Guess who was in the medical bay again?

Yeah.

. . .

Figures.

This time, however, it was of his own make.

Which, shouldn't be surprising at this point . . .


After soothing Miko's complete crying spaz attack, Wheeljack then got her giggling, and then giggling became laughter until the Wrecker had to plead loss of energon because the laughing was making him lightheaded. Instead, jauntily depositing the ruined nuts in Miko's arms (even though he thought the medic wouldn't want them anyways, they looked beyond use) Wheeljack picked up his arm and carried it with a human at his heels.

Riding the elevator down to the base, Wheeljack grinned at Miko before he walked into the silo, dripping energon everywhere. He spied said medic with a box in his hands, full of who knows what, all Wheeljack knew was that it looked heavy because he had picked it up with a grunt. Wheeljack nudged Miko with his foot and winked.

"Need a hand, Doc?"

"I told you, my name is not Doc," the medic muttered irritably. "It's Ratc—WHEELJACK!" He dropped the box with a loud crash, and Wheeljack tried unsuccessfully to stop his snickering. "What did you do to your ARM!?"

Wheeljack shrugged his good shoulder. "Eh, you know, same ol' same ol'." He held out his arm, hand first to Ratchet. "Sure you don't want that hand?"


"Oh, hey Doc, I think I found my finger you've been looking for. It's stuck in my hip here, so I can pull it out if you reall—"

"Wheeljack, how fond are you of your other arm?"

"Shutting up."

Wheeljack had never seen the medic so furious before. His black glare was really nothing to be trifled with right now, and he really didn't think the CMO was bluffing about amputating his other arm, just to prove his point. Honestly, the only other time the medic had been so pissed off was when he made him blow his gasket.

Which . . . wasn't too long ago, in fact.

. . . Oops?

Miko sat idly up on the platform, watching Ratchet's deep scowl as he worked on her partner. She grinned widely. "Aw, Ratchet, you should have seen it! The blast was huge! I've even got the soot on me!"

"It was a really good one this time, an eight at least," Wheeljack mused.

A sharp BANG of his wrench had the Wrecker falling silent with a carangid rub of his aching helm.

Miko shrugged, kicking her feet as she said nonchalantly, "Easy, Ratchet, he only broke one finger, but on the other hand he's just fine."

It took a moment for the bad pun to sink in. Then, Wheeljack began to snort, struggling to hold back the laughter when Miko threw him a grin and a wink. Swallowing his snickering, Wheeljack tried to keep as straight a face as he possibly could as he said, "See, Ratch?" He waggled the five fingers on his good arm. "The other hand's just fine."

Another sharp whack of the wrench across the back of his servo made Wheeljack flinch, but he sputtered into laughter shamelessly again. Miko grinned again, calling, "You know, Ratchet, at least there's not two of Wheeljack. If he had a clone, you'd never have a break."

Wheeljack looked up to her, snapping his fingers. "Yeah! Cloning! Maybe I should figure that out next . . ."

Miko's lips twisted as she held back a smile. "You want to clone yourself? Now wouldn't that be just like you!"

Wheeljack tried so hard not to laugh at the bad pun that tears sparked into his optics. Ratchet just grumbled beneath his breath, a constant string of threats and promises muttered in tightly controlled ire.

"Oh, Jackie! Jackie, I've got a good one!"

"Let 'er fly!"

"Okay, so there's a ten pound baby born," Miko said. "Only, his body weighed five pounds and his balls weighed five pounds."

Wheeljack arched a brow. "Not sure if I like where this is going . . ."

Miko ignored him, saying, "Well, none of the doctors knew what to do with the baby, and when the nurse asked what to do with it, the chief surgeon said to put it in a mental institution. The head nurse asked why, and the surgeon said, 'Because clearly the boy's half NUTS!'"

Wheeljack and Miko roared with laughter. Ratchet hit Wheeljack with the wrench again and muttered for him to hold still if he ever wanted his arm back.

"Okay, I've got one for you, Babe," Wheeljack said. "A man with an electric saw cuts off all ten of his fingers." Ratchet was muttering even before he had gotten far into the joke, knowing it was going to be another doctor joke. "He rushes to the emergency room and the doctor says to give him the fingers and he'd see what he could do. The man says, 'But I don't have the fingers!' The doctor asks why not and the man said he couldn't pick them up!"

Again, Miko and Wheeljack laughed at their horrible jokes, getting Ratchet steamed up under his collar. Arcee drove in at this point, and she transformed up and arched a brow at Wheeljack who was still one arm down on the medical berth. She shook her head, pinching her brows.

"I don't EVEN wanna know."

Wheeljack chuckled, winking at the femme as Ratchet continued to attach his arm. "Sup, Arcee! We're having a blast over here."

Miko suddenly snorted so hard tears came into her eyes. "A blast! Like the one that took your arm!"

That got the human and mech going again, and Arcee just sent him a withering look. Ratchet muttered more, darker now with his words he was getting so worked up.

"Ooh! Jackie! I've got another! Kay, so a man calls the doctor and tells him that his wife is pregnant and her contractions are two minutes apart. The doctor asks if this is her first child, and the man shouts, 'No, you idiot, this is her husband!'"

Miko and Wheeljack collapsed into laughter again, and Arcee just rolled her optics to the heavens in a wordless plea. She understood how much Ratchet was fuming now. Stupid enough to blow his own arm off, and stupid enough to tell stupid jokes like that? She groaned.

"Aw, c'mon, Pookie. You know you love 'em." Arcee just scowled at the pet name. "Know any CPR, chickadee? Cause you're taking my breath away."

"Oh, you SLAY me, tiger."

Wheeljack grinned before wincing at a prod from Ratchet as the doctor finished attaching his arm back to his shoulder; he yanked the finger from his hips, decided it was salvageable, and began to attach it to Wheeljack's hand. "I know I do," Wheeljack said cockily.

Arcee tossed her head. "Well, I think you're missing the most obvious bad pun in the book."

Wheeljack arched a brow. "And that would be?"

A wicked grin split her facial features.

"Ratchet's giving you quite the hand job, Wheeljack."


Miko saving the day—cool.

Wheeljack getting hit by a stasis beam—NOT cool.

But hey, they had four of the next Iacon database entries decoded, so that certainly helped things a bunch. Hopefully slag was going to hit the fan soon. Wheeljack was looking forward to the missions, getting a bit stir crazy from these teeny jobs here and there the bots had done that were nothing like the missions the Wreckers had gone on.

"Hey, Wheeljack?"

"Yeah?"

"Since you're like my dad now, can I call you dad?"

Wheeljack looked down at her in surprise, actually surprised that the thought hadn't come to his mind in the first place. Actually, he was surprised she hadn't asked sooner. Maybe it had just slipped their minds?

"Sure thing, Babe," he said easily. "If I don't respond sometimes yet, don't blame me though, got it?"

"Yeah, I got it." She paused. "Dad."

Miko happily buried her face into Bulkhead's fur. The cat was purring a mile a minute as they sat on top of the silo, and Wheeljack's spark softened as he looked at Miko and the fluffy brown cat. Yeah, he was happy the stupid cat had made it. Even if that meant he had to share.

"So? Can you tell me about Cybertron?"

Wheeljack blinked, taken out of his trace. "Y—What?"

Miko lifted her head and stroked Bulkhead's fur. "Yeah. Can you tell me more about Cybertron when it was still the Golden Age?"

Wheeljack sighed, leaning back against the cavern wall. "Cybertron, eh? Hoo, don't know what to talk about there's so much to say."

Miko shrugged, flipping her ponytail over her shoulder and cuddling Bulkhead. "Just start somewhere. Were there as many Cybertronians as humans?"

"Oh sure," Wheeljack said easily, thinking of how busy the streets could become. "I hated the traffic. Bumper to bumper, and a lot of mechs and femmes figured walking was going to be faster than taking the streets. And the things people would shout! Disgraceful, I tell you! Miko, I promise, if you think humans and their rush hour traffic is bad, it's no match for Cybertronians. At least you guys can't hear each other cursing at each other!"

Miko grinned and giggled a little, backing her head up when Bulkhead's tail whacked her face. "Where was your favorite place to go? A strip joint?" She snorted. "Nah, you're too classy for that, this is before war. Was it a museum?"

Wheeljack grinned. "No, actually, it was a bar." Miko laughed loudly. "Yeah, good ol' Maccadam's Old Oil House. Sub-level six on Cybertron's lower-east quadrant." He leaned forward, pointing a finger at her. "See, Babe, thing was, Maccadam's was a place ANY bot could come. Pit, they didn't care if you were Autobot, Decepticon, or Neutralist, if you paid, you stayed. That," he shrugged, "and it was the biggest source of black market high grade there was during the war."

Miko snickered, nuzzling her nose to Bulkhead's. Wheeljack briefly wondered if the cat EVER stopped purring. "That so?" She cut her eyes to Wheeljack. "Did Autobots and Decepticons get along in there?"

Wheeljack shrugged. "For the most part, I suppose. We mostly tended to stay away from each other. There eventually became a designated 'Bot and 'Con side, but hey, it was subtle. People didn't talk about it much. No one pressured the Neutralists for anything, pick a side or anything. The 'Cons liked to pick fights sometimes, but nothing major."

Miko perked up. "They did?"

Wheeljack shrugged with a grin. "Yeah. I mean, you got a bunch of warriors drinking up the high grade? Miko, things were bound to get emotional, so you always did a scrap here and there. Rocky—the bouncer—always tossed them out, 'Con or 'Bot or Neutral. Tough guy he was. Pity he didn't want to be a Wrecker." As the thought of the old bar began to set in his circuits, Wheeljack felt his fingers twitch with the urge for a high grade. "We Wreckers went there a lot in between battles. It was a nice time to kick back and relax. We usually helped Rocky with any particularly rowdy guys."

"Like who?"

Wheeljack snapped his fingers. "Fang. Aft-hole he is. Babe, he was so big a jerk he'd make Vince look like a saint."

Miko frowned and pumped her fist up. "I could beat the snot out of Vince."

"No doubt you could," Wheeljack said. He shook his head. "Fang thought he was a big shot, bloody Decepticon that didn't know he was worth slag. He was beating on the harpsichord bot, and when he asked if anyone else wanted to take him on." Wheeljack snorted. "Needless to say, Twin Twist beat the slag out of him."

Miko laughed gaily and kicked out her legs straight and crossed them. "Serves him right."

Wheeljack stretched out his legs too and leaned back. The sun was going to dip soon. He'd have to get Miko out of the cold wind of early February so she wouldn't catch a cold. "Yeah. But, while you had the fools that wanted to start fights, for the most part, it was a great place. Get the fuel you wanted at a good price, kick back with friends you hadn't seen in years if you came on the right day, and femmes flinging themselves at any bot they wanted, sexy or not—depending on how slammed they were."

Miko suddenly grinned. "Yeah? What about you? Get some?"

Wheeljack waved a disinterested servo. "Nah. Could have, but didn't. I was a pretty hard-nosed fella way back when. I didn't interface lightly back then, and I still don't to this day. Keeps femme spats to a minimum—fights OR mouth oil."

Wheeljack snickered with Miko again before he sighed and lounged against the canyon wall. Miko lifted her head suddenly. "Wait, a harpsichord? You mean there were pianos on Cybertron?"

"Oh sure," Wheeljack said with a laugh. "You didn't think we were without music, did you?"

Miko made a face. "Well, with how you guys all reacted to my guitar like it was the Plague . . ."

Wheeljack snorted and shook his head. "That's cause it sounds like scrap to us. Besides, we don't have anything like guitars on Cybertron. We don't have strings."

"Seriously? Then what kinds of instruments did you have on Cybertron?"

Wheeljack sighed and leaned back, saying, "Our music . . . wasn't that much different from some of yours, actually. We had a more electronic sound, being a robotic race and all, so your electronica, dubstep, techno, even some alternative, we had it."

"Ick. All the things I hate."

Wheeljack laughed. "We had plenty of piano pieces too, those most of all. I suppose we had a sort of jazz, though I do believe it wasn't half as soulful as what you humans can do. You guys are maestros when it comes to music. And singing! Pit, I didn't know you could do that with your voices!"

Miko's eyes popped. "You guys can't SING?"

"Pit no," Wheeljack said with another wave of his servo. "Kidding me? We don't have vocal cords like you humans do. We can mimic pitches, play things back like recordings, but we don't have vocal cords. It's really a beautiful and fascinating thing to hear you guys sing. Music is never going to be the same for me."

"Huh." Miko puzzled down at Bulkhead, stroking the cat's ears in thought. Bulkhead purred up a storm when she scratched beneath his chin. "So how about dance? Do you guys dance?"

"Sure," Wheeljack said easily. He sat up, crossing his legs. "We're a bit . . . limited on what we can do with our armor on, so we mostly had things like ballroom, some swing dances, and I suppose the ever-popular rave party—" both Miko and Wheeljack snorted at the same time, "but otherwise, we suddenly realize that we're limited in that area. Human culture is . . . rich."

Miko grunted and pushed Bulkhead off her lap so she could lie on her back. The cat planted himself on her belly. "So? Do you guys live like us? Cook, eat, sleep, poop, whatever?"

Wheeljack laughed heartily. "Much less excrement. Waste tanks don't have to be emptied a fraction as much as you humans have to. After all, how often do you clean your car?"

Miko shrugged. "I don't know."

"It's like that, only less. We're just getting rid of dust, oil, and rust, depending on how old you are."

"What's it like if you get rusty?"

"Wouldn't know. I'm not old enough. Maybe you should ask Ratchet." Both of them snickered. "I've heard it's itchy. Like scabbing over."

"Ew!"

"Damn straight." Wheeljack cocked his helm in thought. "We don't refuel as often. Once a day is good if you're active in war usually, unless you're spilling it all over the place. Once a week if you're hardly active at all."

"Wow! Seriously?"

Wheeljack shrugged in turn and arched a brow. "How often do humans pump gas in their cars?" Miko rolled her eyes. "See? Not that different. But we don't sleep, we recharge."

"How's it different?"

Wheeljack frowned. "It's . . ." He shuffled positions. "Kinda hard to explain."

"Do you not get dreams?"

"Oh, sure we get dreams," Wheeljack said, rubbing the back of his neck as he tried to explain it.

"How?"

He paused and licked his lips, wracking his not-as-often-used scientific brain for details. "I guess . . . for the same reason you guys do. Cybertronian scientists theorize that we have a psychosomatic phenomenon comprised of electrical signals in response to stimuli that could cause it, but research had just been launched by the beginning of the war, so it didn't go anywhere . . ."

"Wheeljack? All of that went over my head."

He waved a hand. "Ah, it's . . . Electrical pulses. That's how we think, too."

"So if I tased you, would you think differently?"

Wheeljack gave a belly laugh at that. "Pit no! Babe, our processors are reinforced with surge protectors so if I got electrocuted, it wouldn't affect my processor. Sure, I'd get disoriented, but I'm still exactly who I am." Wheeljack scowled suddenly. "Shockwave dipped into that. They can reformat a mech's processor now, wipe his memories and use those electrical pulses against us. Really a shame . . ."

Sensing a darker path running through the conversation, Miko tapped her toes thoughtfully, saying, "So, you've told me about J'nwan, Crystal City, and Darkmount. Any other interesting cities I should know about?"

Wheeljack gave a perturbed hum and tapped one of his fingers. "You mean to tell me Optimus hasn't told you guys about Iacon?"

"Not much."

Wheeljack smirked. Figures. He looked towards the dipping sun, saying, "Iacon is the name of the city-state as well as the capital city. First off, imagine yourself looking up at the foot of the Burj Khalifa."

"The what?"

Wheeljack rolled his optics. "Tallest building in the world. 829.8 feet." Wondering how much the numbers actually helped her, he added, "163 floors."

"Holy shit."

"Language." Wheeljack shook his head. "Okay, got that image?"

"Yeah."

He barely heard her mutter something about it being really tall. He smirked. "Now make yourself as small as an ant."

Her eyes popped open. "It's huge."

"That's you looking up at the buildings of Iacon." Her jaw dropped. Wheeljack laughed heartily, shaking his head. "Miko, Iacon was—simply put, MASSIVE. It was pretty too, always glistening and shining and it practically blinded you when the sun reverberated across the smooth building tops. This place was the center of operations for the Autobots at the beginning of the war—and it was the last place to fall. Iacon was all polished streets with towering buildings and arches and marvels of engineering. Grand to look at, really.

"There's . . . too much in Iacon to really list it all. Maccadam's was there. The Imperial Amphitheater, the Celestial Temple, the High Council Pavillions, the Grand Oratory, the Chamber of the Ancients, Forum of Enlightenment, you wanted it, Iacon had it." Wheeljack shook his helm with a cluck of his glossia. "This is where your boring museums were, Miko. The only thing like that I had ever been in was the Stellar Galleries, full of pretty pictures and paintings from the artists."

Miko wrinkled her nose, petting the sleeping Bulkhead. "Yeah? Bet you guys had better art than we do. Better colors, right?"

Wheeljack shrugged. "Yeah. You guys are getting there, though. Give yourself some years to figure it out and let your eyes get used to it." Wheeljack hummed thoughtfully to himself. "Iacon was where the Central Spaceport was too. Busy as hell all the time, people shipping stuff from here to yonder and the workers seemed to never ever rest. And the place was busy. Busier than Crystal City, that was for sure. Crystal City only got busy if you had people visiting like tourists, or couples that wanted to be romantic in the Refracting Gardens. Iacon was like squeezing ten Bulkhead's into one pixie stick wrapper."

Miko snorted a little with laughter at the analogy, but shook her head with a grin. "I bet I'd love it! Busier than Tokyo?"

"Busier than Tokyo."

Her smile crinkled her nose. "Yes! I'd love it! Theaters everywhere, stores on every corner, the biggest buildings—oh yeah! I'd have to have you take me around so I wouldn't get stepped on."

Wheeljack chuckled warmly. "Ol' Maccadam's will always be my favorite."

"Bet you want a high grade, don't you?"

"It wouldn't hurt anything but maybe the drive home."

"Mrs. Davis would kill you."

"Nah, she's still just a fleshy."

"I pity you when she brings out the blow torch."

"You guys have a blow torch?"

"Yeah."

"Oh."

Miko shrugged nonchalantly to which Wheeljack could only chuckle softly and sigh as the sun dipped beyond the horizon. "Guess I ought to get you home."

"You should train with Optimus."

Wheeljack looked up, and Miko was suddenly grinning with a tired yawn. "Yeah. Clearly since Dreadwing keeps kicking your tailpipe, you need some more practice, and Optimus can go toe-to-toe with Megatron. And besides, Optimus is big and tall like Dreadwing. It should work." She shrugged nonchalantly, but suggestively. "Besides, you could finally have an excuse to hit him . . . and it'd be cool to watch you guys duke it out."

Wheeljack smirked with a grin as he transformed down around her on the elevator. "Yeah. Good thinking, Babe. I'll kick his can good for you."