The Diego Diaries: Moving Forward (dd7 30)
=0=Later that next morning
They sat together eating breakfast when Ironhide and Ratchet sauntered in minus everyone else. Vehicles of all descriptions carried the imps onward and they were grabbing a bite before going to work themselves. That Ratchet wanted the straight up gossip from Springer was beside the point. They found a booth in the midst of the mob which included the genitors and family members of the kids, then ordered.
Ratchet grinned. "You do remember that Festival is in 12 orns?"
Everyone nodded.
"The light poles have been decked out for a while," Drift said. "The usual frivolity is on?"
Ratchet nodded, then looked at the newbies. "I see you survived."
They nodded, some of them with tension. After all, this was the mech who thought along with the rest that they were bad genitors. Maybe they were on this issue but pride was pride.
Ratchet glanced at Springer. "I see you got some slag handed to you. Anything that needs a tune up?"
"Who, me?" Springer asked as a number of individuals snickered. "I'd heartily recommend court this morning. It should be a train wreck."
Ratchet grinned as their food arrived. "I was told last night that Sam and Carly are getting ready to tie the knot and Carly wants James and Jessie to make it a double."
"What's a double?" Sandstorm asked as he sipped his cup of something or other.
"Wedding. Bonding ceremony. They want Prime to officiate, naturally and the parties to be hearty everywhere. I think they want me to go with them on a chiverie all over the colony, too." Ratchet smiled. "That should be interesting taking Mama along on the honeymoon."
Guffaws commenced after the internet links closed, then Sandy grinned at him. "It might not be a bad thing. You have, what … 800 kids?"
Snickers and preening of the Ironhide variety greeted that.
Ratchet grinned. "There is that."
"When is this supposed to happen?" Kup asked. He liked all of them but Sam was considered to be a little squirrelly if not ultra loyal to the bots. That made him aces with them anyway, AllSpark and all, all but the twins. That was still a work in progress.
"Wasn't Witwicky doing time with that Banes femme? That pretty one?" someone in the back asked.
Ratchet glanced around them then grinned at Bumblebee who grinned back. "You tell me, shorty."
Bumblebee arose, bounced on his peds like a boxer, then sat. "Who ya calling shortie?"
"Everyone shorter than me. What do you know and when does this train wreck start? By the way, what's the word on Mikaela? I heard she had a nice soldier from NEST who's from the Netherlands," Ratchet asked as he smiled a dazzler at everyone there. "I ask because I know ya wanna, cry babies."
Huge laughter and some agreement ensued. The civilians were more relaxed than they probably felt they should be but the crack here was funny. How long this feeling would last was debatable but for now, all of the bots here were good company.
"I don't know because Sam and I've been busy," Bee began.
"Fragging First Aid?" someone in the middle asked.
First Aid glanced around. "Jealous, much?" he asked. It surprised him how much agreement there was to that remark. He didn't know whether to be proud or jealous himself.
Bee smirked, flexed his chassis and got handed his helm.
"I suppose you want me to tell ya when I do," Bee said.
"I already have texts in to everyone. You slaggers, all of you … you aren't fast enough," Ratchet said as everyone laughed.
"Where ya goin', Ironhide?" Hercy asked as he grinned at Ratchet.
"Cybertron. I'm going to inspect armories and depots with Appa Raptor," Ironhide replied.
"What's the word on his projects? Who is it? Rockwell, Pico and Carbide is it?" Hercy asked …
A few orns before in the middle of nowhere waiting for the shuttle to be refueled ...
"Carbide, I want to know your genuine feelings and ideas. I don't want you to tell me slag. My slag meter is lightning fast and it'd frag me off if you aren't honest," Raptor said.
They were sitting on crates at a depot after tramping here and there all morning.
Carbide looked at him, then around. "This is unbearable."
"It is. What does it mean to you about how it happened?" Raptor asked. "You do understand the way this worked out, right? Truthfully?"
Carbide stared at the ground a moment, then looked at Raptor. "I don't know. I don't feel anything at the moment but unbearable sadness. It's unbelievable that our home world should be this way. I know what you want me to say," he said, then Raptor cut him off.
"One of my pet peeves about our former caste was the lies and sniffing around. Everyone was sniffing around so much trying to find the angle, the right way to say what they thought someone more powerful wanted them to say that it was disgusting. Was there ever a high caste slagger out there who every said anything they ever meant? Tell me what you feel about this. I know you don't like it. I want your honest assessment about why this happened," Raptor said.
Carbide sat straighter. "I … I know The System didn't allow everyone a good life. There. I said it."
"Megatron was inevitable. He was born into the same crap as Prime and the others but he didn't find a way to make it better. He just exploited what the high caste system created and took it to the inevitable conclusion. I still know slaggers who won't acknowledge that. Maybe they need to crawl into bomb craters and carry out arms and legs of children and babies. Maybe that would shake some sense into them."
Carbide flinched at the memories, then smirked slightly. "I don't know what it'll take to shake Rockwell. He's so up his own aft." His smirk faded then he glanced around. "Look at this place. It was never that great to start with but look at it now."
They were in a warehouse district that was cratered as far as the optic could see. Crews were working on filling in the area because all of the ordinance exploded or not was finally carted away. The shacks of the locals had been replaced by a tent city nearby but they were still here waiting to be removed as well. "How can anyone live like that and not die?"
"Let's go see," Raptor said as he stood. He began to walk to a series of hovels nearby as Carbide watched him.
He sat a moment, then wearily rose to follow.
"It was terrible, the fighting when it came here. This was a major supply junction and thus the cratering of bombs falling," Raptor said as they stepped around most. They reached the hovel and paused as Raptor stared inside. "What a sad tale for all of us." He glanced at Carbide. "Take a peek and imagine living like this since The Fall."
Carbide hesitated, then peered inside the inadequate cobbled together shelter of metal sheeting, the odd weld and little more. There were discarded rugs and a few soft things that must have been beds but there was nothing else to make it even slightly palatable for a home. It was almost nauseating in its horribleness. He glanced at Raptor. "I never knew this existed before the war. I never saw it. I lived in my cocoon and did my job. I heard about this but I wasn't going to see it, You know?" he asked, then he sagged slightly. "Of course you know."
"What do you feel, Carbide? Tell me," Raptor said.
Carbide stared at the ground, then the dark sky overhead, a sky filled with the lights of ships going here and there. "I hate this so much I could die."
"Imagine how they must have, those who lived here," Raptor said. They stared at the hovel, then Raptor slapped Carbide on the shoulder. "Come on. Let's go. We have to help now, all of us. No one is left out, no one is left behind. Until all are one," he said as he stepped out to go back across the pockmarked landscape.
Carbide stared at him with a terrible sense of defeat, then began to walk across the desolation, too.
Back in the here and now …
"If anyone gets a chance, its with us," Ironhide said proudly. "My elders are relentless. They never give up until you get it."
"What's your excuse then?" Springer said with a grin.
Laughter filled the room.
Ironhide smirked at Springer, then he glanced at Drift. "Tell him I don't have to have a reason to invoke."
Everyone took a moment to let the willies pass through them as Springer sat slightly straighter in his chair. "You won't. You can't. Right?"
Ironhide grinned. "I can. I might. I have spoken."
HUGE laughter greeted that as Ratchet watched the civilians out of the corner of his optic. Some of them smirked slightly, a few laughed and nodded, some just watched with curiosity and slight knee jerk offense. Not bad. He'd have to get the details from The Boss. Springer would give him the edited version that made him look less clobbered.
He read the police reports every day. Ratchet was a good mom.
Chat continued, then Ratchet paused to take a message. "Hardie releases the kids. Everyone is at square one again."
Relief flooded the room as the breakfast wound down. The civilians excused themselves, then walked out as the soldiers watched them go.
Ratchet glanced at Springer. "How do you think this went and will go in the long run."
"Good, hopefully," Springer replied as the soldiers and Watch nodded. "We can always do this again. Right?"
Ratchet laughed. "YOU'RE ASKING ME!? We settled slag with a fist and a iron bar in an alley. All this lawyering slag would never fly there."
"I hear ya," Drift said. "We used guns in Kaon just so you know."
"So you're confessing?" Springer said as he leaned into Drift's shoulder.
"Whatever you want," Drift said to mockery everywhere.
=0=Later that morning
Ratchet walked into the Ops Center with a report on the migration's medical details thus far. He handed it to Hal-3, or 'Halley', Prowl's records and data assistant who was getting things at the desk at the moment before heading out to the office again to make him look good. He sat and put up his big old peds.
"What's the word on the shift last night?" Prowl asked. "I heard there was a brawl at a club in the Crater District."
"There was. Drift and Springer along with a chair made a new window in it bodily, then there was the brawl that followed, a head butt at the jail intake and breakfast at The Diner this morning. The group looked like they had a good time, though seeing Springer laid out is rather amusing in and of itself," Ratchet said.
"You're his ada," Prowl said with a smirk. "He's your son. Remember?"
"That's true but it can't be helped that he's impossibly sexy," Ratchet said. "I'm old but I'm not dead."
Prowl snorted. He grinned then shook his helm. "I concede nothing to the former Mrs. Optimus Prime. I wish I'd been there with a camera."
"There's the security cameras. Tell me you don't know how to hack them, *cop*," Ratchet said.
The door opened and Prime walked out to sit at the table to go over a detail or ten with Prowl. "What am I missing?"
"The Most Excellent Adventures of Springer and Drift," Ratchet said. "They had a ripping night of it."
"Yes, but then consider their mother," Prowl said. "What mama considered any one of their children 'impossibly sexy'?"
Prime grinned, then glanced at Ratchet. "Do you consider Springer that way?"
Ratchet shrugged. "As I told your ball and chain, I'm old but I'm not dead."
"I am as well. Springer is a bit on that side of things," Prime said as he began to record the change of Prowl's smug smirk to something quite less.
Prowl glanced sharply at Prime. "You think Springer is sexy?"
Prime shrugged. "He is rather attractive. So is Drift. I find it hard to fault our people in the looks department, Prowl."
"Do. Fault them. All of them but me." He shot nuclear optics at Ratchet who was lounging in a chair with a big smile. "You. It's always you. You've contaminated the First Disciple of Primus before Festival."
"ME! ME!ME!ME! Its always me and aren't you glad, you corseted slagger, you," Ratchet said as he rose to leave. "Bye-bye." He swished toward the door and disappeared to the greater world beyond.
Prowl and Prime watched him go, then glanced at each other. Prowl frowned. "Your tastes need elevating in some quarters."
Prime grinned. "If you say so."
They'd spend time discussing things, then amble out for lunch together. It would be a much more mellow orn than the last few, though Prowl would still be slightly put out over Springer in spite of himself.
Springer wouldn't have a clue.
=0=TBC 7-4-19
Esl
The Irish call good conversation 'crack'. So do others in the British Isles.