This Love, This Hate: Aftermath Part 10
Hurricane Irene kind of messed up my writing times and mood. Whoops.
*fist shakes at the hurricane*
Also, unrelated snippet from the local news:
"So, you ran, from Brooklyn to Manhatten, over the bridge, in a hurricane, shirtless, to a mandatory evacuation zone."
"Well, when you say it like that, it just sounds sinister."
Cliffjumper shook the entire time. Even as he was turned over on the berth for the final layer of paint, he didn’t stop trembling. Ratchet watched it go on, frowning to himself but otherwise keeping quiet.
Sunstreaker seemed thoroughly disturbed by the entire affair. Ratchet supposed he couldn’t blame him for that, for the gaping sputtering and what would have otherwise been an odd sort of awkwardness from the prim frontliner. The past few hours must have been quite a shock, after all.
Cliffjumper had purged three times. It looked like he may do so again; at least, the noises coming out of his still healing fuel tank were a sign of the approaching mess. Thankfully, the purging wasn’t going to hinder the healing process; considering how far it had shrunk, purging was probably going to happen along the way no matter what.
He was still shaking. As a subdued Sunstreaker began to paint the black along his lower arm, the expected happened; the face-down minibot heaved in to the bucket. However, nothing came out.
Ratchet could only frown. Cliffjumper was taking the simple act of repainting harder then he had anticipated. He had known that Cliffjumper had been repainted in captivity - could only imagine what efforts had to be taken to keep the minibot still long enough to do so - but he still had to wonder what else Soundwave must have done to earn this sort of response.
What had happened to make repainting something so thoroughly traumatic?
Would this happen every time Cliffjumper needed a touch up? Would he need a private room to fix up a scratch? If he did, there was going to be questions from the rest of the ARK. There always was at the slightest bit of odd behavior; the local gossip mill, after all, tended to let things spread and spread fast. He had the feeling that Cliffjumper wouldn’t be the least bit happy to know that he was the center of such things. Never mind that he already was.
Had it only been the issue with paint, Ratchet thought he might have allowed it to slide. People were allowed their quirks, after all; however, his patient had been showing behavior that was troubling on multiple levels. The nightmares at every recharge cycle were to be expected, even if the minibot in question claimed that they were ‘no big deal’, but the obvious terror whenever anything even related to the Decepticons came up alongside with the sensitivity to touch were going to be a problem.
There were things that time alone could not heal. It was starting to appear as if there was no other way around it; Cliffjumper was going to need counseling. Therapy, more likely. He was going to have to actually talk to someone if he had any hope of recovering from the emotional wounds that had been inflicted. Memory files were going to set off more memory files; there were things that had to be done.
He knew that Cliffjumper wasn’t going to like that. Ratchet had stood by, listening in to many of the conversations his patient had with his best friend; even Bumblebee couldn’t get him to talk about what had happened in those months. Although, the yellow scout hadn’t pressed it and asked in the way a proper psychiatrist would.
There was no other way around it. Ratchet looked on, mentally trying to piece together the best way to approach the delicate situation.
--------------------
He had gone in with an entire speech in his processor, an argument floating and ready to hand out to what he knew would be a stubborn patient. ‘Cliffjumper’ and ‘therapy’ seemed at odds simply in concept, after all; he absolutely expected an argument.
Ratchet braced himself, stepped to the door, and waited the brief moment for it to open.
When it did, he stopped completely.
Bumblebee was there; this wasn’t the surprising part, as Bumblebee was there more often then even Swoop at this point. It was what the yellow scout had brought with him.
Cliffjumper sat, the head of the medical gurney propped up to make it more comfortable to do so, and a large, gleaming mirror held in both hands. It was the sort with a handle on one end and what had traditionally been used by detailers and the vain.
The newly painted minibot was staring in to it with a wide, broad grin on his face; optics gleamed far too bright. Bumblebee was smiling as well, one hand on his best friends’ shoulder.
“I’m me again.” Came out in a way that’s sounded like it bordered on a sob. Then, he noticed that Cliffjumper was shaking. “I look like me again.”
Ratchet turned and fled the room.
--------------------
Eventually, Ratchet managed to catch Cliffjumper alone.
When he did, the medic learned that it wouldn’t have mattered how he would have phrased the need for counseling; the word alone, or any word related to it, would have instantly earned the same defiant expression and the same single-syllable response.
“No.”
Really, he shouldn’t have been surprised. “Cliffjumper..”
“I said no.” The minibot in question glared, but wasn’t snarling in the way he would have done six months ago. “I don’t need any therapy or any psycho-slag.” It seemed that he had recovered from the emotional outburst Bumblebee’s mirror had set off.
“Cliffjumper.” Ratchet tried again, giving the newely painted frame a stern stare. “You flinch whenever anyone touches you. First Aid accidentally brushed his hand on your shoulder the other day, and you almost had a panic attack.”
Cliffjumper looked away, but the glare didn’t vanish. His voice dropped to a mumble. “..’Almost’ being the operative word there, Ratch.”
Ratchet released a long, deep sigh. “I’m not going to force you to take counseling, Cliffjumper. But being able to talk about what happened could help you a great deal.”
“Why do I even need to?” Blue optics looked up with a shot; his voice didn’t rise in volume, however. Instead of yelling or screaming as he would have once done, exhaustion marred every word. “You know what happened. Why do I have to tell you about it?”
“This isn’t about what I know, or what anyone else knows.” Ratchet frowned, unable to keep the pity at bay. “This is about you and your recovery. Letting certain things out of your system would help, not to mention that knowing certain.. Details.. Might help in finding new ways to treat you.”
Finally, Cliffjumper snarled. “Details.” Still, he turned away again to stare at the mirror that he had never released.
A moment of silence passed. Then, Ratchet let loose another sigh. “I’m not going to force you in to anything. It’s up to you.”
Cliffjumper continued to stare at his own reflection. The minibot seemed continuously fascinated with his own appearance; he couldn’t really blame him for that much, considering how long he had been forced to look like someone else. “..Can I think about it?”
“Of course.” It was something; better then another full out denial. “Let me know when you decide.”
With that, Ratchet turned and left the room, leaving Cliffjumper alone in privacy.
-----------------
Cliffjumper was left alone for less then two hours. For any other patient, Ratchet would have left him for a day or more; however, with the amount of time the minibot had spent in solitude during his captivity, the medic was concerned about leaving him alone for too long. It was why he allowed Bumblebee -- and anyone else, if Cliffjumper had been willing - to visit whenever he pleased. Too many hours alone and Ratchet feared a relapse.
Granted, there hadn’t been any sort of psychotic episode as of yet, but he wasn’t willing to chance it.
So, a little less then two hours later, he stepped back in to the room. As expected, Cliffjumper was staring in to the small hand mirror that Bumblebee had provided, a small smile on his face. At least, the smile was there for a moment; it vanished all too quickly, likely in response to the door sliding open.
Then, blue optics hardened. He didn’t look away from the mirror, but it was as close to an acknowledgement as anything else.
Ratchet frowned to himself; Cliffjumper must have been angry. Yet, there was no outlash of fury as there should have been; only the same cold restraint he had been exhibiting since his rescue. “Cliffjumper?”
At first, there was no response. Optics looked at him sidelong before going back to the mirror.
After several seconds, there was a slow, angry nod.
Ratchet let out a breath of relief. “All right. Tomorrow, then, we’ll have the first session. It will likely be a weekly thing.”
No response; however, Cliffjumper’s grip on the mirror tightened.
“Bumblebee will be here soon.”
Then, Ratchet turned and left the room once more.
------------------
A day later saw very little change in Cliffjumpers’ behavior. He was still quietly smoldering, glaring not at Ratchet but instead at some undefined point in the floor. It was a rather troubling sort of surrender; Ratchet couldn’t help but wonder how many times he must have given Soundwave that very same look.
There was a separate room tailored specifically for verbal therapy and counseling. Although Cliffjumpers’ missing legs made the chaise lounge next to useless for what it was designed for, he was set out and laid on it regardless. Being in the same room for weeks on end - private and made as comfortable as it was - was likely not the best thing for his mental recovery. At least, not considering how long he must have stared at the same ceiling and walls in Soundwaves’ room. Ratchet made a mental note to move him around more often.
The change in scenery certainly had an impact; Cliffjumper seemed to relax a little more in to the sofa, looking around with what seemed to be mild curiosity.
When the ARK had crashed all those years ago, several sections had been completely destroyed. Crushed by the mountain or wrecked in the crash itself; some had even blended in to the earth over the millions of years that they had spent in stasis. This particular room was literally next door to several of the wrecked ones; rubble sat in the far corner, and half of one wall had fossilized dirt and even a few bones coating it. When previous Autobots had come in here, almost every single one had asked about some of the things long since stuck to the wall in question.
Cliffjumper didn’t. He gave it an odd look, but otherwise didn’t say a word. Before his captivity, Ratchet knew that he would have, at the very least, made a snide comment about it.
Even now, Cliffjumper restrained himself.
Ratchet looked to the minibot, allowing him the time to look around in the way most patients did. Eventually, the red Autobot settled down and went back to that subdued anger.
“So.. What the slag am I supposed to say?” Cliffjumper groused.
Ratchet held a datapad in one end; notes weren’t taken often, as he found it easier just to remember it all, but he found that it helped some patients just to see that he cared enough to have notes at all. “The beginning, if you can.”
A snort. “You mean when we all got our afts captured? Or do you mean..?” An uncomfortable shift.
“Whichever you prefer.” Some patients, after all, found it easier to lead in to events rather then jump in to it. Ratchet had the feeling that Cliffjumper wouldn’t be able to talk about it in any other way.
“Fine.” A deep, angry breath. Cliffjumper continued to stare at the ceiling, shifting uncomfortably as he did so.
It took a long few minutes to actually get there. Ratchet maintained silent the entire time; this was a difficult thing to approach and he knew it.
“..It was stupid!” Was the eventual sputter. “None of us should have even been out there! They were just.. Rocks. Just stupid rocks. But Prowl..” And he spat the name as if it were a curse. “..Said it was either that or cleaning the washracks. Now I know I should’ve taken the washracks.” He rubbed his face with a hand.
A moment of silence passed before he spoke again.
“Barely even remember the fight. I remember the cell with the others, though.” His tone had changed to something more thoughtful; Ratchet hoped that it was comfort this room provided that relaxed the minibot. “Remember kind of being glad when we found out that they just wanted Perceptor to build a weapon. I mean, slag, we’d probably get beaten up, but it was.. Simple. Something I got. We knew what the slag was going on. Until that.. Weird staring match.”
“Staring match?” Ratchet frowned.
“Yeah. They took Perceptor away, and then..” A visible shudder. “Soundwave came in and just.. Stared. Didn’t move, didn’t say anything, just.. Stared. Even Hound said it was creepy. Should’ve figured something was going on, but..” A shrug. “Still didn’t see it coming.”
Cliffjumper fell silent. His optics shut offline.
Ratchet waited, assuming that he needed a moment to get his thoughts together. It was never an easy think to talk about; it was likely even more difficult to recall such a thing from a personal cache.
As the cycles ticked on by, however, the medic began to frown. He was silent for a bit too long. If he hadn’t known better, he might have thought that his patient had slipped in to recharge. “Cliffjumper?”
“I don’t want to talk about this.” It came out fast, tone hard; defensive. His optics were still shut off. “Why do I have to talk about this?”
Ratchet restrained himself from sighing; he had hoped that they had gotten past this. “You don’t have to. But it would help you.”
“How would it help me?” Cliffjumper was cracking away from his restraint; emotion that must have been held back since his captivity was starting to break through. Optics finally lit alight with a fierce flare. “I mean, what the frag can I possibly say that’s anything you don’t already know? How is talking supposed to help me?”
The emotional breakthrough had actually happened faster then Ratchet had thought that it would; he had planned for it to take several weeks, not an outburst minutes in to the very first session. He was actually shouting.
“Cliffjumper -“
“You know what he did.” Cliffjumper hissed as he turned to stare at the medic. “You know I was stuck there for months while he did it, over and over again, just waiting, do you even know what that’s like?!”
Ratchet blinked several times, stunned by the sheer fury on exhibit; he wasn’t certain if this was the breakthrough that he had wanted. He opened his mouth to speak, but was quickly interrupted.
“You said you wanted details? How’s this for details? I was tied down to a berth! Tied down! Sensors so fragged I couldn’t even get up, and if it wasn’t for what I did, if I didn’t put that fraggin’ sign on that fraggin’ window, none of you would have ever even thought to look there!” Blue optics flared in fury.
This hadn’t been what he was expecting. Ratchet had known that there would be pain and the high potential for post-traumatic stress, but resentment for his fellow Autobots was not something he had anticipated.
“Prowl was just going to leave me there.” Cliffjumpers’ tone began to quiet, calming back down from the outburst. “He was just going to toss me up for dead and leave me there. Bumblebee was the only one that kept looking, and I owe everything to him. Not you, not even Prime, but him. So just fix me up, get my legs back, and just send me back out there and I’ll deal with it on my own, okay?”
Then, Cliffjumper sat back on the sofa with anger clearly on display.
Stunned, Ratchet tapped at the datapad.
*fist shakes at the hurricane*
Also, unrelated snippet from the local news:
"So, you ran, from Brooklyn to Manhatten, over the bridge, in a hurricane, shirtless, to a mandatory evacuation zone."
"Well, when you say it like that, it just sounds sinister."
Cliffjumper shook the entire time. Even as he was turned over on the berth for the final layer of paint, he didn’t stop trembling. Ratchet watched it go on, frowning to himself but otherwise keeping quiet.
Sunstreaker seemed thoroughly disturbed by the entire affair. Ratchet supposed he couldn’t blame him for that, for the gaping sputtering and what would have otherwise been an odd sort of awkwardness from the prim frontliner. The past few hours must have been quite a shock, after all.
Cliffjumper had purged three times. It looked like he may do so again; at least, the noises coming out of his still healing fuel tank were a sign of the approaching mess. Thankfully, the purging wasn’t going to hinder the healing process; considering how far it had shrunk, purging was probably going to happen along the way no matter what.
He was still shaking. As a subdued Sunstreaker began to paint the black along his lower arm, the expected happened; the face-down minibot heaved in to the bucket. However, nothing came out.
Ratchet could only frown. Cliffjumper was taking the simple act of repainting harder then he had anticipated. He had known that Cliffjumper had been repainted in captivity - could only imagine what efforts had to be taken to keep the minibot still long enough to do so - but he still had to wonder what else Soundwave must have done to earn this sort of response.
What had happened to make repainting something so thoroughly traumatic?
Would this happen every time Cliffjumper needed a touch up? Would he need a private room to fix up a scratch? If he did, there was going to be questions from the rest of the ARK. There always was at the slightest bit of odd behavior; the local gossip mill, after all, tended to let things spread and spread fast. He had the feeling that Cliffjumper wouldn’t be the least bit happy to know that he was the center of such things. Never mind that he already was.
Had it only been the issue with paint, Ratchet thought he might have allowed it to slide. People were allowed their quirks, after all; however, his patient had been showing behavior that was troubling on multiple levels. The nightmares at every recharge cycle were to be expected, even if the minibot in question claimed that they were ‘no big deal’, but the obvious terror whenever anything even related to the Decepticons came up alongside with the sensitivity to touch were going to be a problem.
There were things that time alone could not heal. It was starting to appear as if there was no other way around it; Cliffjumper was going to need counseling. Therapy, more likely. He was going to have to actually talk to someone if he had any hope of recovering from the emotional wounds that had been inflicted. Memory files were going to set off more memory files; there were things that had to be done.
He knew that Cliffjumper wasn’t going to like that. Ratchet had stood by, listening in to many of the conversations his patient had with his best friend; even Bumblebee couldn’t get him to talk about what had happened in those months. Although, the yellow scout hadn’t pressed it and asked in the way a proper psychiatrist would.
There was no other way around it. Ratchet looked on, mentally trying to piece together the best way to approach the delicate situation.
--------------------
He had gone in with an entire speech in his processor, an argument floating and ready to hand out to what he knew would be a stubborn patient. ‘Cliffjumper’ and ‘therapy’ seemed at odds simply in concept, after all; he absolutely expected an argument.
Ratchet braced himself, stepped to the door, and waited the brief moment for it to open.
When it did, he stopped completely.
Bumblebee was there; this wasn’t the surprising part, as Bumblebee was there more often then even Swoop at this point. It was what the yellow scout had brought with him.
Cliffjumper sat, the head of the medical gurney propped up to make it more comfortable to do so, and a large, gleaming mirror held in both hands. It was the sort with a handle on one end and what had traditionally been used by detailers and the vain.
The newly painted minibot was staring in to it with a wide, broad grin on his face; optics gleamed far too bright. Bumblebee was smiling as well, one hand on his best friends’ shoulder.
“I’m me again.” Came out in a way that’s sounded like it bordered on a sob. Then, he noticed that Cliffjumper was shaking. “I look like me again.”
Ratchet turned and fled the room.
--------------------
Eventually, Ratchet managed to catch Cliffjumper alone.
When he did, the medic learned that it wouldn’t have mattered how he would have phrased the need for counseling; the word alone, or any word related to it, would have instantly earned the same defiant expression and the same single-syllable response.
“No.”
Really, he shouldn’t have been surprised. “Cliffjumper..”
“I said no.” The minibot in question glared, but wasn’t snarling in the way he would have done six months ago. “I don’t need any therapy or any psycho-slag.” It seemed that he had recovered from the emotional outburst Bumblebee’s mirror had set off.
“Cliffjumper.” Ratchet tried again, giving the newely painted frame a stern stare. “You flinch whenever anyone touches you. First Aid accidentally brushed his hand on your shoulder the other day, and you almost had a panic attack.”
Cliffjumper looked away, but the glare didn’t vanish. His voice dropped to a mumble. “..’Almost’ being the operative word there, Ratch.”
Ratchet released a long, deep sigh. “I’m not going to force you to take counseling, Cliffjumper. But being able to talk about what happened could help you a great deal.”
“Why do I even need to?” Blue optics looked up with a shot; his voice didn’t rise in volume, however. Instead of yelling or screaming as he would have once done, exhaustion marred every word. “You know what happened. Why do I have to tell you about it?”
“This isn’t about what I know, or what anyone else knows.” Ratchet frowned, unable to keep the pity at bay. “This is about you and your recovery. Letting certain things out of your system would help, not to mention that knowing certain.. Details.. Might help in finding new ways to treat you.”
Finally, Cliffjumper snarled. “Details.” Still, he turned away again to stare at the mirror that he had never released.
A moment of silence passed. Then, Ratchet let loose another sigh. “I’m not going to force you in to anything. It’s up to you.”
Cliffjumper continued to stare at his own reflection. The minibot seemed continuously fascinated with his own appearance; he couldn’t really blame him for that much, considering how long he had been forced to look like someone else. “..Can I think about it?”
“Of course.” It was something; better then another full out denial. “Let me know when you decide.”
With that, Ratchet turned and left the room, leaving Cliffjumper alone in privacy.
-----------------
Cliffjumper was left alone for less then two hours. For any other patient, Ratchet would have left him for a day or more; however, with the amount of time the minibot had spent in solitude during his captivity, the medic was concerned about leaving him alone for too long. It was why he allowed Bumblebee -- and anyone else, if Cliffjumper had been willing - to visit whenever he pleased. Too many hours alone and Ratchet feared a relapse.
Granted, there hadn’t been any sort of psychotic episode as of yet, but he wasn’t willing to chance it.
So, a little less then two hours later, he stepped back in to the room. As expected, Cliffjumper was staring in to the small hand mirror that Bumblebee had provided, a small smile on his face. At least, the smile was there for a moment; it vanished all too quickly, likely in response to the door sliding open.
Then, blue optics hardened. He didn’t look away from the mirror, but it was as close to an acknowledgement as anything else.
Ratchet frowned to himself; Cliffjumper must have been angry. Yet, there was no outlash of fury as there should have been; only the same cold restraint he had been exhibiting since his rescue. “Cliffjumper?”
At first, there was no response. Optics looked at him sidelong before going back to the mirror.
After several seconds, there was a slow, angry nod.
Ratchet let out a breath of relief. “All right. Tomorrow, then, we’ll have the first session. It will likely be a weekly thing.”
No response; however, Cliffjumper’s grip on the mirror tightened.
“Bumblebee will be here soon.”
Then, Ratchet turned and left the room once more.
------------------
A day later saw very little change in Cliffjumpers’ behavior. He was still quietly smoldering, glaring not at Ratchet but instead at some undefined point in the floor. It was a rather troubling sort of surrender; Ratchet couldn’t help but wonder how many times he must have given Soundwave that very same look.
There was a separate room tailored specifically for verbal therapy and counseling. Although Cliffjumpers’ missing legs made the chaise lounge next to useless for what it was designed for, he was set out and laid on it regardless. Being in the same room for weeks on end - private and made as comfortable as it was - was likely not the best thing for his mental recovery. At least, not considering how long he must have stared at the same ceiling and walls in Soundwaves’ room. Ratchet made a mental note to move him around more often.
The change in scenery certainly had an impact; Cliffjumper seemed to relax a little more in to the sofa, looking around with what seemed to be mild curiosity.
When the ARK had crashed all those years ago, several sections had been completely destroyed. Crushed by the mountain or wrecked in the crash itself; some had even blended in to the earth over the millions of years that they had spent in stasis. This particular room was literally next door to several of the wrecked ones; rubble sat in the far corner, and half of one wall had fossilized dirt and even a few bones coating it. When previous Autobots had come in here, almost every single one had asked about some of the things long since stuck to the wall in question.
Cliffjumper didn’t. He gave it an odd look, but otherwise didn’t say a word. Before his captivity, Ratchet knew that he would have, at the very least, made a snide comment about it.
Even now, Cliffjumper restrained himself.
Ratchet looked to the minibot, allowing him the time to look around in the way most patients did. Eventually, the red Autobot settled down and went back to that subdued anger.
“So.. What the slag am I supposed to say?” Cliffjumper groused.
Ratchet held a datapad in one end; notes weren’t taken often, as he found it easier just to remember it all, but he found that it helped some patients just to see that he cared enough to have notes at all. “The beginning, if you can.”
A snort. “You mean when we all got our afts captured? Or do you mean..?” An uncomfortable shift.
“Whichever you prefer.” Some patients, after all, found it easier to lead in to events rather then jump in to it. Ratchet had the feeling that Cliffjumper wouldn’t be able to talk about it in any other way.
“Fine.” A deep, angry breath. Cliffjumper continued to stare at the ceiling, shifting uncomfortably as he did so.
It took a long few minutes to actually get there. Ratchet maintained silent the entire time; this was a difficult thing to approach and he knew it.
“..It was stupid!” Was the eventual sputter. “None of us should have even been out there! They were just.. Rocks. Just stupid rocks. But Prowl..” And he spat the name as if it were a curse. “..Said it was either that or cleaning the washracks. Now I know I should’ve taken the washracks.” He rubbed his face with a hand.
A moment of silence passed before he spoke again.
“Barely even remember the fight. I remember the cell with the others, though.” His tone had changed to something more thoughtful; Ratchet hoped that it was comfort this room provided that relaxed the minibot. “Remember kind of being glad when we found out that they just wanted Perceptor to build a weapon. I mean, slag, we’d probably get beaten up, but it was.. Simple. Something I got. We knew what the slag was going on. Until that.. Weird staring match.”
“Staring match?” Ratchet frowned.
“Yeah. They took Perceptor away, and then..” A visible shudder. “Soundwave came in and just.. Stared. Didn’t move, didn’t say anything, just.. Stared. Even Hound said it was creepy. Should’ve figured something was going on, but..” A shrug. “Still didn’t see it coming.”
Cliffjumper fell silent. His optics shut offline.
Ratchet waited, assuming that he needed a moment to get his thoughts together. It was never an easy think to talk about; it was likely even more difficult to recall such a thing from a personal cache.
As the cycles ticked on by, however, the medic began to frown. He was silent for a bit too long. If he hadn’t known better, he might have thought that his patient had slipped in to recharge. “Cliffjumper?”
“I don’t want to talk about this.” It came out fast, tone hard; defensive. His optics were still shut off. “Why do I have to talk about this?”
Ratchet restrained himself from sighing; he had hoped that they had gotten past this. “You don’t have to. But it would help you.”
“How would it help me?” Cliffjumper was cracking away from his restraint; emotion that must have been held back since his captivity was starting to break through. Optics finally lit alight with a fierce flare. “I mean, what the frag can I possibly say that’s anything you don’t already know? How is talking supposed to help me?”
The emotional breakthrough had actually happened faster then Ratchet had thought that it would; he had planned for it to take several weeks, not an outburst minutes in to the very first session. He was actually shouting.
“Cliffjumper -“
“You know what he did.” Cliffjumper hissed as he turned to stare at the medic. “You know I was stuck there for months while he did it, over and over again, just waiting, do you even know what that’s like?!”
Ratchet blinked several times, stunned by the sheer fury on exhibit; he wasn’t certain if this was the breakthrough that he had wanted. He opened his mouth to speak, but was quickly interrupted.
“You said you wanted details? How’s this for details? I was tied down to a berth! Tied down! Sensors so fragged I couldn’t even get up, and if it wasn’t for what I did, if I didn’t put that fraggin’ sign on that fraggin’ window, none of you would have ever even thought to look there!” Blue optics flared in fury.
This hadn’t been what he was expecting. Ratchet had known that there would be pain and the high potential for post-traumatic stress, but resentment for his fellow Autobots was not something he had anticipated.
“Prowl was just going to leave me there.” Cliffjumpers’ tone began to quiet, calming back down from the outburst. “He was just going to toss me up for dead and leave me there. Bumblebee was the only one that kept looking, and I owe everything to him. Not you, not even Prime, but him. So just fix me up, get my legs back, and just send me back out there and I’ll deal with it on my own, okay?”
Then, Cliffjumper sat back on the sofa with anger clearly on display.
Stunned, Ratchet tapped at the datapad.