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Windblade sits on the roof of one of Metroplex's taller buildings as the sun sets on Earth, with the black hole next to it following shortly after.
A constant reminder of everything that happened, everyone who died, every world that was destroyed.
Then there's steps behind her and Chromia's voice, a quiet greeting.
She thanks Solus Prime once again that after all this time Chromia has returned to her - safely.
She's missed Chromia for far too long. First because Windblade couldn't forgive her, then because she could but Chromia was in prison, and finally because all she had was a video Chromia had left behind and the knowledge that she was in more danger than any other bot.
And now she's here and Windblade doesn't know where they stand anymore.
From the way Chromia pauses before sitting down a small distance away from Windblade, she guesses Chromia doesn't know either.
Before Cybertron they were inseparable. Nautica had groaned and complained about being a third wheel to the most insufferable Amica Endurae she had ever seen - though all with a smile on her face.
On Cybertron Chromia was always on guard. When Windblade had asked what was wrong, Chromia had always responded the same way. She was just doing her job as a bodyguard on a world where no one feared the consequences of harming a Cityspeaker.
And then Windblade had found out just how far Chromia would go to protect her. How many she was willing to kill to bring Windblade back home.
Windblade hadn't forgiven her. She didn't want to.
But she had still loved Chromia.
Every time Chromia called her Cityspeaker in that formal tone - not the way she always said it before, light and sometimes teasing - had felt like being in the explosion again. A dull shock, and then a stabbing pain.
Forcing herself to accept the first "I'm okay" from Chromia whenever she got injured was no better.
"Windblade."
Chromia is looking at her, pausing to see if Windblade's attention is on her voice.
Then she continues. "Why didn't you ask for a severance, after…" the acrolight bomb.
"Everyone would have wanted to know why."
But that's not the reason. No one on Cybertron even knew they were together to begin with. Chromia had insisted on waiting until they knew more about Cybertron. And then it hadn't mattered anymore.
The real reason… "It would have hurt too much to give up on us."
Chromia is right next to her now, impossible to reach. Windblade can't bring herself to close the distance.
"I thought you did. Give up on me, I mean."
Chromia looks out over the city, and Windblade waits for her to say something else. Something that might be less painful to acknowledge as real.
"I thought you wanted me to leave." Windblade wishes she had taken her chance to respond sooner. "I would have deserved it." Much sooner. "I should have talked to you. Believed in you. I'm sorry I didn't."
When Starscream blackmailed her about the bombing, asking Windblade to kill for him, she had refused. She had told Chromia to flee to Caminus, while she would confess everything that had happened.
Chromia didn't listen.
Instead of going to Caminus where she might be protected from any punishment, she stayed on Cybertron and confessed.
Under her helmet, she had written the names of the bots she had killed so she would never forget.
They had already started reconciling before that moment, but this was when Windblade realized she wanted to forgive Chromia.
And then Chromia was in prison.
All of that goes through Windblade's mind when she hears Chromia's apology.
She thinks that Chromia already apologized back then by confessing what she did.
"I'm glad you stayed." And then, "I missed you."
"I missed you too."
They sit in silence for a bit.
The distance between them is the same, though Chromia is now leaning ever so slightly in Windblade's direction.
But there is something still unsaid, and Windblade is the one that needs to say it.
Chromia always says Windblade is better at talking, but right now Windblade wants to protest against that. Chromia doesn't know how much Windblade doesn't say, or how long she waits between wanting to say something and actually speaking up.
But saying that now would just be a distraction. Another delay to figuring out where they stood now.
A delay to finding out if they would need that severance after all.
She tries to shake the thoughts off. She knows Chromia, she's here because she wants to try.
And so does Windblade.
"I forgive you, Chromia. I think I forgave you a while ago."
Chromia turns and for the first time in this conversation they're facing eachother.
"Thank you."
They both smile.
They're at a standstill.
There's nothing left unsaid, but Windblade still doesn't know where they stand.
She knows how to ask.
She gets up from where she was sitting, walks a few steps away from the edge of the roof, and then looks at Chromia.
Without a word, though probably with a few unasked questions, Chromia follows until she stands opposite of Windblade.
Windblade opens up her sparkchamber, and begins to recite the words that Chromia had once said to her a long time ago.
"I bid you stand in the glow of my spark that you may feel the heat of my words and know them to be true." She takes Chromia's hands. "I invite you to receive my light and in so doing become my Amica Endura - from now until forever."
She lets go of the past and stops holding back all of the love she never stopped feeling for Chromia.
It's hard to pick just one thing she values about Chromia. She has plenty of time to tell her everything else.
"Chromia, for your kindness. As you are to me, may I be to you - today, tomorrow, and always."
The fraction of a second after she falls silent and before Chromia answers stretches out to be longer than it has any right to be.
And then…
"Today, tomorrow, and always."
And then Windblade knows where they stand as she closes her sparkchamber.
They're Amica Endurae, from now until forever.
The same moment that she thinks she would really like to hold Chromia right now, she already feels Chromia's arms wrapping around her.
She responds in kind, and decides that she's not letting go until Chromia does.