🍂🕯️🤎ೀ

you know, after everything cybertronians have been through it's hard to stay that way. sympathetic. after centuries of violence, brutality and fear, after endless battles and losses it's truly hard to sincerely feel compassion or guilt, hard to feel sorry for anyone but yourself. you want to be selfish, you want to finally let go of the past and live the damn life, you want to forget all your sins and enjoy the well-deserved victory, the home, the precious peace for which you went through hell. but jazz can't do that

he's done a terrible thing. he killed a human. many in his place would just accept that "little inconvenience" and move on. again against the backdrop of everything that had happened to them this event really meant nothing. a few lines in the giant book of their history. a few heavy seconds in the flow of the thousands of years of their lives. nonsense. trifle. the death of a bad person who deserved it. a cruel decision of fate. an accident beyond their control. so many ways to justify themselves! but jazz can't do that. shame for what he has done haunts him. he tries to put it aside, tries to start over, but he keeps getting pulled back, to the heat of battle, to the darkness of his former life, by the hands of those closest to him and by his own efforts. it's this event that fundamentally changed something about him. changed the way he looks at the world and himself

he can't forgive himself. he can't forget. he wakes up every night with nightmares, reliving that day and hundreds of other days over and over again. why is he reacting this way? he became a bad man a long time ago. so much blood on his hands, so many murders, so many ruined fates at his mercy, but the bitter sharp shame still stubbornly follows him. he can't move on knowing what he and his people have doomed the earth to by involving it in their conflict, he can't move on knowing that in the eyes of the earthlings they are far from heroes, far from fighters against injustice. for humans there is no much difference between an autobot and a decepticon, they are all murderers, they are all destroyers of their home. if this is his legacy, if his struggles and sacrifices have led to this outcome, doesn't that mean he's been wrong all his life? was it all for nothing? what was even the point? is the only thing he's actually good at is destruction? it can't be true. it can't stay that way!

he wants to understand what he means to others, he wants to make a difference, he's really trying, but the scary truth is... nothing will change. no matter what he does, no matter how hard he tries, there's no going back. he'll remain a monster in their eyes and he'll remain a monster in his own eyes. they won't forgive him and neither will he forgive himself. he'll have to live with that. he accepts it eventually. it will never get any easier, but he will live through it