A/N: I own nothing, sadly enough. (All my work is un-beta'd if anyone notices any glaring mistakes please let me know.)
I've seen authors on do this for years and I finally get the chance. ^_^
Thank you to all my reviewers!
LdyGossamer : Thank you!
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Juzu : I'm glad you like!
PxJLoverKyoto : ^.^ I wonder what other monsters I can throw in … having just vampires seems so – bland.
MyNameIsJag : Here is your next dose of happiness!
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ReveilleWolfie : Glad I could come up with something new for you.
Sanctuary
Part Two
First Aid watched Ratchet finish patching Wheeljack's injuries from the Decepticon attack, awed by Ratchet's skill. The famous myth that nightwalkers were invincible, able to regenerate from any wound was being proven wrong before his optics.
"Are you listening Aid?" Ratchet snapped from his ministrations as his breath misted in the cold air, "High grade, especially gelled high grade is the nightwalker version of sleep rust for mortals. One speck and they're hurting. Every injury must be checked and cleaned with clear solvent. They're systems will handle the rest."
"Boss? What if – " Aid fidgeted as he looked to Wheeljack's face plate nervously, "What if one tries to – you know," The younger medic rubbed his neck, just above his main energon line protectively.
"What if one of us bites you?" Wheeljack asked with a pained chuckle sitting up slightly. "It depends."
"Be quiet and lay down!" Ratchet snarled pushing Wheeljack back down, knowing full well that the masked mech was indulging him by acquiescing. "It depends on your systems. Some mechs succumb with the first bite, becoming more nightwalkers. More are enthralled, becoming spark-less minions of whoever bites them. Most just die and a rare few are immune."
"Immune?" Aid balked, "You mean nothing happens to them?"
"I mean that if the nightwalker is trying for a new childe or ghoul they'll be sorely disappointed. They'll either get a severely depleted mortal who will off-line from energon loss or they'll form a psychic connection to the mortal that becomes a master-slave connection. Normally, we never find out. Most nightwalkers feed to just the point of termination."
"Now can I take you to my leader?" Wheeljack asked with a chuckle, grateful that Ratchet had finally cleaned the lighter wounds once they had gotten into the safety of the deeper woods.
"Yes, you glitch." Ratchet groused, standing stiffly and glaring at the steadily rising sun.
"Come on!" Wheeljack leapt to his feet, grabbing Ratchet's hand nearly skipping across the snow to the deepest shadows of the forest leaving First Aid to scramble to keep up following after.
"But you're injured!" Aid gasped thinking on the deep burns that had littered the other white mech's chest, his feet sliding in the slush left by their heated frames.
Jack spun around flashing the smooth metal of his chest plating underneath his open vest and tunic. "What injuries?" Violet optics flashed merrily over the solid faceplate. Aid stumbled, the wounds were gone, and not a scar or blemish remained. Aid stared until he could finally goad his pedes into following. So this was the power of the nightwalkers.
The sanctuary was beautiful. Ancient stones polished to a burnished gold by the passing ages glowed a warm ruddy hue in the frigid midday sunlight. All around the massive wall mechs stood guard duty in the sun or performed duties outside the great stone wall surrounding the inner keep.
"This is amazing." First Aid murmured in awe as they approached. Behind him Ratchet and Wheeljack bickered back and forth sounding more like an old bonded couple as time went by. Since finding Wheeljack early that morning First Aid had completely forgotten that 'Jack was a nightwalker. The strange alchemist turned inventor seemed harmless, his easy banter and humorous ability to get under Ratchet's plating making the trek to Wheeljack's home enjoyable.
"Glad you like it." Wheeljack finally responded, winning the latest round of snarking while Ratchet grumbled under his breath.
"Halt!" Ratchet froze stunned that one of the guards would actually stop Wheeljack from entering his own home. A blue mech ran up to Jack, blue optics trained on the blackened scorch marks littering the once white shirt. "You're not hurt?"
"I've got a nightwalker healer, Blue. I told you I'd be fine." Jack traced a hand carefully over the younger grey mech's face tenderly.
"Wheeljack," A disturbingly monotonal voice spoke from the deepest shadows of the entry gate. "Why have you brought mortals?" Ratchet looked to the dark silhouette, noting the cold violet optics that bore into his own. Ratchet twitched, the nightwalker was new. And, he barely kept himself from grumbling, new nightwalkers meant explanations.
Wheeljack gestured to the mortals behind him, "Sorry Prowl, this is my big brother, Ratchet."
"B-b-brother? But, Jack you never told me you had a family. How can your brother be mortal and you not or were you bitten?" Blue asked hurriedly before being hushed by the smooth voice Prowl.
"You have a mortal brother?" The figure asked, monotonal voice oozing disdain.
"Uh, well –"
"He's adopted. My creators took him when we found him after a raid on a nightwalker coven. They thought his maker was one of those slain but he didn't revert. So we kept him."
"Hey! I wasn't some pet!" 'Jack cried as Ratchet smirked.
"You are a slayer?" Prowl asked Ratchet making Wheeljack break into peals of laughter.
"No, I'm a healer." Ratchet snapped, tugging at his cloak with its red medic's crosses embroidered into its shoulders for emphasis as if the black and white nightwalker before him were lacking processing capacity.
"Bluestreak, give the healer a room." Prowl commanded softly as he turned, vanishing mid-step into nothing.
"The new leader?" Ratchet asked 'Jack flatly, completely unimpressed with the smaller mech as they walked.
"Yeah, he's good to us, Ratch. I saw Sentinel fall and I could only lead Cyclonus away. He – he's made a new unit called Sweeps. They're worse than most Decepticons." Wheeljack paused in front of a massive set of double doors and nodded his head towards them. "We've got wounded."
Ratchet paused mid step behind Bluestreak, ignoring their guide chatting with his assistant, "And you're just now telling me? Aid!" He stormed towards the massive doors, pushing through brusquely with Aid trotting at his heels.
The room was filled with injured and dying mechs. Nightwalkers darkened towards black while mortal mechs coughed and wheezed or lay with darkened optics as their plating slowly grayed. Several mechs moved through the room offering words of comfort and sips of energon trying to relieve the agony of their friends.
"You know the drill." Ratchet nodded to the mortals lined against the far wall basking in the fading sunlight. Aid nodded, moving to help those he could. Ratchet turned to the nightwalkers, once more wondering if he was damning himself to the Unmaker for aiding those who fed on his own kind. It was an old mental battle he had fought since his creators had adopted a much smaller and younger Wheeljack long ago.
Shrugging off what he couldn't change Ratchet moved to the darkest of the nightwalker forms, noting the many high grade burns and holy water marks. These 'Sweeps' were playing dirty. Ratchet frowned as he worked, grateful when Wheeljack appeared at his side to sooth the terrified nightwalker under his hands.
"No! No, not more! Decepticon!" A massive black nightwalker cried as he desperately struggled to escape from Ratchet, barely able to move his arms from critical wounds piercing his shoulders and chest.
Wheeljack pulled the struggling nightwalker into his arms, murmuring soothingly into his audios, "Trailbreaker, c'mon, it's okay. This is Ratchet he'll make you better, you remember me telling you about him, right?"
Trailbreaker's optics tracked from Ratchet's face to 'Jack's flashing vocal indicators, slowly relaxing as the other nightwalker's words filtered into his processors through the painful haze. Finally able to do his work, Ratchet moved swiftly over wounds cleaning what he could so the nightwalker's repair systems could function properly.
"How are you providing for their energon needs?" Ratchet asked brusquely.
"Volunteer companions." Wheeljack caught Ratchet's gaze, directing him to the front entrance. Several mechs had cued up, all letting their lines be tapped giving their own vital fluids to their wounded protectors. Some wore the red crest of the Autobots, a few with the white crest of the Neutrals, others wore no crest at all, only a simple badge upon their breast sporting a simple brass arch representing their loyalty to the sanctuary. Ratchet shuddered and turned back to his work. He wanted to be in a berth before dawn.
Aid sighed wearily, finally collapsing into a cot near his patients. The normal mechs he had tended were all stable, and hopefully Ratchet would get some rest before the sun rose. He huffed a silent laugh, one day ago he had been trembling in fear from a bedtime story, wondering if the mythological nightwalkers might actually be real. Now, he knew they were. Cycling into recharge, Aid let darkness envelop him as a remembered voice followed him into his dreams. Listen younglings, and listen well, for this is your only warning…
Ratchet scrubbed a weary hand over his optics, wishing that darkness still reigned beyond the keep's windows. A new day had dawned, and since he was here he might as well check over the rest of the inhabitants.
"Ya must be the doc bot Prowl was goin' on 'bout." A voice pulled Ratchet from his musings. Looking up the healer found himself face to face with a visored mech, smaller than him and dressed smartly almost like a noble. "M'name's Jazz. You've done us a big service, keepin' ours functionin' despite bein' what they are." The mech nodded to the now empty corridor that had housed their injured nightwalkers.
"Jazz," Ratchet looked the smaller mech over calmly, noting several deep scrapes along his chassis coming too close to comfort to his neck cabling. "Sit down, that needs tending. 'Jack vouched for Prowl, if he says I can trust a nightwalker its good as iridium crystal."
"Blue's taken with ya as well, likes knowin' who his lover's big brother is." Jazz smiled as Ratchet stopped his cleaning, to pierce the visor with his hard, crystal glare.
"Lover?"
Jazz gulped nervously at the hard glare, suddenly understanding 'Jack's adage of never pissing off a healer, especially if that healer is Ratchet. "Yeah, they took up last winter. Blue had just escaped his entire village's destruction. He used to live in Steeldale."
"Slag, that was our next stop." Ratchet thought back to the quaint village in a quaint, pristine valley. It had been fine early last spring, now it was gone. "Why don't I remember him?" Ratchet scanned his memory, looking for one reference to the youngling. He made sure to meet every member of each community he served, tried to know the major myths of each town, what to say and what not speak of. Yet this one mech he knew nothing of, much like most mechs in this strange sanctuary his brother called home.
"He lived in the forest beyond the town. If he had any family he's never spoken of them." Jazz kept still on the table, unnerved at the stern glare Ratchet possessed. He had faced down Decepticon Sweeps, hungry nightwalkers and imperial soldiers out for mechblood. Each time he had stayed cool and lived to tell about it. In this encounter he wondered if he would come out unscathed. The healer's optics shone with a burning ferocity found in turbo-wolves, yet his deft skill with his hands made him a mortal to be reckoned with.
"I need to go through that town, pay my respects." Ratchet replied standing up from where he had bent over Jazz's repairs. "Stay put a few moments for the welds to harden."
"Thanks, Ratchet. Listen, Prowl wanted me ta speak with ya, we wanna repay ya for services rendered, what can we do?" Jazz asked earnestly, honestly wanting to help their savior.
"My assistant needs rest and a few rations of energon, I could do with a wash and I need to know how to get to the main road without alerting any Decepticons in the area where we came from. You're new here as well, aren't you?" Ratchet asked with a frown, thinking back almost four years ago when he had last visited Goldstone Sanctuary his brother had run to. The place had sheltered the massive nightwalker Sentinel, a small handful of nightwalkers willing to cease hunting and two-dozen or so Neutrals. The place had grown since then.
"Yeah, me an' Prowl wandered here three years ago. A lot o' nightwalkers want peace, an' more mortals are willin' ta live with nightwalkers providin' they aren't on the menu." Jazz looked to a darkened corner of the room, "Prowl is everythin' ta me."
Ratchet nodded while making himself not gag. He hated this part of his job. The mechs and femmes he treated invariably decided he made a great priest to tell their lives to. Those professing their love were the worst. Listening to them spouting, hinting or drooling over their loves irritated him. He had his work, his traveling, his occasional flings when he wasn't playing creator to a journeyman healer.
"Congratulations. Oh, and I need to look over all your mechs, mortal and nightwalker. I'm not leaving a minor injury to fester."
Jazz smiled into the early morning light filtering dimly through the window, "Ya'll have it, all o' it. 'Jack told me 'bout ya once, said he had a terrifying big brother. I thought you'd be a nightwalker." Ratchet only snorted.
"Sorry to disappoint."
First Aid awoke to weak streaming sunlight in the first light of dawn. The soft murmur of voices reminded him that he was in the – sanctuary. He paused, booting up his optics. Did this place have a name?
"Good morning, Aid." Ratchet looked down with a tired smirk. "The nightwalkers are all looked over. You get the mechs. Wake me at noon." The older mech managed settle on the cot and pass out with a professional air, intimidating and caring all at once.
"Thank Primus he's finally asleep." Wheeljack sighed, leaning against a wall near their cots. "I always thought he'd calm down after I left. He hasn't changed a bit." The inventor smiled slightly at his sleeping brother. "Take care of him for me?"
"Uh, yeah" Aid swallowed, suddenly reminded that he was in a stone keep full of nightwalkers. "I'll keep an optic on him." Aid managed to stumble out of his cot, white hands pin wheeling in the air to keep his balance.
"Careful, mech. Ratchet needs ya in one piece." Jazz grinned, bright blue visor gleaming merrily as he easily stabilized the younger medic.
"Thanks," Aid grabbed his pack deftly, casting a glance at his recharging mentor wondering how the older mech managed to maintain his reserved grace even after a full day and night on his pedes. Turning, he moved to the main hall, and the line of chatting mechs waiting for checkups.
"How many mechs live here?" Aid asked Jazz suspiciously.
"We number two hundred mortals, near that many nightwalkers."
"Then why am I taking care of only sixty mechs?" Aid gestured to the cue, frustration building as he already knew the answer.
"I forced him to get some recharge." Wheeljack spoke from behind the group with a victorious smile.
"Meanin' that ration ya so generously gave your big bro was drugged." Jazz chuckled at Aid's scandalized expression. "Don' worry kid, 'Jack's handled Ratchet before."
"I'll get to work then." Aid summoned his first patient. "Wait," He pulled Jazz from going, "What is this place called?"
"Goldstone Sanctuary, First Aid, when you leave here you have to forget this place. No one knows it exists, we're a rumor, just a myth." Jazz warned, holding First Aid's gaze with his own until the younger mech nodded. "Good, we have a lot of good mechs here just looking for safety."
"I understand," Aid nodded somberly as he turned to work.
Wheeljack looked at Jazz, violet optics worried. "We need to tell them."
"I will do so. Your brother cannot be allowed to wander into a trap." Prowl spoke from Jazz's side, appearing out of thin air. "The Decepticons will take advantage of him, and his apprentice if they can." Prowl led Jazz and Wheeljack away from the sundrenched corridor to the dark inner courtyard. "Wheeljack, we need Bluestreak to tell them what happened. They need to know what they're getting into." 'Jack nodded worriedly, waiting impatiently for noon and for Ratchet to wake up.
"You sorry glitch!" Ratchet's bellow and the resounding clang of a wrench against a helm filled the followed by Wheeljack's pained yelp. "What the slag were you thinking!"
"But Ratch, you were always telling our creators not to overwork themselves. I'm just worried about you." 'Jack protested, backing out of the temporary healer sleeping quarters attempting to placate his brother.
Face set in a furious scowl, Ratchet waggled a wrench threateningly at his brother. "Don't pull that slag on me. I've worked longer hours with you cackling over my efforts too often before to fall for your load."
"He drugged you on my request." Prowl placed a restraining hand on Ratchet's wrist.
"Don't –" Wheeljack cringed as Ratchet slipped from Prowl's grasp, bringing his wrench down solidly on Prowl's helm.
"My only rule is don't frag a healer off!" Ratchet stormed from Prowl who stared after him in shock clutching his helm.
"A mortal just hit me." Prowl spoke dazedly.
"He grows on you." Wheeljack chuckled, "Take it as a sign of affection."
Ratchet stormed from the sanctuary leaders, finding First Aid in a grand hall chatting with the young bot Bluestreak. "Aid, how were your patients?"
"They're all fine sir, I've kept my reports." He passed a journal to Ratchet, waiting nervously as his mentor leafed through the records.
"Good job, Aid." Ratchet nodded his approval. Aid ducked his abashed thanks, proud to have finally earned his mentor's approval. "Bluestreak has gathered supplies for us for a few more days. We can leave whenever you want."
"Tomorrow, we leave in the morning. Bluestreak, come with me." Ratchet turned, leaving his waiting lunch and apprentice alone in the long hallway. Ratchet led Bluestreak to a quiet room before abruptly turning on the smaller bot, grabbing the mech's jaw in a steely grip and glaring down into the younger mech's optics.
Bluestreak froze, letting Ratchet turn his head this way and that, staring into his optics before releasing his chin. "You're with Wheeljack?"
"Yes, sir, he found me after the attack last winter. It was bad, I don't remember much." Blue shifted as he spoke, continuing his dialogue and keeping Ratchet from seeing Prowl, Jazz, 'Jack and First Aid file into the room behind them. "I was afraid of everyone, especially mortals. The Decepticons had wiped out the village. The passing nightwalkers had killed a few, but not like them." The youth shuddered, "Never, the nightwalkers were scary, especially in winter but they only took a few of us. It was -" Bluestreak finally quieted himself with one last shudder.
"Just don't break his spark. He may be a nightwalker and an idiot, but he's still my brother." Ratchet warned, somehow unwilling to hurl his normal venom at the youngling who held such dark fear behind his bright optics.
"Aww, Ratch I didn't know you cared." Jack spoke from behind his brother, startling an oath from Ratchet while ducking his surprised swing. "Ratch, Ratch! Calm down, it's me."
"Jack, this had better be good." Ratchet warned.
"It is, but first you need to quit terrorizing my lover." Jack drew Blue close, sheltering the smaller mech from Ratchet. "Steeldale wasn't abandoned after it was destroyed. The Decepticons destroyed it to make it their own. It's now Coldsteel Garrison. Cyclonus heads the garrison, under the command of a fanatic named Megatron. Stay away from them."
"Ratchet, supplies and payment are on your cot. When you leave we will have a four mech team following you. Two nightwalkers, two mortals," Prowl looked at Ratchet earnestly, "You will not see them, but until you are safely out of the Decepticon's path, they will watch over you."
Ratchet nodded, "Understood. Jack, send this to our creators." He handed a thick letter to his brother sealed with the crimson seal of a healer complete with white crosses. "I promised them I'd write if I found myself in trouble. This counts as trouble."
Wheeljack nodded, "Carrier's last letter said Creator was anxious to see my new home, make sure I was being treated right by my 'lord'. Maybe they'll visit?"
"I miss them too, just send the letter, we'll worry about them later." Ratchet sighed and looked out a nearby window. The shortened winter day was already edging towards darkness.
Ratchet and Aid took their leave before first light the next morning, departing with refilled supplies and thicker under cloaks to block the deepening winter chill. The heavy clouds overhead darkened as dawn progressed, dropping thick, fluffy snowflakes within the first hour that worsened steadily until barely becoming a snowstorm.
"Where are we?" Aid asked yelling over the screaming wind as they trudged through hip deep snow. The two days they had tended to the denizens of the sanctuary had been sunny, chilly and perfect. Now, half a day's journey out from the nightwalker stronghold they were bombarded with snow, the thick flakes pelting them and sticking to their frames in a freezing blanket.
"Two more klicks to the next town." Ratchet called above the wind, his voice stolen with the keening cry of the elements.
"How can you tell –" Aid's voice cut off as a booming clap of thunder echoed overhead.
"Fraggit!" Ratchet snarled as they hunkered low, "Thunder snow, if we stay out here we'll become mobile lighting rods!" Fear goading them through the thick snow the pair ran through the painful cold. Behind them echoing like the avenging hosts of Primus roaring thunder claps followed at their pedes. Sensing movement Aid glanced behind him seeing several dark figures riding metallic stallions with glowing crimson optics.
"Ratchet!" Aid barely got his mentor's name from his freezing lips when pain sent him crashing into darkened nothingness.