"You have a shrink ray on hand."
When the Rescue team mentioned that they are good friends with the island's scientist and his family, and that they have what they need, Knockout didn't believe them.
He is eating those words now.
"Of course we do! It was just a matter of finding the thing!" Doc Greene said, his attention mostly focused on fiddling with the controls.
"Thanks, Doc, and sorry for the inconvenience. We weren't expecting anything like this to happen today," Chief Burns apologized. He thought about what he said and laughed.
"Then again, this is Griffin Rock. Weird stuff is bound to happen all the time."
"That is honestly quite the understatement," Chase said.
"An understatement indeed!" Doc Green concurred. He finished with the shrink ray and looked up to Knockout.
"All set! Are you ready?"
"Just to clarify, this is safe, right?" Knockout asked, vocalizer laced with uncertainty.
What if something goes wrong?
What if something happens to his finish?
What if he's permanently human-sized?
"It is, don't you worry!" Doc Green reassured the red medic. "I made sure to test this version before deeming it usable."
"Uh, I'm sorry, this version? How many have you gone through?"
"Nothing you need to concern yourself with. All that matters is that with this shrink ray, you will get the job done. No harm no foul, I promise!"
Knockout groaned. He didn't want to do this anymore. He couldn't stop thinking of all the ways this could go horribly wrong, but it's too late now. Nodding his helm in agreement, a beam shot out from the shrink ray and reduced Knockout to half his original size.
"Can we go now? It's humiliating being this small!" Knockout whined.
"To be fair, you weren't that big to begin with," Chase said.
Knockout, now only standing a few feet taller than the humans, glared at Chase. If he was at his full height, it would have been terrifying. Right now, he's nothing more than a cat with armor.
"Okay, then, I think that's our cue to go! Chase?" Chief Burns asked.
The blue and white mech nodded and transformed, then opened the door for his human partner to climb in. Knockout transformed as well, into a smaller version of his vehicle mode.
"Oh, now isn't that just adorable!" Doc Green chuckled, smiling at the small red car.
Knockout revved his engine, angry at being called adorable. That privilege is reserved for only a select few mecha.
"I'm leaving," Knockout stated bluntly.
He sped out of the lab and back to the firehouse. Once there, he transformed to bipedal mode and, ignoring all the looks he was getting from the normal-sized bots and their humans, walked to the med-bay. Everything in the room looked bigger than normal, increasing Knockout's irritation tenfold.
How is he supposed to work when he can't even reach the tools at his disposal?
"Need a little help?" Ratchet teased, the white and red-orange medic stepping into view.
"Just let me get to work already!" Knockout snapped.
For once, Ratchet didn't get mad at the other mech's outburst. He is quite amused by their predicament. His smug grin never left his face as he grabbed Knockout and lifted him onto the medical slab. The red medic repositioned himself, and with a huff, got to work.
– time skip –
The last thing Thunderhoof remembered was collapsing in Bumblebee's arms, surrounded by other Autobots and humans. He mentally kicked himself for showing such weakness around an enemy, except, they aren't really his enemies. No Cybertronian, regardless of faction, would consider a Rescue Bot the bad guy. Even if they fall under the category of Autobot, they still have their own way of doing things, their own code to uphold. Sometimes, their work puts them at odds with the general Autobot faction.
Probably another reason they were left out of the War.
As he became more awake, Thunderhoof shifted on the medical slab, feeling it give way to his weight. It is abundantly clear that it is not meant for someone as large as the Cervicon, but it will have to do. He blinks open his optics, only to shut them back up nice and tight, partly blinded by the extreme brightness of the room.
There's a shuffling of pedes.
Must be the medic. Or perhaps Bumblebee? Wouldn't put it past him.
"You're in the med-bay, Thunderhoof! You're safe now! You and the sparkling!"
Okay, not Bumblebee.
"Are you okay? Do you need something?"
"Shut the lights off!" Thunderhoof growled.
"Well, I can't really do that, but I can lower the brightness! Will that be alright?"
"Just do it!"
The mech squeaked in fear. Thunderhoof wasn't in the mood to care. He heard the mech walking away from him, but not too far. The footsteps stopped. There was one flick, then a second flick.
"There we go! You can open your eyes now!"
Remaining cautious, Thunderhoof only opened one optic, then both once he realized that the mech was telling the truth. He braced his arms against the berth, vented, and lifted himself into a sitting position. He swayed a bit, almost tipping over the edge.
"Frag," Thunderhoof cursed, gripping the berth as he raised a servo to his helm. "I feel like I just woke up from a hangover."
"In a manner of speaking, I guess."
Oh.
Right.
He wasn't alone.
Thunderhoof looked over and recognized the orange and white copter.
"Yous the medic 'round here?" Thunderhoof asked.
"Y…Yes, I am!" Blades stuttered.
Normally, Thunderhoof would find the sight of bots trembling before him in fear quite nice, but after having a Pit-spawned of a day, he couldn't bring himself to be amused.
"It'd be more reassuring if you stopped shaking," Thunderhoof said. "I ain't gonna harm ya. Not a good idea to throttle a medic when you need 'em."
Blades was still scared, – Thunderhoof knows he will be for a while – but his shaking eased as he fixed his posture, soft amber optics leveling with deep red optics.
"You do make a point, for a big, scary, Decepticon," Blades replied.
"Uh-huh," Thunderhoof mumbled, only half listening to the medic's words. "Tell me something, why does my helm ache so fragging much?"
"Oh, that would be from the anchor!"
Thunderhoof raised an optical ridge, prompting Blades to continue.
"A human was going fishing, and when he found a spot he liked, he had to keep his boat in place, so he dropped anchor. Of course, no one knew you were down there until after the fact…"
"Ya think?" Thunderhoof interrupted, sounding as gruff as ever. He switched focus to his other injury.
"And my hoof?"
"Got caught in a hydrothermal vent, which heated the plating, making it bend and crumple. Just a whole mess down there."
Blades quickly corrected himself.
"Well, it was a whole mess down there. Boulder and I couldn't fix it, so Bumblebee had to call in help from a couple other medics."
"It's a good thing, too, because that stabbing pain you felt was from a broken piece of plating caught in your protoform, sliding in and out and cutting wiring," Boulder explained, walking in after having just returned from a job.
"Yup! You're quite the lucky mech, Thunderhoof!"
"Lucky?" Thunderhoof hissed. "What about any of this is lucky?"
Blades and Boulder were taken aback. They weren't expecting much, but a shred of gratitude would be welcome. They exchanged confused looks.
"What do you mean?" Boulder asked, daring to get closer and placing a large, green and black servo on Thunderhoof's shoulder plate.
Thunderhoof flinched. He wanted to get rid of the unwanted touch, the unwanted sympathy, but despite the fire in his spark, he couldn't. The feeling slowly shifted as Boulder's servo, rough yet gentle, rubbed his upper plating.
"W…What are you doing?" Thunderhoof asked, practically drunk on the soothing, circulating motions.
"Making you relax," Boulder replied, leaning in to put more pressure on certain points. "You're too stressed, and that's not good for the healing process."
"Thought you fixed everythin'?"
"On a surface level, yes, but you still need the rest. You may be better, but you aren't back to a hundred percent just yet. The more relaxed you are, the less time it will take for you to return to normal."
"I second that."
Thunderhoof, Boulder, and Blades all looked up to see Bumblebee standing in the doorway, arms crossed and currently serving as a perch for Steeljaw's daughter. The white pup's yellow optics are locked on Thunderhoof, filled to the brim with joy at the sight of her guardian. Her tail lifted and started wagging, barely scratching the surface of Bumblebee's plating.
"You making sure I ain't causin' trouble?" Thunderhoof asked, an edge to his tone.
"That's one of my reasons, yes," Bumblebee responded curtly.
"And the others?"
Bumblebee ignored the Cervicon for a moment and instead addressed the Rescue bots present.
"Can you leave us alone for a while? I have some things I need to discuss with Thunderhoof."
"Oh, uh, sure, of course! No problem! I was just finishing up here, anyway," Blades said, laughing nervously as he rubbed the back of his helm and side-stepped out of med-bay.
After giving Thunderhoof's shoulder a gentle squeeze, Boulder took his own leave and closed the door on the way out.
Bumblebee locked the door before settling down in a chair by Thunderhoof's bedside. He opens his arms and allows Steeljaw's daughter to jump out of his hold. She lands on the medical slab and climbs onto Thunderhoof. He places his servo on her back and starts to pet her.
"What do you have to say that you don't want your buddies to know?" Thunderhoof asked, not at all hesitating to question Bumblebee's strange behavior.
"I don't know what you're talking about," Bumblebee replied.
"You locked the door, and taking circumstances into account, I assume it's because of a secret of some kind."
His claim didn't receive a rebuttal, so he continued.
"What I don't understand is why you would trust me with this secret as opposed to everyone else. Unless you think I'm the only one strong enough to handle it, even in my current condition?"
Bumblebee was silent a minute longer.
"Yes."
He sighed.
"And no."