Disclaimer: All of these guys below belong to Hasbro. I just like playing with their fates and will return them when done. Except Gregory, he's mine. He stays with me.

Your Author: We are beginning to get somewhere finally!

The pillow failed to drown out the sounds of Gregory's tools. Sam lifted up the corner of the pillow he'd tossed onto the alarm clock and promptly groaned. The tools were always an indication that it was time to get up, for the entire week he hadn't had to set the alarm clock once. Which was just as well. He kicked off the blankets and threw on some clothes, lazily tying on his shoes and grabbing his cell from the nightstand. The pillow did a fantastic job of deflecting whatever his hand discharged. Once again the alarm clock was saved from a horrible charred death.

He wandered into the kitchen and pulled two poptarts out of a box. He decided to eat them just as. The week thus far had been entirely uneventful, not that he was complaining. It was nice. Gregory was openly eccentric and obsessed over cars instead of lawns, but he let Sam have his space. The two men didn't converse much, aside from dinner and work, but it seemed to work out for them. They were guys; they didn't need to talk about how Mrs. Jenkins was cheating on Mr. Jenkins with the mailman. Sam poked his head into the garage, halfway through his second poptart already, surprised to see his Uncle's upper torso hidden by the corvette. Usually he was gathering his tools in preparation to head to the shop.

"Uncle Greg?" The man pushed himself out from under the car looking surprised to see Sam awake before realization dawned on his face.

"Good morning Sam. I'm sorry; I guess I forgot to tell you last night. I'm not opening the shop on time today. I need to finish up this beauty so Richards can pick her up by six." He patted the front end. "I will let you know when I'm headed down there." With that he disappeared beneath the corvette. Sam headed back inside, patting his pockets to ensure that he did grab it. He contemplated just going back to bed, but he was too awake for that. Instead he went back into the guest room and dug out a beat up cd player. It had scorch marks on its surface, but that wasn't due to age. Sam had been using it to practice. He was proud of himself for not having blown it up yet like he did the ones that preceded it. With his uncle in the garage, Sam wasn't going to chance practicing in his room. He didn't know if the energy could go through walls and wasn't willing to find out the hard way.

He walked through the house, trying to find somewhere suitable to practice. Finally he settled on going to the backyard. He hadn't seen his uncle go out there once since he came. The chances of him walking in on him there was much slimmer, or so he hoped. Sam closed the backdoor quietly even though his uncle was unlikely to hear because of the music blasting in the garage. When the man was absorbed nothing else penetrated his bubble, music or no. Like the front the backyard had no grass, but instead of rock it had dirt. There was a square of concrete that protruded from the house with a few chairs on it and a small table. To the far right of the yard sat a car, this really didn't surprise Sam, but the make-shift cover made the make and model difficult to discern. The rest of the yard was bare. Sam sat on one of the dusty chairs and took a few even breaths before beginning his usual ritual. Hold the object, think about only it and hope something happens.

-

Sam groaned as he stood and stretched. He could only keep it up for thirty minutes at a time at the most. Even that was pushing it; humans just weren't made to keep still for any length of time. There was also the case of boredom. Not to mention the bone eating curiosity about what type of car lay beneath the tarp. He should ask his uncle if he could take a look, but he didn't want to bother him when he was working. Besides, if he didn't want Sam near the car he'd have made the backyard off-limits or warned him…or something. He put the cd in the chair and headed towards the hidden car. He would just lift the tarp enough to see the model of the car, that's it. It's not like he was doing anything wrong.

He carefully lifted the front of the tarp away from the car, eyes widening in shock as he did so. He wasn't always able to pick out the exact model of a car that passed much less the year, but anyone with half a brain knew what was beneath the tarp with just that glance at the front. He uncovered the car halfway and stood back to admire the beauty. He couldn't tell what year it was, but he knew for a fact that he'd just uncovered a Lamborghini. The 'look and not touch' concept was thrown out of the window. At one point in their life all men dreamed of owning a Lamborghini. Hell, being able to touch one was a lifetime opportunity! Because it had been sitting back there for so long there was a fine layer of dust and dirt covering the car. His hand was resting lightly against the metal, a habit he'd picked up from being around Bumblebee, and was slightly surprised to find it warm. The weather was cold and despite being under a tarp, the car should be too. His uncle had probably started the engine recently.

Sam jerked his hand back as if he'd been burned. At first he'd merely thought static electricity had caused the shock, but his hand told a different story. What appeared to be bolts of blue lightning danced across his hand like little dancers. Every so often one would strike the uncovered hood of the car. Horrified, Sam stumbled back several steps. He pulled his hand against his chest and closed it into a fist effectively stopping the energy from escaping. The car didn't look like it had taken any damage, but Sam wasn't about to take any further risks. He pulled the cover back over and retreated indoors. Once inside he looked at his hand, which now was normal. It figured. He couldn't get anything to happen when he wanted to, but the moment he got near an expensive piece of machinery, that didn't belong to him mind you, there were sparks everywhere. He grumbled and cursed beneath his breath.

-

Working at the auto shop wasn't as bad as he'd thought it might be. He'd only had two accidents, both of which he managed to cover up. Unfortunately there were days when things ran slow and when things ran slow it gave the opportunity to talk. It just so happened to be one such day.

"So Sam," Gregory started, hands buried in the front end of a car. Sam looked up from what he was doing before returning his attention to it. "Why'd you quit college?" Ah, a serious topic first.

"Wasn't for me." He merely shrugged, trying to appear casual about it. He could just about feel his uncle's hard gaze on him.

"Bull, it wasn't for a girl was it?"

"What?" What sort of guy did he take him for? His uncle must have misinterpreted his expression because the next thing out of his mouth floored Sam.

"Ah, a man then." Ron would never have said it that casually, much less at all. Sam tried, and failed, to get his voice box working. His face was turning a nice shade of pink from embarrassment, which made everything that much worse.

"No! No, I don't swing that way! I had a girlfriend!"

"That doesn't mean anything." His put up a hand in a placating manner. "Calm down Sam, I was just asking."

"That wasn't asking," Sam grumbled. Gregory chuckled, amused by his nephew's actions.

"I'm sorry. Do you have a more interesting reason?"

"Nope," he replied simply. "It just wasn't for me."

"You have no imagination; I'd have gone for 'I dropped out to join a samurai gang'." Sam merely shot him a look. "Alright then." Gregory leaned against a workbench and crossed his arms. "What's going on? There must be a reason you came up here and all I was given was 'issues'. Want to explain?"

"Not really." Sam knew his uncle's heart was in the right place, but there wasn't anything he could say about the situation. He shut the hood of the car he'd been working on and wiped his hands on a rag.

"What's going to need replacing?" Gregory pushed off from the workbench and came to stand by the car, ready to pop the hood again.

"Nothing."

"The owner will be happy to hear that." He took a quick look at Sam's handiwork and shut the hood pleased. "You have too much free time on your hands." He said suddenly in a tone that worried Sam. "You need something to take that up, keep you busy."

"Uh, really?" Sam didn't know where this was going and didn't know if he'd like it. Gregory nodded his head and crossed his arms.

"I'm going to give you a project that ought to take up a good chunk of that free time." Although he was trying to go for the 'serious' look, he couldn't stop a grin from spreading. "In the backyard I have a nineteen eighty-five Lamborghini Countach. I can't get her running worth anything, but I haven't had the heart to put her out. Maybe you ought to tinker around and see if you can work a miracle on her. God knows she needs it. I'd hate to see her go to the junk yard." He found a rag tossed at his head, draping over and into his line of vision nicely. He pulled it off only to find Sam giving him a look that mingled between 'you son of a bitch' and 'oh my god yes'. He laughed outright. "Sorry, I couldn't resist acting serious."

"You're a bastard."

"Thanks!" He looked thoughtful for a moment. "You think you could tell that to the ladies next door? I keep trying to tell them that, but they don't listen to me." Another rag was thrown at him even as he laughed.

-

Gregory had let Sam go early, there wasn't much to be done and he could see the eagerness in his eyes. He could handle closing up the shop himself. Sam emerged from the bathroom and made a straight line for the backyard after gathering a few tools from the garage. He moved the plastic table closer to the covered car and placed the tools on top before completely removing the tarp. He'd previously assumed the car to be in fairly good shape, but was proved wrong. It was obviously damaged with dents and scratches all along the body. One of the windows had been busted and the left rear door had a good sized dent bending it inward. He could tell his uncle had done some work on the body, but when it didn't start up despite his attempts he had to push it to the back of his 'to-do list'. Judging by what his uncle had said the damage was not just superficial.

Sam popped the hood to see what he was working with. He winced upon seeing the damage within. Gregory had done a fantastic job thus far, but he could see why he'd gotten frustrated. It looked as if it would never run again. The engine, top of the line by the looks of it, was in good condition. There had to be some unknown underlying cause that kept it from starting up. Something Gregory had missed. He had his work cut out for him that was certain. His free time would be taken up by the project, but if he could get it running it would all be worth it.

There was some sort of familiarity that was tugging at him, but it was quickly dismissed.

-

Gregory watched Sam from the kitchen window. The boy was uncertain about his direction in life and had issues that he refused to talk about, but obviously hindered him. The only thing he seemed certain about were cars. He rarely talked when working on one, but it was clear he was at peace when he did. He had a knack for working around the components and finding the problem. He couldn't explain nor do it with someone breathing down his neck. It was something that he had to not think about.

Strange things tended happen around the boy. He'd once found Sam using a tool that wasn't plugged in, yet it was working. He'd also found a screwdriver stuck to the ceiling in the shop. It was still there too, he hadn't figured out how to get it down. He hadn't even considered asking Sam about it until he purchased him a new screwdriver, no explanation given. There had been a few times Sam had yelped outright and when Gregory checked on him, he acted as innocent as a child who just broke his neighbor's window. There was no evidence of an accident; therefore Gregory was forced to let it go.

Despite everything, Sam was a fantastic worker. He worked as long as Gregory needed him to and didn't complain. If anything, he seemed to prefer keeping himself busy. At times it appeared as if Sam was trying to distance himself from people and that troubled him deeply. He was fine around his family, he bantered back and forth with Gregory often enough, but it was other people he shied away from. He let Sam tinker with the Lamborghini so that he wasn't pacing around and mumbling beneath his breath in his room. If fixing cars calmed him, then he'd give him the means to take his mind off of everything.

He'd agreed to let him stay for a while simply because he was Ron's son. Now he knew that it had been a good decision.