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The pinprick of red is the only thing that's striking about him, at first glance. It's what makes him unique. It's what's kept him sane. Everything recorded, kept in order, events and facts and words. It is a lifeline.
This same lifeline is now keeping him awake in the dark, sending him down a rabbit hole of obsession. Chromedome tells him to recharge.
"You'll break something going on like that."
"I know what I'm doing."
"It's becoming an addiction."
Rewind looks over to him pointedly, but Chromedome isn't facing him from where he's seated on the edge of the recharge slab. A silence passes between them.
"It's not the same." Chromedome finally argues, but there's no spark in it.
"You're right," Rewind answers, "It's not the same."
Chromedome recharges. Rewind does not. He sits against the wall and he sorts through recordings. There's thousands, millions, trillions. He prides himself on recording everything. Usually, despite his impossibly large collection, he is able to pick out exactly what he's trying to find. Problem is, he doesn't know what he's trying to find.
Early on into meeting Chromedome, before he'd really grasped his conjux's situation, he had invited Chromedome to peer inside his memories; he had marveled at the nearly-complete lack of eidetic decay. Little things- like the names of passer-bys- were lost to him, but otherwise Rewind's memories were near-flawless. That's why it bothered him beyond compare when he had been telling a story of their time on the Lost Light to Blurr, and he realized he was missing something. It wasn't a gap in memory, per say; more like a tiny, poorly filled fissure. A crack that was unmistakably there, but covered up. Sealed over. He wasn't forgetting, he was missing. It bothered him inexplicably and intensely.
He asked Swerve about it.
"Nope, everything lines up! Good story, by the way. Classic."
"You're sure?"
Not even a flicker of doubt. Swerve just frowned in concern.
"Yeah, I'm sure."
So maybe Rewind was just going crazy.
He went to the doctor's just in case, just to make sure he hadn't come down with anything. First Aid gave him the all-clear fairly easily. No sickness, no damage, no mnemosurgery scars. When Rewind finally explained why he was so distraught, First Aid shrugged and told him how he'd once been diagnosed with 'obsessive compulsive tendencies'.
"Did you get help for it?" Rewind asked. First Aid thought on it for a bit, scratching his helm.
"No, not really. It got better though. You might want to see a psychologist, if it's really bothering you." he suggested. Rewind felt sceptical towards this, at best.
"Got any recommendations?" he asked anyways. Again, just in case. Chromedome would probably agree with that choice.
"No, sorry. I can get a list for you?" First aid made to pull up a datapad, but Rewind shook his head. After confirming there wasn't something medically wrong with him, he couldn't believe that it was his processor that was failing him. It had to be something else.
"That's okay, don't worry about it. Thanks for the help." he waved the medic off. First Aid grunted.
"Feel free to visit- with an appointment. I can't take you whenever you drop in, next time," he half-joked, seeing Rewind out the door, "and don't stress; if anyone can piece a story together, it's you."
***
His next idea may have been a more dangerous one, but he was getting desperate. His thought process: he would jump through time to that moment with that fissure, hide in the Lost Light's vents, figure out what was missing when he told his story, and wham, bam, problem fixed! He just needed to visit Brainstorm.
Rewind joined a guided tour of Metroplex's primary laboratories, but just as they passed the closed-off hallway he knew the scientists would be working in, he slipped away.
Perceptor and Wheeljack were discussing something with a holographic Jetfire when Rewind stepped in. Perceptor slinked off to address him.
"Perceptor! It's good to see you!" Rewind called gleefully as he approached. Perceptor paused for a moment, peering around Rewind, likely wondering how he had entered. He ultimately decided to leave the question alone, though, and nodded.
"Likewise." he said. What an emotional bot.
"So I needed to talk to Brainstorm about something. Could you- uh..." Rewind trailed off as Perceptor pointed to the ceiling. He started to follow the direction, but just as he did, there was a whoosh of color, and a clang- Brainstorm had dropped from the ceiling.
"Oh, hi!" Rewind exclaimed.
"I'll leave you to it." and Perceptor turned away to rejoin the others. Rewind waited patiently as Brainstorm finished untangling himself from the ceiling wires, then faced him.
"Rewind! To what do I owe the pleasure?" he asked.
"I was hoping for a favor. You're replicating the time briefcase, right?" Rewind skipped pleasantries; both of them preferred to get right down to the meat of things. Brainstorm's optics widened.
"What?" he asked incredulously, then, "No!" he laughed dismissively, until finally, "Who told you."
"Nobody, but noone perfects time travel and gives up on it. Especially not you." Rewind reasoned. Brainstorm tensed and looked back to the science team. He clicked a digit against his face-plate.
"Your flattery is accurate and appreciated, but you have to keep it down." he said, pushing Rewind along to a more secluded part of the room with an arm looped around his shoulder, "Percy knows, but if Prowl finds out, he'll kill me. If Wheeljack finds out, he'll kill me trying to help me."
Rewind himself wasn't a huge fan of Prowl (major understatement), and he had both heard stories of Wheeljack and even talked to the bot himself (however briefly), but he shoved both potential threats out of mind as soon as they had shown up. This was too important to him!
"I just need to use it for a klik! Not even gonna meddle with anything. I'm just trying to remember something. It's- uh- for a documentary." he lied skillfully and smoothly without any hesitation whatsoever. Brainstorm evidently either didn't notice or didn't care- both were equally likely- because he continued on without so much as an acknowledging pause.
"Percy said it's only for 'emergencies'," he emphasized the quotation marks with visual aid, "and I don't think he'd call this an emergency. Sorry, short-stack."
Rewind hadn't anticipated being turned down so quickly by a bot infamous for his 'exceptions in the name of science'. Luckily, that same someone had a generous weak spot.
"Since when was Perceptor the boss of you?" Rewind challenged. Brainstorm froze.
"Oh- ohoho. No, no, I see what you're doing." he shook his head and digit at Rewind in tandem, "You make a very tempting argument, but I'm on real thin fraggin' ice here. If I could risk helping you, I totally would, but I can't. If you need a new gun, though..." he winked almost obnoxiously. Rewind would have gaped if he had the visible intake for it.
"You're a changed mech." there was a time when Brainstorm would have risen to the challenge like a sparkeater to a hot-spot.
"I'm insulted." Brainstorm said indignantly. Rewind sighed and put his hand over his face.
"Right, well, if you won't help me I guess I'll find another way to fill this mysterious gap in my memory." he said in a feeble half-attempt to guilt Brainstorm as his last resort. It didn't take, of course.
"So that's a no on the guns?" Brainstorm clarified, making Rewind laugh through his hand. He lowered it.
"Maybe some other time."
"I'll be looking forward to it! Just don't take it personally. Anyways, it didn't work right the first time I used it, so I still have to work out some bits. Remember? I was trying to track Megatron's spark signal, but ended up tracking..." he frowned, "well, I dunno. Percy's helping me figure it out."
Rewind did remember. Of course he remembered.
"Good luck, then."
"You too."
***
"Look, if it would make you feel better-"
"No." Rewind grabbed Chromedome's hands in his before he could finish the sentence, the ferocity in his grip matching that of the glare of his optics. Chromedome startled, but recovered quickly and said,
"I was going to say we could look for active mnemosurgeons."
"Oh," Rewind relaxed by a modicum, though he didn't let go, "No to that, too. After Ratchet, First Aid is probably the best medic out there-"
"Don't let him hear you say that."
"-and he said nothing's been tampered with. Besides, some of my files are still corrupted after the whole functionist time-travel ordeal, and I don't really trust anyone to mess with my brain right now. Other than you, of course, but I wouldn't make you do that," Chromedome looked like he was about to protest, so Rewind snapped, "correction, I won't let you do that."
Chromedome grumbled something incoherent and turned away. Rewind let him go, but kept his grasp on the hand closest to him, taking great care to allow himself to ease under the weight. He felt guilty, interrupting the silence through his stiffness and his obviously-wandering mind. Chromedome had been watching the sunset from their place on the rooftop; Rewind had been watching his recordings.
"Sorry. I don't mean to worry you, Domey," Rewind murmured, "I just need to remember this one thing. No big deal."
Chromedome hummed, still watching the sky turn orange. After a moment longer of silence, Rewind leaned against his arm. The orange and grey and blue was overpowered by red the farther down the sun reached, and it cast warm glints across the metallic surface of Cybertron. The pair usually preferred the universal joy of stargazing, but there was a quality to Cybertronian sunsets that was impossible to replicate. They had missed it, after their long voyage through space. Rewind recorded a small portion of the experience; you could never have too many clips of times like these. Beautiful.
"It's probably not one thing." Chromedome interrupted the peace. Rewind could feel a rumble through the larger bot's plating as he spoke, but the smaller had pulled away in confusion almost as soon as the words had been voiced.
"Huh?"
Chromedome snatched Rewind's hand back and watched him intently.
"Well, you described it as a fissure, right? I'm not saying First Aid is wrong- I would feel safer if he was right, and you weren't violated like that- but when mnemosurgeons are covering something up, they edit little things all along the timeline of memory," he explained with zeal, "They don't take out chunks, because that would be clumsy, and the memory would be uncovered much faster. So maybe it's like that; not 'I don't remember the color of the hammer', but rather 'I don't remember bringing the hammer', or 'I don't remembering owning the hammer'. You need to look for patterns everywhere. What changed? What seems out of place? Like that."
Rewind was stunned- both because this had seemingly come out of nowhere, and because- well- wow.
"You are the smartest bot alive. Seriously. I should make a documentary of you, but you just talk for an hour." he proclaimed unbidden, frozen by his conjux' hypothesy. In truth, an hour wasn't enough. He could listen to Chromedome talk forever. Which was a shame, considering the bot leaned a little bit more towards the 'strong, silent' type.
"I don't think that would sell." he said sheepishly.
"I would single-handedly make it the highest-selling vid on Cybertron." Rewind promised. He could totally pull it off.
"Your stubbornness is inspiring." Chromedome shook his head. Rewind snickered.
"The student has become the master, it seems!" he teased, bumping shoulders with Chromedome, who scoffed loudly at the jab.
"Your hand-holding privileges have been revoked." he said, pulling them back and up, out of reach. Rewind made a noise of protest and stretched to take them back, then stood up and tried again, then jumped and kicked at Chromedome when he stood up and laughed. By the time the stars overlooked the pair, they were running around the roof and tackling each other, the spite forgotten for pure fun. The peaceful day to mark the beginning of some not-so-friendly ones.
***
When Chromedome had suggested looking for patterns, he had also told Rewind to take it slow- because the amount of recordings that would need to be rifled through for that were more than could be healthily viewed in one stretch. Rewind had started from the beginning of their voyage on the Lost Light, and had taken the viewings in small doses at first. But then he did start noticing patterns, and he was hooked.
It's the same as before. Rewind's already sitting on the recharge slab against the wall when Chromedome comes in for the night, and at the sight of the mini-bot blankly staring, he seats himself on the other end of the slab without so much as a 'hello'.
It has been five nights of non-stop searching. Watching, replaying, pausing, over and over. There's something there. He knows there is.
"Is this what it was like?" Chromedome's voice overlaps with the sound of Rodimus giving one of his enthusiastic speeches. Rewind doesn't answer. The speech ends. Now there's a flickering image of a hallway. First Aid comes into view and leaves again immediately, to be replaced by an anxious Chromedome.
"I'm sorry." this time, the video and the real Chromedome overlap perfectly. Rewind flinches; this is enough to get him to turn the video off.
"What?" he asks, barely above a whisper. Chromedome turns to him, but points his optics downwards.
"I'm sorry for saying anything. I'm sorry for the mnemosurgery. I'm sorry I didn't listen to you." he says. Rewind recoils.
"But you have to listen to me, okay?" Chromedome ignores the action, continuing with fervor, "I don't know if this is payback for that or the alt-mode jabs or everything that's piled up, but this isn't the way to go about it. It hurts to watch you. You have to recharge."
He's shaking. Rewind can count the times he's seen Chromedome shake on one hand. He offers his palm, and Rewind accepts it. Chromedome curls their digits together.
"Please."
Rewind clears static from his voice, from his optics.
"I didn't mean anything by it, Domey. I'm sorry, too."
Chromedome looks uncertain.
"Then you'll turn in tonight?"
Rewind gives a reassuring squeeze.
"Okay."
Even as his brain module seems to twitch at the thought.
"I love you."
They press their helms together, and recharge. And all is quiet.
Then Rewind is back on the Lost Light.
He's heading down a ramp, and into a hallway, and the lights overhead are too bright but the spaces in-between are too dark. It's a place he barely recognizes, on the far end of the ship where he'd only explored after its final landing.
Right?
A door opens at the far end. A figure steps out, waiting for him.
He's in Swerve's. There's a gathering at the table, and Swerve is passing out drinks. Ratchet comes in, and tells a joke (no one laughs) and doesn't tell a joke (everyone laughs). He feels drunk. He's not holding a drink. He's holding the handles of a wheelchair. There's someone sitting on it.
He's on Necroworld. He's setting up a recording device, and he's full of fear, and full of acceptance. There's a group of bots waiting outside the room. When he walks out, finished, he looks at them all and nods. There's someone standing off to the side. The shape looks lonely.
He's in the hallway. He's holding hands with Chromedome, and the door they're staring at has just closed. He feels dread.
He's at a funeral. Someone he recognizes but doesn't know is reading for the living in honor of the dead.
The setting changes, the time changes, the light changes, over and over and over. Little bits and pieces, missing and returned.
"Ark 1, Ark 2, Ark 3, Ark 4..."
"You realize I'm not that good a shot, right?"
"Whatever it takes, just-"
"Ark 5 is broken."
"Four million years ago, thanks to one autobot, you all came within each other's orbit."
"Ship's Psychiatrist."
"I like to think I'm a pretty good judge of character."
"...It's very personal."
"The matrix."
"My old I.D card."
"Hey, eyebrows."
"It's-"
Rewind shoots up on the recharge slab with a gasp, one word on his processor. A name. A friend.
"Rung!"