AN: A one-shot written for 569413 on dA for the awesome picture of Star she drew for ANVoR. She requested Ratchet/Wheeljack crack pairing, and I added the Dinobots to the mix :3

Dinobot Interpretations

G1 Universe: Ratchet/Wheeljack Crack

One-Shot for 569413 on dA

The Dinobots weren't like the other Autobots living in the Ark. They had been created on Earth, and thus they had managed to identify with the human culture more so than the majority of the other mechs. Some even speculated that they went out of their way to learn more about the humans as opposed to learning about their own "species" because they resented the way they had been created—as beings considered to resemble extinct organic lifeforms and nothing but a quick experiment.

Truth be told, the Dinobots just found humans more interesting. Grimlock found their military strategies to be an interesting read, especially when he could regurgitate the ones that made stick-up-the-aft Prowl blanch in horror. Slag possessed a hidden interest in the human's pop culture, often vanishing for hours on end in order to catch up on whatever was popular at the moment. Sludge found cooking to be extremely exciting, finding their diet of mono-colored Energon cubes to be vastly overrated after seeing a colorful birthday cake after one of the numerous Decepticon encounters, and Snarl thought that their architecture was far more pleasing than the pictures that Grapple showed him of Cybertron.

However, Swoop—being the sensitive one he was—found more interest in the humans themselves than what they created. What they were made of, how they were made, the stark differences between them and the Autobots—Ratchet must have found him annoying for all the curious questions he asked on any given day. The social cues amongst humans were what he found most fascinating. Humans relied more on physical signs from each other; they could say one thing and mean the complete opposite just by the way they hold themselves!

It was through Swoop's understanding of humans that started this whole ordeal.

Swoop had been busily organizing Ratchet's supplies with First Aid by his side after they had finished patching up the Autobots that had been involved in the latest altercation with the Decepticons when Wheeljack had stopped by the med-bay. At first, he hadn't paid the engineer any more attention than he usually did—just a quick cursory glance to see what Ratchet would be fixing this time. He quickly did a double take when he realized that the mech wasn't injured at all. No missing limbs, blackened armor, or sparking wire: if anything, the mech looked nicer than he usually did.

"What's the matter Swoop?" First Aid asked when he noticed the Dinobot had become distracted. He glanced over to where Ratchet was polishing the saw blade he had just threatened Sideswipe with. Wheeljack stood by the medic, and his facial fins were flashing an embarrassed pink as he twiddled his fingers. "What's Wheeljack doing here? I thought he was supposed to be working on some 'super awesome secret device meant for kicking Decepticon booty.' Or that's what he was bragging about earlier."

"Me Swoop not know," Swoop answered distractedly, tilting his head as he watched the two mechs interact with each other. He'd never seen Wheeljack look so nervous around Ratchet before… "Him need checkup?"

"With how many times he ends up here on a given day?" First Aid turned back to what he had been doing with a quiet chuckle. "Ratchet probably knows the mech inside and out by now. Did you know that they've been friends since the war even began back on Cybertron? I actually think they're the only two mechs who have known each other that long."

"Really?" Swoop asked with surprise, though his dark blue optics remained focused on the pair in question. Ratchet was staring at the engineer with a certain level of expectancy, but Wheeljack's fins continued to randomly wink as he stopped and started whatever he was trying to say.

"Yeah. I guess that's why no one was really surprised when they teamed up to create you and your brothers. Surprised by how you turned out, but not surprised that it had been done by them." First Aid looked up to find a strange expression fall over the mech's face and stopped what he was doing. "Are you okay Swoop? You don't look so good now."

"Me Swoop have to go!" the pterodactyl exclaimed, briefly drawing Ratchet's attention to him and allowing Wheeljack to flee as quickly as he had appeared. "You Aid take care of this."

"Uh," the Protectobot stuttered as he watched Swoop run from the med-bay. "Okay? I guess I'll see you later…"

\^o^\

"Carly!"

The blonde woman yelped in surprise and nearly dropped the stack of books she carried in her arms. She turned to see who had called out for her and was surprised to see Swoop jogging towards her. The Ark shook as the Dinobot got closer, and Carly almost ducked to the side when it didn't look like he would stop. But he did, and his final step landed at an uncomfortably close distance.

The Dinobot towered over her even when he knelt down to be more on her level. "Did you need something Swoop? I'm kind of in a hurry at the moment."

Swoop became instantly distracted as he spotted the heavy books in Carly's arms. "Oh. What you doing with those?"

Carly sighed and shifted the weight to a more comfortable position. "Well, these are the text books that I used when I attended MIT. I mentioned something to Wheeljack the other day, and he wanted-"

"That why me Swoop here!" Swoop interrupted, not at all fazed by the brief glare the human gave him for interrupting her. "Me Swoop want to know how you Carly and him Spike got together."

"Oh." Carly blinked in surprised. "Um, why exactly would you want to know that?"

"Me Swoop just curious." The Dinobot tilted his head, and Carly could see the child-like curiosity shining in his dark optics. "You only couple me Swoop know."

"If you really wanna know." Swoop eagerly nodded and sat down right in the middle of the hallway, staring down at her with attentive optics. Carly sighed and put her books down to sit with him. Story time with a Dinobot—a person didn't experience that every day. "It was a gradual thing. I have to admit that I didn't find Spike all that interesting when we first met."

"Why?"

"Well, Bumblebee kind of outshined him, and a fourteen foot tall robot can catch a girl's attention a little more than a man." The woman paused to chuckle at the memory at how disgruntled Spike had looked when she paid more attention to Bumblebee. "Just that look gave me enough pity for him to accept his offer for a date. But to be honest, it took a while before the attraction really set in."

"Really?"

"Umhmm. If I remember correctly, it actually took us…five years? Yeah, five years to 'officially' start dating instead of the off and on stuff we were doing. Sometimes we clicked, and sometimes we didn't, so that and Sideswipe was probably why it took so long."

"What him Sideswipe do?"

"He got us locked in one of the closets on the Ark." Carly stopped to laugh at the memory, completely missing the visual evidence of the light bulb turning for Swoop. "One of his pranks went really wrong, and he ended up welding the door shut with us inside instead of Huffer and Brawn! But I guess that turned out for the best; after all, me and Spike wouldn't be engaged right now, and Huffer might not be around to complain."

"That what me need," Swoop said as he hopped up from the floor. Carly voiced a sound of confusion as the pterodactyl started running off in the direction he had come. "Thank you Carly!"

"Wait a minute!" Carly scrambled to her feet as Swoop paused at the end of the hallway. "What did that have to do with Wheeljack?"

"Me Swoop can't tell. You got big mouth and spoil plan."

"What! Who said that?"

"Them Spike and Bumblebee. They say you not good at keeping secrets."

The woman's face reddened in anger as Swoop innocently continued on his way. She huffed and collected her books before making a beeline to the rec-room where she had left Spike and Bumblebee to chat with the other Autobots. Wheeljack was just going to have to wait a little longer to see her books.

\^o^/

The glare that Grimlock was currently giving him was nothing new to Swoop. In fact, Grimlock not glaring would have signaled that something was extremely wrong. As it was, his big brother was giving him the "Are You Stupid?" glare as he stood with his arms crossed across his massive chest. Swoop stood steadfast as his other brothers watched from the sidelines.

"You Swoop," Grimlock finally said when it became evident that Swoop wouldn't stand down, "are smart. Me Grimlock know that. Why you want to do dumb thing?"

"It not dumb!" Swoop protested, resisting the urge to stomp his foot like a little child. The Dinobots might sometimes be treated as children (when they weren't ripping apart Decepticons), but he was not a child…no matter how much he wanted to stomp his foot. "Why can't you Grimlock see what me Swoop see?"

"'Cause you Swoop don't see nothing," Grimlock said, and he vaguely gestured towards the door of their "den." "You go do doctor thing; not do matchmaking thing."

"But-"

Grimlock was already walking away, and he didn't bother turning back as he turned on the big screen TV they had been given in an attempt to prevent another fight in the rec-room when Slag wanted to watch his soap operas. He had heard that Optimus had a very embarrassing time explaining to the humans why they needed so much building materials. It was the only time he had seen Slag smile…it was creepy, and he never wanted to see it again.

Swoop turned to his other brothers and scowled when he discovered that they had scattered to various parts of the Dinobot lair to do their own thing too. "Fine! Me Swoop go help him Wheeljack and Ratchet. I don't need any of your help!"

Slag uncaringly snorted as he pulled up videos on his personal datapad, and Sludge turned to Snarl, who was quietly constructing his own rendition of the Eiffel Tower with scrap metal he had found around the ship. "Why him Swoop doing that again?"

The stegosaurus shrugged without looking up from the metal plate he was bending. "Something 'bout seeing him Wheeljack 'flirt' or something. It stupid."

Sludge stood beside the other mech for a moment, analyzing what he had just said, before saying, "Oh" and stomping off to do his own thing. The Dinobots completely ignored Swoop when he returned later, grabbing some small things he had been collecting on his side of the room and leaving again.

"…what flirt mean?"

/^o^/

"Swoop," Ratchet grumbled as his Dinobot apprentice guided him through the hallways of the Ark. "As much as I positively love wandering around the ship like an idiot, I need to get back to the med-bay. Mirage needs his cloaking generator to be fixed; Tracks is still under from repairs done his left leg strut; and Cliffjumper's still missing an arm!"

"Him First Aid got under control," Swoop assured, pulling the medic down the hallway. He paused to look around before backtracking to where they had just come from, making Ratchet groan in annoyance. "Me Swoop sorry; it this way."

Ratchet finally yanked his hand from the Dinobot's hold and stood in the middle of the empty hallway with arms crossed over his chest. "Alright that's it. You've already turned us around four times now, and I have too many things that need to get done to be playing-"

"We here!"

Ratchet released an unflattering yelp as he was abruptly shoved to the side. He heard the sound of a door pinging open as his arms flailed in the air, but his attempts to regain his footing were destined to fail, and he fell hard onto the floor. The door seamlessly slid close behind him, and he could faintly hear Swoop from the other side. "Me Swoop sorry, but you Ratchet thank me later!"

Ratchet huffed at the sound of the Dinobot stomping away. "You won't be saying that when I get out of here!"

"Wow. He got you too, huh?"

The medic shamelessly jumped at the revelation that he wasn't alone. He looked around until he found two glowing blue orbs hovering in the darkness, and he took the short time to activate the night vision setting for his optics. Once it had been activated, he found that the room he had been thrust into looked like it was one of the few unused closets on the Ark and that Wheeljack was leaning against the wall closest to the door. Ratchet frowned at the sight of a panel from the wall sitting beside the engineer and a bundle of wires sticking out of the hole he had created.

"I never thought Swoop could be so conniving," Wheeljack continued, his vocal fins brightening the enclosed space. If the engineer just kept talking there wouldn't been any need to use the night vision. "He told me that Sludge had gotten his head stuck in the vents again. Got me all worried—I even abandoned the anti-gravity ray I've been working on to rush over here. Imagine my surprise when he manhandles me into a closet."

Ratchet's optics narrowed as he focused on only one part of the engineer's story. "I thought Optimus strictly forbid you from making that ray."

Wheeljack paused fiddling with the wires from the wall, and his fins flashed a forceful cheery yellow. "Did I say anti-gravity ray? I meant…snow ray? Yeah, a snow ray! See, Spike was wanting to give Carly this surprise and-"

"Wheeljack," Ratchet interrupted as he stood up. He placed his hands on his red hips as he looked around the enclosed space. "I swear, if you start making Mini-Bots fly around the Ark…"

"I'm not!" Wheeljack protested, subtly scooting back into the wall. It looked like he was going to have to tell Cosmos that the project had been unexpectedly scrapped; the poor mini-space craft would just have to deal with Earth's gravity while he was on the ground. "There's no point in looking for a way out. Of all the rooms on the ship, Swoop managed to find the one that didn't have a vent, no way of opening the door from the inside, and one where you can't contact Teletraan 1. Sometimes I wonder just how much smarter the Dinobots are than we actually realize."

"Then how do we get out of here?"

"Well, the obvious point is that we don't. However, I think I've almost managed to rewire the door to open." The wires in his hand spontaneously began to spark, and a little puff of smoke rose from the end as they burned. "Uh, I mean, it's gonna take some time to do this delicate procedure."

The medic sighed and moved to sit down beside the engineer, shuffling around to get comfortable. He attempted to open a comm. link channel to someone like Optimus or Prowl but ended up leaning his head against the wall with a groan. "What is this? A safety room that Red Alert made for himself?"

"You know what? That is a very plausible explanation. I pulled up the schematics I have for the Ark, and this room doesn't even show up. I don't even think there's an actual door to it."

"That's just great," Ratchet growled. He reached up to massage the grey crest on his forehead while Wheeljack dug around in the wall for more wires. "I have too much stuff to get done to be playing Swoop's little games! There are patients to attend to, inventory needs to be taken so Prowl will stop bothering me about it, and I still haven't found my favorite wrench!"

The medic looked up as he felt Wheeljack tense beside him, and he frowned as the engineer stiffly twined the wires in his hands. He looked the mech up and down before a severe frown creased his face. "Wheeljack, what was it you were trying to tell me earlier?"

"I don't remember."

"Funny thing is, my wrench vanished while I was out with the group sent to stop the Decepticons today."

"That's bad luck there."

"And not many were left behind to watch the Ark."

"You should talk to Beachcomber about it. He was lurking around the med-bay earlier."

"You were the only mech left behind with the code to the med-bay and my personal office, which is where my wrench was."

The light from Wheeljack's fins fluttered on and off as the medic stood up to hover over him. He defensively held his hands up, displaying the wires in his hand. "Now Ratchet-"

"What did you do?"

"I just borrowed it for a bit."

"Where is it?"

"Now before you do anything rash, let's just remember that I'm the only one who can get us out."

"Where is it?"

"…it blew up." Wheeljack automatically flinched when he saw Ratchet's hand twitch. He waited for the blow and was surprised when he finally looked up to see the other mech just standing there. "Ratch'? Bud? …you okay?"

"You blew it up."

"Uh…"

"I liked that wrench."

"Ratchet?"

"It was my favorite."

"You're scaring me mech."

"And you blew. It. Up."

"Please don't kill me!"

In the hallway outside of the hidden closet, Bluestreak paused as he skipped by with Jazz. "Did you hear that?"

Jazz looked up from the game of Tetris he played on his datapad. "Hear what?"

"I thought I just heard someone scream."

The saboteur tilted his head, listening closely for the fabled scream the young Praxian had heard. He eventually shrugged and turned back to him. "Ah don't hear nothin'."

"Weird," Bluestreak muttered, looking around for anywhere the sound may have come from. He finally shrugged as the search turned up nothing and ran to catch up with Jazz, who had continued down the hallway with his nose stuck to his datapad. "Anyway, I'm just sayin' that Sunny shouldn't get so worked up when someone tries to tow him from the fire zone when he's napping on patrol. It's just the humans' job, and it's not like they mean to scratch his paint. Hey! Isn't' that the datapad Prowl gave you to write the report on the 'Cons' latest attack?"

"Maybe."

"And you're playing games on it?"

"Umhmm."

"…do you have Angry Birds installed?"

OoO

Grimlock followed his skipping brother down the hallway with an annoyed glare. Honestly, Swoop's little delusions were starting to annoy him. While the Dinobot could have been focusing on more important things—like kicking 'Con aft for instance—he wasted time on "hooking up" the two mechs that had essentially created them.

Grimlock thought it was a great, big, huge waste of time. And yes, he was actually very well aware that each of those words was synonymous with each other. It just put emphasis on how much of a waste of time it was…or so he heard the blue, stick-up-his-aft mech say in the rec-room.

"Hurry up!" Grimlock growled as he stomped after his small Dinobot brother. Swoop didn't even bother looking back as he weaved through the unfamiliar hallways. "Me Grimlock have meet him Prime soon. Tell him how bad leader he is."

"This more important," Swoop insisted as he stopped, spun around on the heel of his foot, and went down the opposite hallway. "Now, where me Swoop find hidden door…"

Grimlock huffed and stopped halfway down the hallway, watching Swoop turn back around at the end and come back. "This pointless! You Swoop not know where going."

"Me do!"

"Nu uh."

"Yeah huh."

"Nu uh."

"Yeah huh."

"Nu uh."

"Nu uh."

"Yeah hu- no!" The leader of the Dinobots pointed an accusing claw at the smirking medic-in-training. "You not trick Grimlock again!"

"Yes me did!"

"Nu uh."

"Yeah huh."

"Nu uh."

"Yeah hu-"

A loud bang from the wall made them jump into defensive stances before a muffled voice could be heard. Swoop instantly perked up and randomly poked the wall, making it light up like a keypad. "Me Swoop knew it was here!"

"No you didn't."

"Yes, me Swoop did!"

"Swoop."

Both Dinobots instantly hushed as Ratchet stepped out from the hole in the wall. His signature glare rested on both of them, making Grimlock actually feel guilty for something he had no part in, before it gradually vanished. He stepped over to reach up and pat Swoop on the shoulder. "Thank you for that. Me and Wheeljack really needed some alone time together…but next time you do it, you won't be getting a pat on the back."

Swoop happily nodded and watched the medic walk away. He grinned up at Grimlock—a pointed "I Told You So" grin—but he effectively hid it when Ratchet turned back to address them. "Oh, Grimlock it's a good thing you came along. Help your brother carry your creator's sorry skid plates back to the med-bay for me. I'll get to him when I finish with everyone else."

Swoop obediently nodded, and Grimlock peeked into the little closet. His visor sparked with surprise when Wheeljack cheerfully waved at him…with the hand that was on the other side of the room. "Oh Grimlock! Boy, am I glad to see you. Can you hand me my arm over there…and my leg…you know, what? You should probably grab the other one too."

"What happen?" Swoop exclaimed when he found the amputated mech leaning up against the wall. He collected the four limbs that had been precisely removed and stepped back for Grimlock to grab the trunk of the engineer's body. Wheeljack grunted as he was haphazardly thrown over the Dinobot's shoulder. "Why you Wheeljack have no limbs? You not explode today."

Wheeljack sheepishly chuckled as he bounced along with each step Grimlock took. "Well…you see here…I've got nothing. I guess this is just how Ratchet shows his love for me. It's sad really."

The engineer's optics winked in surprise as Swoop squawked and skipped ahead to look Grimlock in the face. "See? See! Me Swoop tell you so!"

"No you Swoop not."

"Yeah huh."

"Nu uh."

"Yeah huh."

"Nu uh."

Wheeljack was left to confusedly wonder what the Dinobots argued over as he bounced along on Grimlock's shoulder. He was busy hoping that First Aid was still in the med-bay to attend to him while Ratchet got caught up. Those dark promises the medic had made in the closet…let's just say, he wasn't about to make anything explode for a while. Or borrow the medic's stuff again; or just cross the medic's path for a few days.

It was no wonder the Dinobots were so vicious—they all inherited it from the medic.

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