Chapter 10

The love doctor is in session

Miko gave a criticizing look to the drawing on her notebook before emphasizing some lines, paying special attention to the broad hand leaning on the small shoulder.

"Did you get to solve that problem?" Jack asked her without separating his gaze from the book he was reading.

"I gave up on trigonometry an hour ago." Once again she frowned at her second sketch of the day. She had captured Bulkhead's kind expression the first try, but giving Arcee a tender face was proving to be a challenge. The bouquet of roses, though, had turned out perfect. Miko wondered if some sort of metallic flowers could be found on Cybertron.

"I figured," Jack sighed, pretty clueless to her thoughts. "Do you need help with your homework? I wasn't the best in my class last year, but maybe Raf can give you a hand."

Raf detached his attention from the screen of his laptop and looked at his friends. "Em, sure, but I thought you were already comfortable with polar coordinates, Miko."

Miko snorted. "How can you talk about polar coordinates when we're experiencing such a big tragedy?"

"Tragedy?"

"Duh, yeah! The whole Arcee thing, Raf!"

"I wouldn't call it a tragedy. Ratchet's initial analysis of the virus samples is promising. I'm sure he will have a cure soon. Besides, he made it very clear that Arcee's life is not in immediate danger."

Miko rolled her eyes and turned to look at Jack. "I'm not surprised you didn't notice anything because you're only thirteen, Raf, but what about you, Jack? Arcee is your partner. Of course you must have noticed!"

"I'm thirteen and a quarter—" Raf started to complain, but Miko wouldn't leave Jack alone now that she had made him lower his book.

"Come on. You saw them, right? The sparks flying between her and that Knock Out dude… Didn't she tell you anything about it?"

Jack closed his eleventh grade literature book. "I didn't see any… sparks flying as you say. Besides, I would never ask Arcee any question that involved her private life, especially one that is based only on fantasies, Miko," he said seriously.

"Fantasies? There was chemistry between them, Jack! What do you say, Raf? You're the genius here.

The younger boy adjusted his glasses nervously. "Eh, I wouldn't know about that…"

Miko snorted again. "Of course, you're just thirteen… and a guy. What do you guys know about love? You're like the dumbest thing on the planet!"

She frowned and folded her arms across her chest. Really, she was convinced that the world would be a better place if guys were more in contact with their feelings.

Jack closed his book. "I think you're taking this far out of proportion. I know Arcee, and aside from the fact that she has never shown any kind of romantic interests toward anybody, she wouldn't do it for a Decepticon that is famous for dissecting his victims."

"Besides, that examination session in the medical bay didn't end on the best terms, considering that for some reason Optimus sent Bulkhead out," Raf said timidly. "I don't know what happened after we left, but I'm sure it had nothing to do with… whatever it is that you're thinking."

Miko frowned. Were Jack and Raf really that dumb? "Do those glasses work for something other than slipping down your nose, Raf? Bulk was kicked out of the medbay because he punched the Decepticon. And do you have any idea why he did that? Because he was jealous!"

"Wait, wait…" Jack said, standing up. "Miko, this is not a love movie. We are talking about real life here… and about the Transformers. We don't even know if there is anything resembling romantic interactions in their culture. We have never seen any of the Autobots behaving in any way that suggests that."

"Duuh! Because most of them are guys, Jack!"

"Well, technically speaking, we could say that they are androgynous," Raf said.

"Can we return to the main point here?" Miko said, putting her hands on her hips. "It's more than obvious than Bulk has a thing for Arcee, and I think she's not exactly indifferent toward him. But now that Knock Out comes here and makes a mess!"

"Arcee… and Bulkhead?" Raf put his laptop aside.

Miko rolled her eyes. "For a whiz kid, you're pretty blind when it comes to some things, Raf. Haven't you two noticed how close they both are? They are like an old married couple. They hang out, they complete each other's sentences…"

"I insist that you're confusing things," Jack said. "I know Arcee and she has never shown any kind of romantic interest in Bulkhead or anybody else."

"You may know your partner, Jack, but I know mine too, and I can tell you for sure that Bulk is jealous."

"That would explain why Bulkhead was expelled from Knock Out's examination," Raf suggested. "When I asked Bumblebee, he also said something about Bulkhead… er, physically offlining the Decepticon."

The 'not-you-too-Raf' look that Jack shot at his friend only helped to increase Miko's energy. "That's right!" she said, punching the palm of her hand. "And that's why we have to intervene."

Raf looked very confused. "Intervene? In what?"

"In getting Bulk and Arcee together! What else?"

"Count me out," Jack said, getting up. "I'm not going to play Love Doctor with Arcee; I respect her too much to get involved in her personal life. Besides, I'm sure that everything you said is completely out of proportion, not to mention out of reality."

Miko shrugged her shoulders and turned toward Raf. "What about you, Raf? You'll help me, right?"

Raf seemed to notice that he had stepped on the edge of a very deep chasm and returned to his laptop. "I… uh, no… Sorry, Miko, but I think Jack's right."

The girl frowned. "Of course… What could I expect for you both? You are guys!" She turned around and started to descend the human sized stairs that Ratchet had adapted for them.

"Wait! Where are you going?" Jack asked her.

"To solve this once and for all. Thanks for your help, you two! No wonder why neither of you has a girlfriend!"

Miko hadn't known Bulkhead for long, but she felt like she had known him for her entire life. She could tell his mood even by the slightest movement of his gigantic body, although even a boulder would have noticed that throwing containers from one side of the room to the other was not exactly a display of a happy Bulkhead.

"Bulk, hey Bulk!" she greeted him.

When he didn't react and instead flung another container the same way he would do with an enemy, Miko thought it would be proper to elevate her voice.

"BULKHEAD!"

He heard her this time, stopping in the middle of adding a new container to the pile.

"Oh, Miko… Is it time to take you home already?"

"Not until Raf finishes my homework. I came to see if you needed help playing Tetris with those containers."

Bulkhead sighed, his face acquiring the expression of a frustrated puppy. "No, I can do just fine with the… task that Ratchet assigned me."

Miko had no doubt that said 'task' was some sort of punishment for the way Bulkhead had behaved in the medbay. "Yeah, I can see that. You threw that last one like you did that Vehicon the other day. You almost brought down the entire pile."

"I did?" Bulkhead asked, seeming to shrink a bit. "I was distracted, I guess… I'll be more careful."

And he was, as he actually placed the next container instead of crashing it. Still, Miko could tell that his uneasiness was far from being gone.

She climbed on a small box to her left and sat on the edge, carefully watching how her best friend in the whole world kept mangling Ratchet's precious whatever was in those containers. Certainly the Autobot medic would need that, sooner or later.

"Arcee will be okay, right?" she asked after some seconds of nothing but metal against metal breaking the silence. "I mean, Ratchet will find out what that virus is all about and find a cure."

"Yeah," Bulkhead said, apparently absent-mindedly, but he could never fool Miko. "He will find a cure."

Miko swung her legs a little more before continuing her endless quest to satisfy her curiosity. "What about that Knock Out dude? Will you release him once you're done with him?"

The next container fell on the second pile with more force than required. "He's a Decepticon, Miko. He will be kept in custody and judged for his crimes."

"Oh, do you guys actually do those things too? With judges, jury and the whole thing?"

"We have a legal system."

"And when do you plan to judge him?" Miko insisted. "I thought that Cybertron was kind of, uh, unavailable right now. Will Optimus be the judge? Can Jack, Raf and I be part of the jury? Will Knock Out be allowed to have a lawyer? You're not going to execute him, right?"

Bulkhead sighed and placed the current container upside down. "I don't know, Miko… I used to work in construction before being a Wrecker. I must know the same about our legal system as you do."

Miko twisted her mouth. Any answer that left her with more curiosity than the one she had before was always the wrong answer. Still, she realized she wouldn't get more information from Bulkhead concerning that matter.

"Hey Bulk, do you Autobots fall in love?" she dropped her bomb, pleased with the puzzled expression she caused on the big robot's face.

"W-what…?"

"I know you guys have emotions as we do, so I guess you fall in love too, right? Did you have a girlfriend back on Cybertron?"

Maybe Transformers and humans were more alike than Miko had thought, because she could have sworn that the color of his face grew a little bit red.

"Girlfriend…? Nno…"

"Or a boyfriend?" she insisted, winking. "Raf says that technically you guys are androgynous, so you wouldn't have some prejudices a lot of silly humans have… But not me! So, you can tell me."

"Miko, I was a construction robot. Back before the war I used to spend my days working and recharging. I had no time for… those things."

"Aw, come on! Does that mean you didn't even have dates? Gee, I started dating when I was fourteen!" That was true, although Miko hadn't dated much during the next two years because for some reason guys seemed to think she was too weird.

Bulkhead shot her a pleading look. That was certainly an uncomfortable thing to talk about, so she decided to reroute the target of her conversation, if only to spare her friend from more awkward moments.

"What about Arcee? Did she date somebody?"

But awkward moments continued to be in order, as Bulkhead's expression promptly revealed.

"Arcee? Uh, well…" he said, scratching his head.

Miko closed her eyes and shook her hands before her face in denial. "Okay, okay, private issue there, right? You don't have to tell me… I mean, you and I are best buddies, but I guess you have to protect the secrets of your other friends too."

The Autobots were very protective about their intimate issues, that's why Miko – sometimes – tried not to dig too much into their private matters, but she was sure she had seen a tingle of sadness in Arcee's always hard face. She knew that Jack had noticed it too, but he had been discrete enough not to wonder about his partner's past. Miko, being in love with romance, liked to take things to a more interesting level and wondered if Arcee had loved somebody, somebody that she probably had lost.

"Well, I bet she did. She is very beautiful, and she certainly knows how to kick some serious ass!"

Bulkhead didn't reply. He seemed too busy analyzing whether he should start the next pile to the right or the left part of the room.

"Don't you agree, Bulk? Don't you think Arcee is beautiful?"

"Mm, what?" he said in the worst display of fake indifference Miko had ever seen. "Yeah, I guess she is."

"Have you ever thought about asking her out?"

Bulkhead dropped the container in his hands, turning to look at Miko as if she were the reincarnation of Unicron.

"What?! Asking her… Miko, what are you talking about?"

"I'm only saying that you should ask her on a date. She's very pretty, you are very cute yourself… Why not? You'd make a lovely couple. Besides, I have noticed how you look at her."

Miko never thought she would see Bulkhead's legs turning into two pillars of jelly. But that's exactly what happened, as they failed to sustain him and he fell flat on his aft, making Miko jump with the impact.

"Whoa!" she said, landing gracefully on the floor. "How many tons do you weigh exactly, Bulk? I bet you're heavier than my house."

But Bulkhead didn't seem to hear to her. He was stuck in the past, exactly to five seconds ago.

"You… you noticed? But how…?"

"You're more obvious than you think, but don't worry. I don't think any of the other Autobots, including Arcee, is aware. I could tell because we're best pals. I know you, Bulk."

"Miko, this…" he said, harshly rubbing the right side of his face with his hand. "This is more complicated than you think, even less a simple game. I like Arcee, alright. She's a loyal and brave soldier, much stronger than she looks… But, but… dates? I have never… I mean I could never…"

Okay, it was starting to be disturbing seeing Bulkhead so messed up. Miko's innocent intentions quickly turned into real preoccupation. She hated when her friends suffered, especially when said friend was Bulkhead.

"Because of the war?" she asked carefully.

Bulkhead shook his head. "It goes beyond that. Arcee… well, she has never seen me like that, I'm sure. You said it yourself. She's very beautiful and I… Well, look at me."

"What do you mean 'look at me'? Let me tell you something, mister, you are one very handsome robot! Actually, if I were ten tons heavier and a bulldozer, I'd date you for sure."

"That's my best friend talking," he said, getting up and picking up the container he had dropped before, doing his best to also pick up the pieces of his dignity.

"Well, I know you are far more handsome than him!" Miko said, taking out her cell phone and opening it.

Bulkhead stepped toward her, looking at the picture of Knock Out displayed on the small screen. The anger displayed on his faceplates was quickly replaced with surprise.

"When did you take that?"

"Yesterday, right before his examination."

Bulkhead attempted to grab her phone, but since it was too small for his fingers, he grasped Miko instead and raised her up.

"Hey! I don't want to go home yet!" she complained.

"I'll take you home later. There's something in this picture that Ratchet has to see!"

And they left, Bulkhead's legs once again made of steel.

To be continued.

Remember that weird photo session in chapter six? Now you'll see that I wasn't drunk when I wrote it. It had a purpose, and it will be revealed next chapter.

I'll try to post it as soon as I can. Please be a little patient with me, because there are a couple of my other stories that I want to update first. That doesn't mean I will neglect this one, promise.

See you soon! Please remember to let me know your comments.