"Dad, what are we doin' today?" Steele asked, following Smokescreen through the desert road. "Hey, can we race?"
"Not today, Steele. Too many humans around." Smokescreen replied, disappointed. Despite the human's rules of the road, he still enjoyed racing, and bending a few rules. "And, I thought I'd show you a few trick's on the road."
"Tricks?" Steele felt excited; he always enjoyed learning new tricks from his creator, especially fighting tricks. He prayed that someday he would be able to use those tricks against the other mech's at base, something to show he wasn't as meak as he'd appeared. " What kind of tricks?"
"How to take sharp turns, Earth's speed limits, rules of the road, secret hiding spot's your creator found. You know, simple tricks like that."
"Why haven't we done this before?" Steele asked, remembering that 'trick's' usually meant simple loop holes in fighting styles and self-defense techniques. Not that he would ever really use them, no one in the team would let him fight Decpeticon's. One of the reasons he despised being the youngest sparkling; everyone including the other sparklings , felt a need to protect him.
"I didn't think you'd be interested, but I thought we could spice it up a little bit today."
Stopping behind Smokescreen, he transformed into his bot form. Waiting for his creator to transform, Steele decided to stretch, his senses swimming in the Earth's air. The smell of Earth's sanded ground was much more pleasant then the smell of cement and motor oil. Certainly looks better, and more fun than rolling around the base.
"Hey dad, I figured out something!" Steele cried, excited to share his news with his creator.
"What?" Smokescreen transformed, looking around them to ensure they weren't followed in the sky or on the ground. It was hard enough to get Steele out of the base without an argument with Tier without reporting they were being followed. No doubt Steele would be under lock down if his carrier found anything happened to their son.
"Everyone on the team is like a family."
"How did you figure that?"
"I've been watching how everyone acts around each other." Steele replied, sheepishly. It wasn't often he would share his thoughts with anyone. "They seem to be protective of each other. But in the science lesson's, they said 'family means relation by biological means'. How are we all family if we are not related?"
Smokescreen chuckled; Steele was always so curious and sometimes wouldn't let things be. He remembered, when he joined Team Prime, he always wondered the same thing. He knew there had to be a reason for almost everyone to be giving him the cold stare and trusted him less than they trusted WheelJack. Eventually, and after much effort, they started entrusting him with confidential information and his loyalty to the team. It didn't take long for Smokescreen to realize why everyone was so protective of each other. But being so young, Steele couldn't understand. "Sometime's you don't need to be related to be a family."
"What does that mean?"
"Well, you know how you call WheelJack your uncle?"
"Yeah, I call Bumblebee and Parate my uncle's too."
"They're not related to me, we didn't even know each other until we met on Earth. Now, I can't imagine life without anyone of them, they're kind of like think my brother's."
"Why?"
"Don't start that annoying trend."
"Why?"
"Ha ha, very funny smart guy."
"Ok, why do you think of them like that?"
"What about Kade and his brothers? Would they consider me their brother?" Steele asked, wondering if Kade, Blur and Tobit saw Steele as a brother, like Smokescreen saw WheelJack as his brother. Although he wouldn't admit it, he hoped they did.
"Certainly seems like it." Smokescreen shrugged, walking down the valley.
"They sure have a funny way of showing it." Steele muttered, feeling slightly uncertain.
"Son, if you knew their caretakers, you would understand."
"Do any of us have any family, like related, left?"
"Kind of hard to say, it's a pretty deep topic to talk about." Smokescreen didn't realize how deep the topic was. There were times he wanted to share his family's history with Steele; how close he was with his carrier, his grandcarriers stories, the Gem's he's inherited which would go to Steele. But how could he if he wasn't ready to talk about his creator? "So far, your mom and I have you. Arc and Ree have each other. Bianna has Bee, her kids, and her dad-"
"Who's her dad?"
"Ultra Magnus."
"He's her dad?!" Steele shouted, covering his mouth valve. He didn't mean to shout so loud, but hearing that Ultra Magnus was Bianna's father came more than a shock to him. It seemed almost impossible.
"You didn't know that?"
"No, they don't look alike." Steele said, removing his servo.
"She inherited most of her carrier's appearances, I guess."
"What happened down there?" Steele asked, pointing to car's piled in the center of the road.
"Must've been an accident or something, happens a lot on this planet." Smokescreen replied, refusing to look at the pile of cars. He's seen too many of those, on Earth and on Cybertron.
"Why don't human's know about us?" Steele asked, watching humans running around the piles like insects. Steele debated about going to help them, try to pull the cars off each other and save anyone trapped. He knew humans weren't strong enough to lift any of those cars. But the last time he tried to help any human, they just stood look at him in fear, and then took a picture of him posting him on the world wide web. Ratchet was steaming with terrifying rage when Raf found the picture and replaced it with a tap dancing monkey.
"Oh some humans do, just not everyone."
"I know like Raf and Agent Fowler know about us. But why can't all humans know about us?" Steele asked, feeling mildly offended that humans think they're invisible.
"Robot's in disguise, son. Gotta keep up with the title, you know."
"But you saved them, you and the rest of the team's do heroic work. Wouldn't you want to be rewarded? Or recognized at least?"
"We don't rescue human's for any reward, Steele." Smokescreen replied, lowering down to his level. Although there were times Smokescreen thought the same thing, he knew what the risks would be if they revealed themselves. " We do it because it's what we do, and we really don't ask anything in return."
"Will we ever get to go home?"
"Someday, Steele." Smokescreen replied, his spark heavy thinking about Cybertron. " Just gotta keep the faith."
