The medical wing of Autobot City was typically one of the quietest areas
of the metropolis. There were only a handful of Autobot medics, and at
any given time there were only slightly more injured Autobots. There
were times, Ratchet often said, when you could hear a pin drop.
Those times weren't when one of the newest medics came through. The
asymmetrical thud-ker-click-thud of his walk made it nigh impossible for
him to tread as lightly as the other Autobots. Everyone knew when he was
making rounds, and it had become something of an unstated agreement
among the population that anything short of Stasis Lock could wait until
Ratchet, First-Aid, or even Wheeljack came on duty.
Prowl winced with every thud-ker-click-thud he heard. If it hadn't been
for his stabilizers nearly shutting down twice while on monitor watch,
he would have waited. As it was, having seen Prowl take a dive while
walking across the room, Optimus Prime had ordered him to go see what
was wrong. Given the choice, Prowl figured it was better to follow orders.
The door to his exam room swished open.
"Intermittent failure of your stabilizers," the medic read, "And you
also re****ted having difficulty navigating while transformed."
Prowl nodded. "It's nothing serious," he said, "I just need to spend
more time in the recharge bay. My secondary systems tend to suffer when
I don't get a full charge, and with Megatron's recent movements around--"
The medic nodded along condescendingly for several moments as Prowl
tried to explain away his symptoms. After a minute, he reached down to
his hip, where a small storage compartment was opening up. The medic
pulled out a grey box, and offered it to Prowl.
"Energon goodie?" he asked.
Prowl scowled. "No thanks. I've got to be on duty tonight."
"Technically, I'm on duty now," the medic said. He ejected an Energon
goodie into the palm of his hand, and then tossed it into his mouth. As
he was replacing the dispenser, the medic started to talk.
"Gyro stabilizers and navigational systems are not secondary systems,"
he told Prowl. "Wind****eld wipers, XM Radio, and seat warmers for the
humans, those are secondary. Probably even tertiary."
Prowl opened his mouth to speak, but was interrupted. "When did this
start?" the medic asked.
"About a week ago, I think."
"When the Decepticons were trying to hijack the transmission tower?"
"That sounds right," Prowl nodded.
The medic nodded. "You say you're on duty tonight?" Prowl nodded. "I say
different. Get comfortable, I need to go get someone."
-
"Base!" Ratchet called out as he sprinted down the hall. "Hold up."
The thud-ker-click-thud quickened as the Autobot medic tried to reach
the trans****t lift before the door closed. Unfortunately, Ratchet's
perfectly symmetrical movements were more than a match.
"Yes, Ratchet?" the medic asked, putting on an obviously fake smile.
"Base," Ratchet asked, "What are you doing with Prowl? You can't just
arbitrarily take the second-in-command off duty because he's dizzy. Just
reset his systems, patch the drivers, and let him go."
Base looked at Ratchet curiously for a second. When the time had ticked
by, Base laughed. "Oh, you had me going there, Ratchet. Patch his
drivers. That's rich."
Ratchet shook his head. "It's obviously just a software glitch. Probably
from the last time he was in the repair bay. If the diagnostic jacks
were disconnected too soon, then--"
"Then his file system would have re****ted a corrupt hash," Base said
firmly. "I know about corrupt drivers." Base and Ratchet looked down at
his leg, both thinking back to the first time his drivers had
malfunctioned. They both had tried new software, new legs, but in the
end nothing ever seemed to work. Ratchet had lost track of the vorns
since Base had been able to transform.
When he was sure Ratchet was sufficiently nostalgic, Base continued,
"The fact that my diagnostic scans are all coming up normal means
there's--"
"It means that he's fine" Ratchet insisted. Ratchet's tolerance for
nostalgia wasn't what Base remembered. "Reset, patch, and let him go.
Understand?"
Base scowled. "I understand," he said.
The lift door opened a moment later, and Base took the op****tunity to
get inside. It was long after the doors closed and Ratchet was treating
Grimlock for hiccups that he realized, of course, Base understood what
he said.
Unfortunately that was no guarantee he would comply.
-
"Ratchet says you're free to go," Base said as he limped back into
Prowl's exam room. "Before you go, though," Base hemmed. "Have you met
my assistant?" he asked.
Prowl watched as a Mini-Con walked into the exam room. It was obvious
from the tires on his shoulders that his alternate form was some kind of
road vehicle.
"Prowl, I'd like you to meet Chase," Base said. "Chase, this is Prowl.
He's the second-in-command of all the Autobots here on Earth."
The little Mini-Con warbled and beeped. Prowl couldn't make out what
Chase was saying, but the tone told him he was impressed.
"Long story short," Base explained, "I've got a software glitch of my
own." Base wrapped on his left leg. "Driver incompatibility that
metastasized down to the lowest levels of my laser core. I can't
transform any more, but thanks to Chase here, it's not too big of a
problem."
As if on cue, Chase started to transform. His robot form crumpled and
****fted until he was a small, white truck. Just as he finished
transforming, Chase revved his engine and lunged toward Base. The
Autobot medic was prepared. He caught the lunging truck in one hand, and
snapped him onto his other arm in a seamless movement.
Before Prowl fully realized what was happening, he found himself staring
down the twin barrels of a plasma blaster.
"This probably will hurt," Base said. He levered the blasters downward,
and fired them both into Prowl's leg.
"You slagging pieces of--" Prowl cried out.
He didn't get very far before the exam room door slid open, and Ratchet
appeared. His face went from complete shock to unparallel anger in the
time it took for him to look from Prowl back to Base. "What did you do?"
"If it's not obvious, then you should get your optics examined," Base
replied. He dropped Chase to the ground, letting the Mini-Con transform
on the way down. Base continued to look at Ratchet as if nothing had
happened.
"You shot Prowl!" Ratchet cried.
"Oh," Base said, "That. Yes, and he should be thanking me," Base said,
turning to Prowl, "Not swearing!"
"I should be glad you shot me?"
"If I hadn't shot you," Base explained, "Then Ratchet wouldn't have come
running in here to yell at me, and he would have completely missed
seeing your foot explode." Prowl and Ratchet both goggled at the
statement. Chase took the op****tunity to duck behind Base's leg. "Did I
forget to mention that? We'd better back up a bit."
Before anyone could move, the bottom of Prowl's leg began to spark
dangerously. The foot never completely blew up, but it would have been
hard to differentiate given how much heat and light the sparks were
producing.
"Decepticon virus," Base explained. "It's designed to sit quietly for a
while. It uses the time to infect the host's primary systems. Symptoms
include process cycle loss, which manifests in the disruption of
real-time systems; systems like stabilization, navigation, and--"
"Energon regulation," Ratchet mumbled.
Base reached down to his hip, and pulled out the Energon goodie
dispenser. "If I were you," he said, pausing to toss a goodie into his
mouth, "I'd see about scanning the recharge bays for possible
infections. This could be an epidemic if we're not careful."
--
Andrew Burton
tuglyraisin@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
- A Guide to Esoteric Technology in Paragon City
http://jarodrussell.livejournal.com/
- Take a guess. ;)
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