AN: Short little snippets all having the word louder in them at some point. One contains a very obvious mechxhuman (BarricadexMiles), and others contain hints of SamxBumblebee. There's also mech on mech pairings, and some sad shorts. None of them really have a connection with each other, and are separated. Enjoy.

Giving his Guardian a good wash was one of Sam's guilty pleasures, and a hot summer day was the perfect excuse to go outside and wash Bumblebee, even if the Autobot was almost always in pristine condition. Judy and Ron were out for the day, so Sam wouldn't be roped into washing his father's car, too.

It was the hottest day so far that year, and Sam walked out in just trunks and flip flops. Bumblebee greeted him with a tilt of the side mirror, catching the sun just right to shine it in Sam's eyes. The teen went to the garage, not even needing to tell the Autobot Scout he was getting the spa treatment that day, the outfit said it all.

By the time Sam carried out the buckets, sponges, and hooked up the hose, Bumblebee had rolled down his windows, turning on his radio and letting some music play. Rose Royce's Car Wash drifted through the Scout's speakers, making Sam grin as he wet the Autobot down, before getting out Bumblebee's preferred soap.

And here was one of Sam's favorite parts of washing Bumblebee, getting on his knees and running the sponge along the tire, pretending not to notice as the Scout's radio cut out with a staticky whine. The first time Sam had washed Bumblebee and gotten the same response, he had just figured the area was a bit sensitive.

It wasn't until Sam ran the sponge along harder, attempting to thoroughly clean the tire of anything sticking to it that Bumblebee's frame started to shake. Sam had been fascinated to figure out that Bumblebee had ticklish spots on his frame, and had attempted to locate all of them. He wasn't sure if Bumblebee had figured out his love of these hot spots yet or not, he tried to not spend too much more attention on him then the rest of the Scout's frame. It helped that it was all of his tires, and a bit of his undercarriage.

Sam slipped a hand back behind the wheel to run the sponge along the undercarriage there, Bumblebee letting out another staticky whine as the shaking increased, and Sam smirked to himself. The shaking Sam would have never noticed if he hadn't had his hands on Bumblebee, so that wasn't a problem. He knew it was a bad idea to play with figurative fire, if anyone happened to walk by at the right time and hear Bumblebee making those odd noises, or actually laugh, they'd be caught.

But Sam couldn't help himself. Each time he tried a little harder to win the game he had started since the very first wash, to make the Scout lose his hard earned and battle proven control. Each time he got Bumblebee to get a little bit louder.

A back arched as a simulated mouth nipped at his neck hard enough to bruise, the teen attempting to rock his hips into the teasing feather light touch even as he kept a hand over his mouth to muffle any noises.

The closet he'd been pushed in to by the holoform kept them cramped, pressed closer than Miles would have liked given his circumstances. Just outside the door was the rec-room, and he knew for a fact that Sam, Bumblebee, Mikaela, Will, Epps, and Jazz were all in there.

"Honestly, where is Miles? He wanted to play me and now he isn't even here for me to kick his ass," Sam complained, "You can play me instead, Bee. I'll go get it."

Wide, pleading hazel eyes looked into red ones as Miles listened to Sam get up, starting to move to the closet. Barricade smirked, deciding to stop teasing his favorite organic, and torture him instead. He changed his feather light touches to a hard and firm hand in between the teen's legs, giving him what his body might have wanted, though this time around his mind happened to be fighting it a bit more. But his mind was losing, a strangled moan escaping past the teen's hand as he clenched his eyes shut.

"What was-"

"I'd prefer playing something more physical today, Sam." Bumblebee's voice cut in loudly, distracting Sam from the sound he had heard, and emphasizing the word physical to make sure the two in the closet got his point. Jazz's laughter followed this, though everyone else was left slightly baffled. "How about we all play some baseball? You cheated last time."

Barricade was positive that even if he had had vision like a normal organic's in the darkened closet; he still would have seen Miles blush clearly, the teen covering his face with both hands now. And Barricade let him, waiting just long enough until he knew everyone and mech had left the rec-room.

His wait didn't last long, and the smirk returned to his face as he gave a particularly talented twist of his simulated wrist, Miles crying out through his hand, one reaching to grasp at Barricade's shoulders instead.

"Louder," Barricade growled, almost in warning, and like usual Miles only half listened, removing his hand and using it to pull the mech in for a kiss instead.

Two blue optics watched the Medic work with worry, Optimus' spark filling with concern.

Ratchet had taken Ironhide's death in Chicago hard, the usually noisy Medic having toned it down to only talking when necessary now. There had been no yelling at Skids and Mudflap, no yelling at Optimus for any of his stupid Primely stunts, no yelling at Bumblebee for letting Sam take on Starscream on his own, and no yelling at the Decepticons.

When they had returned to their base Ratchet had taken refuge in his Medbay, working without stop on making Ironhide's Sparkless frame suitable for a send off. Skids and Mudflap had gone in and painted the Medbay when Optimus had forced the Medic into a recharge, and had accidentally gotten paint on Ironhide's frame. Ratchet's silent fury had been even more horrifying then his yelling and wrench throwing, and the twins still haven't been seen since that incident.

Optimus was worried for Ratchet, and missed the constant loudness of the mech. If the Medic was quiet, something was wrong. If he was loud and cranky that meant everything was just as it should be. The Prime wanted his friend to be loud again, even if it was just venting about the unfairness and loss of a good mech, a better friend, and one of the best soldiers in the Autobot army.

Louder, Optimus thought sadly, You need to be louder. It isn't good for you to stay pent up like this, old friend.

But Optimus could do nothing for Ratchet yet, besides offer a comforting servo, and that the Medic was unlikely to reach for.

Megatron sat on his thrown, a clawed finger idly drawing glyphs along the metal as he looked at the spectacle before him.

Optimus Prime, his enemy and his brother, was on his knees before him, Energon cuffs around his wrists as he was held by Barricade and Starscream, forced to watch as Soundwave played with the stupid Witwicky organic, the one who had had the audacity to manage to kill him.

Sam was being held in the air spread eagle by four tentacles, a fifth wrapped around his neck just to hold his head in the direction Soundwave wanted, and to choke him. The teen was panting hard, filthy and bleeding. Organics were delicate, and it didn't take much force at all for Soundwave's claws to pierce his skin, or for a too hard grip to bruise him.

"Query: status of Samuel James Witwicky?" Soundwave asked in a monotone voice, but even Sam and Optimus could tell the mech was just taunting the teen.

"Just fine, glitchhead." Sam rasped, using something he had often heard Ratchet mutter. Soundwave had moved closer, and Sam took the opportunity to spit in his optic.

Megatron laughed coldly, "I barely heard him that time, Soundwave. You've appeared to have done a number on his vocals. Make him louder, I want to hear him."

Soundwave obeyed Megatron's command immediately, a tentacle moving from Sam's wrist to his elbow before bending back, a loud snap heard in the silence before Sam screamed.

Barricade lay on the ground in his bipedal form, spreading himself out as two organics busied themselves on his frame. A groan escaped him as one reached in between the plating on his leg, kneading at a particularly tense set of wires.

"See, Barricade?" Bumblebee was asking, the Scout's voice barely registering to the Decepticon. "Organics can be nice to touch, and be touched by."

Barricade wasn't doing much of the touching, and he would have said this if Mikaela and Sam hadn't shared a look, before moving to the tires on his wrists. Instead, he just groaned louder.

Prowl had been getting weird looks from the soldiers all day, coupled with whispering whenever he passed. When he went to get his Energon cube in the cafeteria, the group of soldiers in there had been laughing loudly. Until he came in, that is. Then everything had gone suddenly quiet, the noise only picking up again once he had left.

He hadn't even been there for a whole day, and already he was the center of attention. Prowl's doorwings lifted into an irritated 'v' shape, and after finishing off his Energon cube, he went to the two soldiers he had been told that he could get help from.

"Captain Lennox, Sergeant Epps, I request an audience from the two of you." Prowl stated as he entered the Captain and Sergeant's shared office. It was one of the few big enough for a Cybertronian to enter without a holoform.

"What do you need, Prowl?" Will asked, setting down some paperwork. "And there is no need to be so formal, we will not see you referring to us as Epps and Will as rude. Everymech else is allowed to."

"I will keep a note of that," Prowl said, though had no intention of following it through. It had taken Jazz forever to break him off of proper titles for Cybertronians, and the humans he planned to be just as stubborn about. "I have not been here for twenty four hours yet, so maybe it is just my processor, but I believe that some of the soldiers are talking about me, and laughing about me for some reason."

Will and Epps looked at each other, and the Captain sighed, leaning back in his chair.

"Robert and Jazz had grown rather close before your landing, and as you may know Jazz has signed up for Guardianship of him." Will paused, letting Prowl nod. "I'll just assume you know Jazz's personality already, and Robert's is fairly similar, I would say. Helps them get along." Prowl nodded once more in understanding, it was fairly obvious that they would need to get along. "When we heard that you would be coming to Earth, Jazz said something along the lines that you belonged to him, and Epps bet him that there was no way that he could prove that to everyone on base with how uptight you had been described as."

"Jazz won that bet. He cornered you in the control room, and had you sitting on the intercom button while you two… sparked." Here Epps smirked, though he was a little sour about losing the bet with his Guardian. "You two were broadcasted around the whole base. Now there's a betting pool on about who was louder, you or Jazz. Jazz of course started it."

Epps and Will watched with interest as Prowl's faceplates blanked completely. Nothing happened for a few seconds, and then Prowl just turned around and walked out of their shared office. Epps was almost disappointed, until they couldn't see Prowl anymore.

"JAZZ!"

Both soldiers winced, Prowl's angry yell leaving their ears ringing. Neither doubted that the whole base couldn't hear Prowl, and this time they didn't even need the intercom.

"Prowl," Will stated, attempting to keep a straight face. "Prowl is definitely the louder one."

Bumblebee sat low on his shocks, trying to not get slightly jealous of the scene before him.

Ever since Sideswipe had arrived on Earth, Sam had been at the Frontliner's side. It was true that Sideswipe had more battle experience than he did, and could tell Sam more firsthand stories of the frontline, of the Decepticons, and of other Autobots that Bumblebee had never actually had the chance to meet. And Sideswipe let Sam get by with whatever he wanted, while Bumblebee did take, and he even would admit it to himself, a more mother hen stand.

Now Sam was giving Sideswipe a wash down, something he had only done for Bumblebee previously. And Bumblebee found himself trying to discretely glare Sideswipe six feet under.

"Primus," Ironhide rumbled from beside Bumblebee, startling the Scout. He hadn't even noticed the Weapons Specialist pull up. "Could you sulk any louder? He'll get tired of Sideswipe soon, so calm your aft and try to stop glaring holes in Sideswipe's paint job."

As it would turn out, Bumblebee could sulk even louder, proving Ironhide wrong. The Weapons Specialist would be torn between amusement and the urge to break something when Bumblebee sulked to Ratchet instead of quietly to himself, taking hard earned time with his mate away from him as payback for his comments.

When Bumblebee had met Sam, he had gotten back his ability to speak. It had helped that Ratchet had fixed his vocalizer, but Ratchet had done so before, and each breaking just made Bumblebee try to use it less and less. But with Sam there to talk to, he used it so much that he had lost his voice within a week of gaining it again, and had immediately gone to see Ratchet to get it fixed.

And then Sam was taken, a video sent a month later spelling out the teen's death. It hit Bumblebee the hardest, the mech losing his ability to talk completely. He refused to even use the radio, or his internal comm system. No matter how hard any organic or Cybertronian tried, none of them could get more than a gesture from Bumblebee.

Optimus held a meeting with Ratchet, Ironhide, Will, Epps, and Fig, and they all came to the same decision. The more they bothered the Scout about Sam, or about not talking, the more upset and withdrawn the Scout would become. So they all planned to stop, just going along with Bumblebee for now.

Ratchet had been able to explain it to them, though Optimus and Ironhide needed no explanation. Bumblebee had just been a Youngling when his home city had been attacked, and his Creators killed in a Decepticon raid. He had been found in the rubble, clinging to his femme creator's chassis and leaking optical fluid, but already mute from one of the Decepticons ripping out his vocalizer. Optimus had taken the Youngling in, and he had joined the team bound on getting the Allspark back. Jazz trained Bumblebee to be a Saboteur, or Scout, and while all of them would have wished he could have grown up innocently, the war didn't allow for that.

But Sam had returned some of Bumblebee's lost innocence, letting the Scout remember how to have fun and enjoy living again. Even when Bumblebee had no vocalizer, and didn't use his radio, Sam still seemed to understand the Scout easily, something no one or mech else had been able to do. And the Decepticons had taken him away and killed him.

After Ratchet's explanation, the soldiers had been more understanding of the situation, and tried harder to have conversations with Bumblebee while the Scout just made gestures. They were no Sam though, and after a while Bumblebee just gave up communicating with them completely, letting one of his fellow Cybertronians answer for him instead.

Half a year after Sam's death, the sensors surrounding the base were set off by two unknown Cybertronians, one registering as Decepticon. The alarms sounded, and all mechs and three organics took to the front of the base to meet the intruders head on.

When Barricade came speeding into sight, they were slightly surprised. He was followed by another, unknown alt mode, but Barricade wasn't often seen on the frontlines, and had never been sent in on a suicide mission before, even as a distraction. They were even more surprised when they could see that Barricade was already wounded and leaking Energon, only transforming when he came to about a hundred feet in front of the Autobots, but not drawing any weapons. Ironhide pushed the soldiers behind him, more on the alert now that something was going oddly.

That was when the mech following Barricade caught up to him, transforming while still on the move and falling forward, Barricade catching him and growling in annoyance. The unknown mech straightened himself, holding on to Barricade for support with one servo, while desperately waving the other at them. Like Barricade, he was leaking Energon, wounds littering his frame. Barricade, however, looked worse.

"No, no, don't shoot!" The mech exclaimed desperately, voice sounding slightly familiar, but off somehow. "It's-"

"Sam?" Bumblebee asked in amazement, the first time anyone or mech had heard his voice since the teen went missing. The Autobots just turned bewildered looks to Bumblebee, before returning them to the mech in front of them with even more amazement than what Bumblebee expressed. The voice was similar, and the optics were such a strange color. Like the cross between brown and hazel Sam's eyes had been.

"Bee!" Sam cried happily, and Barricade barely managed to move to the side fast enough to avoid being taken down with him when Bumblebee launched himself at the human-turned-mech, tackling Sam to the ground.

"Sam! It's really you!" Bumblebee pulled the now mech close, causing Sam to laugh. "Oh, Sam, I thought I'd never see you again!"

Barricade watched in disgust, before turning and surveying the three Autobots and three organics that had yet to move. Ironhide still had his cannon out and ready, Optimus was poised with his battle mask down, and Ratchet had a wrench dangling loosely from his servo. Will, Epps, and Fig just stood there staring at Sam and Bumblebee with wide eyes. Barricade studied all of them, before turning around and addressing Sam.

"If your love fest gets any louder," Barricade ground out, "I'm going to purge my tanks and then return to the Decepticons."

Sam raised a servo and flipped him off, not able to do much else with Bumblebee still situated on top of him. The group of six was left staring at the trio in front of him, wondering how it was possible that Sam was now a mech, and appeared to be on good terms with Barricade. Bumblebee didn't really care about anything besides Sam being back.