Archive of Our Own ^beta

Sunstreaker hated this dirt ball planet.

He hated the particles of organic sediment that got stuck in his wheel wells joints. He hated the smells that he had to turn his olfactory sensors down to avoid. He could barely stand the tiny fragile flesh-bags that inhabited the planet so wildly you couldn’t go anywhere without almost running over – or stepping on – one of them. And he definitely hated how utterly bland their sense of colors were! He hated being on planets where it was obvious the dominant species had such a limited scope of the light and color spectrum.

Since he crashed on Earth after following the Prime’s beacon, few things had been to Sunstreaker’s standards, but few things in life were ever to Sunstreaker’s standards. He had learned to deal with that. He had a much harder time dealing with the utter organic-ness of this planet. Even their technology was influenced by it. What the hell was leather, why did it smell so weird, and why did his alt-mode have to have seats covered in it?

So maybe his attitude was starting to grate on people around him, the other Autobots in particular. Sideswipe usually backed him up – no matter what they fought about between them, they always backed each other up – but even he seemed to be fed up with Sunstreaker’s contempt for everything around them. And his twin thought throwing balls of mud at him was how to deal with it. So maybe Sunstreaker beat Sideswipe’s head in with rebar and tried to sink him into the nearby ocean. And maybe Bumblebee tried to break them up and also took a dip in the ocean for his troubles. And maybe some Earth vehicles ended up in the ocean, too, in the process. Arcee stepped in after that and Sunstreaker would say it all ended in a draw, because that’s what happened.

Shit happened – a human saying that Sunstreaker actually did like. Optimus, on the other hand, didn’t.

All of it led to Optimus being fed up with them – mostly Sunstreaker, even though he hadn’t started it – and his punishment was banishment from their base. Not just their base, but the entire country.

Optimus insisted it wasn’t banishment, but what else could you call it when Sunstreaker was forced to take a ride inside the morbidly cheerful deathtrap that was Stratosphere to a country he’d never been in before, where Wheeljack was all too pleased to guide him into the middle of a slagging jungle and dump him there?!

“You really are leaving me here like this? By myself?” he hissed as he moved carefully through the worst place he could have ever imagined to be in. There were organic things everywhere. Who could deal with this?

“Yes and no,” Wheeljack said with the least bit of care, as he often did. Nothing ruffled Wheeljack, and somehow coming to this planet gave him a renewed lack of giving a frag. He and Hound were so weird for how much they enjoyed this place. Hound had actually been jealous of Sunstreaker somehow when Optimus had said where he was going.

Not a normal processor between the two of them.

“Because that’s an answer to anything,” Sunstreaker muttered.

“You’ll see when we get where we’re going,” Wheeljack shrugged, easily ducking a branch that Sunstreaker had to either stoop under or walk around the entire tree. He wasn’t as big as Optimus by far, but he was taller than Mirage and too many of these trees were scraping his paint job or threatening to stab out an optic with their stupid spindly branches. Ugh.

A hiss and chitter echoed near his pedes and the skittering of leaves and Sunstreaker looked down to see the flickering backplates and underwings as Bob easily maneuvered around by his side. He had worried that his bug would get lost, in this almost pitch-black void of a forest, but his tracking skills were sharp as ever and he somehow kept up with them despite his much shorter legs. Sunstreaker even left his leash off because he didn’t want it to get caught on anything out here and he hadn’t strayed too far.

“And when are we getting there?” Sunstreaker asked. “Bob’s gonna get tired soon, we’re gonna need to find a spot for a break.” Said bug’s antennae twitched and his head perked up at his name being mentioned and Sunstreaker almost smiled, despite the otherwise slag-awful situation. At least Bob seemed to think this was a fun little hike.

Wheeljack laughed again. “Right now actually,” he said and picked up speed through the trees and Sunstreaker groaned before falling after him, wondering exactly where “there” was.

And that was when they finally managed to break free of the foliage and what Sunstreaker found to be a large plain. It was still mostly dark, even though dawn was almost upon them, but he could see the shadows and shapes across the plains. There was of course a long line of trees from the jungle that stretched on for miles, but the plains were massive and had what looked to be a river and some higher hills, then mountains in the jungle in the distance. Enough to realize that the plains had followed for half of their trek through the jungle.

“Wait a minute,” Sunstreaker said. “We could have just driven over the plains instead of going through all of that?!”

Wheeljack continued to smile at him – smile, still not used to that, Wheeljack not having his face covered by a mask – and then bent down to give Bob a little pat on the head. “We could have, but it’s better to stay as hidden as possible here, given what happened last time,” he said. “And this way you didn’t get rocks scrapping your undercarriage so how could you complain about that?”

There were a lot of things Sunstreaker could complain about right now, but before he could a voice broke through across the plains, higher up on the distant hill.

“You took the direct route, I take it.”

Sunstreaker turned his head and he could see the large forms, in shapes he couldn’t recognize, but he had read the reports he’d read from the Autobot’s time on Earth. He knew that they weren’t the only Cybertronians on Earth.

“Primal, greetings!” Wheeljack exclaimed, hands wide in welcome. “I thought we were meeting you at the summit.”

“We thought we would cut your journey shorter, as we assumed you would take the roundabout trail,” the dark form, shadowed by the black expanse of the sky and mountains behind him, said.

“Well, I did think it would be best to get here faster,” Wheeljack said and something in that sounded like an insult. Sunstreaker didn’t call him on it as he was too busy focusing on the figure as they travelled down the hill, and he adjusted his optics, allowing him to see them better despite the dim light that was not the same as the blackness of the jungle they’d just traveled through.

They were mechanoids, definitely, and Sunstreaker had already known they had…unique appearances, but seeing them in person was a different experience entirely. He’d never seen Cybertronians who looked so…organic before. The mechanimal alt-modes of cassettes like Ravage and Steeljaw were not even in the same category as these. Their plating was marked with patterns and grooves and even something that looked like…fur?

The large form was like that of an organic primate, ones he’d seen on videos – Sideswipe did enjoy Earth media for some reason – and the other was obviously felinoid but not like Ravage no. He had spots and a round face with large eyes that looked less like optics and more like glass pools. He bounded over to them much faster than his larger counterpart, transforming mid-motion to stand beside Wheeljack and give him a cheerful pat on the arm.

“It has been some time, amigo,” he said, “you’d think you would visit more often, being neighbors.” Wheeljack clapped him back, with a bit more enthusiastic force.

“You should come down from the mountains more often, then,” Wheeljack said. “The butterflies will be very abundant this year during mating season. We could watch them together. As long as you don’t chase them.”

The feline laughed and gave a little shrug. “I can’t promise to stay put for that long.”

Bob chittered and his back plates shifted, like he wanted to extend his wings, but as they weren’t typical wings, they never fully did. Being the runt did mean he hadn’t developed as much as he should have, but Sunstreaker didn’t let it get in the way of Bob doing whatever he wanted.

Sunstreaker bent down to give him a soothing rub, and that seemed to attract the attention of Primal, as Wheeljack called him – calling him Optimus was not going to happen, it was just too strange – and he tilted his head to the side.

“And who’s this?” he asked, extending one of his massive hands in their direction.

“Ah, that is–”

“Bob,” Sunstreaker said because he didn’t need Wheeljack to speak for him. They just met, he wasn’t going to ruin everything by opening his mouth. “His name is Bob. He’s an insecticon.”

“Another friend for the journey, then,” Primal smiled. “Greetings, Bob.”

He leaned down, letting his face get a lot closer to Bob’s than most other people did – some people didn’t know how to dodge acidic, metal-eating bug-saliva and that was their own fault – and then he scritched at the top of his helm with those massive servos. Bob’s back plates fluttered and his back end quivered so strongly his legs shook with it. He could have been lifted off the ground from the force of his pleasure alone. When Primal stopped, he looked bereft, and Sunstreaker was both in awe…and insulted.

He set his hand right back on Bob, and the bug settled, leaning into him happily. Right where he should be.

Primal didn’t react to that but he did turn his attention to him directly. “And you are the one Optimus Prime spoke of,” he said.

“Sunstreaker,” he said. He stood up fully, noticing that he was taller than Primal like this, no matter how massive this organic-looking altmode was. He did not stretch out his hand for the customary arm clasp, because it wasn’t something Sunstreaker ever cared to do. Primal didn’t seem insulted by that and gave a respectful tilt of his head instead.

“Greetings to you as well, Sunstreaker. I am Optimus Primal and this is Cheetor, of the Maximals. Your Prime has said you would be our guest for some time and we are honored to have you.”

If by some time he meant ‘as long as it takes for Sunstreaker to stop being Sunstreaker,’ then sure, some time was accurate.

“Yeah, living in a jungle isn’t my idea of a good time. No offense. That’s your way of living, have at it.”

“Guess that’s why your Prime didn’t give you much of a choice.”

Primal tilted his head back towards his companion with a look. “Cheetor.”

Cheetor only shrugged back at him with a sheepish tilt of his head and raised hands. “He is not unaware.”

Primal shook his head at him then turned back to Sunstreaker. “Forgive him, he can be too direct with his thoughts, without thinking of their tone,” he said.

Wheeljack rolled his optics. “Believe me, that is not something unfamiliar to Sunstreaker,” he said. Then he walked over and gave Sunstreaker a light nudge on the shoulder.

“Unfortunately, I do have some timely experiments happening back at my own labs, and must be back sooner than I’d like.”

Sunstreaker raised a brow at him. “So you’re leaving just like that?”

“Seems so. Behave yourself, eh?” he said. “Only good reports when I come back through. I believe you can make the best of it.”

Sometimes, oftentimes, Sunstreaker forgot just how much older than him Wheeljack actually was, with his very laid back and un-bothered attitude that could remind him too much of Sideswipe. And then he gave him a look that made him feel like a newbuild plucked off right out of the Well.

“Whatever,” Sunstreaker huffed. “I’m only here because Optimus doesn’t want any trouble with the squish–humans.” He amended his last word when he saw the cut of Wheeljack’s optics.

“You’re here because if we’re not getting through to you, someone with a different perspective might,” Wheeljack said, his voice not as light as before. “And you’ll accept our new home for all of its unique beauty one of these days.”

Except Sunstreaker didn’t want this to be their new home. He’d rather go back and fight for Cybertron. Their real home. The one they just let the Decepticons take like it didn’t matter. Not that anyone cared about Sunstreaker’s opinion on it.

“You’ll be fine,” Wheeljack said, “Just keep an open mind, for once.” And then he was off, transforming back into the long round van he seemed to enjoy at the moment. Completely unlike the sleeker modes he’d had on Cybertron. This planet did things to people and Sunstreaker didn’t understand and didn’t have to like it.

As he watched Wheeljack take off across the plains, towards where it was becoming more obvious a road was likely to be somewhere, he couldn’t help but feel some kind of resentment. “That skid-plate,” he grumbled. “I knew he made me trek through a jungle in the dark for no reason.”

“It’s because out here, we avoid being seen by humans who do not already know we exist,” Primal said. “Now come along, it’ll be dawn soon enough.”

Sunstreaker just huffed again and motioned to Bob, clicking with his tongue, “Come on, Bob.”

Cheetor easily transformed back into his feline-mode, but Sunstreaker didn’t switch to his own altmode. Wheeljack had been right about one thing, he wasn’t going to drag his undercarriage over all of this uneven terrain when he didn’t have to. Instead he followed as Cheetor took off a bit ahead of them and Primal kept in step with him and Bob scurried along to keep pace, sometimes hopping in that kind of cute way of his even though Sunstreaker had no intention of leaving him behind.

“Bob is an interesting name for an insecticon,” Primal said, idly.

“We can’t say his real name around here, it makes the sq–humans uncomfortable, so we gave him a nickname. Turns out giant insects called ‘Corpse-Hunting-Acid-Beetle’ make them nervous, or whatever.” He motioned to Bob. “Look at him, he’s a slagging energon puff and they act like he’ll eat their younglings.”

Primal’s shoulders shook and a deep rumble escaped him, and Sunstreaker froze for just a moment, enough to make him almost stumble, but he quickly recovered, like he had stepped over some large divot instead. “No, he’s a rather affable insecticon,” he agreed.

“At least someone agrees,” Sunstreaker muttered. “At least he likes the name. Gets all cute about it when I say it, don’t you, Bob?”

And Bob proceeded to be really cute, antennae twitching and his four eyes wide and excited. “It’s like he thinks it’s a treat because of how we trained him to respond to it.” He reached into his subspace and pulled out a few nuts and bolts, tossing them into the air. Bob immediately jumped up and his secondary arms snagged the snack from the air and his grill spread open so he could quickly devour them in razor-sharp jaws, before looking about for more. “No, no more treats Bob, that’s all for now.”

His antennae dipped for just a moment, but he got over it quickly, it seemed, as he hopped and his back plates fluttered and he circled Sunstreaker, then Primal. The sky’s light was shifting yet again, not as dark as it had been as dawn finally broke, and Sunstreaker adjusted his optics yet again, just as they reached the top of the hill he’d first seen them standing on.

And on the hill, he stopped, optics wide. The sky in the far off distance was awash in dozens and dozens of colors only disturbed by the mountain disrupting the scene from the northeast, but it didn’t block the view of the sun rising or how the few, wispy clouds reflected the light and spectrums.It was nothing like what he’d seen in the cities they had remained limited to since his arrival. With no smog, smoke or buildings or faulty, inefficient human-made lenses or generated magnetic fields to distort or diminish the view, it was…indescribable.

Organic, as it would always be, but somehow…more.

He looked briefly to his side and Primal standing there next to him, watching with a gleam in his optics that was just as indescribable.

“For all that Earth has changed over thousands of years, it still affords us a sight we could not experience anywhere else,” Primal said.

Sunstreaker continued to stare, watching as the colors shifted the higher in the sky the sun went, taking away the spectacle, but it could not erase what had been permanently recorded in his memory. His servos twitched.

“I need a titanium sheet,” he said. Not that he expected it, because you don’t just find titanium sheets in the middle of jungles. And yet…

“Ah...I am sorry, I do not think we have any in our current base,” Primal said, with some regret in his tone.

Sunstreaker clenches his hands a bit, disappointment warring with common sense. “Of course you don’t,” he said. “We’re in the middle of nowhere, you wouldn’t have anything for painting on.”

“Paint?” Primal said. “You paint?”

“Yeah, maybe, sometimes,” Sunstreaker frowned, optics shifting away. The specialized sealed jars he carried everywhere almost burned him from their hidden place in his subspace. “It’s not like it’s a big deal. Not much art needed around in the middle of a war unless you want propaganda slag.”

“We do have some materials,” Primal said. “Titanium, on the other hand, is very valuable to humans, and thus we avoid collecting it ourselves, but I’m certain Rhinox could make you a canvas out of other metals, if you would accept it. He’s skilled with adapting alloys.”

Sunstreaker blinked at him. “You’d…You’d use up your stock for something like that?”

“Something you will learn, when you have spent a great deal of time around humans, is that the arts are just as valuable as all other aspects of life,” Primal said. “It is how they connect themselves to their histories and worldly experiences. How they hold onto their memories and tell their stories for generations to come. Something Cybertronians have…forgotten can be shared in more than one way.”

The way he says it, like he knows too well how history can be forgotten or overwritten is…hm. Something to remember. For later. Right then, Sunstreaker cared about sheets and the sky and all the colors he could see that he knew most humans couldn’t even fathom. Had they never seen their own sky the way he could?

“Please,” he said. “If you can. I would…I’d appreciate it a lot.”

“Of course,” Primal said, with that smile of his on a face that looked far more suited to this organic, messy, dirt ball of a world than the Cybertron Sunstreaker remembered. But somehow… Somehow, it suited him. The lines and mesh, and how the metal shifted into fur, the way organic and mech seemed to blend together seamlessly.

Sunstreaker’s servos twitched again.

Maybe he’d need a lot of sheets.