Breakdown ran the rotary buffer over the smooth red metal of his partner's chassis, carefully, focused. He hadn't said anything since he had come back on board- just walked slowly into his medbay and pointed at the buffer on the table. He still hadn't fixed the jarring hole in his face, unconnected couplings sparking at the empty optic connections.
Breakdown was rarely worried about Knockout- who had, time and time again, proven he was entirely capable of taking care of himself. He may not have been a heavy hitter like Breakdown, but he was fast, and cunning, and skilled with an energon prod and absolutely, unfailingly ruthless.
Today, he seemed none of those things. Whatever strength his partner had seemed to have temporarily left him- and left him apparently needing a smoothed out finish and an undented frame before a repaired optic.
He picked up Knockout's forearm, running the buffer over the smooth grey steel on the underside, careful of the seams. It was all scored with deep cuts and shallow nicks- a basic buffing wasn't going to cut it, they were going to need to remold the frame here, and there was no way he was going to be able to fix the glass- but, Breakdown thought, right now, having non-organic hands on him might be therapeutic enough, and he could always man the replicator later.
Knockout made a dry static noise, and Breakdown's servos stuttered to a halt.
"What was that?" He asked, hesitantly.
"Turn my pain receptors back on," Knockout said, voice thick with static and low. Breakdown frowned.
"Are you… Sure? You haven't fixed your optic yet, and-"
"Just do it," Knockout hissed, voice clearing. Breakdown put the buffer down and opened the medical panel on the back of Knockout's head, just under the helm. He hesitated, but Knockout hissed static at him again, and he reconnected the sensor net to his brain.
Knockout straightened with a strangled cry, his servos clamping done on the table hard enough to dent and mangle it, back strut taut and denta grit. Breakdown's servos hovered over the sensor net.
"Knockout, you've got internal damage- I have to disconnect your-"
"Shut up!" Knockout snarled, arms shaking, "Shut up. Buff."
Breakdown nodded silently and picked the buffer back up.
"Aw, Dreadwing, I really am sorry, Megatron will be so disappointed, won't he?" Airachnid purred with one of her disturbing low giggles.
Breakdown shifted his shoulder tersely, raising his hammer with threatening intent. Dreadwing pulled against the webs binding him to the deck of the Nemesis fruitlessly, and the wind whipped by his audials, nearly tearing away her words from him.
"Put him down!" He heard himself yell, barely. She waved a leg, one of many, nonchalantly and pressed the point of one pincer against Knockout's fragile neck cables, drawing a thin line of turquoise energon with a hiss.
"Ah-ah," she cooed, "Careful now. I wouldn't want to have to hurt the good doctor."
"Airachnid- what point is there to this madness?" Dreadwing growled, pulling at his restraints again, trying to tear right through them.
"Ha- oh, come on, Dreaders, a routine check for a stray energon signature with both of you along? What part of that was supposed to be subtle?"
"Cutting your losses? Why don't you cut me loose, and then we can just cut you, and then, well, we can call it a day," Knockout said snidly, pulling back from the pincer against his throat with a hiss.
"Watch it," she said dangerously, and Breakdown felt himself step forward.
"Knockout!" He yelled, and Airachnid took a step back, the sunlight gleaming off of her dark armour.
"Stay back," she said, pulling Knockout with her, toward the edge. Breakdown moved forward again, but she pressed the blade into his neck cabling and Knockout stifled a cry and he stopped, servos shaking.
"It's been a pleasure," she purred, "but I really must be going." She sighed, then leapt backwards off the side of the ship, yanking Knockout with her. Her servos fell away and she transformed into her alt mode- a helicopter, and was already speeding off by the time Breakdown, screaming, reached the edge, too late to save Knockout, who was falling, staring up at him with one optic filled with surprise and realization.
He didn't move until Dreadwing pulled himself free of Airachnid's webbing and pulled him to his pedes.
He was on the bridge when it happened, stationed idly. It was a quiet day, the humid air on the nemesis lulling his processor into a warm dullness that had his optics half shuttered and his frame lax, standing at half attention, only technically on duty.
Soundwave tapped him on the shoulder, and he turned sluggishly. It took him a moment to understand the beeping light on Soundwave's screen, the readouts of functioning systems and life signs, the coordinates and the trackers- but only a moment, and he fully onlined his optics with a harsh exvent when he realized what he was looking at: Knockout's life signal. They hadn't been able to find the body when they'd sent Vehicons down to search for it- and apparently he had survived.
Breakdown found himself rebooting his voicebox once, twice, before it spat out anything but static.
"Knockout! My lord-" he said, turning quickly to Megatron, standing some distance away, "Please, my Lord, allow me to lead a team and pick him up. Please."
There was a beat and Breakdown was worried he would say no, but he nodded sternly, and Breakdown felt his spark pulsing rapidly, racing his own fear.
"Knockout! Where have you been, I-"
He froze. Out of the smoke strode- Knockout, but all wrong. His usually flawless finish was utterly ruined, his entire chassis covered in rust and grime and some kind of spidery metal stain giving him a fractured look. Worst of all- the red metal eyepatch he'd taken to wearing was gone, the torn out hole in his optic cavity scarred and ragged, a mechanical replacement installed, glowing a dull and unblinking red that unsettled him.
Knockout would never, ever, ever let himself be seen this way. He was i to proud.
Maybe-Knockout smiled at him, face all wrong, and held up a briefcase.
"You're not… Knockout," Breakdown said, slowly, hesitantly.
"Ding ding ding, we have a winner," a voice that was not Knockout's said, faceplate moving with the words and it was all wrong wrong wrong, "but the real prize is this. Now, take me to your leader."
He couldn't put his hammer away. He knew, logically, he should- he was in Megatron's presence and he was practically demanding permission to pummel the fragger into scrap. It was a good way to get killed.
But it wouldn't retreat. His arms shook with the effort of standing still, ventilations harsh and heavy, staring down the thing boldly wearing Knockout's corpse.
It said things like "Project Damacles" and "Titans" and "satellites," but he couldn't string them together in his head. All he heard was someone else's voice coming out of Knockout's mouth and vaguely, distantly, Megatron ordering him off the bridge.
The first punch connected with the corpse's left arm- a solid strike that continued into its side and sent it sprawling across the floor and into the wall with a shriek, organic and wrong. He walked, slowly, certain, to it, as it struggled back to its feet, claws up in fists.
The organic parasite piloting Knockout's body was not a clever one- it was a fast frame, but not strong, and in close combat it didn't stand a chance. The next strike took out its right leg at the knee and sent it to the ground, screaming.
He didn't look, and didn't have to to know that Megatron was smiling. He was always such a fan of sadism, but Breakdown was a bit distracted at the moment, and too busy to care.
"This is for the optic," he snarled, quiet and angry under heaving ventilations as he leaned down and tore the offending fake optic out of the thing. It shrieked pathetically, clawing at his arms with a sort of desperation unbecoming of the medic it once had belonged to.
"This is for the necromancy scrap," he yelled, putting a pede on it's midsection and ripping off one of the arms scrabbling at him, and activated his hammer, "and this- is- for dying- and leaving me here- alone!" He shoved the hammer through what was left of its sparkchamber with a sickening thud that covered his hammer in an unfamiliar red liquid he found distasteful immediately.
He stood venting heavily over the still, unmoving metal remains.
He turned when he heard clapping, "Bravo, Breakdown," Megatron said, looking dimly amused by the violence, "Drag it down to the incinerator. That abomination won't do for parts."
Breakdown nodded and transformed his servo back, shaking off the unfamiliar liquid, and heaving the remains over one shoulder.