Spots

Sam frowned slightly in confusion as the door was opened by a man he didn’t recognize. “Uh… Is Mikaela ready?”

The man moved aside, letting him in the small apartment. His sandy brown hair was receding, giving him an imposing widow’s peak. It suited the blue collar employment look of his well-worn jeans and work boots. Looking outside, he commented mildly, “A limo?”

“Yeah,” Sam bobbed his head in a quick nod, fussing with the left cuff of his tuxedo jacket. The man’s simple t-shirt had him feeling overdressed and self-conscious. “It’s the prom?”

The questioning lilt to his last word asked if the decision had been a good one. The man nodded, slipping his hands into his pants pockets. “You seem like a good kid, Witticky.”

“It’s uh, Witwicky.”

“Sam!” Mikaela’s exclamation was pleased. Her approach was lost mostly to the inattention of a teenage male studying the latest in halter-top formal wear… and what it barely covered.

“You ready to go?”

He rapidly lifted his eyes to her face, flushing slightly at the knowing amusement. “Uh, yeah,” he stuttered out. Holding out a hand reflexively due to ingrained manners, “It was good to meet you, Mr…”

Mikaela sighed. “Dad, this is Sam. Sam, this is my father.”

“Your father?” Sam’s eyes asked all the questions he wasn’t willing to voice. “Of course,” he followed up, trying to figure out if Mikaela had a good dentist. Really, he was her dad? “Your father… I can certainly see the family resemblance.”

“Are you hitting on me, boy?”

Sam paled, stepping back slightly as he stumbled for a response. Mikaela sighed at her father’s sense of humor, grabbing Sam by the arm and leading him out the door. “Bye, Dad. Don’t wait up.”

Settled into the backseat of the limo as the driver pulled away, Sam finally asked, “So that was your dad.”

Mikaela just nodded, uncomfortable.

“He doesn’t look…” He tapered off, already wincing at what he’d begun to voice.

“Like a felon?” She bit out, eyes flashing.

Wondering exactly how a pissed off girlfriend could be scarier than a Decepticon, Sam rapidly backtracked. “No! Not what I meant… Definitely not what I was going to say… Just, uh… So you take after your Mom?”

“Who knows?” she responded. “And I don’t want to talk about it.”

 

***
 

Dropped off at the end of his driveway, Sam waited for the limo to pull away into the neighborhood and back to wherever they went when your paid time was up. Spotting no immediate observers, he kicked at the gravel on the side of the drive.

The faintly reproving beep he received for his efforts told him that even though his parents hadn’t waited up, someone had. Jacket unbuttoned, tie hanging loose, Sam frowned at the brand new scuff on the shoes that had come with his rented tux.

His approach put him at the right front tire of his Camaro. Slipping his left hand free of the trouser pocket, Sam slid just his fingertips along the cool metal.

“That mission,” he confessed quietly, “was definitely not a success.”

With a heavy sigh, Sam acknowledged the late, or more honestly incredibly early, hour. “Goodnight, Bee.”

 

***
 

Sun was glaring in the multiple windows that bordered his room. Grumbling in displeasure, Sam curled himself deeper into his covers. Burrowing his head under his pillow, he tried to ignore the knocking at his door.

Finally, the person acknowledged that he wasn’t going to answer and the sound ceased. Huffing in satisfaction, Sam was prepared to drop back into a recuperative sleep.

A sleep completely tossed away at the sound of his door opening.

“Sam?”

“Dad,” he whined from beneath obscuring cloth. “Tired…”

“Sam, I need you to get up.”

Wriggling a hand free, he pulled the edge of his twisted sheets off his head. Bleary eyes blinked at the far too serious for so early expression on his Dad’s face. Admitting he was awake was apparently enough.

His dad sighed before starting directly onto his topic. “Someone tried to steal your car last night.”

“WHAT?!?!”

Sam’s screech echoed in the room. He was vertical in seconds, sheets and comforter spilling from the bed to the floor as his pillow bounced off his computer monitor. Body half hanging out the rapidly opened window, Sam finally gasped in a relieved breath as he saw his car… his sentient alien robotic car… sitting safe in the drive.

“Now, son… Calm down.”

Ron Witwicky could understand the extreme concern. It was the reason, carefully discussed with his wife, that they hadn’t informed Sam when he’d arrived home. They might have granted their child the independence of believing no one had waited up, but neither had slept well the night before.

“Calm down?” Sam’s voice rose in incredulity. “Someone tried to steal my car? These phrases don’t connect well, Dad.”

He was hopping on one foot, trying to struggle into a pair of jeans and tangling himself in his haste.

“Sam,” Ron cautioned, watching his only child delay himself further in his rush. “You told us yourself that the government had security precautions put on that vehicle.”

Sam faltered, nearly tripping over the untied laces of his sneakers. His brain stuttered, trying to remember exactly what he’d told his parents about the Camaro. Oh, yeah, expression of appreciation.

“Yeah… Uh, sure.”

“And,” his dad continued, “I said someone tried. You may want to check it for damage and I’ll call the police.”

Sam was nodding, even as he brushed past his father and took the stairs two at a time. His rapid descent had him crouching as he tripped off the bottom step, but he was off again just as quickly.

Scuffing to a halt on the gravel drive, Sam winced at the sound of smaller rocks bouncing up and impacting off metal. The reproving groan of shocks had him frowning as he crouched directly in front of the bumper. His hand reached out, stroking the autobot symbol that decorated the nose of his car in a mirror of his first touch to Bumblebee.

“Are you okay?”

Sam’s quiet question was met with a snort of disgust in the form of a radiator fan stutter. He glanced around quickly and then slipped to the driver’s side of the car. The door clicked unlocked, springing open just as his hand reached for the handle. With a last glance at the house, Sam slipped into the leather that, as it always had, molded just to him.

“Bumblebee?”

The engine rolled over and caught. It idled for a moment before purring into silence once more. Sam couldn’t help the fond grin that stretched his face, erasing some of the anxiety that had brought him from exhausted sleep into startling clarity within the space of a few seconds.

“I get it. No one’s taking you unless you want to go.” Sam ran his hands over the steering wheel in a quick caress before asking with only the faintest doubt, “You don’t, do you?”

The air conditioning farted a breath of humid air at him.

“Okay, okay,” Sam uttered, discarding once more his uncertainty at the wealth fate had afforded him. “I just can’t believe someone tried to steal you from my parent’s driveway. Dad wants to make a police report, not that they’re all that helpful.”

Sam’s last words were a mutter of resentment, still bitter over his last encounter with the local police department. “But,” he continued more brightly, “if there’s anything I can, uh, find out, that might help them…”

Bumblebee was completely silent for a long minute. Sam was just beginning to shift, noticing that for the first time the seat beneath him wasn’t adjusting to suit his altered position.

“Bee?”

Finally, there was a faint humming, like a vastly exaggerated computer processor. Sam caught a reflection in the glass of the driver’s side window. He startled for a moment, before realizing that it must have been what Bumblebee recorded from the night prior.

A darkly clothed figure approached the car, peering closely at the house, before turning his attention to the door and its lock. After a few moments of unsuccessful attempts, the man looked straight in the window.

Sam jerked back in shock, forgetting for a moment that the recording couldn’t see him. Then, as an unexpected fury burned through his veins like a flash-fire, he growled out, “Oh, fuck no.”

The engine growled back to life in startlement, even as Sam reached for the gear shift. The radio trilled a note of question that the young man didn’t answer, backing out of his driveway at a speed faster than recommended and sending more than a few rocks spraying into his father’s prized grass.

For once, abandoning his usual habit of non-verbal communication, Bumblebee expressed himself in words to the human who had always understood him without.

“Sam?”

Hands gripped the wheel tighter than necessary, spinning around corners in a reckless disregard of traffic law that the autobot muted only slightly for safety’s sake. The seatbelt that extended, wrapping protectively around the human and locking with a decisive click, was barely noticed.

Sam was grinding his teeth, a vague observation that was flagged by Bumblebee’s processor as not optimum. “This is not fucking happening to me,” Sam muttered to himself as he practically threw his car through the mostly empty streets of an early Saturday morning.

Bumblebee’s engine growled aggressively. In response to his human’s obvious distress, his processor re-prioritized the identification of the human that had so futilely attempted to access his interior.

As the brakes slammed them both to a screeching halt in a part of town far less privileged than where Sam lived, the identification came back. It had registered a match in the State of California prisoner database.

David Barnes.

Bumblebee grumbled to himself in dissatisfaction as Sam rushed from his seat and took the steps to the home’s front door with long strides.

 

***
 

His repeated slamming of his fist against the front door finally brought an answer. Sam barely acknowledged Mikaela’s disheveled, sleepy presence.

Pushing past her to gain entrance to the residence, he demanded, “Where is he?”

“Sam?” she asked in shock, glancing out the door. She was comforted only minutely by Bumblebee at the curb.

“Where the fuck is he?” Sam demanded again, rounding on her with ire gleaming in his brown eyes.

“Sam? What?” Mikaela could barely manage those few words. She had acknowledged, however silently, that Sam had been planning the usual end to a prom night when they’d parted last… But, she hadn’t been ready for that with him despite their closeness.

“Where. Is. Your. Father?” Sam bit out harshly.

It was so unlike him that Mikaela actually took a step back from him. Anger rising to answer his own, she stiffened her resolve. “Why?” she asked defensively.

“Because he fucking tried to steal my car!” Sam exploded, stepping further towards the interior of the residence, intent on seeking out his prey personally.

Mikaela grabbed his arm in a sudden movement, fingernails digging in just enough to force Sam’s attention. “What did you say?” she asked. Her voice was low and dangerous.

“You heard me,” he replied, shaking off her grip at the loss of more than a few skin cells. The faintly scratched furrows were enough of a sting to switch his attention. “And I helped you protect him… For this?”

“I don’t know what you think happened…” Mikaela started.

Sam cut her words off with a sharp slash of his hand. Mikaela flinched back, a movement that Sam didn’t even react to as he accused, “Bumblebee showed me… Your father. Tried to break into my car.”

“Oh, Bumblebee showed you,” Mikaela retorted, crossing her arms over her chest.

The movement focused Sam’s mind for just a second on something other than his fury. The arms cradled just under her breasts, pressing them against the thin cotton of her pajama top in a way that highlighted her lack of bra. He was still blinking himself off the tangent as she spit her next words at him.

“And just because Bumblebee showed you that made it the truth.”

“You think he’s lying?” Sam’s question was filled with incredulous shock.

“I trust my father,” Mikaela ground out.

“And I trust Bumblebee.”

“More than me?” Mikaela asked.

It was a damning question. Even more so because Sam knew there was only one answer. And he couldn’t force his voice to deliver it.

But Mikaela knew the word that lurked unspoken on Sam’s tongue. “Get out of my house.”

“Mikaela!” Sam cried. “Your dad tried to steal my car!”

“Get out,” she demanded, voice choking, “And don’t come back again.”

Sam’s expression hardened. “Fine,” he bit off. “Protect your father… But if he ever comes near Bumblebee again, I’ll…”

The threat drifted off into silence. Mikaela, angry herself and pushing, insisted, “You’ll what?”

Sam didn’t respond at first, gaze flicking down at his feet. When he looked back up, Mikaela’s breath caught as just for an instant she imagined the flare of deadly red in those chocolate depths.

“There’s more to me, too, than meets the eye.”

Spinning on his heel, Sam stomped out of the home, no more satisfied than when he’d entered. Knowing, somehow instinctually, that he couldn’t go back inside his friend with this much pent up rage, he swung.

The dented mailbox stared back accusingly as Sam shook his aching fist. The faint rev of an engine drew his attention and shame broke through his reactive behavior. He crossed around to the driver’s side of his car, sliding into the seat like he would into the lap of a particularly caring and protective individual.

In a sense, he was.

Curled, his right side to the steering wheel and feet tucked up almost beneath him, his forehead slumped against the head rest. Despite the clear glass in front of his face, Sam’s blank stare registered none of the environment outside his car. Finally, Sam quietly asked, “Just take me home? Please?”

Bumblebee purred into motion. The seat shifted, supporting as Sam shook in reaction to the thwarted adrenaline draining from his system. Soft music covered any sound that Sam might have made, a wordless tune reassuring him that he wasn’t alone.

Finis

 

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