Chapter Text
Servos clenched into fists, B-127 watched the fire burn.
The heat wafted from the furnace, scalding into his plating. His systems lit up with another notification, warning him of the danger of overheating.
Stellar-cycles ago, he would’ve taken the cue and moved somewhere else in the room. Now, seasoned as he was, he knew that nowhere in the room was safe from the boiling heat of the furnace.
His coolant, too, had long since run out.
No matter how many requests he put in for coolant, it never arrived. Even when he sent “Can you please replace the next energon shipment with coolant? Please please please please?” nothing ever changed.
Sometimes they forgot to send energon, so it made sense that they kept forgetting to send coolant, too. It was no biggie. B-127 was the best at what he did, and not just because he was the only one at what he did!
He had learned to grin and bear it.
Sometimes, he wore a helmet to hide it when he stopped being able to grin. Just in case they were watching. He had searched every inch of this place, like, a billion times over and hadn’t seen any hidden cameras, but, hey, they were hidden. He wasn’t supposed to be able to see them, right?
B-127’s digits drummed against his knee, trying to retain some movement even as his metal felt droopy and another notification popped up in his HUD.
His vents hissed, releasing smoke and into the air. It just added to the already thick smog hovering against the ceiling of the room.
The trash continued to move down the conveyor belt, unaware of how hard it was for B-127 to remain alert. He scanned the pieces of scrap past the blaring popups, trying to continue doing his job.
They hadn’t gotten him in trouble, yet, for missing useful pieces of scrap, but there was a first time for everything, right? There was a first time for going hungry, for realizing that it took five kliks to recover from moving even one step, from realizing overheating would be his constant state of existence if he wasn’t careful.
Any other time, he might climb up through the trash shoot, abandoning his duties for a brief couple of groons, just to hang out at waste management. But he guessed the old crew got replaced – even though they looked identical – because they told him he was now a trespasser and wasn’t allowed up there? Restricted clearance or something, and that they weren’t above shooting him for popping up.
B-127 closed his optics for a nano-klik, feeling a wash of dull want and need course through him.
If he didn’t start moving again soon, going somewhere to cool off, he’d go offline here.
End up as just a melted pile of scrap for them to replace with the next bot, and then they’d never think he was doing his job right!
Which, you know. Priorities.
With heavy, labored steps, B-127 finally turned away from the furnace, trying to push himself further away.
He was kind of annoyed that none of his three friends were ever bothered by the heat. They never complained, just continued to sit and stare blankly. And yeah, he knew it was because they didn’t have sparks, but they could at least put in the effort to make him not feel so alone!
B-127 found his way to the trash chute, balancing on the guard rails on either side of the conveyor belt as he reached up, careful to brace himself just right to push himself up. Keeping his helm down to avoid getting trash in his face and intake, B-127 started the long climb up, inching himself up as carefully as he could, wincing as scrap rattled against his back.
His plating and inner circuitry was still far too hot. It’d take groons to cool back down, to reach a somewhat manageable state, and he wouldn’t be on duty during it. He just hoped that someone wouldn’t be waiting to punish him when he went back down.
Everything was just… so hot.
Even the garbage chute was too warm for his liking, but the further up he went, the cooler it got. He knew he wouldn’t be leaving it, not when waste management was out for his tailpipe, but he could at least get somewhere higher up and slightly cooler.
B-127 braced himself somewhere between sublevel 41 and 42, tilting his helm back to rest against the metal behind him. He vented, and while smokes still filtered out, it wasn’t quite as heavy as it was back in sublevel 50.
He was so totally cool. This was fine. He was so totally fine.
B-127 allowed himself to daydream, to think about what would happen if he went back down in a couple groons and found they had finally delivered both energon and coolant and both didn’t evaporate by the time he got down there.
It was a pleasant thought. Not realistic, but B-127 was a dreamer.
What did he have if he didn’t have an imagination?
Nothing but a melting frame.