The first thing Chromia heard as she began to regain consciousness was a whisper of anxious voices. Her optics remained shut so as to not alert them to the fact that she was awake, and she listened carefully to their tones, inferring that they were mechs.
Her first thought was, naturally, that the Decepticons that had been tailing them had finally caught up. She remained still for only a moment longer before erupting into action, lashing out at the nearest blur she saw when she opened her optics.
"Agggh! Primus ya damn femme, we're on your bloody side!" An angry silver mech yelled, glaring at her with fierce blue optics as he rubbed the bleeding scrape she had just gouged down his faceplates with her digits. Blue, she realized, his optics are blue.
"Sorry." She relaxed a little, "Defense mechanism.". She glanced at the other two mechs, one red and white and the other blue and red, before remembering her teammates.
"Primus!" She gasped, struggling to her peds and sprinting to the other femmes' stasis pods. She hit the disengage button and tapped her ped impatiently as the ice slowly melted.
"Who are they?" The silver mech said rudely and then shook his helm, "Nevermind, who are you?"
"What my colleague means," The red and blue mech said hastily, "Is that we would like to hear your stories after you've been treated by our medic, First Aid." He gestured to the red and white mech, who nodded.
Chromia narrowed her optics at him, "Your voice sounds familiar….are you Optimus Prime? We heard your message."
"I am." He nodded to the silver mech, "This is my weapons specialist, Ironhide."
Chromia smirked, "An ironic name, considering it only takes one scratch to pierce your hide." He scowled at her, but she ignored him as Firestar and Strongarm slowly began to wake up.
"Easy femmes." She murmured, helping the two shivering bots out of their stasis pods, relieved. She was worried they might have been injured, but they both seemed fine.
Meanwhile, Optimus Prime and Ironhide seemed to have gotten into an argument and were debating under their breaths.
"We could always use more soldiers, Ironhide." Optimus said quietly
"Not more femmes, Prime." Ironhide groaned softly, "Look at 'em. They couldn't hold out on a battlefield."
"Excuse me!" Chromia interrupted angrily, "We may be femmes, but I could mop the floor with your aft any day of the week, Hotshot!"
Ironhide smirked, "I doubt it."
"Try me." Chromia growled
"Chromia, what are you doing?" Firestar was panicking, "We've barely been here five minutes and you've already picked a fight with someone?!"
Chromia waved her off, "I can take him."
Ironhide glanced at Optimus, "Permission to take her down a few pegs?"
Optimus nodded, "I would like to see how well she fights."
Ironhide sank into a defensive position and grinned, "Come at me, femme."
She rushed at him head on, but at the last minute ducked under his outstretched fist, spun around to be behind him, and slammed her elbow into his back. As he tried to turn and grab her, she knocked his legs out from him with a low, sweeping kick.
As he lay on the ground, struggling to regain his breath (and his pride), Chromia pinned his shoulders to the ground. "Getting a little sloppy, Mr. Weapons Specialist?" She grinned tauntingly as Optimus covered his mouth with his servo and tried not to laugh.
"I-you-" He sputtered, his faceplates growing a rageful and embarrassed blue, "You cheated!"
"Whatever you got to tell yourself to help you recharge at night." She smirked, getting off of him.
He stormed away from her angrily, snapping at Optimus, "What are you laughing at Prime?!"
"Nothing." Optimus coughed, hiding a grin
The silver mech transformed into a GMC Topkick and raced away, purposefully spitting large clouds of dust at Chromia with his back tires.
"Don't worry about him." Optimus chuckled, "He's just angry because you've wounded his pride. Chromia is it?"
Chomia nodded and gestured to her crew, "This is Firestar and Strongarm."
"It's nice to meet you." Optimus inclined his helm, "Chromia, I would like to offer you a place on my team. If your friends fight even half as well as you do, they are welcome as well."
"We would be honored, Optimus Prime." Chromia sighed
"I will need to perform medical scans on the three of you." First Aid said, "When we get back to base, could you follow me to the Medbay?"
The three femmes nodded and transformed into their alt modes, a blue Suzuki B-King, a red Mazda BT-50 pickup truck, and a blue and white Dodge Charger police car, and followed First Aid's ambulance back to the Autobot base, leaving the wreckage of their ship behind.
Once First Aid finished his medical scans and started work on medical files for each of them, he sent them along to a white and red tactician bot named Prowl.
He was in the middle of explaining where all of their new quarters were when a group of mechs walked by and sniggered, "Look, the gay's scaring the newbies."
Prowl's faceplates flushed an angry blue as Chromia started to say to them angrily, "Who in Pit do you think you-"
Firestar clapped a servo over her mouth until the mechs had passed, "Already had one fight today, Captain, I don't think we could handle more."
"What a bunch of stupid, pretentious aftholes." Chromia muttered angrily, and Prowl blinked, surprised, before grinning
"I was just thinking the same thing."
"So, you're um-so yeah?" Chromia tried to ask and Firestar and Strongarm burst out laughing.
"Sorry, she's not the best conversationalist." Firestar cracked up
Prowl smiled, "It's fine. I am gay if that's what you were so poorly attempting to ask. My, um, partner should be around here somewhere."
"Oh cool." Chromia nodded, "How long have you guys been together?"
Prowl stared at her, bemused, "You know, I think that's the most normal reaction I've ever gotten to telling someone about Jazz. I knew I liked you." His faceplates flushed happily, 'It's been just over two years now since we were official."
"Wow, that's a long time." Strongarm said excitedly, "Are you guys going to bond?"
Prowl shrugged, "I dunno. He wants to but...I'm just not sure now is a good time, with the war and all. Well " He clapped his servos together, "That's enough about my personal life. You three should go get some recharge; knowing Optimus he'll want to talk to you first thing tomorrow."
The femmes said goodbye to Prowl, who had buried his faceplates in a datapad by the time they turned around, and headed to where he had directed. They were pleased to find they all had quarters next to each other, with Chromia's in the middle and Firestar and Strongarm on either side of her.
Strongarm, the youngest, was the first to fall into recharge, with Firestar following soon after. Chromia lay awake, listening to the silence coming from the two femme's room, punctuated by the occasional snore from Strongarm, and contemplated the tumultuous events of the day. Attacked by Decepticons, forced to go into stasis, took down a stuck up Autobot, got invited onto the Autobot team, made a gay friend...it had been quite a day.
Chromia briefly wondered if anybot on the team would like her. What Firestar had said was true; she did pick too many fights, and as a result most bots were driven off by her brash attitude. But she couldn't help it; she was a riley femme, always itching to fight.
Chromia shook her helm and turned over to go into recharge, resolving that if anybot didn't like her, they could go frag themselves. She had her femmes, and that was always enough.