Author's Note: -- denotes a translation of Mini-con-speak.
------
"Hey, Red, are you OK?" Smokescreen asked. Red Alert looked up from his work.
"Yeah, I'm fine. What makes you ask?"
"Well, maybe it's just me, but you seem really uptight lately."
"I'm not uptight."
"Are you sure? 'Cuz it sure seems like something's been getting under your armor ever since Nexa and Aurora showed up. See? Right there."
"See what? Right where?"
"You flinched when I mentioned Nexa and Aurora! See? There you go again!"
"I did not flinch!"
"Don't deny it, Red Alert, you definitely flinched!"
"I did no such thing," Red Alert said, utilizing an end-of-conversation-because-I-said-so tone of voice. Smokescreen shrugged it off.
"Whatever you say, Red." Red Alert continued his work in silence for a few minutes, then stopped and sighed.
"Smokescreen?" he asked.
"What?"
"Do you think that Lazerbeak's simple technology?"
"What? Are you kidding, Red Alert?"
"I'm entirely serious. Is Lazerbeak simple?"
"No way! Lazerbeak's not even close to being simple technology!" Smokescreen said, placing his hand of a wall. "You know what this is?"
"It's a wall, Smokescreen."
"That's right, a wall. The very definition of simple technology. After all, technology is something that is built to do something, and walls do all sorts of stuff. Lazerbeak's a lot more complicated than a wall, right?"
"Right, Red Alert said with a slight smile.
"What brought that up, anyway?"
"Nothing. It's nothing," Red Alert said, shaking his head.
"Whatever you say, Red."
------
"Whatcha doin'?" Aurora asked, looking over Red Alert's shoulder.
"What are you doing in the med bay?" Red Alert asked.
"I'm finding out where stuff is around here. So whatcha doin'?"
"I'm rearranging my tools."
"Oohhh..." Aurora said. She watched Red Alert silently for a few minutes, and then said, "That's the third time you've moved that tool."
"What?" Red Alert asked, putting the said tool away and taking out another one.
"The tool you just put away. That was the third time you moved it. And this is the fourth time you've moved that tool," Aurora replied, pointing at the tool that Red Alert was holding. Red Alert didn't say anything, but he exchanged the tool for another one. Aurora informed him that it was the second time he'd moved it. He put that tool down, picked up a different one, and was subsequently informed that he'd moved it four times already. Thoroughly annoyed by now, the medic picked up yet another tool, but this time was met with silence.
Confused he looked at Aurora and asked, "You're not going to point out how many times I've moved this?"
"Actually, this is the first time you've moved that tool," the femme said, as Red Alert got another tool. "But it's the sixth go for that one." This comment was met with silence, which Aurora had become accustomed to, but Red Alert also stopped moving. Although she had kept her distance throughout the mostly one-sided exchange, Aurora lightly touched Red Alert's arm as she asked him if he was OK.
"I'm fine," Red Alert said coldly, quickly moving his arm away and resuming his reorganization. Aurora crossed her arms and glared extremely sharp and pointy daggers at him, her displeasure at his reply painfully evident. She stood there for a while, and then, as though she couldn't find the right words to express her annoyance, she glared one particularly nasty glare at the medic and then left the med bay.
-----
"Hey, Aurora, what's wrong? You look angry," Hot Shot asked as Aurora stormed into the control room. She looked at him and automatically switched into bright and happy mode from her angry musings.
"Nothing's wrong, Hot Shot," the femme said brightly. "I'm not mad at anything." The yellow Autobot was about to voice his doubts when the Mini-con signal went off. "What's that?" Aurora asked.
"That's the Mini-con signal."
"And standard procedure is?"
"Report to the warp room."
"And that is exactly where?"
"You forgot already?" Aurora nodded in reply. Hot Shot signed and said, "Follow me."
------
"When are those Autobots gonna hurry up and get here? I'm starting to get impatient!"
"You're always impatient, Cyclonus," Demolisher said.
"Megatron, sir, can we PLEASE gag him NOW?" Thrust asked. If Megatron head Thrust's plea, he made no movement to indicate that he had. Wheeljack walked over to Cyclonus, tapped him on the arm, and then said something quietly.
"How would you know?" Cyclonus asked loudly in contrast. Wheeljack made no verbal reply, but pointed to the sliced Autobot symbol on his chest. "Oh. Right," Cyclonus said, and then he was silent. Wheeljack returned to where he was previously.
"What did you say to him?" Starscream asked.
"I told him that no Autobot in their right mind would come near here if they could hear him shouting about how impatient he was to blow them up from a mile off."
"And then he asked..." Starscream let his voice trail off.
"Yep," the former Autobot said shortly. Starscream groaned and covered his face with his hand.
"That is truly amazing," the seeker said.
"What's amazing?" Aurora asked, almost seeming to pop up out of nowhere. "That what's-his-face over there could ask such a blatantly stupid question or that Wheeljack, despite his programming and experiences as a member of the Autobots, could come to such a blatantly wrong conclusion? I mean, look! I'm here, aren't I, and last time I checked, I was a perfectly sane Autobot."
The femme's comments were met with silence by the stunned Decepticons, until Wheeljack managed to force out an "Au-Aurora?"
The blue Autobot smiled at him and said, "What are you so surprised about? After all, I'm not the one here that's legally dead according to the Autobot files!"
"Oh, I'm legally dead now? When did I stop being missing in action?" the illegally alive Decepticon asked.
"Actually, you've been dead for a while. A few years now, I think."
"As interesting as discussing what stage of decomposition Wheeljack should be in right now might be to you two, I'm pretty sure that the rest of us are rather bored with it by now," Nexa said while pulling a popping up out of nowhere trick very similar to the one Aurora had used earlier. The blue Autobot began to protest, but Nexa quickly cut her off with "Oh, come on, you know you were about to." Aurora pouted a bit, but didn't reply. "Now, you do recall that our orders were to find the Mini-con, not the Decepticons, right?"
"Yeah, but I don't know what the Mini-con looks like, and the Decepticons were just oh-so easy to find, thanks to rotor-butt over there."
"Hmmm..." Nexa said, looking quite ponderous. "While both of your points are undeniable facts, neither is a suitable excuse for your presence here. After all, it's not like any of the these idiots knows where the Mini-con is, and even if they did, would they really tell you?"
"No, I guess not," Aurora answered.
It was right about then that Optimus tackled Megatron from behind and all hell broke loose.
------
Aurora shook her head as she watched Thrust plummet to the ground. It's just way too easy to beat that guy up, it truly is." The blue femme looked about absent-mindedly when something caught her attention. Specifically, something shiny sticking out of a cliff face. Aurora flew over to it and inspected the blue and green panel. "This must be the Mini-con!" she said optimistically. Then the Autobot grabbed a hold of the Mini-con panel and attempted to yank it out of the cliff. When that yielded no results, she yanked harder. After that attempt proved fruitless, she floated backwards and looked at the panel ponderously. "It's stuck in there pretty tight!" Then the femme flew off to the right as Starscream stabbed the air where she'd just been hovering. "Y'know, it's generally considered rude to try to stab someone when their back is turned," she said as the Decepticon pulled his sword out of the cliff. Aurora, having noticed that the Mini-con panel was slightly looser now, pointed at Starscream's sword and asked if she could borrow it for a minute.
Starscream looked at her confused for a bit, then said, "What? No!"
Aurora pouted a bit and sighed, then said, "Fine, fine. Just remember, I asked you nicely." She then punched the seeker in the nose. He instinctively threw his left hand up to his face, allowing Aurora to grab a hold of his sword and deliver him a solid kick to the abdomen. She shifted the sword, now firmly in her possession to her left hand and aimed the gun on her right arm at Starscream. "Are you going to play nice, or am I going to have to shoot you?" the femmebot asked. The seeker weighed his options and decided that Aurora had the clear upper hand and that attempting an attack would be really, really stupid. The blue Autobot took the look on Starscream's face to be a sort of acceptance of terms, smiled brightly at the Decepticon, and returned her attention to the Mini-con panel. With Starscream's sword acting as a lever and as a very convenient way to break up all the rocks and dirt holding the panel in place, Aurora quickly had the green and blue object out of the cliff face and firmly in the palm of her hand. Aurora turned to face Starscream again and tossed his sword back at him while saying, "Here, catch!" The seeker scrambled madly to catch his sword without sustaining any damage. "Thanks for not being a total idiot. It's very nice to know you have some semblance of honor. I was afraid it was extinct amongst Decepticons," Aurora said. Starscream found himself insulted, not by the claim that he had no honor, as most would expect out of such a high-ranking Decepticon, but rather the claim that the Decepticons as a whole were lacking it. The seeker attacked, and Aurora dodged to the side. He turned around and was about to launch another attack when his comm. link bristled to life with Megatron's order to surrender. Although Starscream was thankful that Megatron obviously had no plans to abandon him this time, he sighed inwardly. His honor would have to wait.
------
Hot Shot had not been acquainted with the red Mini-con Aurora held in her arms for more than five minutes, yet he already disliked him. These feelings were obviously mutual, as the Mini-con, whose alt mode was apparently some sort of truck, if the huge grill on his chest and large wheels on his shoulders were anything to go by, hurled a few more insults at the yellow Autobot. Aurora looked at Hot Shot, expecting a translation of the beeps coming out of the ever-smirking mouth that dominated the Mini-con's face underneath his shiny black visor. Hot Shot sighed and said, "His name's Piston and about every other word he says is an insult." Piston said something that Hot Shot sincerely wished he'd misinterpreted, or hadn't heard at all. "WHAT did you just call me?" Hot Shot asked, not even bothering to try to hide the insulted tone in his voice.
Nexa chuckled, turned to Aurora, and said, "Hey, when I get my hands on one of these Mini-cons, would you be willing to consider trading? I think I like this little guy!" Piston beeped and Hot Shot wondered if Nexa would still like the Mini-con if she could understand what it just said.
------
"Optimus! Optimus, sir! I need to talk to you! The Matrix-bearer turned to look at the medic.
"What is it, Red Alert?" Optimus asked as the blue Autobot caught up to him.
"I need to talk to you."
"So you've already informed me," Optimus said, slightly confused.
"I did? Oh, whoops. Sorry."
"Are you OK, Red Alert?"
"No, no, I'm not. That's why I need to talk to you. I'm not OK. I'm going nuts, crazy, insane, loosing my marbles, not right in the head, messed up, loony. Y'know, I only know so many different ways of saying this, you can show that you understand any time now!" Optimus' only reply was to nod silently, obviously frightened by the medic's tone. "Good," Red Alert continued. "Thankfully, this... condition is easily fixable. I just have to get out of here."
"You want to go back to Cybertron?" Optimus asked, not fully understanding.
"Oh, no, no, nothing that extreme. I can stay on Earth, no problem; I just need to get out of the base. Just bring me on the next mission, real simple."
"Can't you just go for a drive or something?"
"That's what's been keeping me sane thus far, but it doesn't work anymore. I've got the scenery around here memorized."
"Well, there has to be some other way, Red Alert. It's too dangerous to bring you on a mission. You're our only medic here, if you get slagged, who's going to repair you?"
"If I go nuts, who's going to repair you?" Red Alert countered. Optimus was silent, unable to think of a suitable reply to the medic's question. "So, it's decided then?"
Optimus shook his head and said, "I still think it's too dangerous and that you can figure something else out."
"Let me put it this way for you, Prime. While a dead medic's of no use to anyone, a dead medic can't hurt you. A crazy medic, well... That's another story completely."
"Are you threatening me?"
"Nonsense, sir! I'm just pointing out your options. I'd also like to add that although there's no guarantee I'll get slagged, it IS guaranteed that I'll go nuts. Your choice, sir."
"Gee, such a great choice," Optimus said, his voice dripping with sarcasm. Red Alert smiled at him and shrugged slightly.
"So?" he asked expectantly.
"I guess I'll have to let you come on the next mission. I just hope you stay relatively sane until then."
"Good!" the medic said, then he paused for a moment and a blank expression crossed over his face. "Was I talking to you, sir?" he asked.
"Umm... no," Optimus replied, rather unconvincingly.
"Oh," Red Alert said flatly, then an uncharacteristically broad smile crossed his face, he said, "OK then!" and left the rather confused leader of the Autobots. Optimus watched him go, and then continued down the hall, even though what just happened had made him forget where he was going. A short distance later, Smokescreen approached him.
"Umm, sir, would it be possible for me to have a word with you?" he asked.
"Red Alert's going nuts. I know. I'll deal with it, Smokescreen," Optimus said, not even allowing the shorter of the two a chance to bring the subject up.
"Oh," the orange Autobot said. "Never mind then. You've obviously got everything under control."
"Yeah," Optimus said to himself as Smokescreen departed. "I've got everything under control. Riiight."
-------
"Is there always a new Mini-con to be found every few days around here?" Aurora asked, as the Mini-con signal blared to life.
"Sometimes," Hot Shot answered. "There's really no set rhythm to it, sometimes it's a few weeks between Mini-cons."
"A hectic schedule, then? Rapture," Aurora said sarcastically. She followed Hot Shot to the warp room again, even though she knew the way now. When they arrived Aurora was surprised to find Red Alert there. She had assumed that he always stayed at the base with the strange, little creatures Hot Shot fondly referred to as "the kids." She should've known better than to base anything off of a mere two missions. Aurora was also reminded of a phrase one of "the kids" had used about assuming. She couldn't remember exactly what it was, but she remembered it had something to do with a donkey, a low, stubborn, ill-tempered Earth creature. Then she remembered that a donkey represented a certain large group of people, and she wondered why anybody would take pride in being represented by such a disagreeable animal. It was about then that Aurora realized her mind was wandering. She brought it back on track just in time to get back into the loop before anyone realized she'd been out of it. She noted that Scavenger was missing and figured that he was taking Red Alert's place watching "the kids."
After the Autobots launched, Aurora inspected their new surroundings. It appeared that they were in some sort of forest. Aurora sighed inwardly. She was getting tired of tress. "Alright, men. And femmes," Optimus said, earning an approving nod from Nexa. "We've got a lot of land to cover here. It is imperative that we find this Mini-con before the Decepticons do. In order to achieve this goal in the most efficient manner, I believe we should search the area in groups. Jetfire and I will head north, Hot Shot, Blurr, and Sideswipe will head east, Nexa and Smokescreen will head south, and Red Alert and Aurora will go west. Any questions?"
"Ooh, I do!" Red Alert, who was inspecting a tree while Optimus was issuing orders, said, his attention finally caught by the last things Optimus said.
"WTF?" Aurora exclaimed, earning herself more than just a few stares. "What?" she asked.
"I'm... not going to ask," Optimus said.
"Good idea," Nexa agreed.
"Sir, I've got a complaint!" Red Alert said.
"What is it, Red Alert?" Optimus asked. "What's the problem here? You're obviously both nuts." Red Alert couldn't see Optimus' mouth through his faceplate, but he had the suspicious feeling that Optimus was grinning. "Well, we've got a Mini-con to find! Let's go, Jetfire!"
"Have fun, guys!" Jetfire said cheerily, waving as he followed Optimus north.
------
"Y'know, I'm not enjoying this anymore than you are," Aurora said, glaring at the medic.
"No one accused you of that," Red Alert said calmly, not making eye contact.
"You're thinking it."
"That's ridiculous. I'm too busy looking for the Mini-con to worry about whether or not you're enjoying yourself. And you should be too busy to worry about what I'm thinking," Red Alert retorted.
"I can multi-task," the femme shot back.
While searching for a proper comeback, Red Alert glanced into a cave and noticed a small flash of green. "The Mini-con!"
"The Mini-con? Where?" Aurora asked Red Alert made his way over to the cave and entered it. The femme halted at the entrance. "In there?" she asked. The medic turned and looked at her.
"Yes, in here. I saw something green."
"Are, are you sure?"
"I'm sure enough to check it out. Why?" Red Alert asked.
"Die, Autobots!" Cyclonus shouted, shooting madly at the pair before Aurora had a chance to answer Red Alert's question. One of his shots managed to connect with the top of the cave's entrance, causing a landslide.
"What out!" Red Alert shouted, and without even thinking about it, grabbed hold of Aurora's arm, then dragged her inside the cave, just before everything went black.
------
"So, how's everyone at the bar?" Smokescreen asked, desperate to break the silence.
"Hmm? Oh, right. They're all pretty OK. It's really quiet without you and Jetfire there, though. Could you not tell him I said that, it'll enlarge his already over-inflated ego," Nexa replied.
"No problem."
Silence settled over them again, then Nexa asked, "Are you OK? Something seems to be bothering you."
"Nah, I'm fine. I'm just worried about Red Alert," the orange Autobot answered.
"The medic? Why?"
"I'm not really at liberty to say, Red would kill me. Naw, he wouldn't kill me, he'd figure out something worse to do. I know better than to tick off a medic. Bad things happen. I shouldn't have even brought it up."
"OK, then," Nexa said with a shrug. "It's nice to see that unlike Jetfire, you're mildly tolerable when sober."
"'Mildly tolerable?'" Smokescreen asked. "I'm only 'mildly tolerable?'"
"Hey, you should be proud. Only two 'bots are better off than 'mildly tolerable.' One of them's Aurora. The other one's dead."
"Oh, gee, that's bright and cheery," Smokescreen said sarcastically. Nexa shrugged.
"What's this?" Nexa asked, picking something up off the ground.
"That would be the Mini-con. It'd probably be a good idea to report that," Smokescreen replied.
"Really? 'Cuz I was just going to let everybody keep on looking for it, while I went back to the base," Nexa said, before activating her comm. link.
------
Consciousness returned to Red Alert slowly, and it had decided to bring its friend Whomping Big Headache with it. The medic became aware of some noise on his comm. link decided it would probably be a good idea to listen to it.
"I repeat, we have found the Mini-con," Nexa said over the comm. link, listing her co-ordinates. This was followed by the sound of lasers being fired.
"I suggest you get here quick, because the Decepticons have just found us!" Smokescreen added, sounding slightly panicked.
"We'll be right there," Optimus said. He started to say something else, but Red Alert was compelled into shutting his comm. link off by Whomping Big Headache. He finally bothered to take notice of his surroundings, and noticed that there really wasn't much to take notice of. The medic wondered why his night vision wasn't functioning, and then he noticed that Whomping Big Headache had taken residence right where his night vision should've been. He groaned inwardly, as that was the kind of damage that wasn't easily repairable. AT least it wasn't something terribly important. The medic then took notice of some snicker-like beeping.
"What are you laughing at?" he asked the Mini-con calmly.
-"Can'cha see? Ain'cha got night vision?"- Piston asked.
"It's malfunctioning," Red Alert said, not bother to point out the grammatical errors in Piston's questions.
-"Oh. Well, then, I guess I'll hafta show you,"- Piston said, transforming and activating his headlights. Red Alert's optic took a minute to adjust to the sudden brightness after the darkness. After the adjustment, what Red Alert saw scared the proverbial pants off him. He rolled off of Aurora as Piston turned his headlights off and transformed back to robot mode. The Mini-con also promptly resumed laughing. As if that wasn't bad enough, Whomping Big Headache was sill bothering the medic. Regardless, Red Alert forced himself to sit up. A pair of soft blue glows from Aurora's optics next to him showed that the femme was conscious.
"Are you OK?" Red Alert asked her.
"Uh, uhm, y-yeah. Sure," the femme replied quietly.
"That didn't sound very convincing," the medic said, as the glow from Aurora's optics moved upwards and away from Red Alert, towards a wall.
-"She's scared of the dark,"- Piston observed.
"What?" Red Alert asked.
-"Oh, that's right. YOU can't see. Well, she's definitely scared. Heck, I'd go so far as ta say she's absolutely panicked witless."-
"Why?"
-"Geez, I thought ya was a medic! Do I gotta 'splain EVERYTHING ta ya? She's OBVIOUSLY just as blind as you are. Dunno why, though, she didn't get nailed by a big ass rock like ya did."-
"Well, if you know everything, YOU do something about it!"
-"I will,"- Piston said decisively. He approached the femme, and once again transformed and activated his headlights. Red Alert saw from the look on her face that Piston had been right about her being terrified. After the Mini-con turned his lights on, her expression softened, but she kept her knees pressed to her chest.
"What's wrong?" Red Alert asked.
"I, I don't like the dark," Aurora said softly, her tone having changed drastically from what it had been outside.
"Why not?"
Aurora was silent for a while, then sighed and looked upwards at the roof of the cave. "When I was younger, before I joined the army, I wanted to see how the Energon distribution system worked."
"Wait, you went down THERE? Not only is that illegal, that's really dangerous!"
"Yeah, my sister told me the exact same thing. But I wouldn't listen. I was too stubborn, and even more curious."
"Curiosity killed the petro-rabbit," Red Alert said. Aurora chuckled humorlessly.
"Oh, you don't need to tell me that, trust me. My sister keeps petro-rabbits, and I've seen curiosity get the better of more than one of them. Usually using of machine I've built or another, which is why she kicked me out and I'm currently boarding with Nexa. Anyways, back on subject. Despite all the warnings and whatnot, I went down to investigate. Took Borealis, that's my sister, of course, down with me, just to prove that her worries were unfounded. Oh, yeah. They were unfounded, all right. I wish they were," the femme said, sighing. "We got separated, Borealis and I, and, ah, while I was wandering about looking for her, I tripped down a flight of stairs. When, when I woke up, my head hurt, and I, I couldn't see anything. I co-could HEAR things, but I couldn't SEE them, I couldn't tell, tell what they were. I couldn't even MOVE, I, I was so scared. I just, just sat there, scared, in, in the dark, waiting for somebody, ANYBODY, to, to come find me, for, for, Primus, I don't even know how, how long I sat there, but, it, it felt like forever. I just sat there, and I wa-was s-so s-sca-SCARED!" Aurora started another sentence, but she suddenly stopped, buried her head in her arms, and would not say another word.
-"Well..."- Piston said slowly, -"That was certainly different than a big ass rock."- Red Alert gawked at the Mini-con for a moment, very glad the femme couldn't understand what he'd said, and then slowly got to his feet. Whomping Big Headache protested madly to this action, but the medic ignored it.
He walked over to Aurora sat down beside her, and said, "I'm sorry."
Aurora didn't lift her head from her hands as she asked, "For what?"
"For dragging you into this." With a small chuckle, Red Alert added, "Literally."
The femme looked straight at him and said, "If you hadn't dragged me in here, I'd probably be dead right now."
-"She's got a point, ya know? If one big ass rock knocked out yer entire night vision, imagine what that huge pile would do ta her,"- Piston added.
Aurora continued talking, Piston's statement no more than meaningless beeps to her, "Besides what about the Mini-con?"
Red Alert sighed, "It's not here. Smokescreen and Nexa found it. Whatever I saw, it wasn't a Mini-con."
"Oh," Aurora said, and without even really noticing it, lad her head on Red Alert's shoulder. The medic, however, noticed it immediately and quickly moved away from the femme.
Silence descended over the cave fore a while, then Piston asked, -"Is anybody gonna do something about getting' us outta here?"-
"Hmm, the Mini-con's got a point," Red Alert observed.
"What did he say?" Aurora asked.
The medic got to his feet again and said, "He asked why we're still sitting here and not doing anything to get out of here."
The femme didn't budge from her curled up position against the wall, but rather responded quietly, "It's dark."
Red Alert looked up at the ceiling of the cave and sighed. He shut off his optic in thought. Then he reactivated it and sighed again. The medic offered Aurora his hand and said, "Sometimes, there are things that are more important than being afraid. There are things that you have to do, that you don't know if you can do, but it doesn't matter, because you have to do them anyway. And there's a lot of things, that once you try, turn out to be a lot easier than you originally thought."
Aurora looked up at him and asked, "Are you lecturing me?"
"This is as much for me as it is for you," Red Alert said cryptically. "Now, come on, take my hand. Let me help you." Aurora looked up at him silently for a while, and then took his hand. He hoisted her to her feet. To Aurora's surprise, the medic did not let go of her hand the moment she was on her feet. Instead, he smiled at her and said, "Good. Now let's get out of here. It shouldn't take too terribly long."
"Red Alert?"
"What?"
"Thank you. And could you not tell anyone about this?"
"Sure."
"Thanks," Aurora was silent for a moment, and then said, "Hey, red?"
"What?"
"You've got such a nice smile. You should use it more often." Red Alert did not respond.
------
Nexa quietly cursed a blue streak to herself as she searched about on her hands and knees for the Mini-con. She hoped that it hadn't been damaged. The femme had already begun to activate the Mini-con when Megatron shot it out of her hand. Without even thinking about it, she had gone after it. She felt a little guilty about leaving Smokescreen to fend for himself, but then again, she had seen him fight drunk before on more than one occasion, she was sure he'd be able to take care of himself well enough while sober. There was a rustling in some bushes and Nexa froze, trying to pinpoint where the sound had come from. She needn't have wasted her energy as a creature prowled out from the brush in front of her. It looked like an Earth creature, a big cat of some sort, but it was undoubtedly made of metal, and the wheels on its front legs and its back gave it away as a transformer. As if Nexa needed more proof, it made an odd noise, some sort of a cross between some beeps and some meows. The femme extended her hand to it in what she hoped was a non-threatening manner. The cat-like transformer looked at it for a moment, then approached, making more odd sounds. Nexa wasn't sure why, but she took a liking to the strange Mini-con, and she stroked its head as she talked to it. "Can you transform?" The Mini-con nodded happily and transformed into a miniature Indy racecar. "What about robot mode?" The Mini-con transformed back into a cat and cocked its head in confusion. Nexa figured that its strange oddities were the result of being damaged mid-activation. She picked the small, black transformer up, and made her way back to where she had originally found the Mini-con's panel. The femme was surprised to find no Decepticons there.
"Thanks for all your help, Nexa," Smokescreen said sarcastically.
"Yeah, we couldn't have done it without you!" Jetfire added.
"Well, sheesh, excuse me for recovering the Mini-con!" Nexa shot back. Hot Shot inspected the Mini-con closely.
"Hi there, little guy. My name's Hot Shot, what's yours?"
-"Blitz-cat likes Hot Shot-cat!"- The Mini-con decided cheerily.
"Blitz? Is that your name?" The cat-like transformer nodded in reply, and made some more meow-beeps. "He wants to know your name," Hot Shot said to the femme.
"It's Nexa," she said to the Mini-con.
-"Blitz-cat likes Nexa-cat a lot!"-
"He says he likes you a lot. I can't imagine why though," the self-appointed translator said. Before Nexa could reply, though, Aurora and Red Alert arrived at last.
"What took you two so long?" Jetfire asked.
"Well, umm... y'see..." Aurora started.
"Knowing Aurora, she got distracted somewhere," Nexa interjected.
"Thanks. I owe you one," Aurora whispered.
"Hey, no problem. You'll have to tell me what really happened later, though," Nexa muttered back.
"Oh, but of course." Aurora then added louder, "So, about that Mini-con trade you were talking about earlier?"
Nexa looked down at Blitz and answered, "No, I don't think I will."
"Good, because I don't really want to get rid of Piston. Right, so... I'm sill at 2.5, and you're...?"
"Still stuck at .5," Nexa replied, sounding annoyed.
"Bad week, huh?"
"A VERY bad week."
"Hey, are you two going to stand there and gossip all day or can we go back to base?" Jetfire asked.
"Hey, we can gossip just as well back at the base. We've been waiting for YOU! Let's go already!" Nexa answered.
-----
AF: ::Beams:: I'm such a hopeless romantic!
Red Alert: ... -.-
Aurora: ::Glares::
AF: What?