Is it too Late to Say Sorry? (Closed)

[Deleted]

Episode 2| Week 3| Day 1| 2 AM

She probably should have been resting right now. Lying in her quarters with all the lights off in a valiant and desperate attempt to recharge. But she couldn't even if she wanted to. Instead she was sitting against the wall, knees drawn up to her chest, as she stared toward the doors to the medical bay anxiously. Using what little patience Shale had to wait for him.

Hazmat.

Just hours ago she was fully under the assumption that he was dead and that he had been that way for a very long time now. She'd made peace with that thought even if she hated it. This damn war had claimed so many already, she was beyond lucky to have lived the way she did. But Haz had been in the thick of it. Smack in the middle of the fight. The last she had seen him she'd seen the results of such gore. It only made logical sense that eventually in their time apart he'd become another casualty; even now that thought left her with a very bitter aftertaste.

Then to her immense surprise just yesterday evening he'd come waking through the ground bridge. Alive, limping, but very much functional.

She'd just been hoping to get a cube by herself when she'd spotted him out of the corner of her eye. Shale could never mistake that build for anyone else in the universe. It took a long moment for her to process just what she was seeing right then, under the wholehearted belief she was dreaming right then and there. Yeah, she'd fallen asleep without noticing again and her head was playing cruel tricks on her. This was by far not the first time this had happened; her brain feeding her happy memories with her big lovable oaf before reminding her that's just what they were: memories.

But this was different.

She didn't remember approaching him or reaching for his hand but she did remember that painfully familiar warmth they had. So foreign after so long that it startled her at first. But it then slowly dawned on her that he was real, that she could touch this one. It didn't take her five seconds after that to immediately throw her arms around him in the tightest hug she'd ever given him. If it weren't for the fact he needed medical attention she most likely would have never let go again.

Shale had never been so happy, relieved, and overcome in her entire life. But then all the bad memories came back again. The last they'd seen one another had been a very ugly affair to say the bare minimum. Hazmat had practically begged her to sign up, throwing promise after promise that he'd pull every string he could reach so they could be on the same squad. But she knew better, and she was sure he did too. The two had left on very bitter terms after she'd refused one time too many. Her anger and disgust over the sight of the wounded and dying overruling her better judgement.

He just wanted to keep her safe. She understood that now.

It wasn't long after the jubilation had started that she began to think. What if he was still angry at her? Was he still upset about what he'd seen her do? By what she had said to him before they'd gone their separate ways? There wasn't a day that went by after that she didn't feel regret about it. Hazmat had always been that one mech who got to her, the one who mattered. She never knew why but she never found reason to question it either.

She'd missed him, and whether he wanted to hear it or not the weight in her chest needed to be lifted. She needed to apologize. To give him the apology she was wholly convinced she'd never be able to deliver. She also needed to know... everything. How was he still alive? What happened? How did he get to this miserably little ball in the middle of nowhere?

So she waited, and would continue to wait as long at it would take to see him.

Even if her back was starting to ache.

[Deleted]

"Come on you big oaf... focus." Hazmat growled at himself as he tried to work on his re-injured ankle, using an H-shaped tool to carefully open up the plates of his hazard armor so he could work on his injury. He was sitting on top of one of the medical births with his good leg swung over the side with his pede firmly planted on the ground to keep him supported while he had his injured leg up on the birth with him. His knee was fully bent and tilted off to the side so he could get at the injury on his leg better. Under normal circumstances it would be Ratchet fixing his leg but today the grump of a medic was absent. ((In an hour or so the mech would find out the medic was at the truce conference.)) In truth Hazmat didn't mind it too much, considering his was techically a medic himself in a way, and his injury wasn't that bad and he now had the equipment to render proper repairs... and to kill the pain. However as the plates of his armor parted so the mech could get a good look at his injury, his thoughts kept on drifting back to a femme that he hadn't seen in ages.

Shale.

He was having trouble believe she was still functional. A few hours ago he had finally entered Omega base and after glancing around he caught something out of the corner of his optic... and was stunned to see her staring at him. That well built femme's frame was unmistakable for him. If his jaw hadn't been attached to his face plate it would've fallen to the floor. He remembered clearly ignoring the Autobot Red Alert as he approached Shale, kneeling down, and giving her the biggest hug he ever gave her. At first he was worried he might crush her but it was his leg that gave out at that moment instead of Shale. So now he here he was in the medical bay working on his own legs while he kept on thinking about Shale.

With the armor on his leg fully parted Hazmat grabbed a small tool that he had custom made back on Cybertron that he called the micro servo; it was basically a much smaller grasping servo with 3 fingers and a thumb that he could use to work inside much smaller bots. It had saved several dozen mechs and femmes and it would help him save his leg. All he had to do was grab the bad line, carefully remove it, and graft in the new one that he had resting on the birth right next to his leg. The crushed line in his leg wasn't any good anymore and had to be replaced. Still though his thoughts kept on going back to Shale. He had been fully convinced that she had died during the war since in war it wasn't just the warriors that died but the bystanders as well... and Shale wasn't a small target. He also knew that she hated violence so if she ever got in trouble it was more likely that she'd run instead of try to fight, so she might not last long. In an attempt to protect her he tried to get her to join the Autobots and into his unit so he could protect her but she hated violence so much that she refused. They had parted on such horrid terms that day... and Hazmat was regretting everything he said to her that day.

As it turned out if she had joined him she might of died when his entire unit died or she would've been stuck on Cybertron with him... so in a way it turned out fine since she was here now... but still...

Sighing through is vents, Hazmat pulled out the bad line and then use the micro servo to attach the new line. Ratchet might of been able to render proper repairs so a transplant wasn't needed but for now Hazmat had only his own skill to rely on. With his leg repaired he carefully closed up the armor and then welded them back into place with the welder housed in his arm. Putting the tools down and standing up, the mech could see that his repairs were successful since he wasn't getting any error messages. Putting the tools back where he found them, and well as leaving the micro servo with the medical tools in case Ratchet might need it, the custodial mech turned around and started to head for the exit of the med bay.

... only to fine Shale sitting just outside the door. "Shale..." He couldn't get anything else to get out of his mouth. He was at a compete loss for words.

[Deleted]

She was just fighting off the seventh wave of exhaustion, refusing to let herself simply pass out now. There were much more important matters at hand and a mech she hadn't seen in so long in that room she owed an apology to. Although... she wasn't exactly sure how to approach it just yet. Haz had always been that one bot she felt the most comfortable with; but that was such a long time ago that she didn't know if that still held true. Slowly she rested her head on her knees.

Maybe she'd just rest her eyes a little...

"Shale..."

Springing to near immediate attention she lifted her head from her knees. The door had opened and Hazmat stood in the hall watching her. Steadily she pushed herself off the floor and back onto her feet tilting her head back to look him in the eye.

"Hey..."

Good, engage him, try and break the ice first she thought. Lord it almost felt like getting to know one another all over again. For a long moment Shale chewed at the words she wanted to say, trying to think of the best way to say them. She rubbed at her shoulder feeling over the weld marks for a moment as a sort of nervous attempt to ground herself. Say something!

"How's your leg?"

... Are you kidding right now? The first sentence she said to him was "how's your leg?"! Not "I missed you" or "How did you survive?". No. How's your leg. Instant regret flooded her as she firmly planted her own pede up her aft. So much for breaking the ice like that.

Wait. Maybe this wouldn't be a disaster after all.

It still showed her deep concern for him, and she did care if he was alright. But she needed to quickly follow it up to prevent the awkward silence that might come.

"Haz-" his old nickname felt so bittersweet to say - "what happened? After.... that."

He knew what she was talking about, or at least she hoped he did. She really didn't want to remember all the hurtful words they'd thrown at each other.

[Deleted]

Hazmat's optics were locked onto Shale when he saw her and smiled slightly at the sight of her slowly lowering her head onto her knees to rest. As long as he had known her she always seemed reluctant to recharging when she wasn't working. She always had to be doing something, but on more then on occasion he had caught her slipping into recharge while she was still walking and had to catch her. It would seem that despite all the time that had passed at least some parts of her were still the same.

But something had to of changed or she wouldn't have that Autobot emblem on her chest. How long had she been with the Autobots? Just how much had he missed? They really needed to talk... but how could they even start that conversation? He had stopped a few of his strides away from her so she wouldn't have to crane her neck so much to look up at him, but still he was standing farther away from her then he normally stood. When he got his answer as to how this conversation would start, he wasn't sure if he should be relieved that she still cared or if he should be worried that she'd ask that instead of a more important question.

His gaze shifted downwards towards his right ankle where the fresh weld marks could be seen. He shifted his weight to his left leg, resulting in several of his hydraulics pistons groaning slightly, so he could lift his repaired right leg off the floor and bent his knee allowing him to firmly tap the tip of his pede on the floor beneath him causing a few loud clangs. Planting his right pede back onto the floor again and shifting his weight again so all of his weight was on his right leg, this time causing the hydraulics of his limbs to groan even more, and he lifted he left leg to show that his once injured leg could handle his full weight. "Better now, thank you." he answered as he lowered his left leg and properly divided his weight evenly onto his legs, much to the relief of his hydraulics which had stopped groaning. The large mech's gaze shifted from is leg back up to Shale, but it stopped when he saw the wield mark on her shoulder and he cocked a brow plate in concern. The wield looked recent, otherwise Shale's self repair systems would've made the wield mark a bit harder to see. "How's your shoulder?"

Inside Hazmat felt himself flinch slightly. So now that they were finally talking the big questions started to come out. "You mean... after we parted ways from out last... meeting?" He said hesitantly as he crossed his large arms over his chest and shifted his jaw over to the left, the typical posture that Hazmat took when he was trying to figure out if he should tell the whole truth or only part of it. However the instant he realized he had shifted his position into that the custodial mech internally flinched. Had he actually considered not telling Shale everything? How could he do that? Had he changed that much since they last met that he was considering lying to her?

Centering his jaw and letting his arms fall so they hung by his sides, the large mech started to answer.

"Not long after we... parted ways... I was promoted so I was Zeta Company's commanding officer. Held that position for the entire war but when the Arc was getting prepped... I made a bad call." Hazmat began, then his optics slowly shut as he sorrow started to fill his field. "My haste to get my artillery unit to the Arc resulted in every single one of them dying. All of Zeta company... gone in one fell swoop." Hazmat was almost whimpering when he finished. When he had tried to get Shale to join the Autobots during the war he had tried to convince her by saying he could get her transferred into his unit.

If that had happened then Shale would've died that day too. If it was possible for cybertronians to shed tears then Hazmat was doing just that.

Now Hazmat really couldn't continue talking... not in public anyway.

[Deleted]

Hazmat's display to prove that his leg was functioning fine again brought a smile to her face. A simple "fine" would have been easier but that was never how Haz did things. After all this time those little parts of him where sill there, it brought her some comfort to know that. His question about her shoulder made her pause, feel over the healing scar once more, then move her hand to her side.

"It's fine, I got a little hurt when I came to this planet. But I had some help."

She still needed to find Deuce and properly thank him for all he'd done for her the night of her arrival. She'd already made several reminders to herself that if she was ever at the neutral base she'd make that her top priority. Shale slowly drew herself out of those thoughts and focused on Hazmat; a deep frown cut across her face at his mention of their last meeting. He went on, saying that after that day he'd been promoted to commander of his unit...but only stayed there for so long. As the Ark had taken off his entire unit had been killed, in those words she could feel his pain. Being surrounded by the hurt and dying aside she could immediately tell his troops meant a lot to him and seeing that happen still left a deep emotional around. Shale slowly moved forward, reaching out and folding both of her hands over one of his. A small gesture but a meaningful one.

"... I'm sorry... I could tell they meant a lot to you..."

Shale lingered, her grip tightening on him. They couldn't just keep standing around in the hallway like this, she could read how uncomfortable he was talking about it in the open like this. Slowly she moved away and made a hand motion toward the hall.

"Come on... we can't just stand around in the hallway all day."

The walk was made in silence, Shale taking the time to figure out just what she was going to say to him once they were alone. What could she say? He'd seen her doing something not only illegal but morally wrong, then they'd all but cut all ties with each other when he'd found her again. Had time been enough for her to try and make things right? Within hours of their last meeting guilt had eaten her alive and had been slowly dissolving her to this day. She just felt so horrible... She wanted so desperately for things to go back to the way they'd been. She knew they never really would... but she had to at least try.

Shale could have lead him to the rec room or to one of the more secluded closets to talk but those all still had a high chance of someone coming in or overhearing them. So that really only left one option: her room. It was the only real place they could talk around here, and they had a lot of that to do. Shale slipped into the open door letting Hazmat follow her before she let the door shut.

She couldn't even turn around before her normally restricted field bleed heavily into the room. Bringing the crushing wave of guilt, sorrow, self hatred, and remorse that'd been building for thousands of years. She felt like she was drowning in it.

"Haz.... I... I'm sorry.... I'm so.... so sorry..."

[Deleted]

Caused by either his secondary functionality as a combat medic or because of how much he had cared for Shale at one point, Hazmat's optics stayed locked onto the weld scar on the femme's shoulder until she gave him an answer about it... though she really didn't go into detail. She never really did go into detail about such things. She was clearly still the Shale he knew back on Cybertron, or at least part of her was. While he did want more detail about what happened when she arrived on Earth and who had helped her, something made him hold his vocabulator. There was something else they had to talk about, and Hazmat knew it.

With a slow nod the former commanding officer's thoughts drifted back to his old artillery company; Gasket who was so quick with a joke and a pun at the most needed times that the knack for making puns had rubbed off onto Hazmat, Coupler Knuckle who always seemed to be a grump but was the best shot in the entire company and thus manned the most powerful of the cannons in the train, the femme twins Rails and Ties who Hazmat himself had trained when they were first sparked as custodial bots like himself and thus were as close as he would get to having adopted daughters and had transferred into his unit at his request not long after he had become the unit commander, Smog Pusher the fearless scraplit hunter whose heroic acts had saved the company on several occasions despite it caused him an optic and a pede, and finally Tanker Buster who was Hazmat's second-in-command and the only other bot in the unit besides Hazmat that could move the entire artillery train without any aid. He missed his entire team, though he missed those mechs and femmes the most since they had been in the artillery unit since he took command and had remained until they all died together.

"Yes... they did..."

Looking down at the pair of servos that were touching his own, Hazmat brought over his other servo and covered Shale's with it. Thanks to how large his servos were her servos and the lower parts of her forearms all but vanished within Hazmat's. Compared to him she was a runt standing next to a giant... but she was worth more to that giant then anything when they were back on Cybertron. However they parted on such horrid terms that someone might of guessed that they could consider each other enemies now. When he found her committing such a horrid crime he felt so betrayed that he could've sworn that his spark chamber had cracked from the pain... and that feeling had stayed with him ever since then. He nodded and followed her, not sure how their upcoming talk was going to end. The possibilities were so endless that the custodial mech chose not to think about the what ifs and go with the flow this time.

The instant that Shale and Hazmat were alone and Shale allowed all of her bottled up feelings to escape, Hazmat couldn't bare it and visibly flinched. The realization that she felt so much regret and sorrow over that day... he knew what had to be done, and it was going to take multiple steps.

However this first step was one of the two most important ones; Hazmat took a single long stride to close the distance between the two of them causing his massive pede to clang against the floor, and pulled his right leg behind him so he could slowly lower himself into a kneeling position, causing his hydraulics to groan loudly until he had settled down onto his right knee and left pede. In this position he could look Shale directly into her optics, and his field started to resonate in reaction to Shale's field as his own sorrow and pain of that day came to the surface.

The large mech said nothing as he reached out and wrapped his long arms around Shale and held her close to his frame. In this position he could crack her open like a walnut, but instead his massive frame and arms were more of a protective shell around Shale. She didn't have to be worried of anything while she was here like this.

But still... he didn't say a word. Not yet.

[Deleted]

Shale spent a painfully long moment staring at, or rather past the door into nothingness letting her unspoken emotions bleed into the room. She never opened to anyone like this unless their name happened to be Hazmat and Primus knew it'd taken a long time even for that. But so much had happened since that time. They'd fought, they'd separated, the whole damn world came crashing down around them. She wasn't sure if she could even open to him like this anymore. But it felt good to finally let it all go like this.

So why did she feel so empty as well? She never liked the fact that all these negative emotions where always there keeping her awake at night, but that was just it. They'd always been there. They were a constant and a constant she was sure that would remain until the day she died. Letting them go now felt so bizarre.

The groaning and hissing of hydraulics made her look over her shoulder at him. She turned to face him as she felt his own field mingle with hers, matching her sorrow and regret with his own. Then he reached for her. Shale froze in his hold feeling his distantly familiar warmth again. Cautiously she lifted her arms, hesitating briefly just before wrapping her arms around him.

"... I'm so sorry..."

She muttered this six more times as her grip on him tightened. Shale was lost in the silence and just how safe she felt right now. This whole world was in danger from their conflict but right now she was the safest she'd felt in what seemed to be a life time. But they had a long to talk about... and they both knew it.

"Haz... what happened? What did you do after you found me selling-"

She paused trying to find a better way to word it. The last thing she needed was to relive one of the worst choices she'd ever made.

"When you found me underground. You vanished and the next time I see you your carting around half dead bots as a soldier."

She learned back and lowered one of her hands to thumb at the sigil mounted on her chest.

"I know I owe you a lot of answers too."

This was going to be a long night... morning... period of time. Stupid Earth time measurements.

[Deleted]

The large black and green mech stayed in that kneeling position as he held Shale in his arms and let her release her emotions. He wanted to say something but he also knew that this was hard for her, it had to be because it was hard for him as well. So instead of speaking with his voice he let his actions speak. As she wrapped her arms around his torso he shifted his right arm so his servo was on the back of her helm and he gently curved his digits around it, and his thumb was gently brushing against the side of her helm just behind her left optic. The feeling of holding her like this was so familiar and yet so distant as well, to the point of holding her felt almost strange and alien.


The sixth time she said she was sorry Hazmat finally spoke in a quiet soothing tone. "Shhh... easy." was all that he said at first. He wasn't sure how to phrase it. He wanted to calm her down but at the same time he couldn't say it was going to be alright because at the moment the only thing they had on their plates were unknowns and nothing else. Still what ever they faced he planned on being there for her.


That's when Shale asked the question that Hazmat knew was coming and tried to prepare himself for it, but it still felt like he got hit by combiner sized fist. He relaxed his embrace of her so she could lean back and look into his optics... and Hazmat found himself unable to look back as his field became flooded with guilt as he shifted his gaze to the left slightly.


But he couldn't lie to her. He hadn't yet and he couldn't now.


"After... we parted ways the first time... I made the biggest mistake of my life. I was transporting containment carts to Kaon and was still there when the war began. I was stuck inside." he started as the mech tried to look into Shale's optics but still couldn't so he simply shifted his gaze down to her sigil.


"Cycle after cycle all I heard and saw was 'Con propaganda. I went to the Kaon reclamation center in hopes to to find some others that wanted to stay neutral, only to find that every custodial bot had joined the 'Cons because they were sick of being ground into the deck plates." Hazmat continued. He knew full well that Shale was aware about his younger dumber cycles where he was rebellious and how angered he was to be made such a low class despite him being a toxicologist should've put him at the top of the class. He told her about it. He also told her how he matured out of that rebellious state after talking to a Vector Sigma priest.


Hazmat fell silent for a moment before he finally spoke again. "They rekindled my hatred of the tower dwellers. In the beginning of the war I... I was a Deception just like them."

[Deleted]

Feeling his hand on the back of her head and his thumb rubbing behind her optic was the most soothing sensation she'd felt in a very long time. It was too good to put into words, she didn't want to move. But slowly they did and the regret in his field spiked suddenly, he couldn't look her in the eye either. Shale frowned deeply as he began answering her question.

Biggest mistake of his life... that was not reassuring. She listened closely as he further explained just what had happened to him. Trapped in Kaon once the war began, surrounded by Decepticon propaganda, and desperate to find safe haven. It all sounded so awful. Then he paused...

No.

No it was impossible. Not him. He wasn't so easily swayed like that. Some thugs that were tired of the way things were couldn't bring him to that side. Yes the implement of the caste system had angered a much younger and ignorant Hazmat but that was a long time ago. And he'd said that Vector Sigma priest had given him peace of mind. He couldn't have just-

"They rekindled my hatred of the tower dwellers. In the beginning of the war I... I was a Decepticon just like them."

Her face dropped instantaneously staring at him with a mix of horror and disappointment. Hazmat, HER Hazmat... a Decepticon? She didn't know what to say, what could she say right then? Shale stared at him as her mind tried to make sense of what he'd just told her. At first she wanted to get angry with him, say he was so much better than that and tell him how disappointed in him she was. Why did that sound so familiar?...

That'd been what he said.

Realizing that felt like a slap to the face. This is how he felt, she never understood until right this moment. It was such a horrible feeling... no wonder he needed sui much time. Her expression relaxed into a thoughtful one as her gaze lowered to his own chest. Shale had a lot to think about in such a short amount of time. Her rational mind slowly gaining the advantage over her emotions.

He was wearing an Autobot sigil now, so at some point he'd had a change of heart. His regret should have been a testament to that not just the sigil in his chest. There was a lot more to this. Slowly she sifted her eyes back to his a searching and expectant look where once had been hurt and confusion.

"... And?"

[Deleted]

After Hazmat had told Shale about his worst decision ever, he visibly flinched slightly as Shale's face plate shifted to show how angry and disappointed she was. Seeing her looking at him like that made him feel like his spark was going to be snuffed out. In the war he had his armor cracked, blasted, and slashed open and his frame had been broken... but none of it hurt as much as that look she was giving him. Was this how she felt wen he found out about her being a drug dealer? The shame felt like it really was burning it way through his helm.


But when her expression relaxed to one of simply being hurt and confusion, the big mech was slightly confused himself. He had expected her to not only get mad but stay mad, instead she seemed to be trying to figure out what else had happened. Did she understand how he felt when he found out about her worst secret? That assumption seemed to be correct when she asked him for more information, and he provided it.


"I was assigned to work with the Kaon custodial mechs. At first the only thing we did was travel through hazardous zones to adjust some valves that were hard to reach. Then gathering scrap to recycle. During that time they were training me to handle myself better in combat. Each mission was one part of a much larger plan." Hazmat began, though he was still having trouble keeping his gaze on Shale. His guilt was still to much to handle. He also allowed his arms to drift off of her till he had only his servos on her shoulders.


"However later I discovered what are mission was. We were adjusting the valves to remove acid from a containment unit so we could reach a holding unit for a very rare toxin. The stuff was more dangerous then Tox-En. Even with my hazardous armor overclocked I could only handle it for maybe a few hours. They wanted to transfer the toxic chemical to the underground Iacon and then pump it up into the city. It would've resulted in every single Cybertronian in Iacon quickly choking to death." The large bot continued and then paused as he sighed through his vents. He was surprised just how easy it was to talk about this with Shale. He first thought it would be hard but now it was like he blasted a hole in the dam that was holding it all back and now he was just letting it gush out.


After a moment he finally continued. "It flew in the face of everything I stood for my entire life. Even when I was young and prideful I did my work to make sure others didn't get sick. I found a war raging within my processor between the hatred my fellow Decepticons had cultivated within me, and the sense of right and wrong that my priest friend had instilled within my spark."


Finally Hazmat turned to look at Shale, gazing straight into her optics. "And you can see which side won. I found another bot that was having second thoughts and he and I worked together to stop their plan. We succeeded and sealed off the chemical so no one could ever get to it again, but that other mech succumbed to his wounds afterwards. Left Kaon after that and surrendered to the Autobots. Was allowed to join them after several years had passed. You know the rest. Became part of a mobile artillery unit that I in time became the commanding officer of.". Hazmat finished and sighed again. "I've been trying to redeem myself of my war crimes ever since.". He left out how he got stranded on Cybertron on purpose since he thought she already had enough to digest.


Hazmat finally stopped before gazing down at Shale's emblem. "So... your turn. How did you manage to get here?"

[Deleted]

Shale listened closely to everything Hazmat said, watching as he kept avoiding eye contact with her. This was just as hard for him to tell as it was for her to hear. It sounded just like his life before, with the exception of combat training. Shale took some form of comfort in the fact he hadn't directly been involved in the fight right away.

But the cons never did anything without a purpose.

All the gathering and shutting off the valves were all to attempt a massive genocide inside the walls of Iacon from below. Just hearing about it horrified her so she couldn't imagine how Haz had felt knowing he'd taken part in it. As he went on Shale settled a hand over one of his on her shoulder attempting to ground him in the moment. She was listening, and soon she'd give him the answers he needed. She was also afraid that this would be hard. But here he was laying all of his cards on the table before them. Once she started she was sure it would come freely as well.

Hazmat finished then finally looked up at her, only to cast his eyes down to her sigil. It was her turn. She sighed softly lying her other hand on his free one to try and ground herself into the moment. She chewed over her words for a moment before she began.

"When the war started I'd long since thought over what you'd said, and it dawned on me just what I was doing with my life. I became so disgusted with myself that I couldn't bare it. I... I ran Haz. I ran as fast and as far away as I could, I wanted so badly to put it all behind me, to forget what I'd done... I never did."

Her grip on him tightened as she continued.

"I wandered from place to place for a very long time, settling in places as far from the fight as I could for as long as I could before moving on." She chuckled in a sad and dumbfounded tone. "I knew it wouldn't go on forever. When the planet began to die..."

She stopped and shuttered her optics closed. This was the worst part. It took her a moment to continue in a voice barely over a whisper, laced with a sad laugh.

"... When the planet began to die... I was okay with that. I... I'd done so many wrong things. I thought I was okay with dying... but I couldn't. I'd heard about the Ark and in the very back of my head I knew I had to survive. I couldn't die just yet. And if I was going to do that, I couldn't stand on the sidelines anymore. I left right for the Ark... and along the way..."

She gestured down to her chest where the emblem sat.

"When we all boarded the Ark and it began to lift off I felt so hopeful. Then those con glitches chased after us and began raining fire down on us. I got swept up in a wave of panicked bots trying to get to the escape pods while they could. I feel into one and it launched me into space. I must have pushed every button, flipped every switch, and tried everything else twice trying to get the hunk of junk to turn around. But that didn't work out so well... it put me into stasis and I was left floating in space."

Even the memory was haunting her. She could have so easily been shot, but by Primus' will she'd lived. She shrugged her scared shoulder.

"Then about five days ago I crash landed here, with a big ol' piece of glass in my arm. With quite a lot of help from a neutral called Deuce I got patched up and sent here..."

She looked up at him under her optic ridges.

"Not exactly glamorous... but it's what happened."

[Deleted]

Hazmat couldn't help but glance at the servo that the smaller femme had placed on his own. The cool feeling of her digits had been so missed when they had been apart. How much he wished he could turn back time so the nightmare that the two of them had gone through never happened, that way he wouldn't of known the pain of not being with her.


But what was past was past. They had to move on... he had to move on.


As she began was she did after they parted ways what he had said back then returned to him and it made him grimace. What he had said had been filled with such anger that he found himself almost unable to forgive himself for saying it. The memory of it haunted him still.


"You know what? Fine! Say here and keep selling that toxin! Hope you can live with yourself supplying that poison to mechs and femmes so they can't function enough to protect themselves! Lets see how long you'll last with only that garbage watching your fender when the Decepticons show up here!!"


Oh if only he could take back those words... though the sliver of his processor that was still mad at her was proud of the results when the femme said she regretted her actions and ran. However that sliver got snuffed out when she said she was alright with dying with the planet. "You... wanted to die with Cybertron?" the shock and pain was evident in his voice and field.


He continued to listen to her as she told her tale and at then end he smiled. "I think we both owe Deuce a thank you." he said then sighed through his vents. "But the 'Cons had managed to follow the Arc and attacked it from space? I never knew." Hazmat thought out loud, then realized he did and wondered if Shale was going to want clarification. "I... I never made it on board the Arc. I was several hundred clicks away when it launched. That's how far away I was when I lost Zeta Company. You were asleep in that pod during your trip to Earth... I was awake and trying to survive alone on Cybertron that whole time till I was picked up a week ago."

[Deleted]

"You...wanted to die with Cybertron?"

Shale averted her eyes from him and fell into silence. Her field spoke for itself. The thought still haunted her even now, just how comfortable she felt with dying. How she just wanted to give up, find a comfortable place, and just wait until her body finally quit on her. She still felt so ashamed by it.

Once she'd finished she finally looked up at him, surprised to see a smile on his face. Shale decided that it'd be best to keep just how hard Deuce had flirted with her as he was helping pick glass out of her arm. She had ignored it plenty herself.

He'd never made it to the Ark?

She hadn't seen him in the crowds that were funneling into the ship, but she hadn't thought anything of it. He would find a way... but he never did. Left alone on their empty world for so long, it was such a painful thought. Shale frowned deeply as she looked up at him tightening her grip on his hand on her shoulder. And here they were, counting their lucky stars that they hadn't been blown to pieces and together again. Lucky didn't begin to describe it.

"Haz... I'm so sorry... I never would have imagined..."

She slowly shook her head in disbelief, unable to fathom the struggling and the loneliness. Hazmat wasn't like her, he was much more social than she was. Always ready to make some ludicrous pun or joke. She never realized just how much she'd miss those quirks until they were gone. When they parted and the anger had long since faded away all she wanted was to hear him make another stupid topical pun.

"... I'm just glad you're alive."

[Deleted]

As Shale tightened her grip on his servos, he responded by removing them from her shoulders and curling his arms around her again. Once again he had brought her into an embrace, though this one was a little looser so she could either embrace him or remove herself from it. He doubted that she'd brake away from it but he liked to give her the option. "Don't try to imagine. I wouldn't want even a flicker of that nightmare in anyone's processor, even an imagination of it. Or the sense of hopelessness that comes with it." He said soothingly as a servo was once again resting on the back of Shale's helm and gently stroking it. As he said this he remembered the total isolation he was in as he went from cycle to cycle of trying to survive on just about nothing, with no end in sight.

To this date he was still not sure as to why he kept going. It wasn't a need to get rescued because after eons of seeing no one it would be safe to assume no one was coming. It wasn't a need to redeem himself because from his point-f-view that would never happen... he just couldn't forgive himself. What was it that kept him going? Was it... was it to see the femme he had in his arms one more time?

"Same here. I'm glad you're alive too." He said with a smile crossing his face plate as he shifted slightly. The shift caused the panel on his right leg to open slightly. He used to keep his steam hammer in that compartment but with the hammer completely destroyed and left on Cybertron, he just used it for storage. And at the moment there was only one thing in that compartment. Seeing it open out of the corner of his optic, Hazmat almost laughed as he reached into the the compartment, pulled out a small cylinder, and pushed a button on the side of it. The lid opened and a single Rust Stick extended out of the opening. "Did manage to grab a souvenir on my way out though. Remember what happened the first time I tried to make these things myself?"

[Deleted]

Shale quickly returned her arms around him as he pulled her to him again. She didn't want to dwell on the topic anymore, he was here, they were together again... not much else was clear but she knew it'd be one step at a time. They had a lot of forgiving to do, and not just toward each other. Shale leaned back slightly and watched curiously as he reached for his leg. Her optics cycled wide as he produced a cylinder and it's contents toward her.

A rust stick.

She hadn't seen one in such a long time and the smile it brought to her face was massive. It never occurred to her long ago that something so simple could bring her so much joy now. Gingerly removing it - fearful it would crumble to dust upon contact - she turned it over in her fingers with careful reverence. It was just like she remembered it and at this point she almost didn't want to eat it.

... Almost.

When Haz spoke again she paused, slowly recalling the day he declared he wanted to try his hand at candy making. His fellow depot mates were sometimes the "lucky" candidates to try out his early attempts, but most of the time that honor had gone to her. By then they'd become an almost daily occurrence in one another's lives and he always found time to have her try this new batch or the one with more of this in it than that. Shale nodded stiffly as her face pulled down into a thoughtful stare.

"Yeah... I do. You were so tired of having the others take them all before you could on days you were so busy. As I recall your exact words were: "How hard could it possibly be?" Pretty hard evidently."

The left corner of her mouth turned up marginally.

"The very first batch couldn't even hold their shape, they were tar black, and broke at the slightest touch... and they tasted so horrid."

As she spoke she began smiling more and more, and as she finished she chuckled. Then she did it again. And again until she was laughing gleefully. He'd been so excited to have her try them and when she'd given her honest opinion of: "these are awful" she had thought he'd give up, but he'd done the opposite. It was such a silly and plain memory but she was nearly doubled over in laughter about it.

It was so simple but right now it felt so much more important. It felt good to laugh like this, to forget about the problems they had all around them and just revel in the memory of simple rust sticks. It almost felt wrong but that wasn't going to stop her. Finally composing herself she looked at the stick between her fingers and sighed contentedly. Things had been so simple back then, they didn't question if they were going to live through the next day. They didn't have to live in fear of the thought of just how many more Decepticons there were then them. They just lived.

And if it meant that she'd have to live through having to try crappy sticks again then-

"I'd give anything to have those days back."

She frowned deeply, the confection in her hand suddenly feeling much heavier than she remembered it being.