More Than Meets the Eye

|Three|

"Miko, you...want to show Vince around the base? He's...gonna need to get used to it," Jack suggested. The room had been unbearably silent after Optimus had said he would be Vince's guardian, and Jack needed to do something to cut the tension.

"Not really," Miko replied coolly, making Jack give her a look but sighed.

"Alright Vince, my tour won't be nearly as exciting as Miko's, but it'll have to do. I'll show you around."

Vince only nodded, following after Jack and the two disappeared down a hallway. It was silent again for a few seconds until Ratchet looked over at Optimus.

"Optimus, are you certain you want to take on this responsibility?"

Optimus gave Ratchet a sort of "are you doubting my intentions" kind of look. Ratchet went silent and shook his helm. Nobody asked again, though Arcee did bring up a valid point.

"He has his own car, Optimus...with all due respect, we're friends to our charges and partners, but the way we got there was being on curbside duty and being their rides. How would you bond with yours?"

"I am not certain, Arcee," Optimus replied truthfully. "But I will try."

"Good luck," Miko muttered, arms crossed over her chest. Raf was sitting on Bee's shoulder, and Bee knew a little bit of Vince's antics when Raf told him about them. Bee had made an effort to keep Vince away from Raf, which they boy appreciated. He still wasn't sure how to feel about all of this.

"Miko, Raf, may I ask you a question?" Optimus asked, looking over to Miko. She slowly nodded, and Optimus looked to Raf, who nodded as well. Bee gently picked up Raf and set him in the human area. He as well as the other Autobots knew Optimus would prefer to ask when people didn't seem to be trying to eavesdrop, and most of them left, save for Ratchet, who busied himself with something else. Miko was sitting on the makeshift coffee table instead of the couch since Optimus was positioned behind the couch, and Raf cautiously took a seat beside her. Optimus waited for Raf to be comfortably situated before continuing.

"What is your history with Vince?" he asked gently, hoping he wasn't upsetting anything by doing so.

Miko and Raf exchanged glances.

"Well, ever since I've transferred, I seem to always be the target of his spitwads. Like, what are we in, the second year of elementary school? He's harassed Raf too. Even Jack."

"Sometimes...Vince trips me in the hall. Nothing that bad really, but it happens. He does other stuff too sometimes...it always makes me paranoid whenever he's around and I always need to watch out for my stuff. He's taken it before...at the end of the day. Jack confronted him the next day and it was in his locker."

"He's the school bully I guess," Miko muttered. "But he's never, like, punched someone."

"Yet," Raf mumbled under his breath. Optimus had caught what he said and frowned slightly.

"I will see to it that he does not behave in such a way at the base."

Raf looked almost relieved.

***

"And over here...just storage. Nothing terribly exciting." Jack gestured to a hallway of storage rooms. "A few hangars, where the Autobots will spar with each other sometimes."

"Mhm," Vince replied distractedly, trying to look enthused. Really, he was just a little intimidated. The two kept walking for a bit. Jack felt incredibly awkward as he tried to not make it awkward by talking, which he felt it made it more awkward.

"And over here...oh, yeah, the main energon line which runs the GroundBridge. We had to fix it when the bridge had malfunctioned and Optimus and Arcee were stuck in the arctic and scraplets had invaded the base." Jack shuddered slightly. "That was not fun."

"Scraplets?" Vince asked, suddenly becoming interested again when he head the name of his new guardian.

"Yeah, Cybertronian creatures small enough to be held," Jack replied. "They seemed fine at first, but then we found out they have an 'exquisite' taste for anything metal...especially living metal."

"Really? Interesting."

"Yeah. But everyone's fine now, obviously."

The two walked around through the base a bit more, nothing wasn't especially exciting so there wasn't much conversation, which Jack eventually decided was okay. Besides, he was still trying to figure out why Vince hadn't been harassing him about racing or anything else yet.

"Hey, Darby?"

"Yeah?"

"What's...what's Optimus like?"

Jack raised an eyebrow at Vince's question. He wasn't quite sure how to respond and stopped walking as he thought. Vince stopped beside him, looking at him expectantly as he waited for an answer.

"Optimus...is a leader. I mean, he just doesn't show too much emotion. Not that he's emotionless, he's just...stoic. I mean...that's not what makes him a great leader, it's just...something about him. But he cares about his team and about us too. He can also fight well, but that's aside from the point. He tries to do what's best for our planet...I'm sorry, I don't know how much of that you followed."

"Enough," Vince replied with a faint smile. Jack smiled back. Maybe Vince being around wouldn't be too bad.

***

It wasn't long before Vince had to rush home. He couldn't stay nearly as long as he understood the others to, and Jack was covering a late shift at work and he wanted to go home and do homework or take a nap beforehand or something Arcee thought he had said as a reason to leave. She transformed and allowed Jack on before pulling out, Vince behind her in his car. They sped back to the city of Jasper, Nevada, and Vince broke off from them eventually when his street came up, which Arcee made a note to check on her way back.

"So, what do you think?" Jack asked as they approached his house.

"Think about what?" Arcee replied as she slowed and turned to his driveway.

"Vince."

"I don't have much of an opinion," she replied truthfully as she turned off her engine and let Jack get off. He shrugged as he walked over to the garage door and pulled it up. He didn't say anything else as he led her inside the garage, closing the door again so the neighbors wouldn't see a portal open up in his garage.

"GroundBridge?" he asked when she didn't call base for one.

"I think I'll drive back," she replied. He nodded and watched her holoform appear again before he opened the garage door and quickly disappeared, trying to make it seem as if Arcee's hologram had somehow done it herself. She pulled out and drove down the street, driving over to where she had seen Vince drive down. She scanned down that way, soon spotting his car in a driveway. She sped off again, back toward the large rock formation that was Autobot Outpost Omega One.

~~~

Well, long time no see!

I know, I know.

I suck at updating.

It doesn't help that I have writers block for absolutely all of my books right now.

Also for some reason my works won't sync with each other so I can't write on mobile because what I write on my computer won't show up there, which is actually very annoying. Wattpad needs to get its act together.

But hey, thanks for being somewhat patient! :>

Until next time

-BP