[May 2008 Entry, #2 of #13] [Ratchet x Constructicons] Sheer Dumb Luck

[spotlight_noa]

Title: Sheer Dumb Luck
Rating: M
Universe: Movie
Pairing: Ratchet x Constructicons
Word Count: 28,295

And a few notes: set in 2007 movieverse, but featuring characters adapted from G1 canon.

Consider yourself warned for robot sex of the plug-and-play variety, multiple-partner scenes and themes, and what counts as homosexuality if you’re attached to the idea of Transformers as gendered beings.



It had been very, very easy to figure out who the Autobot medic was.

After all, there were only four Autobots on earth, and after they’d gone public, you could find a fair bit of basic information about each one online. Their roles within the pathetic remains of the Autobot ‘army’ were certainly easily available.

The medic had a stable location. He was cut off from the mostly-deserted Autobot base. And he wasn’t built to fight.

Perfect.

---
It took Ratchet too long to realize they were there, and what they were. Decepticons. They were at the edges of all the accidents he’d been called to, over the past-three months, possibly longer. They were regularly in town. As far as he could tell, they had never been the ones responsible for the damage, but he was… suspicious.

By the time he did realize, it was too late.

Was it coincidence that had led them to the same stretch of almost-deserted rural California? He was there because the area needed a second ambulance, something more updated than their old one, and because it was a poor area that couldn’t afford to simply buy a new one. Most of them thought he was an inanimate gift from the benevolent AutoTech corporation: the core staff at the emergency response department knew otherwise, to give him freedom of mobility. He hadn’t bothered to correct the misconception. If he’d been openly himself, he never would have had a moment’s rest. Five years since Mission City, three years since they’d gone public, and the hubbub and hullabaloo still hadn’t died down. It was, quite frankly, ridiculous.

Now, driving along the lonely, remote stretch of desert road, visual scans barely picking up the plume of dust behind him and to the right that was proof he was being followed but energy-readings painfully aware of the three bright spots that each meant ‘Decepticon,’ he’d finally started connecting the dots. Or found the puzzle at all.

Had the Decepticons-all construction vehicles for some bizarre reason, and not even flashy ones at that-tracked him here? Was it somehow a strategic location for them? Had they simply been trying to stay out of sight?

Clearly, they knew where he was now. They were following him, and had been for months, although less… Aggressively, invasively, obviously.

It was… More than worrying. Where had this come from?

He’d tried sending a message to Optimus Prime, this afternoon, when it had finally clicked, once he’d realized what had been going on, right under his nose, as the humans put it. Messages had been blocked. He’d waited until it was safe for him to sneak away, and tried to make a break for it.

It hadn’t worked. Those three were still after him.

There was a good chance there was upwards of five of them, but there were definitely at least the three. There had been five construction vehicles he’d seen around the town, all the same shade of dirty khaki, and all utilizing the same holodriver, a blank-faced female with sunglasses and, sometimes, a light scarf. It looked out-of-place in the dusty, rough vehicles, but he supposed the Decepticons didn’t care much about cultural expectations. It wasn’t like it was a good rendering of the human face, anyways.

He’d seen five different vehicle forms, looking back through his databanks, but he’d only ever seen three together at one time, in differing combinations. It was possible they were regularly switching out their alt modes to confuse him, or to create the illusion of there being more than there actually was, although it seemed unlikely. It was energy-absorbing and uncomfortable to take on a new vehicle mode, and triple chargers almost inevitably took a ground vehicle and an airborne vehicle.

Only three were out there now, though-unless he was missing two because of a really high-quality scanning program. Or possibly more: there was nothing to say that they’d kept a handful of other ’cons out of the way.

---

At least he didn’t have a human driver with him. That was the only upside to the situation that he could see.

It had turned into a dark night, with a new moon and light cloud cover, and out here in the empty Mojave desert, there weren’t any cities to spread light pollution. That hadn’t slowed Ratchet down: the light ranges humans could see in were only one of a range available to him. The roads were empty, which was good, although they were also steadily worsening, as he was driven further and further away from human civilization. They were herding him exactly where they wanted to go.

Up ahead, the stretch of paving petered out to nothing but dust and rocks. And then, a few feet beyond that, there was a crescent of deep trench. The Decepticons were pulling up behind him: he was trapped. This had been planned.

He stopped. There was nothing else to do. The three were surrounding him now, weapons trained on him-it was too late for him to even transform, now.

“Ratchet,” said one of them calmly. “Chief Autobot medic.”

Slag, Ratchet thought. It was always bad when Decepticons decided that taking out the medic was a good battle plan. He’d always managed to get out before, but things were looking bad, and he’d seen what had happened to others, or read the reports, or been forced to simply guess-

“The best known Cybertronian medic,” added another.

The third remained silent.

“We need you to do something for us,” said the first plainly. “Our… Sixth needs repairs.”

“Sixth what?” Ratchet asked, furious enough with the situation to risk baiting them.

“Gestalt member,” said the third shortly, deep voice rumbling, breaking his silence.

“No,” responded Ratchet automatically, without thought. Not that there was anything to think through. So he’d die: that was a risk. And there was always the chance he’d escape. A completed gestalt-the kind of destruction one could cause…

“Please,” said the first, sounding slightly reluctant. “Just-hear us through.” Ratchet was plainly aware of the two Decepticons flanking him, not just the one facing him-the one who seemed to be in charge. Appeared to be, at least-you never knew, with Decepticons.

“You’re a gestalt,” said Ratchet flatly, not waiting at all. “A Decepticon gestalt. A threat to earth, the Autobots and humanity. I will die before I will assist you.”

“We don’t need you dead,” said the first, voice still careful, words obviously painstakingly measured and weighed. “That would bring the rest of your team down on us.”

“At least, most of us don’t,” muttered the second one darkly.

“You don’t seriously think I’d repair a Decepticon with just a nice request to spur me on?” Ratchet was derisive.

“We won’t harm any humans or Autobots, before or after the repairs are finished-unless, of course, you decide not to help,” said the first. “I’ll submit to a full scan as proof.”

“You’d let me run a full scan,” repeated Ratchet, dumbstruck. That was-

With permission, it was possible to tie yourself into another mech’s consciousness. It gave a complete view of intentions, likely actions, personality, history-everything. It was inarguable, absolute proof.

It was incredibly invasive.

Nobody made an offer to go through with a full scan lightly. Especially not when it was for a medic on the opposite side.

“Yes,” confirmed the less-talkative third mech, voice oddly-proud, not of his actions but simply of who he was, or something like that. Prideful. “If you require verification, I’ll undergo one as well.”

“Why?”

“We need the repairs, Autobot,” spat the second.

“Here,” said the first, producing a hardline cable. Slag, they really were serious-

Hesitantly-as ridiculous as the idea was, it had to be a trick, even though that was impossible-Ratchet accepted, transforming to grasp the cord, fit it into one of his ports.

Everything except the rush of foreign data was emptied from his processor as he plugged in. He’d done this before, but he always forgot how-disabling, how crushing, the inrush of information was. It left him weak and trembling, after the flood had retreated.

Once it was over, Ratchet carefully disconnected the cord from his systems, fingers trembling visibly, letting it drop. The Decepticon’s condition was almost as bad as his, he noticed distractedly before forcing his concentration inwards to sort through the data.

Most of it was useless, even though the true basics-basic processing programs-had already been filtered out. Other information was stored for later reference. The immediately relevant he absorbed, picked through carefully.

It was true. A gestalt of six, their final member hovering on the brink of death. Names and faces, alt modes for the others, and a vague sense of personality-that was all he had about them. He’d stored anything further, standard procedure. That was… personal. What mattered was that all of them were, to a greater or lesser extent, willing to play nice if it meant completing their team. All five were willing to do almost anything for that.

No current ties to the Decepticons, and no interest in making new ones. A deep, loathing hatred of Megatron-he had separated them, over the course of the war, and they hated him for that, and blamed him for the death of Bonecrusher for the same reason.

No good reason not to help. And he was a medic.

When he returned to reality, the three were watching him closely. Scrapper, Hook and Longhaul, he could identify now. Longhaul was the violent one of the three; he’d taken Scrapper’s memories; Hook was the stand-offish one. The other stand-offish one, not the violent one.

Ratchet pulled himself to his feet-how had he ended up kneeling, anyways?-and turned to Hook. He’d also offered a scan.

“I’d like to verify,” said Ratchet thinly, face and voice as impassive as he could manage.

Hook nodded, either understanding or accepting or something else or a mixture of the three.

It took longer to recover, the second time: no mech-not even a medic-was built to handle so much extra data.

Everything seemed to match up. The only real differences were when it came to their perceptions of the other team members.

“Well?” said Longhaul, voice tense with a mix of expectations, hope, anger, distrust.

And need. They needed their sixth to balance them.

“I… Don’t know.”

Hook stiffened. Scrapper half-shrugged, an unsurprised but still disappointed motion.

They let him go. Longhaul had whispered a threat, but they’d let him go.

---

It was a strange sort of pity, Ratchet thought. At the depth of their need, their dependence on the full team being there.

The matter was complicated by the scans he’d done. With both of the Decepticons, he’d-

It was odd. He was a good match for them. Their memories sat naturally in his mind, weren’t unbearably foreign to his systems. He’d scanned before, but it had been more… Much more uncomfortable, both during the process and afterwards.

Maybe it was the difference between a gestalt-compatible spark and an ordinary one. That would make a certain amount of sense. As much sense as anything-it wasn’t a highly studied subject, and a lot of the research that had been done had been ‘inconclusive.’ Ratchet knew a lot of people, including some scientists, had written it off as an inexplicable mystery, something beyond science’s understanding. He wasn’t sure what to think of that.

But they really weren’t interested in humans. They simply… Weren’t of importance to them. That would have worried Ratchet more if they hadn’t felt the same way about most Cybertronians, Decepticon or Autobot. They were… Insular. Apparently, getting outside help was almost unheard of for them.

All they needed was the six of them. Independent of the rest of the Cybertronian world-now, at least-but so very dependent on each other.

Gestalt.

Ratchet had been close to various Autobots over the course of the war, culminating with his current team. Jazz’s loss had been a blow to all of them. Certainly to Ratchet. He thought the hardest-hit had been Bumblebee-who’d found a friend in Jazz instead of a teammate, on top of being the youngest-and Optimus.

Optimus Prime. Leader of the Autobots. Ratchet strongly suspected that Jazz was-had been-the only mech he let himself confide in.

But Jazz was dead now, leaving behind his four teammates. They were all still grieving, in their own ways. And the five of them had had-the four of them left still did-a loose team bond. Not a gestalt-bond, which was much closer: not as close as it was possible to get at all, but still very close indeed. He couldn’t imagine what that felt like.

To the gestalt, it had felt like they’d lost Bonecrusher at one point. Ratchet had purposefully left that memory alone, deleting it without viewing it. He wasn’t sure he could take it, and that sort of thing was private.

He shouldn’t be considering the privacy of an enemy Decepticon a concern. He shouldn’t be considering helping them at all. He should have contacted Optimus Prime immediately and turned them in.

They just wanted to survive. Human beings and faction lines were irrelevant. Even if that hadn’t been the case, they were willing to do anything to get their sixth-Bonecrusher-back. And at least some of them wouldn’t go back on a promise-and the ones who would were happy to go along with it.

Ratchet felt… Restless. It was unlikely that there would be an emergency call anything soon-that at least would have taken his mind off of everything, even if it was just another prank call.

It wasn’t like he could call up one of the team to chat about his little dilemma. Or, really, he could, and should, doing just that. Not to try for guidance, but to get Bumblebee to drive over to figure out where they’d squirreled themselves and their injured companion away, and Ironhide to cause large, destructive explosions, and Optimus to lead and cause almost as much damage as Ironhide. And he would be there, with his saw and smaller cannon, fighting off the ’Cons with the rest of his team, the way it was supposed to be, and fixing whatever damage might occur. To his team, not the Decepticons. The way it was supposed to be. Autobots versus Decepticons.

How could he seriously be considering helping them…?

Optimus trusted him. So did Ironhide, and Bumblebee. He would be betraying that trust. Even if he didn’t actually lie to them-which would be hard-he would be betraying them. In the middle of the war, and the later stages, it would have been an unquestionable death sentence, the punishment for turning traitor. That was what he was contemplating. Debating. Thinking about actually going through with.

The war was over… There was no Allspark, not anymore. They were a dying race.

So the war was over. Optimus wanted to believe that, at least. Bumblebee did believe it. Ratchet knew a lot-maybe the majority-of the surviving Autobots and Decepticons would disagree. Too much blood had been spilled for it to just end-

There was a chance the remaining five members of the Decepticon gestalt would die if their final member was lost. Ratchet had seen it happen with bonded pairs, when one had been lost and the other hadn’t, when the ‘survivor’ had been unable to take the backlash, or simply not strong enough to go back to living alone, or too devastated to want anything but oblivion. Twinned or split sparks always offlined together. Gestalt bonds were weaker than that, but he understood what was meant by the team ‘unbalancing’ itself.

A lot of people had died. Did one or two more, or even six, make a difference? He had to believe that it did.

And they weren’t going to hurt anyone, unless he didn’t.

He should call Optimus. That was the right thing to do. The comm. lines were blocked, true, but he could probably figure a way around that.

---

He still hadn’t made up his mind. At least, that was what Ratchet told himself as he jounced his way over the rough road-if you could call it that-that led to where he’d stashed his emergency medical supplies. The materials that were only for Autobots, not people.

And now, the materials that were also for Decepticons.

He didn’t know where the gestalt was, but they wouldn’t be hard to find, he figured. They certainly wouldn’t have left, and his comm. line was still blocked. And they wanted him to find them, assuming he was willing to help, because they needed him. And if he wasn’t going to fix the injured one, because they wanted revenge, or at least spilled blood, or Energon. Or both.

So he hadn’t made a final decision, but he was taking action anyway. This was irrational, unreasonable, crazy.

They needed help.

It was like… It wasn’t like he felt compelled to help them. No, it wasn’t that. He felt… Obliged to help them, or… It was that he wasn’t able to not them. So he was going to. Because he chose to. Even if he didn’t know why. Why was he doing this?

The crunch of tires behind him startled him, making Ratchet whip around, weapons systems suddenly activating. Didn’t relax-didn’t let himself relax-when he recognized Longhaul.

“What do you want?” Ratchet asked, voice hard, glaring at the truck. “What are you doing here?”

“Scavenger found this place, and if you’re going to help you’re going to need supplies. So I’m transport. If you need it.”

Scavenger-the name rang a muffled bell for Ratchet, in the dim, deep-underwater way of encrypted data. He’d cut off most of what he’d gathered from Scrapper’s and Hook’s systems from his general consciousness, what he couldn’t delete.

“Fine,” Ratchet said, voice icy, turning his back on the mech to pick up a box of basic supplies and his set of field tools.

When he turned back around, he had a distinct feeling that the mech was staring at him with something akin to surprise, even though he was in his vehicle mode, making any expressions impossible to discern. Longhaul didn’t say anything, though, so Ratchet was happy to let it go.

Longhaul brought it up once they were both back on the main road, moving swiftly but still close to the speed limit-it was unusual to watch a Decepticon obey human traffic laws. Ratchet had let him set the pace; he was leading the way, anyways. Ratchet still didn’t know where his ‘patient’ was.

“You’re helping,” said Longhaul at last, breaking the quiet. He phrased the fragment oddly, not making it a question or a definitive statement.

Ratchet didn’t answer. There was nothing to say.

“-if you’re doing this to get close enough to sabotage him, you will die, Autobot.”

He snorted. “If I wanted you dead, I wouldn’t be here alone-I’d have the other Autobots and a human military squad outfitted with sabot rounds.”

“-So why are you helping us?”

“Because the risks outweigh the possible benefit.”

“Bleeding-heart Autobot sap-”

“Yes. And aren’t you glad of that? I can’t say that I am. But if I had the personality of almost any other Autobot I’ve met, certain as slag any Decepticon, you would be dead right now, or close to it. You certainly wouldn’t be getting help.” Ratchet’s voice was laden with scorn, and even he wasn’t sure how much of it was self-directed.

There was a long period of silence.

“Thanks.” The single word was said reluctantly, almost angrily, but it was still said.

Ratchet didn’t know how to respond to that.

---

They were underground. Judging by the confusing three-dimensional maze that Longhaul was leading him through, it didn’t matter to the Decepticons that he’d had one entrance revealed to him, because there were still a half-dozen more, and any number of traps around and just inside them. The base was disturbingly permanent-looking. It wasn’t a quick, bare-bones knock-up of a job. That face set Ratchet’s nerves even more on edge-which said something, considering the situation.

Lost in his thoughts and put too on-edge by the bad situation and the eerie, silent tangle of cramped passageways, Ratchet was startled when his guide finally stopped. Ratchet transformed, nervous, glancing quickly around the empty room before turning to quickly unload the supplies he’d brought off of Longhaul, who wasn’t verbally complaining-yet-but had his engine rumbling threateningly. Once the Decepticon had returned to his root mode, he started moving what Ratchet had unloaded, glaring slightly-Ratchet didn’t know why-when the medic moved to help him. They worked silently, and finished quickly.

Ratchet was surprised again when he turned to find a second mech-Decepticon-Hook-had entered the room, jerking desperately as he fought off to urge to bring out his weaponry and fight, for a few brief seconds.

The urge ended unnervingly quickly. He had no reason to feel this, this comfortable-

“Ratchet,” said Hook coldly. The Autobot simply nodded stiffly in return, in recognition of the greeting, barely pausing in the sorting-through of the medical supplies he’d brought.

“Where’s the- Where’s Bonecrusher?” he said finally, turning from his now-neatly-organized rows of laser scalpels, coils of wire and other materials and tools.

Hook didn’t give a direct answer, but nodded at Longhaul, leaning against a wall, who pressed a switch. There was an answering beep from a covered table-it looked vaguely like a stasis berth, to Ratchet-a little ways away, and the panels keeping the injured Decepticon covered folded and flipped away, compacting into nothing but a few inches more of table.

Ratchet had to work very, very hard to keep from yelling at the Decepticons, even from a fair distance away and without augmenting his vision or performing any sort of analysis whatsoever. The condition Bonecrusher was in was just that bad.

He was a mess. A wreck. A heap of scrapped, oxidized, salt-encrusted twisted metal. His head had been placed next to him on the table.

He turned back to Hook, at a loss for words. The two Decepticons eyed him impassively. Was this some sort of twisted joke? Could losing a gestalt member have put them this far over the edge? Ratchet was going to guess ‘yes.’

“He’s dead,” he managed to get out, the words said flatly.

“No,” said Hook and Longhaul simultaneously, their words blending together perfectly, and eerily. More proof of a twisted gestalt mindset? Or just the gestalt part? Or coincidence?

“He’s not,” finished Longhaul on his own. “We can feel him.” Almost subconsciously, as if he wasn’t really aware of the action, he pressed light nervous fingers over the lower part of his abdomen, presumably where his spark was.

“…What?”

“We felt him almost die, a hundred galaxies away. He was-gone.”

“We could feel him again, barely, when we arrived on earth. Now, it’s hard to sense him outside of a ten-mile radius, but I believe that we’d need to exit Earth’s atmosphere again to feel an absence.” Hook’s face and voice were impassive, contrasting with Longhaul’s still-hurting impassioned tones.

Oh, Primus. It couldn’t just be Decepticons that Ratchet had to deal with-that he could of handled-it had to be crazy Decepticons.

Hook, who’d been watching the medic closely, made a huffy annoyed noise. “Check his spark.”

“He’s been hacked through, scrapped after death, then soaked in seawater for a few years. I’d be surprised if I find a single uncorrupted sub file.” Regardless, the mech walked over to the mangled, salt-encrusted body, fingers searching deftly for the spark chamber, olfactory sensors damping down their sensitivity as harsh salt and the chemicals of organic decay reached them.

The chamber was tucked in beneath the Decepticon’s neck, unnervingly close to where the head had been separated from the body with a single slash, almost definitely from Optimus’ sword. The container opened seamlessly, only requiring a little force once or twice where hinges and seams had corroded together, or simply stuck-which was a bad sign. A functioning mech had a list of subroutines, safeguards and warnings a mile long to protect the spark.

Once he got it open, though, there was clearly-something there. The humid, contaminated air it had in it had the typical high-energy flicker of gaseous substances that had been held in a spark chamber, and puddles of, presumably, more seawater were glowing. It looked remarkably like the plasma of a spark, but liquid-although that defied all logic.

“See?”

Ratchet ignored the probably-smirking Decepticon and tried a scanner.

Both attempts using it, with a recalibration in-between, showed the little liquid puddles were sparkmatter, mixed with saltwater and the remains of plankton, plus trace elements regularly found in ocean water and some minor sedimentary particles. It was impossible-

“This makes no sense.”

“No, it means the theory is flawed,” Hook said smugly. Ratchet bit his tongue, figuratively speaking, finding the human saying having an entirely appropriate element of pain to it. “Are you going to set up an energon feed?”

“I don’t know,” snarled Ratchet. “I don’t know if improving conditions will send it-him-into shock and actually kill him this time, or if not doing anything-for now, at least, the spark will need energon before I attach it hook it back up to the body-will kill it because it’s survived this long but it’s a tenuous state or even if it’s the slagging phytoplankton and embryonic crabs that have miraculous curative properties that have let this happen at all-” And there was a very good chance that the crazy Decepticon gestalt would kill him, instantly or very slowly and very painfully, if he did end up permanently off-lining Bonecrusher.

When he turned to face the two Decepticons they were clearly talking on internal comm. systems, whether just the two of them or with more, their eyes dark but for the occasional flicker. After an interminable minute, Hook spoke.

“Try the feed. You’ll need to either way.”

Ratchet nodded firmly, not willing to give either the satisfaction of seeing his nervousness. “I’ll need a monitor, processed energon and a closed-coil circulatory mock-up.” He had isolation valves already, to keep the spark contained during the transfer, and afterwards.

He waited for the monitor instead of to stop up and cut away the energon lines immediately, unwilling to risk so much as jolting the spark when he didn’t have a feed going on its condition-although he wasn’t sure that the monitor would help much. The case was breaking virtually every medical rule he’d though existed. Although his scan had recognized the puddles as sparkmatter…

He was just fumbling around in the dark with this case. Experience, training and access to reference material didn’t give him an edge in this sort of situation.

‘Here,” Longhaul said shortly, reappearing with an armful of supplies, which he placed on the table. Ratchet bit back both a thank-you and a sharp comment, both wanting and not wanting to say both.

Why was he so conflicted? Why was he doing this at all? Because he was a medic.

But right now, he had work to do.

First, attach the monitor. Second, begin isolation. Ratchet tried to ignore the way Longhaul and Hook shuddered whenever he ended up banging his hand too hard against the wall of the spark chamber, vibrating the material side. It made him feel slightly sick; he was an Autobot, and a medic. The gesture was only superficially intimate.

Third, close the spark chamber and move it. Attach it to the energon feed, start up the mechanism in the preliminary stage. Add the energon. Turn it on.

Ratchet counted the seconds, knowing how long it would take for the first energon to hit the spark without thought, from long practice and familiarity. He turned to face the two expectantly waiting Constructicons a moment before-

(There was a very good chance that they would kill him, if he killed their teammate. Very, very good.)

Longhaul was knocked to the floor with the sheer ferocity of the sensation-fire burning along every inner wire, grinding into armor plates and sensor nodes-the overload of information cutting his control over his own body. Hook gave a low Cybertronian scream, a babble of static too low for human ears to pick up, clinging briefly to the table next to him for support before crashing to his knees, shaking helplessly.

Ratchet was frozen. The scan said nothing had changed to Bonecrusher’s spark, but he’d known a false reading had been a risk. He’d just killed Bonecrusher, destroying the gestalt.

He was going to die.

He hadn’t made it past the crippled Deceptions, both motionless and looking almost dead, before Longhaul stirred and Hook pulled himself back and into a sitting position, optics glowing too brightly with the remains of the feedback.

Neither moved to attack. Ratchet thought about fleeing, while they were still incapacitated, or at least weakened. If he did find his way back through the maze of tunnels, it would be mostly through blind luck.

“The others can feel him again,” Longhaul said thickly through a voice that crackled with white noise. “Even though Scrapper’s almost fifty miles away.”

But-that meant that Bonecrusher wasn’t dead- Ratchet reached a hand to the table for support, head reeling.

“Thank you,” said Hook, sounding almost-giddy. That was unnerving. “It-he-it’s better.”

“I thought he was dead,” Ratchet said out loud, stupidly.

Longhaul responded. “But he’s not.”

And that made the difference.

---

It was a week before Ratchet had the time to return.

He’d been avoiding thinking about-any of it, really. About the rest of his team, the Autobot cause, about the five-six-Decepticons, the Decepticon cause, humanity, his ideals as a medic and as an Autobot, and what they had been, at various times during the course of his life, about traitors and the worth of his own life and the worth of every who’d died at his hands, on the operating table or the battlefield-

He’d settled into a kind of willful delusion, or at least tried to. He’d fix them-or fix him, which would fix the rest of them in turn-and leave and if his scans were right, they’d disappear after he was done and nothing would come of it, only there wouldn’t be five crazed Decepticons running around, and instead there would be six more stable ones, but six that comprised a gestalt.

He was also convinced, partially or fully, that they’d found some way to fool a complete scan and a month after he’d finished completing the gestalt the Autobots would be called on to keep them from attacking some human city, or be forced to defend themselves from them-

That conviction wasn’t keeping him from returning. And he hadn’t left the little town, hadn’t even tried to.

…He had no idea how to find the base; he doubted showing up at his storage area would bring one of them out of their hidey-hole again, either. So he’d decided to try the road Longhaul had taken him to, the first time he’d been brought in to do repairs.

---

That had worked-they were clearly watching the area around their home, either remotely or manually. Or both. Ratchet was still a good hour from the small copse of shrubby trees the entrance had been hidden in when Scrapper pulled in front of him.

That was… Good, although Ratchet wasn’t happy to be in the company of Decepticons again. At least he had an hour’s drive until he was forced into actual interaction-of course, for all he knew, there were a dozen ways in, not all of them an hour’s drive away. It seemed like he’d passed through a lot of tunnels, especially for only six mechs-and only five of them functional.

Again, he wondered why they’d put in such a permanent base. And how long it had taken. It had been a year until the Autobot base had had enough complete areas to move into it, and even then everything had been bare-bones. It still wasn’t fully completed, although all that was left was what amounted to hopeful planning for the future-planning for a time when there were more than four Autobots on Earth.

That was… Lonely. Five years and not a peep, hardly even any Decepticon sightings or attacks-Starscream had disappeared, Barricade was lying low for the most part, and the most exciting thing that had happened was Bumblebee and Ironhide getting shipped out to Iraq to track down the Decepticon drone that had been lurking out there. The single human death that had resulted was the only (known) Decepticon-caused casualty since Mission City.

But apparently these five Decepticons had been here for an unknown period of time. He didn’t think any of them had killed any humans… But if it was a third-hand memory, from another mech other than the one he had scanned to get the file in the first place, and the originator had never thought that it was that big an issue, it was technically possible-and, also technically, unlikely-that he’d skipped over a memory of the Decepticons with a human at all, or killing or torturing or maiming or playing with or hurting a human-

Ratchet flinched, swerving momentarily, as he felt a request for a comm. link ping against his sensors, not expecting it and disturbed by the feeling of a Decepticon signal-recognizable because of attempts to intercept and decode Decepticon messages and the occasional battlefield exception or negotiation-brushing against him.

It was Scrapper, clearly, his signal familiar because of the scan. That made it worse, the recognition, and would have made it better at the same time if he hadn’t been so disturbed by the comfort of the Decepticon’s mental presence.

‘What?’ he sent back, opening the link between them, trying to keep his tone from revealing too much about his thoughts. He wasn’t sure why it mattered all that much.

Scrapper waited a long several seconds before replying, the ‘tone’ to the words largely blank, stripped of intonation and implication. ‘Are there any supplies you’re going to need, ones you don’t already have at the base?’

‘I don’t know yet. Today I investigate the damage and figure out what I need to know. If there’s anything, I’ll know by the end of today unless there’s more wrong than preliminary examination revealed.’ It was easy to hide behind details and technical jargon and slight annoyance, perfectly reasonable when you considered the amount of work he had ahead of him…

‘Good.’

---

Scrapper was wondering why Ratchet’s voice was so unobtrusive, although there had been a heavy silence between them for over half an hour. It wasn’t as much a part of him as the other Constructicons, but not nearly as alien as most voices, even with the Autobot overtones that wanted to set him on edge.

Maybe it was because he was a medic in design as well as in practice-not common at all in the Decepticon ranks. It would probably help patients relax. It was… Odd.

---

They drove past the road Longhaul had brought him in on in silence. Ratchet had been right about multiple entrances. He wondered how many there were.

---

Things could have been worse, but they also could have been a whole hell of a lot better, if you asked Ratchet. Bonecrusher’s body, now that the remains of the spark had been removed so he could work on it without worry, was still a wreck.

Salt was everywhere. A lot of corrupted systems. He’d need to find out how many personality-based programs had been lost with no chance of retrieval-that could complicate things immensely, if enough of them had been lost irretrievably. Most of the wiring needed replacing, and a lot of the energon, lubricant and coolant tubes needed repairing or replacing-once that had been done he could flush cleanser through the systems, which would prevent needing to clean the inside of every little capillary. Most of the inner areas would need hand cleaning, though, to remove every last little trace of contaminant-Ratchet didn’t know where he was going to get the sheer volume of cleaning solution that task was going to require. At least he had the synaptic relays he was going to need to connect the external pressure sensors-vaguely analogous to touch, in human terms. He’d only brought them with him to California on a whim, and it had turned out that he did need them-how convenient.

It would probably be best to replace most of the databanks, even if they were mostly sound; the stress would have effects, even if there hadn’t been any more lasting damage-

Several engine parts needed replacing. Optimus Prime had cut off his head and someone had gone through afterwards and made very sure that none of the (already dead) Decepticons were in a state to go anywhere very fast at all. Really, the head wasn’t going to be that hard to replace-cleanly cut wires (at least, they had been before they’d been stewed in seawater for four or five years) were much easier to work with than blunt damage would have been, or cannon fire. There was a little scorching around the bottom of the head, where the remains of the neck were, probably from electrical discharge, but it hadn’t gotten hot enough to melt anything important.

So, the first step would be to locate and analyze the damage to personality centers, essential programs and other important focal points, which would take a minimum of a few days just to gather the data. At least he’d thought to bring a separated scanner, so he wouldn’t have to do it himself. While he was waiting on that, he’d clean.

So that was that. With the beginnings of a plan of action in mind, Ratchet turned away from his intense observation of the body, to find Longhaul and Scrapper both watching him almost as closely. The medic’s engine raced briefly with annoyance, but he simply snorted and then ignored the other two, turning to wander over towards his medical supplies. Somebody had sifted through them he realized, with a jolt of irritation, if not surprise.

He was probably short on wire, especially since Bonecrusher used a thicker-than-average gauge as his default-maybe because of the extra stress caused by the third transformation? Gestalt formation was a very complicated, strenuous process-

“Here,” Longhaul said, coming up behind him. Ratchet jumped and then bit back the urge to snarl-he’d been surprised, had already been tense. The Decepticon was lucky he hadn’t ended up with a saw buried in his side.

He realized he was staring at the bottle the other mech was holding out to him and took it, belatedly. He uncapped it-it was unlabeled-and a quick chemical analysis of the vapor proved it was cleaner. Ratchet was, frankly, baffled-he needed more, yes, but not immediately-

Realization struck as he finally recognized the faint itch on his hands as salt contamination-of course his hands had ended up covered in salt, every part of Bonecrusher he’d touched had been covered in it.

“Thanks,” he muttered.

“Nice of you to mention it,” Longhaul snarled back. “So promptly and cheerily, too. Don’t thank me: Scrapper told me to.”

Ratchet took the opportunity to take his leave of the ‘conversation’ and crossed the room, walking over to a basin mounted in a counter, adding some of the solution and then diluting it with water before he dipped his hands in for a preliminary rinse before turning again to gather up the tools he’d used.

“Just stay put,” Scrapper said as he made to move, voice somewhere between firm and kind. “I’ll get them.” Longhaul beat him there, the two gathering up the selection of dirtied instruments.

Ratchet shrugged mentally and turned back to his hands; now that he was aware of it, the itch seemed to have doubled or tripled in intensity-he was painfully aware of every passing split-second.

He jumped again as one of the Decepticons came up on one side of him, setting the tools down in the sudsy water-Longhaul. Scrapper came up around the other side, leaving Ratchet hemmed in-

Neither moved. Longhaul swished a hand through the water, muttering about how he had better things to do than clean up after an Autobot. His gestalt-mate hid an amused smile, and turned his attention to cleaning a bladed scalpel.

They were close enough that they kept on bumping gently against Ratchet, that he could feel the slow vibration of their engines. He tried to ignore it and concentrate on getting the salt out of his joints.

Once he finished, he helped clean his tools. The three worked in total silence until it was done.

---

Ratchet had been working for hours and had hours left to go. He was extremely annoyed.

The Decepticon staring at him wasn’t helping. At least Hook was able to make himself useful with the cleaning, a side effect of being a self-trained ‘medic’-he had at least a vague idea of what things were supposed to look like.

The new Decepticon-Scavenger-was just watching him from across the table, seated in an awkward, crunched-up position, chin resting on his arms, tail clacking rhythmically and restlessly against something in a steady, ceaseless beat that was driving Ratchet to absolute distraction, and beyond.

-Enough of this. His concentration was waning-he needed a quick break, a chance to refocus. Ratchet leaned back with a sigh, grimacing at the thick slime that was dripping off his fingers, a combination of fouling seawater made thick by salt and plankton as the water slowly evaporated, energon and cleaner, which had reacted oddly to the decomposing plankton-it had never been meant for organic material. Cybertronian scientists had always dismissed the idea of a carbon-based life form as ridiculous.

Scavenger straightened as well, looking expectant. A table away, Hook looked up and over at the other two.

“The internals need spraying down. I can’t work through this slag.”

Scavenger was on his feet almost before Ratchet finished, the odd spine-like projections lining his head lifting, like some off sort of crest-there was a double row of them running down his back, too, and Ratchet assumed they’d shifted positions too, although he couldn’t see them. It was an odd effect, one Ratchet hadn’t seen before-clearly a Decepticon design innovation; Autobot design was more streamlined, cohesive.

Some faction-impartial part of him liked the look.

“Washracks,” said Hook shortly, setting aside what he’d been working on and striding over. He eyed the body, half-filled with the mucous-like slime, dispassionately. “I’ll take the shoulders.” Scavenger nodded his understanding eagerly.

They lifted Bonecrusher between the two of them, careful to try and keep the thick liquid contained, and headed off down the hall. Ratchet followed them wordlessly, half-listening to Scavenger’s idle chatter. He missed his name the first time Scavenger said it.

“-atchet?”

“Huh?”

“Is… Is there anything else you’re going to need? ’Cause it’ll be my job to find it if there is-”

“-Cleaning solution. Wire, in several gauges. I have a list of engine parts, too. Those are the immediate problems.” He tried not to think about how the mech would go about getting those. Once he’d worked with an Autobot known for his slightly underhanded methods (which was definitely an understatement) and he’d had to do the same then, although he’d drawn a line when he’d asked for metal suitable for armor manufacture and he’d been given a ripped-off stack of armor pieces, still splattered with energon and coolant, with one side painted and the other lined with circulatory vessels.

“Wire’s easy-engine parts are easier-I dunno about cleaner, the organics use something different, right?” He paused, waiting for an answer. None came. “…Did you try asking Mixmaster?”

“They haven’t met,” said Hook, and Ratchet frowned at the hidden implications-nothing he understood-in the words. Scavenger shrugged, clearly unhappy-worried-about something.

“I’ll ask him, them.”

Silence fell, the three slowly making their way through the huge tangled mess-although it was very clean-of a base.

Ratchet didn’t even notice that they’d started heading downhill, increasingly swiftly, until the shifting angle slopped some of the liquid in Bonecrusher’s body cavity over Hook’s fingers. Hook flinched slightly, spilling more of the foul substance over himself and the floor, and his disgust was clear, even to Ratchet.

“Sorry,” Scavenger said, feeling slightly guilty. “…Do you want to try and switch sides? So you get the part that’s pointed uphill?” He glanced over at Ratchet, then hastily tacked on a brief explanation, obviously for their ‘guest’s’ benefit. “I know you like to stay clean. -But we are headed to the washracks anyway, I guess.”

Hook didn’t respond, and an uneasy silence fell. Scavenger was clearly on edge, trying to keep from moving restlessly-his tail was twitching nervously, sweeping this way and that along the increasingly narrow hallway.

The inevitable happened, and Ratchet wasn’t able to avoid it as it came sweeping at him again-the clanging noise it made, colliding with his hip, was loud in the silence. Scavenger jumped, spikes-probably some sort of magnification device for one sense or another-bristling with surprise before dropping back to their default position. Hook made an annoyed hissing noise as his front was drenched with salty, slimy contaminated cleaning solution. Ratchet could understand the distaste-salt itched, and it truly was a foul mixture-and some part of him wanted to warn the Decepticon to make sure he got every last trace of the mixture rinsed out of his joints. Like Hook was an Autobot whose health he was supposed to be watching. Like he was his medical charge.

“I’m really glad you agreed to help us,” Scavenger said unexpectedly. Ratchet had to work to hide his surprise, even though Scavenger was turned away from him and Hook, who was facing in the right direction, to carry Bonecrusher, had his view blocked by Scavenger.

“You threatened to kill me, other Autobots and every human you ran into if I didn’t.” Ratchet was honestly amazed by the sheer presumption in the Decepticon’s statement.

“Oh.” Scavenger didn’t sound particularly convinced.

And the thing was, Ratchet wasn’t all that convinced, himself. Because he could have found a way to make sure that the gestalt didn’t get helped and didn’t kill anyone. He could have sacrificed himself for the general good. He could have contacted the Prime, like he should have done. His hands were tied, but not all that tightly.

He was, absolutely and inarguably, not doing the right thing. But some part of him was convinced he was anyways.

---

Bonecrusher’s almost ruined body was clean. Ratchet wasn’t, anymore. He leaned against the wall and wished, uselessly, for the Autobot washracks-the second thing to be finished when they’d built the base, the only higher priority being the communications room. He made a point to head over to Nevada once every three or four months, largely to use them-although also to check up on the news and make sure everyone was functioning well, and to stave off boredom.

Scavenger looked over at him and frowned. Ratchet scowled back.

“Here, do you want to use the washracks? You’re kind of dirty. …So’m I. And Hook. He’s definitely going to get clean before he does anything else.”

Ratchet wanted to say no (because Scavenger was a Decepticon) and wanted to say yes (because Scavenger clearly had good intentions, meant the best) and mostly just wanted to get clean.

“-yes. Thank you.” He looked for a minute at the control display next to him-it was a different design than the ones the Autobots used, a reminder of where he was and who he was with, just in case he had forgotten-then selected a program and stepped into the heavy spray that started, the room suddenly loud with the drumming of water against metal. Unwillingly (he didn’t want to relax) he felt his tension start to melt away.

Across the room, the two Decepticons had paused, watching him. “They really do trust too easily,” muttered Hook, meaning the Autobots.

“Well, it’s not like we’re actually going to do anything.”

“He doesn’t know that.”

“He did scan you-and he’s not stupid. He’s a medic.”

“There’s a difference between stupidity and naivety. I never accused him of the former.”

“Whatever-naïve or not, I like him.”

“You hardly know him.”

“We got a sense off of him, too, when he scanned you and Scrapper. And I think he wants to like us-he’s helping us.”

“We threatened him to make him help us.”

“You know what I’m talking about. Will you help me with my back?”

Ratchet turned and arched to one side, opening up joins and gaps to let more water run over him, wiping away two month’s worth of internal grit and grime, cleansers starting to work at breaking down built-up oils-the fire station washed all their vehicles regularly, but that only got external dirt, and the dry dust of the Mojave desert always built up faster than it could be wiped away.

The two Decepticons were across from him, Scavenger running a rush around the complicated joints where Hook’s two left arms met his body, dripping water and tail held high. His outline was oddly smooth-almost an Autobot design; the sensory extensions had been fully retracted, flush against his body.

And there it was again, their abnormal tendencies to touch each other. Autobots would help each other get at difficult parts to clean, but they wouldn’t do it by having one curl around the other, one hand manipulating the brush and the other holding onto one of the second mech’s wrists, one of his other hands on the first’s shoulders, another stabilizing the two of them, braced against the wall, and the fourth running a cloth around the base of one of Scavenger’s head-spikes.

No, that wasn’t normal. Cybertronians weren’t tactile. Most-all-would not consider physical contact comforting. A fair number, perhaps the nominal majority, didn’t even like to touch during interface, limiting contact to data exchange and energy field manipulation. These two-not mechs Ratchet saw getting along, didn’t see cooperating well, even as gestalt members-were clearly enjoying just the act of touch. It wasn’t even particularly sexualized. Or out-of-the-ordinary, for them. And Ratchet was positive that it wasn’t some sort of bizarre cultural difference between Autobots and Decepticons.

On the other hand, if the spikes covering Scavenger were tactical sensors, partly or fully, it would probably be remarkably nice for the ’Con to have someone running their fingers over them. It was possible that Ratchet was missing something, even though he was pretty positive that Scavenger wasn’t showing any signs of arousal, or of being concentrated on anything other than getting Hook’s joints as clean as possible.

Why did it matter that the Decepticon gestalt was all touchy-feely, anyways? Ratchet turned forcefully away, looking around the rest of the room for a brush.

Hah, there. There was a stool, too. Good-he needed to tweak the alignment of a wire in his foot, anyways, and that would be much easier sitting down. He was pretty sure a pebble had ended up wedged in there.

And yes, there was-not really a problem. It was easy to work it out with the help of a stiff wire brush. With that little niggling problem gone Ratchet traded the brush for a softer one and started working on his knee joints, carefully dulling the tactical feedback he was getting from the area.

He was jolted out of his peaceful state, nerves and concentration shattered, by the sudden appearance of a hand on his shoulder, grip firm, metal against metal unexpected enough to trigger his battle programming, little though it was: his engine raced to life, sensors flared, and his weapons sprang out. If he’d been Ironhide, built for (forceful) peacekeeping and heavily modified for war, the mech who’d surprised him by coming up behind him-Scavenger-would have ended up dead instead of unexpectedly pinned, blade at his through. Ratchet caught the noise of the sudden transformation of Hook’s cannons before he realized, fully, what he’d done. He froze. The noise of Hook’s weapon prepping was copied, magnified a thousand fold, by the automated defense systems activating. Probably a third mech in a security center or control room, he thought.

“I just wanted to see if you needed some help!”

Ratchet took a careful step back, backing away from the Decepticon a little, so they weren’t pressed against each other, expecting to be shot for the unexpected movement. Nothing changed, so he risked speaking. “I was-surprised. I’m not used to physical contact.” From Decepticons. While he was in their base, probably technically their ‘contact,’ repairing their almost-dead gestalt-member. And using their washracks.

Surprisingly, amazingly, the wall-mounted cannons were withdrawn, a few short seconds after he finished speaking. Hook stepped forward instead, all four arms at his side but the upper set still transformed into cannons, matching the one mounted on his shoulder. Scavenger, possibly acting on some unheard cue, produced his own set of nasty-looking weapons. Ratchet didn’t move, didn’t so much as twitch.

“You realize what it looks like, to have you-an Autobot, an enemy combatant forced into providing help-attack one of us?” That was Hook, his voice low and dangerous.

“I did surprise him-”

“You are very lucky Scavenger isn’t harmed, or dead. If he had been offlined, you would be joining him, slowly.” It was impossible to ignore that Hook-that both of them, but especially Hook-were Decepticons, the way he halfway had been. Decepticons, eternal enemies and intrinsic opposites of the Autobots, dangerous and cold, impossible to trust-and if you were stupid enough to try to, it inevitably came back to burn you.

Hook strode forward, his lower set of arms reaching out to grab Ratchet’s wrists in a crushing grip, one cannon rising to point at his head, barely a centimeter away, and the other cannon folding back into a hand so the Decepticon could rest two delicate fingers against the surface of Ratchet’s left optic, so lightly that there was no sensation of touch, or of pressure.

“It would be very, very easy to drag your intentions out of you. Settle once and for all any doubt I hold when it comes to whether or not you’re planning to double-cross us. You’d be begging for me to get into your systems within an hour-or I could simply cripple you so badly with pain that you don’t have the concentration to keep me out, and take the data. I don’t have the skill to drag Autobot secrets out of you, but something like your thoughts when it comes to us? That would be easy, wouldn’t it.”

Hook paused. Ratchet didn’t have anything to say. He’d given in to his ridiculous urges to almost-trust the Decepticons, to help them, and this was just the natural consequence of that. He’d be tortured to death, or just to the edge of it, the Decepticons would be satisfied that he wasn’t-hadn’t-been trying to kill Scavenger, or Bonecrusher, or any of them, and that he’d never planned to turn them in, or tried to, for whatever reason. And their injured sixth would remain in stasis until his spark failed or the Decepticons found another medic-

“But I won’t,” Hook said quietly, stepping away. His fingers glided over Ratchet’s hands as he let go, and Ratchet’s vision sparked momentarily as he tapped the optic his fingers had been resting against, firmly but painlessly.

The Autobot stiffened with shock, just barely managing to keep from snapping around to stare at the medic who’d stepped back behind him. That made no sense-unless they preferred to have the information handed to them, for whatever reason.

“No. I won’t.”

“Won’t what?” That was Scavenger, but even Hook looked almost confused.

“I’m not going to let you bully me into giving up information-not after I’ve provided a reasonable reason for my actions. Is a little jumpiness really all that unbelievable? Considering the circumstances.”

“Um, Ratchet, I’d really like it if you didn’t try to talk Hook into putting his fingers through your optic-”

“You almost killed Scavenger…!”

“But I didn’t. Not a scratch on him-maybe some superficial damage to the wall, but I didn’t even manage any cosmetic damage. Cosmetic. And I’m already helping you repair a damaged teammate, as things are! Which you would realize if you were thinking anything through-”

“It’s not ‘helping’ if you’re being forced to-”

“Oh, please. We both know that you had to be desperate to confront me at all because there were-are-too many ways things could go wrong for you-if I’d called for Optimus Prime during our first ‘meeting’ you probably could have killed me and escaped, but how long could you have stayed hidden? And that wouldn’t do anything for Bonecrusher. Carrying through with your threat and killing humans would leave an obvious trail and make the Autobots even more furious. If I had radioed for my team sometime after I agreed to help you, there’s a chance you would have escaped, but less of one. And even worse odds if I’d done it after my first visit here, because at that point I knew where at least one of your entrances is. True, you’ve set your base up like a slagging maze, but you need all six of you-even the completely disabled one hovering at the point of offlining permanently-to get out clean of any situation. At any point I could have sabotaged Bonecrusher while I was working on him-it would be remarkably easy. You’d probably-doubtlessly-try to kill me, but it would be more than a fair trade-off-grounding a Decepticon gestalt in exchange for my own life? Ordinarily, it’s not even worth thinking about. If I decided to get inventive, I could probably work out something crippling that would only activate once you combined, taking out the whole nest at once.

“But I haven’t. I don’t know why, but I haven’t.”

“Why?” Scavenger asked.

“I told you, I don’t know why.”

There was a long pause.

“Because… Because I’d never thought that I’d see Jazz die, but he did anyways. Or Wheeljack-he died of treachery, a traitor in the ranks. I had a pair of twins under my care once-I couldn’t save one when he came in after a battle, even worse off than Bonecrusher was, and the other died two weeks later-he just didn’t have the will to live, anymore, so he wandered off on his own along the borderline until he ran into a Decepticon patrol-he didn’t fight back…” Ratchet trailed off. “-And even if I’m not sure I can trust it, the scans I read off of you, Hook, and off Scrapper say you’ve got no plans to go after humans, or even Autobots, if it was just the six of you, all functional. So I’ve got no real reason not to help you there…”

Ratchet waited, and resisted the urge to turn away: there were still two sets of weapons trained on him, and he knew better than to move unless he was told to. He settled for glaring balefully at the far wall instead.

There were the sounds of transformation, and Ratchet looked at Scrapper, and then twisted around to look at Hook, surprised: they’d both retracted their weapons systems.

“We still have work to do today,” Hook said loftily, turning away.

“Are you going to keep us working for days again?” Scavenger paused. “-Like that one time when we were working on that bridge?” He sounded-peeved, but resignedly so, familiarly. Like it had been an issue for so long that now it was almost a joke.

Hook snorted. “You’ll never let me hear the end of it-That was at the beginning! I’ve learned your limits for going without recharge or refuel-”

Ratchet stared at the two mechs, now lifting Bonecrusher’s body between them, not entirely sure what had just happened. He was uncomfortably aware of his confessions to the Decepticons, but they’d just-accepted his reasoning, moved on, even after he’d almost killed one of them-

“Are you coming?” Hook called back after him, sounding irritated, but… Not. Like it really didn’t matter, because he knew better.

Belatedly, Ratchet started after them.

---

Ratchet looked up, startled, when Hook spat out a bitten-off Cybertronian curse. He ran through a list of anything he might have done wrong-something to warrant an angry reaction-but came up blank. “What?”

“Longhaul got himself stuck in a canyon. I need to go get him out-he can’t transform, there are witnesses.”

Scavenger laughed. “He got stuck?”

“It’s not funny,” iced Hook, presumably because his own work had been interrupted, as he stalked out of the room. Ratchet just shook his head, turning back to the capillary-sized net of energon, lubricant and coolant lines he was trying to piece back together. It was delicate, fussy work, the sort that took vast amounts of time for relatively little improvement.

And he was having trouble adjusting to the physical differences Bonecrusher had when compared to the Autobots Ratchet had worked on. He didn’t know whether it was a Decepticon thing, a gestalt thing, a Constructicon thing or just a Bonecrusher thing, but the mech had much more heat-sensitive lines than was normal. The thick armor was probably enough to protect them, but now that he was actually working on the veins themselves, he kept on welding the wrong things on accident or overheating the little tubes, occasionally to the point where they collapses in on themselves. And that was with his welder on the lowest setting.