Author's Notes: I have no excuses for this. I just felt like writing some more genfic. This fandom's helping me out of my year-long writer's block. Thank god.

Disclaimer: I own nothing but the word order.

No Such Thing As Dignity

Ironhide did not see any justice here. He wasn't the one who'd wrecked the Witwickys' yard! Yet there he was, helping Ron Witwicky lug stone to the house in order to fix his beloved path.

Although Sam's parents had accepted the news of their son's involvement – and subsequent friendship – with a group of aliens relatively well given the circumstances under which they'd found out about it, they were still a little bit hesitant to have anything to do with the Autobots. Judy was a little more trusting than Ron, which was unsurprising considering how he reacted to 'earthquakes.'

But that didn't stop him from accepting help from the Autobots for his rebuilding project.

He'd refused to ride in Ironhide. The idea clearly bothered the man on some level, which he described simply as being "too weird." And besides which, he had his own car, which Ironhide was currently tailing down the street. Internally, he rolled his optics. The man didn't believe that Ironhide could find his way back, apparently, because he was driving exactly the speed limit and kept pulling over whenever another car managed to pull in between them.

They were the first ones back, Ironhide was quick to note. Bumblebee had taken Sam and Mikaela to see Sam's friend Miles, presumably to reconcile something with the latter. Sam had been muttering something about 'bros before hos,' which didn't make much sense out of context. Ratchet had gone with Judy to pick out flowers and potted plants to replace the ones he and Optimus had crushed in her greenhouse and flowerbed, respectively. Of course, Optimus, as their leader, had much more pressing matters to attend to (such as negotiating with the government about how the Autobots could take responsibility for Mission City when they didn't have any sort of funds to pay for the damages, and so on). Hence, Ironhide had gotten stuck helping the Witwickys in his stead.

Nope, no justice at all.

Ron moved to begin unloading Ironhide's cargo, but he made the task go much more smoothly by transforming. Ron stared at him for a moment as he set the stacks of stone on the ground.

"…I'm never going to get used to that," he decided aloud.

A high-pitched bark suddenly got both of their attentions as the Witwickys' ill-mannered Chihuahua came bounding over. His leg was free of the restraint it had been in during Ironhide's initial encounter with him. He ran right up to Ironhide, then stood and stared at him.

Ironhide stared right back.

This continued for a good thirty seconds before Ron scooped the little dog up and deposited him on the porch of his doghouse, one of the only things that had survived both the Autobots' recon and Sector 7's intrusion unscathed.

"You just stay put, got it?" the human told him, which Ironhide found odd, since his research indicated that dogs couldn't understand much more than single-word commands, and they certainly couldn't reply.

Ironhide spent the next several minutes helping Ron clear away the debris from the old path, piling it off to the opposite side of the yard to be disposed of later. He was just setting down another chunk of stone when his sensors picked up movement to his right. He pivoted to look, and there was the Chihuahua again. He recalled vaguely that the creature's designation was 'Mojo,' and then remembered how Sam had reprimanded the little dog on that first night.

He took on a stern tone and said, "Bad Mojo!"

The dog continued to stare at him, unfazed.

Ironhide detected no sign that the obnoxious little animal intended to lubricate on him again, so he turned to resume his work.

A few seconds later, Mojo ran off.

"I think he likes you," Ron commented.

"Hmph," was all Ironhide could think of to say.

It wasn't long before they were interrupted again. This time, the dog had returned with a ball in his mouth. A quick scan and search indicated that it was a tennis ball. Dogs apparently enjoyed playing with them.

Mojo looked at Ironhide expectantly.

"What?" he snapped, mentally noting that he was now engaged in the same odd behavior as Ron had been before, talking to a dog like he could understand and respond to him.

But of course he couldn't, and so he ran up to Ironhide's foot – the same foot – and dropped the ball in front of it.

Ron started laughing, which did not help matters.

"He wants you to play with him," he explained.

Ironhide heard him make some wisecrack about "robot-man's best friend," but his attention returned to Mojo.

The creature barked at him, a sign of impatience, he figured. Ironhide carefully lifted the fuzzy green object between two digits, intending on a closer inspection. He grimaced; it was wet.

"How vile," he muttered dispassionately as the thing's scent hit his sensors as well. Thoroughly disgusted, he tossed it lightly in the direction of the fence.

Mojo bolted after it.

Ironhide watched the dog's progress as he chased the ball down, snatched it in his mouth, and returned to Ironhide.

By now, Ron was in stitches; apparently it must have looked very 'weird' for an Autobot to be playing catch with a dog.

Feeling perturbed, Ironhide was happy to see Ratchet pull into the yard, Judy in tow. Mojo ran to greet the woman as Ratchet transformed and joined Ironhide beside the newly-started path.

"My scanners indicate that the Witwicky man finds you incredibly amusing," his comrade said, shattering all hope Ironhide had harbored of a distraction. "I suppose there's a first time for everything…"

"Can it," Ironhide grumbled, even as Mojo came running back over to him. Ron started snickering again.

"Aww, how adorable!" Judy said, clearly trying to contain her own amusement.

"The creature considers you to be part of his territory," Ratchet commented.

"What?!"

"That is apparently what he was establishing when he leaked on you."

"You've got to be kidding," Ironhide said, horrified.

The ball was dropped beside his foot again.

Ironhide threw it a lot further away the second time.