Temptest let herself stay offlined longer than usual, but the moment she stepped into the main room, she knew it was going to be a long day.
Shockwave was speaking to Raf, holding him up to the light and examining him with a narrowed optic. Soundwave was uncharacteristically bothered by that as he argued to make the scientist put his charge down. Temptest could hear Ratchet and Knockout yelling at each other from the medbay. Megatron was shoving a piece of dark energon at Megatronus's face and Optimus was trying to stop him.
Arce was just sitting there, arms crossed, and watching the whole thing with a bored expression.
"Err," Temptest walked up to her. "This looks... productive?"
"I'm just glad the rest of my team isn't here to make it worse," Arcee replied.
Temptest winced. "You miss them?"
"Not really," Arcee shrugged. "But I'll be happy to see them when we get back."
"If you get back," Temptest joked. "Seems our teams are a bit distracted right now."
"Yeah," Arcee laughed a little. "I never thought I'd say this, but I wish Airachnid would come back. She was keeping everyone on track before she left for patrol."
Temptest leaned against the wall and frowned. Airachnid. Temptest rubbed her face as she realized that Airachnid was never at fault for abandoning them, but that the spider femme had taken Temptest's scrap regardless. Unfairly.
She groaned.
And the others? They all hid this from her.
Temptest couldn't even bring herself to be mad at them. After all, she'd been needlessly furious with Airachnid for no reason this whole time. A great sum of guilt and shame saturated her spark and Temptest looked at her pedes.
"You good?" Arcee leaned over a bit as she looked at the other femme in concern. "You went quiet."
Temptest shook her helm. "It's nothing. I should go out... for patrol stuff."
She pushed against the wall and left Arcee, headed for the cave exit with a small frown. She needed to apologize to Airachnid. After transforming and taking off into the sky, Temptest zipped around the skyline for a while before finding Airachnid moving at a sluggish pace in her helicopter alternative mode.
"Temptest," Airachnid greeted in surprise. "What are you doing out here?"
"I know," Temptest started. "I know Megatronus sent you away to monitor me and Optimus."
Airachnid's fans sputtered for a moment. "I– I didn't–"
"Can we land?" Temptest asked, keeping her voice carefully controlled.
Airachnid lowered herself to the ground and transformed. Temptest did the same and walked closer, her fists clenched against her side as she fought to control her guilt.
"I treated you terribly," Temptest admitted. "You never did anything wrong, and even when I was a glitch, you never got mad at me. I... I'm really sorry."
"No, dear, I'm sorry," Airachnid reached across the space between them and hugged her. "You had every right to feel betrayed... and I can't imagine how you feel now that Megatronus has told you. We're trying to find a way to help you."
Temptest let go. "Don't apologize. I feel terrible. You've been alone this whole time, lying, risking your life for me, and I've done nothing but blow up at you for it. You... you're amazingly composed."
Airachnid laughed sadly. "I appreciate that, Temptest, but you should know that I don't hold anything against you. This is Optimus's fault. Now he's kidnapped you again, and you have to work with his copy every day! I can't imagine what you're going through, and I can take a few insults if it means helping my friend."
"A few?" Temptest shook her helm. "I was horrible."
Airachnid sighed. "You aren't going to let this go."
"How could I? I verbally abused—!"
"Hold on," Airachnid shushed her. "I'll let you make it up to me, okay. Tonight. You steal some of Makeshift's high-grade from Soundwave. You, me, and the guys will go out and party like old times."
Temptest blinked in surprise. "You want to do what now?"
Airachnid laughed. "You really look surprised. I remember you being quite the partier back on Cybertron."
"Yeah, but you weren't," Temptest pointed out. "You were weird as frag. You wanted to—"
"I swear if you bring up the scraplets again, I'll throw you in space myself," Airachnid groaned. "I was young! It was stupid!"
"But now you want to party?"
"It's been a stressful few months," Airachnid complained. "I need a break before Megatronus sends us to another dimension to rescue our rivals from our other rivals. Are you in or not?"
Temptest smiled. "I guess so."
▪️◾◼⬛◼◾▪️
The trouble with stealing high-grade from Soundwave was that he was Soundwave. Before their exodus to Earth, Soundwave was in charge of the entire Decepticons intelligence and communcations networks. His job wasn't just to oversee one major department, but two. He had optics on the back of his helm and audio receivers connected to everyone else's helm.
The habit seemed to stick. Soundwave knew what was up with everyone, all the time. Temptest hadn't even stepped into the room she was literally sharing with all the Decepticons when she got the first worried thought that he already knew what she was up to. He couldn't really be mad at her if he found out. After all, anyone who knew her before the exodus knew she didn't drink high-grade, but that didn't mean he wouldn't report her to Megatronus.
And Megatronus would kick her aft.
Temptest looked around about five more times before sneaking in. She stepped over the cot she'd been recharging in and then found herself looking under his cot. Nothing.
There was no way he stashed it in his subspace, and he didn't know this base well enough to hide it in another room. Temptest frowned at his berth for a moment before leaving to search her only other guess as to the location of the confiscated high-grade.
The medbay.
Temptest made sure Soundwave was busy working at the monitor with the other smart bots before going in. She stuck to the walls as she went around the room, making sure she had a hiding place to dive into in case someone walked in. That someone being Soundwave.
Clang! Temptest screeched and hopped back, arms flailing as she panicked to remember what hiding even meant. She stood there for a moment in terror before noticing that she had kicked a small can of oil.
"Oh, frag you," Temptest muttered, glaring at the can and walking further into the medbay.
"Beep whiirrlll, beep beep."
This time she didn't react as much, only swiveling around quickly to look at Bumblebee with wide optics. He was sitting in the middle of the room on a cot, watching her with raised brows.
"Huh?"
He cleared his throat. "I said: if you're breaking a rule, don't blame it on the can."
Temptest stood up straight. "Right, yeah. But I'm not breaking any rules. I'm chill. It's all cool."
Bumblebee didn't look convinced.
"You wouldn't happen to have seen a large crate decorated in pink ribbons and slash monkey stickers, would you?"
Bumblebee tilted his helm. "That's oddly specific, but, uh, yeah. I saw Shockwave throw it in the trash when he was digging through the cabinet for pliers."
"Whew," Temptest walked over to the trash can and opened the lid.
Sure enough, the crate was sitting in there, perfectly preserved and unopened. She grinned and looked up at Bumblebee. He was a pretty chill dude. Between her, Airachnid, and Knockout, the party might be pretty boring. Temptest tilted her helm at him.
"What are you doing tonight?" she asked.
Bumblebee shrugged. "Probably sitting here until Ratchet finds something to replace my leg with."
Temptest winced. "Right, uh, well do you want to come to a party tonight? Take your mind off things?"
"Err," Bumblebee cringed. "This is not a good time for a party."
"Exactly."
Bumblebee sat there for a minute before sighing and nodding. "I guess it couldn't hurt. Team bonding, right?"
"That's the spirit!" Temptest pulled the high-grade out of the trash can enthusiastically and stuffed it in her subspace. "We'll be back later tonight to kidnap you from Ratchet."
After she left the medbay, Temptest found Airachnid waiting outside with a hole to bury the over-synthedized energon in until dark. Arcee was standing next to her with a bemused expression and crossed arms.
"Hope you don't mind, but I invited Arcee," Airachnid told her. "She's pretty cool in other dimensions."
"I can't be believe I'm saying this, but you too," Arcee decided. "And who am I to say no to a good time. Life has been garbage since Darkmount."
"What's Darkmount?" Temptest asked.
Airachnid shrugged. "Basically Omega Supreme."
"Oooh," Temptest nodded. "Okay, well I invited Bumblebee. He helped me find the high-grade."
"Cool," Airachnid grinned. "Knockout invited Optimus."
Temptest and Arcee turned to her in horror.
"The point is to avoid authority!" Temptest screeched.
Arcee shook her helm. "Optimus doesn't even like parties!"
Airachnid put her servos up in defense. "Not my fault. Knockout did it."
Temptest groaned. "So we invited every Autobot except Ratchet? How is that fair?"
"Totally fair," Arcee assured her. "Ratchet either rats everyone out or gets way too drunk. He shouldn't be there."
Knockout suddenly ran through the passageway and burst outside, surprising the three of them. He was out of breath and his optics wide.
"They did it!"