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“Hey Fixit, have you seen the lieutenant? He usually gets up before me and I haven’t been able to find him around the scrapyard.”
Strongarm walked to Fixit, who was watching the command center’s screen in case it scanned for any Decepticon activity.
“No, I have not cadet Strongarm, let me run a quick pan—can—scan!”
As he did so, Fixit noticed Strongarm seemed to be moving her servos around—one servo pulling at the other then switching before she shook both and repeated the process again. It reminded him of Denny Clay whenever he wanted to do something but he felt like he knew he couldn’t or shouldn’t—he would bend his fingers until they made a cracking noise and then repeated until he did it to every single one, then he’d shake both of his hands and do it over again—when Fixit asked him about it he stated that he was “fidgeting”, it was something humans did when they were nervous. He was about to ask her if anything was wrong but then his completed scans came up on screen.
“Scan complete! It shows that all Autobot signals are still within the scrapyard—Lieutenant Bumblebee must still be recharging like the rest of the team at this hour.”
He expected Strongarm to look happy at this news, but her expression morphed from nervous to concerned.
“I’m worried about the lieutenant, Fixit.”
“What is there to worry about? Lieutenant Bumblebee performed very well on yesterday’s mission—he single-handedly defeated three Decepticons!”
Strongarm’s expression turned from concerned to annoyed immediately—clearly he said something wrong. Oh dear.
“That’s what I’m worried about! The more missions we go on, the more Bumblebee puts himself at risk for the sake of the team—he was supposed to wait for Sideswipe and I to help him against the Decepticons, but he started the fight without us! When we arrived, we were knocked unconscious by an unexpected attack that was meant for him, and when we woke up he told us the fight was over and to help drive the cons over to the base!”
Now Fixit was confused—there hadn’t been any glaring problems in anything she stated.
“I don’t think I see the renew—tissue—issue here, Strongarm.”
Strongarm sighed—Fixit really hopes he didn’t say something wrong again.
“Bumblebee may have been able to defeat the enemy on his own, but had he just waited for us he wouldn’t have been so exhausted afterwards. He looked like he was just seconds away from passing out when he finally went to recharge—and that was only a few minutes after we put the cons in stasis—he usually asks everyone about the mission afterwards to see if anything went wrong but instead he went straight for his berth!”
Fixit went over what happened yesterday in his neural network, and now that Strongarm brought it up, Lieutenant Bumblebee did seem to act more drained than usual after the mission despite the praise given to him by the rest of the team for the defeat of the criminals.
“I believe you might be into something, though I will admit that basing all of this on the lieutenant spending longer in recharge than usual is a little presumptuous.”
Strongarm sighs again and crosses her arms, looking towards the ground with the same concerned expression.
“For once, I hope I am overthinking things.”
————————————————————————
She wasn’t.
Everyone on the team is awake and beginning their daily routine. Drift and his pupils are meditating. Sideswipe is polishing his frame. Grimlock is practicing his punches. Russel and Denny are having breakfast. Fixit is checking the Alchemor’s internal network to see if he can make it work any faster. And Strongarm is now extra worried because she hasn’t seen Bumblebee anywhere since last night.
She is now considering her earlier statement of Bumblebee “looking like he was seconds away from passing out” was less exaggerated than she had hoped.
Before she could tell the others about her concern, Fixit called the team over to the command center.
“It looks like the scanners picked up two Decepticon signals nearby. They seem to be located in the woods and are moving quickly towards Crown City.”
“Then there is no time to waste. Let us wake up Bumblebee and stop them from reaching the city.”
“Wait!”
Drift stopped walking and turned to see a distressed Strongarm.
“I believe we should go on this mission without the lieutenant. He took on three Decepticons alone yesterday and clearly still needs recovery time from it.”
Sideswipe crossed his arms and gave an annoyed look at Strongarm.
“How can we be sure you aren’t doing this just so you can try out leading the team without Bumbl—OW!”
“Because unlike you, Sideswipe, I care about our leader’s health and well-being and don’t want to risk it getting worse.”
Drift walks up close to Strongarm, holding a neutral-to-mildly-annoyed expression. She could never tell the difference.
“Are you suggesting that we go on a mission to capture two Decepticon criminals without informing lieutenant Bumblebee?”
“…well—”
“I can’t believe it. I think Strongarm may have finally blown a gasket from being on Earth too long.”
While Sideswipe’s tone was sarcastic, his face looked genuinely shocked. Strongarm couldn’t tell what annoyed her more.
“Ms. Regulation is actually asking to break regulation—next you’ll tell me that Grim wants to practice pacifism.”
“Pacifism? Is that when you give someone a hand, like pass-a-fist?”
“No—I mean—never mind…”
Strongarm decided to ignore Sideswipe and focus on the only bot in the base that could actually stop her.
“Look, you know I don’t like breaking regulation like this Drift, but you saw Bumblebee yesterday. He was exhausted from fighting those Decepticons and clearly still hasn't recovered since then considering he hasn’t left his berth all day. I believe he deserves at least one break day—one day where we do his job while he gets to relax and recharge.”
Drift took a moment to consider this. He does remember Bumblebee going slower than usual on the road while driving back to the base. When he asked if he was damaged, Bumblebee took a while to register that Drift was talking to him, as if he was running on auto pilot until they got back to base. He reassured him that he was fine seconds later, but that still stuck out to Drift as odd. If Strongarm was correct in her assessment, then letting an unwell Bumblebee lead them into battle is not a good idea.
“There is good reasoning for your decision, but that does not ignore the fact that Bumblebee would not allow this, and I do not plan on breaking his trust.”
“I know, but you also know that Bee could be missing most of his limbs and he would still try to argue that he would be in a good enough condition to lead the team.”
“…you are not incorrect.”
“Wait wait wait—you’re ACTUALLY considering we go on a mission against TWO cons that we know NOTHING ABOUT, not only WITHOUT BEE, but WITHOUT TELLING HIM?!”
Drift and Strongarm both looked at Sideswipe, seemingly forgetting he was there at all. As they were about to argue against him, Grimlock jumped in.
“I know how we could go on a mission without Bee AND not have him worry about it!”
Drift and Strongarm both looked at each other and then at Grim.
“What is it?”
Oh no. Oh no no no—NO!
“WE ARE NOT DOING THIS!”
Sideswipe now felt like he was the only one that HADN’T blown a gasket. He did NOT like being the only voice of reason in ANY situation.
“There’s NO WAY you’re convincing ME to go along with this dumb plan that will only lead to all of us becoming one with the All Spark and Bee having to deal with it later.”
————————————————————————
“I can’t believe you guys had to talk ME into something stupid for once.”
“It’s not stupid, Sideswipe, it’s for the lieutenant’s own good.”
Sideswipe, Strongarm, and Drift were driving in the direction of the two Decepticon signals with Grimlock running close behind.
“Besides, I’m sure he’ll understand once he reads the note we left him! The humans in that movie Russel showed me seemed to be cool with it, why wouldn’t Bee?”
“Quiet, we are getting close.”
They all slowed and transformed out of vehicle mode, except for Grim who stayed in his dino mode.
Surely they could handle two Decepticons alone, how hard could it be?
————————————————————————
Fixit was talking with Denny at the command center when he heard a member of the team approaching. Considering the approximate weight required to make the specific sound behind those steps, he guessed it was—
“Hey Fixit, did you guys let me sleep in?”
Yes, he had assumed correctly!
“I’m glad you are awake lieutenant Bumblebee! And yes, the team let you get some extra recharge—Strongarm noticed how tired you seemed after yesterday’s mission and decided that you deserved a break!”
Bumblebee smiled softly—while he didn’t like how this was probably going to mess up his recharge cycle, he appreciated how thoughtful Strongarm and the rest of the team were sometimes. They had been working hard a lot recently, and as their leader, he tried to work twice as hard so he could be ready for anything.
“Thank you, Fixit. I’d like to thank everyone else, but I can’t find them around the base, do you know where they are?”
Fixit quickly rolled up to the command center’s main screen to pick up a piece of paper from the keyboard that Bee didn’t notice was there. He then handed the paper to Bumblebee.
“They told me to give this to you before you left so that you wouldn’t worry.”
He brought the paper up to his optics. He wondered what they could’ve possibly needed to write down that they couldn’t just let Fixit tell him.
‘Dear Bumblebee,
We are going on a mission without you. We know you do not like it when we leave the scrapyard without you knowing, especially if it is on a mission. So, we are leaving you this note so you do not worry about us. We will be back soon.
Enjoy your break day,
Grimlock :}’
“…”
Fixit thinks the “Do Not Worry” note did not help as much as Grimlock said it would. Never trust human films.
————————————————————————
Turns out, preparing to face two enemies without knowing anything about them is very hard. Very very hard.
“I TOLD YOU THIS WAS A STUPID PLAN!”
“SWEET SOLUS PRIME—LET IT GO SIDESWIPE!”
In their defense, how were they supposed to know the two Decepticons would be old Insecticons back from the war?
“WHY DO THEY SCREAM SO LOUD? MY AUDIO RECEPTORS WON’T STOP RINGING!”
Grimlock was trying to wack one of the Cons with his tail. He would’ve punched them if he wasn’t holding both of his fists to his audio receptors to try to block out the noise. Drift was currently battling the other Insecticon with his swords. He was trying to come up with a plan in his head, but could not find enough time between blows to formulate one. Strongarm shot at the back of the one Grim was struggling with—not knowing what else to do. As it made its way towards her, Sideswipe decided to take the opportunity to strike it on its side—knocking it off balance for a second before it turned to him and screeched.
“Oh scrap.”
Sideswipe closed his optics, ready to be sent flying by the Insecticon, when he heard blaster shots. When he opened them, the con was lying unconscious on its side in front of him, with harsh burns on the other side of its face and torso.
“Hey, Strongarm, when did your Decepticon Hunter get enough power to knock out an Insecticon?”
“That wasn’t me.”
“Then who—“
He heard more shots fired near Drift and turned to see the Insecticon he was facing in a similar situation to his. While Sideswipe was mostly just relieved to not have to fight the Cons anymore and Grim was just happy to be able to uncover his audio receptors, Drift only looked more weary of his surroundings. He quickly ran towards the others and stood in a defensive position.
“I believe we are not alone.”
They all quickly faced back to back next to each other—Sideswipe and Strongarm holding their Decepticon Hunters and Grimlock getting ready to charge. As they looked around, Strongarm noticed a blue mech behind the trees getting closer in front of her.
“Over there, between the trees!”
Immediately both Sideswipe and Grimlock ran to the woods while Drift and Strongarm stayed at a distance to make sure the mystery bot didn’t try to escape. The stranger dodged both of their attacks, leaving Grimlock to accidentally charge into Sideswipe. Before Strongarm could shoot the stranger, they stepped out into the open and held up their servos.
“Is this how your team always repay bots who save your afts? Because I’m not feeling very appreciated right now.”
The bot was a car mech with doorwings and was mostly blue with yellow and white accent colors. He had Autobot insignias on both shoulder plates and carried an amused expression on his face. Strongarm looked confused but didn't lower her weapon, meanwhile Drift’s expression and posture didn't change. Sideswipe, who was pulled up right by an apologetic looking Grimlock, looked towards the new bot with annoyance.
“Save our afts? I don’t know if you noticed, but we were doing just fine without your ‘help’.”
The stranger put his servos down and walked over to one of the knocked out Insecticons. He lightly kicked its helm.
“Sure you were.”
“Who are you and what is your purpose here?”
The mystery bot looked at Drift, who looked much more angry than annoyed. The bot’s carefree expression quickly turned to surprise before it changed into a more apologetic one.
“Sorry, bad time for jokes—the name’s Smokescreen! Official graduate of the Elite Guard and Wrecker-in-training!”
Smokescreen performed a salute to the team before he relaxed his body again. Strongarm completely lowered her weapon while Drift left his defensive position, though he didn’t put away his weapons. Strongarm’s eyes sparkled while Sideswipe’s face darkened.
“You’re part of the Elite Guard?!”
“Not another one.”
“Yep, one of the last graduates before the war fully went into effect. I was stationed to protect the Iacon Hall of Records, it was—”
“You didn’t finish answering my question—what is your purpose here?”
Smokescreen broke optic contact with Strongarm to look back at Drift apologetically.
“Oh right, I’m here to look for my partner!”
Everyone stared at Smokescreen in surprise, with Grimlock the first to break the silence, quickly followed by an extremely confused sounding Sideswipe.
“Your what?”
“You came to Earth all the way from Cybertron looking for a partner?”
“Not a partner—my partner. He’s been missing for months but I haven’t had enough free time from Wrecker training to go looking for him until now—I’ve heard rumors of him going to this planet for some reason. I’m not that surprised—he’s always loved Earth.”
Drift’s expression returned to neutral before he placed his weapons away.
“That’s certainly an…interesting reason to come to Earth. Though it is far from the strangest I’ve heard while on this planet.”
Smokescreen laughed, Drift’s statement seemingly reminding him of something.
“Yeah, Earth’s always been a magnet for weird stuff—it’s one of the reasons why he likes it so much. So, do you guys have a place I can stay on this planet?”
“Ours is already crowded enough, don’t you have a ship you can stay in?”
“Sideswipe! He’s a member of the Elite Guard!”
“Well, I would have had one, if I took a ship to get here.”
Strongarm and Sideswipe’s bickering stopped for a moment so they could both give a confused look at the new bot.
“Wait—how could you have gotten here without a ship? Were you authorized to use a space bridge?”
Smokescreen’s face took on an embarrassed expression, looking off to the left while he tapped his index fingers together.
“…I did use a space bridge, I just wasn’t exactly authorized to. I also have no way of going back so I’m kinda stuck here.”
Strongarm’s face returned to shock while Sideswipe started cackling.
“YOU ILLEGALLY USED A SPACE BRIDGE?!”
“HAHAHA—SWEET SOLUS PRIME THIS IS BRILLIANT! AN ELITE GUARDSMAN BREAKING THE LAW RIGHT IN FRONT OF STRONGARM—I AM NEVER GOING TO LET THIS GO!”
Drift walked past the red and blue bots to the unconscious Insecticon next to Smokescreen and placed it on his shoulder. He motions Grimlock to do the same with the other one before he makes optic contact with Smokescreen.
“We have a base nearby you can stay at, though we have a lieutenant we must inform of your presence before you can stay. I also would like to know how your blaster shots immediately took out the Insecticons.”
“That’s fine, I just hope they don’t mind me sticking around. And for the blaster being more effective—”
Smokescreen pulls up his right servo and transforms it into a blaster. Drift’s optics widened for a moment before looking back at Smokescreen.
“Wreckers have to keep their bioweapons active in case of an emergency. Don’t worry though, I know how to use it wisely—I was there for the war, you know.”
Drift stares at him briefly before turning around and telling Strongarm and Sideswide to get ready to drive.
————————————————————————
Driving into the scrapyard, the team expected Bumblebee to be there. What they didn’t expect was how angry he’d look. With crossed arms, furrowed brows, and a loud impatient foot tapping, it’d be impossible to not realize how angry he was. Grimlock and Drift tried to walk around him with the unconscious Insecticons in their arms.
“As soon as you put those cons in stasis, report back to me here. Immediately.”
They both nodded quickly and walked towards the stasis pods. Strongarm and Sideswipe stood still, hoping that Smokescreen followed their orders to stay outside until they could tell Bumblebee about him. They stayed quiet for a moment before Sideswipe tried to break the ice.
“Hey, Bee! How was your—”
“Great, thank you. I appreciate it. Do you know what I don’t appreciate?”
Strongarm was about to answer before Sideswipe elbowed her to signal that she shouldn’t. They both shook their heads.
“My team running off on a mission against two Decepticons without informing me about it and without, oh you know, ME! I would tell you more about how not only stupid but dangerous of a decision that was, but I’d rather wait until Grim and Drift come back from putting the Decepticons in stasis.”
Bumblebee looked like he was holding himself back from strangling them both.
“In our defense, sir, you were still recovering from yesterday’s mission. It wouldn’t be wise for you to lead in that condition.”
“I hate to admit it, but for once, Strongarm is right. You barely had enough energy to walk to your berth yesterday, let alone lead. And it’s not like we could’ve just ignored the signals.”
Bumblebee was digging dents into his arms with his hard he was clenching his servos.
“So you just decided to ignore protocol for me to recharge for a few extra hours?! Don’t you see how stupid that is?! It is my job to not only protect this planet, but to protect this team from anything the Decepticons have to throw at us, and I will NOT HAVE ANY OF YOU KILL YOURSELVES BECAUSE YOU DIDN’T LISTEN TO ME!”
Sideswipe looked down with furrowed brows—this wasn’t the first time he told him off for breaking the rules. Strongarm, however, couldn’t stand what Bumblebee was implying. She looked up at Bumblebee with an angry expression, making optic contact.
“Just because you feel the need to sacrifice yourself for us doesn’t mean we want you to. We didn’t do this just because we wanted to go on a mission without you, we did this because we don’t want to lose you either. If you don’t want us to kill ourselves, then how do you think we feel whenever you overwork yourself to the point of forced recharge? It’s not just your job to protect us—it’s our job to protect each other. I’m sorry we went out without your permission, I really am, but I don’t regret it because I can’t stand how you seem to view yourself as a disposable weapon instead of a bot.”
By the time she was finished, she was right in front of Bumblebee’s face. He looked surprised and a little guilty. Strongarm put her servos on her hips and glared into his optics.
“Do we have to endanger ourselves more to get it through your neutral network that we care about you as a bot and not just our leader, or are you going to actually start taking care of yourself?”
He broke optic contact, looking off to the side while one of his servos scratched the back of his helm.
“It wasn’t that obvious, was it?”
“Only to Strongarm really, she had to point it out to all of us how tired you were.”
Grimlock and Drift came back to see a guilty looking Bumblebee, a pissed off Strongarm, and a very impressed Sideswipe. After seeing them, Bumblebee sighed.
“Ok, I understand I should take better care of myself, but that doesn’t suddenly make what you all did acceptable. All of you are not to leave the scrapyard for 2 months with the exception of missions and from now on you must inform me directly before going out for regular patrol of exactly where you are going and for how long you will approximately be gone if there are no interruptions.”
Drift accepted the punishment without complaint, which cannot be said for the rest of the team.
“Now, any more surprises you guys have to report?”
“Yes. While fighting against the Decepticons, we ran into an Autobot. He claims he’s here in search of his partner who is rumored to be on this planet.”
“Oh…well that’s an interesting reason to come to Earth. Where is he?”
“We told him to wait outside in case you were mad about the whole going-on-a-mission-without-you thing. By the way, Strongarm, not to say I told you so but—OW!”
After elbowing Sideswipe, Strongarm let the new bot into the scrapyard. When she drove back in, it was with a racing car with white eighty sixes on its doors. After transforming out of vehicle mode, Smokescreen immediately staggered back at the sight of Bumblebee. Bumblebee looked incredibly confused.
“BB?!”
“Smokey? What—”
Before Bumblebee could say anything else, Smokescreen ran to him and tackled him before picking him up and squeezing him in a hug. While both of them started laughing, the rest of the team was in shock, reactions ranging from Drift widening his eyes to Grimlock’s jaw literally dropping.
“Wait—BB? You don’t think…”
“There’s no way—”
Before Sideswipe and Strongarm could continue their denial, Smokescreen finally brought Bumblebee down so he could kiss him on the cheek before hugging him closer. Sideswipe had to close her jaw for her. Bumblebee seemed to suddenly remember they had an audience as his cheeks turned bright blue.
“Smokey, Smokey I miss you too but can you stop for a second—Smokey my team is right there!”
“You don’t get to disappear for months without telling anyone where you went and then tell me that I can’t hug you for a few minutes. Speaking of which—”
Smokescreen lets go of Bumblebee for a second before grabbing his shoulder blades and shaking him aggressively.
“WHY IN THE NAME OF PRIMUS DID YOU COME BACK TO EARTH WITHOUT TELLING ME?! DO YOU KNOW WORRIED WE’VE BEEN—HOW WORRIED I WAS?! BULKHEAD HAS BEEN WORRIED SICK AND ARCEE ISN’T DOING THAT MUCH BETTER!”
“OK OK I GET IT NOW CAN YOU STOP SHAKING ME!”
Smokescreen stopped and immediately went back to hugging him. Bumblebee sighs but decides that trying to get him off isn’t worth the effort.
“I’m sorry for leaving without saying anything—I would’ve told you but it was such an out of nowhere thing, I didn’t have time to contact anyone before I left. I’m sorry I worried you but I’m fine, I promise.”
“Good, because you definitely aren’t going to be after Wheeljack kicks your aft for scaring Bulkhead so much.”
“AHEM.”
They both look back to the rest of the team. Sideswipe looks like he’s already done with them while Strongarm is still shocked. Drift’s expression has returned to its regular neutral while Grimlock waves his hand as they look at him.
“Mind introducing us to your mystery partner, Bee?”
“Oh, yeah. Smokey, this is my team. We’ve been working together to deal with all the Decepticons still on Earth. Team, this is Smokey, my partner.”
“I already know their names, Bee, we talked on the drive here—wait—YOU NEVER TOLD THEM ABOUT ME?!”
Smokescreen let go of Bumblebee to stare angrily into his optics.
“Why would I? What’s the point of bringing up that I have a partner on a mission?”
“Well…I don’t know, but it still would’ve been nice!”
As Bumblebee and Smokescreen continued to bicker, the team stared as they were forgotten again. Drift walked away, seemingly already tired of them. Grimlock transformed out of his dino mode and looked at Strongarm and Sideswipe.
“So does him being Bee’s partner make him our lieutenant too? Or is he going to be Bee’s second in command?”
“What? No, lieutenant is a job, it’s not something you share with a partner.”
“Besides, I definitely wouldn’t take orders from him. He didn’t even tell us he was there during the mission—he nearly blasted me!”
“Yeah, that sounds like something that you would do, Sideswipe, and you definitely wouldn’t make a good lieutenant.”
“Exactly…HEY!”