So why'd you really do it?

by Dreamingsinger

The last thing the Autobots expected was that Knockout would ever switch sides to join them. But why'd he do it? It's out of character. There are bound to be a few trust issues. But when he is badly injured, saving his team without even thinking about it, the 'bots begin to discover that their suspicious defector is far less confidant than they thought, and far more broken.

47. Chapter 47

"You guys missed out on a great night out last night," Smokescreen remarked, laughing loudly. He idly kicked a large red ball up into the air with the front of his foot, and managed to catch it in his hands. "That club has got to be this city's hot spot for the very best and the brightest of the good looking single bots. And it's amazing just how many seem to have a thing for a bot in the military... and it's more than obvious Bulk' and Wheeljack had a great time, even if you did decide to be party poopers!" He laughed again, louder and kicked the ball in Bumblebee's direction.

But the black and yellow bot did not share in his laughter as he stopped the ball with one foot and kicked it back and forth a moment from one foot the other.

"I didn't miss out on anything," he said, with an almost amused shake of his head, as he booted the ball back to his teammate with a sudden hard kick. "I've got the beautiful bot I want to spend my life with waiting for me right at home. So does Knockout."

"Yep." Knockout only grinned at that, before he shook his head just slightly at the silliness of the whole conversation. "And I think everyone in the city knows I'd never trade her for the world."

"Next time I talk to you two old family bots, you'll be watching game shows and comparing prices on eco-wash stations," Smokescreen laughed again joking, as he stopped the fast-kicked ball, And went back to tossing it around over his head.

The three of them, each one on a break from his own tasks somewhere or other on base, had been killing time together, at the edge of the courtyard, where the high fence had once sat. And kicking around a random red ball for no rhyme or reason.

"Seriously though, I'm not sure I'd mind settling down too," Smokesceen mused. He dropped the ball back to the ground and gave it a good kick towards Knockout, barely even needing to think before he kicked it right toward his feet, so that he could kick it back with his right. "Just as soon as I find that certain someone, I'm done with this partying."

"Ha, not me." Wheeljack, sitting on a nearby bench, with his feet propped up on a some discarded chuck of scrap metal, while he looked over a data pad, chimed in with a laugh. "Hey, don't get me wrong. I like a good lookin' bot as much as anyone. But a nagging bondmate waiting up for me? Not my idea of a good time."

"Ah, come on," Bumblebee laughed slightly with a shake of his head in his teammate's direction. "Speedbreaker has never once nagged anyone. I don't think she's got a nagging wire in her frame."

"Haha, give her a century or so," Wheeljack laughed again.

"Carrying for months, and due any day," 'Bee countered firmly, "and Speedy's never so much as lost her temper and snapped at anyone. Least of all me, who you'd think would be the first to be snapped at. I tell ya, she's never gonna be that nagging mate."

"Young love," laughed Wheeljack. And his tone, though clearly still mostly joking around, turned quickly to a kind of mock cynicism. "It's always perfect at the start. And younglings? Now I know we all love Cybershock around here. There s not one bot on this base who doesn't spoil that kid rotten. Primus knows I do it just as much as everyone else. And soon it's gonna be the very same for 'Bee and Speedy's little bot. But younglings of my own? Crying all night, spilling their energon all over the floor...another of those 'not my things'"

"You guys are crazy," Smokescreen chuckled under his intakes, while he shook his head at both of his debating teammates.

"Knockout." 'Bee laughed a little as he tapped his red teammate's shoulder panel without turning to look at him. "Come on. Back me up here! You and I, we're team 'family bots.'"

"I...I'm sorry?" Knockout mumbled in reply. And Bumblebee turned to see him look up, blinking.

"Ha!" Wheeljack laughed again. The ball, kicked last by Smokescreen, rolled toward him slowly, and he picked it up from the ground, tossing it back in the general direction of the other three. "He's not gonna get involved in this one." And he turned just slightly to look directly at Knockout, mumbling with another laugh, "good call on that one."

"M...me?" Knockout questioned, clearly confused as he gestured too vaguely toward his own chest panel, confirming that it was him that was being spoken to.

"Yeah, you." Wheeljack only laughed again for a second, before he paused a second and looked at the red bot seriously for a second more. "You okay?"

"I... I... my... head..." Knockout began to explain slowly. Or at least he tried to. And he reached up with his right hand, obviously meaning to gesture slightly, just as someone might in order to indicate a sudden headache. But in trying that simple motion, his hand instead smacked lightly against his own face-plate, before it waved behind him, somewhere far over his left shoulder.

"I need... I need to... I... buzzzzzzzzzzzzzz." His vocals went completely to static in the midst of his moment of confused mumbling. And in the next second he was sitting perfectly still on his mobility cart, optics wide open and sheer terror more than clear in an otherwise nearly vacant expression.

"Someone please help me." Bumblebee had moved almost at once to kneel on the ground in front of Knockout's cart, the very second he'd began to behave so strangely. And he reached now for the med scanner he was never without anymore, as he gave a quick order, taking charge without looking up. "We need to get him onto the ground."

"Long time without any reboots," Smokescreen mumbled, uneasy. Anxiously he exchanged uncertain looks with Wheeljack over 'Bee's head. "And it's just gotta be a serious one now, while's he's on shift."

"He'll be fine in a minute," Wheeljack answered back calmly. He stepped forward to help Bumblebee, as he'd asked, and both his tone of voice and his quick movements were calm and collected. But when Knockout suddenly screamed – a high pitched static filled noise of completely and utter panic through an obviously still glitching vocalizer – he was the next bot to cringe with unease.

"Can you keep your optics open," 'Bee said firmly, as he and his teammate lifted carefully, though quickly as they could from the cart, and placed him laying flat on the metal ground in front of it. And with a hand lightly shaking the red bot's shoulder panel as he powered up his scanner, he commanded again with greater urgency. "Optics open for me. You're okay."

"Where is Arcee?" 'Bee asked anyone who may have known, and he barely looked up as he did so.

"She... she's setting up their apartment," Smokescreen's answer was shaky now as he obviously grew increasingly nervous about a situation that was looking steadily worse instead of better. "At least that's what she said to me when she left work early today. They... they are moving in tomorrow."

"Find Arcee," Bumblebee said, seriously. "And comm Ratchet on your way. Tell him I need him out here now."

"This doesn't look like just another reboot to me," Wheeljack said, as Smokescreen roared away from them and the base, already in his vehicle mode.

Knockout might well have lost consciousness quickly in the case of processor rebooting, only to wake up again quickly, tired, confused more than likely, but otherwise fine. This was different entirely. His optics blinked and blinked by now, but he still remained at least partly awake. And he just went on screaming, louder now than before, though the vacalizer static which never did go away again. His body began to shake and tremble almost violently, and just to look at him a moment, to watch the look that remained on his faceplate and in his madly blinking optics, it was to clearly that a fair bit of that was from his degree of sheer panic and terror than from anything else.

"I need you to try and calm yourself a bit, okay?" 'Bee said firmly. He felt his own processor slowly tuning out a fair amount of the outside world and anything irrelevant, as he focused hard on remembering everything he'd ever ben taught so far in his training. And as he spoke, calmly and slow, he knew he could only hope that Knockout could indeed still understand and comprehend a word he said. "I know this is well beyond horrible, but we're going to do everything we can do. You're still okay."

"I don't think this is a reboot," he continued, his tone hushed now as he turned to talk a second to Wheekjack, who remained where he was, kneeling nearby on the ground. "He's going back into processor failure. And worse still; Arcee said once, that he still remembers so much of the last time this happened." The young bot, for all of his collected calmness and his determination to do everything right in yet another time it really mattered, sat on the ground then a second just shaking his head. "Why now, why today? His first home tomorrow, a child that just started walking..."

Bumblebee was pulled at once from his brief second of despair, when Knockout suddenly purged his fuel tank quite violently over the ground, and himself. Quickly the small black and yellow bot, thinking quickly, indeed worked almost without a need to even think at all. He grabbed his teammate quickly and pulled his body into his side, just in time for him to purge his tank twice more before his optics stopped blinking abruptly.

Knockout looked then at his friend and teammate, who held him lightly in his side-turned position. His shaking slowed just a little, and his optics appeared to focus at least a little bit more. His stronger hand, the one that could move to do so at all, reached again toward his head, and in despair of his own, he mumbled almost incoherently, '"pain... hurt... I can't..."

His vocalizer just a second after that went right back to buzzing horribly again. And his body began to shake, this time clearly just as much from the a constant misfiring of processor commands, as from his still present terror.

---

"I can't lie, Arcee," Ratchet said, he leaned hard against the door, right next to the closed medbay doors, and that, right along with the look on the old bot's face-plate, showed her without any doubt, just how devastated he felt, even as he spoke so calmly. "The situation. It's not good."

Arcee stood in the hallway, her hold on Cybershock- who sat quiet in her arms - perhaps a bit too tight. Her spark pounded in her chest with fear and dread, with determination, denial and focus.

"Knockout was perfectly conscious when I got to him out in the courtyard." Ratchet went on speaking, explaining just as much as he could, as quickly as he could manage to, while Arcee just stood staring up at him with a blank look on her face-plate and her youngling in her arms. "And he's still not fully lost consciousness yet. It's so different now from the last time. I'm convinced of course that smashing his head and face-plate off a stair rail, with enough force to bend the railing during his original malfunction, may have been the biggest reason he was so entirely out of it then. Still even that considered, it's already much worse and so fast. He's lost a great deal of any physical function, his internal systems are going down, and he's clearly in a great deal of pain and discomfort."

"Surely this is all fixable," Arcee ventured, holding out hope in the midst of her great denial, because hope was all she had and she knew that. "Just like it was before. I know it probably stands to reason he might be left even more damaged then before. But I think... no, I know, that no matter what, he'd want to live now... try his hardest, do our best... He'll get back to where he was... he's too determined not to."

"Arcee," Ratchet said firmly, interrupting her helpless rambling. And when she looked up at him again, blinking twice to regain her focus as the room began to spin. And she saw then the true degree of devastation and hopelessness on the old bot's face-plate. "Knockout was always physically weak after his last malfunction. We all know that. But I think all of us, myself included and perhaps most of all, overestimated just how much strength he actually had. He'd regained a fair bit of it, yes, thanks to all the rehab and his constant insistence on pushing his body just a little further when it said no more. But that can only go so far. I was able to repair him the last time, and with decent success, but you must remember how physically hard it was on him then. Just surviving recovery... well for a while it was amazing he did at all. Arcee, if I were to even attempt such a thing again, I fear we'd have but a two, possibly five percent chance, it wouldn't actually kill him. And those are just not acceptable medical odds."

"So..." Arcee's voice suddenly sounded so small, and instantly she was aware of that just as soon as she opened her mouth to speak again. And the baby in her arms, appeared at least on some level to understand the serious nature of the situation. Because suddenly she dropped her little head to rest on her carrier's shoulder panel, and started to cry loudly. Arcee bounced lightly on her feet, trying in vain to calm the distressed child, while she fought back her own emotions, trying hard to not distress her little one even more. "What do we do?"

"We give a while," Ratchet explained slowly. "Same as before, there's still a chance that if resting calmly his processor will go into self repair. That would obviously be a very good thing. Otherwise, give me some time to think this over. We are still in unknown territory with this case to begin with. We've been flying by our tailpipes since he survived his first malfunction, and I'm not about to start giving up just yet." The old bot fell silent a moment, and he just looked at her sadly. Slowly he placed his right hand gently under Arcee's chin, and even more gently he urged her that way to look up at him. His other hand reached out for the crying youngling, and his fingertips held her tiny ones gently, as the baby's cries turned slowly to loud shaking sniffles.

"Whatever happens from here," he said slowly, and looking Arcee intently in the optics. "Remember, you've got that beautiful little one to raise. No matter what, she will surely grow up well aware of her parents' love for each other, and her creator's love for her."

"Can I... can I see him now?" Arcee almost begged, insisting just as soon as she found her voice again.

"Of course you can see him," Ratchet answered. He gave a hint of a professional smile of assurance at her, and finally he reached put to put his hand onto her shoulder panel. "You must understand though, he's in a pretty bad state, emotionally just as much as physically. He was in a state of near complete panic by the time I got outside to help. And it didn't let up at all when we brought him in. It was a job and a half just to get a decent assessment of his condition in the first place, because he was shaking in fright, and dangerously close to screaming in terror. I worked as fast as I possibly could, trying to hook up monitors, because we might just need them and I'd rather have everything running than not. And he just cried his optics out the entire time I worked with all of that. I decided in the end, our best choice was to give him high dose sedatives, which certainly did help. But now he's a bit slow, slower than he might have been under the circumstances, because of it. And there is still more I need to do, I left it at just as little as I could before I left it be a moment to give him a break, because he was so panicked. Even now, calmer and with so much medication, I fear he may just lose it on us again."

"Can he talk?" Arcee asked slowly.

"Yes and no," Ratchet said. And though that answered seemed strange of course at first, he quickly explained it. "His vocalizer is working just fine still. But his language dictionary and the connections that govern meaning are corrupted and badly already. So we've got a bot that can speak words just fine. But the words are not the right ones. He knows what he wants to say. I'm sure of that. But he'll open his mouth to speak and what will come out will be entirely nonsense, and usually unrelated."

"Oh..." Arcee gasped then, as more and more of the situation and just how bad things could get began to hit her and hard. But still, from some part of herself, a part trained in battle and used to forcing itself to deny and just keep on running forward, she found a sense of forced calm confidence and smiled a little, however shaky it might have been.

"I'll take the youngling and bring her to Bulkhead so he can watch her a while," Ratchet said quickly. Cybershock had started crying again, and Ratchet bounced her a little as he took her from her carrier gently. "Then I need to get back in there myself obviously." He was about to walk away then, clearly. But he turned around again to face her, and continued almost idly to gently bounce and rock the youngling.

"Arcee," he said seriously, with a look of assurance on his face-plate. And he placed he hand he had just moved away back onto her shoulder once again. "Try your best to be calm and collected for him."

"We've done this before," Arcee answered. And the confidence that she answered with seemed to come from nowhere now, yet she felt it anyway as she nodded her head slowly. "He went though all this once, and I did my best then..."

"He wasn't your bond-mate then," Ratchet reminded her gently, before he turned away, rushing off in a hurry.

Knockout was, at present, the lone patient inside the medbay. And Acree found him at once, on a recharge station in the back corner furthest from the doors. Already, he'd been connected to a handful of various machines, and their wires ran along the sides of the recharge station, tucked away as efficiently as possible to avoid too many running over his frame itself. Bumblebee stood nearby, staring with great focus at a readout on the screen of a spark monitor. And glancing that the same machine herself, Arcee, in her limited understanding of such a thing, could see that the readout did not look close to ideal. Knockout's spark, she could see pulsed at first far too fast. And it slowed abruptly to dangerous at the other end of the spectrum, only to speed up again and began to race, before dropping again. And as she stood a second more shaking her head at the monitor absently, 'Bee hurried over to her. He said not a word, but quickly he wrapped his arms around her, offering a fast hug of support before he backed away and then turned to cross the room in search of some supplies.

"Hey," she said, with a faked smile she hoped would only appear confidant enough. And she quickly took several steps closer to her bond-mate and the recharge station. "I got here as fast as I could." She reached out at once to take one of his hands in hers, and deliberately she grabbed the right, because it always had been the stronger and functional one. But now, he barely managed to squeeze hers back, grabbing instead at hers awkwardly with barely bending fingertips and less function even then she'd ever seen from the left.

"Climb slow speed-bump," he mumbled. He optics alone told her that what he said was urgent. But of course it made no sense at all.

"Filter not shiny blue," he tried again not a second later. His speech was slow, as Ratchet had said, and likely from the sedatives. But the words themselves, that was clearly so much worse and something bigger than that.

Arcee had thought for sure it wouldn't scare her, when Ratchet had warned her just how bad it was. But suddenly her spark dropped just a bit before it started pounding harder. And with his fingertips just barely managing to grab her hand, and just to keep holding on like that, it was obvious to her that he was trying to hold on much harder than that, and he simply could not.

"Rear door hatchback..." he mumbled, with at least a slight show of fear flashing in his optics then, as he stopped speaking again, clearly giving up when he knew he simply couldn't make it work. And his fingertips kept right on holding onto her hers just as hard as they could.

"I... I think I know..." Arcee mummered out loud to him slowly, thinking, trusting in her inner feelings to know she had gotten it right. She sat herself down quickly in a folding chair that had been left close by. Then slowly, careful of the wires that were seemingly everywhere, and each one important, she leaned over and wrapped her free arm around him as tightly as she could.

Tuning in slowly, carefully, to the small and subtle part of her processor that held a constant link to his, via their spark connection, she began to sense his feelings along with her own. It took a brief moment to unravel what was her own from what was his. But soon she had made it all make sense. Outwardly he appeared mostly calm by now. But in is own mind, and in hers when she listened, his panic still raged like a storm. And then there was more. Dread, regret, urgency over far too much to distinguish...

Arcee was entirely unsure what else she could do. She she just stayed exactly like she was, and simply held him a moment, and then a moment more. That, she knew quickly, was what he had been so urgently trying to ask of her in the first place. Focusing intently on the panic and the fear she felt so well and knew was not her own, she sent calmness and love back through their connection, only hoping that he would sense it himself. For long moments more, she didn't move and just kept on sending. And slowly, she sensed her mate's emotions shift a little, so that he was finally calmer, if only just a litttle. It was another long moment until she finally lifted her head from its place on his chest panel again. And with great reluctance, she slowly let him go.

For the first time since she'd hurried in, Arcee took a second or two to really look at her bondmate closely. And she saw at once that for as clearly sick he was, as inwardly damaged, and his condition so completely devastating, outwardly he still looked completely fine. She'd helped him to buff and shine his finish just that morning while he lay on their recharge station. And Knockout's buffed paint now bore only a couple of light scratches, more than likely, it seemed, from him being placed onto rough metal ground outside. And that, along with light thin trails of coolant on his face-plate that let her know just how badly he'd been crying from terror not long before, were the all that looked at all out of place.

She had assured Ratchet, still only a short time before, that she could indeed stay calm and collected. She'd promised him, and even herself that of course she could, and she would. But looking him over once again, truly noticing the wires around his frame from the monitors behind him, recalling how they'd given their youngling a light little buffing too, after he'd gotten onto his mobility cart... how the baby had giggled and grinned, and later she looked just as proud of her own shiny finish as her creator always did... A memory flashed through her mind then of just the day before – her mate racing his cart around a still empty apartment that was finally theirs, shouting down the hall, excitedly yelling out something about racing flags on the baby's room walls... It was then that coolant tears of her own came to her optics, And her promises meant so little.

She tried to look down to the floor, struggling to hide her tears as they flowed freely down her face-plate. But she couldn't couldn't force herself to move fast enough to do even that. And she fought hard to stop the tears as soon as they started. But she couldn't make them stop falling.

'Please... don't do that...' Knockout's voice spoke to her, sounding just slightly different somehow. And in the second it took for her processor to catch up and clue in, she realized that she was hearing his telepathic voice, the voice of his thoughts, speaking to her silently though their spark connection. His ability to physically speak to her may have been all but gone entirely – she'd heard all to well, how he tried and tried and still managed to only mumble random nonsense. But still his telepathic inner voice worked just fine and and he'd found a way he could talk to her. It was probably, she noticed, because of the medication; but even his inner voice though was just the slightest bit slow and lagging.

'Please don't cry. Please don't cry.' he said urgently, somewhere in her mind. His hand still held onto hers just as well as he could. He'd never once let it go yet since he'd grabbed it. 'You're so pretty when you smile.'

"It... it wasn't supposed to be like this," Arcee cried, speaking out loud to him, and trying as hard as she could to stop her tears to no avail.

'We were supposed to move into our apartment, and have centuries together' she continued to herself. 'we were supposed to watch the sunset from our balcony, and watch our daughter grow up to be anyone she wants to be, because we both love her enough to let her.'

'You and our baby, you'll make it on your own,' Knockout said to her, again in her head. His telepathic voice sound just slightly stronger now, and she realized only then to her shock and horror that he might have heard the thoughts she'd been thinking only for herself. 'The two of you, against the world. You'll teach her how to be amazing. And you, teaching in the preschool, just like you want to... you can inspire her to chase those dreams of hers..."

"Arcee," Ratchet's voice, speaking somewhere close behind her made her turned just slightly so that she could look at him. And she realized, with a start, that she was not even heard him enter the medbay at all, or even heard his feet cross the floor. He had a push cart with him, and on it he carried medical supplies, which he must have fetched from a cabinet somewhere close by. But she hadn't heard him do that either. "I just need you to back up a bit. I've got a little more work to do, quickly."

Arcee stood up slowly from the chair she'd been sitting on, and she took a small step backward. But The look that showed at once in Knockout's optics, at clearly understanding Ratchet's intent to make his mate step away from him, was quickly one of complete dread and terror. His hand still held her fingertips, still just as tightly as he could possibly have done. And she lacked any spark to try forcing him to let go of her.

"I... I can't possibly leave him," Arcee said firmly.

"You're fine right there." Ratchet smiled slightly in assurance, and nodding his understanding. "A little bit of room to work is all I need."

"Door, metal cobalt, plane field," Knockout mumbled fearfully at the old medic. His words still made no sense at all, and Arcee knew just how unlikely it was that they ever would again. But the look that flashed again across his still wide open red optics, said so much. And that look showed nothing but fright again. "Brake dispenser, falling, windy morning..."

"It's alright, it's alright," Arcee said to him, urgently, trying hard to hold his focus, when he only stared at nothing with complete terror flashing through his optics, and his frame began to tremble again. After another second, she held his hand tighter, shaking it just a little and gently, while she said firmly, "Knockout. Look at me."

'Arcee,' his voice said in her mind, too fast and shaky. 'I'm afraid. I'm afraid! Please... please help me..."

'Shhh' Arcee answered at once, talking back to him only through their telepathic link, instead of bothering to speak again out loud. 'I know. It's okay. Just keep looking right at me, okay.'

'I... I can't do this again. Can't go through all this again. Too... horrible. I can't... My body, my head... it hurts so much...'

Arcee understood instantly that her bondmate was not simply talking about a couple of simple emergency medical procedures. Processor scans, the attachment of a secondary energon line, and certainly the quick re-connection of a couple spark monitor wires that had been pulled loose accidentally, were all simple and run of the mill things that should not have made any bot more then just slightly uneasy, if they were prone to nerves in medbays. No. In his case, those simple things were triggering every flashback, and every terrible and vivid memory he had ever had of his last malfunction, and his own helpless awareness of slowly shutting down.

'One bridge at a time, okay?' she said to him silently. It was an Earth expression, something she'd heard humans say a lot about crossing their bridges one a time, that inspired her words. And she wondered for just a second if he would even understand the reference. But he smiled, or least it was clear he tired to, however shakily it might have been. And he gave her a look, through still fear-filled optics, that told her he trusted her.

'Cybershock!' Knockout almost screamed somewhere in her processor. And it was clear he'd almost forgotten entirely about his fear from the minor medical procedures, as he so urgently asked after his youngling daughter. His optics opened wider then even before, and he moved the very little he still could, so obviously trying to look around to find her somewhere.

"Bulkhead has the baby," Arcee explained. And once again, she spoke out loud. Her words made at least a bit of difference, because he blinked at her a moment and then finally his optics closed just a little. "He'll take good care of her for us, for now."

The second Ratchet stepped back, done with his work, at least for a while, Arcee dropped back into the folding chair, and lowered her head right back down to rest it against her mate's chest panel. Her free hand once again wrapped around him just as tightly as she could told on, and for a long while she just stayed like that. She payed closer attention again to anything he sent to her through their shared spark connection, and again she sensed fear and dread, though slightly less so by then. She sensed his urgency over their youngling, his love and concern, though he'd heard that of course she was alright. And behind all of that, there was strangely and growing confusion. A hazy kind of feeling to every thought she sensed, and she wondered, at first only in passing what that might have meant.

Knockout's right hand had held onto hers since she'd arrived. And he never had seemed in any hurry at all to let go of it. But suddenly he did. And all too abruptly at that. With her head still resting against his chest panel lightly, she felt his fingertips drops hers. And that was enough to make her sit up just as fast as she could so that she could look at him with her spark dropping quickly. His optics had closed entirely, and she realized only then, with a start, that she had stopped hearing anything of his inner voice or feelings.

"He's alright," Ratchet said, assuring her as he hurried closer to her again from behind. And the old bot rested his hand on her shoulder panel as she turned to look at him shakily. "He's in light recharge is all. It's the medication. I'm frankly surprised he was awake as long as he was." He gestured, half absently toward the monitors, and Arcee recalled only then that of course those would let anyone know if Knockout was or was not in any real trouble.

"Will he sleep long?" Arcee asked, uncertain if she hoped he would sleep as long as he could so that everything would surely be easier, at least for him; or if she hoped he would wake up so that could know for sure he was going to again.

"It's hard to say for certain. It won't likely be too terribly long. And hour, maybe two at most I would guess, Any longer and I'll need to wake him anyway to recheck processor functions. It'll be a while though surely." Ratchet looked at her with compassion in his optics, and once again she could see just how uneasy and saddened he was himself.

"Sit back a second," he ordered unexpected. And he reached quickly to a nearby worktable, to pick up his med scanner.

"Ratchet. I'm not a patient," she protested, dismayed as he scanned her once quickly and then promptly he did it again slower, the second she hesitantly sat back in her folding chair.

"You most certainly are, now," Ratchet answered firmly, and it was more than clear at once that he meant it entirely. "You're clearly in high stress. And though not without perfectly understandable and good reason, obviously, high stress is still high stress. You've been in spark failure once, and however small the danger is of this whole situation causing it again, I'm not about to take a single risk. The good news is you are currently just fine." he smiled then just slightly with obvious compassion and put a hand back onto her shoulder panel. "Arcee, why don't you go outside for a few minutes. I'm not going anywhere. And I don't think 'Bee is either. Get a little fresh air and have your afternoon fuel. Both will be the best thing for you."

Arcee shook her head firmly for a moment in refusal. But Ratchet had meant exactly what he said, and the look he gave her when she refused to get up told her so in no uncertain terms. Slowly she stood from the folding chair, and after she'd made him promise her four times that he'd comm the very second something happened, if anything did, she took a few slow steps to the doors of the medbay. When she paused again right where she was standing, Ratchet again cast her a look that surely could have killed her at once, had his optics been weapons, and slowly she walked out.

---

The air and the gentle breeze outside in the courtyard certainly was nice. And as much as Arcee did not want to admit it, she was glad for the sunshine, still overhead and bright in the early hours of the evening. She marvelled, almost startled that already the day was nearly gone. The morning had barely been over when she'd gotten the terrible call, in the midst of unpacking a box of datapads in her new home, that had brought her speeding toward the base and the medbay.

Distracted and shaking on the bench she tried to sit still on, she took a tiny sip from the energon container she held in her hands, not wanting to drink it, but well aware that she needed it, and more so because the excitement of her moving house had made her skip the morning. With her fuel tank flipping so badly inside her frame that she was almost sure she would purge it all over the ground, she chanced one more small sip, forcing herself by then, but determined only because she knew Ratchet would be so disappointed if she didn't even try.

"Mama," cried the voice of her youngling, from halfway across the courtyard. And Arcee looked up from her own thoughts, to see Bulkhead, walking slow on the path that led around the base, with the baby in his big strong arms.

Cybershock had so clearly been distressed and crying a moment before. Because tears stained her face-plate, her little voice shook with near sobs as she called out to her carrier, and the bot that held her as he walked was obviously anxious, and trying hard not to drop her as she wiggled.

"Arcee," Bulk' said, his tone uncertain as she slowly walked toward her with the little one. "I didn't know you'd be out here. Letting her see you right now might just make her feel worse, eh?" The big bot pulled the baby closer against him, and tried hard to bounce her in a way that would have been well beyond cute if the day wasn't so very upsetting.

"So" Bulk' said, searching for words as she sometimes seemed to when things seemed uncertain. "Smokescreen said that Knockout... well it might have been a reboot at first, but then it got..."

"It's not just a reboot," Arcee said, trying hard to explain, because he simply wanted to know. Everyone must have wanted to know by then, because Knockout was pretty well everybody's friend. But she simply couldn't explain it right then. She wasn't sure yet she fully understood the entire situation herself, except that it was terrible and going to get much worse.

"I'll take her, Bulk'" she said after another second to think, and a second more to berate herself just a little for hesitating, when the decision should have been easy. And quickly she reached out to take her child from her teammate.

"Arcee, if you need anything at all... if I need to take the kid for you again or something... comm me anytime."

"Thank you Bulk."

Back in her carrier's arms again, Cybershock calmed a fair bit. And after a moment of simply resting against her shoulder panel and sniffling, the baby lifted her head, looked around her again, waved at Bulkhead as he walked away, and even smiled a little when Arcee smiled at her. Quickly though her smile dissolved again into more little sniffles, and Arcee knew to her dismay that though she had certainly been trying to, she could not exactly hide her own distress from her youngling. At least not entirely.

"Let's go," she said to her little one, in a voice just as light and cheerful as she could manage to make it. "We're going to go see your creator."

"Excuse me, miss," said a voice, just as soon as Arcee had walked the pathway around a corner, heading back toward the front doors leading into the base. And she paused to see some elderly refugee stand up from the bench, she was sitting on outside the doors.

This bot truly was old. Certainly the oldest living Cybertronian Arcee had ever seen by far. And judging by the bandaged wrists and the carefulness of her steps as she walked toward her, the refugee was obviously a patient from somewhere inside the hospital wing of the base.

"Yes?" Arcee said to her politely. She felt inwardly like she didn't exactly have time to deal with this elderly bot right then. But how would the poor old refugee possibly have known that. Arcee was an Autobot and duty was duty.

"You must be Knockout's bondmate." the grey painted refugee said hesitantly. And when Arcee nodded, admittedly uncertain over what to make of the exchange by then, the old bot explained quickly. "Knockout pops in every morning to say hello and chat a moment while he makes his morning rounds. He's showed me pictures of his daughter, because he's such a proud creator of course. And so I recognized your little one here. She's such a beautiful youngling."

"Thank you," Arcee answered, still politely. And course she had to admit that she was just as proud a parent as her mate was.

"I... asked around a bit today, when Knockout didn't come back in today to close my window. He'd said he would later when he opened it again this morning, and something just seemed wrong to me. I've heard very little obviously but what I have heard, it's bad news."

Arcee only nodded at that. And the polite smile she'd forced onto her face-plate began to slowly disappear for a look more genuine than that. Whoever this very elderly bot was, it was more than clear she truly was concerned, that she had a good spark, and that somehow Knockout had made an impression on her, just as it seemed he had on so many others.

"May I include him in my prayers tonight? And you and that child of yours of course?" the refugee patient questioned after another second. And Arcee blinked once, startled and dismayed at that.

There had been a time once, when bots had prayed to Primus. Arcee knew that from history lessons and stories passed down by old bots from some long passed, who had been older still. But in her own time, it was simply not something anyone did anymore. And she blinked again at realizing with another start, just how old this bot may have been to have lived in the time when bots still prayed, to to possibly never have stopped.

"I think that Knockout would appreciate that," Arcee said smiling again at the old bot. After all, she reflected to herself, what could it possibly hurt? "Thank you."

Her commlink beeped suddenly, and the second she recognized the comm signature as that of the medbay, she stood up straighter again and turned to run back. The kind elderly bot clearly understood what had happened, or at least she glimpsed the urgency of it, because she just gave a polite nod of good bye, as Arcee turned to hurry back power walking.

"Arcee?" Ratchet questioned her with clear dismay, meeting her close to the doors, as she almost ran ran back into the medbay. He looked from her to the youngling now in her arms, and back again with a look that made it perfectly clear he did not exactly approve.

"Has Knockout woken up?" Arcee asked. In her spark dropping concern that he may have without her, she dodged the old medic's unasked line of questioning altogether.

"He's starting to," Ratchet's tone was calmer now, compassionate again. "Don't worry. He wouldn't have known you were ever gone." But his optics narrowed again in the next fraction of a second, and he looked again from her to her youngling. Quickly, almost under his intakes entirely, he mumbled, "Arcee, I'm really not sure she should be..."

"Cybershock needs to see Knockout too," Arcee countered firmly. Her mind was made up and no one would change it now. "He's her creator. She needs him. And he needs her more so."

"Fine fine," Ratchet mumbled, all the while shaking his head just a little. But his optics quickly softened again and Arcee knew he felt she was right. Sure enough he nodded then, and smiled slightly at the baby before he waved then on past him with a quick motion of his hand.

'Arcee? Arcee!" Knockout first questioned and then begged in quickly growing panic through their shared connection, before she was quite close enough to him that he could have seen her from the recharge station he lat flat on.

'It's alright,' she answered back, speaking silently again herself. She took several hurried steps to stand close to him again. 'I'm right here. It's okay.'

"I've got someone here to see you," she said, speaking out loud now. And slowly she began to bounce just a little on the fronts of her feet almost unconsciously, as the baby in her arms began to whimper in fright, as her little blue optics looked around the medbay.

Knockout looked up at the youngling and he smiled then, a true and real grin that seemed to overtake his fear, at just seeing his daughter again. And he tried to reach up to her just a little, though his body of course could barely move at all.

"Scrapheap drink funny signs," he said, speaking slowly, determination showing in his optics, as though he might still make some sense if only he tried hard enough. His optics met the baby's, and he blinked several times, with a look that said he was struggling then in so many ways. Intently he stared at the youngling and urgently he mumbled at her, "Reverse city doors."

His despair at not managing to even call his own youngling, his only child, by her name – because clearly that's exactly what he'd tried so very hard to do – appeared to crush him far more than anything had so far. And for a second he blinked several times more with tears of coolant forming in his optics again.

The youngling, watching him in clear and obvious confusion at first, must have only wondered initially why it was her creator was mumbling utter nonsense at her. And she stayed still, in her carrier's arms watching him, baffled and listening to see what he might say next. But after a second more she clearly clued in that something was very wrong. Slowly she started to sniffle again, and ever more slowly she turned just as much as she possibly could, little arms reaching out to him just as far as she could reach, grabbing for his fingers just the way she'd always done. Devastation quickly filled her face-plate when he didn't move to let her.

"Dada..." Cybershock screeched horribly, as her little processor clearly tried its hardest to place exactly what it was that had happened to him. And coolant poured from her optics as she reached out again.

Arcee felt her own spark nearly breaking as she held her screaming, sobbing child. And she only hoped beyond all hope then that the hunch she'd followed in bringing the little one back with her, had been right after all. The baby's hands reaching forward a moment before, had now come to cling in terror to her carrier's left arm. And Arcee carefully coaxed her into letting go again, before she bent slowly forward, to set the child down, sitting on the recharge station her creator was laying on.

Cybershock may have been a child so young she could barely talk and had only just began to walk. But even at her young age she knew love and compassion, perhaps far better than some three times her age. She possessed innate understanding of weakness and of strength, and she could clearly demonstrate gentleness and patience when it was needed most of her. And indeed sure enough, just as soon as she was set down, she half crawled and half awkwardly wiggled a little so the she could be closer to her creator's nearly still frame. And still moving slowly, showing care seen mostly in children already much older, she lay down beside him, grabbed for his hand, and held it in both of her much smaller ones, while she snuggled tight against him and cried.

"U-turn river, quiet junk, wash station," Knockout mumbled at her helplessly, as his vocalizer started to buzz with static again over his nonsensical words. And he looked horrified now at his own condition, as his frame began to tremble again, though this time just slightly.

"Ah-tay, dada," said Cybershock, speaking as well as she could in her tiny little voice, and doing so with such surprising calmness. She lifted her head from the recharge station just enough to talk to him, to tell him in the the best way she could that it was okay, before she settled back down again.

"You were right it seems, Arcee," Ratchet's voice said, from somewhere close by again. And Arcee turned around, startled, as the old medic stepped up beside her. He spoke in hushed tones and gestured slightly to her mate and her child.

"She's the light of his life, and he's her super hero," Arcee answered simply, as tears threatened again, and stubbornly she forced them back. "How could I possibly not..."

"Ratchet," she said a second after she'd first let her words die out in mid-sentence, and changing the direction of the conversation entirely. Gently she grabbed for his arm, and led him a few steps away, closer to the centre of the medbay, daring to leave her bondmate for a second only because he was presently so well distracted by their youngling. And because 'Bee had stepped closer to make certain that said youngling didn't fall if she were to move, which she didn't. She looked up again at the old medic with wide optics, filling quickly with coolant tears and this time one fell before she could help it. "If the worst really happens... if you can't find a way to save him this time. Do you think there might..." she paused a second while more small tears fell and she wiped at them stubbornly with the back of a hand. After a slow intake she said with determination, "do you think there might just be a way to power him down completely well before his processor begins it's final, fatal shut down. That's exactly the thing he fears the most, the thought that terrifies him the point of shaking... just being aware while the lights slowly start to go out..."

"I need a short while to think all this over..."

"Ratchet. Please. I know you'll do your best. We all will. I know that and I thank you. But if you do fail, if this is it... I... I just can't think of letting him suffer in pain and terror. Maybe, if he was just powered down long enough before, the last thing he'd ever know would be just falling into recharge..."

"I can promise you I'll do the very best I can," Ratchet answered, firm and kindly while he gently brushed a tear or two from her optics.

Cybershock, screeching horribly from her place still on the recharge station, made Arcee turned around fast to see what had happened before she could say another word to the old medic. And at nearly the very same moment, a flash of fear so terrible it nearly caused her to freeze where she stood, broke through her still open spark connection to her mate. And with a quick intake to snap herself out of it, when she knew at once it was not her feeling she felt, she ran the five steps back to him.

'Help me. Please help me!' Knockout's inner voice begged somewhere in her processor. He was crying from hard from panic, and she heard it in his telepathic voice just as surely as she saw it in the tears pouring down his face-plate.

The rough uncontrolled moment of his limbs as connections from his processor sent through his frame without meaningful purpose, made her spark drop at once. Arcee recalled at once, to her own horror, just how during his initial malfunction, seemingly so long ago by then, he'd managed to bang his hands against a wall so hard he could easily have hurt himself. And she understood quickly that this did not happen now only because his body lacked the simple ability to do any thing like that. Still it was enough to alarm and startle the youngling and that's why she must have screamed as she had. Bumblebee, standing close by, where's he'd been watching for her safety, scooped the youngling immediately into his arms, and the little one burst out crying then, once again in obvious despair.

'I'm falling,' Knockout's telepathic voice mumbled miserly in confusion, and still with great panic. 'Where... where... am I? Arcee! Where are you. Please... help me!'

"I'm right beside you," Arcee assured gently assured him quickly. Her vision faded a second, before flashing all too bright, and dimming, as the room began to spin a little and then much more. She knew once again that anything she felt, however frightening or out of place it may have been, it was not her feeling but only feedback through the spark connection.. And certainly his feeling of falling made a lot of sense. Still standing, she felt for a second like her feet would not continue to hold her steady, and she leaned to rest against his frame again, just as much to keep herself from stumbling as to comfort him. "We're still here on base."

"Primary glitch in processor area six, and it looks like the secondary glitch is area two, " Ratchet was saying somewhere nearby, and Arcee knew without looking up that he must have been reading monitors and translating whatever he was seeing for 'Bee who still stood beside him. But in her intent focus on her mate and and anything she could gather from him directly through their spark connection, the old bot's words were barely barely registered at all.

"Frag it all," Ratchet continued in under a second. And it was the urgency and the frustration in his voice that made Arcee at least try to listen then, because this was clearly serious. "We have small glitches showing in area four, one, nine and fifteen. It's triggered a ripple effect through his entire frontal processor."

Bumblebee asked a question, over the sound of the youngling fussing horribly in his arms. And Arcee tried to make out exactly what it was he'd asked wanting to know in turn what the answer would be. But his words were little more then jumbled noise, buried by Knockout's telepathic voice as he started to scream louder in her head. Her spark ached with his pain. And forcing herself to lift her head from his chest panel again, she forced herself to intake. His body continued to tremble and shake, and struggle to move without any purpose. In her head, his voice was only screamed and screamed entirely without even any words now, and the tears he cried quickly covered his face plate.

"Look at me," Arcee said to him again. It had helped at least a little bit once before and she was helplessly at a loss for what else she might actually do by now. Quickly she offered him her hand again, but now he could not hold on at all anymore. So she just held his instead, tightly enough that surely he'd know she was not letting go. As she stepped carefully to her right just a bit so that she knew she for sure he might still see her. "Optics right on mine... there you go."

'Ar...cee,' his voice cried helplessly in her processor. 'Don't let go. Please... don't let go.'

'Never' Arcee promised silently. 'Tell me, what is it you need? What... What can I do?'

Her simple question, asked of him in the midst of steady growing panic and terror that she could fear clear inside her own mind, in the form of feedback from his, was mostly meant to make him focus on simply answering it instead of only on his terror. And slowly, she felt him calm just slightly, as his faulting processor, struggled hard just to form an answer.

'Just hold me,' he answered. His telepathic voice was mumbling now, and shaky and slow. 'Talk to me, and don't let me go.'

'Okay,' without letting go of the hand she already held, Arcee quickly sat back down in the little folding chair again, so that she could lean easily forward. And gently, yet still firmly, she wrapped her free arm around him again. 'I can do that. You know what? When we get out of here, and get you back home, we're going to plan our first little party in our new apartment. Invite our workmates to show them the new place. Cybershock is nearly a solar cycle old now. It will be a little birthday party for her too..."

"Glitches now in areas three, seven, eight, and nine," Bumblebee's voice said, from somewhere that sounded so far away, but was really still close behind her. "And areas six and two look like they've gone down completely."

"They have gone down indeed," Ratchet all but growled in frustration close by. And Arcee heard the familiar banging of his hand against a nearby work table, as the old bot vented rage at a losing battle. "And we're clearly about to lose two more."

"R... Ratchet," 'Bee was so obviously anxious as he spoke. "The last time this happened, at the time of his initial malfunction, it was fast glitches and he's snap back out of it again awhile. Why... why not now? It's different this time."

"Area six caused a little ripple that brought down more. Now that's causing cascade failures in the entire processor. He's going to go downhill very fast from here and any second now."

"What about a hard reset?" Bumblebee suggested, quickly. And Ratchet all but dismissed the idea at once.

"We'd need to tear the entire back of his head apart just to get to the reset control safely. Then reassemble it after the fact. It's a good thought, but with his systems already failing, that invasive a thing is a major risk."

"Arcee' Knockout cried silently. His mental voice was more muddled now than ever, and his hand shook terribly in hers. 'No! No! Please... no...'

Arcee was about to question him gently about exactly what it was he was trying to tell her. What was it, she wondered urgently, that he was saying no to so desperately. And her spark dropped a second later, and she fought back a sudden pressing urge to purge her fuel tank, when she realized it. He may have had no voice left to speak out loud – even his nonsensical strings of words had long dissolved into nothing but static, And he'd since stopped trying to speak completely – but still for his complete lack to commutation with the world outside of himself, he was still aware of everything. It was, she understood with dismay and dread and utter horror, exactly like before. He was feeling himself fading away, and no one else had any way to know that.

'Shh. Shh,' she said to him silently. And as she did, she held him just a little tighter. 'No one's going to tear you apart. It sounds like Ratchet's dismissed that option. And anyway I'd tell him no in a second if that isn't what you'd want, okay?'

"Arcee! I can barely see you. My... visuals are... bad... scrolling, Colours... wrong..."

"Your visual processing system is starting to fail. Oh. Don't panic. Everything's alright. Do you still feel your hand in mine?"

'I... I... dunno... yeah. I can. Please don't let go!"

'I'm not letting go. It's okay. It's okay.'

'Cybershock!'

'Do you want to hold her?' Arcee asked slowly. She knew just how much she'd have to help him just to do that, but there was no doubt at all in her mind that the youngling, still crying softly in 'Bee's arms, while he worked, tracking monitor readouts, would easily let him.

'Yeah.'

'I need to let you go, for just a second,' Arcee explained. Her tone was calm, or at least she only hoped it was. But her spark was dropping hard, and taking just one small step, she felt like she would collapse from her shock and her grief. 'I'm not going anywhere. I'm just going to take our baby back from 'Bee.

Bumblebee clearly understood exactly what it was she wanted to do, the second she turned quickly to face him. Because he gently coaxed the baby's head up from his shoulder panel, where she'd laid it down to cry softly in her own sadness and confusion. And he took just a second to gently take Arcee by the arm, preventing her from falling just when she was sure she easily may have done, and carefully he turned to put the baby down on the recharge station again.

Reassuring him all the while though their shared spark connection, Arcee gently moved her bondmate's body – which he was now almost entirely unable to move on his own – placing his arms gently around their youngling's tiny frame as she lay snuffling again against him.

"There you go," she said slowly, quietly and speaking out loud to him now. Gently she placed one of her hands on his lower arm, and the other behind the baby, again to keep her from falling if she moved. "You've got her. And I've got you."

"Areas one and nine are down," Ratchet mumbled in helpless frustration. And Arcee glanced up just a second in dismay to see him just staring at the monitors, because he could not think of anything left to do.

"'Bee I need you to stand by ready to help me if he starts to panic a bit, which I fear he easily might," the old medic said after a second. And in the tone of his voice, he sounded fully decided now. We're putting him into complete power down."

"A complete power down, during this kind of steady processor glitching and shut down?" Bumblebee questioned, clearly baffled by his teacher's instructions. 'Bee was a young bot, who never had had much trouble following orders and direction, and he enjoyed learning by just taking instructions. He was very good at it. But at the same time he never had been one to refrain from a question or three when something made little sense to him and he felt somehow that even an expert at anything really, might have been wrong. "Ratchet, his chances of coming back from a power down now are well under..."

"He's not coming back from any of this," Ratchet snapped. And Arcee, glancing up at him for just another fraction of a second, saw the regret flash across the old bot's optics at once for snapping at his student. She saw his regret over everything, and she knew it included his own self perceived failure, as he shook his head a moment. "We had so little we could have done from the start. And we've done all of that. Our last choice now becomes whether to let him stay awake to know too much as it all ends horribly, or to power him down just for the hope it will be easier..."

Arcee would make it on her own. She knew in a moment of suddenly reflection, that Knockout had been right about that, when he'd told her so himself only several hours before. Of course she could make it. But still that didn't mean she'd ever wanted to have to. And while she held her mate's still so badly trembling hand in hers, and sent him every bit of calmness and her love as she could through their connection, while he struggled to just barely hold onto their youngling – who was now crying so hard again tiny frame shook, and refusing to let him go. - with his arm over her in the position it had been carefully placed in, she wondered so horribly then, just how it would be until the baby had all but forgotten him entirely.

She'd taken, since they'd bonded, to snapping pictures. Photofiles of him in every stage of his progress through rehab and life itself - and plenty with the baby too, laughing on his lap.. (In most he was smiling, because he'd begged her so often to rid their datapads of any where he was certainly not.) And she was glad for each one often images now, because she knew that as her child grew up, those photos, more than anything, could tell the story of just who he had been. She wondered then and asked herself strangely, if she would have done life differently, perhaps chosen not to love him, not to be his mate and all that had led to, if only she'd known...

"I wouldn't have missed this for the world," she said out loud to him, the answer to her own question decided in under a second. "We sure had fun, didn't we?" Within likely minutes, he would be powered down entirely. And giving the progress of his failing condition... too impossibly fast this time, without only hours he would likely be offline. She wanted so bad for him to know, in the final conscious moments he'd ever have, that their time together, cut short though it was, left no source of regret.

"Ratchet," Arcee heard Bumblebee exclaim perhaps too boldly, and she went on listening just as well as she possibly could to their conversation. "What if there was one thing you haven't done yet? One more trick to try, that wouldn't involve partly disassembling him, or invasive repairs that would probably kill him?"

"''Bee..." Ratchet said, not without any compassion. But he never did finish whatever it was he'd started to say. And his words just died in the air as he stood shaking his head sadly.

For all the horrible revelry of the war, between two fast car alt modes, the two well matched bots perhaps fought the most of any. But Knockout had since become one of the young bot's best friends. They'd raced against each other, in friendly competition at first, in their alt modes. And not long at all after Knockout's first tragic malfunction, 'Bee had easily been among the first of his teammates to behave just as though truly felt Knockout was still just another Autobot. Arcee knew he could not stand to see a best friend die, anymore then he could see a bot who was practically his sister's spark break.

"Cybermatter," Bumblebee persisted, with the confidence of someone who truly thought he might just be right. Arcee watched him both sadly and almost hopeful as he turned to Ratchet with determination on his face-plate. "The project is complete now, thanks to Speedbreaker's work. Ratchet, this is what you dreamed when you first started to pursue the work again. A chance of repair for bots without chances, hope when someone is damaged beyond all medical knowledge or technology..."

"Still completely untested," Ratchet pointed out, grumbling with a shake of his head. "I can hardly use a dying patient as a test subject for a brand new idea, that might work only because I've seen it do something interesting once in my career."

"Knockout's life was just as devoted to medical science as yours is," 'Bee countered. And the boldness with which the young bot spoke, was entirely surprising. "If he's going to very soon die, I think it stands to reason he'd want to go out still trying to make medical history. And as long as there is still that one chance this may actually work..."

"I can't think of how I might just be able to look that little baby girl in the optics one day when she's grown, and tell her honestly that I may have passed on one last viable shot at saving her creator," Ratchet mumbled under his intakes. And Arcee glanced up with tear filled optics, to see him staring down at her baby and shaking his head.

Knockout's voice was just as silent now in her head as it had been for a while outside of it. And she sensed him only as a barely conscious hint of awareness somewhere inside her processor and spark. There was hardly any fear left anymore. And that of course was a good thing. But there was so little sense of any emotional at all, or any real awareness, and that was far from good. Still Arcee went right back to sending her feelings to him, only hoping he would still sense it all, at least a little, on some level.

When Ratchet tapped her gently on the shoulder, she was startled so badly from her own intense focus and thoughts, that she nearly jumped out of her body armour. And she struggled to listen carefully when the old bot asked her, quite unexpectedly to make the final call regarding the matter she'd vaguely heard discussed. Knockout was far past a point of being able to give or deny any permissions for himself, though in a far more ideal situation his own opinion most certainly would have mattered greatly. Arcee was his bondmate, and the call fell then to her. Slowly she found herself nodding her head mutely, without daring to hope.

"The plan has changed then," the old medic said quickly. And if there had been any doubt left that what he said was important, the tone of his voice alone would have dashed those doubts fast. He moved as gently as he could have to pick up Cybershock, from where she lay on the recharge station, still holding onto her creator's left hand in both of hers, long after he's lost all ability to hold onto her little frame at all, and his right arm had simply come to flop awkwardly onto the recharge station beside them. The youngling reached a second as though she hoped he might reach back now that she'd been moved. And when nothing happened at all, she moved to cry softly into the old bots shoulder panel. "Instead of a complete power down, I'm going to give him another, much stronger dose of sedative medication. We're so far from anything close to exact science on this. But I feel like one litre of liquid form cybermatter, injected slowly into his energon line is a good starting point with this." Beside him, Bumblebee nodded his understanding and he held out his arms to take the youngling.

"How can I help?" Arcee asked quickly. She wrung her hands together, and was well aware of her frame trembling as the stress and grief, uncertainty and horror of the entire day began to catch up to her, and quickly become almost too much. She stepped a few few steps, just enough to be well out of her teammates' way, but still close as she could be to her bondmate and her child. Hope was becoming tempting, and stubbornly she fought it back, not daring to hope for a thing, terrified she would only be crushed if she did.

"You're going right into some medically aided recharge yourself," Ratchet answered, firmly. And Arcee, dismayed, stood a second blinking at him.

"You need rest, badly," he explained before she could even find her voice again, to protest. "And I'm not about to send you off home with the orders to simply get a good night's recharge and stop back in the morning. You'd never sleep, and I know that."

"Ratchet. I'm not about to just..." Arcee's protest, however firm, however pleading, was interrupted, with the old medic quite unexpectedly lifted her from the floor and plopped her down quickly onto her mate's recharge station.

"No use in me calling this a bad idea," he mumbled quickly. He held out his hand, containing two large blue pills, glaring at her until she slowly reached out to take them, trusting him because her mind really was beyond any will to do otherwise. "That's exactly where's he'd want you to be."

"Umm, Ratchet," Arcee heard 'Bee say quietly, as she carefully and somewhat hesitantly put her arms lightly around her mate's frame as soon as she'd lay down close to him. "I... I'm sorry. I might have a situation at home."

Whatever it was that the old medic had given her to take, it's effects were certainly fast acting. And it was in an already half asleep state that she realized 'Bee must have answered his commlink.

"A comm from Speedbreaker," the young bot said quickly. And his tone showed just how much he was clearly torn between duty to his family and duty to his work.

Arcee heard Ratchet quickly tell him to go and to hurry about it. Because she would have have comm'd if her reasons had not been truly serious ones.

"Your med scanner, 'Bee," Ratchet's voice sounded far away by then. "Never run off without your scanner..."

Scene Break Scene Break Scene Break Scene Break

"Speedy?" Bumblebee called the second the door to their apartment had slid open in front of him. No answer greeted him as one usually did, and the door to wash station sat wide open. Odd, he noted quickly, because he could hear water running hard inside the shower.

"Speedbreaker!" he said louder, far more urgent now as he stepped toward their wash station with his spark beating faster.

'I need you home,' her message to him had said simply, scrolling in simple text across his visual comm. 'It might be an emergency.' And of course he'd hurried back as fast as he possibly could, speeding. She knew well he was tied up with a serious emergency already, and he knew she would never have comm'd like that if hers was not just as much one, or even more so.

"Bee!" Speedbreaker called from inside the wash station. Her voice, calling loud over the sound of the pouring water and oil, was shaky and scared. "I... I'm in... here."

Bumblebee found his mate in the shower, sitting oddly on the metal tiles of the soaked wet floor, with the stream from the tap high above flowing over her head. She leaned badly against the edge, one hand tight in a fist and the other holding tightly to the small ledge the surrounded their shower enclosure.

"Primus, Speedy, what happened?" 'Bee's first thought was that she may have slipped and fallen while simply bathing. He imagined for a fleeting second that she'd clearly hurt herself and possibly badly if she'd called him home because of it. But that would not have explained the open door, and something still seemed off.

"'Bee... the newspark." Her answer was urgent and fearful and it made him catch himself at once and clue in to the obvious. His optics went at once to her spark chamber. And he noticed already the slight gap in places where the plating was just beginning to slide apart on her body's own accord.

"Scrap. It's clearly been hours already," he mumbled, dismayed as he grabbed hold her her gently and pulled her out onto the wash station floor, where she half sat up, leaning weakly against a wall. "What were you thinking waiting so long?" He reached at once for his med scanner, glad as anything that Ratchet had stopped him from leaving it behind.

"I... I knew you were busy," Speedy answered, whimpering a little before she gasped with pain and seemed to struggle against what could easily have been terrible scream. "I thought it was nothing at first. Just the newspark shifting a bit too much. So I... I got into the shower, hoping the pain would pass in there."

Bumblebee sat himself down on the floor beside her, and gently he pulled her against him, wrapping his arms around her so he could hold her for a moment. Her frame was retaining so much heat that the water on her body from the shower was turning already to vapour that streamed off of her as it cooled in the air. And she whimpered against him loudly, with hands reaching like they were searching for something to grab onto.

"Relax," he said slowly, intaking once carefully, so that she might too. She grabbed for his hand, the one closest to hers, and she held it hard enough he thought she might just injure him, however mildly. "Yeah, I know. Easier said that done. How is your pain level?"

"Out of ten?" Speedy mumbled her question against his platting and promptly she went right back to her quiet whimpering again.

"Yeah."

"Twenty-five." Her little whimpers were fast becoming cries. And looking at her chest panel the best he could manage to without letting go or forcing her to sit back again, 'Bee saw the first hints of bright whitish light showing between now wider cracks in the spaces of her body armour.

"You might just be so close now. Okay. It's okay. It's okay."

"Is this... is this supposed to happen?" Speedbreaker looked at her own panel, and she blinked with uncertainty at the steady growing light from within her own body.

"Exactly what's supposed to happen," 'Bee assured her, and he forced a little smile to reinforce his point. Speedy had talked at length to Ratchet of course, about many things newspark related. Both of them had. But still she had never even seen the process of spark separation before without a massive amount of unforeseen complications involved.

"We've got to get back to the base medbay," he continued quickly, hurriedly thinking out loud. "I've got to comm for a bit of help..." His mind ran fast through several possibilities, quickly discarding them as he remembered the serious emergency that had kept him away in the first place. Finally, he made up him mind and nodded firmly. "Bulkhead. He's certainly big enough to easily carry you."

"'Bee," said Speedbreaker, through continued steady whimpers of pain. Slowly she lifted her head from his armour so that her tear filled optics could look into his. "Please don't be angry..."

No sooner had she moved to look at him, than she lowered her head again so that she could scream loudly into his metal plating as pain tore through her upper frame, and the light grew brighter.

"I'm not angry. I could never be angry at you. It was my fault you waited so long to call. I never should have left you on your own all day while I knew this could happen anytime..."

---

"Help me!" Speedbreaker screamed, loud enough to nearly shake the armour on the frames of any bots nearby. And tears fell from her optics as she was set down gently as possible, in a backroom of the hospital wing. Instantly she was trying her hardest just to turn to first one side and then the other, clearly seeking a most comfortable position where none could be found. "I'm dying! I'm dying!"

"Speedbreaker," Ratchet said firmly, hurrying over as fast as he could, with his trusted old scanner in hand. He shook his head just slightly and chucked under his intakes with mild amusement, despite the seriousness of the situation. "You aren't dying. I need you to listen to me. I need you flat on your back just like we put you, and your arms down at your sides if you can. You panel is almost entirely open now. We're just going to let it go a tiny bit more, and we should be able to easily grab the newspark gently and help it out."

"I'm not ready," Speedbreaker screamed, just as loud as before. The little bot had always been by nature a quiet one, never known to make much noise at all, if any. And both Bumblebee and Ratchet exchanged looks of shocked dismay, and certainly compassion, over her surprising ability to scream like that in the first place. "I can't, I can't! I'm dying, I'm dying!"

"It's not too late is it, to give her something for pain?" 'Bee questioned, his compassion turning by then to concern, as his mate screamed again, a wordless scream of pain this time. And he could see so easily, that she was starting to panic.

"We are cutting everything so close," Ratchet answered quickly, thinking out loud. "But I think we can still make it work just fine. That should help her with nerves too. I've just got to hook her up to an energon line here quick..."

"No! No way! Nooo!" Speedy screamed, in response to that.

It was just another thing she was screaming over, and perhaps far too unreasonably frightened of by then. And Bumblebee was, at least for a moment, taken aback entirely by just how panicked she really was, since they'd gotten to the base. But Speedy was a refugee. She never fought in the war. Never been half way to scrapped even once, or even hurt far less. Her only real experience of being in a medbay at all as a patient was for simple scans of herself and the newspark's health, and once for a small and completely painless repair of a rusty knee joint. 'Bee could feel all to clearly through their shared spark connection when he tried to, just how much the bright overhead lights were scaring her badly, and how the pain, worsening by the minute only made that all seem far worse still.

"Just a tiny little pinch okay," 'Bee said calmly, and when his mate grabbed his hand and squeezed it far too hard in her growing pain, he just let her. "I'm not sure you'll feel it at all with the pain you're already in. No no, don't move, don't move. Lay flat like that. Very soon now we'll have our own little youngling in our arms."

"Y... yeah," Speedbreaker mumbled a shaky answer. And she managed to smile just a little through her pain, before she screamed again, and tried to roll sideways again.

"What colour do you think our baby's paint will be when she finally gets her colours?" 'Bee asked her. The question was one he's thought of quickly and quite out of nowhere, in an effort to distract her as Ratchet carefully fed thin wire tubing through a gap in the armour plates of her lower arm.

"I dunno," Speedbreaker answered after thinking a second. She was clearly as far from happy as she;d been since he'd found her at home. But at least her screaming had stopped as she focused a little on conversation.

"Well. My bet is on blue. Bright cobalt blue... maybe some white mixed in."

"Blue?" Speedy almost laughed then, as the medication quickly began to have at least some effect and she felt even slightly better. She looked at him with a half sideways look that showed confusion. "How could he possibly be..."

It was most unlikely of course. Blue was so from from the orange and yellow of their combined primary colours. And there was no known blue paint code in their known genetic coding for generations. But it had made her smile, and that's all he'd hoped for.

Scene Break Scene Break Scene Break Scene Break

Arcee gained awareness slowly at first, as light pouring through a window behind her from the early morning sun, hit her closed optics. She was confused at first, wondering exactly where she was, because of course she was not in her own familiar recharge room. And with her processor slowly catching up then, she recalled with dread everything that had happened, before she'd been practically forced into recharge.

Her arms were still wrapped tight around Knockout's frame, and one of her hands held onto one of his carefully. And it was with a feeling of wonder and joy that she realized quickly, he was actually holding onto hers as well as she held his. He looked at her with open optics as she stared at him blinking. And his face-plate showed a state of shock, confusion and still more of his terror and panic. Coolant tears that had covered his face-plate the night before, had dried into streaks of light bluish mess. But still, he was looking at her.

"Knockout?" she said in nearly whisper under her intakes. And her spark pounded just a little with her growing hope, when he actually smiled slightly in reply.

Cybershock's little body was tucked tightly between the two of them, her head against her carrier's chest panel and her right hand stuffed into her mouth. And Arcee only realized she was there at all, when the baby's foot kicked her lightly, as she wiggled.

"We... we did it..." Knockout mumbled slowly, quiet and shaky. But he had spoken out loud. And his words made perfect sense.

"Yes," Arcee said back. Spark pounding harder now. And she fought back tears again – but this time she all but grinned though them. "I... Think we did."

"I brought the little one back to you, sometime well into the night," Ratchet explained, after he'd hurried over with his familiar old scanner in hand. "Not long at all after I realized he was rapidly getting better instead of much worse as I feared."

"Th...thank you, Ratchet," Arcee mumbled, still disbelieving as she struggled just a little to sit herself up without disturbing the baby, who turned still asleep, to lay against her creator. Whatever it was he had given her, she noted more than ever how much she did not like its after effects.

"Bumblebee and Speedbreaker have a brand new youngling boy," Ratchet said, speaking slowly as he went about scanning Knockout's frame and then properly re-scanning twice more, while he held the recharging child. "Turns out Speedy certainly meant it when she'd comm'd about an emergency. Little guy was born not two hours after they got back here. He took right away to his frame, and it looks like he's loving having a body of his own. Speedbreaker did so well too, for a first time carrier. She was pretty scared at first, which is perfectly understandable. But she did just fine.

Ratchet was sharing the wonderful news partly because of course he too excited not to. But also, he did it it seemed simply to see just how well Knockout could listen and comprehend it all. Arcee understood that in under a second. And she smiled happily when her mate smiled at the news. Clearly showing just how he followed it perfectly.

"Oh, everyone's awake now. Great to see that," Bumblebee's voice from somewhere still a ways away. And Arcee realized with dismay that she had not ever heard the door open or close behind him, nor had she registered the sound of his footsteps. And she blinked in near disbelief at the tiny youngling he held in his arms. One with his bright yellow colour, and Speedbreaker's shinning chrome highlights. 'Bee hurried across the room toward them.

"The little one there will surely be proud of his creator one day," Ratchet said gesturing toward the new youngling, as he quickly reconnected Knockout to a processor scanner, he'd been disconnected from sometime in the night. And Knockout, simply let him without struggle, though he did look undeniably uneasy about it for a second or two. "Bumblebee is going to make a wonderful medi-bot. I knew that from the start, but if I'd had any doubts left, they'd surely be gone now." he turned away from his work just a second to look his young student in the optics. "You took a huge risking even wanting to try exactly what we did. And it took a lot of nerve, as such an early level student, to insist you confidently that you might just have been right. But you were right, and somehow you clearly knew it. That's the instinct I've tried hard before to explain... The base instinct relied so heavily on, by what will one day slowly become your medical programming."

"This is Hotwire," Bumblebee said, gesturing with his optics to his youngling, laying still in his arms and with his optics closed contently, and not even bothering to comment on his own achievement in his training. Anyone who knew him surely knew that to him, there was little need of such pride in that. Like anything else he'd done in life, he was simply doing his job just as well as he could. The young bot laughed a little, mostly in Knockout's direction, in a clear, discrete effort to distract him from the scanning process. "Speedy is resting for a while now. And I was finally able to convince her to give him up a while so I could show him off, because of it."

"'Bee!" Ratchet exclaimed to his young student, looking intently at the screen of the processor monitor, and gesturing right at it so the young bot (and the others as well) would look at it too. "We didn't only save Knockout's life by providing his body with the means to self repair the processor quickly enough. Look at these readings... check out the full frame internal wiring network..."

"We've got almost full connectivity to the left leg and foot, as well as the left arm and hand," the young bot, mused, looking over the readings carefully, and so clearly using every bit of understanding he had thus far gained, just to understand exactly what it was he was looking at on the screen.

"W... wait..." Arcee said, shocked at the still unspoken implications. Her spark had slowly settled down, but suddenly it began to pound again with her amazement. "That could mean.." She grabbed Knockout's hand, - his left one – in her excitement. And only then did she notice as he grabbed right back, that he did do a just slightly better job of holding onto hers.

"This will be a long road still," Ratchet explained. His voice was calm, profession as ever. But still a hint of a smile showed on his face-plate. "Much higher connectivity will do nothing about the weakness of his limbs due to previous damage. But I have little doubt now that with a good amount of work, after we restart with rehab, Knockout will eventually walk again."

~ End ~

Notes / Well I guess that's that. This entire story was one I worked on for over a year, and that amazes me. If I'm honest I'm a bit sad to be finished because obviously I did have this project for so long. It's exciting though at the same time because this means new stuff to write.

I did know how this would end. I've known from well before I wrote the middle, just how I would end the story. Still writing it was sad as anything.

Thanks everyone for all the wonderful reviews and the feedback. I truly mean it. I would have continued writing this even if not for any of those. But it certainly is harder to do, with no way of knowing if anyone actually thinks its any good or not. Be on the lookout for the start of the soon upcoming second part of this, 'So What Happens Now.'