GROWING OUR WINGS
Summary: The Aerialbots never really had a childhood, what if a misshapen in the labs changed that?
Disclaimer: I own nothing here except my OC's please ask first if you want to use any part of them.
Talking: "English or other Earth language,"
"Cybertronian,"
'thoughts'
:Comm. link:
(Bond talk)
*(Sparkling talk)*
Chapter 1:
The day had started like any other at the Autobot base, formerly known as the Ark, the 'Bots had just come back from a battle with the Decepticons , Ratchet was in the Medbay dealing with the injured—thankfully no one was seriously injured—with Perceptor assisting while Wheeljack was in his lab working on… whatever Wheeljack was working on during the battle.
Meanwhile, a group of mechs were on their way to the labs, one being dragged unwillingly by the others, who were just as nervous as he was.
"I don't see why we have to go to Wheeljack's…"
"need I remind you what happened in the Rec. Room?"
"But what if he blows something up while we're in there?"
"Hey you were the one that broke it you get to come with and ask for his help, or would you rather we go get Ratchet?"
They walked silently, the only sound in the corridor were those of their peds; the thuds of their footfalls and the screeching of the ones being dragged. One of them looked back at him and saw him scowling.
"Ah. C'mon Slingshot, don't be such a sparkling,"
Slingshot hissed back "I am not a sparkling, We never got to be sparklings because they onlined us in these adult frames but they still treat us like little kids unless they need us to fight,"
The others pondered this a moment "you know, he's right Silverbolt."
Silverbolt sighed "I know…" he kept walking, helm bowed solemly.
Eventually, they made it to the heavy reinforced steel doors of the lab. Airraid slowly reached for the keypad then backed away "So, who wants to go first?"
"Nose goes!" Fireflight touched his olfactory sensor.
"What?"
"It's something Spike taught us, last one to touch their nose has to do it,"
"Oh" Skydive and Airraid touched theirs as well.
Silverbolt huffed air out his vents "I'll go first," he entered the code into the key pad and stood back for the door to open as the others jumped aside as if something was going to jump out and eat them. Seeing as nothing bad happened—yet—they all entered the room cautiously.
The Inventor inside didn't hear them come in, he was too absorbed in his work. Wheeljack reached for a piece he needed for his project and jumped, just now realizing he wasn't alone. "Oh, hey guys, how's it goin'?"
Slingshot tried to remain out of sight, but Skydive caught him by the arm and pushed his brother forward. "Go on tell'im,"
"Fine, The energon dispenser is on the fritz and we were wondering if…"
"What he means is," Silverbolt cut him off "Some of us were messing around in the Rec. Room and the dispenser got broke, and we were wondering if you could help us fix it, since Ratchet is busy with…"
"Being Ratchet?"
"Um, Yeah pretty much,"
The Green and white mechs optics shone with mirth and crinkled at the corners to show he was smiling behind his blast mask. "Sure I'll help ya, just let me finish up with this and I'll get right on it." He turned back to his machine and started putting on the finishing touches.
"What are you working on?"
"Huh? Oh this? This is something I've been working on for a while. You know how we crashed here on Earth a few million years ago? Well, you mechs weren't here for that but my point is, in reality we should be all ancient rusted out hunks of scrap, but the reason we are still here today is because we were in stasis for so long, We mentioned this to the humans and wondered 'What if the 'Cons aged while in stasis and we didn't? Wouldn't they be easier to fight?' So I got to thinking, if there was a way to age them to that point artificially we actually could defeat them more easily. I brought this up with Prime and he agreed as long as no one got hurt,"
"So, does it work?" No one noticed Fireflight had gotten closer to the work bench for a better look.
"Well, I haven't been able to test it on anything alive, Sparkplug suggested trying to make something called 'wine', it's a human high grade made from fermented fruit juices, so I plan to test it on that. He says he can take it to a "wine tasting" party in town where experts try different blends of the stuff to see if it—Oh slag." He accidently turned the devise on. As he desperately tried to shut it off, the gestalt saw that their brother was point blank of the beam that was powering up.
"FIREFLIGHT, NO!" they all jumped forward to put him out of the way but…
ZZ-Zap! Ka-BOOM! The machine fired a bright flash of light, blinding the occupants in the room, and exploded.
As the dust cleared, Wheeljack reset his optics so he could he again. "Fireflight? Silverbolt?"
No answer "Skydive? Airraid? Slingshot? Guys, where are you?" again no answer, until he heard little noises; Chirps, clicks and what sounded like… crying? They sounded nearby "Guys? Is that you?" The fog was completely gone, revealing the source of the noise. Wheeljack's optics widened then he gasped, covering his lower face. "Oh shi—I mean, Shh Shh, it's okay," he slowly moved forward and held one of them close. "Everything's goin' to be okay," He opened a comm. link to Optimus Prime.
:Wheeljack to Optimus Prime.:
:Optimus Prime here, go ahead Wheeljack,:
:You think you an' a few other officers can come to the lab? There's something you mechs might want to see.:
The Prime tried to keep his voice even :Does this have to do with the explosion from earlier?:
Ratchet cut in through the sibling Bond (How many pieces, Wheeljack?)
Wheeljack patched his brother into the conversation :Jeez, have some faith in me guys. Anyway, yes it does, but it also involves the Aerialbots.:
:Aerialbots? What happened?:
:…You're just going to have to come see for yourself. Wheeljack out.:
He terminated the connection and grabbed a crate and lined it with some soft packing material he found. 'I am so dead. I am so dead. I am so…'
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
Optimus Prime and the other Autobot officers able to come; Prowl: Second in command and head Tactitian, Ratchet: Chief Medical Officer, Jazz:Third in command and head of Special Ops and Ironhide: Weapons Specialist.
Red Alert decided he would rather observe from the security hub. This information was relayed by Inferno due to the fact that the Security Director was too busy ranting about what he saw in the labs.
Perceptor and Skyfire were also waiting to see what had happened in the labs and were worried about Wheeljack, who was the only other officer not present.
The blast door had locked them out so Ratchet had to use his medic's override code on the lock to let them in. When they got inside they saw that the place looked like a mess—surprise, surprise—and Wheeljack crouched over a crate, talking Cybertronian in a low voice to something inside.
"Wheeljack where are the…?"
The scientist held a digit to his face to silence them and pointed to the box.
"What the…"
Squeeak! They all jumped, that noise sounded familiar, but no one could place how. Slowly, Jazz crept up to it and peered inside. The visored mech covered his face plates with his servos to muffle a barely suppressed squeal of glee. "Prowler, Prowler c'm'ere," he quietly called his Bondmate over.
"My designation is Prowl, Jazz. What is it?"
Jazz just waved him over again. Rolling his optics, the Praxian crept over to see for himself, and promptly crashed. The saboteur caught him and lowered him to the ground. "Wheeljack, where did you…" His visor brightened as Wheeljack whispered in his audio. Jazz looked at him, then the box and back again "Seriously?"
Wheeljack gave him a look that said "Why would I joke about something like this?"
The black and white mech nodded and got out of Ratchet's way so he could fix Prowl and directed his attention to the source of the crash. Ratchet's jaw dropped.
"uh, Ratch?" the red and white mech turned on his brother, intent on bodily harm, and grabbed him by the chestplates. The Engineer held up his servo in surrender, hoping to placate his wrath.
While they were arguing back and forth in Cybertronian, the others ventured forth to see what the fuss was about. There was a collective gasp as their jaws dropped.
Inside the crate, nestled amongst packing material, were five little red and white sparklings. Flier sparklings that looked very familiar.
"Are… are these…?"
"The Aerialbots? Yeah,"
Prime opened and closed his mouth, trying to find words to say, had it not been for his mask he would have looked like a fish. "How did this happen?" he switched to English in case they heard them speaking so what they were saying wouldn't scare them.
"I was working on an invention…"
"Ah, hell, here we go again,"
"Ironhide! Go on Wheeljack,"
"…to make it so the Decepticons would be the way they'd be if they aged naturally, the ones that were in stasis would have been millions of years older and the newer ones, like the Stunticons, would have been sparklings,"
"If what Wheeljack's saying is true they have been reverted to the age they would be if they weren't onlined in adult frames." Ratchet stopped trying to beat up the aforementioned mech and was examining the mini flyers. "They seem healthy enough, they appear to be not quite a vorn old, which proves Wheeljacks theory." He brushed his servos off and stood "Well, 'Jack, you were right it works, now how do you plan on turning them back?"
Wheeljack's helm fins turned pinkish-purple. "Um, well you see…"
"YOU MEAN YOU DON'T KNOW HOW TO CHANGE THEM BACK?"
"Ratchet, calm down, you'll scare the little ones and killing Wheeljack won't solve anything either,"
Ratchet removed his servos from the inventor's throat. "Thanks Prime, as I was saying, while there is a way to reverse the effect I hadn't been able to install the needed components for it yet when they came in asking for help fixing the energon dispenser in the rec. room,"
"What happened to the dispenser in the rec. room?" Prowl had just came to and was already asking questions.
"Don't worry about it, it's been taken care of, the nozzle was just knocked loose."
"Oh, good one less thing to worry about. Unfortunately, some of the components here have been fried when the thing blew. So, I'm going to have to replace them along with the finishing touches, it's a setback but shouldn't take that long," he looked up from checking over what still needed to be done and over to the box. "What I'm worried about is what we're gonna do with these guys in the meantime,"
Skyfire leaned over the edge of the box. "Hey, I think they're waking up,"
*Sparkling POV*
Systems onlined slowly, the little sparkling wasn't sure where it was, all it knew was it was warm. He unshuttered his optics and looked down at himself. He saw little servos and tiny digits, he wiggled them and played with his peds. He saw another pair of peds beside him. 'I wonder what these are?' he grabbed one and pulled on it.
Squeak! The sparkling that the peds belonged to woke and looked around. 'What was that?' The two sparklings saw each other and the others started waking up too.
*(What is this place? Who are you guys?)* The first one asked.
*(Who are you?)*
*(Oh, Right, sorry. I think my name's… Silverbolt?)* He wasn't sure how he knew, but a feeling in his spark told him so, just as it told him these other bots were his… what?
The second sparkling pulled his peds close to him. *(Skydive)*
*(and I'm Airraid)*
*(Fireflight, ooh shiny!)* The curious sparkling grabbed the "shiny" that he found in the corner of the box and started fiddling with it.
*(I'm Slingshot)*
*(it's weird, I feel like I know you guys, but I don't know how?)* They all thought about it, Silverbolt was right, they all seemed familiar to each other.
*(Well, we did just come online, and we all kinda look the same… hey, guys I think we're brothers)* That seemed about right and they all agreed.
*(SWEET! Brothers! GROUP HUG!)* Airraid glomped Skydive.
Chirp! *(Hey!)* The two sparklings started to wrestle, then the others joined in, until something big came down and separated them.
*(whoa, what is that?)* Slingshot ruffled his armor and hissed at it, it didn't move.
*(looks like a servo. A really big servo.)* Silverbolt sniffed it.
*(Let's get it!)*Airraid latched onto it and held on as he was lifted up. *(Whoa!)*
*(Hang on!)* Skydive grabbed on too as they were lifted out of the box.
*regular POV*
"I think they are waking up," sure enough they were. They all watched as one onlined its optics and started playing with its digits and peds. When it pulled on another's peds it let out a squeak which woke the rest of them up. Seeing there were others around, they started chirping to each other and then started play fighting.
"Hey, hey, none of that now," Skyfire reached in to break up the fight. They all looked at his servo like they didn't know what it was. One of them—he recognized it as Slingshot—fluffed up and hissed at him. While reflex told him to pull back, instinct told him not to, so he remained as he was. Another one—Silverbolt—cautiously came up and sniffed him before Airraid latched on. "Hey," he slowly lifted his servo out as Skydive grabbed on too. Very carefully, he lifted them out of the crate and placed his other servo under them so they wouldn't fall. They both looked at him and Skydive chirped and warbled to the others below.
*(Hey, Silverbolt you were right it was a really big servo. There's a really big bot out here.)*
*(I wanna see)* they all tried to climb out of the box, cheeping like baby birds in a nest.
"Skyfire, I don't think they like being split up like that,"
"Oh, right, sorry little ones," he put them down alongside their brothers and withdrew his servos, careful to move slowly so he wouldn't startle them; They took notice of the other bots looking down at them and they all tried to stand up for a better look.
"Ah, they're just like turbopuppies at a pet store, 'Pick meh! Pick meh!'" Jazz leaned closer "Aint ya guys the cutest?" The sparklings, not used to this kind of attention from strange bots, squealed and tried to burrow into the packing material. "Ah, c'mon, little buddies, ," he leaned further into the box so his faceplates disappeared from view. "ah didn't mean ta scare ya…" Clang! "OW!" he fell back clutching his helm. "Wha' was that?"
Ratchet noticed a bolt fall on the ground and picked it up "I think one of them threw this at you, Question is where did they get it?"
"Probably in the box with them," Skyfire looked down at them and spoke firmly but gently. "Alright, which one of you threw that?" the sparklings all hid deeper into their little "nest". Skyfire's voice softened "Why are you so frightened? I will not harm you. Shh, it's okay, come on out. No one's going to hurt you." He reached for the closest one and stroked it with his digit. The sparkling, who turned out to be Fireflight, purred and leaned into the caress. The others saw this and came over and nuzzled his servo, asking for the same treatment. Skyfire happily obliged them until they curled up together and dozed off under his servo.
The others observed this and smiled. "Well, 'Jack, I think that answers your question,"
"Hm?" Skyfire pulled his attention away from the sparklings to see his fellow Autobots smiling at him. "Oh, you mean..."
"What's wrong, Skyfire? Don't you want to?"
"Well, yes… sort of… I don't know. I mean, all five of them? Surely there's someone more qualified for this, Isn't there?"
Optimus politely interrupted "Skyfire, you're not alone in this, it's not like we're going to leave all the responsibility on you, We will all be glad to help if you need it, they just need someone to be their guardian being as they don't have actual creators to look after them."
Skyfire fidgeted "What if I mess up? What if I'm incapable of…"
Again the Prime cut him off. "Skyfire, From what we just witnessed, you seem perfectly capable of handling them, they already seem to trust you, and you're a flier,"
"And no one knows fliers better than another flier," Ratchet put in. "Besides, you are a flier with similar coloring to theirs, I wouldn't find it surprising if they imprint on you as their caretaker as it is,"
"Ratchet's right, but I'll leave the decision up to you. Skyfire will you accept the responsibility as guardian?"
Realizing he had spoken the first part of the "guardian oath" he took one long look at the sparklings, raised himself on one knee with a servo on the edge of the crate, took a deep intake and replied "Optimus Prime, I, Skyfire, accept the role as guardian to these sparklings. I will do everything within my power to make sure they are happy, healthy, and well cared for until they are no longer in need of me."
"Thank you Skyfire, and like I said, you're not alone here. If you need any help don't be afraid to ask,"
"Thank you," The Shuttleformer stooped to pick up the crate carefully so he wouldn't jostle them. "You need help with anything Wheeljack?"
"Don't worry about it, I'll manage." The engineer waved him off, helm fins flashing blue.
"Well, in that case I'll just get these little bitlets out of your way. C'mon guys,"
Ratchet followed him out. "Bring them by the medbay, I want to give them a thorough checkup before you do anything else,"
Sudden realization dawned on him "I don't have anything to take care of sparklings though,"
Ratchet flashed one of his rare smiles at him "Another reason to take them to the medbay; I can get some of the things you need there, the rest we might be able to piece together from what we have in storage."
"Thank you, Ratchet."
A.N.: And there you have it! What sort of mischief will they get into as sparklings? Will there be sparkling cuteness? Slag Yes! But you're going to have to wait and see ; )
Any flames will be converted into energon to be made into energon goodies for the nice people that review.