Deep Cover.
Chapter Six.
Optimus looked at Ratchet and said "We appear to have a problem on our hands, but if we work our way through it, perhaps we can sort out a solution. Let's assume we kept Barricade, or just released him to return to the Decepticons. What would happen to him?"
"He would return to them, and it would be as if we never caught him, except that he would be far more wary of us than he had been before." Ratchet stated.
"You do know that technically we could not do this, even if he were not our Prowl in another guise?" Optimus asked. "For a start, the list of war crimes against Barricade is a very long one, we could not allow him loose to commit more. We would have to keep him incarcerated here, or somewhere else, for a very long time, risking escape or sabotage or the death of other mechs the whole time?"
"Yes, I can see how that would be an issue, although it does not give us the right to kill him. The death penalty on Cybertron was abolished well before the war began," the medic stated. "I will not sacrifice Barricade simply because the personality we gave him led him to kill and torment and commit crimes that we see as irredeemable. To reach the Decepticon ranks, I had to give him a personality that could do that if called upon: the fault is as much mine as it is his."
"On the other hand, Prowl's only wrong was to take on this spy mission and unknowingly become absent for longer than planned. Does he not deserve his right to live, to his own identity, to the memories he had before he took on this mission?" Optimus asked. "You can download the Barricade memories, perhaps put them in an artificial consciousness, keep the personality alive perhaps by putting all the programmed stuff and memories into a computer, let him run that. It won't quite be him because it will not have a Spark, thus not really alive, but it will keep his personality and memories intact. It is surely better than being wiped and discarded – or indeed, incarcerated for the rest of his life to do nothing but attempt to escape, to sabotage our or the human's systems, and to try and kill his guards."
"I'll take it for now," growled Ratchet, still not really happy. "I'm accepting it merely as a temporary solution to the issue though, and will work my hardest to find some way to allow the personality to gain a life and Spark of it's own – perhaps if a dormant Spark is found, no clue as to who and what it was, we can give it the personality but wipe the memories of the worst crimes from the processors to give the personality a second chance. Let it try both sides and then let it choose once it has both choices to choose from. One way or another, I think this personality should have some sort of chance. Thank you, Prime, I knew we could not desert Prowl, but the idea of simply discarding Barricade's personality sat bad with me, this way I can at least save it, it may have a chance to continue its life in the near future if the opportunity presents itself."
Ratchet went back to the med bay and began sorting parts to construct into a crude device to save the personality. It would take at least a week he guessed, but now that Barricade was fixed, another week offline wouldn't make much difference. He gave a distracted wave to Cliffjumper, who seemed to be working on something made of metal, then turned to take a closer look at what the talented craftsmech was working on. He grinned.
"A sparkling body? Which femme has said she's carrying and who's the co-creator?" he asked as he looked at the almost-complete exoskeleton Cliffjumper was working on.
"None yet, but how long do you want to bet before this'll be needed? I did an earlier one but it's not so good, I'm out of practice, but this one should be up to standard," said Cliffjumper. Ratchet kept the smile: Cliffjumper was likely right, once the femmes got over the loss of the AllSpark and decided to settle to sparkling-raising, the bodies would indeed be in demand. It could never be too early to be prepared in cases like this.
"Well, perhaps when you're finished with that you could help me with this?" he asked. He explained what he hoped to make, and Cliffjumper nodded and agreed to help
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In the end it took closer to six weeks – Ratchet send some blueprints for parts off to be made specially as he feared what the humans already had would not be up to the task. While they waited, Cliffjumper continued to make sparkling bodies, during which time Elita-One walked into the med bay looking very pleased with herself and placidly announced "I am carrying mine and Optimus' sparkling. Will a body be available in time?" Cliffjumper actually surprised her when he pulled out five assorted different sizes and colours to choose from, and after choosing one of the sparkling bodies, she complimented him on his foresight and went back out.
Once the storage device was completed, Ratchet went to Barricade and copied off Barricade's memories, as a backup in case something went hideously wrong, then removed the processors and chips he'd replaced Prowl's own with so long ago. He had to tug and heave a bit, they had got quite wedged into place over the years, but he managed to remove them and put them in the device without any hitches.
Ratchet took Prowl's processors and memory chips out of subspace where they had lain since he put them there, and after checking each one for wear or damage, he inserted them back in. While waiting for the parts, Ratchet had not been idle, had altered the plating and restored Prowl's body back to its original appearance, all excepting the chest. This was because Prowl/Barricade had received further alterations after being picked up by the Decepticons to be given new weaponry, and to accommodate Frenzy, and those modifications had involved altering and moving the mech's Spark- chamber, a procedure that had left it damaged, much to Ratchet's dismay.
He had readied one of the Sparkling-bodies: Ratchet would be adjusting Prowl's body back to its original chest arrangement. The procedure was risky, he might need a temporary body if things didn't go to plan, although if he was careful there should be no problem. The biggest issue was that the Spark-chamber had been damaged: it had scratches on it, and it had been altered and moved, and Ratchet had no clue what that might have done to the vulnerable Spark within.
Ratchet made his changes, starting on the further connections and moving inwards, careful to check things twice before moving them. Upon inspecting the Spark-chamber he realised that some of the scratches were so deep that the chamber could breach if put under too much stress, he would have to risk repairing the damage. He had a special tool for this, he had not had to use it much but knew how to, and he used it to infill the scratches, then passed an electrical current over them to harden the metal-based filler. Once done, the repair was indistinguishable from the original chamber to the naked optic, although scans would show that it was a repair job.
Ratchet couldn't say whether it was some sort of unknown feedback from use of the repairing mechanism or whether what happened was spontaneous, but the readings from the quiescent Spark on his scanners suddenly jumped. The Spark was agitated, something had taken it from quiescent to active, and its activity level was at a level Ratchet had rarely seen before, in fact on only two types of occasion had he seen a pattern like this. The first was when a femme was giving Spark to a sparkling, the second was when a mech or femme was dying, and Prowl was no carrying femme.
As the frenetic Spark pushed against its casing in an attempt to escape, Ratchet rushed for his equipment, databursting for anyone near the medbay to come in and help, hoping he could save the unstable Spark that was trying to escape from the body.
He had discussed with Prime earlier which mech they should allow to continue existing. He had not thought that they might end up with neither.
