Bombus

Chapter 3

  "It sucks being cooped up in a VW all day, huh? Is there anyone that can help you?" We were walking through the woods now while following paths joggers and hikers didn't really use this time of year. Bumblebee just pointed at me, and Charlie shook her head. "No, I mean help help. Do you have a family? You know, like a mom, dad, siblings. You all love each other." Charlie paused but kept walking. "Or drive each other crazy and you can't wait to get away and start a whole new life."

  Something began to spark under one of Bee's chest plates, and I stopped Charlie so that she could translate for me. The robot apparently only knew English so far, so he didn't quite know what I was saying with my hands. However, he seemed to get a vague idea of what I was saying as he tapped where the sparks were coming from.

  "Alex wants to know if you'll let them take a look at it, see if they can fix it." Charlie said and Bumblebee paused. "They'll be gentle. Promise." There was hesitation, but the big robot sat down, and Charlie shrugged off her backpack that no doubt had tools in it. She handed me what I needed to get the plate off, and taking a look inside, I saw more sparks. "Wow!" Charlie gasped, seeing the strange parts inside that I had seen a few of when repairing the beetle.

  I signed to my sister, and she looked up at Bee.

  "Could you lay down?" And the robot did to allow me to reach inside and feel for what I saw just a few seconds before. Feeling around for a bit, I found it and gently pushed it to the side before hearing a noise and jumping back to not lose my hand. Good news: I wouldn't have lost my hand. Bad news: something was creating light and building a holographic image of a massive robot yards above us, and I had no clue what or who it was.

  "B-127, I pray this message finds you," The robot spoke while his image was glitching. "our war rages on....planet Earth. Survival...." It was glitching even more as some of the audio was missing. "Your mission- soldier. I-" Then everything cut out as the light turned off, and we were all quiet for a few seconds.

  "Are you okay?" Charlie sounded off as she stepped closer. "Who was that? That voice, he said something about a-a-a war. Do you remember anything?" Bee made a noise while sitting up, his head still higher than us as we stood right next to him. "Is the VW beetle some kind of disguise? Are you hiding from something? ....Are you scared?" And Bee just looked down and away from us.

  A plate lifted on his torso and he started fumbling with the radio that was there but nothing but static was coming through.

  "It's broken. It's okay. I think we can help. Let's go home. Alex, you wanna put that back on?" Charlie waved her hand to the yellow piece of metal on the ground, and I nodded before picking it up and putting it back onto Bee's chest.

~

  Hanging over the side of the car, I could hear The Breakfast Club playing in the background while Charlie was showing the robot different movies and even the ASL books since the big guy had shown interest in them.

  "Alex, do you see this?" Looking up, I saw Charlie standing behind the massive robot that had his fist in the air like he was seeing on the TV. Chuckling as the credits began to roll, I turned back to get the radio out. "You can pop in another one if you want." Charlie said while walking over to me to check on my progress.

  "Woo-hoo! Come on, sweety!" I heard a familiar voice as I pulled out the radio. "You got this, Charlie girl!" I stopped and turned, already seeing my little sister's face glued to the TV screen. "Where are you, Charlie girl?" There was applauding after a splash, and it seemed as if Bee had found footage of an old dive meet. "Hello, Brighton Falls, this is Charlie Watson, future Olympic gold medalist. That was so perfect."

  "Thanks, dad."

  "How do you feel? You're amazing-"

  "No! Why would you play this?" And Charlie seemed to snap out of it as she rushed over to the VHS player and turned it off. Bee took a defensive pose, unsure of why my sister was suddenly raising her voice. "I-I'm sorry, I'm just...." Getting up and hopping out of the corvette, I waved the radio in my hands.

  Carrying over a step stool, Bee stood up, and I went to the top step with the radio in my hands. The plate over where the radio was was still down, so I knocked on it, and Bee had it lift up. Taking out the broken radio, I then put in the new one with Charlie's help.

  Holding my breath, I had no clue if this car radio would be compatible with this giant robot, but I turned it on, and Take On Me began to play from it.

  "Oh, my God! Yes!" Charlie cheered. "It worked!" And Bee began to sway to the music. "How do you know? Man, you got some moves!" Getting down from the stool, I saw Charlie going to a box of her tapes to pull one out. "You know, Bee, music can help us to say what we're feeling. You're gonna love this. It's brand new." My sister got up onto the stool and stuck the tape into the radio.

  The Smiths began to play, and Bee just kind of stood there for a few seconds before ejecting the tape so fast it flew across the garage.

  "....Not a Smiths fan? Okay, um.... Here. Try this." Never Gonna Give You Up barely even played before it was shot into the wall of tools. "Fine." And Charlie went to dig through more of her tapes while Bee became distracted by the vinyls on the shelf. He began to flip through them, and I quickly grabbed his arm to get his attention. He was a big robot- I didn't want him to accidentally break any of them.

  Without thinking, I started to sign to him, but as he was staring at my hands, I remembered that he didn't know sign language, and I turned to Charlie.

  "Those were our dad's." Her face fell as she looked at the shelf of discs. She walked over and picked up the one Bee had just been looking at. "Do you want to hear it?" The robot gave a slight nod and went to the record player. Charlie placed the vinyl down and set the needle on the record before Unchained Melody began to softly play. "We used to listen to this while we were working on our corvette. This was his favorite. He used to say it would make the car feel better." My little sister then turned to the red car in the garage as she was reminiscing.

  "We used to work on this car every weekend together. It was our thing. That tape...." Charlie looked at Bumblebee with tears welling in her eyes. "That was the last time we saw him. He died of a heart attack. And I never really got to say goodbye. You know, I always thought if we could just....finish fixing his car. If we could just get it to start up again....he would hear us. He would hear me." Charlie was crying now, and I grabbed her in a hug. She buried her face into the crook of my neck while holding onto the back of my shirt.

  I could hear Bee moving, and the next thing I knew, Charlie and I were wrapped up in his massive arms. Charlie still cried, but I knew she appreciated the robot's sentiment.