A/N:Somehow I managed to upload here the unbetad version. But here's the beta'd version. Thanks Gixxer Pilot. Also thanks for the faves and reviews it got even without being betad. My Ironhide toy nearly shot me when he noticed this.
Ironhide was nowhere to be seen. He hadn't come to the lessons at all which made Ratchet feel very uneasy. He knew that Ironhide had serious trouble at home, but the red youngling never revealed them. That was obvious from all the dents and cracks Ratchet had fixed by now. Sometimes he joked to Ironhide that he should become a field medic instead of researcher since he already had so much experience on that area.
That wasn't important now, but the fact that his friend was missing was. Ratchet accelerated breaking speed limits in the 3rd District. 'Nobody would care anyway,' he thought while passing by various nearly crumbled buildings. The white youngling was right; nobody did care about him speeding in the slums.
Unfortunately he had to detour because there was a gang fight going on in the middle of the road. He cursed the gangs in his mind for many reasons. He didn't want to be caught in cross fire and be deactivated. He could still hear them shooting at each other even though he had put a good distance between them and himself.
A bad thought crossed his mind: 'What if Ironhide was caught in the crossfire and got himself deactivated?' That just couldn't be the case. His friend was more used to this than he himself and knew how to avoid trouble much more better than Ratchet, but still the thought lingered refusing to go away.
He arrived in front of the block he was living, transformed and went in. He hurried the steps up, while several turborats fled from his legs. Those nasty little things were everywhere eating whatever garbage they could find.
Ratchet stopped in front of his door. His systems were heated from all the hurrying, which resulted his intakes to be quick and vocal. He wasn't used to running around like that,but there was really no other way. After his intakes had slowed down a bit he keyed the access code. The gadget kept quiet. The white youngling keyed the code again. Still nothing.
"Not now! You stupid thing," Ratchet cursed, but then he remembered what Ironhide had done when the panel had refused to work properly. He removed the panel carefully from the wall, while trying not to damage it. He pressed the reboot button and put the panel back to its place.
He keyed the access code once again. This time Ratchet was greeted with a familiar beep and the sound of locks opening. It was great he had a friend who knew things like this, which gave the white youngling more reasons to find him.
He stepped inside his home, so he could confirm some things. He searched for his creators that he found from the living room watching some cybersoap which he believed was named The Metallic and the Rusty. The show was immensely popular even though the plot kept revolving around the same things and moved very slowly.
"Mother, Father has Ironhide been here?" Ratchet asked his parents. His father looked at him with questioning facial expression.
"No. Why?"
"Well he wasn't at the lessons today and I don't know where he is. I'm worried about him." The worry for his friend could be heard from his voice clearly.
"Hmmm... That sounds odd."
"I'm going to go look for him. I'll be back before evening," Ratched said, determined.
"Just be careful." Ratchet's mother voiced herself for the first time.
"I will. It's not like I'm going in the middle of a gang war, you know." The youngling smiled at his creators. After saying that he hurried out to search for his friend.
Ironhide had become very important to him lately. He had even trusted him with touching his hands, which was a really big thing for him. He didn't even trust his own creators with touching them, because they always made him hurt unintentionally. He hadn't even realised it until now when Ironhide was missing, how much he actually cared about the red youngling and how important he had become to him.
Ratchet got outside of the block,but he had no idea where to start searching. He started wandering aimlessly around the slums in the hopes of he would find his friend or at least get a clue where to look for. He accidentally happened to stumble upon the block where his friend lived. He had never been to Ironhide's home, but he knew that the red youngling lived there.
Somebody came out of the block. Ratchet could smell the smell of high-grade from miles away reeking from the bot. It was disgusting, but he decided he would ask the bot about Ironhide anyway.
"Excuse me, but have you seen a red bot who has the same basic structure as me named Ironhide. He lives in this block," Ratchet asked the bot.
"There's nobody like that living in here," the bot answered harshly.
"What do you mean? I know my friend lives here," the youngling demanded.
"Because I threw that twat out just yesterday. He was annoying." Ratchet became enraged. The bot he had been speaking to was Ironhide's guardian.
"Now you listen to me! I know you are the one making Ironhide hurt all the time and now you even threw him out! I'm not leaving this thing alone," he yelled at the mech. Then he marched away still feeling mad towards the older bot.
He transformed into his vehicle mode continuing his search. He searched furiously from the various places while being afraid that Ironhide was hurt. Horrible mental pictures of his friend being totally scrapped and leaking energon flashed through his CPU. Ratchet searched through every place he could think of, but didn't find Ironhide anywhere.
He checked the time. It was almost the time the white youngling was supposed to go back home. Rachet sat on a rail in the side of a road while desperation was trying to seize him. He went through all the places in his CPU he had been and had not been, but could not come up with anything new.
'Why Ironhide, why are you doing this to me? Why didn't you come to me? I thought you trusted me, like I trusted you in the hill that one time...' Ratchet kept thinking. 'No wait! That was it! The hill! I haven't looked from there." He decided that he would check the hill before he headed home. It wasn't even far away from the place he was sitting, so it wouldn't take long. He transformed once again and headed for the hill.
On his way there, Ratchet somehow had the feeling he would find his friend from there which raised up his hopes. He was feeling tired from all the running around, but he still managed to find some extra power to speed up his white alternate mode's moving. This was really important to him. Almost as important as his creators or maybe it was as important that was hard to classify in the current state of his mind.
He drove up the hill feeling a bit sluggish while it was getting darker by the moment. Then the white youngling finally reached the top. 'Primus, let him be here and in one piece and that's all I ask for. I think you owe me that much,' he kept thinking while he transformed to his robot mode. He wouldn't have any more power to transform back to his alternate mode. He walked few steps towards the place they had been studying some orns ago.
Ratchet caught a glimpse of red which made his spirits go high up. He was now sure it was Ironhide and despite of his quick intakes and exhaustion he started running towards the place where he saw some of the red armor plating. The white youngling hadn't been wrong; it was Ironhide there, though not in the condition Ratchet had hoped for.
Ironhide was laying in the ground unmoving, optics offlined. 'Don't tell me he's deactivated. This can't be happening to me. It just can't be.' Ratchet knelt beside his friend, white bot ready to cry. He ran his fingers over Ironhide's frame – It was cold and dented. The core temperature of the red youngling must have been really low, but he could hear something through his own vocal breathing. He held his breath for a while.
It was faint, but it definitely was the sound of Ironhide's intakes. "Now what? He's offline and I don't have enough energy to transform. I can't leave him here even for a minute longer or he might freeze into deactivation." Finally Ratchet decided that he would try to carry his friend to home even if it cost his remaining energon. He didn't care as long as he could have Ironhide safe.
He picked up one of Ironhide's arms and pulled him off the ground. Ratchet wasn't exactly very powerful in his current physical state, but he could drag his friend like this back to his place. He started moving slowly towards his home while dragging the dead weight that Ironhide was at the time. Luckily he wasn't smaller than his friend or it would have been even more difficult task to do. He just wished he wouldn't crash into any gang fights and that he would make it before dark.
To be completely honest Ratchet was struggling to carry Ironhide. His energon levels were low. He was really sluggish from all strain, which made him gasp for air to cool his insides. He had to stop on several occasions to catch some breath, but he didn't dare to put his friend down because he was afraid that he wouldn't have the strength to pick him up again. His hands had started hurting from the unsteady grip he had on Ironhide's plating. The white youngling just gritted his dental plates together and kept on going.
Finally he made it back to the block, but it was way beyond the time he usually came home. He dragged the offlined bot up the stairs somehow, if asked afterwards Ratchet probably wouldn't have been able to give a proper answer how. The access panel also decided to co-operate, which made Ratchet sigh in relief. He entered the apartment and headed straight to his room. He was so tired himself that he wanted to jump on the berth and fall into recharge, but instead of that he placed his friend in the berth and covered him with a thermal blanket meant for cold nights.
There were still his creators to take care of. The white youngling headed himself to the kitchen for energon. He drank some to make up for the alerting low energy levels of his, but more important than his own energy levels was getting energon to his creators. Ratchet took two cubes and went to the living room where his creators were watching some cyber contest.
Luckily Ratchet's father could drink the energon without his help, but his mother did not. He had to help his mother to drink the energon which wasn't very pleasant with her trembling and shaking nonstop. After feeding his creators the white youngling helped them for recharge. He walked each one of them for their recharge berth, so they wouldn't fall down and hurt themselves.
When everything was done Ratchet was alone and tired. He felt like he might flop from all the stress he was feeling at the time. The white youngling stood in the middle of their living room looking down at his feet, while worrying about Ironhide. His friend needed to warm up fast or he might be a goner.
He took the lights out before going to recharge. Ratchet decided he could provide Ironhide with extra warmth by recharging next to him. He snuggled next to Ironhide feeling the coldness of his friend's armor to clash with his own over heated frame. He didn't care. He just wanted to get some rest. He took a comfortable position while trying to cover as much as he could of his friend's frame. Then he offlined his optics and fell instantly into comfortable recharge.