Alright this is my first actual, posted fanfiction! dances Ahem, anyway… be kind? Rewind?

Honestly though, I'm sure I'll be getting more flames than I will compliments but oh well, as long as I have fun writing this that's all that matters right?

Besides, between work, school and all of my pets, prefect writing skills as a hobby isn't that high on the list.

Anyway, constructive reviews are always welcomed.

Edit: Props to my BETA Teh blumchenkinder who has fixed everything I post after the original posting. XD That means it's posted and crappy til' Teh tells me what's wrong.

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Nick Aker always knew her life would be different. From an early age she had a fundamental understanding of this; perhaps that was why she was taking things all in stride. The events leading to this very moment had begun one week ago with an innocent phone call.

"Josh I know you're in love with that thing but you've got work to do..." Nick growled from her place in the extra large garage, three semis were lined up inside and there was room for at least three more. "Replacing the fuel line on this big guy is gonna take me at least an hour, so you get started on that one." she commented pointing towards the simple and white cab-over rig.

Joshua was what the small town would call a troublemaker; he didn't try to go out and get in trouble, it found him. At 18 he was brash, an adult and yet still a boy at heart. This could easily be proven in the way he was fawning over his new ATV 4-wheeler, and constant comments that he couldn't wait to try it out. Despite his antics, Nick had to admit Josh was easy on the eyes, dark hair, blue eyes; he was a lady killer and he knew it. Luckily she and her father and kept the boy on the straight and narrow-when it came to women, despite any joking comments, he was a gentleman at heart. "Chill out Nick…Big Daddy's just in for an oil change and the Mac's air conditioning needs a recharge, no big deal." Most trucks in the industry had their own nicknames painted somewhere on the cab, or if nothing else usually went by the driver's last name. It gave a little life to what they did, though despite his comments; Josh left the ATV to begin his work on 'Big Daddy'.

Of course the cheeky grin and wink he sent her way were met with a rolling of her eyes. His charm and good looks were useless on her. If she had to describe herself, Nick would say that she cleaned up nice, most people did anyway, the real question was, exactly how often was she cleaned up? Normally her outfits consisted of jeans, jean shorts, and a large array of t-shirts with various logos on them. She had no one to impress in the garage, and personally felt that if she had to impress someone to get them to like her, well they weren't worth the time of day.

As for the truck she was working on, or rather trucks in general, they were in a sense, Nick's life. The first thing she could remember was the road trips she and her father would take across country in one of the big rigs, and the hide and seek game she had to play at all the weigh stations. After all the police would see a middle-aged man and a young girl and often got the wrong impression, even if it was father and daughter.

When it was time for her to start school her father had done the most reasonable thing-considering staying on the road was no longer a possibility and knowing that trucking was in their blood, he started up a truck stop. This wasn't one of those truck stops passing motorists stopped at, this wasn't a rest stop, it was a hard core truck stop. They were well known throughout the trucking world, offering full service care for the rigs at mom and pop business prices. More than once it had been mentioned that if the Akers couldn't fix it, scrap it.

Her father had made the business prosper and they were able to buy plenty of land. Years on the road made her father not real desperate for close neighbors, in fact the further away the better, though he was a good and honest man. As she grew Nick picked up on the trade, by twelve she had replaced her first transmission. Or rather had walked her father through the steps considering most of the machinery was still to large for her to handle. Her father had beamed with pride, seeing Nick interested in his work, the interest only growing over time.

Of course, trucks weren't all she knew. She had gone to college briefly, in two years she'd managed to cram in her bachelor's degree in business. While she was overworking herself with school her dad had hired Joshua, a boy who lived several miles from their house and used the ATV trails to get around at the time. After two years Nick was surprised to see him at work in the garage, though he was only skilled in the basics. When it came to problem solving with the rigs he wasn't always the best man for the job.

It had been three years since she'd returned from school, times were tough but she wasn't giving up hope-though all she had learned from college told her that hope was about all she'd have at the end of the day.

Only a year and a half ago her father had suffered a heart attack. While he'd lived and suffered minor effects, working on the rigs was out of the question, and the medical bills had stacked up quickly. Rolling her shoulders with a sigh she quickly cleared her mind, refusing to get on that subject yet again-it caused her enough stress as it was.

The truck stop itself was made of several components, the diner (no truck stop was complete without one) that paid rent considering it had been built on the Akers property, the garage she was working in, a general store of storts for truckers, the fueling station, and a large field that was prepped for the trucks to rest overnight in. That had been the last and possibly best addition, in essence it appeared to be connected and large archways that the truck cabs parked under with a thick tube like structure hanging down. With only a ten dollar adaptor a trucker could easily mount the front of the hanging gadget to the window and do a number of things, surf the web, watch tv and the system even had an heating and cooling unit so the truckers didn't have to waste fuel idling, or create more fumes for the planet.

Akers Truck Stop was proud to be one of only ten locations to offer the feature and it brought more business their way which Nick was thankful for-after two years she knew they still had another year before the system was paid off.

Wiping the sweat from her forehead and grimacing slightly when she figured she'd smeared grease, or fuel, or some other dirty substance there she only sighed, it came with the work after all. It was at that point, fate decided to throw her a curveball, as the wall mounted phone began to ring.

Normally the phone was just used for inter property communication, from the house, the gas station, the diner and so on, though it did connect to the outside world, few people knew the number. Climbing down from the side of the rig she made her way to the wall wiping her hands with one of many available rags in the garage. "Tell Jones it's going to take me longer every time he calls." Jones was the owner of the rig she was currently working on and he'd had the waitress at the diner call over at least three times to check on the progress.

"Nicole Akers?" She blinked at the unfamiliar voice, male, and slightly younger, probably around Joshua's age.

"This is Nick.." She clarified, using her much more common nickname, "Who's this?"

"Ah this is Sam…Sam Witwicky." The male, Sam, responded, the name rung a slight bell.

"The L.A. Witwicky's?" It wasn't as if she knew any other Witwicky's but at least the location would clarify that she was remembering correctly.

"Yeah. Yeah that's us…You were at the family reunion about ten years ago…" Clearly the guy on the other end was attempting to refresh her memory and it was working.

When she was about fourteen her father had begun dating a rather nice woman. Nick's mom had died at a very early stage of her life so Nick didn't really mind. Even when the relationship ended it had been on good terms, her father and the woman had laughed it off, wondering how they'd managed to stay together so long. That summer though she and her father were host to the Witwicky family reunion, Nick couldn't recall how the woman had been related to the Witwicky family, a cousin of a step sibling of a brother's…well she didn't bother remembering how but the fact was the Witwicky's had spend a week on her father's property and it had been interesting to say the least.

"You…you were the bee kid weren't you?" She questioned, the memory popping into her head of a young dark-haired boy flipping out whenever a bee-let alone any innocent bug came within ten feet of him, of course Nick thought it was the funniest thing in the world at the time, still did.

"Yeah.." This time Sam didn't sound too happy that she had remembered him. "So I was wondering, you and your dad still have all that property?"

"Yeah why….?" She frowned a little, it had been ten years and the kid-well young adult now she figured, was calling him, usually people wanted something when they called.

Sam on the other end sighed softly, covering the mouthpiece of his cell phone so the sound couldn't be heard, and so the lie began. "Well you see when I turned eighteen my friend said I had to buy a lotto ticket because it was legal to do so…and I won…And you know LA the houses are pretty crunched together…" She frowned trying to figure out what he was getting at. "Anyway you know us boys I went out and bought a couple of cars and I have no place to store them." That was followed by a slightly strained chuckle, "So I was wondering if I could…I mean if that old aviator hanger was still on the property…if I could store them there for a while…Mom, Dad, and I are going to take a vacation before moving to a bigger home…and I really don't want to leave this cars sitting on L.A. streets ya know?"

Sam paused, wanting for a response, and when he heard none a frown crossed his features. "I'd be willing to pay a storage fee, you know for taking up the space…and keeping them in good working order." That had her attention. Nick wasn't the type to ask for a hand out, hearing that Sam had won, clearly, a large sum in the lotto had her thinking just maybe she'd ask for help, but her pride wouldn't let her and she inwardly cursed her father. A good old fashioned man himself, his rules were simple: if he couldn't do it himself, it wasn't meant to be done. Of course her father had passed along the same traits to her, though her business mind saw around certain aspects of her pride, if she was storing his items and he was paying a storage fee then it wasn't really a hand out.

"I think that could work out..." she began, still thinking over the idea. Sam cut her off.

"Great! Nick, you're awesome! They'll be there by next week…" The boy sounded a little too happy, then again boys and their toys… "You want me to wire you the first payment? If you've got a bank account I could just set up direct deposits, or just pay in advance…like I said me and the family are going on vacation so I figure the cars will be there at least a year before we find a large enough property to store them.."

Nick blinked at the phone, clearly Sam had things all planned out, "Any way works…"

One week later Nick gave a refreshing sigh, having just showered after a long day at the garage. The Aker's house was situated nearly five miles from the truck stop, as mentioned, they had land and plenty of it. At the time thankfully, no one was really pressing for it. No one wanted condo's built in a town that couldn't even boast two Mcdonalds.

Walking down the stairs and into the kitchen she found her father reading the morning paper. She didn't bother commenting that it was a little late to be reading the news, they'd had that argument several times, his response was always the same: work in the morning, relaxing at night.

While her father couldn't work on the rigs anymore, he could keep up the house, the property, and took care of the several dogs they had. Edward Clark Akers was, much like his daughter, a force to be reckoned with, though their approaches did differ. While Nick went for the more direct, the louder the better, Ed went for the silent, laid back approach. Nick smiled fondly at the thought, remembering several times in high school she'd brought boys home to meet her father; he never did raise his voice to any of them, and yet few of them would ever talk to her again. Thinking back she figured it probably had to do with the phrase, 'See this prison record? You hurt her and I've got no probably going back.'

"How's Hank doing?" She questioned as she grabbed a drink from the fridge and took a seat across from him at the table. Hank was the newest addition to their family, as mentioned the two of them had several dogs that mostly lived outside, having free roam of the property and control of the barn several yards from the house, Hank was a rather large mutt that had one day simply showed up for breakfast with the other dogs and been with them ever since. According to her father people in the cities were crazy for fencing in, or leashing their dogs, after all there was no fencing on their miles of property and yet no dog had ever left permanently.

Speaking of the little devils several barks drew the Akers' attention to the back door, Nick sighed as she rose from her seat, "I'll see what it is.." She commented as her father made no move to get up.

"Probably that damn 'coon again, stupid thing doesn't realize those dogs would make a chew toy out of it…" Was the older man's only comment as he flipped the page of his paper.

Stepping outside Nick frowned, nothing seemed immediately out of place, and it wasn't as if they had anything worth stealing around the house, the expensive equipment was all at the garage. Following the direction several dogs were barking in she frowned, some distance away laid the hanger-left over from when a military base had occupied the land, it dwarfed the garage to say the least, though, even some distance away she could see lights flickering from within briefly illuminating the fog glass window panes-true there was nothing in there at the moment but the last thing she needed where squatters present when Sam dropped off his cars.

Shouting that she'd be back in a bit, her father waved her off, he cared for his daughter of course, she was his pride and joy, but he respected her as well and knew that if he didn't let her go she'd be angry at him for weeks. Sliding into the beat up ford truck she made sure the shotgun was secure in the gun rack, no country truck was complete without it, and began the drive over the hilly terrain to the hanger. By the time she'd gotten half way there the lights had disappeared; though she didn't turn around then, best to sort this out now.

Grabbing the shotgun and the flashlight from the glove box she stepped out of the truck and made her way inside without much hesitation, shining the light around the hanger she frowned at the reflections the light seemed to be bouncing off of in what should have been an empty space. Finding the lights she flicked them on, the large bulbs above humming as they slowly came to life, dimly lighting the area at first though it was enough to cause her to stop in her tracks.

The first thing she noticed was the Peterbilt. In all her life she'd never seen something like it, sure she'd seen other Peterbilts, but the paint job along with what must have been several custom features had her staring for several minutes, as if she'd blink and it would be gone. After a short period of staring she managed to tear her eyes away and scan over the other vehicles in the room. A bright yellow Camaro with racing stripes seemed to shout out 'play with me' while the Topkick parked some distance way screamed the exact opposite. Oddly enough the Solstice in the corner seemed to say nothing at all, inwardly she berated herself, cars couldn't say anything so of course it didn't seem to say something.

Nick shook her head figuring she'd spent too much time around the trucks in the garage. The oddest one seemed to be the Hummer-if it had been just a regular Hummer she figured it would have fit into the theme of expensive and or flashy cars, instead it was a search and rescue SUV, perhaps the flashing lights were what convinced Sam to buy it.

She shook her head at the thought, boys.

After looking over each car she checked the area but found it to be void of any drivers, stumped she headed back to the Peterbilt, for some reason she figured this truck would hold all the answers, or perhaps it was merely because she was used to the large rig more so than the small sports cars. Reaching for the door she blinked when it opened with ease-having thought it would be locked on her, with only a moment's hesitation she pulled herself up into the car and was again awestruck. Rather than the dirty and grease stained cabs she was used to this rig had leather interior, the bed was pristine, the dash decked out in chrome, definitely a custom job.

In the passenger seat she noticed an envelope and small box, deciding to read the letter first she made short work of opening it, the box could wait.

Hey Nick,

Sorry I couldn't stop by to visit, we had a plane to catch, I figured you'd come to this big guy first considering you work with big trucks so I left the note here. At the reunion I remember you telling me how each truck had it's own name and personality, you described them as if they were living breathing beings.

She smiled, remembering the conversation, and still believed it true, each rig had certain quirks, some liked one oil, other's preferred another-despite what the manufacturer claimed was the best brand, the same went with all other aspects of the rigs, from loads, to the tire pressure, a happy truck didn't break down.

Well that stuck with me, so each of these guys have names, the Camaro is Bumblebee, he's a great ride but his gears grind if he gets too much dirt or mud on him.

The Camaro wasn't fond of dirt, or rather his engine wasn't, check.

Ratchet is the Hummer, he's not built for speed but he'll get you where you need to go. I left him fully loaded in case of an emergency.

The Hummer was a hospital on wheels, check.

The Topkick is Ironhide. He can be a bit of a brute, and he doesn't do well on day to day driving, he'd rather be pulling a semi load then go pick up the mail from the post office.

The Topkick was a badass truck who couldn't handle rush hour, or probably burned off too much gas doing so.

The Peterbilt you're in is the smoothest riding truck you'll find, you can call him Optimus.

The rig was definitely a custom job if it rode smooth; normally the cabs shook somewhat from the power under the hood.

Lastly the Solstice, that's Jazz he's only for looks, nothing's working under the hood, I'll have him in the shop as soon as we get back from vacation.

Nick frowned a little glancing to the silver car in the corner, just as she'd thought, the car seemed to say nothing, in a way, it was dead.

In the box under this note I provided the first six months rent for each car, there is also a bracelet, it's special made, it will turn on each car, unlock the doors, trunks etc. just by getting it close enough to the door handle or ignition, etc. The keys for each car are in the glove boxes, just incase you need those too. Feel free to drive them a bit, just remember what I said about Ironhide.

Thanks again and I'll call soon.

It was signed 'Sam Witwicky'.

Reaching over she grabbed the small box and opened it with care, inside was a check with the promised payment, much more than she'd first thought- it would definitely brighten their bank account to have it, as well as the small, metallic bracelet. Jewelry wasn't really her style, but if it had to do with the cars she figured she could bare it, slipping it on she glanced at the Peterbilts ignition, "Now..just how do you work..?" She questioned, mostly to herself as she passed her wrist close to the keyhole. The rig roared to life as the engine turned over and for a second Nick had to brace herself from the surprise "So it really does work.." She had to grin to herself, in a way this was like Christmas, even if the cars weren't hers.

For a moment she tried to figure out just how to turn the truck off and logically waved her wrist by the ignition once more, in response the truck died down, inwardly she made a note to ask Sam for more detailed instructions about these cars. Climbing down from the cab she closed the door before looking over the vehicles spread out across the hanger, "Well boys…looks like it's going to be a long year…" Despite the fact that it was getting late Nick couldn't pull herself away from the cars, walking around each one at least twice, when she reached the Solstice in the corner a frown crossed her features.

For a second she felt like murmuring, 'what is this murderous intent?' As many Japanese anime characters stated just before the enemy made themselves known, in truth she did feel as if someone was glaring daggers at her but with a roll of her shoulders brushed it off. In silence she ran her hand over the hood, "So you won't work for Sam huh? Just taking a little break?" waving her wrist over the front of the hood she noted that the silver sports car didn't respond by opening it's hood, just as Sam mentioned it was well and truly dead.

Opening the hood the old fashioned way she gave a low whistle as she looked over the racing engine, not something she was particularly familiar with considering her line of work, but when it came down to it an engine was an engine. "Everything looks alright…" She commented to herself after giving it a quick once over, "Well we'll see about getting you up and running later, I doubt you'd want to be stuck in this hanger all the time." She gave the rim of the hood an affectionate pat before letting the hood fall shut once more.

The excitement wearing off for the night she began to regret staying out so long. Grabbing the forgotten shotgun and flashlight she moved to turn off the lights on her way out.

With a last look back she smiled at the Peterbilt, "Dad's just going to love you…" she commented just before flicking off the lights and closing the regular sized door behind her-the hanger had large doors that opened to let-in this case the cars through, or a few human sized doors as well for convenience.

Only when scanners deemed that the old truck had parked at the farm house did the first change, Ironhide was in his regular form in a minute cannons at the ready, "She'll go to the slagging Pit for messing with Jazz." The death of Optimus' Lieutenant was still fresh on all of their minds and while they were battle worn, the loss of a comrade still hurt. Unusually Bumblebee seemed to agree, his battle visor slipping down into place briefly.

"Easy Ironhide…" Optimus commented once he'd transformed, all of them keeping their lights off to avoid attracting attention. "She doesn't know." Of course Nick didn't know that Jazz was in fact 'dead', rather than just broken as Earth vehicles became.

"Indeed, though she did seem quite interested in us." Ratchet added, glancing through one of the large fog window panes towards the house some distance away.

"Prime, you aren't seriously going to let her work on Jazz are you?" Ironhide questioned, it was the closest the black bot would come to saying he cared.

"We don't have much choice; we can't leave him anywhere safe." Optimus stated with a sigh, which was really just the ejection of air from his ventilation system, a human trait they'd picked up.

"It doesn't seem as though she wishes to cause any damage, it's an honorable endeavor that she wishes to fix a mere car that isn't hers, or her responsibility to fix." Ratchet added, in attempts to calm Ironhide, Bumblebee was easily swayed from one side to the other, being the youngest of their group and, despite having his voice back had yet to really speak up-having noticed that he could in fact learn much more by keeping silent.

Ironhide let out what could have passed as a growl, "Fine, but if she even thinks about taking me to the mall…" His threat trailed off, though it seemed for the moment he'd been abated.

None of them particularly liked the situation they were in, after the Mission city incident they'd been forced back into hiding, luckily the American government, in part mostly due to the defense secretary, had allowed them stay on the planet, and had even informed several other superpowers on Earth to the existence of the Autobots, in the beginning tensions had been high, but Optimus was a fine leader and after a while each country's leaders had agreed to the secret. Or rather, Optimus had reasoned them into the corner without ever raising his voice.

The Decepticons were out there, with Megatron's body at the bottom of the ocean others might come in attempts to take control of the Decepticons, prove themselves as leader. The battle was coming to Earth whether the humans wanted it or not, once this had been established the Earth leaders agreed to allow the Autobots free reign, with Will Lennox and Sam Witwicky as their office go between, or rather usually the government would beg the two humans into asking the Autobots for one thing or another, or an update on this or that.

Though a thorn in their side had appeared nearly two months after Mission City, it appeared, despite their best efforts that information on them had leaked, most thought of it as some crazy cover up for what really happened in Mission City, as Optimus had mentioned the best lie can in fact be the truth. Who would really believe giant alien robots waged war in the metropolis? Though a few fanatic groups were out to prove their existence, Bumblebee had come in the closest contact, someone learned of Sam's unexplainable association with the government and the boy and bee and found themselves trailed for several hours until Will and Ironhide had effectively ended the bizarre chase.

Thus far, no injury, human or Autobot, had occurred, though Optimus feared it was only a matter of time. To avoid undo injury they'd decided to go into hiding, Sam, Mikaela, the Lennoxs and several others were likewise going into hiding for the time being, if anything several large governments could hide them for a while from whatever groups were out there-though keeping the Autobots with them would merely draw attention to the humans.

While the other's continued discussing their situation, and trying to keep Ironhide calm, Bumblebee moved towards the back of the hanger, cracking open one of the large, airplane sized doors with ease, what he saw out make had his optics going wide, "Maybe this won't be so bad." He commented gaining the attention of the other's who likewise stalked over, the other three were tall enough to glance outside through the high fog windows.

What lay behind the hanging for some distance it seemed, was a graveyard, a mechanical graveyard, airplanes mostly, though some military vehicles could be seen here or there. Granted they were all human supplies but still, it gave the Autobots spare parts and an endless supply of scrap metal to work with.

Bumblebee was clearly very happy with himself, after all his charge had been the one to suggest this location for hiding and-besides the tense moment over Jazz's remains, everything was perfect.