Your Curated Tumblr Experience Awaits!
So, I read @lovinglonerhybrid 's post here. And it absolutely had me in a chokehold, so this is based off that premise. I'm in the UK so please excuse my ignorance of American states lmao.
So, there is a part 2 to this, but I'm going away for 4 days and wanted to get some of it posted before then.
You've broken down fifteen miles short of Jasper's city limits in the dead of night. Deciding to hike in to town, you feel the earth rumble beneath you, and over the horizon, something enormous approaches...
Chapter 1: 9352 words.
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It’s a rare and covetous thing, to find even a single moment of peace in the midst of an intergalactic war.
The gap from one of those precious moments to the next seems to grow wider and wider every time, until their frequency is so negligible, it becomes hard to recognise them for what they are anymore.
For everything Earth could have offered Optimus Prime, he hadn’t been expecting it to relinquish the gift of peace so willingly. But he’s glad – more than glad – to accept them when they come, even if he’s only stealing glimpses of tranquillity on the sand-swept road leading out of Jasper.
Low-beam headlights lazily trace over the faded tarmac ahead of Optimus’s tyres as he trundles along Highway 49, one of only two roads that surround the small, sleepy city of Jasper. It’s a very routine patrol, one he obligingly excused Bumblebee from taking after his poor scout all but begged Optimus to give it to someone else, beeping out promises that he’ll take double shift tomorrow night, if need be.
All this on the back of Miko announcing another of her ‘slumber parties’ at the base, much to Ratchet’s noisy chagrin and Optimus’s private amusement. And, of course, when Bumblebee found out that Rafael would be staying the night too… Well…
‘You’re too indulging,’ their old medic had admonished from his workstation, the broad expanse of his back turned to the Prime, ‘He ought to learn he can’t always have his way.’
But it was a harmless indulgence, and Prime was more than happy to take over the patrol in this instance.
Besides, he had an arguably selfish reason for doing so.
If he’d admitted as much out loud, Ratchet would have scoffed and sent a pulse of chiding dismissal crashing into Optimus’s EM field. ‘You don’t have a selfish component in your body,’ he might say.
But this… Optimus muses, gazing skyward as he trundles down the highway in vehicle mode, letting the crisp, night air slide through his grill and cool his powerful engine… This is the appeal of a solo patrol.
Every now and then, there are times when the Decepticon activity goes quiet, Fowler has nothing to report, and Optimus can almost pretend that he’s just another Cybertronian enjoying a long, quiet drive through the Mojave wilderness. And while he remains ever vigilant, keeping every sensor poised outwardly in a constant surveillance of his surroundings, the old bot still permits at least one sense to wander.
Somehow, it’s always his sight.
Oftentimes he catches himself doing it. Other times, on nights that are quiet and still and clear like this one, there’s a wire-deep longing that overrides his logic gates, and the Prime won’t notice that he isn’t keeping his processor and his optics on the dusty road ahead of him. He’s too busy stealing long, pensive looks at the stars above him, scattered like a-hundred-billion souls sprawling across a curtain of crushed velvet.
It’s out there… somewhere… riding a lonely orbit on the furthest reaches of the galaxy’s Centaurus arm.
Cybertron.
Home.
Their first home, he amends gently, depressing his accelerator to speed up when he realises he’s starting to crawl. Earth is as much their home now as Cybertron ever was.
Sagging on his suspension with a low hiss, Optimus drags his hidden optics back to the road ahead, and all at once, he nearly lurches to a halt, his exhaust pipes sputtering out a hollow sound to betray his surprise.
There, parked several feet from the road a few hundred yards ahead of him, is a vehicle.
Prime’s senses sharpen to a startling focus.
Pumping his brakes, he slows down again, and the roar of his engine fades to a fluctuating hum.
A Decepticon…?
He doesn’t feel anything trying to breach his EM field, nor does he pick up on any resistance when his scanners hone in on the vehicle – ‘Ford. F250. A Pickup truck.’ Year….? Optimus’s focus narrows to a pinprick… ‘Eighty-seven.’
It’s red - a faded, dusky red like some of the sun-baked sandstone at Red Rock Canyon. As Prime’s massive form rumbles on through the night, looming closer and closer to the mysterious truck, his lights reflect off something situated above its rear bumper, the presence of which quells his flaring codes and eases his rigid frame.
A number plate.
Thick, black numbers and letters stand out against the white rectangle, though it isn’t the sequence that alleviates Optimus’s suspicion, it’s their mere presence.
No Decepticon he knows would ever suffer the ‘indignity’ of having a human number plate stapled to their bumpers.
Primus, even the Autobots have foregone the accessory after Fowler gave up trying to keep Bumblebee from losing his, Ratchet from ‘misplacing’ his, and Bulkhead from bending his irreparably whenever he transformed. Optimus had given it a go, for a time… mainly because he was growing worried that their overworked liaison would quite simply combust if he had to intercept one more phone call from ‘concerned civilians’ who were reporting a semi-truck driving through Jasper without its registration.
The Prime’s number plate came to its own crumpled end when he sat down on his berth one evening without removing it first.
One genuine, slightly sheepish apology to a very fed-up liaison later, and Optimus was informed that he and his team no longer needed to wear the plates.
So, the presence of one on this truck is a good sign. It’s less likely to transform and cause an incident.
That does, however, open up an entirely new avenue for concern to creep in.
A crash, perhaps?
Several dark skid marks indicate that it must have veered off the road after a hard, panicked brake.
He can’t pick up any biological signatures either. Even when he casts a wider net, all his sensors catch are the heat signatures of a few tiny, Earthen mammals scurrying about over the sand before they dart into various rock formations when he rolls by. But just because he isn’t picking up the presence of a living human, it doesn’t negate the possibility of a human being inside…
Frame suddenly taut, Optimus trundles to a cautious halt on the road alongside the truck, his engine idling like some great, murmuring beast in the quiet of the desert.
A throaty hum seems to escape his smokestacks as he peers down at the smaller truck, contemplative… considering… Then finally, relieved. There doesn’t appear to be anyone inside, judging by what his headlights illuminate through the cab windows.
What is it doing out here?
It definitely wasn’t here yesterday when he made the drive into Jasper. It isn’t a vehicle he recognises either, and he’s been doubly vigilant of late regarding all the civilian cars, bikes, trucks, vans, and even agricultural vehicles in and around the town.
Privately, he’s been compiling a catalogue of them all, for his own reference.
If there’s a threat to his human charges lurking about in their hometown, Optimus needs to know about it. A Decepticon disguised as a civilian vehicle would be an effective method of infiltration.
Casting one more, cursory ping out into the night to check that he’s definitely alone, he at last begins to unfurl himself into his bipedal mode. Metal plating slides away from his grill, pulling back and rolling along the body of the semi as he rises onto newly revealed pedes. The mechanical whines, whirrs and buzzes are terribly loud and alien amongst the desert’s natural ambiance, but soon enough, the air falls still once again, and a monolithic Cybertronian stands in the place where a Peterbilt used to be.
Soft, cerulean light spills over the abandoned truck as Optimus settles his optics upon it, easing his enormous frame down into a crouch and draping one arm across his knee with a ‘clunk.’
At first glance, he hadn’t noticed anything especially odd about the truck save for its unexpected presence. Leaning sideways, he casts an optic over the front bumper and finds nothing out of place, no damage to indicate a crash, no broken headlights or crushed bonnet.
It’s the same story with the truck’s bed. Only when Optimus hauls himself upright and treads carefully around it to inspect the other side does he notices the glaring problem.
The whole vehicle is canting onto its offside front tyre, a tyre that sports a rather sizeable puncture, considering how flat it is. And from the looks of it, this one was only ever meant to be used as a temporary spare. A quick glance into the truck’s bed reveals what he assumes must be the original tyre, flat as well, with the silver head of a nail jutting from the centre tread block.
Optimus clicks his glossa softly for the owner’s run of bad luck.
Right away, he sends a ping to his team, advising them to be wary of stray nails along this stretch…
He receives several pings in return. Immediately comes Bumblebee’s frustration, buzzed over the airwaves like a sulking sparkling who’s been told his toy was broken. Given the Scout’s inclination to race at top speed all over these roads, Optimus doesn’t doubt he’s just vexed at the shuddersome notion of having to slow down.
Arcee and Bulkhead respond in kind as their leader absently moves his attention to something strange obscuring part of driver’s window, letting their concern wash over his field.
‘Popped a tyre, Boss?’ Bulkhead’s message hits his comm, informal and probing, but with the warmth of care behind it.
Optimus is quick to send a pulse of reassurance back through their shared channel. He’s fine. If one little nail was all it took to take a Prime out of commission, they’d all be in serious, serious trouble.
The channels go quiet after Arcee and Ratchet send their short, concise responses, and once again, Optimus is alone on the road, peering down at a small sheet of paper that’s been taped to the inside of the truck’s front window.
Gradually, he furrows his optical ridges until they almost click together into one, solid line, the apertures inside each optic whirring and shrinking as he reads the words scribbled on the paper.
He recalls the first time he encountered the languages of Earth as they were written. The looping letters, graceful and elegant, chasing one another across the front of the letter Agent Fowler gave him as part of an unofficial welcome to the United States.
Optimus had held the paper so delicately between two of his digits, blinking down at the dark ink soaked into repurposed cellulose fibre. It was beautiful.
When he remarked as such, Fowler made a noncommittal comment that you could tell a lot about humans from their handwriting.
Optimus would sometimes find himself glancing over the children’s homework when they left their books out unattended on the table in their recreational area.
Jack’s neat and sensible cursive. Miko’s chaotic, glittery script that rose and fell and ventured outside the lines because she was usually paying more attention to her music than the words she wrote in her textbook. And Rafael, of course, with his quick, almost frantic stokes of the pen as he tried to scribble his thoughts down as fast as his brain could make them, only to end up losing his confidence halfway through a sentence, doubled back, drew a single line through the words, and started again on a fresh page.
This handwriting though… written in blue, splotchy ink and stuck with a piece of scotch tape to the truck’s window, makes Fowler’s words ring true in Optimus’s processor.
He can tell a lot about the human who wrote it.
‘Please don’t steal/break into my truck,’ it reads. The word ‘please’ has been underlined several times. ‘Not worth much, it’s all I’ve got. Tyre is flat, spare tyre too, so can’t get far anyway. Walking to town to find help bcos phone died and I don’t have a charger. Be back soon. Thanks.’
The ink has run in several places and rendered some of the letters illegible, as if water has been dropped on them from above.
Optimus isn’t naïve. He’s seen the children cry, more times than he can bear.
Then underneath all that, in much smaller writing stuffed underneath the first message like an afterthought they forgot to leave enough space for…
‘P.s, if the truck is still here in 3 days, assume I’m dead.’
With a sudden groan of his metal frame, Optimus braces a servo on his knee and hurriedly pushes himself to his pedes once again, helm swivelling sideways to stare down the length of the road.
The truck’s nose is pointed in the direction of Jasper, but the town itself is still about a fifteen-mile drive…
Surely they wouldn’t make the journey on foot…
But if the note is any indication, then…
His processor flashes again to the children; Miko in particular, and the alarming disregard she has for her own safety. The boys are guilty of that as well, though to a lesser degree.
Suddenly, there’s a very high likelihood that there might be a human wondering through the vast Mojave, alone. Worse still, Bumblebee had reported just last week that there’s been an increase in Decepticon patrols in the area around Jasper. No doubt Megatron has been ramping up his efforts to locate the Autobot base. Their growing presence in the vicinity of town makes these roads particularly treacherous…
Optimus ex-vents roughly, more troubled than frustrated.
Blue optics narrow at the road ahead, and once again, the peace of the desert night is filled by the sounds of living metal collapsing back in on itself.
A powerful engine roars to life. Somewhere nearby, a startled jackrabbit darts beneath the safety of a sagebrush, hiding herself amongst its silvery leaves.
Unblinking, her wild eyes stare after the great, thrumming beast as it moves on down the road.
—————-
You’ve had a lot of ideas in your life.
Some good. Some bad. Some that have paid off, but most that have gone nowhere at all.
Perhaps you were growing tired of going nowhere…
What else would have possessed you to up and move all the way to the middle of Nevada state on the back of a job offer that came from a man your uncle purported to know?
‘Oh yeah, Terry? Did a job with him a few years back for some cattle baron out in the sticks. ‘Course, Terry always wanted his own dairy… Want me to tell him you’re lookin’ for work?’
Turns out, Terry did end up getting that dairy he always wanted. And as it happened, he was looking for a farm hand.
Does it count as nepotism if you’re fairly sure your uncle had only met your future employer once?
Beyond a certain point, you simply couldn’t care less.
A job is a job, even if it is out here in the desert near a town you’d never heard of a month ago.
Dust-caked trainers trudge to a weary halt in front of a large, green road sign.
The moon, thankfully, hangs fat and luminous in the cloudless sky. So at least you don’t need a torch to see, not now that your eyes have had time to adjust the darkness cloaked over the desert.
With your run of bad luck, you half assumed the heavens would have opened by now and given the Mojave a nice, little dose of rain.
“Well,” you mutter aloud to yourself, peering up at the green sign with a grimace, “Could be worse…”
‘Jasper – 10 miles,’ reads like a slap to the face.
Still… It’s better than the fifteen miles.
You must have walked at least five already, dragging your legs behind you like extra baggage that doesn’t want to cooperate.
It has to be beyond midnight now. Well beyond, you suppose.
You’ve been walking for the better part of two hours, slow and sluggish and exhausted. The journey getting to Nevada had been tiring enough, then as soon as you crossed state lines, your tyre caught a puncture going over a particularly nasty pothole that had snuck up on you.
After an hour spent in the blazing sun jacking up the truck and changing to the spare, you set off again for another several hours of travel. Then, twenty miles out of Jasper, just as you dared to celebrate being home-free, the unthinkable had happened.
Who hits a pothole and drives over a nail in the same, damn day? Apparently, the same person who forgot to buy a charger adaptor for the truck.
No charger? No phone.
No phone…? No calling for help…
Your chest expands and deflates with a bone-tired sigh, turning your gaze back onto the long, dark road ahead of you. Tears sting at the inside of your eyelids, and for a moment, you consider letting them fall, if only to ease some of the pressure building up behind your temples. But crying hysterically about the unfairness of the world hadn’t un-punctured your spare tyre, so why would it help the situation now.
“Come on,” you coax yourself, hauling one leg out in front of the other. Rinse. Repeat. “Not far now.”
Just a few more hours…
The going is slow, tough, draining. Even the dark shapes of rocks start to look enticing as you pass them, letting your eyes slide over to them as you wonder just how safe it would be to fall asleep in the desert by the side of a road.
Ever since you broke down a few hours ago, you haven’t seen one, single vehicle out here.
‘Which,’ you hum, pursing your lips and tipping your head back to peer up at the bleary sky far above you, ‘Isn’t so bad…’
The stars are numerous, and startlingly clear out in the wilderness. The moon as well seems brighter here, unobscured by clouds. She makes for a quiet companion on your journey towards Jasper, her starry brethren endlessly stretching out to each corner of the horizon.
Suddenly, you feel very small. A hopeless traveller trying to find port in a sea of sand and rock.
Swallowing roughly, you hike your tattered rucksack high onto your shoulder and tear your gaze from the stars.
It’s quiet out here, save for the rustle of sage bushes disturbed by the warm breeze, and the skittering of rocks as night-time animals go about their hunts.
Perhaps that natural silence is why the sudden introduction of an entirely new sound unnerves you so much.
You jerk to a halt, ears straining to hear something approaching from the distance. Underneath the thin, worn soles of your shoes, you start to feel it; the road thrumming with gentle vibrations, growing stronger every second.
Lighting quick, you whirl around to face the way you’d come, hands flying up to grip anxiously at the straps of your rucksack.
You’d have thought you’d be excited to see those headlights rise up above the horizon line. At last! A stroke of luck! A potential ride! Potential help.
Instead, it’s as though the sudden appearance of two, dazzling lights blooming into view as they crest over the hill finally jar some sense back into your dizzy head.
The haze of fatigue lifts slightly, pushed away by little bursts of adrenaline as your brain fights to wake you up to an unconscious threat.
You’re alone out here. Defenceless, phoneless. You don’t know the area. Nobody knows you’ve broken down… You try so hard to think the best of people, but now that you’ve had one doubt, a hundred others start to scurry around in your brain, demanding attention.
You can see the vehicle, or their lights at least, but you doubt they can see you yet, this far down the road. You wonder what it is. Car? Truck?
… Alien spacecraft? Despite yourself, you let out a snort at that. Isn’t that infamous military base supposed to be in Nevada? The one hiding alien activity?
Right. Sure.
Despite your scepticism however, a thrill of fear rushes down the length of your spine as if to say, ‘Oh? But are you sure sure?’
Gulping audibly, you take a few steps sideways off the road, stealing a glance at a cluster of large rocks that sit conveniently just several yards to your rear.
You have a decision to make.
Maybe you’ve been alone on the road for too long, and isolation has bred a paranoia in you that’s so deeply rooted, you can’t shift it at a moment’s notice. If the sun was out, perhaps you’d be less apprehensive, but the night, no matter where you are, makes everything seem so much more… treacherous. It hides things. People, motivations, monsters.
And though it pains you to do so, you swiftly decide to err on the side of personal safety.
The vehicle is closer now, and your blood trembles as the roar of a loud, formidable engine thunders over the tarmac. Yet you’re still certain it isn’t close enough to have caught you in its high-beams.
On sluggish legs, you haul yourself about and make a clumsy dash for the rocks, clenching a fist around one strap of the rucksack and using your other hand to grab the closest rock and swing yourself behind it. Dropping to your backside, you flatten your spine against the cool, solid surface, eyes wide, heart beating hard against the cage of ribs keeping it from leaping up into your throat.
‘Coward,’ a voice in the back of your head scoffs, sounding suspiciously like your father. You shake it loose. Now is not the time to be bothered by old ghosts.
The thundering engine draws nearer, rumbling in your chest as it seems to creep towards your hiding spot at a pace even a glacier would be impressed by.
Around the corner of the rock, you can finally see the glow of its headlights smoothing over the tarmac, illuminating the sand and brush all around you. Hurriedly, you tuck your toes right into the shadow cast by your rock, keeping a breath held hostage behind clenched teeth.
“Come on… Come on,” you urge it frustratedly, aware that every second you spend not moving is another second towards sunrise. If you’re not on the dairy ready for work by then…
The vehicle rolls to a stop.
It stops.
The temptation to let out a frustrated scream is only held in check by your tongue getting stuck to the roof of bone-dry mouth.
They saw you. They must have seen you. There’s no way they could have known you were here otherwise.
Idiot!
Wasting time on the decision has only taken it right out of your hands in the end.
A bead of sweat escapes your hairline and rolls down the side of your face, following the curve of your cheek. Should you run? Keep hiding? Did they stop by coincidence? If they meant no harm, they’d have seen you hide and kept on driving, wouldn’t they? Stopping is suspicious. It conveys a desire to engage.
And then something really strange happens.
“Excuse me?”
And… Well, you’re… not entirely proud of the choked gasp that jumps out of you, nor the way you flinch as if you’d been struck.
When did they – He? It’s a low voice, deeper than anything you’ve heard in a long while, full of bass but soft like distant brontide.
When did he get out of the vehicle? You didn’t hear a door open, nor close.
You nearly jump out of your skin when he speaks again.
“I’ve frightened you…” Despite how gentle the timbre is, his voice is loud, like he’s speaking all around you, not just behind you. “I apologise,” the stranger continues, “That is the last thing I meant to do.”
What the Hell is he talking about?
There’s a long, unpleasant stretch of time until he speaks again.
“Was that your… Ford?” he asks, like he’s testing the word on his tongue, “Up the road?”
Shit. You’re starting to regret leaving that note. He must have read it and knew someone would be walking into town, alone and vulnerable.
The engine of his vehicle is still idling, strong and steady, buzzing through the ground and up through your feet.
It goes against your nature to ignore someone when they’re talking to you, but there’s still a part of you clinging to the hope that he’ll just give up and move on if you don’t respond or show yourself. Perhaps he’ll think you were just a figment of an overtired imagination…
Of course, instead, he persists. “Please.”
Jesus, he almost squeezes the word out, oozing dejection.
“You have nothing to fear from me… I’m a friend.”
A friend indeed. You huff quietly to yourself. You don’t even know him. He doesn’t know you. He’s trying to coax you out of hiding after watching you flee from his vehicle. Hardly the foundation for a good friendship. Still, you have to wonder why he doesn’t just come around the rock to stand over you if he’s so keen.
After another few seconds of stubborn silence on your part, the voice speaks again.
“Will you at least step back from the rock?”
What?
“There are scorpions on it, and I fear you’ll get-“
You don’t think you’ve moved so fast in quite some time. One moment you’re pressing yourself to the rock, and the next, you’re scrabbling to your feet with gusto, lurching away from your prior hiding space and spinning around, skin already crawling.
Sure enough, a pair of giant scorpions are scuttling around on the flat top, their tails held aloft, proud and large in the moonlight.
“-Hurt,” the stranger finishes.
Snatching your head up, you find yourself staring right into the vehicle’s headlights, and you instantly grunt with discomfort, raising a hand to shield your eyes from the light.
“Oh.” There’s a pause, the vehicle’s engine skips, and the lights suddenly dim, plunging you into almost darkness save for the dim glow of residual light. “Forgive me. Is that better?”
“Much. Thanks,” you respond automatically, only to turn rigid once you realise you’ve spoken aloud.
Well. He’s already seen you. No point pretending you can’t talk either…
Again, the stranger’s vehicle makes an odd noise, it’s engine hums gently, and as you lower your arm to seek out the man you’ve just opened a line of conversation with, you finally see what you’d been hiding from.
A monstrous Peterbilt sits squarely across the width of the road, entirely alien in the barren, natural landscape. Smokestacks on either side of its cab reach towards the sky, glinting silver in the moonlight. It looks red under the meagre glow, with lighter panelling on the main body and dark, blue accents on the wheel trims and storage compartment. The grill is, in a word, massive, standing taller than you are, sporting a logo you don’t recognise on the front.
All in all, it’s a hell of a truck. Powerful, you imagine. Expensive too.
You try not to let your mouth hang ajar.
“Where-” Your voice cracks, still dry. “Ahem…! Where are you?”
Glancing around, your hackles start to rise. You can’t see the speaker anywhere. Which is why you let out an embarrassingly shrill yelp when his voice rumbles directly from the semi.
“I’m right here,” he assures you, polite enough not to show his amusement whilst you flap your mouth open and closed.
No, you shake your head. No, that is too weird. “What, are there like… speakers on the outside of your truck or something?”
There’s the tiniest of pauses, followed by a simple, concise, “There are.”
Oh. Well, then. That answers that burning question.
“Okay? So, um… Can I… help you?” you ask awkwardly, screwing one side of your face up.
The man seems to hesitate, allowing a pregnant pause to hang in the air between you before he replies, “I was going to ask you the same thing.”
Somehow, your expression twists even further south, and you begin casting your eyes over the semi, squinting through its dark windshield to try and catch a glimpse of what’s on the other side.
“I saw your truck on the side of the road,” the unseen man continues, “I feared you might have been hurt in a crash, so, I stopped to check you weren’t still inside the vehicle. Then I found your note.”
He falls silent, and the air is dominated once again by the purring of his semi’s engine.
“Okay?” you prompt, still unsure of his motivations.
“It said you need help.”
He trails off, waiting. You’re promptly struck by the idea that he’s trying to guide you to some conclusion he hasn’t yet revealed. Finally, just as you start to grow restless, he forges ahead, “These roads can be hazardous for a lone hu-“
Suddenly, the truck’s engine revs, drowning out his voice for a second and sending you leaping backwards, startled.
“- A lone traveller…” he clears his throat just after the roar of its exhaust cuts out. Then, “Ah, If I may be so bold...”
All of a sudden, the passenger side door unlatches and swings open, and you’re presented with a clear invitation into the darkened cab. “May I offer you a ride into town?”
You wonder if he can see you turn stiff at his suggestion. Your body all but pleads on hands and knees for you to accept. What’s the worst that could happen, after all?
Well. You’ve watched several documentaries and movies that give you a pretty good indication of what ‘the Worst’ entails, thank you very much. You don’t like that he’s inviting you into his truck without showing his face to you yet. You’d like to gauge the person you’re speaking to. Get a bead on him. Is he big? Strong? Tall? Could you overpower him if it came down to it? Does he look like he’s hiding a weapon on him?
All these questions only serve to dry the moisture in your throat.
“I… That’s… very kind of you,” you admit, wringing your hands together as you take a small step away from the semi, “But I’m sure it’ll be okay, it isn’t that far.”
“At an average speed of three miles per hour, you will reach the outskirts of town in just under three and a half hours.”
You blink, caught off guard. ‘And they said we’d never need to use equations after we graduated.’
“Maths guy, huh?” you cock a hip, laying a hand across it and shooting the truck’s windshield a tentative smile, “Maybe I walk at four miles an hour.”
“Two and a half then,” he quips back just as smoothly, the door to his semi still hanging open. When he continues, you can’t help but notice that the cadence of his baritone voice rumbling through the speakers has turned to something a little more sombre, quieter, like he’s trying to impress upon you the gravity of a situation you don’t yet know about. “But time and distance aside, I do not wish to leave you to walk into Jasper by yourself, particularly at this time of night.”
He speaks like he’s been to elocution lessons. Every word seems to be carefully selected, every vowel and consonant articulate and refined.
It’s disarming. He’s disarming. But you’re still not convinced.
“Listen… Thank you, again. But…” It feels rude, like you’re committing some kind of faux pas in turning your back on the semi, yet you can’t shake the nagging voice at the back of your head, telling you that there’s something not quite right about the man in the truck. Not bad, just… off.
“It’s a kind offer,” you tell him again lamely, turning on your heel. And so, you recommence your weary march for Jasper, tossing one last sentiment over your shoulder, “But I’m sure I can make it on my own. Take care, okay?”
You almost expect him to argue, but all you can hear is the now familiar drone of the semi’s almighty engine. For several paces, you can feel a pair of eyes watching you, scrutinising and pensive, if a little baffled by your short yet polite dismissal.
When you make it another ten feet, heaving your tired legs after you over the tarmac, your ears perk up to the sound of an engine revving.
Smokestacks chugging, the massive truck pulls out of its standstill, unseen behind you.
Chewing on the inside of your lip, you keep your gaze fixed to the ground ahead and raise a hand, flapping it about in an apologetic farewell as you meander further off the road and onto the sand, giving him plenty of space to get past.
You start to frown when you make it twenty paces without being overtaken by the truck.
That frown only grows deeper when the engine keeps churring away behind you, rubber tyres crunching tiny particles of sand under their treads as it crawls along in your wake.
Is he…?
Tearing your eyes off the toes of your shoes, you send a fleeting glance over your shoulder, surprised – but not much – to find the nose of the Peterbilt creeping slowly along in your peripheral vision, keeping pace with you.
Your frown eases back, and you quirk a brow at him instead, calmly asking, “What are you doing?”
And just as easily, the voice returns, “If you will not allow me to drive you, I will happily escort you to your destination.”
You can’t help yourself.
“Ha! ‘Escort.’” The snicker jumps out of you faster than you can raise your hands to press your fingertips against an unbidden grin. “Sorry,” you immediately try to amend, “You just sounded so serious.”
“… I… am serious?”
Letting your hand flop back to your side, you give your head a shake, still grinning. You really do meet all sorts on the road.
“Regardless, I’m sure you have far better things to be doing with your time.”
How the truck matches your walking speed without his engine faltering or sputtering, you’ll never know.
A strange noise gurgles from its exhaust, almost perfectly reminiscent of a troubled hum.
“On the contrary,” the driver responds, pulling forwards a little until only the grill overtakes you, and for a moment, you worry he’s about to drive across your path, “There is nothing at the moment that concerns me more than getting you safely where you need to go.”
Huh. Of all the genuine, stubborn…
“Look.” Your shoes scuff up a cloud of sand as you draw to an abrupt and decisive halt, turning bodily towards the truck. Hands splayed on your hips, you glare at the windscreen, aiming approximately for the driver. A second later, he must have hit the brakes because the semi lurches to a stop as well, hissing noisily.
Still, he doesn’t step out.
“You seem like a nice guy,” you start, trying to keep your chin raised and your tone stern. You fail, of course. Your voice cracks nervously, but at least you try. Taking a deep, steadying breath, you finally elect to stop beating around the bush and just address the elephant in the room – or desert, as it were.
“But I don’t make it a habit to get into random trucks with strangers.” You make it a point not to directly accuse him of having ulterior motives, but you hope you’ve at least driven home your main concern. At best, he’ll grow offended that you’d think him capable of such a thing and – hopefully – move on. At worst… Well. You brace yourself for that, teeth grit so tightly, your jaw starts to ache as you flick your eyes over towards the truck’s driver-side door, waiting.
The truck in question does something odd then. It… sinks? At least you think it does, lowering on its axles by a few inches like the wheels have just deflated. It’s difficult to tell in the dim moonlight though, and it’s over so quickly, you can’t be sure you saw anything at all that wasn’t just a trick of the desert.
How long have you been awake?
You’re busy calculating the hours you were driving when the stranger’s voice is kicked out over the speakers again.
“You assume I mean you harm…” he utters.
And just like that, the stern, rigid scowl is instantly wiped off your face.
He sounds…
…sad.
Not offended. Not angered by your thinly-veiled implication.
Just sad. Dispirited, even. As if it’s only just occurred to him that you might have perceived him as a threat.
It’s almost painful when the pair of you dissolve into an uncomfortable silence that lasts for several beats of your rapid-fire heart.
Biting down on the inside of your cheek, your brows drift apart whilst you try to think of something to say. Trouble is, you’re afraid that speaking again will only make things worse.
You have no idea what’s going through his head. What if his dejected tone is followed by something worse?
“I’m sorry,” you backtrack, pressing your lips together and chiding yourself for faltering, “It’s nothing personal, just… I-I should probably get going before I fall asleep standing up.” You give a stilted laugh, but it soon turns into an awkward sound made at the back of your throat, lips pulled over your teeth in a grimace.
Dipping your head, you swallow thickly and grip the straps of your rucksack again. But just as you make to turn away, the semi’s wheels abruptly twist towards you. It’s ever so slight, just enough that the truck rolls a few paces in your direction before it stops again, its grill pointed straight at you.
With an audible gulp, you go to take another step back, staring at the metal in anticipation. Your retreat is soon halted by the mellow rumble of his voice.
“I understand your hesitation. And I know that the word of a stranger may not hold much weight,” he begins slowly. The Peterbilt inches forwards again. “But I can assure you, you have nothing to fear from me…”
Shifting on your feet, you let go of your bag and clutch instead at your elbows, brows tipped up indecisively. He’s persistent, you’ll give him that. He also speaks with a candour you’ve never encountered outside of a film or a storybook. Frank and forthright in a way you’ve never been privy to. Is that why you’re hesitating? Is that why he seems ‘off?’ Because his level of sincerity doesn’t have a place in your world?
Perhaps you’ve been spending so much time by yourself, it’s turned you distrustful. Maybe you’re just getting cynical. Looking back on your journey here, you realise that only other person who you’ve spoken to was a disinterested server who took your order at a drive-thru… That was four days ago. How long before that did you listen to someone who wasn’t the people on your truck’s radio?
Why is it so suspicious that this trucker wants to help? Hell, you’d be concerned as well if you saw some poor bastard hiking alone through the desert at night without a friend in the world.
Christ, you need some perspective.
The driver must see the conflict painted like a brand across your expression.
“Would it reassure you to know that this vehicle is operated entirely remotely?” he pipes up.
You blink once. Then again to wake yourself up a little more, pulled from your inner turmoil. “What?”
“This vehicle,” he tells you, “It is an unmanned vehicle.”
Curiosity overtakes suspicion faster than you can uncross your arms and stare at the grill dumbly, face opening up in surprise. “Wait. You mean it’s one of those self-driving things?”
“In a sense.” The semi’s engine rumbles softly, and the not-driver adds, “I am what you might call… the safety driver.”
Now that is curious.
You don’t even realise you’ve taken a step closer. “Really? But I thought that sort of tech was still in testing?”
“It is,” he replies, “We are, however, attempting to advance to field-tests, to see if these vehicles can autonomously haul freight in areas with sparser populations, to minimise the risk of collision.”
“Hence why you’re driving it out here in the middle of the night,” you realise aloud, raising an inquisitive brow at the windscreen, “So you’re really not in there? You’re driving it from somewhere else?”
“Would you care to see for yourself?” he asks kindly.
Your wide eyes flit to the passenger door when it eases open once again, though this time, it seems far less foreboding than before.
Tugging a loose piece of skin between your teeth, you give the silver steps leading to the door a scrutinising glance.
That does reassure you…
Slowly, still at least a little wary, you coax your legs to move, and they begrudgingly carry you onto the road. You approach the semi-truck with all the caution of a doe crossing an open meadow.
As you venture closer, its engine kicks up a notch, emitting a steady, gentle purr as if the vehicle itself is pleased with your acquiescence.
Suddenly, as you move along to the open door, you’re dazzled by a light flickering on inside the cab, bathing what you can see from this angle in a calm, golden hue.
From down here, it looks… just like an ordinary interior.
And lo and behold, as you stand on your tiptoes to see in, you find the driver’s seat is eerily devoid of its occupant.
You let out a breath that emerges shakier than you would have liked it to.
“Wow,” you laugh, impressed.
Maybe just a quick peek…
A vast chunk of apprehension breaks away from your chest and vanishes into the ether as you shuffle towards the steps, raising an arm and stretching your fingers across the space to the grab handle that sits invitingly just beside the open door.
This side of the truck is bathed in silver moonlight, and it’s only now that you’re this close that you happen to notice something you hadn’t before.
You almost wince when you spot them.
Although shiny and speckled with only the lightest dusting of desert sand, the metal panelling on the semi is covered in signs of wear and tear.
Enough to give you pause, at least.
For a moment, you’re taken aback, turning bodily away from the open door and cocking your head at the myriad of scratches that criss-cross their way up towards the semi’s roof.
All the paint in the world couldn’t hide some of those shallow nicks and lines that have been scraped out of the metal. In any case, something big must have scuffed it. Perhaps another driver in their own Peterbilt? Or perhaps it’s all damage sustained in testing the vehicle’s automated capabilities.
Clicking your tongue, you absently raise a hand to stroke your fingertips gingerly along the length of a particularly prominent scratch by the door.
“Oh dear,” you tut softly at the side of the truck, “You’ve been in the wars, haven’t you?”
Without warning, the engine that had been buzzing so gently suddenly ramps up and starts to vibrate firmly beneath your fingers, so strong you can even feel it judder the ground through the soles of your feet.
Recoiling like you’ve been zapped, you whip your head around to peer through the open door, half expecting the driver to admonish you for touching his vehicle.
As swiftly as it started however, the thrumming engine dies down, and the truck returns to its soft, benign idling. “My apologies,” comes that gentle voice again through the speakers, “Just an overactive combustion chamber.”
“Is it... safe to ride in?” you retort, giving the back of the truck a sidelong glance.
“You will find very few vehicles safer than this one,” he tells you patiently, “I will not allow any harm to befall you, as I would not allow it to befall any of my passengers.”
Your shoulders jump with a silent laugh. “Befall,” you parrot, fighting a smile, “I love the way you talk.”
“… You do?” His speakers buzz with a pleasant hum.
Fingers flexing anxiously, you reach out once again and slide them around the grab handle beside the door, finding that it’s unexpectedly warm under your palm.
“So, I just… get in?” you ask, only to cringe immediately, realising you probably sound like a fool who’s forgotten how to get into a truck.
Before you can rebuke yourself harshly though, the absent stranger offers his response. “Do you require assistance?”
“No, no,” you rush out, placing one foot on the first, silver step and hoisting yourself up off the ground, bringing yourself level with the cab’s seats.
Your eyes grow wide with wonder as you take in the interior.
“Oh, wow,” you breathe, suddenly hesitant to pull yourself up those last few feet.
“Is there something wrong?”
“It’s just… It’s so clean!”
Laid out before you is a perfectly ordinary truck cabin. Soft, grey leather covers the seats, with the same dark colouration on the roof, doors and most of the glovebox, interspersed by a rich, black steering wheel. The soft light, you discover, is emitted by multiple strips of blue neon LEDs that the driver must have fitted underneath the radio dials and dashboard, casting the truck’s interior in a cool, soothing glow.
But most astonishingly, for as much as you search, you can’t spot a single thing out of place. It’s absolutely immaculate. There isn’t one receipt stuffed in the door pockets, no traces of sand or gravel dirtying the footwells, no loose change tossed into the centre console…
Dumbfounded, you glance into the back, but all you find it a dark, grey panel and a shelf set back into the semi’s rear wall, meant for use as a bed, you surmise. It’s empty, unsurprisingly. Not a blanket or a pillow in sight.
Finally, your suspicions are put to rest. This truck doesn’t look lived in at all. He really is operating it remotely.
“God, it looks brand new in here,” you marvel aloud, suddenly hyper-conscious of the abysmal state of your old pickup. The scratches on this semi’s exterior play briefly on your mind but you brush your musings aside, too fatigued to consider the contradictions of a worn exterior but an immaculate interior.
Instead, you feel a frown crease the skin between your brows.
It really is immaculate in here…
Glancing down, you scowl disdainfully at your filthy shoes, the tank-top that’s stained irreparably by dropped food and greasy finger-smears, and trousers that are tattered and worn at their hems.
“Is everything all right?” the ‘driver’ asks again. His voice must emerge from the speakers on each door, low and warm, filling up the cabin.
“My shoes are dirty,” you admit out loud, your grip on the handle turning slack until you sink a few inches back to the first step, “I’m dirty. I-I don’t want to get sand and crap all over your truck.”
“I don’t mind.”
Spoken with more consideration than you’ve heard in a long, long time.
You pause at once, brows tipping up in the centre of your forehead.
A deep inhale through your nose brings with it the unobtrusive scent of leather, with the faintest undertone of adhesive sealers, giving the interior that ‘new truck smell’ that so many drivers try to replicate artificially.
Comparatively, it’s been several days since you passed a rest stop that had showering facilities. Those that did asked for a hefty charge. You’d glanced down at the handful of coppers in your centre console and decided you could go without. Now, you’re starting to regret that decision. Every now and then, whenever you raised your arms to stretch or flip the visor down in your pickup, you’d catch an unpleasant whiff of yourself wafting out from under your light, cotton shirt.
Embarrassed as you are to confess that you’ve been severely neglecting your personal hygiene, you swallow past a lump in your throat and croak, “I… haven’t exactly washed for a couple of days… I wouldn’t want to make your truck smell…”
And in a tone so kind it threatens to brings a tear to your eye, the stranger answers consolingly, “I think your scent is perfectly fine.”
It’s so damnably genuine, you can’t even find it in yourself to point out that he isn’t here to smell you, so his point is moot.
“I…” One more cop-out strikes you. “I don’t have any money,” you murmur truthfully, ashamed, “I can’t pay you for the fuel, or-“
“-I ask for nothing in return but your company,” is all he says, cutting you off as gently as his profound voice will allow.
And just like that, you’re out of viable excuses. Or perhaps your body has noticed the comfortable seats right in front of it and you don’t have enough fight left in you to deny it a sit down. Besides, any reasons you come up with to dip are likely to be met with a counterpoint.
Even so, you can’t help but hesitate for one more question, hand clasping and unclasping around the grab handle. “Are you sure it’s okay? I’m not going to get you in trouble or anything am I?”
The next sound that hums through his speakers is so soft and rich, you think it’s the truck’s engine playing up again, at least until the stranger cuts the noise off by saying, “You do not look like trouble to me.”
If he only knew.
The sound prior, you realise, was a chuckle, the first one you’ve heard out of him yet. Something in the measure of it settles the last of your nerves, only slightly, just long enough to have you throwing caution to the wind. With a final heave, you pull yourself the rest of the way inside, sliding gingerly into the comfortable passenger seat. You never notice how the metal below your foot shifts microscopically, lifting you closer to the cab.
It takes a lot of restraint not to let your eyes drift closed, nor to slump backwards into the wondrously giving material on your spine.
Instead, you sit stiffly with your rucksack keeping you upright, legs pressed together, hands folded neatly in your lap. If you make any kind of mess in here, you’ll be mortified.
After a moment, you remember to close the door, but just as you turn and peel a hand off your thigh, you jolt, staring agog at the door as it swings slowly shut with a dull ‘click.’ All of its own accord.
“Full remote access,” the voice pipes up as the engine below you roars to life, and then you’re moving, and all you can do is stare through the window at the desert drifting by whilst trying to ignore the uninvited ache in your chest.
“Seatbelt.”
His gentle prompt spurs you to reach over and grab the fabric near your shoulder, tugging it across your body and fumbling a little to slot it into place. Suddenly, you feel an invisible pull on the belt, and the metal buckle finds its way into the socket on your next pass.
‘Must be magnetic,’ you muse distractedly.
“Are you comfortable?”
Blinking back the moisture in your eyes, you turn to glance at the empty driver’s seat. It’s bizarre, and more than a little unsettling to see the steering wheel turn itself around as the truck pulls back onto the road, driven by unseen hands.
When you don’t immediately respond to his query, the man continues just as patiently as before. “If it is too cold, I can turn up the heater. Or… perhaps you are too warm…” He hums to himself, thoughtful. “You have been exerting yourself.”
You instantly become aware of the light sheen of sweat that hasn’t quite dried on your forehead. Puckering your face up into a solemn smile, you shake your head and at last respond. “Not to worry. It’s very comfortable in here.”
What follows is a poignant moment of hesitation before the voice speaks again. “Forgive me if I’m overstepping, but… You do not seem comfortable…”
The open-ended statement fades into silence, and you’re left casting nervous glances around the cabin again. “How do you-?” you start, tugging your shirt further down your arms, “Can you see me? Like… in here?”
Again, there’s a pause, barely longer than a second, yet long enough for you to notice it.
“Cameras,” comes his measured response, “Both external and internal. They’re how I spotted you on the road.”
“Oh, I hadn’t even considered that… Of course.”
Suddenly self-conscious, you reach up and begin to paw uselessly at your dishevelled hair, humming though a thin-lipped smile. “I must look a sight,” you half joke.
“You look tired…” he replies diplomatically, and there’s nothing in it for you to be offended by.
Rubbing a thumb over the wrinkle slowly carving a home between your brows, you heave a dreary sigh. “It’s been a long journey.”
“I can only imagine… And… Where does it culminate, if I may?”
“Terry’s Dairy?” you offer, “Uh, it’s this little farm just on the outskirts of Jasper.”
The truck beneath you gives a reverberating thrum. “I know the pastures, but I’m afraid you will find they lay beyond the ‘outskirts’ of the city.”
Letting out a groan, you knock your head back against the seat behind you, staring bleakly up at the ceiling. “Of course… How far?”
“Only a few miles, to the East of Jasper. We’re coming in from the Northwest highway. I can get you there in twenty-five minutes.”
“Twenty- Oh, no, no. You really don’t have to do that,” you protest, shifting in the seat to frown at the empty driver’s seat in lieu of anywhere else to look, “Just drop me off in town and I’ll walk the rest. You’re already going out of your way for a stranger.”
“I am dropping you off at your destination and not a mile before,” he tells you steadily.
His uncompromising tone brooks no argument.
You stare at the spot a person should be for several, long moments, debating how much you could push an argument. He’s already coaxed you into his truck, his powers of persuasion are rather good. What chance do you have, sleep-deprived as you are?
Conceding sullenly, yet appreciatively, you let your back touch the seat, settling into it a little less hesitantly. “You won’t be taking no for an answer, I assume?”
He only lapses into a stubborn silence, an answer in and of itself.
That quiet is broken, however, when you suddenly let out all the air from your lungs, a smile growing across the width of your face as the breath escapes your nostrils in a sigh. “Thank you for this… Really. You’re saving me a lot of grief.”
The blue neons on his dashboard seem to flare a bit brighter for all of a second before they dim again. “I am glad to be of service,” he replies warmly.
“Oh my god,” you blurt without warning, leaning forwards in the seat and staring through the windscreen with wide eyes, “I’m so sorry, you’re being so nice and I’m so rude – I never asked your name.”
“Nor did I yours,” he points out, “You may call me Op-“
Suddenly, a burst of static buzzes through the radio. You shoot it a funny look.
“Optimus,” the stranger admits over the static with a hesitance you pick up on right away, drawing your gaze from the dash, “My name is Optimus.”
“Optimus?” you repeat incredulously, a small smile quirking at the edges of your mouth, “Wow… You must have had creative parents.”
“I appreciate that it might seem… an unusual name…”
“It is,” you agree pleasantly, “I like it. Makes you sound cool. Unique. My parents just stuck me with Y/n.”
At once, Optimus echoes your name, and you’re jarred by the sound of it coming from someone else’s lips, reverberating around the truck. It’s been a while since anyone used it.
“Y/n,” he says again in his velvety timbre, “It’s a fine name. I like yours too.”