Chapter Text
Yellow peddes stumbled backwards, blue optics locking onto red. The oil barrel slammed against the ground and rolled a few feet behind the canary bot.
Bumblebee activated his blaster, the blue light building up as he thrusted it upwards at the offending figure. His vents raged and his spark spun wildly as the activation of his blaster seemed to stretch on indefinitely, drowning out the creaking of his plating scraping tightly against itself, as if to protect the soft plating inside which still remained not fully cured even after all the time it had been since his premature upgrade.
“Wait!” The powering gun was shoved downwards, the suddenness of the action disengaging the weapon. “He is of no threat to you!”
Disbelief struck him as lightning to his processor, the enemy leader, Megatron, isn't a threat? He staggered back another few steps to assess the situation plainly.
Optimus, his Prime was turned fully away from the hulking grey warlord, while the threat himself was only slightly tensed, facing the scout himself instead of his greatest enemy. His colossal achromatic faceplate remained unreadably blank, as if his very presence was incomprehensible to the yellow bot.
Vaguely he recalls a time in the beginning of his isolation, near the end of the war, he had heard that there was a collaboration between the Autobots and Decepticons, but his knowledge ended there along with his contact and communication with any of the Autobots, and in turn followed his many solar cycles of loneliness. However this information fizzled away when faced with the one responsible for so much harm to the ones he cared about.
“I command you, Bumblebee, please put away your weapon. This is no way to act like a dear friend of mine.” Optimus explained, as if that made any part of the situation any better. His processor was overheating; if he hadn’t known better, he would’ve for sure thought red-hot smoke was coming out of his vents.
Torn between following his leader’s commands and his own sense of safety, he stiffly lowered his blaster, but still kept it firmly engaged. Bumblebee’s voicebox spluttered with grating static -and He even seemed to wince, which was impossible- a yellow helm turned to better face Optimus despite never taking his optics off of the threat.
“I- Apologies, my Prime, but I… I don’t…” He paused, voicebox faltering. “Why? Why is he here?” As he kept talking, he became more unsure, his voice crackling and breaking at the end of his sentence.
“Bumblebee, surely you knew. I am sure I told you, had I not? Megatron has been on the side of the Autobots, and my very own dear friend, for much of a decade now.”
He wasn’t sure how to respond. It was as if his circuits froze right in their place. He… almost can’t believe it. Only almost, as by running back the recording in his processor he could double then triple check that yes, those words did come from his own Prime’s mouth, and whatever he said, goes. No matter his own thoughts on the matter. It's not like he had the Matrix humming in his chassis, although the almost-consealed rattle of his plating sure did give that impression.
The yellow bot bowed his helm, face plate vacant. “Yes, of course optimus. Thank you, commander.”
Bumblebee stepped back, fully deactivating and detransforming his blaster back into a closed servo, his digits creaking painfully as they pressed inwards.
He nodded stiffly at the two bots, pointedly avoiding one’s red gaze. Bumblebee turned- and then marched away, missing the barrel that had begun leaking water into the grooves of the stones and dirt that surrounded the barn.
As he approached the nearest corner, his pedde-steps sped up, before morphing into a full-stumbling sprint as he passed the barn’s edge; tripping on objects that his muffled processor couldn’t quite see.
After a particularly rough trip had almost sent him prone on the floor, he slumped partially upright on the painted wooden slabs that creaked slightly at the excess weight. He attempted to calm his raging spark and worn vents, but the muffled sounds of talking prevented it. For every second he gained more control, his well-tuned audials caught the sound of two distinct voices conversing; one dear and the other deep, somber and itching against his senses.
It was as if he could feel the figure looming over his own form, the battlefield raging around them. His weapons offline and useless, all the while large servos gripped at his limbs, pulling and pulling against his softened plating until it finally wretched apart to the sound of ripping cables and-
*WARNING! Internal temperature exceeding optimal level, immediate cooling needed*
Bumblebee’s rough servos grasped at his chassis, red paint peeling onto the grass in small flakes. As he slipped farther from the present, he clawed violently with his dulled digits at the symbol displayed pitifully on himself; he felt disgusted at the sign.
If a bot like Megatron was able to gain Optimus’ favor, what was wrong with him that prevented him from doing the same? He was picked singlehandedly by Optimus - chosen out of the last batch of war time sparklings, all that he had been through for him, was it not enough? Is he still not good enough for his Prime? The scout pawed at the freshly aggravated wounds as a whirl of self-doubt curled and gnawed at his processor, keening quietly as coolant struggled to stay inside his optics as he then placed a deep gash diagonally along his torn insignia and bright plating.
He flung his servos away from his plating, hissing as the pain sunk in, looking around himself as the impact of the injury shocked him into awareness.
He slowly stopped, pauldrons still hunched and shaking, however the silence had now returned and Meg- the grey mech had gone, and Bumblebee expelled a vent, a burst of heat accompanying it as his operations returned to mostly-normal- minus his energy had seemed to have been completely zapped out of him not even before the Earth’s full cycle had completed.
However his newfound peace had swiftly ended and he recalled the spilt water out of the sideways barrel that he had not-so-carefully abandoned following his own misunderstanding of a simple situation. His prime was meeting with someone. It didn’t matter who he thought that someone was, but he still disrupted him with his own failure causing issues with the supplies he was specifically tasked with delivering.
Oh no, oh Primus- he managed to mess up. Again. There's no way they will let this go now, he might as well enjoy the last cycle he spends inside at least.
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Bumblebee used just about all of his stealth training to get back into the bunker unnoticed, but the overall silence of the area unnerved him still.
Closing the berthroom’s door, and after a moment of thought, he placed himself between the back wall and the slab. It was the farthest from the door and hopefully less visible from the entrance. Although, with his rounded horns and doorwings giving his silhouette’s height a boost he was not quite sure that it was successful.
Slumping down impossibly further, he disengaged his vocaliser, but this… uncomfortably familiar action then had the unintended effect of engaging his fans at a more-that-not noticeable volume. His spark stung slightly in his chassis, spinning more frantically as the kilks ticked farther forward.
Distantly he recognised the taste of energon in his mouth, awkwardly twisting at his spark as if it were unused to the sensation.
In response to the taste, his tanks gave a slight lurch. But he was alright, it was nothing he had dealt with before - he had refueled only last cycle. Although… it might be a good idea to stock up before he leaves.
Bumblebee peeked out sideways from behind the berth and looked towards the door where he had left his empty cube the previous night, however he widened his optics as in its place sat a newly refilled, full cube - bright and well-refined.
Oh. He hadn't remembered putting that there.
Taking the opportunity he moved his yellow peddes, stiffly crawling out of his curled up position and moving towards the left of the entrance, claiming it as if it would disappear if he took too long. Moving with this line of reasoning, Bumbelbee lifted the cube and let the act of refuelling calm his heated processor and worn vents from the day’s events.
His partly desperate actions halted as he reached two-thirds of the way through the cube, gently lowering it back to its space on the dugout’s floor, then stumbled - slower than last time - back to the berth instead of beside it.
As he slumped his helm on the surface and offlined his optics, facing the door, and as his systems shut down one by one, he didn’t notice the opening of the door and the new cube that appeared next to the half-empty one, lingering for a few seconds on the deep gouges on his chassis before leaving the scout to recharge in silence.