robothell | insert one arm joke here

Entry tags:

ratchet | asafepairofhands

insert one arm joke here

Who: First Aid and U
Where: Red Alert's clinic
When: Post-Pharma cutting off his arm
What: wow the medics are gimpier than the rest of you guys
Warnings: mild robot gore, a sad cinnamon bun

[ Closed to Ratchet ]

Leaving his arm behind was the last of First Aid's problems. His run in with Pharma left him a bit more damaged up mentally -- and physically -- than he'd care to admit to himself. At the very least, he hadn't lost a wheel, something he was grateful for as he speeds off. Parts of his altmode still dragged as he drove through the city, uneven from the loss of a limb, leaving a trail of sparks and energon puddles behind him.

He had nowhere to go except away from the clinic, no ability to comm someone else to locate him. Eventually, he stops, ducking into a half collapsed building, and weeps privately. Seeing Pharma again brought back the rush of emotions he felt after killing him, making him feel drained for more reasons than the loss of energon.

Well, he's a rightful pathetic scene.

First Aid vents raggedly as he reaches up and brushes his fingers over the shredded joint where his arm used to be. He hisses in pain, pinching at a few ragged lines and clamping them closed, before he starts the arduous task of welding broken parts together. It might make the reattachment harder in the long run, but he'd be bleeding less.

It's a few hours before First Aid returns to the clinic, faint and tired, dirty with grit and sticky with drying energon. Even longer he waits outside, making sure that Pharma had left the premises long enough for him to slip back inside. He's tired-- he really wants to sleep, but he knows well enough that it's pain and energon loss, so instead he drags himself into the main clinic, clutching his shoulder.

"Ratchet?" he asks, trying not to be too loud so he doesn't wake the other patients.

-------

[ OPEN ]

Having only one arm proved to be difficult in accomplishing anything useful. It was a significant blow to First Aid's self esteem, and sometimes he spent ages just staring down at his work, feeling helpless. He couldn't lift with ease, but he could clean as much as he's able with one hand and take care of basic maintenance tasks, such as changing fluids and updating charts. Nurse work. He felt so humiliated.

First Aid touches the stump where his arm used to be, rubbing it thoughtfully. Sometimes he thought he could feel it still. Not really uncommon-- it was a psychological phenomena. Sighing, he drops his hand and begins piling charts, looking over each carefully to make sure that he hadn't missed any details. They didn't have a sophisticated database here, so it was important to keep manual records at the very least.

He picks them up holding them delicately in his hand and attempting to balance them against his chest, but they just end up slipping out of his hand and clattering to the floor.

"Oh--" he makes a soft sound. "Slag."

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Ratchet follows him without comment.

"I'll get you a cube," he says, moving off and transferring both crutches under one arm to hold the energon in the other as he limps back to First Aid's berth, hesitating slightly.

"Where is it?" he asks. "Your arm, I mean."

Well, she's picking up some of those data pads then while he talks. But when he's done she'll look at him, her usual unreadable expression on her face.

"Does the Cybertronian require assistance in retrieving the missing limb?" she asks, pretty much offering in her own weird way to help with that too.

First Aid's arm lifts as Sixshot pushes forward, his hand ending up somewhere between his ears. He hisses reflexively at the bump, bracing for pain, but he's since shut off the pain receptors to that area. Everything was neatly clamped, broken connectors removed at the joint, almost like he never had an arm at all.

"Tarn nearly killed Ratchet when he refused to assist with his addiction. Another Decepticon attempted to take our supplies."

They really can't catch a break here. First Aid knew that they needed more protection; his time on Messatine had taught him to always keep a gun close and have an extensive security system in the medibay. They didn't quite have that here, but at least he was armed again.

"Funny, since I would have given what we can spare if asked." Anxiety wells up in him. First Aid's hand stills as he tries to calm his venting. "Pharma cut off my arm with a chainsaw."

"Sixshot?" First Aid asks, but his voice is filled with wonder rather than actual shock.

He does know him -- he's the one who pointed him towards others, where he found Trailcutter. He reaches for the drone, brushing his fingers over it before taking it slowly.

"A diagnostic drone." First Aid turns the drone over in his hand, noting dented plating and a shattered optic. It would need work... Though it wasn't hopeless. He could fix the drone. He looks back to Pipes, his visor narrowing in a smile. "Thank you."

The sudden hiss makes Sixshot draw back slightly, tilting his head to peer up at First Aid in quiet curiosity. He didn't seem to be in pain. Regardless, the six-former doesn't try to repeat the gesture.

He listens quietly as First Aid lists down the events of the past few weeks. It shed some light on why the Megatrons had gone after Tarn so thoroughly. It also explained the scent he'd caught around the Decepticon base after Tarn's repairs. Pharma, was it?

He's a little hunting to do then.

"The looter was Spinister," he says as he presses his chin against the back of First Aid's shoulder and gently nudges the little medic closer with it, into the space between his two massive forelegs. "He was told the Autobots were still hostile."

"Yeah, I stumbled across him searching through a building and he gave it to me."

Really scared him. For a Phase Sixer, he's alright. Mostly because of the lack of horrible murder.

"No problem. Uh... I can stay and help a while if you need it. Just like-- if you have chores, or anything."

For lack of anything better to do, and to keep an eye on Nautica as she was recovering, Trailcutter had been making ins and outs of the medical bay, softly dodging the Megatron that worked there. Not that he didn't think he was friendly but...awkward conversation was immensely awkward. This time, though, is different.

First Aid is there doing paperwork. That's already strange. And...the fact that First Aid has one arm.

Yeah. That's new.

"F-First Aid?!" His exclamation is knocked short by the charts splaying across the floor. And despite his bulk, he could not have moved faster if he tried to pick those up. "W..What happened to you!?"

First Aid tilts his head, horribly amused by her disbelief. He gives a little chuckle himself, turning away to get back to some work while he talks with her.

"I suppose he is doing nurse work at the moment, but he's training to be a full doctor. He's not quite... built for it, but we'll see how he does. I have to say, he excels at what he puts his mind to."

And what a mind.

"But yes, Megatron."

"Huh." That's weird. Can't say he's figured out Sixshot yet.

He sets the diagnostic drone down, turning to find some tools, but he turns back to Pipes at the offer, still smiling, and reaches to touch Pipe's arm.

"You can help me fix the drone. I need an extra pair of hands."

First Aid sits up as Ratchet returns with the energon, taking a moment to vent and steady himself as his dizziness brings on a wave of nausea. He turns, leaning on his arm, and tries to reach for the energon with his arm arm automatically. The mechanisms give a grinding protest before he remembers, and he grunts softly as he pushes himself up fully.

"I had to leave it. It should have been right outside, but it's not there anymore."

Spinister. He doesn't know the name.

"What?" First Aid sounds genuinely surprised. He doesn't resist as Sixshot nudges him closer, though part of him knows he should probably be more cautious around the Phase Sixer. He's too forgiving, maybe. Probably too trusting. "Who would tell him that?"

He pushes against the warmth of Sixshot's plating, right under his neck and looks up at him.

"There's too few of us here. I mean-- there are some who probably would, especially since there seem to be some who don't remember the war ending, but..."

"You have to be messing with me," she tells him. "I'll believe it when I see it. Is he around often?"

Yeah, okay, you sound so disbelieving, Slipstream.

"Doctor Megatron," she murmurs to herself, and giggles. How absurd is that?

Absently, she picks up all the rest of the data pads and sets them on the desk, then props herself against it. "So I guess there's no war happening here, huh? 'Cause I can't imagine Megatron being let into an Autobot clinic under combat circumstances..."

"Tarn told him that." Sixshot shifts, curling his paws around First Aid in a protective circle, rumbling a low and serene sound. "He's a medic. Since no one else was going to treat Tarn, I think he had a vested interest in keeping Spinister near."

The fact that the Sixer didn't seem particularly bothered by this fact was, perhaps, a bit a odd. Then again, the dichotomy was not entirely surprising if one looked at the source. This was a mech who had brought worlds to their ends; what moral compass would he have? The Sixer would burn down whole metropolises to High Command's exacting standards without question. Then turn around and go off to the ends of the universe and fight off beings as powerful as him to rescue a group of combiners just because they'd been nice to him a few times.

Maybe First Aid shouldn't be too trusting after all.

For a moment, First Aid had started to relax. He leans into the closed circle of Sixshot's legs, letting the tension drain out of him, but he freezes as the Phase Sixer speaks, his remaining hand tightening on the warm metal of the leg around this.

"You know this. Because you've spoken to him recently? Tarn?" He already knows the answer to the question, so he's not expecting a yes or no response. His tone is tense, dark, and he's not even attempting to hide his loathing for the mech. He doesn't hate easily. The DJD are an exception.

"I lived on Messatine for ten years; my job was patching together mechs half alive after the DJD ran into them. Tarn drove Pharma insane. He made him choose between supplying him with t-cogs and killing all of us. In the end, Pharma broke from the pressure and tried to kill all of us himself with a plague. Mechs cried tears of rust until they died from their insides liquifying. I was infected-- we were all infected."

He hadn't even known he was venting raggedly until his chest starts to ache from the heat. First Aid stops to swallow.

"The CMO I told you I killed-- that was Pharma."

It was weird and terrifying.

Pipes' own visor brightens at First Aid taking his offer. Finally, something to do!

"I can do that. Are you gonna name it anything?"

If Sixshot had been on Messatine, First Aid wouldn't have had much of a job. The DJD had a reason to stick around and slowly make their way through the Autobot ranks. Tarn wanted those t-cogs. Pharma wouldn't have had much of anything to leverage against Sixshot; the world would have ended up an icy grave and the clinic would be lost, buried under the snow, probably with a dead First Aid in it.

That was the problem with their relationship as is though, wasn't it? This strange and tenuous connection was born from a favor Sixshot had done; the only reason he wasn't as hated as Tarn was because he's not killed or hurt any Autobots yet. If First Aid had seen him as he truly was, the mountains of bodies that'd been left in his wake...

Well, he never had any illusions about this thing lasting.

Still, the Sixer was fond of him. Even if it wasn't to be mutual anymore, he didn't particularly want First Aid hurt.

"I don't think I can kill Tarn," he confesses quietly. "I can make sure he doesn't hurt you and by proxy, Pharma will behave."

Edited 2015-03-01 01:34 (UTC)

First Aid feels the anger well up in his spark, a tightening in his chest, and he doesn't say anything for a few moments, too frustrated with Sixshot to designate him a response. He rolls to his side against his paws, curling in on himself, his EM field like needles.

"I intend to kill Pharma again. I can't allow him to live."

He wished he could and it hurt his spark, his visor dimming. He wonders if Sixshot ever had anything personal like this before. He knows the Phase Sixers were rebuilt for war but-- what were they before that? Sometimes he has to remind himself that he's an opposite faction, that he had been forged to a privileged class.

"Why are you kind to me?"

Edited 2015-03-01 03:40 (UTC)

First Aid appreciates the concern, but he had to admit to himself that every time he laid optics on Trailcutter he switched automatically into fretting mode. He meets the other mech's worry with his own, glancing over his frame as he bends to gather the chart, and then places a hand over his shoulder.

"I was attached, but I'm all right. It doesn't hurt anymore."

It's true enough, physically at least. His right hand had been his primary hand, and while he could use his left fine, he found himself trying to utilize an arm that wasn't there anymore often.

"Pharma's alive."

Honestly, he was rather inclined to agree that Pharma was better off dead. A mech who could engineer a plague wasn't the mech one wanted as a medic. They had Spinister anyways; the only thing that would stand between Pharma and a quick blast from his cannons was Tarn's... unfortunate addiction.

For now, Pharma was good leverage at least.

First Aid's question draws Sixshot out of his mental Decepticon politicking. He can feel the angry and frustrated buzz of First Aid's field against his chest and the Sixer closes his optics.

Why?

"I don't... know."

It was more impulse than sense that had found him helping First Aid when he'd still been reeling from the Reapers and the discovery of his kill-switch, way back in the crater. It was impulse that had drawn him here, too, into the heart of potentially hostile Autobot territory, just for the sake of seeing how this little mech was doing. Sixshot didn't entirely understand it, but he also found he wasn't entirely compelled to go against it either.

He knows First Aid tends to care more about the patients than his own wellbeing, and maybe that was the cause of the worry. Either way, they were both locked in fretting over the other.

"Can you get it fixed? I mean...hard to do surgery with one arm."

His eyes keep darting to it, that frown becoming ever more apparent. If there's one thing that gave Trailcutter away, it was his facial expressions. And it shows in the way it goes from sad to shocked, almost knocking the same data pads he'd just picked up.

"WHAT?!"

Sixshot had given a similar answer to his question on intent to kill him out at the crater. For now, First Aid was content with that. At the very least, when it came time the Phase Sixer would likely end his life, he wouldn't draw out the affair like Overlord would have.

First Aid thinks he might be fine with dying, as long as it was quick. It would be an end to all the pain and sadness he'd been feeling.

"I like you," he says in response, and he knows it's foolish, but he does.

"Pipes brought me the drone. Thank you. It'll probably help until I have an arm."

Rodimus either has the best or the worst luck in the world - it probably depends on where you're standing and what's just happened. He'd gone out looking for two somethings while Drift had been sleeping, reluctant to leave the place where so many of his crew were laid up to begin with. But then he sees First Aid fumble with the datapads and the empty joint where an arm should be and--

"Not you too." Rodimus says with a groan, tempted to drag a hand down his face if he wasn't holding onto Drift's swords that he'd gone and fetched for his friend. And brought back into a clinic because he doesn't see a problem with this plan. "Are you kidding? Please tell me this is now a joke between medics."

Why is everyone intent on de-limbing and maiming his crew?!

The fact of the matter was that Sixshot didn't know what he wanted. He'd served Megatron for four million years. He hasn't socialized or done things just for his own wants for nearly just as long. Having arrived here just after his attempted defection, he hadn't expected to discover just how big of a void Megatron had occupied up until these past few weeks of aimless, meaningless 'freedom'.

Tarn's loss of direction had resonated with him, but it'd garnered him no direction for himself either. First Aid, however. First Aid was the first real sign he'd seen on this murky road. He's not sure what any of this was leading to yet, but it was beginning to feel less like wandering.

"I'm glad it came to you safely," Sixshot says softly. Silence stretches on for a bit after that, a little awkward, a little unsure. He shifts slightly, letting the tip of his snout bump against the top of First Aid's helm.

"... I like you too."

First Aid curls his hand around Pipes', holding it just a moment and squeezing it tight, before he lets it go. He's really glad to see him, truthfully. Trailcutter had shocked him, but after Pharma, he wasn't going to start questioning good things while he had them.

"We don't normally name our drones," he starts, moving over to push a cart to go look for the delicate tools it would take to take apart the drone to check and repair its components. "But this one-- I'm thinking Ambulon."

First Aid's visor flickers at the question, and he bends down on a knee slightly to get more on level with her, placing an hand on her shoulder.

"That's kind of you. It's probably too dangerous though, if I think who has it has it. I don't even know your name."

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