Jasmine sighed, drumming her fingers against the desk in her trailer. She was so, so tired . . . She glanced back at the TV, where another song was starting up. She couldn’t bring herself to change the channel. She’d come to her trailer to escape all the cooing her coworkers had produced at the spectacle Orion was producing. She needed to be alone, to think, before she just . . . ran off . . .

    No matter how much she wanted to, she was holding back from sprinting down the streets to the cafe. It wasn’t that far of a trip, really, less than a mile . . . She could close it in ten minutes or less, depending on if she went at a brisk walk or jog. But she couldn’t. Not yet. She had to know what she was getting into if she went, and she wasn’t certain of that at the moment.

???: “Oh, Darrrrllliiiinnngggg!”

    Jasmine raised a brow, making an odd face at the sound of his voice. Daniel opened the door to her trailer with a broad grin. She turned and looked at him, obviously not looking too pleased.

Daniel: “Oh, don’t look at me like that, Girl! Did you see that serenade? Absolutely breathtaking! Why are you still sitting here and not running down the streets calling his name like it was your personal salvation? Because it may very well be.”

    He winked at her, grinning, and laughed when she faked a disgusted look at him.

Daniel: “You little faker!”

    He took her face in his hands with a smile.

Daniel: “You little . . . Girl you’re going to drive me crazy, you know that? That man, that man is out on the street with who knows how many cameras on him as he does his best to serenade you! You! Who, on this crazy, godforsaken Earth, is EVER going to love you like that man loves you? How many times does a love like that even take place, Jazz? How many? I could count the times on one hand. So if you think you’re going to just sit here and act like he is not head-over-heels for you, and you aren’t head-over-heels for him, then you are the craziest woman I have ever met. I’ll give you an hour to be out of here. It doesn’t matter where you go . . .”

    His eyes flicked to the television, where a few more chords were beginning to start. Test chords. He smiled.

Daniel: “But I definitely know where you should be going if you give an ounce of care to your personal happiness . . . Then I know where you will be going . . .”

    Without giving her the chance to speak, Daniel left, and Jasmine’s eyebrows stitched together at his quick departure. She sighed, turning her attention to the screen again, just to hear Orion begin singing again.

Orion: Hey, One day to get it all right,

Two wrong and not enough right,

Three words you said in the night,

Before we held the fire,

High five me brother it's amazing,

Her six shooter came out blazing,

7 up and coke on the pavement,

Ate my heart out daily baby.”

    She laughed gently. He certainly had a way with words, now didn’t he . . . ‘Six shooter’ . . . It made her chuckle . . . And yet . . .

“Hey I love, Hey I need you,

Hey I want you do you want me too?”

    Did he really just . . . ? She shook her head. It was part of the song. What did it matter if he’d just said he loved her on live TV? It wasn’t anything major, right . . . ?

“You can count on me, When you cannot see,

Let me spell it out, Plain and simple now,

When your numbers called, Backs against the wall,

Pick you up when you fall, Be there when you call,

Singing a-b-c, You can count on me,

1-2-3, You can count on me.”

    She let out a slow breath. He was certainly working to get his point across. With a shake of her head, she turned off the TV. She needed to clear her head, and watching him over and over certainly wasn’t going to do that for her. She need to relax, and just not think about him for a bit. What she really wanted was a short nap. Maybe that would help . . . So she went to the bed in back and laid down, blinds drawn tightly to block out the midday sun. She just needed to blank her mind and . . . relax . . . Think about nothing for a while . . . Absolutely nothing . . . She could do that . . . Except when she couldn’t.

She tossed and turned for a while, a freezing image finally seizing her into a dream. Or a semi-dream . . . A young couple stood in front of her. A woman with dark, shoulder blade length brown hair and blue eyes. A taller man with medium brown hair and brown eyes. She looked at them questioningly, brows stitching together.

Jasmine: “What’s going on here . . . ?”

    The woman laughed. The man just smiled at her. That was when it came flying back, hitting her like a ton of bricks. Linda and Matthew. Her parents. Her real parents from before she’d gone through not one transformation, but two.

Jasmine: “Oh my . . . AllSpark . . .”

    She swallowed nervously, eyes flicking between the two. Her mother smiled at her gently, embracing her taller daughter.

Linda: “That’s my baby girl . . .”

    She chuckled when Jasmine, Tracy, tensed at the gesture before returning it. Her father quickly joined them, lifting his daughter off her feet into his arms. Jasmine laughed at his display of affection and his smile grew.

Jasmine: “What are you guys doing here?”

    His deep chuckle showed her father’s amusement in her question, like she were still a child, asking things like ‘why is the sky blue?’ or ‘where do babies come from?’.

Matthew: “Why do you think we’re here?”

    Jasmine shrugged, blinking at his counter-question.

Jasmine: “Because you’re odd, odd people with horrid timing?”

    Linda laughed again, shaking her head at her daughter.

Linda: “No, Baby Girl . . . We’re here because of you . . . and Orion . . . Optimus . . . Whatever you call that man nowadays. See, you doubted him before . . . And we showed up then . . . You’re doubting him now and we honestly can’t understand why, Hon. He’s doing everything he can think of to make you trust him again, to love him openly.”

    Jasmine bit her lip, looking away from her mother, feeling conflicted again. Her mother quickly took hold of her daughter’s chin and turned her attention back.

Linda: “Baby Girl, if you could see how much Optimus loves you, it wouldn’t just fill the Autobot base anymore . . . It would fill the WORLD.”

    Jasmine nodded slowly, the quiet tone in her mother’s voice making it sound something like . . . awe . . . Blue eyes met green, and, satisfied, her mother let go.

Matthew: “Go get him, Tiger . . . He’s waiting . . .”

    Without any further notice, she woke in her bed, or rather, the tiny one in the trailer. And a strange woman was standing over her.

Jasmine: “Whoa, whoa, whoa!”

    She flung her arms around, scooting back on the bed, her flesh transforming to metal cannons out of shock. The woman didn’t look the slightest bit shocked. She looked Asian, with black hair and amber eyes.

???: “Pfft! You really going to pull that old party trick on me, Trace? Chill out.”

    Jasmine rose a brow, sensing no danger from this woman, however strange she was. The stranger extended her hand as Jasmine’s transformed back.

???: “Name’s Miko. You apparently still have no idea who I am. And I am here to talk some slagging sense into you, Girl! You’re driving me nuts! That guy has been out there for like, three, four hours now? What are you doing sitting on your butt! Go to him! Go to him now! That nut is the best thing that ever happened to you! And if you don’t go to him, some other super-nut will, and you . . . well, okay, I don’t think you’re ever going to ‘lose him’ to any woman, crazy or otherwise. But that’s so not the point!”

    She gripped Jasmine’s shoulders tightly, looking her dead in the eye.

Miko: “Listen to me. I know you’re in there, Jewel. And that guy singing outside a cafe with some amateur guitar player backing him up? That guy is the love of your life, if not every life you will ever lead, if you believe in reincarnation stuff, from now on. He loves you, and you love him. What is so hard to accept about that? What is so hard to understand that he is the best thing that has waltzed into your life? Well, besides me, maybe, but again, not the point. He’s your bondmate, Jewel . . . He’s the one and only person you should ever worry about or love or anything! Do you know how much you two have been through? Of course you don’t! Just trust me, get your half-metal butt downtown and kiss the scrap outta that guy because he is everything you need! Just stop overthinking and accept it already, would ya?”

    Jasmine blinked, overloaded with information with this woman she could swear she’d never met before, and yet . . . she seemed to know so much . . . More than Jasmine knew herself. Yet the words she spoke felt incredibly, everlastingly true.

    Without considering it any further, Jasmine nodded her affirmation to Miko.

Jasmine: “I will . . . I do . . . Excuse me . . .”

    She stood, heading out of the trailer without another thought towards the strange woman or the words she’d spoken that rang so true. She needed to see Orion. She had to be with him again. Now that she’d come to that realization, the last few hours seemed . . . ridiculous. She loved Orion. She knew that. So why was it so hard to accept?

    It shouldn’t be. She understood that. And she understood that overcoming that hurdle would be the best thing she could possibly do at the moment. Heading downtown at a slight jog, weaving expertly through the people that walked there at this time of day. She had to get back to him. She wanted to go home. And that’s exactly what he felt like.

    ‘I wanna go home . . .’ She’d told Angel that . . . Even when she’d been in the house she considered home . . . How long had she been missing Orion this way . . . ? She didn’t know, but she had to be with him again. ‘He’s your ex-fiance, girl . . . wake up and smell the roses . . .’ It was a half-conscious thought. One that made her move her legs a little bit faster through the people. She’d get there. She’d . . . she didn’t have to make him understand, did she? He already did . . .

    Orion, meanwhile, felt the surge in her spark, felt as she drew closer and closer, as she pushed through the crowds that had gathered, both spectators and news crews alike watching, waiting. He nodded back to Mindy, signaling ‘two’ with his fingers. She nodded back, breaking into a smile and began to strum the strings of her guitar with ease. She’d rehearsed this tune in particular when they took breaks.