Title: Meet the Sparklings
Author: Lurkerlynne
Characters: Various original characters plus Blaster and Starscream
Rating: G
Summary: Introducing all of the Autobot kids.
Disclaimer: Still not mine. Except for Optronix, which means I have Starscream. Woo-hoo!
Notes: rezuri beta'd but I still lay claim to any and all mistakes. Also, math is not one of my strong suits, so apologies of I get anything wrong.

Wildride let the noise of the younglings distract him from his homework and turned to watch them; they were all present that day, and the noise was providing a welcome interruption.

Landslide was chasing a giggling Flipside, roaring like his creator. Or trying to; he lacked the vocal processors to pull off the kind of volume and frequency level that Grimlock could. All of a sudden Overhaul, Flipside's twin, intercepted Landslide and they went rolling onto the sleeping mats. Flipside jumped in with a yell of his own and they gleefully wrestled.

With the exception of Landslide and Optronix, all of the younglings had been sparked on Seibertron, and though most of them were fortunate to have been reunited with their creators after they had been retrieved from stasis, the twins hadn't been so lucky. Their creators were among the unfortunate mechs who were permanently offlined by the crash to Earth, and so Flipside and Overhaul had been adopted by Red Alert and Inferno.

Wildride grinned as he watched them play. They were the only ones that could keep up with the mini-Dinobot, whose development had been accelerated to that of a 6-vorn old. Neither Swoop nor Grimlock were entirely prepared for the realities of taking care of a new spark and aging the sparkling had been the best solution.

The three sprang apart and started the chase all over again, this time Overhaul chasing Flipside. Steeljaw and Ramhorm watched them carefully, amusement in their optics as they waited to see if they needed to intervene.

On the other side of the room was Pathway with Eject, carefully constructing a representation of a tree out of a pile of tinkertoys. He was a fun little guy and full of weird facts about nature. Beachcomber had split his spark to make him, and was the only other mech, besides Blaster, that Wildride had ever heard of doing something like that.

Patchup and Shado were curled up together on a cushioned chair and reading a datapad, occasionally sounding a word out aloud and crowing when the 'pad confirmed the pronunciation. The two of them were nearly inseparable and had been since they'd been introduced; Patchup spent as much time at Hound and Mirage's quarters as Shado did at Ratchet and Wheeljack's.

Rewind was seated nearby, engrossed in his own datapad and glancing up at the two every once in a while.

Blaster, their caretaker, was in the rocking chair, holding Optronix. The sparkling was deep in recharge and didn't so much as twitch when Landslide and the twins shrieked in delight. Sparklings as young as Optronix needed to recharge a lot, since their energy reserves weren't that big and depleted quickly; Wildride didn't think the little guy had been all that physically active before coming here and so ran down even faster. He remembered Patchup being able to run her creators into the ground before needing to recharge when she was that age.

"Guys," Blaster called. "Time for school."

Landslide and the twins groaned theatrically but dutifully tramped over to collect datapads. Blaster carried Optronix over to where they gathered, accepting the datapad Flipside handed him. "Thank you."

Wildride sighed as the four of them settled in for lessons; no more distractions. Turning back to his own math, Wildride read the equations again. And it still didn't make sense! He scowled at his pad, poking harder with his stylus than was recommended.

"Something wrong?"

Wildride jumped at the voice just behind him. Whirling around, he saw Starscream standing behind him; Trailbreaker lurked behind the Seeker. "What are you doing here?"

"Refueling break," Starscream told him, leaning forward to look at the holodisplay of the equation. "I thought to visit with Optronix."

"He's recharging," Wildride said, fighting the urge to hide his datapad; Starscream was a scientist and could probably solve the slagging equation in a pumpbeat.

"So I see." Starscream frowned thoughtfully. "Quantum equations?"

"Yeah." Wildride scowled at the display. "It's due tomorrow."

Starscream pulled over a chair and sat down, tugging the datapad closer to get a better look. His optics flickered as he read through the problem and then paged through the entire assignment. "There's an easier way to solve these."

"It's the only way Perceptor taught me."

"Perceptor has difficulty understanding that others are not as proficient, scientifically, as he is and therefore teaches at his level."

Starscream called up the first equation and displayed it. Plucking the stylus from Wildride's fingers, the Seeker walked Wildride through a different way to solve. Soon, a graph bloomed on the display.

"You did it!"

"You can as well." Starscream handed the stylus back. "Next problem."

"Okay." Encouraged, Wildride started the next equation. He got stuck a short ways in and Starscream talked him through it; he wouldn't do the work or out-and-out say what Wildride was supposed to do but that was all right; Starscream explained, and he did it in a way that Wildride could understand.

He lost track of time as Starscream walked him through his assignment, teaching him how best to show his work and easier ways to solve some of the equations. Not the most elegant or fastest solutions but ones that didn't confuse him.

"Working on extra-credit?" Blaster asked, amusement coloring his voice. He was still carrying Optronix; behind him, the younglings were working at their datapads.

"Something like that." Wildride grinned. "This is finally making sense."

Blaster grinned back. "I know the feeling; one of the human scientists tried to teach me string theory a couple years ago and it finally started sinking in after the second week."

Turning to Starscream, Blaster continued. "Thought you'd want a little time with Optronix before you went back."

"Don't online him." Starscream rose to stand next to Blaster, stroking a gentle hand down Optronix's helm. "He still runs down quickly?"

"Yeah, but that's not unusual for a sparkling his age," Blaster reassured him. "It'll get better as his systems adjust to being more active; he'll be running the lot of us into the ground in no time."

"Hn." Starscream didn't sound all that reassured.

"Wanna hold him?"

"I must be going back shortly," Starscream told him, still watching Optronix.

"Actually," Trailbreaker broke in, "we shoulda headed back a couple of breems ago."

At Starscream's look, Trailbreaker informed him. "I radioed Prime and told him you were caught up with a few things here. He said to head back whenever you were finished."

"And you left him believing there was a problem with Optronix," Starscream said flatly.

"Nah. He's probably thinking you needed a longer break and were using Optronix as an excuse." Trailbreaker's visor lightened in a grin. "Although, if I told him you were explaining quantum equations, he'd tell you to wait until he could join in."

"They are not that difficult." Starscream scowled.

"For you maybe," Blaster broke in. "Us working-mechs aren't that lucky."

"You're a communications specialist!" Starscream scoffed.

"I'm a comm specialist with a fantastic cheat-sheet." Blaster tapped his helm. "Got a few programs that help me get by."

"Cheater." Starscream tsked. "Not a good example for the younglings. Cover your audios, Wildride."

"Oh, he can come up with his own cheats; I have no intention of sharing."

Wildride listened to the adults snark at each other, trying not to grin; Ironhide, his Da, had a lot to say about Starscream and none of it was nice. He was glad to see that the Seeker wasn't anywhere near as bad as Ironhide had claimed. Starscream and Optronix were tight and having Optronix in the daycare meant that he'd be seeing a lot of Starscream. Chromia didn't like the Seeker any more than Ironhide did but wasn't as vocal about it; his mom was willing to be convinced Starscream was sincere in his defection.

Turning back to his assignment when the adults started walking to the door, Wildride thought that having Starscream stop by a lot wouldn't be such a bad thing if he could translate Perceptor's techno-babble into something easily understandable.

And as far as Wildride was concerned, that was better than any intel that Starscream gave Rodimus.