No, Wheeljack felt no more comfortable with the girl whose metal boot covers were nibbled on by a scraplet as she kicked her feet lazily in the air while reading a book.

He was just creeped the frag out.

He'd seen bots and fleshies alike eaten alive because of the fragging pests before. Even the humans seemed a bit uncomfortable with the bug hive, who slept under the couch, on the table, on Margo, on the couch, in the rafters, anywhere they could be within easy grabbing distance of their Queen.

Who was currently letting her scraplets eat useless burst-pen shells, random fragments Ratchet let her have, spoons, anything. She was starting to carry around boxes of screws in her pockets, ever since they started eating her coin change.

The constant faint drilling made his audial throb.

He was about to transform and go out when eh heard Bulkhead roll up.

"Ugh! You sound just like my parents," and Miko sounded oddly critical for that. What Wheeljack wouldn't give to see his creators again...

"Uh," Bulkhead said, "I thought your parents were Japanese?"

"You may speak a different language, but you say the same things," Miko's eyes narrowed.

"Because we want what's best for you," Bulkhead tried. "That means making sure you go to school, not jail."

Wheeljack really did bolt now. Mushy stuff really wasn't his thing.

~?~

Margo could only blink when she saw Miko come through the bridge, and Bulkhead absentmindedly rubbing his back.

"Bulk got tossed into concrete," Miko answered the unasked question. "Totalled a painting that said where a thing was. But I've got a picture, so maybe upload that."

She gave her phone to Raf, who plugged it into his computer, uploaded the image, and projected it on the screen.

Optimus was immediately called.

"It is indeed an energon harvester. A powerful tool created by the ancients to remove raw energon from any source," Optimus explained.

Margo's scraplets were all firmly against the ceiling right now, save one cradled in her arms being petted. "Right. So... Our figures of ancient mythology knew greek gods?"

"Or they interacted with the greek?" Miko suggested.

"Or maybe they were greek gods?" Jack added.

"No," Optimus answered. "The ancients often used the art of a given era to conceal messages. This fresco was likely a signpost indicating a harvester's location hidden somewhere on this planet."

"Uh, Optimus?" Jack called. "If the harvester removes energon from anything and you all have energon pumping inside you..."

Optimus nodded. "In decepticon hands, the harvester would be a devastating weapon."

"See?" Miko said, turning to Bulkhead for reassurance. "You were a genius to total that painting."

"He was thrown into it," Margo corrected.

"I mean, Miko's not wrong either," Bumblebee said. "How are the 'cons gonna know how to find the harvester without the fresco?"

"With high-speed internet," Raf said. "If you do an image search for 'greek god and golden orb', this comes up." He pressed a few keys and the image popped up on the viewscreen, replacing the one of the fresco. "See? It's in a museum."

Arcee looked to Optimus. "That the real deal?"

"Contact Agent Fowler and summon Wheeljack back to base."

~?~

"I hate talking to machines," Ratchet groaned at the voicemail.

"You're a machine, fuckface," Margo said.

"Margo," Optimus warned.

The girl fell silent.

"Without Agent Fowler's direct aid, we will have to confiscate the harvester on our own," Optimus said.

"Whoa, whoa! Confiscate? As in, steal museum property?"

"Well, I don't think he stuttered, Jack," Margo bitched. "But, ya know, that does sound illegal, OP."

"I have no wish to break human law, but once the decepticons learn of the harvester's location, they will not hesitate to obtain it by any means necessary," Optimus said. "We must act covertly."

Jack chuckled awkwardly. "Okay, Optimus, n-no offense, but 'covertly' and 'giant robots' don't really go together."

"What's your point?" Margo asked, trailing gentle touches over her scraplet's body.

"Yeah!" Miko agreed. "We're small enough to sneak in, and we're not a government secret!"

"Miko, I'm not sure that's wise," Bulkhead said.

"But it may be our best option," Arcee shrugged.

"It is the one we will use," Optimus decided. "The longer we debate, the more time we give the decepticons."

"Do you want me to bring my scraplets?" Margo asked.

"Yes."

~?~

"Sound off," Optimus ordered.

"Westward ho," Arcee said.

"East here!" Bumblebee said.

"Southside covered," Bulkhead said.

"Topside down," Wheeljack said.

"We're ready," Jack said.

The groundbridge didn't take long to open.

Margo looked around the museum floor plan. "Fuck, this is disorganized. A dinosaur, ancient greece, I think that's from Easter Island, eastern Asian, I'm pretty sure that's from Egypt - fuck, does this museum not have more than one room?"

Miko took a picture, set it on her phone, and placed it over the security camera so it was covered.

Jack rolled the platform closer, and Margo's scraplets slowly lifted it. Raf was helping to direct the little bugs as Margo murmured little commands and reassurances.

Crack!

The three humans looked over to see Optimus holding a missile against the broken pane.

He looked around, a bit confused, until a decepticon shoved a lightning rod into his neck cabling. Optimus stumbled down the stairs too small for his pedes, and fell, dropping the missile. The red mech jumped on the autobot leader again and shoved the lightning staff straight into his neck cabling. Optimus fritzed and vibrated, in too much pain to scream.

"It's cons!" Raf gulped.

"They've got my guardian!" Margo growled. The scraplets dropped the harvester on the platform and Jack had to physically hold Margo back.

"The bots will help! We've got to get the harvester back to base!" Jack yelled.

"Let me go!" Margo yelled, struggling fiercely.

"Ratchet, bridge now!" Raf said into his phone as Miko rolled the machine back to get her own phone, askew from the security camera.

The ground bridge opened immediately, and the platform rolled back through.

The harvester was safe.

Their guardians were not.

The call for a bridge came three minutes later.

Arcee was rubbing a bruise covered by the black paint on her thighs, Bulkhead and a limping Wheeljack were supporting a swaying Optimus who'd suddenly lost all composure and was poking at Wheeljack's faceplate like it was interesting watching the malleable metal dent under his servo and repair whenever he took his finger away, and Bumblebee was carefully loosening the armour plating under his arm.

Optimus stayed on his feet on his own for precisely three seconds before he was picked up and swung over Ratchet's shoulder, carried off into the hallways and another room.

"I have a lovely ass!" the overcharged bot suddenly shouted.

"Uh, huh," Arcee said absentmindedly, walking alongside Wheeljack and Bumblebee as they went to have their minor wounds treated.

"When was I painted white?" he asked loudly as they continued down the corridors.

Arcee's response was lost, but Optimus's answer was not.

"What the frag do you mean, I wasn't painted white?"

Margo looked on in shock, and then turned to the only remaining autobot in the room. "Hey, Bulk, why's my guardian being crazy?"

"He's just overcharged," Bulkhead said. "It'll wear off in a few joors."

"And then he'll go back to being the magnificent jackass he usually is?" she asked, just to confirm.

"Yup," Bulkhead said.

"Wonderful!" Margo said. "Well, all our guardians 'cept you are injured or otherwise incapacitated and can't take us home. Do ya mind?"

Bulkhead didn't mind.

Margo's stop was the last one, so she and Bulkhead decided to talk.

"Hey, why do you curse all the time?"

"Because my family's religious and I'm gay. It's my little way of rebellion," Margo answered.

"Okay. Why do you insult people?"

"Self-defense mechanism. People usually don't get emotionally attached if you curse at the up the wall, so there's no chance of either of us hurting the other."

"So... how did you and Miko get close?"

"We're in the same exchange program. She came here because the brochure made this place seem a lot more exciting than it is, and I chose the first place I could get to that wasn't in a country where being gay is still illegal."

"Being gay is illegal?"

"Oh, yeah. It started about ten thousand years ago in the Bible's book of Exodus. The verse was written wrong. It said 'man shall not lie with another man', when it really should have said 'man shall not rape children, he who rapes children will burn for all of eternity despite the promise of eternal salvation'."

Bulkhead's armour shuddered. "So you're not religious?"

"Nope. I left the church on principle."

"Really?"

"My younger brother's bisexual, and I'm aego homoromantic. My older sibling's nonbinary. A lady at church kept misgendering xir. And also compared all gay people to rapists, murderers, pedophiles, and the scum of the world in an innocent conversation with such a casual manner like she expected me to agree with her. And also the hundreds of bishops and archbishops who kept molesting and raping the altar boys." Her nose scrunched up. "It made me sick that they used a benevolent deity as an excuse for this shit."

So Bulkhead started crafting a plan.