TF: A Different Path
Rating: PG
Series: G1
Pairings: Wheeljack/Ratchet
Summary: A brief glimpse at the mech known as Wheeljack
Warnings: None
Disclaimer: As per usual, the good things in life are not mine to have, but belong to someone else... in this case Hasbro, Takara and IDW and anyone else I’ve forgotten…
Authors Notes: For the tf_speedwriting Saturday 30th July - prompt 1 - "Do not go where the path may lead; go instead where there is no path and leave a trail." - Ralph Waldo Emerson
Feedback makes friends. Flames dealt with by the masters of paranoia and fire, Red Alert and Inferno.
Prompt: 1
Time: About 35-40 minutes
He wasn’t a mech given to musing. At least not about the everyday things. He wondered more about what his next invention was going to be; what he could create that would further the Autobot cause. It was probably that that gained him his reputation.
‘He’s not a mech that follows a path’ was something he’d heard time and time again, right from when he was still at the Academy to just the other day. Although, more recently, it had been followed pretty quickly by ‘at least you can tell where he is by the trail of devastation’. It wasn’t his fault that he worked with materials that were more volatile than they should be. The lack of decent resources meant that refining fuels was out of the question. The refinement processes they had were used for energon and energon alone. Which meant that fuels and other raw materials weren’t refined. Which meant that they had a tendency to be more combustible.
Which of course, meant that he had a tendency to end up in the medbay whilst working on his latest invention.
“All right, I know you’re online, you can quit pretending to be recharging.”
“I wasn’t!” Wheeljack protested, onlining his optics and trying to sit up. Ratchet moved to help him.
“Of course not, you were just lying there thinking.”
“I was.” Wheeljack groaned as he sat up, stabilisers struggling briefly to compensate.
“How do you feel?”
“Like you’ve just had to replace far too much armor?”
“Aside from that.” Wheeljack noted that Ratchet didn’t correct him. Which meant he’d guessed right.
“Systems diagnostics all come back normal. But then, you already knew that.” Ratchet sighed. Sometimes, the medic just needed to hear Wheeljack say he was all right.
“I don’t know what you were thinking…” Ratchet started, ready to launch into yet another rant about why Wheeljack still persisted in working with unrefined materials that endangered him.
“I nearly had it Ratchet!” Wheeljack’s memories loaded, the last few seconds admittedly scrambled as he was overwhelmed by the explosion he hadn’t been expecting.
“Wheeljack!”
“But I did. This could revolutionise everything.” Ratchet leant against the berth as Wheeljack launched into a long, convoluted explanation of what had happened, and what he’d been working on. With luck, Ratchet could help him refine a little of the materials to reduce the risk of explosions.
Yes indeed, Wheeljack followed his own path. But in doing so, he had created so many useful inventions for the Autobots. And he would keep stumbling along his chosen path, and Ratchet would be right there behind him, picking up the pieces if needed.