When All Lights Go Out I (TFP)

Chapter 44

"That's to be expected," Ratchet said in an understanding tone. "We will know if Azura is safe soon enough. But I am going to give her a good talking to when she does come back. I do not like being worried like that at all."

"Agreed."

Jack huffed in amusement. "For all we know, she's wrestling with Stitch and she has no idea she is in trouble. At least she will know for next time."

"She won't be in as huge trouble as you might think, Jack. We do not punish sparklings if their actions do not deem punishments. And in this case, Azura will not get one. She will simply be spoken to and made to realize why she had scared us." Optimus looked at the hallway again with worry. "Although...I do really hope she is simply hiding."

"Yeah...I agree." Ratchet looked back at the screen with a frown. "And I am almost there with the defrag for the ground bridge too, so I cannot leave to go and look for her. But since you already did, she might not come out even for me."

"It definitely seems very strange." Bumblebee was also very curious and suspicious of everything at this time. He was wondering where Azura was, and if she was really hiding. "I haven't noticed anything about Wheeljack. But now that you mentioned it, Bulkhead, he was reluctant to tell the story. Which says to me he isn't fully familiar of the story, or he never was there."

Bulkhead nodded in agreement with Bumblebee's thought process. "And yet, I am curious if he really is Wheeljack. He doesn't seem like himself." Bulkhead frowned at the hallway before looking at the other bots. "Look, I know Wheeljack better than anyone, so even if we are having some kind of misunderstanding, he is still acting strange."

Just as Bulkhead finished speaking, Wheeljack walked into the lobby with Miko. "Hey, what are you guys talking about?"

"I was just telling the guys about you and me," Bulkhead responded to the bot. "At the battle or Dark Mount Pass."

"That's a heck of a story," Wheeljack said with a smile as he approached the bots calmly.

"Yep. Tell it!" Bulkhead barked at the bot with narrowed optics, surprising Wheeljack and Miko with his order.

However, Miko rolled her eyes at Bulkhead as his snap had annoyed her and she thought he was being ridiculous.. "Talk, talk, talk. How about after we go off-roading?"

"Miko! Stay out of this!" Bulkhead snapped at the girl, startling her again as he did not want her to get involved with a possible decepticon.

"Bulkhead, easy," Arcee said in a soothing tone to try and calm the wrecker down and not take it out on the human.

Wheeljack frowned a little as he glanced at Arcee. "I'm not sure I..."

"Tell it!!" Bulkhead snapped, interrupting Wheeljack angrily, narrowing his optics a little more as he was starting to lose patience with him.

Wheeljack stared at Bulkhead with a frown before he replied. "Fine. You want to live in the past, Bulkhead." He glanced down at the humans as they look up at him curiously, though they all seemed to be uncertain, especially Jack and Rafael. "The wreckers were trapped between a decepticon patrol and the smelting pit. The cons were vicious, bearing down on us with everything they had." Optimus listened intently to the bot while not taking his optics off him for a second. "Me and Bulkhead engaged the enemy, left them for scrap. Then I made us a way out using their backsides as stepping stones to cross the molten metal." He glanced at Bulkhead with a slight smirk. "Ain't that how it happened?"

Bulkhead had a surprised expression on his face as though he didn't expect him to know it. "Yeah. That's exactly how it happened." Wheeljack smirked as Bulkhead confirmed that the story was true. "Except for one little thing." The bot widened his optics in shock as Bulkhead said that sentence and he tensed a little. "I wasn't there."