ROH Chapter 8
"Why you slagging little glitched out, virus plagued fragger!" Ratchet was steaming. That pit spawned junkyard operator had gotten the best of him AGAIN!
"Yeah,
yeah, yeah. You're pissed, and I'm insane. Can you PLEASE tell me
something I DON'T know?" Daniel asked with absolute sincerity.
Of course, this only made Ratchet madder, and everyone else laugh harder.
"Ah well. Back to work." Daniel stated very nonchalantly as he turned and went to his workbench, completely ignoring the enraged medic.
Ratchet was fuming. How the pit can he just irritate someone like that and then just totally ignore them? Primus! He's as bad as the twins are, and there's only ONE of him!
Daniel pulled over one of the plasma cannons that they had stripped from Blackout's carcass and began to examine it. He then reached over and grabbed a container of energon that had been generated by Bonecrusher's spark. Having spotted the power connections and mounting brackets while dismantling the Decepticons had given him an idea. Now, Daniel wanted to find out if he could make it happen.
Daniel was examining the cannon, looking for some type of firing control when something hit the back of his head with a fair amount of force.
The impact had enough force behind it to knock his head forward and make him see stars for a few seconds. When he recovered he looked around to see what had hit him, he spotted a box of Kleenex tissues on the ground, one side caved in from hitting his hard head.
Daniel turned around slowly. There was a deadly purpose to his movement now. For some people it might have been like watching the one of the main gun turrets of a battleship being brought to bear.
Daniel looked around at the people and mechs in the room.
"Who threw that?" Daniel said in a near growl pointing at the crumpled box of tissues.
Several people and a couple of mechs instantly pointed at Ratchet, who was still seething inside. Daniel nodded his head and turned around to his workbench. He snapped out a hand, grabbed a two-pound sledgehammer off the workbench, and turned back to Ratchet.
"OK, you wanna throw something besides words. All bets are off." Daniel growled as he started towards the still pissed off medic.
"Oh SLAG!" Barricade said as he took several steps back. He could feel the psychotic rage boiling off his new spark brother, and he did NOT like the intensity of that rage.
"You aren't supposed to use those against us remember?" Ratchet demanded as he realized that he might have gone too far. Ratchet had thrown the tissue box because it was the only non-lethal implement that he could find. Had he known it would generate a murderous rage he might have reconsidered!
"Nope! Boss told me not to START anything. I didn't. YOU DID!" Daniel growled in reply.
Seeing that the irate salvage operator was still stalking towards him obviously intent on doing some major bodily harm, Ratchet threw a second box of tissues. This box hit the man square in the face.
Daniel was stunned for just a few seconds, as something snapped inside his head. Then the sledgehammer dropped from apparently nerveless fingers, as a totally blank expression took over Daniel's features.
Barricade began stumbling backwards as he stared at the human with horror written all over his features.
"SLAG! That glitch just shut down his logic processors!" Barricade said just before he fell on his aft clutching his head.
At that comment, Maigan looked at her uncle closely, noting his lack of expression, and everything else about him.
"Oh SHIT! Optimus grab him! He's gone berserk!" Maigan shouted.
Optimus hesitated for just a second, before reaching out and wrapping his hand around the salvage operator, holding him tightly but carefully nonetheless.
Hearing the tone of alarm in Maigan's voice Ratchet scanned the salvage operator, and found that the adrenal system was flooding the man's blood stream with far more nuero-muscular stimulants, than it would normally receive in a 48-hour period! Worse, those glands showed no signs of slowing their production rate. Ratchet continued to scan the human in horror as his heart rate doubled, and his blood pressure tripled. Respiration was deep and steady, so the overall result was that the muscles of his body were pumped full of oxygenated blood and massive amounts of adrenalin, effectively quadrupling the man's strength, and rendering him totally unable to feel and injury that might be done to him in the next few minutes!
"Primus! Can all humans do that?!" Ratchet demanded from Maigan.
"No. Actually very few people have a berserker rage, Thank God. But he's told me what happens to him, and it only happens when someone physically hurts him, and not always then. The only way to calm him down is for you to leave the room or Optimus to take him out of here for a while." Maigan said worriedly.
"How will I know when he has calmed down enough to safely release him?" Optimus asked her.
"That's easy. Just wait until he tells you to let him go." Maigan replied.
"And you expect us to trust his word on that?" Ratchet demanded.
Maigan nodded her head.
"If he has enough of his brains back to be able to talk, then he's got too much sense in his head to be going off like that. As scary as that berserker rage is to us, it scares him even more because he knows what he is capable of doing while he's like that, and he doesn't really know or care who gets hurt while he's going after someone that way." Maigan explained.
The subject of this conversation was silent the entire time, the only sign that he had not calmed down was his obvious struggles to get loose from the grip that Optimus had on him. Everyone couldn't help but notice though that the salvage operator had managed to get his arms loose and was straining against the index finger of the hand that held him.
Optimus noticed that amount of sheer power that was being applied to his finger; he locked his joints to prevent himself from accidentally crushing the man if his strength suddenly gave out.
Ratchet scanned the enraged human again, what he found during that scan really disturbed him. That man was exerting far more pressure against Prime's finger than he should be able to. Ratchet began to worry that he might cause further damage to the already damaged shoulder muscles and ligaments.
"Optimus, would you mind getting him out of here to see if Maigan's suggestion will work to calm him down. He's likely to pop his arms out of their sockets if he keeps on struggling that way." Ratchet said irritably as he glared at the object of his frustration.
Optimus nodded and began walking out of the room. Maigan ran over to the workbench and grabbed her uncle's cigarettes and lighter, before following the Autobot leader.
Barricade was still sitting on the floor holding his head, as Ratchet walked over to scan him.
"There's, there's no slagging way ANYONE can get that fragged off! There's just no way!" Barricade was saying.
The black and white mech had been stunned by the sheer animalistic intensity of the cold boiling rage that he'd felt from his human spark brother. Even his own anger was mere irritation by comparison.
"SLAGGING PITS OF THE MATRIX!" Ratchet bellowed in surprise. "Just how fragged off IS he?"
Ratchet grabbed Barricade and quickly hauled him back onto the platform where he'd been worked on.
"Quit struggling you slagger. He nearly fried half of your emotion processors!" Ratchet told the former Decepticon.
Ratchet quickly took Barricade off line and opened his cranial casing. Once inside Ratchet saw that while there was no actual damage to the emotional processors; the black and white mech would need the installation of an additional cooling system to prevent damage from the strong emotions that his human spark brother produced.
Ratchet wasn't sure just how to make certain that those particular processors would stay cool enough to prevent the damage that would occur if that slagging salvage operator got that mad again. He'd been about to leave the former Decepticon offline for a while until he could figure something out, when Sam and Michaela came over offering to help.
"These chips need to be kept cool without over cooling the rest of his systems." Ratchet explained.
"Why not just install cooling fans on 'em like we do for the main processors in our computers?" Sam asked not sure if it would work.
Ratchet quickly hit the web to see what Sam was referring to.
"Hmmm, that should work. Do we have any of those components here?" Ratchet replied.
"Glen might have 'em." Sam piped up quickly. "He's been upgrading all of the computers in this place since he got here." He continued.
"You mean that kid you came in with? I'll get him for you." Agent Simmons interjected pulling out his cell phone.
Less then five minutes later, Glen came in from a side entrance that led past the Starbucks break room. He was packing a small toolbox in the fingers of one hand while using it to support a medium sized box of computer parts in both hands.
Sam went over and took the box of parts from Glen so that he would be able to see while climbing the stairs. Sam had no trouble looking past the box to see the stairs, but Glen's weight would have made such a maneuver impossible.
Once Glen was able to see what they were talking about doing, he quickly pulled out half a dozen heats inks and cooling fans to go with them.
At that point, Ratchet had no problem installing the parts and connecting them.
Maigan was starting to get concerned about her uncle. The man still had not stopped trying to get free from Optimus' grasp. Optimus scanned him again for the fifth time in as many minutes. He may not have had Ratchet's medical knowledge, but his scanners were just as sensitive. He found that the massive adrenaline levels that flooded the human's system were beginning to subside.
"I think he will calm down soon. His body can't fuel this rage for much longer." Optimus told Maigan.
"God I hope so! Just don't turn him loose until you know for sure though, ok?" Maigan said with a worried expression.
"Don't worry. I'm not letting him go until I am certain that he will not try to kill my medical officer." The big mech replied.
Seconds after had Optimus finished speaking, Daniel stopped pushing against his fingers. The salvage operator glanced around as if he were looking for something.
"You can put me down now, Big Rig." Daniel told the big mech.
"Are you going to try to kill my medical officer, again?" Optimus asked not sure about letting the potentially dangerous man go.
"Not unless he throws something else at me. But I do plan to knock him in the head for that second shot that he took at me, and you can either watch it happen now or you can wait until you least expect it. But if I have to sit back and plan it out, it's gonna be a thousand time worse, for HIM!" Daniel stated in a deadly tone.
"I will not allow you to kill or damage my medical officer." Optimus said sternly.
"I have no intention of killing him, but I AM going to put a dent in his head." Daniel shot back.
Optimus made the sound of a sigh as he blew a massive amount of air through his cooling vents. He bent down and set the still angry salvage operator down.
The first thing Daniel did when he was turned loose was look over at his niece and asked her for a smoke. He smiled his thanks when she handed him his instead of one of hers.
Daniel started shaking from the after effects of the adrenaline. It took him a good twenty minutes to stop his muscles from shaking. When he was finally ready, Daniel quietly stalked into the med bay to see Ratchet, Sam, Michaela, and Glen working on Barricade.
Daniel walked over to his workbench and quietly picked up a two-inch socket. Then he walked up behind Ratchet and with perfect aim, threw the socket to hit the CMO square in the back of his head with a resounding clang.
"What the fuck's wrong with him now?" Daniel demanded when Ratchet turned around angrily.
Ratchet growled as he glared down at what was fast becoming the bane of his entire existence.
"That fragging rage of yours nearly burnt out his emotion processors. You rotten slagger!" Ratchet bellowed.
"So what are you doing about it?" Daniel shot back not giving an inch.
Ratchet looked down at Daniel curiously. The human didn't have any other items that could be used as a weapon, but then that didn't seem to faze the strange little man. The medic rubbed the back of his head where the socket had hit him and glared at the human again.
"Glen is installing additional heat sinks and cooling fans to protect Barricade's emotional processors from the strain produced by your glitched out rage." Ratchet growled.
That got the junkyard owners attention. He started over and climbed the stairs onto the platform that the now ex- Decepticon was laying on. He saw that Glen was just closing up the mechs head after installing the cooling units and allowing everything to cool down. The salvage operator glanced at the box of parts that Glen had brought with him and seeing all the top end computer gear, Daniel realized that the guy knew what he was about.
Ratchet reached down and reactivated Barricade. Then he looked down at Daniel.
"I don't care how angry you get you better never throw another thing at me again." The medic growled.
"Hah! You don't have to worry about that because the next time you throw something at me, it had better be nothing but words, or I'll kill ya." Daniel shot back in an amused tone.
"Do you actually think I'll let you get close enough to use that crow bar of yours?" Ratchet demanded.
"Who the hell said that that's the only weapon I have in my arsenal? I got stuff I can use to reduce you to a screaming molten puddle!" Daniel said in deadly quiet tone.
Ratchet knew from the look on the humans face that he wasn't bluffing. The only question was would what the human had in mind work? Given the humans track record so far, Ratchet did not want to risk his life on it. The CMO growled and returned his attention back to Barricade who had heard a good part of the exchange.
"Ok, you two need to interface or kill each other, but either way shut the frag up about it!" Barricade growled.
All of the Autobots present started laughing at that comment, all except Ratchet that is. The medic glared at Barricade, as he went over to the workbench that had been set up for him. Daniel was giving the black and white mech a dirty look that said he was pretty sure he knew what the Decepticon had said, but wasn't willing to bet on it.
Daniel turned to climb down the stairs off the platform when he turned to Barricade.
"If you ever tell me to go fuck somebody again, they'd better be three things. Split tailed, over the age of 18, and decent looking." He whispered to his spark brother as he passed.
Barricade roared with laughter at that comment, while the human kept going. Daniel went to his workbench and grabbed a couple of Java Monsters, before going into the next room to spend some time with Chinook.
The Autobots were standing around discussing the potential of their new engines, when Barricade started getting a strange feeling from his connection with the human. The black and white mech went to check it out. When he got to the doorway of the next room, he stopped. Daniel was sitting in the enclosure with the aged hybrid cradled in his lap. His ever present coffee discarded on the floor. Barricade turned around and went over to Ratchet.
In total silence, Barricade got the medics attention and motioned for him to follow. The medic glared at the Decepticon before he noted the expression in those red optics. Without a word, the medic put down his project and followed Barricade into the next room.
The old hybrid was looking at Daniel as it was struggling for breath. The human was sitting there gently stroking the animals fur and whispering softly to it.
"I'm sorry Buddy. There's nothing I can do." Ratchet heard him say.
A thorough scan revealed that there was nothing Ratchet could do for the animal either. The two mechs stood there silently observing the scene before them. This of course got everyone else's attention.
Daniel was oblivious to anything else around him. His entire concentration at that point was on his friend of nearly seventeen years. He leaned down and kissed the hybrids muzzle. Chinook licked his cheek and whined softly. Then the hybrids body was racked with massive spasms as he fought for breath. The old canine bending nearly double in his efforts to take one more breath. Daniel silently held him the entire time.
Daniel didn't need to be told when it was over. He knew, and he held his friends lifeless body as he thought about what to do next. He gently laid Chinook on the floor and got up. Daniel went over to his wrecker and started pulling out all of the tools in it. He laid every one of them on the floor. Then he went and picked up his friend and loaded him up in the truck for one last ride. Daniel moved the fence panels out of the way, so he could get his wrecker out and then he got in and cranked it up.
Maigan grabbed her uncles cigarettes and lighter along with the two cans of coffee that had been dropped without a second thought.
"Can you give me a ride to follow him?" She asked looking up at several of the mechs. "I'd like to say goodbye too." She said with tears in her eyes.
Without a word the Autobots, and one Decepticon transformed. The humans quickly climbed in, and the strange convoy followed Daniel back to the salvage yard on the outskirts of Mission City.
Daniel didn't know that he was being followed, nor would he have cared if he had known. There were no tears in his eyes as he drove his friend home. He would have welcomed them if there had been. Many times in his life he'd been called cold, callus, and uncaring. This was not quite the truth. The brain damage that he'd received early on in life had destroyed his emotion center in his brain, which meant that he didn't experience emotions the same way that others did. This was one of the times when he really hated what had happened to him.
When Daniel got to the salvage yard, he found a corner of the lot that was fairly empty and parked. Then he got out and went over to a backhoe. Daniel climbed up in the backhoe and cranked it up. Then he set about digging a very large pit.
It took him several hours, but when he was done, the pit was just over ten feet wide, sixteen feet deep, and forty feet long with a slope leading out of it. There was a small nook at the far edge of it. Daniel pulled the backhoe out of the pit and parked it over to the side. Then he got back in his wrecker and pulled into the garage.
The salvage operator shut off the truck and popped the hood. He got out and grabbed an oil pan and crescent wrench before he shoved the pan under the truck. Then he started draining the oil. While the oil was draining, Daniel made quick work of changing out the spark plugs and plug wires. He also changed the oil and fuel filters. Then he re-plugged the oil pan and put fresh oil in to the engine. He topped off the tanks with fresh diesel from a few gas cans and closed them up.
Now Daniel walked through his salvage yard and grabbed a bundle of three-foot long iron bars that were actually one-inch strap iron. Being one inch wide and 3/8 inch thick, they could be bent to hold any shape desired. Daniel took these into his garage and laid them by his welder. Then Daniel went back out into the yard and through the various stacks of scrapped steel, until he found two pieces of four-inch steel girder, one longer than the other. He drug those into the shop and dropped them next to the strap iron. Then he walked over to a wall that had several dozen steel plates leaning against it and selected two of them. The first steel plate was four feet to a side; the other was two feel long and one-foot wide; both were a half-inch thick.
Daniel said not a single word to anyone as he went about doing whatever it was he had planned, and if anyone said something to him, he didn't seem to hear it. Everyone could tell that he was concentrating on what was going on in his head.
Grabbing a pair of angle grinders from among the tools that were scattered everywhere around the shop, he selected one that had a standard grinding wheel on it and another that had a cutting wheel on it.
The salvage operator pulled on his gloves that were lying on top of the welder, but didn't bother with the welding goggles. Then he grabbed the shorter of the two girders and began cutting it in half. Once he did that, he fired up the TIG welder and pulled on the goggles. He wasn't using a tape measure, but then he didn't really need one as he took the two pieces of girder and laid them against the longer one to form the shape of a ten foot cross. Daniel welded the cross together and then welded the smaller plate to the center of it. Daniel then used the welder to write Chinook's name on the center plate in raised letters that were more than half an inch tall. Then he grabbed one of the pieces of strap iron and using the framework of his tool bench, he began bending it. He bent three others to match the first and welded them to the sides of the cross that he'd made. He continued in this fashion until he'd constructed a very ornate iron cross, similar to those made and used by German settlers during the 1800's. The difference was in size. Where the originals were three to four feet tall, this one was ten feet tall. Daniel set the four-foot square plate on the floor of his shop and stood the cross on it. He locked it into place with magnetic clamps and tacked it down with the welder. Removing the clamps, he began to weld the cross down in earnest.
Daniel pulled off the goggles and stepped back to let the cross cool down for a minute before he leaned over and laying it across his shoulder picked up the now three hundred pound monument to his friend. He didn't ask for help, and somehow he didn't seem to need it. Daniel carried the cross to the front edge of the pit that he'd dug and set it down into the nook that he'd put there for that purpose.
Then he grabbed an old wheelbarrow and rolled it into the shop.
Setting the wheelbarrow down Daniel grabbed a bag of cement and tossed it in. He tore the bag open and dumped it. He got a water hose, mixed up the concrete with a beat up shovel, and rolled the wet cement over to the cross. He poured the concrete over the base plate of the cross and tossed the wheelbarrow aside.
Daniel walked back to his wrecker and placed his hand on the driver's door latch. He seemed to be thinking, as if there were something he'd missed. Then with a quick move, he went over and grabbed Chinooks bedding and toys. He put those on the back of the wrecker and got the food and water bowls. Then Daniel got in the truck and cranked it up.
The old wrecker seemed to sound rejuvenated as the engine cranked over. Daniel backed out of the garage and drove the wrecker down into the pit that he'd dug. He sat there a second before he turned off the engine and got out. He moved Chinooks body into the driver seat and placed all the bedding and toys in the back seat; arranging them as if to be used. Then Daniel set out fresh water and food in the seat for his friend.
Daniel unclipped the keys to the wrecker and put them back in the ignition. Then he locked the doors and closed it up. The weight of the world seemed to be on the salvage operator's shoulders as he walked out of that pit and away from the wrecker and his friend. He climbed up in the backhoe and started it up. Turning the seat around, he faced the controls to the large bucket at the other end. Daniel put the backhoe in gear and began to bury both the wrecker and his friend at the same time.
When the massive grave was filled back in Daniel shut down the backhoe and jumped down. He walked over to the cross and laid his hand on it.
"Well Buddy, you gave it one hell of a run. A better friend I couldn't have asked for. I hope this old truck takes your spirit wherever you want to go, because I know that no one will ever bother it again. It's all yours now." Daniel said quietly.
Author's note's.
This chapter is dedicated to the memory of Chinook. 4/18/92 – 9/11/08. Rest in Piece my friend, I hope I'll see you on the other side.
