The Diego Diaries: Where in the world is Ironhide? (dd6 388)
-0-Around the may pole
They drove madly along the highway toward the Industrial Park Cities. Ironhide's signal was buzzing along and they drove as fast as they dared on the nearly desserted highway to get to the Industrial Park before he crashed into a pile of steel and dented his cute little pug face.
"I can't figure this out. He's not exactly running on the roadway" Raptor said to his father.
"I know," Hardie replied as he gunned it to get ahead of the signal and beat Ironhide there. "He might be off road, the slagger. We better get there to cut him off."
They poured it onward and soon drove through the large gate that fronted the huge fence that ran all around this, the main industrial plant for Mars and a great deal of Cybertron. Sliding to a stop, then transforming, they stood side by side to await for sight of their wayward boy. What they would do if he came barreling in, they had no idea. Improvisation would have to be the name of the game. They stood braced for his arrival as the signal got closer and closer, then passed directly underneath them to move onward to the metro station half a mile away in the Park.
"Frag. He's on a train. I FORGOT THE TRAINS! What comes here?" Hardie asked as he turned to run for the metro down the parkway.
"THE BLUE LINE! IT COMES HERE!" Raptor said as he hoofed it after his father.
They ran swiftly, waving to a couple of mechs who knew them, then reached the metro station. They ran down the stairs, headed toward the platform but there was no train there. It had already stopped, picked up passengers, then sped onward. They fumed mightily a moment, considered running down the track, then jumped on the next train as it slid in. It slid out just as swiftly. It was silent on the platform and would remain so until shift changed again.
-0-In an alleyway
He lay on his side hugging a small trash bin to his bosom. He was out like a light having danced and drank himself to oblivion. It would be debatable when and if someone missed him. Everyone was cutting loose at the Club. It was long overdue and welcomed. Like right now was. He was comfortable as could be laying in the sand among the bins. It wasn't like this was a new experience. Sometimes when he did this, there was a gunfire staccato to keep him company. He dozed onward as the night grew deep.
-0-At the Clerb
They gathered together to hit the road for the next watering hole. Turbine and Delphi were still gone and so was Ironhide, Hardie and Raptor. No one noticed that or Ratchet missing as they laughed, danced and guffawed their way out to the street. "Where now, Prowler?" Optimus asked as he half held up the winger of his dreams who was three sheets to the wind.
Prowl smiled at Optimus. "Wherever you go, wither shall I go. Whatever you do, that shalt I do-do." He laughed. "I said do-do."
"Potty mouth," Alor said as he swayed beside Blackjack who was nearly numb in his lower extremities from mixing his drinks. "Let's go. Follow me," Alor said, then stepped out into the street. The sound of a car slamming on its breaks, then a thud could be heard. Alor rose up over the top of the group, all of them looking up to follow his trajectory, then landed in a heap. He lay there a moment, then sat up.
Blackjack who was trying to get his legs to go in the same direction crab walked over to him. Reaching down to grab Alie's helm, he bellowed. "ALIE! YOU OKAY!?"
"LET GO OF MY HELM!" Alor then bit Blackjack on the thumb.
He bellowed. Alor stood finally, then they hugged it out. Alor laughed loudly as a shaken mech stared at him with doubt. "You okay, Maestro?" he asked.
"I'M FINE! I AM ALOR OF IACON! I BOUNCE!" he said, then smiled at the others. "Come with me. I, ALOR OF IACON WILL LEAD THE WAY!" He did and everyone followed.
The mech stared at them, then shrugged. "Okay," he said with a slight grin, then transformed to make his way home with a really, really good story.
Moments later, Delphi and Turbine were back. They scanned the mob inside, then stepped out. "Zero in on his transponder, Turbine," Delphi said.
"Which one, Delph?" he asked with a grin. He was silent a moment, then grinned. "I have him. Come on. We need to take the Circle line a couple of stops." With that, Delphi and Turbine of Praxus stepped out to hunt the elusive grandson-in-law. The party would keep swinging in Club Cybertron for another joor or so before they would begin to evict the drunks. The Watch would be nearby watching them to gather in those that weren't going to make it any farther than Ratchet.
-0-On a Blue train, three stations behind Ironhide
"Frag, that little mech," Hardie said with a chuckle. "He's my boy."
"He is," Raptor said proudly. "Do you think we're going to catch him?"
"Not unless they arrest him," Hardie said.
Truer words never spoken.
-0-On a Blue train ahead of the posse
Ironhide swayed in the doorway as he watched the lights come and go. He was 'stepping on his own tongue drunk'. They had made a bargain. He would get trashed and Ratchet would get ripped. There was some discussion over the internal line about which was the one where you fell down and didn't get up and which was the one with enough sense to get a cab for two. Apparently, he was the trash panda of this escapade. He didn't know that Ratchet was getting collected by the police two steps ahead of Delphi and Turbine as the local beat cops loaded his smiling aft into a paddy wagon. It would be turning the corner to go to the police station just as Delphi and Turbine arrived to find him gone. His outline in the sand would be small consolation to both.
Ironhide on the other servo watched the train slow, then stop. Ordinarily, he would be easily able to stay on his peds short of the train crashing into a brick wall, but this time he wasn't. He slammed into the divider by the door that funneled people in and out, then fell forward out the door when they opened. Standing on the platform, several cops heading back for their beats after carting off a raging drunk watched as he staggered out and fell on his face.
"Well, would you look at that," one said with a grin. "I think that's Springer's old pa."
They nodded. "What do we do with him?" one asked.
"Well," the first said, then paused as two young trainee cops stared at them. He looked at the two, then the others. "Uh ..."
"We take him to jail, right, Sargent?" a fresh faced youngster trainee-probationary cop asked. "I mean … Commander Springer would never show favoritism would he?"
The older cops stared at the two young kids. Then the first grinned. "I don't think so. Call a pick up, Link."
The young kid nodded most earnestly, then made the call. Between all of them, they managed to get all of Ironhide up the steps and into the paddy wagon. He sprawled on the floor next to another mech who was going to jail, too. The doors shut and they drove off.
The older cops grinned. "That was Ratchet," one said.
They nodded.
"This is going to be a fun night," the first said as the five of them walked down to go back to their beats. They would join the next train and miss the following one, the one with Hardie and Raptor.
It was one of those kind of nights.
-0-Springer and Drift
They would run in circles until five cops, two of them trainee-probationary kids would tell them the Tale of Ratchet and Ironhide. It would be a foot race to the jail house.
-0-At another club
They danced, laughed, drank, ate good food, chatted, told jokes, and watched Prowl practically drool into his fries. Prime was a pretty big mech and could hold his hootch. He wasn't being moderate tonight. He was needful of giving into the zeitgeist, apparently. Besides, Magnus, Jetta, Hardie, Raptor, and a couple of others were being sober for him. He was grateful. Prowl was hilarious.
Their dance of doom and hilarity would continue from here to the bowling alley before Jetta and Magnus would call it and stuff individuals and their partners into cabs to go home. They would all make it. They would find their apartments, some would fall down and stay there while others would make it to their berths. Among them would be everyone but Ratchet and Ironhide. They would have their own berths elsewhere.
In the jail.
Alor of Iacon would be PISSED when he found out.
-0-At the Jail House now …
They drove up to the parking lot, then halted by the door. Mechs were waiting for the night's catch. The doors opened and mechs reached in. They pulled Ratchet out and held him between them. He had silly string for legs at the moment, so he held on for dear life. "HELLO, BOYS! WHERE AM I!?" he asked loudly with a big silly grin.
"The lock up, Ratchet," one of the jailers said with a grin of his own.
"OKAY! *WHO* AM I!?" he asked next as they half carried him in. HUGE laughter greeted that. It would take all of them to get the dead weight of Ironhide inside. They would both be placed in a drunk cell in the back where it was quieter than the front where the mini-con taggers from Port of Nexus in the eight city metro district were going at each other at the top of their vocal processors and would for some time.
-0-At Club Cybertron
Hardie and Raptor walked into the club, then noticed no one was there. Walking to the door to reconnoiter, they noticed Turbine and Delphi walking toward them down the street. They waited, everyone compared notes, then walked across the street to Day/Night Watch substation #6 nearby to see if they were picked up yet. When they entered, a loudly yelling amma was letting her three GIANT grandsons have it.
"YOU WERE SUPPOSED TO COME HOME! I HAD CHORES! YOUR OLD APPA NEEDED YOU TO COME HOME! I TOLD YOU, DIDN'T I!?"
"Yes, Amma." -three grandsons who were being shredded by a micro amma of IMMENSE RAGE
"YOU DIDN'T, DID YOU!? YOUR OLD APPA TRIED TO FIX THE THING HIMSELF AND HE PUT A HOLE IN THE WALL!"
"I can fix it, Amma," one of them said in a tiny voice as he tried to placate the smallest littlest old amma Hardie and his family had seen in some time. She wasn't having it.
"I DIDN'T ASK YOU TO GO TO THE CLUB, GRANDSONS, SO YOUR OLD APPA COULD CLIMB ON A LADDER AND MAKE A HOLE IN THE WALL HANGING A PICTURE OF YOUR SORRY AFTS GRADUATING FROM TRADE SCHOOL! I ASKED *YOU* TO COME AND DO IT! BUT DID YOU?"
"No, Amma." -Tiny contrite voices from three monster trucks.
"YOU DIDN'T! NOW YOUR SWEET OLD APPA FEELS STUPID! DID YOU KNOW HOW BAD HE FEELS RIGHT NOW?!"
"Uh, no, Amma." -three monster trucks shrinking before everyone's optics in mortification and regret
"BADLY! THAT'S HOW HE FEELS!" -Amma who wasn't feeling badly. She was too pissed to feel badly.
"Uh, Abba," the desk sargent asked behind his desk as the entire Watch crew present, some civilians who worked there and everyone nearby in a cell watched in fascination. "What do you want me to do?"
"PUT THEIR SORRY AFTS IN JAIL!" Amma/Abba said in fury. "I ASKED THEM TO DO THIS! MY OLD MECH CAN'T DO HEIGHTS! HE WANTED THAT PICTURE UP SO EVERYONE COULD SEE HIS LITTLE MECHS AND THEIR GRADUATION! HE FELL ON HIS AFT! FORTUNATELY, HE'S TOUGH AS TITANIUM BUT ITS THE PRINCIPLE! I NEVER ASK ANYONE TO HELP US UNLESS WE NEED IT! PUT THEM IN JAIL AND LET THE JUDGE HEAR THIS! I WANT THEM IN PRISON!"
Hardie almost couldn't contain the urge to laugh as a tiny, tiny little femme QUIVERING with OUTRAGE let her three grandsons have it.
"Uh, Abba … I can't do that. There's no crime here," the sargent ventured.
She turned on him with fury. "THEY DIDN'T HELP THEIR APPA! THAT'S CRIMINAL!"
It was at that moment a tiny mech limped in and stood beside his little femme. "Coco, you aren't going to have them arrested are you?" he asked with a slight grin.
YES, I AM, BIM! WATCH ME!" she said as she looked him over. "Are you alright? You should be sitting down." She turned on her boys. "GET YOUR APPA A CHAIR!"
The three nearly ran up each others backside to comply. Three chairs appeared. Bim took one, then sat. "Go ahead, Coco. Show them your stuff."
She looked at him, then the three hulking grandsons. "I'M LEAVING YOU HERE! THE JUDGE CAN SORT IT OUT!" She turned to a nearby cop who was grinning until she looked at him. The grin was gone at warp speed. "YOU THERE! GRINNER! DO YOU TREAT YOUR GRAND GENITORS LIKE SLAG?"
"Uh, no, Amma," he said as he shifted to strand straighter.
"Good. CARRY MY OLD MECH! HE FELL ON HIS AFT!" She stared up at him with a 'don't test me' expression.
The watch officer glanced at his sargent who nodded. Gently, he picked up the mech, then the femme. "Let me get you home."
"SEE HOW ITS DONE!? A TOTAL STRANGER KNOWS HOW TO TAKE CARE OF OLD PEOPLE!" she said as they disappeared out the door.
It was silent a moment, then everyone turned toward the three contrite grandsons. The sargent grinned. "You three are idiots."
"We got the date confused. I thought Amma said tomorrow," as the other two nodded. He stepped closer to the desk. "We aren't going to jail, are we?"
"No. You should," the sargent said. "Go home. Fix this by morning. Don't darken my door again."
They nodded, then beat feet out. It was quiet as the mechs grinned at each other, then all turned toward Hardie, Turbine, Delphi, and Raptor. "What can we do for you? Are you volunteering for jail, too?"
"Uh, no. We want to find two missing family members." Hardie gave them the names and he searched.
Then he grinned. The sargent looked up at the four. "They're in the jail house now."
It was silent a moment, then they beat feet for the door. They were gone in seconds. The cops looked at the door, then their sargent. He laughed. "It must be in the water tonight."
He got no arguments from anyone there.
-0-TBC 6-18-18 edited 6-25-18