A New Kind Of Challenge

[heliopauseentertainments]

For korloniumcrystals on Tumblr.

Continuity: IDW2
Rating: General
Relationship: Greenlight/Arcee
Characters: Greenlight & Arcee

Summary: In which Arcee waits for Greenlight to arrive for their date.

Crossposting: Tumblr | AO3 | Pillowfort

Fic under cut

Arcee didn’t know how this date would end. She’d been shocked Greenlight had even agreed to go with her. Sure, she’d been a fierce, valorous soldier during the War of the Threefold Spark, and had even struck a blow against one of Exarchon’s bodies herself, but trying to court a beautiful xenobiologist was an altogether different sort of battle that she wasn’t sure she was prepared for. This wasn’t a challenge she could defeat with blades.

Civilian life was still… new. Difficult.

Since the beginning of peace following the Nominus Edict, Arcee had been struggling to adjust to not throwing herself into the jaws of death on a daily basis. Now, instead she simply got up each day, went about mundane business, and went to recharge at night. Most nights. It was becoming easier to rest without worry, easier for her tactical and battle software to accept being powered down for a proper, restorative recharge.

It had been happenstance that Arcee had run into Greenlight in the first place. Arcee had been part of a team escorting some visiting aliens from their accommodations in the Xeno Quarter to their ship in the spaceport the other day when a gorgeous green Cybertronian met them at the ship, having apparently forgotten to return something she had borrowed from the visitors. She hadn’t even flinched at Arcee’s veritable armory of swords and guns. She hadn’t even cared when Arcee found her vocalizer had stopped working at the sight of her. She’d just smiled and introduced herself as soon as the aliens had disembarked.

Greenlight.

A name that fit. A name Arcee wanted to commit to memory immediately.

The moment she had gotten her voice back, Arcee had asked Greenlight to go with her for fuel and much to her surprise, Greenlight said yes. No hesitation. Just a bright, shining, fearless smile.

Now, Arcee paced uneasily in front of the oil house Greenlight had agreed to meet her at after her shift at the labs. It had taken her several tries to leave her quarters earlier without being armed. Each time she had put one weapon down, she had reflexively picked up yet another one, smaller and less obvious. A show of force would not be what she would need to impress her date. That had finally convinced her worried processor to let it go and just leave her quarters, empty-handed.

Empty-handed.

Scrap, she ’d forgotten a gift!

Arcee clapped her palms to the sides of her head as she began to frantically look around the small section of street for any sign of Greenlight. No sign yet, not a flash of gleaming green paint to be seen as she turned this way and that.

Greenlight would probably just walk away when she got here, offended that Arcee hadn’t even had the forethought to get her something nice to really show that she was interested. Her optics scanned over nearby advertisements, in hopes of locating a shop that would sell something appropriate.

News stands. Boring.

Home furnishings. Save that for the second date if they got that far.

Candy—Candy!

She still had some time before the official start of their date, a handful of minutes. Plenty of time to run in and make a purchase. Arcee jogged down the street, trying—with limited success—to veer around other pedestrians as she went. She only knocked over a couple of people, so it would be fine.

Just as she was about to cross the threshold of the shop, a mech exiting the store stepped into her path.

“Arcee?”

She skidded to a stop, only just stopping short of smacking right into the mech.

“Greenlight‽”

“I’m sorry I’m late. I almost forgot to bring you something and didn’t want to show up without something.” Arcee’s optics dropped to the small box in Greenlight’s hands. “Is candy alright? I should have asked ahead of time, but—”

Oh, thank Primus, she thought.

Hands clasped together so she couldn’t wave them around and make the situation worse with nervous gestures, Arcee smiled in a failed attempt to conceal her embarrassment.

“Candy’s great!”