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Humans are so fragile.
So minuscule.
So momentary.
So…
~~~~~~~~~~
Their battles were always, always destructive. Always so full of danger, regardless of where the battle finds itself to be, even in the desolated lands they stand now, there will always be someone caught in the crossfire between these mechanical titans.
They sadly would never have thought it’d be one of their own.
It was the Decepticons that started it. One in particular, hell-bent on overthrowing the mighty Optimus Prime as he leads a charge of Stunticons against Optimus’ team and Cade Yeager. It’s not so much of leading as it is imposing his forceful authority on the Stunticons that cowers to his bidding, that detests Motormaster just as much as the fear that drives the cons to charge collectively at Bumblebee. Before Hound tackles them and a rumble between the four autobots and Stunticons ensues. Cade tenses visibly because he’s the odd one out of the bunch. Because when his own alien weapon pales in comparison to Cybertronian’s much larger firearms, it’s all Cade does to support his Autobots by distracting the Stunticons with his own shots, albeit small.
And when Motormaster lunges, it was only to Optimus that he had set his optics on as sword meets sword, his against the Prime’s. Both appear equal, both are giants in their forms and one is as intimidating and powerful as the other. But one is loud, insulting, and lacks dignity.
“Look at you! Pathetic!” Motormaster mocks, yet only silence is returned. “You're a general and this is what you do!? Weak! This is hardly a challenge-”
Motormaster doesn’t finish when Optimus makes a clean hit. It drops him to the ground. “You were saying?”
“Cheap tactics!” He exclaims and blasts Optimus at close distance with a canon. Motormaster stands, admiring the damage on Prime that fell back down. He picks his own sword up and plunges it through one of the Prime’s servo, pinning Optimus down. A pede steps on Optimus’ chassis, pushing as to keep him locked in position. “Heh, King of the Road my aft! I’m the one and only king! You’re nothing but the king of junk-”
“Hey!” There’s a blast that cuts him off, a blast that hits directly behind Motormaster’s tank. “Get off him, dipshit!”
Motormaster turns to find the sight of a tiny human at a distance, one holding a weapon that fires at him again, striking his chassis.
“You lil’ fragger!”
“Cade!” There’s a shout that pulls Motormaster's attention. "Get away from here!"
"Like hell I will, Prime!" Came the human's response.
He fires off more blasts that tick the Decepticon more than actual damage. But the reaction. The alarm of Optimus Prime, triggered by the mere appearance of the human. And Motormaster thought of another idea, a small devious plan forming. Motormaster pedals threateningly to the human, and Cade steps back almost at the same pace.
Motormaster smiles at the panic. “Cade! Run!”
He barely does. He barely falters while his focus is still engaged to the Decepticon, and still fires with his weapon because it’s all he can do to shift the con’s attention away from Optimus. Motormaster picks up a sword, Prime’s sword. Because his is too deep into the earth, too deep that Optimus struggles to free his servo, and witnesses as Motormaster attempts the swing.
And it’s all too late when Cade moves his weapon in between the sword that is swung to his side, attempting to lessen the blow. But the flat surface of the blade hits him heavily, and the impact sends him a distance away, Cade crashing to the ground and a crack that is all too awfully loud. The sound of the hit had been audible, so intense in the force that every Cybertronian paused. And optics stare with the realization that the human standing before is now too stagnant, motionless, and seemingly lifeless. It causes all the bots to take a step back, and what was a war-sounded battle turns immensely silent.
Not Motormaster, though. “Hah! Didn’t even use my full strength for that-”
“MOTORMASTER!” The wrath is never heard of. It is raw, unbridled, and seething. Optimus wrenches and lets the blade cut through his servo, and comes at Motormaster, the momentum pushes the Decepticon flat on the ground. And the Prime pulls back a servo, his good one.
“HOW!” The first hit connects to the helm. It’s powerful enough to split it open. “DARE!” It’s the second hit that Optimus uses his other servo, it’s still as strong. “YOU!” Then the blows don't stop, it’s all Optimus thinks as he bashes the Decepticon continuously, to have him offline for what he did. It’s what he keeps thinking as the optics that glow a colour begin to subside and disappear. It’s what he still thinks as Motormaster is left unrecognizable, and the look Prime gives the Stunticons that stare at him tell that the same fate may bestow upon them.
“LEAVE!!” Optimus roared furiously. It’s enough to keep them from sparing a second to reconsider, fleeing from the battleground.
And they left, almost too easily. Optimus doesn’t care.
“Boss!” Hound had been closest and the first to look at him, and held him carefully when all ceased attacks. “Cade...he’s still-”
Breathing. Despite the excessive blood that pours out of him, there’s breathing. It’s small and weak, but it’s there.
“Bumblebee,” Optimus switches all too quickly into alt-mode when he holds on to Cade and positions him carefully to lie on his cab. “Get Tessa.”
The drive is hurried and frenzied, it’s all the more difficult when Optimus rushes through the road but affords to be gentle with the unmoving body that resides within him. It’s all the more difficult with the rush of what had transpired, and he almost misses a turn to the hospital that was the closest within the area. The speeding, yellow vehicle he sees on his peripheral falls into the drive beside the semi. Optimus hears her panicked sounds.
“What happened!?” Tessa screams from inside Bumblebee. “Optimus, what the fuck happened!?”
Optimus briefs her quickly as his tires screech and he pulls into the parking space of the hospital, his wheels are heating and the rubber marks the pavement of the hospital grounds when he turns. He opens his door and tells Tessa to admit Cade in, Shane following as he was along with when Bumblebee picked her up. She almost wanted to cry, the loud gasp when Tessa sees her father was clear enough of a signal. And it took her best to not break down when she carries and allows Cade to lean into her shoulder, crying for help at one staff that so happened to be outside and witness the state of the man.
~~~~~~~~~~
She starts crying inside the cabin the Prime offered to her, his privacy conceals the heart-rending paranoia and the sorrowful stress of the possible loss of another parent. But he hears her melancholy, the erratic twist and turns of her figure inside. Optimus worries for the sparkling as with her father that is currently undergoing surgery — the unsettling sounds emitting from his engine did little in hiding his own troubles to anyone but the one inside, in her own apprehension. For Optimus Prime, the leader of the Autobots, is disturbed by the possibilities.
His team remains seated in the parking lot, still in their alt-mode to pass as normal without raising questioning stares. At least, for as much as they can anyways. With the colorful, vibrant looks of their form, came the wandering gazes of passersby, sometimes out of admiration. Their presence did little in explaining why one row may contain something grand as a semi plastered with flames and a Unimog on one end, in a hospital parking lot no less. As Autobots though, they are present for an ally in recovery.
There is Shane that stays inside Bumblebee, his head hangs low as he deals with his own concern for Cade and respects his partner that wished to be left alone. While the scout plays small volumes of music, to ease tensions if anything. There is Drift that exudes calmness amongst everyone else, yet battles for stability and composure inside his processors. Optimus does not hear the low rumbles Hound makes periodically. And Crosshairs… he is abrasive, boisterous, but Crosshairs is never this silent - it startles a family as they pass when he jerks mindlessly in rampant unease.
Tessa heads inside when she’s prepared, ready for what's to come. It’s all he does as Optimus watches the shuddering woman confront the doctor, one of many to initiate the medical aid and he feels dread and dismay when Tessa collapses to her knees over a conversation. One Optimus does not pick up from the distance but is telling when Tessa wails sadly and the doctor offers his sympathy. The distraught Optimus feels is overwhelming, threatening to force shut his system.
No…
Cade is…
He’s…
“He’s alive,” Tessa reveals later. “He has a leg fracture… a cut on his head…broken ribs, he shouldn’t be alive, but he is.” It’s a small whimper and a realization to herself, it’s a hit to her at how close he had been. How terrifyingly close he was to go. Tessa clutches Shane as though comfort becomes a necessity and he was a lifeline, and Shane motions his trembling hand to soothe her in small circles.
How Optimus wishes he can do the same.
~~~~~~~~~~
Optimus can see the room through the windows.
He's in bed, placed in the center. He has tubes that go in and out of his body, the upper half of his head is covered in bandages, so too is his chest and of one arm. And he is still, still as an offline mech is. The betrayal of such a thing is only presented by the beeping monitor tracking his pulses. It takes a minute to process the absolutely, dire state that Cade is in. It takes another minute to process that he is in there and Optimus is outside, helpless.
Tessa had told him that she doesn’t know what will happen, though he supposed neither does anyone else really. Time will tell. But Optimus braces whatever may come impacting their life, Cade Yeager especially. Because Tessa vented about the consequential effect of the head trauma. Because Cade Yeager may become paralytic, or have behavioural changes, or even memory losses, or have his life cut too short and Optimus had to reassure the anxious, rambling sparkling that he will keep watch over him, should there be any emergency. Before suggesting Tessa go home first with his team and prepare adequately for days where she stays monitoring him, and she abides, if only reluctantly and only if Optimus keeps an optic on her father intently. The Prime emits a buzz, as means to nod when there was a couple that walked by.
Optimus does not know if it was Tessa’s influence that Cade was placed in the only room closest to the parking lot, or if it was the fortune bestowed upon Primus for him to watch Cade with relative ease from where he parked. But Optimus soon finds that he doesn’t really care. He sees him, that is all that matters. That, although his massive size may be incompatible to keep vigil in his bedside, he may at least survey Cade the closest he can — parked right beside the walls to the hospital. Parked where his optics may bear witness to his uneven breathing and his audials pick up the irregular beep! beep! of the heart monitor as the windows are slightly edged open.
It is a little over the evening. Tessa will be returning shortly with Bumblebee. She’d come back after a shower and look presentable, something about how Cade would scold her when he’d wake. For looking anything other than well-attired in a public setting, even though the hypocrisy is very evident - such that he goes out constantly with raggedy boots and a crusty, tattered jacket. Optimus wonders if she said so in a hopeful manner knowing Cade isn’t likely waking soon. Though, it wouldn’t mean he can’t wake up soon. It’s one hope Tessa holds incredulously.
It’s also one hope Optimus keeps to his spark.
~~~~~~~~~~
Tessa visits him on the first to the fifth day, she sleeps by Cade’s side on the sixth to eight, she moves to sleep inside Optimus on the ninth when the room becomes overbearing with its odor that reeks of blood and medicine. And after all these, Optimus has yet to move his optics away, has yet to obligate himself with other duties and tasks, much less recharge. And when he does, it’s never more than a few hours before he rouses awake to inspect the oddities of Cade’s breathing, or Tessa’s whereabouts because he cares for the sparkling as well. He doesn’t say he’s tired, even though he is. So, so, tired. But he doesn’t compare when Tessa feels it as well, he doesn’t proclaim it when Tessa needs him to be her rock and finds it okay when she cries without hiding it from him.
“Uh, here you go, Optimus.” Shane empties the canister, filling his fuel tank. It’s not energon. though it should suffice, after all, Optimus is a ‘normal’ semi. Normal semis don’t take in energon, normal semis are dull, inanimate, and do not produce sounds that form into coherent words.
“Thank you, Shane,” Optimus murmurs low, cautious. Shane comes as frequently as he can, but doesn’t make it all the time Tessa does her daily visits. And times he does, he sides with Tessa more often than not. “How has Tessa been at home?”
Tessa doesn’t usually lie, and she doesn’t need to when they make conversations. But Optimus is aware, for every moment Optimus questions her mentality and condition after the incident, she smiles, nods, and assures him she’s getting better. Another lie, it keeps piling every day. Shane should be truthful, there’s no reason he isn’t. There's no reason he needs to keep a facade.
His answer was expected as they came, Optimus wishes it wasn’t so. “Depressed. Stressed. She’s uh… not doing so good. She doesn’t like hospitals either.”
Optimus eyes Tessa inside the hospital room, anxiety is etched on her features while she tangles her small digits around Cade’s motionless ones and Optimus thinks. Soon, he should talk to Tessa. Soon, he should comfort her when she comes riding here with Bumblebee alone.
“Well,” Shane pats the hood of the semi, climbing the steps. “Tessa told me to get you back home so you can rest up, think we can make it there before it gets dark if we go-” The doors remain locked, Shane pulls the handle but is met with silence and unopened doors. “Uh…”
“Shane…” Optimus says as Shane steps down. “I am staying here.”
Shane rubs the back of his head sheepishly. “Uh, you sure? I mean, Tessa is staying over this time, so we already have a pair of eyes watching him.”
“I know, it is my decision to stay,” he speaks to him as his resolve remains strong. “Forgive me. I shall send a message to Bumblebee, he can pick you up.”
“Sure, sure.” There was an awkward repetition of words, Shane is confused but doesn’t question the order nor go against it. Not like he can anyway. “Let me just tell Tess about it.”
Shane’s movement is too casual despite being very evident with his puzzlement at the mech, so much so that it makes him feel small when Optimus speaks. Like Shane is underneath a behemoth. And Optimus thinks of how minuscule humans are, such as him.
~~~~~~~~~~
Two weeks and a half come and go.
Optimus expected Tessa to come out. It does not happen as the yellow Chevrolet Camaro parks in the conveniently empty space beside Optimus, joining him in obscurity.
“Bumblebee, where is Tessa?” his voice rings and Bumblebee replies just as fast.
“Tessa is still at home. Crosshairs is driving her today,” The mish-mash of audios makes it through, and Bumblebee continues. “Why aren’t you back yet?”
And Bumblebee should know this. He should know this because this is him. Because it’s like him and another human again, because everything between Cade Yeager and prime is too familiar to him that he should know. So he should understand when Prime admits, “Because I’d like to see him wake up myself.”
It’s the closest thing to a confession, Optimus thinks. It’s the closest to realizing there’s… something. Something ever-present that tugs at his chassis, something cultivating that is keen to expand so naturally and wonderfully flourish. Something Optimus Prime feels around him, and it’s so beautiful.
And Bumblebee knows. He just wanted to hear it from him.
“Damn, Motormaster.” The scout swore. Cade wouldn’t have been like this and Optimus wouldn’t be this down.
Optimus agreed. “Have you located where those stunticons went?” Remembering, more or less, of those frightened optics as the Prime roared in anguish. Their flee was from horror, as much as it is freedom, given the authoritarian control and abuse of Motormaster, Optimus thinks they are much harmless as of now.
“No, but everyone’s working hard.” It keeps their mind off Cade for a while.
“Then, I leave you in charge.” An ‘Aye, aye, captain!’ plays and Bumblebee’s engine rumbles alive. “And be careful Bumblebee,” the older mech still watches over Cade, still waiting. However long it takes. “We don’t need any more losses. And not with our friend still in recovery.”
There’s barely a reply as Bumblebee drives away, but Optimus thinks he gets the message. Bumblebee always knows.
~~~~~~~~~~
Thirty-seven days in and they began expecting the worst.
The doctors did, they wouldn’t have a direct answer. Shane did. Tessa, as well. She'd come, per usual, sitting down on a chair beside the bed with a laptop on her lap and glances back and forth between the screen and the father that slumbers peacefully. Too peaceful. Sometimes, she's frustrated, and upset, and moody, and sometimes she speaks with Optimus as if to ignore wholly of the man unconscious. And sometimes, she only wants to hear him speak because the damn room is too restricting and white and she wants to cancel the utterly annoying ding of the heart monitor.
And so, Optimus talks, of tales born from experience and past, of tales years older than Tessa herself, of his own species and their wonders before he talks of the same to humans - she snorts but does not comment further.
She stresses over the work on her screen and vents about it to Optimus. She positions her chair against the open windows and Tessa faces away from the window, and when she talks with Optimus and comes in the nurse to routinely check on her dad, Tessa acts as though she is in a video feed with another caller on the laptop. But seen from the window, the blue truck suspiciously shifts closer and closer every time, and they both wonder if it’s all too obvious or the nurse has far more important matters to ponder about, with what stress one may have worked under a hospital.
Tessa talks one day, she opens her laptop but doesn’t turn the power on. “Do you think he’ll wake up soon?”
She asks this every time she stays. Optimus makes it a habit to inspect the area before speaking. “Every day is another day I wish for him to wake from his recharge.”
“And?” Tessa asks, knowing there’s more.
Optimus looks around again. “Every passing day is another reminder that his optics may open another time.”
“You mean his eyes.”
Had he not stayed a semi, Optimus would have smiled sarcastically. “Yes, I mean his eyes.”
She looks deflated in her chair, as if she’d rather hear something else other than what was already evident coming from the extra-terrestrial robot. But Tessa does not look all too concerned. “Everyone misses you, by the way. ‘cept for, uh… Crosshairs, been handling things not so well. I think? First, dad was gone and now, you.”
Tessa turns to look at the truck behind, forgoing the play with her laptop. “You know we can always take turns, right?” She asks him like it was aforementioned, or even what was intended all along. Though, her features look nothing like chiding, instead, Tessa looks grateful, appreciative, unexpecting of the mech to have endured staying this long without so much of a care to himself. Only towards the sleeping man from nowhere, the widowed, brilliant engineer, the human whom he owed his life to twice. “I watch him and you leave. I leave and you watch over him.”
Cade’s the human Optimus would burn Cybertron for, if it would ensure his safety and his stay beside the Prime.
“Yes, I am aware of what we agreed upon. But I wish to still stay watching over him.” forever. Optimus felt like adding, but disregarded it last minute.
She raises a brow, her silence is tense, and the inner gears of her head start spinning, connecting thinking dots to analyze Optimus’ response and his abruptly endearing, but somewhat off behaviour. The Prime can always be endearing regarding close comrades, though as stoic as he may be, it is not as if Optimus Prime does not care for his close ones. But Tessa concludes that he seems...clingy?
Optimus wonders what she thinks. What would she think? Or if he has proclaimed too much, and left an odd impression. For his spark seems to yearn Cade Yeager, and thus, grows the affection towards him and who he is associated with, such as Tessa Yeager. His sparkling. Daughter, by human terms. This means, he rather not act like a hopeless fool in front of Tessa.
“You care for my dad,” Tessa says so, unlike a question. Almost with certainty, like something factual. No doubt. No hesitation. She repeats it softly, casting a small look at her father. “You care for him.”
Optimus waits, testing changes on her facial expressions, if any. Be it any emotions, and again, he wonders what she is thinking. “Cade Yeager... is in my debt, for he has saved me plentiful times.”
Tessa faces him again, curiously. “So, that’s it? Just something about honour? Honour between you two?”
Optimus doesn’t answer, she thinks it as intentional, for as magnificently enigmatic and capable as Transformers may be, their attitude is comparable to that of humans. Well, some of it. But one glance and her peripheral catches a small child staring at the semi, admiring.
Tessa groans at the timing, and turns on her laptop, and does not think of the implications as she opens folders.
She has one dad to worry about for now.
~~~~~~~~~~
He was at recharge when it happened.
He was at recharge, in the dead night when his partially-cognizant audials registered the uneven, unsteady beeping that sounded all too familiar until this point. Optimus peeks from his recharge and meets eyes through glass so understandably tired, so sorely recovering, but so wondrously open. The abundant pause in thoughts did stop Optimus from processing everything, and only until the barely conscious human parted his cold, shaky lips.
“Optimus….” Words that come out are dry. And Optimus becomes all the more relieved that words are out at all. “You awake, bud?”
“Cade.” Optimus answers his question.
“How come I'm not in your cab?” There’s frantic in his voice at the unfamiliarity. “Where is this?”
There’s an edge of worry in Prime’s own vocalized statement. “You were injured by Motormaster, you’re in the hospital now.”
“Figures. On a scale of one to ten, how bad was I under?”
No answer, none Optimus can give without the glitches on his vocalizers. Not without steading himself over the fact that, after 6 weeks of no gradual progression on his health, after days his family mourned and Tessa begins another round of crying, after Optimus steel himself and his fragility, Cade is awake. Is breathing. Is rubbing his sore muscles in shame and guilt.
“That bad, huh?” His eyes darted across the room, almost expecting a more crowded fill. “Where’s Tess?”
“Tessa, I told her to go home. She was worried.” Optimus said, senses returning. “I should call for her or the doctor.”
His reply is haste. “No! No. Just. Not now? I want some time to myself… Process everything ya’know?” The hisses Cade makes when shifting uncomfortably does not abide his increasing weariness for the condition his inventor is in. “And... I don't need people invading my space.”
“Cade, you need the att-”
“I promise I won't fall out again!” Cade interrupts. “Been sleeping for what? Days? Weeks?”
“6 weeks.” Optimus grimaces, he exhausts like he sighs, the disapproval dwindling from Cade’s insistence. “30 minutes before I call somebody.”
Cade nods silently, a low murmur escapes. “Gosh, so it was that bad…”
“It was.”
There’s a strain in the sound that Cade doesn’t mention or bothers, for it adds to the guilt. Through groans, he straightens his posture, an act if any.
“Well, I’m here now, awake, recharged. Have 6 weeks-worth of energy.” Cade states, though groggy. “You can go recharge, Optimus. I’m back, not leaving.”
It’s the first thought in a while where his recharge should be blissful, and Optimus thinks it will. Sensibly, he should contact Tessa, tell the news and leave it almost as immediately. But for now… For now. Maybe after weeks, he should recharge easy first. No fear. No alarm.
His voice is soft and something of a lull. “Welcome back, Cade.”
~~~~~~~~~~
Cade does not like hospitals.
Or perhaps, he does not like the humans associated with them.
Or even that this is the most of social interactions and responses Cade has received over the years he shifted effortlessly into becoming the Autobots’ go-to medic, and somewhat of an unmentioned leader in the times they ran from TRF. All before Optimus Prime returned, but it did not diminish the respect and trust built by Cade Yeager and the team. Rarely has he ever sat down to engage in jovial, human-like conversations with much of his species, saved for his own daughter, who’d scolded him just days ago, but tightly hugged him as if he was about to leave. Izabella and Viviane are some of the fewer exceptions. As for Shane, he claims, ‘Do I have to like Luckycharms? No. But Tessa will never let me hear the end of it, so I have to like him.’ But now and then, Optimus sees that Cade makes an effort to make it manageable to like him, and when he points it out to the man tinkering away at his barn, Cade only chuckled and said, ‘Your optics are prolly wrecked. Gotta check em’.’
Either way, its result is a less-pleased Cade Yeager.
“Sick and tired of this god-awful place,” he told the Prime, when the hospital was closed and the glow of the moonlight became their glistening light. “Fuck knows how much this stay is already costing.”
The latter does not sound much like an issue, for it is known that whatever price tagged for all the medical assistance used will be paid from the wallet of another man, such that Joshua Joyce has promised to provide financial stability for the Yeager family. No, it is the former that had aggravated the wounded man, limping closer to the window as he held on to his ‘forced-upon-him’ crutches. It is when he sat on the armchair Tessa left purposefully near, that Optimus calmly spoke.
“There are but a few weeks left. Maybe less if you play nice.”
Though it was when he spoke, Optimus did not miss the muted hiss of Cade as he settled on the cushion, but Cade played it off with a wave. Though he acts with practiced patience, the inability to side next to Cade under his guise of protection bothers the mech mildly, as restricted through the bricks and windows that separate them and the action of ruining his cover may cause unnecessary attractions. Optimus is wise and patient, so he stays truly in his alt-mode, and listens continuously to the human he enjoys his presence with. And can never find comfort without.
“Sure, that’s a few days more of being prodded like an animal,” Cade grumbles. “Seriously, I can walk without my ass hurting now and then, can’t I get an early discharge?”
“You are being overdramatic.” The Prime scolds him.
“Course I am, this place is rubbin’ me wrong.” A pause, then Cade eyes the semi, a sudden twinkle in his eyes. It was as though an idea, a mischievous one, came to mind as Cade flashes Optimus with a wide grin, teeth showing and all. “What say you and I have a drive, right now?”
Optimus is unamused, but he thinks it was a good attempt. “Considering these circumstances, I would believe it is not the best course of action.”
“Come on bud, just sum’ you and me time, alone. Watchin’ the stars.”
“Cade…” his name said in a warning tone, yet it’s one full of care.
“Wortha try, Prime.” Cade sags, last bit of effort dwindling as his hands raise in defeat. “Least wortha try.”
“Do not mistake me, Cade,” Optimus says all too quickly. To reassure, if anything, not wanting simple misunderstandings. “Just as you have missed being inside me, I too, have missed the familiar weight and presence that resides within my cab. However it is wise to have professional supervision should you leave the premises, no?”
Cade looks at him again, and this time, sighs. Because it’s the reality and truth that Optimus will be and always is his voice of reason, and whilst at times, he keeps in mind the Prime’s words followed by a direct disobeying of his orders not too long later, Cade will try his best to keep an eye out. Because Cade Yeager is as stubborn as they come, and as loving as they may be.
“Wouldn't look great for a guy with crutches to start driving a big ol’ guy like you, huh?” He asks though the answer is obvious.
“No. it would not." Optimus contemplates, but asks anyway. “What seems to trouble you?”
The silence that ensues answers the Prime, somewhat. Topics may be hard, some harder to talk about, and he supposed it’s one that Cade isn’t ready. To Prime’s surprise, he shakes his head, laughs disheartenedly, and opens. “This whole room just reminds me of Em, Emily.” Cade corrects her name, the name that rolled easily coming from the human and one bringing so many emotions. But he presses on, “It's hard cus, I look at this bed, I look at that seat and it brings me just… brings me to when Tess and I watched her. Every day. Every night. Meds weren’t any helpful and I… I watched her slowly fade”
Cade swore, so low it questioned Prime if Cade even mentioned the curse in between. “I watched her slip away, Opt.”
“And Tess... God, Tess was too young.” The memory bubbles, a little girl asking why her mother won’t wake up to read her bedtime stories. Tessa never asks again, and Cade knew, but wondered if it was normal, for a little girl so independent without that motherly figure. “She’s bright, and too smart fer her own good sometimes. She doesn’t listen to me. Scratch that, she never listens to me.” He remarks, as though to lift himself. Cade made peace with many, some anticipated more so compared to tragedies. And he loves Emily, but understands when little Tessa complained about the different way Cade makes breakfast pancakes than usual, or when she’d have no fresh clothing because someone missed out doing laundry and he was too busy inventing, that it’d be only those two starting from then. And how he had to move on. And how Emily would have liked it that way. The bed Cade dwells for however long left he’s stuck here looks displeasing to the man, but it’s not just the bed, it’s not just how the walls are like those years ago, or that the room reeks of antiseptics and fluids. It’s that guilt of how his family looks at him in destructive, trepidation.
“Must have looked like her there, like Em.” The chuckle he makes is from a reminder that he did this to himself. “That woulda scare Tess alright, it did to me. And the last thing I want is doing that to her,” he mulls over it, and when he looks at the flame-printed semi, he smiles. And Cade thinks he would’ve done it over and over again, no questions asked. “Or you."
Optimus pauses. His words had been so direct, so easy, and obvious all the same. And he ponders over the significance in it, or had Cade meant anything less than the title that his spark delightedly designated. Sparkmates. For what Optimus appears outwardly, stoical and controlled, does not count for the internal deliberation his processor is undergoing.
And between here and there, between the now and then, Optimus wonders when did his spark desire something so foreign to him, but so familiar in concept. Perhaps, he was already hopelessly enraptured, from the start, from the day a vulnerable man approaches a hulking mechanical fugitive, with an offering of a broken audial.
“Thank you.” He said, for his intake encounters a profound, hindering malfunction over the revelation and his vocalizers do not produce many more words because of the unfamiliarity.
“Of course.”
“You have risked your life for me, Cade. I promise to do the same for you.”
And he would promise so much more.
“Hopefully it doesn't come to that ya’ old wreck.” His all-too-cheery smile, his features Optimus captures and stores in his processors.
Humans are so momentary. So brief in their longevity, that they become so utterly valuable and precious. And though, fleeting how their lifespan might be when compared to those of Transformers and many more known beings of the universe, it becomes all the more significant each speckle of memory holds. Optimus Prime indulges that, should he be allowed, for every moment onwards is rather spent closely with Cade Yeager. And that, Cade Yeager would accept the proposition.
Just as Cade had accepted many before. Emily is a name so rare to be heard and so loved by many, him especially. And Optimus supposes, he wonders what it was like. For neither jealousy nor resentment fluttered when Emily was called, but only sympathy and gratitude for she had been a core of the inventor’s life. It’s all Optimus thinks about, if Emily would have agreed to the Prime.
It’s all he thinks about if Cade Yeager would.
~~~~~~~~~~
He grows overly enthusiastic as the days pass and over the moon when the doctor declares his leave tomorrow to be set and done. He makes it look like he hasn’t been comatose in the prior weeks, with what the energy he displays from the excitement of it all, but the crutches and protective footwear tells a different story. Optimus may have to live knowing this tragedy, for it is all the more reason he heightens his battle experience and the shielding of his human.
“You seem so exuberant.”
The man chuckles as his hand raises in a shrug. “Movin’ day, Prime. Tomorrow I'm a free man.”
“It does not mean you are free to pursue reckless abandon in a given moment. I will watch over you.” Optimus says so in warning, but it does not feel so much so.
“You’d watch me either way,” Cade makes a face, a finger pointing to the semi. “Don’t deny me you won’t.”
His fond smile would have shown, if not for the alt-form. “That is something we can agree upon...”
It did not go unnoticed, the distraction voiced by the Prime itself. Cade knows, because he does, in an odd sense of pride about knowing Optimus Prime. It was years they met each other, it was a few months they reunited, he feels like they’ve known longer.
“What's up?” Cade asks, eyes with interest and anticipation. “Cat got your tongue- glossa?”
The audio Cade picks up is a low rumble from the engines, as though referring to an exaggerated sigh. “I supposed, it may be time.”
And Cade falters, so perceived poorly from the vague context of the line. The dismay becomes evident, that he barely makes it as he crosses to the armchair, that his expression morphs indescribable fright contrast to the content face he displays moments prior. For the human to construct such a brave front in dire times, but discloses lingering fear in regards to the big bot, Optimus’ spark pulses adoringly.
"Time for what? Yer not gonna leave, are ya?” He frets, there’s a very prominent fear in his voice. And Cade clenches his chair a bit too hard. “I get that you could’ve been somewhere else important than keepin’ an eye on me. You’re Optimus Prime, the leader of the Autobots and everything and that means getting calls and transmissions from outer- “
“Cade, calm down.” Optimus interrupted, there’s a small hum in his vocalizers, so soothing to the ears. It eases the man, mildly at least. “That is not what I was about to say.”
Cade sinks into the cushion, a breath escaping him.
“So, not leaving? For real?”
“Far from it, the matter is actually quite the opposite, really,” Optimus admits, seemingly too casual and steady. There’s a surge of confidence that rises to which he knows nothing of where it’s coming from, or how Optimus concludes that everything will be okay. And Cade deserves to know.
“Do you have problems with staying?” Cade asks, lacking any preceding worry. The question is genuine, and he is curious and all he thinks is dealing with the issue if something unsettles his truck.
“It is furthest from constituting as a problem, more so a… revelation.”
He raises a brow, eyes brimming with curiosity and his attention captured. “So what's in that head of yours? You had me worried there, bud.”
Optimus would have given him a longing look, he would have lifted him on a servo and surveyed his beauty at such close proximity. That’s not an option now. “I would never want to worry you, the subject is more personal, and it is something I have come to discover as you were comatose. But if it eases your mind to know what it is, so be it.” There’s preparedness, there’s the knowing feeling of what's to come out because it feels so right and fitting. “I have been rather unconventional in the past weeks.”
There’s a small chuckle at the confession. “Heh, did my sleep cause you to-”
“I love you, Cade Yeager.”
The snicker he did pauses in the middle. His expression is one Optimus can’t decipher.
He had said it like a common word, like one expressed almost daily and casually. It’s not, those are the words that emphasize something much more.
“This sensation is odd, for I have not come to understand what it is that my spark has sought, let alone after what feels like eons ago. This is the first I have felt in a long time, but I would understand if my announcement came off surprisingly.” It’s a moment he regrets staying in his alt-mode. He wishes he weren’t so restricted, so trapped in another form. And he’d be able to express to the human truthfully. He’d be able to show the warmth he’d received from the inventor, no matter what they become. “Cade, I want you to know, no matter what you choose, there are no strings attached, and whatever decision you make, I will accept it regardless.”
There’s a concerning look of shock from him. “What happens if I say yes or no?”
“If you do not return my feelings, Cade, then nothing will change, and we will move on as we’ve always had. But, if you choose the former...”
He registers now the sobbing tears Cade makes. And Optimus wonders if he’s made a mistake.
“Cade, forgive me, my actions may have been-”
“No, no, it's not that,” Cade interjects quickly. “Happy tears, Opt. Happy. I’m just-” he becomes almost red everywhere and wipes the tears that cascade without stopping. ”Optimus. I love you. I’ve been in love with you, I didn’t say it because what can I say?”
Cade laughs mockingly, all to himself. “Not very good with this and you know that. But Optimus... I love you. I love you and you mean so much to me.”
It’s all Optimus manages when he moves closer. So clearly, it threatens exposing everything. But Optimus doesn’t give a damn. And when his hood is reachable enough for Cade to firmly touch it as the windows are fully open, he speaks. “I will cherish you, Cade Yeager. You are as important to me as I am to you.”
His hand still stays. Cade never wants to let it go. “I'd give you something but…” His other hand motions to the concrete wall.
“Later, then.” Optimus states. And he was right, everything is okay. Everything is better. “Right now, I just want the two of us.”
The night is young, and they stay facing one another. A sight to behold. A thing of beauty. They both think.
~~~~~~~~~~
He complains again like an old man when he was treated like one - the nurses look at him as though he could keel over any time. Nonetheless, Cade reassures, albeit grumbly, he still has a few years left inside of him, stepping outside for the first in weeks.
He looks like he wants to run to him. And if not for multiple circumstances affecting the brash decision, Optimus was sure this lovable human had it innately to drop everything and trek the distance in under mere seconds. He looks like he wants to hug him, those hazel-green of his are as captivating as the eager expression displayed. If only they weren’t in public, then Cade wouldn’t walk ever so slowly and casually, and Optimus wouldn’t be ever so restricted in his form. Though, in all honesty, that may be a good thing.
He leans on the crutches that have now become essential for him, and Optimus expects a few more grumbles in their days henceforth. Tessa makes a noise of disapproval as Cade hoists himself into the driver’s seat of Optimus.
“Don’t give people the wrong idea, dad. Scoot over, I’m driving.”
Cade obeys the telltale warning, knowingly to never cross the line of a testy Tessa. It’s the same Tessa that makes him breakfast in the morning, does a great deal of care to the Autobots, and reprimands him for when he’s too busy in his barn and not outside to bask in the sunlight. She’s grown too fast and he wishes she’d shrunk back to the youthful girl that lets only the adults be responsible. She’s grown too fast, that in a few more weeks, she’d leave him again for the other side of the country to get her mechanical engineering degree. She’s grown so fast that it leaves him proud, but lonely.
“Ah, shoot,” Tessa mumbles as she searches her pockets. “I think I left my phone back in the room.”
She leaves with haste, exclaiming how she’ll be back quickly so her father doesn’t do anything stupid while she’s gone. Cade scoffs humorously, dramatically offended.
“I lose consciousness for one month and now she thinks I’m unreasonable.”
His voice comes out in small mirth. “Are you saying that you aren’t, love?”
“No, it just sucks that I’m finally being called out for it.” Cade leans back, dropping the crutches on the spacious spot behind the seatings. “You just called me ‘love’.”
“I did.”
Cade snickers amusingly. “Aw shucks, now I need to call you names.” There’s a gleeful grin that crosses his features and he starts citing off the top of his head. “Babe? No. Hot stuff? Maybe not.” He contemplates all too seriously. “What about ‘Handsome’?”
Optimus snorts, sounds that suddenly burst from his engines. “Regardless of what names you decide, call me and I will be there.”
It’s… a bit of an assurance as it is a pledge. A promise. It’s one that comfort swells on his (miraculously) still-beating heart and speaks of a loyalty that is unmatched and undeterred. Cade is a long, hard puzzle that lost its pieces due to time. Due to a disease taking Emily. Due to Tessa thinking about her future. And many more in due time. But now… Optimus Prime is a piece of his delicate puzzle. A piece not purposefully made, yet fits almost too perfectly. A piece inside his heart.
Cade is a happy man again.
“Well, aren’t you just full of flattery,” He’s been mindlessly stroking the surface of Optimus’ interior. His palm caresses the mech lovingly, and Cade wishes they do more if their differing sizes weren’t so much an issue for many of their activities. “I missed you, Optimus.”
“As I have missed you, Cade.”
And when the wheels move, Tessa returns to climb on the truck, occupying to steer and trifling with controls like how an unexceptional driver would. When they turn to the road, Cade does not look back at the hospital, nor does Optimus as it dwindles further from view.
The journey home is not a long one. But the journey home is a rare, quiet one with the careful drive by Optimus. It’s ever more slow and peaceful when Tessa slumbers, and Optimus starts a soft melody in his radio to accompany the serene atmosphere. And Cade muses that Optimus acts as much of a father as he is to Tessa.
He’d like to remember this image. He’d like to capture it and frame it on a wall or his work table.
It’s another image he cherishes when his home comes to view and Cade sees a giant banner held by Drift and Crosshairs. The words ‘Welcome Home’ strikes a sweet, endearing spot inside the human, and he finds himself almost stumbling as he races to his bots on the pair of crutches. They were careful with him when Bumblebee lifts the man, and Hound is as explosive as ever with the barrels of ammunitions he pours into the sky. Hound is a hazard, one that Cade tolerates and protects immensely. Like the rest of his Autobots, his family.
~~~~~~~~~~
The barn doors weren’t fully closed when she started speaking.
“We never got to talk.” Tessa is there, an oversized sweater donned for the chilly air of the night as she enters the barn. And Optimus is there, his full size and not of an indistinguishable semi, awaiting his newfound sparkmate to enter their most cherished spot. Where everything all began. Instead, against him comes Tessa, face tender and grinning with joy at the fact that everything is returning to normal. A new normal. “About you and my dad.” She looks behind her, hearing. When the silence confirms the absence of nosy bots snooping, and the air fills with the chirping of crickets far from them, only then does Tessa face Optimus again. “He’s having trouble putting on clothes, but told me he could handle it.”
“Hello, Tessa.” The Prime greets, to start the conversation, to start off well under the impression. Though, it’s not far from the fact that Optimus has no knowledge of what may come out from this exchange. Knowing she is Cade’s sparkling, in turn, she is also potentially his.
Last they talked, of the buried connection Optimus had, were a few weeks ago. In between that time, were changes in topics, awkward silences, and irrelevant commentaries. Sometimes, pertaining to her. Sometimes, pertaining to him. But not once about them. About her father and him.
Tessa glances at him, hands tied behind her back. The words she utter are with little problems despite the growing awkwardness. “Frankly, I have no clue what's going on between you and him. But well, I can come up with a couple of guesses.”
She says this but Tessa knows there’s really only one guess. One very accurate guess.
Optimus wonders how long she knows. How long she was confident in her answer. But rarely, should it come to a surprise that Tessa understands faster compared to most. He has yet to inform his team about him and Cade. The Prime deliberates internally about when he should, or if they already are aware, if it was that obvious. Bee is likely to know, maybe Optimus should start with him if they were to announce it soon.
“Tessa…” He speaks, almost ready to confess.
“No, it's fine Optimus, really,” Tessa speaks faster, her hands up and shaking like everything is okay. “It’s not like I'm against you two or anything.” She looks at him again, and it brings him back to the same expression of gratitude in the hospital. A face so appreciative and appreciated, and she does so because of him. Because of Optimus Prime. “Dad’s been looking at you— he is looking at you like you'll travel across another galaxy again. Guess that’s what scares him the most. He's so hopelessly in love it's… reassuring, if that makes sense?”
His helm nods in agreement. And brings it up when Tessa hums delightfully at the response.
“I am fortunate to find that my feelings were reciprocated,” Optimus admits. There’s a wry smile he makes, he knows she knows. “Though, I’m certain you are aware of that. You’re the first to know.”
She smiles like it was anticipated, like a flower that bloomed after tremendous hours of waiting. Tessa seems so relieved, from the shoulder that slumped and the content breath released, a burden finally lifted.
“Yeah? That's great, Optimus.” She replies brightly. Optimus wonders ridiculously if she referred to the budding romance or the pride of being the first amongst others.
“And,” he starts almost hesitantly. “Would you object to our relationship?”
She snorts when asked and shrugs at the notion that Tessa would ever do such a thing. After years, her father finally has someone to, well, be who he was meant to be. A doting father with a heart too big for his body. But not much logic to balance him out. She surmises that’s where Optimus comes in. “I’ve been telling him for the better part of our years to get someone that can keep him in place, he gets into sticky situations more times than I'd like.”
Optimus laughs inwardly at the truth. A knowing smile appears. “We both know that even he wouldn't listen to me at times.”
“That’s true.” There’s an inescapable sigh from her, and Tessa lives with the fact that that’s how her father truly is and truly will be. That doesn’t mean she’ll play by the rules. She never did with that dating rule, never did with a lot of the overbearing and overprotective attempts her father did. Tessa realizes that she really is a daddy’s girl, and the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree. “But you have better luck than even I do with him. I'm his daughter, you're his, well…”
Tessa almost embarrassingly prays her search for words does not equate to compromising tension with Optimus. It is none that the mech did, he only smirks and proudly finishes for her.
“Equal.” Optimus claims.
And Tessa laughs. She laughs but never intentionally offensive. "You're a 22-feet tall advanced, space robot from another planet. Equal isn't really there," Tessa points out effortlessly. And yet, she finds it’s not the most ludicrous thing to call them. “But yeah, equal. I just need someone to look after him, you know? He tells me this all the time, but I won't exactly be there to watch over him as I'd like.”
“He does try to be there for you.”
“That's what I love about him. But you will be there to look after him for me, right?”
Optimus wouldn’t have it any other way. “You have my word, Tessa.”
“That’s all I needed to hear.” She concludes smoothly, making her way to the door before pausing briefly. “She'd like you. Mom.”
The comment elicits a warm reassurance that spreads across the Prime. It’s baffling that the thought of an approval may matter tremendously knowing Optimus is above such commendations. But he can’t help when his spark beats joyously over the mention. His chuckle is that of contentment. “Would she now? After all, we may be sharing partners now.”
“Liked. Respected. Approved.” Tessa listed, her agreement comes so naturally. “I know you have my approval, Optimus.”
“Your acceptance matters to me,” She nods at his words, and Optimus begins to love the sparkling even more. “Thank you, Tessa.”
The door closes and Tessa bids the mech a good recharge. All is silent now. But he enjoys the momentary calm and quiet, there’s a smile on his faceplates that he realizes recently, and Optimus wonders just how long he’d been smiling casually in front of her. And if she noticed, but doesn’t comment because the Prime can do a few smiles once every few moments.
The creaky noise of movement signals the opening of the doors again, and Cade hobbles slowly inside, still in the practice of moving with his crutches without hurting after too much pressure. His voice is curious when his lips part to speak.
“What did she do to you?” Cade questions, then thought of another. “Or... you to her?"
His optics look down, confusion expressed through those vibrant blues. “What do you mean?”
“She’s smiling, Optimus. She never smiles in the barn.” The blend of amusement and bewilderment finds it to his feature, and Cade rubs the back of his neck sheepishly. “She didn’t threaten you, did she?”
In delight, Optimus shakes his helm. “None of that, Tessa and I were merely conversing. She knows about us.”
The face cade makes concludes the expectations of that possibility. Cade wonders that too, and he reasons that Tessa is his daughter. She should know him. Or if it were reasons elsewhere, if Optimus really had been that unconventional. And one day, maybe he’ll ask Tessa the specifics of Optimus’ state when he was flat on the bed, unconscious. One day, he’ll ask if she found out through him or Optimus. “Does she now? I told ya she’s too smart fer her own good. What’d she say?”
“She approves of us.”
“She better,” Cade chuckles, recalling her incessant persuasions to reconsider another romance. “Or I’ll start putting down rules with her and Luckycharms.”
“Tessa wouldn’t like that.”
“Prolly not,” it’s not like she won’t break them anyway, Cade sighs at the thought. “Think we should tell the team about us?”
“It wouldn’t surprise me if Bumblebee knows. Perhaps, when the time is right, we can tell them.” Optimus states, and dips down at Cade that has fallen adoringly in awe. “You’re staring.”
He still is even after the line.
“You love me.” Cade says dumbly.
“I do, indeed.” Optimus answers jovially.
“Lift me up, bud.” Optimus does and does it with careful consideration. But Cade leaves the crutches to drop when he sits on the giant servo. “Once I get better I'm dismantling those junks for parts.”
He rolls his optics at the antics. “What is it?”
Even his antics can be from the grin he makes. “Just that thing I wanted to give.”
His hand reaches the sides of his helm, for how much he tries to anyway, and pulls him closer so that Cade’s lips meet his own bigger, metallic ones. And oh… isn't this pleasant. It’s Cade that instigated it and Cade that finally parted them. There’s a lovely look that comes across his face, and furthermore when his grin widens and leaves another peck on the side of Optimus’ faceplates.
“So, how was that… Handsome?”
“Enjoyable.” Optimus loves him so. “The name, however…”
His laugh can fill his spark with utter contentment. “Still have my beautiful mind, and I’ll even git to a million names until I find the right one for ya.”
Optimus thinks it’s a promise he’ll be persistent on.
Humans are so fragile.
So minuscule.
So momentary.
But so full of love.