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Tripping over himself, Bumblebee nearly missed the elevator by a fraction—only making it in time by jamming his boot into the nearly closed doors. They clattered open at the obstruction, reversing to leave more than enough room for him and his mountain of data files to slip in.
He strictly ignored Cliffjumper, who had watched him rushing over and refrained from holding open the doors with his servo. The newest head of CYINT took position in the right corner of the elevator, leaning against the railing with his arms crossed—as such, Bumblebee took the opposite corner. Keeping as far away from him as possible.
Adjusting his grip on the stack weighing him down, Bumblebee focused on nothing else but staring at the rising floor numbers. He waited patiently, counting away each floor that they passed. Intel and the Magnus' office were on two different floors, meaning Cliffjumper would get off soon. With any luck, nobody else would enter… leaving the elevator all to himself and his dread.
If they got through this awkward interaction in pure silence the whole way up, Bumblebee would just about sigh in relief–
"Desk jockey, huh?" Bumblebee pressed his lips tightly together to resist groaning in frustration, wanting to stomp his boot against the floor. If Cliffjumper saw his irritated face, he clearly didn't care enough to stop pressing him, "All that spectacle just to end up as an assistant, what a shame."
"I'm an Elite Guard warrior," he kept his focus on the LED display. They were floors away from the first drop off. "See the wings on the badge?"
"Not really, it's kinda hard to behind all those data pads."
His digits curled tightly against the file at the bottom of the stack. Reigning his temper, Bumblebee said, "Yeah, well, I have them. Which is more than can be said of you. So why don't you mind your own business and stay in your lane, okay? I don't need this."
"Kid–"
"I'm not a kid," he snapped, throwing his helm to openly glare at his senior.
With a roll of his optics, Cliffjumper repeated himself, "Kid, listen. I'm not going to pretend as though sitting behind a desk and taking calls for an ignoramus like Sentinel is any definition of a self-fulling job—I've been there, done that—but you gotta admit you got the short end of a pretty bad deal."
He told him this as though it were news. As if Bumblebee didn't know the truth so intimately that it kept him up during the night cycle.
Bee got his wings, but hadn't left Iacon even once since his induction into the Elite Guard. All those talks and promises of making him a Prime were nothing but a carrot on a stick to keep him at bay–in line and obedient. Any attempts of his own at bringing it up—not even particularly out of a want to become a Prime but because the dawning realization that he got played threatened to consume him— were met with the runaround.
Oh, Sentinel couldn't do it yet because he needed to propose it to the Council and no, it wasn't on the agenda the next gathering or the one after that. Stop asking, unless he wanted to go crawling back to his so-called friends.
"Doesn't that make you mad?"
No duh it pissed him off. All that pomp and betrayal so that Sentinel could become the Magnus over Optimus—for what, exactly? Bumblebee upheld his end of the deal by helping ensure that happened, but Sentinel refused to make good on his half.
And after everything, what rewarded greeted him for his efforts? Nobody would talk to him, his communication line was blocked on every channel, and he couldn't even pretend as though he could live out his dream fully. Bumblebee had cheated his way into the Elite Guard and still couldn't bridge the gap of stinging emptiness in his spark.
"Leave me alone. Isn't your floor coming up soon?" Could this elevator move any slower? "Or have you considered taking the stairs? I've been told it helps keep the joints of you old-timers well maintained."
"My advice–"
"Nobody asked for your advice!"
"–is that you should cut your losses now. I mean, are you really willing to side with Sentinel once he loses control of office?" Cliffjumper shook his helm. "And he is going to lose it. The public wants him out and he's made no friends or allies in the High Council. It's a matter of when, not if."
"And what would you have me do?" His facial sculpt heated up, face flushed with mortification. If he had known that Cliffjumper would corner him like this, he'd have waited for the next lift. "Where would I go? I don't know if you've noticed, but I'm completely alone in this."
"I don't know, have you considered apologizing to your friends? Begging for forgiveness? Outright bailing, before Sentinel drags you down with him?" Cliffjumper shrugged and the elevator slowed to a stop. Finally. It dinged, signifying that they had arrived at the Intelligence sector. "Fuel for thought. Not my problem if you choose not to listen."
Bumblebee mumbled a dejected, "Whatever," as Cliffjumper straightened his posture and walked passed him. Refusing to meet him head on, he glared down at the black screen of the files.
A reflection of his abject misery, mocking him without words.
Nobody entered the elevator for the rest of his ride up. Static echoed through his audial horns, stuffing his helm full of fluff. Despite himself, Cliffjumper's lecture buried into his circuitry. Bumblebee planned to disregarded all of it, even though it stuck around like rust. What did Cliffjumper know about anything, huh? He hadn't even realized that he'd been toting around Blurr's nearly deactivated frame like a paperweight…
A ping broke through the white noise, having reached the top floor. Bumblebee stepped out of the elevator purely by rote, computer drifting off… elsewhere.
The trek to his desk, and thus to Sentinel's office, was short. Shorter still if he didn't trudge the entire way through the corridor, dragging his pedes with every step.
Cliffjumper wanted him to 'bail'. After everything that Bumblebee gave up just to finally get into the Elite Guard? Sari and Bulkhead wanted nothing to do with him, Ratchet couldn't look him in the optics with a flash of disdain crossing through them, and forget about Boss-bot.
No. He couldn't wipe his servos clean. So what if he never actually went on any missions? Bumblebee got to join Sentinel when he made public appearances with the twins. He got out, he received a steady pay, and he had it on the books that he was a member of the Elite Guard.
What did it matter that he had been practically chained to his desk and stuck managing a schedule to a pompous afthole who couldn't help but make enemies with every other mech that crossed his paths? Bumblebee got everything he wanted and exactly what he deserved.
Turning into the open receptionist area that had been his personal base of operations, an internal buzz rattled in his helm. Cursing, Bumblebee pushed the data files into the corner of his arm and juggled them all with one servo as the other rose below his audials.
Answering, Bumblebee recited, "Sentinel Magnus' office, please hold–!" He transferred the caller right as he tripped over himself, all of the files toppling over and falling to the ground in loud clatters. "Scrap!"
Kneeling down, Bumblebee started to gather them all up. A few of the screens carried hairline fractures—not cracked enough to obstruct the information contained, but bad enough that when he returned them to the archive he'd surely get his neck cables wrung.
"Just my luck," he hissed, steering fluid gathering at the corners of his optics. "Stupid slagging data files. Sentinel isn't even going to look at them."
Considering that he had already broken a few, Bumblebee tossed all pretense out the window and jammed them close to his false hood. Keep a tally in his helm, he knew that he had been missing one last file.
It must have been behind him. Twisting around, Bumblebee caught sight of the file and started to reach over when a blue servo beat him to it.
He paused. Bumblebee hadn't heard anyone approach, firstly. And second, he fully expected to have to snatch it back from them. Even though they were old case files, they were still technically classified and restricted to certain security levels.
But before he could reprimand the mech, they held it out back for him to take. No turning it on first to see what it said or even withholding it from him, merely… helping for the sake of helping out.
"Hey, thanks," with a small smile, Bumblebee gratefully took it. He redirected his gaze upward, preparing himself to either recognize the mech before him or gathering some sort of quick introduction with whoever it was.
But all hope died in his vocoder as he stared up at Optimus, who gazed at him with nothing but pity.
"O–optimus." Bumblebee flinched, withering in an instant. "What are you doing here?"
"I had an appointment with Sentinel. I tried calling ahead to see if he was ready for me yet, but you put me on hold," he responded wryly. "I see why though. Here, lemme help you up."
"No, no, I'm fine I can–" Not like he expected otherwise, but Bumblebee had very little sway with Optimus when he put his computer to something. He hauled him up, slowly so that he wouldn't drop everything all over again. Even though he knew it would have been out of character for him to do so, Bumblebee still expected for him to callously wrench him off the ground.
It stupefied him, that Optimus treated him as though they were still friends instead of Bumblebee as a traitor.
Optimus even took the pile of data files out of his servos and placed them down on his desk. In a daze, and falling back easily into old habits, Bumblebee followed diligently behind Optimus. Quickly, he realized that he should move around Optimus and actually sit down at his desk, assuming his new… role between the two.
They weren't fellow space bridge technicians anymore. Bumblebee was Sentinel's glorified personal assistant and Optimus… He didn't really know what Optimus was doing anymore. He hadn't been privy to any of his activities, for obvious reasons.
Even still… Instead of getting on the intercom and letting Sentinel know that Optimus had arrived—and since when did Sentinel have a meeting with Optimus today, his schedule was synced with Bumblebee's workstation… unless he purposefully left it off the calendar…—he stalled for time.
Picking up one of the data files from the stack, he set it down on the desk in front of him and adjusted random bits and bobs. Anything to look busy or organized or as though he had settled in his position and didn't regret accepting that bribe and ruining any chance for Optimus to have looked competent during Megatron's trial. No not all, why should anyone think otherwise?
"You look well, Bumblebee," Optimus said, not letting them sit in silence for longer than a beat. "I'm glad."
Did he? Consider it news to him. Bumblebee didn't look any different from normal, even if he felt awful each cycle that passed. "Yeah, well. Working for the office of the Magnus pays pretty good. You wouldn't believe the kind of high-end maintenance bays I've lounged in since working here."
"I can believe that." Optimus smiled slightly. He didn't seem in any hurry to meet with Sentinel, either because he wanted to continue talking to Bee or because he genuinely wanted to avoid the inevitable. Like an idiot, he hoped for the former. "How have you been? Really been, I mean. We haven't heard from you in a long while and… I mostly agreed to meet with Sentinel today to check up on you, honestly."
You all have me blocked, he wanted to blurt out badly. Instead he said, "That's a pretty big price to pay for something so stupid. If you wanted to see how I was doing you could've just turned on the news."
"And listen to one of Sentinel's big speeches? No thanks. Besides, you're barely in frame during those, I wouldn't be catching much." Optimus moved forward, laying a servo on his pauldron. Bee had ditched his Earth alt mode ages ago, sporting his original body-con from his factory days yet it still settled as well as it did on the old him. "I know things have been… tense between us, but I wanted you to know it's alright, Bumblebee."
"It… is?" Confused, his shutters blinked up at him.
"I won't lie and say I understand why you took Sentinel's bribe or why it was so important for you to have become a part of the Elite Guard but… I've only ever wanted the best for you guys. Cybertron hasn't burst into flames yet from Sentinel's leadership and if you're happy then… That's enough for me." Optimus gripped his pauldron, his presence firm. "And you are happy right?"
A specter of Cliffjumper loomed over him, his words from earlier creating a racket across his memory banks. He made it out as if it were so easy to wipe his hands clean of Sentinel and the universe sought to prove him right by throwing the perfect opportunity right into Bumblebee's lap. All it would take was Bee spilling his inner workings out to Optimus, admitting how lonely he's been, and how each new day proved over again that it hadn't been worth it—not for even one nanoklik.
All Cliffjumper thought he had to do was apologize, right? Admit the truth, amending the perjury he committed for a deal not worth taking? Optimus extended one of those olive branches from Earth and he–
"It's everything I dreamed it would be," refused to take it. Bumblebee continued to lie, stretching a fake smile across his facial sculpt as though it could convince Optimus that he could trust his words now—even though historically, he couldn't. "This is the happiest I've ever been."
"Bumblebee–"
He twisted away from Optimus' grip, not so much lurching away from his touch, but freeing himself all the same. Bumblebee leaned down toward the intercom microphone and clicked it on.
Calmly he spoke, "Sentinel Magnus, Optimus Prime is here for your appointment."
Disappointed, a feeling he constantly felt when around Bee, Optimus backed off. As though he had been waiting at the door for his arrival, Sentinel swung them open and sauntered out of his office into the waiting area.
"Optimus, old buddy! What took you so long? Don't you know not to keep the Magnus waiting?" Sentinel jeered, smirking all the while. He glanced over at Bumblebee briefly, but he put his helm down and worked on re-organizing the data files by relevancy. "Come on, let's talk inside so we can get some privacy."
Sentinel wrapped an arm around Optimus and steered him toward those same doors. Prick. Bumblebee rolled his optics and fixed his face quick before Sentinel could notice—not that he ever paid attention to him.
"Sure thing, Sentinel." Optimus nodded, already exhausted from the conversation. "Bumbleb–"
Interrupting him, Sentinel poked at Optimus' chest. "That's Sentinel Magnus, unless you already forgot which of the two of us won that little race."
"Of course, Sentinel Magnus," he corrected with only a hint of distaste lacing his words. Not letting Sentinel's provocation deter him, Optimus continued where he left off, "Bumblebee, perhaps after this we could go for a drive? It's been a while since we've gotten the chance to do so."
Why… Why was Optimus still trying to reach out… After everything that Bumblebee had done to him? Was he truly that good of a mechanism or was Bumblebee so awful that in his pity-party he had even swept Optimus in? Tricking him into feeling bad for the mech who screwed him over?
His tanks dropped, a heavy feeling coiling throughout his engine.
"I don't feel so good," Bumblebee announced abruptly. Sentinel rose a brow ridge and glared at him, while Optimus frowned. Servos laid flat against the desktop, he pushed himself away. "Must've had some bad oil, I– I'm gonna get some air. I'll be back, sir."
"Yeah, you do that," Sentinel rolled his optics. "But I'm correcting your time card for when you're back to work."
"Yes, sir." Bumblebee hurried away.
He couldn't actually do it without drawing undo attention, but for all intents and purposes he ran. Crossing the threshold as quickly as he could with Optimus' words of, "Right. I'll see you later, Bumblebee," disappearing into the distance.
How foolish of him to even fall for Cliffjumper's slag for even a moment. Bumblebee was as stuck with Sentinel as he was certain that he could never betray Optimus again.