”
“You tell me to take responsibility for my actions,” he bit out. “Well here I am, trying to take responsibility- I came to you!- for the worst slagging thing I’ve ever done in my life, and you won’t--” He threw Rung’s hand off him, violently. His rotors spun and stilled and spun again. “You won’t slagging let me.”
“I’m sorry,” Rung said. The words seemed to settle Whirl down - not too many people apologized to him, no matter what they’d done. The reaction was ephemeral, though, and purely physical. Rung’s apology didn’t soothe his processor.
“Sorry to tell me that I’m wrong or something, probably,” he growled. “Gonna tell me how I’m wrong about taking responsibility for this? I can take responsibility for something else, but not this?”
“Tell me about what you did to Megatron. What you did to inspire him.”
Some of the tension left Whirl’s posture. “Heh. Really?”
Rung nodded.
“Back then I had claws I could really hit someone with,” he said thoughtfully. “I mean, these are good. You can ask Horn-head. But not as great for serious blunt-force action, you know? Not enough weight to ‘em. Gotta use my whole arm for a really good hit now. But back then… They were heavy.” He looked up slightly, optic clicking open by degrees. “You want details? I don’t think you want details.”
It was not uncommon for Rung’s patients to try to intimidate him with references to the violence they were capable of delivering. He was small, unarmoured, apparently vulnerable. But Rung was far beyond being cowed by veiled threats. And as bad as Whirl imagined himself to be, he wasn’t he most dangerous patient Rung had worked with.
“Whirl,” Rung said, gently, “You know that talking about that won’t drive me away. Do you want to talk about it?”
“You want me to tell you what it felt like? What I was thinking in the moment, or some scrap?” Before Rung could reply, Whirl looked away. “I don’t remember.”
Rung fixed him with a long, unflinching look. “Is that true?”
“Yeah, it’s true!” Whirl snarled, glaring back, “I don’t remember.” And then he was quiet, optic focusing and dilating, clicking softly, incessantly, while his claw moved restlessly in his lap.
“Why do you think that is?”
“Slag, Rung, because I can’t! How the slag am I supposed to know why I don’t remember something? That’s some paradoxical scrap right there.” He lurched to his feet and stalked to a window. Rung watched Whirl watch him in the reflection.
“If you hadn’t attacked Megatron, do you believe the war wouldn’t have happened?”
Whirl lowered his helm. “Way to simplify it.”
“This is what you’re saying, Whirl. I’m not the one simplifying events.”
Whirl didn’t answer. Rung stayed silent, giving him the space he needed to wind himself down.
“It’s not that I beat him,” Whirl finally said. “It’s that I didn’t kill him.”
“Did you want to kill him?”
“I don’t remember,” Whirl said tersely.
“Why does it matter that you didn’t kill him?”
“Cause if I’d killed him, there wouldn’t be a war.” Whirl turned and slouched against the window, elbow on the sill. “But I didn’t and there was. And who are we kidding, the war’s not over, it’s just… dormant.”
Rung must have frowned because Whirl straightened up a little, stabilizers rising, attention focusing on Rung again.
“You actually think it’s over?” he scoffed.
Rung nodded. “I do.” He didn’t elaborate. Whirl waited, but Rung’s patience won out.
“You’re wrong. War’s just taking a break. It’s who we are- it’s how the rest of the galaxy defines us. You can’t stop being something after so much time spent being it.”
“Is that how you feel about the war, Whirl? Or are you talking about something else?”
Whirl’s optic narrowed to a horizontal slit. “I know where this is going,” he said, pointing his claw at Rung. “No.”
“You’re more resilient than you realize, Whirl. More capable of change. Look at what you’ve accomplished.”
“Pfft.”
“No, don’t discount this.” Rung stood and went to join Whirl at the window. “You’re still alive. Four million years later” -- and they both knew he was counting from the date of Whirl’s mutilation, not the onset of the war -- “and you’re still alive.”
“Big deal,” Whirl muttered. “So’re you.”
“It is a big deal. I haven’t survived what you did. You know the numbers, Whirl. Many empurata survivors became isolated after their abuse. Many chose suicide.” Whirl shifted his weight and turned away from Rung. “And so many lost their whole sense of self. Look at Shockwave. He was a senator-”
“Look, can we not talk about this?”
“It’s important that we talk about it, Whirl.” Rung stood back. “Shockwave was a senator. Empurata destroyed him. Look at what he became- a shell of a person, cold, pitiless, a war criminal.”
Whirl gave a single syllable of empty laughter. “War criminal.”
“Is that funny?”
“War criminal? You mean like Impactor?”
Rung paused. Well, this was new. “Do you want to explain?”
Whirl’s optic narrowed, all amusement gone. “Not really.”
Rung shifted tactics. “How do you feel about what you did as a Wrecker?”
Whirl shrugged.
“Do you feel any different about your work with the Wreckers than you do about the violence you committed for the Senate?”
Whirl shrugged again.
“I think you do,” Rung said. “You were miserable working for the Senate. They hurt you; they used you. Working for the Wreckers must have been different.”
Whirl muttered a vague agreement.
“Was it the type of violence?” Rung asked. “Or the fact that it was voluntary? Or something else?”
Whirl leaned back against the window and went to cross his arms under his chest, but one was missing. He looked down at the stump, his limited expression difficult to read. “Guess it was the company.”
“You had comrades in the Wreckers.”
“Sure. Comrades.”
“No? Not comrades?”
Whirl fixed him with a half-shuttered gaze. “Maybe some of them.” He looked away. “Anyway, I fit in better there than anywhere else.” He pushed himself away from the window sill. “This isn’t a real session. I’m gonna go.”
Rung put a hand on his arm - gentle contact with no attempt at restraint. “Please don’t. You came to me for a reason.” He gestured toward the couch. “Who were your comrades?”
Whirl made a dramatic sigh but returned to sit on the edge of the couch, facing Rung as the psychotherapist took his traditional seat. Whirl never laid down during their sessions; Rung spent most of them dogging him from one corner of the office to another, attempting to steer Whirl back to the couch without making it seem like he was trying to corner him.
“Does it matter? None of them are here. I’m stuck here with you people.” Whirl made a vague gesture with his remaining claw. “Surrounded by a bunch of D-listers and losers and has-beens.”
Rung tried not to smile at the description.
“I didn’t even sign up for this,” Whirl muttered, half to himself.
“But you did, Whirl.”
Whirl looked over at him.
“The first time you didn’t. That’s true. You were incapacitated, and we took you on board for your own safety. But this second time you did. You could have stayed behind on Cybertron. You chose not to. You chose to come with us.” Rung leaned forward. “Why?”
Whirl turned his helm aside, as though attempting to deflect Rung’s concern. “Because... I guess I fit in here better than anywhere. The ex-Wrecker.” He hissed, still avoiding Rung’s gaze.
“What makes that so bad?”
“Wreckers don’t retire. An ex-Wrecker is supposed to be a corpse.”
Rung let the words hang there for a moment.
“You weren’t supposed to leave alive,” he said, slowly. “You were supposed to die.”
Whirl didn’t answer. He shifted his weight, snuck a glance at Rung, and looked away.
“Whirl, you’re aware that I’ve done extensive work with the Wreckers.”
Whirl glanced at Rung again, longer, suspicious about the merciful change in subject.
“Yeah. You did my intake evaluation. And the, uh, the other ones.”
“Yes,” Rung said, smiling fondly. “I remember.”
“I’m still mad you wouldn’t let me read the profile you wrote about me.”
Rung crossed one leg over the other, actively choosing a casual posture. “I’ve been working with the Wreckers for a very long time,” Rung said. “Since they were formed as a unit. And I’ve been involved in unit member evaluations from the beginning. Over the years, I’ve found that there are two basic types of applicants. There are exceptions, of course, but the vast majority of applicants fall into one of these two categories.”
Whirl leaned forward slightly, optic fixed on Rung. Rung had his attention now.
“The first are glory seekers. Wreckers fans. Bots who buy into the hype. They want to be a part of something bright and brilliant. They want to make a name for themselves. Go down in history.”
Whirl made a derisive noise. “Yeah,” he said. “Yeah, I know those.”
“I thought you might,” Rung said. “Sometimes they work out well. Sometimes they don’t. It depends on how well they can adjust to the reality of the unit.”
Whirl nodded. “The ones that can’t let go of that, they don’t last long.”
“The second type of applicants,” Rung said, “are death-seekers. Bots with a death wish. They aren’t willing to go to a relinquishment clinic and have their lives ended. That wouldn’t match their perception of who they are. They join the Wreckers, hoping they can end their lives in a way that fits their self-identity.”
Whirl took this in, optic contracting. Then he laughed. “And you approve ‘em anyway. Harsh.”
“Sometimes, I do. If I think the odds are high enough that they’ll end their own lives even if I deny their application. If I think their positive traits - loyalty, ingenuity, bravery - outweigh any potential risk their self-destructive tendencies bring to the unit. And especially if I think there’s a chance that they might find something in the Wreckers to live for.”
Whirl was staring at him.
“That’s why I approved your application, Whirl. Because I suspected that you’d be beneficial to the unit. But also because I hoped you’d find something worth living for within it.” Rung held his gaze and smiled. “I was correct, I think. On both accounts.”
Whirl didn’t immediately turn away or offer a rebuttal, and Rung considered that a success. “Too bad they kicked me out, huh?” Whirl rested his elbow on his knees, leaning in. “Look, doc, I appreciate the pep-talk-”
“It isn’t a pep-talk, Whirl. It’s the truth and I want you to think about it. Right now.” Whirl drew back, perhaps a little startled. “You were an asset to your unit. You found meaning in that. You found something to live for.”
Whirl did think about it, optic wide for a moment before whirring back into focus. “Yeah,” Whirl said. “And now it’s history.”
“Yes,” Rung said. “It is. There are no more Wreckers. The entire unit has been disbanded - has been erased as a concept. You, Impactor, Springer -- You’re all ex-Wreckers now.”
“No, they’re former Wreckers,” Whirl said. “They got disbanded. I got kicked out.”
“I know you feel betrayed. Hurt. Rejected-”
Whirl held up his claw. “Yeah, yeah. Okay. Let’s not get all emotional.”
“-but you’ve made tremendous progress,” Rung continued. “You were an asset to the Wreckers. You’ve proved to be an asset aboard the Lost Light as well. Did you sign up with us the second time because you’re an ex-Wrecker who fits in with the losers, or because you found camaraderie here?”
“That’s the same thing.”
“No, it isn’t. You saw Megatron assume the captaincy. You knew most of us were already committed to continuing the mission. And then you signed on.”
“I signed on late because I spent three days in Maccadam’s with the Dinobots and Arcee. I didn’t know what day it was.”
Rung frowned. “Not because you didn’t like the idea of your friends alone in space with the Slagmaker.” Whirl looked at the floor. Rung leaned forward. “Whirl, much of your progress lately has come from you taking responsibility for your choices.”
Whirl grumbled.
“Are you willing to take responsibility for the decision that resulted in your being removed from the Wreckers?”
“Trying to kill Springer? Yeah, I told you why I did it already. I never said I didn’t do it. I admitted to it.” He was motionless, but Rung could hear the rising groan of his engine. His rotor blades twitched in their shrouds.
“Admitting it isn’t the same as taking responsibility- full responsibility- for what happened. There was no way that you could deny what you had tried to do. Roadbuster caught you in the act. Admitting what everyone already knew to be true was simple. Do you see how that’s different from taking responsibility for your choice?”
Whirl drew back, optic narrowing, but the ominous sound in his chest cycled down. “It is different,” he said slowly. “I guess.” He sounded hesitant.
“Taking responsibility means accepting your own actions.”
“So I’m supposed to what? Accept that all the slag that’s happened to me is my fault?”
“No,” said Rung quickly. “The choices were yours. But you can’t be responsible for the actions of others. You-” he paused, “-you chose to resist the Senate when they attempted to recruit you. You’re responsible for that decision. But how the Senate reacted to your choice is not your fault. This-” he touched Whirl’s claw, “-was their choice, it was their action. Do you understand?”
Whirl was motionless for a moment, then opened and closed his claw a few times, bumping against Rung’s still-outstretched fingers. “I get it, sort of. In an ideological way or whatever. It’s easy to look back and say, ‘Oh, that was my choice and their reaction was wrong’. But it’s cause and effect, Rung. My choice caused their reaction. It is my fault.”
“Like your choice to beat Megatron caused the war?”
“Exactly.”
“What about Megatron’s choice?”
“What choice?”
“To start the war. Do you think he had a choice?”
“Not after what I did to him.”
Rung sat back in his chair and crossed his legs. “He had a choice, Whirl. He chose to initiate an uprising. He chose to do it violently. He chose to tell the Decepticons not to kill you. All of those things were his decisions, his responsibilities. You didn’t make those decisions, you didn’t issue those orders.”
“But it was because of me-”
“You are not solely responsible for the war. You are solely responsible for beating an unarmed prisoner.”
“The Senate-”
“Ordered you to do it, I know. You chose to follow that order. You are responsible for that choice.”
Whirl sat quietly for several seconds. “So you won’t… let me take responsibility for the war, but you’ll let me take responsibility for pummelling Megatron in that cell.”
Rung nodded once.
“Well, yeah, I did that. But look what happened-”
“Whirl, you have to let other people take responsibility for their own actions, too. Life is not a case of simple cause and effect. Whatever Megatron says, he had choices. Was he influenced by his anger and his humiliation? Yes, certainly. But he still chose.”
After a moment, Whirl looked down at Rung’s hand on his claw. “I understand anger,” he said quietly. His tone had changed so completely that it startled Rung. But he didn’t continue.
“Whirl?”
“He must still be angry. Why else would he- he must have actually given that order.” Whirl shook his head slightly. “And he knew telling me would piss me off. So he must be angry still. He wanted me to be angry too.” Rung said nothing. Whirl opened his claw, turned it, clasped Rung’s little finger gently. “Or maybe not.” He looked up. “That’s what you’re talking about, isn’t it? Guessing why he did it is pointless. He chose to do it for his own reason.”
Rung smiled. “You can’t know what he was thinking. But you can choose how you react.”
Whirl nodded. “Yeah, I chose to punch him and now I don’t have an arm.” The words were combative but his tone held no real conviction. He was concentrating on weaving the tip of his claw between Rung’s slack fingers. “Kind of how life works though.”
“What do you mean?”
“The choices I make haven’t, historically, ended well. You know what they say: once is an event, twice is a coincidence, three times is a pattern.”
Rung hesitated before responding. He cupped his other hand over the back of Whirl’s claw.
“I did not see it that way before,” he said slowly. “You’ve been... punished, repeatedly, for doing what you thought was right.” Rung paused, but Whirl didn’t make any immediate response. He just turned his claw, splaying Rung’s fingers further apart, then let them fall together again. He didn’t pull away.
Rung continued. “You chose to leave the life that was decided for you and become a watchmaker, only to have that destroyed. You chose to resist the Senate, only to have them mutilate you. You chose to warn Optimus not to cross the Senate, and then you warned him about the bomb, only to have him arrest and then abandon you. And then you made a choice with Springer, only to be thrown out of your unit.”
Whirl flinched, a minute contraction of hydraulics. But he didn’t speak.
“You’ve told me before that the voice in your spark - the voice that tells you to do the right thing - you’ve told me before that the voice is quiet,” said Rung. “It isn’t quiet because it’s missing, is it Whirl? It’s quiet because you’ve tried to silence it. Because that’s what you had to do in order to survive.”
Whirl twitched again, harder; it was almost a shrug but Rung doubted it was voluntary. Rung hated to cause him pain, but sometimes pain was the only way to get to the truth.
“You silenced it,” Rung pushed, “but it was never really gone.” He firmed up his grip on Whirl’s claw. “You could have killed Fort Max, after I got shot, when he was distracted. You could have but you didn’t. You volunteered to spark-jump Rewind; a risky, un-studied medical procedure. You saved his life.”
Whirl was staring down at their entwined digits.
“You thought up a way to save Tailgate,” Rung continued. “Whirl, that voice isn’t gone. You do listen to it. I think that frightens you, because of this pattern you’ve identified.” He paused, letting his words sink in because Whirl was actively listening for once, for perhaps the first time ever in their sessions. Rung squeezed his claw. “I think being a crew member here, belonging here, being attached here, scares you, because you know how easy it is to lose it all. You know how much that hurts.”
“Are you gonna tell me everything’ll work out fine?” said Whirl at last. “Because I thought you were smarter than that.”
“No,” said Rung. “I won’t tell you that. We both know it might not be true. But I can promise you that I’ll stay here for as long as I can, and work with you as long as you’re willing, to help you make good choices. And maybe some things will work out.” He squeezed Whirl’s claw again. “What do you say?”
Whirl looked up. “Some things?” He gave a dry laugh. “Yeah, all right.”
“All right what?”
“All right, I’ll-” Whirl paused and shrugged. “Maybe you’re right. Maybe I’m- no. You are right.” He went quiet, and Rung heard the click of his vocalizer rebooting. “I decided to be part of the crew. You losers need me.”
Whirl leaned forward abruptly, grabbing Rung around the shoulders in a rough half-embrace with his one functional arm. Rung reacted slowly, uncertain what had prompted the gesture, or what it meant, but he laid his hands cautiously on Whirl’s sides.
“I don’t trust Megatron,” Whirl muttered close to Rung’s audial, vehement. “I don’t care what he says, he’s Megatron.”
“I understand,” Rung replied. He had his own opinions of the situation, but Megatron was a patient, now. This was not the time or place to share them. “What are you going to do?”
Whirl’s arm tensed around his shoulders. “Stay here,” he said. “Watch him.” He paused. “Talk to you.”
“Good. Good choice.” Rung gave the helicopter a little pat and to his surprise, Whirl hitched himself forward and gathered him in a solid one-armed hug.
“Not giving this up without a fight,” Whirl whispered. He released Rung and sat back. “That’s what I’m good at. Megatron be damned.”
“Be careful,” Rung advised. Whirl huffed and looked away. “I’m serious, Whirl. Be careful. Think. Fight smart. Okay?”
“Yeah, smart. Okay.”
“Okay.” Rung reached up and touched Whirl’s shoulder, above his severed arm. “Now let’s get you to the medibay, yes?”
Whirl stood. “My legs are fine. I can get there by mys-”
Rung put his arm around Whirl’s waist. “Whirl? Let me help you.”
“All right, all right. Letting you help.”