When All Lights Go Out I (TFP)

Chapter 23

"No, it is not. I will not pressure you, Azura. I do believe a small amount of training is better than a heap, especially for your age. You are not at a suitable age to be put under that kind of pressure." She raised an eyebrow as her school assignments and homework would beg to differ. However, she did not comment about that. "Your mind will work better if you learn from short periods. I know you will practice in your own time, but any serious training can be done in short periods."

"I am glad to hear you say that." Azura swallowed a few more mouthfuls of energon as she thought about it. "I can control water fine. It's the earth, fire, wind and lightning I have the most trouble with."

"That we can work on down the track." Optimus definitely did not wish to force her into perfecting the elements. "Do not concern yourself about it tonight." He could tell Azura was starting to get full as she slowed down on her drinking. "I know you may not believe this, but I honestly feel like the luckiest mech from Cybertron." She paused her drinking as she was stunned by his words. "I always wanted a sparkling, and I never thought I could have one. And yet, despite the evil intentions, a miracle was creation." She blinked as tears fill her eyes and she drank some more energon as Optimus shut off the flow. "And I never cared if I would get a mech or a femme, and if they were strong or not. I know you are already strong, maybe not physically, but you are strong."

Azura let the happy tears flow, smacking her lips as she finished drinking and spread her hands on his chassis as an awkward hug. "Thank you for your kind words, Optimus. You make me feel special."

"Because you are." He kissed the top of her head as he retracted the fuel line and closed the panel. He walked over to her bed. "Never forget that." She smiled as he rubbed her back gently and he moved to sit beside the bed. "Let me tell you a story from my past. About my old friend...who sadly perished in the war, Ironhide..."

Azura looked up at Optimus as he moved her to sit on his knee as he began telling her the story of how he met Ironhide. It was apparently by accident. A funny accident as Optimus admitted that in his youth, he did some stupid things. Like drink the Cybertronian equivalent to alcohol. And he had actually challenged Ironhide to a race at the time. Both of them had been drunk and they raced around the city, causing a few accident along the way. Hearing this story made her wonder how he grew into this calm, stoic leader in front of her. But...this was his teenage years. She listened to his story until she fell asleep and he gently placed her into her bed, allowing her to dream away happily.

Azura's Dream

Finding herself back in the dream world, Azura had expected to find herself in the castle. However, she was shocked to find herself standing in a bioluminescent forest. There were wattle-like trees everywhere, and glowing crystals of different colors stuck out from the ground with tiny, golden, glowing insects flying around. This place felt familiar, and yet she did not recognize it. However, she had a hunch. This was the world that went dark. She looked up and saw this world was surrounded by three moons, and it was very beautiful.

A grassy path was before her and she looked down to see she still had dragon paws instead of human feet. She smiled and walked along the path carefully, looking around in awe as she saw so many large flowers as well. They were golden, and seemed to look like daffodil flowers. She saw some mountains surrounding the forest and it just seemed so peaceful here. If this was the world the dragon came from, she guessed that the fight with Unicron must have been pretty bad enough for the dragon to leave this home world.

However, her attention was caught by what looked like a massive temple with golden walls and goldish red roof tiles. Celestial dragon statues stood outside the temple, covered in vines with a calm pose. They were standing gesturing to a stone flower on their pillar. Azura couldn't help but wondered what they were made from as they looked like metal, but it wasn't iron...or at least, not the iron she knew.

She looked at the large doorway, looking at the ivy growing over the large temple curiously. She sensed she had to go inside. She felt a big upset as she had expected to look into another pool tonight, but the scenery has changed. She could not help but wonder why it kept changing. It felt like a coincidence that she heard about this world from Optimus and she was now seeing it.

"This is because you have accepted more of yourself," Alpha Trion's voice startled Azura just before she entered the temple. She froze and glanced around in shock. "The more you discover and accept yourself, the world evolves with you. You have accepted that your power comes from the dragon who helped to save Cybertron. I am just sad we were not able to help in return."

"Why did the Cybertronians not help?" Azura asked curiously, entering the temple and glancing around at the painted glass windows that had blue, flying celestial dragons on them with raindrops. "I would have thought they would."

"Sadly, our world was in such devastation after Unicron, it took years of rebuilding before they could even build a ship to fly to this planet," Alpha Trion explained gently as she walked through the temple. "No one had anticipated that the world would die before Cybertrionians reached it."

"I see." Azura did not know if that was all true, but she didn't know how long ago this took, so she really could only go by his words. "Now it makes sense...the castle was me accepting that...I am...not human."

"Correct. Keep walking, the pools are still here." She looked ahead at a rectangular archway with lit torches either side. "However, there is nothing to see in the pools tonight. There are other things for you to do." She was a bit disappointed as she walked through the archway and found herself in a large room. This wasn't a cave this time, and the pools were all in raised pools with fountains. "I will be helping you learn and practice more of your abilities. This world is filled with what you might consider as magic, and it will help you a lot."

Magic was a word Azura never thought she would hear from any of the Cybertronians. She knew that the Cybertronians were way more logical than that, but she guessed using the idea of magic would actually help her. In fact, she liked the idea a lot. She smiled at him happily. "When do we begin?"