Notes: Wheeljack is the pimp, nuff' said. Seriously though, I'm such a Wheeljack fangirl so I was excited when this bunny came up and demanded it be written right. now. Massive thanks to yankeesailor for the beta and for suggesting the title.
Disclaimer: I do not own the characters within, nor am I making any money off of this story. All I own are the twisted ideas floating around in my head.
Thou hast endowed man with the wisdom to relieve the suffering of his brother, to recognize his disorders, to extract the healing substances, to discover their powers and to prepare and to apply them to suit every ill.
--Maimonides
"Long day, huh?" Wheeljack settled into a chair next to Ratchet and just sort of sagged for a moment as if he didn't even have the energy to sit up straight.
The medic grunted unintelligibly and pushed a cube of energon in Wheeljack's direction. Judging by the two empty cubes sitting at his elbow, Ratchet had been hitting the energon a little harder than normal today. Of course, if you had a job as stressful as CMO to a bunch of ragtag rebels, you'd probably turn to drinking as well.
Wheeljack didn't begrudge his friend his occasional need for the bliss of overcharging and needing to hide away from reality. The engineer himself, only a junior medic at best, had been up to his elbows in 'bots' coolant and energon today. The 'cons had been hitting them hard and fast for the past few orns and the strain was beginning to show. "You sure that's such a good idea?"
All he received was a baleful glower and another noncommittal grunt. In the sullen darkness of the seedy energon bar, Ratchet and Wheeljack stood out like sore thumbs. For the most part, only grimy Neutrals and mechs teetering on the edge of the ignoble title of Empties frequented this place. It was a good place to disappear, a place where people didn't come looking for you.
Until Wheeljack sought him out.
"Come on, Ratch, talk to me."
"Nothing to talk about," the medic finally rumbled and finished off what looked to be his third cube of high grade.
"Don't lie to me," Wheeljack ground out, his already fraying nerves and temper threatening to break. "I know you better than that, Ratchet."
"Do you?" A challenge glowed in Ratchet's optics as he glared at the engineer. "If you know me so well you should know that the last thing I want to do is deal with any slag from anyone, 'jack. Just leave me alone."
"I'm not going to do that. Come on, Ratchet. Let's get out of here. I've got a couple cubes of my special brew laying around at the base, let's go back there and get ridiculously overcharged in a place where we don't have to worry about a mech slicing our energon lines for a quick charge." Wheeljack's ear fins flashed dully in a hopeful smile. For a moment, it looked like Ratchet was going to fall in line with that plan but then a mulish expression crossed his face.
"I don't want to go back there. Just go, 'jack."
"I'm ain't going nowhere."
"And I'm not leaving here." Ratchet had that stubborn look on his faceplates, the one Wheeljack was all too familiar with, unfortunately.
"Then we ain't leaving." Shrugging his shoulders in an eloquent fashion, the engineer glanced around the nearly empty energon bar nervously to see if they were drawing any unwanted attention. They weren't, thankfully.
Autobots weren't totally unheard of in this part of Iacon but they were somewhat of a rarity. This was where mechs came to escape. Or to die. The war had hit sectors like this the hardest and had taken their toll on everyone. Wheeljack had walked past three deactivated mechs just lying in the street.
The pedestrians had stepped over them as if they were nothing more than discarded trash or scrap. That sort of callous outlook was what made this sector such a great place to go to if you wanted to disappear. And while Wheeljack could understand Ratchet's craving for anonymity, he didn't want to run the risk of losing his friend forever in these sparkless, cold streets.
When Wheeljack made no motion to drink the energon, Ratchet snatched it up and started to down it. It was vile stuff but it made it hard to think, hard to remember. As far as high grade went, it could hardly justify the title, and the stale taste of it made Ratchet wonder about the questionable freshness of the brew.
But then the energy spiked through his system and robbed him of such pointless thoughts. It lifted him above the squalor and pain surrounded him and painted the world in a shimmer of warm numbness. Ahh, this was what he'd been seeking.
Wheeljack watched as Ratchet's optics slowly bled in color till they were nearly grey and dark, almost reaching an offlined state. He half expected his friend to topple out of his seat but Ratchet only swayed for a moment before his optics brightened once again. "You okay?"
"I'm fine, just wish I could stay like this all the time," the medic said with an almost dreamy expression.
Concern exploded into full-blown worry. Wheeljack had seen more than his share of mechs who'd slid down the slippery slope of energon addiction and he'd be damned before he let Ratchet join their ranks. Autobots weren't built for war and the stress of war played tricks on them all. It caused a lot of good mechs to break under the pressure. Some exploded into psychotic episodes of violence and blind hatred like the twin melee warriors, others imploded in cycles of self-destructive behavior.
"Right, well, let's get out of here and back to base."
"I told you, I don't want to go back there." With the volatile mood-swings that only came from over-charging, Ratchet went from giddy to angry in less than an astro-click.
"Yeah well, we can't stay here. If you're going to drink yourself into an offline state, it's going to be somewhere where I don't have to drag your chassis across half a war-zone to do it," Wheeljack stated grimly and grabbed Ratchet by the shoulders to pull him to his feet. The medic struggled briefly but the engineer was sober and more determined.
"Let go of me, 'jack! I don't want to go back there."
"We're just going back to the base, Ratch. To my quarters." Where he could keep an optic on him.
Ratchet looked at him with haunted optics. "It reeks of energon and deactivation there, 'jack. I'm tired of turning around and seeing nothing but deactivated mechs and Sparklings everywhere I look."
Sympathy and pity shot through Wheeljack as he looked at Ratchet. He pulled the taller mech in for a hug and the medic sagged against his friend with a shuddering exhalation. "I'm so tired, 'jack."
"I know, Ratch, I know." The inventor guided Ratchet's head down to rest against his shoulder as he held the suddenly trembling medic gently. "Believe me, I wish it was in my power to spare you the horrors of this war." And he meant that all the way down to his spark.
"He was just a Sparkling, 'jack. Not even a quarter of a vorn old," Ratchet whispered brokenly. "Not even old enough for his first upgrades and they just gunned him down."
Wheeljack flinched slightly. So that was what had upset Ratchet so much. He always hated losing a patient but it was the senseless destruction the Decepticons brought that really upset his friend. The callous destruction of innocence and the death of those who had nothing to do with their war that truly made Ratchet realize that he couldn't save everyone. Sparklings and the very old were always the frailest. They either didn't have the secondary and redundancy systems adult Cybertronians had, or their systems were old and failing. They couldn't sustain the damage and wounds mature Cybertronians in good repair could take. And they were always the first to die on the operating tables.
What was worse, some Decepticons took great pleasure in aiming deliberately at the Neutrals and civilians, the mechs that had never lifted a weapon against them. In Decepticon optics, you were either with them or not. Your faction didn't matter if you didn't have their sigil on your chassis.
"Primus, Ratchet," his friend finally managed to get out.
"Don't even waste your breath, Wheeljack. Don't you dare tell me 'It's not your fault, you couldn't have done anything to save him' blah, blah, slaggit!" Outrage colored Ratchet's voice as he snarled those words into Wheeljack's shoulder.
"I wasn't going to say that."
Understandably deflated, Ratchet just paused. "Good. I hate being patronized."
Wheeljack was relieved to see a hint of his friend's usual gruff demeanor and chuckled weakly. "I'll try and keep that in mind. Can we go now? I'm starting to get that itchy feeling between my shoulders that tells me we're attracting unwanted attention."
Ratchet frowned and raised his head enough to peek over Wheeljack's shoulder. Sure enough, a few of the bar's patrons were looking at them with less than benign expressions. "Fine, let's go." The medic pulled away reluctantly and finished off the last cube of energon before paying.
"Are you going to make it back to the base?" Wheeljack asked doubtfully when he saw the slightly unsteady hitch in Ratchet's gait.
"I'll be fine, just drive slow." Ratchet dropped down into his vehicle mode and started down the street. Wheeljack followed close behind and occasionally nudged Ratchet's bumper with his own when his friend looked to be listing a little too far to one side. The streets of Iacon were eerily empty. It was almost surreal considering the city had at one point been bustling with activity and life.
Now, after orns of endless Decepticon attacks, most of Iacon's denizens remained huddled indoors and only the desperate or suicidal were out on the streets this late at night.
Wheeljack wasn't sure which category he and Ratchet fell into. But when the welcome brightness of the Autobot base came into view, the inventor cycled a breath of relief. He was even relieved to see a grim-faced Prowl waiting for them at the gates. Wheeljack had radioed ahead to let the Autobots know he was returning with their wayward CMO but the expression on Prowl's faceplates did not bode well for either mech.
"Report to Prime's office immediately," the second-in-command ordered without preamble. He turned on his heel and stalked back into the military complex without waiting to see if his orders would be followed.
Ratchet transformed and swayed unsteadily on his feet. Wheeljack caught him as he listed towards the wall and wrapped an arm around the medic's waist to hold him up. "Easy there, Ratch."
The over-charged mech's optics flickered rapidly as his equilibrium servos tried to right themselves. "Ugh. I don't feel so good," Ratchet muttered and shook his head.
Looking around desperately for a waste receptacle, Wheeljack grimaced behind his battlemask as Ratchet's engine gave a sickening grind. "Oh no you don't, come on, Ratchet." The guard on duty, Bluestreak, hurried over with a waste receptacle and politely averted his optics when Ratchet doubled over and emptied the contents of his fuel tank.
"Primus, Ratch," Wheeljack's ear fins flashed a sickly orange color as he fished out a rag for his friend. He helped the CMO to his feet and wiped up the splotches of energon Ratchet had missed. "Let's get you to your quarters."
"Mngh. Gotta see Prime," Ratchet muttered blearily as his systems started to shut down in preparation for standby mode.
"Uh huh, the only place you're going is your berth, Ratch. I'll deal with Prime. I'm sure you purging energon onto his datapads will not improve his mood," Wheeljack reminded him ironically. He helped the stumbling CMO to his quarters and deposited Ratchet on his recharge berth. After that, he located Ratchet's waste bin and set it beside the berth. "I'll be back afterwards. If you get sick again, the waste receptacle is right here, okay?" He laid his hand gently against the medic's cheek and stroked it briefly in a comforting manner.
"Mnn…thanks, 'jack."
"Just rest now, Ratch. I'll check on you in a little bit. You've got my comm unit if you need anything." He could not convey his smile with the battlemask on but the warmth in his voice was unmistakable.
"M'kay," Ratchet murmured as his optics slowly dimmed and he slipped into recharge.
After checking Ratchet's systems over one last time, Wheeljack steeled himself for the inevitable dressing down still to come and squared his shoulders as he walked to Prime's office.
"Enter." His fingers had barely even touched the call button when Prime's sonorous voice filtered through the intercom. Fighting back nervousness, Wheeljack pressed the button to open the door and entered the office. The engineer wilted slightly when he caught sight of Prowl's gimlet glower from where he sat in his seat at Prime's right. Optimus stood with his back to the door, staring at the simulated viewscreen of Iacon's skyline.
Not much was known about the new Prime and it was that uncertainty in dealing with the mech that made Wheeljack scared down to his spark. For all he knew, the mech could be a complete hard-aft and was bent on throwing Ratchet and himself into the brig.
"Optimus, Prowl." Fighting the urge to squirm like a guilty school-mech, Wheeljack stood at attention and furtively shot a nervous glance at his commanding officers.
"Where's Ratchet? He was ordered to come as well," Prowl queried suspiciously.
"He was… err… sick - I thought it best to take him to his quarters to recover."
"Over-indulging in energon will do that to a mech," the tactician said icily. "The two of you are making it a habit to disobey orders tonight. I should hope this isn't going to become a habit."
"Now that ain't fair. Tonight was an aberration and you know it," Wheeljack shot back, his temper fraying along with his nerves.
"Really?" Prowl cocked an optic ridge and typed a few keys on the computer in front of him. A holographic display flickered to life over the table. "It shows here that you and Ratchet have a habit of just taking it upon yourselves to leave the base without permission to go on a drinking binge down in lower Iacon. Ratchet's been cited three times for leaving without permission. And tonight was an 'aberration', you said?"
Prime was silent, a somber, towering figure standing with his back to them as he watched his city sleep.
"Yes, it's an aberration! With all due respect, sir, but you don't have a fragging clue what's going on." Wheeljack's temper when riled was infamous. The fact that it was hard to tick off the inventor didn't matter, because when he did loose his temper, it was usually explosive but quick to pass. He had a few select buttons that were guaranteed to anger him and Ratchet was one of them.
"Really? Enlighten me then. Why shouldn't I have the pair of you thrown into the brig for gross negligence and dereliction of duty?"
"Dereliction of duty!? We just spent the last fragging three orns piecing mechs back together! What more do you want from us?"
"The ability to locate our CMO in case of a crisis would be a good start." Prowl's own optics were brightening with anger now as he leaned forward in his seat. The dramatic sweep of his doorwings and the high angle he carried them at betrayed his own temper. The medics weren't the only mechs who'd been up for nearly three orns straight now and it was showing in all of them.
"Frag you, Prowl. Ratchet needed to get out. He's been up to his elbows in mechs and innocent Sparklings. If you think any mech can put up with three orns of that kind of torment and not need to blow off some steam afterwards then you really are a cold-sparked son of a glitch."
"Wheeljack—" Prime finally broke his silence with a quiet warning. "You are addressing a superior officer and you will show him his due respect."
"Sorry, Optimus." Chastened, Wheeljack looked down at the plating near his foot and cycled air raggedly through his intakes. "But you didn't see him down there. You didn't see the look in his optics. Ratchet's a good mech, a strong mech. But there's only so many innocent kids he can watch deactivate in front of him before he snaps."
Wheeljack grimaced then and paused to gather his words. Unconsciously, his hands curled into shaking fists at his side. "You don't know Ratchet. Sometimes, he has to get away because otherwise, he's going to become so strung-out that he's going to make mistake in the operating room and that's going to destroy him."
"He's not the only one suffering because of this war, Wheeljack. All of us have been up for three orns surrounded by wounded and dying mechs."
"But it's not your job to save them! You might have spent the last three orns finding ways to destroy lives but Ratchet's been trying to save them. And it's a whole lot harder to put someone back together than it is to tear them apart. It's fragging easy to kill someone but it's a lot harder to save them."
Even Prowl was shocked into silence by the venom in Wheeljack's voice.
"Wheeljack, we're not trivializing what the med-staff is doing," Optimus intoned sadly as he turned to study the upset engineer with somber optics. "Primus knows none of us would be standing here if it wasn't for Ratchet and his team but that doesn't change the fact that he's an officer and he can't just up and disappear out of nowhere."
"And you can't apply military thinking to a mech like Ratchet, Optimus. He'd give you his spark on a platter to save every mech that crosses his table but the last thing you want is a medic who snaps in the middle of a battle. When it's one of his own medics on the verge of losing it, Ratchet can deal with it. He doesn't have that luxury when it's him on the edge. Look, I ain't making excuses for Ratchet. He can do that on his own when he's back on his feet. I just want you two to try and realize how dangerously taut his psyche is these days. He's on the edge of losing it, Optimus. And I'll be damned if I'm going to sit back and watch."
When his commanding officers didn't speak, Wheeljack took it as his cue to continue. "As for myself, yes, I left the base without permission, but I had to find Ratchet before he got himself into real trouble. When he does go on these binges of his, he's sometimes careless so I gotta be there to watch his back and to bring him back to base."
"We're not questioning your loyalty to your friend, Wheeljack. If anything, it's a credit to you that you're willing to risk your career to help him out in his time of need--but we can't risk our head medic just leaving whenever he feels like it," Prime tried to interject reasonably.
"I understand that, Optimus. And hey, if you can think of a way of making sure he doesn't fry his circuits from the stress of it all, more power to you. Sentinel Prime understood why Ratchet sometimes needed to take a break. That's why you'll find that none of those incidents on his official record are recent, Prowl." Wheeljack frowned at the tactician. "But I can promise you that whenever Ratchet did take a break, he always made certain the medbay was adequately staffed and prepared in case an attack did come. He takes his job very seriously and would never leave the medbay if he thought they couldn't cope without him for a few breems."
Optimus nodded solemnly and seated himself at the table. "Very well. You and Ratchet are both confined to quarters for the next deca-cycle unless on duty. In light of the… extenuating circumstances, I won't put this in your files but I'm going to meet with you and Ratchet tomorrow after your shifts to discuss a better option for when he needs to get away. Agreed?"
Wheeljack nodded eagerly and scarcely dared cycle air through his vents as his earfins flashed a much more cheerful blue color. "Thank you, Optimus."
"Don't thank me yet. I'm sure Prowl here will be coming up with a few extra projects to occupy your time while you two are under house arrest."
Prowl just shot his commander an ironic look and pasted a bland smile on his faceplates. "Of course, Prime."
Wheeljack's spark sank a bit, but he knew better than to push his luck. "Yes, sir."
"Dismissed."
The engineer saluted sharply but hesitated.
"Did you have something else to add, Wheeljack?" Prowl asked laconically.
"Well... err… with your permission, I'd like to stay with Ratchet tonight. Make sure he's going to be okay coming off of his over-charge."
The two officers exchanged a look. "If you're that worried about him, perhaps he'd be better off being monitored by a more qualified medic."
"Yes, sir. But… well… Ratchet doesn't like his staff knowing about these occasions. Says it would affect morale and diminish their confidence in him."
"Ah, I see. Very well, stay with him tonight, Wheeljack. Your sentence will start tomorrow." A trace of wry amusement worked its way into Prime's voice as he watched the engineer.
"Thank you, Optimus. And… Prowl? I'm sorry for snapping at you."
"Don't test your luck, Wheeljack," Prowl rumbled. "You'll have your extra assignments tomorrow by mid-shift."
"Yes, sir." Wheeljack beat a hasty retreat rather than test the limits of his superior's mercy. After the engineer left, Prowl shot Optimus an amused look.
"Why do I always play the bad Enforcer part and you play the good guy?"
Optimus chuckled softly and clapped his second on the shoulder. "You play the part so well, Prowl. Besides, the second-in-command is supposed the hard-aft slaghead every grunt hates and fears while the commander is supposed to be the wise and magnanimous one everyone looks up to."
"Uh huh." Unconvinced, Prowl snorted and shook his head. "Well, kind and magnanimous leader, I would like to hit my recharge berth sometime tonight and since I have to draw up a whole new schedule for our two wayward mechs, that's not going to happen for a while."
"Go recharge, Prowl. I'll take care of it."
The tactician narrowed his optics in a stubborn expression. "I can deal with it."
"I realize that, but you've been up for three orns straight. Besides, I've got a few other things to do anyway." Optimus smiled beneath his faceplate as he looked at his suspicious second. "Go recharge, Prowl. That's an order."
"Yes, sir." Cycling air in an exasperated sigh, Prowl climbed to his feet and was surprised when he swayed fractionally for a moment. Apparently he was more depleted than he'd realized.
"Get an energon ration before you recharge. You look like slag." Optimus teased gently.
"Ha! You're not going to be winning any beauty contests yourself, Optimus," Prowl shot back with a faint smirk as he walked to the door. "And don't you dare recharge at your desk again. If you do, I'll sic Ratchet on you and I'm sure he'll be in wonderful mood once he wakes up from his energon binge."
Optimus winced slightly. "No need to break out the heavy artillery, Prowl. I'll hit my berth soon enough."
"Right, good night, Optimus."
"Night, Prowl." Prime waved him out the door and turned his attention to the extra duty rosters. After he completed them, the Autobot leader rubbed at tired optics before turning his attention to the viewscreen behind him once more. There were a few less buildings piercing the skyline. A few more scars in Iacon's once beautiful streets. But the important thing was that they'd survived. They'd live to see another day and in Prime's book, that was enough.
Smiling grimly beneath his battlemask, Optimus laid a hand over his chest where he could feel the quiet pulse of the matrix beat beneath the armored plating. Yes, it was enough for now. Nodding decisively to himself, Optimus shut down his computers and turned off the viewscreen. As he exited the office, he keyed down the lights and closed the door quietly. The halls were quiet and empty as he walked towards his quarters. At this late hour, it was easy to believe he was the only mech on the base, but Optimus knew that mechs would be bustling around and clamoring as they went about their duties in just a few breems. Life would return to the base and Iacon no matter how battered and tired they would become.
Life always returned to Iacon. It was with that last hopeful thought that Optimus was finally able to slip into recharge.