Silenced

1 | Flashbacks

Soundwave decided not to waste his breath on answering such an open-ended inquiry, which would in turn most likely end up as a full fledged conversation - and instead ignored it outright.

After a semi-brief wait, it was made clear that Soundwave had no inention of answering, causing Knockout to bare a distinct expression of dissatisfaction across his faceplate, folding his arms against his chest plate with an irked humph.

"Oh come now, why do you always have to be so silent all the time... You've got pipes, don't you?" He rolled his optics, his smooth-spoken voice echoing around the large chamber. Soundwaves' digits froze at Knockout's remark, and they both stood there underneath the quiet drone of the ship's engines, long enough to make the silence uncomfortable for at least one of them.

"Well then, I must apologize. I didn't know you were so sensitive." Knockout quoted sarcastically with a huff, his apology clearly dressed in a mocking manner. The physician's face plate tugged downwards into a thin frown before he slowly turned away and stepped back off into the hull, instantly losing interest in further pestering the Surveillance Chief.

"Tch..mute..." Soundwave could hear him mutter before the door whirred shut.

One of Soundwave's servos involuntarily curled into a fist for a few moments, but he let it go. No sense in getting a rise out of a passing insult that didn't have an inch of thought put into it. With an inaudible vent, Soundwave went back to rapidly typing on the keys, the monitor giving out various signals in response. The screen happened to blur for an obscure moment, and Soundwave's dark visor couldn't see it clearly. He motioned closer in question.

Strange...

This had never happened before.

He blinked, believing it would solve the conundrum, yet it still failed to correct his malfunctioning vision. Suddenly, his helm began to sway, and he started to lose his sense of balance. Soundwave managed to support himself from falling by reflexively grabbing the solid desk he had been typing upon with a shaky servo. Yet, this act still couldn't stop his optics from the dark illusion it was to materialize for himself.

. . .

Terrible, vagrant flames engulfed everything it laid it's scorching hand upon; nothing was to escape its fiery grasp. No one was there to aid me. I was left helpless as its vibrantly painted tendrils crept ever closer, dancing around just out of reach as if to taunt my fear. The ever increasing heat felt like it was melting me alive, and it wouldn't be long before it would..

Soundwave forcibly shook his helm, ventilating out heavily as both his servos grasped the edge of the desk for dear life, a sickening screech of metal being produced from his claws digging viciously into the thin steel.

"No..." Soundwave echoed woefully in a recorded clip of sound, lifting a trembling servo to the tip of his black tinted visor.

Not...now....

Soundwave managed to compose themselves before any other Decepticons gave their report, keeping themselves upright for now. The waves on their visor, picking up on their heavy breathing - lessened, and their helm lowered to stare at the cold metal flooring.

Nothing can change what happened...

Shaking their helm once more, they returned their optics back to the screen, albeit with a somewhat off-kilter manner now.

Sounwave's sudden flashback of sorts that appeared out of the blue; there was reasoning behind it. Occasionally, the trauma from that day would be triggered by some random event or situation Soundwave was in. Though usually, they could handle it without much trouble. Normally, the flashback was more visually vague, and only showed a few brief moments of the experience. Soundwave could not grasp the idea as to why it was now suddenly getting worse at such a severely crippling rate.