A/N: Hmm, this idea just seemed to work better this way. In other news... OmigodwhathaveIdone?

Translation: While you're here, go check out my new Transformers story, 'Til All Are One. I've only recently posted it. Go read! Go read! (not that I'm begging...)

Disclaimer Transformers property of HasTak and some other companies.

More Bass

The day started off with a bang.

Literally.

Ratchet groaned and flung his arms over his head. According to his chronometer, he'd gotten into recharge only three hours ago, it was the ass-crack of dawn and Wheeljack was already blowing himself up.

Figures.

The medic oozed out of the bunk sluggishly, barely aware of where he was supposed to be going, much less where the door was. Only three hours of recharge a

after a straight week of almost none at all. He wobbled on his feet, ran into the wall and bounced off, his fingers fumbling with the touch-pad that opened the door and stumbled into the corridor. His bleary vision picked up a light haze of smoke drifting through the hall. This was what he got for sharing a connecting corridor to Wheeljack's lab.

Damn slagger... getting me out of bed at this time...

A few minutes later -- streak marks left behind on the wall from where he'd been leaning -- Ratchet arrived at the laboratory and was not surprised to find most of it covered in dark gray soot and that a few of the lights had been taken out. He looked around and didn't see Wheeljack anywhere. There was a pile of machinery covered in the dark gray soot there and a second pile over there was smoking and sparking and also covered in dark gray soot.

Ratchet frowned. "Wheeljack?"

"Yes?"

The first pile of soot-covered machinery turned towards him, two vocal resonators flashing a muted blue.

"What did you do?"

"Oh, this!" The pile of machinery now positively identified as Wheeljack jumped to its feet, walking over to the smoking, sparking pile. "I accidentally crossed two wires with the power packs and the whole thing backfired in a chain reaction and took out all the others. I didn't think it was going to have that much of reaction, honestly. Maybe a little one. At least it didn't throw me through the wall like last time--"

"Last time?!" Ratchet's temper, now worse due to his fatigue, flared. "There was a last time?!"

"Yeah... Right there." The inventor pointed to the Wheeljack-shaped hole in the wall the lab shared with the medbay.

Ratchet looked at the hole and then back at Wheeljack, his glare sharpening to a laser-like intensity. To his credit, Wheeljack didn't cringe or cower. He was probably the only mech that could take an evil-Ratchet glare at full force.

"Mind you, the power packs had a much stronger voltage earlier. I had to take them down a notch; the explosion was much bigger. Speaking of that, could you take a look at my hand?" Wheeljack waved the aforementioned hand in the medic's face. "It's sort of numb. I'm not exactly sure what happened to it, but when the power packs blew the first time, my hand was sort of right on them--"

"Wheeljack." Ratchet interrupted him, pushing the hand away. "What in the name of Primus were you doing with--" He glanced at the sparking machinery and frowned. "Whatever those were previously."

"Speakers."

"Speakers?..."

"Jazz got them. He wanted more bass."

"So he brought them to you."

"Yep."

Ratchet let out an exasperated sigh and made a mental note to give Jazz a brand-new dent to go with the one from the other day.

"I think I've almost got it too." Wheeljack said cheerfully, turning his attention away from Ratchet -- which is something you don't do when the medic was in a mood -- and bending over the sad, sorry pile of speakers. "He wants to install a new sound system and these speakers are just about the right size. They should fit well with the rest of the Ark's systems, given the level of human technology and the age of the Ark. The only problem is I think glitch-mice chewed through most of the wiring years back, so w

we're gonna have to run some new wire -- well, a lot, really -- but that shouldn't--"

Bam!

Ratchet clocked him over the head with a wrench.

"Why must you mess with everything that comes your way?!" he snapped, taking another swing. "Why can't you do something that doesn't involve something getting blown up?! And why must I feel obliged to repair you every time you blow yourself up?!"

Wheeljack shrugged. It wasn't like he did it on purpose.

A little later in the day when the sun was at a reasonable height in the sky, Jazz came running up to him, brandishing a music disk.

"Here, Ratch was complainin'." he said, by way of explanation.

"About what?" Wheeljack asked. Had the medic finally cracked?

"Not sure, but th' gist of it was 'Find Wheeljack some music'. Dunno what th' slag that's 'bout." Jazz shrugged and handed him the disk. "So I downloaded this for ya. It's th' 1812 Overture. Wit' cannon percussion."

Wheeljack's optics lit up.

"Cannons, you say?"