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Chapter 2
Ratchet eventually found the will to at least look to find where his charge had run off to when the sun rose over the horizon.
Pah, my charge, more like my liability… he thought with a foul look as he stomped towards the thicker grove of trees. As the humans went, Evee was probably the most tolerable…at least she knew when to stay put.
Most of the time.
He wasn't even bothering to watch out for other humans along the way, if they got his mug shot to post all over the Internet then so be it, he really couldn't have cared less. There didn't seem to be any around as he glanced at his feet just in case the girl happened to be lying on the ground somewhere, but it turned out that she wasn't on the ground at all. When he glanced up at the tree line–which was about eye level with him–he saw the child sitting on a thick branch with one knee pulled up to her chest with both arms draped over it while her other leg simply hung carelessly off the side, looking like she was posing for a scene from that 'Tom Sawyer' novel that Jack Darby had once brought to base, all she needed was a straw hat and a piece of wheat in between her teeth and the picture would be complete.
She glanced over at him and gave him a slight smile when he approached but it faded as soon as it appeared.
"And you were in this tree the entire night?" Ratchet asked dryly while arching an optic ridge. Evee shrugged and glanced out to the small forest.
"It was a nice place to stay, and it's got a great view." She replied.
"I don't see anything spectacular about it."
Evee looked back at him when she realized what he was getting at and laughed once, "oh yeah, I guess it isn't really anything new for you."
But Ratchet didn't laugh. She probably didn't expect him to though because she immediately shrugged it off and stood up while keeping one hand on the trunk of the tree.
"But I actually saw a junk yard down that way, maybe we could go there soon?" she asked. Ratchet held out his hand for her to climb in and he set her on the ground.
"Why would you want to go to an unsanitary place like that…" he muttered.
"I have an idea to get in contact with the others, or at least a way to find them." She explained patiently. Ratchet only shook his helm in disgust.
"There is nothing useful at a waste disposal pit."
"Well there is the saying 'one man's trash is another man's treasure.'"
"You humans and your sayings…go there if you wish, but you will be going by yourself."
"Are you sure? Don't you want to know if we can find…"
"No."
He wasn't budging, but Evee assumed that he was still taking what had recently happened pretty hard and she couldn't fault him for that. She herself was still in shock, but the only thing that was keeping her going even now was the hope that she could find the others. She owed it to Ratchet to at least try, even if he wouldn't.
"…Alright, I'll let you know if I come across anything useful or mildly entertaining."
And with that she headed off, past her tree and down a light hill where the a wooden fence could be seen at the bottom, it bordered a large pile of twisted metal remains of vehicles and other lovely things that made the medic want to retch if that were possible. But he didn't turn away despite that. Even if he was not happy about it, he had to keep an eye on her.
He watched her agile form jump the wooden fence and heard a slight crash only indicating that she most likely landed on a pile of scrap metal on the other side, her loud curse shortly following confirmed that theory. A small guffaw wanted to escape his vocal processor but he forced it back even if there would be no one around to hear. Soon he heard the sound of shifting metal crashing against each other was evidential of her moving out of the pile and sure enough she was back in view from within the garbage dump. The medic could only shudder at the thought of all the bacteria she was exposing herself to.
Soon she vanished from sight again for some time. Ratchet soon found himself coming closer to the dump until he was standing at the fence, trying to see if he could catch a glimpse of her again. He only heard the sound of her digging through more metal like some stray Scraplet.
The human can handle herself, what are you even doing here? He mentally scolded himself and was ready to turn around and head back up the hill but stopped when he heard her exclaim:
"Eureka!"
"What in the All-Spark…" the medic muttered and finally stepped over the knee-high fence despite his own protests. He was very careful not to step on any rubbish as he trekked through towards Evee's sounds. There were several piles of scrapped vehicles that stacked up higher than he was; shells, engines, tires and many other parts that would've made any mechanic or grease monkey drool at the sight. He finally spotted the girl sitting on the dusty ground with her back against what looked like the door of an old yellow punch buggy. She was hunched over some make shift device that was obviously created recently by her own hands. Ratchet never admitted it but he was always impressed on how fast the girl could put something useful together with just a few pieces of scrap and no tools. She glanced up at him wearing her usual wired expression she always possessed when she was in 'Cybertronian engineer' mode. It also appeared that she had made transmission fluid and greases a fashion statement because they were all over her face, hands and arms.
"I knew you'd come around! You wouldn't believe the doo-dads that I found from the hot-rodders in this fat city!" she exclaimed while gesturing to the mountains of vehicles around them. Ratchet rolled his eyes; he really hated it when she spoke like a youngster from the 1950s.
"Just tell me what you have decided to build…" he muttered.
"Alright, alright. Do you recall the time, I believe it was maybe four years prior, but when you taught me about spark signatures?" Evee asked eagerly, all but bouncing up in down like she had just solved Archimedes' dilemma with the king's crown–perhaps that explained her shouting Eureka–but Ratchet wasn't quite following where she was going with this.
"Naturally, and?" he asked. All right, he had to admit she had peaked his curiosity, which she was notorious for doing.
"Well I was spitballin' that idea as I was sitting back in that tree, and then it hit me when I was casting an eyeball here."
"Evelyn just tell me in coherent English would you?" Ratchet said while making a human-like gesture of pinching the plating between his eyes like one would do with their nose.
"Sorry, I'll clue you…darn it all…anyways, so I was thinking, every Cybertronian has a different spark pattern just like human finger prints, all of them are a little different," she said, emphasizing 'little' by holding up her right metal hand with her finger and thumb pressed together, "Over time I figured out Team Prime's different spark patterns with a scanner I once made, and maybe if I can construct another one out of these pieces, that's how…"
"…We can find the others." Ratchet finished, finally catching on. Evee beamed, knowing she had fully captured his interest.
"Exactly. I have a pretty good idea how with this car radio here attached to the translator over here," she said, tapping one hand on said device while the other was resting on an old car radio that was sitting on a pile of rags with some of the wires sticking out of the back, indicating that she had most likely ripped it out herself, "it might even help us pick out Decepticons."
"And how would you do that, you don't know a Decepticon's spark signature." Ratchet snorted, aaaaand, grumpy is back Evee thought but wasn't deterred.
"That's the whole idea, if a signature pops up that we don't recognize, we goose it outta here–leave as fast as we can." She said, correcting herself quickly before he most likely threw something heavy or sharp at her, as he would do with any of the Autobots if they pushed him over the edge.
Ratchet grew quiet after her explanation. He wanted to believe that the plan would work, really he did…she had spoken her idea out with so much enthusiasm that it pained him to even think of how she would react if it didn't work.
He was an older bot than most, the oldest on Team Prime and was well known with the risks of hoping in dire situations. He had been to war and returned but the experiences and sights he lived through it would never leave him; the times he had shared the same naïve hope that Evee expressed and seen it extinguish along with the sparks of comrades he had hung those hopes on. He didn't have the courage to tell her the probability of the detector seeking out any of their friends; maybe he was just a soft-sparked old fool.
"Evelyn…how do you know that…" he started with a shaky exhale through his vents but slowly faded to silence like someone had fiddled with an imaginary volume button for his voice. Evee regarded him with a look in her eyes that made him unconsciously shift on his peds. It was a look of an older being, one that had seen many things in their life.
"I don't." she spoke, "but what other choice do we have my friend…"
And those words were all he needed to know. Perhaps she didn't seem as inexperienced in life as he truly believed. With the other children, they always seemed innocent; so blissfully unaware of how harsh the world truly could be, they seemed like normal children with their whole lives ahead of them.
Evelyn was never seen that way. Not to any of them. Despite her childish appearance with a ratty old sleeveless green hoodie, dirty, dusty blue pants and well-worn brown loafers on her feet with the old grey wool hat that she never removed from her head…it wasn't an act to be mature as he had come to believe in the past; it was an act to behave like a light-hearted child in the end. The quirky behavior, singing along to an old radio while she worked, playing video games against Rafael and Bumblebee on rainy days…it was all just a mask, a mask that she had almost perfected over her life. Though Ratchet never really understood the concept of human lifespans, mere flickers compared to his own; he had come to know that Evee's seventy-eight years on the planet was indeed a long time. Sixty-nine of those being on the run only made it seem even longer.
The medic had seen her true personality only for a split second, but it was all he needed to see. She almost reminded him of…Optimus. Both were able to keep things inside as not to burden anyone else with their troubles.
Though she had never really told him the entire story of her past, he did know that it was a dark one that no child should have to go through. Loosing her family after making contact with an essence of the ancient All-Spark; resulting in her extremely slow aging…
"Ratchet are you ok?" Evee asked him, breaking the silence. That was the second time she had asked him that. Ratchet shook the thoughts away and his usual scowl reappeared on his face.
"I am fine Evelyn…if I am feeling unwell that doesn't need to be your concern. He said, but he hesitated before saying that and Evee caught noticed.
"Ratchet…you don't need to get sore in order to hide your feeling from others." She said quietly, "If we're alone, we should be able to tell each other anything on our minds."
"Puh-leeze…" the medic scoffed, "this isn't some human slumber party, this is war, this is real life."
"I wouldn't think less of my friend," The girl said unfazed by his comment and rested a hand on his ankle while looking directly into his eyes, "I want you to know…nothing you say would lower my respect for you. Ever."
Ratchet shut his optics tight and stepped away from her touch. He didn't want to see the look she was giving him. He turned in pace and started heading off in the opposite direction.
"Just…keep working on your project." He almost whispered without looking back.
"Of course Ratchet…I'll tell you if I find anything." She complied softly and didn't speak again as he headed further away.
