Notes: If you want to know what the weapon mentioned in this chapter looks like, picture a machine gun, only made of yellow plastic and full of suction cup darts.

Beverly's character is based off a child I know. The Beverly in the story is about eleven. The one I know is three and the mispronunciation of her name is accurate to real life.

Andrew's character is slightly inspired by Mr. Freeman from the novel Speak.

…I wonder if newer computers recognize the word "texting" as legit. My spellcheck doesn't.

Enjoy!

-

Even heroes have the right to dream
It's not easy to be me…

-Five For Fighting

-

Drawing from Experience

Being human really wasn't so bad.

A lot of human culture -especially pop culture- was really fun. Mudflap had been interested in it even before the Change, but it had been more difficult to participate in organic leisure activities as a robot; he was too big or too bulky or too heavy for most of them. While he was smaller than most of the others and, therefore, more capable of fitting inside buildings, he had still broken a DDR pad at the arcade, been kicked out of a movie theater for being too loud (he couldn't really help the random noises his exhaust fans made!), and knocked over a basketball hoop. It had sucked, not being able to try out things that were new and exciting.

But now…He was small enough to try it all. Mudflap doubted that the arcade at the mall would never be the same again after he and Skids were done with it. They had already been to the movies six times since they found themselves in their current state and discovered that Pizza Hut's lunch buffet was a little slice of heaven on a plate.

Bumblebee was proving to be a fountain of information; he knew much more about human rituals and culture than they could ever expect to. Mudflap was certain that all the things the scout knew far surpassed his memory's capacity and he therefore pestered Bumblebee at every chance he got.

Unfortunately, Bumblebee's patience only extended so far.

No one else really had the time to do the stuff he enjoyed with him, either. Mudflap was hyper; always moving. He couldn't stay focused on anything important for very long and he more often than not forgot the whole reason he wanted to do something to begin with. Almost any activity or project he began was abandoned halfway through. And so his erratic behavior, poor impulse control and big mouth left him a most undesirable companion.

Worse yet, even Skids seemed to be too busy for him most of the time! The twins, once inseparable, were growing apart.

Something had changed between them after the battle in Egypt; something he didn't quite understand. Maybe Skids understood it…Mudflap didn't know. But his brother did always claim to be smarter, so it was possible.

In any case, nothing was the same and Mudflap found himself alone and bored as every one went about their duties and Skids went off somewhere with fraggin' Leo.

And a bored Mudflap…was a dangerous thing.

…Or…He should have been, at least.

He seemed depressed instead.

He spent a lot of time in the space designated the "family room," balled up on the couch with a hand-held gaming device of some sort -the PSP was his favorite- or upside down, feet in the air as he watched something violent or lewd on the television. Any one else who entered the room ran the risk of stepping on candy wrappers or comic books or dead batteries; he was an untidy individual. And it seemed there was a direct correlation between the size of his mess and his state of boredom.

Hoist found it sad; he hated seeing Mudflap moping around the place. But he wasn't quite sure what to do about it, either. He was simply too busy to spend unlimited amounts of time with the youngster and he knew most of the others -even if they could stand to be in his presence for more than five minutes- would likely have the same reasoning for not being able to do things with him.

Really, he needed friends.

But Hoist wasn't sure how to find him any.

That had been part of the point of the failed attempt to send them to school. Both of the twins were constantly underfoot because they didn't have many responsibilities now that they were human. And Skids went off with Leo to cause trouble quite often, leaving his brother behind and lonely. Hoist knew social skills were not their strong point; they were too rough around the edges to easily invite friendship. But they were young and still developing and they needed more social interaction with their peers.

School would have been an ideal place for that interaction to occur, but it had been a disaster and there was no way in the Pit he was sending them back.

It was bad. Mudflap was getting on every one's last nerves. Even easy-going Jolt had come to Hoist to complain, grumbling something about the small twin interrupting his downtime by creeping into the rec room armed with a Nerf N Strike Vulcan EBF-25 Blaster and a seemingly unlimited supply of small foamy projectiles for said gun.

This complaint had been confirmed to be true when Sideswipe marched through the door of Hoist's office about five minutes after Jolt, jostling a squirming Mudflap along beside him. Sideswipe had a hold on the youngster's neck so tight that he probably could have snapped it if he squeezed, and Mudflap was flailing, still stupidly trying to escape.

"I didn't do nothin'!" The words were out of Mudflap's mouth before Hoist even had a chance to question what was going on. "Thidethwipe hath no thenthe of fun, man!" At Sideswipe's dark look, he wisely stopped struggling, going limp in the older man's grasp. "'Thideth, I didn't know what they wath doing! They thoulda been doin' that in their private quarterth." He muttered sullenly.

Hoist reeeally didn't want to know.

But he had to ask, anyway.

"What happened?" Again, he fought the urge to bury his face in his hands. That desire was becoming a normal one; either or both of the twins left him feeling that exasperated at least once a day.

"I'm sure Jolt already told you." Sideswipe grumbled, the murderous glint never leaving his eyes, "You deal with him. He's your responsibility." And with that, he shoved the young Autobot towards Hoist, turned on his heal and stormed out of the room.

Hoist took the split second in which Sideswipe departed to puzzle out the entire situation. Obviously, Mudflap had started shooting the soldiers unprovoked. That was bad enough on its own. But given the fact he had attacked them while they were together, it was likely that he had interrupted something rather intimate…

Slag. Not only would he have to come up with a suitable punishment for Mudflap, he'd also have to steam clean that couch. Again.

"Hoitht-" Mudflap began, his remorseful expression crossing his face, baby blue eyes going big and wide.

"Mudflap…" The medic sighed, dragging a weary hand across his face, "You can't keep doing things like this. You're driving every one out of their processors. And until I figure out what to do about it, you're confined to your quarters."

"But Hoitht!"

"No 'buts'! Go!"

The boy looked up at him for a moment, a hint of betrayal flashing across his face.

Then he went.

-

"I don't know what to do about Mudflap."

Grapple was used to Hoist visiting him in his workroom. Mostly, the medic came to make sure he was still alive -he had a habit of forgetting to do things like fuel and sleep when he was busy- but he occasionally came for other reasons, such as asking his partner to go out to lunch with him, or just to chat about what he was working on and how his day was going.

He wasn't used to Hoist looking so mopey. And it was somewhat odd that he found himself with Hoist draped over his back and sort of clingy.

He'd been bent over his worktable, sketching an intricate design for a human-sized desk for Prime -a fabulous one that would easily house a computer monitor or two- when the medic had appeared, leaning against him and looking woeful.

"…What did he do now?" Grapple asked distractedly, moving his t-square and running his pencil along the edge of it to make another precise line. Complaints about Mudflap's behavior were nothing new; Hoist had been handling the insanity he wrought since long before they'd found themselves human.

"He walked in on Sideswipe and Jolt doing…something in the rec room," Hoist rested his chin on the architect's shoulder and glanced down at his blueprints, sighing, "and rather than just leave them alone…He launched an assault with a toy firearm."

There was silence for a moment.

Then Grapple began to laugh, shoulders shaking. He could picture it, punky Jolt and quiet, brooding Sideswipe entwined together on the couch -and knowing Jolt, there'd be some kind of new age music involved- suddenly finding themselves victim to a shower of little foam darts that were in no way discriminating about what surfaces they stuck to. It served them right; they'd already been talked to several times about fraternizing in common areas.

Hoist thumped a fist against his back, trying not to fall prey to the contagious laughter. "It isn't funny! We're lucky Sideswipe didn't offline Mudflap! He was positively livid; you should have seen his face." He stepped back, frowning at his still-snickering partner, "This is a serious problem, Grapple. Especially now that Skids is disappearing to do his own thing so often…Mudflap has nothing to do, so he's wreaking havoc on the entirety of the base."

"So we find him something to do so he won't be bored." Grapple shrugged, taking up his pencil again and making another mark on the diagram laid before him.

Another weary sigh escaped the medic. It was easy enough to say things like that; it didn't mean it was as simple to do them. "Nobody trusts him enough to do anything important around here and you know it, Grapple. He's not really the kind to follow through on 'boring' work orders."

There was another pregnant pause as Grapple finally -finally!- set aside the t-square and pencil and fully turned to look at Hoist. "So we send him off-base to do something. Enroll him in some kind of Earth child's extracurricular activity to keep him busy. Something he'd enjoy, rather than consider work, so he would want to go."

Hoist's mouth fell open and he simply looked at his other half in wonder for a moment or so. That idea was sheer genius! Why hadn't he thought of it himself? "That is a capital idea, Grapple!" He smiled, genuinely pleased with the suggestion, "But what do you suppose he'd like to do? I'd rather not encourage anything violent; he already spends enough time fighting with his brother. I'd rather he channel his excess energy into a creative outlet…"

Grapple just looked at the other man while he spoke, giving him time to think out loud. He liked to watch Hoist; the medic's face was incredibly expressive. His eyes were a pale shade -cornflower- that showed emotion easily. He was a patient, forgiving man and everything about his face showed it.

"Well, he steals my Sharpies quite often," -A pause- "to scribble on the walls." Grapple frowned a little, pondering the situation, "So perhaps some sort of drawing course? He seems interested in it, at least and if he learns how to use my materials properly, perhaps he won't feel the need to destroy them by drawing with them on things they're not meant to draw on." Though thinking about the theft of his valuable supplies made him a bit cross, he couldn't help being secretly pleased that Mudflap was showing an interest in his profession, even if he was only grasping at straws in thinking so.

"Another good idea." Hoist's face lit with a smile, "Though he's not a very good artist, is he? I've seen his scribbles on the wall and it seems that, in addition to his other myriad problems, he has poor hand-eye coordination. So maybe just a general arts class would be more fitting for his skill level." He gave Grapple's head a fond pat, fingers lingering in his tousled sandy hair. "Thank you for your input. I'll start looking for something suitable."

And that was how Mudflap found himself enrolled in a creative arts course for middle school aged children.

-

The first day was a little rough.

The only thing Mudflap could think as Hoist ushered him into the spacious, airy room at the library that served as the art studio was "being human sucks."

He hadn't forgotten how terrible school had been and he wasn't expecting this to be much better. The other kids were the same age as his former classmates, after all, and they looked like they'd be just as big jerks. They were all milling around, sitting on tables and chatting, chomping on bubblegum, texting and listening to music.

A youngish looking man with a tangled ponytail and leather sandals wandered over to the door to meet them, smiling pleasantly and extending his hand to Hoist, who shook it. "Hi." He said cheerfully, "I'm Andrew; I run the class." He smiled down at the child half-hidden behind the man, "Given that I know all the other students already, you must be Mudflap." He had been fully apprised of the situation; he and Hoist had had a lengthy phone conversation prior to Mudflap's enrollment in the class. He knew that this child had once been an alien robot, that he had many and varying issues regarding academics and that he desperately sought praise. He'd been instructed to treat him like any other child and to forget the part about his having been a robot.

Way easier said that done.

Hoist nudged Mudflap forward. Andrew looked him over discreetly. He'd heard of the Autobots, of course. Who hadn't? And most of the world also knew of their mysterious change from giant robots from space to fairly attractive humans. But still, he hadn't been quite sure what to expect.

Whatever it was, it certainly wasn't the child staring up at him. Mudflap was small, with a kind of dopey looking face. He had big, pale blue eyes and a turned-up nose. His mouth almost seemed too wide for his face and his ears stuck out from beneath the ski cap he had pulled low over his forehead. His hoodie was at least a size too big and his jeans showed off just how skinny and scrawny he really was underneath the baggy sweatshirt.

He was not at all what the art teacher had imagined an elite warrior from another planet would look like.

"Yeah." The kid mumbled, stuffing his hands in his pocket, "'m Mudfwap."

Andrew smiled again, trying to ease some of the tension radiating from the robot-turned-human. Clearly, Mudflap did not want to be there. "Well, you're just on time, so come on in. We're about to get started with today's lesson."

He looked up at Hoist uncertainly and the medic smiled encouragingly and patted his shoulder. "I'll come back to get you later." Hoist informed him, "Have a good time."

Mudflap glanced around, then gave Hoist a quick hug, mumbling something that might have been a "see you later." The older man seemed to take that as a sign that it was okay to leave and he smiled again, waving on his way out the door.

If Bumblebee had been there, Mudflap thought as he glanced around the room again, and had still been in his original form, he would have rolled a clip of "Welcome to the Jungle" at that exact moment.

"All right, people." Andrew clapped his hands twice and students scrabbled to find seats at all the tables around the room. "Today we're going to talk about charcoal pencils. Can any one tell me…"

Mudflap plunked himself in the only available chair and found himself seated next to a young girl with a riot of curly hair pushed back by a headband. She had a pencil tucked behind her ear and the sleeves of her billowy, paisley print shirt had been pushed up. He watched her for a moment as she glanced between the teacher and the paper on the table before her; occasionally she made an experimental stroke on her paper with what must have been a charcoal pencil.

"Who are you?" The girl -who's name was Beverly- turned to him when Andrew stopped speaking, gaze critical. The class had begun for the semester a month or so ago and every one already knew every one else from sports and school and other extracurricular activities. It was really weird that some outsider was showing up out of nowhere.

Mudflap looked at her suspiciously, absently scratching a pencil across his paper in a sweeping motion. "People call me Mudfwap." He answered cautiously, uncertain what she would say next. Human children made him nervous; he knew he wasn't supposed to talk the way he usually did around them. And besides, the ones at the school had been mean. "'Cauthe I like gettin' methy." He added, suddenly remembering that humans didn't have names that described them like Cybertronians did.

Beverly turned back to her own drawing, adding a scraggly tree to the meadow scene she'd begun sketching earlier. "How come you talk like that?" She asked almost absently, brow furrowing in concentration as she painstakingly added leaves to the branches.

At that question, he felt his spark sink. Queries about his language issues usually lead to teasing. "I got a thpeach dithorder." The lines on his paper were taking shape of their own accord; turning into some kind of tall, pointy tower, "It come from a thothal anthiety problem I got. When I get nervouth, I can't talk right."

"Oh." She shrugged, hair bouncing, and looked back at her drawing, "I'm Beverly, by the way. You should probably know that, if we're going to be sharing a table for the rest of the class."

A tentative smile crossed his face. "Beberly. It ain't got an eth in it…I like that." And even without an "S," he still said it wrong. Mudflap was never quite sure how to act around others. He knew he couldn't insult and smack around other humans, and that was what he always did with Skids…

Beverly returned the smiled and picked up a paper stump, then set about adding some shading to her picture. A couple of the other students wandered over to the table eventually; apparently the girl was one of the better artists in the class. They were also curious about the newcomer and, seeing as how they were children, acted accordingly.

"Who're you?"

"Why'd you come in the middle of the class?"

"What's yer name?"

"How old are you?"

"What school do you go to?"

Suddenly, they were all asking questions at once, crowding around his chair. Mudflap sank into his seat a little, shrinking in on himself until Beverly snapped at them to "get outta the way and let him talk!"

They backed off a little and Mudflap sat back up in his chair. He hadn't expected to be so popular! It hadn't been like this at the school. "I'm Mudfwap." He said, looking from one expectant face to another, "I wathn't here b'fore 'cauthe we didn't know 'bout thith clath b'fore. An' I don't go to thcool 'cauthe-"

"You talk like an idiot!" One of the girls cut him off, a malicious smirk crossing her face. She looked slightly older than most of the others -she was actually the oldest student in the class and, therefore, the queen bee- and the smirk soon shifted to a full-blown grin, "Bet you don't go to school because you're too stupid."

A spattering of laughter followed this and Mudflap's eyes went wide. It was like school all over again! Abruptly, he pushed back his chair, fighting the urge to punch that slaggin' bitch in the face; how dare she! That whiny little female had no idea how hard he worked to overcome his problems, how much he struggled with language and how terrible it felt to have some one judge you for something you couldn't help.

He wanted to punch her in her pretty little face. He wanted to hit her so bad.

Instead, he shoved through the throng of kids -some laughing, some looking bewildered- and ran from the room, Beverly simultaneously yelling for him to come back and threatening the bully.

Hoist found him later, after no one else could, hiding in a broom closet. Closets had always been Mudflap's favorite place to hide when he was in trouble, for as long as Hoist had known him. He liked to fit himself into small, dark places; he seemed to think it would make him invisible.

"Come on." The medic said, voice kind. He offered a hand to the crouched figure among the buckets and brooms and Mudflap took it, dragging himself up off the floor and out into the dim light of the hall. He'd clearly been crying, but Hoist said nothing about it, and simply put an arm around his shoulders.

Mudflap sank into his side gratefully and glanced up at him. "Why don't no one like me, Hoitht?" He asked morosely, "I didn't do nothin' wrong an' thome jerk-fathe girl wath thill makin' fun a me. It ain't fair…"

"I don't know." Came the quiet response. Hoist found himself wishing, not for the first time, that Mudflap's life could be different. Underneath all of the mayhem and crude language, the youngster was really quite vulnerable and insecure. He was also incredibly friendly and desperate for affection, but didn't always know how to go about getting it. He had a lot of problems, due to the unfortunate fact that he had been created in the slums -the less income a family unit had, the more likely it was that they would suffer from irreparable malfunctions- and none of them were his fault. "But I do know that I'm proud of you for not getting into trouble over it."

"It wathn't tho bad in th' beginning." Mudflap informed him as they headed out the door, "Teacher gave uth really methy pencilth an' we got to do whatevah we wanted wit' 'em. The girl thittin' by me, Beberly…The wath nithe. Maybe I'll hafta go back next week, jutht ta thow that othah girl I ain't thupid."

"That would be awfully mature of you." Hoist smiled, tightening the arm around his companion's shoulder, "And besides, Grapple would really like it if you learn some proper art techniques before you borrow his materials again." He teased lightly, glad to see the mood lifting somewhat as a sheepish grin crossed Mudflap's face.

"I'll do m' betht!" Mudflap declared, suddenly looking a lot more animated than he had in a long time. He liked pleasing Hoist and he liked the fact that sometimes Grapple let him hang out in his workroom, if he was good. And he knew both of them would be proud if he stuck with this art class thing, all the way to the end. No one thought he could finish anything he started, but he was a tenacious little bugger and he would do this -no matter how hard it was!- to prove them all wrong.

Hoist rewarded the proclamation with a smile. "I know you will." He didn't doubt that in the least.