[ti]Ep 2.5[/ti]Viva Las Vegas!

[Hot Rod]

     "There's nothing to apologize for. If you're not willing to do what you're told, then you may as well roll over and die. What's the point in fighting for a cause if you're not willing to give it your all to make sure that it happens? We all die somehow, some day. May as well be fighting, right?"

     Hot Rod paused as he considered the situation. He was still a kid himself in Cybertronian standards, especially next to Ratchet and Optimus, and if he were being told all of this after you'd had an innocent view of things because the only exposure you'd had were on small scales with no real clue how an invading race handled situations, he probably would have been at a loss of words as well. This silence wasn't because they didn't have anything to say from choice, but... because they were taking it all in.

     He hadn't been allowed to take things in slow, he was thrown into the pot with the water boiling, and that was just how he handled everything else around him. He'd laid it all out on these organic, fleshy, innocent human kids just as rough as he'd been exposed to it and hadn't even taken their reaction into consideration. The sorry wasn't pity.

     They were coming up on the turn for the museum and he looked in the rearview mirror at Raf, who seemed to be taking all of this a lot harder than he had expected. Man, if he returned the kids to the base in this condition he wouldn't hear the end of it from Ratchet! He hadn't dealt with Optimus yet, but the old medic was more than enough for him- thanks. Without saying anything, he turned off in the direction to head to where Raf had wanted to go. His car show could come another day. Right now, he wanted to let the kids enjoy a day he felt he had already ruined.

     "It's okay, really. I should be the one to say sorry. I never really learned how to keep my mouth shut anyway." He sighed. "I'm sorry, too. I was thrown into the war when everyone else was already fighting and it was just common knowledge what was happening. I forgot that you guys really don't have anything to do with this. You really just got thrown into the middle of it by no fault of your own. We're ruining everything by being here. You guys deserve to grow up in a world without having to deal with all of this shit. It's not fair." He looked at Miko, then Raf, then back to the road ahead of them.

[Raf Esquivel]

Raf turned his attention back out the window, thinking over everything Hot Rod had told him.

It still felt wrong. Like the things he was saying didn’t make sense. It still gave him a very unhappy feeling in the pit of his stomach, and he knew he was going to have to talk to Bumblebee later, find out if the things Hot Rod was saying was even half true.

“Maybe we do,” he said slowly, as if analyzing the words himself as they left his mouth, as if even he himself wasn’t sure what he was going to actually say, “But what we deserve, and what happens, are two different things, and no amount of wishing changes that.”

Raf turned his attention from the window towards where the young man’s holoform sat driving.

“And a lot of things happen without your say so. Things just happen. It’s not fair, but...it happens.”

Small shoulders gave a little shrug.

“What’s important is what you do when it does happen. Do what you can, or do nothing. At least, if you do what you can....you know you tried.”

He looked like he was going to say something else, but changed his mind. He gave another small shrug, and turned back to the window, looking out again, silent.

[Miko Nakadai]

Miko smiled at Hot Rod’s words, and found herself sympathizing with him even more. He’d been through so much, and even despite everything? He kept fighting. All Cybertronians did. They had to - those that were still on Earth had fought with probably everything they had to get here, and every single day? They fought to stay here in one way or another, even if it was something as simple as keeping a low profile.

They’d all been through so much, and she was sure that even with Hot Rod explaining a few things that the others wouldn’t dare mention, there was still a lot that wasn’t being said.

And she honestly didn’t dare ask. At least, not yet. The last thing she wanted to do was ask something that would upset Hot Rod or bring up bad memories. Even though the war between Autobots and Decepticons had shifted onto this planet, she had NO idea what any of it was like. Yet for some like Bee and Hot Rod? It was all they knew.

Yet they kept going. They kept fighting.

“You don’t have to say sorry either!” she frowned, some insistence in her voice. She didn’t want him to feel bad for telling the truth. Nobody else would, or they’d skirt around it with the absolute bare minimum in details in some weird attempt to protect them just because they were children. It probably hurt to talk about, and yet he had - he’d spoken honestly and openly, and she respected him so much for it.

“It does suck that the war came here, but if it hadn’t? We wouldn’t have met you or any of the others!”

Her naivety was showing a little with her comment, but she meant it. Now that she knew Bulkhead and the other Autobots? She didn’t want to go to a place or time where she couldn’t talk to or see them every day.

The fact that Hot Rod had changed course was not lost on her, but she wouldn’t comment - she knew exactly where he was taking them, and she could only smile weakly that he was thinking of them.

At Raf’s words, she would nod in agreement, turning to look back at him and smiling before turning straight ahead before the motion sickness kicked in.

“Exactly! You have to at least try.”

Raf was younger than her, and yet his words were so wise and full of wisdom beyond his years.

[Hot Rod]

     "I'm sure the others are happy to have met ya, too. I'm also sure that they'd never say it to your faces, but if they were given the choice to never come to Earth to spare it of the war we're involved in, they would jump at that choice, even if it meant never meeting any of you." The vehicle turned off the main road once the turning exit came up and he followed the signs on the side roads.

     "Neither of you have seen what the war did to our home. You've probably had your own types of war here, but nothing compared to what we had or the extremes we took. Our entire planet went dark. It's uninhabitable. I don't know how anyone would wanna have that just to make a couple extra friends." It was clear that Hot Rod had never had anyone that he cared about in the way the team probably cared about the kids in how dismissive he was towards the mere thought of a friendship strong enough to risk your entire planet for. Things like that just seemed trivial to him, at least for now. 

     Maybe some time with the team would change his perspective. For now, it was what it was.

     Hot Rod pulled into the facility parking lot and came to a stop after finding a spot as close as he could. Once everything was off, his holoform turned in the seat and looked at the two. "Looks like we got a couple hours to kill before this place closes, so lets enjoy it and take our time. And don't break anything. I don't wanna have to get arrested on a field trip."

     Roddy nodded to the pair and got out of the vehicle to look at the building before them. Instead of heading to the car show as he had originally intended, he'd diverted them to the Atomic Testing Museum. While this wasn't his thing, hopefully the kids would enjoy it at least. Perhaps there would even be a thing or two he could learn from this as well.

[Raf Esquivel]

Raf perked up slightly as they turned into the parking lot, and once Hot Rod opened the doors, he managed to slither out from the backseat like a little fish.

He took a few steps forward, readjusting his glasses and tugging his clothing back into place as he gazed up at the building before them.

It was an interestingly shaped building, grey and blue, looking like it was made out of concrete. Raf could just make out a sign with the atomic symbol on it, showing the electrons orbiting the neutron. He found himself wondering if the design of the building itself had anything to do with atomic energy – like it was shaped a certain way for a reason.

It was almost strange, looking at this building, proudly announcing it was “an affiliate of the Smithsonian Institution”, dedicated to studying atomic energy, and the atomic bomb, and yet all around them cars were driving by, people lost in their own lives. To Raf, it was almost unreal, in a strange way.

Even stranger to be standing there with an alien robot in disguise.

He glanced back to Hot Rod and Miko, and nodded.

[Miko Nakadai]

As Hot Rod pulled off the main road, Miko would turn to look out the window at her side. They must be close to the car show now! Only- uh, the signs… were directing them to the Atomic Testing Museum instead.

Change of plan, she figured. It made sense- Raf had gone awful quiet back there, maybe this was Hot Rod’s way of trying to cheer him up a bit. This would probably be way more fun, too. Maybe she would actually learn something. Okay, maaaaaybe not, but if Raf had fun? Then she would too.

She was quiet as Hot Rod spoke about Cybertron. Bulkhead had told her a little bit about it, how the war had made the planet dangerous to live on. But to hear the whole thing had gone dark and completely uninhabitable? It was a scary thought- would the same happen here on Earth? Even though they had moments like this where they could have fun, the Autobots were at war with the Decepticons.

“That makes sense.” she frowned, slowly turning to look at the holoform in the driver seat.

“Still though, here on Earth, you have us! And Fowler, too!” humans may be small, but they were mighty- and she was sure that with the extra help and advantage of their tiny human allies? That things would work out. She believed in the Autobots, and could only hope that history wouldn’t repeat itself too much.

As they pulled to a stop, Miko was the first to unbuckle her seatbelt. Sitting for so long was uncomfortable, and she was excited to finally stretch her legs.

“We’ll behave! Or, I will!” she grinned, before quickly making her way from the car once the doors had been opened. It didn’t take her long to catch up to Raf, and she’d smile.

“You think we’ll be able to see everything in the time we have? Was there anything that you really really wanted to see first?”

This was Raf’s day now- and as such, Miko wanted him to take charge and direct them on where to go first.

[Hot Rod]

Hot Rod's holoform looked at Miko and squinted hard enough that his eyes were barely slits. "Somehow I don't believe you when you say you'll behave." Miko was a human after his own spark with how much of a wild child she was, but that was also dangerous. It meant that Raf was gonna have to be the adult. Trying to corral one human girl seemed hard enough, but when the other child was a giant robot who could literally flatten you under the tip of one digit? That could have made things a little more difficult.

He shoved his hands into the side pockets of his jeans like any typical human would as he glanced from Miko to Raf. The expression had since faded, since there wasn't really a point in being that intense with the smaller human. Hot Rod didn't know the first thing about the stuff they were going to see in the mueseam so if there was something he was wanting to see, Roddy would just need to leave it to him to point them in the right direction.

All he could do was hope that they didn't get split up or he'd be lost.

Well, that wasn't the only thing he could do. A part of him was going to be hoping no one decided to play stupid and park like an idiot that would casually chip his paint by bumping him with their car door or belongings. If he felt even the slightest pinch that was gonna be a hairline trigger to get him pretty heated up.

Pay attention and stay cool. Seemed easy enough, right?