“Unit-512. Former designation: Petal .”
7712 stayed there for a long time. When the storm cleared, he used his own hands to dig a grave in the ash and dust. He buried her under a pile of scrap metal—not a marker, but a cairn. He did not take her insignia. He did not report her location.
“No,” 7712 said. “The storm erased the trail. She’s gone.”
Her optics brightened for just a moment. A genuine flicker of light. autobot-7712
His squad was three other mechs: , a former medic who had stopped carrying medical supplies after the first month; Runnel , a scout with a cracked voice box who communicated in static clicks and gestures; and Javelin , their commander—a sleek, arrogant femme who still believed the war could be won with proper tactics and discipline.
The name hit his processor like a short-circuit.
Petal was crouched inside the burned-out husk of a transport carrier, her yellow paint scoured down to raw metal in patches. One arm hung at an unnatural angle. Her optics were dim, flickering. “Unit-512
He went alone. That was his choice. Sunder and Runnel watched him go from the trench lip, their optics unreadable.
Her optics flickered once, twice. “I want someone to remember that I was not always a soldier.”
“Thank you,” she said.
Javelin hesitated. That was new.
“What do you want?” he asked.
“Command says we’ve got a deserter,” she said, her voice flat over the comm. “Autobot-7712, you’re the closest to the last known location. Go bring them in.” He buried her under a pile of scrap
7712’s job was simple. Every third cycle, he walked the eastern supply trench, checked the pressure seals on the reserve energon cubes, and reported back. It was a two-klick round trip through terrain that had been bombed so many times it no longer resembled a planet’s surface—just sharp-edged craters and fine gray dust that got into every joint.