Shamelessly borrowed this idea from a TMNT fanfic by nightwalker3 called The Secret Language of Raph. If anyone here happens to be a Turtles geek, you should really check it out. Anyone? No one? Well, this is the Transformers section...xD;;;

Disclaimer: Transformers Animated is not mine. If it was, there would be A LOT MORE SARI/BUMBLEBEE FLUFF. GAWD, HASBRO.

The Secret Language of Ratchet
OR
Four Ways Ratchet Shows He Really Does Care About His Teammates (even when they're being totally spastic coughBUMBLEBEEcough)

Supervising

Ratchet never could understand what in Primus' name was going on in the heads of certain bots he knew. Certain young bots. Who had no idea how much trouble certain things could get them into—and didn't particularly care, most of the time.

Back when Sari had still been, for all intents and purposes, a regular eight-year-old girl, she and Bumblebee's favorite past-time (next to video-gaming, of course) had been going for joyrides through the streets of Detroit. This was one of the stupidest hobbies Ratchet could think of; it wouldn't exactly go over well with the human police if they wound up catching a speeding Autobot transporting a mere child at highly dangerous speeds. But neither one of them would listen to reason—Bumblebee would start moving, restless, and then he simply wouldn't stop until the two of them had run at least three laps around the city and tired each other out.

At first, Ratchet had tried everything short of magnetizing Bumblebee to the wall to dissuade them, but the little yellow mech and his human compatriot always managed to slip right out of his fingers. This inevitably led to the old medic transforming as well and racing after them as they swerved recklessly through traffic, nearly giving him a spark-attack on numerous occasions. They took insane risks, the kind that made Ratchet swear under his breath and gun his engine, wondering how it was that the two of them were still online.

After a while, he gave up even trying to prevent them from leaving. Optimus didn't seem to have a problem with it, after all, and he was the bot in charge...but maybe that was because Ratchet still followed them every time they left the warehouse. It became a game of sorts; 'Bee and Sari would try to lose him with every maneuver they could think up, and Ratchet would keep doggedly after them, letting them speed ahead only to catch up a few minutes later. It was a game he had actually grown fond of—and he would never admit it out loud, but he was glad when, even after her upgrade, Sari was still more than willing to let Bumblebee take her for a spin around Detroit every once in a while.

Maybe herding around young bots wasn't so bad after all.

Teaching

"I wouldn't touch that if I were you, Prime."

Optimus jerked his hand away from the half-built jetpack lying on Ratchet's workbench, optics flashing uncomfortably toward the old medic. He had his back turned at the moment, digging through a cabinet for some tool or other, and yet he had still caught the young commander red-handed. The situation brought to mind, unbidden, stories from long ago about bots with optics in the backs of their processors, for no other purpose than to catch naughty sparklings doing something they shouldn't—

He shook his own processor; now wasn't the time to be thinking about that sort of thing. "Sorry. How's it going? And where's Professor Sumdac?"

"I sent him home with Sari. He looked like a few megacycles' recharge would do him good." Ratchet turned and walked back to the bench, setting his trusty pipe wrench aside in favor of a more delicate tool. "As for the progress—well, I've had to improvise a couple of things, but it shouldn't hurt in the long run."

"'Shouldn't hurt'?" Optimus raised an optic ridge. After a moment or two of silence, he heaved a sigh. "Ratchet, I know this is probably asking a lot of you, but I don't think we have the luxury for guesswork. I need this jetpack to work if I want to be able to fight on an even footing with Megatron. You know that."

"I do know, and it will work!" Ratchet snapped, shooting a withering glare at his commander. "Have a little more faith in your subordinates!"

Optimus blinked, taken aback. "I never said—"

"Actually, you just did." Ratchet slapped the tool down on the bench and folded his arms, glaring at his commander. "Look, Prime, you're a good mech. Your spark is in the right place. You care about the bots under your command—you don't look at us as units to be ordered around, like that slagheap Sentinel Prime does. But you need to learn to trust us a little more. We haven't let you down before, and we aren't gonna start now."

Optimus was quiet for a few moments, turning the words over in his processor. Then he sighed again, turning away. "You're right. I'm sorry." He moved a few steps toward the door, then paused, looking over his shoulder. "It's getting late—maybe you should get some recharge of your own."

Ratchet chuckled softly, picking up the tool once more. "What did I just tell you? Have some faith, Prime. If I can take care of this glitch-brained scheme of yours, I can definitely take care of myself."

Repairing

Bumblebee gunned his engine and fled at top speed from Ratchet's room, narrowly avoiding a concussion via the wrench that came sailing out after him. "SLAGGING SPEEDSTER!" the medic roared over the young bot's echoing laughter. "Next time you need repairs, don't come crying to me! I'll pound more dents into your processor than whatever glitch-headed stunt you pull next does!!!"

Bulkhead, who had been lingering at the end of the hall waiting for his friend to finish, ducked out of sight around the corner as Ratchet snatched up his wrench and stormed back into his room. The green mech frowned a little at Bumblebee, who was now leaning against the wall, laughing almost hard enough to cramp his chassis. "Why do you always have to tick him off like that?"

"Because it's funny!" Bumblebee snickered as the sound of Ratchet's furious grumbling continued to echo down the hall. "Didn't you see his face? Best comeback ever!"

"I dunno..." Bulkhead looked over his shoulder as the two of them headed for the main part of the warehouse. "Don't you ever think that maybe you're going a little too far? I mean, he does have to fix you up an awful lot, and you never thank him for it..."

"Fixing us is his job, isn't it?" Bumblebee flopped down on the couch and kicked his legs up, grabbing the remote. "Besides, he doesn't want thanks. Says it makes him feel stifled or something."

"That's just Ratchet-speak for saying it embarrasses him, but you should still thank him. You keep acting like that, and he might just do like he says and deactivate you one day on his own!" Bulkhead frowned again, poking the yellow mech in the side of the head. "You even listening to me?"

"Yeah yeah, I'm listening." Bumblebee tore his optics away from the TV to grin up at his friend. "And see if you can answer me this, oh wise expert of Ratchet-speak—how come no matter how many times he says he's gonna leave me to rust, he never does?"

It didn't take long for Bulkhead to come up with the answer. Seeing the smug look on Bumblebee's face, however, the green mech figured he already knew.

Checking

Perhaps Ratchet was just a bit paranoid, Prowl mused, as the old medic ran what he insisted was the very last diagnostics scan on the cyberninja and his new gear.

Ever since he had returned from his confrontation with Lockdown bearing his master's helmet and the bounty hunter's modded armor, Ratchet had been after him for what he referred to as a "precautionary" checkup. Not obviously, most of the time; it was usually in small ways, like making it a point to hover innocuously nearby whenever Prowl was on monitor duty, or giving him pointed looks when Jazz mentioned that the twins were due in for a systems check of their own. Often, however, Ratchet would remind him rather sternly that he was the team's medic, and it was his job to check everyone out regularly and make sure they were all running without a hitch. In layman's terms, of course, that meant the field-tech was worried about the safety of battle armor nicked from a Decepticon-affiliated bounty hunter, and wanted to make absolutely sure it wasn't bugged or trapped in any way—so Prowl finally relented, allowing him to run a number of scans and tests on every inch of the gear.

"Well, kid, looks like you check out after all." Ratchet's voice was gruff as he snapped one last panel on the ninjabot's back shut. "This stuff is top quality...even if it was built by a filthy Decepticon."

"I told you this system check was unnecessary." Prowl slid off the workbench and straightened, brushing a loose film of iron filings off of his shoulder plates. "Lockdown intended this armor for his own use, after all—I highly doubt he would have intentionally bugged it or overlooked anything that could compromise its functionality."

"Yeah, yeah," Ratchet grumbled, setting his tools on the now-vacated bench and turning away to rummage through a cabinet. "We're done here, so you can stop hanging around to humor the old bot."

A smile touched Prowl's faceplate as he knelt down, reaching under the workbench to pull out the oil-stained square of cloth that had fallen beneath it earlier. He reached out and rested his other servo on Ratchet's arm, holding out the cloth for the medic to take. "Thank you for worrying, Ratchet."

"I wasn't worried. I'm just doing my job." Ratchet took the cloth and began to wipe down his tools (an odd habit he had picked up from human mechanics—Prowl didn't quite understand it, but it seemed comforting somehow to the field-tech, so he never commented). "Now go meditate or something, I have work to do."

His voice had once again taken on it's usual "I'm-busy-you're-stupid-have-a-nice-day" tone, but as he turned to leave, Prowl didn't fail to notice the warm smile on Ratchet's face.

C&C muchly appreciated, since I already know I suck. xD