Prowl POV
I sat there on the med bay berth, simply watching the fragile frame of the femmeling under my care. Her armor glimmered softly, a green color with white accents. Her wings were drooped in exhaustion.
How long has it been since she has recharged properly? Guilt entered my spark, just another reminder of how much I had to work on as a Guardian. Sighing I glanced up at Ratchet's open office door, grimacing I stood up carefully.
My equilibrium still trying to adjust back to Earth's gravity instead of Cybertron's, it always reset after a glitch. Which quite frankly, was too often for me to really care. Walking to the door I stood silently and waited patiently for Ratchet to acknowledge me.
After all, if I hated to be interrupted when doing a report I knew for a fact others must feel the same. Common courtesy really. After a few Earthen minutes, no more than a breem, Ratchet looked up.
"What?" He stated blandly, irritation in his optics. I resisted the urge to roll my optics as I looked him directly in his own blue ones.
"I have decided that you looking through her processors is really the best course of action." A somewhat subdued smug, yet sad, smile crossed his lip plates.
"Understood, we can start immediately while she is still out." I nodded at his words, a sense of dread pooling in my spark.
What would be the damage? Is she alright? Is she more injured and unstable than she lets on? A sudden warm servo touched my shoulder, jerking me from my thoughts. I tensed and stared up at Ratchet, Praxians were after all of the shorter build of bots, his deep cerulean optics seemed to stare into my very spark.
"I'm sure she'll be fine Prowl. Let's just get this over with." I nodded and moved discretely out from under his servo. Turning, wings high and tense, I walked to my charge's unconscious side. Ratchet was there, pulling a cable from his wrist joint and plugging it carefully into a panel in the back of Autumn's helm.
He glanced up one more time at me, a curt nod, and then his optics went dim while his facial plates remained impassive.
Ratchet's POV
After plugging into the femmeling's helm I gave Prowl a nod and offlined my optics, intent on sliding through the little femme's processors and looking into what had been done. I would need to check her Emotion Cortex (EC), Memory Files (MF), and lastly her Personality Crystal (PC).
I slipped into the that suction feeling, tunneling through a wall of electricity, a dark tube with crackling lighting to represent cerebration, sensation, modality, and audial. Everything opened up to darkness with very few glowing pin points of light slowly blinked into existence.
These, I thought in dismay, are her dreams and hopes... so very little is actually here. I've seen actual sparklings with far more than this. Pain clenched my spark. A femme so young, so delicate, with absolutely nothing to live for... It pained me to see this. I pushed forward with a gentleness that was almost foreign to me.
Sudden laughter bubbled not far from me, turning towards the flamboyant noise in curiosity; I saw a glowing string of data representing a stray memory. A memory... in her main data area where there should be nothing but firewalls?
Concern gripped my spark; her processors must be more fragged up than I originally thought. Grasping the strain of data, I took a quick peek to see it was a memory of a beautiful human woman. The woman's eyes were glowing with the fond gentleness of a loving carrier. Feeling, for once, like an intruder, I let go of the memory file and continued my trek.
I found the access area and when her processors asked for a code I entered in the medical over ride 002321. After a moment her Processors accepted the code and allowed me in. I moved to her MF core and was surprised to see all of her memories intact.
Sadly, nearly all of the memories were corrupted with evil and pain from her creator, so much trauma to one so young. Innocence stolen from her, in both mind and body. I moved to her EC and was immediately bombarded with an avalanche of emotions.
It was a raging torrent of agony, confusion flung up like dust, sorrow raining down like the acid storms of Kaon. Everything was fragged up, her Emotional Cortex sparking and glowing with odd pulses of distress. What was once an empty darkness from her opening 'firewall' center, was lit up by a damaged emotional flux.
Primus fraggit, I screamed mentally, it is a lot worse than I thought it would be! I moved through the flux with caution, worry eating at my spark. It was worse than a battle field, far worse.
I moved onto the last part of her processor that I had to check, her PC-also known as her Personality Crystal. I entered the pulsing area with dread. What damages, possibly irreversible ones, are in here? Biting my proverbial lip, I embarked into her PC and froze.
I could see a long fissure in her mental walls; I had a sinking feeling that if I were to take the physical crystal out that it would be cracked and broken. Slowly moving forward I found two different personality cores, both were cracked and pushed together.
One was the very definition of insanity and madness. There was pain, sorrow, despair, depression, anguish, and fury, along with the desire to kill and destroy. Murderously psychotic laughter coiling around it. The other however, was glowing weakly. A strange but powerful feminine gentleness emanated from it, even far more gentleness than one would see from Firstaid. Perhaps the worst part of this whole thing was that all of this was actually hers! There were absolutely no signs of the tampering Soundwave had done!
I began to pull from her processors when I noticed a small file, floating toward me with an unknown signal. It was not a file that had originated from Autumn. I opened it carefully and was astounded by what I found.
Soundwave's signal was all over this file, yes, but there were firewalls and programs that were safe for a sparkling's processors. Specialized coding, and even educational packets for her developing psyche. Lastly a message was encoded to me.
Suspicion tore at my spark, but I carefully opened it to find a report of sorts. All written out to me... and Prowl.
Autobot Ratchet, Enclosed within this file are programs and necessary firewalls that are suitable for a sparkling of Autobot Autumn's age. I have restored her processors and memory files to the state they were in prior to my interference. Autobot Autumn is a sparkling, and should never have been subjected to my influence, therefore I have taken measures to rectify any damage I might have caused. In addition Autobot Prowl will find most of these programs and files useful for dealing with femmeling. In meantime I shall keep Decepticons away from the Femme as much as possible, she is more important than you could ever know. She is the final creation of the now destroyed Allspark. Though I am now unable to prove my hypothesis, I strongly suspect that the Allspark was sentient. The result is that Autobot Autumn must be allowed to meet her destiny, what ever that might be, without interference.
One of the files that I have enclosed will allow you to dissolve the inappropriate sparkbond Autobot Autumn has with Autobot Sniper Bluestreak. In this way, there will be no repercussions for either of them and Autobot Autumn's processors can fully heal and mature. Suggestion: Autobot Second In Command, Prowl, create a Guardian bond with Autobot Autumn. This will allow her time to completely mature, and she will be safer from Decepticon faction and the repercussions of a spark bond she is not ready for. Once old enough the Guardian bond will diminish and she can recreate the bond with Autobot Bluestreak.
Soundwave, out.
With that, the message ended. Frowning I saved the whole file into my own processor and followed the connection back to my own body. Onlining my optics I set my optics on Prowl with an expression of slight confusion, but mostly calculating.
"Prowl, we have a situation."
Prowl POV
Ratchet said nothing by way of warning as he sent me the message and files that originated from Soundwave. I felt my battle computer filter out the rage that filled my processors at the thought of what that Decepticon had so ruthlessly done to Autumn. Then, I was rendered speechless as I processed the various meanings within the message.
Emotionally, I did not want anything from Soundwave with the sole exception of his absence from Autumn's processors! Logic however, dictated a far different course of action. Soundwave stated in his message that Autumn was the last creation of the Allspark, and that she was a sparkling. What I found most unbelievable was that Soundwave… a Decepticon was logically arguing for Autumn's protection! Granted, Autumn is a sparkling, and therefore one to be protected and cherished, but to find that there is a Decepticon, who is noted for his cold and emotionless actions, would also believe that Autumn should be protected was astounding to me. I knew that Soundwave could have destroyed the bond himself, and then arranged for Autumn's capture for use as an unwilling sparkling factory, but I would never have suspected the existence of anything even approaching morals within that spark.
I stared down at the green and white frame. Autumn was fragile and from what Ratchet has said, she would need the bond removed ASAP; but now they had a safe way to do it. Then I could create a Guardian bond. I had to admit, a bond with the femme I considered someone I needed to protect would allow me to do that job far more efficiently.
I would always know when she was injured, what she was feeling, and where she was. Blue no doubt would be upset, but it was for Autumn's own good. Bluestreak would understand. Looking up at Ratchet, who had finished relaying the information he had found only minutes early, I nodded.
"This would be for the best." With a heavy sigh, I watched Ratchet open her chest plates and carefully move a few tubes and wires out of the way to expose her spark chamber. Plugging something else the in back of her helm the medic stood ready as his optics flashed, her spark stuttered briefly, due to the bond no doubt breaking. Suddenly her spark changed rhythm; no longer in tandem with another's, now her spark was all alone.
. ! Where's Autumn… I can't feel her anymore!.:.
. had to remove the bond, safely of course, it was harming her..:. There was silence on the other end, with my brother most probably—83.45472 percent chance—fuming. Now is all I had to do was create a Guardian bond with her.
Looking down at the small femmeling, whom Ratchet was keeping in stasis for all of this, I slowly connected a cord from my spark chamber to hers and linked with her mind. Sending out a signal of a Guardian, I awaited her distressed spark's acceptance.
After a few moments, my signal was accepted by hers, our sparks linking in that of a Guardian's bond. I could feel confusion, fear, pain, and then acceptance of the situation. Retracting my cord from her, I shivered at the feeling of still being ethereally connected by an invisible tether, a bond.
I pressed a little further and felt a ghost of pain pulse in my spark. I sent back a sense of peace, and safety and sighed heavily when I felt her slip back into the darkness of recharge. It was moments like this when I hated being so qualified for everything.