Title: Caught in Traffic (Pt. 3?)

Warnings: Creating a background. Deal with it.

Rating: G

Continuity: Brave Police J-Decker

Characters: Gunmax, Dumpson, Brave Police

Disclaimer: The theatre doesn't own the script or actors, nor does it make a profit from the play.

Motivation (Prompt): Yuuta - appreciation


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"They had questions without answers."

[* * * * *]


Dumpson admitted that Shadowmaru had a point. Deckerd, too. Gunmax was the most irritating mecha this side of the law, but he'd turned the tide of battle more than once. The Motorcycle Detective was a strong fighter and an even stronger weapon when transformed into his Max Cannon Mode. Dumpson could recognize the worth of that.

He didn't protest the plan. Bringing Gunmax over to the Brave Police should have been simple, but men like Vice-Commissioner Azuma seemed to specialize in complicating simple things. It was apparently up to the Decker Room to do it themselves, because the humans were mired in politics. Although Shadowmaru stealing all of the Highway Patrolman's pens seemed petty even for inter-office warfare. It'd been an experiment in seeing what it'd take to get Gunmax to use his desk in the Decker Room instead of the Highway Patrol building, but the tactic seemed to only result in Gunmax producing office supplies out of every orifice imaginable. Also improbable, because, well, a stapler? Dumpson was still trying to figure out where the stapler had come from, and he'd been standing right next to the green mecha when Gunmax had produced it.

Deckerd remarked on the plethora of hidden pens after Shadowmaru had casually swiped about fifteen more that'd surfaced after the ninja's initial office supply raid. The green mecha had finally caught on and refused to loan his deskmate any more after the first five were never returned, but Shadowmaru was good at 'borrowing.' He had a whole locked drawer in his desk full of things he'd found that people didn't even knew they'd lost, too. The evidence lab regularly sorted through it for relevant items after suspects were in custody.

Gunmax didn't know about the drawer - yet - but he knew enough to keep a death grip on his current pen. "Always have some on you, boy scout, Gunmax advised, keeping his head angled enough to watch the ninja innocently writing his own reports opposite him. Shadowmaru seemed oblivious to the amount of visored suspicion glaring in his direction. "Ever had to write with a human-sized pen?"

As one, all the Braves looked to the front of the room. Yuuta's desk was surprisingly tidy considering the age of its owner, but there were still a couple pens on one corner. Dumpson looked down at his hand, imagining his large fingers trying to the close on the tiny items. He might be able to do it. Theoretically, if he could wedge the friction pads on his fingertips against the stick of plastic just right, he could write. Er, maybe.

He looked up and saw the others eying their own hands as if sizing up the task. They came up a bit short. Shadowmaru looked thoughtful as he turned his hand this way and that, glancing between Yuuta's pens and his current report, and Drill Boy had extended his cockpit's internal arm to stare at speculatively.

"No?" Deckerd ventured at last, tone asking the question none of them would ask.

Gunmax scowled faintly at his report as he wrote, optics and furrowed brow concealed behind his visor. Wrote? Scribbled, more like. Dumpson hated Gunmax's penmanship. How could such an expression of concentration produce a report that looked like a toddler had written it? Deckerd and Power Joe both wrote with the boxy perfection of grade school children worried about being graded on their handwriting, and Drill Boy's reports suffered from a surfeit of doodles in the margins, but McCrane's reports looked like art. Every time Dumpson saw Gunmax's sloppy scrawl, he wanted to shove the Motorcycle Detective at McCrane in hopes that some of the calligraphy skills would rub off.

"I wouldn't recommend it," the green mecha said, abruptly pushing his chair back to stand and slap the report down on Deckerd's desk. Deckerd jumped in his seat, startled, and Gunmax gave him a cocky grin. It had a weirdly bitter edge to it. "Especially when you need to write your first traffic ticket." The bitterness deepened, and Dumpson's puzzlement with it, because Deckerd's expression had taken on a just-as-weird hint of sympathy. The idea of Gunmax trying to use a human-sized pen to write his first traffic ticket was enough to make the dumptruck smile, but the two mecha, green and blue, seemed to be having a unvoiced conversation beneath the words.

"With your brand new partner standing there evaluating your performance the whole time," Gunmax almost off-handedly added as he turned away from the Brave Detective. "Not cool." Deckerd's optics widened. Dumpson glanced to the Build Team only to see them exchanging a look as confused as he felt, but the moment was over by the time they turned back. Gunmax had retreated to his desk to grab his Magnum off the top, and he tossed the room as a whole a salute as he holstered it and sauntered toward the door. "See ya, losers."

Shadowmaru waited until the door closed before opening his desk drawer and counting the new stash of stolen pens. Dumpson grinned when McCrane turned his head away to hide the amused crinkle around his optics. The image of the Ninja Detective gleefully gathering pens like a magpie finding shiny things was as cute as Drill Boy jigging at the loading dock waiting for a delivery of a new crate of weaponized soccer balls. "This is going to take more effort than I thought," the purple mecha said after a few minutes of gloating over his hoard.

"It won't work," Power Joe predicted. He pointed at the clock on his desk, frowning. "He only stayed until the shift finished. Taking his stuff is only going to make him even more of insufferable jerk when he's here, not make him be here more often." And make them not want him there even less, but he didn't say that. They were all thinking it, but he didn't say it.

"The Highway Patrol budget for the BP project isn't nearly the size of our department's. They won't buy him any more. If our dear BP-601 doesn't want to use human pens, he'll have to come calling more often in order to use ours," the ninja said softly, and helms turned as that sank in.

Drill Boy looked a bit confused, but budgeting wasn't something that the rest of the department had involved him in. The other Braves knew exactly how much their ammunition and maintenance cost every time they were assigned a case. What they didn't know was filled in down to the last yen by Vice-Commissioner Azuma. Commissioner Saejima had never put a cap on their expenditures, but Deckerd had held several low-voiced budget meetings about that fact with him. The gist of those meetings had then been passed on to the other Braves in this very room while Drill Boy and Yuuta were occupied elsewhere. Just because the cap didn't exist didn't mean it wouldn't some day. The goal was to keep their costs as low as possible to keep their budget free for when they really, really needed the money.

Like, say, when Chief Engineer Toudou had to make a massive parts purchase because one of the BP units got totaled in battle. Humans worried about the money for hospital bills. The Braves worried that they'd be left in pieces because gears and hydraulic fluid were too expensive to buy this month.

Dumpson exchanged another speaking look with Power Joe and McCrane. Another clue in the Great Gunmax Mystery had just slotted into place. Despite himself, Dumpson couldn't help but feel a little sorry for the obnoxious jackass. Other cops got health insurance and benefits supplied by the municipal government, as well as regular duty-related supplies paid for by their divisions. What kind of budget stipulations did Gunmax have, separated from the actual Brave Police department as he was? Pens were a minor expense, comparatively, but it wasn't like the BP units could just run out to the store and buy some on their own. Everything they used to work had to be specially made for their size, and the money certainly wasn't under their control. Police Headquarters was their station, not their home, and they earned no salary. Everything they received for work or - rarely - play came through the Committee. Their requests for more pens were allowed according to a Committee vote, but they did have an entire department budget to draw on.

Gunmax didn't. Gunmax needed new pens because Shadowmaru had stolen all his pens. The Decker Room had acquisition forms to at least fill out and file until the Committee listened to them, but Gunmax didn't have their forms or their budget. He didn't have the power over his own job, or even his own life, to buy new pens himself.

None of them did. That was nothing new. Suddenly, however, that fact of their lives wasn't so small or easy to ignore. Usually, it was just there, part of their existence, but when it got shoved in their faces like this…

McCrane's mouth tightened. Power Joe's hands drew into fists. Dumpson consciously stopped his foot from tapping on the floor, knowing it was a bad habit that gave his mood away. Drill Boy was glancing between the other Build Team members anxiously, torn between automatically chattering to dispel the tension or being serious and asking what everyone was looking glum about. Deckerd had turned his head toward Yuuta's desk, hiding his expression, but the set of his shoulders wasn't happy. Shadowmaru's subdued gloating over his stolen hoard had come to a dead stop.

They dropped the topic, on the surface because they didn't want to distress Drill Boy, but mostly because there wasn't anything they could do. Rubbing Gunmax's face in his lack of control wasn't a nice move, but inter-departmental warfare wasn't about nice. It was about getting their rogue BP unit back where he belonged, no matter what strings Highway Patrol pulled with Vice-Commissioner Azuma. Dumpson knew it. It bothered him immensely, because police work shouldn't have that uncomfortable shade of grey around it, but still. The plan was sound, even if the tactics made his hoses knot inside his chest.

The knot eased a little when the plan seemed to start working. Oh, not right away. Shadowmaru slowly whittled away at Gunmax's cache of pens, but the green mecha responded by squirreling away errant pens from the other Braves' desks when no one was looking. That ended when Power Joe called upon his league of primary school friends to personalize the Brave Police department's pens, which is how Dumpson ended up with pens that had his name spelled out in glitter stickers. That wasn't so bad. Kind of cute, although he'd never hear the end of it the next time Miss Ayako saw his desk.

He got off lighter than Shadowmaru, however, who took one look at the adorable little bat wings Emily had carefully glued onto the ends of all his pens, froze into a stricken statue, and promptly vanished for days. That had been…yeah. Power Joe had lied his aft off to Emily about accidentally losing Shadowmaru's special pens during a case, and she'd still been heartbroken that all her hard work had gone to waste. Power Joe had brought her all of Gunmax's 'borrowed' pens and a whole pack of neon-colored pipe cleaners to make up for it, and now Shadowmaru's pens all sported wire stick-figure sculptures in whacky colors.

Of course, McCrane now had to write reports with his fingers painstakingly placed around the dozens of paper origami tigers and plushie pandas glued to his pens. It made it easy to see when Gunmax used his pens, however. It was easier for all of them. Once all their pens were clearly marked as 'theirs', it became really easy to see when the Motorcycle Detective sneaked away with a handful. Unmarked pens vanishing into Gunmax's hands? Easy to miss. A handful of glittery-stickered pens spelling "I Brake For Reporters" and "I (heart) Yuuta"? Not so easy to overlook.

Smooshed decorations and teethmarks betrayed unlawful usage within the Decker Room, as well as outright theft. Gunmax had issues with sticking things other than his own foot in his mouth. Drill Boy complained bitterly about the teethmarks on his soccer-ball end-nubbed pens. McCrane just mildly asked Power Joe to request a few more paper tigers from Masaki to replace the mangled ones on his pens. That made the Motorcycle Detective squirm in his chair, however much he tried to look like he was busy reading at the time, and two days later, awkwardly-folded origami began appearing on McCrane's desk like the world's most backward apology.

Dumpson deliberately dropped them into the wastepaper basket whenever he was the first one in the Decker Room in the mornings. He didn't want Gunmax being around his team anymore than necessary, and stupid little paper animals were no substitute for a proper apology. McCrane had too soft a heart. He'd let the jerk get away with his jerk behavior if Dumpson didn't intervene.

The whole situation left Gunmax with no choice but to man up and ask Deckerd for a box of pens of his own. Okay, so less of 'ask' and more like 'demand'. The green mecha was painfully blunt most days, but it'd taken him a good forty minutes to finally get around to anything that sounded even vaguely like a direct request for some pens. The Braves' fearless leader had smiled at all the excuses and justifications and hints, but he'd agreed to submit the paperwork for new pens - after laying down the rule that they didn't leave the Decker Room, as they were BP department property.

One thing in Gunmax's favor was that he was honest to a fault. Offensively frank, outrageous, and rude, but honest. He'd bitched and moaned about it, but in the end, he'd agreed to Deckerd's terms. The other Braves had practically strained their shoulders patting each other on the back when Gunmax very reluctantly began bringing in his Highway Patrol reports to work on in the Decker Room.

Once decorated by Power Joe's friends, Gunmax would have been hard-pressed to smuggle the pens out, anyway. The kids didn't know Gunmax at all, so they'd erred on the side of sparkly and just dunked the pens in loose glitter. Gunmax's hands sparkled after using them to write. It'd irritated the macho Highway Patrolman at first, but then he'd apparently started taking a perverse joy in leaving shiny handprints in bizarre areas. Like McCrane's hip, Drill Boy's head, Deckerd's aft, and the ceiling. Nobody knew how Gunmax had even gotten up there, but Shadowmaru had taken it as a personal insult, as he'd been on clean-up duty that day.

The handprints, as most things about Gunmax did, annoyed Dumpson. The green mecha just got on his nerves. Yes, they'd met under less than ideal circumstances. Yes, the Highway Patrolman had stabilized considerably in the last month. He still didn't think Gunmax had the right mindset for a cop. Using the Boss as a human shield had been bad enough, but blowing off his Brave Police duties regularly set Dumpson's teeth on edge. The Vice-Commissioner was causing inter-departmental problems, yeah, headquarters politics, okay, but Gunmax wasn't helping matters with his attitude problems. It kind of helped knowing that all the difficulties weren't all his fault, but it didn't mean Dumpson liked him any better.

Especially when the green idiot stopped by his desk one day and stated, "You smell."

"What?" The truck reared back in his seat and gaped, too taken aback to properly react for a moment.

The white helmet tipped to one side, and Gunmax's perpetual smirk widened. The Motorcycle Detective actually leaned closer and sniffed, which was crass of him. Their scent modules were located on the roof of their mouths; their noses didn't even have nostrils to draw in air. "Diesel. You smell like diesel. The brat and the doggie stink to the airport and back of kerosene, but they're better about it. You three," his hand waved at the cluster of desks where the three original Build Team members sat, "just reek."

"It's jet fuel, not kerosene," Dumpson's mouth answered on automatic. "Whaddya mean I - we do not!"

"Teh." Gunmax straightened up, making the bulkier mech suddenly aware that he'd recoiled before the invasion of his personal space. Dumpson sat up with an angry scowl, then stood up to use whatever height advantage he could. Dealing with Gunmax, you had to break out every weapon available. The slightly shorter mecha folded his arms and stuck out a hip, arrogance written in every line of his body. The refusal to so much as acknowledge Dumpson's superior looming capabilities made him even more annoying. "You do."

It was juvenile, and yet he still couldn't stop the words even as he thought that. "Do not!"

By the smirk's width, the green mech was congratulating himself on said juvenile retort. Yeah, that's right, sink to his level, Dumpson. "Yeah, y'do."

"Do no - stop that." It wasn't clear if Dumpson was referring to the bad English or the stupid argument. "And what would you know, anyway!"

A delighted gleam light the partially-obscured optics behind that damn visor, and the truck realized he'd just walked straight into a verbal trap. "I'm a detective," Gunmax said, wounded dignity and horrid evil smirk blooming out from him in smug waves. "I investigate things. There was a stench, and I investigated to discover the source. I thought you, as a fellow detective, might want to know it's all you." That hip popped further out, as if all that attitude weighed heavy upon him. "Hit the car wash, huh?"

"You bastard," Dumpson started, and Power Joe had rocketed to his feet beside him, and it was going to get ugly real quick -

"Are you still planning on visiting Miss Ayako tonight, Dumpson?" McCrane asked. Although his voice was level and cut through Dumpson's rage and Power Joe's wordless burst of angry sound, the glare the crane leveled on Gunmax was anything but calm.

Bewildered, Dumpson blinked at his team leader. "Uh…yeah?"

"I believe," McCrane said, "that Gunmax was merely trying to…suggest," he said the word distastefully, and Gunmax's already-fading smug grin congealed under the chill blast of trademarked McCrane Brand Disapproval, "that humans are not as tolerant of the scent of diesel as we are. Perhaps you should wash your tires after fueling up tonight, as the rubber tends to collect petrol and oil off the fueling station floor?"

This was a real suggestion, not an insult wrapped around one, and Dumpson was abruptly aware of - scent.

Air traveled naturally over his tongue, funneling up to the scent modules on the roof of his mouth, and the receptors broke down the air for analysis. Technically, there was nothing wrong with the air in the Decker Room. It had the same levels of chemicals present that much of the city air did, but there were certain things present in larger amounts. Carbon emissions, of course, because the Brave Police were robots that ran their engines off of petroleum products, and petroleum itself evaporated into a gaseous state that clung in a thick scent to all of them. Which didn't mean much to a regular robot, but what slammed head-on into Dumpson's Yuuta-given heart was the fact that he had a preference for how air should smell, and this? This room didn't smell how he preferred.

He preferred the light scent of the ocean, the dusty scent of old newspapers and books, and ginkgo biloba facial crème. Nowhere in the Decker Room, or the maintenance bay, or anywhere where robots should be, had he gotten that preference. He probably shouldn't even have a preference, not like that, because he was guiltily aware of just why he preferred those scents.

He'd just…never thought about it before.

"Um," Power Joe said from beside him, obviously having run the same analysis. "What do I smell like?"

"Bad kung fu movies," Gunmax said promptly, then flinched slightly as the McCrane Brand Disapproval rating in the Decker Room went up. Smooth move, asshole. "Candy and diesel," he finished in a more subdued tone, and that hip wasn't sticking out quite so much. He had some strange form of respect for McCrane, Dumpson remembered. He respected the crane's professionalism or something. "You smell like diesel and green tea," the green mecha said to McCrane like a peace offering.

The Build Team leader inclined his head, graciously accepting the implied apology. "Colonel Seia spilled a mug of her tea on my upholstery last week. I haven't asked the maintenance crews to clean my seats yet. It's hardly an urgent issue."

"Masaki," Power Joe sighed as he dug through his cab. Now that he was aware of it, Dumpson could smell the sweet tang of sugar hovering about the power shovel, and Power Joe was on the hunt for the source. Somewhere hidden in his small driver's cab, one of his school children friends had apparently lost a piece of candy. "I told them not to eat inside me."

Dumpson frowned thunderously, unwilling to let Gunmax's general smart-assery get a free pass. So the bastard had a point about the smell. Tact was a requirement for a policeman! He turned his head to inhale deeply of the air around the green mecha, intending on making a comment of his own.

Except that chemical analysis yielded…huh. That was odd.

The invasion of the cocky robot's personal space got an annoyed glare that almost covered Gunmax's defensive posture. Apparently McCrane's application of Verbal Smackdown had been super effective. "What?" Gunmax snapped.

"You don't stink," the dumptruck said, doing his level best to match the green mecha's offensively blunt language. "What'd you do, crawl through a carwash before walking in here?" That was a mental image he wanted to see in reality, actually. How did the Highway Patrolman keep so clean without a vehicle transformation? So far as Dumpson knew, Gunmax didn't even know where the BP maintenance bay was, much less ever used the attached washracks. No one had ever managed to collar the rebel unit long enough for a formal tour of the department building to show him where they were.

He casually reached down and jotted a note to himself about that with his sticker bedecked pen. Not just the tour part - did they even have Magnum ammunition in the lock-up? - but the surrounding questions that brought up. Shadowmaru really needed to track down where exactly Gunmax's repair cradle was stowed. There were too many questions about his basic maintenance going unanswered.

"As if," Gunmax scoffed in the meantime. "I don't reek for the same reason blue boy doesn't."

Oh, gods, more bad English. They really needed a translator program, at this rate. Contextually, the first two (One? Three? Who knew, with English) words were probably an exclamation of disbelief. Blue was the color blue, at least Dumpson thought that sounded familiar, and boy…um, no, he didn't remember what that one meant. But the only blue mecha in the Brave Police was Deckerd, and Gunmax did tend to assign random English slang words to Deckerd. Dumpson couldn't tell if it was a sign of affection or contempt.

In any case, Gunmax was probably referring to Deckerd. "You both run on unleaded?" Power Joe hazarded a guess.

"No, because I'm only getting whiffs of fumes." Dumpson's frown deepened, but thought instead of disapproval was the source this time. Hmm, a puzzle. "Even unleaded petroleum registers higher than this." He leaned further forward and took another gulp of air, but he wasn't even thinking about how he was crowding Gunmax.

Until the green mecha unfolded his arms and put both hand on his shoulders to shove him away. "Hey, back off. I'm not an air freshener!" The trim hips shifted sidelong, and one hand rested on a hip as Gunmax's brattitude climbed back into pre-McCrane heights. The other hand pointed right between Dumpson's optics as if warding him away. "I don't want to smell like diesel, Wrestlemania."

That sounded like it referred to him. Great. Now he had an English nickname of his very own. He was going to have to look that up later, because it was probably something insulting. "I don't smell," Dumpson grumbled, on the defensive and knowing it because, yeah, he kind of did.

"You do," Gunmax insisted self-righteously. "I can't believe the Boss hasn't said something yet, but maybe he's just too damn nice to say anything about how his sisters likely have to soak all his clothes in grease cutter just to get the reek out."

That gave the Build Team pause.

Did Yuuta really go home smelling like diesel? That wasn't good. Mechanics did it all the time, but Yuuta was a kid. Children were less tolerant to the side effects of extended exposure to gasoline fumes. It might not do permanent damage, but a search of the health resources databank spit up all kinds of side effects from concentrated petroleum byproducts. The levels in the Decker Room weren't up to that level, but nobody had specifically been paying attention to it all this time. While the maintenance bay had huge vent fans to circulate air, the Decker Room had no direct access to outside the building. Humans died from being shut into poorly ventilated rooms with running cars because of carbon dioxide levels!

Also, his sisters were responsible for Yuuta's laundry, and Dumpson would feel absolutely awful if they were forced to wash holes in Yuuta's favorite shirts. They were already secondhand clothes from his sisters, but it was some kind of proud Tomonaga tradition that hand-me-downs were a sign of a thrifty, thriving family. Plus, unlike Power Joe, Dumpson and McCrane knew that sometimes the BP units' Super A.I. naivety - well, didn't precisely embarrass Yuuta, but. Well. Showing up to school smelling like a gas station employee probably wasn't doing him any favors in the classroom.

Even McCrane looked down, away from Gunmax. Power Joe had renewed his search for the candy in his cab, but the way he avoided even glancing up at the slim Highway Patrolman gave away that he was searching as an excuse to not have to reply to the challenge in Gunmax's words. Only Dumpson met the visored gaze squarely, but the red mecha's bulldog tenacity was the sole reason for that courage. He looked, but he couldn't say anything.

Gunmax had them dead to rights, and he had to know it.

Dumpson expected a mocking comment on their sudden guilt, or a snide dig at how they'd accidentally endangered their boss for months without even a thought for his safety. Chemical byproducts of their own bodies, betrayed by scent of all things, and the sonnuva doublebot had them by the short wires because the Build Team nursed a secret not even Deckerd knew about. They'd gone through great pains to make sure Drill Boy never even suspected.

Dumpson had a secret he knew only the other two original Build Team members knew and shared, and that was why they looked away from Gunmax in silent shame. Back when they'd first tried to form Build Tiger, they'd failed. Deckerd's advice had been to keep calm and trust in - love - Yuuta. The Boss. The fourth grader who did his serious best to step into a policeman's shoes every day and fight for them in the adult-level HQ politics he barely understood and could do so painfully little to change. The kid who loved them so fiercely he'd hurl himself in front of them no matter if the foe was forty centimeters or forty meters tall. If anyone deserved their love, respect, and total trust, it was Yuuta. Deckerd had told them to trust that child, because the child trusted them, and they'd failed.

They'd failed to form Build Tiger, yes, but the part that made Dumpson cringe behind his glower even now was that they'd failed to trust Yuuta. They'd failed to love him enough.

Dumpson knew that, because there were people who the Build Team did love enough to trust. They'd formed Build Tiger in the end, and it wasn't because of or for Yuuta. They'd gone out and found other people to love that much. Good people: Power Joe's grade school friends, McCrane's Defense colonel, Dumpson's very own reporter. People who chose to stand by them in turn, and that was great. No denying that! Miss Ayako was a baffling individual, and Dumpson couldn't even put a name to what she provoked in him, but she was a good person. None of the Build Team could be ashamed of their friends. They were shy about a couple of those friends being…maybe…something more than just platonic friends, but ashamed? Never.

But they'd failed to return the infinitely precious emotion offered to them, and their lack had been illustrated in a pitilessly stark way. There was no making up for that. That, they were ashamed of.

Now Gunmax had pointed out yet another way they'd failed the Boss, and they had no defense. Once more, they'd come up short when it counted. Dumpson expected the Highway Patrolman's next selection of abrasive remarks to rasp their consciences raw, and even though he braced for it, part of him waited to welcome the sting. McCrane would disapprove, Power Joe would go for the green mecha's throat, and Dumpson would get stuck in the irritating role of restraining the power shovel despite wanting to throw a few punches of his own. But deep down in the dark places of his Super A.I. where he'd tucked his team's secret, Dumpson wanted the penance of dealing with Gunmax's bluntness. Nuts and bolts if they didn't deserved to be picked on a bit over this. The green mecha didn't know the secret source of the Build Team's soreness on any topic related to Yuuta, but he'd surely zero in on anything that got a reaction from them.

Instead of a cocky grin and sharp words, however, Dumpson was surprised to find a flask of gasoline shoved in his direction. So surprised, in fact, that he fumbled it, and only Gunmax's quick reflexes kept it from falling to the floor. "Hey!"

"Jesus Christ, why do I even bother," Gunmax grumbled, other hand still perched on his hip as he used the other to poke the bulkier mecha in the chest with the flask until Dumpson finally got a grip on it. "Look, this isn't a difficult concept. Your tires are picking up the worst of it from the refueling station, because it's got years' worth of spilt oil tracked into the concrete. The other half's probably from driving on asphalt, but it's not like any of you are tidy, y'know?" McCrane's face tightened, and Dumpson scowled, but they were listening. The Motorcycle Detective was a jerk and dedicated to giving them a hard time, but the optics half-hidden behind the dark visor were unexpectedly serious. Hard though it was to remember, behind the asshole façade lurked someone who Yuuta clung to and Deckerd smiled at. Occasionally, that hidden heart got through - despite Gunmax's best efforts at stifling it. "You spill drips of diesel out of your intakes while fueling. I know." Gunmax's nose crinkled, which sounded stupid for a robot but was an entirely human expression. "I smell it every time you come back from refueling. So just stop it."

Power Joe had bristled initially, but he subsided out of sheer puzzlement when the green mecha poked at the flask again. "Stop using diesel?" he asked, confused. "But we run on diesel!"

They all had optics. It was physically impossible for them to roll them. Yet, somehow, despite the visor and everything, Gunmax managed to convey that he'd rolled his optics. "Stop using the refueling station, you complete and total used car lot reject."

Wow. Power Joe's English nickname was a heckuva lot longer than Deckerd's or Dumpson's. It didn't sound very flattering, either, and Dumpson didn't know enough English to even begin to know how to translate that.

The three Build Team members stared in utter confusion. Gunmax glared back. After half a minute of no response, the Highway Patrolman sighed dramatically and snatched the gasoline flask back from Dumpson's loose grip. "Fine! Geez, not like I need to top off, but if it'll get you to stop looking at me like that," he muttered as he twisted the cap off. "Watch me. Take notes if you have to. Hell, draw a picture."

Ah, sarcasm. That translated easily, at least.

Gunmax heaved another overdone sigh and - swigged from the gas flask.

The move was quick and natural, and Dumpson vaguely recognized it as something he'd seen before without really knowing what he'd been seeing. He recalled wondering what Deckerd had been doing with the gas flask at his desk, but…it had honestly never occurred to him to…huh. Half his vision suddenly overlaid with his own design schematics as he traced the intake routes for his gas tanks, and…yeah. There was an intake from his throat. They were capable of oral ingestion of fuel. Why had they never thought to - ?

Well, obviously Deckerd had, but the patrol car must have gotten the idea from Gunmax. That still didn't answer the question of why it hadn't occurred to the rest of them!

Power Joe shouldered in front of Dumpson, optics wide and fascinated. "What the - I mean," the Kung Fu Detective tried to disguise his excitement by flicking his fingers dismissively, "that's got to taste disgusting." His curiosity came through clearly, making the statement more of a question.

Gunmax grinned and took another drink. "Wouldn't you like to know." The flask swished tauntingly, filled with unleaded, and they were going to have to ask the maintenance crew to start filling flasks for them if they wanted to try fueling this way. The minute diesel flasks started appearing, however, Gunmax was going to know he won, and that just rubbed Dumpson the wrong way because they all knew he already had. Two long sips from the gas flask, and analysis of the air surrounding the green mecha showed only a tiny spike in chemical emission from the gasoline. No picking up old oil from concrete/tire contact, no spills as injector nozzles went into their external intakes; just a fast swallow, and Gunmax had refueled without the stench of gas lingering around him.

"The rest of the office used to complain about the smell," the rogue BP unit said quietly. The words were oddly hurried, as if he didn't want to say them but felt obligated to. McCrane looked up sharply, brow furrowed, but Gunmax had already turned on his heel. One hand waved over his shoulder, half goodbye to the three mecha and half a whatever gesture at the world at large. "I figured out what was wrong and fixed the problem. Question is, why didn't you?"

He strode from the Decker Room, and Dumpson knew he was returning to 'the office,' the other office, the Highway Patrol office. The office that wasn't the Decker Room and therefore was more important to him. The question was, what could they do to stop him? What could they do to change his mind?

The Build Team looked at each other, then at the gasoline flask left among the childishly-decorated pens on their desk, and there were no easy answers to be found.


[* * * * *]