binary_runaway | NOVA STORM'S BEST AND GREATEST INBOX

No, it was my choice. Don't make it about you. [she hisses, trying to get through nova's fog by accusing her of the one thing she knows her sister hates to be accused of. regardless of whether she is or not, it should still serve as a jolt back to reality.] There was a lot that should've been different, but it wasn't.

[skywarp generally tries to avoid getting caught up in the what ifs and who could've and i should've, as nova does. it is simply a dichotomy in their thought processes, as skywarp not doing this means she doesn't always see the bigger picture and accepts things as they are rather than how they can be better.]

Hmm. Target located.

[Nova Storm's next words clog in her throat and she presses back into the hull at her back, optics going wide] I didn't- Not for you- [But, yes, that does serve to slice into the knot built up around her spark enough for Nova to heave in, and heave out a vicious swear, although this time she doesn't even know what about. Everything, maybe]

[Another kick, another wobble, and target acquired]

[Nova jerks and looks up for the first time, lowering one arm where it had crept up to grab her helm. She thinks about running again, then just vents out a resigned sigh that doesn't sting this time and shifts to hold out her arms, instead of curling in on herself]

Fine. Fine, you found me, like always. Get in here before I change my mind, already.

[there's a flash of red lighting and there she is, though she doesn't come extremely close to nova, just floats lazily in space a few feet away.]

Are you going to tell me why you're doing this?

[she could guess. but she wants words.]

[Nova just looks back at Skywarp for a few seconds, then slowly draws her arms back and over her head, curling up tight except to snap out another vicious kick at the curve of the ship, then another and another and another and-]

I- It-

[Nova heaves in a vent and expels heat in a shudder that wants to be a sob but comes out as a snarl]

It's my own stupid head going around in circles about things I don't know how to fix and can't talk about cause I'm a stupid bird and-

[another and another and another and-]

When I figure it out I'll make those things burn for making me feel this way, helpless and pathetic and-

[another and another and]

[she stays lazing around, only pulling nova back from kicking the ship by her shoulder, then whaps her upside the head. not gently, either, but not hard enough to dent.]

Get it together. [she doesn't say this angrily, though, as she's genuinely trying to pull nova out of a spiral.] Tell me what you can talk about.

[Nova grunts at the smack, but not out of pain or even as a protest, but simple acknowledgement. She huffs and lowers her arms, but keeps her optics aimed at the ship instead of her sister so she won't be tempted to say things that'll just end up getting trapped between her teeth and tongue, anyway. She's tried before]

Isn't great, [she mutters, plating rustling silent in the vacuum out of discomfort. Then she pauses, optics narrowing. Maybe she could dance around it...?]

...Y'know how with Mandroid, we used to- [They'd had a system with each other for if that idiot tried anything with the other, different movements and blinking patterns in their biolights from their twin language, but even saying this much twists tight in her chest. Nova averts her face with a frustrated snarl, so Skywarp doesn't see her wince. Stupid Antlers and his stupid, stupid compulsions]

[She kicks the ship again, hard, and gets a certain vicious satisfaction that she dents whatever is holding up that antennae]

[not fully understanding why nova has stopped suddenly, skywarp responds in positive in their language, then tilts her head with an inqusitive chirp. is this something that will work? she won't know until nova responds.]

[Nova sags back and lets her helm thunk silently against the hull behind her, easing out a vent before responding back in their twin language of biolights and chirps]

Compromised. Can't say it.

[her expression twists suddenly, as she knows who it is. who else could it be, but the mech she saw stab nova and who whatever it is he did to her spark-- and all the incompetents on the ship let him get away with it. growling, skywarp buries her fist in the ship wall next to nova.]

I know who it is. I don't care if you have to tell him I know. His sloppy work is going to undo him again.

[turning back to nova, her optics narrow.]

You stop blaming yourself for this right now. This is his fault, not yours. If you blame yourself and run away like this then he wins.

where @

[Nova Storm immediately jerks to a halt in the middle of whatever she was doing, utterly frozen in place with wide, stunned optics for several seconds when the notification crosses her HUD. She scrabbles for her datapad and curses as she fumbles it and almost drops it in what would a VERY embarrassing way if she cared at all]

[Finally she gets a good grip on it and types as fast as she can]

thirdfloor left side where we race

Edited 2025-09-10 21:46 (UTC)

[there's no more reason to reply, so skywarp doesn't.

as usual, her arrival is heralded by flashing red lightning as she teleports down into the hall where she suspects nova will be, rather than racing up and down it.

skywarp has not planned this, as she didn't plan running away. not everything she's done recently has been so impulsive, but this was. everything was amplified because of what had been done to nova and she couldn't manage everything as well as her own pain of losing her and refusing to deal with it. skywarp hates that the deal she made has made it easier to manage all the emotions in their bond and her own fear that would feed off nova's.

there's more to it. but she doesn't think about any of it. just teleports and look for a yellow blur.]

[Red arcs of lightning crack and paint the walls red, but Nova Storm isn't watching where Skywarp was, already turning to where she knows Skywarp will be. A lifetime of racing and playing and scrapping and fighting alongside her twin sister tells her exactly where to intercept Skywarp, and she does]

[Nova crashes gracelessly into her and grips Skywarp around the middle, keening out a sob of agonized relief into her side. She was back she was back she was back she was-]

Me...

[she doesn't really know what she expected or how she was going to react or what to say. skywarp knows she failed her sister by becoming overwhelmed and running away-- it's her duty as the oldest to make sure she's safe instead of leaving her alone with whatever it is that's hurt her and expect that she defend herself.

skywarp slumps in nova's grip, not making a sound, as she's momentarily overwhelmed with shame and anger with herself for what she did. back in nova's company after so long (not really that long, considering their life spans, but too long), it's far too easy for her to push her own emotions aside and focus on her sister's. perhaps this is a large factor to why she came back, so she can stop thinking.

so she just grips nova hard, like the silent promise of not leaving again that she's certain could not be trusted, and buries her face in her neck.]

[Nova Storm buries herself into that desperately tight hug right back. Here, alone with her twin, Nova finally drops every ounce of anger she's been using as the thinnest candy coating over terror and hurt and loneliness and starts to shake with wracking sobs, clutching at Warp with spasming hands]

[She'd thought Warp was dead she thought was dead she thought she was dead-]

[The only word she can gasp out between cries of anguish is simply,] Please- [Please stay please stay please stay, she'd be saying if she could, but they're all tangled up and come out as a wail, instead]

Unlike Nova, Skywarp hasn't been covering anything. These days it just seems like all her feelings filter down into one universal truth: anger. She is still angry now, she knows it, and she's angry that she's angry and angry that Nova Storm is hurt and crying and that she did it to her and angry that they're stuck here because she thought it had been freedom at first but it's just worse and more aimless than Earth.

Skywarp still says nothing, because she doesn't know what to say yet, she just keeps holding onto Nova, even though at the back of her mind she thinks she should probably explain herself. Explain why she did this to her only family. She can't though, and she's angry about that. It's just pure, unrelenting, white hot fury that burned the one person she can't live without, who she sold her spark for so she wouldn't have to live without her.

Nothing has been resolved, nothing has changed, she has just done the unforgivable and made everything worse. Nova would be well within her right to leave her behind, too.

[Nova gasps out a wordless, inarticulate noise of relief at being held back. She buries herself as close as she can into that embrace, vents whistling between raw, cracked noises]

[-thought she was dead thought was dead thought she was dead-]

[It isn't Warp's fault that Starscream went home or that Megatron followed or those slagging bears or her own disastrous trip through the bridge happened, but... Warp is here. That's what matters. Her sister came back]

[She reaches up to brush trembling fingers on one of Skywarp's wings to complete a gesture she isn't capable of anyway, and relaxes just a bit. Sags into Skywarp in relief and speaks to her in their silent twin language]

'Me... I'm sorry I'm sorry I wasn't being fair, I-'

[Another noise that is softer, barely heard over her own vents, and opens her own end of the bond. Even if Skywarp is still mad... she deserves to have that]

Edited 2025-09-23 16:45 (UTC)

"Do you remember going through the bridge?" she asks finally, not moving from where Nova Storm is clinging to her. She knows it can happen at random; she knows it happened even to Megatron, who she had always, even after his betrayal, considered powerful enough to control everything that happens to him. Some part of her had feared that the other Megatron had got Nova Storm again, and this is what brought her back. A flood of sick, angry fear that the worst had happened again.

It's not great, knowing that she might've even gone back to her own death or whatever the hell is happening back home either way. Skywarp had felt so obscenely sick with guilt for it, and still does. It's hard to feel anything else but.

When Nova opens her side of the bond again, she'll find that Skywarp's was open the whole time. So why does it still feel like that?

"The... the first time?" Nova Storm asks into Skywarp's abdomen, feeling that lurch in her chest as always when she thinks about it, or maybe it's because the bond... it's open on both sides, she can tell, she always can at close range, so why... "When he-"

She shakes her head into Skywarp. "No. A- a few things lingered a tiny bit, but I don't. Nothing. Nothing before him standing over me and you came and got me. It's just... nothing."

That twisty feeling twisted further. "Or do you mean when it brought me back and everything went as wrong as it can? Yeah," she rasped, desperately reaching through their bond for Skywarp but it felt empty, a vast empty nothing, and she shuddered again, tightening her grip.

"Warp..." She whispered into her, not looking up to her face, "you- the bond... It still feels- it feels like you aren't here. I thought you were dead when you were gone, and-" Her vents were speeding up again, mouth trembling as words spilled out, "and now you're back but I can't feel you, I can't-"

"No, not those times."

She frowns above Nova... but this gives an opportunity for her.

"You disappeared again a month or so ago for a few days." How could she know that without being on the ship? This is not the first time she tried to come running back to Nova, and there's a reason she ran further after it. "It's probably just the bridge doing some weird scrap. It'll just feel muted until everything goes back to normal."

Skywarp makes a face, painted lips turning down. Perhaps she's still being a bit cold, but Nova doesn't need to know that just not being there isn't how it feels when she died. It felt like she had never been.

"I'm not dead and I didn't die, so you can stop worrying about all that, okay?"

Nova Storm cycled her optics uncertainly, rapidly thinking, scrambling, through any gaps or flaws in her memory and how that meant Warp had to have been on the ship or in communication with someone. Did she come back, and thought herself that Nova was...

She opened her mouth to say something, but in truth she was still far too slagging relieved that Warp was here to want to tear apart what she was being told when there was no evidence of it being incorrect. It would just feel weird for a little while.

It would be okay soon.

Nova nodded. "Okay. Okay," she said, nodding more emphatically. "And- and I'm sorry I didn't- that I drove you off being stubborn. I don't want to do that again. Not to you, and not to us. So- so I've been trying. I have. So you don't have to worry either, okay?"

"It's not just you," she says, regret not clear in her voice. "It's okay, Nova, I know you've been trying, even before I left. I shouldn't have done that to you."

It's her job to protect her sister, but she doesn't say that aloud. It is the simple truth she's lived by for a very long time, but knows only reaffirming it would make Nova pull back further into herself.

"I won't do it again, okay? Not by choice."

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