Title: Car Wash
Content: car washing, wet bodies, and tactile overloads
Characters: Sam, Mikaela, Bumblebee, Sideswipe, Ratchet, Ironhide, Optimus
Prompt: Challenge: make the unsexy sexy. Choose an aspect of TFs that you don't think of as particularly sexy - not something you actively dislike, but something that you haven't given much thought to before. Now, write it like it's the hottest thing your character(s) can imagine. These prompts were for the week of April 14-20, 2012 and each one is only allowed 120 minutes for writing, editing and posting.
Notes: Written for prompt #1 at lj user="tf_speedwriting". Yes, I know there are errors in the parts of the vehicles. I'm sorry. My brain is failing me.
Sam looked at Bumblebee as they drove away from the latest clash with the Decepticons. He looked behind him. Ratchet, Sideswipe, Ironhide, and Optimus were trailing them, and they were as dirty as Bee, with streaks and black marks marring their paint.
"Hey, Bee, what do you guys think of a car wash?" Sam asked, turning and dropping back into the seat. He looked over at Mikaela, who had a wide grin on her face. "What do you say, Mik?"
"I'd love to get my hands on these guys and clean them up." Mikaela purred.
"Not to mention, getting clean ourselves," Sam said, looking down at himself.
"Right, that, too," Mikaela agreed. She opened Bee's glove box and pulled out a credit card. "I know a wash that will accommodate Optimus AND takes credit cards. Do it yourself, too."
"Perfect," Sam said.
Mikaela gave Bee instructions on how to get to the car wash, and soon, they were there. Sam stepped out of Bumblebee and looked around. The car wash was on a side street, away from the main road, and it was surrounded by small offices and the back of a large grocery store and strip mall. It was also empty.
"This place got cut off when they build that," Mikaela said, pointing at the low office building in front of the car wash, "and a lot of people don't know that it's here. I like bringing my machines here to clean, because I can take my time and nobody's honking at me or yelling because I take too long."
"Sweet," Sam commented. "OK, let's get these guys clean."
Bumblebee was first, of course, and the others parked themselves on the street to wait their turns. Sam and Mikaela worked as a team. Mikaela used the wand to spray a pre-treatment over Bee, then Sam used the other wand to put soap on Bee's tires. Then it was Mikaela's turn again, using the wand to spray soapy water over Bee, starting at the roof and working around him, gradually circling lower as she walked around him. Then Sam used the foaming brush to really work out the remaining gritty areas, being careful to not rub too hard and damage Bumblebee's plating. They had fun, too, spraying each other with the soapy water and Sam felt he'd won when he managed to get the brush and bring it down Mikaela's back. She laughed and switched the wand to rinse, then sprayed him thoroughly before turning it on Bumblebee and rinsing all the soap off him.
Dripping with water, Bee pulled forward and Ratchet pulled into the bay next. Sam popped open Ratchet's doors and pulled a stack of terry cloth towels out, handing them to Mikaela, who carried them out to Bee to dry him off while Sam started the process on Ratchet.
Ratchet, being taller, was harder to clean. Fortunately, he also had a lot of parts sticking out, and Sam used those to clamber on top of the modified Hummer frame. Mikaela came over and handed the wand up to him, and he sprayed as much as he could from atop Ratchet.
Mikaela finished drying Bee and used the wand to finish up Ratchet's frame, then handed the foaming brush up to Sam, who scrubbed at the huge black mark on Ratchet's top from where he'd take a shot when he was in mech form. Ratchet grumbled and shifted beneath him, so Sam changed to using his hands to rub at the marks, using the soap from the brush to get the grit out. He squeezed a lot of soap out and handed the brush down to Mikaela, who used it along Ratchet's sides while Sam was working on Ratchet's top. Then they got the wand and turned it to rinse, Sam working from the top and getting as much as he could from up there before handing the wand down to Mikaela. She got an evil grin on her face, and as Sam was climbing down from Ratchet, being very careful where he put his feet so he didn't slip, she came around, waving the wand back and forth, rinsing the soap off, and timing it just right so that Sam got a blast of water right down his front. He fell off Ratchet and Mikaela covered her mouth.
"Sorry, Sam!"
He laughed up at her, shaking his head, "Not as sorry as you're going to be!" He rushed toward her and she brought the wand around, pulling the trigger and spraying him further. That didn't deter him, though, and he soon wrestled the wand away from her and sprayed her in retaliation before finishing Ratchet's frame.
Dripping wet, laughing, they continued. Sam dried Ratchet while Mikaela cleaned Sideswipe. Fortunately, Sides was low, because they finished at about the same time, and Sam dried Sideswipe, too, while Mikaela began working on Ironhide. When Sam finished with Sides, he came over to help Mikaela. Again, Ironhide was so tall they had to climb into the bed of his truck form to clean the roof of his truck cab. It also made getting the hood easier, squirting from the top, and Mikaela made sure to use the foaming brush on his exhaust stacks, shining them up and getting all the dirt free before rinsing everything off. She stayed in Ironhide's bed while he pulled forward and Optimus took his place.
He wouldn't fit, so Sam pulled the credit card out and moved him to the unroofed bay at the very end of the car wash.
Optimus was a lot harder to climb around than either Ratchet or Ironhide, but Sam persevered. He climbed on the back board, using the chains hanging back there to pull himself up and spray the top of Optimus' cab. The running boards were used to give him and Mikaela the height they needed to clean Optimus' hood. Sam stood on the rear of the truck to wash around the fifth wheel and rear fenders. He looked over and yelled,
"Ratchet! You'll need to grease him up after this!"
The ambulance gave a beep of his horn in acknowledgement and Sam returned his attention to getting Optimus clean. When they were finally done, Mikaela brought over the remaining towels and they dried him off, Sam climbing up again to dry the cab's roof while Mikaela climbed up onto the fenders to dry Optimus' hood and air intakes. They carefully dried all the chrome of his grill and front bumper, his steps and fuel tanks. Once they were done, they gathered all the towels and climbed back into Bumblebee for the ride home.
The odd convoy threaded through the streets until they reached Sam's house, where Bumblebee let the two humans out. Sam took all the towels, intending to wash them, and waved good-bye. Mikaela gave her own wave and walked with Sam up to the house. She was spending the night in the guest room, something Sam had arranged with his mother just a few minutes before, when Bee told them he had something he needed to do with the other Autobots.
After seeing the two safely inside, Bee softly beeped his horn and pulled out again, followed by the rest of the Autobots. They drove until they reached their base, an old Quonset hut on the edge of Nellis AFB, and pulled in.
They all sat silently until the door rattled closed behind them, then they fell into their mech forms as quickly as they could. Ratchet delved his hands into Ironhide's frame as Ironhide reached for Optimus, while Sideswipe and Bumblebee tangled themselves together. A few twitches of fingers and they were all writhing in overload on the floor, blue lightning jumping from one to the other.
"I never knew such small beings could raise so much charge just by washing us," Ironhide groaned.
"Do they know?" Ratchet wondered.
"No, they don't," Bumblebee answered.
"Nor should they," Optimus said quietly, "I believe it would be, ah, TMI."
"When can we have them do it again, though?" Sideswipe wondered.
Grins broke out on every face.
"Soon," Ratchet proclaimed, "we should have them do that again very soon."
The end!
Final note: So, I tend to think of the movie guys especially in mech form, and don't often think about their vehicle forms. Given the prompt, I thought it would be fun to explore how the Autobots would respond to a car wash in vehicle form.