I'm going away until tomorrow, so I thought I'd leave you with something until then. I don't know what time I'm coming home, so you might not get another update until Monday. Maybe not thought, considering the next part is already typed up and ready to be submitted. I guess it just depends on how tired I am when I get back. =D

The further along that Elita got into her pregnancy, the more Optimus began to understand what his older brother had meant when he told him those many years ago that "If you have sex, you die, in violent and horrible ways." All this time, he had thought that Megatron was just trying to scare his kid brother away from doing something stupid while he was underage. Now he realized that it was a valid warning.

"I feel fat…" Elita growled.

"Elita, you're not fat," Optimus replied. Kinda pudgy from the displacement of internal processors, but far from fat, anyway. Pudgy or not, she actually looked quite beautiful pregnant, when she wasn't acting all homicidal, anyway.

"I guess we're gonna have to think of a name for the sparkling," Elita said thoughtfully.

"Name it Jazz!"

"No, name it Bumblebee!"

"Guys, what if the sparkling's a girl?"

"Stay out of this, Arcee!"

"I dunno… Bumblebeena?"

"Bumblebeena? Do you want the kid to get beat up?"

"Shut up, Jazz!"

Optimus and Elita both sighed as Jazz, Bumblebee, and Arcee continued to argue in the other room. This was going to be fun…

Barricade hung over the back of Elita One's chair. "Whatcha doin'? Naming the sparkling? Name it "Metallica". No…wait… Don't name it Metallica. I'm going to save that one for my first sparkling."

"Woah, Barricade, how did you get in here?!" Elita screamed, spinning around in her seat.

"I let him in," Bumblebee replied. He was standing behind Barricade, calmly eating an energon pudding pop.

"Bumblebee, what have we told you about letting Decepticons into the base? Remember Bonecrusher? I remember Bonecrusher…" Optimus shivered.

"But he's my friend! I had to tell him about the sparkling! He likes sparklings!" Bumblebee protested. "Besides, I let him in all the time! You just never noticed before."

Jazz walked in. "Oh, hey Barricade. Welcome back!"

Optimus slammed his head on the table. He was going to have to have a talk with Bumblebee on trusting anyone he comes across later. "So how often is "all the time" by any chance?"

"About once a week," Jazz replied for them. "He stays long enough to flirt with Arcee, eat all our food, and watch our TV. Then he leaves and comes back the next week." Barricade nodded to confirm this statement.

"Oh…and if you ever need a babysitter, I'm always available. It's not like there's anything else for me to do out by myself, anyway," Barricade volunteered.

Optimus and Elita exchanged glances. "Uh… I'm not sure that that would be a good idea…" Optimus shook his head.

"Why not? He watched Jazz and me when we were sparklings. Remember that, Jazz?" Bumblebee asked.

"Okay Barricade, remember! Don't let him eat too much junk food, or he'll grow up to be the size of a bean," Optimus warned. Elita impatiently pulled him out the door.

Jazz gnawed on his hand and looked up at Barricade, who was holding him in his arms. Barricade returned his look. "Okay, Shrimp… Now I don't know how to cook, so we're having chips for dinner. Got that?"

Jazz remained silent a moment. "Oh, yeah… I remember…"

"We trusted him with you two because back then, he wasn't a Decepticon!" Elita pointed out.

"Yeah, and I was an alcoholic gang member with a really bad drug addiction when you trusted me with them. The sparkling will be fine. Just look at how they turned out in my care!" Barricade countered.

Optimus and Elita both took a moment to stare at Jazz and Bumblebee. "Oh… So that's what went wrong?"

"Hey!" they both snapped.

"Alright, Barricade. We'll think about it," Optimus caved. Barricade's cheering was cut short when he noticed Arcee walk past, prompting him to follow her.

Optimus entered the room looking somewhat irritated and slumped on the berth opposite Elita. She looked up from the data pad she was looking over and smiled at him. "Hey, sweetie. What's wrong? Did you walk out of the room without putting your crotch plate back on again?"

"No!" he quickly replied. "Yes…" he admitted. "But that's not why I'm upset. I still can't come up with a decent name for our sparkling."

She crawled over to his side and curled up in his lap. "If it makes you feel any better, I'm pressed for ideas too. I went around the base asking for suggestions in the event that someone would suggest something that didn't suck."

"Any luck?" he asked, his arms wrapping around her protectively.

"Well, let's see…" She pulled out the data pad she was looking at when Optimus came in. "Sideswipe suggested "Heywood Jablome". I don't get it, but apparently Jazz and Arcee did, because it took Prowl fifteen minutes to get them to stop laughing. Sunstreaker suggested "Batman" and then changed his mind and suggested "Iron Man", apparently because Batman totals a Lamborghini in the newest movie… Ironhide suggested…uh…you don't want to know what he suggested. The list just goes downhill from here."

"Primus help any sparkling born to them," Optimus sighed.

"I've got an idea… Whether it's a mech or femme, I don't care. We're naming the baby Bob," Elita replied.

"Okay… Everything seems to be in place," Ratchet said, finishing Elita's checkup. "So… Did you want to know the gender?"

"No. Optimus and I wanted that to be a surprise," Elita shook her head.

"Alright. Fair enough." He went to take a few files to the medbay office and paused in the doorway. "Oh, and for the love of Primus… Please DO NOT name your sparkling "Bumblebeena"…"

Optimus pushed aside his work so he could mess around with possible names for their sparkling on a data pad. If Prowl happened to come in, at least he'd look busy instead of like he was ignoring his duties.

"Ratchet says that everything's fine," Elita smiled, joining him in his office. "He also asked me not to name the baby "Bumblebeena", so fortunately, that name's out. Did you think of something yet?"

Optimus stared at the name he'd just come up with on the data pad while randomly jumbling up the letters in words out of boredom. That was…actually not that bad… "What about this one?"

Elita leaned over to look at the pad. "Hmm… I kind of like it…"

The sparkling's actually had a name and gender picked out for about a year... Also, the original draft of this part actually told you want Ironhide wanted them to name the sparkling. I thought it would be best to leave that up to your imaginations. It is something that's way out there, so go ahead and get creative with it if you want.