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sakon76This is, I hope the final piece of the "Ghost Stories" arc. Because I really would like to be writing other things. And it's double length! Very rough, but hopefully still comprehensible....
Crossroads at Midnight
by K. Stonham
prereleased 14th October 2007
"The Devil Went Down to Georgia" was playing on the juke box as Sam entered the diner, and for a minute he suspected his partner of collusion. A quick glance backward with a raised eyebrow at the yellow vehicle, though, gave him the radiated impression of denial and innocence.
That lasted just as long at it took for two more cars, one a Lamborghini Murcielago as golden yellow as the Camaro, and the other a red Dome Zero painted with orange and gold flames, to screech around a corner and do neat parallel drifts into the parking lot, ending up just a couple feet from one another and the black-striped Camaro. Sam rolled his eyes and let the diner door drift closed behind him just as the two vehicles' drivers--who may or may not have been there a moment before--exited their vehicles, smiling and laughing at one another.
It was real easy to find the crowd of racers whose vehicles were parked outside. They were gathered around a few tables in the corner, looking out the window at the new arrivals, some of them practically drooling over the admittedly very shiny supercars. Sam, who actually knew said supercars, was less impressed by them. He sauntered over. "Hey," he said, "mind if I join you?"
By the time Sunstreaker and Hot Rod got over themselves, actually remembered they were on a mission, and entered the diner, Sam had made friends with the four fellow car aficionados at his table, waved off the waitress' offer of a menu, and was defending the honor of his 2009 Camaro. "Sure, it's a little old by now," he admitted, amused, thinking of how old Bumblebee really was, "but it's tuned as sweet as you please, and I've never had a smoother, faster ride." No need to say that Bumblebee had not only been his first car, but his only car. All matters of whether Bumblebee was his or if he was in fact Bumblebee's aside, he'd never wanted another car.
"Oh, excuse me, what are my brother and I?" Sunstreaker demanded through his hologram.
Sam strove for guilelessness. "Pains in the ass?" he suggested. Sunstreaker glowered at him, while Hot Rod stifled a laugh. "Guys, these are Sunny and Rod," he introduced his friends to the racing crowd. "The Lambo and the Zero are theirs."
Hot Rod's hologram wasn't too out of the ordinary, a slender, pale human with an engaging grin, freckles and red hair and the startling blue eyes all the Autobots favored. Sunstreaker, though, suiting his reputation as the Autobots' peacock, was stunning, all rich golden hair and warm sun-tanned skin, a body that Mikaela would have once drooled over, and a face that would have been perfect on the cover of any men's fashion magazine. When the two Autobots had found seats at the other tables full of racers, Tony leaned across the table toward Sam. "Your friend Sunny," he asked in a low, hopeful tone. "Is he single?"
"Sort of," Sam replied. "He hasn't got a steady, if that's what you mean. I'll give you a warning, though: he's an insensitive ass."
Tony grinned back. "Sometimes, who cares?" he asked in reply.
Sam laughed a little. "Good luck, then."
*
It hadn't been much initially, Bumblebee thought, keeping one set of sensors on the diner while scanning the parked vehicles with others. A few reports of illegal street races in mid-Western American towns. There had been some injured bystanders and a few totaled cars with badly injured or killed drivers. Nothing that would seem out of the ordinary for the activity they were engaged in. Except then the property damage and life tolls for each incident had begun increasing beyond the normal, and the eyewitness reports included irregularities, things human cars simply couldn't do: vehicles that soared through the air and smashed down atop others, or crashed through brick buildings, and then drove away without a scratch.
In other words, Decepticons.
Optimus had dispatched several teams of the younger, faster Autobots to fan out through the cities in the calculated path of destruction and intercept the Decepticons. They were to capture them if it was possible, and incapacitate or destroy them if not. So far none of the teams had had any luck, but sooner or later one of them had to. All the teams had at least one human liaison with them to help them get entrance into the local racing sub-cultures. This was because, frankly, even with the external holomatter projectors everyone else had gotten installed for the mission, most of the Autobots still weren't able to fake being human all that well. Bumblebee, having been on Earth the longest of all of them, was one of the best at it, but even with his knack of picking up the nuances of local cultures, he was happy to leave the "meet, greet, and blend" part of the operation to his partner. Sam, as a human, understood humans.
So it wasn't a surprise when they ended up at the outskirts of the town, in the parking lot of a dilapidated drive-in movie theater, at a half hour to midnight. Most of the local racers were gathered, only waiting for a couple more to arrive, and more than a few of them were gathered around Sunstreaker and Hot Rod, checking out their interiors and exteriors while bemused holograms lingered nearby. Bumblebee wasn't bothered by the relative lack of attention; the twins and Hot Rod, among others, had always been flashier than he had. Faster, too, though granted even they couldn't best Blurr in a land speed contest. No one could best Blurr. But he was on another team, and while Bumblebee couldn't outrace Sunstreaker or Hot Rod, he could almost certainly outpace any human vehicle present, being much faster than the purported factory specs for his chosen alt mode.
Holographic fingers shushed along the satin finish of his left front quarter-panel. Holographic jeans touched against him, the weight of an artificial body leaning on him as Sam looked around at the gathered racers before tugging open Bumblebee's door and getting into the driver's seat. "I don't think any of them are the problems," he said, hands running along the steering wheel's leather grip.
"I agree," Bumblebee replied softly. "Maybe the next town?"
"Maybe," Sam agreed.
"Hey, Sam!" Tony jogged up. "Carlos is here and we're ready to start the race."
*
A map of the town was spread out on Hot Rod's hood since he was the one closest to the light post. "Right, listen up, ladies and gents," Carlos instructed the gathered crowd. "Tonight we start here and end up at Big Red Rock on the north side of town. The cops--" and there was a snicker because his father was apparently the chief of police, "--have speed traps set up on the south and west sides, so don't go messing it up for the rest of us, okay? They're at Nelson and Warner, Third and Green, and Main and Bansford." He stabbed a finger at the appropriate points on the maps. "Avoid at all costs. Now, for our newcomers," he said, grinning at Hot Rod, Sunstreaker, and Sam, "house rules are any route goes, any pedestrians injured loses you the game, same if the cops catch you, and property damage incurred costs you off your finish time. You in?"
"We're in," Hot Rod snapped. "See if you can keep up with us."
The grins from the humans clustered around his hood told him they were all thinking the same thing.
"Need maps?" one of the girls, he thought her name was Ellie maybe, asked with a saucy smirk.
"Who needs maps," Sam quipped, "when you have satellite?"
"Well, then." Carlos folded up the map. "Everyone, start your engines."
*
The race itself was uneventful: darkened streets with only a few onlookers, his engine thrumming hot, and friction warming his tires as Sunstreaker drifted around corners. The pleasant heft of inertia and Earth's gravity lent challenge to his perfection, Hot Rod's taunts impetus, and it was so satisfying when he finally arrived at the endpoint seconds ahead of the speedster. Bumblebee wasn't that far behind them, arriving more modestly with most of the rest of the pack, and then there were envied congratulations and discussions of route and technique and it all felt like a waste of Sunstreaker's time.
He didn't like humans the way the rest of the Autobots seemed to. Oh, he appreciated that Earth was their planet and that it really wasn't right for the Decepticons to get to kill them, but even after they'd realized their species wasn't the only sentient one out there, they really had nothing to recommend them as a race. Their species-centricism was stunning and their xenophobia astounding. Sunstreaker knew his opinions weren't popular and so usually kept them to himself, but when he was forced into pointless socializing like this with them--
"You're glowering," Bumblebee told him, his own hologram appearing next to Sunstreaker, arrival unnoticed by any of the humans. "What's wrong?"
"This is pointless," Sunstreaker retorted, gesturing around. "Why do we have to interact with them like this? We're not like they are."
Bumblebee's hologram, shorter than his, with messy dark blond curls, a gentle smile, and a build that hinted at hidden strength, shrugged slightly. "I don't like using the holograms either, but in this case it's to help us catch the Decepticons. We'd be too obvious any other way."
"You like the humans," Sunstreaker accused. "You even have one of your own."
"So you'd like them better if you had a human partner too?" Bumblebee jibed.
"No," Sunstreaker shot back. "I just don't understand why we have to stay here."
Bumblebee's hologram leaned back a little further against Sunstreaker, deliberately in his space. "The Decepticons are targeting them and you know it. Besides, what has any other world got to offer that this one hasn't?"
"Culture. Class. A society built to our scale," Sunstreaker relentlessly ticked off.
"And history with us," Bumblebee agreed. "Most of them not so good," he said pointedly. "On Earth we have the chance to create that history, Sunstreaker."
Sunstreaker laughed. "And, what, be partners with them?" he asked. "Allies?" He shook his head. "You've gone native, Bumblebee. The humans don't like us and probably never will. We have to hide from them. Why are you on their side?"
Bumblebee's humanoid expression was soft and unconcerned. "You say that like compassion's a bad thing," he replied. "You can always leave if you really dislike Earth that much, Sunstreaker. Most of us would understand why."
"I'm not leaving Sideswipe," Sunstreaker replied flatly.
"Well, then, why not at least try to have a good time?" Bumblebee asked. He flashed a sudden bright grin. "You're got more than your share of admirers--car or hologram," he teased.
"Organics," Sunstreaker scoffed, but had to admit at least some of the humans had decent taste. The lines of the alternate mode he and Sideswipe had picked weren't too bad.
"You could always take up painting and sculpture again," Bumblebee told him. "Teach the 'organics' a thing or two."
"I live in terror," Sam said dryly, walking up to the two of them.
"Shut up," Sunstreaker sniped at Bumblebee's partner.
"You do know most of them would flip out if you transformed?" Sam asked Sunstreaker. "They'd be on you like white on rice if they realized you were an Autobot."
Sunstreaker looked at Bumblebee. "Idiomatic translation?" he asked.
Bumblebee laughed. "They'd love you," he explained.
Sunstreaker blinked in surprise.
"You spend too much time around the politicians," Sam said. "The younger humans are, generally the more flexible. And car lovers? Tend to have wet dreams over Lamborghinis who're actually kick-ass giant alien robots."
Sunstreaker blinked again and looked at the humans.
"So, do you think we should move on too?" Bumblebee asked Sam. Beyond the ghost's hologram, Hot Rod's sat by a fire, laughing and chatting with a female human with a comfortable ease Sunstreaker could not understand. He wondered what Hot Rod was saying to her.
"Actually, no," Sam said. His hologram uncharacteristically fritzed out for a second, catching Sunstreaker's attention again. Bumblebee stood up a little straighter where he leaned against Sunstreaker, expression going serious. "There's something..." Sam trailed off, eyes unfocusing. "I think we need to stay here," he said, voice soft and distant. "If we leave, we'll miss them."
"Are you malfunctioning?" Sunstreaker asked uncertainly.
"Are you sure, Sam?" Bumblebee asked.
The human ghost shrugged, refocusing. "I'm never sure about this stuff, Bumblebee."
"But you're always right," Bumblebee countered. Sam nodded. "So we stay." His hologram abruptly disappeared, and Sunstreaker turned, unsurprised to see Tony and Carlos walking toward them, drinks in hand.
"So, you're moving on later today, then?" Carlos asked Sam even as Tony perched on Sunstreaker's hood right next to his hologram.
"Actually," Sam said, with a glance at Sunstreaker even as he leaned back himself against Bumblebee, "we decided we'd like to hang around for a few days. When's the next race?"
*
Whatever it was that felt off about Dalby's Falls, Sam couldn't find it directly. It ended up a game of hot/cold with the local energy currents over the next few days until he and Bumblebee ended up at an old railroad crossing, staring at the raised crossing bars.
"This is it, Sam?" Bumblebee asked, transforming. He raised a hand and ran it along the white-painted wood, using his own extra-human senses to scan it.
"Yep." Sam reformed at his guardian's feet and stared out at the rusty tracks, considering. The shimmering energy he felt stretched along the rails a few hundred feet in either direction of the crossing. "Maybe there was an accident?"
"Few years back, actually," said an old man's voice. Sam jumped and whirled in surprise; the whirring of his partner's servos indicated Bumblebee had jerked his head in shock too.
An old man in a flannel shirt, straw hat, and worn blue overalls had walked up behind them. He looked up at Bumblebee in interest. "You're one of those Autobots, am I right?"
"Yes, sir," Bumblebee answered.
"Nice work your people do," the old man said with a nod. "Much appreciated."
"Thank you."
The man looked at Sam. "You were asking if there was a train wreck here? There was, back in the nineteen-sixties. Train ran into a car full of kids high out of their minds. They were racing and thought they could beat it." He shook his head in disgust, tucking his thumbs into his pockets. "Idiots. None of them survived. Folks say sometimes on a full moon at midnight you can still hear the train go through." He quirked a smile. "Don't put too much stock in it myself, but I did hear it once or twice when I was younger."
Sam looked up at his partner; Bumblebee met his gaze and shrugged.
"Don't think you boys came out here just to chase down old ghost stories, though," the man said thoughtfully. "Anything I can help you with?"
Bumblebee knelt down to be closer to the human level. "There have been street races with high fatalities recently," he said. "We have reason to believe that the perpetrators are not human, and may choose to race here soon."
The man nodded slowly. "Not much I can do about that," he admitted. "You boys be careful, though. Don't need any more people getting hurt."
"Yes, sir," Sam and Bumblebee replied almost as one.
*
Trouble showed up at the diner the next afternoon.
Sam, Sunstreaker, and Hot Rod all tensed at their tables as three new vehicles cruised into the parking lot of the racers' hang-out. A dark gray Enzo Ferrari pulled up, engine roaring, followed by a Lamborghini Gallardo SE, white with deep blue trim, and finally a wine-colored Porsche 550 Spyder with a man with short brown hair, a mustache, and piercing blue eyes sitting in the driver's seat.
"I recognize that hologram," Sam muttered.
"They have no imagination," Sunstreaker agreed contemptuously.
"Money starts coming to town and it doesn't stop," Carlos murmured.
"Hey, guys, think they're here to race?" Hot Rod asked from the next table, his eyes alight in anticipation of a race... or a fight.
"If they're not," Ellie said, "they're wasting those sweet rides. I'd love to take a spin in that Porsche... what?" she defended herself, looking around. "It's a classic!"
"You have no appreciation for speed," Tony told her.
"You have no appreciation for styling," she shot back.
"I don't know," Sunstreaker disagreed, leaning back in his seat and looking smug. "I think he has a pretty good eye for style...."
"You looking to pick up a new driving partner after all?" Sam teased.
"Thank Primus Tracks didn't come with us too," Hot Rod responded. "One peacock's enough in this party!"
Outside, three men looking enough alike to be brothers got out of the three vehicles and headed into the diner, giving only contemptuous glances to any of the vehicles waiting in the parking lot.
*
A quarter to midnight found them lined up outside the drive-in again, six Cybertronians swelling the ranks of the local racing club to nearly twenty. Bumblebee kept an eye on the Decepticons. One was revving his engine wildly, another practically rocking back and forth on his struts, while the impression the third gave off via his hologram was bored apathy. Sunstreaker, you take the Ferrari. Hot Rod, you're on the Lamborghini.
What, no Lamborghini versus Lamborghini battle action? Hot Rod teased.
Bumblebee was amused at the idea, but didn't let himself laugh. Human lives were at stake. Don't let them hurt anyone, transform and take them out if necessary. Let them know first that they have an option to come along peacefully.
Ellie danced into the headlights of the front row of cars, flag held high as she stopped on the divider line. "Gentlemen, start your engines!" she commanded unnecessarily, eyes sparkling. Grinning at the hum of powerful machinery displayed before her, she dropped the flag.
Cars tore off into the night.
*
Oh no you don't, Hot Rod thought to himself, diving in front of the Gallardo, forcing it away from the sidewalk as it was able to jump a corner--one with three college-age humans standing on it, watching wide-eyed. The Lamborghini spun out of control for a minute, then revved angrily and tore after him. "I see you!" Hot Rod called back to it. "Tacky paint job--the red hood so does not suit!"
"Stop looking at me!" the Decepticon demanded, putting on even a little more speed. Hot Rod laughed contemptuously, hanging a sharp left that took them away from the race's endpoint, but more importantly out of town. No Decepticon could outrun him, and there was a nice deserted dry riverbed a few miles out that would be the perfect place to take down a pain in the aft....
*
The Ferrari led him on a nice chase, deviating from the race course early on and doubling back behind the others. Its dark gray paint helped it fade into the night, and if it wasn't for IR tracking Sunstreaker might almost have lost the guy. Fortunately he'd played more than enough racing games with Decepticons to know all their tricks. So far the guy hadn't hurt anyone or anything, but as soon as he saw the taillights of the other race vehicles coming up ahead of them, Sunstreaker knew that was about to change. He cursed silently as he realized the hindmost was Tony's midnight blue Integra, and put on an extra burst of speed, catching up just as the Decepticon smashed through the smaller vehicle and, undeterred, into the next.
"Oh, slaggit," Sunstreaker muttered, transforming in a somersault over the wrecked vehicles, arm cannon already out and locked on target. Six fast plasma blasts blew out the Ferrari's rear tires and windscreen, and with a scream of rage the Decepticon whirled, transforming himself, and launched himself through the air at Sunstreaker.
Using a move he'd perfected during millenia of fighting Decepticon jets, Sunstreaker caught the 'Con's wrists, slammed him into the pavement, and fired three more blasts right into his core unit, knocking the Ferrari into stasis lock. "You," he said, annoyed enough to quote Prowl, "are under arrest."
"...Sunny?" a human voice asked from by his right foot. Startled, Sunstreaker looked down.
Tony was looking up at him, expression stunned, nearly half the members of the racing club arrayed behind him.
After a minute Tony's face broke into a wide grin. "That was so cool," he said. "Thanks."
Feeling strange, Sunstreaker hesitated. "You're welcome," he said finally.
*
Bumblebee would not have expected the small Porsche to be the most difficult to catch of the three Decepticons. In retrospect, perhaps he should have. He was hard-put to keep up with the Porsche, even as Sunstreaker and then Hot Rod reported missions accomplished.
Sam slipped from his driver's seat and into his systems, spreading out through every inch of Bumblebee. His touch cooled down engine heat a little, but he couldn't help any with more downdraft. "Trust me?" his partner asked.
"Always," Bumblebee answered, concentrating on not losing the burgundy Decepticon.
"Then take the corners tighter--don't mind the lampposts."
Sam did something and the air resistance dropped just slightly and unthinkingly Bumblebee obeyed--
--passing through lampposts and power poles like they weren't even there.
"Sam?" he asked, startled, screeching just a little closer to the Porsche.
He could feel the grin. "Ghosts are immaterial," Sam explained. "Why shouldn't the car they're possessing be too?"
A fierce shock of joy leaped through him. Sam had figured it out, what to do, how they could catch the car....
"Chase him toward the railroad crossing," Sam murmured distantly, and it was with another kind of shock that Bumblebee realized he'd gone "mystic," as Mikaela called it, again.
"Why?" he asked, even as he moved to do so.
"Don't know," Sam murmured in reply. "I just know it's important."
The tracks weren't that far away and the Decepticon either willing or unrealizing that it was being herded. The klaxons were sounding and the crossing bars lowering as they approached, even though there was no train approaching--
A silver-white train roared out of nowhere even as the Porsche slid under the lowered crossing bars and into the train, the Camaro roaring after, unable to stop as it phased through the bars and through the train and came out the other side.
The night was silent as Bumblebee skidded to a halt, drifting the turn to face the crossing again.
There was no train.
The klaxons were silent.
The crossing bars were up.
More tellingly, the Porsche had disappeared. There were no skid marks on the crossing's far side save Bumblebee's own, and no sound of another engine.
"What the Pit was that?" Bumblebee swore in rare shock.
He got no answer from his partner.
"Sam?" he asked.
And realized, to his horror, that the cool touch of his partner, even the faintest sense of his presence that was there while he was unconscious, was gone.
Bumblebee was alone in the middle of the road on the moonlit country night.
*
The Autobots, Carlos thought, were pretty damn cool.
After their reinforcements had arrived and taken away the two that Sunny and Rod had captured, they'd helped repair the damage to downtown, which put them in the good graces of Carlos' father and the mayor, and then they'd hung around. Luckily the insurance companies took "destroyed by Decepticon attack" as a valid excuse for car destruction these days, so Tony and Rick and Liza had gotten payouts for their vehicles... though the current bet in the race club was that Tony would be leaving town with Sunny once the Autobots took off. It turned out that Sunny had a twin brother, even, who'd turned up and approved of Tony on the basis that Sunny liked him.
Interspecies relationships. Who knew?
Sam's car, though, was quieter than most of the other Autobots, and just hung around the edges of things even though he'd apparently been the team's leader. And when asked where Sam had gone, he just got even quieter and said "Away," in a tone that didn't encourage further questioning. He sounded... actually, he sounded a lot like a guy who'd lost his best friend, and only talking with the middle-aged chick who'd arrived in the emergency Hummer seemed to make him feel any better.
Still, in the end, the Autobots were too much excitement for their little mid-Western town, and Carlos knew they'd be leaving soon. All the same, he decided, he was really glad they'd come to Dalby's Falls.
*
Bumblebee sat in the middle of the road, engine silenced, as the clouds drifted lazily in front of the full moon. He'd seen Sunstreaker and Sideswipe off earlier that day, with a promise only half meant of following behind them soon.
His chronometer slowly counted down to midnight.
He'd discussed it with Mikaela, and come to the conclusion that the ghost train had somehow taken not only Dead End--the name of the Decepticon, according to his brothers in custody--but Sam as well. And that the only way he could get Sam back, or go on with Sam, was to find that train again.
I'm not leaving you, Sam had promised. Whenever you go, I'll go there with you. But not until then.
"I'm not leaving you either, Sam," Bumblebee promised back.
So it was nearly midnight, on the night of a full moon, and he was waiting.
He nearly jumped as the klaxons began ringing, starting his engine as the crossing bars came down. He had to time it right....
A rush of air preceded the passage of the ghost train, and he ran for it, his accelerator pedal pressing to the floor as the train appeared, rushing past.
He ran--
The white bars shattered as he rammed through them--
SAM! he cried as he hit the train--
...and he found himself sitting once again on the far side of the tracks, staring at the empty rails, the only evidence of his passage the splinters of the wooden crossing bars strewn all over the ground.
"Sam?" he asked hesitantly.
There was no answer.
Bumblebee's processors failed.
As he tried to work through the incomprehensible fact that it hadn't worked, he hadn't got his partner back, a pair of sneakered footsteps slowly walked up from behind him.
A hand tugged his driver's-side door open.
A human body slipped into his driver's seat.
Hands ran over his steering wheel.
"Sam?" he barely dared ask or hope.
The figure dissolved, endothermic touch spreading out through him, like a full-body hug.
"You came back," Sam whispered. "I thought I was stuck on that train forever. My own personal Purgatory--" There was a hitch in his voice, almost a sob.
"I'm not going to leave you," Bumblebee repeated his promise. "I am never going to leave you behind."
Sam was silent for a minute, his spectral touch almost vibrating with emotion. Like transformers, ghosts couldn't cry, but he was close. "Thank you," he finally whispered.
A car engine started up behind the two of them, making Bumblebee start on his shocks. Sam slipped back into his driver's seat, reforming as the burgundy Porsche pulled up next to Bumblebee. "That's...?" Bumblebee asked his partner.
"Dead End," Sam confirmed, thumbs stroking the grip of Bumblebee's steering wheel like he hadn't touched it in months. Years. "He's okay. We spent a lot of time talking." He leaned forward, grinning wanly. "I think he just needs hugs, as Mom would say. Or Prozac."
"Are you going to come along quietly?" Bumblebee asked the Decepticon.
"Whatever," the Decepticon replied. "I don't have anything better to do, and you'll only chase me if I run."
"See what I mean?" Sam asked rhetorically.
It was so good to feel Sam's weight in his driver's seat again, to have his presence in the back of Bumblebee's processors, that he couldn't even mind having to shepherd an apathetic Decepticon all the way back to Autobot City. "Let's drive," Bumblebee said, perfectly happy now that all was right in his world again.
*~*~*
Author's Notes: This chapter was originally not going to have a ghost train in it. Then it wrote itself in. ^^;; As did two more Stunticons and thus Sunny and Roddy to handle them. Originally it was just going to be Dead End, because I read up on the curse of "Little Bastard," the car James Dean was driving when killed, and thought it would be cool to work a story around that vehicle. Then I realized Dead End was also a Porsche... and when I read on wikipedia that "...he is also vain, and constantly polishing himself. It is speculated by the other Stunticons that, when he dies, he at least wants to leave a nice wreck"... well, doesn't that sound just a little bit like the line most commonly associated with James Dean, "Live fast. Die young. Leave a good-looking corpse."?
I really have no idea where Sunstreaker's issues came from, but they intrigued me so they got to stay. As for his relationship with Tony, and Carlos' crack about interspecies relationships... I have no idea if that was serious or not, so make of it what you will. Maybe they're just friends and Sunstreaker is Tony's ticket out of Dalby's Falls. Maybe it's more. I didn't ask, and they didn't volunteer the info. Also, I don't know what happened in the Hot Rod versus Breakdown battle. Neither of them were interested in letting me know. I think Roddy used "headology" as part of it and it was over quick, but beyond that, no clue. In any case, I hope you all enjoyed the read!
Crossroads at Midnight
by K. Stonham
prereleased 14th October 2007
"The Devil Went Down to Georgia" was playing on the juke box as Sam entered the diner, and for a minute he suspected his partner of collusion. A quick glance backward with a raised eyebrow at the yellow vehicle, though, gave him the radiated impression of denial and innocence.
That lasted just as long at it took for two more cars, one a Lamborghini Murcielago as golden yellow as the Camaro, and the other a red Dome Zero painted with orange and gold flames, to screech around a corner and do neat parallel drifts into the parking lot, ending up just a couple feet from one another and the black-striped Camaro. Sam rolled his eyes and let the diner door drift closed behind him just as the two vehicles' drivers--who may or may not have been there a moment before--exited their vehicles, smiling and laughing at one another.
It was real easy to find the crowd of racers whose vehicles were parked outside. They were gathered around a few tables in the corner, looking out the window at the new arrivals, some of them practically drooling over the admittedly very shiny supercars. Sam, who actually knew said supercars, was less impressed by them. He sauntered over. "Hey," he said, "mind if I join you?"
By the time Sunstreaker and Hot Rod got over themselves, actually remembered they were on a mission, and entered the diner, Sam had made friends with the four fellow car aficionados at his table, waved off the waitress' offer of a menu, and was defending the honor of his 2009 Camaro. "Sure, it's a little old by now," he admitted, amused, thinking of how old Bumblebee really was, "but it's tuned as sweet as you please, and I've never had a smoother, faster ride." No need to say that Bumblebee had not only been his first car, but his only car. All matters of whether Bumblebee was his or if he was in fact Bumblebee's aside, he'd never wanted another car.
"Oh, excuse me, what are my brother and I?" Sunstreaker demanded through his hologram.
Sam strove for guilelessness. "Pains in the ass?" he suggested. Sunstreaker glowered at him, while Hot Rod stifled a laugh. "Guys, these are Sunny and Rod," he introduced his friends to the racing crowd. "The Lambo and the Zero are theirs."
Hot Rod's hologram wasn't too out of the ordinary, a slender, pale human with an engaging grin, freckles and red hair and the startling blue eyes all the Autobots favored. Sunstreaker, though, suiting his reputation as the Autobots' peacock, was stunning, all rich golden hair and warm sun-tanned skin, a body that Mikaela would have once drooled over, and a face that would have been perfect on the cover of any men's fashion magazine. When the two Autobots had found seats at the other tables full of racers, Tony leaned across the table toward Sam. "Your friend Sunny," he asked in a low, hopeful tone. "Is he single?"
"Sort of," Sam replied. "He hasn't got a steady, if that's what you mean. I'll give you a warning, though: he's an insensitive ass."
Tony grinned back. "Sometimes, who cares?" he asked in reply.
Sam laughed a little. "Good luck, then."
It hadn't been much initially, Bumblebee thought, keeping one set of sensors on the diner while scanning the parked vehicles with others. A few reports of illegal street races in mid-Western American towns. There had been some injured bystanders and a few totaled cars with badly injured or killed drivers. Nothing that would seem out of the ordinary for the activity they were engaged in. Except then the property damage and life tolls for each incident had begun increasing beyond the normal, and the eyewitness reports included irregularities, things human cars simply couldn't do: vehicles that soared through the air and smashed down atop others, or crashed through brick buildings, and then drove away without a scratch.
In other words, Decepticons.
Optimus had dispatched several teams of the younger, faster Autobots to fan out through the cities in the calculated path of destruction and intercept the Decepticons. They were to capture them if it was possible, and incapacitate or destroy them if not. So far none of the teams had had any luck, but sooner or later one of them had to. All the teams had at least one human liaison with them to help them get entrance into the local racing sub-cultures. This was because, frankly, even with the external holomatter projectors everyone else had gotten installed for the mission, most of the Autobots still weren't able to fake being human all that well. Bumblebee, having been on Earth the longest of all of them, was one of the best at it, but even with his knack of picking up the nuances of local cultures, he was happy to leave the "meet, greet, and blend" part of the operation to his partner. Sam, as a human, understood humans.
So it wasn't a surprise when they ended up at the outskirts of the town, in the parking lot of a dilapidated drive-in movie theater, at a half hour to midnight. Most of the local racers were gathered, only waiting for a couple more to arrive, and more than a few of them were gathered around Sunstreaker and Hot Rod, checking out their interiors and exteriors while bemused holograms lingered nearby. Bumblebee wasn't bothered by the relative lack of attention; the twins and Hot Rod, among others, had always been flashier than he had. Faster, too, though granted even they couldn't best Blurr in a land speed contest. No one could best Blurr. But he was on another team, and while Bumblebee couldn't outrace Sunstreaker or Hot Rod, he could almost certainly outpace any human vehicle present, being much faster than the purported factory specs for his chosen alt mode.
Holographic fingers shushed along the satin finish of his left front quarter-panel. Holographic jeans touched against him, the weight of an artificial body leaning on him as Sam looked around at the gathered racers before tugging open Bumblebee's door and getting into the driver's seat. "I don't think any of them are the problems," he said, hands running along the steering wheel's leather grip.
"I agree," Bumblebee replied softly. "Maybe the next town?"
"Maybe," Sam agreed.
"Hey, Sam!" Tony jogged up. "Carlos is here and we're ready to start the race."
A map of the town was spread out on Hot Rod's hood since he was the one closest to the light post. "Right, listen up, ladies and gents," Carlos instructed the gathered crowd. "Tonight we start here and end up at Big Red Rock on the north side of town. The cops--" and there was a snicker because his father was apparently the chief of police, "--have speed traps set up on the south and west sides, so don't go messing it up for the rest of us, okay? They're at Nelson and Warner, Third and Green, and Main and Bansford." He stabbed a finger at the appropriate points on the maps. "Avoid at all costs. Now, for our newcomers," he said, grinning at Hot Rod, Sunstreaker, and Sam, "house rules are any route goes, any pedestrians injured loses you the game, same if the cops catch you, and property damage incurred costs you off your finish time. You in?"
"We're in," Hot Rod snapped. "See if you can keep up with us."
The grins from the humans clustered around his hood told him they were all thinking the same thing.
"Need maps?" one of the girls, he thought her name was Ellie maybe, asked with a saucy smirk.
"Who needs maps," Sam quipped, "when you have satellite?"
"Well, then." Carlos folded up the map. "Everyone, start your engines."
The race itself was uneventful: darkened streets with only a few onlookers, his engine thrumming hot, and friction warming his tires as Sunstreaker drifted around corners. The pleasant heft of inertia and Earth's gravity lent challenge to his perfection, Hot Rod's taunts impetus, and it was so satisfying when he finally arrived at the endpoint seconds ahead of the speedster. Bumblebee wasn't that far behind them, arriving more modestly with most of the rest of the pack, and then there were envied congratulations and discussions of route and technique and it all felt like a waste of Sunstreaker's time.
He didn't like humans the way the rest of the Autobots seemed to. Oh, he appreciated that Earth was their planet and that it really wasn't right for the Decepticons to get to kill them, but even after they'd realized their species wasn't the only sentient one out there, they really had nothing to recommend them as a race. Their species-centricism was stunning and their xenophobia astounding. Sunstreaker knew his opinions weren't popular and so usually kept them to himself, but when he was forced into pointless socializing like this with them--
"You're glowering," Bumblebee told him, his own hologram appearing next to Sunstreaker, arrival unnoticed by any of the humans. "What's wrong?"
"This is pointless," Sunstreaker retorted, gesturing around. "Why do we have to interact with them like this? We're not like they are."
Bumblebee's hologram, shorter than his, with messy dark blond curls, a gentle smile, and a build that hinted at hidden strength, shrugged slightly. "I don't like using the holograms either, but in this case it's to help us catch the Decepticons. We'd be too obvious any other way."
"You like the humans," Sunstreaker accused. "You even have one of your own."
"So you'd like them better if you had a human partner too?" Bumblebee jibed.
"No," Sunstreaker shot back. "I just don't understand why we have to stay here."
Bumblebee's hologram leaned back a little further against Sunstreaker, deliberately in his space. "The Decepticons are targeting them and you know it. Besides, what has any other world got to offer that this one hasn't?"
"Culture. Class. A society built to our scale," Sunstreaker relentlessly ticked off.
"And history with us," Bumblebee agreed. "Most of them not so good," he said pointedly. "On Earth we have the chance to create that history, Sunstreaker."
Sunstreaker laughed. "And, what, be partners with them?" he asked. "Allies?" He shook his head. "You've gone native, Bumblebee. The humans don't like us and probably never will. We have to hide from them. Why are you on their side?"
Bumblebee's humanoid expression was soft and unconcerned. "You say that like compassion's a bad thing," he replied. "You can always leave if you really dislike Earth that much, Sunstreaker. Most of us would understand why."
"I'm not leaving Sideswipe," Sunstreaker replied flatly.
"Well, then, why not at least try to have a good time?" Bumblebee asked. He flashed a sudden bright grin. "You're got more than your share of admirers--car or hologram," he teased.
"Organics," Sunstreaker scoffed, but had to admit at least some of the humans had decent taste. The lines of the alternate mode he and Sideswipe had picked weren't too bad.
"You could always take up painting and sculpture again," Bumblebee told him. "Teach the 'organics' a thing or two."
"I live in terror," Sam said dryly, walking up to the two of them.
"Shut up," Sunstreaker sniped at Bumblebee's partner.
"You do know most of them would flip out if you transformed?" Sam asked Sunstreaker. "They'd be on you like white on rice if they realized you were an Autobot."
Sunstreaker looked at Bumblebee. "Idiomatic translation?" he asked.
Bumblebee laughed. "They'd love you," he explained.
Sunstreaker blinked in surprise.
"You spend too much time around the politicians," Sam said. "The younger humans are, generally the more flexible. And car lovers? Tend to have wet dreams over Lamborghinis who're actually kick-ass giant alien robots."
Sunstreaker blinked again and looked at the humans.
"So, do you think we should move on too?" Bumblebee asked Sam. Beyond the ghost's hologram, Hot Rod's sat by a fire, laughing and chatting with a female human with a comfortable ease Sunstreaker could not understand. He wondered what Hot Rod was saying to her.
"Actually, no," Sam said. His hologram uncharacteristically fritzed out for a second, catching Sunstreaker's attention again. Bumblebee stood up a little straighter where he leaned against Sunstreaker, expression going serious. "There's something..." Sam trailed off, eyes unfocusing. "I think we need to stay here," he said, voice soft and distant. "If we leave, we'll miss them."
"Are you malfunctioning?" Sunstreaker asked uncertainly.
"Are you sure, Sam?" Bumblebee asked.
The human ghost shrugged, refocusing. "I'm never sure about this stuff, Bumblebee."
"But you're always right," Bumblebee countered. Sam nodded. "So we stay." His hologram abruptly disappeared, and Sunstreaker turned, unsurprised to see Tony and Carlos walking toward them, drinks in hand.
"So, you're moving on later today, then?" Carlos asked Sam even as Tony perched on Sunstreaker's hood right next to his hologram.
"Actually," Sam said, with a glance at Sunstreaker even as he leaned back himself against Bumblebee, "we decided we'd like to hang around for a few days. When's the next race?"
Whatever it was that felt off about Dalby's Falls, Sam couldn't find it directly. It ended up a game of hot/cold with the local energy currents over the next few days until he and Bumblebee ended up at an old railroad crossing, staring at the raised crossing bars.
"This is it, Sam?" Bumblebee asked, transforming. He raised a hand and ran it along the white-painted wood, using his own extra-human senses to scan it.
"Yep." Sam reformed at his guardian's feet and stared out at the rusty tracks, considering. The shimmering energy he felt stretched along the rails a few hundred feet in either direction of the crossing. "Maybe there was an accident?"
"Few years back, actually," said an old man's voice. Sam jumped and whirled in surprise; the whirring of his partner's servos indicated Bumblebee had jerked his head in shock too.
An old man in a flannel shirt, straw hat, and worn blue overalls had walked up behind them. He looked up at Bumblebee in interest. "You're one of those Autobots, am I right?"
"Yes, sir," Bumblebee answered.
"Nice work your people do," the old man said with a nod. "Much appreciated."
"Thank you."
The man looked at Sam. "You were asking if there was a train wreck here? There was, back in the nineteen-sixties. Train ran into a car full of kids high out of their minds. They were racing and thought they could beat it." He shook his head in disgust, tucking his thumbs into his pockets. "Idiots. None of them survived. Folks say sometimes on a full moon at midnight you can still hear the train go through." He quirked a smile. "Don't put too much stock in it myself, but I did hear it once or twice when I was younger."
Sam looked up at his partner; Bumblebee met his gaze and shrugged.
"Don't think you boys came out here just to chase down old ghost stories, though," the man said thoughtfully. "Anything I can help you with?"
Bumblebee knelt down to be closer to the human level. "There have been street races with high fatalities recently," he said. "We have reason to believe that the perpetrators are not human, and may choose to race here soon."
The man nodded slowly. "Not much I can do about that," he admitted. "You boys be careful, though. Don't need any more people getting hurt."
"Yes, sir," Sam and Bumblebee replied almost as one.
Trouble showed up at the diner the next afternoon.
Sam, Sunstreaker, and Hot Rod all tensed at their tables as three new vehicles cruised into the parking lot of the racers' hang-out. A dark gray Enzo Ferrari pulled up, engine roaring, followed by a Lamborghini Gallardo SE, white with deep blue trim, and finally a wine-colored Porsche 550 Spyder with a man with short brown hair, a mustache, and piercing blue eyes sitting in the driver's seat.
"I recognize that hologram," Sam muttered.
"They have no imagination," Sunstreaker agreed contemptuously.
"Money starts coming to town and it doesn't stop," Carlos murmured.
"Hey, guys, think they're here to race?" Hot Rod asked from the next table, his eyes alight in anticipation of a race... or a fight.
"If they're not," Ellie said, "they're wasting those sweet rides. I'd love to take a spin in that Porsche... what?" she defended herself, looking around. "It's a classic!"
"You have no appreciation for speed," Tony told her.
"You have no appreciation for styling," she shot back.
"I don't know," Sunstreaker disagreed, leaning back in his seat and looking smug. "I think he has a pretty good eye for style...."
"You looking to pick up a new driving partner after all?" Sam teased.
"Thank Primus Tracks didn't come with us too," Hot Rod responded. "One peacock's enough in this party!"
Outside, three men looking enough alike to be brothers got out of the three vehicles and headed into the diner, giving only contemptuous glances to any of the vehicles waiting in the parking lot.
A quarter to midnight found them lined up outside the drive-in again, six Cybertronians swelling the ranks of the local racing club to nearly twenty. Bumblebee kept an eye on the Decepticons. One was revving his engine wildly, another practically rocking back and forth on his struts, while the impression the third gave off via his hologram was bored apathy. Sunstreaker, you take the Ferrari. Hot Rod, you're on the Lamborghini.
What, no Lamborghini versus Lamborghini battle action? Hot Rod teased.
Bumblebee was amused at the idea, but didn't let himself laugh. Human lives were at stake. Don't let them hurt anyone, transform and take them out if necessary. Let them know first that they have an option to come along peacefully.
Ellie danced into the headlights of the front row of cars, flag held high as she stopped on the divider line. "Gentlemen, start your engines!" she commanded unnecessarily, eyes sparkling. Grinning at the hum of powerful machinery displayed before her, she dropped the flag.
Cars tore off into the night.
Oh no you don't, Hot Rod thought to himself, diving in front of the Gallardo, forcing it away from the sidewalk as it was able to jump a corner--one with three college-age humans standing on it, watching wide-eyed. The Lamborghini spun out of control for a minute, then revved angrily and tore after him. "I see you!" Hot Rod called back to it. "Tacky paint job--the red hood so does not suit!"
"Stop looking at me!" the Decepticon demanded, putting on even a little more speed. Hot Rod laughed contemptuously, hanging a sharp left that took them away from the race's endpoint, but more importantly out of town. No Decepticon could outrun him, and there was a nice deserted dry riverbed a few miles out that would be the perfect place to take down a pain in the aft....
The Ferrari led him on a nice chase, deviating from the race course early on and doubling back behind the others. Its dark gray paint helped it fade into the night, and if it wasn't for IR tracking Sunstreaker might almost have lost the guy. Fortunately he'd played more than enough racing games with Decepticons to know all their tricks. So far the guy hadn't hurt anyone or anything, but as soon as he saw the taillights of the other race vehicles coming up ahead of them, Sunstreaker knew that was about to change. He cursed silently as he realized the hindmost was Tony's midnight blue Integra, and put on an extra burst of speed, catching up just as the Decepticon smashed through the smaller vehicle and, undeterred, into the next.
"Oh, slaggit," Sunstreaker muttered, transforming in a somersault over the wrecked vehicles, arm cannon already out and locked on target. Six fast plasma blasts blew out the Ferrari's rear tires and windscreen, and with a scream of rage the Decepticon whirled, transforming himself, and launched himself through the air at Sunstreaker.
Using a move he'd perfected during millenia of fighting Decepticon jets, Sunstreaker caught the 'Con's wrists, slammed him into the pavement, and fired three more blasts right into his core unit, knocking the Ferrari into stasis lock. "You," he said, annoyed enough to quote Prowl, "are under arrest."
"...Sunny?" a human voice asked from by his right foot. Startled, Sunstreaker looked down.
Tony was looking up at him, expression stunned, nearly half the members of the racing club arrayed behind him.
After a minute Tony's face broke into a wide grin. "That was so cool," he said. "Thanks."
Feeling strange, Sunstreaker hesitated. "You're welcome," he said finally.
Bumblebee would not have expected the small Porsche to be the most difficult to catch of the three Decepticons. In retrospect, perhaps he should have. He was hard-put to keep up with the Porsche, even as Sunstreaker and then Hot Rod reported missions accomplished.
Sam slipped from his driver's seat and into his systems, spreading out through every inch of Bumblebee. His touch cooled down engine heat a little, but he couldn't help any with more downdraft. "Trust me?" his partner asked.
"Always," Bumblebee answered, concentrating on not losing the burgundy Decepticon.
"Then take the corners tighter--don't mind the lampposts."
Sam did something and the air resistance dropped just slightly and unthinkingly Bumblebee obeyed--
--passing through lampposts and power poles like they weren't even there.
"Sam?" he asked, startled, screeching just a little closer to the Porsche.
He could feel the grin. "Ghosts are immaterial," Sam explained. "Why shouldn't the car they're possessing be too?"
A fierce shock of joy leaped through him. Sam had figured it out, what to do, how they could catch the car....
"Chase him toward the railroad crossing," Sam murmured distantly, and it was with another kind of shock that Bumblebee realized he'd gone "mystic," as Mikaela called it, again.
"Why?" he asked, even as he moved to do so.
"Don't know," Sam murmured in reply. "I just know it's important."
The tracks weren't that far away and the Decepticon either willing or unrealizing that it was being herded. The klaxons were sounding and the crossing bars lowering as they approached, even though there was no train approaching--
A silver-white train roared out of nowhere even as the Porsche slid under the lowered crossing bars and into the train, the Camaro roaring after, unable to stop as it phased through the bars and through the train and came out the other side.
The night was silent as Bumblebee skidded to a halt, drifting the turn to face the crossing again.
There was no train.
The klaxons were silent.
The crossing bars were up.
More tellingly, the Porsche had disappeared. There were no skid marks on the crossing's far side save Bumblebee's own, and no sound of another engine.
"What the Pit was that?" Bumblebee swore in rare shock.
He got no answer from his partner.
"Sam?" he asked.
And realized, to his horror, that the cool touch of his partner, even the faintest sense of his presence that was there while he was unconscious, was gone.
Bumblebee was alone in the middle of the road on the moonlit country night.
The Autobots, Carlos thought, were pretty damn cool.
After their reinforcements had arrived and taken away the two that Sunny and Rod had captured, they'd helped repair the damage to downtown, which put them in the good graces of Carlos' father and the mayor, and then they'd hung around. Luckily the insurance companies took "destroyed by Decepticon attack" as a valid excuse for car destruction these days, so Tony and Rick and Liza had gotten payouts for their vehicles... though the current bet in the race club was that Tony would be leaving town with Sunny once the Autobots took off. It turned out that Sunny had a twin brother, even, who'd turned up and approved of Tony on the basis that Sunny liked him.
Interspecies relationships. Who knew?
Sam's car, though, was quieter than most of the other Autobots, and just hung around the edges of things even though he'd apparently been the team's leader. And when asked where Sam had gone, he just got even quieter and said "Away," in a tone that didn't encourage further questioning. He sounded... actually, he sounded a lot like a guy who'd lost his best friend, and only talking with the middle-aged chick who'd arrived in the emergency Hummer seemed to make him feel any better.
Still, in the end, the Autobots were too much excitement for their little mid-Western town, and Carlos knew they'd be leaving soon. All the same, he decided, he was really glad they'd come to Dalby's Falls.
Bumblebee sat in the middle of the road, engine silenced, as the clouds drifted lazily in front of the full moon. He'd seen Sunstreaker and Sideswipe off earlier that day, with a promise only half meant of following behind them soon.
His chronometer slowly counted down to midnight.
He'd discussed it with Mikaela, and come to the conclusion that the ghost train had somehow taken not only Dead End--the name of the Decepticon, according to his brothers in custody--but Sam as well. And that the only way he could get Sam back, or go on with Sam, was to find that train again.
I'm not leaving you, Sam had promised. Whenever you go, I'll go there with you. But not until then.
"I'm not leaving you either, Sam," Bumblebee promised back.
So it was nearly midnight, on the night of a full moon, and he was waiting.
He nearly jumped as the klaxons began ringing, starting his engine as the crossing bars came down. He had to time it right....
A rush of air preceded the passage of the ghost train, and he ran for it, his accelerator pedal pressing to the floor as the train appeared, rushing past.
He ran--
The white bars shattered as he rammed through them--
SAM! he cried as he hit the train--
...and he found himself sitting once again on the far side of the tracks, staring at the empty rails, the only evidence of his passage the splinters of the wooden crossing bars strewn all over the ground.
"Sam?" he asked hesitantly.
There was no answer.
Bumblebee's processors failed.
As he tried to work through the incomprehensible fact that it hadn't worked, he hadn't got his partner back, a pair of sneakered footsteps slowly walked up from behind him.
A hand tugged his driver's-side door open.
A human body slipped into his driver's seat.
Hands ran over his steering wheel.
"Sam?" he barely dared ask or hope.
The figure dissolved, endothermic touch spreading out through him, like a full-body hug.
"You came back," Sam whispered. "I thought I was stuck on that train forever. My own personal Purgatory--" There was a hitch in his voice, almost a sob.
"I'm not going to leave you," Bumblebee repeated his promise. "I am never going to leave you behind."
Sam was silent for a minute, his spectral touch almost vibrating with emotion. Like transformers, ghosts couldn't cry, but he was close. "Thank you," he finally whispered.
A car engine started up behind the two of them, making Bumblebee start on his shocks. Sam slipped back into his driver's seat, reforming as the burgundy Porsche pulled up next to Bumblebee. "That's...?" Bumblebee asked his partner.
"Dead End," Sam confirmed, thumbs stroking the grip of Bumblebee's steering wheel like he hadn't touched it in months. Years. "He's okay. We spent a lot of time talking." He leaned forward, grinning wanly. "I think he just needs hugs, as Mom would say. Or Prozac."
"Are you going to come along quietly?" Bumblebee asked the Decepticon.
"Whatever," the Decepticon replied. "I don't have anything better to do, and you'll only chase me if I run."
"See what I mean?" Sam asked rhetorically.
It was so good to feel Sam's weight in his driver's seat again, to have his presence in the back of Bumblebee's processors, that he couldn't even mind having to shepherd an apathetic Decepticon all the way back to Autobot City. "Let's drive," Bumblebee said, perfectly happy now that all was right in his world again.
Author's Notes: This chapter was originally not going to have a ghost train in it. Then it wrote itself in. ^^;; As did two more Stunticons and thus Sunny and Roddy to handle them. Originally it was just going to be Dead End, because I read up on the curse of "Little Bastard," the car James Dean was driving when killed, and thought it would be cool to work a story around that vehicle. Then I realized Dead End was also a Porsche... and when I read on wikipedia that "...he is also vain, and constantly polishing himself. It is speculated by the other Stunticons that, when he dies, he at least wants to leave a nice wreck"... well, doesn't that sound just a little bit like the line most commonly associated with James Dean, "Live fast. Die young. Leave a good-looking corpse."?
I really have no idea where Sunstreaker's issues came from, but they intrigued me so they got to stay. As for his relationship with Tony, and Carlos' crack about interspecies relationships... I have no idea if that was serious or not, so make of it what you will. Maybe they're just friends and Sunstreaker is Tony's ticket out of Dalby's Falls. Maybe it's more. I didn't ask, and they didn't volunteer the info. Also, I don't know what happened in the Hot Rod versus Breakdown battle. Neither of them were interested in letting me know. I think Roddy used "headology" as part of it and it was over quick, but beyond that, no clue. In any case, I hope you all enjoyed the read!
