Slowly Getting There

'C'mon, just tell her that you like her,' Jetfire told himself.

It happened right after Prowl's funeral. A majority of Optimus Prime's team was down in the dumps.

Sentinel, begrudgingly seeing it his duty, had assigned a few bots to keep an optic on the homecoming heroes, just in case.

Jetfire was tasked to keep an eye on the little mini-bot the Space Bridge cleaning crew brought back.

But she wasn't a mini-bot.

Sentinel had taken it up with the Council that letting an organic run about Cybertron again was far too dangerous.

Much to Optimus and his team's vehemence about it, Sari was nearly sent back to Earth. The fact that she transformed in front of the High Council changed everything.

Sari Sumdac was a bona fide techno-organic.

Jetfire knew it, because he and his brother were standing right next to her when she transformed.

The twins scrambled away in fear when the human/Cybertronian's face mask slid away, allowing everyone to see her face.

After some more deliberating, the Council ruled that she was allowed to stay on Cybertron. In addition to that, she was to be taught about Cybertron's history and culture; Arcee was tasked with doing that.

After the hearing, Jazz herded the twins to the table where Optimus's team was around.

"Just listen to them," Jazz insisted when Bulkhead and Bumblebee tried to shoo them away.

When the twins didn't say anything and looked to the ground, Jazz "ahemed" and gave the twins a look. Much to their surprise, the twins fully apologized to Sari and the team.

"Ve vere being stupid," the twin younglings stated. Their servos were clasped behind their backs, looking sheepish.

Jetfire looked to the ground and added, "Sentinel be telling us his encounter vith organics from a long time ago, and ve . . ." The orange youngling cringed as he saw the expression on Bulkhead's face-plates.

The Elite Guardsmech half expected Sari to slap his face-plate when she zoomed up to his height with her jetpack.

To his relief, Sari wasn't mad.

Instead she gave him a small smile and said, "It's ok. You were just following orders from Sentinel. You didn't know any better."

She held out her servo-no wait . . . hand to him.

"Let's start over, ok?"

Jetfire eagerly nodded and stuck out a digit for her to shake.

Jetfire had grown a crush the size of an Omega Sentinel on the girl ever since.

She was smart, kind, and had a good head on her shoulders.

At the moment, Jetfire helped Sari sort out data-pads. There was a back log of those data-pads and the secretaries needed additional help.

"Say Jetfire, have you noticed that the other guys are acting weird lately?" Sari asked. She nudged the massive data-pads with her body to specific containers that would go to various mechs and femmes in the guard.

Jetfire shook his helm, but he knew the reason why. And he didn't like it. Not one bit.

Jazz and Jetstorm found out about his crush on Sari. Jetfire didn't want the help, especially since Miss Sari was . . . well with Bumblebee.

He held back a sigh as they continued to file away the data pads.

'Red Alert is after Cosmos . . . Perceptor before Red Alert . . .''

Unconsciously, the youngling stuck his tongue out in concentration.

The young techno-organic looked up at the orange jet. She couldn't help but giggle quietly.

Later . . .

Jetfire had a feeling someone was watching him. Slowly, he lifted his helm and looked right.

Sari squeaked and turned around, quickly putting away the data-pad that was meant for Jazz.

Jetfire's optics were as wide as dinner plates.

W-what just . . .?

O*O*O

Jazz noticed Jetfire the pair tip-toeing around Sari. No matter when the kid tried to approach the Cybertronian, Jetfire would up and make an excuse to not be in the same area.

"Oi, this getting tiring," Jetstorm said to Jazz during an energon break.

"I hear you . . . It's like pulling denta with trying to get them to 'fess up," Jazz said.

"So, vhat you thinking?" the young jet looked at him with curiosity.

"Well . . ." Like two scheming criminals, they huddled together and came up with a plan.

Sari waited for Bumblebee in the mess hall.

"What do you want me in there for?" she had asked.

"Uh . . . just ah . . . Just meet me there, ok?"

Bumblebee acted pretty weird. Oh well. Her best friend could be kooky at times.

She giggled. Ah. She hardly saw her best friends anyway, considering they were back to being assigned to being space bridge cleaning crew.

Back to where they started, but they all got honorary Elite Guard memberships.

"'Much that'll get me,'" Sari imitated Ratchet.

Soon, she heard steps coming her way.

"Well, that took you much longer than usual, Bee," Sari looked up. "So, what-huh?"

Jetfire stared back at her. He quickly backtracked and made a break for it.

Oh Primus, why did he listen to Jazz?

"Wait!" Sari exclaimed. She utilized her jet pack and fly after him as Jetfire ran.

After she chased him around a few corridors and empty meeting rooms, he became exhausted and ended up in the Elite Guard crystal gardens.

Sari heard of the gardens, but until now she never seem them.

The small plot they ended up in was surrounded by tiny tufts of turquoise crystal seedlings, sticking out of the metal ground.

Jetfire panted.

"V-vhat-vhat? Mister Jazz told me to meet up vith him there," Jetfire muttered, panting.

"Bee told me he was going to meet up with me in there," Sari added.

At the sound of Bumblebee's nickname, Jetfire winced a bit.

"Oi, I thinking I know vhy they trick us," Jetfire said. He frowned a little, turning away from the techno-organic.

"But, it don't matter . . ."

Sari blinked in confusion. "What are you talking about?"

Jetfire rubbed his face. "Jazz and Brother getting notion that . . . you and me avoiding each other . . . but the reason vhy is ridiculous . . ."

Sari canted her head to the side, curious. "What way?" she asked.

"You vith Bumblebee," Jetfire wrapped his arms around himself and exhaled quietly, mouth creased into a sad frown.

"What?!" Sari exclaimed, her pigtails sticking up a bit. "Oh! No, no, no!" She laughed a bit.

"Where did you get that idea?!"

Jetfire sat up and whipped himself around to stare at her.

"But . . . you two . . ."

"Oh stop it," Sari stated quietly. Slightly embarrassed, she rubbed her arm as she blushed.

Jetfire leaned forward a bit as he looked at her.

"You needing say something?" He tilted his helm to the side as he blinked, curious.

"Well, considering I'm all alone a lot of the time, other than with Arcee for my lessons . . . do you think I could hang out with you more often? And maybe . . . spend time together?"

Seeing her timid smile behind her mask, Jetfire chuckled. He nodded in agreement.

Maybe . . . maybe it could work out.