The Band's Called...

Disclaimer: Same as the last chapter.

Swerve's room was cozy now that there were so many people crammed into it. Skids was delighted by the fact.

Swerve had almost nothing in the space. It was cleaner than Swerve himself would ever make it himself, so he suspected Ultra Magnus had something to do with it. It made for easy cramming into. Tailgate, Skids, Cyclonus, and Skid's guitar fit easily on the two beds while Swerve stood on a chair and set up the projector screen. He'd brought them snacks and drinks, leftovers from the bar, still a little warm from the transporting and lighting the room like fairy lights scattered on every horizontal surface. Tailgate hiccuped. Cyclonus patted his back. Skids plucked at his guitar. He could get used to this.

The project lit up from behind, backlighting Swerve in the dark. "All right! We're getting the band together!"

"So soon?" Tailgate chirped. "Did we vote on this?"

"No need to vote! It's fate! I can feel it in my spark!" Swerve gesticulated hard enough to nearly throw himself off his chair. "We have strings! We have drums! We have... uh... Cyclonus."

Cyclonus huffed. "I'm not participating."

"Frankly, I wasn't gonna ask you to. But whatever! That's not important!"

Tailgate huffed. "Hey..."

Swerve's smile twitched. "Because every band needs fans, and Tailgate, nobody's a bigger fan of you than Cyclonus!"

Crisis averted. Skids laughed at the pair of them blushing hard enough to warp their EM fields, Tailgate's matched with an elated squeal and Cyclonus averting his gaze. Swerve pumped his fist in victory. Swerve flipped through a slide or two of blank white before landing on a still screen of something in English. "All right, if we're gonna do this, we'll do it by the book! We're following the Behind the Music formula!"

"I thought that was the Weird Al formula," Skids asked.

"No! If anything, Weird Al is the exception to the formula. NO, we're on it solid right now!" Swerve clicked to the next screen, and this time, Skids tried to actually pay attention and read it. There was no need. Swerve had a pointer stick and outlined it bit by bit. "We're on Step 1; the meeting of the two original band members who eventually have a big fight and break the band up-"

Tailgate squealed again, this time in horror, and Skids stepped in. "Woah, okay, Swerve, let's not go down the bad route already. We're not even a band yet and you're already talking about us breaking up? You're going to scare Tailgate."

Tailgate whimpered. "He already did!"

"Um... right! My bad." Swerve skipped to the next slide. "Now we gotta make a quick progression onto Step 2. Now, I've flowcharted it-"

Cyclonus's hand met his head so hard it echoed.

"-and normally there's at least one band member who's so deep in emotional turmoil that they cause a rift and break up the band!"

Tailgate squealed yet again. Skids leaned forward. This was getting ridiculous. "Swerve!"

"But we don't have that guy!" Swerve kept on and louder, talking over Skids. "Usually it's one of the startup members, but Tailgate's such a sweetie he wouldn't hurt a scraplet and Skids is practically a superhero. So we don't have that problem!"

Skids sat back down, weirdly humbled and flattered. Tailgate's beaming smile must have meant the same thing. "Okay good."

"Which means we're missing a band member."

The feeling was gone. "Swerve!"

Cyclonus growled. "This is pointless."

"I just need you guys to help me brainstorm, is all! In the verb sense, not the actual bot sense." The next slide clicked into place, and Swerve went down the list line by line. "We need to find someone with emotional issues, a need for purpose in their life, undiscovered musical talent, and a lot of free time!"

"All right, this has gone far enough." Skids leveled with Swerve as gently as he could. "I know you're in love with this idea, but we can't just slot real people into these weird stereotypes you've gleaned from watching too much Earth media. If we're going to actually play in a band and do music together, we should enjoy the people we have, not look for people that we think we should have."

"But the formula!" Swerve argued. "That's Behind the Music down to the episode summary!"

"We're not Behind the Music!"

"I mean I am," Tailgate added. "I can get behind any idea as long as it's not too cruel."

"Tailgate that's not- nevermind. Can we just do this without a flowchart?" Skids suggested. "Something a little more organic?"

"But we're-"

"I know we're not literally organic, Swerve. Now you're just being glib."

Swerve smirked. "You got me."

Hopefully this would just be one ridiculous night out of a quiet, boring year. It had to be. Skids' hydraulics pressure was going up and down with the stress of this conversation already. He felt safe enough to settle back onto his bed- this might have been Swerve's bed he wasn't sure- but made sure to talk off his guitar for quick exits. Who knew what was coming up on that ridiculous flowchart?

"Oh!" Swerve snapped his fingers. "That wouldn't have worked anyway. I forgot, the guy has to have a substance abuse problem too, and I don't know anyone wi-"

He locked into place.

Cyclonus sighed. "He has crashed his systems from sheer stupidity. We can escape now."

"Cyclonus that's mean!" Tailgate stood up on the bed. "He might still be able to hear us."

Swerve's unsure expression split into that wide, dangerous smile. "TRAILCUTTER!"

The pieces did not immediately click, but when they did, they clicked together loud and crashed onto the rest of the room like a megaton of Megatrons. Everyone jumped up at once, all spouting some version of "Swerve don't, not to Trailcutter, don't you dare-" before Swerve transformed and drove full speed out the door.

"Cyclonus, go right! Tailgate, with me and split off at the elevator!" Skids commanded. "Don't let him get to Trailcutter!"

The scrambled out in a flash, immediately pinging everyone they knew to point them at Trailcutter and to not tell Magnus, no questions, just do it. Skids HUD filled with bots responding that they hadn't seen Trailcutter, or if they had then where, and then everyone he hadn't pinged asking him why Cyclonus and Tailgate were asking where Trailcutter was. They searched for a few long minutes before their paths converged in a single hallway with Trailcutter at the end and Swerve right in front of him. They were too late! Swerve would crush his spark with talk like his! How could they-?

"-thinking of starting a band, and we need another member!" Swerve asked the dark mech. "Do you wanna join us?"

Trailcutter only gasped and dashed back into the door behind him. It must have been his room. Swerve wilted. "A 'no' would've been fine."

"What did you say to him?!" Skids barked.

Swerve jolted and whipped around to face them. "I didn't say anything to him! I just asked if he wanted to join the band! That's all I said!"

"Is that true?!" Flanked by Cyclonus and Tailgate, Skids felt big and important enough to really lay it on the mini. "No talk about how you need him to be the token emotionally unstable group member with a substance abuse problem?"

"N-no!" Swerve gulped. "If I had said that, then he would've refused right off the bat!"

"So it's okay to talk about him like that when he's not looking?"

Swerve crumpled. "You make it sound terrible when you put it like that..."

"Because it is!" Tailgate piped.

"Do you see why we're mad, Swerve?" Skids put his foot down hard. "We're not little paperdolls like your cartoon characters to slot into your little perfect fantasy band! You don't get to put us in categories based on what you want us to be for your own ends-" The parallels snapped into place in his head so hard he choked on his own words. "Do you know who you sound like right now?!"

"Oh jeeze..." Swerve swallowed hard. "I uh... I-I wasn't thinking about it that way, but now that you say it... I-I'm sorry."

Skids searched Swerve's face, scanned his EM field, and found him genuine. His anger abated breath by breath, and on either side of him he could feel Cyclonus and Tailgate cycling down.

"Let's go, Tailgate."

"I-I was really excited about being in a band, too," Tailgate cooed.

"I still want there to be a band!" Swerve yelped. "I-I'm really sorry! It'll be fun and amazing, I know it! I-I'll just let you guys decide! Throw out the whole flowchart and let it come together naturally! Please, please give me another shot!"

"I found it!"

Trailcutter stepped out of his room, grinning ear to ear and holding something almost taller than himself. "I-I had to make sure I still had it before I said yes! I-I was dumbstruck! A real band! I haven't played since before the war, but- but look!"

Setting the device against his shoulder, Trailcutter tapped against its long neck and caressed its strings. A stand-up bass, a standard but well-maintained electric one, soon found its tune and buzzed out a strong base line while Trailcutter found his fingers again.

"See?! S-so do I get the part?" Trailcutter smiled wide.

That couldn't have been... Trailcutter played bass. Did Swerve's stupid formula actually lead them to a bass player?

Why was everyone looking at him specifically? Skids cleared his throat. "W-well, Swerve's actually the one organizing most of this. I-I pass the reins to you. Swerve?"

Swerve's body language unfolded from hopefully terrified to blossoming out in joy. He really was taking this seriously, wasn't he? He was honest to Primus excited, and that energy was starting to echo out into the usually dour and quiet Trailcutter. He couldn't remember the last time he'd seen the truck sincerely smile, sober or overcharged.

"We're gonna be amazing!" Swerve. "Meet me at my room! I-In about five minutes. I... think I left the projector on."