Several Earth Months Later
"Good morning, Overdrive," Knockout said. He rolled slowly into the room, only after a moment's pause in which he'd used his right hand to tap on the halfway open door.
And inside the room, the patient he'd come to see - an old bot with a pair of well bandaged wrists – looked up from her recharge station, and smiled a greeting to him.
"I've been working exactly like you told me to do," Overdrive said proudly, and still smiling. Lifting her left arm a little, she carefully bent and unbent the fingers of the left hand several times, before slowly turning her arm back and forth slightly.
"Your range of motion is clearly improving," Knockout nodded approvingly. "Nice work. Let's see the other one quick."
"The right was always the worse of the two, remember," he reminded her with confidence and a smile of assurance, when she tried to move that arm and hand just as much as the first and could not quite manage to fully do so. "It'll be more work to catch up now with that one, but you'll get there."
"Practice makes perfect I do suppose," the elderly bot said, nodding back, and letting him know she believed him entirely. And she glanced a moment toward the window across the room from her recharge station, through which the morning sun was already streaming in. And smiling as ever she asked slowly. "Do you suppose you could do me a small favour?"
"For you... I think I could certainly make it happen," Knockout joked easily.
"Could you open the window for me, dear? It looks like it's going to be such a lovely day..." Overdrive stopped then suddenly, and for a second she just looked from Knockout to his cart and up to the window, almost above his reach. "I wasn't thinking. Are you able to do that?"
"I can." Knockout only smiled at her concern, clearly meant only out of polite understanding. And reaching down to the space beside him on the cart, a gap between his frame and the armrest, he fetched a reaching tool that had fast become a most useful item. With his stronger hand he worked the handle of the thing, so that it's other end could bend to catch the window's edge as he grabbed for it. And then he simply reversed the cart, pulling the window open as he did so.
"Perhaps today you can get up for a while," he said, turning back the old bot on the recharge station. "Maybe even take a short walk outside, if you're up to it. Enjoy some of that lovely sunshine in the courtyard."
"Oh I think I'd most certainly like that."
"I'd imagine so. But I'll leave you to rest a while for now. Someone will be around soon enough with some fuel for you."
"Knockout," the elderly bot called after him, as soon as he had turned to roll back out of her room again on his cart. "May I speak with you a moment? If you have a moment of course."
Knockout turned around again, and rolled himself back toward the recharge station, carefully placing his reaching tool back into it's place out of his way. "Oh I think I have a moment or two."
"I feel I must admit I was floored entirely when I found out you were the doctor that would be taking over my case while I was in here. Why, the first time I saw you anywhere around here, on that machine of yours, I naturally just assumed you were another patient... and one in a terrible state I might add. I could only think at first, 'poor young bot. I do hope he survives.' And those optics of yours... well it seemed such a great misfortune, because of course of what red ones have come to mean to Cybertron. And when you first came in to say hello, rolling on over, with that datapad of notes in your hand, and I watched you promptly taking more, I wondered, and quite ignorantly I'm afraid, just how it was you could possibly be doing this work. And then I was just plain afraid, because of things I just did not understand." Overdrive stopped speaking for a brief moment, in which she reached out with her left hand, the one she was so far able to work with , and gently she lifted Knockout's almost completely dysfunctional hand from the hand control of his cart, so that she could gently hold onto it a second and firmly make her point. "I learned quite quickly that that was all ridiculous. You're such a sweet young bot. And smart and capable as anyone. It's instantly clear how you love your work. Ratchet told me yesterday you might just be chief administrator one day. I told him we could all only hope so. And..." she paused again to smile for a second, with a reminiscing look about her. "You remind me so much of my great grand-creation..."
"That all means a lot to me," Knockout answered in thanks. And he meant it entirely.
Work had been tireless in the past months when it came to the job of converting the base into Cybertron's first new hospital. Indeed the entire section that the medbay happened to inhabit, the entire long hallway leading to it from the main doors, was now devoted entirely to patient care and the art of medicine. Rooms once used to house Autobot soldiers, were simple but certainly comfortable patient rooms. And each ship that landed – and there were still many arrival regularly – seemed to bring with them bots sick and injured, some for a long time, and in need of immediate care. Indeed, that combined with the needs of a growing city already well populated, and there was never any shortage of bots needing treatment. The very elderly bot he was presently talking with, had come in recently on board a returning ship, in need of urgent surgery to partly reconstruct lower arms severely damaged due to lack of any needed maintenance in her old age.
Knockout had stepped up at once, doing just as much as he could, and taking on any job or case that did not require two good and steady hands. And the busier the hospital seemed to become, the more he learned that he could actually do, to be completely useful in his field. But Knockout had initially been trained primarily with battle field medicine in mind, and for service on board a warship. Patient consultations, morning rounds, common viruses and broken fingers were things he could master if he tried. But he was still indeed in the midst of mastering it all. And the opinions of the civilian bots themselves, those were still so mixed. Some feared for the colour of his optics. Some barely seemed to notice they were red at all, and discriminated instead because of the mobility cart and poor function of his limbs. Still others seemed to care less, and those were growing more and more common already. But still, no matter how much she shrugged off the regular insults and outwardly laughed about it, inwardly he still cringed, and worse, doubted himself, every time he heard it.
"Thank you for making my day much better," Knockout added after a second of simply reflecting. He smiled a quick smile at the elderly bot, who was quickly becoming a favourite patient of his.
"Ratchet said in passing yesterday that you have a lovely little daughter," Overdrive said. She let her light hold on him go.
"I certainly do," Knockout answered at once, laughing and instantly proud as ever at a chance to brag about his youngling. In a second he'd reached down to rummage carefully through the side basket attached to his cart, and found his datapad that he carried with him for personal note taking. On the front page, when powered up, was a picture of his daughter, and of course he held it out then to show it off. "That's Cybershock. I may have made far more than my share of bad mistakes in life, but she will always be my greatest accomplishment."
"She looks a fair bit like you," Overdrive smiled again. And her face-plate turned serious as she added thoughtfully, "there will always be so many bots who will think of what you can't do, instead of many things you clearly can. But you'll always be a hero to that little girl of yours. She'll always think you're perfect as you are just because she loves you, and it's what she always knew. Really, at the end of the day, you surely agree that's what most matters."
"I think you're very right." Knockout sat a moment on his cart, just reflecting, grateful to have that simple reminder of what really did matter more than anything.
"I suppose I had best let you get back to your rounds," Overdrive said, dragging him quickly back from his thoughts. And he nodded with another little smile on his face-plate
"Well you have a wonderful morning, Overdrive. And enjoy that sunshine outside later, hey."
Rolling back out of overdrive's room, Knockout travelled perhaps a few metres before he nearly bumped his cart right into a patient, who sat strangely enough in the hallway not far from doors that led to the medbay. The bot, Turbocharge, was currently the only youngling patient in the hospital, and he was still a pretty young one too. Not even close to half grown yet. He'd been found on the very same recently arrived ship, seemingly filled with misfortune and damaged bots. The young one, it appeared had had troubles with both of his legs, since half a century before. And with no one to diagnose and certainly no one to fix a then still possibly fixable problem, it had only gotten worse and worse. The little one had arrived back on Cybertron, unable to walk or even to move either leg at all. But still he smiled often and pushed himself around the medical centre sitting on a mechanic's sliding board, his carrier had found for him one day outside. And he used both of his arms, hands reaching over the sides, to move himself on it. The kid did have a wheelchair to move himself around in, obviously. Ratchet had quickly located one that was 'youngling-sized' when he'd arrived. But the kid it seemed actually liked the board far more. He'd stated before that it was 'fun.'
None of this though, explained why the little bot was actually in the middle of the hallway on his little wheeled board, stopped right in the way. And Knockout only shook his head, amused where perhaps he should not have been, And relieved he hadn't run into him.
"Sorry, Doctor Knockout," Turbocharge exclaimed. And the look on his little red face-plate showed that he meant it.
"That's okay, Turbo," Knockout answered, understanding. "You just be careful. I can't exactly trip and fall, but anyone else easily can."
"I'll be careful," the young agreed nodding. He pushed himself back and forth a little on the mechanic's board, and looked up with a contemplating expression. "Are you going to fix my legs?"
"I can't do that kind of work," Knockout explained. He talked to the youngling just like he would any grown bot, just the way he spoke even to his own youngling who was of course so much younger than this one. And Turbocharge looked up at him, with obvious willingness to listen just like an adult would have done. "Well, at least I can't anymore. Ratchet will give it his best try. If anyone can get you back up running, he can. And then you get me for follow up consultations later on."
"Okay," the little bot replied simply, with a smile and shrug of his shoulders. Then his expression turned contemplating again, and more so this time.
"Doctor, Knockout?" He asked slowly, and Knockout could practically see the gears in the little one's head turning. "If Doctor Ratchet can fix me... and he's already fixed so many others, will he ever fix you too?"
Knockout paused a moment before he even tried to give the youngling any real answer. How, he wondered, could he explained to him that a processor was far more complex than a pair of legs could ever be. The little's bot's trouble was mostly a matter of bad and faulty wiring and limbs that needed straightening. A processor; that was so much more than that. No bot fully even understood exactly how one worked yet, let alone how to even try to fix one when it failed the body. But how, he wondered, could he even try to explain the difference.
"He's certainly still trying to," he said simply after a moment, settling on the most simple of answers. And it was certainly not untrue.
"Hey Turbo," he said, after the youngling had nodded his pleased understanding of the answer but said nothing more about it. "Come here a second and look in my side basket." He gestured with his right hand down toward the little basket mounted to the side of his cart.
Turbocharge pushed himself closer to the side of the mobility and he reached out slowly. But his small hand was clearly hesitant to reach in and mess with whatever it was that was stored inside the basket. Knockout only nodded at him grinning, assuring him that indeed he wanted him to do exactly that.
"Reach right to the bottom," he said, still smiling. "I think there might just be something in there for you."
"Something for me?" The youngling, bracing his right hand on the floor to hold the rolling board in place while he sat on it, with his badly bent and damaged legs in front of him, smiled with anticipation as he played along with Knockout's little game and reached down into the basket.
"Sweets!" he cried happily, finally pulling out a small handful of them. And he looked a second at his prize. "Cobalt flavoured ones!"
"Your carrier said you like those best," Knockout laughed. And promptly he raised his right hand to put a finger against his lips to make a 'shh' kind of motion. "Just don't tell Doctor Ratchet I gave you so many."
Scene Break Scene Break Scene Break Scene Break
Soundwave flew at low altitude over endless flat plains of sulphur. And when the sulphur plain turned abruptly to shimmering amythist and quartz that stretched on for miles, he dropped his altitude more more still, flying fast over the shinning crystal field at perhaps only hundreds of metres in the air. Firestorm - carried carefully with him as he flew, holding onto her tightly below his jet mode, with his electrified cables he had always used for more more sinister reasons – was added weight obviously. And he was not exactly used to flying with such additional weight at all. But she was not exactly heavy. He could carry her just fine.
"Where'we goin'?" Firestorm questioned, speaking for the first time since he had picked her up and jumped with her from a clifftop.
He'd worried, admittedly, that at first she may just have screamed at his unannounced decision. But she hadn't. And now she was laughing as she asked her simple question.
"There is... a place I want to show you," Soundwave answered simply.
He turned fast, banking hard to the left, and angling steadily upward, quickly gaining the altitude he needed, as he approached the city they had been close to in the first place. But this time he zoomed right over it, not stopping and hardly slowly, quickly rising even higher to far more then clear the tops of high rise housing buildings, that occupied the North-East side. The place was going up fast, he knew. But looking down now to see the look of shock and wonder on Firestorm's face-plate, he understood how strange the simple realiztion of this fact was for her, seeing it from the air for the first time in her life. The city was barely even a true city yet, not by far. It should not have needed many floor highrises. But this was the way the Autobot's were planning and the planning did make sense Build upward early. This lesson Bulkhead had given him once when they had got to talking construction. Create a place where that made sense from the start, and keep the city as compact as it could be when one day it housed five million bots.
"Fly higha' Soundwave," Firestorm exclaimed, below him. Her tone of voice was still laughing, excited to see just how high he could go.
And so he did.
Leaving the city again, he flew upward and upward, reaching the highest he could possibly have felt safe carrying her at in minutes. And at a couple thousand metres above their world, they could see in so many directions at once. The sulpher fields to the North and the crystal plain beyond that. The fast expanding city to the South. And the cliffs and valleys that stretched far to the South of that. Out to the East, the cliffs stretched further and then dropped off again to level plain, and through a ridge of jagged foothills wound the Boiling River. And it was to the East that Soundwave quickly turned to fly.
Firestorm had been holding lightly to the cables that held her. But suddenly both of her small hands let them go. Slowly she moved both of her arms out to the sides, reaching out just as far as she could clearly reach. Just as though she were flying on her own. They moved fast then toward the river of thin boiling water oil, so hot that the steam pouring from it rose high into the air. But from so high up, its heat did not so much as touch their body armour. And Soundwave circled the long way around, passing high over the cliffs and the river below again, just because Firestorm was clearly having too much fun to make him want to land.
Eventually though he slowly began to drop his altitude again. And carefully he descended toward a low steep sided valley tucked away between the cliffs, far behind the Boiling River. He dropped still more and when he was only metres above the valley he transformed in the air, holding his companion in his still extended cables, to drop them both safely to the ground.
"I un'a-stan' why ya' need'ed ta fly here," Firestorm remarked, amazed and looking around the small valley, as she carefully stood herself up on the ground, from the seated position she had landed in. Indeed, the entire small valley was enclosed on all sides by high and steep, sheer sheets of metal and more shimmering crystal. And beyond it on all sides, any hope of a road or path of any kind through utterly unforgiving and deadly terrain, would surely have been impossible.
"Location – so inaccessible, the great war never reached it," Soundwave said.
"Its'amazin'" Firestorm mumbled back, smiling bright as usual and probably more so. She stood a while looking up at Soundwave, before her optics went back to looking around the small valley again. "Wha'is this'place?"
Firestorm's little walking frame had been picked up by Soundwave before he had flown off. And he'd brought it with them, stored inside his alt mode. Now it sat, safe and sound inside his storage compartment. And she laughed a little as he quickly reached in to retrieve it again. But instead of using it to walk anywhere – there was little need to walk anywhere fast- she just stayed standing still on her own.
"I found this place when I was still a youngling bot," Soundwave explained, speaking slowly, searching again for words, as he so often did when he spoke entire long sentences. Laserbeak left her place mounted to his chest panel, and he watched a second as she flew happily toward the sky above, ready for some freedom in flight of her own. "Still long before the start of the war."
Firestorm moved slowly, to sit herself carefully back down on the ground, dropping first onto her knees, and then shifting her position so that she was seated. And Soundwave, with some hesitation, moved to sit with her.
"My creation was a mistake," he began to explain, sure that his words would barely seem relevant to start, but trusting Firestorm to assume it would come together. " My carrier... She never hid that fact. Never denied it. But..." he paused for a moment that to himself felt far too long, while he struggled harder than he wanted to, just to put together spoken language, and make it make sense. "She used to tell me so much while I still very small, that I was the best mistake that had ever been made. And she would smile, just as brightly as you, while she threw me into the air laughing. My creator though, he liked to beat her badly, throw her to the floor and kick her until she bled, call her nothing and worthless... She had been sold to him once to be his mate and his slave. And he made it no secret that one day he would sell me back into slavery. When he drank high grade, he would beat her worse than ever, and she would yell at me to run, to run away and wait for her to come and find me when he finally collapsed into recharge on the living room floor. When finally I was big enough to have alt mode, and I learned how to fly, I would fly away instead of running. And I could fly further than id ever been. One day I found this place. This became my hideaway from Cybertron, from the creator that called me broken, a mistake because I could barely speak a sentence then."
Firestorm wanted to believe then that perhaps he had escaped from that life. That his carrier may have found him own day hiding in that little valley, with a bag packed for him and one for herself, to tell him she was taking him away that brute she'd been left with. She wanted to imagine they had run together for their lives, worked hard as they could, and somehow they'd made it. But even the hints of details she knew already of his life at some point later than that, let her know for sure that was simply not likely the case at all. And sadly she shook her head, looked up at him, and wondered if he might just say more.
"My creator beat me one day, for dropping a high grade container he'd ordered me to bring him," Soundwave went on, after several long moments. "And he called me a slagging coward when I would not dare to fight back. But I didn't know how. He hit me again and again. It was certainly not the first time, but it was certainly the worst by far. Eventually I was knocked unconscious from constant hard blows, and the last I remember was the sound of my carrier screaming at him, begging him to stop. When I woke again, it was evening and my carrier was dead. He explained to me with, some sick kind of calm, that she'd come after him with a pot filled with boiling water, she'd been heating to sanitize energon containers. So he shot her dead for it.
"The next morning I was sold, just as he'd long promised I would be. Bought like I was only property, by a cruel master who beat me up as badly as my creator had. Within only days I had run away, certain I didn't want to live life enslaved like my carrier had been. My spark knew somewhere that the only bot that had ever truly loved and valued me would have wanted me to run away, just like she'd always taught me to. I nearly starved in the streets and finally I was caught by somebot recharging on a roadside, and brought to the council. The council gave me choices... the first time in my life that anyone had. Return to the master I'd fled from. Die in the streets I'd been found in. Or travel to the fighting pits, and state that I wished to train to be a fighter. The choice back then... it seemed so obvious..."
Soundwave's voice trailed off and he didn't speak anymore. But Firestorm sat for another long moment, shuddering in horror at the tale he had told. He may not have finished the story, but she could easily finish it herself, from her understanding of history. She knew that this bot, still not even legally quite an adult, and who had never known a single combat move, and had never raised a fist before, had trained brutally and violently against other young bots, many likely much bigger, many likely meaner and stronger, until he learned to fight for his very life. She knew he'd fought and battled, fell to the ground time again in pools of his own bleeding energon, until one day he started winning. And then his youngling-hood was over and his innocence was gone. Years, and quite possibly many centuries later some bot he'd trained with when they had both been younglings, some bot that in a far more perfect world may have been his friend, had melted his face-plate and destroyed his optics, in some savage hope of killing him.
Neither one of them knew exactly what to say then. So for many moments, no one said anything at all. Instead they simply sat on the ground in the valley, calmly watching Laserbeak, who flew high above in wide excited circles, clearly enjoying her time to fly around a bit. She landed to sit with them on the ground, just as she had taken to doing. And Firestorm happily obliged her with a pat on the head, before the bird simply flew off again.
"Why'da ya talk'ta me 'bout these things?" Firestorm asked slowly, as the bird flew off again. "I mean...I'don' mind'it. I like ta listen to'ya."
"Firestorm – helpful listener," Soundwave answered simply, his language pattern reverting right back into his simplified shorthand, now that he again used short sentences.
Firestorm had lived on the Autobot base for a good while by then, staying in a room down the same hallway as his own, far down at the opposite end. He talked to her often. And quickly it had became her that he talked to more than anyone on base. He supposed it was because she liked to listen to him. And her near constant smile, her way of laughing at things that most bots found far from funny, it amused him. And he was only still growing used to being amused by anything.
"Ya... Okay'thouhg?" Firestorm's simple question was asked in obvious concern. And she sat for a moment, just looking up at him with slightly wider open optics.
"I am... becoming moreso, the longer I live peaceful neutrality," Soundwave explained very slowly. He was sure his wording was awkward, and it made less then perfect sense. But it was truely the best he could do at that moment. And Firestorm only smiled her understanding, which gave him confidence again.
"Ya'faction symbols..." Firestorm said after a moment, and clearly she was putting in ever more effort than before to speak even more clearly, trying to make her own damaged possessor work like she wanted. And slowly, her constantly trembling hand gestured vaguely toward what it was she was talking about. "Sure'ly just'bad, reminda now..."
Soundwave only nodded his head slightly. So slightly in fact that he wondered if Firestorm even noticed the motion at all, as he considered the possibility where he never had before. He wondered then if Laserbeak, though he had never indicated anything at all about it through their telepathic link, felt anything of the sort about hers. And firmly he resolved that later he would ask her.
"Confession -" Soundwave said, speaking again abruptly, and changing the subject. "I once called you an annoyance when I first knew of you."
He worried for less than a second that perhaps she would be mad. And perhaps if she was it would be rightly so. But Firestorm was laughing instead. And she smiled while she shook her head.
"Well that'd har'ly be'da worse'thing anyone's said'ah'mee," she said, mumbling more than usual because she was still laughing a little while she talked. But slowly she gathered her composure, and finally she looked up at him, serious again, as she slowly explained. "Bots on'the ship... well some'of'em... They said I'shouldnt'a lived afta'I'fell, an'was damaged. They comdem'my brother'Windstorm, 'cause he refused'ta let'me be oflined. One'of'em a bot'named Raodtrip, he'was the loudest about'it..." What Firestorm was speaking about was obviously serious. But suddenly the little bot's face-plate turned again to a smile, which fast became laughter. And after a moment, through her laughs, she exclaimed, "one'day in'da mess'hall, W...Windstorm, he'd'had just'bout'nough. He... he jump right'up an'he... he punched'im right'in da'face-plate!"
"Functionalist thinking – foreseen for certain end with New Cybertron and reintegrated society," Soundwave said. He tried hard through his tone to give her confidence, though it was more than clear she did not exactly need that sort of assurance then. "You will always have what anyone has now." He sat for a moment just musing out loud. "You can earn your own credits, pursue higher education, socialize... find a bot to love one day."
Firestorm's optics unexpectedly shifted, and she stared a second down toward the ground, with an expression that was abruptly almost sad.
"But I...I'think..." she said, looking up again, still too sadly. "I'think I'could love... you..."
Scene Break Scene Break Scene Break Scene Break
"See, that wasn't so bad, now was it?" Ratchet said chuckling to Runway, the small first-frame youngling flyer, who sat up pouting on the closest repair table.
Ratchet turned away just a brief moment so that he could rummage in the drawer of his worktable. And when he pulled out a couple of colourful energon sweets on sticks, the youngling's pouting face-plate turned to a grin. He grabbed eagerly for the treat, when the old bot offered one to him. And once he had it, Ratchet turned quickly to Runway's twin, Takeoff, likewise pouting in his carrier's arms behind the repair table. The second youngling, reached for an offered sweet with the eagerness of his brother. And quickly he was smiling too.
"Now that's much better," Ratchet chuckled. He picked up Runway from the repair table, and turned, smiling to hand him to his carrier, who shifted the other youngling he held already, in order to balance him too with his other elbow. Both of the little ones talked to each other now in some inaudible babbling and ever more simply but real words, while both sucked happily between words, on their lollipops. After a brief moment of this, they traded sweets and happily enjoyed each other's. Because the sweets were after all, very different flavors.
"And that's all there is to it really, 'Bee" the old medic told his young student with another chuckle, after he'd taken a moment to talk medical needs with the twins' carrier, and another moment of casual chat with him, exchanging pleasantries that pertained mostly to how well the twins were doing. "Antivurus immunizations for both of them, and neither one seems to hold the least bit of a grudge against me."
"The real trick is in the lollipops, I'm sure," Bumblebee answered quickly, laughing.
At present, six rooms on the inpatient ward were occupied by ten patients. And Bumblebee was busy at that moment, filling energon containers from the dispenser in a corner of the medbay, and loading the filled containers onto a wheeled push-cart, so that he could take morning fuel to each one of them.
"I'm sure you're right," Ratchet said, chuckling again under his intakes. His voice turned serious then and he continued, "You remember that both bots in room three are still on medical grade energon?"
"Got it," 'Bee said quickly. He gestured with a hand to a couple of containers at the back of the cart, seperated from the rest by a gap, and filled with much brighter lighter blue.
"Nice work."
"Hey... Ratchet?"
"Hmm?"
"Speaking earlier of younglings; do you think you could take a look at mine and Speedy's youngling frame later. Speedbreaker can build a lot of things, but she's never built a frame before of course. She's been talking so often, about how she wants to be sure that ours is more than good enough."
"I'd be more than happy to look it over for you two." Ratchet smiled then
When the young bot walked away pushing the cart out the door and into the hall to go and fuel the patients, the old medic stood a moment alone in the medbay, simply deciding what it was he should get to doing next. He decided on some restocking work and quickly he got to it, checking supplies of bandages and thin sheets of bendable metal a cupboard to his left, and hurrying then to a storeroom in the back to bring over more. He hummed away as he worked, recalling the tune of yet another folk song he'd sang in his near youngling days. And he smiled to himself happily, as he did. Slowly he recalled at least some of the words to the old song, the refrain anyway, and then a little of the second verse. The song had been written in the old formal Cybertronian language. And few bots spoke that anymore, far better versed instead in the informal common, that had taken over as an official language so many centuries ago. But he sang the words he knew slowly, recalling just how they fit into the tune of the song, remembering at least in part, how to speak the old language he'd once been brilliant at.
The sound of footsteps and the sliding of the door as it opened and then closed again, made the old bot turn to look in its direction. He stopped his singing when Soundwave walked slowly, deliberately, into the medbay. Laserbeak sat this time, perched on his shoulder.
"Soundwave," Ratchet said, nodding to the other bot in simple greeting. And his optics moved to the bird as he went on politely, nodding to her too. "Laserbeak."
"Song – ancient tale of the roadside merchant who dared claim the daughter of the ruler of Iacon city for a bondmate," Soundwave said slowly. Clearly he knew the the song that Ratchet had been singing, and he'd recognized its story. Ratchet only nodded simply.
"Not the most happy of folk songs, I suppose," he muttered, frowning as he remembered the end. "I do believe the merchant was swiftly off lined by the wealthy bot chosen already, by the ruler for his daughter."
"Young femme – sparkbroken – ended life by her own hand," Soundwave finished.
"All this makes me wonder," mumbled Ratchet, with a dismayed shake of his head, "why it is the world once so loved to sing that, of any song."
"So then" he went on, looking right at him again, with professionalism. "What is it that brings you here?"
"Decepticon faction symbol – no longer desirable," Soundwave explained simply. And Ratchet nodded his understanding.
"Let me take a quick look at that," he said, gesturing slightly to the symbol in question. And after a moment he looked up again at Soundwave. "A good bit of power sanding, maybe a little grinding, should take that right off your body armour. Then of course a slight bit of repainting would be required. All perfectly quick and painless."
"Inquiry – have you time today, or do I need to make an appointment?"
Just a few short months before, Ratchet might have almost assumed soundwave was making his best attempt at joking around, with his question about making an appointment. But things were different now. The old medic, who for centuries had put his medical energies almost exclusively into repairing damaged Autobot soldiers, had a steadily growing influx of civilian patients with an endless variety of mundane, common medical complaints. And in non-emergency cases, many of those did indeed book appointments. It let him know more than anything, just how much the returning bots of Cybertron truly did need a hospital to go to, and though there were days it seemed almost overwhelming with just how many needed one for just as many reasons, Knockout was never unwilling to see any that had issues needing mostly simple scans and medical advice, and did not require two steady and able bodied hands. Ratchet just smiled with happiness most days at simply knowing, no matter how busy it sometimes became, he was doing the service he'd once become a medic in order to do.
"An appointment? No no, it's fine," Ratchet said, with a pleased smile and a shake of his head. "For the first time in days now, it's actually quiet in here. Barring any emergencies of course, I think I can deal with this for you right now."
"Thank you."
"Should I assume you are here for the very same reason?" Ratchet asked next, addressing the bird that sat on Soundwave's shoulder. She rode on him for easy transportation, yes. That much was certainly obvious. But her posture; one of interest, and the simple fact that she had not yet flown away to seek a makeshift perch somewhere close by, told him that indeed Laserbeak had business of her own in the medbay.
Soundwave nodded in reply to that, and Ratchet knew more then well enough by then that he was simply translating for her, something that he had heard somehow from her silent voice that only he could hear.
"Not a problem," He said, nodding back. He gestured toward a repair table near the back of the medbay. "Give me just a minute to gather some tools, and I'll get to it, if you wanna take a seat up there. And I'm going to call down to the workshop..." Wheeljack was in there, working through a short list of tasks already, he remembered gladly. Surely one more simple job would be little trouble at all. "...See if I can't get a bit of paint mixed to match your colours."
"So, why today?" He asked after another moment, making conversation while he dug in a low cabinet for the right kind of stiff sandpaper, then reached toward the worktable behind him for the sander to put it into. "What made you decide this was finally the day?"
"We had... reasons to consider things," Soundwave answered simply.
Scene Break Scene Break Scene Break Scene Break
"Let's hurry," Arcee exclaimed, to her bondmate. And she tugged playfully at his left arm – the one not being used to hold their little one - just slightly, to urge him move just a little faster, and with little regard for the fact that he couldn't exactly drive his cart with her pulling like that. That and of course it was causing him to move far slower instead of faster. "The last thing we want is to be late." And she walked slowly and backwards, while he and the cart moved very slowly forward, just as much as he felt even slightly safe at without any ability to actually steer anywhere with his hand control.
"Arcee. I can't exactly drive anywhere like this," he reminded her laughing, after just a couple moments of struggling with his hazardous lack of steering. And promptly, with a laugh of her own at the realization, she let go of his arm.
"Go! Go!" Cybershock exclaimed from her place still sitting on her creator's lap, and laughing now, mostly because her parents were. She always had liked it when he drove as fast as he could go, whenever they went outdoors.
"I'm going, I'm going," Knockout answered his youngling, still laughing as he did. He was still far from his cart's top speed, but he did get the machine up to a decent pace, with Arcee walking easily beside him.
"So, how was work?" Arcee asked, making cheerful conversation as they continued down the sidewalk.
"Wonderful today actually." Knockout smiled brighter.
"Your work makes a such a remarkable difference to the people." Arcee grinned in his direction while the kept right on moving forwards. And without missing a step she leaned over to grab for his shoulder panel quickly before she let go again. "And you, who once insisted you were better at breaking bots then fixing anyone... you're helping save lives everyday."
"Well," Knockout answered with another little laugh and a dismayed shake of his head. "Not everyday exactly. Medical practice is, at least in general, for more mundane than that usually. And thank Primus for that, of course."
"But you have a hand in making bots' lives better," Arcee persisted. And her smile grew bigger. "Never stop being proud of that."
"Go! Go go go," Cybershock demanded in another second or two, still obviously wanting her creator to drive faster while he carried her on his knees.
She was growing up already. And more so it seemed with every passing day. She'd been speaking for a while, still mostly one word of her steady growing vocabulary here and there. But more and more now, her simple language was becoming short sentences, that most often made sense. And she was determined to walk – pulling herself up onto anything she could in order to stand for as long as she could until she fell down, usually laughing about it. She loved to hear her story books read to her (and Knockout in particular loved to read them to her in silly voices with added sound effects,) and it was clear she understood what it was he was reading by now. She would not by tiny forever. There was no way to ever deny that. But in the moment her parents wanted only to enjoy her childhood right along with her.
"Arcee," Knockout exclaimed, grinning while he moved again to bump the hand control of his cart forward, as his foot pressed down against the foot pedal. "Jump on!"
And jump on she did. Laughing, she stepped up quickly to balance with her feet on the narrow support bar behind the cart's back wheels, holding on with both hands, each one reaching around the back of the cart, to hold onto the backs of the armrests. Arcee's weight did add some slight drag to the cart, and of course it could not reach it's full speed with her holding on. But she was light enough not to make that huge a difference. And he could still go fast enough. Indeed, he was quickly moving at a near the speed of a bot's slow run, within several seconds. And he kept right on going like this, into their first intersection, and carefully but quickly crossed the empty road that led away from the base, with no trouble.
They reached 'downtown' only to find it more crowded than it usually was, with bots walking both ways on the sidewalk, while many others rolled, in vehicle modes along the roadway. And several bots, some who had once mocked and pointed, laughing in Knockout's direction when he ventured just as regularly out into the city many months before, only nodded politely in greeting, and mumbled friendly 'good day's to he and his bondmate as they passed each other. Some still stared of course, and more still pointed, laughing at least a little. There would always be some in every crowd. And a few just looked at the little family blankly, making it entirely clear that they simply didn't know how to react to a red optic'd badly damaged bot at all. For the most part though the bots of the city had simply stopped being shocked by now and had learned to be comfortable with just being decent neighbours.
Arcee hopped easily off the back of the cart, to the good natured laughs of a couple of passing civilians, after Knockout had slowed down for safety's sake amid the crowd. And she walked beside him for a while, past a still growing number of shops and bars, and offices, the bank, and the social hall. A recreation centre had finally opened its doors across the road recently, and a small crowd of bots hurried toward it, heading likely for their workouts in its gym.
"My work is certainly nothing like it once was," Arcee mused, carefully steering the conversation back into it's original direction, and with some degree of uncertainty. Knockout nodded his understanding of that, perfectly aware of exactly what it was she was talking about.
There was still a military obviously. And bots could most certainly still serve in it. She certainly did. But the work had become so very different. Without a war to fight, or an enemy to defeat while staying steps ahead of, it felt like the enemy now was the endless data pad work that landed on her worktable. There were certainly still daily patrols to do. But those now meant more or less patrolling the city now and then for trouble makers, and doing the work of a still yet to be formed police force.
"The youngling centre will be finished construction soon," Arcee gestured in the roughly direction of the place she was referring to, right beside the recreation centre. It's outside was completed already and it awaited only the finishing touches to the inner structure. "I would have been an early educator if only the world had not gone to war... Ratchet and Bulkhead both say, I'd be a wonderful choice for a bot to run the preschool..."
"You surely know I'd support your choice, no matter what you want to do in life," Knockout said, smiling as much as ever. "If you're really contemplating a career change, well then I'd say that's great."
"Go!" Cybershock exclaimed once again, when Knockout stopped his cart at the edge of the next intersection. And he and Arcee waited with a couple of strangers at the edge of a recently painted crosswalk, while bots, driving in all manner of vehicle modes passed by on the streeet.
"I can't go," Knockout told the youngling, laughing a little. And he gave her the very simplest of life's little lessons. "It's not safe to cross the road now."
"No go," Cybershock said. She looked up at him then with an almost silly look of agreement on her little blue metal face-plate.
"Yep. No go," Arcee confirmed nodding at the youngling. And beside her, a stranger waiting too, chuckled under his intakes, and smiled politely.
The lights changed and the little family started off again, crossing the road and into a district of closely packed apartment buildings. The first entire block of these, many ten or fourteen floors high, were already at least close to full entirely. But one more block up, across a road that led still nowhere in one direction and out to a far off energon mine in the other, were still more just slightly newer buildings. And of these ones, many were still half empty. Arcee excitedly pulled open the door to one of them when they reached it, a huge bluish coloured structure. And grinning, she ran on inside.
"Down! Down!" Cybershock exclaimed, just as soon as Knockout had rolled into the large and mostly empty atrium behind his mate. Seeing no real harm in it, Arcee lifted the baby quickly from Knockout's lap and set her down, sitting on the clean and shiny atrium floor.
No one was waiting to meet them. But after a very short wait, they could hear the sound of heavy footsteps, hurrying away from a maintenance room across the open space. And a bot - a former vehicon trooper who had chosen at some point to be repainted a cheerful bright green, and had named himself Blastoff – working for the housing commission, hurried toward them.
"I'm terribly sorry," Blastoff expalined, on seeing that they were already clearly waiting for him. "Troubles this afternoon with an oil tap in 401..." He'd held his right hand thusfar behind his back. And now, slowly bringing it around to the front of his frame again, he held out a blue energon lollipop for Cybershock. The youngling stared a second just blinking at him, amused, before she gave a tiny sequel of delight and reached up to gently accept the sweet.
"Thank you," Arcee said to the housing-bot, smiling. She quickly scooped up her youngling, who was already making a sticky mess of her face-plate sucking happily on the sweet. And again she tugged with her free hand on Knockout's arm, trying playfully as before to pull him forward after her.
"Let's roll," Knockout answered with a laugh and a grin. And when she let his arm go again, he rolled on across the atrium, following Blastoff, who led the way to the elevator.
"Tenth floor," the housing-bot said politely, when the elevator came to a stop moments later. "Off we get."
"Here it is," Arcee said, excited when they stopped before a locked door number with a shining 1014 on its door. She'd seen the place before of course. And several times in fact. But she was speaking mostly to the now sticky youngling she still held. "Our home."
"'Ome, 'ome!'" the baby yelled too loudly, in response to her carrier's excitement.
"I'll give you the key cards for the place today," Blastoff explained, with a chuckle at the baby. "You can start moving in tomorrow as planned, if that still works for you."
"The modifications for accessibility are all fully functional and should match the list that Bulkhead gave me from his construction notes," the housing-bot went on, as he led the way inside. "If you need to test out the equipment, go for it of course."
Arcee was sure that Knockout would at least test out the voice controls for the lighting, or some related thing. And certainly he would be interested in the wash station, which was actually more than big enough for his cart to turn around in, negating the need for anymore awkward backing it out, and nearly clipping counter corners time and again. But he didn't. Instead he just sat on the cart exactly where he'd stopped it, inside the doorway, parked next to the energon refiner, and facing toward the closed set of wide patio doors clear across the still empty living room.
"Knockout?" Arcee said, perhaps a little too loud and urgently. Quickly she put the baby down, letting her sit on the floor in the middle of the room, before she back back to step toward her mate.
It had been months now since his last random reboot. And she had almost dared by then to hope they'd seen the last of them. They both did.
His last one – and she remembered it all too well – had happened perhaps days after their young human friends and left to return to Earth. He had gone suddenly into reboot without any warning at all, while their baby was happily on his lap, waiting for the bath her carrier had been running in the wash station. Arcee had found Cybershock perhaps half a minute too late, still sitting up on her creator's knees, visibly scared and crying in steady high pitched cries of alarm as he, entirely unconscious and still belted into his cart, could not acknowledge her. But as more time passed without another one after that, than ever had before, and then that time doubled and tripled, it begun to look hopeful. Then it looked possible. Then slowly they let their constant guards down a little at first and then more and more.
"I'm good," Knockout said, understanding at once what it was she had been so fearfully thinking, when she hurried closer to him. He looked at her again, with a smile that turned quickly much bigger.
"I'm just..." he mumbled happily, still smiling. Slowly he rolled forward a very short ways, before moving much faster, across the living room, and toward those big glass doors.
"Arcee," He exclaimed then, grinning, "we have patio doors. Just like we dreamed this place!" Turning quickly, he rolled fast down a long hallway leading away from the living room. "Ooh, our recharge room is a fair bit bigger than on base. And its going to be perfect when we finish unpacking. Come down here. Check this out. I think we should move the recharge station so the head of it is against this big window. And Cybershock is going to love her room. You actually convinced Bulkhead's building crew to paint it pink for her? Ha, I suppose it would hardly be hard to do. 'Bulk would do anything for his favourite little bot. I love the wall boarders. Who says a baby girl can't have checkered flags, hey! Arcee, Cybershock, come check this out!"
"I am correct then in assuming the apartment is satisfactory?" questioned Blastoff a moment later. He stayed standing just inside the doorway. And it clear by then that he was trying his best not to burst out laughing.
"More than satisfactory," Arcee answered, grinning. "Thank you."
"Well you hardly need to thank me," Blastoff answered, happily. He paused just a second before he explained. "Maintaining this building, keeping these apartments filled... it really is a true labour of love. As a simple vehicon, model S-7, the whole point of my existence was little more than to follow orders without question, and of course to serve as canon fodder. Bulkhead trained me to do a job, yes. But the job gave me a true purpose in this new world."
Cybershock had been left to sit happily on the floor of the still almost empty living room, while the adult bots talked. And slowly she'd made her way, crawling, toward the energon dispenser back out close to the doorway, and next the apartment door, which was thankfully closed. Promptly she'd pulled herself up to standing,reaching out and holding onto the firmly mounted dispenser for balance. And for a long moment, she just stood like that, giggling over her creator, who shouted his excitement down the hall, and watching her carrier as she chuckled because of just that.
Finally she let go of the dispenser, first with just one hand and then the other. And instead of dropping back down to sitting on the floor, Cybershock took one step forward , arms out beside her searching for balance. She stood just a second then, one step away from her hand holds and grinning, before she quickly took at least seven more steps across the room and then she fell down.
"Cybershock," Arcee exclaimed, spark pounding as watched her. "Oh my goodness. Look at you go!"
Crossing the room quickly, Arcee gently took her youngling's hands as the body reached up for her, and just as gently she pulled the baby back onto her little metal feet. She barely held the youngling up at all, instead letting her simply hold loosely to her fingertips to find her own balance again.
"Knockout," she called, now far too loudly herself down the hallway. "Come and see what our youngling can do."
With a confused look on his face-plate rolled back out of the youngling's room and turned his cart in the hallway. Just as soon as she saw him come back, and he rolled slowly toward her, Cybershock took off again, taking seven more steps, toward him this time, before she fell down again laughing.
Notes/ I'm close as anything now to wrapping this up. This mostly pure fluff chapter is second from the last chapter of this entire story. And the closing chapter is fully planned out. I just need to write it, and I'll be starting to very soon. Even though I do of coruse have that one more to go, I still want to post thanks here to everyone for following this one and for early waiting for more or it. I would not have thought that first the thing I ever wrote for the Transformers Prime fandom, would become my most successful fanfiction... And yet it did.