Before long, Bumblebee found that whatever had been attached under his hood didn't really seem to be hurting him; that is, aside from the profound feeling of violation and lack of ability to control himself. He felt normal, had all the power he usually did... only now he couldn't use it. That device, whatever it was, acted as a leash, holding him until he was released by the driver behind the steering wheel.

He didn't try to fight back with resistance.

One lesson was all it took to get the point across to him that he didn't want that button on the dash pressed. It wasn't worth it. He'd have his chance to get free, but the time wasn't now, the place wasn't here. Patience wasn't exactly his strong suit, but he'd been forced to use it before.

It was long past dark before Bumblebee found himself being directed out of the train station and out onto the open road, the man who'd addressed him earlier still behind the wheel. Once Bee had been removed from the rail-car and put on the ground, the man behind the wheel had put him through his paces like a reining horse. With a turn of the wheel, the device inside him sent a signal that he was released to turn right or left, but he had to initiate that action for himself after getting the request to do so. It turned out that Bumblebee was astonishingly bad at taking directions, but his driver was patient with him, evidently as reluctant to push the button on the dash as Bee was to have that done.

Hours of turns, starts, stops, accelerations and U-turns later, they were out on the road, beyond sight of the other men who'd been hanging around and watching. Evidently, their part in this was through.

"You're going to have to respond faster in future than you did today," the driver said, "You know the steering wheel in here must be directly responsible for the turning of your front wheels out there, right? A slow response will never do, especially not with my kids. You see, they won't know where I got you."

Bumblebee's speed faltered for a beat before he leveled out. Today had been very alarming and deeply confusing, but this statement somehow was the one that took the cake for him. He had assumed that the Decepticon activity had been a deception to lure him in, and that he'd been caught by MECH, for use in one of their experiments. It had become clear over the course of the day that wasn't the case, that he was to be given to this man's children for some reason. But still he'd assumed they were intent on getting their hands on a Cybertronian. What would they want with him if they thought he was just a regular -if rather expensive- car?

"My kids have a tendency to be reckless," the driver said, "And I want the best for them. I happen to know that transformers are made of much sterner stuff than any Earth vehicle. You're faster, more maneuverable and much tougher than any vehicle on the market. Whatever my kids get into, I believe they'll be far safer in a transformer than any ordinary car."

Bee suddenly missed the time early this morning when everything had made sense to him.

"I do work for MECH, if that's what you're wondering. Getting you was basically a holiday bonus."

Some bonus. Bumblebee didn't say anything.

"I knew from the moment I first saw you that you were the answer to my problems."

Did he even hear himself? This was the craziest, shakiest, most broken line of reasoning Bee had ever heard, and he'd heard some real doozies. He felt like there was some piece of information he wasn't being given, something he hadn't been told yet.

"Besides," the man said after a momentary pause, "who wouldn't want one of your kind sitting in his garage? I mean, how incredible are you, right?"

There it was.

"Best part is, you're the one that never talks. Oh, don't be surprised. MECH knows a lot about your kind, and you especially. What? You thought the only thing we did when we had you was take your T-Cog? We had the time, of course we took a good look at you."

Bumblebee shuddered so that his engine hiccuped and almost stalled before he got himself under control again. It didn't matter that he hadn't been pained, or even aware of what was happening to him. He still felt assaulted in a way that was intensely personal, his self had been invaded in a way he couldn't entirely describe. It wasn't like someone sitting in the driver's seat or a passenger seat. That was normal for him, and he was able to cope with it even if it was a stranger or someone he didn't want to be there. But that someone had opened him up and taken a piece of him... of what made him what he was... he'd never be sure whether he despised MECH or Megatron more. After all, though the latter had tortured him and actually literally gotten inside his head, the first was just a product of war and the other was because Megatron hadn't had another option if he wanted to obtain consciousness again. What MECH had done... that was different. Knowing that they'd also poked at his mangled voice box while they were at it only made him feel more violated. Somehow the casual way this man talked about it only made it worse. He talked as if Bumblebee were no more alive than the train which had brought him here, like taking his T-Cog hadn't been any more wrong than taking a tire off an Earth car.

Yet some part of him had to know Bumblebee was a thinking, feeling creature. Otherwise, bridling his power wouldn't seem necessary, nor would he now be attempting to explain his reasons for what he'd done. Unfortunately, because of his speech impediment, Bee couldn't try to reach the part of this man that knew what he was doing was wrong. Bumblebee was a thing alive, with free will. But if the man knew, he didn't believe, otherwise he would not be doing this to Bee.

Bumblebee was tired from the long day, and almost missed the signal to turn in to a driveway. Lit in the headlights, it looked for a moment as though he was being asked to drive into a pit of pure darkness. Then he turned, and realized the concrete driveway -wide enough for two cars his size to drive next to each other- went steeply downward. He went downhill, rolling all the way to a large square of concrete in front of a garage. It wasn't quite level, ensuring that any rain would run off to the right of the garage, but it was functionally flat. The man pulled out a key ring and pushed a button that made one of the garage doors slide up to reveal the large interior. Bee's headlights illuminated the clean concrete flooring and walls, along with two other vehicles and the space for a potential third and fourth.

He was turned around and backed into the garage, a huge black SUV on his right and a sleek silver sports car on his left. On the other side of the SUV was space for another vehicle, and there might have been one hidden behind it for all Bee knew.

Bumblebee choked a little when the man put him in park and then cut the engine and pulled out the key which worked in tandem with the device he'd attached to Bee. From the outside, it looked just the same as turning on any ordinary car. Under the surface, a much more complex operation took place. The key slid into the ignition and a computer inside of it communicated with the computer in the other device and sent the signal to turn over the engine when the key was turned.

"It's late," the man said as he shut the door, "the kids are asleep. You'll meet them in the morning."

He then stepped back, pressed the garage door button again and stood there until it rattled shut. Bee heard him walk across the concrete area to the first of several staircases that led up to the mansion on the hill, which Bumblebee had barely glimpsed as he was driving in.

Once the sound of footsteps was gone, Bumblebee knew he was well and truly alone. It was dark, and there was nothing he could do, so he decided to try to rest, hopefully take a stasis nap to pass the time. He knew that at some point he would have to figure out how to break free, but he was tired now, and he'd already spent much of the day trying to think how to escape and he'd gotten nowhere.

Bumblebee knew that driving himself crazy trying to think of a way out when there clearly wasn't one right now wouldn't do him any good. This wasn't the first time he'd had to sleep in what he considered to be hostile territory. He had the uneasy feeling that it also wouldn't be the last.

At least he now knew what he was to this man. Like the vehicles on either side of him and the big mansion on the hill, Bumblebee was a trophy, his worth measured by the difficulty and expense inherent in acquiring him. He was just a thing to this man. An extremely valuable thing, but just that and nothing more. His worth to this man could be measured in dollars. He didn't know what good that information might be, but he decided that it was better than the not knowing. And, he supposed, it was better than any of the other times he'd been caught and imprisoned. The objective wasn't to take anything from him. Anything, that is, except for his freedom, which he was understandably rather fond of. Still, the loss of freedom was an inherent part of being a prisoner. If that was the worst of it, Bumblebee could think of times when he'd been in much worse situations.

That didn't mean he liked it, or that he found it easy to relax in the enemy's camp.

There had been no traffic cameras in the area Bumblebee had been driving when he was captured, so there was no visual record of what had happened to him. That wasn't surprising, as every enemy of the Autobots was just as eager to remain secret as they themselves were. Still, it was disappointing that the last sighting of Bee was that of a street light cam about thirty miles from where he would have been when he missed the check in, assuming he'd ever gotten that far. The wind-driven snow had done a good job at covering his tracks, making it hard to tell exactly how far he'd gotten before whatever happened to him... happened.

Raf had quickly linked in to the nearest cameras in all directions and spent hours rolling them back up to the time stamp on the camera which had last picked him up. He could only guess at when Bee had been caught, and he might not have been transported for some time after that. It took awhile to go through all of that. Once he had, Raf knew Bumblebee hadn't driven out on any road that had a traffic cam, nor had he been towed. That only cut down the possibilities. Bumblebee wasn't exactly confined to the roads, nor were any of the Decepticons.

Something about this didn't seem like the 'Cons. What would they need with an Autobot prisoner now? If it was for information, they had to know that it was a waste of time to capture Bumblebee, who had already resisted whatever torture Megatron could dish out. Even if they used the cortical psychic patch, what could Bumblebee possibly know that was worth the risk of taking him prisoner? Autobots were well known for their willingness to go to almost any length to save one of their own. They would be relentless and also ruthless in their search. They were not above killing Decepticons, especially not when they were hunting for one of their missing. It was a huge risk to take an Autobot prisoner; militarily it was unwise as the danger far outweighed the potential for reward, assuming they could keep their hands on Bee long enough to get what they wanted out of him.

When Raf mentioned it, Ratchet seemed to agree with him, but was unwilling to speak of the only other possible explanation. But Raf could see the unspoken fear in the Autobot medic's eyes. MECH, who had as much regard for Cybertronian life as Decepticons had for humans. Decepticons in human skin.

If they had Bumblebee, things were worse than Raf had feared.