New Cybertron Academy

|3|

As the crowd began to disperse to head to their homerooms, Hornetbee turned to his group of friends, who were all gathering their datapads and new handouts. The young scout in training shuffled over to Wheeler, who was teasing Rewind in some way. He smiled to himself before kicking him in the back of his knee plate. Wheeler let out a yelp before turning around sharply.

"Dude!" he laughed. "What was that for?"

"You gotta let up, man," he chuckled. Rewind gave him a thumbs up from behind the young Wrecker and turned to her two friends, Graffiti and Miko. "Rewind will kick your tailpipe if you keep annoying her like that."

"Psh," his friend scoffed, waving a servo. "She loves it."

Hornetbee shook his helm with a light sigh, though he was still smiling. "Yeah, just like every other femme you've tried that with."

"Oh, come on, I'm no player," Wheeler said in a mock offended voice.

Tailwind strolled into the middle of the group, his bouncy sister beside him. "Can we focus, please?" he droned, giving them an unimpressed look. "It would be best if we all head towards our homeroom class now."

"Yeah, don't you wanna see who our homeroom teacher is??" Arrow said excitedly, practically bouncing from pede to pede.

Hornetbee chuckled and scratched the back of his neck cables. "Yeah, sounds like a good idea."

Tailwind nodded and began to lead the way. Graffiti caught up to him and looked back to the other younglings behind them. "It's pretty great that we all got the same homeroom!!" she said enthusiastically.

Her twin Miko nodded her helm. "Yeah, and isn't Street Jack in our homeroom, too?" she asked.

Rewind nodded. "You bet, I heard his designation called. Where was he, anyway? I didn't see him."

Hornetbee shrugged. "It's hard to see anyone in this crowd." He remembered meeting Street Jack briefly, since his father was a part of Team Prime as well.

Arrowwind, however, had never met the mech, and was insanely curious. "Who's Street Jack?" she asked, looking to Hornetbee with wide, teal optics.

The yellow mech felt his spark do a flip, for some reason. He cleared his throat before answering. <Well, he's actually our principles son. You know, Ultra Magnus?>

Most of them turned to him, surprise in their faceplates. It took him a moment to realize what had just happened, and he groaned loudly, though it came out more like a high pitched whine. His mouth guard went up on instinct and he slapped his chest chassis a few times.

<Sorry. Scrap, my voicebox glitched!> he cried in beeps and warbles, slapping where his voiceboc was a few more times.

Wheeler suddenly popped him from behind, hard. Hornetbee exvented forcefully and nearly doubled over, stumbling a bit as he walked. The wrecker took his fist back and looked at him expectedly. "There, did that help?"

"Not-" he started, pausing to cough as he rubbed his sore back, "the help I was looking for. But sounds like it, yeah," he finished with a loud sigh.

Arrowwind looked at him with a bit of worry in her optics. "Your voicebox is still glitching?"

Hornetbee tried not to look upset about it, shrugging his shoulder plates. "Yeah, it's no big deal, though. Ratchet's stumped, but he's still trying."

Tailwind nodded his helm calmly. "Grandsire isn't one to give up on his patients."

"Well, at least I made it through the better part of the morning without glitching," Hornet said nonchalantly, clearing his throat a little more, hoping it would help his voicebox.

Rewind popped her hand up to interrupt their conversation. "Hey, guys, I think this is it!" she called out.

The group all stopped and looked towards the door she was pointing at. Hung on the top was a sign that said "New Trion", the homeroom that was named after the city. From what Ultra Magnus had said, this was theirs. The door was rather large for even full grown Cybertronian standards.

"Talk about overdoing it," Wheeler scoffed, crossing his arms.

Hornet was about to tease him back, but Rewind beat him to it. The femme punched his back and scolded him, telling him how hard her sire and members of the Council had worked for this. A few of the others joined in while Hornetbee watched with a smile, amused and happy.

What was I so afraid of? I've got plenty of friends here, he thought to himself, feeling the pit of dark feelings disperse from his chest chassis. His processor flashed to a memory from the previous day.

Bumblebee had walked into his son's room slowly, not bothering to knock on the door. He saw the young mech laying on his back, holding a datapad above his helm while his other arm curled under it. A gentle smile went up his derma and he strolled over to the berth, sitting down by Hornet's pedes.

"Hey, little Hornet," his sire had said with a grin. "Excited for the big day tomorrow?"

The younger scout had let silence fall for a few moments before looking away from his datapad, sitting up with a nervous expression. "More like losing my processor with nerves," he corrected in a low voice.

Bee had only laughed and patted his son on the helm. "Okay, that sounds about right. Don't worry about it. It's completely normal to be nervous." He took the datapad and set it aside.

Hornetbee raise a skeptical optic ridge. "Carrier gets nervous?" he said with disbelief, though a light smirk had reached his derma.

His sire laughed louder this time. "Okay, normal for most Cybertronians. Arcee is.. a special case. But it's not like it's never happened to her."

Hornet has rolled his optics while swinging his legs over his berth. "Yeah, right." He sighed and leaned on his sire's arm. "It's not really the classes I'm worried about. It's.. all those other kids. And the teachers."

Bumblebee took the younger mech's servo and rubbed it with one digit. "I know it's a little nerve racking to meet a bunch of new Cybertronians; believe me, when all the ships started coming in after our home was restored, it felt weird for us, too. Smokimus especially." He paused to give him an assuring grin. "But all you're friends will be there, too! You guys have grown up together, so there isn't much to be worried about."

<Some of us grew up together,> Hornetbee has corrected, flinching when his voice gave out again. <And then there's that, too.> He clenched his fist and punched his chest chassis, hoping to restore it.

Bee looked at him sadly, lifting his other servo to rub his helm comfortingly. "I know, squirt, believe me. But I'm sure Ratchet will fix it eventually. It took me a while to get my own voice back." His optics looked a little distant for a moment before he brought himself back to reality, smiling more gently at his son. "Don't worry, little Hornet. You'll do great in school, and your friends will be with you. Once you get there, you'll realize you have nothing to worry about!"

Hornetbee felt his spark flutter lightly in happiness as he watched his friends. Tailwind interrupted the group to tell them it would be better if they actually entered the homeroom, to which Wheeler returned with a remark about the mech's hesitation to even go inside the building. The femmes all laughed at them, Rewind and her friends shoving Tailwind and Wheeler towards the door. Meanwhile, Arrow ran behind Hornet and slammed her servos onto his back.

"Come on, you shy mech, you hafta come, too!" she joked with a bright smile as she shoved him forwards.

Hornet laughed and sped up so that she would lose her footing, sticking his glossa out at her with a smirk as he hurried after the others. The femme laughed and swore at him, racing after him while waving her fist, all the while keeping a cheerful expression.

You were right, sire, Hornet thought to himself. I don't have anything to worry about.

~

I hope y'all have enjoyed the third chapter! Tho, the way it's been getting so many reads lately, I'd imagine you are.

This crappy was kinda boring tho...

Oh well! Lemme know what you think in the comments!