Chapter 148 – Universal Apprehension
(BPOV)
His sister was coming.
Bee couldn't wait.
But he had to wait. That was the only problem with curb duty.
You had to sit on your tires.
And wait.
"Bee," a female voice whispered on the radio.
"Carly?" he whispered back curiously.
"You wanna use the cargo elevator?" she whispered. "I need to talk to you... please?"
Bee nodded immediately, shocked, he carefully drove into the elevator and hacked it to go up to the right floor. Then, then a very careful sequence of turns and he drove into the living room.
He opened the door for the femme. She sat down on his seat and lightly closed his door.
"Uh..." Carly muttered softly.
Bee waited. Out of habit, he switched the radio on, playing her a soft song.
"Could... could you tell me about..." she stuttered softly.
"You wanna know about Kae?" Bee asked her gently.
"...Yeah..."
"Kae's my big sister, she and Sam were the first two humans I ever met," Bumblebee shrugged. "She's the mate of my Prime now."
"So there's no way Sam will be still interested in her?" Carly asked worriedly.
"Well..." Bee muttered, he pondered that for a moment. "I mean there's no way in hell Sam'll ever cheat on you, especially with her."
Carly sighed in relief in his seat, which made Bee smile. She really did love Sam.
"So she's your sister?" Carly asked curiously. "How does that work?"
"Well, Kae's my big sister, she always took care of me," Bumblebee shrugged. "I had a brother once, but he abandoned me."
"He abandoned you!?" Carly demanded with a gasp of horror.
"Well, he believed in Megatron," Bumblebee sighed. "Joined the Decepticons, and Megatron turned around and used him for target practice."
Bumblebee sagged on his tires.
"You poor thing!" Carly whispered, stroking his seat. "So Kae's your sister now?"
Bumblebee perked up slightly, he had his sister now.
"Yep! Kae's my big sister," he smiled. "Even when she was tiny she was my big sister."
"And she's coming tomorrow?" Carly asked in amusement.
"Yep!" Bee grinned. He got to see his sister again.
"Well we can't have you all dusty, can we?" Carly asked in amusement, she got out of his cabin and walked over to the kitchen, digging out polishing supplies.
Bee was actually kinda apprehensive about that, it'd taken him a while to teach Sam how to wax his armour properly.
"Be not afraid, you are in the presence of a waxing master," Carly chuckled. "Part of the new job, I wax cars from time to time."
Bee nodded somewhat, and surveyed the manner that she held the supplies.
Adequate.
"You're still worried," he murmured to Carly gently.
Carly jumped, and stared at him.
"My big-sister began as a human," Bumblebee murmured with a small smile. "She taught me how to read the moods of the humans around us. You're worried, Carly."
"The..." Carly started shyly.
Bee sat silently, waiting.
"Bee?" Carly murmured with a small frown.
"Oh! Sorry," Bumblebee stated immediately, he onlined his holoform, standing beside himself to look at her. "I'm really used to talking with Kae, she always knows when I'm nodding, or waiting for her to continue. Even in my alt form, I still don't know how she did it though."
Carly smiled shyly.
"The thing I liked about Sam's stories, was that they were stories, they were the past," Carly murmured softly, she looked down, seeming to focus on waxing his hood.
"Sam is frustrated that he's not as important as he was," Bumblebee shrugged gently. "That will pass, in time."
"He matters to me," Carly murmured, Bee reached out and gently dabbed the tear from her cheek.
"We're gonna do everything we can... make it like it was..." Bumblebee played for her gently. "You just gotta be patient with him. We're gonna do our best to make sure none of the humans are in the battle-zones... if it ever comes to that, I mean."
"I'm not ready for this," Carly whispered, her hand froze, she had the last of the wax off of his hood now. Bumblebee gently took his friend's mate's hand and guided her to lean against his hood. He wound his holoform's arm across her shoulders, the manner that Kae said was generally accepted as a friend's touch.
"None of us were," Bumblebee shrugged quietly. "Fate rarely calls upon us at a moment of our choosing." he smiled somewhat, his Prime had told him that, a long time ago.
Good advice always bore repeating.
"But..." Carly murmured softly.
Bumblebee looked at her calmly.
"My sister is better at explaining things," he murmured gently. "We're gonna keep you and Sam as far away from the danger as we can, you know that, right?"
Carly nodded and leaned her head against his shoulder.
"So you're sure Sam's not going to try to get back together with Mikaela?" Carly asked softly. She seemed so scared.
But Bumblebee struggled to hold back the snort of laughter. He really did.
"He'll have to go through Optimus to try that," he snorted softly. "Sam's brave, but not even Primus would be brave enough to get between Optimus and his mate."
"Mate?" Carly asked curiously.
"Spark-bonded mate," Bumblebee nodded, he grinned. "Even if Sam managed to get through Optimus, it wouldn't do any good, my sister just doesn't bother with other people. Mind, they're still early in their bonding, give them a few vorn before they start interfacing without each other."
"Vorn?"
"About eighty six of your years," Bee grinned down at her.
"So if Sam wanted to get with Kae..."
"Then he'd have to show an extreme fascination with interfacing with not simply one Prime, but two," Bumblebee snorted gleefully.
Carly stared at him incredulously for a long moment before she began giggling softly.
"I mean yeah," Bumblebee continued with a broad grin. "I know Sam's fond of Optimus-"
"But not that fond," Carly snorted. The two of them looked at each other and promptly howled with laughter. Sam chose that moment to stagger into the main room, half asleep and looking at them curiously.
Carly looked at Sam for a long moment and turned to Bee.
"Oh, now you've got that image stuck in my head!" she complained with mocking indignation.
Bee shot her an unrepentant grin, which made her laugh harder. She glanced at the window and started, immediately going to the doors.
"Wheelie! Brains! Get in out of the rain!" she called out worriedly.
"Careful now, don't wanna start gettin' soft on us," Brains snorted, staggering in through the door behind Wheelie. "Bad enough you're squishy!"
"And how do you know that?" Carly demanded flatly.
"Well, you're human ain't'cha?" Wheelie snorted.
(MPOV)
I roused from my recharge and smiled at my position.
Sentinel was humming softly behind me, soft light flickering in the dark as he hovered holos above his optics. My Optimus was still dead to the world, wound around me as he always did.
I squirmed slightly, as I did on occasion, pushing myself to sit up somewhat. My Optimus barely roused, shifting only so that his head rested lightly on my abdomen, an arm curled around my waist as I sat beside Sentinel.
"He always was a remarkably deep recharger," Sentinel murmured with a low laugh, glancing at my mate in amusement as Optimus squirmed ever so slightly, burying his face into my abdomen. I lightly rested a hand on his shoulders, the position we assumed when I was processing data late into the night. Sentinel was smiling at us.
"If memory serves, Elita used to hate when he did that," Sentinel murmured quietly.
I couldn't help the soft indignation that hummed from my spark at the thought.
"You are a good mate for him," Sentinel chuckled, his face turned serious. "We have much to discuss, young warrior."
"We do," I murmured.
"Will he rouse soon?" Sentinel asked quietly.
"No," I murmured with a small smile, gently stroking my bot's cheek. "When he's like this, nothing short of spark flare or a bomb going off will rouse him."
"Or Ironhide thundering at him to wake up," Sentinel chuckled softly.
"How does that differ from a bomb going off?" I asked innocently.
Sentinel pursed his lip plates somewhat.
"A good point, Kae," he murmured. He looked at me seriously. "The Decepticons will soon try to contact me."
I nodded.
"Have you your response already?" I asked quietly.
"I do," he nodded. "It is my actions afterwards which worry me."
I looked at him patiently, waiting for him to continue.
"I worry, Kae, that the Decepticons will watch my return to your headquarters, it will not be believable if I stride in, collect the five pillars in the humans' care and stride back out again without resistance."
"A good point," I murmured with a small frown. "Without a doubt, once this is finished we will have to relocate again..."
"With the Decepticons potentially following me, your base will no doubt be compromised," Sentinel continued with a matching frown.
"They would also expect you to take out a few of us," I murmured.
"Ironhide," Sentinel stated with a frown. I glanced at him. "The key target would be Ironhide, formerly, the ultimate of betrayal to Optimus would be the murder of Ironhide. The Weapons Master has long been Optimus' bodyguard and friend. His offlining would be a severe blow to the entire unit. His continued survival through the worst of times has often been inspiration to them."
I nodded thoughtfully, a plan already beginning to form itself in my processors.
He glanced at me and seemed to recognize that, the light of battle beginning to gleam in his optics again.
"What is my part?" he asked with a practically wolfish grin. "How many are involved in your scheme?"
"Rule number four," I murmured, frowning as I began ironing out our plan of action. Sentinel looked at me curiously. "The best way to keep a secret, keep it to yourself. Second best, tell one other person, if you must. There is no third best. My Optimus is terrible at lying."
At the continued mention of his name, my mate began to stir somewhat, nuzzling his face into my abdomen before moving up to press his lips to my chamber.
::. It would be well for us, Kae, to have a private comm for the time being.:: Sentinel sent softly.
I glanced at him and nodded before smiling, and as was habitual for me, beginning to tease my beloved's circuits.
(WPOV)
Will gave his baby girl yet another kiss on the forehead before depositing her in the arms of the woman he worshiped. Anabelle was whimpering softly.
"What is it, dear-spark?" Ironhide rumbled gently, reaching out and gently touching the tear on Anabelle's cheek.
"Don' wan' you to go," Anabelle pouted sadly. "Don' wan you to die!"
"I will protect your father, sweet niece of mine," Ironhide rumbled gently, pressing a gentle kiss to Anabelle's forehead.
"Po'miss?" Anabelle asked hopefully, looking up at him.
"With all that I am, I promise," Ironhide rumbled gently, smiling and running a gentle thumb across her cheek. He leaned over and pressed a kiss to Sarah's cheek, something that Will was eminently comfortable with now, the bots were very specific that it was the kiss of a sibling's love.
But then, had Ironhide been human? Will was certain that he would have wanted the bot to take care of his Sarah, up to and including marrying her if he were to kick it.
He'd never had a friend that close to he and his family before, and he'd come to really enjoy it.
Sarah walked back into their home, and Will heaved a deep breath, climbing into Ironhide's cab and leaning back in his friend's seat.
"Dunno what we'd do without you, 'Hide," he stated with a small smile.
"You'd keep goin'," Ironhide rumbled flatly.
Silence.
"Well I'd stop for a min-"
"No, you keep goin'!" Ironhide growled, onlining his holoform and glaring at Will. "I haven't spent this much time keepin' your sorry aft out the pit for you to stand around, staring at my corpse. If I'm taken out in your lifetime you keep goin'!"
Will sat in shock, staring at the glaring Weapons Master.
Ironhide leaned back in his own seat, turning to look at the road with an idle hand on the steering wheel.
"I need you to promise me something, Will," Ironhide rumbled quietly. He was looking off into the distance. Will immediately paid attention.
"What?"
"No matter what happens, you gotta keep goin' Will," Ironhide rumbled quietly.
"Ironhide what's going to happen?" Will demanded worriedly.
"Promise me, Will. If I'm taken down, you don't stand around gawping at my corpse, you gotta keep going," Ironhide growled softly.
Will sat, shocked, staring at his best friend of six years.
"But-" he started in a choked tone.
"We're warriors, Will, I'll not break my promise to your daughter, my niece. Promise me, if I'm ever taken down, you survey the situation for no more than a click and you either fight back, or you turn tail and you run. When my spark goes out, it ain't gonna be me no more, it'll be a pile a scrap metals. You keep goin' Will, don't shame my memory or your trainin' by standin' aroun', gawpin' at where I ain't."
(MPOV)
I strode down the corridors of NEST headquarters with a purpose, striding into the entrance bay and folding into my Optimus' form.
"Where you headed Kae?" Chance called out curiously.
"Visit with Sam, Carly and Bee," I smiled, winking my holoform online for a moment.
"No more dams to hold back?" the man asked apprehensively. I couldn't help but laugh, reaching out and pulling the dear man into a hug.
"No dams to hold back, I'm not even leaving the city," I informed him fondly. "Now quit fussing, or I'll ship you off to the shrink."
"Ratchet's a better shrink than that headcase they assigned to us," Chance grumbled with a frown.
"What now?" Ratchet called out curiously.
"I believe you caught the tail end of a compliment, father," I smiled at him.
"Backhanded?" Ratchet glowered.
"No, I'm saying I'm better off talking to you about shit than that friggen shrink," Chance grumbled.
Silence.
"Still having nightmares about the Kortes dam?" Ratchet asked calmly, gently picking the lieutenant up and carrying him into the med-bay.
"...yeah..."
"What precisely?"
"What those cybermites did..."
I smiled slightly and winked my holoform off, between Ratchet's clinical analysis and sparkfelt advice Chance'd be just fine. I drove out of the bay and made a beeline for my little brother's signature.
(BPOV)
Bumblebee sat, very carefully in Sam and Carly's apartment, fiddling with his cannons and waiting.
His sister was coming today.
Sam, Simmons, Dutch, Carly, Wheelie and Brains all had pictures, articles and posters pinned on boards along the walls. Boards at Carly's insistence. Easy compromise.
There was a soft knock on the door, Carly rose to answer it, but Dutch and Bee both waved her back.
Until of course:
"=It's just me little-brother=" Mikaela's voice chirped with a laugh.
Of course that had the humans a bit more paranoid.
=Come on through!=" he chirped back.
Mikaela laughed and walked her holoform through the closed door.
"Carly, Sam," she nodded with a smile. "Agent Simmons, good to see you again. Dutch," she nodded calmly to the man, even as Bee piped his name to her. Something thunked on the other side of the door. "Oops!" Mikaela snorted in amusement, turning and opening the door.
Bumblebee just about blew his vocal processors trying to hold back a snort of laughter at the expressions on Wheelie and Brains' faceplates at the cubes of energon floating toward the holoform.
"You're the best Big-Sister ever!" he chirped gleefully as Mikaela idly deposited a cube in his hand. He popped the top open and looked at Carly. "Got any shot-glasses?" he asked curiously.
Carly walked into her kitchen and returned with a couple of glasses, the perfect size for Wheelie and Brains, the two drones grinning as he lowered the cube enough that they could dip out their own fuel before he drank his. He waited patiently as the tiny bots chugged their first glasses and offered them to re-dip.
"Oh, see now you're just spoilin' us with the good shit," Brains rasped with a broad grin, dipping out a cup and setting it down for a bit later.
"You've been working your processors hard," Bumblebee shrugged.
"Glowing blue stuff?" Carly murmured.
"Energon," Wheelie supplied cheerfully. "This is the stuff we convert the other fuels into to run on, but it works out a lot better when you get the pure stuff. Everything that I'll ever need to survive, is right here in this cup." he sipped delicately at the glass with a look of relish in his optics.
"Wait, if it's what you need to survive, how is Bee spoiling you?" Carly asked with a frown.
"Well, we're drones," Wheelie shrugged.
Carly still looked confused.
"By tradition of the caste systems, and something that Megatron hammered into the Decepticon's circuits, drones like Wheelie and Brains subsist on the dregs left in the cubes drunk by larger bots," Bumblebee explained as gently as he could.
But there it was anyway, the look of indignation in Carly's eyes, in his sister's eyes too, but Mikaela already knew about it, so it was less pronounced with her.
"They-!" Carly began sputtering.
"Some of them were real assholes," Wheelie stated in a grumpy tone. "Guys like Demolishor who'd crush their cubes closed again, so it didn't matter how much time you spent trying to get the damn cube apart to get at the dregs it wasn't worth it."
"Soundwave was kinda cool though," Brains stated musingly.
"Yeah?" Wheelie asked curiously.
"Well, yeah, all of the drones that served under him served as his eyes and ears a lot of the time, and he has a ton of symbionts too, so he knows what the drones go through with assholes like Demolishor. He had this habit of drinking half a cube and setting it down. It'd sit there for like, an hour, then he'd look at the drones eyeing it up and ask why they hadn't cleaned it up yet." Brains snorted.
"Whoaaa..." Wheelie murmured in awe.
Bumblebee filed that piece of information away.
"He'd leave a half cube of energon for the drones?" Carly asked with a frown.
"Scrap yeah," Brains grinned. "Half a cube of energon? Kept all fifty of us at the top of our game, all we had to do in return? Keep our eyes open, not hard to do anyway, it's how you keep from gettin' squished. But we all kept our auditory receptors online. If Soundwave needed to know something about a bot, pretty much a guarantee one of us would know it. He didn't even mind that the lot of us had an energon stash."
"Why'd you run off then, sounds like your ship was pretty scrapping good," Wheelie snorted.
"Well, Soundwave got ordered to provide recon," Brains shrugged. "No Soundwave, shitty ship."
"Yeah, that makes sense," Wheelie nodded. Bumblebee shook his head somewhat, grateful once again that he was an auto-bot.
"=Little-Brother=" Mikaela murmured softly. "=How close are they?="
"Hey! Speaking in Scout is just rude!" Wheelie complained. The humans were looking at us curiously.
"=Getting there= Sorry, habit," Bumblebee shrugged with a grin.
Kae stayed for a little while, chatting with the humans, thanking Carly for her patience and making Sam's femme smile.
His sister was the best when it came to smoothing feathers, and that proved more-so, when Carly really began contributing to the human's hunt for the truth.
(OPOV)
Optimus drove out onto the rough roads, his mentor close behind.
He wanted Sentinel to see the sunset. Finally, he stopped, disconnected from his trailer and transformed, watching his Mentor do the same.
"So majestic, and peaceful this planet," Sentinel murmured. "Unlike the final days of Cybertron."
"I have wondered what might have been, if you had fought the final battle, instead of me," Optimus murmured, standing with his old friend.
"Never mourn the past, young warrior," Sentinel told him fondly. "But I suppose your mate has said the same. You have chosen well, my young friend."
Optimus couldn't help the small smile as Sentinel rested a gentle hand on his shoulder.
"You found her, and our race will survive," Sentinel murmured gently. "We have hard times ahead of us."
"She often reminds me, live in the present, work for the future," Optimus murmured with a small smile. He sighed. "You were our leader, Sentinel, it should be your right to lead us again."
"In a world I do not know," Sentinel murmured with a low chuckle. "I am no longer your teacher, Optimus, you are mine."
They stood for a long time, watching the stars in silence.
"When this is finished," Sentinel murmured. "Have you a plan for the revival of Cybertron?"
Optimus shot his mentor a guilty look.
"I..." he began, and trailed off.
Sentinel watched him patiently.
"I fear for my Kae," Optimus murmured softly. "In the dark of night, as she holds me close she reminds me that together we will breathe life into Cybertron again, and that she will not suffer for it..."
"You doubt her?" Sentinel murmured with a frown.
"I have no doubt, that she will heal our home," Optimus sighed, he looked toward Cybertron. "That she will survive it, I do not know."
"What brings this doubt?" Sentinel asked him softly. Optimus snorted.
"When we fought together, two annum ago, Megatron wished to take her, to use the knowledge that the All-spark had passed into her mind to find the Matrix and destroy this world. She took severe damage, and unbeknownst to me bound her wounds and continued to fight by my side."
"Your point?" Sentinel asked gently.
"Even when she was bleeding to death," Optimus murmured with a wry chuckle. "Her first concern was for my own wellbeing."
"Then we will stand with you, Optimus," Sentinel chuckled softly. "And we will watch your backs, as you did mine all those vorn ago."
(LPOV)
Lena woke up slowly, smiling at the position she was in.
Not a night had gone by, for the past six months that she and Jolt hadn't fallen into their recharges with her nestled into his chest.
It wasn't precisely the most... physically comfortable place to sleep. But it was with him, and after a week? Her body had become very accustomed to the feeling of his neurals cradling her, his hand protectively shielding her from the world...
Lena opened her eyes worriedly the second she recognized the resonation of worry emanating from her lover's spark.
"Jolt?" she murmured gently.
"Lena..." he whispered. "Lena I need you to know something."
"What?"
"I need you to keep a secret."
"Okay." Lena nodded comfortably. Jolt never asked her to keep difficult secrets, the bots never kept anything from each other anyway, which meant it was a secret from the other humans.
"If we're ever asked to leave Lena..."
Lena could feel her heart beginning to break at the mere thought of such a thing.
"We're not gonna go, Lena, I need you to stay alive for me," Jolt whispered. "Because no matter what happens, I'm coming back for you, I need you to know that."
Next to the weapons information in her brain, that was an easy secret to keep.
"I won't tell a single soul," Lena murmured gently, reaching up and stroking her lover's chamber.
"Promise me Lena-"
"I promise I-"
"No, promise me you'll stay alive for me," Jolt whispered.
"I promise."