[TFP] Event Horizon Origins - Not Quite Paradise
a/n: Another update to my Origins series, this time featuring more First Aid
Title: Not Quite Paradise
Universe: TFP, Event Horizon
Characters: First Aid, Sideswipe, Sunstreaker, Ratchet
Rating: T
Description: First Aid meets Ratchet for the first time. Tremble in fear.
Standing outside the ramshackle building on the distant edge of civilization, First Aid feels like someone has played a very unfunny joke on him. Surely, this isn't a clinic. Surely, they don't actually perform medical procedures in such a place.
There's rust on the eaves! It's leaning dangerously to the left, and the sign is crooked. There are noticeable energon stains on the ground outside, and it looks like someone has pummeled the front of the building.
The street itself isn’t in much better condition. Sure, the buildings are still standing, but that’s almost the extent of it. The fronts are mostly blackened or at the very least severely scorched, as though from a long ago fire no one bothered to clean up after, and there is detritus and what looks like rust-dust covering every single molecule of roadway. The visible alleyways are all choked with trash and other cast-offs, and Aid is certain the building at the corner - the lone bright and reasonably clean one - is actually a brothel.
First Aid glances back down at his datapad yet again. Once more verifying the address given for his practice assignment. It seems he’s at the correct place, but...
“You look a little lost,” a voice comes out from behind him. “Forget to update your navs or something?”
First Aid nearly crawls out of his plating and whirls to face the speaker. He comes faceplate to… well, chestplate with a bright red mech. He leaps back a pace, tilting his helm up.
“I'm not lost,” he says with a touch of indignity. “I think someone has given me a wrong address, however.”
His optics glance over the mysterious mech's frame. Red plating has been polished to perfection, every inch gleaming in the pale overhead light. Yet, there's something to the way he carries himself, a lazy grace perhaps, that suggests gladiator. Except for the bright merchant mark emblazoned on his right shoulder panel.
The stranger gives First Aid a slow, lazy grin. The sort that Streetwise keeps telling Aid to be suspicious of. Dangerous smirks, he calls them. A sure sign that a bot's up to no good.
“Maybe I can help. What ya looking for?”
First Aid holds out his datapad. “Ratchet's clinic.”
The red mech lets out a sharp bark of laughter. “Then you've come to the right place.” He pauses, optics raking First Aid from helm to pede. “You don't look broken to me. What would you need with the Hatchet?”
“The... Hatchet?” First Aid gives the mech a blank stare.
The merchant (or gladiator) grins.
“You really aren't from around here.” He peers at Aid and then circles around the medic-in-training. “Nah, you're higher caste. Third tier at least.” One finger taps his chin.
First Aid bristles, optics cycling down. “You can't tell that kind of thing just by looking.”
Standard parts, after all. Unless the mech is so high class he lives in the Towers, but they never deign to set pede in commoner territory.
“I can. It's one of my specialties.” The stranger cocks his head. “Why're you slumming it?”
“I'm a working class mech, I'll have you know. I'm not slumming it,” First Aid snaps, drawing himself up straight.
He won't let a little thing like being a whole helm shorter intimidate him. Hot Spot's two helms taller!
“I have a legitimate reason for being here.”
Or he would, if his directions hadn't been so wrong. He's still not entirely sure that this is Ratchet's clinic. No mech should be performing maintenance in that ramshackle building, much less surgery.
The stranger laughs again, clapping a hand on First Aid's shoulder. “Oh, my mech, Ratchet’s gonna chew up a pretty thing like you and spit you out like rusted nails.”
First Aid splutters, ducking out from under the merchant's unwelcome advance. Pretty? And he seriously doubts his instructor would send him to Ratchet if the medic were someone to fear.
This is, of course, when the door to the disaster-waiting-to-happen slams open with a creaky rattle. First Aid whirls and a hand lands on his shoulder again, jerking him backward. He stumbles, backplate smacking into a chestplate, just in time to avoid being trampled by a very angry, very yellow mech as he storms out of the so-called clinic.
Said mech's energy field radiates fury and just an edge of murderous intent that makes Aid want to back up to a safer distance. He would too if his exit wasn't being blocked by the nameless merchant behind him, a hand firmly on his shoulder.
“Yo, Sunny! Where are you--”
“Out!” the yellow mech snarls without so much as a backward glance, stomping pedes leaving prints in the dusty street. His hands are clenched at his sides, plating clamped down firmly.
Oh, he's furious. Definitely.
“But--”
Once again, the red bot’s words are cut off as another mech makes an appearance, this time in the doorway of the dangerously leaning edifice. First Aid watches with the sort of mouth-gaping awe one gives to a shuttle collision in midair.
The red and white mech, a medic's sigil emblazoned between the doors perched on his chestplate, snarls. He’s positively vibrating with fury.
“Sunstreaker, you get your slagging aft back here right now!” the medic hollers at a volume that First Aid's instructor would envy; indeed, they probably heard him all the way in Praxus. “I'm not through with you!”
Yellow mech - Sunstreaker - neither bothers with a verbal response nor turns around to acknowledge that he's been summoned.
“Trouble in paradise?” the merchant asks, tone amused and probably a tad bit suicidal as no mech in their right mind should get between those two.
The medic shifts his potent glare to a new target, namely the mech behind First Aid. Aid, in turn, tries to make himself very small and thinks invisible thoughts.
“Shove it up your exhaust, Sideswipe,” the medic growls and whips around on a pede, storming back into the clinic.
The door slides shut with an indignant huff and squeak of ungreased gears.
First Aid is at first too stunned to move.
Behind him, the merchant - Sideswipe - pats him on the shoulder before finally removing his hand.
“Welcome to the neighborhood,” he comments pleasantly. “C'mon, I'll introduce ya to Ratchet.”
First Aid whirls around. “That...?”
“Was Ratchet, yeah. He's a cuddly cybercat.” Sideswipe laughs, his smile curving up his lipplates. “He's got the bedside manner of a rabid turbofox, but we love him anyway.”
Suddenly, he understands why Buildup had smirked so brightly when giving him this assignment. Aid stares dumbly as Sideswipe heads for the door and gives it a little kick when it doesn't immediately open. He gestures for Aid to precede him, head cocking as First Aid hesitates.
“You're not scared, are you?” Sideswipe asks, shuttering one optic.
Scared? Hardly. Wary, yes. But not afraid.
Clutching his datapad, First Aid holds up his helm and steps inside. He half-expects for the interior to resemble the exterior, eying each inner support for noticeable cracks, rust stains, areas of corrosion...
The scent of cleaner and the sharper odor of welding attacks First Aid's olfactory sensors. It's also bright inside, brighter than the dim public utilities outside. And... it's clean, almost obsessively so.
There's a small waiting area, no one occupying the seats at present. There's a counter, dividing said area from the surgery room and med berths beyond. Some of the equipment Aid can see is outdated. Serviceable but outdated. And there are other pieces that look to be handmade or cobbled together from bits and pieces.
The white and red medic First Aid had seen earlier is nowhere in sight, but there's another medic, one in grey armor with blue accents, who is currently wiping down the berths.
“Oh, Ratchet!” Sideswipe singsongs, swaggering ahead of First Aid with another one of those half-opticed shutters. “I have something for you.”
“Not interested,” comes the gruff snarl from just out of sight. “Put it back where you found it before the guard comes sniffing around here again.”
Sideswipe laughs, like nettling grumpy medics is his idea of a good time. “But it wandered here of its own accord. All bright optics and eager servos and ready to learn.”
There's a pause. Aid leans around Sideswipe, peering into the clinic. The grey medic gives him a brief, appraising glance.
Ratchet makes an appearance then. He shuffles out of a back room, a suspicious gleam in his optics.
“Did Buildup send you?” he asks, or barks rather.
“Yes, sir.” Aid holds out his datapad. “Designation: First Aid. I was told to complete my practical here.”
Ratchet waves off the datapad and shifts his attention back to Sideswipe. There’s a very dangerous look on his face.
“Don't you have some work to do?”
“This is much more interesting.” The merchant leans on a nearby medberth as if he hadn’t a care in the world.
“That wasn't a suggestion.”
“Fine, fine.” Sideswipe levers himself back upright and tosses a grin at First Aid. “Nice meeting ya. See you around.”
“Not if you're lucky,” Ratchet mutters and returns his attention to First Aid, sweeping a gaze over the younger mech from top to bottom. “This is a free clinic. You don't get paid. You probably won't get any thanks, and my clientele ensures you'll probably be in danger from one orn to the next. Still want to do this?”
None of that sounds appealing at all. Aid doesn't care so much about the not getting paid, or the thanks, as neither are why he choose becoming a medic over a civil servant position. But the danger aspect is a bit off-putting.
“It's not a matter of want, sir,” First Aid replies, tucking his datapad into subspace. “I was assigned here.”
Ratchet huffs. “Don't matter what the paperwork says. This place is volunteer only. I told Buildup to send me only those, fraggit. I don't have time for soft-sparks or idiots or amateurs.”
“Then why are you accepting students?” First Aid frowns.
“Need the creds. Free clinics don't pay for themselves.”
In other words, Ratchet accepts trainees like First Aid, teaches them, and the Academy will send him a stipend. How very practical of him.
Ratchet flicks his hand at First Aid. “So that's how it is. I'm sure you know where the door is.” He turns away.
“But...” Aid lifts his chin. “This is where I was assigned, sir.”
“And I'm telling you that you have other options.” Ratchet pauses and moves to eye him. “I'm not wasting my time on some soft-shell that's going to quit halfway through.”
First Aid doesn’t glare. Not quite.
“I've never abandoned anything, sir.”
This isn't the ideal location, and his brothers would undoubtedly prefer if he did pick another clinic. Specifically, one that’s safer and staffed by kinder medics.
But Aid had asked Buildup to assign him to the best, and Buildup had given him to Ratchet. No matter his instructor's sometimes questionable methods, First Aid believes that the mech wouldn't have sent him here just for a joke.
“I want to take this assignment, sir,” First Aid adds, just in case his previous statements weren't clear.
“I'm not a sir,” Ratchet retorts, but it's almost half-sparked. “Fine. But don't say I didn't warn you. And call me, Ratchet.”
“Yes, si-- Ratchet.” First Aid's mouth twitches toward a smile, but he doesn't let it slip. His new mentor doesn't seem to have much of a sense of humor.
Ratchet gives him another searching glance before shaking his helm.
“All right, newbie. I'll give you a tour, go over some basics, and then I'll see what kind of useless knowledge they stuffed into your processor at that overblown university. That way we can get rid of any bad habits.”
Aid follows the other medic before he can convince himself this is a very bad idea. His brothers probably won't be happy. Hot Spot might throw a fit. Blades would follow him next time, rotors quivering over protectively. Groove would hover. Streetwise would investigate sneakily.
But they won't stop him.
This is First Aid's choice after all.
***
a/n: I've still got another Sideswipe/First Aid fic in the works for this series, and I'm pondering how to handle Perceptor's. Don't know where I'm going after that. Maybe some more Jazz? Heh. We'll see.
Reviews are welcome!
Also, don't forget, flash fiction Friday returns tomorrow!
This entry was originally posted at http://dracoqueen22.dreamwidth.org/187698.html. Feel free to comment wherever you find most convenient.
Title: Not Quite Paradise
Universe: TFP, Event Horizon
Characters: First Aid, Sideswipe, Sunstreaker, Ratchet
Rating: T
Description: First Aid meets Ratchet for the first time. Tremble in fear.
Standing outside the ramshackle building on the distant edge of civilization, First Aid feels like someone has played a very unfunny joke on him. Surely, this isn't a clinic. Surely, they don't actually perform medical procedures in such a place.
There's rust on the eaves! It's leaning dangerously to the left, and the sign is crooked. There are noticeable energon stains on the ground outside, and it looks like someone has pummeled the front of the building.
The street itself isn’t in much better condition. Sure, the buildings are still standing, but that’s almost the extent of it. The fronts are mostly blackened or at the very least severely scorched, as though from a long ago fire no one bothered to clean up after, and there is detritus and what looks like rust-dust covering every single molecule of roadway. The visible alleyways are all choked with trash and other cast-offs, and Aid is certain the building at the corner - the lone bright and reasonably clean one - is actually a brothel.
First Aid glances back down at his datapad yet again. Once more verifying the address given for his practice assignment. It seems he’s at the correct place, but...
“You look a little lost,” a voice comes out from behind him. “Forget to update your navs or something?”
First Aid nearly crawls out of his plating and whirls to face the speaker. He comes faceplate to… well, chestplate with a bright red mech. He leaps back a pace, tilting his helm up.
“I'm not lost,” he says with a touch of indignity. “I think someone has given me a wrong address, however.”
His optics glance over the mysterious mech's frame. Red plating has been polished to perfection, every inch gleaming in the pale overhead light. Yet, there's something to the way he carries himself, a lazy grace perhaps, that suggests gladiator. Except for the bright merchant mark emblazoned on his right shoulder panel.
The stranger gives First Aid a slow, lazy grin. The sort that Streetwise keeps telling Aid to be suspicious of. Dangerous smirks, he calls them. A sure sign that a bot's up to no good.
“Maybe I can help. What ya looking for?”
First Aid holds out his datapad. “Ratchet's clinic.”
The red mech lets out a sharp bark of laughter. “Then you've come to the right place.” He pauses, optics raking First Aid from helm to pede. “You don't look broken to me. What would you need with the Hatchet?”
“The... Hatchet?” First Aid gives the mech a blank stare.
The merchant (or gladiator) grins.
“You really aren't from around here.” He peers at Aid and then circles around the medic-in-training. “Nah, you're higher caste. Third tier at least.” One finger taps his chin.
First Aid bristles, optics cycling down. “You can't tell that kind of thing just by looking.”
Standard parts, after all. Unless the mech is so high class he lives in the Towers, but they never deign to set pede in commoner territory.
“I can. It's one of my specialties.” The stranger cocks his head. “Why're you slumming it?”
“I'm a working class mech, I'll have you know. I'm not slumming it,” First Aid snaps, drawing himself up straight.
He won't let a little thing like being a whole helm shorter intimidate him. Hot Spot's two helms taller!
“I have a legitimate reason for being here.”
Or he would, if his directions hadn't been so wrong. He's still not entirely sure that this is Ratchet's clinic. No mech should be performing maintenance in that ramshackle building, much less surgery.
The stranger laughs again, clapping a hand on First Aid's shoulder. “Oh, my mech, Ratchet’s gonna chew up a pretty thing like you and spit you out like rusted nails.”
First Aid splutters, ducking out from under the merchant's unwelcome advance. Pretty? And he seriously doubts his instructor would send him to Ratchet if the medic were someone to fear.
This is, of course, when the door to the disaster-waiting-to-happen slams open with a creaky rattle. First Aid whirls and a hand lands on his shoulder again, jerking him backward. He stumbles, backplate smacking into a chestplate, just in time to avoid being trampled by a very angry, very yellow mech as he storms out of the so-called clinic.
Said mech's energy field radiates fury and just an edge of murderous intent that makes Aid want to back up to a safer distance. He would too if his exit wasn't being blocked by the nameless merchant behind him, a hand firmly on his shoulder.
“Yo, Sunny! Where are you--”
“Out!” the yellow mech snarls without so much as a backward glance, stomping pedes leaving prints in the dusty street. His hands are clenched at his sides, plating clamped down firmly.
Oh, he's furious. Definitely.
“But--”
Once again, the red bot’s words are cut off as another mech makes an appearance, this time in the doorway of the dangerously leaning edifice. First Aid watches with the sort of mouth-gaping awe one gives to a shuttle collision in midair.
The red and white mech, a medic's sigil emblazoned between the doors perched on his chestplate, snarls. He’s positively vibrating with fury.
“Sunstreaker, you get your slagging aft back here right now!” the medic hollers at a volume that First Aid's instructor would envy; indeed, they probably heard him all the way in Praxus. “I'm not through with you!”
Yellow mech - Sunstreaker - neither bothers with a verbal response nor turns around to acknowledge that he's been summoned.
“Trouble in paradise?” the merchant asks, tone amused and probably a tad bit suicidal as no mech in their right mind should get between those two.
The medic shifts his potent glare to a new target, namely the mech behind First Aid. Aid, in turn, tries to make himself very small and thinks invisible thoughts.
“Shove it up your exhaust, Sideswipe,” the medic growls and whips around on a pede, storming back into the clinic.
The door slides shut with an indignant huff and squeak of ungreased gears.
First Aid is at first too stunned to move.
Behind him, the merchant - Sideswipe - pats him on the shoulder before finally removing his hand.
“Welcome to the neighborhood,” he comments pleasantly. “C'mon, I'll introduce ya to Ratchet.”
First Aid whirls around. “That...?”
“Was Ratchet, yeah. He's a cuddly cybercat.” Sideswipe laughs, his smile curving up his lipplates. “He's got the bedside manner of a rabid turbofox, but we love him anyway.”
Suddenly, he understands why Buildup had smirked so brightly when giving him this assignment. Aid stares dumbly as Sideswipe heads for the door and gives it a little kick when it doesn't immediately open. He gestures for Aid to precede him, head cocking as First Aid hesitates.
“You're not scared, are you?” Sideswipe asks, shuttering one optic.
Scared? Hardly. Wary, yes. But not afraid.
Clutching his datapad, First Aid holds up his helm and steps inside. He half-expects for the interior to resemble the exterior, eying each inner support for noticeable cracks, rust stains, areas of corrosion...
The scent of cleaner and the sharper odor of welding attacks First Aid's olfactory sensors. It's also bright inside, brighter than the dim public utilities outside. And... it's clean, almost obsessively so.
There's a small waiting area, no one occupying the seats at present. There's a counter, dividing said area from the surgery room and med berths beyond. Some of the equipment Aid can see is outdated. Serviceable but outdated. And there are other pieces that look to be handmade or cobbled together from bits and pieces.
The white and red medic First Aid had seen earlier is nowhere in sight, but there's another medic, one in grey armor with blue accents, who is currently wiping down the berths.
“Oh, Ratchet!” Sideswipe singsongs, swaggering ahead of First Aid with another one of those half-opticed shutters. “I have something for you.”
“Not interested,” comes the gruff snarl from just out of sight. “Put it back where you found it before the guard comes sniffing around here again.”
Sideswipe laughs, like nettling grumpy medics is his idea of a good time. “But it wandered here of its own accord. All bright optics and eager servos and ready to learn.”
There's a pause. Aid leans around Sideswipe, peering into the clinic. The grey medic gives him a brief, appraising glance.
Ratchet makes an appearance then. He shuffles out of a back room, a suspicious gleam in his optics.
“Did Buildup send you?” he asks, or barks rather.
“Yes, sir.” Aid holds out his datapad. “Designation: First Aid. I was told to complete my practical here.”
Ratchet waves off the datapad and shifts his attention back to Sideswipe. There’s a very dangerous look on his face.
“Don't you have some work to do?”
“This is much more interesting.” The merchant leans on a nearby medberth as if he hadn’t a care in the world.
“That wasn't a suggestion.”
“Fine, fine.” Sideswipe levers himself back upright and tosses a grin at First Aid. “Nice meeting ya. See you around.”
“Not if you're lucky,” Ratchet mutters and returns his attention to First Aid, sweeping a gaze over the younger mech from top to bottom. “This is a free clinic. You don't get paid. You probably won't get any thanks, and my clientele ensures you'll probably be in danger from one orn to the next. Still want to do this?”
None of that sounds appealing at all. Aid doesn't care so much about the not getting paid, or the thanks, as neither are why he choose becoming a medic over a civil servant position. But the danger aspect is a bit off-putting.
“It's not a matter of want, sir,” First Aid replies, tucking his datapad into subspace. “I was assigned here.”
Ratchet huffs. “Don't matter what the paperwork says. This place is volunteer only. I told Buildup to send me only those, fraggit. I don't have time for soft-sparks or idiots or amateurs.”
“Then why are you accepting students?” First Aid frowns.
“Need the creds. Free clinics don't pay for themselves.”
In other words, Ratchet accepts trainees like First Aid, teaches them, and the Academy will send him a stipend. How very practical of him.
Ratchet flicks his hand at First Aid. “So that's how it is. I'm sure you know where the door is.” He turns away.
“But...” Aid lifts his chin. “This is where I was assigned, sir.”
“And I'm telling you that you have other options.” Ratchet pauses and moves to eye him. “I'm not wasting my time on some soft-shell that's going to quit halfway through.”
First Aid doesn’t glare. Not quite.
“I've never abandoned anything, sir.”
This isn't the ideal location, and his brothers would undoubtedly prefer if he did pick another clinic. Specifically, one that’s safer and staffed by kinder medics.
But Aid had asked Buildup to assign him to the best, and Buildup had given him to Ratchet. No matter his instructor's sometimes questionable methods, First Aid believes that the mech wouldn't have sent him here just for a joke.
“I want to take this assignment, sir,” First Aid adds, just in case his previous statements weren't clear.
“I'm not a sir,” Ratchet retorts, but it's almost half-sparked. “Fine. But don't say I didn't warn you. And call me, Ratchet.”
“Yes, si-- Ratchet.” First Aid's mouth twitches toward a smile, but he doesn't let it slip. His new mentor doesn't seem to have much of a sense of humor.
Ratchet gives him another searching glance before shaking his helm.
“All right, newbie. I'll give you a tour, go over some basics, and then I'll see what kind of useless knowledge they stuffed into your processor at that overblown university. That way we can get rid of any bad habits.”
Aid follows the other medic before he can convince himself this is a very bad idea. His brothers probably won't be happy. Hot Spot might throw a fit. Blades would follow him next time, rotors quivering over protectively. Groove would hover. Streetwise would investigate sneakily.
But they won't stop him.
This is First Aid's choice after all.
***
a/n: I've still got another Sideswipe/First Aid fic in the works for this series, and I'm pondering how to handle Perceptor's. Don't know where I'm going after that. Maybe some more Jazz? Heh. We'll see.
Reviews are welcome!
Also, don't forget, flash fiction Friday returns tomorrow!
This entry was originally posted at http://dracoqueen22.dreamwidth.org/187698.html. Feel free to comment wherever you find most convenient.