Optimus was waking up slowly. He had to reset his optics a few times before his vision became clear. He noticed he was on top of Smokescreen and on top of him was Fall Risa. He turned his head to see that he was in his apartment living room with all his friends scattered among the furniture. He was with Risa and Smokescreen on the floor of his living room. He can still smell the faint scent of lubricant, transfluid and High-Grade Energon. Chromia and Windblade were cuddling each other on one end of his long sleek black couch, while Blaster, Springer, and Bluestreak were on the other side, scooting closer to each other in their recharge. He turned his head to the other side of the living room to see Moonracer laying on top of his kitchen counter with an empty Energon cube in servo. Hound was...stasis cuffed to the the wall next to the kitchen entrance. Optimus giggled at that. Optimus checked his chronometer to see that he needed to be at the Elite Guards Headquarters in less than breem. Panic was rising inside Optimus.

"Fall! Fall! Fall wake up!" Optimus whispered

"Mmh? What's wrong." Fall responded in a sleepy voice.

"I need to be at the Headquarters in less than a breem! Please get off of me so I can clean myself before I leave!" Optimus explained in a hushed voice

"Oh frag! Then clean up and leave. Sorry!" Fall said before tumbling off of Optimus. Optimus slid off of Smokescreen afterwards. Once he stood back up, he bolted to his washracks. He turned on the showerhead and it began jetting cold water. He didn't care if it was cold, he needed to get rid of the smell of transfluid and lubricate on him. After some rough rubbing of soap, Optimus turned off the water once all the suds were watered down from his frame. Optimus ran back in his living room still dripping wet.

"Fall can you make sure that you all clean up my apartment and tell the Director to put the show on hiatus until I come back." Optimus explained

"Sure do Optimus and Optimus good luck on Space Bridge repair duty." Fall responded

"Thank you Fall. Bye" Optimus gave his farewell before opening his window on the far right of him. With one pede out, he jumped onto the other building on the other side of the street.

With haste, Optimus parkoured ontop of various buildings hoping he will not arrive late. It will not look good to Ultra Magnus seeing him arriving late to meet his new team.

"Can not be late. I can not be late for this!" Optimus shouted mentally. He forced himself to really speed up which almost made him trip over himself, but he managed to catch himself from falling into an alleyway. It felt like he was running in circles because he wasn't seeing the Elite Guards Headquarters peaking out between the buildings. Optimus checked his chronometer to see only a cycle has passed. He mentally sighed.

"It shouldn't be that far." Optimus thought again

Optimus was on the verge of just flying over there, but one of the buildings of the Headquarters peaked over the horizon. He sighed in relief. Optimus leaped over more buildings and streets before landing in front of the entrance guards who jolted in surprise.

"I am here to see Ultra Magnus. He expects to see me in a few cycles." Optimus in his most forced composed voice. He was slightly heating up due to the parkouring and worry. He needed up his exercises more.

"Oh of course just go right along Optimus." One of the entrance guards spoke.

Optimus sighed in relief then patted the guard's left shoulder guard. "Thank you." Optimus said before bolting towards the main building.

Optimus figured it was going to take too long to get to Ultra's office by going through the building's many floors. He decided to run up the building's wall, making his way towards the top floor. Once he got close enough Optimus latched onto the window that he jumped out of just yesterday. He tried sliding up the window, but it was locked. Peering into the room, Optimus saw Ultra Magnus sitting behind his desk reading one of the many datapads on his desk. He knocked on the glass which made Ultra Magnus look up from the datapad to see Optimus crouching outside his window. Ultra raised an optic ridge at that, but decided to open the window to let Optimus in. Once Optimus swiftly entered the office, he immediately saluted to Ultra Magnus.

"Optimus reporting in to finally meet the team." Optimus stated. He was feeling absolutely giddy about meeting his team, but he forced all the seriousness to the surface so he wouldn't make a fool of himself in front of Ultra Magnus.

"Acknowledged. Follow me Optimus, we are going to make our way to the hanger where your team is residing in." Ultra Magnus ordered

Optimus nodded and let Ultra lead the way. He was quickly led out of the building to drive towards one of the few hangers at Headquarters. Ultra Magnus and Optimus passed by different busy mechs and femmes all going towards different buildings to finish certain tasks. A dull throb ached in his spark. He could have been among these bots, working to make Cybertron a safe place. Optimus mentally sighed, but something else came to mind. He wouldn't have known Fall Risa or Smokescreen or Chromia or any other of his friends if he was not expelled from the Academy.

But he lost two of his closest friends. Elita-One who perished on that Primus-forsaken planet and Sential who Optimus chose to shun himself away from because everytime he just see a glimpse of him, an overwhelming amount of guilt consumes his spark. He should have tried harder to persuade his friends not go to the planet. He should have dragged his friends out of the damn cave. He should have fragged the rules and transform and save Elita-One from falling back into the pit of the exploding cave. But he didn't because he was slow, stupid, and overwhelmed from the whole situation.

Optimus barely restrain a shudder before Ultra Magnus stopped and transformed in front of him. Optimus followed suit. Ultra placed his servo on the scan pad, letting it identify that he was himself. A moment later, a soft beep came from the doors before it slid open. Ultra Magnus and Optimus walked down a small hallway, the doors sliding close once they entered. They stopped once more at another pair of doors, but this time Ultra Magnus turned around to face Optimus, face neutral.

"Optimus beyond these doors is your new team. They still work almost non-stop to repair the ship you will help pilot, but there is still some patching up to do. With your help, hopefully, it will be done quicker. Once you and your team finish repairs, you all will immediately travel to one of the down space bridges. Got it Optimus?" Ultra Magnus explained

Optimus nodded with all of the force professionalism in him to the surface. He was buzzing on the spot with excitement, momentarily forgetting all of his past regrets.

"Alright," Ultra Magnus gave a salute to Optimus as Optimus did the same to him. "I wish you the best of luck... Optimus Prime."

Optimus nearly caved in and gave what would have probably been his most shocked face. Ultra Magnus just ranked Optimus immediately as a Prime right on the spot. Optimus remembered that only Primes can lead teams so this shouldn't be a surprise, but this was for those who were are actually a part of the Elite Guards. Ultra Magnus was really showing that he still has faith in him which made Optimus all warm inside.

"Thank you sir, I will not let you down." Optimus responded. "At least not again." He thought

Ultra Magnus gave a slow nod before quickly telling him the code to open the doors next to them. Ultra left immediately, leaving Optimus staring at the code pad and the doors. Optimus' spark raced in his spark chamber. He took a swift in-vent before pushing in the numbers on the code pad.

The doors gave a soft beep, just like the previous pair of doors, and slid open revealing a heavily damage ship. Optimus took a few steps inside, letting the doors to close behind him. He stared at the ship with awe. It looked like this ship went through the Pit and back. Eventually Optimus' optics landed on a red and white bot under the ship. His optics looked farther down the ship to see two bots, one small, yellow, and black and the other big and dull green. They seemed to be struggling with the wiring of the ship seeing that the big, green one has his servos wrapped up in them while the small one hopped about, zapping the wiring.

Optimus softly smiled at the two's antics, but he noticed that they didn't noticed he was there yet. He loudly cleared his throat to grab all the bots attention. The two dealing with the wires looked him, while the bot underneath slid out and sat up, looking at him. Just as he was going to speak the yellow bot gave out a loud whistle.

"Damn what's a hottie like you doing in this dirty hanger?" The yellow bot asked.

The white and red bot loudly sighed in what sounded like disappointment and embarrassment. The big bot bend over to whisper something to the yellow bot that Optimus can hear perfectly from he was at.

"Bumblebee you can't just cybercat call a random bot like that. It is a little rude." He whispered

"I'm sorry, but that bot is smoking hot. I wondered if I can get his com number." The yellow bot whispered in response

Optimus covered his giggle as best he could while the signs of embarrassment spread across his faceplates.

"Mind the young bots especially Bumblebee over there. He tends to do things with thinking." The white and red bot explained in a gruff voice

"Oh really? I should keep that mind when I am leading you bots." Optimus noted.

"What...leading us? You mean are our-"

"Your new team leader, yes Bumblebee." Optimus politely cut off Bumblebee's question with his answer. Bumblebee hung his mouth in shock, while the other two took this as a pleasant surprise.

"We actually have a team leader? That is great!" The big, green bot expressed his gratefulness by the wide smile across his faceplates.

"I say it is about time. There was no way I was going to be stuck repairing a down space bridge with these two causing so much trouble for themselves and for me." Ratchet complained mostly to himself, but Optimus heard all of it.

"Just to get formalities out the way, my designation is Optimus Prime." Optimus introduced himself in a regal manner.

"Ratchet" Ratchet slightly raised his servo in a sort of lazily manner.

"Oh, my designation is Bulkhead." Bulkhead gave quick but small waves to Optimus with his servos due to his servos still being wrapped up together by the ship's wire.

Bumblebee remained frozen in shock, until Bulkhead nudged him back to reality. His posture was a bit rigid when he introduced himself.

"Bu-Bumblebee is my designation!" Bumblebee stuttered in open embarrassment because he just cybercat-called his new team leader.

Optimus felt a little bad for Bumblebee. Optimus is assuming that he is not too far from Bumblebee's age, so Optimus found this situation a little amusing overall.

"Alright you lazy box of bolts get back to working already. I need a word with our new leader." Ratchet ordered

Bumblebee and Bulkhead almost instantly went back to tending to the ship's wires which were still wrapped around Bulkhead's servos. Optimus walked closer to Ratchet when he motioned to him to come closer.

"Leading this team will be a challenge Optimus, just letting you know." Ratchet stated

"I can already tell, but I welcome the challenge. I will need to learn and adapt if I am going to be at least a decent leader to you bots." Optimus reasoned with confidence in his eyes. Ratchet gave a critical stare to Optimus, but a small smile slowly formed on his faceplates.

"I can tell you are going to be." Ratchet spoke just above a whisper, like was he was telling a dark secret. Ratchet's expression then turn serious and professional.

"Now that's enough chit-chat, we have a ship to fix. Take that driller and unscrew the dented plating, so we can buff it out." Ratchet ordered. He lay back down and rolled under the ship again. Optimus looked around the hanger to find the driller to see it was in one of the tool boxes on the table next to the doors he came from.

"This is going to be fun...and probably hard." Optimus thought as he walked up to one of the dented plating. A smile curved his lipplates.


My readers I am so absolutely sorry for not uploading anything for probably months now. I have procrastinating a lot and school got me too, but those should not be excuses. I hope you all will forgive me. If you follow my other stories, I promise you that I will update them with a new chapter soon. Please be patient with me. Thank you and I hope you enjoyed this chapter.