A Different Perspective

"A human?"

Seeing the human in Drift's servos... I can't really describe what emotions were zooming through my processor, but I knew one thing for sure. I was ecstatic. Beside me, I could see Fulcrum practically gag, seeing the human, but I was awestruck. A human! On the Lost Light! I could barely hear the voices around me. Oh, Primus, she was talking... my excitement made it impossible for me to understand her words.

×××

"Swerve." I turned to see Rodimus approaching me after Drift had left with the human. What was her name again? "I got a task for you."

"For me?" I looked around, double checking to see if there was a small chance that he was talking to someone else. There was no one.

"Yes. Rin needs someone to show her around, and with you being a minibot, who is a fan of humans, I think you'd be the best one for the job." Rodimus explained. I felt my spark heat up in my chassis with excitement. A quest! The human quest. That was what I was going to call it. One of my first real quests in a long time.

"I take that the smile on your faceplate means it's a 'yes'?" Was I smiling?

"Yes! Of course it's a yes. Why wouldn't I say yes?" I quickly tried to compose myself.

"Great, well..." Rodimus put his servos on his hips. "She's in the medibay. Just... try not to talk her audial off." I nodded vigorously before running off towards the medibay.

×××

She was pretty. Probably the prettiest humans I've ever seen. Which... I guess isn't the best way to describe her beauty because I've never actually see a real human up close. The human had long hair that matched the colour of her eyes. And she was tiny. Probably only reaching five feet, a bit under half my size.

"Hey! It's nice to meet you, the name's Swerve!" I said. My processor was in overdrive as I was no long able to control my excitement. "I've never met a real life human before! Wow, you're a lot smaller than I expected. And that stuff on your head. That's hair, right? Can I touch it? Can I touch you? Sorry, that was rude. Of course you don't want to be touched by a stranger. So, are you from Earth? Have you watched a lot of media? Which is your favourite? We have a movie night ever so often, if you have a suggestion for..."

"SWERVE!" I stopped upon hearing Ratchet yell. I had forgotten he was there.

What are you doing here?" Ratchet asked.

"Rodimus told me that I was to help the human get around and keep her company." I replied. Ratchet's frown became more frowny, which I didn't even know was possible for anyone other than Crankcase, who was practically the king of frowning.

"Look, Swerve. How about you wait outside. I'll bring her out when I'm finished. There are still tests that I need to go through and..." I jumped at the opportunity. I really wanted to get to know her better.

"Do you need help? I can totally help! I'd like to get to know her and..."

"You can help by standing outside!" Ratchet snapped.

"Right. Outside. I'll wait... outside." I glanced one last time at the human before leaving to room. What was her name again?

You're too much.

You're going to scare her away.

She won't like you.

No one likes you.

You're going to fail the quest....

I paced outside of the door as the thoughts continued. I couldn't help but feel worried and anxious. What if I was too much? Was I going to scare her away? Make her not want to be part of the Lost Light crew? Would I be responsible for her running away? What if she got hurt because of me?

You are not worthy.

Give up before you make a bigger fool of yourself.

My thoughts were cut off as the door hissed open. Ratchet held the human gently in his servos before setting her down.

"Do NOT do anything that could harm her, physically or mentally." Ratchet said. "She is a sentient being. Not a pet or a play thing."

"Got it!" I saluted, scooping the human up before rushing off. "What was your name again?" I asked, realizing that maybe I should have asked that before picking her up. Perhaps I should have asked to pick her up in the first place. She hadn't made any sound of protest, however.

"Rin Hikari." She replied.

"Rin! I like that. It suits you!"

"Drift picked it out for me." Rin said.

"Right! You were found on that trading planet! Did you not have a name before?" Rin shook her head. She was like how Skids was. He hadn't remembered anything either, but at least he remembered his name. I wonder why Rin didn't remember her's.

"Not that I can remember." She said. "I don't remember much. I'm a blank slate."

"Well, I hope we can fill that blank slate with happy memories and lots of friends!" I smiled at her, once again, excitement taking control of my intake. "Can I be your friend? Is that a weird thing to ask? Am I talking to much? Sorry, I ramble when I'm excited, or nervous, or angry... I ramble all the time. At the academy, my nickname was 'shut the hell up'. Because I talked so much." Rin giggled. It was the most wonderful sound my audials have every heard.

"I'd love for you to be my friend." She paused. "What's a friend?" I thought for a moment, trying to figure out what the best way to answer was.

"It's two or more people who are... close, trust each other, and can confide in each other." I explained. I hoped it was a good explanation. The human in my arms nodded.

"Confide in..." She paused for a moment. "Well... to be honest with you. I don't know what I am. I was being sold as a human. I was told I was taken from the planet Earth, but Ratchet says my DNA had been altered... he doesn't know what I am yet. I'm sorry I'm not entirely human like you hoped."

"Don't worry about it!" I said. It didn't bother me. After all, I was more excited to be in the presence of a human-like organic. Not only that, but I was also in charge of helping her! "I'm still excited to have you aboard! I get to teach you things about humans and maybe we can figure things out together!"

"I'd like that, very much." Rin said. "Thank you." I couldn't help but grin... until the worries started to return. What if I'm not a good teacher? What if I taught her the wrong things? What if she doesn't like the stuff I was show her?

'No!' I mentally scolded myself. I was going to succeed in my quest. She needs my help, and I'm going to help her. That was my goal. A goal I could not fail no matter what.

You are not worthy.

×××

I took her to my bar, thinking that would be the best place to start.

"Welcome to Swerve's!" I said, proudly. "This is my bar. It's a place where I serve drinks to other bots."

"What kind of drinks do you serve?" Rin asked. I tried to think of the best way to explain it. Did she know what engex was? Did she know what alcohol was?

"Different forms of engex. It's... like an alcoholic beverage." She seemed to understand.

"I see!" I set her her down it was really I saw how truly small she was. She barely reached my mid-thigh. At least I didn't have to worry too much about accidently stepping on her like the other bots did.

"Want to try some?" I asked. "I don't really have a human sized glass... but..." An idea struck me and I looked underneath the counter and pulled out a tiny vial that I used to a free samples. It was still pretty large compared to her.

"This might work!" I poured some normal engex into the vial and handed it to the human. I watched as she drank it down. She blinked slightly. I began to panic. Was Engex poisonous to humans? Did I accidentally poison her? I stared, expectantly, hoping she was going to be alright.

"That's good!" She said. "Kinda sharp tasting and bubbly." She smiled at me. I let out an ex-vent of relief and beamed back. At least I hadn't killed her. A pair of pedesteps caused us both to look up.

"That's Rewind, and his conjunx, Chromedome. Conjunx Endura is kinda like marriage. Like the romantic bond between two people." I explained, introducing them to Rin. She waved slightly.

"Wow, a real human!" Rewind said. Rin had opened her intake to speak until she glanced at the blinking red light of his camera.

"What's the light?" Rin asked.

"I'm recording. I hope you don't mind." Rewind said.

"He records everything." Chromedome said.

"I don't mind." Rin said. "I'm Rin Hikari. A probably human."

"A probably human?"

"We're still trying to figure it out." She explained. "I have human DNA, but... it's mixed with other things. I guess to make thing more simple, I'm fine with the term human."

"Tell me a bit about yourself!" Rewind said. "I want to document this moment! A human on a Cybertronian ship!"

"Well, there's not much to tell." Rin replied. "I don't know much about myself. I don't remember anything from before I was captured. Swerve is helping me figure things out." Rewind and Chromedome exchanged a strange glance.

"I'm an expert on humans!" I boasted, not liking the look they presented. "Well, the only expert on this ship."

"You've never met a human before." Rewind cut in. "Rodimus, Ratchet, and Drift would know more about humans than you do."

"I'm sure that Swerve knows plenty, too!" Rin said. I felt the annoyance vanish at those words. Did she had faith in me? "As I told Swerve, I'm a blank slate, and I'm happy with Swerve helping with filling it in."

"If you say so." Rewind said. The two sat at the bar and ordered drinks. Rin watched as I make the drinks for the two.

"Since you're, at least, partially human, let's watch some off-world media!" I suggested. "Do you like action? Adventure? Romance? Comedy? Wait... you don't know yet. Oh! There's this really funny show that reminds me of the things that happen on the Lost It's called Brooklyn 99. It's a comedy about Earth law enforcement. The main character, Jake, reminds me of Rodimus, and the police captain is like Magnus or Megatron. Have you met Megatron yet? Probably not. He's not one to make his presence know around organics."

I paused, looking at her. She was staring intently at me. She didn't look annoyed at all, which was surprising to me. I coughed slightly. Trying to figure out what else to say.

"Thank you so much." I said.

"For what?" Rin asked.

"For trusting me. It means a lot. Really. You have no idea how happy it makes me." I replied. "Not a lot of people would defend me like that."

"You said it yourself, Swerve." Rin smiled up at me. "Friends trust each other." I gave her a wide grin. Maybe I wasn't going to fail this quest after all.

×××

We all stared intently at Rin when Whirl asked the question. I had suggested we play Truth or Dare. A game where a player gets to dare someone to do something, or ask for a truthful answer about something. It was fun until Whirl dared Tailgate to sneak into Mags's office and steal a datapad or share when them how many times he and Cyclonus interfaced. Surprisingly Tailgate chose the dare and was able to pull it off, but no one wanted to pick the dare option on Whirl's turn. Rin had to choose between kissing Cyclonus, or share her secret crush.

"Who is your secret crush?" He repeated.

"In all honesty, I don't have a secret crush." Rin confessed. "It's obvious that I like Nautica and Swerve."

"M-Me?" I was shocked, practically lost for words. It was an odd feeling, not being able to find anything to say.

"Yeah, you goof!" Rin said, playfully smacking my shoulder. "You've helped me with so much! It would have been weird if I didn't have some kind of feeling towards you." My intake fell open, but no words came out.

"Primus, Squishy, you made him speechless." Whirl said. "That's an achievement." Rin finished her engex.

"I think that means the game's over, then!" She said. "Want help cleaning up?" She turned to me.

"What? Oh... yeah! No. I mean... you don't have to clean up. I got it!" I managed to stammer, beginning to grab the empty glasses. My cooling fans were kicking on.

"You sure?"

"Yeah, yeah! It's late. You should go recharge! I mean, uh..." Rin chuckled, wobbling a little as she climbed to the floor.

"I'm not tired yet, but if you don't need help, I'm going to go stargaze. If you need anything, I'll be outside on the hull." She grabbed her hoverboard before leaving the bar. I fidgeted, watching her leave. I found it so hard to believe. The human... liking me? No one likes me. They may laugh at my jokes, but that's all. I try to be likeable, I try to be friendly, by my mouth gets in the way. The fact that Rin, the one I admired most, confessed to liking me? Wow...

"I caught all of that on camera, by the way!" Rewind said. My faceplate heat up. I was flattered by her confession, but it didn't top my processor from getting flooded with worry.

"Maybe she was just drunk..." I muttered.

"Likely." Whirl replied. "I mean, liking a mouthy mech like you? She's definitely fragged in the helm."

"I don't think so!" Tailgate argued. "She didn't look drunk to me."

"Perhaps a little tipsy, but not enough to not know what she was saying." Cyclonus agreed.

"Whatever..." Whirl waved his claw dismissively.

'What if she was lying? What if she really was drunk? Or sick? She had never made any signs that she liked me before, had she? Had I just missed them? Did she think I didn't like her because I didn't notice her trying to make a move?' The thoughts flew through my helm. I almost dropped the glass I was holding to the floor, as set it down. I needed to know for sure. I couldn't wait any longer. I needed to look her in the eye and hear her say it again. Without a word, again, very out of character for me, I ran out of the bar.

After I put on the magnaclamps, I opened the hatch that lead outside. I hesitated, seeing Rin sitting there, looking at the stars. Did I want to know the truth? Or would it be better off not to push it further. If she was lying, it would only hurt to know the truth. With a small ex-vent and even more hesitation, I stepped out and walked towards her sitting form. I tapped her shoulder. She turned, looking up at me, a smile appeared on her face as out optics met.

"Hey." I said, nervously. "Is it okay if I joined you?" Rin nodded.

"I've never really seen space from outside the Lost Light like this. It's amazing! I can see why you come out here." Rin nodded again. I knew she couldn't speak in space. She had told me that before. She said that the only way she could communicate was if she was right against someone's audial. I sat down beside her, glancing at her every so often. I didn't want to stare, but I couldn't help but look at her. She was so pretty. Was this wrong? Was this something I shouldn't pursue? What if this was a mistake? Was it a mistake? I hope it wasn't. I scooted closer.

"Did you really mean what you said in there? About you liking me that way? I mean, I have nothing against it! In fact, I'm ecstatic that you feel the same way. I just didn't want to step over any boundaries or make you think I only liked you because you were a human, which I don't. I mean-" Rin stood up, placing a finger over my intake. I fell silent. She nodded once more before she leaned in and hugging my helm. My fans were on overdrive as she spoke right in my audial:

"I meant it."

Those three words. They meant the world to me. The words I desperately wanted to hear more than anything, and I had a huge list of things I wanted to hear people say to me. But out of all those phrases, Rin's words mattered the most.

After I closed the bar for the evening, Rin and I headed back to our hab-suite, her perched over my helm, one of her favourite spots to be, she had told me.

×××

"Have you ever been in a relationship before?" She asked.

"Me? Never officially." I replied. "Not a lot of people could handle my constant rambling. Except Skids. He... I don't think he minded. But I don't think he saw us as more than just friends, you know? I thought I had a connection with Blurr, but it turns out that wasn't real." I remembered the let down I felt when I had realized the truth about Blurr. It turns out you're idols were never who they seemed.

"Well, maybe we could learn together?" Rin said, unable to hide her questioning tone.

"Rin, ever since you came on this ship, that's what we've done. We've learned together." I said, snapping out of my self-pity. "I'm not going to leave you hanging, now!" The human chuckled, laying down, staring up at the ceiling.

"Together..." She muttered. "I like that word."

"I like it too." I replied.

×××

"Can I come along this time?" I asked, excitedly. Rin was called over by Rodimus and I had decided to tag along out of curiosity.

"What about your bar?" He asked.

"I'll close it for the cycle!" I replied with a wave of my servo. "What's one day gonna do?" There was a slight pause. I knew he really didn't want me to come along. It wouldn't have been the first time. There were even a few times where they wanted to leave me behind on a planet.

"Fine." Rodimus finally said. I was ecstatic! "Let's go, then! Time for an adventure!"

×××

I could barely remember what had happened before Rin had took be a distance away from the group. There was a festival, however, Rin had asked if the two of us could walk up a hill to enjoy some quiet. I knew how overwhelmed she could get in a crowd. I had agreed, walking beside her. I was getting nervous. The two of us... together... alone. After the discussion we had... I didn't know if I should feel scared or not. Should I be excited? Worried? I mean, what was there to worry about? Right?

"It's beautiful isn't it?" Rin said, looking up at the two moons overhead.

"Yeah..." I replied as we reached the top of the hill. Rin sat down and I sat beside her.

"That was a lot of fun!" I said, referring to the party. "All the music and food. The drinks were also amazing. I wonder how they made them and if there was a way I could serve them at the bar. I mean, I guess it would be difficult since we're always on the move, but... I wonder if I could leave a subspace hatch here. Wait... no... I'd probably have to pay for everything, and we don't use the same currency. Did they say what currency they used? Do you think-"

"Swerve..." Rin interrupted my rambling.

"Was I talking to much?" I asked.

"No, that not it." She got to her feet. "Can you turn off your mass displacement for a klik?" I was confused, but did so, getting to my pedes, looking down at her. She was nervous. Was she going to tell me that everything from yesterday was a prank? Was she going to tell me that I wasn't actually the one she liked? She did mention she liked Nautica too...

"Is something wrong?" He asked. Rin took a deep breath, placing both hands over her heart.

"I...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..." I froze up. I knew what this was. Rin continued. "I invite you to receive me light and in so doing become my Amica Endura - from now until forever." She paused, looking up at me. She removed her hands from her chest and took ahold of one of my digits and holding it tightly.

"Swerve, I love your kindness and compassion. You mean the universe to me." She hesitated before speaking the last words. "As you are to me, may I be to you - today, tomorrow, and always." She held my digit to her chest. I could feel her spark... no... heart, beating hard inside her chest. I was stunned. No one had ever asked me to be their Amica Endura. Friends? Sure, although it was stretching it a bit, but never something as close as an Amica. I felt like my spark was going to explode out of my chassis.

"Today, tomorrow, and always." I repeated, accepting her offer. I knelt down when she crashed into me with a hug.

"Thank you..." She said. She sounded like she was going to cry. "Thank you so much. For everything you've done for me." I gently placed a servo on her back.

"Together." I said, remembering what we had talked about back in the hab-suite. Our favorite word...

"Together."