"You know," Knock Out snapped and passed the downright ancient woman in the tan DeVille in front of them, "I almost preferred you as an Urbana. At least then, it wasn't obvious you were trying to insult me ."
"Knock Out," Bumblebee tried to follow him, but a Jeep-no doors, ouch-sped up beside him on the left. Knock Out, the ass, was driving in the passing lane, and passing anyone going the speed limit from the right lane. This stretch of the highway, which he drove often enough to know like the grease on his engine, was a notorious cop ambush spot. Bumblebee only ever speeded at night, when it was hard to get a good glance at his plates. Knock Out, hedonist that he was, almost never drove the speed limit. He also never pulled over for flashing blue lights.
The last time he'd gotten this peeved at Bumblebee, he'd lead twenty state troopers on a ten hour, high speed chase, which only ended because he blew out his tires on the road spikes across Route 93 and flipped off the overpass into the Colorado River.
"Mooovve," Bumblebee grumbled at the Jeep, flicking on his blinkers, "come on!"
The Jeep finally slid in front of the DeVille, and Bumblebee sped around both of them. Knock Out was a few miles ahead, and gaining distance as much as he was gaining speed. Which was to say a lot . He must have been close to hitting his max. Bumblebee could go faster than him-new engine and all that-but Knock Out was more reckless, and cared less about property damage and insurance bills. It was something about being a surgeon; he never had to worry about finding someone to patch him back together, so he never worried about the damage he accumulated-except when it impacted his appearance, of course.
His vanity, at least, kept him from carelessly playing bumper cars with a minivan.
"Knock Out," Bumblebee hailed him again, "there's cops."
"Maybe they'll pull me over and I won't have to look at you anymore." And then he cut communication.
Bumblebee counted to ten and tried to remind himself why he put up with Knock Out. When that didn't work, he opened a SMS.
Raf , he typed, we might be late.
Sirens blared somewhere behind him, and he pulled onto the shoulder to let the patrol car-a Crown Victoria with flashy stripes-pass him.
He deleted the message and started again.
Raf, we'll be late. Knock Out is playing chase with the police again.
Bumblebee pulled back onto the road and started driving, careful to keep the speed limit, despite how much he wanted to zip down the road and join Knock Out in his game of high stakes tag. He forced himself to drive at a steady seventy though, and ignored all the cars passing him.
Raf responded, I found the police radio. They're calling him 'James Bond'.
That was some sort of joke, a reference. Bumblebee was getting good at spotting them, even if he didn't understand them all of the time. Still…
Lol. He typed carefully, and sent it. The acronym was a good response for things he didn't get, or things he did get, or when he wanted to let Raf know he was joking, or even sometimes to Knock Out to curb his temper. It was pretty great.
I'd go with Pussy Galore , Raf responded, don't tell him I said that.
Bumblebee didn't know what cats had to do with anything, but asking would expose his ignorance, so he went with 'Lol' again-with a winking emoji this time. No, a cat winking emoji. Much funnier.
He flipped on the radio and tuned to the classic rock station. Raf made a game of fiddling around with his presets so he could listen to the top 40, so Bumblebee had committed to deep memory the location of his favorite stations. This one for instance, which avoided nu metal and garage punk like the plague (cybonic and bubonic), and who's announcer actually shut up once in awhile.
"-crash on I-15 before exit 76, with a fifteen minute slowdown. High in the area is 87, with a low of 66. Zero percent chance of humidity and clear skies for the week ahead. That's your traffic and weather; I'm-"
Bumblebee clicked off the radio and commed Knock Out.
"You crashed?"
"As if," Knock Out's snobby indignation was actually comforting, "some semi blew a tire and swung across three lanes. I'm exiting on 74."
"I'll see you in Berkeley?"
Knock Out replied with a noncommittal grunt and signed off. Bumblebee fought down the urge to demand a status report. Logically, he knew Knock Out had suffered worse than a crash in the past with less complaining. He had, after all, been present at Knock Out's amnesty trial, and after hearing what Megatron did, even to his own troops, he was really glad Optimus wasn't there to see how far his friend had fallen. Still. Still, he couldn't tamp down the straggling fringes of concern towards Knock Out, which was stupid, because Knock Out had definitely tried his level best to kill him in the past.
Not to mention how often he'd taken the time out of his day to torment humans.
It had been years-a blink of an eye to a transformer, to use a human phrase, but an eternity to a human-and June Darby's heart rate still spiked when she had to hitch a ride with Knock Out. Bumblebee thought he should have still been angry with him on her behalf, but found he couldn't conjure up any hatred. War was hell, and after drowning in rage for so long, he was just grateful to drive out in the morning without wondering who was going to shoot at him.
A comm request pinged him. Bumblebee opened it.
"Why are you following me?" Knock Out snapped over the channel. "I'd have thought that my speeding off might convey that I don't want to be around you, but if you're going to be so willfully dense you exceed the Moh's scale, then I will spell it out for you."
"What?"
"It measures density, which is what you are being right now."
"What? No, not that," Bumblebee made a note to ask Raf about this 'Moe's scale', "I'm still on I-15, honest."
"Well, there's a sunshine yellow Murciélago with the Autobrand lurking in my rear view, and unless you've got a twin I don't know about, I'm inclined to believe you've got a stalking problem ."
"I'm opening a channel to Ratchet," Bumblebee rolled to a halt as gridlock set in, "I just hit the rubberneckers behind the semi, so I'm stuck in this parking lot until the cops let me by."
"Hmph," Knock Out accepted the channel request, " Goldenbug here keeps revving at me and I'm getting a little irritated ."
"Knock Out!" Ratchet shouted over the comm, "what did you do?"
"Moi?" Knock Out sneered back at him, "I haven't done anything."
"Except thirty above the speed limit," Bumblebee muttered.
"Then why," Ratchet ignored him, "am I getting reports across the state about a red muscle car drag racing in the middle of the day?"
" Muscle car ? Unlike Bumblebee, I have some class. This is a grand tourer."
"Aannh," Ratchet shooshed him, "semantics!"
"Semantics are important! Anyway, I told you, I wasn't drag racing. I've been with honeybee here all day."
"He's right, Ratchet," Bumblebee ignored the nickname, "we called to see if you've spotted any Autobot signals in the area."
"It's just the two of you. Knock Out, why are you so far from the interstate?"
"I've got a fan," he said, and sent an image capture. A conspicuously bright Lamborghini Murciélago lurked off to his left, about three cars behind him. The image was obviously taken in motion, and everything was a little blurred, but the Autobrand was distinctly present on its grill.
"And that's not Bumblebee?" Ratchet asked, mostly to himself, "have you tried hailing him?"
"Yes." Knock Out said, indignation obvious in his tone. "I scanned for his signal after Bumblebee told he was still on the freeway. He isn't picking up. No taste, clearly, even if it wasn't obvious from that atrocious vehicle mode."
Bumblebee inched forwards until the cop on traffic duty finally waved him past the accident.
"I'm heading off the highway," he pulled off at the exit, "where are you?"
"Some podunk town called Sensibility, I'll send you my Lat/Long."
"Got it," Bumblebee plugged it into his GPS, "I'll be there in ten. Don't start a fight? For me?"
"I'll do my best." The comm terminated with a click.
"I'll keep scanning. He must have a signal dampener, or some sort of blocker."
"Thanks, Ratchet."
Bumblebee started picking through the city roads towards Knock Out's position. The air was dusty and hot, and the street splintered into a dozen turn-offs for gas and motels. This was an overnight town, a place for tourists to catch a break during the drive to Vegas, or in their case, Berkeley.
The car behind him honked.
Bumblebee almost started driving, before he realized the light was still red. The car honking at him was red, too, a flashy shade of 'arrest me', that must have attracted cops like scraplets. It was not , surprisingly, Knock Out. No, this was yet another Murciélago. Maybe Knock Out was right, and this was a cliché car? No, wait, Knock Out's issue was that it was ugly, because he was a snob.
He barely had time to register the Autobrand before the car pinged him. He opened the message cautiously, wary of viruses.
"Hello?"
"Primus, Sunny, finally ," the car began chatting without preamble, or anything useful, like an introduction, "I've been looking for you for ages. Where have you been? I can't believe you slipped past that truck; the humans seem pretty fragged off about it crashing."
Bumblebee forwarded the signal to Ratchet before he responded.
"I think you've got the wrong yellow sports car, pal," he sped forwards when the light turned, "what's your designation?"
The red Murciélago pulled up beside him, revving his engine. "Depends what yours is, pal ."
Bumblebee bit back a sigh, and was suddenly grateful he had to deal with Knock Out so often. If he had any less practice reining in his temper, there was like a ninety percent probability that he would have hauled off and slugged Mister Flashy Paintjob, human witnesses be damned.
"Bumblebee," he snapped instead, "stationed with Team Prime."
"Oh," the mechanism responded, nervous, even if his cocky tone managed to cover most of it, "I, uh, I'm Sideswipe. A frontliner with Elita-One's team. Sir." He added as an afterthought.
"Elita-One?" Bumblebee took the next right. He was getting awfully close to Knock Out's position. No large scale destruction, which was a good sign. "I thought she was with the campaign on Halex-263."
"Halex-26whatever nothing! We were on Romeria."
Bumblebee caught him grumbling about the idiots at command before he followed Bumblebee onto the street.
"Halex-263 is Galactic Standard. Look, I'm pretty sure I'm right about this; I talked to Elita about it."
"Pft." A pause-presumably Sideswipe looking up the deployment details-, and Sideswipe's voice came back sheepish. "Romeria is the local name. 'S not my fault the briefing was so boring."
"Alright," Bumblebee fought down the urge to gloat, "but that doesn't explain what you're doing on Ea-on Sol-3."
"Me and my brother crashed here. The Decepticons like, renounced, or something, so we all got sent back to Cybertron to aid with reconstruction. Our stasis pods were kind of slaggy, though. We went to sleep on Romeria, and the next thing we know, we're waking up on some squishy, green planet."
Bumblebee suddenly had a pang of deep sympathy for Ultra Magnus. And for Elita. And whoever had to fill out this lugnut's personal history.
"Brother?" Bumblebee tried not to let his exasperation show.
"Duh," Sideswipe said like it was obvious.
"Who?"
"Sunstreaker. I totally mentioned him before; you look like him."
Bumblebee counted to ten. Was this just a red car thing? Slap on a new coat of paint and suddenly it was their goal in life to burn out his processor?
He braked suddenly. Sideswipe skidded as he tried to keep from slamming into his bumper.
"Hey, aft! What gives?"
Bumblebee let his engine idle. Sunstreaker… you look like him .
"Knock Out?" He commed.
"Can't bear to keep away?"
Deep breath. "Is that car still following you?"
"Still lurking in my rear view. He drives terribly, but with that alt mode, I'm not sure what else I expected."
"Sideswipe," Bumblebee ignored the barb and reopened the channel, "can you contact your brother?"
"Nah, our radios got fragged in the crash. We've only got line of sight."
Bumblebee forwarded the message to Knock Out, and sectioned off a relay to serve as a makeshift radio connection between him and Sideswipe. He was no Blaster, but he could keep a communications system above water if he had to.
"Hn. Explains why Thing One thinks you're Thing Two," bless Knock Out and his quick uptake of literally any situation, "but why hasn't big, bad, and yellow responded to my hails?"
"Sunny is kind of a rust-muncher," Sideswipe confessed, "and he's fragged off because I spooked a truck into swerving and it scraped his paint."
"And you say I'm a public safety hazard."
"Shut up, Knock Out," Bumblebee ignored Knock Out's indignant squawk, "meet us on the outskirts of town, near the billboard of the human wearing the strange underwear."
"You mean the stripper with the tassels?"
He had no idea what either of those things were.
"Yeah, that one. Sideswipe, will your brother keep following Knock Out?"
"If he thinks he's me, yeah. Our crash knocked his alt mode visuals out of whack. But he might just be following him for bolts and giggles."
"How charming."
"If he stops following you, track him, and we'll come to you." Bumblebee's engine turned over, and he took a U-turn back towards the billboard.
"Marvelous. I hope he gets as irritated as I was about someone lurking three cars away, pretending to be subtle. Of all the stalkers I've had, he's by far the worst."
Bumblebee made a note to ask about stalkers later, and cut the radio connection.
"Knock Out," Sideswipe mused, "I've totally heard that name before."
Ah, and here it was: the moment of truth. Knock Out was a former Deception, regardless of his current status as a probationary Autobot. The last time he'd been introduced to someone outside of Team Prime, the 'bot in question had him in stasis cuffs on the floor before anyone could explain that he'd defected.
Luckily, Knock Out was both a medic, and had been stationed with high command for most of the war. He didn't have a chance to find an arch-nemesis for himself, and the only Autobots who took real exception to him were those who disliked Decepticons-former or otherwise-on a general basis, not personally.
"He used to be a Decepticon," Bumblebee responded, "you might have seen his dossier."
"Pft, reading is for nerds." Sideswipe sped up beside him. "No, like, it was before the war. Was he in one of the merchant guilds or something?"
"Uh, no. He was a doctor. Specialized in processor surgery or something." Or something indeed. Knock Out had tried to explain his pre-war job to Bumblebee, but Bumblebee had bowed out, begging for mercy by the time he had finished introducing 'abstraction penalty '.
"Nah, neither of us had processor stuff done." Sideswipe groaned. "This is gonna bug me all day!"
Bumblebee took the left onto the main road, tracing his path back through town. New Autobots, that sure was… something. Most of the Cybertronian refugees were on Cybertron , but there were a few stragglers responding to the signal Team Prime put out. It was lucky co-incidence that Sideswipe and his brother happened to land while Bumblebee and Knock Out were taking some much needed time off and visiting Raf. If they landed here alone, it would have been ages before Ratchet noticed them, especially with their signals distorted like they were.
The roads were smoother outside of the town, but the dust picked up. What he wouldn't give for a good car wash. Poor Knock Out must have been having a conniption.
"Hey, that's them!"
Sideswipe sped around him, towards a sleek, red Martin Aston, and a bold, yellow Lamborghini Murciélago. Knock Out and Sunstreaker, then. Wow, he really did look like Bumblebee. He honked at the Murciélago, who swerved wildly before regaining control. Bumblebee pulled off the road towards the billboard, and after some complaining, Knock Out followed him—no doubt risking untold damage to his wheels. Poor baby.
He transformed after a cursory scan for humans.
"Alright, I-"
"Fragger," Sunstreaker transformed and cuffed his brother over the head.
"Hey," Sideswipe slapped back at him and ducked out of reach, "it takes one to know one!"
Knock Out leaned against Bumblebee and tracked the pair as they kicked up dust. He was warm, and smelled-under the dust and dirt of the road-like polish and soap. Bumblebee halted that train of thought where it started. Nope, nope, nope. Bad thoughts. Off limits.
He took a short moment to luxuriate in being taller than someone who wasn't Arcee-new alt mode, new height-and absolutely nothing elseabout Knock Out touching him, before emitting a sharp, high frequency whistle.
"Hey," he shouted as the brothers cringed and Knock Out shot him a nasty glare, "cut it out!"
Sideswipe had the social grace to look cowed, but his brother didn't bother with the niceties. Sunstreaker sneered down his tall nose at Bumblebee. He only had a few inches in on Bumblebee, but he used every fraction of it. Aside from being moderate in height, which they all were, barring Knock Out who was short, he was handsome, with a flash paint job and a neat face. His brother was nearly identical, but a little less clean and a little more plain.
"Alright," Bumblebee began once they fell in, "Sideswipe told me you two were separated from your unit and crashed here." At Sunstreaker's faintly condescending stare, he continued. "Riiightt, uh, we can get you to Cybertron via the spacebridge but you'll have to accompany us to Berkeley. Once we get back, you two will need to report to Ultra Magnus for work detail. Cybertron's in pretty poor shape, but with the population coming back and everything, it won't be long until-would you pay attention?"
Sideswipe froze, his elbow planted firmly in his brother's ribs. Sunstreaker had him in a headlock, and looked absolutely horrified.
"What?" Bumblebee glanced behind himself. Nope, no Megatron, no Unicron.
"Dude, I recognize him," Sideswipe pointed at Knock Out, jabbing Sunstreaker, "I totally recognize him."
Knock Out pointed at himself, brow cocked in incredulity. "Moi? I can't say I remember either of you, and you two certainly make… an impression . Did you ever run the Kaon gladiatorial circuits?"
"Sunny fought in Iacon for a bit-ow, slaggit, stop hitting me," Sideswipe ducked away, dodging behind Bumblebee, "but we've never been to Kaon."
He sprinted over to Knock Out when Sunstreaker got too close, and grabbed his face.
"Hey, hands off!" Knock Out smacked at him.
"Ah, just give me a sec," he turned Knock Out's head this way and that, "I totally recognize you, but I can't-"
He let go abruptly, and weathered through Knock Out slapping him.
"You little snot!" Knock Out hid behind Bumblebee and checked his face in his door window. "You gave me dents!"
Knock Out's face was still flawless. Bumblebee had to check, of course, but just to make sure he wasn't damaged. His eyes didn't linger at all .
"Yeah, whatever. Sunstreaker!" he sang, poking his brother in the shoulder.
"Shut up," Sunstreaker swatted his hand away.
"You recognize him? I do !"
"Shut up, Sideswipe!" Was it Bumblebee's imagination, or did Sunstreaker sound embarrassed?
"Ahhhhahahahahha, you had his poster over your berth-oof!"
Sunstreaker tackled Sideswipe, knocking him to the ground.
"I said shut up , you fragger!" He shouted in-between punches. Sideswipe halfheartedly blocked, still hysterical with laughter.
Bumblebee grimaced. Knock Out raised a brow and glanced at him.
"How did the Autobots win, again?"
Bumblebee pressed a finger over Knock Out's mouth. "I don't need this."
Knock Out jerked backwards and leveled a glare at him. Bumblebee ignored him and stomped over to the fighting mess of brightly colored armor. He cringed, plunged his hands into the mess, and somehow grabbed their armor collars without losing a finger. He flung whoever was in his left hand away, regretting that he hadn't harassed Bulkhead into coming back from Japan a day early. He was great at crowd control.
Stepping back, he tugged whoever he had left hand-red armor, it was Sideswipe-upright, and away from the fight.
"I said," he stomped over and hauled Sunstreaker to his feet, "to knock it off!"
"Ha, that's the whole issue!" Sideswipe cackled, wiping the dust off his face.
Sunstreaker lunged for him again, but Bumblebee managed to catch him under the arms and haul him back. He struggled for a few seconds, but acquiesced, and sagged in Bumblebee's grip.
"What?" He shouted, raising his hands and dumping Sunstreaker on the dirt. "What? Posters? Knock Out?" He turned to look at Knock Out in desperation.
Knock Out mouthed the word and tapped his chin with the tips of his claws. His eyes brightened.
"Oh, my-"
"Sunstreaker had a poster of him," Sideswipe interrupted, "it was on our wall for ages . He was all," Sideswipe approximated a seductive pose, jutting his hip out and crossing his hands over his torso, "haaa!"
"I modeled before the war," Knock Out explained as Sideswipe tumbled to the ground in hysterics, "to pay for med school. Cosmetic waxes and detailing, mostly. I didn't think I had any fans ."
Knocks Out's condescending sneer had taken a full one-eighty once someone started complimenting him. He looked almost friendly. And very, very attractive.
Bumblebee looked away.
"Seriously?" he asked Sunstreaker, who was aggressive staring at the dirt.
Sunstreaker shrugged. "Whatever."
Despite his anger, Bumblebee could tell he was deeply embarrassed.
"I'm very flattered," Knock Out offered, preening under the attention. "Really, I am."
Sideswipe sat up, propping his arms on his knees. "Think you can get him to sign it?"
"Would you want me to?" Knock Out interrupted the impending fight by stepping in front of Sunstreaker.
He shrugged, glanced at Knock Out's expectant face, and managed to grumble a reply. "Hn."
"No need to be embarrassed," Knock Out took it in stride, pressing a hand to his chest, "not my own words, of course, but I have been told that I'm 'intimidatingly pretty'. I'm used to people staring."
That sounded really, really fake. Either that, or Smokescreen had said it.
Bumblebee shooed Sideswipe to his feet.
"Alright," he ignored Knock Out's offended expression, "I'm going to give you short range radio codes. They won't work beyond a hundred feet, so stay close."
Sideswipe sniggered; Sunstreaker smacked him again. Bumblebee's headache couldn't bring itself to care.
"Okay, let's go-"
"Paint job," Sunstreaker grit out from under his scowl.
"Excuse me?"
He jutted his chin towards Knock Out, still refusing to make eye contact with anyone but the dirt. "I liked your paint job. The pinstriping. It's boring now."
"I beg your pardon?" said Knock Out, in the tone of voice that implied he wasn't begging for anything, he never begged for anything, and was genuinely offended he had to ask.
"You look boring."
Sideswipe, at least, could read the mood. "Uh, Sunny, maybe we should-"
"Do you want to repeat that, or just apologize?" Knock Out crossed his arms. The vitriol was back, bitter and sneering. "Because the rest of your day depends on what you say next."
Sunstreaker stared down his nose at Knock Out. "You're boring."
"Oh, that's rich," Knock Out reached over and tapped his claws on Sunstreaker's chest, carelessly marring the metal, "have you seen yourself in a mirror recently? I suppose a root mode as bulky as yours needs all the sleekness it can get, but honestly, did you pick your alt mode because you like scissor doors that much, or was it just the closest car when you stumbled onto the edge of the sale lot ? Really, if you wanted advice on how to make a box on wheels look trim, you should have just asked Ratchet."
Silence. Bumblebee cringed. The last time Knock Out had done something like this, Wheeljack had insulted Breakdown. He'd never seen a Wrecker so close to tears.
"Bro," Sideswipe gestured helplessly, "say something. You can't just let him drag you like that."
"Oh, don't even bother ," Knock Out stopped Sunstreaker before he could begin, "what are you planning on doing? Glowering a bit more? Maybe you'll hit me? Ooh, I'm shaking; look at the big, bad frontliner," Knock Out snorted, "please, I've seen scraplet s more intimidating than you. You think a scowl and a few guns makes you scary?" He poked Sunstreaker's arm, where his cannon was beginning to whirl to life. "I've been beaten half to death by Megatron . Do you honestly think you can intimidate me?"
That got a reaction, a sort of subtle flinch from Sunstreaker, and a full body cringe from Sideswipe. A memory file queued, and Bumblebee dismissed it. Knock Out's trial required him to submit his memory for evidence. One file stood out, from the long, dragging middle of the war, before he'd been stationed on earth. Megatron had been angry about something-his memory was fragmented, which Ratchet confirmed happened with severe trauma-and Knock Out was responsible enough to earn a beating. Bumblebee had been able to watch until Knock Out's vision fritzed out, until Megatron dropped a knee on his chest and started hitting him until he worked himself out of whatever rage he had been in, long after Knock Out had burnt out his vocalizer sobbing for mercy, before he'd had to look away.
"Sunny, come on," Sideswipe shook the hesitation out of his voice, "don't worry, I've got your back." He gave Knock Out a quick glance over. "Sunny might be fat, but at least he isn't, uh, he isn't… rusty."
Knock Out's face snapped towards Sideswipe.
Raf , Bumblebee texted desperately.
What's up?
Call an Uber. We won't make it.
Title comes from the Boston song Foreplay/Long Time.
Bumblebee, Sideswipe, and Sunstreaker are all Lamborghini Murciélagos. Knock Out is a Aston Martin DB5, which is James Bond's car from Goldfinger.
Moh's scale measures the hardness of minerals, something I forgot when I thought of the joke, but there is a correlation between hardness and density, so there's that.
Uber is a smart phone based taxi service.
Thanks for reading!