"Give it up, ain't no use. I can help myself if I'd wanted to. I'm hung up, no doubt: I'm so in love with you, for me there's no way out. 'Cause deeper and deeper in love with you I'm falling. Sweeter and sweeter your tender words of love keeps calling..."
Barry White
"Whoa, amber is the color of your energy. Whoa, shades of gold displayed naturally. Launched a thousand ships in my heart, so easy. Still it's fine from afar, and you know that."
311
The day began at the lab the usual way. Lyra came into the room to see everyone hard at work, in an energon-frenzied pace rivaling a hive. No matter the workload, they always greeted each other as they walked in the room. Lyra found out that bringing in steaming mugs of energon to declare her entrance guaranteed her a more pleasant salutation.
Clunk. Perceptor's mug was empty; he was glad to get another. He had the microchip enlarger on its side for repairs. "Hi Lee." Her name was officially pronounced "Lie-ra" but nobody enunciated it as such. Cybertronian accents made it "Leer-a." Lee sounded better as a diminutive.
"Hi Percy."
Clunk. Grapple still had a semi-full mug. "'Morning, Lee."
"Good morning, Graps!"
Skyfire didn't look up, nor did he answer her greeting. He was scowling at the broken soldering iron. "Problem, Sky?" Plunk. Skyfire had no mug at all.
"None," the sweet, cantankerous scientist murmured. "Nothing I cannot repair."
"Right. So what am I helping you with today?" Lyra was still classified as an assistant. She mixed basic chemicals, retrieved objects, made deliveries, legitimized their reports before they e-mailed them to Optimus (made them a whole lot easier to read, might she add), and, of course...made the energon runs.
"Nothing."
"Nothing?" That was a little disappointing. Lyra had begun to enjoy aiding him in his endeavors. That meant today she had to work with Grapple, who had too many verbal shortcuts and less patience; or Perceptor, who spent the whole time talking to her about the theory behind what she was doing instead of how to operate.
"Percy? Graps? Need help with anything?" Anywhere else but the lab they used their formal names.
"No," they chorused.
"Well, I guess I could...um..." Maybe she could study something.
"I need another sample of the material from Starscream's armor. Would you please retrieve another scraping for me?" Grapple handed her a test tube.
Perceptor looked up from the chip enlarger he was repairing. "Graps, she has been barred from the Detention Center until further notice."
"That does not alter the fact that I am without a sample. Besides, Starscream is overtly hostile to everyone but the femmes. I could not go near him. Go ahead, my dear." Lyra shuddered to be called that.
"No. She will not defy orders to circumnavigate your dread of Starscream. I will go." Skyfire took the tube and walked out.
"Is he all right?" Perceptor asked.
Grapple shrugged. "I didn't want him to see Starscream because they still don't speak."
"What happened?" Lyra demanded. "He won't tell me."
"Perhaps we are not authorized to reveal this tale."
"Please? Nobody else will elucidate." The shorter the nickname, the more time they had to try to outdo each other with big words. So far Perceptor dominated the group.
"I will," Grapple volunteered. He told a story similar to the one she had heard a distant dark night ago. Why had she never realized the name fit the description? He was Starscream's best friend!
Skyfire returned with the sample and a chore for Lyra: catalogue the data files by date, subject, and categories of war, energy, history, and etc.
"Sure." Lyra inwardly groaned. This could not be more TEDIOUS if Skyfire tried!
They tried to keep their conversation low, but spies have really good hearing when they want to. Skyfire was being told about Grapple's story.
"What did she say when you told her?"
"Nothing. I believe she had no idea."
"She should have. I told her we had once been colleagues."
"I do not know, Sky. She is an odd one."
"That is an understatement," Perceptor snorted. "A pity-"
He never finished. There was a blasting noise, a whirring sound, silence, then chaos as they all started talking in an agitated fashion. Still no yelling, but enough of a storm to merit Lyra rushing out of her alcove. Seeing the mess, she radioed Optimus.
"No! He is unnecessary! We can fix this!" Skyfire was eye-level with Lyra. The others were worse. All were at least a third their normal size. Optimus arrived demanding they tried to make a damage report. He was glad they could not see his masked grin.
"What happened?" he asked.
"The chip enlarger engine malfunctioned," Perceptor explained.
"I'll say!" exclaimed the omnipresent Bumblebee, now looking straight at Grapple. "You're all the right size to me!"
"This is the first time I've ever looked up to you, Optimus!" Skyfire seemed mildly amused, now that the shock had worn off. "And right at...you." He uneasily shied away from Lyra quickly. Perceptor inspected the broken-down chip enlarger gingerly.
"Recall that the last employment of this chip enlarger on Autobots was a temporary situation; my inspection of this machine concludes the same hypothesis."
"And if we DO NOT naturally return to our normal selves?" Grapple demanded. His voice had not shrunk.
"Then you fix the chip enlarger to bring yourselves back," Prime supplied. "You have no need of me here. Lyra, I expect a report when this is over, e-mail it to me. Good luck." He hurried out of the room to keep from chortling in their presence.
"Wow. I wanted something to do today. I guess I got it." Lyra dragged a stool up for Perceptor to sit on. "Lead on, Percy."
"I need sustenance first." He looked hopefully at Lyra.
"I'm on my way," she sighed. This task was getting old fast.
By the end of the day there was no change. Perceptor refused to leave and denied any of the others a chance to stay longer, telling them to take some time off. Grapple was hiding in the sickbay with Hoist, afraid of the taunting he would get. Skyfire walked with Lyra outside, since Mirage was out on patrol again.
"I get the feeling Perceptor is eager to figure it out himself." Lyra commented. "You know, 'I got you into this mess, I'll get you out' type of thinking?"
"That is probably his rationale." Skyfire watched the sun slip behind the mountains as he spoke. He chuckled. "I enjoyed Prime finding humor in the situation."
"Yeah." It was so odd to have Skyfire her size. Their wings were a large impediment. Usually when Lyra walked this close to him she stopped before his wings began. Now her wings were brushing up against Skyfire's. His discomfort was palatable. Lyra decided it would be better to lance the boil than allow it to fester, so she ignored her sense of decorum and asked him why he was so upset about having to get a sample from Starscream. Immediately Skyfire's face clouded over. His whole body stiffened.
"We do not get along."
"I don't find that hard to believe. He WAS your closest companion, wasn't he?"
He nodded. "He has a choleric method of implementation." Lyra smiled to herself. The wording was Perceptor's. The explanation sounded like Starscream. "What has he told you concerning me?" All day Skyfire kept looking at her, realizing he was uncomfortable being at eye-level, glancing away, forgetting that he could meet her optics, turning back, etc.
"His version of everything. What has he told you about me?" she asked.
"His version of everything." The gentle white mech stared away from her again. "Why are we even talking about him?" he demanded, pace increasing slightly.
"Would you prefer a different subject?" So Skyfire was unfazed at her being a Decepticon. She was relieved that his perspective of her had not changed.
"Please."
"OK..." Lyra racked her brain. It had been a mistake to mention Starscream. She turned to face Skyfire. "What was the nicest planet you ever explored?"
"Jupiter. Why do you spend so much time with me?"
"Because you're fun, and the only one who doesn't hate me. Who's your best friend, and why?"
"Until recently, due to a disagreement, Cliffjumper, because he is not afraid to tell the truth. What is a harmless secret you have?"
"I'm afraid of the dark." That was a lie. Mirage was afraid of the dark. All right, she admitted, she was too. "What's the dumbest plan Megatron ever concocted?"
"He turned a human city into a nickel-plated dump. How did you know about the microchip enlarger?"
"Starscream had one. How do you have one?" They'd stopped walking; now they were having a staring contest. Rapid-fire mundane questioning had been a game Autobots played to better get to know somebody while keeping them preoccupied. It worked best when they were waiting for Ratchet to come and take a look at the wounded on the battlefield.
"I invented it. He probably copied mine. How can you cloak yourself for so long when Mirage can only stay invisible for six minutes?"
"My creator let me have it, and when he saw its potential for corruption he decided to limit the capacity on his newer model. What do you do when you're not in the laboratory?"
"Watch earth television." He stopped looking into her optics and thought about this. "I would love to fly more, but Optimus has us obeying earth fly zone laws. Where were you created?"
"Iacon. I had a wealthy creator obsessed with making dizygotic twins. My twin did not function properly, so he scrapped it and made Mirage out of it a few cycles later. He also made Sunstreaker and Sideswipe. Who made you?"
Skyfire turned away. "This game is insipid."
Lyra was dismayed. She seemed to annoy the quiet scientist more than entertain him. Watching him unsteadily walk over the sandy terrain, still unaccustomed to the new, closer depth perception, Lyra felt apprehensive. Perhaps she should stay away from him for awhile. Even if he was the only part of the lab she liked. The other two still hadn't made her feel particularly welcome. "I am sorry," she called. She watched him walk a few paces more, ignoring her. "I think I'll go find Perceptor and see how he's doing." Lyra disappeared and hurried off before he could notice.
She was sitting on a rock, watching the sun rise the next morning when who she assumed was Bumblebee ran up to her. "Perceptor concluded that the machine has not cancelled out our shrinking, therefore he must repair it. We are coming up short yet another day."
Lyra looked at Grapple and tried to gauge his expression. Was that a joke? She wasn't sure. She slid off the rock, burning the cloud of thoughts out of her CPU like the sun would to fog.
"I'm right behind you."
"Not quite. Perceptor needs energon."
Lyra didn't sigh this time. "Grapple, if you guys want an energon dispenser in the lab, maybe you should take it up with Jazz. I'm really sick of being your transport. I thought I'd be learning something, becoming a scientist, but the lessons have tapered into oblivion and I spend more time doing busy work than real work. Swoop said the same thing when I asked him about working there." She walked past the shrunken architect. "I'm asking for a re-assignment."
He caught up quickly, due to her slower gait. "I had no idea you felt that way," Grapple said, concerned.
"I didn't either." Not until last night. "You guys really are great. I'm just...disappointed. Nothing's changing."
"When this mess is cleaned up, I want all of us to discuss it with Perceptor so that we can find ways to make you feel more included in the laboratory. Until then, let me take you to med bay to help Hoist. You were requested to go there anyway, correct?"
The task Optimus Prime offered. "Yes." What choice did she have? Her other option was to haul energon for what seemed to be the ENTIRE day, between Starscream and Perceptor. Something had to change.
"Come along, I can radio Hoist for you."
Med bay proved to be her second limbo.
Her first task was inventory, since Ratchet couldn't think of a single thing to assign her. "I thought Perceptor was patronizing," she muttered to herself, a nasty habit she picked up before she moved back to Cybertron. "I forgot how superior DOCTORS thought themselves to be." She collected every single piece of medical equipment she could find, put it all on one table, and began making lists. "Never mind that I was a lieutenant, a spy, a master of slaves..." Luckily she was alone while Ratchet the others were bringing in the wounded from another ambush from the Decepticons. She was still under suspicion, forcing her to remain in the ark while everyone she knew was getting beaten into new alt modes. Lyra caught motion out of the corner of her eye and turned to the door to greet-
"Oh, hi." Sunstreaker, the front of the line returning victorious, halted in his tracks at the sight of Lyra knee-deep in soldering irons. She continued to talk o herself as he remained in his spot. Did any of them work? She should test them first. "The others will be back soon. Is there anything I can help you with?" Good Primus, this was a good-looking Autobot.
"No," he snorted, walking over to a cabinet by the wall. For the millionth time, Lyra had never seen a mech so beautiful.
"OK." Soldering iron #1 did not work. Numbers 2-16 did. Hmm, 17, 19, 27, 32 did not. Out of the corner of her optic Lyra watched her visitor. Sunstreaker worked his way up and down the wall until he came across a file cabinet that would not open.
"Is there a key for this?" he demanded.
"Probably. I don't know." This was a lie. Ratchet gave her the keys before he left, telling her they were for emergencies. Skyfire came in, looking for Sparkplug's favorite wrench.
"It's small enough to fit in an unattainable spot. Per-" He saw Sunstreaker glowering at the medical record cabinets. "-ceptor thought it a good idea to try anything. It is a Binford, 5/8 inches."
"That certainly is anything." She helped him look. At one point in time he had to go around the pillaging Sunstreaker in his search. Even when he made such sour faces, Sunstreaker was gorgeous. Skyfire was pleasing to the eye, Starscream was handsome, but this yellow mech was a work of art. Lyra was caught in wonder at his perfection. She was so lost in thought that she forgot something vital as she unlocked a tool chest with Ratchet's keys to check if the wrench was there.
"Well, I suppose it's not here. Can you ask Ratchet for me when he returns, Lyra?"
"Sure." Skyfire bid her goodbye and nudged past the yellow mech, who folded his arms and tilted his chin down in a more aggressive stance. Lyra ignored him, now singing to herself softly. If he was going to be completely rude to her and her friend, he could do it without an audience.
Soldering irons that worked were to be put away in the cupboards on the other side of the room. Lyra grabbed an armful. Could they be stacked? It seemed feasible. They were a little slippery, falling when not stacked properly. It took longer than she anticipated, and more concentration than usual. When they were properly stacked Lyra closed the cupboard door and turned around to be face-to-face with Sunstreaker.
Leaning his exquisite head over until he was nose to nose with her, he placed his hands on the counter behind his target, locking her in between his arms. Panicking, Lyra sat on the counter. He closed in for the kill by forcing her knees to open and leaving her nowhere to run to. "I want those keys," he commanded darkly. This forced intimacy, a bully's tactic, angered Lyra. It reminded her of her old boss. Well, she would do that last thing he expected her to do. Or the first; he had an ego. She kissed him.
Instead of pulling away and swearing at her, as she hoped he would, Sunstreaker milked this for all it was worth. So he had an ego. Maybe he had expected this. He was pressing down while she pressed up, his tongue tickling the roof of her mouth. Lyra felt sorry for Nova, Sunstreaker was a messy kisser. To heighten the sensation, the female disappeared. A certain other recipient of her affections liked it when she did that. This Autobot must too, she heard him make a satisfied noise.
Ratchet burst into the room, yelling orders at anyone in the vicinity. First Aid ran around the room, hollering back. Sunstreaker jumped away from the counter in shock.
"Sunstreaker! Where's Lyra!"
Lyra came out of the next room, datapad in hand. "Hi Ratchet. Hi Sunstreaker. What happened?"
Ratchet scowled. "Andromeda is dragging Brawn over here. Stubborn little diode wouldn't ride with us, even though he can't transform."
"Brawn's the type who will never die," Andromeda commented as she and the patient slowly limped in.
"Don't you forget it!" Brawn heaved himself on the table. "Let's get this over with, guys."
Ratchet, still in loud mode, turned to the blue female. "Get over here! Sunstreaker, why are you still lurking?"
"I need another shot of your premium lube."
"AGAIN! You go through that stuff like there's no tomorrow!" He scowled in defeat. "It's in Wheeljack's lab. Lyra! Front and center!"
Sunstreaker hurried over to Wheeljack's corner, where a small container of oil (Pennsylvania's finest) stood on the counter. The pile of datapads beside it caught his attention when he noticed the name on the top. "I guess it wasn't locked up." He pocketed it in subspace and hurried to find Nova.
By the end of her shift Lyra was beat. What a day! Sunstreaker arrived to ask for oil and started a snarling match leading to a BIG mistake, Ratchet snapped at her the whole day, Hoist was no help at all...and in the midst of it she had to accompany Wheeljack and Ratchet to inspect why Starscream continued to thrive on no supplies.
"His oil pressure's nominal, his energon rating is low, but nowhere near where it should be..." Ratchet was annoyed. Conundrums only further incensed him. "Why don't you deteriorate?" he demanded the silent Seeker.
"Only the good die young, Auto-fool," he sneered. Mishap was taking another sample of his protective coating while she secretly left him a mug and leaned over to do her most daring.
"I've missed you," she whispered in his audios as Wheeljack and Ratchet argued a few meters from them. For extra daring she allowed a hand to caress the underside of his wing, the one facing away from the quibbling mechs. He stared off into space. "What?"
"What do you want me to do, sweep you into my arms and kiss you?" Shocked, she felt the irk come off of him like a wave on the beach, hitting her. "I'll leave that for your boyfriend."
"My what?" She sensed him thinking he'd said too much. Did Nova tell him what she did to Sunstreaker?
"Nothing. Bring me decent-tasting energon the next time you come here." The amused contempt said it best. Why was she here? Lyra had no business with Starscream, no right to be here. She was disobeying orders, aiding and abetting the enemy, and her reward was impudent disdain. She got up and walked out of the room, ignoring the two quarreling medics and the ever-watchful Cliffjumper, who noticed the mug of energon she left behind.
That evening Skyfire, after having another staring contest with Starscream, headed to his chambers to watch his newest edition of "Neon Genesis Evangelion." He discovered Lyra at her brother's door, morosely hugging her knees while she sat on the floor like a dog awaiting her master's return.
"Has anyone seen you here?" Skyfire whispered, anxiously looking about.
"Only Bluestreak. He lives across the hall." Lyra gestured to the door where sounds of metal clattering could be heard. Skyfire peered down at her, making her uneasy. This was bad enough without him here to witness it. "It's no big deal." If there was one thing Lyra could not stand doing, but seemed to constantly do, it was look like a victim. Primus, she hated being a hypocrite.
"Get up, this is a good way to get people talking about your iconoclastic operatives even more than usual." Lyra allowed him to pull her up, lead her down the hall, and almost throw her into his room.
Skyfire's chamber did not have the typical orange walls as the rest of the ark did. It was part of the expansion Grapple came down from Cybertron to build. Skyfire had a large room with a recharge plate and a television. That was all standard issue Autobot fare; the TV was an extension of Teltraan-1. The charge plate dominated the room. There was nowhere else to sit. Lyra plopped on the corner nearest to the door and folded her hands on her lap. Her optics skimmed the layout of the room, trying to find something conversational.
"You have a big place." Brilliant. Five million years in Cybertonium pits had done wonders for her social skills.
"Up until a few days ago, I was a big mech."
"Do you like being smaller?"
"No." A long awkward pause. Skyfire asked her to stand on his shoulders to reach into the cupboard he had on his wall and withdraw two glasses and a bottle of pure ethanol. She looked at the liquid suspiciously.
"What does that do?" she asked, pouring.
"Nothing much. It cleans out your system a little, mostly it's harmless." His fingers grazed hers as he accepted the glass. Lyra was fascinated by his hands. They were perfect scientist's hands: agile, flexible joints, soft white. Still smaller than they were used to being, but the white mech adapted well. She'd rather inspect his hands than see his optics, which were right now searching her intently. "Lyra...you have to stop obsessing over him."
"Over who?" She was not going to aid his inquisition.
Skyfire chickened out. "Your brother."
"I don't obsess."
"Why were you waiting by his chamber door for his return?"
She sighed. "I have nowhere else to go." It was true. Perceptor had kicked them out of the laboratory again, Optimus had ordered that no one go outside until Nightbird was found, and the rest of the ark was awash with hostile Autobots.
"You can always come here." He crawled behind her and folded his legs, pulling her onto his lap. His front-end bulk moved forward suddenly, causing her to fall away from him, sloshing the remainder of her drink. Skyfire snorted. "This was different from the way I pictured it."
"You were bigger," she laughed, as she turned to regard him, and something made her double-take. "You are bigger." He grew a size larger as she watched. "You're growing!" He knocked her off the recharge plate as he enlarged.
Skyfire gasped. "I am!" He was his normal size in less than five minutes. He eagerly grabbed Lyra's hands, hauling her off the floor. "To the laboratory!"
Lyra ran as fast as she could to allow Skyfire to pull her along with minimal hassle. Skyfire bolted down to the laboratory, where they ran in to accost a dancing, full-sized Perceptor.
"It worked!" he yelled jubilantly to them.
"It worked!" they hollered back. All three jumped up and down in the air, cheering.
"Where is Grapple? He should be with us." Skyfire asked.
"Still incognito at the med bay, I would venture." Perceptor ran out of the lab. "Accompany me!" He was hooting and hollering most uncharacteristically as he galloped away. Lyra and Skyfire shrugged and did likewise.
Skyfire continued to drag Lyra down the hall as they passed by Optimus and Mirage. Mirage was back from patrol, reporting. Both pressed themselves against the wall as the flurry of scientific celebration whirled past.
"Lyra! What's going on?" called Mirage, amused.
"Everything's back to normal!" she shouted back.
"As normal as can be expected," Mirage said, trying to recover from the blur that had passed by.
Optimus chuckled. "Affirmative."
Ratchet tried not laugh at the disheveled group, especially Perceptor. "He's in Hoist's maintenance alcove."
"Great!" All three took off, squealing.
Perceptor skidded around the corner and halted. His face fell. Lyra and Skyfire peeked inside the doorway. Lyra gasped.
The noise caused Hoist and Grapple to pull apart from their passionate embrace. Hoist rashly reached for his faceplate as Grapple hurried to the door. "Hello," he acknowledged breathlessly. "I see you've returned to normal."
"We did," Skyfire returned uneasily. No one met the yellow architect's optics. "I see you have as well."
"We thought we would share the moment with you," Lyra added, composure deteriorating.
"Well, thank you." Hoist came over to congratulate Perceptor.
"How did you fix it?"
"I had to rewire a few circuits." Normally Perceptor would have a long-winded diatribe, but he was still taken aback from seeing the two mechs kissing. "I don't know about you, but I could use a congratulatory drink. Skyfire, do you still have that trove of ethanol?"
"Yes...yes, I do. Let's go over to my room and make a toast."
"Good idea," Hoist agreed in his silky accent. "We will join you in a few moments."
Lyra, Skyfire, and Perceptor hurried up to Skyfire's room. They barely made it out of earshot before Lyra started laughing. The other two joined her almost immediately.
"I am telling NO ONE about this." Perceptor guffawed. It was difficult for him to comprehend that the only two Autobots considered as stuffy as he was would ever give in to a moment of passion, no matter the reason. Relief, disbelief, and mischief mixed together and the three leaned against a wall for support.
"Agreed," said Skyfire, practically doubled over. Hoist and Grapple knocked on the door and entered, forcing them to calm themselves. There were big grins as Skyfire poured the beverages. "To Perceptor."
"To Perceptor!" Lyra looked around the relieved Autobots until her optics rested on Skyfire's, causing her to smile. These scientists, rejects in their own encampment, so dissimilar to each other, connected together as they relived the whole event for Hoist's benefit. It was completely communal. She was, for a brief, happy moment, at home.