[rd][fic][Transformers Bayverse] Summer Job 8/?
Summer Job: Tight Spaces
by K. Stonham
released 1st June 2011
June 18th, 2010. Cybertron.
It had been a long time since Ratchet had been in the catacombs. Some areas, sheltered by the geography of the underground labyrinth, seemed almost untouched. Others were clearly spillways for the acid rain, worn smooth by time. Two were impassable, and their rescue team had to reroute.
He couldn't keep his mind from that list of names Wheeljack had left for him. Eighteen survivors! And one of his former apprentices among them. Not that Jolt's landing on Earth hadn't been boon and miracle enough, but Ratchet had always had a weak point in his plating for First Aid. If inebriated enough (torture, as the Decepticons had discovered to their regret, was ineffective at interrogating Ratchet), he would admit that the younger mech's pure faith sometimes humbled him.
(And, he thought, he couldn't wait to see what First Aid and Mikaela would make of one another's styles.)
The final entrance to the secure storage area Wheeljack had designated as the stasis chamber involved a long, long spiral ramp that corkscrewed down into the depths of the planet.
//Race you,// Ratchet told Ironhide, feeling almost giddy for the first time in a very long time.
//Are you out of your processor?// Ironhide demanded. //You have no idea if it's still structurally sound.//
Ironhide, like Ratchet, had been made to deal with stresses that would drive most other mechs insane. That didn't mean he was above being a worrywart and a killjoy.
Bumblebee, engine revving, blew them a raspberry and leapt onto the ramp, disappearing into the darkness beyond the first curve, his aft end slinging around into a tight drift that had been exactly how Wheeljack always preferred to take the ramp.
The rest of them stared after him for a moment, then Optimus gave what sounded suspiciously like a laugh. "'Where angels fear to tread'," he said in English.
A ping sounded through all their comms. //All clear,// Bumblebee sent.
Had he been in root form, Ratchet would have grinned. //Race you,// he repeated to Ironhide, and jumped onto the ramp, not waiting to see if the weapons specialist followed or not.
Optimus' laughter, and his own, carried Ratchet all the way to the bottom.
***
This was... not possible.
Yet somehow it was.
Red Alert kept his optics fast on the organic who had declared (proven?) himself to be a Prime. He ignored all the others; they were irrelevant until he either figured out this conundrum or broke himself trying.
There were no more Primes, save for Optimus Prime, who Red Alert knew was called that only as a courtesy. He had hacked into the Autobots' cloud database, finding that information, before he had offered his allegiance to their faction. That Optimus' appellation was specious was not a secret, but not something widely discussed either. Those who followed him followed his vision and integrity rather than a title that had been dead longer than most of them had been functioning.
Red Alert's first task as an Autobot had been to fix the holes that had let him into their data. It had only gotten more challenging from there.
But this... this was beyond any challenge offered to him before. He knew what Prowl's cool logic would have had the tactician declare: that as nothing unreal exists, given the fact that the organic had used the dimension-altering speech of the Primes, he was obviously a Prime. End of discussion.
Except that this Prime was an organic. It was not only impossible, it was unthinkable!
...There were traces of Allspark radiation lingering around the maybe-Prime.
Processors whirling, Red Alert continued to stare.
***
He was being stared at.
This was exactly what Sam didn't want. Being caught somewhere between human and Autobot he could deal with. Being a Prime, being a telekinetic... given a little time and space to deal with the revelations, he thought he'd adapted quite well. He was pulling his own weight with the team. Go team, go Witwicky Prime or whatever.
But being stared at like this, like he was some kind of freak....
He repressed another shiver and the urge to retch. He was in some kind of shock, he knew, and he ached all over. His throat felt scraped raw, and a corner of his mind would have killed for a blanket and a strawberry milkshake, but at least those were all things whose sources he knew and whose ends he could eventually negotiate. There were prices that got paid when you pushed further than you really should. Cuts, contusions, and a mild concussion. Broken hands and second-degree burns.
Full body shock and laryngitis seemed a mild price to pay for stopping the Autobot--whose name Sam still didn't know--from slaughtering NEST.
Behind him, muttered cursing accompanied Mikaela's field repairs of Jetstorm. He would survive; Sam knew that as sure as his own name. If Jetstorm's wounds had been truly life-threatening, Mikaela's words and tone would be very, very different.
He suffered another round of shuddering before managing to pull his body back under his control, and looked up at blue optics that had never strayed from him.
The mech didn't know English. No one else knew Cybertronian. And Sam's throat was totally burnt out.
They were at an impasse until Optimus returned.
Sam swallowed, grimacing at the pain, and wished his brother Prime would hurry up already.
***
The storage unit opened to Ratchet's same code (which in these less dire circumstances made half their party snigger; only Arcee and Optimus were exempt, and even then Ratchet suspected the Prime of secret, silent laughter). Only the very lowest level of lighting came on as they entered the room; humans would be blind. Most of the energy stored in the batteries, Ratchet noted with approval, was going to maintain the statis pods.
They were, at their most concise, silicon cocoons that enclosed the base Cybertronian form the humans referred to as "cometary landing form." To Cybertronians, it was as natural a shape as the humans folding themselves up into fetal or cannonball position. The compact form took less space, conserved energy, and frequently induced calm from its relative imperviousness. Ratchet had seen more than a few mechs and femmes pulled out of the remains of a battlefield who had survived their injuries due only to the instinct to curl up in that most basic, protective form.
There were no names to the individual pods, but having worked on almost all of them either before or during the war, Ratchet could name most of them. Others could name a few.
//All of them?// Optimus whispered in shock, starting at the five forms laid next to each other.
//All five,// Ratchet confirmed. It was surely a miracle that First Aid's entire clade had survived. While gestalt-capable mechs could switch out with others who held their same specs, many of them formed teams with tight bonds, and preferred those partners above all others of their type. In this, First Aid had been entirely conventional.
Arcee stood next to another curled figure, staring with all four of her optics as though she couldn't believe their input. //Transmutate?// she whispered, reaching out but not quite daring to touch the still form.
Only Jolt seemed somewhat disappointed as he looked around at their sleeping brethren. Ratchet raised an optic ridge at him. Caught out, the younger medic deflated somewhat and sighed. //I was hoping Sunstreaker might be here,// he confessed.
The thought of Sideswipe's missing twin caught them all aback for a moment, then Optimus stepped forward, laying a hand on Jolt's shoulder. //We may not have found him today,// he said kindly, //but this may be merely the first of many such happy discoveries. Let us not give up hope for Sunstreaker just yet, my friend.//
//Very touching.// Ironhide mimed wiping a tear away from the corner of his optic. //But if we could get on with it, we're on a schedule here.//
//So we are.// Stepping back, Optimus unfolded a silver-white trailer flatbed from his subspace. A low railing wrapped around its edges.
//Primus, how long have you been carrying this around?// Ironhide demanded. He poked at the side of the trailer. //It's still got its maker's marks!//
//Too long,// Optimus replied. //Let's get them loaded up.//
***
It seemed like forever, but probably wasn't quite that long, before the Autobots returned. Seymour had spent most of the time studying NEST's captive. In that time he had come to some conclusions.
One, the mech was nothing like the Ice Man. Megatron had been rage and fury; this mech was cool, calm, and entirely deliberate.
Two, he was wickedly intelligent and Seymour was going to enjoy debating with him once the mech got some language downloads.
Three, whatever Witwicky had told him had thrown the 'Bot for a total loop and he was now at an utter loss for how to proceed.
Seymour grinned. He really liked Witwicky's style.
His contemplation of the prisoner was interrupted by the irising open of the door the Autobot team had left through. The Prime drove through first, pulling a silvery flatbed, as tire-less as the 'Bots themselves currently, full of silvery lumps. Behind him was Ironhide, with three more precariously balanced in the bed of his truck form, and finally...
He blinked.
Okay, when had Arcee ever combined her bodies before? Because the femme was definitely the one he knew, but larger, with elegant stripings of blue and pink and two wheels on the ground instead of one. In her arms she carried a final comet form with a particular tenderness that was almost out of character for her.
The rest of the Cybertronians brought up the rear. Most of them, predictably, transformed the moment they saw the situation. It took Prime a moment to disarticulate himself from the trailer, and Ironhide, obviously, couldn't switch without upsetting his cargo, but the rest stared and then started asking questions.
The kneeling, captive mech finally looked away from Witwicky and stared up at Optimus Prime. Seymour was familiar enough with Autobot body language to read his posture as pleading.
"Red Alert?" the Cybertronian leader asked, stepping forward. Behind him Ratchet beelined for Jetstorm.
***
"Fragging paranoid--" Ratchet muttered to himself, inspecting the damage. At least, he noted, Red had aimed to disable (presumably so as to allow later interrogation) and not to kill. "Good work," he told Mikaela, going for the damage she hadn't gotten to yet. He nodded Jolt over to Jetstorm's other side so all three of them could work at once without getting into each other's areas.
"Thanks." She looked over her shoulder at Red Alert. "So who's he?"
"Security director for Altihex. Back when there was an Altihex. Looks like Wheeljack managed to rope him into--or Red Alert insisted himself on--guarding the lab and protoforms." Ratchet grunted, transforming a hand into a welder. "Wish he'd thought to mention that in his message."
"You got everybody down there?"
"Every last one accounted for, praise Primus."
***
//Red Alert,// Optimus repeated in their own language, stooping to kneel beside the mech. He noted with approval that NEST's new filament lines were indeed capable of restraining a mech, though to be fair it looked like Red hadn't even struggled. //What happened?//
//He....// The blue optics looking into Optimus' were those of a sparkling, confused and trying to make sense of the world.
//Tell me,// Optimus prompted.
//He said he was a Prime. In the language of the Primes! He told me to stop, and to stay, so I did.// Optimus nodded. He doubted Red Alert had moved so much as a micron since Sam had given him those orders. He shot a quick glance at his human brother, who met his gaze evenly.
//Go on.//
//And he said you were a Prime. A real one, I mean.//
At that, Optimus smiled. //Yes, Red Alert, I am. It's one of the many things we've learned on Earth. Will you come there with us?//
//How?// Red blinked and seemed to notice the other Autobots for the first time. //How are you even all here?// he demanded.
//We've found out how to operate the space bridges,// Optimus told the security mech, and watched as his optics widened.
***
"So, you got 'em all?" Will asked Ironhide.
"Yep," the black truck said.
"Good. Where the hell did that trailer come from?"
"It was in the storage area with them. Looks like Wheeljack thought ahead. Good thing too."
"And Arcee's cuddling that protoform why...?" Will prompted.
Ironhide made a sound that was somewhere between a laugh and a sigh. "It's her sister."
"Sister? Like Skids and Mudflap type siblings?"
"Much less annoying."
"Thank God." Will did not want to imagine another pair of overpowered robots running amok on Earth possessing the particular immaturity of that duo. He looked at Optimus as the leader mech looked at him and silently indicated Red Alert's bonds. Will gave a nod, then a sharp whistle, catching the attention of his men. He jerked his chin toward the captive mech and, interpreting his orders correctly, NEST descended on the Autobot to free him just as neatly as they had to truss him. Optimus stood and stepped back to let them work. Red Alert just watched, still not moving a metal muscle.
Ratchet and Jolt were taking care of Jetstorm... who would hopefully be awake enough to transport himself back to the space bridge, because Will really didn't see how they could haul him there in addition to the protoform pods. Arcee was carrying her sister. That left....
Bumblebee, who unsurprisingly was hovering over Sam. The yellow mech spat static at Ratchet, who paused in his repairs to look over at the human, then pulled a blanket out of somewhere and handed it to Mikaela, gesturing her over to her boyfriend. The mechanic wiped her hands on her jeans, accepted the bundle, and obeyed.
Watching her and Bumblebee fuss over Sam (nothing Will could do for him right now, though the minute they all got back to Diego Garcia Sam was getting taken to the infirmary), Will paused. There was something....
Bumblebee's touches were too gentle. Not cautious, like the rest of the Autobots around humans, but... tender? Something like that. And something in Sam's face as he looked up at his guardian mech, and something in Mikaela's posture....
The pieces clicked together in Will's mind with a suddenness that left him blanching.
How the hell was that even possible?! Two of them were human, and one of them... for God's sake, Bumblebee was a Camaro! The size difference was all wrong, to say nothing of flesh as opposed to metal, and Will knew for a solid fact that the Autobots didn't even have human-equatable equipment....
Put it out of your mind, he told himself, forcing himself to look away. It's none of your business. Bring it up with them individually later. Focus now on getting everyone safely home.
Sam and Mikaela and Bumblebee was a problem that could keep.
*~*~*
A/N: This takes a little inspiration from Dwimordene's work, tainry's writing, and undoubtedly the subconscious influence of many other fine storytellers in our shared fandom. And, yes, for those who caught it, Transmutate being Arcee's younger sister is indeed a voice actor in-joke. Thank you to the many people who gave me suggestions, both here on LJ and in private conversations, for who should be rescued. I will give out a full list in the next (final) chapter of this story....