Pain wracked my broken body as I lay, unseeing, on the pavement. I heard something about a drunk driver and I wanted to scream in agony when I was lifted from the ground; every movement, every jostle shot blinding signals of pain throughout my entire body.
"I don't know Prowl, the damage is extensive, and with an organic? I hardly know anything about their medicine..." Ratchet said.
"Please, you have to try; you're her only hope right now." Prowl pleaded. He felt terrible, if he hadn't tried to pass the drunk driver on the road, the car wouldn't have swerved and collided at full speed with the girl who had been walking along the sidewalk.
I couldn't open my eyes; my entire body seemed frozen, though my only senses seemed to be hearing and pain. Pain... it was almost all I could think of, and I wished my mind would just blank out. Finally, mercifully, it did and I clung to the darkness, not wanting to go back.
"I really don't know if she'll pull through, she's hurt pretty badly. I've had to download almost everything about human medicine off the Internet and I had to call the local hospital as well. They were skeptical that she'd live." Ratchet said.
"What about her damage? Is there some way she could survive?" Prowl asked. Ratchet glanced down at the human female lying on the operating table in his lab. She looked almost the same age as Hayli, but her features were marred by blood and many of her bones were broken.
"Her entire right side was crushed; her ribs were stabbing her lung, that's why she has a tube down her throat to help her breathe. The bumper of the car shattered when she was hit, in addition to breaking her leg it severed a main artery, and I barely got it repaired before she would've bled out; I'm still not sure whether her leg can be saved... I've never seen an organic with a will to live that was this strong, set aside Hayli. Her arm is completely shattered though, I'll probably have to replace it with a mechanical one, and it looks like some of her internal organs are damaged as well, I'm not sure if I'll have to open her up in order to fix her." Ratchet said. Prowl stared down at the girl, he felt awful. It was bad enough when he hadn't been able to save Hayli when she was hit, now it was actually his fault for causing the wreck.
"Just do what you can... I'll leave you be." Prowl said, walking out the door as he tried to regain his thoughts. Ratchet turned back to the girl, he was used to working with metal and circuits, not flesh and blood, and he was a bit worried he might end up hurting her more but he shrugged it off and went back to work.
I could hear voices, though thankfully my pain was gone for now. Where was I? What had happened? Was I dead?
Ratchet was thankful she was unconscious already; he didn't have anything to put her under with and probably would have had to just wait until she lost consciousness from the pain. Regretful that he hadn't been able to repair it, Ratchet carefully amputated her right arm, replacing it with a slightly scaled-down version of one of Hayli's, minus her shoulder pad and arm guard. He avoided taking her entire leg, but he had to replace the bones with steel rods because they were shattered too much to be fixed. Ratchet carefully made an incision over the girl's right side and examined the internal damage. A few of her ribs had punctured her lung, and he removed all of the broken pieces of bone from her torso so they wouldn't cause further damage. He also had to remove her spleen, as it had ruptured.
He glanced up as her heart monitor gave a shrill warning that her blood pressure was dropping. Ratchet contemplated what to do, thinking quickly. The girl already had Cybertronian biology embedded in her, which wasn't necessarily compatible with her body; perhaps all she needed was a bit of energon to get her going...
Ratchet prepared a drip, drawing his own energon to be used before hanging the transfusion over the girl's head. He took a needle connected to the syringe and inserted it into one of the main pipelines in her new arm. Ratchet stepped back, surprised when he found it was actually working. The dull gray of her arm brightened to a shining black like Hayli's, and he quickly stitched up the incision in her side, noting that the blood leaking from her wounds was now mixed with glowing blue.
I definitely wasn't dead; the pain had come back, though now it was more throbbing than slashing. Something was happening; I could feel what felt like ice creeping through my veins, spreading through my right arm and across my chest. The substance reached my heart, and I thought I was dying, but I wasn't. My heart seemed to crumple in on itself, it was extremely painful, but I couldn't cry out. I panicked when I didn't feel it beating, but soon the thrum returned, though it was different somehow...
Ratchet worried greatly when her heart monitor flat-lined, he thought she had given up. Oddly enough, his scanner was picking up a Spark signature, but he thought it had to have been a mistake, she had definitely had a heart, and not a Spark when she was first brought to him. Curious, he hooked her up to a Spark monitor instead and was taken aback when a steady beat flashed up on the screen. He called Prowl in, showing him his findings.
"I don't believe this... It was strange enough when the All Spark changed Hayli, but how did this happen?" Ratchet said. Prowl thought for a long moment, taking in the girl's Cybertronian add-ons and the energon hanging over her head.
"I have a theory, though a bit far-fetched." Prowl said. "It has been stated that all living creatures have a Spark, though because most have such short life spans, it doesn't have time to develop. Perhaps the Cybertronian biology as well as the energon you transfused into her helped speed up the process...?" Prowl guessed. Ratchet shrugged.
"I wouldn't doubt it; nothing on this crazy planet surprises me anymore."
The voices had returned, I must open my eyes and see what is going on...
Prowl glanced at the girl again, doing a double-take when he saw a finger twitch on her un-mechanized hand.
My eyes finally obeyed me, and I became aware of many things at once. There was a tube down my throat, and I felt an I.V. in my right arm, though when I tried to look, my arm wasn't there, it had been replaced by a metal version. Pained as I was, I started to panic.
The seriously wounded girl's eyes widened, and she tried to sit up, but Ratchet gently held her down.
"Easy there, you're hurt very badly. I had to re-construct most of your right side, though I couldn't save your arm." Ratchet said. The girl still weakly struggled, and Ratchet was worried she was going to hurt herself even more.
"Calm down, we aren't going to hurt you, what's your name?" Prowl said.
I recognized these two from the news, they were Autobots, but my mind was set on getting out of there. I had lived on the street since I was twelve, I was now eighteen. I fended for myself, and there was actually something a bit off about me.
"Did you hear me? I'm Prowl, and you are?" Prowl tried to persuade.
I couldn't have answered if I wanted to. When I had been on the streets a few years ago, a gang banger had slit my throat. I had barely survived, but now I could barely speak. The only sound I could even make was a scream if I was in pain. The red and white medi-bot who I think was named Ratchet pinned me down as I squirmed to get free. I desperately motioned for something to write with.
The girl was miming writing something down, and Prowl quickly retrieved a notepad and a pen. The girl didn't say anything, not even gratitude showing in her eyes. She scrawled something down hastily and turned it to face the two Autobots.
I'm mute, can't talk. My name is Aria. Please let me go, I don't want to be here! She had written. Prowl glanced at Ratchet, who shook his head.
"Not until you're recovered." Ratchet said. The girl's face darkened, turning angry, and she kicked Ratchet's hand with her good leg harder than he would've expected. She scribbled down something else and turned it to the pair.
I'm not dying now, so I'm going to go. Let me leave or else you're holding me prisoner. I didn't ask for your help, and now I don't have my arm because of you and I'm a freak now! She wrote. Ratchet looked helplessly at Prowl, who held up his hands in a 'don't look at me' gesture. Ratchet retracted his hand from Aria, who promptly sat up with a grimace. She yanked out the multiple wires and tubes that were attached to her, and swung her legs over the side of the table before dropping down.
How do you get out of this place? She asked on paper. Prowl pointed down the hallway and she left with a very heavy limp and slow pace.