Hello, readers!

What's this? I'm updating my Transformers anthology with more one-shots? WHAT? IT'S BEEN OVER A YEAR? OH MY GOOOOODDDD.

Sorry, I don't know what came over me. I finally got around to writing more of these and coming up with ideas, so here they are. I also have an alternate ending chapter coming up that was requested, so be on the lookout for that. At last, I have all my Noctuary one-shots ported over to AO3 so now I'm moving on to these. I'm also starting to write more Ask Not the Sparrow chapters, so I'm gonna keep to my weekly update schedule! I'm actually pretty proud of myself if I do say so.

Thanks for the support from my patrons! Toby, Tonya, Narttu, and Kendra are the real MVPs! They get early access to chapters and they also get access to a bunch of other stuff I post, like chapter notes and outlines, my planning pages, covers, and all kinds of stuff!

These aren't edited very much, so they're going to be a little rough. Any critiques are welcome, but try to be specific so I can edit easier! Thanks!

~ Crayola

No News

Kathryn is given the news that her parents were in a horrible accident. Rated T.

I stepped out into the daylight, squinting and lifting my hands to shield my eyes. The lighting inside the bank was nothing compared to Mother Nature, and I had to stand and wait for my eyes to adjust before trying to navigate the parking lot.

My antique—just another word for "old as balls"—Camry was right where I left it and I headed toward it, coming to pause when a cop car pulled up and blocked my way.

Officer Wright rolled down his window and I smiled at him in greeting. "Evening, Officer."

"Evening, Ms. Walker."

The somber tone and serious expression wiped the smile clean off my face and I walked closer to his car, leaning down slightly. "Is . . . everything okay, Officer?"

He took a breath and climbed out of his cruiser. I wasn't sure what was going on, so I took a step back onto the sidewalk. He said, "You'd better come with me, Ms. Walker. There's somewhere I have to take you."

All at once, my brain flipped through everything that had happened within the last 24 hours. The last week. Hell, the last three months. I couldn't come up with anything that I would have done to warrant being picked up by the police. It didn't seem like he was arresting me, and nothing on his face told me I was in any sort of trouble.

So, I just asked.

"Did . . . did I do something wrong, officer?" I asked, my throat going dry. I looked around the parking lot of my bank, catching a few of my coworkers standing by their cars and gawking, and my face turned red.

Shaking his head, Officer Wright assured me, "No, no. Nothing like that, Ms. Walker. There's, um, there's been an accident. Your parents were involved. I'm going to take you to the hospital." He came around his cruiser and opened the back door for me, motioning for me to take a seat.

I hesitated, staring at the interior while I tried to wrap my mind around what he had just said to me."What kind of accident?" I asked, turning my attention to him.

"It's your parents. They were in a car accident."

Immediately, my hands started to shake. I nodded, my mouth hanging open wordlessly, and I crawled into the back of the cruiser. Officer Wright shut the door behind me and I mechanically pulled the seatbelt over me and clicked it into place. Once we were on the road, I came back to myself and remembered my car in the lot.

"What about my car?" I asked, my voice hollow.

"Someone can bring you back to pick it up later."

What I wanted to ask next stuck in my throat. If I didn't ask, he couldn't tell me the worst case answer. If I didn't ask, I could sit there and pretend like I knew it was just a small accident. They were in the hospital being treated for stiff necks and maybe some sore limbs. Everything was going to be fine. We'd come to pick up my car later, just like he said.

An itty bitty voice in the back of my head told me that if it was as simple as that, they wouldn't have sent a police officer to pick me up at work.

I told that itty bitty voice to shut up.

When I couldn't stand the silence anymore, I asked Officer Wright, "Do . . . do you know what happened? Did they tell you anything?" However, I wasn't sure if he'd even heard me because my voice refused to go any louder than a whisper.

He did, though, and answered. "I was only told to come to pick you up, sorry."

There was a genuine concern in his voice. The sympathy in his expression was reflected in the rearview mirror as he glanced back at me. I averted my eyes and stared out the window, my hands squeezing each other until my knuckles turned white.

"I know it was the Richards couple, but that's it," he said after a long pause.

Sniffing, I looked up and said, "Carla and Lloyd?"

"Mm-hmm."

"Are they okay?" I asked without conviction. All I cared about right then was my parents.

"I'm not sure," Officer Wright admitted.

The guy was an absolute font of knowledge and I had to keep myself from lashing out at him. It wasn't his fault he didn't know anything, and venting my fear and frustration on him wouldn't help me or him any. Instead, I bit the inside of my cheek and repeated over and over in my head a single mantra: no news is good news.

No news is good news.

No news is good news.

No news is goo—

"We're here," Officer Wright announced. "Would you like me to escort you in?"

At first, I was going to decline his officer. However, I thought better of it and nodded. "Yes, please. That would be nice."

He found a place to park close to the emergency entrance and we headed inside together. I was glad for the company, glad that someone who wasn't seconds from falling apart was going into the hospital with me. With both my parents there in unknown conditions, I had nobody to stand by my side. My best friend lived in a different city; I was going to have to call her later.

When I had more info.

When I knew how okay I was going to be.

Officer Wright led me to the desk and asked the nurse, "I brought Kathryn Walker. She's here about her parents. They were in an accident, brought by ambulance."

The nurse looked up from her computer long enough to look at me and Officer Wright, then nodded and clicked away at her computer's keyboard. "Let's see, Walker . . . Walker . . . . Ah, yes. Um—Oh. Uh . . . your father is in OR Four. Second floor. I'll page someone and let them know you're coming. They'll, uh, they'll be able to tell you more about your mother."

I didn't like the way she'd paused or said that "Oh".

"Thank you. I'll stay with you, Ms. Walker," Officer Wright offered, lifting his arm to invite me further into the hospital.

All I could do was nod and follow him to the elevators.

OR. Operating Room. One or both of them were under the knife. If my memory served, the Richards had a big SUV. An Escalade or something. My parents drove a tiny Monte Carlo—if the two cars had collided, then my parents would have . . . their car might have . . . .

It—they—wouldn't have stood a chance.

The trip up to the second floor was all a haze as my mind ran through every single worst-case scenario. My eyes itched as tears slowly and silently trickled down my cheeks. I tried to hide them from Officer Wright, carefully wiping them away to avoid smearing my mascara. By this time in my life, it was more of a habit than from any real concern over my appearance. Especially with the new waterproof stuff.

Ugh. I'm so fried I'm thinking about my makeup.

To tell the truth, it was better than thinking about my parents. Easier. Less scary. I had half a mind to just bolt back down to the first floor and flee the hospital altogether. Run all the way back to my house and hide under my covers. Wish this all away. A thick, hot feeling in my gut told me everything was wrong. From the nurse's face to her pauses . . . things were wrong.

And I was going to have to sit in a stuffy waiting room and wait for someone to come and tell me how wrong.