Alien: Not Over Yet

by Dreaming of Everything

Oneshot continuations of a completed story. Canon characters, OCs and G1 characters. Current story: Coldfront's disappeared: Irene's worried. Thundercracker and Skywarp are bored enough to help. So it's off to Alaska! 'Front's got issues to work through..

1. Keats and Bluestreak

Alien: Not Over Yet
A Side Story
By Dreaming of Everything

Disclaimer: I do not own Transformers, either the movie characters or the G1 characters I borrowed and updated for movieverse, and my own (slightly evil?) purposes.

Warnings: If you haven't read Alien, all of the stories in this series will probably make little to no sense. While I suppose it's possible to read them individually, a lot of the main characters, human and Transformer, are OCs. If you don't care about that, have at it. If you do and feel like wading through another one of my stories, the story ID for Alien is 3640604; it can also be found on my profile page, with all the rest of my stories, or on my writing LJ, dream-it-all.

If you have read Alien, these are unordered oneshots. Details as for when/where/who it is taking place/is involved will be posted in the Author's Notes of each post.

Author's Notes: This takes place approximately a year after the end of Alien. Nothing much has happened during this time.

On another note, anyone have requests? I can't promise I'll write them, but if you inspire me, there is a good chance it will get written and then posted. I have two others in the beginning stages as well (one for Coldfront and one for Solarity as inspired by Cazcatharsis) but I'm looking for new ideas already anyways.

Also: Jesus Christ this is long. 47 pages in word. Eeep!

Thank you very much to my beta, mmouse15!

Dedication: For Riana1, who is an inspiration. Remember how you mentioned Keats should meet Bluestreak? This is the end result.

(To anyone who clicked the link very, very quickly when the email alert went out: I accidentally uploaded the non-betaed version. That is now fixed.)

oOo

Keats stumbled over to his window. He had been sleeping. Now, he was pretending he was still asleep.

He'd gotten three hours the night before, and it had been well past midnight before he'd gotten to sleep last night. This morning. Whatever. Such was the result of an experiment that needed constant monitoring despite the fact that half the researchers had come down with the flu from hell.

And now one of his neighbors had their car alarm going off at three thirty in the morning. And it had been for somewhere between five and fifteen minutes. Probably between five and fifteen minutes, actually… He was tired enough that his sense of timing was likely to be kind of iffy.

His sheer-intrinsic-dislike-of-the-world factor was setting new records. Ordinarily, he was a pretty good-natured person, he thought, easy to get along with, both professionally and socially, and maybe he wasn't the most interesting person around—if anything, he was slightly boring—but at least he wasn't actively grating, when it came to personality.

But he was about five seconds and a positive identification of whose car it was away from knocking on someone's door and yelling. Doubly so if there was someone in it making all that racket. (Of course, in all reality, he knew that he was much more likely to go knock on someone's door and make a polite request—no reason to tick off your neighbors, after all—but it was still nice to imagine being unreasonable.)

The responsible car was obvious: the lights flashing in time and everything. Keats rubbed sleep-smeared eyes and looked closer: something sporty and expensive-looking, brand new with just a few smears of fresh-looking mud. He had the distinct feeling that if he was almost any other guy he'd recognize something about the make and model, but as things were, he didn't. There was a reason he'd majored in biology.

The noise redoubled, and Keats frowned. It wasn't a car he recognized, so it didn't belong to anyone in the neighborhood—not that anyone who could afford something like that would live here. And now that he thought about it, the noise was just the car horn and not the car alarm. There wasn't... anybody in the car…

Realization struck and Keats was pulling on a jacket and pushing his feet into a pair of shoes and out the door in thirty seconds flat.

A door swung open seemingly of its own as he approached, confirming his guess, and a sudden thought struck. What if it wasn't an Autobot? Nimbus hadn't been, to start with, at least. And he'd stories about the other who were out there… Just because they hadn't been the main threat to Earth in his own save-the-earth escapades with the Transformers didn't mean that they weren't a very real threat.

Too late now. He climbed into the car, still nervous. The Autobots were kind of… Unnerving. Especially at first, although he'd gotten more comfortable with them as time went on. It'd been a while since he'd seen any of them, though—although he'd caught a glimpse of that one Autobot, Coldfront, when he'd last seen Irene.

The government had promised him that what he'd been told and what he'd seen would never impact his life again, that he could just forget it all—in fact, forgetting about it all would be a very good idea, if he got what they meant. He hadn't believed them then, and he didn't believe them now, and clearly he was the one who had been right.

"…Hello?" said a surprisingly young voice, sounding cautious, and Keats jumped visibly. The sound of a voice surrounding you—it was as eerie as he remembered it being. (Although it helped that he wasn't in the middle of the Amazon and that it wasn't an ex-Decepticon. He assumed. Actually, he was assuming it was an Autobot at all…)

Okay, now he was kind of freaked out. "Uh, hello—"

"Hi! I'm Bluestreak and I'm new here—really really new—and I found you online since you worked with the rest of the Autobots with that whole Cordyceps business and you were closest to where I landed—I need someone to look like they're driving me because I don't want to get caught before I even report in to Optimus Prime and Bumblebee and all the others, by humans or by Decepticons because I'm worried I've been followed and that the others won't get to them in time and that would be really bad—I got this far by hiding and sort of sneaking around but that's really hard and my stealth sucks. Prowl says it's because I talk too much."

Keats didn't respond, still trying to catch up with what he'd said while running on seven—or possibly less—hours of sleep out of the past 48.

"—are you okay? Oh, Primus, there's not something wrong, is there? I don't know what to do if—"

"I'm fine," squeaked Keats, jumping slightly again. "Just really, really tired. I've gotten almost no sleep—there's this big project…" He had no idea what he was really saying, but he tended to react to stress like this. It was a big problem. "We need to keep on monitoring the cultures, and we can't just film it because whenever the damned things decide to enter phase II we need someone there to react immediately, which means 24-7 observation, and most of the others have the flu and can barely move, let alone get themselves to the lab, which means that we're all pulling double and triple shifts, and I was finally—finally—getting some sleep when this happens…!"

"Sorry," cringed Bluestreak, and Keats sighed.

"Yeah, me too. I really shouldn't have snapped at you like that—it's just been a long week. And I, uh, wasn't expecting this to happen. Again."

"I'm sorry… But you were closest, that I could find, and I need to be able to get to Optimus Prime to report in—and Prowl said he wanted me to do it in person in case it got intercepted by Decepticons because we're still not sure where they are, so do you know where they actually are? Anyone, really, because I just need to talk to somebody who has a secure line which I don't—none of us do 'cause none of us have really had the chance to work with any of the Autobots on Earth right now. At least, I think so, because somebody might have arrived that one of us knows—probably not me, but one of the others—but we don't know if they're there if they are, so we can't send them a message, right?"

"Oh," said Keats. "Uh… I guess I need to deal with this, then." He sighed. "Give me fifteen minutes to get some stuff together, okay? I have no idea how long this is going to take, and it's best to be prepared… And I need to find someone to cover me in the lab. And it's probably only a matter of time until one of my neighbors calls the police because I'm sitting in a car that's obviously not mine talking to myself. So, uh, I'll be right back."

Keats was back pretty quickly, with a bag of essentials (two changes of clothes, travel food, an emergency kit, toiletries and reference books) and his cell phone. He'd also changed out of his pajamas.

"You know, I have no idea where any of the Autobots are," he said conversationally as they pulled away.

There was a long, worrying minute of silence.

"—but we could try one of the other scientists involved with the Cordyceps event? I think they might have stayed in touch more… Kristine, maybe. She's the only one I actually have personal contact information for. She lives in Maine, though… At least the time zone change means it's two hours later over there then it is here. Here, I'll call her and see if she knows anything." Ignoring the fact that 'two hours later' still translated to five-thirty AM, he dialed the number.

"Hello?" said the clear, female voice that answered, obviously distracted, after enough rings that Keats was starting to get nervous.

"Kristine! Thank God. I didn't wake you up, did I…?"

"Do you have any idea what time it is, Keats? Jesus Christ, what were you thinking?"

"Uh—"

"But no, you didn't wake me up. I'm getting in touch with my nocturnal side in order to commune with the goddamn jellyfish." Keats winced. Kristine was obviously in a mood.

"…Jellyfish are nocturnal?" some part of him was forced to ask.

"These ones are. But what's up with you? I'm going to assume that you had some reason you called me—and I'm guessing that it's not because you missed me."

"Remember that last project we all worked together on? And how there were some other… people there?"

"Ohhhh, right. Yes, I think I do… Fungus, if I recall. There were some interesting characters, hmm?" They'd all been strictly forbidden from talking about the Autobots—or the Decepticons, he supposed—by any means that weren't face-to-face: email especially, but also online chatting, phone calls, cell phone calls, even letters. They'd also been told to keep their conversations involving them curtailed to secure, private locations.

"Yeah. You ever keep in touch with any of them?"

"Me? No. Did you try the kids?"

"The kids? Kristine, after saving the world, I think you could be a little less demeaning…"

"Hey, I've saved it at least twice that I can remember, and I'm going to do it again with these jellyfish. Just you wait. And I don't get much respect—my lab students still call me Krissie the Bitchy behind my back when I finish going over their work for the day."

"…Well, to be fair, you can be kind of harsh…"

"But it pays off in the long run… Would you have improved if your own teacher had been nice?"

"Kristine, my own teacher was nice. But no, I didn't keep in touch with the other two. Any other ideas?"

"Oh—wait—yeah! Right, I remember now. Do you know where Irene lives?"

oOo

Keats hadn't known where Irene lived, but he had known that Evan knew, and he had Evan's phone number.

So now they were headed for northern Oregon. Really, it could have been a lot worse—they could have needed to meet up with Kristine. New Mexico to Maine was not a trip he wanted to make by car.

He kept on drifting off to sleep. Admittedly, this wasn't as bad as it normally was when someone was in the driver's seat of a moving car, considering that he wasn't the one who was actually driving.

But on the other hand, he really didn't want to end up accidentally upsetting the Autobot currently holding him, because it was probably just good principle to not upset giant alien robots driving you around when you didn't know them too well, and because, really, he seemed pretty nice. At least he seemed to understand that Keats didn't have much to say in reply to his ramblings. Of course, he also didn't seem to understand that humans needed sleep…

"Keats Lagoya? Is something wrong?" asked Bluestreak suddenly, snapping him out of yet another doze. Keats jumped slightly, jerking his neck painfully.

"Ahh! Huh? Yeah—I'm kind of tired." He smothered another yawn, proving the point—or at least, the point would have been proven if the other person was human and Keats had any reason to think that he could pick up on the meanings of physical reactions like yawning. "I'm running on something like… Uh… Six hours of sleep out of the last forty-eight. Would you mind too much if I tried to nap a little?"

"Oh. I figured you were malfunctioning or something… I didn't realize it was a voluntary action! I'm still really new here and I'm trying to get some research off of your information network, but it's going kind of slowly, I think I got some kind of virus implanted the last time I got captured—"

Keats figured it was time to break off this particular tangent, at least so he could get a word in edgewise.

"At this point, it's really not all that voluntary," he said tiredly, rubbing at one eye and then smothering another yawn. "Much longer and I'll probably start hallucinating. That would be a malfunction."

"…Oh." Bluestreak had figured that sleep was equivalent to recharge, and then hadn't bothered to look into it any further. Apparently, it wasn't as exact a parallel as he'd originally thought… "I'm sorry, then, you should sleep, if you need it. I see— No, I can't believe—" There was a burst of what sounded like squealing static to Keats; he assumed it was Cybertronian. "(Primus) that can happen to humans because of lack of rest? And it takes so little time?"

"Mmm," muttered Keats agreeably, half-asleep again. Bluestreak decided to let it go, switching to a private line. Yeah, it didn't tie into anyone or anything, but he needed something to talk to, after all, and it wouldn't interrupt the human—and if their processors (brains?) could start malfunctioning like that just because of lack of recharge, no, sleep, he wouldn't want to show up with his first charge on Earth irreparably damaged—and he'd started to get almost attached to the silence on the other end of the line, what with all the time he'd spent chatting to it out in space. There hadn't been much else to do, once he'd lost his team.

oOo

It was late when Keats woke up—the sun was setting. He half-stretched, slightly hampered by the room he had, yawning again, working out some of the stiffness. His neck was painfully sore—he'd had it at a funny half-drooped-over angle as he slept, not very comfortable.

"—Oh good, you're awake," Bluestreak said suddenly, making Keats jump a little. "I wasn't sure and I was hoping you were okay and that nothing had gone wrong… I did a little more research, though, because I figured it was going to be necessary for this in the long run, since the Autobots here have been working with the organics—with you—so much, and it took a while but I think I've got more of the basics down now, at least, do you need me to stop so you can eat—or well, you'd call it eating, right? I'd use 'refuel' but that's not right for you, is it?"

"Uh, no, 'eat' is the right word," said Keats absentmindedly. "I have a little food with me, but if you could pull over at the next gas station? That'd be good."

"Alright!" said Bluestreak cheerily. "I mean, sure, it's no problem at all! You're the one doing me the favor, after all—"

"It's no problem. I had the next few days off, anyways—people were finally starting to get over their colds, and taking over their own shifts again, and they gave me some time to recover."

"—But still, it's really nice of you. I don't know what I'd do, I really didn't want to get discovered and possibly break cover, that would be a really bad way to start this all off, and Prowl wouldn't let me hear the end of it ever, and I don't have time to lay low and take my time, I'm still worried about those Decepticons following me—I don't know how long they'd been behind me, I only picked up their signal right around when I got Optimus Prime's message, I think I'd been separated from the team maybe a month in your local time at that point, and now I've lost them again, probably because of the atmosphere here, it takes a little getting used to—I hope that the others will have met up here by now, although there's a good chance that they're dead… Anyways," Bluestreak tried to cheer back up, it didn't do any good to dwell on something he couldn't deal with—"Do you know who's here on earth already?"

"Optimus you know about," said Keats. "Um… Ratchet, Coldfront, who's with Irene, Ironhide, Solarity, Gyro, Bumblebee—"

"Really? He's always been my hero! Aside from Optimus Prime, of course, but he was incredible at Tyger Pax—And he's closer to my age, there's not a lot of us anymore, I'd like to be as heroic as he is… Oh, I'm sorry for interrupting. That's a lot… There's more?"

"Yeah. Landslide, and then Nimbus, but he used to be a Decepticon."

Bluestreak jerked suddenly. "What?"

"Uh… Like I said. He ended up crash-landing on an alien planet, and they took care of him, and he switched factions—I don't know how long ago. He didn't seem all that bad to me."

There was a long, slightly worrying moment of silence.

"…Oh. I guess if Optimus Prime approved there's not much I can say…"

"Right," Keats said, deciding to avoid that subject from now on. "Who are the others you're waiting for?"

"Oh! Well, all that's left of my original unit is Prowl, he's the commander—he's kind of stiff sometimes but he's really good at what he does. He's one of the best tacticians there is—and he's always been really nice to me, in a kind of removed way. I don't mind too much, I really like him. And then a while ago we ran into the remains of a different unit, so we've been working together for a while. That's Wheeljack and the twins—Sideswipe and Sunstreaker."

"…Twins."

"Yeah—that's kind of the same word, or as close as it gets? English isn't a very good language for some of these concepts, I think. They're… It's like, well, so there's the spark, right? And it makes you who they are? Theirs are kind of… Connected, in a way, it's like there's a little overlap. It's not that they have the same spark—I met someone—a group of someones—like that once, just one spark and three bodies, so just one mind. It was very, very creepy—always moving together and speaking, and they went by one name. It was kind of unsettling.

"But anyways, some part of the twins' sparks are more-or-less the same… I think. Wheeljack was trying to explain it to me, but he kept on going off on these complex tangents and I'm not really sure I ended up understanding everything. Or anything, really."

"So, what's… Wheeljack like?"

"Oh, he's the leader of that team. Originally he was with a science branch so I don't know how he ended up in charge of a couple of brawlers like Sideswipe and Sunstreaker, but he's really smart. He's nice, too—I like him. He doesn't complain when I talk too much—which I do a lot, I know, I try not to but I'm really, really bad at it—and he's happy to explain things to me. I don't like the twins as much, they can be kind of scary. Sideswipe's okay, I guess, but you're never really sure what he's thinking or if he's going to pull some kind of weird prank on you, or do something to freak you out or whatever. And then Sunstreaker's just… Scary, yeah. He doesn't really like me at all—and at least with Sideswipe I'm never really sure if he does or not. Actually, I'm not sure that's any better at all, now I think about it. At least I know where I am, with Sunstreaker. Of course, I think 'where I am' might mean 'dead if I piss him off at the wrong moment,' so I don't know. I haven't been travelling with them very long, though, which probably doesn't help. And I am kind of annoying, I know, I talk too much—do you want me to just shut up by now?"

"No, it's fine," said Keats, looking away from the empty hills flashing past them, only to realize that he had no idea what the equivalent of looking someone in the eye was when they were a car you were sitting in was. He settled for an awkward middle distance that kind of included the rear-view mirror and the steering wheel. "I don't mind—I understand, I can babble a bit myself, and it's nice to have something to listen to."

"Thank you… Where was I? Oh. Sunstreaker. Yeah, I'm kind of annoying, and that probably doesn't help, and then I'm really kind of useless—I mean, Prowl's a better fighter than me and he's meant to be a tactician, and I'm a pretty good shot but I freeze up sometimes and a sniper's just not as helpful as a general fighter when there's so few of us, and Wheeljack's at least always coming up with weapons for us, and things like that, and he's a genius, everyone knows it… So really, I'm the useless one, and I think the twins like me even less for that. I don't know. But I'm really looking forward to meeting all the newcomers here on earth! …Well, I suppose I'm the newcomer, but I still can't wait to meet everyone. It's been a long time since I've really met anyone new—I mean, there was Wheeljack and Sunstreaker and Sideswipe, but that was a while ago, too, really, and it was a long, long time before that—I'm kind of nervous actually…"

oOo

Keats left Bluestreak in the driveway to knock on Irene's door. He waited for a few minutes—nothing. A little bit of looking revealed a doorbell, ingeniously concealed behind some potted plants. Irene didn't necessarily want visitors at any given moment.

Still nothing. Keats fidgeted. It was seven in the morning, which was pretty early, yeah, but Irene tended to be an early riser, from what he knew, and even she would probably get up to see what was going on when someone was alternating ringing and knocking insistently on her door, no matter how early it was.

After all, you never knew when it would turn out to be a colleague-of-sorts you'd saved the world with by killing off killer fig virus Cordyceps fungus showing up with a giant alien robot trying to get in touch with his own kind.

A noise behind him made him turn around to look—and freeze.

Ah. Coldfront. Aiming a weapon of some sort—all he was coming up with was "really big gun"—at Bluestreak, who had transformed as well and was standing, frozen—almost comically, Keats thought. He also realized it was the first time he'd seen the newcomer—Bluestreak—as anything other than a car. He was still gray with a red stripe, although the stripe had been broken up with the splitting of the car's 'shell' into, well, armor.

"Coldfront?" he said cautiously. Surprisingly, the Autobot relaxed slightly as he looked over to focus on the scientist.

"Keats," he said, by way of perfunctory greeting.

"Uh—" Bluestreak started.

"State your faction and your designation," said Coldfront immediately, eyes narrowing to slits again.

"Autobot Bluestreak under command of Prowl—" started Bluestreak again, before he was cut off.

"Coldfront?" started Keats. "I really don't think he's a disguised Decepticon or anything—he got me here in one piece, after all—"

"Protocol dictates that an Autobot contact others in the area using private radio lines—"

"Whoa, Coldfront, it's okay, calm down a little," Irene said sleepily, pulling open the front door. Her hair was badly tangled, she had mascara smeared down one cheek and she was wearing wrinkled flannel pajamas: clearly, she had been asleep.

After a second's thought, Keats changed his original deduction. It was likely that she had been asleep, but you never knew, with Irene.

"I want to know why this self-proclaimed Autobot did not bother to follow protocol and contact another Autobot, instead abducting a human—"

"What?" yelped Bluestreak.

"I haven't been abducted," said Keats, objecting mildly.

"I did try sending off a message but nobody responded and I think it's because our general-call line got switched after the 'Cons got a hold of it and I didn't want to use a general-frequency message because I'm being followed by Decepticons!" Bluestreak said, in a rush to get his explanation out before the other Autobot interrupted him again.

Coldfront did not look amused.

oOo

The four of them had relocated to a patio around the back; Irene had clearly had it put in specifically for situations involving Autobots, or at least heavily remodeled it: the large, flat gravel bed surrounding it looked slightly out of the place in the middle of the huge, overflowing muddle of a garden, especially with the delineation of it harshened by the still-new construction zone.

"So," Irene said, pushing a mug and a pot of coffee in Keats' direction; she already had a cup for herself. "What exactly is going on?" She'd also cleaned herself up, changing into her standard jeans-and-a-t-shirt, pulling her hair back into a ponytail. As she sat she shrugged on a light jacket, defense against the early June morning chill, something Keats wished he had thought to bring with him; New Mexico hadn't been cold at all, but Oregon was a little chilly.

Bluestreak took the opportunity to speak; he'd been silent, intimidated by Coldfront, and twitch because of it, Keats had noticed. Or twitchy, at least—Keats didn't know if Bluestreak was or wasn't twitchy all the time, he'd realized.

"I was separated from my commanding officer and a cooperating team approximately three months ago, after a battle; we weren't going anywhere in particular, just back in the general direction of Cybertron, to see if we could find someone qualified to give us orders, or at least more Decepticons. I was separated from the group, and failed to make radio contact with any of them for another week, so I continued in the direction we'd been heading towards in the first place. After about a month I picked up Optimus Prime's signal and switched courses, assuming the others would do the same thing, and around the same time I became aware that I was being followed by Decepticons, I didn't really know how many—I didn't manage to shake them off my trail, I don't know how long they'd been following me before I noticed them and I don't know if they're still following me or if I lost them on entry into this planet's atmosphere."

"Protocol dictates that I either accompany you to an officer or keep you under watch until an officer can attend to the matter." Coldfront didn't sound as sure, as unaffected, as he usually did—he almost sounded torn, conflicted. "In this situation, with possible pursuers, it would be better if you continued, instead of waiting. It's possible you've been bugged."

"(Primus) I hope not," Bluestreak said, looking unnerved.

"Okay," Irene said cheerily. "I guess I'll see you in a few days or a week, then, Coldfront? I suppose I'll see you the next time we pull the world's collective bacon out of the fire, Keats—and I haven't the foggiest when it comes to you, Bluestreak. Here, Keats, can I give you lettuce and peas to take with you? I always plant way more than I need because the squirrels eat what the raccoons don't, even with the crazy old lady down the road who's always feeding them. This year I think Coldfront is scaring them off, so—Coldfront? Is something wrong?"

Keats couldn't seem much difference in the mech's expression, himself, but he figured that Irene had more practice than he did.

"I'm going to sent Bluestreak on ahead with directions and Optimus Prime's contacts," said Coldfront uneasily. "It's… Against procedure, but with possible Decepticons in the area, I don't want to leave you unguarded, in particular now that you've been involved in this matter by sheltering Bluestreak and Keats, even for this short a period of time."

"I'm not sure this counts as 'sheltering,'" said Bluestreak uneasily.

Keats was surprised by what Coldfront had said, but Irene looked honest-to-God bowled over—he had the feeling that he was missing something in the conversation, probably a year's worth of context.

"I'd be fine on my own, you know," said Irene gently.

"Possibly," allowed Coldfront. "Even probably."

"I'll go too, then," said Irene with a that's-that tone to her voice.

"…Did you really just compromise with someone?" asked Keats slowly, one eyebrow arched. Irene stuck her tongue out at him.

oOo

Keats was sleeping again and Bluestreak didn't want to bother Coldfront—who wasn't as scary as the twins, true, but he was also less annoying, so Bluestreak didn't want to annoy him even more than he didn't want to annoy them, and then there was how he was so professional—it reminded Bluestreak of Prowl, only not as familiar or friendly, although he also thought that it might be kind of strange to describe distance, or Prowl too, come to think of it, as 'friendly,' even if it was true, which Bluestreak at least thought it was—so he was talking to his blank line again.

There'd never been anyone on the other end of it. Bluestreak had had the number programmed in when he'd been transferred to Prowl's unit, but the 'bot it had belonged to had died the day before he'd started; they'd never even met. So it wasn't like he was pretending he was talking to a dead comrade or anything—that would have been down-right crazy, and Bluestreak wasn't that bad, yet. He just needed something to keep his mind off… Things. He didn't like silence.

So he talked, even if it meant talking to nobody. Not that anybody knew this. Prowl knew about the insomnia, but that was hard to hide—and it was something that could affect his performance in the field, so he'd kind-of had to tell him. Wheeljack didn't know, and neither did the twins—who were the ones Bluestreak was most interested in keeping it from. Primus alone knew what they'd do with that sort of information. There was a good chance that Prowl had already guessed that Bluestreak was talking to himself sometimes, as a sort of stop-gap measure, but he hadn't brought it up with him, and Bluestreak certainly wasn't going to clue him in if he didn't already know.

"—So it's weird how much life there is around here, jammed into everything, it's almost unbelievable—and most of it is really kind of fragile, it seems almost like a miracle that so many different types have survived—It's nothing like space, especially. Or even Cybertron—especially afterwards." Bluestreak cut off quickly, balancing over a thin edge, quiet for a few seconds before he quickly switched directions. "But it's all kind of cool. I wish I could research it more—or at least more easily.

"Slagging Decepticons, with their invasive programs—I'm lucky I ran into Wheeljack when I did, probably be a twitching, nonfunctional lump with a dead processor by now, one even worse than my glitched self as of right now, and I don't want that. I hope there's a medic—I mean a real one, not an engineer like 'Jack—not that he's not great! But I'm worried about Prowl, and y'know what he's like. Which I suppose is kind of hypocritical, since he's always after me about doing that sort of thing. I guess that's been better now we have a kind-of medic to go to. Or at least we did. I don't—" Bluestreak broke off again.

"I can't believe Optimus Prime—Optimus Prime!—would let a Decepticon go free. Live around humans. They shouldn't be—I know that. It's going to end badly. I… It's stupid! And not worth the chance, even if the Pit-damned thing is telling the truth. Maybe the human was just wrong? That's not too unlikely, I guess. But… Maybe I can ask Coldfront once he's had some more time to calm down—not that I know how long that takes for him, at all. And I don't know if he's talking to that human right now. She might be asleep. It seems awfully inconvenient, to be tied to planetary rotations like that—but I don't know if it would make that much of a difference if everyone was tied to the same cycle. Of course, I'm not, and the other Autobots, and I suppose even the traitor Decepticon and all the other Decepticons out there—not that they're going to care about whether or not humans have a heliocentric mindset, things like that don't matter when you're killing someone…"

oOo

"Slag," muttered one of the jets from where they were hunkered down in a small meadow, hidden by the trees surrounding them.

"What?" said the other.

"It's crazy, an Autobot, and it won't shut up," growled the first. "Got it figured out yet?"

His partner ignored him. "Anything useful?" he asked.

"Yeah, actually…"

oOo

Optimus was waiting for them just outside Seattle. It had been a long, long time since Bluestreak had been as nervous as he was for the hour it took to drive to the patch of National Forest they'd agreed to meet at from where Optimus Prime had commed them.

He was bad enough that Keats noticed, and noticed enough to ask.

"Are you… Nervous? I get the feeling that you're a talker, but this is worse than you've been the rest of the trip…"

"Yeah, I'm nervous—This is Optimus Prime. He's a legend! Nobody doesn't know about him, Autobot or Decepticon—there's not a one of them not terrified of him, and on our side he's the hero you get told about, the one who inspires you to join up in the active-fighting ranks, he's—he's…"

"Oh. I, uh, didn't really know all that when we met. He seemed nice."

For once, words seemed to fail Bluestreak.

For a while, at least. "…Have you met Bumblebee? What's he like? Is he really serious? That's what I've always imagined him as, after I heard about him and the Battle at Tyger Pax, but I don't really know anyone who's ever met him—well, except for you, of course—"

"I can't answer the question unless you give me a chance to speak," Keats said, sounding amused.

"Sorry, I'm trying not to talk so much, but—"

"No, it's fine." Keats thought for a second before he answered the question. "Bumblebee's… Well, I didn't get to know him all that way, but he was really, really protective when it came to the two kids with him, Sam and Mikaela. And he really, really didn't like Nimbus because of it, from what I can recall." Bluestreak brightened considerably—at least someone was keeping some sense to balance out the over-hopeful, unrealistic and dangerous optimism. "And not serious at all. Kind of a joker, actually, really pretty funny. A lot of personality."

"…Oh. I hadn't thought—I'd just heard the stories and assumed—"

oOo

The clearing didn't have Optimus Prime in it, but it did have Nimbus and Bumblebee, both in vehicle mode, with Sam, Mikaela and a boy about their age whom Keats didn't recognize sitting on a couple of nearby rocks. Bluestreak slid to a halt, a door sliding open, and Keats got out, happy for the chance to stretch. Behind him, Irene did the same, allowing the two Autobots to transform. Bumblebee followed suit, nudging at Nimbus with one foot when he hesitated for a second, before he followed their example.

Bluestreak had reacted before Nimbus had even transformed fully, a mean-looking gun of some type or another—Keats couldn't say he was able to tell much more than that—sliding (transforming?) into place along his arm, pointed straight-on dead-center at the utterly still ex-Decepticon.

"Jesus," muttered the kid Keats didn't recognize.

There was a another soft flurry of noises behind him, and Keats snuck a quick glance over his shoulder: Coldfront had drawn his weapons as well, although presumably to keep Bluestreak in line, not Nimbus, if the new 'bot tried anything. Irene looked the way he felt, and thought he probably looked: surprised and a little (maybe more than a little) frightened. There were some things he didn't want to experience, and a shootout between two over-powered giant robots was one of them.

"Don't even think of attacking one of your fellow soldiers on my watch," said Bumblebee, striding forward aggressively, wings stiff. He was the shortest one there, but he made up for it with sheer presence and attitude.

"What the hell's going on?" said Mikaela quietly—her tone said it was a rhetorical question, but Keats really did want to know…

"He's a Decepticon," said Bluestreak, sounding almost bewildered but mostly nervous, and maybe a little belligerent.

"I can go if things will be easier that way," said Nimbus softly. Bumblebee didn't reply immediately, and Nimbus subsided into his vehicle form and left. A second later, Mikaela jogged away after him.

"Bumblebee?" said Sam. "You didn't have to make him go."

"He wanted to leave," Bumblebee pointed out. "And hopefully, it will make things easier." Motioning slightly with a shoulder and wing for emphasis, he turned his full attention back to Bluestreak. "Who are you?"

"Bluestreak," said Bluestreak automatically. "But… You're Bumblebee? The hero of Tyger Pax?"

"Sam—your car is a hero, too?" Miles said, sounding slightly envious, turning a little to look at his friend.

"Miles, I saved the world," Sam said patiently. "It's really not that big of a stretch…"

"Should I be insulted?" Bumblebee said brightly, although he didn't look away from Bluestreak.

After a few seconds more tense waiting, Bluestreak relaxed, lowering his weapon—although he didn't un-transform it, Keats noticed—and straightened slightly.

"Alright," said Bumblebee. "Nimbus was a Decepticon: he had a change of heart and defaulted. If it's good enough for Prime and the rest of us, that should be good enough for you. He's off probation, and personally responsible for saving the life of a human closely connected to the Autobot cause on at least one situation. Whatever grudges you have from the war, let them go."

oOo

"Sir!" said Bluestreak promptly, straightening completely and standing stiffly to attention as Optimus Prime transformed.

"At ease," said Optimus, tone fairly light. Bluestreak relaxed—somewhat. Prowl had made an impression on him. "Bluestreak, right?"

"Yes, sir." He really wanted to add more, but stopped himself. Bit his tongue—that was the human saying. It was kind of graphic, really, a lot of their sayings seemed to be, and Transformers didn't have tongues or mouths but he did kind of like the phrase, it made a lot of sense…

Primus above he was nervous.

"Nice to see you again, Keats, Coldfront, Irene. I'm sorry for the trouble."

"Wasn't a problem," said Keats, only lying a little. "I needed a break, anyways."

"I think it worked out." Irene's eyes were hooded, tone inscrutable, and Keats shot her a questioning look, which she ignored.

"What's the full situation, then, Bluestreak?" Optimus asked, turning towards the young Autobot. He tried to keep his tone somewhat comforting—the newcomer was clearly somewhat anxious.

"My team—well, Prowl—and another were attacked by Decepticons—I was separated from them and then followed on my way here after I got your message and I think I might have lost them but I'm not… Sure."

Before anyone else could speak, there was a strange, almost shimmery sound that made Keats feel as if his ears, sensitive internal parts included, were trying to turn themselves inside-out and crawl out of his head; when it passed, he looked around: there was a jet circling overhead, and all of the (apparently unaffected) Autobots had produced weapons.

Surprisingly gracefully, the plane transformed, dropping to the ground to face them; he wasn't obviously armed, but looked unnervingly… spiky to Keats. Kind of like Nimbus.

"Hold fire," said Optimus Prime quietly, and the other three Autobots obeyed, although Bluestreak looked unnervingly—strained, to Keats—not that he was an expert. "What do you want from us?"

"Not getting shot at would be nice," rumbled the Decepticon—he looked remarkably like he was smirking. Maybe that was just all the extraneous protrusions around his mouth—and the rest of his body—though. His voice was deep, lower than the others—and he was big, too, maybe the size of Prime.

At least he wasn't a big airplane, Keats thought, masking a horrified shiver. Autobot or Decepticon, but especially with the latter, he never wanted to see, say, a jumbo jet Transformer, just by virtue of how big it would be.

"Why come here, then?" Bumblebee shot back.

"Well, you know, we'd rather not be hunted down and shot when we're not expecting it."

"We?"

"—And we've got this injured Autobot. We don't know what else to do with him."

Bluestreak stiffened noticeably, and Keats took the time to spare a nervous glance in his direction.

"Which Autobot?" said Bumblebee.

"Oh, I don't know—he wasn't conscious when we found him. Kind of short, maybe 20 feet tall, pretty high-ranking, I think a sub-commander but Thundercracker's the one who studies that stuff, and I don't know if I'm remembering right—"

"Black and white," said Bluestreak urgently. "Is he black and white?"

"What? Yeah—"

"Prowl! Oh (Primus) what have you done—"

"Bluestreak," said Prime, voice commanding. Keats jumped; it was something of a surprise. Optimus was usually pretty easy-going and… Well, not unobtrusive, but not demanding attention. "Calm down."

Bluestreak didn't calm down at all, from what Keats could tell.

We'll get your commander back. Calm down. Now, Bluestreak, I need you to leave; you're not calm enough for a negotiation, Optimus Prime repeated, sending a private message this time. He continued out loud: "Take the humans with you."

Keats, Irene, Sam and the other teenager—Keats still didn't recognize him—followed the unspoken order silently, hurrying around the edge of the glade because the Decepticon was still standing in the middle of it, climbing into a transformed Bluestreak and heading off down the rough road.

They found Mikaela and Nimbus in his vehicle mode around the first curve. Bluestreak didn't bother trying to hide his absolute loathing as he transformed, glaring at the other Autobot with clearly transformed guns, although he didn't shoot; he clearly thought of him as a Decepticon and nothing else.

Nimbus followed Bluestreak, transforming to his bipedal mode to stand facing him. He was, Keats realized, braced protectively over Mikaela, quite possibly subconsciously.

"Watch Mikaela for me," he said simply, turning to walk back down the road. "I have orders to join the main group."

Bluestreak twitched slightly, which made Keats jump; giant robots with grudges and an apparently itchy trigger finger made him nervous.

He didn't do anything else, though. After a minute, Irene spoke up. "I think he's communicating using his internal communications systems—see how the eyes are a little dimmed?"

That explained something, Keats thought.

After a minute he started pacing.

"What's going on?" asked the unnamed teenager after a minute.

"I don't know," said Bluestreak, voice sounding tense, strained. "They can't risk the loss of concentration to tell me what's happening. Oh—who are you? What's your name? And yours—"

"Oh, I'm Miles," he said. "I got wrapped up in all this because of Sam—we've been friends for a long time—since kindergarten, I think—and a few months ago he introduced me to his car."

"Bee's not 'my car,'" said Sam, sounding mildly irritated. "He's not my anything—except 'my friend,' I guess."

"Whatever. Man, this is so crazy—Decepticons appearing out of nowhere complete with weird brain-melting sound effects and hostages—damn, this is so cool!"

"Keep in mind that the hostage is Bluestreak's commanding officer," pointed out Irene from a little ways away—she'd wandered over to investigate some sort of white flower. "Hey, Keats, come look at this, I found some Cornus canadensis!"

"You know weird people," said Miles to Sam and Mikaela.

"So, you're Sam?" Bluestreak asked, looking at him.

"They're scientists," Mikaela explained in an aside to him. "Irene's a botanist. We met them in Brazil…"

"Yeah, I'm Sam. And Bee's my… Partner, I guess. We've known each other since before Mission City."

"And I'm Mikaela. I guess I'm partnered with Nimbus—he was under Bee's watch while he was on probation, so I lent him my driveway, and he drove me around, and then once he finished his probationary period he kind of just stayed…"

"That happens," Irene said, standing up and wiping, somewhat uselessly, at the mud on her knees. "Coldfront offered me a ride back up from the Amazon, along with some chauffeuring before I left, and he's been at my house since then."

"I didn't know that," said Sam, turning to look at her, surprised. "Coldfront? Really? He always seemed kind of—removed, a little too professional—"

"I think it's like the yin and yang of personalities," said Keats reflectively. "They balance each other out. Both go a little too far, but in opposite directions…"

"Hey," said Irene mildly. "What do you mean, 'go too far?'"

"Irene, I—Actually, that's so shameless I don't know where to start. How about almost all the interaction you've ever had with Evan?"

"Oh, like your relationship with Kristine is any different—"

"Kristine at least knows when to rein it in and is somewhat helpful—and I'm not as jumpy as Evan and you know it!"

"Negotiations are over," said Bluestreak suddenly. "We can all head back."

"What happened?" Mikaela asked.

"I don't know," he said distractedly. The girl felt a twinge of sympathy—he sounded deeply worried. Apparently Prowl was more than just his commanding officer—she knew that the original Autobots certainly saw themselves as something more like family than a military unit, at least by human standards. On the other hand, Coldfront clearly had not had that sort of relationship with his commander.

"We'll catch up," said Keats. "You should go find out what happened."

"Thank you," Bluestreak said, striding forward.

"Come on," said Irene. "I'm curious, too."

The Decepticon was still there when the humans walked into the clearing, and was still clearly under guard—he was being flanked by Bumblebee and Coldfront. On the other hand, the other three Autobots—Nimbus, Optimus Prime and Bluestreak—no longer had weapons pointed at him; only Bluestreak had his guns out at all.

"What happened?" Sam asked.

"Skywarp," Optimus said, nodding at the Decepticon, "And another Decepticon—"

"Thundercracker," interrupted the Decepticon, making Bluestreak half twitch around, guns rising a little.

Optimus nodded in recognition of the correction. "Skywarp and Thundercracker found Prowl injured in the aftermath of a battle—the one that separated Bluestreak from the rest of his team. This was after they'd received my message. Neither wants to continue fighting, and they brought along Prowl as a gesture of goodwill—although neither is a medic. Prowl was injured, and entered stasis; they've kept him stable, but haven't been able to start repairs. Ratchet and Thundercracker, who has Prowl, are both en route here, and I've sent out a message informing the other Autobots of the situation—Landslide is unhappy, and I haven't heard back from the other three, although I doubt Ironhide will be any more satisfied with the situation."

"So what are the conditions of the agreement?" Sam asked. He'd started studying politics and diplomacy—things he figured he'd need, if Keller had been serious when he'd told him that the Autobots were going to need liaisons to human governments, and he had the potential to be a prime candidate.

"They'll be figured out once Thundercracker's here—apparently he's the one who's going to carry out the negotiations. It will probably be some sort of mutual nonaggression pact."

Irene had wandered over to the small pile of luggage—belonging to, variously, her, the teenagers and Keats—and was digging through one of her bags.

"What are you looking for?" Keats asked.

"I packed a native plants guide," she explained, still rummaging through it. "And I figured I'd take the chance to get some sight-seeing in. I mean, where we are isn't the Olympic National Park, but it's still National Forest—and I'm used to the stuff I get down in Oregon, I'm hoping I'll see something new. You want to come?"

"Sure," said Keats. Regardless of whatever else you could say about the Autobots, they seemed to end up in biologically interesting areas. "And other guides?"

"Uh, two birding guides and a guide to 'Insects of the Pacific Northwest.'"

"Ooo, insect guide! I'll take that one."

"We can take the bird ones along for the hell of it, then," said Irene, grinning at him. And then, louder, "Hey, Coldfront, I'm going to go on a walk with Keats—I'll tell you if I find anything really interesting! And take pictures. Okay?"

Coldfront nodded stiffly in her direction, which was apparently enough for her. "Okay, then, let's go. Think the teenagers will want to come? Hey, Sam, Mikaela and Miles, any of you want to go investigate local biodiversity?"

"No," said Sam and Mikaela, simultaneously.

"You know weird people," said Miles reflectively, although he knew he was repeating himself, looking up at the towering forms around them.

oOo

Ratchet was working on an injured Autobot—presumably Prowl—and there was a toweringly huge Decepticon in the clearing when the two scientists returned. It was twilight, verging into full night: it was hard to see, with the trees deepening the gloom.

"We got lost," announced Irene cheerily, rubbing at a patch of mud smeared on her face. "In a swamp. But we found saprophytes!"

"I am never listening to any of your suggestions ever again," announced Keats, dropping wearily to sit on a comfortable-looking rock. "I am covered in mud."

"You really are," said Bumblebee, unhelpfully. Keats shot him a look.

Irene snickered. "You know, I'm pretty sure I've seen Kristine use that exact same glare. Like U.S. Government Emergency Team Member Sponsor, like sponsoree?"

"More organics?" said the larger Decepticon—Thundercracker.

"Keats got Bluestreak in touch with us," said Nimbus, who seemed the calmest in the group.

"I need to look you over, too," snarled Ratchet to Bluestreak, from where he was half-buried in Prowl. "And you, Decepticon—the smaller one. Something's wrong with your engine."

"Whoa," said Irene, eyes comically wide.

"Nice to see you again, Ratchet," said Keats, ignoring the Decepticons. He didn't appreciate being referred to as 'organic.' A lot of things fit that description, and a lot of them weren't particularly complimentary things to be grouped in with.

"Hi, Keats, Irene," greeted the medic, looking up momentarily.

"You sure can be foul-tempered for someone who's not a snapping turtle," said Irene happily.

"What?" said Miles.

"Is that supposed to make sense?" asked the big Decepticon—Thundercracker, Keats though. Thunder-something, certainly.

"Only to Irene," he said, with a slight sigh. "I think that translates to, more or less, pointing out the fact that Ratchet seems unusually grumpy for someone who's seemed pretty easy-going in the past—Ow!"

Irene stepped smoothly away from Keats before he could elbow her in the ribs in return, explaining herself. "A snapping turtle is, of course, a type of terrapin known for its foul temper and extraordinarily strong jaws, giving rise to several idiomatic sayings. It's really not much of a jump to simply translate 'somebody with a foul temper' to 'snapping turtle,' considering the circumstances. And then my sentence makes perfect sense."

There was a dumbfounded pause.

"Really weird people," said Miles.

"So what's going on?" Irene asked, walking over to sit on Coldfront's foot as people returned to what they'd been doing before the scientists had interrupted them. He seemed to have been removed from guard duty, although he was still sitting there stiffly, clearly on edge—although not so badly as Bluestreak was. Keats was surprised he wasn't babbling a mile a minute. Talking a blue streak, so to speak. How did they come up with their names?

"There's been some discussion about the terms of the ceasefire," said Coldfront, glaring at the closest Decepticon—Skywarp—who was eying the two of them with a certain amount of interest. "So far, nothing definite has been decided. I think Optimus Prime is currently …discussing something to do with the situation with Ironhide. Did you see anything interesting?"

"Saprophytes!" said Irene happily. "Candystick, to be exact—so named for the resemblance it has to peppermint stick candy—see, here's the picture I got— Oh! And there were reign orchids as well, once we got into the swamp, where it opened up a little—"

"So, who're you, squ—organic?" asked the smaller Decepticon, leaning down to eye Keats. The biologist swallowed nervously: he looked distinctly… predatory. Or maybe it was all the spikes.

Or maybe it was how he'd started to say 'squishy' and then ended on 'organic'—which was an improvement, albeit a word that wasn't a particular favorite of his, at least when it came to how he was referred to. At least Landslide hadn't been too likely to actually follow through with his threats—and he'd also given Keats a distinct feeling that he had been unnervingly like that, in some ways, at ages fourteen and fifteen. Thankfully, it seemed to be one of the things that he'd grown out of.

"Watch yourself," snapped Bumblebee, stepping forward a little. Keats did some fast mental calculations about how potentially insulting it would be if he started backing up.

"You know," said Thundercracker, looking over, "You're adamant that we need to get along with the natives, but apparently you don't want us actually interacting with them." His voice was deceptively lazy.

"I don't trust them," said Bluestreak abruptly, standing suddenly and pacing again. "If they're lying—and they're Decepticons, I'm slagging sure they are—then any humans are at risk. They're so fragile—"

Keats thought about protesting but, really, by comparison, they kind of were.

"—and we can't just let them go free, that would be crazy!"

"I can make decisions for myself, you know," Keats said, slightly reproachful. "Maybe you should be asking those humans you're talking about what they think about the potential risk."

"…Oh," said Bluestreak, momentarily flummoxed. He really hadn't thought about that.

Skywarp snickered. His apparent personality getting slightly obnoxious, Keats thought, but he also knew that his own mood was headed straight downhill—not enough sleep, getting lost, now he was kind of hungry, missing work, going off on adventures, and he had a headache sneaking up on him on top of everything else—which wouldn't help his reaction to the Decepticon's baiting.

Patience, he told himself.

Thankfully, Irene spoke up at this point. "I'll talk to you," she said brightly, looking at the two Decepticons. "I don't know how interested you'll be in what I have to say—sadly, not everybody appreciates 'Hey, I think I found some Solomon's-seal, want to check it out?' as a conversation starter—but I'll do it."

"Irene!" Coldfront snapped out, sounding horrified. Keats had never heard that much emotion in his voice before. "What are you thinking—"

"If I die, at least I'll be some kind of extend-the-hand-of-friendship-to-your-enemies martyr—No wait, if I die, I'll probably only discourage people—"

It was Keats' turn this time. "Irene!"

"Seriously, Coldfront, it's a conversation. I have them—okay, not really on a regular basis, unless you count the garden or you—but fairly regularly. Nothing's going to happen, you're right here." More quietly, she added, "I trust you."

Coldfront didn't respond, but Irene seemed to get something out of the blank silence. She smiled up at the 'bot.

"Well, that's decided," she said. "I'm Irene Grey, it's nice to meet you. What are your thoughts on the natural sciences?"

"Boring," said Skywarp promptly, flopping backward so he was staring up at the sky. "Even most organics think that's boring. And you're made of carbon."

"I'm actually in the middle of negotiations," said Thundercracker, sounding almost sheepish. "Uh…"

"Oh. Well, then," said Irene, one eyebrow raised. "I don't suppose somebody would agree to go with me to get food? I don't think there are any actual cars here."

oOo

"So," Thundercracker said. "You're willing to let us go free—sort of."

"You're a risk," Optimus said calmly. "But I'm willing to give you the benefit of doubt. On the other hand, I'd like to be at least slightly informed about your general location and actions."

"Skywarp is a teleporter. He doesn't have a general location."

"You're not, though. Are you likely to be separated on a regular basis?"

"No," admitted Thundercracker. "We're not. How often would the check-ins be?"

"Six months."

"Every year."

"You're fliers—it won't take you long, no matter where you are, and with your current alt forms, it will be hard for you to pass unnoticed outside of the United States. Six months, and Ratchet will run basic maintenance or larger repairs whenever you need them."

"Good enough. What's your line on interaction with organics?"

"I'd like you to avoid it," Optimus said coldly, voice chilly.

Thundercracker snorted. "I'll try. What about the humans who already know about you? …And you realize that you're about as subtle as a bag of hammers, collectively, and you're all going to end up revealed to the public eye soon? What should I do then?"

"I doubt any of the people currently connected to the Autobots would be interested in getting to know either of you," said Ratchet coldly from where he had his hands buried in Prowl's internals.

"We'll cross the latter bridge when we come to it," Optimus said. "The humans already acquainted with Cybertronian life are all free to make their own decisions when it comes to meeting with you, of course, but I'd like you to respect them once they're made. Why do you ask?"

"Because it's better safe than sorry, and because Skywarp's a mediocre conversationalist at best. –Irene seemed happy to talk."

"I'll warn you that Coldfront might object even if Irene didn't, and that Irene is often… difficult to fully follow. She's also highly eccentric, by human or Cybertronian standards."

Thundercracker shrugged. "Whatever. But you have to respect a species as determined to fly as humans are, no matter how much their biology sucks for it. Me and 'Warp will try and stay out of the way. It's not like he really wants to get to know any of them—the opposite, in fact." He switched topics again, just as suddenly, something Optimus was starting to identify as normal for him. "What happens if one or both of us are attacked by Decepticon forces when an Autobot's nearby?"

"If it's a mutually beneficial situation, that Autobot would join in."

"What? That's all? Look—No. Okay, how 'bout this: any of your guys in trouble around me and Skywarp, we'll help, if you'll do the same for us. You don't have air support, and we don't have numbers."

Optimus regarded him thoughtfully for a minute. "Fair enough. I'll agree to that. You won't have any problems fighting against your faction?"

Thundercracker snorted. "No."

"But you refuse to become Autobots."

"No." His tone was absolute: Thundercracker was and always would be a Decepticon.

"I could work on drafting something that would, in essence, give you ties to the Autobot army that convey most of the rights of a full Autobot—on a probationary basis, clearly—while allowing you to remain a Decepticon. It will take time, of course, but there's a precedent—I know of at least one incident where something similar was used for a neutral."

"Skywarp?" asked Thundercracker, looking away, towards his partner.

"Yeah," he said, nodding slowly. If it means we got back-up if we need it, and energy sources? Yeah.

"Alright," said Thundercracker firmly, turning back to look Optimus squarely in the face. "But I get time to read the fine print before anything gets signed."

The Prime sighed. "Of course."

oOo

Keats jumped as his cell phone rang. He didn't get regular calls on it—mostly it was there in case of emergency.

"Hello?" he said, answering.

"Keats," said Irene, voice sounding uncharacteristically strained. "I'm—oh shit!" There were the noises of a loud explosion in the background. The Autobots—and Decepticons—in the clearing turned, almost as one, to look at him with a sudden intensity. Clearly they could hear the conversation.

"Irene? Irene?" he said, frantically.

"I'm okay, but—Coldfront's hurt. I don't think it's good. Oh, hell, I think it's really, really bad—Coldfront? 'Front! Are you—Is there anything I can do?"

There was a tortured metallic scraping. Keats winced.

"Where is she?" OP prompted him, leaning down. "Bumblebee, see if you can contact Coldfront."

"Irene? Where are you?"

"Fringes of that town we passed through—on the road—oh god, I think they killed them—"

"Who killed who?" Mikaela asked, calmly and clearly, taking the phone from Keats' unresisting hands. "You're on the road?"

There was another explosion. Irene shrieked, the volume making the speakers on the phone blur a little with static, before she responded. "—Decepticons, don't know how many—at least five—I don't know them, but the other cars—rush hour traffic—they have to be dead—"

"Autobots, move out," said Optimus Prime, voice urgent but calm, composed.

"Bluestreak, you're not cleared for active duty," Ratchet said shortly. "Stay here. If anything in Prowl's condition changes, message me if you can, but it's unlikely to happen."

Before he could argue, the Autobots were gone, speeding down the road towards the scene of the battle. Bumblebee was the last in the clearing: he knelt, leaning in close to Sam and Mikaela.

"Be careful, okay?" he told them, gently. Sam whispered something in reply, Mikaela nodding, and then the robot was a Camaro again, speeding off down the road.

"…Should we have followed them?" asked Skywarp rhetorically, cocking his head to look up at Thundercracker.

Bluestreak snarled. "You better not."

oOo

It was unnervingly quiet in the clearing. The Decepticons' eyes kept on flickering: they were talking with each other, Sam guessed. At least, if they worked the same way Autobot optics did when the bot—or con—wasn't concentrating fully on the outside world.

"Let's go for a walk," Mikaela said, suddenly.

"Okay," Miles said immediately.

Sam shrugged, and stood. He did want to burn off some of his nervous energy. What was going on with the battle?

oOo

"So, uh—" started Thundercracker.

"What?" snapped Bluestreak, absolutely bristling.

"The, um, personal frequency you've been using—"

Bluestreak stiffened.

"—to talk to yourself is actually mine."

"What?"

Keats ears were ringing. The volume angry Autobots could apparently reach was… Impressive. Damn. He was partially deaf already.

But maybe it didn't matter if his hearing deteriorated. Bluestreak had a gun braced, aimed at the Decepticons, both of whom had moved to their feet and produced weapons as well, their positions just as defensive. Keats tried to swallow, but his mouth had gone dry. From the looks of things, he wouldn't live long enough for worsening hearing to become a problem.

The silence dragged on, until Keats found his voice.

"Bluestreak. Please—please—calm down, don't start anything now—bring it up when the others get back or something, but wait just a little while, please, or at least keep this verbal—at the very least—I'm kind of fragile compared to you, and probably harder to fix—good things don't happen when and I know this from experience, back in Brazil, and it was an accident back then, too, but I still ended up almost dead—very, very closely, enough so that thinking about it still freaks me out now and it was a year ago that it happened, now—and that was just one of you, he wasn't in a fight or distracted, if he had been I'd be moldering dead jelly right now, or a pile of ash-or maybe less than that, just a charred spot in the floor, I don't know but I'm willing to bet it wouldn't be good and if one of you misses a shot with those really, really big guns you've got pointing out each other and I happen to be a little too close, or if you misstep before I've made it out of here, I will die—"

Bluestreak wasn't reacting. Keats started backing up, ready to turn and run, ready to try and get as far away as he could from the almost inevitable brawl, at a moment's notice.

Amazingly, to Keats' huge relief, Thundercracker backed up a step, canons half-transforming back into hands—although not completely.

"I don't want to fight," said the Decepticon warily. "And the squi—organi—human is right. We're a threat to him, and the other humans, even if they're not in the immediate area. A fight could also draw unwanted attention here."

"Not to mention, we just kind of ended up as slagging Autobots. And if the Decepticons frown on fighting in the ranks, I bet the good-two-shoes team does too," cut in Skywarp—who, Keats noticed, still had clearly visible guns. Bluestreak still hadn't dropped his, either.

"You didn't tell me," Bluestreak hissed—the mechanical quality to his voice had increased with his anger, Keats realized. The undertones sounded like a boiling tea kettle just before it whistled—or like steam about to blow a valve. "I—You—I never blocked my own comm. signature, you could have responded whenever—"

"Glitch," Thundercracker said. "My comm. system's… sporadic. It's been a long time since the Decepticons had reliable medics. Especially us grunts."

"Thundercracker's always been kind of glitchy, though," Skywarp sniggered.

"Convenient," spat Bluestreak, but he wasn't as fixated on the others, as close to snapping, as he had been. He started pacing quickly, giant feet plowing furrows into the soft, damp soil, and Keats moved away a little more, regardless that it put him closer to the Decepticons. He had his doubts about them, but Nimbus had been one, after all, and he was fine, and it wasn't like he had any real reason to distrust them. They were also sitting and stationary.

…The smaller one, Skywarp, was eying him kind of unnervingly, though. And Thundercracker was just plain huge, head and shoulders above the (very tall) trees, even sitting. Maybe more. It was hard to tell from where he as, and because the mech was slumped, clearly trying to keep as hidden as possible.

"What did you hear," Bluestreak said suddenly, stopping his pacing and snapping around to face the others. He didn't phrase it like a question.

"Nothing sensitive," Thundercracker said, referring to military secrets. "And I didn't always pick it up—like I said, glitched comm. system. I… A lot of personal stuff." He paused, sounding uncomfortable.

"Did you ever hear me talking about… Home?" Bluestreak asked, suddenly sounding more hurt, more like his private thoughts had been badly invaded, than angry.

"Not really," Thundercracker said. "You compared Cybertron—before things got bad—to other planets."

Bluestreak didn't say anything, but relaxed visibly. Keats let himself relax a little with him.

"…I heard you talk about Prowl a lot," Thundercracker said, unprompted. Then, suddenly, "I'm sorry I couldn't tell you we'd found him."

Bluestreak turned and walked off down the rough road, without saying a word—unnervingly—and leaving Keats and the two Decepticons behind.

"Are you going to leave with him?" asked Thundercracker, testing the waters.

"It's not like I would be able of catching up," said Keats matter-of-factly. "Anyways, the only Decepticon I've ever had any contact with is Nimbus; so I don't have any real phobia, because I've never had a traumatic experience like that—well, the figs, but that only means I'm paranoid when it comes to eating syconiums. I can't say it's had all that much of an impact on my life. But, I mean, I'm scared, yes, you'd have to be stupid not to be—and maybe I am kind of stupid (1) in some ways, but I am nervous—but I'm also afraid of flying, and I do that, and I'm afraid of snakes, but I worked on that one experiment with them—It's something you can deal with, right? And like I said, no real traumatic experiences, and I don't have any reason to doubt you when you say you want to do this whole getting-along-with-humans-and-Autobots thing, so then it's only fair—"

"You talk even more than he does," Skywarp smirked, gesturing in the direction Bluestreak had left.

"—even if you do remind me of Irene at her worst crossed with this jock I knew. He gave me hell all through high school," Keats finished sourly. Skywarp laughed outright at that.

"Interesting," said Thundercracker slowly. "You said that this Nimbus almost killed you?"

"Nah, that was Coldfront," Keats said, looking up from where he'd been poking dubiously at the ground—he wanted to sit, but everything was wet, and nothing was unpleasant like wet pants. Even the rocks and fallen logs were covered with moss, which seemed to be acting like a sponge. On top of that, the shadows were beginning to lengthen; it was getting chillier, which would make being wet even more unpleasant. "I was really skittish for a while, while I was still getting used to the idea of you guys existing at all. Then I fell asleep when I was in the lab one night, Coldfront ended up blocking me in, I got panicky, he woke up when I was trying to climb over him and he freaked out or something, then later Irene forced us—well, tricked us—into meeting up again, and eventually I got over my problem and calmed down and saved the world. That was a year ago… My world view's finally had time to settle. I'm getting better at accepting the apparently unbelievable—or at least the highly unlikely. Twelve impossible things before breakfast, and all that."

"What?" asked Skywarp, suddenly looking confused.

Thundercracker made a noise that sounded unnervingly like a sigh, or how a sigh would sound if machines sighed. "It's a quote," he said.

"Reference, actually," Keats said. "Or at least I'd consider it one."

"Oh. I get it," Skywarp added. Then, after a minute, "…Humans are weird."

Having read the Alice books, Keats was inclined to agree with him. Still, something made him defend his species—probably the patriot-while-abroad factor (2) on a grander scale. "Well, they were apparently inspired by rampant drug use…"

"But they're considered classic children's books and gone through multiple adaptations and reprints, and that can only be caused by the general culture," Thundercracker pointed out.

"Point," Keats admitted. "But—" and then he paused, because he didn't know what to say. "But literature's never been my strong point," he finished with a slightly self-deprecating grin.

"So, what is your strong point?" Thundercracker asked.

Keats shifted a little before he spoke—the tree trunk he was leaning against wasn't very comfy, and with such a long jaunt in the car on top of everything, he was feeling kind of stiff. "Biology," he said. "I've always liked microorganisms, but I never bothered specializing—I think it's all fascinating. At the very beginning—what got me into bio at all—there was entomology. Or maybe dinosaurs, at the very root of it all—when I was five or so. But I think everyone gets a dinosaur phase."

"You seem very calm," said Thundercracker, a little hesitantly, as if pointing that fact out would send Keats off into some sort of cascading mental breakdown.

"I've discovered untapped depths of not freaking out." Keats paused reflectively. "Or I'm going to do it about fifteen minutes after I finally get some time alone to reflect." The biologist turned away from the tree trunk he'd been studying—there were ferns growing out of it, kind of a novelty for him, still, after so much time in New Mexico—to look quickly at the Transformer he was talking to.

Jesus he was big. And he'd thought Optimus Prime had been bad, or Ironhide. The other Decepticon has leant back down again, clearly uninterested—Keats was kind of glad about that.

That repressive silence had returned.

"I wish Irene had thought to leave her guides," he said, just to break the silence. It was putting him on edge.

"She did," said Skywarp, apparently not as uninterested as he'd seemed to be. "It's over there." He pointed to a rock, and sure enough, the book was there. Keats began to wander in its general direction, poking at interesting bits of greenery as he went; he didn't take the most direct route, which would have led him very close to the Decepticons. At the same time, he avoided the path that would keep him as far away from them as possible. He wondered if they'd noticed his avoidance.

They had, of course.

oOo

He had found the guide and leafed through it a little, walking around the clearing to look at some plants—he ascertained that one tree was a grand fir instead of the more common Douglas fir, and looked at the mouse tails in the cones he found. It was starting to get dark, the heavy tree cover of the forest surrounding the clearing hastening the process. At some point, Bluestreak had returned; he'd muttered something about running into the others, but they hadn't been ready to come back yet, and then sat silently.

He was significantly damp, and freezing cold by the time it was too dark out to see the flowers he'd been looking at. He was tired beyond belief: this time, he didn't bother with fussing about sitting down somewhere dry—he just took a seat on the rock. He regretted it a minute later.

Now he had wet underwear.

At least there wouldn't be many mosquitoes: the acidic quality of the ground leached into any standing water, and the high pH was apparently prohibitive to the larval stages. Of course, he thought, as he heard a familiar whine in one year, that didn't mean there were no mosquitoes.

Bluestreak moved suddenly, Keats jerking to attention: he'd only caught an impression of complicated metal limbs moving in the gloom above him.

"Keats, your external temperature is dropping, is everything okay? Something's not wrong, is it? I wish one of the others were here, they have more experience—well, Prowl doesn't, but he's kind of here. I wish he was awake, I wish he wasn't injured—but he at least would know what to do—I don't know but he's good at keeping calm and thinking up plans and making important decisions, he's terribly smart—"

"I'm fine," said Keats, trying to keep from shivering, which would probably just freak the robot out more: he had this vague feeling that they didn't have any equivalent to involuntary muscle spasms.

"You can find out this sort of information more easily and faster online," Skywarp said pointedly, tone rune.

Bluestreak didn't answer. It was tense silence.

"I mean, it's not all that pleasant and I suppose I'll go hypothermic eventually, if I'm out here long enough, but it's pretty normal to feel cold, and to get cold—I mean, there's varying levels of danger and it's different for everyone: just look at, oh, Lynne Cox (3) for example, but everyone's going to start developing hypothermia eventually. We're built to deal with it, though, the cold: more or less, I mean. Not like any number of cetaceans, or Antarctic ice-fish, but we are warm-blooded. There are safety measures: increased metabolism, restricted blood vessels, shivering. That sort of thing."

"Here," said Bluestreak abruptly, standing to take a few steps, until he was closer to Keats and then kneeling, one hand held out to him. "I have an idea."

"Some humans are afraid of heights." Keats was surprised by the comment—not that it was an unusual thing to say, or that it wasn't true or didn't make sense, but that Skywarp had said it. It was… Thoughtful.

"Are you?" asked Bluestreak, although he didn't recognize the comment in any other way. It looked like they had a truce of sorts, but an uneasy one. "I can put you near an active part of my systems or something—it should be warmer. I don't know if you'll be warm enough, you're supposed to be—36 or 37 degrees? But I don't know what it figures out to in our system—"

There was what sounded like a brief rumble-crackle of static from Thundercracker, but Bluestreak seemed to get something out of it.

"—alright. Yeah, it should help, if you want it. I just don't want you to be in an endangered physical state, or even uncomfortable—" He broke off for a second. "What's hypothermia, anyways?"

oOo

It was very cold out, now, but Keats was actually pretty warm. He'd dug out an extra shirt and the light jacket that was all he'd thought to bring, and then Bluestreak really was warm. The seat wasn't too comfortable, but he was dry and off the ground and it could have been a lot worse. Plus, there was a low humming, one he was picking up almost subconsciously, coming off of the robot—their version of breathing and a heartbeat, he thought sleepily. And he wasn't the only one who felt tired: it looked like Skywarp had already curled up and gone to 'sleep,' and Thundercracker looked remarkably close to copying him, although he was still watching Bluestreak warily, obviously hesitant to put himself in such a position of vulnerability in front of an enemy—even though he was technically an ally, now.

He looked up as he caught a sudden noise: there were twin beams of light cutting through the trees, headlights, and he panicked slightly, before Bluestreak identified the unknown car as Ratchet for him.

The medic pulled up and opened his doors, letting out Sam, Mikaela, Miles and a worse-for-the-wear Irene, before he transformed.

"We brought food," announced Mikaela. Keats didn't hesitate to slip onto the hand Bluestreak offered to him, stomach roaring with hunger.

"What's going on?" asked Skywarp out of the dark, red eyes flickering on to stare at them out of the dark. It was an eerie effect.

"Temporary standoff," Ratchet said promptly. "They're holed up in a warehouse—we can't fire on them without a lot of caution until we get the buildings around it evacuated. The others are still there, watching and waiting, and making themselves useful wherever they can. I fixed Coldfront up and repaired a few minor injuries, and I shuttled humans for a while before I was told to get Irene to a safe zone—Coldfront was insistent." Keats was sure he had been.

"He ran into us on the way back," added in Sam. "Thankfully, he had food with him." Keats nodded fervently, mouth full of sandwich.

Ratchet eyed the small group of humans for a minute; Keats got the feeling that he was seeing more than he was. After a second, he turned a little to face Bluestreak.

"Was sticking Keats next to a hot spot in your armor your idea?" he asked.

"Yes—I'm really sorry if—"

"Don't worry about it: it was a good idea. You!"

His change of tone was enough to make Keats and Miles jump; Mikaela and Sam just looked startled, and Irene looked too tired to react, almost weaving on her feet and eyelids drooping.

"Me?" asked Thundercracker, looking just as startled as Keats, if distinctly more imposing in his startlement.

"No, the other," Ratchet snapped out. "You—Skywarp. Were you in recharge?"

"Yessir," muttered Skywarp. Thundercracker's surprised expression melted into a disbelieving one—Skywarp was only respectful when he absolutely had to be. Bluestreak looked bewildered, and even Ratchet paused for a second. Irene managed a tired giggle.

Ratchet didn't skip a beat in his questioning. "Why?"

"We've been traveling a long—" Ratchet switched his attention away from the rest of Thundercracker's explanation, flapping a hand at him as an unvoiced order to wait, as he received a message from Optimus.

Switch on your external speakers, read the burst of data. Ratchet didn't think to question him. Just a split second later, a voiced message came through.

The Decepticon had fallen silent, waiting for Ratchet. "Message from Optimus Prime," the medic said into the silence, and let it play.

"Decepticon reinforcements arrived; we're close to being overrun. Endangered humans are hindering us. Ratchet, can you see that the humans over there get to safety before you join us?"

"Yes, sir," Ratchet said, echoing the spoken message with a text one to Optimus.

"I can do it faster," cut in Skywarp. "I can teleport."

"You're far too low on energy to risk that!" spat out Ratchet. "Absolutely not. It's likely you've got a slow leak in a system line."

"Fine," cut in Thundercracker. "I'll fly them."

"…Is anyone going to ask us what we want?" asked Miles faintly. Sam was eyeing the Decepticon who'd just offered to carry them.

"This is a bad idea," said Mikaela softly. "Can we trust them?"

"Oh, just get in," growled Irene, stalking past them towards Thundercracker, now in his alt mode.

oOo

Coldfront almost shot the Decepticon who landed next to him and transformed, until he recognized their new 'ally.' He didn't like it, though. Nimbus had revoked his status as a Decepticon entirely, something these two had refused to do. On top of that, they'd showed up just before a battle had broken out, even if they had saved the life of an important Autobot officer.

The Decepticon loosed a shot at a sudden hint of movement, cursing when it missed, his target diving back behind the pile of rubble he was using as a shelter. "Soundwave," he growled. "Who else is back there?"

"Barricade. Bonecrusher. Soundwave and his dependents, of course. The humans tried to bring in jets, but they were waylaid by 'multicolored' fliers of some sort—I don't think they have Earth alt forms, but they're not Cybertronian, either." Bumblebee didn't look at the 'con as he talked, still methodically scanning for enemy combatants.

A soldier ran up, stopping a short distance away from them and saluting sharply. "Area cleared of civilians, sirs!" he called, saluting them sharply. He looked half frightened and half exhilarated, part of a sci-fi movie become real.

"Thank you," Bumblebee called back. Then, to, Skywarp, "Prime's ordered us to hold our positions for now," he said. "He—"

A strangled scream behind him made him whip around in time to see Scorponok carefully shake the body of the soldier who'd reported to them off his tail, blood splattering wildly. The man was dead, Bee realized, so there was nothing to keep him from shooting. Skywarp joined him, Coldfront watching for approaching threats from behind.

There was an earth-shaking thud as Thundercracker transformed in midair, landing on his feet. "The organics are a safe distance away!" he bellowed over the shooting. Distractedly, Bumblebee thought that they need to trade comm. links with the newcomers, and set them up with a modified cell phone line—Soundwave was blocking their usual contact links, but the Autobots had installed a slightly more advanced version of a personal cell, something he hadn't thought to block.

The shooting continued for a few minutes longer, until Bumblebee realized the battlefield was suddenly quieting. That was unnatural. He turned to look.

Starscream.

When he judged things were quiet enough, the new Decepticon leader spoke. "So it comes to this," he sneered. "Autobots, fighting for their lives, just as hindered by their pathetic love for squishy life forms as they are by their own ineptitude." He paused for a minute, gazing around the frozen tableau. "My faithful followers—" he allowed himself to savor the phrase "—all true Decepticons. And two, the most faithful of all: my own wingmates…"

Bumblebee froze, suddenly aware of the Decepticon next to him.

"My own wingmates, who have successfully infiltrated the Autobot ranks!"

Bumblebee reacted before Starscream had finished the sentence, but he was too late: before he could fire on the snickering Skywarp, Thundercracker had Ratchet held bodily, dangling helplessly above the ground with his arms pinned and the Decepticon's cannon pointed pointblank at his spark.

Not a single Autobot moved. The Decepticons fanned out a little, slowly, surrounding them.

"Come," said Starscream, almost delirious with glee. "Join me, my brothers! Don't shoot, Prime, and order your pathetic rabble to stay still—unless you want to see your medic dead, that is. You do seem to lose soldiers quickly... What was the name of that little silver 'bot, the one who was torn apart the last time we fought?"

"Stay still," Optimus Prime ordered his men, voice blank of emotions.

Thundercracker and Skywarp started forward, Skywarp walking more quickly: Thundercracker was hampered by Ratchet's dead weight. Starscream greeted him as he drew close.

"It's been too long," he said, "since I've had my most trusted companions—my wingmates—"

"Like slag you're my wingmate," grunted Skywarp, brining a cannon up to fire. Starscream fell.

The two groups flinched as one as he fell, then froze again.

"You abandoned us to play politics," he continued, shooting again. Starscream jerked. The explosion was deafening in the silence. "You—" he broke off into Cybertronian.

Carefully, Thundercracker set Ratchet down.

"Die," spat Skywarp, and fired one last time.

Barricade broke the stillness even before the last echoes of the final explosion had faded: he fled, tires squealing as he sped off.

Soundwave followed him, and most of the other Decepticons. The three jets didn't leave immediately, standing their ground for a minute, hissing and weaving from side to side, like snakes about to strike. It was only a soldier, nervous to the point of breaking, who loosed a sabot round and hit one on the side of the face that sent them into retreat, leaving behind the two traitors.

"Sorry," said Thundercracker guiltily to Ratchet, who was tense with pain as he attempted to investigate the leaking dent on his shoulder, where the Decepticon had held him.

Skywarp fell over.

"Energy exhaustion," identified Ratchet distractedly after a brief glimpse to the side. His voice was staticky with pain. "Someone get the idiot back to base."

"Where'd you leave Sam and Mikaela?" Bumblebee asked, his voice not that much better than Ratchet's, although that was fairly normal, for him: his voice still fluctuated, not completely healed by the Allspark.

Bumblebee sped off as Thundercracker shouted out the coordinates for their location, Coldfront just behind him. Nimbus left to help transport human wounded: he trusted Bumblebee and Coldfront to take care of his charge. Optimus had moved to investigate Starscream's deactivated shell, and he shifted Skywarp's unconscious body off of it, supporting the limp frame as he looked.

Bluestreak seemed to be in shock, or something like it, standing motionless.

"Holy shit," managed one of the soldiers.

"Bluestreak," said Optimus, turning around again. "See if you can help Ratchet with his shoulder. Thundercracker, I think I can get Skywarp back to the base; go—" belatedly, remembering that Thundercracker wasn't his soldier to command, he changed his wording. "—would you be willing to help the government with their rescue attempts?"

The Decepticon nodded swiftly, and headed towards where the officer in command of the situation was. He was careful of his feet; regardless, most of the soldiers were clearly afraid: they had all thought that he was going to be the death of them, along of Skywarp. On top of that, he was the largest Transformer there, and the fact that he'd betrayed the Decepticons, helped kill Starscream and played a vital role in winning the battle would only help a little, when it came to managing their fear.

Ratchet was feeling pretty ambivalent about the situation, himself. On one hand, he was alive, as were all the other Autobots, and there had been minimal human fatalities. Starscream was dead. On the other hand, he had severely dented armor plating on his shoulder, pinching several wires—and a few pain receptors—and breaking a tertiary energon line, causing the slow leak that was making everything slippery and even harder to try and fix than it would have been otherwise.

He also could still remembering being held, dangling, off of the ground like that. He'd been very convinced that he was about to die.

Bluestreak would be some help with the injury, though. If nothing else, he had a good pair of hands—steady, like a sniper needed. It was part of the reason why Optimus had assigned him to help Ratchet with his shoulder, doubtlessly: Bumblebee and Coldfront had left, although one of them could have been called back if Optimus had insisted; Skywarp was down for the count, and Ratchet wouldn't trust him in his internals anyways; Thundercracker was—not a good choice, even if his hands hadn't been far too big; Optimus himself also had hands that were a little too large, as well as needing to be free to deal with the general situation: to start with, with this many witnesses, there was no way that the government could cover it up. And that left Nimbus and Bluestreak. Of the two, Bluestreak was better-suited to the job.

It was just Ratchet's luck, though, that the mech 'helping' him was highly distracted, and seemed to be going through some kind of personal revelation or internal struggle.

"The other wire, that one's still connected," Ratchet said, for the third time.

"—Oh." Bluestreak looked blankly at what he'd been doing. "This one?"

Ratchet sighed. This wasn't getting either of them anywhere. "Look, Bluestreak, if you're too distracted to do this, I understand. You can go drive around in circles or whatever it is you need to do to calm down." He'd known other mechs who got post-battle jitters, and that was a medical issue, putting them under his jurisdiction: if Optimus had problems with Bluestreak leaving instead of staying to be helpful, he could talk to Ratchet about it.

"Oh, no, I'm fine," Bluestreak said, immediately and extremely unconvincingly.

"Riiight."

"It's—I—They," he glanced over at Thundercracker, who was holding up the roof of a damaged building up and apparently bitching at Nimbus for not moving fast enough as he carefully moved rubble. "—I don't get it! They're Decepticons."

"I—It's hard for me, too," Ratchet said, looking over at the young 'bot. "And that's just thinking about whether or not we should give them a chance. But… Let me put it this way. I knew an Autobot, a devoted Autobot, one who would never betray our cause and believed in it fully, who hacked a bloody trail for himself leading up the chain of command, until he was caught poisoning his commander's energy ration—and all because he thought he thought he could do a better job so he was, through that, helping the Autobots. There have been traitorous Autobots, too. Autobots have killed innocents. One of the most unpleasant mechs I've ever had the misfortune of dealing with? (4) An Autobot."

"Yeah," said Bluestreak, thinking: well, of course. Sunstreaker and Sideswipe were at the front of his mind.

"It's possible—I'd say probable—the same's true of the Decepticons, you know. No, don't look at me like that, I'm not saying we embrace every Decepticon who comes knocking with blind trust and a hug, I'm saying that once someone's proved themselves—and I think killing Starscream counts—then it's only fair to be open to the idea of accepting them. Even if Skywarp is a menace and Thundercracker crushed in my shoulder."

Bluestreak didn't answer, looking doubtfully at the medic, but when he focused his attention back on the repairs, he got the wires right the first time.

oOo

The Autobots had been ready to head back to the base, and the teens were with them, but Irene had put her foot down. She and Keats had each gotten hotel rooms for the night, with Coldfront and, surprisingly, Bluestreak, who had asked, staying behind to get them home the next day.

Keats slept over twelve hours straight, and then had a hot breakfast. It was his idea of heaven.

Irene slept until five in the morning before tossing herself awake, still exhausted but unable to do anything but doze restlessly because of the painful bruising she'd gotten when Coldfront had run into the Decepticons. The hot bath she had at seven when she gave up on trying to fall back asleep was her idea of heaven.

The drive back was uneventful. Mostly, Keats chatted with Bluestreak, not about anything in particular, or anything important. They talked some about earth, and about the planets Bluestreak had seen—that in particular fascinated Keats. Keats also did a little work playing with the preliminary results of an experiment he was working on, did a little reading when his stomach was steady enough. The time passed surprisingly quickly.

Bluestreak dropped Keats off outside his apartment, and he decided he didn't care what the neighbors did or didn't find suspicious. He didn't even unpacking before he went to bed, only pausing to eat some leftovers he'd had in the fridge. After all, he needed to be at the lab by four tomorrow morning. His shift had come up again, after all.

It was over.

oOo

It had been five weeks since Keats had returned home. He'd finished the life-consuming project three weeks ago, and reveled in waking up at 7:30 every day for a week.

The past two weeks had just been unpleasant.

He always got this way after a big project finished, but it usually didn't last long. It had been pretty bad after the Brazil incident had finished: that was more what he felt like now. It was hard to go from 'saving the world with the Autobots' to 'eight-to-five existence as cog-in-the-machine working stiff.'"

And then today he'd been laid off.

If he had been honest with himself, earlier, he wouldn't have been so surprised. The company had been having trouble, and the biological sciences had never been their primary focus. And it wasn't like it was just him: everyone except for Jaime, who was getting moved to management, and Linda, who had a double degree and was getting shunted off to a different department, was in the same boat.

It still sucked.

The phone started ringing as he turned the key to his apartment door. Keats thought about ignoring it, but didn't, mostly because the noise was obnoxious.

"Hello?" he asked, trying to juggle the phone one-handed as he shrugged off his wet coat. It figured that today was one of the (very) few rainy ones.

"Hey, Keats, you're home!"

"Hi, Kristine."

"Great—you're always working late, so I was afraid I was going to miss you—my evenings are reserved for jellies, so I couldn't just call a bit later. And you never answer your phone messages."

"Well, I'll be free more evenings, now," Keats said, ignoring the jab about his answering machine—it was only partly true, after all. "I'm losing my job."

"Ohhh, I'm so sorry! Was… Was it your fault?"

"Kristine!"

"Fine, fine, I'm sorry." She paused a minute. "…Well, was it?"

"No! The business is in trouble, that's all. My whole department got the boot. Except for Jaime, lucky bastard he is, and Linda—I'd say she's a lucky bastard, too, but she got moved to engineering, which makes up for it."

"Tough luck... Listen, you want me to ask around to see if there's an interesting position open right now? I can't promise you that you'll get to stay in that hellpit you call your home state, but there's probably something out there."

'No, but thank you, really. I'll look by myself for a while, at least—it sounds like you're busy. I might take a little time off, since I've got some savings—you know, get things figured out and get my life in order. Maybe I'll deliver pizza."

Kristine laughed. "The only problem with that idea is that you're too far away for me to get you as my delivery boy. Seriously, though, if you need anything—even a place to crash for a while. I've got an empty room, now that the kid's moved out."

"Thanks," Keats said, really meaning it.

"Of course, you get to help me with the jellyfish if you're taking up my spare room."

"—I think."

"Cute. Just for that, you're cooking too."

"Having tasted your cooking, I'd do that anyways."

"Hey! I've improved, I'll have you know. I've mastered any number of dishes, from scrambled eggs to, uh, fried eggs. If you don't mind broken yolks. Oh, I can do salad too."

"Impressive. And, uh, not that I'm hinting that I really want to get some food and take a shower before I crash or anything like that, but is there a reason you called?"

"Oh, right, that. Would you look over some of the work I've done relating to the useless bioflourescent bags of goo? I'd like your opinion on a few parts—"

"Really? Sure—I'll certainly have the time, like I said, and I'm curious about what it is you're actually doing with these things. You're being remarkably closemouthed about the specifics."

"Yeah, 'cause it's embarrassing. And, of course, I'll pay you the going rate for consultations—"

"What? Kristine!"

"Don't argue, whiner. I'm still your government-appointed mentor. So, you found a new girlfriend yet?"

Keats sighed. "Oh, like you're one to talk—"

"Yeah, but I'm old…"

oOo

It was well past eleven when Keats dragged himself out of bed, but he didn't feel too guilty about it. After all, he didn't have anywhere he needed to be, and he'd stayed up late the night before, trying to puzzle his way through Kristine's shorthand—it had taken her two weeks, but she'd finally gotten him the documents he was supposed to be poking through.

Keats poured himself his customary cup of black-as-the-pits-of-hell coffee with a sigh. ("That stuff's going to give you cancer someday," his mom had told him the last time she'd visited, tongue firmly in cheek. His mother bore an unnerving resemblance—when it came to personality—to Kristine. And Irene, for that matter, although thankfully less of one. Keats didn't want to imagine someone who'd been raised by the botanist.)

Half-heartedly, he poked through the fridge. It was too late for breakfast, and early for lunch. Maybe he'd make French toast and just combine the two meals into one. He sniffed gingerly at the milk, and almost gagged at the stench.

Okay, maybe he'd have eggs.

…Eggs which he would float first, to see if they were still good, before he cracked.

Damn but his fridge was a mess. Maybe he'd clean it out tomorrow. Or this weekend. Unlike other household chores—which he was usually pretty good about getting to at least somewhat regularly, even when he was bogged down with work—he really hated cleaning out the refrigerator.

Maybe he could get a dog or something. Not that a pet would help keep moldering leftovers out of his fridge, but it would be nice to have some company. Or a cat instead—they were supposed to be lower-maintenance, right?

Hell, what he needed was a social life. It was a pity his best conversational topics all had to do with biology. Weird biology, most of the time—although admittedly not as weird as what Irene came up with. And Kristine was right, the jellyfish project was embarrassing. Evan was good at social stuff outside of the lab, though, and Toni, at least when it wasn't Irene he was socializing.

The last time he'd really had a social life had been in the eleventh grade with the Dungeons and Dragons crew at his high school, and even then he'd kind of been the outsider. Really, he'd only been invited because he'd been in advanced math with them. Keats got along with people, but he really didn't—It was very rarely anything more than a casual friendship, more an acquaintanceship than anything else.

Maybe there was a lecture series at the local university he could attend, although that might turn out to just be college students. He was a little old for most of that group, by now—which was hard to admit. He was getting old. He might find a lecture series anyways—it could be interesting. He also needed something to occupy himself with.

Maybe he'd just have a months-long internal debate over all of the above and some extra until he got a job again and no longer had 17 empty hours to fill each day. Surfing the Internet could only occupy him for so long, after all.

That sounded like the most likely option, really.

In the meantime, he was going to walk to the corner store down the road for milk and a newspaper, because French toast really did sound good, and you needed milk for that. He'd also probably get some kind of cereal that would cause a diabetic coma an hour or so after consumption and cancer a few years down the road while he was at it, the kind of thing his mom never let him eat.

One of the cars he saw on the short walk there looked vaguely familiar, but he dismissed the feeling as a product of his bored imagination until he found it waiting for him in the apartment complex parking lot. One door popped open as he approached it—although the car (maybe "the 'car'" was more appropriate, his mind whispered) although it was apparently empty.

"Bluestreak?" he hissed, disbelieving, as he ducked inside.

"Yeah! Don't you recognize me?"

"No, you're a different color—"

"But it's the same model and everything! Same modifications—and it's hardly something you're likely to see on the roads around here, unmodified or otherwise—"

"Bluestreak, I have a genetically inherent ability to distinguish and recognize the subtleties of the human face. All people do, like emperor penguins when it comes to penguin noises. It doesn't work with cars."

"Oh, fine. But how are you? It's been a long time, huh? Well, I mean, comparatively speaking, and since you're human and everything so you live such a short while—that must be weird—and then you don't have a comm. system so we couldn't even talk after I got cleared to use internal communications systems again by Ratchet—that's a long story, I'll have to explain everything later—although I suppose I could have tracked down your cell phone number and used that even though it's apparently kind of illegal and Optimus Prime told me to only use it if it's important 'cause relations with the human government are kind of tense right now—even though I think Bumblebee calls Sam and Mikaela all the time, but it might be different 'cause he's gotten the modified attachment installed—"

"Whoa, wait a minute!" Keats laughed. "First of all, is Prowl okay?" Did you ever run into the other team you were looking for? Why are you a different color? What's up with the other Autobots? And the kind-of-Decepticons, I guess, although you aren't all that hot on them, I know."

"Oh! Prowl's fine. Great. He wants to know if he can meet you some time… That would be alright, right? And don't worry if he seems kind of cold, he's just like that—I mean, he's Prowl. We still don't know where Wheeljack and the twins are, though—I'm kind of worried. They've had a lot of time to get here, since they were in about the same place me and Prowl were, and they must have gotten Optimus Prime's message—and yeah, Sunstreaker and Sideswipe are kind of weird Autobots but they're Autobots, right? So I'm worried they're in trouble and can't come to earth or something. Although I think the twins could probably fight their out of anything—or through anything—and Wheeljack could probably figure his way out of anything, he's really smart and he's kind of destructive even when he's trying not to be—"

"I'm sure they're fine. They sound like they can take care of themselves—maybe something just held them up."

"—thanks. Anyways, I changed my color because after we went public people kept on recognizing me. Do you like it? I thought it looked good. Sunstreaker'll probably tease the hell out of me when he gets here, though…"

"Yeah, it looks good." It was true, too—the warm burgundy color fit, even if Keats thought he preferred the less-flashy gray. Bluestreak had also gotten rid of the striping, he noticed.

"Thank you—But how are you? Oh. Do you mind me showing up like this? I guess some humans just kind of want to pretend we don't exist, and after all the trouble I put you through—I wanted to see how you were doing, though, you know, and maybe talk a little—I didn't think about how you might not want to—"

"Don't worry about it! It's always nice to spend some time with a friend." Friend—Bluestreak was oddly happy with that. After all, he'd caused the man nothing but trouble, and really, Keats had done him a huge favor. And he was the first human he'd ever had contact with. The only human he'd ever really had a lot of contact with, or gotten to know. He'd been nice. He'd liked talking to him.

Keats continued. "I'm doing… Well, not all that great, since I lost my job, but not too badly, considering the circumstances. I have a friend who might let me housesit for him out in the mountains when he leaves in a week or so—it's not quite definite yet, he's one of the worst people I've ever met for planning ahead."

"Ohhh. I'm sorry. It's not because you were gone those days, when we drove up to Washington? I—"

"Just bad luck," said Keats, with a crooked smile. "It's not anyone's fault, let alone yours—I didn't even have to call in sick, I didn't have my shift any of those days we were gone, thankfully."

"Good… Still, though, I'm sorry. Is… Is there anything you can do to help?"

"It's nice just to have someone to talk to, really. I hadn't realized how little time I spent socializing outside of work… And you're good conversationalist."

"I… It doesn't bother you that I talk so much?" Bluestreak sounded surprised, almost hopeful. "I do, I know—Ironhide threatened to shoot me the next time I started my vocalizer around him the second day we were both stationed at the Autobot base together."

"No," Keats said, bemused. "I mean, I can talk a fair bit, myself. …Usually only when I'm close to panicking, but I'm still capable of it. And you usually have good sense, and make a fair amount of sense. Like I said, good conversation."

"Thank you, it's nice to talk to you too—you always have interesting things to say."

Keats smiled. "Thanks to you, too. Anyways, what have you been up to?"

"Not a lot," Bluestreak confessed. "I spent a while running a deep systems check—that took a while. I don't really know what happened, I was really out of it, but now Bumblebee keeps on snickering whenever he sees me. It turned out that I had some real problems—Wheeljack hadn't really noticed since he's not a trained medic and everything, and I didn't notice until I got to earth and my downloads were all weird. Prowl had problems too, and the Decepticons. Especially them." He paused a minute, and then continued, abruptly. "I hadn't realized they didn't really have trained medics, especially not after the beginning of the war—it made them kind of weird around Ratchet, kind of respectful and almost—worried? Or afraid—but—that doesn't make sense, Ratchet's no threat to either of them… Thundercracker's worst about it, I think it's because of what happened in the battle—"

"What ended up happening with that?" Keats asked, interrupting. "I mean, with the Decepticon attacks—I haven't seen anything in the news, but that doesn't mean much…"

"Not much, thankfully—just, y'know, skirmishes now and then. Though I'm worried about those three ugly jets, do you remember them? The ones with the ridiculous paintjob—they looked kind of crazy. It happens.

"Barricade's mostly lying low, Bumblebee says he won't risk another attack until there's a big force built up again because he's mostly looking out for himself, not the Decepticon ideals—I guess they've got some kind of history—Bumblebee and Barricade, I mean. I don't know about Soundwave, nobody really does—he's always been really high-up in the ranks but Thundercracker said he's never fought for his place or tried to overthrow anyone else, which is weird when you're a Decepticon apparently, which sounds like it would suck—so Soundwave might just be waiting to attack or he might not be planning to at all."

"At least things have been quiet, then?"

"Well, kind of—there are still all kinds of calls and diplomatic visits and things like that, it's all really complicated since we went public and all. I try to avoid all that, since I'm not too good at politics, but Prowl's been really involved in it, he's always busy—which is how he likes it, he starts getting really twitchy when he's not working more than any other mech could manage, because he feels like he should be doing as absolutely much as he's capable of, even when there's nothing to do—he was like that even when it was just the two of us drifting along in the middle of space—I don't really get it, honestly."

"I've never had much of an interest in politics either. I follow the news, of course, but I've got no taste for the analysis and strategy—and, in a lot of cases, the manipulation, I get the feeling. But I noticed none of the reports talked about Skywarp and Thundercracker, even when they talked about the Decepticons—what's up with that?"

"Oh, right. Well, I think a lot of governments know about them, but it's kind of being kept a secret—I think they're afraid it would freak people out. Even more than this all has already—Us, I mean. Some of the news coverage—it's not very nice, and the letters are worse—well, not all of them, but a lot and the demonstrations… It's kind of lonely, sometimes. It's—This is an alien planet, you know? It's not home, which is kind of a crazy thing for me to think, I know, I haven't been home in—who knows how long, there isn't a home for me to go home to at all—But anyways, that's the reaction to just the Autobots, so it would be worse—"

"Have you met many people? Humans, I mean."

"No… Mostly, it's just politicians and journalists who show up, and soldiers, and I don't want to accidentally say something stupid, which happens a lot with me—and they're kind of intimidating, so I stay out of the way: so does Ironhide. Ratchet would like to, I think, but he doesn't, and Gyro's under orders to act 'normal' when he's under the public eye; Solarity gets interviewed a lot, probably because he's friendly and reasonable—he likes asking the journalists questions, and I think they like talking to him, too. Coldfront does some, too. Bumblebee never talks much—he's got a good excuse—but he gets filmed a lot with Sam and Mikaela—the three of them are favorites, I think, but I also think that none of them really like it. I haven't met Landslide, he's staying far away from the base entirely. And Nimbus avoids most humans—he makes them nervous, 'cause of the Decepticon design, even though he's got the Autobot sigil and took the oath and everything, and I don't think anyone really understands what all the spikes and things mean, so I guess it doesn't make much sense that they're afraid of him at all. Anyways, I don't know, but I guess Skywarp and Thundercracker are the same—but they haven't met many humans at all, especially face-to-face. I don't know if they just don't want to, or if they don't want to because of the reaction they'd cause, or because they're under actual orders to stay away or what, but they do. I wouldn't like it. …Well, really, it's not like my life's been much different recently. Now I'm a little different, I guess, because of meeting with you—they seem to just spend a lot of time with each other. It's a Seeker thing—it's kind of like a family? Where they're all really close and there's rules and expectations, and they all support each other, and what happened back at the battlefield was that Starscream had broken some agreement, or something like that, and that's why they were so angry. I think it would be nice, to have someone you could rely on like that—well, I guess it's like me and prowl. For me, at least, Prowl doesn't really need to rely on me—but it's weird thinking that Decepticons, even just a subset of them, have some sort of custom like that, where it's all about trust and love and faithfulness…"

Bluestreak trailed off. Keats didn't know what to say.

He had the feeling, though, that Bluestreak was more—at peace, now. He was certainly calmer.

The silence stretched a minute longer.

"Hey, Bluestreak—want to go for a drive out in the desert, or something like that?"

"Yeah… Yeah, I would."

Life went on. Things really weren't so horrible, after all. Maybe there'd be bats out—he was pretty sure the cactus would be blooming tonight. And he had a lot of catching-up to do, with Bluestreak. He wasn't planning on being back soon.

--END--

(1) Keats differentiates between intelligence and smartness.

(2) It's one thing for a citizen to complain about their home country. It's another thing entirely for a foreigner—especially when you're traveling in a foreign country.

(3) Lynne Cox swam across the Bering Strait in only a bathing suit. Later, she swam a mile in 32-degree water in the Antarctic, and lived.

(4) He's thinking of Landslide here, actually.