The Children Chapter 12

Moonlight Repairs

Penny took a step back and almost as instantly as it appeared the giant ship was gone again. Rubbing her eyes Penny took a few more steps forward, once again it appeared. She looked at the giant ship confused by its disappearing act. It looked like it had been there for some time, weeds were overgrown all around it, and a small family of squirrels had made a hole in the side their home. Out front was a large green jeep. It was rusted slightly and coated in a layer of moss and weeds looked exactly like the setting behind it, old and forgotten. Taking a few more steps forward she put her hand gently on the vehicles hood taking a better look at it she noticed a large object was protruding from its back. Looking back down at the hood she realised something, strangely enough it felt slightly warm. She furrowed her brow and began clearing the rest of the weeds and vines from the vehicle. She was honestly shocked by how much there was, after clearing up enough of the seats she managed to climb on them and reach up to clear the weeds off of the strange object.

"No way" She said as she stared at the large white tubular object. It was glowing very dimly and was pointed away from the ark. Looking back down at the vehicles steering wheel she recognised a very clear autobot symbol in the center.

"Hound?" She asked out loud. She knew the jeep had looked familiar; the cartoon had the exact same vehicle. The machine didn't make any movements, it didn't respond to her. Shoulders drooping slightly she sat in the driver's seat. The entire Ark was sitting behind her and now she didn't know what to do with it. She didn't even know whether it was safe to enter it. Suddenly the engine started up,

"Eeep!" Penny squeaked in surprise, the jeep creaked as the wheels barely turned it didn't move an inch. The wheels were rusted in place Penny knew that, the vehicle didn't seem to.

"Hound?" She asked again this time with a bit more urgency. She was starting to feel rather ridiculous talking to a jeep which suddenly sprang to life.

"I think im stuck..." A voice said emanating from the vehicle. Penny sighed heavily relieved to hear she wasn't going crazy with her assumptions and excited by the fact that this transformer wasn't tiny. He was full size, real and big.

"Ma'am do you have a license for this vehicle?" A tall gruff man asked as he hooked up his tow truck to the front of the green jeep.

"Uh no, I found it today." She said giving the man a guilty look. She didn't know what else to do in this situation. She didn't want to leave Hound out here any longer in the condition he was in, so calling in someone to tow him at least to her house was the best idea she had. Hound hadn't agreed to let her do so at first but after struggling for some time until finally managing to remove his hologram projector, which was what the huge object on his back was. He finally agreed to it. The projector now cloaked the ark right behind where the jeep was sitting.

"Well I ran the license plate through, and it isn't registered to anyone. To honest I think this old pile of rust should be just towed to the dump. I'll do that for free for you if you want?" The man finished as he managed to loosen the two back wheels so they would actually turn enough for him to tow it.

"No!" That came out before she even had time to stop herself. The man gave her a strange look and swallowing hard she attempted to mend her speech.

"er...I mean no thanks. I want to see if I can fix him up first" She finished looking at him nervously. The man just shrugged and finished hooking up the rusty green jeep.

"If you insist, but I don't think there is much you can do for this one. Get in the front with me i'll drive you home. Might as well its better than waiting for your bus to drop you off" The man finished motioning toward the passenger side door. Penny thanked him and climbed in, it would definitely be interesting trying to piece Hound back together.

The man with the tow truck's name was Al, he had two kids and was married to " a very beautiful girl". Or at least that's what he said. He talked Penny's ear off the entire time back to her house. It was about a half hour car ride and she knew more about the man then his kids probably did.

"Thanks for your help" Penny said as he helped her get the jeep into her garage. It took a bit of effort because she had to move a heaping pile of car parts over to one corner of her garage. Hound fit in perfectly beside her father's vehicle which was covered up by a sheet. Running inside to grab some cash she swiftly paid Al and ushered him on his way. The minute the truck was out of sight she took a very heavy sigh.

"Anymore of those family stories and I would've been sick" She said looking back at the green jeep now sitting in her garage. The damage to his body seemed rather extensive, there was rust all over the place and with Hound's lack of ability to move or transform... She honestly didn't know how she was going to fix him up.

"From what I heard of them I found rather interesting" He responded. She couldn't really tell whether that was supposed to be sarcasm or not. Truthfully without being able to see his face she couldn't tell what any of his emotions were. She walked closer to the jeep and placed her hand on his hood, once again it was slightly warm.

"So he did give ya the co-ordinates" A voice said coming from behind her. Penny jumped slightly and turned around. Leaning against the opening to the garage arms crossed was Jazz.

"Uh Jazz I can..." Penny trailed off. She really couldn't explain why she hadn't shown Jazz the note Sparkplug had given her. She probably should have but she just didn't. If Thundercracker had stuck around to simply to place a seed of doubt in her mind he had succeeded.

"Don't fret too much over it Pen" He responded. Penny didn't really understand why he didn't use her full name but the fact he wasn't mad made everything better.

"Hound I'd like to say it was nice to see you man but, what happened?" The small white and black robot walked into the garage to inspect all of the rust marks on his clearly larger friend.

"To be honest with you I wasn't even aware of my surroundings until your human friend was sitting in me" Hound responded chuckling slightly. Penny just stood there awkwardly not really knowing what to say to either of them. Letting them talk a bit was probably the best idea anyway, she thought as she moved out of the garage and into her house. She wasn't attacked by anyone this time; Ratchet had been holding up the fort a lot better than Jazz ever did. The only difference now was the Ratchet had someone to back his threats up with.

"Penny?" Looking down she saw Ironhide.

"I know things've been rough fer ya lately. The boys'n I were thinking, maybe we should... well ya know give ya a nice long break of something" He said as he shifted his weight from one leg to another uncomfortably.

"You want to leave?" Penny asked him furrowing her brow. She didn't think something like this would come up until someone like Prowl or Optimus were in positions of power.

"We'd jus be over at Sparkplug's" He responded quickly. Penny just shook her head and sat down on her knees.

"Ironhide, its been a while since I've had anyone else living in this house. You guys bring life into it. Please don't leave." She leaned closer to Ironhide her eyes tearing up slightly.

"I knew that'd be your answer" Ratchet voice said. He had jumped off the couch and came over.

"Penny, when you were gone Thundercracker came by. He told us what had happened with Mike and that he felt we were endangering you by staying here." Sideswipe said this; he had now joined into the conversation. His brother Sunstreaker just leaned against the wall not too far away pretending to not pay attention to the current conversation.

"At first we didn't believe'im" Ironhide continued shrugging slightly.

"But then your story confirmed his and with us at our current size we may not be able to continue protecting you from the decepticon threat. I've already spoken to Jazz about this but he didn't put in much input so it's going to be a consensus decision" Ratchet finished. Everything in the way of his speech and stature said that he was serious and emotionless, but Penny knew what to look for. Pain was behind his strong optics.

"You guys are worried about not being able to protect me because of your size?" She asked them her mind already forming an idea. They all nodded at her question causing her to smile slightly.

"Well you guys have obviously not looked in the garage"

"I need everyone to stay back, don't touch him until I look him over" Ratchet said pushing the nose of a far too curious Grimlock away from Hound's tire.

"There isn't much on earth that can rust Cybertronian metal" He finished as he began to inspect the rust patches covering the scout's body. Penny had informed the others of who exactly she now had in her garage. This had caused all eight mini robots to congregate in her garage themselves and having them all in there meant she had to close the doors if she didn't wish to warrant unwanted attention. This made the area seem considerably darker since there was only one lonely light bulb hanging from the ceiling.

"So what do you think doc? Am I going to live?" Hound asked calmly. Once again Penny had trouble deciding whether he was joking with this comment or not.

"Me Grimlock think finding out why rusty bot still big while me Grimlock little more important" The small dinosaur said stamping his foot on the ground unhappily.

"Chill Grimlock being this size has its advantages" Jazz said calmly sitting in one of Hounds seats. Ratchet had tried to get him to leave but eventually given up the excuse being that Jazz wasn't actually touching any of the metallic parts.

"Hound appears to have a very slight case of cosmic rust." Ratchet said frowning slightly. His optics began scanning the room as if he was looking for something.

"Looking for something like this" Blaster said dragging over a piece of metal from the car parts on the other side of the room. Ratchet nodded and took the metal, he put it up against a rusted part of Hound's body. Nothing happened.

"Couldn't he have a case of normal rust?" Penny asked glancing at the piece of metal in Ratchets hand, but surely enough it slowly began to brown. The change was so slight that it took Penny a really long time to notice it at all. Ratchet nodded at the newly formed tinted brown patch rubbing his chin in thought.

"We're going to have to remove the rusted parts" Ratchet stated.

"Preferably without actually touching the metal ourselves" He finished trying to figure out how he was going to do this.

"Im not metal." Penny offered.

"Just tell me what to do"

It had taken them a lot longer than Penny had expected to remove all of Hounds rusted parts. She had to use tons of different tools she was not used to using and her cast around her ribs proved it difficult for her to move into too many positions. By the time they were done Hound looked a lot more like a shell of a car then an actual vehicle.

"Aren't you cold?" Penny asked Hound as she struggled to move the rusted bits away from anything metal.

"I'm a Cybertronian Penny. I'm all metal so I don't have as sensitive a nervous system as you humans do" He said making a robotic sigh.

"You are lucky, you humans" He continued wistfully. Penny stared at the vehicle strangely, she had to admit that was the first time she had ever heard one of the transformers say they wanted to be like her. Ratchet began surveying what was left of Hound now that most of his outer shell had been removed. Penny could only guess he was looking for internal damage, there didn't seem to be any but Penny wasn't going to interrupt the medics work.

"Hound, you're missing your transformation cog" Ratchet said his optics widening slightly as he sifted through the wires that were where the hood used to be. Penny searched he memory trying to remember what that looked like. What drew more of her attention was the sizeable black box that had been where the hood was. After cleaning the rust from her hands she couldn't help but place her hand on it causing the entire vehicle to creak uncomfortably.

"Penny" Ratchet said giving her a warning glance. She instantly pulled her hand away feeling bad for not asking Ratchet what the box was before laying her hand on it. She had forgotten that this was basically surgery to the transformers and she had to be gentler about everything that was in them.

"Did I hurt you?" She asked Hound trying to keep her distance from him.

"No, you didn't hurt him that's the spark chamber" Sunstreaker had just entered the garage through the little space she had left between the garage door and the ground. This allowed passage for small autobots ever since Ratchet had kicked them all out.

"You over reacted a bit Rusty" Sunstreaker said leaning against the wall and watching Ratchet as he continued to survey the wreckage. Penny turned and glared at the little yellow robot.

"If you just came in here to insult him then get out" She stated strongly. The yellow twin was nothing like Sideswipe he hadn't even really made an effort to get to know Penny.

"Uh..." was all Sunstreaker could say in response. He hadn't been taken aback by Penny 's harsh reaction. She continued to glare at him until he managed to utter a response.

"Well if I'm not wanted here then I guess I will take my leave" He said as he sauntered out maintaining somewhat of a haughty stance.

"You were a bit harsh" Hounds voice said another creaking sound coming from somewhere within him.

"He was insulting you" Penny responded turning to face the heap of metal.

"He's always been like that though. It's his way of showing concern..." Hound finished trailing off. Penny stared at the area of the garage where the yellow robot had exited.

"You should go, I don't need you here any longer now that the rust problem has been contained" Ratchet stated not even turning to look at the expression on Penny's face. Sighing she thanked him and moved the garage up just enough for her to sneak through; then returned it to its previous position. She couldn't believe she was actually going after him. Once she was back in the standing position she looked around, it was already dark, a lot had happened to distract her from the time. At the end of her driveway was Sunstreaker, to her surprised he was sitting on the curb staring up at the sky where a brilliant full moon shone. Penny walked over and sat beside him.

"Pretty isn't it?" She asked glancing down at him. Trying to fix this situation wasn't the easiest thing to do. He nodded and turned to face her.

"Kinda reminds me of myself during the day" He said smirking. Penny's face scrunched up as she tried to hold back but she couldn't help it. She began to giggle.

"I thought we could have a tender moment there" She said laughing a bit harder causing herself to cough and wheeze due to pain in her ribs.

"You're going to kill yourself" He said smiling back at her. This was the first time she had seen him smile since he had come to life and it was when she was in pain.

"You really are twisted" She responded sitting there comfortable in his presence.

"Hey you haven't even seen some of the things Sideswipe has done" He retorted defending himself. She didn't respond to that, she just continued sitting there looking at the yellow bot. She had to admit if she squinted he did glow a tiny bit in the light of the moon.

Believe is or not this chapter has been done for over three weeks xD
My amazing editor has just been so busy with school work that it took him a while to go over it ^^; So sorry for the delay this is the second chapter that was promised for November :)
Hope you enjoyed it!
Please R&R I love hearing what you think!~
Thanks for reading next chapter should be out before the end of December~!