Airachnid was in her human form, submerged in a steaming bathtub. She was completely relaxed, only part of her face visible above the surface, eyes half-closed in pure delight.
"Oh, by Primus…" she whispered, exhaling a sigh that turned into soft bubbles on the water. "This is better than oil baths…"
She would never admit it out loud, but that tub — that simple combination of hot water and silence — was the first thing on Earth she genuinely loved.
Her eyes fell on a small object floating in front of her. It had a curious shape: a small yellow duck with wide, expressionless eyes. Airachnid eyed it suspiciously.
For a moment the two of them stared at each other like in a silent western duel.
"Your shape is intriguing…" she murmured, narrowing her eyes. "But don't annoy me. So keep quiet, as you are."
She sank a little deeper into the tub, sending up more bubbles, and the rubber duck bobbed there impassive, like a sphinx.
***
While Airachnid occupied the bathroom for three hours — yes, I was counting — it was unlikely she'd emerge anytime soon. I, meanwhile, was on my own diplomatic mission: food.
Food in absurd quantities.
I intended to keep my promise. After all, she had barely explored human flavors, and I suspected burgers would be one of the few universal languages to keep her… let's say, compliant. For now.
"That comes to six hundred dollars…" the delivery guy muttered, incredulous at the size of the order.
Without a word, I slipped my hand behind my back, discreetly conjured over a thousand dollars in untraceable cash — obviously, because I'm not an idiot — and handed the bills to him as if giving change for a coffee.
The delivery guy's eyes went wide, clearly in shock.
"Keep the change. Thanks for lugging more than ten kilos of food up here. I really wasn't in the mood to walk down to reception," I said.
"N-no problem!" he stammered, counting the bills like a kid in front of a mountain of chocolate. "If you keep tipping me like this, I'll deliver food to you every day!"
He then shot me the most sensible look a human could offer in that situation:
"You… gonna eat all that?"
I smiled crookedly and closed the door slowly, like one guarding a precious secret.
After locking up, I walked over to the table that now looked like the altar of a fast-food cult: dozens of burgers piled in bags, wrappers, and boxes. Enough, I hoped, to keep an unstable ex-Decepticon goth satisfied.
I sat on the couch in comfortable, loose clothes — almost like wool pajamas. Over them I wore a long-sleeved shirt to discreetly hide my metal arm, a precaution against unwanted stares.
The hotel we were in was simple, three-star, nothing luxurious. But comfortable enough.
I breathed in and looked at the feast on the table.
"Airachnid!" I called, loud enough to make the bathroom walls tremble. "I bought food!"
From inside, the silence was broken only by the sudden splash of water. Something told me she'd heard me and that her hunger outweighed her threatening posture.
I heard the door open. I kept my eyes closed, trying to let sleep take me — rare for someone who, in three hundred thousand years of existence, had rarely wanted nothing more than… to sleep.
Her footsteps drew nearer. She clearly had her eyes on the overloaded table. I admit it was impressive how silent she could be — especially for someone who, in her original form, must weigh over twelve tons. But in that human guise, lightness seemed part of the disguise.
"This is wonderful… what a delicious taste," Airachnid said, beginning her first assault on the banquet with both hunger and reverence.
I opened my eyes just a crack, enough to peek at the scene. I wanted to see her smeared in cheddar, surrounded by the glorious mess of a gastronomic assault. But the moment I looked, I nearly jumped out of my skin.
She was completely naked.
She had simply gotten out of the tub and, like the protagonist of some bored otaku's erotic fantasy, was there eating without clothes, with an almost unnerving naturalness.
It was, at the very least, a staggering sight. And even though the logical part of my brain insisted she meant no harm in the human sense, the other part — the more primitive, hormonal part — was losing the fight. Especially given her history of… questionable behavior.
I sprang up and headed straight for the bathroom. I definitely didn't have the emotional maturity to deal with a body like that without doing something stupid in my head. I came back with a towel in hand and chucked it at her head so hard I almost knocked her to the floor.
"Put some clothes on, you pervert!" I barked, trying not to look directly at her.
"What the hell was that? Why'd you attack me out of nowhere?" she protested, more offended at being interrupted during her meal than at her own nudity.
"Just put some clothes on! You know most humans don't exactly consider walking around naked… polite?"
"I truly don't get these human rules. In my original form I don't wear clothes. Why do you keep judging me?" She crossed her arms. "Why worry about such stupid, aesthetic things?"
She'd unintentionally made a valid point.
Indeed, in robot form she — like every Cybertronian — didn't wear clothing. Their bodies were living armor, forged of metal and energy. By human logic that technically made them… naked? Damn. Maybe I'd lost that argument.
"Still," I muttered as she finally wrapped the towel around herself, "that doesn't justify you being naked in human form. There are social rules you need to understand."
"I still don't comprehend your complaint," she said, with a look I couldn't read. For a moment I thought she might hurl a burger at me — but she hesitated. Her burgers were far too valuable to waste as ammunition.
"Think of human clothes as a kind of aesthetic armor," I began, trying to stay calm. "I tried to tell you at the bar but you didn't listen. Depending on what you wear you can look more… elegant. Or, depending on how you wear it, you can end up looking vulgar. Sometimes you send the wrong message without even noticing."
I didn't want to get into how humans react to other people's bodies. I wasn't ready to have that conversation with someone who could tear me in half without effort. Especially with a mind as chaotic and curious as hers.
To be honest: I was genuinely afraid of what might happen if Airachnid really understood how the human body worked.
She'd been a bitch to me so many times I'd lost count. But if by some crooked miracle she grasped certain human instincts… no doubt she'd use me as a guinea pig. And things could get ugly for me. Or good. I couldn't tell. I'd never been a fan of dominant women, so I preferred not to find out.
I decided to ignore the accidental pervert-goth she naturally was and turned on the TV to distract my head, maybe find some news that didn't involve tragedy, political chaos, or natural disasters. Of course I didn't succeed. Same old drivel.
I gave up. Seeing the world was still as fucked as it had been the last few days, I decided on a sensible — or not so sensible — course of action. I grabbed the remote, slipped into a few vulnerabilities in the TV system and, with some rather unethical technical finesse, started reprogramming the interface. Long story short? I was cheating to unlock full access to every streaming service on the planet. A private cinema, so to speak.
Airachnid watched me while she devoured two burgers at once, her face completely covered in cheddar.
"What were you doing?" she asked with her mouth full, but she didn't take her focus off the food.
"Let's say I'm doing a little data theft," I replied casually. "So we can watch anything on the internet for free. Like a private cinema — no lines, no people talking, no censorship."
"I'm sure that's illegal," she commented, but there was more approval in her tone than reproach.
"Listen… I've been dodging taxes for, I don't know, eighty or four hundred years. I lost count. Ever since taxes were invented I've just been saying no. So technically I'm the greatest financial criminal in human history. Doing stuff like this is natural for me."
"You just earned extra respect from me," she said, as if stamping my criminal record with a little gold star.
"Don't treat tax evasion like a crime. It's just… self-defense. For my wallet. And for my sanity. Even though I could print money forever." I shrugged, mocking the situation.
"Every day I'm more convinced we were meant to meet, Lux."
"Don't say that, you're bringing me down..." I murmured, feeling a tingle down my spine, as if my body remembered the exact moment she crushed me like an ant.
When I finished the operation on the TV and turned around, I got a shock.
She had eaten everything.
Yes, everything. More than ten kilos of burgers. In less than five minutes.
"Please tell me you're full," I asked, already knowing the answer.
"No. And now I want something sweet. Like that cotton candy you gave me, and then denied me the pleasure of continuing to eat."
"First of all," I began, my patience wearing thin, "we both saw what happened when you tried that. It was like giving you thirty kilos of meth at once. You're forbidden from eating sweets, understand?"
She crossed her arms and gave me that look she always does — a mix of defiance, stubbornness, and a faint touch of psychopathy.
It was obvious. She was about to try something. And knowing her, it would probably involve emotional blackmail, a veiled threat, or some indecent behavior to manipulate me.
I sighed.
There was no choice. I'd have to use one of the abilities I'd sworn never to activate again in my life. But maybe… maybe it was the only way to deal with a hyperactive goth alien before she caused a scandal big enough to get NASA involved.