Veritas et Mendacium Part 1

[dens_extra_pups]

Whatever Sideswipe and Strongarm had been expecting upon encountering the crash site, two Autobots arguing wasn't it. Or rather, one large, green and black Autobot (he had to have been as big as Grimlock) fending off blows from a smaller, patchwork painted Autobot, and laughing about the hits as he tried earnestly to rub his beard on the smaller bot's helm. Sideswipe cringed at a particularly vicious blow that sent the larger Autobot's helmet flying.

As the helmet flew through the air, the smaller Autobot stormed off, transforming to what was clearly a small Cybertronian transport. Moments later, they were gone in a cloud of dust, while the larger Autobot chuckled and moved to retrieve his helmet.

"She'll be back. She'll think 'a somethin' really good ta say 'n come back ta say it ta my face."


-------


"So you and the big guy are Wreckers?" Sideswipe asked as he watched Ordnance wrestle with Grimlock.

"Yup." Mira replied, doorwings moving even as she seemed to be paying full attention to the scuffle between the two sizable green and black bots. "You were too, at one point."

Sideswipe blinked and looked at the small femme incredulously. "Wait, what?"

Mira looked up, expression unreadable as she studied the red warrior for a few moments.

"You really don't remember? You, Sunstreaker, and Calyx taught me everything I knew..."

Sideswipe blinked. "I think you're confused. Sunstreaker and I haven't talked since I started street racing back on Cybertron... And I don't know anyone named Calyx."

Mira was silent for a few moments before quietly replying. "Guess I have you confused with someone else then..." With that, the patchwork painted femme walked off, likely to try and harass Strongarm about some regulation or something.

"... That was weird." Sideswipe mused before his attention went back to watching Grimlock and Ordnance rumble.


-------


"Babe?" Ordnance looked up to where Mira was sitting on the hull of the Junk in the Trunk. After her talk with Sideswipe, Ordnance had watched Mira wander off toward the ship they had called home for the past several vorns. Then he'd clobbered Grimlock square on the jaw and had told the Dinobot he still had to pay back the credits he'd borrowed. That had been a few hours ago, so now it was time to try and coax Mira into letting off more steam.

Mira leaned forward slightly, expression unreadable. "He didn't know me, Ordnance." Her voice was soft, tone even. Ordnance could see how her doorwings had adopted a near vertical orientation, giving away just how upset by this revelation the tiny brawler was.

"Maybe he hasn't landed on his head enough times yet. Can I play kick the can with him? Huh? Can I?" Ordnance asked, giving Mira a hopeful grin as the femme moved to slide down into his outstretched arms, landing against his chest with a soft clank.

Mira snorted as she snuggled close, shaking her head. "No. Not yet. Let him do something really stupid first."

Ordnance grinned and moved to rub Mira's back between her doorwings, chuckling as the femme slumped and began purring quietly. He knew she'd likely dwell on the fact that Sideswipe didn't know her for a bit longer, which meant it was his duty to try and distract her as much as he could and as often as he could.


-------


A few days later, things had finally begun to settle into a bit of a routine once more. Mira and Ordnance had proven quite handy at helping round up Decepticons while keeping a low profile, and Bumblebee was glad for the extra help, even if their definition of 'fun' was to play Lob with Grimlock, sometimes with Mira playing the role of the ball. The first time it had happened, Bumblebee had been shocked at the sheer number of obscenities Mira knew, Sideswipe and Grimlock had taken notes, and Strongarm had spent an hour trying to find some regulation or citation that she could use against the Wreckers.

Fixit and Denny had (thankfully) been too busy working on another pair of Decepticon Hunters, and Russell had been helping, so nobody else's education had been furthered by the Wreckers and Dinobot playing. Little did Bumblebee know, however, that things would be getting even more chaotic in the next few solar cycles...


-------


//Autobot prison ship Alchemor, this is Autobot scout ship RapidRun. Requesting permission and coordinates to land. Do you copy?//

Bumblebee had been on monitor duty with Fixit, and had also been refueling. Fixit had no idea why the sound of a femme's voice had caused Bumblebee to spittake his fuel, but the way the Lieutenant reacted next gave the repairbot a few ideas...

"Kriti?"

//...Okay, so I owe Jazz credits now.// The femme replied with a laugh. //Seriously though, can I land my ship or do I need to park it and make planetfall?//

"There's a safe area a few clicks out... Wait. How big is the RapidRun?" Bumblebee wondered, thinking of the need for maintaining cover.

//Let's just put it this way. If the Rapid Run was any smaller, you'd have to have a medic cut me outta it.// Kriti replied, sounding a bit irritated. //Perceptor is working on repairing the Ifiri's Wrath, and the other two jump shuttles, otherwise I'd have arrived in that, instead.//

"Wait. You traveled from Cybertron in a jump shuttle?!" Strongarm asked, doorwings giving away her shock.

//Yeah. It was the only ship available at the time that was space-worthy. I'll tell ya all about it when I land. That is, if I can get coordinates for a safe landing spot. There's a meteor shower I want to use for cover.//


-------


It was dark by the time Kriti pulled up to the entrance of the scrapyard. The meteor shower had started just after twilight, and nobody had been any the wiser that an Autobot had brought their ship down to the planet surface. Bumblebee had been pacing by the gate the entire time from the start of the meteor shower to the first quiet knocks on the gate, and he nearly tripped over his own pedes in his haste to open the gate enough to allow a sleek looking, dark blue car into the salvage yard.

Strongarm watched with trepidation as the car, clearly an Earth-based model, transformed into a visored femme a little shorter than Bumblebee. The femme stretched a bit before looking around at the group gathered to meet her. "Okay, Jazz told me a few names, so let me see if I can get this right in one go." Her voice was similar in pitch to Strongarm's own, though it also had nods to Mira's voice as well. Pointing to Sideswipe, Kriti said his name, then turned to Fixit and did similar before repeating the process with Grimlock, then Strongarm herself.

Kriti looked to Ordnance and Mira, snorting slightly. "I already know these two crazies, so introductions aren't necessary." All that did was earn Kriti a bit of rowdy laughter from the two Wreckers and a headshake from Bumblebee.

"They're not so bad, Kriti. Ordnance and Mira haven't gotten into too much trouble since they arrived. I haven't even had to go over sticking to alt mode outside of the salvage yard more than once."

Kriti was silent for a few moments, though she gave the impression of a raised brow ridge behind her visor. "'Bee, you've changed more than I thought, if that's how you define 'trouble', especially where these two are concerned."

"Hey! I resemble that remark!" Ordnance chimed in with a laugh, even as Mira swatted at his head from her perch on his shoulder.

"Believe me, Ordnance, I know you do." Kriti replied, smirking slightly. Ordnance boggled and then he and Grimlock were cracking up.

"All due respect, Ma'am, but I wouldn't encourage them..." Strongarm said quietly.

Kriti turned her attention to the Cadet, expression softening into a smile. "I know, Strongarm. It's just been awhile since I saw either of them, or Bumblebee."

Strongarm blinked, giving Kriti a surprised look. "How long is 'awhile'?"

"Well... The last time I saw Ordnance and Mira was a few cycles after I came back out to the battlefield after Tyger Pax. I hadn't seen Bumblebee since the middle of that battle." Kriti replied quietly, doorwings drooping a bit as she spoke. Then she was shaking her head and giving everyone a smile. "But let's not talk about that right now. Part of why I came here is to learn more about Earth, and its people and customs."

Bumblebee couldn't help but notice that despite her cheery tone, Kriti still seemed a bit tense. He'd spent enough time around her during the war to recognize the signs, and part of him was glad to know he could still read her so well.


-------


"Next thing I know, Hot Rod's jumping off the roof, and Springer looks to Prowl and says 'There he goes, and I must follow, for the village needs its idiot.'!" Kriti paused to wipe away lubricants on her cheek, caused by laughing so much during the telling of one of the more memorable moments during the war.

Bumblebee frowned before pointing something out. "Wait, I don't remember that happening at all."

"Not surprised there, 'Bee. Hot Rod landed on you." Kriti replied, shrugging one shoulder. "It took Springer, Jazz, and Kup to get him off of you, and that was with Jazz laughing so hard that he couldn't keep a grip on Hot Rod. Kup finally had to kick him off the recovery team because he couldn't stay upright. I don't blame him though. Hot Rod kept calling everyone 'Mommy'."

Strongarm was stunned. She'd never heard of so many regulations being broken in one go. Much less by someone who was supposed to be an officer.

"Hah! Then what happened?" Sideswipe asked, giving Kriti a hopeful look.

Kriti snorted softly. "Well, after we got them both to the medic, and repaired, Hot Rod went and jumped off the roof of another, taller, building, and landed on a 'Con."

"You're kidding, right?" Bumblebee gave Kriti an incredulous look.

"I wish. The kicker is that when he flattened the 'Con, he didn't even get so much as a scratch." Kriti replied with a 'what can you do?' shrug.

"Wait, so this Hot Rod guy jumps off of one roof and knocks Bumblebee out... but then jumps off an even higher roof, squishes a Decepticon, and doesn't get scratched? How does that even work?" Sideswipe asked, brows raised.

"I wish I knew. It was pretty funny though... Especially once Kup read Hot Rod the riot act..."


-------


Later that night, Strongarm watched from the end of one of the aisles as Bumblebee climbed up the ladder to the top of the diner sign to sit with Kriti. Something about the visored femme just didn't seem right to the cadet. There was something Kriti was hiding, and Strongarm intended to find out, hopefully before it was too late...

As she observed, Bumblebee reached the top of the sign and settled next to Kriti. Then, the lieutenant was slowly moving to put his arm around Kriti's shoulders. The femme reacted by leaning against Bumblebee a bit more closely, doorwings moving slowly. Strongarm frowned and moved as close as she dared, hoping to hear what the Lieutenant and Kriti were talking about.


-------


"I'm glad you're here, Kriti." Bumblebee admitted quietly as Kriti snuggled against him.

"I'm glad you're here, too, 'Bee. I missed you." Kriti murmured. "After Tyger Pax... Things just weren't the same, you know? I mean, yeah, my new team was good, and Perceptor did all he could to help out, but without you there, it just didn't feel right..."

Bumblebee wasn't sure how to respond to that, so for several minutes, he and Kriti sat in uncomfortable silence before he hesitantly asked, "How long after were you...?"

Kriti sighed and tipped her head in the way that Bumblebee remembered meaning that she'd closed her optics behind her visor. "As soon as Perceptor and First Aid cleared me for duty... Against their better judgement, I might add. Perceptor wanted me to rest and recover a bit more before going back out to fight, but the higher-ups wanted as many wheels to the ground as possible." There was a momentary pause as the femme collected herself. "Perceptor left Cybertron not too long after, informing them that if they continued to treat soldiers the way they'd treated me, they'd be dealing with deaths due to burnout, and not due to the Decepticons."

"I'm sorry... Nobody should have had to go through that... Least of all, you." Bumblebee murmured quietly. A gentle backrub, between Kriti's doorwings, accompanied the apology.

Another sigh. "'Bee, what happened in the past is the past. Let's just focus on the now, and what the next day brings. Alright?" Kriti's tone was quietly pleading. Bumblebee nodded, giving the femme a gentle hug.

"Alright. We should go get some rest."

"Yeah... And we need to quit giving your Lieutenant a reason to eavesdrop on us." Kriti replied with a small smile as she moved to get to her feet. "But let's not tell her I saw her following you."



Continued here.