The Diego Diaries: Ho-H-Ho (dd6 567)
(It has been below zero sometimes as much as 15 degrees here for two weeks and my hands are so dry the ends of them split. It's like typing on wounds. :D They're better today and I'm going to hit it. HUGS! wherever you are. Its going to be be about 20-30 degrees for the rest of January so things are going to be way better.) :D
-0-Around
Ratchet walked into the house of someone on his list, shut ins for medical or mental reasons, those who were so elderly they couldn't leave their homes for various reasons or other miscellaneous things. There were a host of family members waiting expectantly for Santa Ratchet to show up and fete their little ancient relic appas and ammas. There were six and they were sitting or lying on couches with family fussing over them as they watched, some of them without much coherence about all the hoo-hah.
"Well, look at you!" Ratchet said with a big smile. "I never thought I'd find you. And here you are all along!" He walked to them and scanned each, finding them on various places of the upside of the curve toward productive lives and coherency. "You've gotten so much better. Good thing Santa Doctor came to call. You've been doing a good job taking care of them," he said glancing to the many adults standing around the room, some holding children.
"They earned it," a big mech said as everyone nodded. "It took all we had to keep them with us and alive."
"And that's why all of you are my heroes," Ratchet said with a smile. He glanced at Pulley and OD who volunteered to be elves for the Santas. "My minions here have brought gifts for you from the colony," he said to the elders, some of whom smiled. "I guess your babies got presents yesterday?" he asked.
They nodded as Ratchet took gifts from the two kids, then one by one gave them to the little elders who smiled at him with delight and surprise.
A tiny little mech thanked him profusely.
Ratchet knelt beside his chair. "Appa … where would we all be without you and your family here? Where would we be without all of us together? Without all of you elders who remember everything?"
"We'd be nowhere," a big mech said. He was holding a baby in his big arms. "We'd be lost."
"Slag right," Ratchet said as he stood. "Look at all of you. Getting better every orn. Shiny as a new penny." He looked at the family around the room. "This would never happen without you. All of you together will be fine and recover, remember that. Give them a few more decaorns and they'll be dancing."
"They do, you know … dance like a dream," one of them said.
"Then invite me along and we'll burn this place down," Ratchet said to laughter all around. He hugged the little mechs, took the thanks of the crowd, then stepped out with the two kids. They walked to the elevator to go upward to one more place in the building before heading outward to more. Entering, they grinned at each other.
"That was nice, Abba," OD said as he looked into the bag, his elf hat set firmly on his helm.
"Doing something for others always makes you feel better. It reminds you each time that all of us are one," Ratchet said. "You two younglings impress. How lucky I was to have you along."
They smiled at him. "I really like my life here, Abba. I love school and I love being in the Mentorship program with the Watch. Springer and Drift are who I want to be," OD said with enthusiasm.
"Yeah. The six of us are going to be in the Watch and do stuff. We like going on beats and helping others. Stopping a fight without violence is the best thing," Pulley said.
"Those two are gold. Listen to them and do what they say. The mechs will always protect you because you're learning. You will be even more awesome some fine orn when you become a Watch officer," Ratchet said as the elevator stopped on their floor. They ambled off following him.
"Its what we want, Abba," OD said. "Do you think we should join the Home Guard, too? It's all good together, the training, right?"
Ratchet grinned. "It is. Most if not all the Watch belong to the regular army or the Guard. If you want to learn from the big mechs, I would agree with that."
"We do," Pulley said as Ratchet rapped on a door.
It opened and they walked in, exclaiming the good health and their own good fortune that the colony could have such occupants as citizens. It would be great fun for everyone.
-0-Femmes here and there
Elita, Jetta, Jessine and her friend, Sil reached the mall then the two tiny femmes hopped out of the bed of Jetta's truck format. The two adults then transformed, grinning at the girls as all of them put elf and Santa hats on their helms. They walked to the huge street side doors, entered the enthusiastic place, then walked to the metro station nearby. Down they went, then over to the corridor nearby that led to the armory, hub and depot below The Mall at Tyger Pax.
It was filled with 'rough cobs', that is, mechs who were gnarly, tough, rough and ready, with little exposure to the 'finer things in life'. They were bachelors, dudes in relationships just this short of the harness, most of them and they came here to have a beer and the sumptuous supplied buffet meal all of these areas catered toda, a game or two and hang out on this, an off duty holiday for most of them.
Elita and Jetta walked in ahead of the two little femmes and caught the full blast of their slag, insults, laughter, shouts to join them, rude remarks and other things that people who know each other very well and work in dangerous professions reserve for each other. All of them were friends, most of them very veteran and all of them cared about each other. That didn't mean they couldn't pitch slag.
"Well, isn't this just like home with Ma and Pa," Elita said with a chuckle as Jetta heaved the bag onto a table. That was when the laughing crowd noticed two very small, very awestruck sub adult femme-lets standing behind them in little green hats. It went silent immediately.
"Well, you do have some refinement after all," Jetta said as he chuckled.
The mechs grinned as they stared at the girls. "Who are the little ladies, Jetta? I didn't know you and Elita had kids," a huge mech, a Wrecker said with a grin.
"We should be so lucky," Elita said as she looked at the little girls. "This is Jessine of Capital City and this is Sil of Tarn. They want to be Watch officers some fine orn and they're going to do it, too. Even the Home Guard."
The mechs stared at the two girls who looked at them like they were gods from Olympus. The big gnarly mech grinned. "If I knew that the Watch was so cute I might have to break a few laws."
Huge slag greeted that, then it silenced again. Elita grinned at Jetta who leaned against the table with a smirk. She turned to the little girls. "How about I read names and you hand things out?"
"We would do that, Abba," Jessine said with enthusiasm. "Sil, you help us." She looked at the big mechs. "Sil likes what I do. She wants to join the Watch, too. We want to help our people."
Everyone in the room had done 'the automatic', that is, they had read the girl's tats and knew they were high caste. Their frames and paint schemes had made that clear from the start. Yet, they were here trying to help The People. It was an amazing thing.
"Well," Sandstorm said as he sat at a table with a card game, "that's about as good as it gets. You and Sil are welcome here, infants. Do you know Gypsy?"
"We do," Jessine said. "There's a lot of amazing femmes in the services and Watch. Gypsy is so nice. She tells us things, too."
"Did she tell you she was a Wrecker medic?" Sandstorm said proudly. "Our medic."
Mechs around the room, Wreckers all nodded in agreement.
"She did. I saw her tattoo. It's awesome. I want the Mentorship program from the Watch to have tattoos. I want everyone to see me have one. They'll know we can help them, too."
The mechs stared at the little femmes, both almost painfully earnest and sincere, then Jetta and Elita who looked as proud of them as genitors.
Sandstorm grinned. "How is it that I've never met a femme yet that wasn't the greatest?"
Laughter filled the room as the two little femmes did the Cybertronian version of blushes. Being here with these mechs, types of which they had never experienced before was exhilarating in a way neither had felt before getting into the Watch. Life had become filled with colors and sights, a realness none knew even existed before.
"This is for you, Sandy," Jetta said as he pulled a bottle in a bag out of the sack he had carried. Bottles of high grade with bags of candy were the gifts. He would hand them to the femmes and with Elita directing them to the right mech, they spent a bunch of time delivering gifts and chatting together. The little femmes would ask a million questions and the big mechs would explain to them what they wanted to know.
It would be AWESOME!
When they left to get their next bag and location, the femmes would be floating on air, Sil would be a member of the Watch Mentorship program, sending her application when she got home that night, Springer would get a request to design a tattoo for the kids and their program and the mechs would be happy to spend a few moments with genuine sweetness.
Win-win.
No one got coal in their stockings this time.
-0-Meanwhile, back at the Intermediate School
They handed gifts to the children waiting, laughing and chatting with kids who found them amazing. Their tattoos were much commented upon, the 'rumor' that you could be part of the Watch discussed and whispered confessions that some of them were 'no longer … you know … drawing on things' exchanged. The line walked off as the Level 2's finished up. Level 1's were coming.
Springer sat back with a grin. "Jetta sent a request from Jessine that the kids requested to have their own tattoo. Jessine wants everyone to see it so if they need help they can get it from them."
Drift grinned. "Those kids are amazing."
"They are. I'll get Sunny to design one. Where is he anyway?" Springer asked.
"He's with Blackjack and Alor. Sideswipe went with Sun and Hardie," Drift replied. "Send him the message. Something tells me the sooner the better on this request."
Springer laughed. "I agree. I wonder what their genitors will think when they see them?"
"We'll find out," Drift said as lines of Level 1's began to show up, their happiness off the scale with delight.
It would match the adults crowding the room including the Santa team.
-0-Blackjack, Alor and Sunstreaker
They walked into the stables to hand out treats prepared by The Feed Store in Iacon. It was a huge facility that had a store front that 'sold' food for all the animals in the colony including their toys and much requested tack and 'clothes, Ada. Tippy might get cold'.
Like that.
They manufactured all the feed and medicine that all the animals both working and companion needed in their state-of-the-art facility. Pallets of 'fruit mashups' … all manner of fruit and small pellet hay formed into lumps with a sweet tasting 'apple' flavored goo filled big bins and was ready to hand over to the horses in the barn by hanging them on a hook. The rest would be delivered to the many feed stations in the 250 square miles of 'pasture land' fenced in for the big animals to run. Seldom were they more than ten miles from the stable at any one time, tough they could be.
The horses peered out of their stalls, those that were used by the Night and Day Watch. They were kept close to utilize, then alternated with others so they could have some free time running madly with the herds. Patting noses and necks, the three hung up the big treats on hooks by the door and watched as the horses began to devour them. Onward they went, then joined the trucks at the fence loaded down ready to go into the pastures to find the animals for their treats.
Sunstreaker grinned, then glanced at Alor and Blackjack who were in a paddock petting a small group of Shetland-type ponies and small horses that were boarded here by those who asked for a 'child horse' for their kids. They were MUCHO popular and some of them ate more than they needed from treats that people brought here when they visited. They got their treats today, too.
Miniature anythings were always popular. Ask Cliffjumper. Uh, wait …
"Springer let me know that the kids want a tattoo for the Watch Mentor program. They want everyone to know that they can help them if they need someone," Sunstreaker said.
"Those kids are rising in my estimation every orn. What a nice group. Maybe mixing everyone together is a good thing. I do remember they were a terrible group when they came. I wonder what their genitors will think about that kind of tattoo?" Alor said with a grin.
"We'll see," Sunstreaker said as they walked into through the gate into the fence after the flatbeds. They transformed and followed them, heading for the herds found here and there by GPS locator on their bodies. It would be a great ramble around the fields.
-0-TBC 1-11-19 edited 1-17-19