NOTE: The story line in order from Transformers: Prime won't be going on here. I can't make the story I'm writing fit the sequence of TFP so I'm going to use the episodes out of order to fit the story. I'll make sure it makes sense but if you see things happening later rather than earlier, you'll know why. HUGS, all of you. :D
-0-Onward
What Makes No Difference Is no Difference (WMNDIND 4)
-0-Later that day
Ratchet worked quietly at the computer station in the main room. Behind him, he could hear bots walking past, their voices a welcome relief from the constant din of English, a language that was difficult but not impossible for them to formulate. The sound of Cybertronian language and their many dialects was like being home if he didn't look up to see the earthen walls of their underground base.
A huge Autobrand on the floor was placed there as a balm to his own longing. Their home world almost seemed like a bad joke told to him long ago by a parent who wanted his rootlessness to have meaning. There were times he almost considered it a ghost concocted by someone to tease them than a real place he had once lived. A heavy tread caught him from his thoughts. He tensed, then willed himself to relax. A big servo touched his shoulder, then withdrew.
Ironhide stood beside him looking at the screen. "Anything out there?"
"Not much," he replied. "Megatron has his ship shielded. It could be overhead but we wouldn't know."
Ironhide nodded. "Weird equipment. You made do I see."
"I do what I can," Ratchet replied quietly.
It was silent a moment, then Ironhide spoke softly in his own dialect, one Ratchet loved. "I moved into your quarters."
Ratchet glanced sharply at him. "You never asked."
"I wasn't aware that I had to," he replied. He braced himself for the arguments, determined to win this discussion as he always did. They didn't come.
Ratchet looked at the screen again, his posture showing resignation. "It won't help to argue. You always prevail."
"I wasn't aware that you viewed it that way, Ratchet," Ironhide said softly.
Ratchet didn't reply. He kept his gaze firmly on the screen, his servos on the keypads. He willed himself to stay strong in the intensity of Ironhide. "You should do what you want."
"I would like for you to want it, too, Ratchet," Ironhide said. He shook his helm. "I've missed you forever."
Ratchet wavered a moment, then glanced up at Ironhide. The bot towered over him, his bulk reminiscent of Optimus when he stood nearby. "I am sorry."
Ironhide looked at him measuring his expression, his energy, his posture. They were experts of their own nuance, each knowing from every small gesture and inflected word what the other was feeling, thinking or going to do. There was a cloud here now, one of a deep pain that never went away. He could see Ratchet through the gauze of it and missed him. So close, so far away. "I know. You know that I feel the same for you."
Ratchet looked back to the screen. "This isn't the place to talk."
"Then pick one and I'll be there," Ironhide said leaning closer to emphasize his intentions.
A light flashed, then a Decepticon signal appeared on the screen. "We have a flight. Everyone needs to come inside," Ratchet said. "They fly over looking for us. We're concerned they may narrow it down and discover the base."
Ironhide nodded, then glanced at the elevator. Walking to it, he entered and disappeared.
As he did, Ratchet noticed Miko looking at him with her arms crossed. That was never a good thing. It was a tell. It gave him a clue of her resolve to pursuit a point. He looked away watching as the bogies numbering five came ever closer. Before Miko could speak, the elevator opened and bots began to step out.
Bumblebee with Jazz, Wheeljack, Arcee and Bulkhead congregated, then turned to Ratchet. "What's up?" Wheeljack asked.
"We have a flyover," Ratchet said as Springer and Drift walked in from the rest of the installation. "When they pass, we can be topside.
"Why don't we blast them?" Drift asked.
"They'll have evidence that we're from around here," Ratchet said. "We'd do their job for them."
They stood quietly together a moment watching the screen. The flight flew over their base and continued onward.
Jazz walked up to stand beside Ratchet. "These fraggers have to learn their manners."
Ratchet looked at him and nodded. "I agree but not in our own backyard. Prime has a standing order. If they come our way, we go to ground."
"Some day, we slag them," Jazz replied with an uncharacteristically cold expression on his handsome face.
"You and me both," Ratchet said softly.
The signals disappeared from the screen.
-0-Later that day
"There's something between Ratchet and Ironhide and it isn't good," Miko said to Jack as they sat together on the couch playing video games. Raf sat nearby engrossed in home work.
"There may be but it isn't our business," Jack said.
She put down her control and rose to stretch. "I'm going to find out."
"Miko!"
She looked at him. "What?"
"Maybe its something terrible from the war. Maybe it'll bring back terrible memories. Leave it alone," Jack said with a frown.
"I won't ask them, dummy. I'll ask Bulkhead." With that, she hurried for the stairs. She took them swiftly and ran for the corridor that led into the base interior.
Jack watched her, then put down his game control, racing to follow her inside.
Raf didn't notice either leave.
-0-Inside
She paused at the doorway of the room where the bots usually energized. The room was stacked floor to ceiling several cubes deep and from wall to wall along the back with the shimmering blue bricks. Sitting at a huge table laughing and talking, Wheeljack, Bulkhead, Springer and Drift congregated. Bumblebee who was walking from a dispenser with a small cube in his servo sat in an empty chair. They must have given him guff because he flared up comically and punched Bulkhead in the arm.
For a moment they chuckled, then Wheeljack turned in his chair to look down. "We have company," he said in English, his silky voice almost a purr. He grinned as he glanced at the others. "Miko likes to hang out. She's a good listener."
The others nodded as Bulkhead reached down. She climbed on board and jumped down onto the tabletop to find a spot to sit on a box of ammo on the table. "Thanks, Bulk. I wanted to ask you all something."
Jack who was standing by the door blanched, then stepped forward. "Miko!"
They all looked down again.
"More of them," Drift said with a slight smirk.
"The place is crawling with them. You would think they owned the planet," Springer said with a grin.
"Miko, you need to think," Jack said.
"What, me think? Where's the fun in that?" she asked with a grin.
"What do you want to know, Miko?" Bulkhead asked.
"I want to know about Ironhide and Ratchet," she said.
The mellow tone of the room dropped as the bots sat back in their chairs, their smiles fading.
Bulkhead looked at her with alarm. "Miko, we don't do that. It's not considered polite and Cybertronians don't gossip."
Wheeljack looked at Bulkhead with a slight smirk.
Bulkhead looked at him, then grinned. "Much anyway."
Jack stepped closer. "Good. See, Miko? Now come on."
"I want to know. We're part of the team and anything that affects the team is good to know," Miko said. She crossed her arms. "Either we're a team or we aren't, Bulk. I want to know why Ratchet is so upset around Ironhide."
They sat in silence staring at her, then each other. As they did, Jack felt his insides turn over. This could be a huge taboo she was challenging.
Springer leaned forward on his elbows. "We don't tell the deep important stuff like this. Its considered impolite. It's also a way to undermine the cohesiveness and unity of our group if we gossip about each other. I don't know how you do things, little girl, but we can't tell you without the permission of Ironhide or Ratchet and they won't give it or they would've told you themselves."
Miko looked at Springer levelly, then nodded. "Okay." For a moment it was just silent, then Miko stood up. "I'll ask them." She walked to Bulkhead and waited.
He held out his servo and the little girl climbed on board. He paused his servo before his face. "Miko, you better leave things alone. This is our way. If you respect us and me, you'll do what I ask."
She looked at him, then leaned out to grip his face with both arms. Hugging him, pressing her own against him, she stepped back. "You know I love you, Bulkhead."
He nodded. "And?"
"I won't ask," Miko said.
Bulkhead smiled. "That's my girl." He lowered her to the floor and watched as she walked to the door, then paused. Looking back, she grinned. "For now." Then she walked out with a flustered Jack in hot pursuit.
The bots looked at the door, then Bulkhead. He vented a sigh. "She's a hard aft."
"So she is," Springer said with a grin. "I like her. Femme has bearings."
"She does. Too many," Wheeljack said shaking his helm. "She can fight with the best of them. She took out Hardshell."
They looked at Wheeljack for a moment, then Bulkhead who nodded. "She did."
Sitting back, they considered that, the nemesis bot of the Wreckers falling to a little organic girl.
Springer shook his helm. "This is one strange organic species."
"Tell me about it," Bulkhead said proudly.
-0-In the corridor
"You heard them, Miko. They have their ways and you're stepping on them." Jack looked at her with exasperation.
She looked back just as intensely. "You want to ask them, too."
"I would if it didn't violate some sort of rule," Jack said. "You heard them."
"I did," Miko said crossing her arms. "For now."
Jack shook his head. "Promise me when you decide to do it I won't be around. I feel like asking would be to lose their respect, Miko."
She considered that, then shrugged. "Alright."
Jack looking intensely relieved walked toward the great room and the others.
Miko watched him go with a cloud of aggravation around her. She considered him, then relaxed. "For now, Jack," she said as she began to follow him.
-0-Out in the void of space
The transport ship flew through space heading for their destination on a programmed setting. Most of the crew was in stasis or part of the skeleton shift that flew her. In the hold were a number of important things including an Autobot youngster who'd been captured trying to defend the Hall of Records on Cybertron.
He hung quietly in his energon chains, faking lack of sentience. He was waiting for an opportunity. He wouldn't have to wait long.
Moments later with a bit of luck for him and none for the guard walking past ...
Running down the hold heading for an escape pod, Smokescreen hugged the shadows. His guards were looking for him but they wouldn't get him back. He entered an escape pod and buckled in, the vehicle starting up as the hatch sealed. It launched, a hard jolting event and fell into darkness right away. As it kicked in and began to fly away, the mechanism that kept occupants in good condition for long deep space flights kicked in and he fell into stasis. He would remain there until a ship commanded by Megatron picked him up on sensors and guided him in.
It would be a hard landing on the organic surface of Earth.
-0-TBC 04-18-2013 01-23-2021
