Ten Silver Spoons Part 2 of 2

[ratchetxhide]

Title: Ten Silver Spoons
Rating:T
Pairing: Ratchet/Wheeljack
Continuity: Transformers Prime
WARNING: Mentions of Ed Gein and treatment of his victims.
Prompt: Written for TF_Rare_Pairing June Challenge. "Different States of Viewing" Sub-cat. "Hallucinations".

"Bulkhead, Optimus Prime, keep him under as much control as you can. I am going to look into this," Ratchet said as he made his way safely around the fighting Wheeljack and over to his Medbay.

Opening up the information on N5MT, he quickly scanned through in search of anything dealing with hallucinations and found exactly what he was looking for. From such a small dose of N-acetyl-5-methoxytryptamine, he might have overdosed Wheeljack and if this information was true, then Wheeljack could experience dizziness, headaches, nightmares, sleepwalking, feeling overwhelmed, uneasiness, hallucinations, and decrease his chances of being a carrier. He was almost in disbelief that he didn't think all of this out before giving the shot to Wheeljack. Turning around, he watched as Wheeljack went from a dancing fight around the room to attacking one of the walls yelling for the spoon to die. Shaking his head, he looked at his watch and noticed that the medicine had been in his system for an hour now and there was nothing to do about it, but let it run its course.

Wheeljack hit at the spoon as hard as he could before pulling out a gun and shooting at it and watching as the blast went right through it. The spoons were immortals, he thought to himself as he watched nothing harm it, but he knew that he was hitting it. He could feel the impact through his swords and that alone told him that the spoons were real and not just a figment of his imagination.

"Wheeljack, you are attacking the wall," Bulkhead told him calmly as he carefully made his way over to his friend.

"Bulkhead, I am hitting it. I can feel it," he said turning around and having his optics go wide.

Behind Bulkhead were now ten shiny, silver, demonic spoons and they all had the same angry look in their eyes and Megatron's fanged teeth bared at him. The only difference this time was they were no longer ghostly figures, but solid forms.

"Bulkhead, they are going to kill us all," Wheeljack freaked even more than before as he readied his weapons to fight his way through them.

"Jackie, I do not see anything," he replied as he turned to face whatever his wrecker friend was about to fight.

"Wheeljack, there are no spoons," Ratchet said as he slowly made his way into Wheeljack's view.

"Ratchet, did you turn into a fork?" Wheeljack asked confused as he looked at the fork among the spoons who was speaking to him.

"I don't think I have," Ratchet replied looking down at his form wondering why he was taking the shape of a fork in the eyes of the warrior.

"Ratchet, I think the fork has your voice," Wheeljack said as he looked at the fork confused as to what was going on.

"The fork has my voice?" Ratchet asked looking at the others in disbelief. "Maybe you should listen to the fork. What is the fork telling you to do?"

Wheeljack watched the fork for a moment and shook his head.

"He isn't speaking. The spoons are speaking to me."

"What are the spoons saying, Jackie?" Bulkhead asked trying to coax information out of him.

"We are the spoons. We scooped our way into your dreams, to knock the knives out bloody cold. And lead you down the unforsaken road," Wheeljack spoke softly as if in a trance.

Everyone looked at Wheeljack totally confused now. What road was he talking about and why was it unforsaken? All they knew was that there was no way they could let Wheeljack out of the base. If they did, there was no telling where he would go and what would happen.

“Wheeljack,” Ratchet said walking over to him slowly. “Lower your weapons for just a moment. I am not going to harm you.”

Wheeljack watched as the fork walked over to him and spoke. Nodding he listened and lowered his weapons as the fork stood in front of him.

“Anything you say,” he told the fork as he watched it closely.

Ratchet nodded and placed a servo on Wheeljack’s shoulder.

“Come over here and sit with me. I promise you, the spoons won’t come towards us,” Ratchet spoke softly as he took a step towards Wheeljack’s room.

Wheeljack cautiously watched the spoons as he took a step with the fork with the voice of Ratchet towards his room. The spoons didn’t seem to notice he was moving and were too busy knocking out the knives that had just recently appeared in the room. One of the knives had lost almost all of its blade and was now lying on the ground dead.

“Fork, when did the knives get here?” Wheeljack asked as he watched as the spoons took down another knife.

“I didn’t realize they were here. What are they doing?” Ratchet asked shocked that knives were now invading the base with the spoons.

“The spoons are knocking them out and there is one dead over there,” Wheeljack said as he pointed at the dead knife. “Are the knifes evil?”

“I think so,” Ratchet told him as he sat down on the medical berth and gently held Wheeljack’s hand. “Sit with me and I will protect you from both the spoons and the knives.”

Wheeljack nodded and laid down on the medical berth with his head in the fork’s lap. Something in his mind told him that here was where he was safest.

“Why are the chasing me, fork?” Wheeljack asked very confused.

“I don’t know why Jackie, but I won’t let them get you.” Ratchet promised knowing that Wheeljack was seeing him as a fork now.

As to why he was a fork, it was still unknown and Wheeljack probably wouldn’t ever know why. Ratchet looked down at the very tired and panicking mech in his lap as he started to rub his back in hopes of calming him down enough so he could sleep. Wheeljack relaxed and leaned into Ratchet's touch as his optics started to dim but not go completely offline. Wheeljack was scared that if he offlined his optics, the spoons from across the room would come closer even though the fork had promised to keep them at bay. There was no guarantee that 'the' fork could keep all ten silver spoons from coming to get him. They had already taken out two dozen knives and the knives that were now fighting them looked as if they were going to die any second now. What if no more knives came to fight the spoons after they died and they decided that he would be the next target? What if the fork was wrong and was holding him down and calming him before the spoons came for him? He just didn't want the cultery to keep on chasing him. He wanted to escape from all of them and be free from their wrath. But would he upset the fork knowing that he didn't trust him enough to guarantee safety? But what made him think that the fork really would betray him? The fork had the voice of his medic, his comrade, his personal friend, and his crush. Maybe it was the fact that the fork had the appearance of a piece of cultery and not a Cybertronian body. Maybe it was the fact that it had the voice of Ratchet and not the shrieking voice of the spoons or the crying voices of the knives. Maybe the fork took the voice of one closest to him in order to calm him or was it to decieve him. Shaking his head, he let thoughts slip from his mind as he saw more knives appear in the room from what looked like a ground bridge and the spoons start to take on more of them. Sighing a little, Wheeljack let his optics offline as he decided to trust the fork with his safety and try to rest at least a little.

Ratchet smiled when he noticed that Wheeljack had finally fallen into a light stasis. Anything was better than nothing at the moment. At least they wouldn't have to see Wheeljack hallucinating and potentially hurt himself or others.

"Jack, can you call your mother? I have a few things I would like to discuss with her," Ratchet said softly as he watched the sleeping mech in his lap.

"Sure," Jack said as Arcee transformed into her motorcycle alt-form and allowed Jack to climb on before quietly leaving the base and heading into town to contact with his mother.

Optimus Prime, Bulkhead, and Bumblebee sat silently with Miko and Raf as they watched Wheeljack recharge. Wheeljack had been in need of stasis for some time now, but that didn't mean that overdosing him on N5MT was the right answer to this issue. And they were almost certain from the way that Ratchet reacted that he didn't mean to. Why would anyone in their right processor overdose a mech or femme on N5MT and give them hallucinations like this?

Ratchet's train of thought got sidetracked when Arcee returned with Jack and his mother, June.

"You called for me, doctor?" June Darby asked as she climbed off of Arcee and made her way towards Ratchet who had Wheeljack sleeping still in his lap.

"Yes. I wanted to ask you a few questions about N-acetyl-5-methoxytryptamine. I didn't know if humans had the same stuff in their systems that caused sleep," Ratchet responded as he watched Arcee lift her so that she has sitting on the medical berth with Ratchet.

"Humans do have N-acetyl-5-methoxytryptamine in their systems. It makes humans sleep but for short we call it Melatonin. Its activated when in an area that's dark and stops producing more when in a lighted area."

"Cybertronian medics have been calling it N5MT for as long as I can remember," Ratchet told her as he continued to rub Wheeljack's back gently. "Earlier today I was commed by Wheeljack informing me that he was having issues recharging. I didn't think much about it at first and when I ran some tests, nothing came back. I figured giving him a small dose of N5MT would help him recharge, but it seems that I overdosed him. He was seeing forks and freaking out till just recently."

"I have seen a few humans do that too. Melatonin is such a strong medicine that very little can work wonders. With us, half of a milligram if plenty and as little as twenty milligrams can overdose us," she explained to Ratchet.

"But I almost feel as if it is my fault that I overdosed him. If I could have thought about it, I wouldn't have given it to him. I didn't want him to hallucinate. For Primus sake, he think's I am a fork and that there are spoons killing knives in our base," Ratchet told her as his voice raised a little.

"If you raise your voice, you will wake him up," June warned him causing Ratchet to relax.

"We don't want him awake. I am afraid that he will hurt himself if he does wake up with such a high level in his systems," Ratchet told June. "I don't think I could live with myself if he hurt himself over my mistake.”

June looked at Ratchet wondering if there was something more to their relationship than he was saying. If there was something more than just a comrade relationship or medic and patient, that could explain why Ratchet felt like he had let Wheeljack down.

“Ratchet, may I ask you a personal question?”

Ratchet looked down at the human nurse and nodded.

“Is there something more than a doctor/patient relationship between you and Wheeljack?”

Ratchet looked at her shocked for a moment before a small smile formed on his lips.

“I wish. Wheeljack… he is stubborn and would never look at me in that way.”

“Why wouldn’t he?” June asked confused.

“Personally I think he has fallen for Bulkhead, but is afraid to tell him. He keeps talking about how a certain mech has captured his spark for eons and has never shown affection towards him. Who else could it be, but the one that he has worked beside for eons,” Ratchet told her softly as his optics drifted from her to Bulkhead who was playing music over his alt-form speakers for Miko and the kids.

“I don’t think it is Bulkhead personally. He found comfort in you while having hallucinations. Doesn’t that say something?” June asked him.

“Maybe, but he saw me as a fork, June,” Ratchet said almost denying the fact that Wheeljack could even find anything in him other than a grumpy, old mech.

“Give him a chance, Ratchet,” June smiled. “You will be surprised what a little trust can do. Anyway, I have to head back to work. They will be wondering where I ran off to soon.”

Arcee walked over and lifted June and placed her on the floor as Jack and his mother put on the bike helmets they wore. Arcee transformed swiftly and allowed the humans to climb on before they sped off and into town.

Later that night

Wheeljack stirred and onlined his optics to see light and the mechs walking around silently. It was if they had lost a comrade or something. Sitting up he rubbed his helm and moaned at the soreness in his muscles.

“What happened?” he mumbled causing Ratchet to rush over to him.

“How does your helm feel?” Ratchet asked praying to Primus that there were no spoons.

“Foggy in a way. Why am I recharging out here?”

“Let’s just say that you were hallucinating and wouldn’t recharge until I got you to lay down with me,” Ratchet explained.

Wheeljack looked down for a moment almost embarrassed that he had fallen into recharge on Ratchet and then the memories of earlier all flooded his mind. There were spoons and knives in fights and the single fork that protected him. The fork that had Ratchet’s voice and got him to lay down.

“You were the fork, weren’t you?” Wheeljack asked softly.

“I guess you can say that,” Ratchet smiled. “Are the spoons and knives gone?”

“Yes, they are gone. Let’s just say I don’t want to be on that medicine again, Ratchet.”

“Trust me, I won’t put you on it again.”

“Thanks,” Wheeljack smiled as he looked up into the eyes of the medic that he had fallen for. “Hey Ratchet, do you mind staying in the same room as me tonight? I don’t think I feel comfortable being alone yet.”

Ratchet looked at the mech with a surprised look. Maybe June was right and Wheeljack wasn’t in love with Bulkhead. He didn’t want to push him into telling him this soon, but he at least had a chance.

“I can do that,” Ratchet smiled.

“Thanks,” Wheeljack smiled back before adding, “Doc.”

“Don’t call me that,” Ratchet said with a little annoyance in his voice as he heard everyone start to laugh.

At least he could tease the doctor.

“Whatever you say, Sunshine,” Wheeljack replied as he watched Ratchet get annoyed with him once more.