Okay this is a different way the trip to the medbay at month six could have gone
Things were going okay when suddenly before the next Sonogram appointment there was an emergency with Barricade. He was simply in the rec room watching TV and drinking his Energon when suddenly he felt a sharp pain in the area where he was carrying the sparkling
"Guys...help...hurts..."
Jazz and Prowl rush Barricade to the medbay where Ratchet's equipment gave off all sorts of crazy readings. He gave Barricade drugs that he thought would help but instead Barricade's pain continued to increase and he almost lost Barricade when he tried to give him painkillers forcing him to call his human colleagues in once Barricade was stabilized, as soon as one checks on Barricade, who had been simply breathing through the pain the entire time once stable, he goes dead serious in his tone of voice
"Ratchet, Barricade I need you to listen to me and do exactly what I tell you. Ratchet do you have the incubators I asked you to prepare ready?"
"Yes, I got that done the day you told me to, though Wheeljack, Perceptor and I are all confused on why you wanted four made"
"Doesn't matter, right now I need to know how long it will take to get them fully set up"
"They're in standby mode right now, all I need to do is flip the power switch and they'll be ready"
"Good do it, now Barricade I need you to listen to me, you're in what's known as premature labor"
"What?! I can't be in labor, it's too soon"
"Yes it is, however your body is saying otherwise and there isn't time to prep for a c-section due to the fact that you're almost fully dilated. As such we're going to have to keep a close eye on you so that we know when it's time for you to deliver your sparkling"
Five minutes later the doctor was checking on Barricade and gave him the news he was waiting for
"Okay Barricade on the next contraction I want you to push as hard as you can"
Three minutes later after Barricade finished screaming in pain Ratchet was telling Barricade what he had just given birth to
"Congratulations it's a boy"
(Groans in pain) "not done yet"
"What?"
Two minutes later and Barricade was finishing giving birth to another sparkling not even screaming this time purely from not having time to express the pain he was in
"A girl Barricade, you just gave birth to a girl, twins are rare enough but one of each is even rarer"
However Barricade doesn't even respond to Ratchet and instead simply pushes when he feels another contraction. The human medic doesn't think anything of it initially figuring that Barricade was expelling the afterbirth, however a minute later and the human doctor would be speaking out in surprise
"I see a head, oh my word...Barricade, you're having triplets depending on if this is the last one"
Two minutes later and Barricade was finally expelling the afterbirth while Ratchet was doing a check on his triplets, finally he comes over
"I'm not going to lie Barricade, they're small and weak due to being premature, however I promise to do my best to help them pull through, at the same time though I need you to understand that we're going to have to go one day at a time with them"
"But..."
One of Ratchet's human colleagues interrupts before he can get more than one word out though
"Listen Barricade, human babies that are premature are at risk of serious complications and the earlier they are the more serious it can be, that is because they're not meant to survive outside of their mother's womb for at least another two months, and even with medical intervention premature babies don't always survive, how premature are the sparklings?"
"The sparklings are three months premature and that means there's a huge risk of losing them with this being more like a human pregnancy than a Cybertronian carrying period. Do you have a carrier bond with them Barricade?"
"Not that I'm aware of"
"Then I want you to stay here and work on establishing a bond, it might help them survive"
Barricade focuses on the energy fields of his triplets and discovers a nice surprise
"Ratchet, I have a bond with them, it's weak but there, feels like it happened while I was concentrating on just breathing through the pain before the human doctors arrived"
"Okay that's good news and bad news since if they die you're going to feel it, however for now I want you to work on strengthening the bond with your triplets until I say otherwise"
"Okay, have the leaders been informed?"
"Yes I've already told the Primes and Galvatron that you're immediately on leave having delivered your sparklings early, they were just as surprised as we were to discover it was triplets by the way"
Barricade then gets off the bed and starts to walk which Ratchet interrupts highly amused
"And just where do you think you're going?"
"To the rec room to get Energon and tell everyone there about the fact that I just gave birth to triplets. I can just as easily work on strengthening the bond while I'm there as if I was here"
"I don't think you'll be able to leave the medbay that easily"
"Just watch me"
And so Barricade actually manages to impress Ratchet by getting far enough out of the medbay that the door closes, however moments later Barricade was right back in the room and by his triplets sides
(Sighs) "OK you win, I can't leave them, they're...they're so weak, I don't want to be away if I should lose them and not know it because of a weak carrier bond"
A few days later Barricade was still working on strengthening the bond he had with his triplets when he suddenly started feeling really uncomfortable pressure in his chest, however he decides to wait to see if it passes but it doesn't. Half an hour later Ratchet came by to do his daily checks on the triplets and once he was done, before he could even give Barricade his report Barricade speaks up having neared his threshold of being able to handle the pressure
"Ratchet, could you check my chest, I've been feeling really uncomfortable pressure for the last half hour"
"Okay, open up your chest plate"
As soon as Barricade opens his chest plate Ratchet gasps in shock, however when he speaks up his voice is completely professional
"Barricade, have you been feeling any odd sensations or anything else I can't currently think of in your chest?"
"No, just the pressure for the past half hour, why?"
"Because you have...sacs of Energon, for lack of a better description in your chest"
"You mean I can feed my sparklings myself?"
"Yes however...whoa there you're going too far ahead of me!"
Ratchet stops Barricade before he takes one of his triplets out of the incubator it was currently residing in
"Barricade I need you to listen to me completely next time, you can't feed your sparklings yourself right now due to the fact that they are just short of being on full life support, add to that the fact that their systems can't handle a lot of Energon right now due to just how underdeveloped they currently are. However I do have a solution thanks to the humans, they have a machine called a breast pump, I can have Wheeljack invent a Cybertronian version and we can give your triplets the Energon you're producing through their feeding tube, I know it won't be the same as feeding them personally but until they're strong enough it will have to do"
"I understand"
It would turn out that giving the triplets the Energon from Barricade's sacs had an unexpected but welcomed side effect, two months after their birth they were almost completely off the machines keeping them alive. The only thing that remained was the feeding tube due to the fact that they still weren't able to feed from Barricade himself consistently or well enough to warrant it's removal
"Ratchet, when can I take them home?"
"Once they can start properly feeding from you Barricade"
"It's already been two months"
"And it's amazing they've made it this far and gotten this strong in such a short amount of time, they were three months premature Barricade, considering how weak they were when they were first born they've made excellent progress and if not for the feeding issue I would have discharged them a week ago"
"I just...wish that they were home"
"I know Barricade, I wish that was the case as well, it's not healthy for you to be stuck here like you are, I know for a fact that your bond is strong enough for you to leave them for a few hours but you haven't yet"
"I guess...I guess their first days are still stuck in my mind, I keep seeing them so very weak and on the verge of death"
"But they're almost completely healthy, you need time for yourself or you'll burn out. Go outside for some fresh air Barricade"
"But..."
"Doctor's orders, I should have done this sooner actually"
Barricade knows better than to argue with Ratchet once he's pulled medical rank. Two weeks later and the triplets are finally released from the medbay with Barricade being given strict instructions to bring them in for daily check-ups unless something happens sooner than their scheduled appointments. This was due to Ratchet finally being forced to try other methods of getting the triplets to start feeding from Barricade consistently after Dawnbreaker rejected the Energon from Barricade's sac when Barricade tried to feed them himself at a time that wasn't normal. A human doctor theorized that it was possible that the triplets wouldn't get any better until they were no longer dependent on the feeding tube, their thinking being that the triplets associated the feeding tube with their meal when they should have been associating Barricade with their meal once they were actually strong enough to start feeding from him. It turned out that the human medic was only partially correct, the triplets did need to start associating Barricade with food however at the same time their systems were still not capable of fully processing a purer form of sparkling Energon since Ratchet diluted the Energon in the feeding tube to help it settle in their delicate systems easier. Ratchet had unknowingly saved the triplets lives by diluting the Energon that Barricade gave him from the breast pump, however he hadn't fully figured out how to ween them off of the feeding tube yet and that was the most frustrating part of the situation. However eventually Ratchet succeeded in weening the triplets off the feeding tubes and six months after Barricade gave birth to premature triplets they were able to stop the daily check-ups and Barricade himself was allowed back on very light duty, doing most of his work in his quarters so that he could feed his sparklings on a regular basis