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The door slammed shut.
“Could you stand to be more careful? I would appreciate if you could enter like a normal mech” The orange and white medic sitting by a table littered with different parts and tools scoffed. “I would also appreciate not having to fix that primus forsaken door. Again”
Hot Rod cringed, moving to sit over on the waiting chairs in the corner “Sorry sorry. I was just.. in a rush is all.”
Another white mech came through a side hall, carrying three stacked boxes. He placed them down, making sure they were neatly stacked on top of one another. Tilting his head, he stared at Hot Rod thoughtfully, who was currently fidgeting and finding a comfortable position to sit in while looking down. He playfully piped up, “What’s with the rush? I know your whole thing is being fast, but I take it the job went well?”
“It better have. Primus knows this kid needs more money to finally relax and stop you from hovering over him, Drift” The medic sighed, turning to look at Drift, then at Hot Rod.
“Don’t worry Ratch, you know he doesn't leave a job unfinished. It’s like saying he lost.” Drift chuckled a bit, teasing the younger mech.
Hot Rod continued to fidget. Upon locking optics with Drift, the latter squinted them and did not waste anytime in questioning the nervous mech, “Something happened-”
“Of course nothing happened, I have no idea what you’re talking about!” Hot Rod interjected skittishly. He sat still, one pede on the chair and the other stretched out, his servos clutching onto the undersides of the chair with wide cerulean optics.
There was a moment of silence. Awkward. Tense. Then another.
Drift was the first to break the silence, crossing his arms as he moved to take a step forward. “If you don’t tell me what happened right now you know I’ll figure it out eventually, right?” Raising an optic ridge at Hot Rod, who’s optics began to dart all over the place before he abruptly stood up. Walking backward he nervously replied, “Ummmmmm close call is all! Anyways, I really do have a client to meet up with soon, so. Catch you both later!”
The door slammed shut, again, as Hot Rod quickly left the building.
Ratchet turned to look at Drift, unamused, before going back to work on his project. Drift sighed, turning to open the boxes and begin working on his own project.
Hot Rod would come back. Eventually.
— —
The energon was bitter as he downed the cube. Nightbeat had made sure it wasn’t anything but regular energon, then again he was sure some of the energon he had stored was a little more dated than usual. He really had to take the time to organize.
Right now though, he was staring at all the information he had been able to gather. Three days of research, a late-night encounter, and early morning thoughts. All this to come to a board where he could connect the pieces, or at least partially. Admittedly there wasn’t much, but there was definitely more than what he had started out with.
If only he had been able to get a look at the item…
No matter. He could try and figure it out through context and other sources. Nothing was impossible in these types of situations.
One thing that stood out to him was how quickly the thief, Hot Rod, had composed himself after being caught. The fact that he had referred to Nightbeat as an officer was also strange, but he assumed that’s all they had sent his way for a while. The little card had given out his designation, which was odd, because there had been no prior pointers towards any sort of designation or reference to it. The recent photograph had presumably been a signature of his, but they were just flames. If he tried hard enough, maybe he could see an ‘R’ amongst the scribbles. Or maybe it was the lack of recharge catching up to him.
Nightbeat was not a stranger to late recharges or even lack of them, yet every time it happened he seemed surprised at the outcome. Whatever the case, he’d take advantage to get some recharge mid day to be able to work late again.
For now, he continued to work as the hours went by. One detail lead to another, one inference to the next, along with all the organization that came with investigations, and suddenly it was late enough that the HUD errors letting him know his processor was being overworked were a constant. It was later than expected, which was unsurprising for Nightbeat. The amount of information he was uncovering was invaluable, and sure it was possible some of it was a longshot, but when had he ever uncovered an incorrect path?
Maybe once, but that was because his partner couldn’t distinguish left from right! Technically, not his fault.
Deciding against sleeping in his office (again), Nightbeat decided to go home for the night. It would have been ideal to take a power nap and keep going, but he wanted to be at proper processor power for when things escalated. If they even reached that point. Considering he had managed to catch the thief in action less than a week after being handed the case, Nightbeat was pretty sure this would not go on as long as it had with the other authorities. Nothing new when it was him working on a new case, of course.
As he turned a corner, he saw a flash of movement turn into an alleyway. On any day he would not be interested, he wouldn’t care enough to spare it a second glance, but he could have sworn the light shined off of orange plating with yellow accents. In fact, he was more than certain that was the shadow of a spoiler that managed to disappear into the shadows of the alleyway. Preparing himself, Nightbeat decided to check his surroundings before walking towards the alleyway. He stopped right before going in to listen for any activity, and upon hearing nothing, turned to walk in. Call him stupid for walking into a suspicious alleyway after seeing a possible, unconfirmed target, but curiosity did always get the better of him.
As he walked down the alley, he stopped halfway in, looking around. There was absolutely nothing, so maybe it was a trick of the light or his lack of recharge catching up to him for real this time. He turned to leave, and before he could take a step forward, a playful voice rang out behind him, “We keep meeting up like this.”
Nightbeat froze. So it was him.
He turned back around to confirm his suspicions, coming face to face with Hot Rod, who was walking closer to Nightbeat. Before he could get any closer he came to a stop, leaning as he crossed his arms, a cocky grin adorning his face. Raising an optic ridge, he tilted his helm, “Youre awfully good for being a lousy cop..”
Nightbeat, taken aback by the comment, stood upright and placed a servo on his hip, challenging, “Really now. I’ll take that as a compliment.” He didn’t make en effort to correct Hot Rod on his reference to him as a cop. Let the mech think he has it all figured out. Those were the easiest to catch.
“Don’t flatter yourself, mech. You may be more capable than most of the bots around here, but that doesn’t mean you’re getting anywhere” Hot Rod taunted as he came up to shove his faceplate into Nightbeat’s, who suddenly leaned back, taking a step back to keep his balance. Rolling his optics under his visor, he ignored the quip, instead asking, “What did you take that night. Clearly it was important enough to take it before you ran off”
Hot Rod let out a small sound as he leaned back, never taking his optics off of Nightbeat. “Whether it was important or not is one thing. I just never leave a job unfinished and you’re next on the list” He grinned. Before Nightbeat could figure out what any of that meant he quickly dodged a kick coming his way as he stumbled down and off to the side. He quickly looked up to see Hot Rod already scaling up the building. As he moved to get up, he began to get pinged with HUD errors, most prominently his fuel levels being too low. “Frag!”
Nightbeat could’ve sworn he had just had that cube, but then again he had never taken note of the time. Either that or this small encounter had used up more energon than expected, considering he didn’t have the best quality at his office anyway. He really considered going after Hot Rod. It was a cheap shot on Hot Rod’s part to attack him like that, but he supposed it was such that a criminal would find any way out. What Nightbeat didn’t understand was why the thief had shown himelf like that. Whether it had been his intention to be seen or not by Nightbeat, it was strange, and even stranger that he revealed himself and didn’t look to finish him off. Just ran away after a meager kick. Maybe not all that meager, there was definitely power behind that kick, but still. Just a kick and he leaves. Unless the bot wanted Nightbeat to follow. Perhaps a trap.
With HUD errors unable to be dimissed, Nightbeat turned to head back home, groaning as he went over the events just now. All this was just so strange to him. He didn’t know what to make of it yet, but he was going to figure it all out soon.
For now, some needed recharge was past due for him, perhaps some energon as well.
— —
Sitting atop a building, Hot Rod huffs as he drops to lay down on his back. The cop hadn’t followed him, probably too scared to climb and run across the buildings. Typical.
He could attribute it to the guy being tired, it was extremely late afterall (he wondered why the guy was out so late. Terribly late). Perhaps he actually did land the kick and didn’t realize, but he could’ve sworn he hadn’t landed that attack! Or maybe he did but it was weak. Or the mech was weak. He agreed on the latter conclusion.
In all honesty, Hot Rod was just taking a walk, he didn’t mean to be seen, much less for him to be followed. Can’t a mech dawdle about the neighborhood these days. The nerve of some bots…
But it was fine. He learned a few things. The cop won’t run around and have fun on the buildings (lame), works around the clock (boring) and seems to have a keen optic (interesting). Either way, the yellow and blue bot was turning out to be interesting and Hot Rod couldn’t deny he was in dire need of some excitement. Filing away his mental notes, Hot Rod jumps back up and moves to the edge of the building. “I wouldn’t mind a game of cat and mouse. I wonder what else you’ve got in store little mouse?” He muttered to himself before climbing down.