"My baby! They said you were awake!" His mother burst into the room with Mikaela close on her heels about ten minutes after Sam actually woke up to a clear head that was free of drugs or pain.
"I'm fine, Mom," Sam insisted, and it felt true. He had dim memories of awakening a few times in a fair amount of agony, but nothing hurt now. The oxygen tubing in front of his nose was driving him nuts, however, and he had another complaint. He lifted his arm, which was wrapped in some sort of metallic cast, and told Doc, "My arm itches."
"It's healing quickly," Doc said, "I am sorry about the itching, but your arm must be immobilized to prevent a misalignment of the bones."
His mother turned an angry glare on Doc, and Sam thought Doc had done nothing to deserve that look. Sam winced, even as his mother demanded, "What did you do to him? We need to get him out of here and to a real hospital!"
Sam figured the med bay was a real hospital, though most of the hospital beds were several feet above the level of his head and the oxygen tank beside his cot appeared to have come from engineering by the glyphs on it. He had actually started recognizing some of the more common Cybertronian symbols. Doc, at a minimum and probably Ratchet too, had a very good grasp of human medicine and he wasn't worried about the care they would give him. Besides, he didn't have health insurance. This was undoubtedly cheaper than the emergency room.
Doc stood his ground, peering at Judy Witwicky with what looked like bemusement. Doc wasn't much taller than his mother, but he did mass a lot more, and Sam, too, was a little amused when his mother stomped up to the small Autobot. Doc explained patiently, "Mrs. Witwicky, what we did was save his life. Sam would not have survived the trip to a human hospital. He was bleeding very severely internally."
"Mom," Sam repeated, trying to reassure her, "I'm fine. Doc, where's Bee?"
"He hit you!" Mikaela's words were horrified, and surprised Sam. Doc had told him what had happened a minute earlier: that Bumblebee had suffered some sort of internal error and had lashed out at Sam. Doc had also reassured him that Bee's problem had already been corrected and would not happen again. He was still trying to wrap his brain around what had happened, but he was pretty sure that he didn't even need to forgive Bee, because he wasn't mad to begin with. If anything, Sam was worried about Bumblebee, who probably wasn't very happy with himself at the moment.
"I don't want you anywhere near that thing! I thought it was safe!" His mother was working up to a fine frenzy. "I thought we would be safe here! And they hurt you! And you!" She turned back to Doc, "What did you do to him?"
Doc padded closer to him, metal feet clicking on the deck plating, and calmly reached for Sam's good arm. Sam let him take his hand without resistance, though his mom sucked in a surprised and worried breath. Doc spoke in that emotionless voice many of the mechs seemed to use when they were not as calm as they wanted to seem. "I used a nanotech compound to repair the internal damage to his vascular system and bone structures, while providing supportive care in the form of plasma and blood donated by human staff here at the base. I have also used oxygen and some fairly standard antibiotics synthesized in our lab, and standard intravenous IV fluids."
"A nanotech compound," she repeated, picking that phrase out.
"It would probably be best if the medical establishment does not become aware of the depth of my involvement in his care. They may react badly, and that could delay the testing of the compound in proper human trials, as per the laws of this country. I do not wish to see the compound I used delayed, as it is quite effective and will save many lives," Doc said, as he examined the IV in the back of Sam's hand, then pinched Sam's finger between two of his. Doc's fingers glowed red for a moment, and Sam stared in fascination, wondering what he was doing. "Sam, your oxygen saturation is up to 98%. I believe you will be fine with room air now."
Sam eagerly clawed the tubing away from his nose, even as his mother was screeching, "You used him as a guinea pig?"
"Where's Bee?" Sam repeated. "Talk to me, Doc."
"He hit you!" Mikaela yelled at Sam.
"Better a live rodent than a dead man," Doc told his mother, one optic ridge arching very high. He was ignoring Sam's question. Mikaela was on one side of Doc, his mom on the other, and the Autobot still managed to look coolly dignified despite two very irate humans on either side of him and one nearly frantic one in the bed before him. Given Doc's too controlled voice and body language, Sam suspected he wasn't anywhere near as collected as he appeared, but you had to really know Autobots to understand the distinction between 'relaxed mech' and 'mech using knowledge of human behavior to project a desired image.'
"Doc, where's BEE?" Sam demanded, "Damnit! Where is he?"
And at that moment, with a three-way argument threatening to erupt in the room, Bumblebee stepped through the open doorway. "Here, Sam."
"Bumblebee," he said, in relief, holding his good hand out towards his best friend. Bee's arrival shut Mikaela up, and stopped his mother from interrogating Doc further. "Come here a minute."
Bee stopped uncertainly halfway across the room. Both women, and Doc, all stared at him. He said, to Doc, "Ratchet released me, and cleared me to return to duty."
Doc said shortly, "That surprises me. May I speak to Ratchet?"
"You may," Bee said, "he will confirm it."
"He didn't hit me! He wouldn't!" Sam sat up, and swung his legs over the edge of the bed. Ignoring warning twinges in his ribs he tried to stand, but Doc moved faster than he would have believed, and blocked him from rising with a hand on his shoulder.
"Do not get up. The nanotech repairs are not complete. You do not want to rupture a partially healed injury, Sam." Doc pushed him back, "Also, you have an IV in your hand and it is attached to a bag that is hanging on a hook on the wall."
"Bee!" Sam made two fists. One hand was blocked by the cast, but he managed a good approximation around it. "Bee, tell them."
Bumblebee made a low, miserable keening noise and padded closer. He slumped to the ground beside Sam's cot with a clatter of metal armor, and would not meet Sam's eyes. "Your faith in me is utterly overwhelming, Sam," he said, even as his mother started to scream something he didn't quite catch, "but what they say is true. I am so very sorry."
"What?" Sam reached out. He could barely touch Bee's face from his position seated on the bed. He tried to get Bumblebee to turn his head towards him but Bee resisted. "Bee, look at me. What happened?"
"Get that thing away from him!" His mother stood a few feet from Bee, fists balled, looking like she was ready to attack Bee herself. Mikaela, mouth set in an unhappy line, was neither trying to stop his mom, nor speaking up in Bee's defense. "Get away from him!"
"That 'thing' is my best friend," Sam reminded his mother.
"Mrs. Witwicky," Bee said, quietly, "I will not hurt him. What happened was an accident."
"You hit him! I've seen the surveillance video!" She clearly wasn't letting it drop. "Get away!"
She took a step towards Bumblebee. Bee rose and retreated, backing away from his mother's fury. His mom was angrier than Sam had ever remembered seeing. Unfortunately, Sam could also tell quite a bit about Bee's mental state from his stance. His mom might not be able to read it, but Sam could. Bee was about two seconds from spinning around and fleeing. There was utter and complete sorrow and misery written in the droop of his door wings, and the slackness of his hands. Sam wanted to do something to ease Bee's grief, and his mom was making that very difficult.
"What is it you aliens say?" His mother proved she had actually been paying more attention to the Autobots than he would have believed when she ground out, "In your terms, Bumblebee, Blast you to the Pit for what you did to my son!"
"Mom, stop it!" Sam did stand up then, dodging Doc's attempt to grab him, and stumbling forward two steps in his bare feet. The IV ripped out of the back of his hand with a sharp pain, but he ignored that. "Mom, stop!"
"Get out of here!" Judy screamed at Bee, who took a step backwards and averted his gaze. His doorwings pinned flat to his back and his optics went dark. Sam had never seen that specific reaction from an Autobot before, but figured it meant Bee was really upset.
"NO!" Sam managed to get between her and Bee. "Everyone shut up! Damnit!"
Bumblebee still had his optics turned off and he whispered, "I made a mistake coming in here. I'm sorry."
"Sorry? Sorry! He says he's sorry!" His mom shouted, voice mocking and enraged.
"Sam, you are bleeding," Doc said, behind Sam.
"Mom! He's my best friend! Shut up for a minute!" Sam yelled at her, in a tone which he'd frankly never used towards his mother before. He was frustrated, his ribs were beginning to hurt, he was feeling lightheaded, and Bumblebee was headed for the door with the clear intention of slinking back out the way he'd come. "Bee! Stop! I want you here!"
Bee, who had his back to Sam now, froze in place. His doorwings lifted wide, however, and Sam saw a certain lessening of tension in his stance. He turned, slowly, looking back at Sam. His optics were wide, and he hesitated.
"Please. Stay. Everyone was screaming before you arrived, anyway, you didn't cause the fighting," Sam made a beckoning gesture with his good hand. His skin was slick with blood, he realized, and Doc caught his fingers in mid-air and slapped a wad of gauze over the wound left by the IV needle.
"Most of your blood is currently a gift from others, Sam," Doc said, chidingly, and with more than a little humor, "It would be rude to waste it."
"Please go back to your berth, Sam," Bee said, quietly, without moving from his position across the room. "I will not go far."
"He hurt you!" His mother screeched.
"Bee, will you please tell me what happened?" Sam demanded. "Nobody's talking to me. They just keep saying you hit me. And I don't believe it. You're my friend!"
Bumblebee looked over at the wall rather than Sam, and Doc guided Sam back to his army-cot bed. Since they'd stopped screaming, Sam cooperated with Doc, laid down, and let the Autobot medic drape a blanket over him and then tend to his hand.
Bee didn't say anything, but a monitor sprang to life where he was looking. The screen was nearly ten feet off the ground and so large it brought a Weird Al Yankovich song about a big-screen TV to mind. A video began to play, and Sam watched with sudden horror. He was working on his laptop, and without warning, Bee woke from recharge and just nailed him. He could not believe what he was seeing. The image repeated twice. He had no memory of it, but clearly Bumblebee had hit him so hard it was a wonder he wasn't dead.
"That's enough, Teletraan," Doc said, voice grim. "Bee, you didn't have to show him that way."
"He needs to know," Bumblebee finally met Sam's eyes. "It was a glitch, of sorts, and Ratchet has given me code to prevent it in the future. But I nearly killed you, Sam, and I will understand if you wish to avoid me --"
"Bee!" Sam managed to hit a note of frantic fear that surprised even himself. Everyone stared at him, including Bee himself. "Bumblebee. Get your ass -- aft -- over here, before I have to get up again."
Bee crept closer, after a wary look at Sam's mother. Judy glared, but she had finally stopped yelling. Sam pulled his bandaged hand out of Doc's fingers and pointed at the ground. "Get down here so I'm not yelling up at you."
His best friend, whose bearing was currently showing a rather close resemblance to that of a kicked puppy, crouched beside him. "I am so very so--"
"Shut up," Sam said, and reached out, and touched the back of one of Bee's enormous hands with shaking fingers. Bee's optics snapped off in reaction, and his wings pinned flat again. Sam wondered if he wasn't seeing the Autobot version of tears. Very softly he asked, "A glitch, you said?"
He suddenly understood why 'glitch' was just about the worst thing you could call an Autobot, because not all glitches were benign, annoying things. When you were dealing with living war machines, glitches could be deadly.
Bumblebee sighed very heavily, and bowed his head, and said, "Of sorts. I was careless. It will never happen again."
"Good, because I think my mother would take you apart bolt by bolt if it did," Sam said, casting her a glance. She didn't see his look initially, as she still had Bee fixed with a deadly stare. However, his words made her glance in his direction, and Sam added, "Mom, please! He's my best friend. Chill for a moment."
Uncertainly, Judy said, "... but he hurt you."
Mikaela said quietly, to Bumblebee, "So it was a programming glitch of some kind?"
Mikaela was calming down, Sam noted thankfully.
"Of some kind," Bee agreed. He heaved an enormous sigh that seemed to come from deep within his torso, then said, "Sam, I was careless in how I had my boot sector sequences laid out. The problem has been corrected. However, I will understand if--"
"Bee," Sam interrupted, "Stop. Just, stop."
His mother's voice made him flinch when she shrieked, "Samuel James Witwicky, that thing nearly killed--!"
"What," an annoyed voice demanded from the doorway at a thunderous volume far greater than anyone human could ever manage, "is going on here?"
Ratchet's loud and angry presence effectively short-circuited his mother's rant. She stared up at the very large, heavily armored and very angry looking mech as he stalked into the room and loomed over everyone else. Only Doc seemed unruffled; Sam wildly wondered if the calm way that Doc was regarding Ratchet was still acting or if Doc really was that unafraid of the Autobot's CMO. Ratchet said, with real irritation, "Clearly, my assumptions that there would be tender apologies from Bee and heartfelt acceptance from Sam and friends and family were not correct. Everyone out of my med bay. Now."
His voice was megaphone loud, but the acoustics were perfect. Sam was impressed.
"Hey!" Sam protested, "I'm not yelling! Can I have a moment with Bee, please?"
Ratchet glowered. Doc said, at a normal volume, "He's been trying to talk to Bumblebee since Bee walked in the door, Ratch. His mother won't let him."
Bumblebee added in a voice that was distinctly quieter than typical, "Mrs. Witwicky, I swear I will not hurt your son. Will you please give us just a minute?"
"Mom, please!"
Uncertainly, she looked from Bumblebee to Sam and back, and then to Mikaela, who shrugged. And then to Ratchet, who glowered in a manner that sent grown Autobot warriors running. "You," Ratchet said to his mother, "will get out of my medical bay now. You may return after your lunch period."
"You can't order me out!"
"I can physically remove you," Ratchet advised her. "Or you can respect your son's wishes to talk to his friend -- and I assure you, they are friends -- and leave on your own."
Doc's voice a soft counterpoint to Ratchet's, "Judy, I would prefer that your son not be stressed right now. The healing tissue is somewhat fragile and he could start bleeding again if his blood pressure rises. I can hear his heartbeat, and it slowed significantly when Bumblebee entered. It keeps spiking when you yell. However justifiably angry you are at Bee, and by extension the rest of us, please bear your son's welfare in mind."
"I ..." she looked at Sam, then up at Bee, and declared, "If you hurt him again, I will personally dismantle you. Don't think I won't do it, buster."
"Yes, ma'am." Bee blinked his optics at her. Sam hoped Bee was taking that threat as seriously as his mother intended it. He also made a mental note to keep the sabot rounds away from her.
After she stalked out, Doc said in a somewhat awed tone of voice, "Sam, I am rather glad your mother is only five foot seven inches. If she were any bigger, she would be dangerous."
"Oh, trust me," Sam rolled his eyes. "That was minor. When I was seven, this older kid beat me up for my lunch money. She went to talk the boy's parents, that didn't go well, she got in a fight with his dad, and she won."
"I," Mikaela had remained behind after his mom had left, "... I'll let you two be. Sam, I'm glad you're awake and okay."
"Stay," Bumblebee said to her. "I'm certain Sam doesn't want you to go. And I owe both of you an apology for hurting you, Sam. Plus, I have something I want to show you both."
"That was pretty scary, Bee," Mikaela sounded uncertain and shaken. She sat down on the edge of Sam's cot and said, "Can't we just have one day without drama?"
Bee slumped to the ground beside them, and Sam didn't think Bee missed the way that Sam flinched a little at the sudden movement. He tried not to, but that video had been awful. He sorta thought he could remember a bit of the incident, too, now that he'd seen the recording: a flash of yellow coming at him blinding fast, and impact. Bumblebee tactfully didn't comment on his reaction, however. Instead he said to Mikaela, "It would be nice, wouldn't it?"
Sam, resolving not to be afraid, reached his hand out towards Bee and Bumblebee obligingly moved closer, so Sam could put his hand on Bee's forearm. Sam said sturdily, "Bumblebee, it was an accident. You wouldn't hurt me deliberately."
"Never." Bee sighed again. "Sam, your mother's terrified of me. And Mikaela, I think you're a little worried, too."
Mikaela said, "It was a glitch."
Sam wondered if Mikaela was trying as hard as he was to not be afraid.
When Sam had been small, his grandmother had owned a couple horses. He'd loved the horses and had petted them whenever he got a chance. However, one day he'd gotten kicked by accident; the horse had been aiming at one of the farm dogs, and the gelding had inadvertently nailed him in the thigh hard enough to knock him tumbling. It had hurt like hell, left a bruise the size of the palm of his hand, and it had been a long time before he could stand next to any horse, even horses that were being completely friendly, without being deeply afraid of getting kicked.
This felt the same. It was nearly an instinctual fear. Even though he knew Bee had not meant it.
Bee said in a steady, unruffled tone of voice that was probably hiding a good deal of angst, "I do not blame you for being afraid I might have another glitch."
"Busted," Mikaela said, looking a trifle embarrassed. "But you gotta admit, big guy, that there is that possibility."
"No," Bee said, and now Sam heard a note of the self-recrimination that he had strongly suspected Bee was feeling, "I will not have the same sort of error. That's fixed. It was an easy fix, slag it. Primus, I was so stupid. If I'd reacted that way to another Autobot, I might have given them a dent, but it could have saved my aft if we were attacked. I needed to rewrite some things to account for human design tolerances, and I didn't. It didn't even occur to me."
"I'm going to be okay," Sam said, tugging at Bee's arm. Bee moved his hand closer, and Sam transferred his grip to one of Bee's fingers, the closest he could come to holding his hand. He did remember that hand hitting him, he was sure of it, and he forced himself to grip that long digit now. He was worried about Bumblebee, and asked directly, "And you're going to be okay too, right?"
"Yes. I will be okay, as long as you two are."
"Fifteen minutes, you three. Then I want everyone out. This is a med bay, not a rec room," Ratchet said, then left the room, heading back into the surgery. Doc also moved across the vast chamber, giving them the illusion of privacy. However, both mechs were not so discretely supervising.
Sam said, quietly, "Don't beat yourself up, Bee."
Bumblebee fell quiet, for a moment, then said, "I am so very large, and you two are so very fragile. I have a possible solution to that problem. Here, look."
There was a click somewhere in Bumblebee's body and his holo-emitter activated. Sam sat up in surprise, and Mikaela said, "What ... who? A new hologram?"
Bee had cast an image of a young man next to him. "Not a hologram. Well, yes, you're looking at a hologram. It's a rendering of a project that Ratchet, Wheeljack, and Doc are working on. It's a very sophisticated protoform, and not something we could do without the labs on this ship."
"You mean a protoform for you?" Sam shook his head vigorously, horrified by the implications. "Bee, no. You'd be defenseless. You can't!"
"It would be something like Arcee's protoforms, actually," Bumblebee explained, "My spark would be split between two forms. If anything, that would make me harder to kill. They would have to take both of me out to make it permanent."
The two humans exchanged a long look between them. Sam said quietly, in an awed tone of voice, "You would do this for us ...?"
Bee made a snorting noise. "I believe the idea is to give me an avatar that won't terrify half the humans on this planet. I am generally the mech given the task of PR in a situation like this, and humans are so blasted tiny ..." he made a fist with what looked like real frustration, "However, the fact that I could interact with you two on a very different level is a part of my calculations when I consider this option."
"Bumblebee!" Mikaela interrupted and actually seemed angry, "You don't need to change who you are for us to be your friends!"
Bee replied, "This isn't just about your friendship with me, Mikaela. In fact, this is not the sort of modification that Optimus would ever authorize for personal reasons. However, we have to gain acceptance on this world. We desperately need to establish a base of operations where we are welcomed and supported by the native population. Optimus is quite serious when he says that we will leave if human governments ask us to. We currently live here at the whim of elected United States officials, and we are well aware that they must cater to the desires of their people. In order to stay here, long term, we must gain acceptance. And it is very hard for us to forge bonds with humans when the humans hyperventilate when they see us." He pointed at the hologram. "That thing isn't going to scare nearly as many people as my current form does."
They both studied the hologram of the project for a moment. Mikaela gave Bee a slow, searching look, then walked over to it. The protoform was a few inches taller than Mikaela (which meant it was about the same height as Sam). It -- he -- was strikingly human in appearance, and was even dressed in a pair of jeans and a plain white t-shirt. The only really noticeable feature that made it clearly 'not human' were a set of glowing blue optics where human eyes should have been.
"It was deliberately designed to be appealing to humans," Doc said, from across the room. He sounded curious. "Did we succeed?"
"The eyes are creepy," Mikaela objected, shaking her head.
"We wanted something to distinguish it as 'not human'," Doc explained.
Mikaela tilted her head, and said, "What, to avoid people thinking of Terminator?"
"Yes. We are not trying to hide our identity as aliens." Doc shrugged. "And humans seem to be genuinely afraid of monsters taking the form of humans, and living undetected among you. Not just science fiction creatures but fantasy and magic as well, and there are examples dating back throughout human history. I could name a hundred easily: tricksters and sidhe, Greek Gods and vampires, those would be just a few. We do not wish to trigger those instinctual fears."
"Hmm. Can you do some patches of metal on his arms and legs or something? That would be less disturbing." Mikaela folded her arms. "Those eyes are just ... ooooh, freaky."
Bumblebee tilted his head sideways for a moment. "Do you find my eyes in this form unsettling?"
"No!" She glanced up at him. "It's a human thing, though. Animals and people with glowing eyes are seen as, I dunno, demonic? Robots can have glowing eyes. That is not nearly as scary."
"That is not a robot," Bee, like most of the mechs, shared a distaste for the term 'robot' as applied to Autobots. But he was smiling, a little, when he spoke. He added, "However, I think that non-glowing optics could be achieved, right Doc?"
"Easily," the medic replied. He padded back over, taking his inclusion in the conversation as an invitation to join them. He and Bee shared a look, and Sam suspected a transfer of data, and then the hologram changed. "In fact, what Mikaela suggested will give us a handy place to put a dataport and even weapon mounts."
Now it had armored forearms in gleaming silver, though its hands remained human-like. The eyes changed to a non-glowing blue so vivid it was definitely not natural.
"Anything else?" Doc asked, pleasantly. "And if absolutely need be, Bumblebee, you can attach weapons to armor I just exposed on the forearms. I'll modify it a bit for weapons mounts. Might as well, on the off chance you need them."
Mikaela considered the question, and said, "Bee, do you want people to see you as very macho, or with a bit of a gentler side?"
"Gentler, of course," Bumblebee said, and ducked his head with what looked like minor embarrassment. "I'm a warrior when I have to be. I'd rather humans not be afraid, though. You both know that."
"Hmm. Doc, can you make his cheekbones a little higher, and lengthen the hair? Make it come down to his mid back." Mikaela studied the effect that was created, then added, "And the jaw less strong. He looks like a linebacker right now."
The change was swiftly made, and the result was an androgynous young man, beardless, slim. Mikaela gestured with her hands behind her head, indicating that his hair should be pulled back into a tail. When they'd made that change, she nodded thoughtfully. "It doesn't really look like you, Bee, but it will work if you want to appeal to people. Honestly, I'm not sure what would look like you."
Sam said, with a frown, "He looks like a model or a movie star."
Bee chuckled, then stated, "Those looks are deliberate, Sam. I'm not exactly playing the role of a politician. That's Optimus's role, and probably Magnus and Rodimus. I'm the one who gets to be charismatic and appealing to the public."
"He's going to get hit on by lots of men." Sam scowled. The protoform was just too much a 'pretty boy' for his tastes. He found it vaguely disturbing.
"He exaggerates," Mikaela laughed.
Bee shrugged, clearly unimpressed by Sam's concerns. "And why would that be a problem?"
"Don't worry, Sam, I'll defend him," Mikaela said. "Though if they think he's straight, it'll be the women he's beating off with a stick ..."
Sam snickered, despite his misgivings. "True, and even if they think he's gay, from what I've observed."
"And if they realize I'm neither?" Bee sounded just a hair annoyed by the direction the discussion had gone. "I am an alien."
"Sorry, Bee, human assumptions don't work that way." Sam rolled his eyes. "I know the truth and I still default to thinking of you as a guy."
Mikaela sat down on the edge of the cot and regarded Bumblebee with a thoughtful expression. She said, "Bee, this mod is a big deal, right? Are you sure you want to do it?"
"The pros outweigh the cons, I believe," Bumblebee replied, though to Sam's ears he sounded uncertain. "It will ... change me. There will be two of me. That's a profound change, any way you look at it."
"How does that actually work?" Mikaela asked. She'd gone from pissed-off angry mad to curious, and Sam smiled when she wasn't looking in his direction. The key to calming Mikaela down was to distract her, something Bee had pointed out to him a long time ago. He wondered if this revelation from Bee wasn't a distraction in and of itself, too, meant to calm both of them by turning their focus away from Bee's malfunction and his injuries. Mikaela added, as if her meaning wasn't clear, "I mean, technically."
Bee held up two fingers. "Two memory cores, two processors, and part of my spark in each body. But there's also a quantum level link between the cores, and what is written to one affects the other immediately. It's a very sophisticated technology even by our standards, and actually has some parallels to how our starship engines work. Due to the quantum link the encryption level is so high as to be effectively unhackable, and the communication range between bodies is not limited by space, it's limited by time."
"Time?" Sam said, blankly. Disturbingly photographic images of a certain astronomy textbook popped up in his memory. They weren't helpful. He knew Autobot astrophysics were far, far more advanced than human.
"Time flows at different rates, affected by gravitational fields and the like," Doc spoke up with what Sam suspected was a very simplistic explanation. "It can be a problem if the cores get out of sync with each other, either because of proximity to a strong gravitational field, or by starship travel. You can't leave one half on a planet and send the other to Cybertron, because it would break the quantum bond."
"... Oh." Sam thought he understood.
"That would not necessarily kill him, but it would be dangerous, painful, and very undesirable. Arcee was split four ways and one of her protoforms was destroyed. She nearly died from the shock, and took a very long time to recover emotionally. However, for practical purposes he'll have unlimited range planet wide."
"So that's how Arcee was able to communicate with herself when we were in Egypt," Sam mused. "I'd wondered."
Doc nodded, "You know, we once used this technology a lot, for long-distance communications purposes, but with the war we have lost much of our manufacturing ability." Doc trailed off, eyes going distant, then continued. "The Primes carry within them the all the knowledge we require to restart our civilization, if we can ever end this war."
Bee made a soft noise, not quite a chirp, and he didn't sound happy. Sam thought it was the word 'Matrix' and he was proven right when Doc glanced up at him and said, "The Matrix would stay with your original protoform, but both forms would have access to the data. We can't split that, and I'm not even sure how to convince it to move if we had to transfer your cores to a new shell. Ratchet -- or Wheeljack -- might have more of an idea how that would work. It's not my area of expertise. I'm just designing the organic structures."
Mikaela then asked a question Sam wouldn't even have thought of (he was going, 'Organic?' and remembering Doc taking a swab of his cheek the day before) when she said, "What about spare parts, then? Sounds like you're using stuff from the ship's stores, but when they're gone ..."
"The quantum tech bits are solid state," Doc said, "and the estimated lifespan of the parts we'll use is measured in the tens of thousands of years. They'll be placed within his spark chambers, so any battle damage that destroys them would have offlined him permanently anyway. By the time he needs replacement parts either we will have established an economic and technological platform able to manufacture them, or, one hopes, humanity will be more accepting of us and we won't need him to have a humanoid avatar. Alternately, he will no longer be on this world, rendering a humanoid protoform a bit of a moot point."
He nodded at the hologram. "The cores will be durable, but the protoform itself is going to be a good bit more fragile, and will need regular maintenance. At some point, we may have to do a core transplant into something else, or reverse the procedure. It is reversible, by the way, Bee. I don't know if you caught that from the notes."
"I saw," Bumblebee said, thoughtfully. "Which is one of the reasons I'm considering this."
Doc added, a bit teasingly, "And if you ever go civilian on us, be aware that this is going to be very expensive technology to repair or upgrade no matter where it's built."
Bee snorted. "I'm a Prime. I don't think 'civilian' is in my near future."
"True," Doc grinned at him. "I don't think you'll ever have to worry about pinching your credits like the rest of us peons."
"The drawbacks," Bumblebee said, thoughtfully, "are going to be that the little protoform will be far more vulnerable. Also, if I'm reading the schematics on the sensory net right, it's going to be very sensitive to touch."
Smack it, and it hurts, Sam guessed.
Doc nodded. "You can be hurt by other humans. Not fatally with anything short of being run down by a SUV ..." he grinned at Mikaela, who smiled brightly, and Sam realized that the story of Mikaela taking out a Decepticon Pretender was probably widely known, "but hurt. That's deliberate, Bee. And that sensory net you're referring to is based on the human nervous system. My work."
"If the little form does get destroyed, I get really injured, badly." Bee fell silent, for a moment, then said, "On the other hand, I've been badly hurt in this form a few times. I might survive an attack on this form that would otherwise kill me as the little protoform would still have half my spark. Obviously, we wouldn't be taking my shorter half into battle."
Mikaela added, "And you'd have a backup memory core."
"Yes, true." Bee's eyes flicked in the direction of the surgical bay, and Prowl. "Though that wouldn't be proof against a virus, it would help in the case of an unlucky injury."
"Yes." Doc nodded. "You realize that the major reason we don't do this more often is the sheer bloody expensive use of rare resources. I'm not kidding when I say the quantum link between the cores is on par with the technology used to create a starship engine. We're literally using undamaged parts from the Ark's ruined engine for this. They're just doing a swap and replace on the engine with a spare in the subspace hold, and we three med bay nerds," he grinned at the phrase, "called dibs on the parts before Grimlock did."
"Grimlock wants to be able to do quantum jumps again?" Bee said, tone approaching 'horror' and doorwings pinning flat to his back. "Primus! Not with his processor core damage. And aside from that, I seem to remember him jumping into the Earth's mantle last time ... Wheeljack was crazy to fix him the first time."
"Fortunately, that was also Optimus's reaction." Doc lifted an optic ridge at Bumblebee. "Wheeljack's judgment leaves a lot to be desired sometimes, doesn't it?"
"And he can talk Ratchet into anything," Bee groaned, sagging in place. "Ratchet by himself has tons of common sense, but Wheeljack seems to cancel that out. It's like matter and antimatter when they get together."
"Apt description, given Wheeljack's explosive tendencies," Doc chuckled.
"I can hear you!" Ratchet called from the next room.
"We know!" Bee shot back, causing Mikaela to giggle and Sam to smile.
"He's Dr. McCoy with armor and a welding torch," Doc said, definitely loud enough for Ratchet to hear, and Sam shot the alien doctor a very startled look at the comment. Doc was so damned dignified, where had that reference come from?
"So," Mikaela had been silently studying the protoform. "Does it transform into anything?"
"A real boy!" Ratchet shouted from the next room.
Bumblebee replied with a clip of music from an old Disney movie, "I've got no strings to hold me down, to make me fret or make me frown, I had strings but now I'm free. There are no strings on me!"
Doc said, "Wishful thinking, Bee?"
"Something like that," Bee said, wings drooping. He glanced sideways at Sam, and Sam suddenly realized he still had his hand holding on to Bee's finger. "And I believe our fifteen minutes is about up. Before Ratchet puts a dent or two in me, I should go -- Optimus just pinged me to remind me I am back on active duty, too, and I need to go play tour guide."
"How long will it take you to build the protoform?" Mikaela asked, before they could leave.
Sam was expecting an answer like "ten years" given the level of sophisticated technology involved. If the Autobots called it "high tech" then it was probably going to take forever, right?
"Hmm. The hardest part will be the organic parts, and those are already nearly done. I have a few tricks at my disposal that fall under the category of 'things Autobots don't tell humans about' to speed the growth of cellular tissue. As far as the protoform, Teletraan's drones are working on it, and Wheeljack's supervising. Maybe -- tomorrow?" Doc sounded a little hesitant. "I believe that the departure date for the Ark was finalized for next Monday, which will allow us time to get to Nieryl Six before the end of the truce. We will need to hustle a bit if we want to get this project finished, and Prowl online, before it departs."
"You are assuming Fang will keep his word and honor the truce until the 30th," Sam pointed out.
Bee huffed a long sigh. To Sam's surprise, and apparently Doc's as well because Doc lifted an optic ridge, Bee said, "Fang will keep his word, I can virtually guarantee that. None of us are worried about it. Random Decepticon trouble isn't out of the question, but Fangface won't be behind it."
Doc snorted delicately. "Are you certain he isn't just playing mind games with us? Killing traitors to his cause does not make him remotely loyal to ours."
Bee's vocalizer clicked as if Bee was thinking about saying something, but then the Autobot pulled his finger free of Sam's grasp and stood up. "You assumed ahead of time I would say yes to this modification?"
To Sam's ears, Bee sounded surprisingly defiant given his usual polite deference to other Autobots. But Doc's response clearly eased Bee's mind, because he visibly relaxed when Doc said, "No. You were merely our first choice. Elita and Bluestreak were both in the running, and Hound, as well."
Bee covered his face with one hand. "I will accept this, then, simply to avoid the possibility of there being two of Bluestreak."
From the surgery, Ratchet's response made everyone chuckle, "Thank you, Bee!"