AN: So yeah. A temporary alliance turns into a guardianship? Permanent or not we'll see how it flows. School will be starting on the 29th so I might not post as often, if at all.
Bookworm Gal: A lot of people would be scarred for life if they say that.
anonybot: Undecided on that yet.
writergurl616: Fig should know better than to touch Sideswipe's stuff.
Fk306 animelover: Hmm, maybe plan for it to be only a few paragraphs or mostly talking? That way it might not be as daunting.
Autobot Firekat: Haha, I have succeeded into converting you on to the Barricade/Miles path! Don't know if I'll actually have it though :D
SamWhitlock: I'm happy you enjoy the story, and thanks for adding it to your alerts!
The result of Squffie: They fell asleep in the rec-room. Anyone could waltz right in. Especially Fig.
Question: If I were to have any pairings, what would you guys like to see? I'm curious
Prowl was in his office, innocently working as Second in Command to Optimus Prime, leader of the Autobots, when the distraction in the form of a tiny organic had come into his office. He had tried to ignore it at first, but when he didn't respond to the organic the creature had climbed up onto his desk and was standing on top of his desk, arms crossed against his chest impatiently.
With a sigh, he finally put his data pad down to look at Miles. "What do you want?"
"A temporary alliance." Miles replied to the question, sitting on the desk now that he had Prowl's attention.
"A what?" An optic ridge was raised as the question was asked.
Miles pointed to the cat ears on top of his head, figuring the tail spoke for itself as it moved around. "I know this was your idea." He paused slightly to see what Prowl's reaction would be.
"But-" Prowl began, only to be cut off by the human.
"I'm just going to assume you didn't know all the specifics and just suggested the idea. I don't think you actually planned to have them be stuck on me, even if it's not even been a full two days with them yet." Miles said swiftly, waving a dismissive hand. "However, the fact remains that I am now stuck with them, and those nano-whosits that are apparently changing me slightly. For the better I guess, but that doesn't matter. I would have aimed to get you back for it, but I want to team up with you instead."
"For what, exactly?" Prowl asked, thrown for a loop as his logic processor tried to figure out just what Miles was talking about.
Miles grinned, "Teaming up against the twins. I've heard stories of how annoying they must be to you, and I feel kind of guilty for just ditching Sam like that and leaving him in the clutches of the twins' Halloween prank. If they're getting bold enough to mess with humans, then I think its time that humans messed back."
Prowl was silent for a moment as he studied Miles. Slowly he turned off his data pad, and made sure the door was locked so no random 'bot could burst in. "What did you have in mind?"
"Something drawn out, that would really mess with their brai-Err, processors. Earth is still new to them and there are a lot of superstitions and folk lore on this planet. I figure we must be able to use something against them, and you basically being a giant walking super computer, I figured if they tried to look stuff up you could mess with their searches or something." Miles said softly, grinning mischievously. "Just the basic lay out for a real idea, I wanted you in on it before deciding on something."
"I believe that we may need to do some research, Miles." Prowl replied, picking up the tiny organic and placing him on his shoulder as he re-activated his data pad so Miles could see the information as well.
And research they did. The two stayed together locked up in that room from a little after breakfast until it was almost dinner time, both skipping lunch in favor of working on their plan. As they were in North America they mainly focused on legends that had started in these lands, researching a lot of Native American folk lore, stories from early settlers, and the like.
No one really wondered where Miles had went to, and Prowl would often stay locked up in his office being what others deemed a 'workaholic'. No one really wondered what happened to Fig after Sideswipe got a hold of him, either. Most of the people who actually worked at NEST were busy cleaning up all the Halloween decorations.
During lunch a lot of people started to remind Sam of what had happened the night before, much to his embarrassment and horror. He had known deep inside that the fake Megatron's and Startscream's had to be fake, but he had still panicked and nearly purged his tanks as the Cybertronians would call it after the fake Megatron had asked him to join in their fake sexcapades.
He glared moodily at Epps when the older man kept bringing it up just to annoy him. It was working perfectly, and it didn't help that he had the worst head ache from the alcohol he had drank the night before. He half wondered if Miles was doing any better as Bumblebee and Barricade joined Sam, Epps, and Mikaela at the table.
"Hey, Bee, do you guys get hangovers?" Sam asked curiously, looking at his guardian's holoform.
"It depends on the amount of high grade they've taken in." The mech replied.
"Ironhide's probably in an extremely bad mood right now." Mikaela said, giggling slightly. Yes, she was a proud teenage girl that could giggle at large alien robots and not be afraid.
Epps snorted, "Good thing we hid all of his ammo then!"
"That'll just make his mood worse." Sam pointed out. "And Miles ratted you out yesterday. Even Will."
"Oh…" Epps softly replied, only just realizing how true that was. "Well, slag."
Barricade snorted, and Bumblebee laughed. "That about sums it up!" The yellow scout said cheerfully, grinning.
About that time Will came into the cafeteria, walking over to them and looking at Epps. "We have to wash the paint off Hide like now if we want to survive. I don't know what he's having Jazz do, and I don't want to know." And with that he simply dragged the Sergeant out with him.
"Still think we should have somehow convinced Hide to dress up as the tooth fairy." Sam stated wistfully.
"When Annabelle gets old enough we can have her help." Bumblebee said, smirking.
Barricade snorted, "Oh how the strong have fallen."
"Oh, you're one to talk." Bumblebee replied, grinning. "Where's your kitty, hmm?"
"How should I know? He's not my pet." Barricade said, glaring at the Autobot.
Sam and Mikaela watched as the two argued back and forth. Sam was somewhat thankful that Miles had up and disappeared after breakfast, he could just see Barricade saying something out of anger that would hurt his friend. Sighing, he got up, tossed away his food, and grabbed Mikaela to drag her out of the room.
They went to the med bay, thinking that Miles may be there, there may be new news about his condition, or they could at least find out what the violent Medic did to Sunstreaker and Sideswipe. At some point during the morning the CMO had declared a mech hunt on the two.
"Found Sunny or Sides, yet?" Sam asked, stepping in to the med bay while holding the door for Mikaela. The only two who were already in the med bay was Ratchet himself, and Wheeljack. The place looked like a disaster.
"No." Ratchet replied, sending a brief glare their way. "You two have been assigned to help."
"Let me guess, Sunny and Sides?" Mikaela asked, stepping over a random data pad on the floor.
Ratchet grumbled something under his breath in Cybertronian, nodding slightly to confirm the answer to Mikaela's question.
Sam whistled, "Da-aaamn. They're so going to wish they were in the pit once they're found."
Mikaela laughed, and Wheeljack nodded, causing Ratchet to throw a wrench at the poor inventor. The two teenagers got to work helping Ratchet clean up and reorganize what they could while Wheeljack worked on whatever Ratchet wanted him to work on, threatening him with wrenches if he complained about mistreatment by CMOs.
Sam groaned, sitting once again in the cafeteria, but for dinner now. It was surprisingly quiet in the room despite all the people, and the occasional Cybertronian in holoform. This was only because Bumblebee and Barricade had continued to fight, and it was steadily escalating in words and in pitch. Some people were still talking, just not caring, or annoyed at the fight. Sam was sitting by Mikaela, dreading the moment that Miles might appear.
"Just admit it you stubborn 'con!" Bumblebee snapped, Barricade having managed to snap his last thread of patience on the topic.
Barricade snarled, "There's nothing to admit, you stupid 'bot! He's just a convenience!"
Mikaela glared at Barricade, looking about ready to yell at the 'con until Sam stopped her, shaking his head. Neither saw Miles and Prowl come into the cafeteria, only to stop dead in their tracks as they heard the fight going on. Anyone else who had kept talking over the two fighting Cybertronians suddenly stopped when they saw the two enter.
Bumbelbee and Barricade kept fighting, out of their seats and leaning across the table to glare at each other as they went back and forth. Miles and Prowl watched this in silence, the teenager shocked and the Cybertronian annoyed at the illogical behavior from the two of his kind, especially Barricade.
Mikaela decided to ignore Sam after awhile more of watching the fight. "Would you two idiots stop it? Miles could come in at any minute! This is the cafeteria for God's sake!"
"You're so slagging ridiculous! You're basically already his Guardian!" Bumblebee exclaimed, pretending not to hear Mikaela.
Mikaela opened her mouth to retort, but heard a gasp from Sam and looked at him to see his gaze elsewhere. She followed the look to see what had made him react like that, only to see Miles and Prowl. She desperately tried to get Barricade's attention him to stop him from replying, but she was too late.
"Get it through that thick metal plating of yours, Autobot! I'm not his Guardian, I'm not his friend! Hell I like Ironhide better than him! He was just a convenience in the time I needed one, I wouldn't even call him a socket! I would never want to be his Guardian!" Barricade snarled, glaring at Bumblebee as the Autobot glared back at him.
"Good, then I can go tell Optimus Prime that I'll be filling the position of Guardian concerning Miles." Prowl cut in, loud enough to be heard by the two as he stood behind Miles.
Barricade and Bumblebee turned to glare at Prowl, about to tell him off for cutting in to their fight, when they noticed Miles standing in front of him. Bumblebee felt almost immediately guilty as he looked at the teen, opening his mouth to say something before deciding against it. He glanced warily at Barricade, noticing the 'con seemed to be shocked. Whether it was that Miles had heard, or it was over what Miles had heard, he wasn't sure. The teenager himself was staring at the two with wide eyes, and Bumblebee tried not to read the emotions in his expression.
"No arguments?" Prowl asked dryly, putting a hand on Miles shoulder and turning the teenager around to face the door. "Excellent." He then proceeded to push Miles out ahead of them, leaving the cafeteria with him.
Once they were out of the cafeteria, Prowl let his holoform disappear, quickly picking Miles up before he could say anything. The teen didn't say anything as the Cybertronian walked to one of the only vending machines on the NEST base. He set Miles down in front of it.
"You're not serious, right?" Miles asked, giving Prowl an incredulous look.
"Once in awhile isn't that bad, and it'll hold you off until we can actually go to the cafeteria without running into those overgrown sparklings." Prowl replied, glancing around for Ratchet.
Miles shrugged, "Can't say I'm going to out right refuse junk food as long as the Hatchet isn't around." He dug in his pockets for his wallet, then fed the machine his money. Glancing over the selection, he quickly chose a bag of cheetos. He leaned against a wall, opening the bag and started to eat. He wasn't going to subject Prowl to crumbs of cheesy goodness.
"I honestly have to say I am surprised over how they acted." Prowl said after a few minutes, watching Miles crumble up the empty bag and toss it in a trash can.
"I find myself hoping that you walking super computers can say stupid things that you don't mean every once in awhile." Miles replied softly, just opting to wipe his hands on his pants.
"Even if you think he didn't mean it, it still has to…" Prowl trailed off, picking Miles up. Cybertronians and humans may be similar emotionally, but that didn't know he meant how to deal with one if they were upset.
"Hurt?" Miles asked. "Well, yeah. But Barricade can be an aft, we all know this. Doesn't make it any better, though." A pause as Miles realized something. "And I'm stuck on base, great."
"You'll be sticking with me anyway." Prowl set Miles on his shoulder, walking away from the
"Does that mean I can cheer myself up by tripping your glitch?" Miles asked, though the usual grin wasn't in place.
Prowl vented softly, "No."
"Aw, but it'd make me happy!" Miles whined, but this got him no response. He huffed, "So what's this about the Guardian thing?"
"What do you mean?" Prowl asked, glancing at the teenager on his shoulder. Surely, he thought, he has to know that Bumblebee is Sam's.
"Well I… dunno." Miles said. "I always thought it was just a Bumblebee and Ironhide thing because they had actually been with Sam and Will in battle, or something. And like maybe they had defended them? No one ever actually explained it to me.
"Certainly not." Prowl paused, thinking it over. "In the English language there is two meanings to guardian. Like your parents would be your legal guardians, and then the act of actually guarding someone. That is the closest thing we could get to what our guardian means."
Miles glanced at Prowl, "Okaaay, so what does the Cybertronian version of guardian mean?"
Prowl vented softly again, "It is a relationship between one Cybertronian and then one non-Cybertronian. Like Sam and Bumblebee. Through it the charge would become… an 'honorary' Cybertronian, you could say. This way the Guardian wouldn't normally have to worry about the fuss of the other species over their chosen. With your government it helps give us a little bit more lee way with you civilians, which is one reason I plan on telling Optimus I'll become your guardian. It also says that the Cybertronian themselves will very possibly risk their life to save their charge. It is meant to show how close a Cybertronian is to a person of a non-Cybertronian species as we can not bond with other species."
"So it's like a combination of the two English uses?" Miles asked, pausing. "You stupid computers are too confusing."
"The Guardian can take precedence over others concerning the Charge." Prowl continued, ignoring Miles. "Even some of their higher ups. Like Bumblebee would take precedence over me concerning Sam, and I wouldn't have a say if he wanted to take Sam somewhere that I didn't agree with. However, Optimus Prime and Ratchet would be able to tell him no."
"This sounds a bit like…" Miles trailed off, sure Prowl would understand.
"Most Cybertronians, like Bumblebee, let the Charge have a large say in their relationship. A Cybertronian pet, or slave, is a…" He hesitated, remembering Barricade had used the word. "A socket."
"Oh." Miles replied, then paused. "Oh." He repeated as he remembered where he had heard it.
Prowl nodded, deciding that path didn't need to be gone down just yet. "Some other reasons I would like to be your guardian are that I do need to get better acquainted with this planet, and you can explain anything I don't understand. We'll be spending a lot of time together because of this new 'alliance' anyway, so people will just chalk it up to us being a new bonded pair. Out of all the humans I've spent the most time with you, and if anything you help me with my glitch because I have to adjust to how illogical you can be."
"If you want to sign yourself up for your early demise, be my guest, Prowler." Miles said, grinning. "But don't use bonded pair again. Sound like we're dating or something."
"I'll try not to." He said dryly, narrowing his optics.
It was surprisingly easy to start their plan against the twins after Prowl told Optimus that he would be Miles' Guardian. Optimus had just agreed, figuring his SIC had his reasons, and when he asked Miles the teen said it was fine. So when Prowl suggested having a military camping trip to teach Miles how to survive out in the wild, as well as Sam if he wanted, the suggestion was taken and looked at. It was decided that the suggestion would be done, and they could tell the school that the military was in the process of teaching the two and hopefully get them off the hook for a bit.
Miles wasn't quite sure how Prowl managed to ge the twins to go, but he did. In truth, Optimus wanted two extra mechs along for safety measures, and decided to do something akin to pulling names out of a hat, which Prowl then rigged.
On the days leading up to the camping trip, Miles and Prowl planned and gathered supplies. Prowl would be going a day ahead of time to search the area for anything significantly dangerous, like Decepticons, and would be setting up the beginnings of the plan. Miles also avoided Barricade, which worked well, since Barricade was working on avoiding Miles, too. After Sam had chewed them both out, Bumblebee had apologized to Miles for starting the whole mess. Miles had accepted the apology, and smiled.
While Sam had opted out of the camping trip, mainly so he could try to talk to Barricade, Will and Ironhide were going to be there as well.
It was a week in to November when they finally went on the trip. They had had to find a forest where most of the trees would be taller than the Cybertronians. Miles had rode up in Ironhide with Will since Prowl was already at their selected camping spot waiting for them. It didn't take long at all for the Captain to show Miles how to pitch a tent, and best set up the logs to start a fire. Once he was done Miles went to Prowl, and Prowl suggested that the twins go looking for some more firewood. Will and Ironhide agreed, and the twins were sent away. Will and Ironhide went to hunt, fish, or whatever they planned to do to collect food, leaving Miles and Prowl to keep the fire going.
"How's it gonna go down?" Miles asked softly, speaking lowly just in case anyone might come back.
"I have a holoform there waiting for them. You'll be able to watch later when we get back to base. I might be a bit out of it, but if Ironhide and Will get back sooner than I do then just tell them I went into a light recharge." Prowl instructed, leaning against a tough tree.
Miles nodded. He waited for awhile, ploking at the fire and throwing random things in it to see how they burned. Prowl eventually sat upright again, but didn't say anything just yet. Miles looked at him curiously, deciding it best not to say anything if Prowl wasn't. He heard the twins coming before he saw them, the nanobots already having succeeded in making his hearing slightly better, as well as how well he could see during the night. He watched with a bit of amusement as they raced into the clearing where camp was set up.
"Prowl-!" Sideswipe began, only to be cut off by Sunstreaker.
"There was this thing, and then we destroyed this thing, and then something happened! And Sideswipe scratched my paint!" Sunstreaker exclaimed.
Miles put a hand over his mouth to keep from snorting. He enjoyed the description that Sunstreaker gave, but Prowl just acted annoyed.
"If you destroyed something attempt to go fix it, at least." Prowl stated, not even looking at them.
"But we think we made something angry!" Sideswipe protested.
Miles put on a worried face, "There was someone there who saw you? We can't have you guys being found out just yet."
"No, no one saw us!" Sunstreaker cut in, stopping Sideswipe before he could say something. "We aren't stupid enough for that."
"Then what did you make angry?" Prowl asked.
The twins looked at eachother, then back to Prowl. "We don't know!" They exclaimed together.
Miles tried not to grin, knowing it was his turn to further the prank. "What did you destroy?"
"It'll be easier if we show you." Sideswipe said, picking Miles up and holding him as Sunstreaker activated a very basic hologram of where they had been and what they had destroyed.
Miles frowned, "That lookes Native American to me, must have been there for awhile. Sam and me had to learn about them in elementary school." Which wasn't a lie, they had learned about Native Americans way back then. "I can't remember what that thing is called, or what tribe had it, but there was a legend that whoever destroyed one would be cursed by the spirtits." He laughed. "I always enjoyed Native American legends, they were so inventive." He pretended not to notice Sunstreaker and Sideswipe look at eachother with wide optics.
"You don't think any of it's true, do you?" Sideswipe asked tentavily.
"The legends? Oh no, I don't believe a word of them. Some, like this one, could be pretty gruesome, though." Miles replied as Sideswipe set him back down.
The twins silently conversed with eachother over their private comm link as Miles scrambled up Prowl's leg and sat so he was leaning against his some of Prowl's chest plates.
"Do you think you could get us that information you researched, Miles?" Sideswipe finally asked.
Sunstreaker cut in quickly, "Those odd ancestors of yours have gotten our interest." Coudln't seem like they were afraid or might think they were targeted by a curse.
"Sure." Miles said, glancing up at Prowl with the barest of smirks. Phase B would be planned and put into action soon.