Archive of Our Own ^beta

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Rad had been acting strangely for the past few weeks, they noted the oddness in his behavior almost automatically. But because he didn't really seem all that bothered by whatever had him acting so strangely around them, they hadn't really done anything but continue to observe the boy when he wasn't watching them.

Just in case whatever it was developed into something that would begin to trouble him. Or worse, become a danger to him. And at first, they were okay with merely observing. But then after about a week or so, Alexis and Carlos began to act oddly too.

And when they had three very young, very small, and fragile organics running around their base like lunatics- or more aptly described- crazed Decepticons.

Well, everyone just sort of stopped whatever they were doing and watched the three a bit more closely while they ran all kinds of scans and programs on them in an effort to figure out what the hell was wrong with their little humans.

Weirdly enough, even when Optimus and the rest of them finally managed to corner the kids and ask them what was up. None of them would say anything to them about the possible problem.

Instead the the kids just got mirroring looks on their faces akin to some of the 'uh-oh' ones that they sometimes got whenever they were about to get busted for something big, which slid right into a couple of nervous looks- which caused the kids to promptly try to run from them.

Literally.

Which was not only suspicious, but just a tad bit upsetting to the mechs since the kids practically came to them for everything nowadays. Homework, advice, bullies- that had been a fun conversation. Nearly as fun as the time they had caught Carlos and Rad sort of using one of their monitors to check out porn sites.

The conversations alluding to that incident were beyond weird. Not to mention epically uncomfortable for all of them given the huge gaps in both their ages and species.

The mechs had no idea how to give their young humans the talk.

So after taking about a week to do individual research into human sexuality, Optimus had simply pulled all three of the kids aside and told them that interfacing is for older people. Much older.

He then asked them in the same kind, and fatherly tone that he used to speak with them- to please not interface either until they were at least a thousand years old. Or they had finally left earth- and didn't have to worry about a human female laying her eggs in their brains.

And yes, the normally fearless leader of the Autobots actually said this before shooing the kids away. And then the second that the three were out of earshot, he turned to his men and hissed that they needed to separate the boys from Alexis for a little while so that there was no secret egg laying when they weren't watching.

Which meant that poor Red Alert was stuck with trying to entertain Alexis for nearly a week before she caught on to Optimus's plan and chewed their fearless leader out big time in front of everyone. And then they got the most educated 'sex' talk from the girl that any of them could ever imagine.

It took hours!

And by the time Alexis was done telling them that girl's don't lay eggs in a boy's brain. (Because boys had very little brain cells that they actually used when they were young. There was no nutrition in them to sustain their eggs apparently.) Although she didn't actually say this to them aloud.

It was the distinct impression that they all got the more that she talked. Which...was a little bit of a relief to everyone since they had been really worried that Rad and Carlos would wind up victims to their own species need to procreate. Optimus had even gone the extra mile and made the boys special helmets to protect their brains whenever they were at home or school!

The helmets were a nice touch, but the two boys hadn't liked wearing them any.

Anyways, because the kids had been acting so weird- and refusing to talk to them about the reason- Optimus had had Red Alert pull up Laser Beak's camera footage so that they could finally figure out what was going on.

They hadn't expected Laser Beak to have caught some pretty interesting stuff on his camera. Nor did they expect their first encounter with 'the reason' to make them all...so- so curious.

The reason that Rad and the others had been acting so oddly lately was because they had apparently made a new friend. A new friend with some pretty big secrets of her own if Laser Beak's footage was to be believed.

Which it was.

Laser Beak was a lot of things, but capable of lying wasn't one of them. And Optimus had the footage checked, twice, just to make sure that it hadn't been tampered with in some way.

Still, the footage pretty much spoke for itself.

Especially when said new friend to their little human's frigging blew some Decepticon's away with an unseen weapon of some sort. Which was...not just incredible. But totally unprecedented for an organic since they were so very fragile.

And given the girl's size, age, and evident species, it became even more exponentially so. After all, they hadn't been aware that there were humans- no, human children- capable of such feats of strength. Not to mention courage and the sheer amount of ruthlessness that they saw being displayed by their human's new friend in the video.

All that they knew was that such traits were uncharacteristic of someone so young. After all, even their own little human's didn't possess such courage or ruthlessness. They had some. But not like this human.

She had those things in spades. She wrapped herself in it as if it were her shield.

She fucking owned that shit and it really showed with how she easily blew the two Decepticons away with some sort of energy weapon.

All they really knew was those characteristics were something that humans usually learned over time from various life experiences. Heartbreak, tragedy, experiencing utter terror and helplessness...and rising above them all and evolving.

Of course seeing/believing/and naturally, the clash of their logic and overly protective programing made it difficult to even stand there and keep watching the video without deciding to take off and see if they could track the girl down.

Just to check and see for themselves that she was actually okay.

Especially after seeing her take a few laser shots head on. I mean, she had been bleeding, right? So maybe they should take it upon themselves to go and see if they could find her.

And several of them would have done exactly that if Optimus hadn't have brought them to heel by swiftly reminding them all that the girl didn't know of their existence. Which was a bummer really. Some of them liked the idea of having a new human to call their very own.

After all, weren't they already sort of raising Rad, Carlos, and Alexis like they were their very own sparklings? What was one more human to even things up a bit between the kids? Gender wise.

Alexis was always complaining that she needed another girl around to help her deal with the stupid.

Which, some of the younger mechs did point out to Optimus. Although whether or not he was all for the plan or not- they probably wouldn't know anytime soon. Their fearless leader was difficult to read at times. Even to all of them.

But one thing that he did mention was being intrigued by the new human. Hot Shot and the other younger mechs would take that as a huge win since it basically meant that he was a step away from adopting the little human anyways.

Chapter Text

Of course, unbeknownst to them, their fearless leader had already given Laser Beak a job concerning the new human. Intel gathering.

His exact orders were to collect as much information on the girl as possible and report back to him whenever he could. And it was apparently a job that Laser Beak took very seriously since the next time he reported to Optimus he had some new stuff to show the mech.

After Optimus got rid of the others and locked himself in his quarters so that he could view what he'd brought for him.

One of the first things that Laser Beak managed to show him, was some carefully collected video of the human in a half dressed state. Which was embarrassing, but as he went to fast forward things a bit, Laser Beak squawked at him to watch. It was important.

And to be perfectly honest, Optimus balked a little bit since the girl wasn't in a...good or even totally proper state at the moment. But after Laser Beak assured him that nothing terribly questionable was shown- he relented despite his instinct to look away.

And Laser Beak was right.

Nothing terribly questionable was shown. It was simply the girl's bare back.

Which he was about to question Laser Beak on the importance of seeing; when he saw the girl lift her long dark hair out of the way, revealing scars, both old and new.

Deep, jagged, torn pieces of barely knitted together flesh that looked alarmingly vivid and raw to him.

The top ones overlapping with various others that looked months, and even years old. All of which mapped out a story of pain and agony the likes of which even he had probably never seen before on another living being.

And that was really saying something since he was well over twenty five thousand years old. Especially so for someone who had been at war for a vast majority of those years.

Still, as horrifying as the scars on the human's back were- they were also oddly fascinating to him.

His warrior programing couldn't help but admire someone so fragile, who had likely gone through all kinds of hell, and somehow managed to survive it all in fairly one piece.

He couldn't help it. As a fighter- he admired strength, courage, determination and many other attributes that he rarely saw in anyone outside of his own kind.

Why if he didn't know any better, he would absolutely swear that the girl was another Prime! She certainly had acted like one during her fight with the Decepticons.

Another thing that he noticed was that she wore dog tags on a slender chain around her neck.

He'd had to look up some information on them since he wasn't sure that they represented the same thing on Earth as they did on Cybertron- and once he had the information that he was looking for- he hummed thoughtfully as he watched the girl remove the tags from inside of her new shirt.

Making sure that they were where they could be seen...just like a soldier would.

It was an odd habit for a kid to have. But it was understandable, he supposed. If the tags bore the names of people close to her heart whom weren't alive anymore. But since he didn't know that for certain then he settled in to watch a bit more. Though he did file the small bit of information away for later examination.

She had lovely eyes. He noted a little bit later on as he watched her interact with Rad outside.

Her eyes sparkled like neon blue miniature stars whenever she smiled or laughed. The color would even darken a bit, becoming a vivid shade of blue not totally unlike his own optics whenever something had her deep in thought or angry.

For the moment though, he simply enjoyed watching her run Rad around his yard playing together since it was something that he rarely got to see any of the kids do while they visited the base. He was simply usually too busy to sit down somewhere and watch them play their games. Unlike some of the others.

So honestly this was a treat for him.

The two of them had declared 'war' on one another a short time ago in the video. And while he'd initially been somewhat concerned- he wasn't anymore since the two had laid their war plans out for their opponent. And both kids were at present using what was called, water guns, to fight one another.

Rad was losing. Pitifully, he might add.

The boy simply couldn't stop laughing long enough to really retaliate at all against the girl whom had cornered him behind a tree and flushed him out with a variety of jokes and water gun assault.

Rad tried to escape, but was caught around the waist by the girl who promptly play 'body slammed' him onto the ground and then squirted him with her water gun until the sputtering and laughing boy was totally soaked.

"Looks like I win again, giggle box." The girl said as she reached down and helped Rad up off of the ground. The boy's laughter slowly died down as he tried to catch his breath. His expression was exuberant in only the way that a child's could be as he gazed up at the girl.

"That was fun. You're so good at warfare Ichigo! Maybe you could give me some pointers?" Rad asked hesitantly.

"Sure," The girl said slowly, something in her expression shifting from lighthearted and happy to guarded in the span of nanoseconds. "My first tip is try not to laugh next time. Sound generally tends to give your position away when your trying to sneak up on someone for an ambush."

The boy nodded his head soberly in understanding. "Okay."

"The next tip that I can give you- is know your enemy. And I don't mean just bits and pieces of information either. Know their personality, watch them, study their habits, know their favorite and most destructive attacks-"

Optimus blinked and leaned forward a little bit. Suddenly understanding that the girl wasn't just giving Rad tips on how to win their next water gun fight. She was also giving him tips on how to get the better of others. Of the Decepticon's.

She gave some pretty sound advice too. Knowing your enemy on such a deep level helped you to avoid certain attacks and tragedies.

"Alright!" Rad said and then focused his eyes on her. The boy must have caught on to her, because his smile became a little bit less happy, and became a tad bit more brittle or strained.

"But most of all..." Optimus couldn't help but tense up a little bit in dread as she then said, "Leave beating up the baddies to me." He went almost lax with relief for a second, but the feeling of dread remained as Rad asked why he needed to leave beating the baddies up to her.

He hinted that he had other friends who liked to beat baddies up too, which made Optimus's spark fill with warmth as the girl simply told him that she was a guardian. It was her job to beat up baddies so that other people didn't have to.

It was after hearing her say this that Optimus realized that he and the new human seemed to have a lot more in common than he had initially thought. Which was why after he finished going through Laser Beaks footage, he decided to go for a little bit of a drive so that he could think over some stuff.

It was late, she noted absently as she walked down the quickly darkening street away from her aunt and uncle's home. It had been about a week since she'd come here. And despite being resolved to be pissed about how her dad had sent her away so suddenly- she couldn't exactly say that she didn't understand his reasons any.

She got into enough trouble with her Soul Reaper work.

She didn't need human trouble on top of everything else.

But she hadn't been able to back down this time. She hadn't bothered to care all that much who she was messing with either. Or to even care whether or not he and his henchmen could actually follow through with their dumb threats.

After all, it wasn't as if she hadn't dealt with yakuza's before. Though she usually sent them running, screaming, away from her within minutes of kicking their asses.

But this time- she hadn't managed to do the same to the new guys. For some weird reason, they had been made of much sterner stuff. And yeah, she had beat the holy hell out of them. Which had been kind of fun.

But she had absolutely hated the drive by shooting that had occurred barely an hour after she had gone home for the day. And if not for the bullets lodged in one of her lungs, and another that had managed to shatter one of her knees- she probably would have gone after those mother fuckers and snapped their necks for daring to attack her home in such a way.

It was only pure blind luck that her dad hadn't been there at the time. But man had he been pissed when he'd finally came home with her sisters.

The only reason she wasn't currently laid up in a hospital bed was because her dad had called Orihime to come and heal her. However while her friend had been doing that, her dad had been calling some relatives that she had known nothing at all about and talked to them about having her come and stay with them for a while.

He hadn't specified how long she would be here. But according to how miffed he'd been about his house being turned into swiss cheese by a bunch of thugs- she would calculate her odds at going home soon to be practically non existent.

Still, it wasn't as if the time away from home was necessarily a bad thing.

Kisuke and the others had promised to keep an eye on things. And to personally tear the yakuza's limb from limb for her. Besides, she sort of needed some down time from being a Soul Reaper to catch up on her school work and stuff anyways.

And it wasn't as if learning that she had family outside of her dad and sisters was a terrible thing. Quite the contrary, the Whites had been really nice and accommodating of her thus far. And she really liked getting to know her younger cousin, Rad.

He was a sweet kid for someone who was barely three and a half years younger than herself.

And to be honest, when she had been told that she had a younger cousin, she had been expecting someone a little bit less...nice and maybe a bit more annoying.

But Rad had surprised her the moment that she'd walked through the door to his home by running up to her and introducing himself and then bombarding her with all kinds of questions.

The typical kid kind of stuff.

He had wanted to know her likes, dislikes, favorite colors, foods, music, movies ect. He had asked her so many questions that her head had felt as if it had actually spun for a little while there. He'd even decided to have an impromptu sleep over in her room that same night.

She knew this because he'd nearly scared the hell out of her crawling into her bed with her. She hadn't realized it right then, but Rad was a very affectionate kid. Very. Affectionate.

And due to her many, many years of conditioning via her dad's random ambushes- it had taken nearly every ounce of control that she had to not fling the younger kid across the room like a rag doll in a fit of temper.

Thankfully, she hadn't actually flung him across the room like her virgin mind had pretty much screamed at her to. But she had been just a tad bit upset with him. After all, what the hell was a thirteen your old boy doing crawling in bed with a girl in the first frigging place anyways?

Did he not even realize how wrong it was for him to crawl into her bed?

He hadn't until she had pointed out why it was wrong. Rad had been entirely focused on just getting to know her. And thankfully, nothing else.

Which had been a relief to her since she really didn't want to get perved on by her cousin. That was simply a whole new level of fucked up that she just didn't have the patience to deal with. Especially while she was suffering from jet lag and was utterly exhausted.

Still, in the end she had wound up staying up part of that first night talking with the boy until he finally dozed off.

Reaching the corner of the street, she paused for a second to check out her surroundings. She was a fair distance from the house and her family now. And since it was getting darker by the minute, many people were calling their kids inside to settle in for the night.

Which meant that she was more or less alone since Rad was too busy doing his homework to bother following her out this time.

Taking her first real breath of freedom in nearly a week, she couldn't help but smile a little bit as she decided to go for a run and try and work off some of her excess energy before she had to go back.