Driver 14
Acclimation
A Transformers Prime Fanfiction
"They should be back by now," Ratchet fumed pacing back and forth.
"Easy old friend," Optimus soothed the medic without looking up from the computer. "If anything had happened to June the tracking sensor you left in her hairpiece would have alerted us by now."
Ratchet started and glanced up guiltily at the Prime. How did he know about that? As if reading his thoughts the Autobot leader turned to look at him with a patient smile.
"While I sympathize with your desire to ensure June's safety I would suggest obtaining her permission before utilizing such methods to trace her."
The Autobot healer gave an aggravated grunt and turned away from his leader; embarrassment creasing his faceplates. He'd thought the tracker had gone unnoticed. His discomfort was interrupted as Arcee rolled into the base and transformed.
"Is June back yet?" she asked trying to sound casual.
"Not yet," Ratchet barked shortly.
"Yeah, can't wait for her to get here, Docbot's been wearing a path in the floor," Miko offered from where she was hauling a trolley of various lubricants across the silo floor to where she was assisting, mostly willingly, in the repair of the Darby's white sedan.
"Ah, I was not," the medic protested, but he was cut off by the blaring of the proximity alarm. He glanced eagerly at the screen and then scowled as he recognized the signal.
"Fowler," he muttered.
"Indeed," Optimus acknowledged. "He said he would be coming to the base soon to finalize the paperwork for Driver."
The medic let out a harrumph and turned off the alarms shortly, only to have them flare to life again a moment later. His blue optics once more flicked eagerly over the display.
"There they are!" he called out in relief.
The battered white pickup pulled into the silo proper and June stepped out. It took an immense effort on Arcee's part to restrain herself from snatching the woman up right there and running a full battery of scans. To her surprise, and slight annoyance the nurse had a huge grin on her face and looked for all the world as if she had enjoyed herself immensely.
"Hey Mom!" Jack's voice called out as he stepped stiffly out into the silo proper. He was wearing his 'nice' clothes; a navy blue suit that had fit just a few weeks ago but now showed a bit too much wrist and ankle. He was knotting a long black tie as he approached. "Did you have a good shopping trip?"
"Oh yes," she confirmed with a particular grin.
Her son looked at her curiously but he had long ago learned not to question that expression.
"Great," he replied. "Bumblebee is taking us to the party. If Miko will get ready," he yelled over his shoulder.
"Hey! I've been working my fingers to the bone over here!" she snapped back. "I'll be ready in five."
"Nurse Darby," Ratchet asked, trying to hide his agitation, "may I ask why your trip exceeded the expected time frame?"
A huge grin split her face as the woman pondered her answer.
"Why yes you can Ratchet," she weighed her words carefully. "It would seem that Driver attracts a bit more attention than I expected."
"Attention?" The medic frowned and shot a sharp glance at the truck who was still sitting quietly beside the human.
"Yes," June thought for a moment then shrugged her shoulders and decided to get it out in the open. "Apparently he's a natural stud magnet."
"What?" Jack and Miko cried out in astonishment; Jack from hearing his mother use the term, Miko from trying to see the battered metal form as attractive in any way.
Ratchet scrunched his faceplates in perplexity. He didn't understand the term, and a basic entomological analysis made no sense. He continued to listen as June went on.
"Every time we stopped, some gentleman would come up and start the same conversation…"
"Prime! … Hey! Is that a Diesel Rabbit?" Fowler's voice cut off in mid tirade and suddenly took on a joyous note as he entered the silo.
June grinned and inclined her head toward the agent. Driver shifted a bit nervously before responding.
"Yes, I scanned it just outside the village I woke up in."
"Nice alt mode," the agent eyed the truck with obvious approval. "That's a good truck. I used to have a truck like that." The man's gaze grew far off and wistful. "I miss that truck."
"That," the woman said with a grin; pointing at the slightly bemused agent. "That was the very conversation I kept having."
"No way," Miko suddenly interjected. "I just can't believe that old truck brought the boys to the yard."
The nurse grinned at her and pulled three piece of paper out of her pocket.
"Then how about some proof?"
The slim Asian snatched the papers out of her hand and examined them carefully.
"Driver scored you three phone numbers?" she demanded incredulously.
"Yep, and decent quality goods at that," June confirmed. "All solid blue collar Joes."
The girl still looked unconvinced.
"You wouldn't understand," Fowler offered. "It's a guy thing. There's just something about a lady in a pickup truck." If his eyes lingered a bit too long on the lady in question the Cybertronians didn't notice.
Arcee was trying to follow the conversation but not having much luck. She turned to Jack for clarification only to find him off in a corner doing his best to ignore the whole thing. The cycle-bot shook her helm in frustration; humans could be so confusing sometimes.
Driver rolled back slightly and transformed. He glanced worriedly between the confused Autobots and the amused humans.
"I am sorry if my appearance caused problems for you," he offered contritely.
"No, no problems," June assured him with a wide grin. "Not even an inconvenience."
"Won't it take some time to contact the individuals who gave you their comm. codes?"
"Oh, I'm not going to contact them," the woman shrugged dismissively. "Miko, toss those for me will you?"
"Then why did you accept their information if you had no intention of contacting them?" The white mech asked in confusion. He wasn't the only one interested. Fowler looked quite attentive despite giving a bit too much deliberate attention to the paperwork he was shuffling.
"It's a rather complicated human tradition," June explained as the miner followed her across the floor. "If I had refused the contact information outright it would have been a fairly serious insult, indicating that I judged them completely unfit individuals as potential mates and they were all well within my primary standards. I'm just not interested at the moment. The standard response in that situation is simply to not contact them. If they don't get a response in seven days they know I'm not interested."
The confused look on the mech's faceplates indicated he still had questions but a suspiciously relieved looking Fowler hailed him and Optimus to come over and begin the current round of paperwork. Jack and Miko climbed hurriedly into Bumblebee and slipped out of the base while June was still distracted. A maneuver they had discussed earlier to avoid any picture taking by the mother. Once they were gone Arcee strolled over to June and awkwardly tried to start up a conversation. The nurse was tired but tried gamely to keep up her end. The Autobot finally realized how exhausted the woman was and offered to bridge her home. Driver came out of the conference and glanced at her blankly before picking up a bag of concrete from the floor.
Arcee tried to fight back the cold rage she felt on seeing the con walking free through the base, interacting with her humans. The Autobots had spent years building trust with the governments of Earth. They had bent over backwards to make sure the humans were not afraid of them. Over the eons of exile from Cybertron they had done their best to respect and protect every sentient life form they had encountered. Memories of thousands of battles, crouched in fear over injured comrades flitted through the femme's processor. The steep price paid to build the relationships they had. Now this Con; who had admitted to murdering thousands of organics, simply strolled up and reaped the dividends of their hard work.
The base suddenly felt stifling. With a flurry of movement the Autobot transformed and raced out into the night. She tore along the asphalt towards Jasper trying to shake the dull burning in her spark. Soon she began to regret leaving the base. Out in the quiet Nevada night her thoughts turned inward, examining her feelings. Selfish, whispered a voice that sounded suspiciously like Jack's, jealous. Arcee drove faster. When, she wondered, had her conscience taken to sounding like the young human? Unfair, the still small voice continued, he was forced. He is trying to make amends. He makes no excuses. With a howl of fury the femme tried to reject the gentle logic as the glittering desert stars watched silently.
O
O
A sleek yellow muscle car rolled gracefully to a stop outside of the Darby's house. Jack staggered out with a huge yawn. He caught himself on the roof of the car as he leaned in to bid goodbye to the girl seated within.
"See you tomorrow at school Miko," he called out. "Thanks for the ride Bee."
"Maybe," the slim Asian replied with a groan over the Autobot's cheerful beeping. "Scrap and thunder, who knew Abuelita could party like that?"
"She's a remarkable woman," Jack agreed with a grin.
"You think they'll ever find the rest of the gerbils?"
"Hard to say, the python had everyone in a pretty good panic by then."
"Yeah, well night Jack."
"Night Miko."
The raven haired youth let himself into the house. He paused at his mother's door and peeked in, reassuring himself that she was safely asleep before going into the garage.
"Hey Arcee," he called out to the blue motorcycle parked against the wall. He frowned in worry when she didn't respond. "Arcee?" he asked tentatively as he reached out to tenderly stroke her saddle.
At the touch of his hand the Autobot leaned suddenly into him, almost throwing the human off balance. Unsure what this was all about but suspecting it had something to do with Driver, Jack remained silent and simply leaned into the cycle letting his hand rest on the living metal. Finally the blue form shifted away and turned her front end into the wall. Jack stepped back at the clear dismissal and went into the house. A few moments later he reappeared in his pajamas carrying a loose bundle of thick cloth and a foam pad. He unrolled the pad and sleeping bag in the exact middle of the floor between Arcee and the far wall and climbed in without a word. The tired human was almost asleep when he heard the metallic whirring of transformation. There was the sound of living metal rearranging itself and then Jack felt a warm silent presence at his back. A soft smile played at the corners of his mouth as he drifted off to sleep with the feel of Arcee's backstrut lightly touching his spine.
O
O
Driver quickly became a regular sight at the Darby household when he was not with Rafael. The small town of Jasper soon got used to June driving around in the battered white truck, which admittedly looked much better once Miko had badgered the mech to consent to a scrub down in the wash facility on the base. Arcee found that constant exposure to the meek and conscientious mech was slowly dissipating the hard feelings she was harboring. It was difficult to stay angry at somebot who so clearly was giving his all to serve and protect the humans under his care. She didn't want to admit how much it helped that out of respect for what Arcee was struggling with Jack kept the miner at arm's length, refusing rides even if Arcee was unavailable.
She had just gotten back from an especially long and boring energon patrol and was enjoying just cruising Jasper with Jack when her comm. sounded. The blue motorcycle's engine gave a frustrated growl into the evening air as she acknowledged.
"Arcee here. What IS it Ratchet?"
"I am reading three energon signals in Jasper," the medic said urgently.
Arcee felt her energon run cold and Jack's grip tighten on her handle bars. She was here. Driver was escorting June on some sort of nurses' outing. Every other Cybertronian belonging to the base was either in the base proper or on another continent.
"Bridge Driver and June back to base now!" Arcee snapped. "Where is that third signal?"
"The unaccounted for signal is approximately a klick northeast of your current position," Ratchet informed her. "I'm bridging Optimus back from his patrol, but he is currently in a populated area and won't be able to reach a concealed location for some time."
"Understood," the cycle bot said grimly as she spun around and accelerated toward the coordinates. If that scrapping Con had betrayed them, there wouldn't be enough of him left to fit in her saddle bags.
O
O
Driver shifted uneasily in his parking space. The refueling station June was currently in with her fellow healers was not to his liking. He had dropped all six of his remaining sensor drones and still hadn't been able to cover all the exits. The level of noise and light coming from the crowded room behind the small windows made it impossible to keep a steady eye on the human. The group she was with had flatly refused to let her wear the Buletooth in. A particularly dominant female who went by Sandy had finally snatched the device off June's head and tossed it into the cab before ushering the weakly protesting nurse into the building.
When Ratchet radioed in warning of an unaccounted for energon signal nearby the miner barely restrained himself from transforming on the spot and physically extracting the human from the building. He calmed down a bit when the medic informed his that Arcee was inbound and closing fast. He ran several scenarios through his processor and conferred with Ratchet on how he might get the woman's attention. The two mechs had just about decided to send in one of the sensor drones when Miko took over the conversation with an exasperated sigh.
"Driver! What is the name of the restaurant?"
"Lamar's Family Dining," he replied in confusion. He heard papers being shuffled and the girl muttering through a list of names.
"Lamar's! There we go. Now I just call them and have the boss give Mrs. Darby a message for us."
There was silence on either end of the line as the simplicity of the plan sunk in. After a few moments…
"There! Mission accomplished," the girl cried out triumphantly. "The manager says she's on the way out now."
Driver immediately recalled his drones which rolled back into the carrying cases on his undercarriage. His optics eagerly tracked June as she walked briskly towards him in the dim evening light. She paused momentarily under a tall light source to reassure her companion that this was indeed an emergency. Sandy shook her head in exasperation and made some threat involving kidnapping June and a tropical island before returning to the party. The nurse resumed her course towards the white mech when it happened. There was a flash of silver and the place where June had been standing was empty.
No.
Ratchet was demanding an update over the comm. Arcee was adding her own voice to the request. But the miner sat dumbly in shock, for a moment refusing to believe what his optics were telling him.
Primus please no, not her, don't let it be her.
"Driver! Report!" the medic's voice roared over the horrified fog in his processor.
"Driver please, is something wrong?"
It was the fear and concern in Jack's voice that snapped the white pickup out of his shock rather than the demanding shouts of the Autobot.
"She has June," the miner stated flatly steeling himself to face reality.
"Who? Who has her?" Ratchet cried out.
"Flight capable/drilling femme. Last known rank and assignment, first officer on the Viper. Designation Airachnid."