There's a small easter egg from the Bumblebee movie in this chapter. So be sure to look out for that. I'm curious to see how many of you catch it. Now on with the story.
The next day Optimus and Ratchet broke the news about General Brice's death to Agent Fowler who took it as hard as they had expected. And everyone on the team help comfort him.
While they all continued to think of how to stop Scourge and Cyclonus and clear themselves to the human government.
Starscream's voice still hadn't held yet but was improving and Ratchet had happily reported that it would go back to normal and the damage was healing. Other than that the seeker was already back to normal.
And it was actually pretty funny watching Starscream have to mime everything to them. At one point there had nearly been a fight when he was trying to get Smokescreen's attention for something and did it by using one of his digits to bonk him between the optics.
Smokescreen had responded by trying to grab his finger and Starscream jumped back and ended up hitting Sideswipe in the face with one of his wings almost knocking him out.
But he made it up to them both by bringing them energon later.
Later everyone went out to look for energon after seeing that they were getting low. Starscream went too and because he couldn't speak right now but he could fight and fly.
Knock Out who still couldn't bring himself to use his weapons do to being triggered stayed at the scrapyard he was currently the only cybertronian there.
"So how are you holding up?" Asked June understand that knowing the red medic hadn't yet recovered from his trama.
"I wish I could help the team more but everytime I activate my dill I just hear and see the ones they used on me and my energon prob's zap reminds me of the one that rendered me unconscious." He explained.
"Well that's understandable after what you went through." She told him.
"No I'm a medic but I can't bring myself to use any of my tools or even to use my weapons on the field." He replied.
"I just keep thinking what if one of my friends get captured like I did or comes back wounded and Ratchet and Fixit aren't available and I can't bring myself to use my tools? Or what if a Con attacks and I can't you my weapons to stop them?" He added almost in coolant tears.
"I already failed friends! I watched Megatron beat Starscream half to death multiple times during the war and neaver lefted a digit to stop it! And I could have volunteered to go on that mission with Breakdown and Dreadwing but didn't and now my best friend is dead!"
"And before that when he was captured by MECH I didn't go to save him I mean Megatron made it clear we weren't aloud to but I could have.. should have snuck out to help him! When I was being drilled into all I could think is that was what he went through!"
"And now I know what he went through and I know it was my fault if I had gone with him that day he wouldn't have been caught by them and he might have survived that mission with Arachnid if he'd had both his optics.." he finished now sobbing. "But I had to look out for my finish and my own sorry hide!"
"It's ok Knock Out none of that was your fault." Jack cut in having heard some of the conversation. "If you would have intervened any of those times you would have been killed and look at all the good you've been doing now."
"He right you've been a really good friend to Starscream and were the one who convinced him to switch sides after Optimus offer him a place in the Autobots Raff told him.
"And you helped Ratchet in the medbay a whole bunch of times." Miko added.
"You've done more for this team then you think." Agent Fowler told him and Denny and Russel both nodded in agreement not having know Knock Out long enough to add anything.
Knock Out was silent not being able to think of anything to say feeling touch by what the humans had just said to him.
But they suddenly heard the alarm go off and knew someone was breaking into the scrapyard. Knock Out transformed into his vehicle mode upon seeing Barricade he still wasn't feeling up for a fight and didn't want to risk any of the humans being hurt.
"Go hide." He told them. And they all went inside Denny's home. Knock Out's plan was to let Barricade think he was a normal sports car hoping he would leave thinking nothing was there.
Barricade entered the scrapyard and walked the energon that was left in the storage area having detected it's signal since Denny, Fixit, Knock Out and Ratchet had been fixing things around the scrapyard and the device that normally masked the signal was down.
Knock Out was staying as still as possible in his vehicle mode hoping Barricade would just take the energon and go since the team was out getting more anyway it wasn't a big deal as long as the humans were safe.
Knock Out was just hoping Barricade wouldn't detecte his life signal. Then much to his horror Barricade started to approach him. Then the Decepticon police car started looking his alt mode up and down fortunately he didn't have a way to check for life signals at the moment.
But Knock Out saw a look in Barricade's optics that told him he recognized his vehicle mode and was about to check to see if it was him.
"Knock Out is that you?" Barricade said in a mocking tone knowing the red mech had switched sides and wanting to make him hurt for it.
Knock Out didn't answer hoping if he didn't speakp he would think he was a regular car and go away.
Barricade suddenly broght his fist down hard on Knock Out's hood making him fight the urge to wince or cry out in pain. Then the Decepticon started stomping on him. But the red spots car still fought the urge to move not wanting to risk a fight and the humans being harmed.
"Well can't be to sure." Barricade said aiming his blaster at the Austin Marten.
But suddenly a clanging sound got their attention and Knock Out thought he felt his spark drop when he saw Miko hitting Barricade's leg with a pipe screaming. "Stop leave him alone!"
The other who were in the house were looking at each other wonder how she got back out there.
"Ah you must be a human let's see if you pop?" Barricade said aiming his blaster at her.
But before he could pull the trigger Knock Out suddenly transformed and grabbed his servo and flipped him around and tossed him into some old washing machines much to Denny's dismay.
"Miko run get out of here!" Knock Out yelled at the girl to get to safety. And she obeyed. And Knock Out saw Jack practically drag her inside one she reached Denny's home.
Barricade saw where she ran and started to go after her only for Knock Out to activate both his saw and his drill and start fighting him.
Knock Out went at Barricade with his saw and drill but the cop car Decepticon managed to block them and tried to use his blaster only for Knock Out to saw it in half rendering the weapon useless.
But Barricade was proving to be stronger then Knock Out. And was tossing the red bot all over the place.
And Knock Out was currently down and Barricade rush over and talked him only to suddenly fall to the ground after the humans who were watching from inside Denny's home saw what looked like something spark.
Then they ran out to see Knock Out pull himself up and drag Barricade to a stasis pod that he sealed him inside of.
And they noticed Knock Out was holding his energon prob which had been where he'd been tossed that he had used on Barricade and that was how he won the fight.
And he looked at the humans and smiled at them glad they were all safe and unharmed. And they smiled back.
Later when the other got back they saw Barricade in the stasis pod and Knock Out buffing himself after having help the humans clean up after his fight with cop car.
"Wow you took down Barricade?" Bumblebee said impressed.
"Yeah but it was horrible what he did to my paint job." Knock Out replied as he put his buffer away having fixed the damage to his finish.
"He's back." Said Smokescreen.
And they were glad to see that Knock Out had gotten over his trama for the most part and regained his confidence. Having overcome his fear of using his tools and weapon because he had only been thinking about saving his human friends and not the memories they had been triggering.
Just then Starscream returned to the scrapyard with the last of the energon they had gathered.
"Well I'm back." Said the seeker. (In his screechy G1 voice.)
"You can talk again." Bumblebee smiled glad the seeker could speak again.
But Sideswipe and Smokescreen both busted out laughing along with Miko and Bulkhead.
"Oh scrap I sound like an earth cartoon character!" Starscream whined.
"Don't worry your voice should go back to normal when it finishs healing in a few days." Ratchet told him.
"It better this is humiliating." Starscream complained.
"And annoying." Ratchet thought but didn't say out loud.
Then Starscream was glad to hear that Knock Out was back to his old self again. And everyone went to recharge after the busy day and would try to figure out what to do about Scourge and Cyclonus and how to get the government to trust them again the next day.
To Be Continued.
Hope this chapter turned out OK. I'll try to update everything soon. In the meantime feel free to send feedback.