Smokescreen onlined to find himself on a berth in an unfamiliar room. He was lying on his front with his arm flung over another bot. Justice was already awake and she turned her optics to his as he turned his head.

"I received an invite to meet the newly arrived femmes," she said. "Is it fine if I go meet them before seeing Ratchet?"

"Sure," said Smokescreen. "I'll let him know to expect you later."

"Great, now if you'd remove your arm, I'll be on my way," she said.

"Sorry, of course," said Smokescreen pushing himself up and off of her. He felt a twinge of regret in his spark as she moved away.

She quickly collected something from her shelves and promptly walked out the door. He marveled at how composed she had been waking up next to him. She was almost casual about it like it was a common thing. He wondered if it would be different if they'd done more than recharge together. He was also secretly glad that the femme he had gotten to know was like that from the start as he'd been worried about how she would change if her human memories were erased. As he collected the now empty energon cubes and subspaced them, he suddenly realized that his spark was reaching with longing for the femme that had just walked out the door. He had it bad. Smokescreen left the room and walked down the hall reviewing the information he had learned last night. After her admission about Rain's plans, he now recalled the many things about himself that he'd let slip after that. He wasn't quite sure it was such a good thing to have done so. In her presence in the future he would have to make a point to avoid the high grade.

xxxxx

Echo, Justice, Dawn, Mist and Night were lounging in the conference room when Elita and the other femmes walked in. The two groups paused sizing each other up. Night stepped forward gallantly. "I'm Night, this is Justice, this is Mist, this is Echo and this is Dawn," she said gesturing.

"My designation is Elita, this is Chromia, Flareup and Arcee," said Elita copying her move.

"So we have a really important question for you," said Dawn seriously.

Elita stiffened in anticipation.

"How in the world did you get Optimus as a sparkmate?" she blurted out excitedly.

Elita relaxed slightly.

"For that matter, how did you and Ironhide get together?" Mist asked Chromia.

"Oh geez," said Arcee. "Don't get them started."

"I agree with you there," said Echo. "The unattached ones in the room don't want to hear all your mushy stories."

"Oh, are they bonded?" asked Chromia.

"My sparkmate is Prowl," said Mist proudly.

The four femmes looked at her like she'd grown another head.

"What?" she asked.

"Prowl, for real?" asked Flareup. "But that mech is so stiff."

"What she means," said Elita diplomatically. "Is that it's very unexpected. We've known Prowl for a long time and he never gave any indication that he was interested in a sparkmate."

"I guess I just have that effect on some mechs," said Mist proudly.

"The way you threw yourself at him probably didn't hurt," said Night snorting.

Mist just shrugged.

"I totally want to hear that story sometime," said Flareup.

"I'm also bonded," said Dawn chiming in. "My sparkmate is Wheeljack."

There was another round of silence.

"Are you all right?" asked Arcee seriously.

"How are you still in one piece you poor femme?" asked Chromia sympathetically.

Dawn merely chuckled.

"Wheeljack built her a blast proof room so she could visit his lab safely," said Justice. "He doesn't spend quite as much time in there as he used to."

"How romantic," said Chromia.

The femmes chatted for a while about their sparkmates or lack thereof, until Elita brought up joining her group. "I'm the commander of the femmes and I'd like you to join my group," she said.

"I'm a field medic that's been assigned to the wreckers," said Dawn. "Would that interfere?"

"If that's the case, you can train and go on missions with the wreckers, but you'd also be able to go with us on our missions."

"I'm being trained as a frontliner so I'd like to continue training with the twins sometimes," said Night.

Elita nodded. "Any other concerns? If not, then welcome to the team. Feel free to bring up any issues you encounter in the future."

"What's the situation with the femme Rain?" asked Chromia curiously.

"Rain went rogue to fulfill her own mission," said Justice bluntly.

"Do you think she'll come back?" asked Elita.

"I don't believe she feels welcome here, but we do have ways of contacting each other so if we need outside help, she will step in," said Justice. "She still supports the Autobots even if indirectly now."

xxxxx

Optimus sat at his desk and sighed. Smokescreen had revealed some of the details that Justice had provided and that helped clear up a lot of his confusion. The fact that the femmes had deleted most of their human memories themselves shortly after they onlined came as quite the shock. For bots so young, they were continually full of surprises. His door slid open and Elita entered coming to stand next to him. She put a hand on his shoulder comfortingly.

"I'm worried about that femme," said Elita. "Someone so young should not be out there on her own."

"I failed to protect her Elita," said Optimus sadly.

"Optimus, you can't protect them all neither do you bear the responsibility," said Elita. "The femmes were born into this war and they have already chosen their own paths." She pressed her head into his neck. "Rain sounds like a resilient femme and if she knows she is welcome, she may come back. Only time will tell."

Optimus turned in his chair pulling Elita onto his lap. "Oh, how I have missed you my love," he said.

"And I you," Elita purred.

xxxxx

Echo, Arcee and Flareup walked into the rec room and were accosted by a chorus of greetings from the mechs. They settled at a table by themselves after grabbing some energon. The two newly arrived femmes weren't the only ones catching the mech's eye. Echo had changed her paint to a light and dark blue meshed with purple. In her altmode it was a galaxy design spotted with stars. Jazz was sitting at the counter, but turned to watch as they entered. Sometime later he casually glanced their way, he quickly blinked his optics behind his visor and looked again, but Echo was indeed talking almost as animatedly as the other two femmes. The shy polite femme he had known before had disappeared. Cliffjumper and several other bots joined their table and it only got louder as the older femmes teased some of the mechs that they'd known for a long time. Jazz turned back to the conversation he was having with Blaster. There was no way he was getting in the middle of that chaos. Later as he rose to leave, he found his way blocked by the galaxy colored femme.

"Hi Jazz," said Echo smiling. "I just wanted to apologize for what I said in your office. I had some expectations I shouldn't have placed on you and it was childish of me. I hope there are no hard feelings. See you around."

She had appeared suddenly and was gone like a whirlwind leaving Jazz to wonder if that could possibly be her. He stood frozen for a moment until he heard a laugh from behind him and turned to see Night passing by. She must have seen the whole thing.

"What happened to her?" asked Jazz in confusion.

"That's her real personality," said Night. "She finally decided to stop suppressing it. She'll be a lot happier for it."

xxxxx

Night was headed down the hall toward her room when she activated a trap the twins had set. Silver glitter covered her head and shoulders and streamed off of her as she immediately turned and walked toward the nearest wash racks. She sent a private comm to Sideswipe. "Sideswipe, did you leave a glitter trap in the hall?" she asked.

Sideswipe laughed in response. "Sorry, but it wasn't me."

"Must have been the younger twins then," she said. "I thought as much since it was only glitter and not glue or paint. I only wanted to confirm it."

"Where are you now?" asked Sideswipe.

"I'm headed to the wash racks. Most of this should blow right off at least I'm hoping it will," she said. She entered the wash racks and was happy to find them empty. The fewer bots she had to explain this to the better. She stepped under the blower and it activated, but little air came out instead gold glitter poured onto her. Night huffed in annoyance and stepped out. Just then the door opened and in walked Sideswipe and Sunstreaker. They had washing supplies with them.

"Oh, they really got you good," said Sideswipe laughing.

"I'd advise against using the blowers," she said. "I was just going to check if they rigged them all."

"Let me do that," said Sideswipe walking around her glittered form.

Sunstreaker went over to the showers and turned on the water.

"Wow, you must be incredibly lucky," said Sideswipe. "You got the only one that was rigged."

Sunstreaker laughed.

"I wouldn't call it lucky," she said stepping under the next blower. The air sent streams of glitter to the floor and through the floor grates. "The thing about glitter is that it gets everywhere and you can never get all of it off. There's still that sparkle or two you'll find months later. I hope it didn't get into my joints or Ratchet will have my head. The only plus is that it was dry. Wet glitter sticks like a suction cup on glass."

"Ah geez," said Sideswipe suddenly. "Prowl's on the comm complaining about the glitter in the hall."

Night contacted Prowl and told him that she was currently with the older twins and that he should investigate the younger. As they were the more careless set of twins, she was sure he could find trace sparkles on them. "He's headed to check on the younger twins," she said.

"Thanks for that," said Sideswipe with a smile. "I didn't want to end up in the brig for something I didn't do."

"The brig would be better than cleaning up that mess they made in the hall," said Sunstreaker as he rinsed off.

Night stood in front of the mirror turning in a slow circle to try and see if any glitter remained. As she did a second circuit, she noticed the twins watching her. She raised an eye ridge at them and asked, "Did I miss a patch or something?"

"Not that I can see," said Sideswipe smiling widely. "But I'd recommend a wash to make sure."

Sunstreaker turned on the shower next to him and Night shrugged and entered the water. The warm solvent cascaded over her form relaxing her and removing the dust that had accumulated on her form as well as any remaining glitter.

"I think I see some you missed," said Sunstreaker stepping in behind her. He used one of his clean rags on her back tracing her armor slowly following every seam.

While it wasn't unusual for other mechs and femmes to help each other wash, Night was getting a strange vibe from the twins. She had turned her head to look at Sunstreaker and when she turned back she was nearly face to face with Sideswipe. He too had a washrag and he got to work starting at her shoulders. Suddenly she could feel Sunstreaker's arm circle her waist pulling her against him. In front of her Sideswipe pressed in closer. One of the twins, she wasn't sure which one, touched one of the more sensitive lines below her armor and that made a delicious shiver travel through her frame. It took her three swift moves and she broke free of their embrace retreating to the blowers. The twins didn't immediately follow her and seemed somewhat disheartened by her reaction. They slowly finished their wash and turned off the water just as Night finished drying.

As Night headed toward the door, she stopped and looked back. "I don't know what you're up to, but don't play games with femmes," she said. "If I hear about you two causing trouble for my fellow femmes, you'll be the first Autobots to experience my claws, pretty paint job or not." She then turned and stalked out the door.

"At least she called our paint pretty," said Sideswipe sighing.

"Yes while threatening to scratch it off," said Sunstreaker darkly.

"She didn't react badly to our touch though," said Sideswipe. "That's got to count for something."

"She didn't believe we were sincere," said Sunstreaker. "It's hard to tell what she's feeling sometimes. I wish I could see the optics under that visor."

"At the beginning we didn't get along so maybe she doesn't believe that we'd see her that way," said Sideswipe.

"Her mindset is more mature than some of the other femmes. We may have to approach this in another manner," said Sunstreaker.

"The old fashioned way?" asked Sideswipe raising an eye ridge. "We've never done that before."

"Well it's time we did if we really want to pursue her," said Sunstreaker.

Sideswipe nodded his head. "Let's give it a try."