I am so sorry this is so late; I've been suffering from major writer's block on this story ^_^' and it's only just abated. Here's a new chapter to hopefully set minds at ease.

Thanks to those who read, fav and follow. If you have read this, faved this or followed please leave a comment even if you are a guest, I'd love to read what you have enjoyed about Growing Up AlleyBot or what you think could be improved on. Same goes for my other two stories.

Ch. 6

Nightfire onlined to total darkness. Frowning, he ran an internal diagnostics check focussing mainly on his CPU and optics. He was stunned when he received constant error messages back from his optics, even though the rest of the diagnostics readout came back as him recovering but getting better. Panicking he tried to get up, only to find himself unable to do so. Maxing out his other senses, his audios perked up as he heard an approaching figure.

Jacker frowned as he watched the young AlleyBots head move towards his hoof beats, his empty, blind optics searching for the source of the sound. Sighing the medic continued over to the berth the Nightfire lay on and began removing the medical overrides that were preventing the young mech from moving about and worsening his injuries.

"So, yer awake. How d'ya feel … Commander."

Nightfire frowned at the title, he hadn't been fighting for that, he had just wanted revenge and he had got it. Who was even talking to him anyway, it wasn't one of his brothers or Glacialnova, so it was possibly a medic; even so, who?

"Don' call meh dat, ah don' wan' ta be da Commander … dat's no' wat ah challenge' Omega fer. Ah'm jus' a figh'er, an' a broke one at dat, ah can' lead no-one. 'ho are yew anyways?"

Jacker reared back, shocked, and stared at Nightfire. He continued to check on Nightfires injuries as he contemplated what he had just heard.

"I'm Jacker, one of the medics. Kid, yew beat Omega 17. Primus yew killed 'im. Yer the Commander now, whether yew wanted it or no'. Ain't nuthin's gonna change that … touch that patch and lose those fingers!"

Nightfire retracted his hand away from his face, as if burnt. He wanted to know why he couldn't see, of course he was going to try and touch his face! Nevertheless, he wasn't about to tangle with a medic, now that he had a name to put to the voice, he remembered that Jacker was a no-nonsense medic. He was also infamous for throwing spanners at anyone who caused him trouble, something Nightfire had seen before and had no desire to experience first-hand. Huffing his annoyance, Nightfire shoved himself into a sitting position, ignoring the medics enraged curses. He waited for a brief moment; 3…2…1… and yep, here it came. Nightfire let out a pained yip as a spanner crashed into his still sore jaw. He turned his aching head to where the cursing was loudest, figuring that the noisy Iaconian was somewhere in that vicinity.

"Look medic, gimme it straigh'. Wat's da matta wit' mah optics, why can' ah see? Everytin' else is alrigh', so wat's da deal?"

Jacker shifted, rubbing the back of his neck awkwardly, whilst shielding his thoughts from the other telepath. From what Jacker had seen of Nightfire before the fight, he had very little training on how to control his telepathy. As such, he couldn't 'turn it off' and ignore random thoughts, he 'heard' everything. Jacker had heard of such cases before, AlleyBot's who never learned to control their telepathy and as such hated their ability and some even utilised their lack of control as a weapon: viciously lashing out with aggressive telepathic attacks. Untrained or partially trained telepathy was dangerous as, unless any bot was particularly skilled at shielding his thoughts, every thought was vulnerable to being detected and 'heard'; this led to important secrets sometimes being uncovered like that Legacy Scandal mess several hundred vorns ago.

Jacker hadn't counted on Nightfire having enough training to detect that he was shielding, even if it was a basic ability, as the younger mech frowned, his sightless optics directed just to Jacker's left.

:Don' bloc' meh Jacker; jus' wat are yew tryin' ta hide?:

The tired medic sighed, might as well break it to him quickly. Less chance of him getting punched this way. Or worse, this kid was Nightpyra Prime's son after all. Although that didn't automatically mean he was the next Prime, he had the potential and that made him dangerous. Prime legacies were activated by intense emotional trauma, the bombshell that Jacker was about to drop may be enough and the medic was unsure whether or not his force fields would withstand the blast.

"The thing is kid … Omega did a lotta damage to yer face and optics, some of the damage I couldn't fix, not with the limited supplies I have. Kid … Nightfire … I'm sorry but … but… aw ferget it… you're blind. It's permanent … unless I can get you a complete set of replacement optics. I'm really sorry."

Nightfire froze on the berth. Blind?! Jacker's voice echoed around his mind. He was blind? How could this had happened, surely Omega hadn't injured his face that much? With trembling fingers, Nightfire reached up and ran his hands over his face. Thick, heavy weld scars and patches met his fingers as he followed the lines of his face up towards his optics. His fingers stilled as they approached the worst of the scarring directly around his optics. Jacker took a few steps back as Nightfire started shaking.

:No…no, no, no, NO! Yer lyin' Jacker, ah can' be blind! Ah jus' can' be!?:

Jacker looked sympathetically and tried to calm the younger AlleyBot down, quickly bringing up a force field so that the taller mech wouldn't lash out and injure him. As Nightfire slowly calmed his hands dropped into his lap and he sent a telepathic ping to Jacker, childishly asking that the Iaconian showed him what he looked like. Tentatively, Jacker responded, hoping that this would reassure Nightfire. Nightfire still recoiled as he saw himself through Jacker's optics, his entire body was covered in large scars and patched up in places. But the worst image by far was of his optics: surrounded by scars, the once proud electric blue-violet orbs were sightless, dead and grey; with his lost look he looked absolutely pathetic. He was a mess, worse still, he was crippled. He loosed an angry sob at his situation.

Nightfire roughly pulled away from the mental link and turned away, angry at himself, at Omega, at Jacker; and at the world in general. What had he done to deserve this, was this punishment for all the lives he had taken in the pit? If so, Primus was one cruel, sparkless sonofabitch. He didn't react when he heard the medbay doors open, nor did he turn to the approaching footsteps and skates. In his heightened state of telepathic awareness he did however, detect the presence of three familiar minds.

"Whyd'ya come 'ere yew three, though' yew'd be out 'avin fun, no' comin' ta see a blin' mech like meh."

The twins and Glacialnova froze at Nightfire's dead tone, just what had happened? Jacker hadn't told them anything except that they could see him today and this was the greeting they got. Blind? Why did Nightfire believe he was blind, surely Omega hadn't done that much damage during the fight. Glacialnova continued over to the berth Nightfire was still sat on and sat herself down next to him, cuddling into his side. She ran a hand gently over the scar on Nightfire's side, ignoring his flinch. She looked up at her boyfriend's face and gasped.

"Oh Nigh' … wat … wat happene' ta yer optics?"

She couldn't help but stare in horror at what had been Nightfire's most attractive feature, noting the lifelessness of the greyed optics. The scars she couldn't care less about, she had more than her fair share, but his optics … she had often enjoyed just staring into their tumultuous electric blue-violet depths. At her gasp the twins had come rushing over and were now staring with a mixture of horror and anger at the damage done to their little brother. Nightfire turned away from his brothers, his body language speaking for him, the pain and sadness cutting into both the twins sparks. Snarling with anger at his brother's sadness, Sunstreaker turned on Jacker and grabbed the Iaconian by his arms.

"Wat did yew do?! Fix mah lil'bro proper dammit!"

Jacker's ruby red optics turned cold as he pulled himself free from the sociopathic yellow twins grip.

"Repeat those words to meh again Sunstreaker, I dare yew. I did all I could alright but I can't work miracles. So if yew ever imply I didn't do mah job properly, I'll drop yew were yew stand an' use yew fer spare parts … got it?"

Sunstreaker looked mutinous as he backed away from Jacker. He threw a worried look at Nightfire before sharing a helpless look with his twin. Sideswipe put his hand on his brother's shoulder.

"Is dere anythin' dat coul' 'elp lil'Night see again?"

Jacker rubbed his chin, trying to think of a solution. He looked over to where Glacialnova was comforting her boyfriend. Nightfire had flinched sharply and deployed his visor, hiding his optics but not all the scars that now covered his face. Jacker studied the visor, an idea beginning to form. He threw a wary look at the twins, the last thing he needed was for them to react badly to his idea and make things worse. He liked having all four legs and both of his arms attached thank you very much.

He pulled the two brothers to the opposite side of the medbay.

"I have an idea, but I wanna run it past yew two first."

The twins looked at each other before Sunstreaker gestured for Jacker to continue.

"What I coul' do is get one of the other medics or one of the engineers to build Nightfire a face mask and visor to act as his optics instead, at least until I can get the supplies I need. It'll protect the still healing areas of his face as well."

The twins stared at Jacker. A face mask?! Nightfire would never allow himself to wear such an item, the proud, somewhat arrogant AlleyBot would see it as a weakness. Yet, if it gave him his sight back, at least until he could get his optics fixed, they may be able to persuade him to see reason and use it. Sideswipe looked to his brother, Sunstreaker's side of the bond was unsurprisingly a mishmash of uncertainty, anger and concern. Yes, there was a tinge of angry rejection … but the yellow twin knew that this was pretty much their only option if Nightfire wanted to ever be able to see again. Unhappy acceptance flooded across the bond.

[Sunny?]

[Ah don' like it Sides … bu' its de only idea that ain' 'alf fragged]

[True dat. Don' mean ah 'ave ta like it]

[Fer Night?]

[Yeah]

As one the twins nodded their agreement with each other before looking at Jacker. The Iaconian met their gazes easily, although his optics were wary. He knew of all three brothers by reputation and he really didn't want to see first-hand if the twins lived up to their reputation as well as their brother.

"Alrigh', we don' 'ave ta like it … bu' … we'll talk ta Nigh' 'bout 'avin a mask."

Jacker vented a sigh of relief, he had already being trying to figure out who he knew that could design and build the facemask. There was Jackhammer, but the lanky Tarnite engineer had a nasty habit of blowing himself and his inventions sky high whenever something went wrong. There was also his brother, but Kicker was an overly obsessive perfectionist, not to mention addicted to high grade, and Nightfire really couldn't afford to wait for orns. Still, those two were the only two Jacker would even consider asking given the timeframe and competency of the other medics that he knew. It was more of a question of would they agree to help, if he knew what was best for his own health Jackhammer would considering Jacker was his medic, and also would Nightfire agree to wear a facemask.

The twins left Jacker to his deliberations and skated back over to their brother and Glacialnova. Sideswipe dropped down onto the berth next to Nightfire and wrapped an arm around his shoulders. Nightfire snuggled into his older brother's side and keened quietly, almost like a sparkling.

Jacker watched as the young AlleyBot's head dropped and his shoulders began to shake as the shock fully began to set in. He steeled his resolve. He would help the youngster to see again, even if it took him vorns. He turned away to give the small family some privacy and activated his comlink. His brother had better be sober.

I'll hopefully write more soon, keep reading ^_^

Cyber cookies to whoever finds where Jacker has cameoed before and the previous chapter doesn't count!