And now, after my little explorations of Big Convoy from BW Neo (in Soliloquy of A Mammoth) and Scourge from Robots in Disguise (in Autobot No More) (thank you to anyone who checked those out!), I'm back with a new little TFA update. This time, we catch up with Ratchet and Arcee.

Catching Up

"What's your name, soldier?"

"Ar...Arcee...Sir..."

"Don't call me 'Sir'! I work for a living. Name's Ratchet. You got that?"

"Ye...Yes, Sir. Yes...Ratchet."

"Use it on me. Full blast. Wipe...my memory core."

"What? Arcee...no."

"Ratchet, the access codes in my processor are crucial to the war effort. If Megatron gets them..."

"You're overloading the EMP!"

"Arcee! NOOOO!"

"Ratchet..."

"Ratchet? Is that you?"

"Arcee... You remember?"

"Arcee?"

Arcee onlined her optics again at the call of her name. The city of Iacon lay spread before her. She looked down at the rising buildings and lights from her elevated position on a balcony of the Iacon Central Infirmary. Then she turned to face the one who had broken her silent reminiscence: Ratchet.

The aged Autobot war veteran approached her with an amicable smile.

"How's the updating process going?"

Arcee returned his amicable smile.

"As well as can be expected."

She turned back to gaze down at Iacon again.

"So the war really is over?" Her question carried a hint of uncertainty, the evidence of her stellar cycles spent offline.

"Yes," Ratchet said gently, still sensitive to Arcee's outdated psychological state.

"And yet you and your current crew were still fighting Megatron on that organic planet," she pointed out, looking back again curiously at Ratchet.

Ratchet sighed heavily, casting his weary old optics to the floor.

"It's a long story."

"I'd like to hear it." Arcee took a few steps toward Ratchet. "All of it. Everything you've been through whilst I've been offline."

Ratchet gazed at her sincerely. His tone was genuine.

"Arcee, you don't owe me anything."

Her earnest optics remained fixed on the old Autobot medic.

"On the contrary, I owe you for fulfilling the duties that I could not. I owe you for mentoring Omega Supreme. I owe you rescuing me from the Decepticons on more than one occasion. And I owe you for bringing me back online again."

Ratchet chuckled lightly.

"Actually, you have my, err, 'human' friend Sari to thank for that last one."

Arcee nodded with a thankful smile.

"Yes, her as well. But that does not change the fact that I owe you a great debt of gratitude."

Arcee reached for Ratchet's hand. He stiffened as she lightly took a hold of his fingers.

"We met only briefly on the battlefield," she continued, seemingly unembarrassed by her contact with Ratchet's hand, "where I had been damaged and in shock. And after that, you spent a lifetime taking over my duties for Project Omega. I can never repay you enough for everything you've done for me and Omega Supreme."

Then Ratchet reciprocated her touch. His fingers tightened around hers.

"Just seeing both you and Omega online and fully operational again is enough reward for me, Arcee. Believe me."

Arcee's other hand rose to touch Ratchet's battle-scarred face. A sad expression crept into her well-preserved features.

"How long have you burdened yourself with guilt over what happened to me, Ratchet?"

Ratchet did not reply, but his falling optic ridges told Arcee enough. She lowered her head.

"I'm sorry," she said quietly.

One of Ratchet's optics ridges rose instantly in puzzlement.

"You're sorry? For what? It's my fault that your memories were wiped."

Arcee did not lift her head to look at him.

"For all the grief I've caused you over the stellar cycles. And for the tremendous responsibility I left in your servos."

Uncomfortable memories echoed through Ratchet's mind.

"You...You alright, Arcee?"

"Who's...Arcee? Where are we? What's going on? Do I know you?"

"Did the intel bot give you any information about the access codes she was carrying?"

"She had a name, Sir: Arcee."

"You must gain the trust of Omega Supreme."

"And then what? Teach him how to be a doomsday device?"

"You taught me to protect like an Autobot, but all I did was destroy like a Decepticon."

"We do what we must, even if it sometimes doesn't make sense."

"I...don't understand."

"I'm not sure I do either. Just rest now, old friend. You've earned it."

"Noooo! I didn't bring you back to life just to watch you self-destruct!"

"I am programmed to protect and sacrifice if necessary."

The blue light of the old Autobot medic's optics softened. Bringing both his hands up, Ratchet laid them on the sides of Arcee's shoulders in a comforting gesture. In truth, it was as much for himself as it was for her. She brought her gaze up to meet his again.

"It's all in the past now," he said peacefully. "I don't regret my friendship with Omega Supreme. And I don't regret finding you on the battlefield all those millions of stellar cycles ago."

Arcee offered a simple smile. The two Great War survivors fell into a comfortable momentary silence. Then Ratchet dropped his hands from Arcee's shoulders.

"What will you do now then?" he asked. "Stay in intelligence?"

Arcee shook her head.

"No. The war, and my role in it, is over. It's time to put aside old memories and forge new ones."

As he watched her, Ratchet thought passively of Blackarachnia, Optimus' former Academy friend now turned Decepticon. He thought of what Optimus had told him about her, how she had never forgiven him for leaving her behind on Archa Seven and for her techno-organic transformation. Where Blackarachnia had suffered the memory of abandonment and traumatic mutation, Arcee had suffered an opposite fate: the erasure of all her memories. It was a reversal of tragedies. Ratchet wondered glumly which was worse: being unable to forget painful memories, or losing your memories and forgetting everything?

Arcee's gentle blue optics wandered away from her male companion. She stared into the distance over the structures of Iacon.

"Y'know, it feels like it all happened just last solar cycle for me," she mused. "Being captured by Lockdown, the blast, then waking up to see you again. Everything occurred within the space of less than a cycle for me. I remember nothing in between."

She returned her attention back to Ratchet.

"We never got the chance to get to know each other, Ratchet. I don't know anything about you other than that you were a field medic in the war. Yet you thought about me all these stellar cycles."

Ratchet's old optics fell subtly at the sides.

"It's hard to forget someone whose memories you've wiped."

Arcee drew a little closer to Ratchet. A warm smile graced her pink features.

"I think it's finally time for us to catch up with one another, Ratchet. I'd like to get to know you better."

Slowly, a rare smile of youthful charm manifested on the old Autobot medic's face. For a moment, time reversed and he was a young bot at the start of the war once again.

"My name is Ratchet. I came online in the second quarter of stellar cycle 36297.4. I graduated from Protihex Medical Mechanical. As an Autobot medic, it's my job to save lives..."