Chapter Three: Nervous

Disclaimer: I don't own anything but my OC's. Ask before you take and you'll most likely get a yes.

Nightshade was panicking. The steady humming of his cooling fans rose to a dull whine, the only outward indication of Nightshade's impending anxiety attack. Ratchet gave the rookie an amused smirk and dropped the datapad down in front of him. Nightshade clutched at the table. What was he getting himself into? He wasn't ready for this! He had barely skimmed over the last two topics!

"Nightshade, are you functioning properly," Ratchet asked, genuine concern laced in his voice. A quick scan revealed that the rookie's internal temperatures were a bit high, his cooling systems were working overtime, and his spark frequency was off. Ratchet frowned slightly as he went over the spark readings. Nightshade's spark was too low. He would have to look at that later.

Nightshade nodded faintly, picking up the stylus. He was so fragged.

"The written portion of your exam begins now. You have one joor to complete the one hundred questions. Remember that the solution itself and its accuracy counts as sixty percent of the total score. The method by which you propose to solve the introduced problem counts as the other forty percent. If you have any questions, now is the time to ask."

Nightshade shook his head, staring at the hefty datapad in front of him. Ratchet let a smirk cross his face plates.

"You may begin."

Ratchet walked around the room occasionally, snatching glances over Nightshade's shoulder as he worked. Ratchet was quite satisfied with what he had managed to read so far. This rookie sounded promising. Just as Ratchet sat down, Nightshade timidly put one hand into the air.

"Sir?"

"Yes, Nightshade?"

"There's one hundred and one questions," the mech stated. On the inside, Nightshade was fritzing. He had carefully timed each of his responses to be exactly 4.8 minutes long! And he only had seven minutes left!

"Answer them all to the best of your ability. I will be discarding of one."

Nightshade nodded and answered the next question quite easily. However, with the final question, Nightshade was completely stumped. The question was:

The AllSpark has been destroyed, effectively keeping our species from reproducing at a healthy rate. While a pair of bonded mechs can produce viable offspring, the chance of that happening is next to zero. How can this be solved?

Nightshade stared at the question blankly. How the Pit was hesupposed to know how sparklings were made? In sheer desperation, Nightshade scribbled down the first thing that came to mind. The timer on Ratchet's desk went off, making Nightshade start badly. Ratchet whisked the datapad away.

"The first of three practical exams begins tomorrow at exactly 8 a.m. It is divided into two sections, each lasting four cycles. You will have a one cycle break in-between. Brush up on your tool manuals," Ratchet said, clapping Nightshade on the back. The mech nodded faintly and got to his feet, walking to the door.

Once Nightshade was out of the way, Ratchet called Red Alert into his office.

"The kid finished the exam," Ratchet said, taking a seat, "Here's your copy."

"Ah. Thank you. Did he finish it all?"

"Yup," Ratchet said, picking up his stylus and reformatting the color. Red Alert made a humming noise and sat down. Two hours of silence passed by quickly, interrupted periodically by a stray comment or question. When Red Alert reached the end of the datapad, he was eager to see what ingenious method of reproduction Nightshade had come up with. It wasn't that they really had to ask that question - they only wanted to gauge the student's creativity. When he flipped to the next page, he read the one line answer and promptly grinned. Ratchet raised one optical ridge in his direction.

"What?"

"Go to the last question," Red Alert said, his sentence interspersed with chuckles. Ratchet obeyed. His optics widened upon reading the statement.

"I think we have a new intern," he said, smirking at Red Alert. Ratchet never thought that Nightshade was a smart-aft, but his answer to the question was nothing short of genius:

Find me a femme and I'll take care of the rest.

There were five tools on the table. They were all the same exact tool, but in different sizes. Sunstreaker lay on one of the tables, watching Nightshade stare at the tools. Ratchet stood in the corner, his hand hovering over his datapad.

One of the halogen lights overhead flickered.

"All you have to do is pick one that fits your hand," Ratchet said gently, trying to bite down his impatience. Nightshade turned a suspicious glare over at Ratchet before glancing back down at the tools. Nightshade raised one hand and reached for the smallest one. Then he saw Ratchet start to write on the datapad in his hand and froze. Nightshade immediately recoiled.

"Are these all the same? No glitches, no loose wiring? No pranks?"

Ratchet groaned quietly. His grip tightened on the stylus in his hand.

"Nightshade, I guarantee that they are all working perfectly. For the love of Primus, just pick a fragging tool already."

Nightshade's suspicion only grew. The stylus in Ratchet's hand was now bent at a lovely forty five degree angle. Ratchet glared at Nightshade, who imitated the caustic glare frighteningly well.

"You're not pulling my leg, are you? Because after that stunt with Sam and Mikaela…" Nightshade trailed off, giving Ratchet a third glare. Ratchet counted slowly before responding. He had given Red Alert his promise that he would give the rookie a fair chance.

"Nightshade, I swear it on my honor as a medic. I tested them this morning."

Nightshade nodded and picked up the smallest tool.

"Finally," Ratchet muttered, walking closer to the surgical berth, "Now. Remove the armor on Sunstreaker's upper left shoulder and locate the main motor cable leading to his rotor cuff."

Nightshade stared at Ratchet for a split second before turning around. Ratchet watched as Nightshade pushed the chair over to the berth and clambered onto it.

"One word, either of you," Nightshade growled quietly, stabilizing himself with the back of the chair. Ratchet's optics narrowed again.

"First rule of the medical bay, rookie: You do not give me orders. This is my medical bay. Got it?"

Nightshade only nodded carelessly and leaned over the table, tool in hand. Sunstreaker cringed, scooting away slightly. Did the rookie seriously just brush off the Hatchet's comment? Sunstreaker may have been reckless, but he did have self-preservation programming, and that subtle twitching in Ratchet's left optic did notbode well for either of them. Sunstreaker cringed again. Nightshade latched onto his arm and began prying the armor off gently.

"Wait an astrosecond, Red needs my opinion on something," Ratchet said. Before Nightshade or Sunstreaker could speak, the mech had already disappeared through the door. Nightshade then turned to Sunstreaker.

"Ruin this for me and I will make Ratchet look like a turbokitten," Nightshade snarled quietly at the melee warrior, brandishing the sharp end of the device. Now, Sunstreaker was a seasoned warrior, his skills surpassed only by a few select. He could have turned Nightshade into a pile of scrap metal with one hand tied behind his back and with both of his optics offline. However, having a medical tool leveled at his head was a sort of 'Pavlov's Bell' to him – he immediately cowered and ducked, a reflex honed by many years on Ratchet's surgical table. Nightshade backed down as Ratchet entered the room. It wouldn't do for Ratchet to see Nightshade terrorizing a patient.

Ratchet looked over suspiciously. Sunstreaker was lying abnormally still and quiet. Usually, it took several knocks to the head to make him shut his vocalizer off. But now, he was as still as a statue and staring up at the ceiling with a mixture of fear and awe on his face plates. Ratchet shook his cranial unit. He must have been seeing things, because there was no way on this planet that meek and mild little Nightshade could have made Sunstreaker flinch with a pointed glance.

Oh dear, Nightshade's grown some lugnuts. :)