Polar Claw swam confidently through the cold water, every so often huffing mist when his snout went underwater. Beside him, Optimus paddled less confidently, his optics wide and scared. This swimming thing was not as cool as he thought it would be. Meanwhile, Sideswipe was not showing wear, even with Windblade still clinging to him like a burr. Drift was keeping his minicons out of the water, mostly. Every so often a wave from Polar Claw made them squeak in fear.
The Decepticon hauled himself onto an ice floe, resting his helm on it to take a break while his back legs treaded water. Optimus and the other Autobots did the same. Jetstorm and Slipstream huddled onto the floe like penguins. Optimus looked at Polar Claw, who exvented mist.
"How much further, Polar Claw?"
The Decepticon watched him wearily before he pointed with a claw to a distant shore. "Close," he growled. He stiffened when a black fin broke the surface.
Optimus watched as one fin cut a little too close for comfort and he gave a shout when the smooth-skinned mammal nuzzled up to him. He relaxed as it gave light nips to his leg and he rubbed its head.
"Travel in pods," Polar Claw grumbled. He released the floe, rocking everyone else. Drift gave a shudder, his optics dim and closing slowly. "Calf travels beside mother." He waved his claws at the calf, but it whistled and hid behind Optimus, nuzzling the back of his knees.
Optimus dove under the water to touch the calf's nose. It regarded him with a tiny black eye set in front of a large white oval. He smiled, finding he liked this little calf. The pod was slowly surrounding a leopard seal that bathed in the sun, the blood of an unfortunate baby on its snout. It burped contentedly and rolled over, closer to the orcas. Optimus looked away when the shrieks started.
The baby rubbed up against him, swimming around and around him, beating him lightly with flukes and fins before the Prime started to swim after it. Polar Claw led the Autobots after him.
The pod started up again, and allowed the Autobots to grab at their dorsal fins. They stayed closer to the surface, the cows. The bulls were unimpressed by the Cybertronain visitors. However, Optimus' calf stayed beside him.
"It is an orphan," Polar Claw growled. "It joined this pod. Different accent in whistle and clicks. Doesn't belong."
Optimus shifted his grip on the cow he was clinging to. She exhaled mist and whistled as Optimus stroked the head of the calf beside him. "Hello, misfit."
It squealed and swam faster. The cow bellowed and it circled back, almost like a punished sparkling would. It stayed close to the cow.
"She has claimed it as her own," Drift observed. He was trembling, laying out on the back of an old cow that the calves liked to swim around.
Polar Claw swam beside Optimus, huffing and snorting mist. The calf nuzzled under him several times, and Optimus always feared that the little calf would get stuck with Polar Claw's claws, but it never was and his fear slowly got less and less as he watched.
They left the pod when the shore came into view. Optimus slipped off the cow first, and then the others reluctantly splashed down. Polar Claw shook off on solid ground and turned his helm to see the calf still following, its cries insistent and begging, provoking Optimus to walk back into the water and hold the calf. The pod stopped, but Optimus was too far away to tell why. The calf, meanwhile, was nuzzling up to him and chirping.
"I have to go," he whispered and he rubbed its smooth skin. The calf burbled gently and moved closer. "I will see you around, okay?" He gave a squeal that sparklings knew as I'll be back.
The calf turned away and bolted from him, surprising and saddenning the Prime. Did he offend it? But no, it came back with a rock grasped gently in its teeth. He took it and rubbed its nose. Then it swam right for the pod, which gathered back up again and continued. Optimus waded back onto dry land and he subspaced the rock.
"Made a friend today?" Drift laid out in the dying sun, trembling under the cold rocks. Snow fell down around them, and Polar Claw was tearing up the earth to dig a cave big enough before the storm started. He was muttering about it as he worked. The minicons joined in frantically, but they were shovelled back with the scoops of snow.
"It appears so." He looked at Polar Claw. "Do you have any friends?" Perhaps Polar Claw isn't the only polar Decepticon romping around.
"Had mate, maybe cubs. Have not seen any cubs for long time." He grunted, shovelling Slipstream back with the last pawful of snow before he leaned back and looked over at Optimus. "Miss them sometimes."
Optimus remembered that male polar bears didn't care for the cubs they sired. They created with a female, then left, and the females gave birth to one or two cubs in her long sleep, waking up to bundles of white pressing against her. They grew fast, he recalled, and some twin brothers stayed with each other longer than normal after leaving their mother before finally separating.
"I know the feeling," Optimus chuckled softly, shaking his helm. He got up and helped Polar Claw with the cave. The Decepticon huffed a little bit. "I have my own boys."
Polar Claw went back to digging, hurrying his efforts when he struck dirt and he shovelled it into the minicons faces when they tried to get a closer look. Optimus spared them, chuckling. "Orion and Paxus, in honor of my former self."
"Clever," the Decepticon growled. He disappeared into the cave he was crafting, making it wider. Optimus knew it promised warmth, and it touched him how the Decepticon was making it wider, as if he had accepted the Autobots into his little pack of one.
"Paxus is a bookworm, as I had been," Optimus continued. He smiled at the memories of his boys. "And Orion wants nothing to do with history or reading."
"Very, very interesting," Polar Claw said. He laid down on the dirt and huffed. "Are you coming in?"
After all the Autobots crawled in and curled up with each other, Optimus made more room by pulling Polar Claw into his lap instead of leaving him in exile. The Decepticon struggled only minutely before Optimus' digits scratched behind his audio. Polar Claw laid his helm down on Optimus' thigh and he closed his optics.
"You are not going to knock me out?"
"No," Optimus smiled. "I trust you."