Ratchet had never been a patient mech. Dedicated, yes. Hardworking, yes. Temperamental, definitely. But he most certainly not a patient mech, and when his new apprentice(who he hadn't asked to have) was ten minutes late to their first meeting, any sense of patience he might have held flew right out the door.
When Optimus had told him he was assigning him another apprentice, Ratchet hadn't exactly been the happiest of bots. He'd already had several apprentices over his lifetime, and had been looking forward to getting to run his Medbay uninterrupted, without some bumbling kid who had no idea what they were doing messing it up.
But Optimus, kind soul that he was, tried to pay attention to every young bot's aspirations and tried to give them as many opportunities as he could. And seeing as Ratchet was the most qualified medic they had left, he got stuck with any snot-nosed brat who said they wanted to be a medic.
Ratchet was actually beginning to wish his new apprentice would arrive from Cybertron already, so he could teach him the basics and get him out of the way. Ultra Magnus had taken a team out to investigate some Decepticon activity on the edge of Jasper, Nevada, and Ratchet was almost certain that with that idiot heading the team, there was bound to be some injured bots.
Finally, he heard the sound of unfamiliar pedsteps behind him and a tentative knock on the Medbay door.
"You're late." He said irritably, not even bothering to turn around, "But moving on." He began gathering datapads and charts together for the apprentice, "Basically your job here is to watch my every move, to learn from what I do, and to help with the overload of medical reports that have heaped-you're a femme?"
He had been walking toward the apprentice, still looking at the datapads, when he had glanced up finally and come to a complete stop. The apprentice was slim, green and white, and most definitely female, with a questioning and slightly offended look on her faceplates.
"...Is that a problem sir?"
"No." He ran a servo over his helm, "No, of course not. Forgive me, I just-all of my past apprentices have been mechs. I've grown used to it…" He stuck out his servo, "Ratchet."
She shook it, "Moonracer."
He looked at her thoughtfully a moment more and then fell into his usual bluster, "Right then. You've already heard the basic job description. Do you have any prior medical experience?"
"I mean I've been patching bots up for..." She trailed off, seeing the look he was giving her.
"Right." He said crisply, "All the way back to the beginning for training then."
He shoved the datapads and charts in her servos and began walking away back to his computer, leaving her gaping at his back, "Let's just assume that everything you know how to do, medically, is wrong."
"What?" Moonracer said incredulously, "Why? I've been doing this for years, I've-"
"Because you were not taught by me." He said impatiently, "My way is the only right way, and I have a reason for why everything I do is exactly correct. So, if you want to be exactly correct in everything you do, medically, you will have to listen to me, and do exactly as I tell you."
"So I should just completely forget everything I ever learned?" Moonracer huffed annoyedly, struggling with the datapads, "All of my experience, everything?"
"Look kid." Ratchet said, and she bristled a little at being called kid, "This is the situation. You're stuck with me, and I'm stuck with you. So either you listen to me, and we get along and everything goes swimmingly, or," He picked up his wrench from the counter and hefted it, giving her a meaningful look, "Not so swimmingly. Which will it be?"
"...Swimmingly." She grumbled
"That's what I thought."
"For the record." She raised an optic ridge, "You may feel that you're stuck with me, but I don't feel like I'm stuck with you. I came to train under the best medic on Cybertron…"
"But no one told you what I'm really like?" He finished her thought, grinning a little, "Don't worry. You'll feel like you're stuck with me soon enough."