Authors' note : Breakdown refuses to come out of hiding - we think being the narrator twice in a row spooked him (he's probably wondering why we took so much notice of him). So instead we'll just thank you all for your reviews, and say we're glad you're enjoying the fic. There's also a subtle shoutout in this chapter… you know who you are.


Chapter 7 : Please Drive Safely

By the time they reached their room again, the tension of the fight and the escape had drained away, leaving Breakdown exhausted. His self-repair system – thankfully humans had one – had sealed the leaks on his hand and forehead, but there was enough dried blood on his face and clothes that Motormaster ruled out taking a cab back to the motel.

So they walked the entire distance, which seemed to have tripled in length. Breakdown kept looking around in case they were being followed again – isn't there some kind of portable radar system we could get? – and Wildrider was stumbling so badly by the end of the trip that Motormaster finally picked him up and tossed him over one broad shoulder without breaking stride. Wildrider just slumped there and didn't say anything, which was even more worrying.

Even when the door of their room closed behind them, Breakdown didn't feel safe. Dead End led him into the 'racks, peeled off his ruined clothes and washed him down, carefully dabbing at his face and around the cut in his head. It didn't make much difference. The water stung when it trickled into his injuries, and Breakdown felt as if all his internal components were drawing themselves up into small cold knots.

Wrapped in three towels because he was still shivering occasionally, he plodded out and sat down on the bed so Drag Strip could take Wildrider into the 'racks. A pot of coffee had brewed by then and the television was on. It felt normal – about as normal as their lives could get at that point, Breakdown supposed.

And we're lucky, he thought. All that time they had complained and grumbled about the lack of clothes, the long distances to walk, the strange solid food… it was nothing compared to the knowledge that he and Wildrider could have died that night. Or been captured by human law enforcement.

Breakdown held a paper cup of hot coffee wrapped in paper towels and sipped while Motormaster looked him over. Finally he turned away with an unreadable expression and began looking through the wallets they had collected, making a little stack of the paper money.

"Did we get enough?" Dead End asked.

"Nine hundred and twenty," Motormaster said, thumb riffling through the stack. "Is that enough to—"

There was a knock on the door.

Coffee slopped from Breakdown's cup as his hand jolted, and he would have burned himself if not for the towel across his thighs. Wildrider and Drag Strip froze in the doorway of the washracks. Motormaster turned silently and set the money down on the bed without taking his eyes off the door.

Again someone knocked.

Dead End slid like a shadow to the other side of the door as Motormaster picked up the tire iron. Breakdown swallowed hard, his mind racing. The knife he'd found was concealed in his clothes, which were lying on the bathroom floor. I'll throw the pot of coffin at whoever breaks in as long as Dead End and Motormaster are clear—

Motormaster yanked the door open. From where he sat Breakdown couldn't see who was outside, but there was a blank silence.

"Emily!" someone shouted from outside. "It's three-ten, not three-oh-one!"

"Oh." There was a nervous chuckle from whoever stood outside. "I'm sorry, I have the wrong room." Breakdown heard quick footsteps move away. "Sorry. Didn't mean to bother you."

Motormaster said nothing, nor did he move. Dead End pushed the door shut.

Breakdown slumped in what was not so much relief as the absence of immediate fear. Fuel was still hammering through his system when Motormaster turned and set down the tire iron.

Wildrider came to sit beside Breakdown, leaning tiredly against him, but Motormaster only moved away from the door when the television started to show a news broadcast about a gang-related altercation that had occurred just an hour before. "Police have a suspect in custody," a human said just before Motormaster's face twisted in a scowl and he turned the television off.

"Breakdown," he said. "We've got nearly a thousand dollars. Is that enough?"

"For a computer?" Breakdown felt doubtful.

"No, to replace your fragged-up processors."

Breakdown ignored that, though it made his face grow warm for some reason. "I don't know. Maybe. I'd have to check with whoever sells them." Somehow, he didn't think it would be – as far as he knew, the best computers in human societies were owned by research institutes and military bases and the government, not by people who had to steal money to pay for their rented rooms.

But he knew better than to say that to Motormaster at the moment. Not only would it be bad timing, Motormaster would just point out that he didn't really know until he had checked with a computer company.

He felt as if he had been carrying a heavy weight across his shoulders and someone had added a load of I-beams to it. How am I supposed to find a computer company? Their room had a telephone, but Breakdown didn't know of anyone to call.

Motormaster didn't look pleased at that, but he didn't look angry either, which was the best that Breakdown supposed he could expect. "All right. Then tomorrow you can search for a human establishment which sells them while we get a little more money just in case—"

"I think we should leave," someone said in a small voice.

Breakdown only realized that he had spoken when everyone turned to look at him… and Primus, he would never quite get used to that! He cringed back into the towels reflexively.

"Leave?" Motormaster said as if pronouncing a word in another language.

Breakdown swallowed again. The dark gleaming surface of the coffee in his cup was wobbling for some reason. He nodded.

"It's not safe here," he said, still quietly. He nearly always spoke more softly than the rest of his team – except perhaps Dead End – but now it felt as though there was a steel band around his throat. Not enough to choke him silent, but just tight enough to make him aware of its presence.

Motormaster snorted irritably. "Those pieces of slag won't bother us again. We chased 'em off, remember?"

Wildrider raised his head. "Boss. They had a knife."

"Yeah, they had a knife. Breakdown's got it now and the rest of us can get knives too."

"And what shall we do when they get guns?" Dead End said.

The silence that fell was coldly tense, tinged with fear. But for once, Breakdown didn't feel as if it was something Motormaster was using to control them – it was something outside Motormaster, something potentially stronger than him.

That scared him even more. He pressed closer to Wildrider, drawing as much strength as possible from his warm solid presence – human, but it didn't matter, it was still Wildrider – and spoke.

"We were on their trajectory… I mean, territory," he said, looking from Motormaster to Dead End. "They told me so. Even if we move someplace else, what if there's another group of humans controlling that? And you heard what they said on the television—the police have one of the people who attacked us."

Motormaster had many faults, but being slow on the uptake wasn't one of them. "They'll interrogate him."

Wildrider nodded. "With bright lights. And rubber hoses." He lay down and curled up around Breakdown, pillowing his head on a bent elbow.

"Rubber…? Never mind." Motormaster rubbed his jaw, the heel of his hand making a strange rasping sound. "Still, even if he describes us, they don't know anything else. Like who we are, or where we're staying."

"But the more humans we ambush, the more we risk being caught," Breakdown said. "And then they'll put us in a human brig." Just the thought of the security cameras in such a place made him shudder.

Dead End grimaced. "Those probably aren't cleaned very often."

Motormaster ignored him. "If that happens we just stay quiet. Not a word, even if they use rubber hoses on us – and no, Wildrider, I don't want to know how they use those."

"What if they separate us?" Breakdown said.

That struck home. He could see it in the sudden stiffening of Motormaster's shoulders, the unblinking fixity in his eyes. Wildrider's breathing stopped for a moment. Whatever else they had lost, they were still the team they had been from the moment of their creation, still had the others who were a part of themselves in a way that no one who wasn't part of a gestalt could understand. The thought of being taken from that…

"We'll leave, then," Motormaster said finally. "Go somewhere else."

Breakdown had pushed his share of the discussion about as far as he could. He caught Dead End's eye, but Drag Strip was quicker as always.

"So we just repeat the same performance somewhere different?" he said, and managed to make it sound like the usual challenge-to-authority that Motormaster ignored when he could and beat down when he couldn't.

That time, though, Motormaster just looked at him, looked in silence until Drag Strip shifted back a little, shoulders to the wall, and dropped his gaze. When Motormaster took a step towards him Drag Strip's head jolted back up, but for once there was no cruel, anticipatory look on Motormaster's face. He looked as though he had his back to a wall as well.

"What do you propose we do?" he said through clenched jaws.

Not fight with each other, Breakdown thought. He looked at Dead End again, silently pleading.

"I suppose we could leave," Dead End said. "Not that it makes a difference in the end, of course. Plus ca change, plus c'est le meme chose. Eventually we'll be caught and discovered. And in these little organic bodies we're sure to die quickly and messily."

Even Motormaster looked as though he didn't quite know how to respond to that at first, but it shifted his attention away from Drag Strip. "We're not going to die, so shut the frag up about that," he said, then rounded on Breakdown. "All right, you brought this up. Find a way for us to get money without attracting human attention."

Why do I always have to be the ideas mech at times like this? Breakdown thought, but he knew the answer. Being the team's scout, he took the most interest in human society and he had always thought that if only he was a human, none of them would stare at him. He would be wonderfully unnoticed, would slip as easily into a native population as a card into a pack, rather than standing out as a fast and expensive sports car.

"I'm waiting." Motormaster gritted the two words out.

Think, Breakdown, think! How do humans get money without having law enforcement after them?

"Jobs," he said suddenly.

Motormaster's optic ridges came together. He looked at Dead End as if waiting for the word to be translated.

"Employment," Dead End said. "We find paid work."

"Work?" Drag Strip's lip curled. "As what?"

"I don't know." Breakdown resisted an urge to reply, "Traffic control cops." "But there have to be at least some jobs available in a human city. Especially a big one."

Motormaster still looked deeply skeptical. "And why would anyone hire us? We don't even have human names."

"I could come up with those." Breakdown had already come up with several different human names for himself, on the accounts he used for hacking.

Drag Strip folded his arms. "I like my name. Drag Strip. What's wrong with that?"

An ominous rumble came from Motormaster's throat, almost as if he still had a powerful engine. "It stands out like a plane in a parking lot, that's what's wrong with it, and if the humans know who you are they'll haul you off to their brig. Or better yet, turn you over to the Autobots. You fine with that? Because I think I might be."

"All right," Drag Strip said. "But I still want my name, Breakdown. Make a human name out of it."

"What?" Not for the first time, Breakdown wanted to slap some sense into him; this was no time to be demanding! "How am I supposed to do that?"

"I don't know. You're the expert on humans, not me."

Motomaster made a disgusted sound. "Breakdown, pick whatever names will help us go unnoticed. I'll get some food and travel passes while you're doing it. Dead End, get that map and find us somewhere to go."

Dead End unfolded the map they had found in the humans' Accord, studied it and then turned it the correct way around. "I suppose we should select the nearest major city," he said finally, sounding as though he had been asked to choose between deactivation by electrocution or explosive.

"Yes," Motormaster said tightly. "Pick something on the coast, so we'll be close to home. And do it in the next ten seconds or I'll fill the sink with water and hold your head under it until you learn to make decisions without whining about them."

Breakdown winced inwardly. He might have suggested finding a new location himself, but he was too unnerved by then and he knew why Motormaster had asked Dead End instead of him. Although Breakdown was the scout, Dead End had had the best radar, so he had often been ordered to scan ahead when they drove out. Old habits died hard.

"Very well," Dead End sounded resigned. "San Francisco."

Motormaster grunted an acknowledgement. "Fine. Drag Strip, you're with me." He turned and strode out.

But that's a new habit, Breakdown thought. Previously, Motormaster had left their room by himself; now, with their new vulnerability very much in evidence and the possibility that human law enforcement had been alerted to them, it was best not to be alone.

Once the door had closed behind Drag Strip, he looked down in mild surprise that Wildrider was so quiet, only to realize that Wildrider had fallen asleep. Dark hair that looked reddish where the light struck it was still slightly damp from the washracks, and the darker shadow of a bruise spread across Wildrider's cheekbone.

Dead End folded the map neatly and put it away, then took Breakdown's damp towels away to hang them up on the rails that ran around the washrack's walls. Breakdown could imagine him arranging them so that they were all perfectly straight. He lay down as well. After the tense confrontations of the day, it felt good to have the room quiet and peaceful and all to themselves. Breakdown liked the company of his teammates – well, all except Motormaster – but he enjoyed his own space and some time to himself as well.

He tried not to think of his quarters back in the Decepticon base, his private little room with his maps and posters on the walls. He tried even harder not to think about Soundwave sneaking in there to install hidden cameras, or Soundwave's nasty little midgets pawing through his belongings.

Dead End came back in, gave him a long thoughtful look and pulled the suitcase out from beneath the bed. "I think I saw some human grooming equipment in here," he said as he opened it. "Ah, yes." He took out a zippered case and opened it, studying the contents critically before he selected a brush.

Breakdown had used those on the treads and wheel-wells of the tires he no longer had, so he automatically extended a leg. Dead End took the brush to his head instead, carefully stroking the bristles through his hair and smoothing it back from his forehead. "There's something we can apply to that injury too," he said when he had finished, and took a small box labeled "Band-Aid" out of the case.

Breakdown watched curiously as he extracted a narrow strip of material and peeled off a layer of it. "Hold still," he said, and pressed it down flat across the cut on Breakdown's forehead. Breakdown tried to see it but his eyes wouldn't rotate that far upward.

Dead End drew back, eyes narrowing in concentration as he studied his handiwork. "Hmm… no, that's not quite straight. I'd better take it off and reapply it."

"Nnnnno, that's all right." There was some kind of adhesive holding the strip in place, and he had a feeling that pulling it off wouldn't be easy. He supposed the strips were skin-colored so that they would go unnoticed from a distance, making injured humans look less like easy targets.

"Oh, very well." Dead End stuck another piece across the cut on Breakdown's hand, though it took him a good two minutes to position it accurately and Breakdown had to suppress an urge to call him Hook. "There," he said.

"Thanks," Breakdown said but he felt worried, because the sound of their voices hadn't brought Wildrider back online. "Do you think we should wake him up?" he said uneasily. "He might have a percussion."

Dead End shook Wildrider's shoulder and, when he yawned and stirred, told him to find a movie for them to watch. Wildrider grumbled that he wanted to sleep, but he was soon flicking through channels while Dead End continued looking through the contents of the case.

"Is this for hair too?" he said, holding up another brush with short bristles embedded in it. "It's very small."

"Maybe it's for eyebrows," Breakdown said. "They're small too."

"And this?" Dead End took out a shorter plastic implement with a wide head. Light reflected off it as he turned it in his hand, and when Breakdown looked more closely he saw overlapping metal blades set in the head, but he had no idea what they did. Dead End held it up before his eyes and squinted at it.

"There are little hairs in it," he said thoughtfully, then took Breakdown's arm and stroked the implement along it. Breakdown felt nothing except a slight friction, but when he looked down at his arm he let out a shocked squeak that took Wildrider's attention away from the television set.

"What is it?" Dead End said. "Did that hurt?"

"No, but now I have a bare patch on one arm! I'm assimilatrical. People will stare at me."

Dead End sighed. "Well, I doubt the hair can be put back, so why don't I just do your other arm as well?" He held a hand out.

Mollified, Breakdown gave him the other arm. "All right, just make them identical."

"Guys, look!" Wildrider said and gestured at the television with the remote control. "It's a commercial with that brush thingy."

Breakdown watched until the commercial was over, while Dead End looked in the case again and took out a small tube. "This isn't the product advertised and may not make our teeth their whitest, but it'll have to do. And Breakdown, now that I've finished with your maintenance, do try to find some human names for us before Motormaster gets back." He sat down on Breakdown's other side, tsking in disapproval at the untidiness of Wildrider's hair before trying to restore it to a semblance of order.

"How am I supposed to make a human name out of 'Drag Strip'?" Breakdown said without much interest. He liked the idea of coming up with human designations that would allow them to pass unnoticed, but he wasn't as keen on Drag Strip placing restrictions on the process.

For all Dead End's indifference and chronic depression, he did tend to respond better to requests for help than to orders and insults. "Make an anagram out of it," he said. "Mix up the letters and put them back together to make a convincing human name."

Intrigued, Breakdown got up and retrieved the pen they had taken from the humans' car. He found a scrap of paper as well, then sat down on the bed and began to scribble. One thing he did like about being human, though he was careful not to mention that where Motormaster could hear, was that everything was adjusted to their new size.

"I did your name," he said happily. "Dan Deed. How does that sound?"

There was a pause. "I'll try to remember it," Dead End said finally.

Breakdown supposed that was the best response he could get; at least Dead End hadn't grumbled or pointed out anything wrong with the name or demanded another one. He tried out a few more combinations. "Mine is Bad Kowen. I mean Brad Kowen. The best I can get for Motormaster is Tomas Morter."

"What about High-Maintenance in Yellow? Or no longer in yellow, as it were."

'Drag Strip,' as Breakdown was discovering, wasn't easy to turn into a human name. He scratched valiantly at the paper, turned it over and worked on the other side. "Sid R. Pragt," he said finally. "It's the best I can do."

"It sounds like Starscream with a glitch in his vocalizer," was Wildrider's opinion. "What about my name?"

"Um." Breakdown carefully tore the paper into tiny scraps that no one would be able to piece back together. "Wil Drider."

"What?" Wildrider's eyes opened all the way. "That's the same as my real name! It's not even mixed up like everyone else's."

Breakdown shrugged. "You try monogramming 'Wildrider' and see how far you get."

"Fine. I'll just pick my own human name." Wildrider frowned, considering. "Like… Melanie."

I knew there'd be some damage from him being hit in the head. "Wildrider," Breakdown said, "are you sure you want to call yourself that? Melanie died at the end of that film."

"Everyone dies in the end, eventually," Dead End informed them. "And rather untidily, if they're human."