I don't know who started calling the Vehicons Steves, but it is hilarious.

Takes place right after "Deus Ex Machina." Knockout's wolf-whistle at Optimus was priceless.


"Pathetic!"

Knockout grimaced, touching a hand delicately to his right audio receptor, leaning peevishly away from his screeching commander. "Ouch. Just in case you were wondering."

"No I was not, and shut up!" Starscream snapped, long fingers curling and uncurling into fists at his sides, wings arched high in what was quickly turning from disgruntlement to full-blown rage. "You two could not be more pitiful, you know that?! Breakdown breaking everything he sees—"

"Well, that's my job," the brute muttered.

"—you, Knockout, continue to nurse this ridiculous crush on Optimus Prime—"

Knockout swooned dramatically against Breakdown's shoulder, placing a hand over his chest. "Oh, be still, my beating spark!"

"—And you, Soundwave, are not helping me at all here!" the aerial commander screeched, rounding on the communications officer with a furiously pointed finger. "You're a part of this command, now help me discipline our troops!"

Soundwave hovered in characteristic silence for a moment before replaying "crush on Optimus Prime."

"You would too if you saw those rims—"

"Gah!" Starscream threw his arms into the air. "I'm about ready to claw my own optics out just so I won't have to look at all of you! No one behaved like this when Megatron was around!"

"Ixnay on the Egatron-may," Knockout muttered behind his hand, jabbing a thumb toward sick bay, where the warlord slumbered on in deep stasis. Breakdown looked over his shoulder quickly, as if expecting their old leader to lumber out with a yawn and stretch and destroy them all for their insubordination.

"He—can't—hear—us—Knockout!"

"You hope."

"Shut up!"

"Alright, alright, let's all just take a moment to calm down," Knockout sighed, raising his hands passively. "Yes, the loss of the energon harvester is a blow to the cause, but we're hardly worse off, we're just right back where we were before! Well—we're down a Steve now, since you sucked the life energon from him and all—"

"Down a what?" Starscream demanded, bewilderment taking the edge off of his anger for the moment.

Knockout raised his optic ridges. "A Steve. You know—the Vehicons? I got tired of just calling them 'Vehicon,' so I gave them all names. Well. The same name. But you get the idea."

Starscream stared at the scientist for a moment. His wings twitched. "But Steve is a human name."

"Well, yes, but—"

"Don't name my elite warriors after a scummy bag of bacteria-infested water!"

"But it suits them—"

"Shut up!"