Yeah, the worst part is that it's not even Orion's fault 🥲

It's because in this AU, bots can be born with or without cogs and the cogless ones have limited options, and suddenly Alpha Trions adopted a random one he liked and it made the others jealous and they don't like Orion as a result, seeing him as "Privileged" and a "Primes's boy"

It took some time and effort from the royal family, but they quickly assured Branch that he had nothing to fear, because family was forever and they would never leave him aside. On the contrary, their family only grew.

Those were some of the questions that started to come to his mind with the fear that they would leave him behind.+

"If they already found their lost son, does that make me the third wheel?"

"What if I was just a rebound until they found their real son?"

"Are they going to abandon me like my former brothers did?"

"Does D like him more than me?" +

Once they find Cooper, Branch is okay at first. But as he slowly sees Prince D and Cooper bonding, it made his insecurities spike. He started to feel fear for his place in the family. +

He thinks D-16 is the troublemaker for getting Orion out of his home and getting him in trouble at the mines. And since then, he doesn't approve of D-16 and wants Orion to break up with him and come back home.

He thinks of Orion as an excellent student and even sees him as a son, but all the other Primes know he's a troublemaker, and most importantly, so does D. He's gotten him in trouble more than once, and Alpha refuses to believe that. +

He prohibited Orion Pax to go to the mines just for "a bot" and stay at home with him and the rest of the Primes, but Orion refused and left anyway. Alpha was furious about this and thinks that D-16 talked him into this, because Orion had never acted that way. +

Alpha Trion found out about this and at first it was acceptable, but when Orion told him he wants to work at the mines to be with D-16, he almosted offlined on the spot. Having prepared him all his life for the archives and receive that news was a blow to his ego. +

D-16 is at the top of the board and has an impeccable record at the mines, but since Orion Pax showed up, it's making him tumble, a little. But, Orion is slowly growing into him. And now they're officially dating. +

And since then, he did NOT leave him alone. He kept sneaking back into the mines. He would always freak him out and catch him off guard just to talk and distract him from his job. +

Orion knows it, but tries not to let him affect him, and he does try to befriend other cogless bots, but it doesn't work. One day, when exploring the mines along with the other Primes, Orion Pax saw a certain miner pulling a crate, and it happened to be D-16. +