“What are you doing?” Fay whispered as Charlie and Optimus slipped into her isolated room, kneeling at her bedside. “Get the hell out of here,” she hissed. “If they find you, you’ll never be let back in here! I can’t lose you!”

        “Fay!” Charlie shot back in a hushed voice. Begrudgingly, Optimus had agreed to let her do the talking to her friend. Charlie’s argument had been that she knew how to get Fay to listen to her no matter what was going on, and Optimus, more often than not, wound up just pissing her off or scaring her or startling her. Charlie was Fay’s rock, and Optimus was the fuel to her flame. Well, more appropriately, if she was going to use elemental references, he was the wind. Depending on the day, on his actions, he either encouraged the flames to grow higher and higher or he helped them dwindle down.

        But they couldn’t take that chance today. Of all things, they needed to be absolutely certain that they could get Fay out of this wretched room. They had to be certain they could break her out of her own mental prison. It was so difficult to try and explain that everything that was happening was her own doing. Of course Fay would punish herself. Of course her subconscious would piece these small things together about the injections. What Charlie and Optimus didn’t know was what exactly had been in that syringe, or how it had affected her so drastically.

        As Charlie fought to undo the bindings of the straightjacket, she kept her voice low. “Listen to me and listen good, Fay-.”

        “Well,” Fay replied evenly, even though the sound of Charlie’s voice was a step away from a version of heaven.

        “Excuse me?” Charlie shot back.

        “You mean well,” Fay told her. “You never were that good at English.”

        “Oh, shush!” Charlie snapped, the tension pushing on her shoulders. Fay’s mind was a dangerous place. She knew that much. Trying to weave through it long enough to get the girl away from this situation was a gamble. Because Fay was violent on the inside, thanks to her origins. If things went awry . . . Well, they could be facing the barrels of guns, the tips of spears . . . Charlie wasn’t sure what to expect. Only that they had to get Fay to what she perceived as safety. “Just listen, okay? We’re getting you out of here. Now. Come with us and stay calm.”

        A delighted laugh slipped from Fay’s throat and her eyes crinkled as her grin spread up against her cheeks. “You think I could panic with all the drugs I’m on? You’re funny, Char!”

        Charlie, however, frowned. If Fay couldn’t think clearly, this could all be in vain. Charlie had her hunch, and Optimus, as well as several other Autobots, shared it. Fay could fix this. She could go back. They could stop the incident that had sent her here.

        But if it was going to work this late, it had to be done immediately.

        Charlie’s fingers finished fumbling with the straightjacket and she eased it off Fay with a bit of rushed care. “We have to go, now, Fay. Come on.” The blonde girl grabbed at the brunette’s hands, pulling to help heave her off the simple bed.

        But Fay didn’t budge. She just stared at Charlie, an immense sorrow and despair filling her gaze. “I don’t deserve to be out there, Charlie. I’m a monster.” As Fay’s mind forced itself to sober up, flashes of that night crossed her vision. Fay had beaten that unnamed, irritating young man to a bloody pulp, but he never weakened. He laughed at her, actually. With each blow, his smile grew, his laugh became louder. With every blow, she became more and more frustrated.

        More so, Carrie seemed weaker, the tears coming quietly down her cheeks, but they were all too obvious to Fay for her to even try to ignore them. ‘Sadist,’ she told herself. ‘He was a sadist. A masochist. That’s why he enjoyed the pain. That’s why it never bothered him when I started breaking his bones and spilling his blood. That’s why he relished in the fact that I couldn’t kill him. It’s not me who failed. It’s just what he is. He adores the darkness. You just wallow in it. You’re different. You’re not like him.’

        As much as she tried to tell herself these things, she could never really shake the way his eyes glittered every time her fist came down. Every time he seemed stronger when she tried to break him down. It was a fruitless effort. And she -- she’d actually had the intent to KILL that boy. She’d had the intent to wipe him off the face of the planet. More than anything. For harming Carrie, he would pay.

        But as much as she tried to make him regret his actions, he only seemed to love them more. And it only seemed to make Carrie fade further.

        It was probably a good thing when the nurses had come. It was probably a good thing they’d sedated her, even though she was kicking and screaming. Then they’d taken that young man away, tending to his injuries, a wicked grin across his alluring face the entire time they’d taken him away.

        But Carrie . . .

        No one had come for Carrie. She had been overlooked. Or maybe purposely forgotten. But no one had found the girl. No one had bothered to take care of her.

        “You are not a monster, Fay!”Charlie muttered, her nails digging into Fay’s flesh just enough to try to wake her up from this half-hearted fantasy. “Come on. You have to believe me. You have to listen. If you come with us, we’ll make it better. We can fix what happened, Fay, but you have to believe me! You have to have the damned guts to get your ass out of that bed and do something about it instead of just pouting! You’re a big girl now, so pull on your big girl panties and start acting like it!”

        “What about Carrie?” Fay asked half-heartedly. “What happened to Carrie? Did she die . . . ?” Charlie paused, blinking, glancing at Optimus. They both knew what had happened that night, and what had happened in the nights following. Fay took their silence as confirmation. “I knew it! She’s dead! I wasn’t supposed to let her be taken away!” With her hands now grasping her skull, Fay leaned into herself. “I wasn’t supposed to let anything happen to her and, and I did! She’s gone, Charlie! She’s gone! She was important!”

        “Fay . . .” Charlie’s voice softened a bit. “Do you know why she was important?”

        “No, but she was!” Fay insisted. “She said she was! She said to not let them take her away from me! I don’t even know that foolish girl! I don’t know what any of this is about, but dammit, I’m scared, Charlie! What’s going to happen now? I’ve broken everything!”

        “And you can fix it, Fay,” Charlie told her quietly, squeezing her friend’s hand. “Just come with us. You can fix all of it. Just trust me. It’ll all be okay.”

        ‘Go.’

        Fay wasn’t sure where that voice came from, only that it had been a small whisper, reaching into her mind. Charlie nearly winced, nearly simultaneous with the sound, but a millisecond or so after.

        On shaky legs, Fay stood, her blue eyes uneasily met Charlie’s green ones. “All right,” Fay told her friend in a hushed voice. “Tell me how to fix it.”

        Taking a deep breath, Charlie decided to test the power of suggestion. “The halls are empty right now. The Autobots have distracted all the security, doctors and nurses. No one else is around. We just have to walk out to the courtyard and we’ll be okay. I’ll explain it to you when we get there.”

        Once Fay gave a small nod acknowledging that she understood, Charlie and Optimus began to lead her from the room, Charlie’s hand still holding Fay’s. Hushed murmurs passed between Charlie and Optimus as they walked, discussing the small details of how they were going to get Fay to turn things back. It wasn’t an easy thing to create. And while Optimus had had a bit of success with getting her to backtrack in the past, it had been under immense pressure. Fay had been scared. Petrified and panicked after what she had perceived as a near-death experience. Neither of them were certain how to do that right now.

        More so, it never seemed to occur when she was calm. Only when her spark was unstable. Only when she was exposing the reasons why she, and her kind, were referred to as Catalytics.

        But she was the only one who had survived. She was the only one left from that batch of created sparks. More importantly, no one knew of any other Catalytics that were online. They couldn’t contact any others to find the answers they desperately needed for Fay, and so they were stuck on trying to find these answers on their own, testing out theories as they emerged.

        At least, that was the sort of thing they’d been doing. But now . . . Now they had Carrie. And while she had yet to tell them a damned thing about Fay, they knew she was far less than ignorant, even if the girl wasn’t truly alive. The redhead revealed that she was knowledgeable without actually saying a single cursed word to them. At least, not outside the words, “I’m sorry, but I’m not talking.”

        That was all she said. Those six words. Even when Charlie and Optimus simply sat in silence, or whether they were tending to her wounds, or if they were preparing her food. That was all she said to them. Even if they didn’t mention it, she knew they were thinking about it. Charlie supposed that it was reasonable. After all, they were in Fay’s mind. Even if she didn’t consciously register that fact, their presence with her was registered in her subconscious, and by being on her playing field, they were made vulnerable to her thoughts and her mind.

        That was all right. They had nothing to hide from her.

        Well, Optimus didn’t. Charlie didn’t exactly have anything to hide, but it wasn’t exactly something she wanted to go around exposing right now. Fay didn’t need that extra stress. She didn’t need that mind-shattering truth breaking through the fragile safety she’d built for herself. While the reunion with her father and brother had gone well, Charlie had no such hopes here.

        But today, it didn’t seem that Fay’s mind had any limits. A small tickle slid into Charlie’s mind. Pleasant at first, seeming to light up a small portion of her mind with a bit of a tingle that was inexpressible.

        Then it went downhill. It burned a bit like acid for a small millisecond, enough to warn her but not enough to cause her serious pain. Fay’s hand gripped Charlie’s tighter, but not for comfort.

        “You bitch!” A snarl swept across Fay’s face, her face contorting in anger. “How dare you! You deceitful, conniving-! I gave you a gift and you-! I’ll send you to Pit for allowing me to suffer!”

        Charlie nearly froze at the sound of Fay’s voice. While the words were indeed being spoken by her friend, the voice they came from . . . That wasn’t Fay. “Fay, please calm down,” Charlie pleaded gently. “You have to understand what happened.”

        “I know what happened!” Fay quickly snapped. “You betrayed me!” Her voice had become a roar. “How dare you!” Fay attempted to yank on Charlie’s arm, but the blonde slyly pulled herself from Fay’s grip. With a small glance, Charlie let her eyes alone speak to Optimus: this was what they needed. Fay’s spark was surging. Now she could perform the Backtrack.

        Without another word to Fay, Charlie took off running down the hall, attempting to distance herself from the brunette and the man whose mission would quickly become that of preventing serious damage. No. Optimus wouldn’t stop Farrah. He would merely keep her from executing Charlotte. That was the only line he would draw. Because it would be in those moments between injury and death that Fay would, hopefully, come back to herself, instead of lingering as FarLust.

        And once Fay was in that inbetween state, where her spark would start to settle again, the Backtrack could take place. It would be up to Optimus to persuade her to activate it then. More so when Charlie knew what kind of condition Fay was capable of putting her in, especially if she didn’t fight back.

        It didn’t take even a second before Fay tore after Charlie, tearing down the hall like death itself as the formerly small red ring in her eyes began to dominate her irises. That femme . . .

        A growl, deep and guttural, rose from Fay’s throat as her spark drove her onward. Betrayal. Hurt. Fear. Loneliness. Years and years of these emotions and they all could have been prevented. If only . . . If only . . .

        Fay let loose an angered scream. It was only a step away from becoming a sob. While FarLust dominated on the surface, the lost young woman known as Fay was still inside, uncertain and broken. How had any of this happened?

        “Treacherous-!” Charlie flung a door closed behind her, and Fay crashed through it, the wood splintering and shattering from the impact as she forced her way through it and outside.

        ‘Stop.’

        That voice urged her again, only a simple, single word. But Fay ignored it this time. Her rage had taken over her control. How had everything been hidden right in front of her? How could she have been so blind? So foolish? And Charlie hadn’t done a damn thing to stop it. Charlie hadn’t done a damn thing to help her.

        “Traitor!” Fay bellowed, her throat already aching from the screams and yells. But no other volume felt appropriate for the pain that was ripping through her spark. “You damned traitor! I swear to Pit I’ll rip out your spark for what you’ve done! How could you even think of leaving me to suffer alone after all I’ve done for you? And for him? For that damned-! You shallow, selfish traitor!”

        “Fay, it’s not like it!” Charlie insisted, even though she knew her words would do no good. Actually, it was because she knew her words were currently worthless that she even dared to speak to Fay at all unless she was egging her on at this point. But Fay’s hurt, the hurt that surged in the red of her irises -- red in a place where that bright blue belonged -- tore at Charlie’s heart. “You don’t understand what it’s like!”

        “Don’t understand what it’s like?” Fay shrieked, her self control having diminished to nothing. “How don’t I understand? At least you had someone when you were scared! At least you had someone to calm you! While you were with him I was scared and alone you damned . . . You damned harlot!”

        Harlot. One of the words Malakai had called her. Now she was flinging it at her best friend even though their . . . relationship, if you could call it that, had been far from that sort of situation. Charlie had been faithful. Monogamous. A well-behaved girl.

        Fay had been the one getting involved where she wasn’t wanted or needed. But her hurt from that word, from so many things Malakai had called her, from so many things she’d envied about Charlie . . . For one thing, Charlie had had her freedom.

        Fay lunged at her, pinning Charlie to the soft ground, and the silken grass beneath their feet.  “Bitch!” Fay shouted as her fist came down to strike Charlie for the first time.

        The blow echoed from the crack that came from Charlie’s cheekbone. Wincing, Charlie realized exactly why it was so important that all of Fay’s injuries in her dream world were treated as real wounds. That blow hurt like hell. It hurt still when another blow came to Charlie’s shoulder. To her nose. To her skull. To her collarbone. Those blows hurt like hell, and Charlie knew she was bleeding from at least one.

        It took a few short moments for Optimus to pull Fay off Charlie. The blows had been swift and harsh. By the time Optimus pulled her away, the rage was still burning in her eyes, and she would’ve struck him, too, if he hadn’t held her arms with a firm grip. “Filly.” He called her by her nickname, the first word he’d spoken today. The first word he’d spoken to her in days upon days.

        The wild energy in her eyes still burned, and she still struggled to get away from him, would’ve clawed his face if she’d been able to get the leverage. “Get off me!” She shouted. “Damn you!”

        “Filly,” Optimus called again, just as calm as before. “Look at what you’ve done. Look at the harm you’ve caused her.”

        Her bright red eyes flicked to Charlie’s form on the ground. “Good!” She shouted. “Bitch deserved it for deserting me! For making me feel so damn alone!”

        “Filly,” Optimus pulled her into him gently, letting his warm breath mingle against her hair. “Listen to me, Filly . . . She’s your friend, and you’ve hurt her. Look at the damage you’ve caused. Breathe slowly, and see what you’ve done to her. Look what you’ve done to someone so dear to your spark.”

        “She is not- . . .” Fay began to protest, but as her spark began to wind down, having expended some of the rage that had surged inside it, Fay began to rise back to the surface, slowly replacing the bit of FarLust that had taken over. And as blue began to ebb away at the red, Fay’s eyes widened. “By the AllSpark what have I done?”

        “Backtrack, Fay . . . Turn it back . . . Fix it . . . Back to the night of the half moon. Go back. Will it to go back.”

        “Are you insane?” Fay protested. “That’s impossible. It’s illogical.”

        “Just focus, Filly . . .” Optimus vented slowly, keeping himself calm for her sake. “Don’t you want to help Charlie? Don’t you wish to help Carrie?”

        Fay winced at the names, of the damage done to each of them. “Yes . . .” Fay murmured. “But I don’t know how, Optimus . . . I can’t fix this . . .”

        “You can, Filly . . . Focus . . . Let it come to you . . . Your spark will let it occur so long as you wish it. Let it feel natural. It’ll flow to you.” He embraced her tighter to him. “Just relax . . . Focus on going back . . .”

        “But it’s absurd-!”

        “I know, Filly. I know precisely how unnatural and absurd it seems. Simply let it come.”

        With a slow huff, Fay let herself go. She let go of her ties and how broken she felt. She let her spark take over. As her eyes began to glow and her mind began to blank itself out, Fay simply said, “You may remember.”