Cackling Is Fun
"Any suggestions on how to make them suffer?"
"…neon and…um…ooo! Hormones."
Miles stared fixedly at the door.
There was a rustle from behind him as his best friend and godbrother shifted behind him, also staring at the door.
"Boys, dinner's ready! Come eat!" Uncle Ron called from the kitchen. Then he yelped the boys heard Aunt Judy wack him with a spoon again.
"Ron! We are not eating until Fixit gets here!" she scolded. "Christmas is a time for family!"
"But she can't even eat any of it- ow!"
"Ronald!"
Just then, the doorknob rattled. Instantly, the two nine year olds shot to attention, leaping up to hover next to the door. Slowly, ever so slowly, agonizingly so, the handle turned…and the door creaked open to reveal…
"GAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!" the boys screamed in unison at the giant squirrel standing on the porch. They slammed the door in its face, bolting up the stairs to hide under Sam's bed.
Fixit and Judy wheezed, laughing so hard tears were running down their cheeks. Ron had laughed as well, but eventually choked it down to go check on the boys and coax them back downstairs for Christmas dinner.
"Oh Primus, I love doing that," the cybertronian gasped, leaning against the couch, the head of the squirrel resting on the ground next to her.
Judy snickered as she calmed down, rolling to sit next to her adopted younger sister. "I don't think…they'll ever get over…their fear of…squirrels if you…keep doing that…"
Fixit grinned wolfishly. "Exactly. I will forever be able to blackmail them into doing what I want."
The mother snorted, shaking her head in fond exasperation. "Come on, you guardian devil. Let's go get you out of that horrid suit."
"Aw, but I wanted to scare them some more…"
The cybertronian propped her head on her hands, a fond smile tugging at her lips as she watched her family eat. She herself had a thermos of home-made energon, courtesy of her modified personal solar power system, and would take a sip occasionally.
She didn't really need to hide the fact she only consumed a liquid in this house, but whenever Marie Callahan was invited out to business dinners, she explained her diet as a side-effect of damage from when she was a child. If she didn't follow an extremely strict diet, she could die! Hence, why she only drank from her thermos in public. She 'ate' in private.
She chuckled softly to herself as the boys unwrapped their presents from her. They were instantly in love with the neon orange spelunking gear and dull red lockpicks she had gotten them, especially since there was a coupon for a vacation to go to Yellowstone- just the three of them.
Ron rolled his eyes in exasperated disapproval as Judy joined the boys in exclaiming in delight over the gifts. Honestly, did no one follow the law in this house?
Fixit grinned at him, easily guessing what he was thinking. He said it often enough, after all…
…slaggit, she really missed her creeper and the rest of her family back home now…Ron would really disapprove of most of them!
"Now then, milads, today we will learn the fine art of cackling," Fixit proclaimed snootily, helm turned dramatically upwards.
The two boys sitting on her knees ceased their (supposedly surreptitious) slap fight, giving her their full attention.
She grinned madly. "Now, in order to produce a proper cackle, one must first-"
The Eradicon hummed to herself as she danced around her main Nebraskan warehouse to Bon Jovi's "Living on a Prayer." Totally her fav. song…right, moving on!
"Fixy!" a voice cackled from across the room, causing her to whip around into a defensive stance, servo hovering, ready to whip out her trusty hammer.
Barricade raised a brow at her quick reaction as Frenzy bounded across the room to swarm up her frame.
"CadeCade, Fritz! Hey, how ya doing!?" she exclaimed happily, relaxing as the tiny silver mech amused himself by climbing all over her.
"Don't call me that," the beat-up cop car grumbled as he walked over.
"CadeCade grumpygrump," Frenzy informed Fixit sagely, nodding his helm. "Whitey makes him an old fart!"
Fixit suppressed the urge to laugh at the murderous scowl on Barricade's face, instead nodding her helm along with the little mech on her shoulder. "Ah, yes, the whitey makes many an old fart," she said solemnly.
"You do realize the pair of you look like some of those stupid bobblehead things, right?" he huffed, gingerly settling down on the bright blue stool Fixit pointed out to him.
"Yup!" they said cheerfully in unison, continuing to bob their helms as Fixit moved to scan the cruiser.
He snorted, watching the Eradicon's moves carefully, but he wasn't as paranoid as he had been. They had known each other for around a year now, and while the Decepticons still didn't trust her very much, she was their only source of medical aid. It was very rare that any of the pair's injuries (although it was usually Barricade that was injured) came from a legitimate fight- Barricade was, apparently, completely horrible at driving in the snow.
Fixit had suggested time and again that he get proper equipment for snowy weather if he continued to insist on driving in it, but the mech's stubborn sense of pride kept getting in the way. He was a mighty Decepticon warrior, slaggit! He refused to be beaten by mere hydrogen!
(And that was pretty much a direct quote, too.)
"So, are we finally going to get proper equipment, or are we going to continue to be a stubborn, aft-helmed glitch?" she inquired mildly, finally ceasing her helm's movement.
Frenzy started cackling again as he climbed the walls of the warehouse, exploring. Barricade huffed, turning his helm to avoid her optics.
Wait…was he…?
The cop car mumbled something she didn't catch, being too busy attempting not to break into outright laughter as the mech flushed in embarrassment.
"S-sorry, what was that?"
He glared at the hidden amusement in her voice, but his optics quickly slid back to his pedes.
"…where do you buy the proper equipment."
"He's seen the error of his ways! Cry Hallelujah!" Fixit proclaimed, throwing her arms into the air and accidentally tossing her wrench behind her. "Oops."
Abruptly, Handel's Hallelujah Chorus began blaring out of the speakers, nearly deafening the two of them before they shut off their audios.
:Oh look, Fritz found my extremely expensive sound system. Joy.: she commented over the comm as she moved to a box nearby.
Barricade scowled at the walls as the vibrations from the loud music rumbled softly through their frames. Luckily, he was so focused on scowling that he completely missed Fixit's shivers at the vibrations. :Little slagger'll be lucky if I don't offline him outright,: he fumed.
Hastily, Fixit accessed her remote control and shut off the music before it could work her up so much her cooling fans kicked in. That would just be embarrassing.
"Sure, CadeCade. Whatever you say," she said outloud, walking back over with her servos full of snow gear. "Here, for you!"
He looked taken aback as she dumped the entire lot into his lap, Frenzy reappearing on his shoulder to stare with him. "Wha-?"
"I got it all after the second time you crashed," she explained absently, dusting off her servos and getting right back to work. "If you hadn't willingly taken it today, I would've welded it to your aft before I let you leave."
"W-w-why?" Frenzy looked up at her, shuttering his optics rapidly as he fidgeted. Barricade was watching her with an unreadable look in his optics.
"Besides the fact I'm tired of always fixing you two up for a stupid mistake you refuse to learn from?" she said dryly, crouching as she moved to the cruiser's knee. "I consider you two friends, even if you don't consider me one. And I don't expect you to. You are Decepticons, after all. Rarr, look at us, we're big baddies that kick aft. Pfft, friends? We don't need friends, only weaklings need friends."
The two partners shared a glance as the normally irrepressibly bubbly mech's tone gained a bitter, knowing edge, but they didn't press. Doing so would likely result in Fixit methodically disassembling and then reassembling their limbs again, like had happened the only other time they had actually angered the mech.
The Eradicon clapped her servos together as she stood up. "Right, all finished, you can go now! And watch out for those killer squirrels, CadeCade!"
Frenzy burst out laughing as Barricade snarled, grabbing his partner and stalking away in an attempt to retain at least some of his dignity.
"D'aww, look at the cute little ruffled kitty kat…" Fixit cooed after him, ducking the piece of scrap thrown her way before the cruiser took off into the softly falling snow.
A/N: And now that the necessary background details have been put in, we can finally get to some of the good stuff!
This is also the last prewritten chapter, and with school starting back up, updates are probably going to slow down.
It all depends on how hyper Fixit is, though...