I do not own Transformers. Do you really suspect I did? Because you're sadly mistaken - I don't!

The Invitation

It all started with an invitation...

And prgressed from there...


"What's this, Carly?"

She smiled as the minibot read the piece of paper over and over, trying to make some sense of it, "A birthday invitation. Do you want to come?"

Bumblebee scratched the back of his head, "I don't know. What's a birthday?"

She looked at him in surprise. "You mean you don't know what a birthday is?"

"No, I don't"

"Well, it's a celebration. Of the day you were born. I suppose you could call it a creation day."

"A date celebrating your creation? Alright! I'm there!"

They should have been more careful to whom they talk infront of, really...


Carly had just finishes handing out another invitation, and explaining what it meant, to Ironhide when she felt a push in the back and tumbled onto the ground.

Grimlock looked down at the fallen figure, a thought briefly crossing his CPU as to why a gentle nudge would make her fall to the floor. Carly turned around, determined to give whoever it was a piece of her mind, but withdrew when she realised who it was.

"Me, Grimlock, come to your 'Crate Date' Carly?" Grimlock asked.

Her brow furrowed in concentration, "A what?"

"A Crate Date. What you say, a Bert Day."

"Oh. You mean a Birthday."

"Dat's what me say. Bert Day," Grimlock labouriously pointed out, "Crate Date. Me, Grimlock, can come?"

Carly grinned, "Okay, you can come. But there's not much room in my backyard. You might not be able to join in."

The Dino smile widened. "Dat okay. Me, Grimlock, just watch."


And all during the party, Grimlock watched.

And listened.

And learned.

And crushed the pinyata when everybody else had had a turn.

And when Grimlock returned, wide-opticed, he shared his experiences with the other Dinobots.


Wheeljack was mildly surprised the next day when his lab door opened(1) and revealed Sludge. Carefully putting down the welder and making sure it was nowhere near the invention he had been working on, he questioned the Dinobot.

"So, what would you like, Sludge?"

"Mud."

"Mud?"

"Yeah, Sludge like mud."

"I mean, why did you come in here?"

Sludge thought hard before answering, "Me, Sludge, want to know when is Crate Date."

Wheeljack was puzzled to say the least. "'Crate Date'?"

He nodded. "Crate date. Like Carly. Carly had Crate Date yesterday."

Realisation dawned. "You mean a creation date? Like what Carly had?" Seeing Sludge nod, he continued, "Well, let me check my databanks... It is two weeks from now, that is, October 27th ." Sludge nodded again and turned to leave.

"Why did you want to know?" Wheeljack called as Sludge waddled to the door.

As the tail slipped around the corner, he thought he heard Sludge respond "You see."


While updating his reports, Prowl looked up and found Slag in his office.

"What can I do for you?" He asked, hoping to get one of the most destuctive of the Dinobots out of the delicate office as fast as possible.

"Me, Slag, want paper."

Had Prowl eyebrows, he would have raised one. "And what do you want that for?"

"Why you want know? Me, Slag, want paper. Enough?."

"I need to write down why you wanted it, so Optimus doesn't think someone stole it," He explained.

"Oh. you tell Optimus: me, Slag want paper to," Slag thought, "Draw."

Believing this would be the best he would get out of the Dinobot, Prowl nodded and fetched the paper.


The next day, the Dinobots were walking around with large wads of colourful papers.

Everytime they would see someone, Slag and Sludge would corner the unfortunate 'bot while Grimlock leafed through the papers until he found one with a drawing, in the Transformer equivalent of crayon, matching the colours of whoever was cornered. They would then be forced to take the paper and finally allowed to be let go.

The Dinobots eventually reached the command center, where Prime, Prowl and Wheeljack were on duty. Before they could utter a single word, they found themselves presented with drawings with, supposedly, the likeness of themselves.

"So that's what you wanted the paper for?" Prowl asked. "Pictures of us?"

"No," Swoop said.

"Invitations," Slag continued.

Snarl explained, "Carly say we got to have invitations if we make party."

"Party?" Optimus inquired cauciously, you could never be too careful when dealing with a Dinobot with an idea firmly stuck in his head.

"Bert Day party. For Dinobots."

"Oh. No," Wheeljack mumbled.

Which pretty much sums up the events of the next two weeks.


(1) No-one had ventured unexpectedly into his lab since the incident coded HURRICANE (2)

(2) It involved a weather machine he was working on, a startled autobot and Wheeljack's tendency to bring about a malfunction any piece of equipment just by looking at it.


Please, please, please tell me if I should continue.

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