Disclaimer: Me no own, you no sue.

A/N: I have come to a very important point. I have realized that there are many other things in life more important to me than fan fic. Not that I didn't know that before, I'm just officially putting that out there. With the scanty number of reviews I have been receiving and my busy and somewhat stressful life in what we call the 'Real World' this fic and my other fic may not be updated for rather long periods of time. Just fair warning. Enjoy the chapter!

Chapter Seven: Of Brotherly Angst and Serious Glomping

Ironhide met his charge and the Fenner boy at the airport. They stepped quickly out of the busy automatic doors, which were open more often than closed at this time of day, and the two men made a beeline for the intimidating black pick-up patiently awaiting them by the curb. Even before Jeremy's seatbelt clicked into place, he was inquiring about his sister.

"How is she? Is she hurt? Have you got her talking? 'Cause if she's not talking it means she's probably freaked out of her mind..."

"Your sibling unit is FINE," growled Ironhide. "You can ask Ratchet all about her when we arrive. Or, better yet, you can ask the youngling yourself."

"Sorry," Jeremy muttered, sliding deeper into his seat. Few things still intimidated him since his entrance into the Air Force, but giant black trucks that turned into giant, bad tempered robots was one of those things.

Will patted the dashboard teasingly and scolded, "Behave, 'Hide. You're scaring the newbie. Now, give us some details. I want to know, too."

"Jazz arrived with the femme at approximately 2:00 A.M. local time," Iron replied, switching into soldier-gear. "She was taken directly to Ratchet, and when she woke up again at approximately 6:00 local time she was debriefed by Prime and the medic."

"At least she's up to speed," Will sighed as he rubbed the back of his neck. "That's one thing we won't have to worry about."

For the rest of the ride Jeremy maintained his silence, and neither Lennox nor Ironhide felt the need to break it. Thankfully, the weapons specialist bended a few traffic laws and shattered the speed limit on several back roads, so they arrived much sooner than anticipated. Ironhide had radioed ahead to alert the others that two humans were en route, and they were greeted by a party of three 'bots waiting for them just inside the door.

Optimus and Ratchet were standing to either side of Jazz, who had his hands cupped up protectively close to his chest. In contradiction to the behavior he had exhibited getting out of Ironhide, Jeremy hesitated near the stopped truck that was now rapidly unfolding behind him. Smoothly, like someone holding an infant they were afraid to jar awake, Jazz stepped forward and knelt in front of the young airman. He held his hands out slowly, curling back the fingers to reveal a slightly befuddled-looking Astrid.

"She just woke up," the Autobot informed Jeremy. "Might not be quite with it yet."

Scoot up so that he could offer his sister a hand down, Jeremy sheepishly mumbled, "Hey, sis."

"Hi, Jer," she replied in a slightly slurred voice. "Was' up?"

"Well, you right now," said Jeremy. "Here, let me help you down."

"Ok."

Jazz tipped his hand just enough so that the sleepy Astrid slid down to the waiting hands of her brother. The young man caught her easily enough, steadying her with his shoulder until she'd rediscovered what exactly it was her feet were for. As Astrid slowly rejoined the land of the conscious, Will crept out from behind Ironhide's legs, keeping an eye on his fellow soldier... just in case. Men were unpredictable things when family members were involved.

But he need not have worried. Jeremy was too busy blaming himself and Astrid was too concerned with not falling asleep again to cause any kind of scene.

"So..." Will said, edging closer to the young people, "you feeling better, Astrid?"

"Much," Astrid yawned. "Tired, though."

"That's what you get for staying up partying all night with giant mechs from outer space," said Will.

"Yeah. I'll remember that." Astrid's head dropped down to her brother's shoulder.

"I don't mean to be rude or anything," Jeremy said, looking up at the massive creatures still waiting patiently in front of him, "but would it be ok if we just went home now? Astrid looks whacked. We can discuss all this tomorrow..."

"Airman Fenner has a very good point," said Ratchet. "Her energy levels are severely depleted, and she is in desperate need of a lengthy recharge."

"Very well," Optimus intoned. "Jazz will bring you back a day from now, when Astrid is feeling more herself, and we may better discuss the situation."

"I'll bring the captain," Ironhide grumbled. "He should be here for this, too."

"I agree," both Lennox and Optimus said at once. They glanced at each other in quizzical surprise, but Jeremy interrupted them with a quiet cough.

Once again, the airman and his sister were the center of attention, and Jeremy shifted the drowsing Astrid in his arms. Quietly, he reminded them, "I, uh, I kinda need a lift home."

"Just a sec', little man," Jazz said.

In another minute he was in his Solstice disguise, and Will had helped Jeremy load Astrid, who was well past waking at this stage, into the passenger's seat. They exchanged hasty goodbyes and quickly climbed behind the wheels of their respective Autobot guardians.

Neither were anticipating the responses the women in their lives would give them once they got home.

.O.O.O.

With a giant yawn and a tremendous stretch, Astrid woke up. She looked around lazily, somewhat surprised to find herself back in her won room. The last thing she remembered was Jazz nudging her awake, and then seeing Jeremy... Jeremy! Jeremy was back!

Without further delay she swung her legs over the side of the bed and quickly tossed on a fresh set of clothes. Her poor brother never even knew what hit him as she came flying down the stairs and pounced on him from halfway across the kitchen.

"Jeremy!"

"Vrrlgg!"

Astrid's arms tightened around him like a boa constrictor, and the airman scrabbled o unlatch her fingers from the back of his t-shirt as he struggled to breathe.

"Off... Astrid... OFF... Get off!" he wheezed.

"Ok," chimed Astrid. Her arms fell back promptly to her sides a second later, and her face beamed with angelic innocence that Jeremy just knew was not entirely genuine. They had, after all, spent many April Fool's Days in the same household.

He remained doubled-over for several more minutes before he raised his eyes warily to meet Astrid's. The younger girl's face was unusually bright and happy, especially considering that she'd nearly been squished to death by a giant, alien death machine. But at the same time, she didn't look upset, and Jeremy would rather she be insanely upbeat than traumatized with lingering fears.

"You look good," he said at last.

"Ratchet took care of me," she replied, some of the uncanny cheerfulness seeping out of her. "I'm fine... now."

"Thank you for not having a panic attack on me," said Jeremy.

"You're welcome. You can thank the Autobots. They had to take the brunt of it."

"Right."

"...Are you mad?"

"Wha- No! Why the he- why the heck would I be mad?" Jeremy demanded, just catching himself before he spewed out a curse word and got a smack.

Glancing around the room, purposefully avoiding her brother's face, Astrid mumbled, "'Cause you're gonna be in trouble at work now..."

"Hey, hey," Jeremy said as he pulled his baby sister into a close hug. "I'm not in trouble. There's some paperwork that I'm sure will come piling up, but I'm not in trouble. Everybody knows it was an accident, and you're the last one anyone's blaming. Even Secretary Keller was concerned about you. He had his secretary arrange the flight home and everything."

"Sounds like a nice guy," Astrid sniffed.

"Yeah. He is."

Something dawned on Astrid then, and she looked up into Jeremy's eyes with new-found hope and excitement. "Will I get to see the Autobots again?"

Jeremy smirked. "I'm sure, sis. And don't forget that we still have one living in our garage."

Astrid squealed, pulling out of Jeremy's arms and hopping around the kitchen with her hands flapping at her sides and her hair bouncing in an untidy mess. For a couple minutes, Jeremy sated his frazzled nerves with watching Astrid's childish glee, and inwardly hoped that Will got as favorable a reaction at his house. Such a thing was unlikely, though, seeing as how worried wives dealt with things worse than younger sisters. Sarah Lennox would undoubtedly be furious at the attack on her new little friend. The only question was just who she would funnel that anger at. Then he stirred himself and went into the single car garage to talk with Jazz. The mech had been waiting patiently all day, and it was about time he got an update.

.O.O.O.

Astrid squirmed a little uncomfortably in the passenger's seat of Jazz's alternate form. She'd spent the remainder of the previous day sitting outside in the garage in front of the Solstice's bumper, carrying on a conversation with what she really knew was a very big robotic alien from outer space. It had been a strange sensation, but enlightening all the same. During her time in Autobot headquarters she'd still been too shell shocked to take in very much, but with Jazz's patient tutoring she was brought completely up to speed, and even felt like she knew a little more about Jazz personally. She'd wanted to bring out her soundtrack collection to let him listen to, but both the mech and her brother insisted that it was time she was getting to bed. The next day would be long and tiring for all involved.

Now she was glad she'd listened. They'd left at eight, which wasn't particularly early, but Astrid was still feeling the consequences of her very long night two days before. Several times she'd been tempted to take a snooze in the comfy seat of the car, but every time her eyes started drifting closed, she'd suddenly remember that she was sitting inside a living being, and she'd snap right awake again.

Captain William Lennox and Ironhide were waiting for them just inside the entrance, and Astrid climbed out of Jazz's safe interior extremely slowly. Her eyes immediately dropped shyly to the ground, and she shuffled her feet embarrassedly as she wondered whether they thought she was a total weakling and idiot for her reactions on that awful night. But she needn't have worried.

Will stepped forward before Jazz had even finished transforming to sweep Astrid into a concerned hug, and then held her out at arm's length to carefully scrutinize her.

"How you feeling, kid?" he asked lightly.

"Pretty good," said Astrid. She managed a shaky smile and glanced quickly passed Lennox's face towards the grouchy behemoth standing a little ways off with his arms crossed over his chest. Will followed her glance and waved Ironhide over eagerly.

"You remember Astrid, don't you, Ironhide?" he inquired.

"Clearly," the mech rumbled.

"Aw, now, 'Hide," Jazz admonished, clapping his fellow soldier on the arm, "but nice to the little lady. She's just a newbie, after all."

"Pleased to meet you," Ironhide grumbled. "Happy now?"

"Yep."

Will cleared his throat and smiled apologetically to everyone in the room. "I'm sorry to make this reunion so short, but we've got a meeting to go to, Fenner, and Ratchet wants to give Astrid a follow-up to make sure she'd doing alright."

"He's not paranoid much, is he?" said Astrid.

"Only very," said Will. "Now follow me, and I'll show you to the med bay."

The journey was very quiet, everyone occupied with trying to keep tensions low and figure out just where each person stood (both mentally and physically). For once there were hardly any mechs roaming the halls, and the Fenners would later be told that this was due to Prime's order to keep out of the way until they were sure Astrid was adjusting and her brother had calmed down from any brotherly instincts he may be running on.

As they walked, Astrid slipped her hand into Jeremy's, happily surprised when he didn't pull away like he usually did. Apparently little sisters who'd just endured life and death trauma were granted a little leeway in the macho brother department. "I love you," she whispered, seeing just how far that leeway extended. Jeremy dipped his gaze down to her, rolled his eyes, and looked back down the hallway in front of them.

Evidently that was too far a stretch... even for distressed siblings.

At last they arrived before the Autobot-sized door leading into Ratchet's domain, also more commonly known as the med bay. Will gave Astrid an encouraging little push towards the door before slapping a button placed low enough for humans to reach. The doors opened with an airy swoosh, and the soldiers, both human and mechanoid, left the teenager to fend for herself.

"Come in!" Ratchet's eternally irrate voice boomed from within.

Astrid gulped. He sounded a lot more annoyed than he had last time. But she slipped inside obediently, spotting the tall mech at once, though it took him a couple beats to spot her.

"What do you... Oh, Astrid," he said, changing gears from the royally ticked to the gently polite as he caught sight of his newest patient.

"Hey," she offered weakly.

"I trust Captain Lennox explained why I wanted to see you?" Ratchet inquired.

"Yeah. Check-up."

Gears rumbled and hummed as the medic gave an approving nod of his head. "Very good, now if you would just come this way..."

.O.O.O.

The impossible had occurred within the top secret walls of the Autobot Earth base. Ratchet had found a patient that he actually liked. Every mech and human aware of the transformers' presence on the planet was understandably shocked, but their surprise came with many smug smiles and gossip-swapping in the rec room. Of course, it wasn't like Ratchet wasn't the only one who was fond of the little human who was now appearing in their midst once or twice every week.

She'd been granted full security clearance since her episode with the infamous evil police cruiser, and Will had argued quite reasonably that she was far enough in now to attract more Decpticon attention, and without being fully informed, or fully initiated among the Autobot contingent, then she would be worse than a walking target.

By the way things were going, she'd have no problem summoning up a whole army of mechs if she so much as whimpered. Ratchet was treating her like the younglings he'd so delighted in back on Cybertron, Prime was acting much the same way, Bumblebee had taken to having movie and music trivia wars with her, and of course Jazz had practically adopted her as his own little sister. Every other member of the crew was at least familiar with the sight of the tiny femme as she went skipping through the halls or skittering over the mech-sized tables in the rec room.

And, of course, there were now several Air Force personnel walking around base with slightly lighter pockets and their airman's coin clutched constantly in one of their front pockets.

A/N: FEED THE STARVING AUTHORS! LEAVE A REVIEW!

Replies:

GodisGod!andIamnot: Thank you very, VERY much! Dedication indeed! I hope you don't have to work so late again the near future. That is never, EVER fun. Hope this chapter makes you happy! Thanks again!