AN: Hey…

So due to personal reasons, I will be ignoring cannon and creating my own AU. This is set when the war was still on Cybertron and all characters are G1 style, but fancier. Think 'Travis Knight Animation' K? Anyway, enjoy and be sure to review!

:Comm Talk:

/bond talk/ (both spark bonds(sibling) and bond mates)

oOo

:Optimus to Ratchet:

:Go Ahead:

:All clear, you may proceed:

:Copy that: Ratchet shifted to drive and headed towards the cave opening some couple hundred feet away. Optimus had suggested that he hang back and wait until it was cleared, the main reason being Ratchet had no real weaponry. Well… no weaponry that he didnt have to get up and personal with, and scalpels didn't count. Optimus told him to attend to anyone who may have gotten injured once they cleared the building. Ratchet of course, had argued but Prime won, leaving Ratchet to sulk for the 30 minutes as he waited outside.

At the entrance Ratchet transformed, white and red plating clicking and whirring into place to create a 16 foot mech. "Did any idiots hurt themselves or do I get the day off?" He said dryly, walking past several mechs on his way to Optimus.

"No one's here Ratchet, the place is abandoned." Ironhide crossed his arms.

"That's all well and good but that doesn't answer my question." Ratchet paused, "Wait...abandoned?" Ironhide nodded.

"It's rather odd, there's still a ton of expensive equipment here. It's not like the Cons to just up and leave like this." Wheeljack walked into a large room close to them, Ratchet, Ironhide, Jazz, Blaster, and Optimus all following him. "I mean look at this! There's a carbon generator, parts to a laser rifle, a ton of good wiring… this is like a gold mine! Wait are those grenades!" Wheeljack ran out of sight behind a few large generators. There was a slight pause and the sound of shuffling objects. "Oh Primus they are…"

Jazz and Blaster couldn't stifle a few giggles at Wheeljack's somewhat giddy excitement. "Whatever ya say Jackie…" Jazz grinned, and began looking around the lab. They had cleared the room earlier, but he wanted to get a closer look.

"How long ago do you think the con's ditched this dump?" Blaster asked no one in particular, messing with something he found on one of the tables.

"Mechs…" Wheeljack's voice came out as a whisper, uncharacteristically quiet for the wrecker. All optics turned to Wheeljack, who pointed to a cup of energon.

"That's energon Jack. Ennneerrrjoooonn…" Blaster sounded out.

Wheeljack's helm snapped in Blaster's direction, earphins flashing in annoyance. "No slag Blaster, look."

Blaster, as well as the rest of the group observed the cup more closely. It was full of energon yes, but the energon had small little plumes of steam rising off the top. It was still warm. "So they just left then." Blaster concluded.

"Or, they're still here." Ironhide growled, the whirring of his powering up fusion cannons audible to everyone in the room.

"That's impossible! We double checked everything." Jazz exclaimed, although quietly.

"Never can be too sure…" Ironhide slowly turned around, analyzing everything in the room, ready to open fire on anything that wasn't an Autobot.

"Autobots," Optimus said in a low tone, "Spread out, and keep your comm.s on. Ratchet," Optimus turned to the medic, pulling a Blaster out of his subspace and handing it to him, "stay in this room, comm. us if anyone leaves." Ratchet nodded and the group dispersed, Wheeljack the last one to leave the room.

"Wheeljack," Ratchet called out to him quietly. Wheeljack stopped in the doorway, and tilted his head slightly.

/Be careful/

Wheeljack smiled. /Careful Ratch, I might just think you like me /Wheeljack winked and walked out the door, the audible *click* of his blast mask reaching Ratchet's audios.

Ratchet rolled his eyes. /We're bonded, you idiot/

oOo

Ratchet waited just inside the door frame, he angled himself so he could see the exit, but that any mech walking towards it wouldn't see him. The comm.s had little chatter on them, just a simple 'clear' as each of the bots slowly skimmed the whole lab.

Ratchet didn't notice the quiet hiss as a door slid open at the other end of the room. His only indication that another mech was present, was the deep, slightly accented voice that carried over to his audios.

"Don't move, autobot." Shockwave. Ratchet froze in place. Wheeljack picked up on Ratchet's spike in anxiety and asked, /What is it Ratch?/

/Shockwave's here./

oOo

Wheeljack, to the others had been walking down the hall when he suddenly stopped, Blaster crashing into him loudly. "Dude, warn a mech would ya?!"

Wheeljack didn't say anything for a few moments, before promptly turning on his heel and sprinting in the opposite direction.

"Ratchet." Jazz realized, mumbling after a moment and began to follow Wheeljack, the others doing the same.

Wheeljack rounded the corner a to find that indeed, Shockwave was here. Ratchet was on one knee, the back of it lightly leaking energon, with Shockwave behind him, his arm cannon fully charged and ready to fire, aimed right at the back of Ratchet's helm.

Wheeljack involuntarily lifted a lip, and snarled at Shockwave. His armour plating slid and clamped down solidly over sensitive wiring and protoform, battle systems fully engaged. He was ready to completely rip Shockwave's spark out if that's what it took. He hadn't realized he had been moving until Optimus had stepped next to him, his arm the only thing holding him back.

"Your most logical course of action, would be to let me leave." Shockwave said plainly, emphasising his point by tapping the end of his arm cannon on Ratchet's helm. Ratchet looked up at Wheeljack. /Calm down./ Wheeljack resisted the urge to roll his eyes.

"And if we do?" Optimus asked, not moving his arm away from Wheeljack.

"Then I wont kill him." The bots looked at each other.

"Alright." Optimus agreed.

"Back up, towards the exit." Shockwave instructed, kicking Ratchet in the side. Not enough to knock him over but enough for him to get the message that he was supposed to stand up.

The autobots obeyed, slowly backing towards the exit as Ratchet got to his pedes. His face set into a scowl when Shockwave nudged him forward.

Once they got to the exit, Ratchet's leg had bled enough that he had begun to leave a trail of energon pede-prints. He was trying his best to hide it, but was favoring his injured leg pretty good.

"Stop." Shockwave instructed the autobots when they were outside of the cave entrance, then turned and continued to back away with Ratchet.

"Why you…" Wheeljack started forward, and again the Prime's arm held him back.

"Once I am at a safe distance, I will leave, but not until then." Shockwave said to a very obviously angry Wheeljack. "If you move again, without me telling you to, I will shoot him. It would be most illogical of you to do that."

Shockwave started to back away again, clawed digits wrapped around Ratchet's shoulder, while the cannon was still pointed at his head. Once they were about 300 feet away, they stopped.

"Walk forward, 10 paces." Ratchet walked, counting his steps, and stopped at ten. He could hear the tell tale clicks and whirs of a transformation sequence behind him, before the sound of tank treads filled his audios. They slowly got quieter and quieter.

He risked a glance behind him, and only saw a small cloud of dust a ways away from him. He took a step, intent on walking back to his comrades, bus his knee buckled underneath him without warning.

A few moments later and Wheeljack was next to him, grabbing his arm and throwing it over his shoulder. "Don't you dare do that again." Wheeljack whispered into his audios. His seemingly angry words lost their meaning with the shaky tone.

Ratchet used his free arm to pat Wheeljack's chest plates. "I'll try." Wheeljack tilted his helm so it rested on Ratchet's for a moment, his arm around Ratchet's waist tightening.

oOo

They were back in the Decepticon lab, that being closer than the ark and with decent sized welding equipment. Also, Ratchet wasn't sure how such a large mech as Shockwave could have snuck up on him, and he planned to figure that out.

"Jazz I told you, one moment I was alone in this room, the next Shockwave was-" Ratchet paused, his vents hitching slightly when Wheeljack welded together a small energon line, "behind me." He explained to Jazz, again what happened.

"Well that seems very, illogical." Blaster imitated Shockwave's voice.

"Hidden room possibly?" Optimus thought out loud.

"I like that idea…" Jazz answered and began to walk around the room, seemingly randomly knocking on the walls.

Ironhide huffed a vent of air and leaned against the wall. He had been excited to blast some Decepticons to the pit, and he was dissapointed, to say the least, that that didn't happen.

Now, if he had leaned against the wall, then why was he falling? Ironhide landed on his aft with a loud crash. His optic ridges scrunched together, why was he on the ground? He looked around and he seemed to be in another room, the other autobots looked at him through the doorway he had accidentally opened.

"I found your hidden room Jazz." He ground out, pushing himself up. He glanced around the room and did a very obvious double take. "What the Pit…" Ironhide disappeared out of sight.

Blaster glanced around at everyone, shrugged, and walked into the room, also disappearing around the corner. "Hey Ratchet!" Came Ironhide's muffled voice, "You might want to come in here."

Ratchet huffed, and slid off the table he had been sitting on, and limped into the secret room. Inside the lights were dim, and he could make out a table, cluttered with tools. To the right, Ironhide and Blaster were crouched down next to a couple of brig cells, but they're red frames blocked what was inside.

"All right, what's this all-" Ratchet stopped short. Over the top of Ironhide and Blaster's helms, he could see two younglings. One, the red one, was standing away from the bars fearfully, hissing whenever Blaster reached through the bars. The other one was yellow, and seemed dazed.

Ratchet wasn't prepared for his Creator coding to kick in. It had never been activated before and it hit him like a train.

A million things spun through his mind. Blaster was scaring the red youngling, although not intending to. That didn't matter. Blaster was the problem. Blaster was The problem. Blast…

Ratchet pinched the bridge of his nose. Blaster wasn't a problem. He was Blaster. He'd never hurt…

Protect. Protect. Protect. Protect. Protect.

His coding screamed at him, and he tried to fight it. Blaster is safe! He just needs to stop being touchy-

PROTECT. PROTECT. PROTECT. PROTECT. PROTECT.

Blaster was trying to get the locked door open. He rattled it, and decided that blasting the lock off was a good idea. It was not.

The red youngling shrieked at the loud sound. That was it.

Ratchet was across the room, faster than his leg should have allowed. He grabbed Blaster by the arm and wrenched him away from the cell. He had to get him away.

Away. Away. Away. Away. Away. Away…

No he didn't. Blaster was safe. He shook his helm. Why did he do that? He looked around, noticing the others were in the room, probably standing behind him while his processor glitched.

"You ok Ratch?" Jazz asked, standing next to a very confused Blaster.

"I…" Ratchet shook his helm again. "I don't know." He answered honestly.

"It wouldn't be your Carrier thing… would it?" Wheeljack asked, slowly approaching Ratchet.

"His what!" Almost all the bots said in unison. "Ratchet you're a Carrier?" Ironhide spat out before he could stop himself.

"Well, technically yes but I've never had a sparkling so I don't understand why-" Ratchet's words were interrupted by a whimper. All faces turned towards the cell. The red mechling was curled up as far away from the open door as possible, the sound of his light armour plates clicking as he shook. The yellow one hadn't moved from his sitting position.

Ratchet no longer cared about the conversation and limped to the door of the cell. "Hey mechling," he said quietly, leaning on the bars for support, "you're ok, no one's going to hurt you." The mechling continued to shake. Ratchet sighed and stepped into the cell.

It was small, and he didn't want to make the mechling feel cornered, so he stayed at the opposite end. He glanced to the yellow one, noticing he was watching him now. Ratchet ran a scan over his frame, and blinked in surprise.

He was severely underfuled, running on about 20% energon levels. If it got down to 10% he'd go into stasis lock until he was refueled. Ratchet noticed several parts of his armour were missing. Some along his legs, others on his arms. He had dents and scrstches littering his small frame. What really caught Ratchet's eye though, was the young mech's spark chamber.

The armour over it was completely gone. The glass shield the only thing from keeping his spark out in the open. It was surrounded by rough welds and poorly carterized energon lines. The mechling's yellow optics watched Ratchet's. They seemed completely devoid of… well anything.

"I'm here to help you, ok?" Ratchet walked over to the yellow mechling and knelt down on his good knee, wincing as he did so. The yellow mechling simply looked up at him with blank yellow optics. Ratchet reached out and in subspace a small welder. He clicked it on and reached out for one of the dripping energon lines near the mechling's spark chamber. Now, as soon as those were sealed of they could-

"Don't touch Sunny!" The red mechling cried out, and with new found courage ran at Ratchet, his small but sharp denta sinking into Ratchet's outstretched servo. He had not been expecting that.

Ratchet involuntarily hissed when his hand was bit, the mechling immediately let go, his blue optics wide as he quickly hoisted, 'Sunny' up and somewhat pushed the unstable mechling behind him. The red mechling's armour sheets began to rattle again, his small fans of his intakes whirring to life. His wide optics frantically looked at Ratchet, and the rest of the huge bots outside the cell.

Ratchet's optic ridges knit together as he looked at the mechlings in front of him. He looked over his servo quickly, two deep intents were left on the plating, slowly oozing energon.

"Sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry…" the red mechling mumbled, backing towards the back of the cell, "I'll do whatever you want, just don't let him take Sunny again!" The yellow mechling groaned quietly when the red one ran into him, pushing him into the far bars of the cell.

"All of you leave." Ratchet said evenly to the group of autobots, "They're overwhelmed, let me talk to them." Optimus nodded, and was the first to leave, followed by Ironhide, Blaster, then Jazz. Wheeljack then lingered a moment, before turning to follow the others. "Wheeljack hold on, I might need you." Ratchet called out to him, and he stopped, and mumbled something to the others outside the door. He closed the door quietly, softly clicking it shut.

"Alright…" Ratchet turned back to the terrified red mechling. "I am Ratchet," he pointed to himself, "and that is Wheeljack." He pointed to the white green and red much that stood outside the cell. "We're autobots, and we are here to help you. There's no reason to be afraid younglings." Ratchet let a small smile touch his lips, intending to look friendly.

"So you're not with Shockwave?" The red one asked, his armour no longer clicking as loudly as it was before.

Ratchet shook his head. "No. Shockwave is a Decepticon. We are Autobots. We don't like the Decepticons." The red mechling seemed to relax a bit.

"So is Shockwave gone?"

"Yes."

"He won't hurt Sunny anymore." The red mechling glanced at the other mechling, he still hasn't said anything. He didn't appear to even a knowledge that there was a conversation going on.

"No, he won't hurt Sunny anymore." Ratchet assured him. The red mechling nodded.

"Okay."

"Now if it's ok with you, I need to weld some of Sunny's emerging lines. Can I do that?" The red mechling gave Ratchet a weary look before nodding, grabbing Sunny by the arm.

"Come on Sunny, Ratchet is going to fix you up." Sunny went where the red mechling slowly led him, his eyes not tracking anything in particular. The red mechling stopped when he was just out of arm's reach of Ratchet, and paused.

"It's alright, I'm not gonna hurt him. I'm the Chief Medical Officer for the Autobots, I know what I'm doing." Ratchet reassured the red mechling. He nodded and told Sunny to sit down, which he did.

"So his name is Sunny?" Ratchet pointed to the yellow mechling.

"Well… technically it's Sunstreaker, but I like calling him Sunny, it annoys him." Ratchet looked at the yellow mechling. It annoyed him? So far he hadn't shown an sign of emotion, even after Ratchet established that he was here to help with the red mechling.

Ratchet smiled softly, "Ok, and you are?"

"Sideswipe." The little horned mechling stated proudly.

"Sideswipe and Sunstreaker huh?" Ratchet continued to work on Sunstreaker's energon lines. "The two of you sound like trouble." Sideswipe giggled. "Are the two of you related?"

"He's my brother."

"Are you older or younger?"

"We're twins." Twins? Twins were rare enough that they were almost non-existent. The mechling had no reason to lie about this, so Ratchet believed him.

Ratchet observed Sunstreaker again. "Does your brother talk?"

Sideswipe's happy demeanor changed immediately, and his face went slack. "He… He used to…" He stepped closer to his brother. "Then he just... Kind of stopped. At first I thought he was mad at me."

"Why would he be mad at you?"

"Maybe for calling him Sunny."

"I don't think he'd be mad enough not to talk to you."

"I didn't think so either but, then he just stopped and started ignoring me."

"Hey Sideswipe," Sideswipe turned his attention from Sunstreaker to him, "How did the two of you get here?"

"We uh… Shockwave brought us here."

"What happened before that?" Sideswipe tensed up, and looked at the ground.

"Tell you what," Ratchet sealed off the last of Sunstreaker's leaking energon lines and slowly stood up. "Once we get back to the Ark, and I get you and your brother patched up, you can tell me then, deal?" Sideswipe nodded.

/Wheeljack, come over here. I need you to carry Sunstreaker/

/Why?/

/Because my leg is busted, idiot/ Ratchet heard an audible huff as Wheeljack walked over to the cell.

/I know that Ratch, why does he need carrying?/

/His energon levels are at 20%, and his stabilizers seem to be off/

Ratchet stepped out of the cell, holding his hand for Sideswipe to follow him. Sideswipe glanced at his brother, then Wheeljack. He didn't move.

"It's ok lil' mech, I don't bite I promise." Wheeljack retracted his blast mask, showing his scarred face. His scars were not horribly disfiguring, but they weren't pretty either. Ratchet had told him otherwise, but still. He offered a small smile to the mechling, hoping that helped put him at ease.

Sideswipe seemed to take another minute to think it over, before visibly relaxing. He grabbed his brothers black servo, and began to pull him along with him when Ratchet gently stopped him.

"I'm going to have Wheeljack carry him ok? Is that ok Sunstreaker?" Sideswipe looked at his brother worriedly. Sunstreaker didn't respond.

"He doesn't like people touching him." Sideswipe stepped a bit closer to his brother. Ratchet and Wheeljack shared a look.

"Why's that?" Sideswipe stepped closer.

"Uh… Shockwave. Shockwave umm…"

"Can he just walk outside Ratch?" Wheeljack interrupted him. Ratchet looked at the twins before nodding.

Once they walked outside, Ratchet transformed and Wheeljack helped the twins into the back, and they all drove back to base. Now, how would everyone react to younglings?

AN:

So… ahm probably gonna write up to 6 chapters of this. It will probably be just flashes of the twins growing up with Ratch and Jackie as their dads :)

Updated 5/26/19