Transformers Fan Fiction ❯ Cover Me ❯ Back Again ( Chapter 9 )

Cover Me

By Black Dragon Queen

Author's note:

PLEASE NOTE! I am NOT a mechanic! Everything in here and in future chapters regarding repair work is completely made up! I tried to do some researching for certain things such as the tools but everything else I pulled from the dark pit of my brain! So all you grease monkeys out there, I'm sorry! I tried! I really did!

PAIRINGS REVEALED THUS FAR:

Wheeljack x Ratchet, Past Prowl x Jazz

Font Index:

“Speaking”

`Thinking'

“-Radio Transmissions-” - I forgot that in chapter 5 didn't I? Whoops.

“Cybertronion”

~*~

Chapter Nine: Back Again

At the start of their senior year three months after the Mission City incident, Mikaela and Sam were both very surprised to learn that they had absolutely no classes together. It was completely unbelievable that the school board would do something so cruel, so evil as to tear them apart after so many years. That they had classes together every year since first grade only to be torn asunder when they finally got together! It was intolerable! `Then again,' she thought reflectively as she watched Sam trudge towards their usual lunch table leaning against Miles supportive arm as if it were the only thing holding him up, `it sometimes can be a good thing.' “What happened to you?” she asked as the two boys practically fell into their seats across from her.

“I never got any sleep last night!” Sam moaned as he brought his head down on his folded arms with a thud.

“Really?” she drawled as she eyed his slack figure, “and here I thought Trent had gone after you again.”

Sam offered a groan in answer as Miles gave him a comforting pat on the shoulder, worried about his friend's odd behavior. Sam had been quiet and withdrawn ever since he had asked about the patrol car earlier that morning. Miles dutifully clammed up and did not bring up the subject again as it was clear that it was something Sam did not wish to discuss. He apprehensively glanced at Mikaela who gave him a wide grin in return. “Um, I've got to get in line now or I'll never get lunch,” Miles stuttered as he stood and quickly made his retreat, giving Sam one last thump on the back before disappearing into the crowded line. Mikaela smiled at the boy's departure, slightly amused at his uneasiness around her. Ever since she had joined their little twosome, Miles had been drastically nervous around her.

Even now that she and Sam were broken up, the blonde boy was still twitchy around her since she still hung around Sam most of the time. He got especially jumpy when she and Sam started speaking only to clam up whenever he approached. Miles had assumed it had been some weird dating code and it was a code… in a way. “So what was it really?” Mikaela asked as she took a bite of her sandwich. She frowned at the bitter taste of mustard her aunt had slathered it with but continued to chew on. Ham was her favorite, after all.

Sam groaned again in answer. “I need your help,” he finally admitted, raising his head as far as his chin. He blinked at her with one bleary eye and squinted at the sun pouring in from the large picture window behind her. He quickly buried his face again in the folds of his arms.

“Help with what?” she asked as she polished off her meal and chased it down with a sip of milk, quickly wanting to wash out the taste of mustard. Sam muttered something and Mikaela tilted her head quizzically as she set down her carton. “What?”

“I said you have to help us fix a Cybertronion,” he whispered again just a tad bit louder.

Mikaela blinked, setting aside her cupcake and leaned forward, getting closer to her odd friend. “Is it Bumblebee?” Mikaela fired at him. “I was wondering why your father had driven you to school today! What happened? Is he all right?”

“Yes, `Bee is perfectly okay,” Sam reassured her. “It's… someone else who needs your help.”

Mikaela frowned, utterly confused. “Well what happened to Ratchet? It's not him, is it? Is that why you need me to help out? Because Ratchet is out of commission?”

“No, Ratchet's fine.”

Mikaela huffed in frustration. `Boys!' she thought irritably. `Why can't they ever give you a straight answer?' “So Ratchet needs my help repairing someone else?”

Sam shook his head as he finally raised it from the pillow of his arms. “No, all the Autobots are well and accounted for.”

Mikaela blinked at that statement and shot a look at her ex with accusing eyes. “The Autobots are perfectly fine, and yet you need me to help with a repair?” Mikaela frowned at him. “What do you mean you need my help? What aren't you telling me? Why won't Ratchet go ahead and do the repair?”

“Well…” Sam hesitated. “We can't really ask Ratchet to help. You see it's… complicated.”

She slammed down her empty milk carton and leaned as far over the lunch table as she could possibly go ending nearly nose to nose with a wide-eyed Sam. “Let's start again, shall we?” she snarled. “Exactly why is it that you have come to me for help in repairing a Cybertronion and not to Ratchet? Hmm? Unless… it's not an Autobot is it?” Sam swallowed the forming lump in his throat and fearfully nodded “yes”.

“YOU WANT ME TO HELP FIX A DECEPTICON?” Mikaela screeched outraged.

All conversation at the tables around them stopped dead and even Miles in the lunch cue turned to send them a “what the hell was that?” look. Mikaela blushed as she sat back down in her seat, entirely grateful that it was such a lovely day out and that the majority of students were actually eating outside at the moment. Thank God Trent and his crew had the third lunch block and not the first with them. “Was it the- the `meteor' that landed in Mono Friday?” she asked hesitantly. “Was it a Decepticon that the others fought?”

“No, it was an Autobot that made it. A real piece of work too. He's the security chief but he's really paranoid about it. Nearly shot Will and Epps when they came over-”

“SAM!” Mikaela snapped, her temper beginning to rise once again. “Who. Is. It?”

“Well it's…” Sam trailed off with a mumble and Mikaela rolled her eyes at the childish antics.

“Care to repeat that?”

“It's Bar…” another mumble.

She tilted her head again. “Bare fades?”

“Barricade,” Sam finally said, clear as day as he once more raised his head and looked Mikaela strait in the eye.

Mikaela just gapped at Sam, convinced that she had heard differently. It couldn't possibly be what she thought he had said. She must have interference with the large hope earrings she bought when she was upstate. “Huh? What was that?” she questioned dazedly. “I could have sworn that you said it was that damn piece of Decepticon crap that chased us throughout the back ally's of Tranquility city intent on killing us!”

The last two words were said in a shout and now even the teachers, who were surly enough to be placed on lunch duty, were looking over in their direction. Sam quickly waved them off. “Video game,” he said hastily with a sheepish chuckle, “never can beat that third level.” The teachers sniffed haughtily as they moved away and there were a few mutters of things like “loser” and “geek” floating from the tables around them but they didn't care. Sam sighed in relief and turned back to Mikaela. “It's Barricade who's been damaged and needs your help,” he told her solemnly.

“But Sam! He's a Decepticon!” she hissed at him. “Why should I help him?”

“Because he asked,” Sam stressed the word as he brought his hand down on the tabletop forcefully, startling the girl with his conviction. “Shouldn't that be reason enough? He's dying `Kaela and he came to me for help.”

Mikaela bit her lip as she thought over the situation, a little disturbed that the `Con was actually dying. “Did you even speak to Optimus?” she finally asked. “If he's really that injured-”

“I did speak to Optimus but I didn't know that Barricade was dying at the time. I thought he was just injured. Barricade had come to me to ask for help in negotiating a truce for him with the others but since the Autobots finally have proof that their comrades are on their way Optimus said it wouldn't be the best time to have a `Con, former or not, at the base.”

“Makes sense,” Mikaela muttered as she reached once more for her milk and scowled down at the empty cardboard. “Damn.” Sam reached into his backpack and passed her a rather large green bottle.

“I bought four,” Sam said when her eyes lit up at the sight of the precious, holy drink of lemon lime goodness. “Needed something to keep me awake for classes.”

A well-manicured hand snatched the plastic from his hand and she quickly twisted off the gold cap. “Damn, why do I always get these?” she muttered and tossed the “buy one, get one free” cap to Sam in irritation, “have a whole drawer full of them.” She took a long sip of the lukewarm soda as she studied her ex's slumped form. “Didn't you get any sleep?”

“No,” Sam moaned as he dropped his head once more into his arms. “After we got Barricade over to my house, dad insisted on trying to help. We spent the rest of the early dawn going over him with what little knowledge `Bee and I had. That's why dad drove me this morning, `Bee's still at the house guarding.”

“Your dad?” Mikaela asked incredulously. “I thought his pastime was gardening.” Sam groaned in response and she shrugged it off. She gave Sam a searching stare before sighing in defeat as she finally came to a decision, though she was still uncomfortable about the whole situation. “Well, I can't do anything until after classes so if there's enough room in your dad's car I'll come over after school and have a look,” she stated as she took another sip from the rapidly emptying bottle.

Sam's eyes instantly lit up with joy as practically bounced up and down in his chair. “You'll help?” he asked happily.

Mikaela's lips quirked upward as she gave him a supportive grin, “I said I would, didn't I? And since I have to repair him I might as well have all the facts. So start from the beginning,” she leaned back in her chair and shot him a penetrating stare. “Barricade came to you with a truce? What'd he do? Show up at your house and raise the proverbial white flag?”

“I only wish it was that,” he rolled his eyes in exasperation. “He was waiting in the parking lot when class let out on Friday.”

Mikaela nearly spewed her drink on the poor boy. “He was here?” she gapped in complete surprise. She never would have thought the `Con would have had it in him to wait in plain view of the humans, but then again who would suspect a patrol car?

“Yeah. Trent was having a field day when he saw me getting into a cop car.”

Mikaela scowled at that; finally understanding what Trent had meant by his comment of “jail bird slut” earlier that day. “I'll kill him,” she growled and Sam tilted his head baffled by the threat but she waved him off. “Never mind. What happened next? Why do I need to repair him?”

Sam gave her an odd look but decided not to question her deadly comment. “Apparently, he refused to follow Starscream who's set himself up as the new rising `star' of the Decepticons.”

Mikaela snorted. “That was lame, Sam.”

Sam gave a lopsided grin before once more turning serious. “What matters is that Starscream took offense at his defiance and then took it out on Barricade.”

“What is that jet thinking?” Mikaela said more rhetorically than an actual question. “Barricade is the only other Decepticon whose planet side. Sending him away is casting out his only remaining ally.”

“Well Red Alert, the Autobot who showed up Friday, said that he and his team had some encounters with the other Decepticons so we can only assume that it's just a matter of time before they arrive too. Barricade did say it was unlikely that they'd follow Starscream but then again, who really knows?”

“Can't say that I blame them,” Mikaela's tone was ripe with ridiculed. “Though it's possible that their squabbling over filling Megatron's void could be a blessing in disguise.”

“Optimus didn't think so,” Sam admitted. “He was muttering something about `more hot heads out to make a name for themselves'. Though, I don't think he realized that he was speaking out loud.” Mikaela giggled at that and Sam snickered as well. “He does that a lot doesn't he?”

“He's fun, that's for sure,” Mikaela agreed with a sly smile. They enjoyed a fun laugh over Optimus' odd habit for a moment as she polished off the rest of her drink. “What did you do with him?” she then asked. “Barricade, I mean.”

“Well, he was originally in an out of the way parking garage but we were afraid that he would be towed by local authorities so `Bee and I borrowed `Hide's tow cable and towed him to my house.”

“Ironhide let you borrow his tow cable? How did you explain that?”

Sam felt his face flame up and he looked back down at the table in embarrassment. “Er, he doesn't actually know it was us who borrowed it.” Mikaela raised her eyebrow and Sam folded like a deck of cards. “We stole it, okay,” he blurted. “Are you happy now?”

Mikaela's laughter greeted Miles as he returned with his overflowing tray. “What I miss?” he asked bemused as he glanced between the laughing Mikaela and the still red Sam.

Sam sighed. “It doesn't matter. Did you get that new game from the fantasy realm? The one that was the prologue to the original game?” he asked instead.

“Oh yeah!” Miles' eyes lit up with joy. “It was so awesome! It answered a lot questions that a lot of the fan base had-”

Sam nodded absentmindedly as Miles prattled on, content in allowing the mundane daily life of a normal high school student once more engulf his attention.

~*~

“This is not good,” Mikaela reported later that afternoon as she slid out from under the stationary mustang and wiped the grease off her hands. Bumblebee, who was still in car mode in the drive, Sam and both his parents watched as the girl began to dig through Ron's toolbox. “If I'm right about what I'm looking at, the roll cage in his chest is nearly crushed inward, pressing against his spark cavity.”

`Bee gasped in shock and Sam knelt down next to the grease covered girl, fear evident in his eyes. “Is there anything you can do to help?” he asked.

“I would prefer we took him to Ratchet but barring that,” she sighed as she finally pulled out a socket wrench and scuttled back under the `Con, “I'll do what I can.”

“It has to be the pressure sensors that's triggering the stasis lock,” `Bee announced from the drive and the three Witwicky's turned to him for further information. “The bars compressing his spark triggered the alarms and the stasis activated to conserve energy. If we can get that pulled out then we could bring him out of it.”

“That's what I figured,” Mikaela's voice floated out from behind Barricade's rear tier. “That's what we have to focus on right now; any other repair can wait until after we get him up and functioning again. How many days did you calculate again?” her last question was addressed to `Bee.

“Two to three day's minimum,” he answered gravely. “If he's not out of stasis by then, then we may as well scrap him for parts.”

“'Bee!” Judy gasped horrified. “How could you say that? This is his life we're talking about.”

“I don't think he meant it that way,” Ron said in a hushed tone and Judy turned her frown towards her husband. “I'm just saying.”

“There's a lot I need to do here before I can even begin to get to the spark chamber,” Mikaela announced as the sound of bolts twisting followed her statement. “I have to get most of the damaged undercarriage out of the way first but I'm not sure if I can do it with what I have now.”

“I think I have some of my father's old tools in the attic,” Judy suggested. “Do you think that could help?”

“Anything would be appreciated at this time Mrs. Witwicky,” Mikaela grunted as she forced yet another stubborn bolt loose. “I may have to see if I can get my dad's old things out of storage too. A lot of things are going to have to be pounded out before I can get to the main problem.”

Judy nodded as she turned towards the house, Ron following close behind her. “I'll go see if I can find them,” she called over her shoulder as the two disappeared into the building.

Mikaela once more appeared from under the patrol car and she made her way towards `Bee, slipping into the driver's seat. “Could you show me those schematics again?” she asked the `Bot and he immediately pulled up the file on basic Cybertronion anatomy. Mikaela snorted irritably. “Wish you guys had a version of this for your vehicle mode,” she growled as Sam leaned on `Bee's hood to see inside the cab. “Everything moves whenever you guys transform. Ninety percent of this isn't where it usually is when you guys are in your original forms.”

“Can you fix him though?” Sam asked nervously, worried that all this was nothing more than delaying the inevitable.

Mikaela sighed as she slumped into the warm leather seats completely exhausted. It had been four hours since she had arrived at the Witwicky residence and she had immediately upon arriving started working on the saleen patrol car. “Depends,” she admitted somberly as she started folding the grease towel in her lap absentmindedly. “If I can get the damaged pieces out of the way, then I may be able to get to his roll cage off and bang out his paneling but as I said, it all depends.”

“Depends on what?” `Bee asked softly.

Mikaela sighed again. “I need certain tools that are modified specifically for Cybertronions,” she admitted, “and I highly doubt anything your parents or my dad has could possibly do the job.”

“T-then,” Sam stuttered fearfully, “then what do we do?”

“Obviously we need specific tools,” Mikaela explained to the confused boy, “and we know of one person who has these tools.”

`Bee gasped in horror as the girls implications computed and Sam's eyes flew open wide as he backed away from both car and obviously insane girl. “Oh no!” he shouted. “I'm not about to ask Ratchet to borrow his tools!”

“Why not?” Mikaela demanded as she jumped out of the camaro and made her way towards the retreating boy. “I need a modified air drill that can handle their customized lug nuts and Ratchet is the only person on Earth I know of that has one!

“But how can we get Ratchet's air drill?” Sam demanded. “It's not like we could just ask him for them!”

“You `borrowed' Ironhide's winch, didn't you?” Mikaela retorted heatedly. “Well then you two could just go and `borrow' Ratchet's drill. I'm sure for two such resourceful, capable beings such as yourselves you can come up with something.” She shot Sam a pointed stare and he gulped under her completely unsympathetic gaze. Turning a fearful look towards `Bee, the two weighed their options, both of which were utterly dismal and completely unappealing. Sam knew full well what Mikaela was hinting at but what Mikaela didn't understand, apparently, was that while it was one thing to steal from Ironhide, it was a completely different matter all together stealing from Ratchet. Could they even manage the same feat twice?

Mikaela cleared her throat pointedly and started pushing Sam towards the frozen `Bee. “I'm not going to tell you again,” she declared. “I need those tools if I'm going to save Barricade.” Her eyes narrowed then suddenly. “This is a life or death situation boys, don't tell me you're chickening out now?”

Sam gapped at her; completely affronted that Mikaela would dare suggest that he would put his own fear of Ratchet above that of someone else's life. `Bee, meanwhile, shifted on his tires and he sighed as swung open his door for Sam to climb in resignedly. With one last glance at Mikaela's firm stance, the two made their way once more towards the Autobot base for their second win or die operation.

The very next morning, Mikaela had her drill.

~*~

It was slow going as he powered back up. Almost like coming out of a fog as his start up menus flashed across his internal screen and he tired to muddle out of his memory banks just what had transpired over the last few days. The last recording had been of him at a learning facility for the human's rather large collection of whelps and he had been speaking to one of them. One he knew…

`Ladiesman217,' he finally recalled as the image of the boy's face appeared in the corner of his monitor. `I was injured and I had gone to the human for help. Or rather for him to go to the Autobots for help,' he thought fuzzily. `And if I'm still functional, then I can only assume that they took me up on it.'

With that thought in mind, Barricade finally turned on his external optics and scanned the room at large with some small amount of surprise. If this was the Autobots main headquarters then there were some serious errors in the information databanks he had about their base of operations. For one, he wasn't expecting a sea of human faces all looking down at him with worry as they all crowded around his hood. For another, there wasn't an Autobot in sight; well more specifically he did not sense their medic anywhere in his scanners range. What he did pick up was Bumblebee in full mech mode in the drive, uncaringly since it was the middle of the night, with both his blaster cannons charged and aimed right at his aft.

Barricade groaned as he finally managed to deduce what must have happened. He wasn't in the Autobot base; he was at a human dwelling in what was designated the “garage” that obviously must have belonged to the boy. Evidently, if he was here then that must have meant that Optimus had declined his “invitation”. That he was now functional however, and obviously not by the medics doing could only mean one thing. That he had been repaired and subsequently saved by the, he sighed, humans.

“Oh just let me die,” Barricade moaned as he turned off his optics against the sight of the four humans and one oversized bug staring down at him.

Bumblebee grinned as he powered down his weapons and leaned against the side of the garage chuckling at the multitude of snarls the `Con was muttering on a frequency lower than human hearing could detect. “I think he'll live.”

~*~

“AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!”

Three heads jerked up and looked at one another in surprise at the resounding wail that resonated out of the main hanger and floated towards their position in the yard. Startled, each one of the mechs dropped the I-beams that they had been stacking, as there was a sudden mad dash towards the building where the cry had originated. The small group bolted through the doors and skidded to a stop at one of the corners where they found the panicking `Bot.

“What happed? What's wrong?” Ironhide shouted as he charged his cannons and did a quick scan of the room.

“Is it an attack?” Red asked as he, too, powered up his weapons and searched the darkened corners for any hidden Decepticons who may just suddenly jump out and attack them. “Should I sound the alarm?”

“NO!” Optimus shouted desperately, halting the red mech before he could do anything. Once more he bemoaned the fact that Red Alert had found the controls for the base's air raid sirens. “Everyone stand down!” The two glanced at him but at least they followed his orders as they both relaxed their stances. Optimus shook his head in disbelief before turning to the still freaking Ratchet who was frantically digging thought his medical “toy box”. Wrenches and hammers and a whole slew of assorted tools came flying out of the bin sporadically, forcing the three to duck and dodge out of the way as Ratchet dug his way towards the bottom. Or possibly China, who knew? “Ratchet, what happed?” he asked tentatively. “Why did you scream?”

“Gone! It's gone! How can it be gone?” Ratchet was muttering as he abandoned the box and began to sift through the mass wreckage on the hanger floor. “I just finished the slagging thing too! It can't possibly be GONE!”

“What?” Ironhide exclaimed as he retracted his cannons. “What the frag are you babbling about now? Loose your notebook or something?”

Both Optimus and Red Alert winced at the sudden clang of Ratchets' Wrench-of-Pain bouncing off the Top Kicks forehead. “Silence you!” Ratchet snapped as he shoved a large piece of scrap metal out of the way and began searching the different piles of junk shoved in the random corners for what ever it was that he was hunting for. “Damn it! It just can't be gone!”

“Er,” Optimus slowly approached the muttering `Bot, “if you tell us what you are searching for we could help you look.”

“My reversible air drill!” Ratchet snarled as he yanked open a boxcar and dug through the assortment of crap they had already accumulated since arriving on Earth four months prior. “I just finished customizing the thing and now it's gone!” The medic suddenly straightened with a baffled look on his face as he dangled something from between two fingers. “Why do we have a toaster?” he demanded and tossed the thing over his shoulder, nearly pelting poor Red with the innocent object. “Damn it! How did we manage to collect so much slagging crap in such a short amount of time?”

“Now just calm down, it has to be here somewhere,” Optimus soothed as he began to pick up the various items off the floor. “It couldn't just walk away.” There was a sudden bark of laughter and Optimus turned towards Ironhide questioningly.

“You mean like how my winch couldn't just `walk away'?” the gunner mocked sarcastically.

Optimus frowned in irritation and shoved the items he collected into Red's arms, who struggled in surprise at the load. “For the last time `Hide, you weren't robbed, you just misplaced it.”

“It was bolted to my BUMPER!” `Hide shouted in aggravation. “Explain how in the matrix I could have possibly misplaced it!”

“I'm beginning to agree with him Prime,” Ratchet snarled as he moved on to the fourth boxcar. “You know how methodical I am about my stuff. I have a system. Everything is organized by size and in alphabetical order. I never misplace my tools.”

“Throwing things around on the ground is a system?” Red mused dazedly. Ratchet growled and reached for his wrench and Red squeaked in terror as he quickly ducked behind Optimus.

“Oh now you're all just being silly!” Optimus chided his three subordinates as he dumped his latest load of Ratchets tools into the storage box. “Who could possibly sneak into our own base and rob us blind right under our scanners without us even knowing about it?” and he waved his hands about the room in order to make his point. “We would know if someone broke in!”

“Not necessarily,” Red Alert responded proficiently as he quickly fell into expert mode. “It's unlikely but it doesn't mean it's impossible.”

“A tow cable?” Optimus countered. “An air drill? Who would bother stealing those things?” Two pair of optics snapped to Optimus and just glowered. “I mean, wouldn't they take other things as well?” he quickly added. “Why just those items?”

“Well obviously someone took them,” Ratchet muttered as he continued his frantic search through the boxes. “They're obviously not here, are they?”

“All right then,” Optimus finally resigned himself to the insanity and glared at his friends with annoyance, “then what's your explanation for everything going missing?”

“Gremlins,” `Hide quipped. Both Optimus and Red Alert stared at him completely thunderstruck.

Ratchet just scoffed as he made his way to the last boxcar and threw the doors open wide, determined on finding his drill before the day was out. “I work with idiots.”

-TBC