(Untitled)

[prob_japanese]

One of the more interesting side effects of the Bar's subspace compression field, so far as Bumblebee is concerned, is the way it shunts most of his mass off to someplace else entirely while he's there. He doesn't weigh a whole lot more than a large, heavyset human despite being made of metal. While this would cramp his style during a fight, if a

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[trustydriver]

A girl in a steel-gray unitard also happens to be sitting in the rafters a few yards away from where Bumblebee is clambering up.

She's staring, a bit.

[prob_japanese]

Once Bumblebee is up and fully balanced, he turns to scan the area for more detailed information than just 'structural integrity'. Thus- ooh, human! He waves cheerfully from where he's crouched, and Peter Gabriel's voice chirps out, "Hi there!"

[trustydriver]

Yeah, Kit is from 1934. Peter Gabriel isn't due to be born for another 16 years yet.

"Uh... hi." A tentative wave back. "What are you supposed to be?"

[prob_japanese]

"nice view up here, isn't it?" says the mech, who makes no move to come closer- some people are just afraid of robots. "I've never seen it at this scale before." Pause. "Oh- I'm an Autobot. An autonomous robotic lifeform from the planet Cybertron."

They'll get to names in a bit.

[trustydriver]

"...I'm a human, from Earth."

Yeah, what else are you gonna say to that?

[prob_japanese]

The mech's speakers flare briefly at that with the sound of a drawly human male voice accompanied by acoustic guitar.

Bought Manhattan for a string of beads
Brought along some gadgets for you to see
Here's a crazy little thing we call TV
Do you have electricity?

We're humans from Earth
We're humans from Earth
You have nothing at all to fear...

Then they cut off and the crackly voice returns. "Oh, good. I like humans. My designation is Bumblebee. It's nice to meet you."

[trustydriver]

"Name's 'The Flying Squirrel'." She eyes the robot's chassis curiously. "You got a built-in dictaphone or somethin'?"

[prob_japanese]

"Something like that. I recorded a lot of music off my radio receiver, and I play it back when some human's already said what I want to say, only better than I could say it."

[trustydriver]

"Never heard music like that on the radio. What year are you from?"

[prob_japanese]

"2007. Although the song is from 1991."

[trustydriver]

"Huh. Seems like everybody here's from that time period. What's so special about it?"

[prob_japanese]

"I don't know," Bumblebee readily admits. "I left Cybertron more than ten thousand years ago. I only came to Earth's system a few years ago, so I haven't really been there very long."

[trustydriver]

"Ten thous--" she boggles. "What's so important about Earth that you were willin' ta spend ten thousand years gettin' here??"

[prob_japanese]

"Oh, it wasn't that Earth was important for being Earth," says Bumblebee. "But my people's most important artifact had to be shot into space to keep it out of a tyrant's hands, and when he went off in search of it, a lot of us fanned out to find it before he did. And it wound up on Earth. It just took ten thousand years to find it, that's all."

[trustydriver]

Kit is silent for a moment, digesting this.

"What kinda artifact are we talkin' about, here?"

[prob_japanese]

"A big metal cube," says Bumblebee, "that gives off several different kinds of energies, and has writing like this on it."

He'd been in the Allspark's chamber on Cybertron often enough to have the inscriptions down the sides memorized, so Bumblebee finds a dusty spot among the rafters, marks out the first few characters, and shines one of his lights in that direction to make it readable.