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Chapter Text

"Hook, get up, Megatron wants to see us."

The gravel of Scrapper's voice startled the crane awake. He felt his processor subroutines snap back online, activating his fight matrix until he felt Scrapper's familiar servo rest over his chest plate. Reassurance pulsed from the wheel loader's field, drawing Hook to clench his servos enough that he could concentrate on shutting off his subroutines.

"No one else is injured," Scrapper whispered, "that much Megatron assured me of."

The crane met Scrapper's gaze, reading uncertainty and bewilderment in the flickering red of his visor, then let out a tired vent.

Megatron.

No one ever knew the whims of their glorious leader's processor.

For all Hook knew, Megatron was going to punish him somehow for the crane's increasing bitterness in the medical bay. As if the Decepticon leader held no understanding of how utterly exhausting it was working for three straight days on repairs for another failed, mass casualty, mission against the Autobots. Especially when half of the crane's patients insisted on being as poorly behaved as they possibly could be.

Too tired to even joke or carouse with Scrapper over what his best friend thought Megatron wanted of them, they walked in total silence until they reached Megatron's throne room. The warlord was seated with one arm over a raised knee, while his right arm dangled over the armrests of his throne. Scrapper positioned himself ever so slightly in front of Hook, protecting him as they stopped before the throne where Megatron was seated, his expression contorted with all that Hook could guess was contentment.

"Prompt as ever, Scrapper," Megatron mused, his sharp denta bared in a smile that had Hook shoot Scrapper a concerned pulse of worry through their gestalt bond.

He did not have much keen mind of being blown up by a smiling Megatron. At least if he was frowning, Hook would know Megatron was irritated with them. A smiling Megatron could mean literally anything.

Scrapper bowed his helm, a polite, "Yes, Lord Megatron," covering the flash of confusion that came off the wheel loader's field, close enough to scorch against Hook's plating.

Hook brushed a servo against Scrapper's back, underneath the bucket's bucket link, comforting the wheel loader as best he could. Neither of them had the energy to deal with an unpredictable Megatron.

Then Megatron's gaze turned to Hook and the crane felt a jolt of fear shoot through his spinal strut. His wire pulled taut in its housing, sending a rattle down through his boom as he met Megatron's gaze firmly.

"Yes?" Hook questioned, his voice tightly controlled.

No need to show Megatron that a simple look could cow the proud crane.

"I have received… complaints."

Hook froze.

Scrap.

He opened his mouth, ready to retort with his usual spiel about limited resources and limited servos in the medical bay — as if there would be a complaint aimed towards Hook from anywhere else — but a raised servo from Megatron halted him before even a sound escaped Hook.

"Not against you, Hook," Megatron almost reassured — this meeting had to be a figment of Hook's imagination, Megatron was never this calm — with a dismissive wave of his servo, "but at how short staffed the medical bay is. I found a solution."

Hook stared at Megatron. Stared at Scrapper, who shrugged, his field now flashing with sharp bewilderment. Stared back at Megatron. "What."

Megatron beamed. The dim lighting of the Victory's throne room made that smile far more menacing than Hook imagined Megatron had intended. "I have found you an assistant."

What.

Hook stared.

"I do not need an assistant," Hook spat.

The affront of the mere suggestion. Did Megatron lack faith in him after he'd been the one who had forced Hook into his position as the Chief Medical Officer of the Decepticon force? Yes, he was overworked and his supplies were stretched thin every day, but there was no one on the Victory Hook would trust with even a patient chart. His brothers helped but the intonation of Megatron's "assistant" struck Hook as someone whose entire designation would be a medical assistant, not Hook's brothers helping him as they always did.

"If it is one of those wild Stunticons, I—"

Megatron put up a servo, cutting off Hook's grumbling before the crane could gather too much steam. "Not at all. Someone who is already trained and skilled in medical repairs."

Hook scoffed. Impossible. No Decepticon on Earth, or Cybertron, was more skilled than Hook in repairs, if they even knew how to repair themselves. The only other medics on Earth were Autobots. Ratchet would never have helped the Decepticons, even one dying on the battlefield. Megatron had to be pulling Hook's wire, there was no one qualified to be his assistant—

Megatron yanked his right servo forward, revealing it from the shadows of the throne room's poor lighting, and the red and white servocuffed Autobot that stumbled forwards from where Megatron's large servo held his wrists.

It wasn't Ratchet.

"First Aid?" Scrapper gasped, his field contorting with shock as Hook stared, flabbergasted at the servocuffed Protectobot.

First Aid looked uninjured, not even a scratch or dent in his plating, but his visor was blazing with fear as Megatron released his hold on the Protectobot's cuffed wrists. With a satisfied smirk, Megatron shoved First Aid forward, sending the ambulance skittering down the steps to his throne before First Aid caught himself and straightened.

Hook stared.

Scrapper stared too, though he reached out a servo to mechanically grab First Aid's wrists to pull the Protectobot beside him. First Aid followed suit, his field surprisingly controlled as he was dwarfed by Scrapper's bulk and hefty construction warframe. Hook had to hand it to the pacifist, he was acting quite controlled considering he'd been captured by Megatron.

"Show him how your medical bay works, Hook," Megatron said, dismissively. "Any matter concerning First Aid goes through you, and you alone. He is here to stay."

That finally pulled a reaction from First Aid, a tiny little startle that allowed a hint of panic to brush over Hook from the Protectobot's field before First Aid reeled it in and became a quiet sea of control once again.

Hook looked at First Aid, then Scrapper, then finally Megatron. "Y-yes, Lord Megatron. I understand."

With a wave of Megatron's servo, Hook and his brother were dismissed, leaving them to escort First Aid towards the medical bay. The ambulance didn't once speak as they walked, nor did Scrapper, who looked as startled as could be, judging from the static bursts in his visor. That same shock was felt by Hook, though he kept it hidden behind a furious scowl.

He could not allow the Protectobot to see how floored, and even betrayed, he felt by Megatron's actions. Megatron generally stayed as far from being involved as he could be from the medical bay. The medical bay was Hook's and no one else's. All decisions around the medical bay belonged to the crane… all for Megatron to throw an Autobot for an assistant at him?

As if hearing Hook's thoughts about him, Megatron's voice clipped through Hook's internal comms with a pleasant, amused air. I don't believe you need to worry about First Aid poisoning our supplies, but do keep an optic on him. If he does anything untoward in taking care of any injured or the supplies, report it immediately to me.

Hook nodded, then remembered that Megatron couldn't see him nodding, and responded with a curt, As you wish, Lord Megatron.

The comms cut out just as the two Constructicons and their prisoner-assistant-captive arrived at the medical bay. Hook glowered as he stomped through the doors first. The medical bay's dim power setting when it wasn't being used could not hide the dearth of supplies Hook was missing, nor the energon stains on the floor and berths that he had not been able to clean before Scrapper had ordered him to rest from his three day/night stint of repairs.

He hated to think of the scorn First Aid must have been viewing his medical bay with.

Hook prided himself on cleanliness and having a spotless medical bay. The many rumors he knew the Autobots had generated about him, as a savage, dirty crane who peeled apart living Cybertronians for their parts, infuriated him on a normal day. To have an Autobot see evidence that those false allegations could be true almost made a circuit break in his processor.

A glance over his shoulder plating had Hook catch on a growl as he noticed First Aid looking around the medical bay, his facemask and visor making his expression impossible to read. Judgment was all Hook could assume the other was giving to Hook's medical bay and it took everything in him to restrain himself to a mere clearing of his vocalizer as he stalked up to the Protectobot.

First Aid's helm snapped to him, his visor flickering with something as Scrapper released his hold on First Aid's wrist, then unlocked his servocuffs. The ambulance rubbed at his wrists, then nodded to Scrapper and—

Thanked him.

Hook snorted, his spinal strut snapping straight as he shot Scrapper a stunned look. One his brother returned with a light shrug of his shoulders before Scrapper moved from First Aid to stand beside Hook.

The ambulance stared at them both, then back to the energon stains, then back to them both. Hook noticed the way First Aid rubbed at his servos, seemingly nervously by the tight way he wrung at each digit.

"What do you want," Hook snarled, his harsh tone earning him a sharp look from Scrapper that had the crane inhaling a deep, cooling draw of air into his vents. Calm down.

"May I clean?" First Aid asked imploringly. His optics darted to the energon stains again, then back to Hook with a near pleading expression.

Hook scowled, but glanced towards Scrapper, who gave him the tiniest of nods. "If you insist," Hook grumbled before he pointed to a cabinet near his office, which was at the very corner of the medical bay, "supplies would be in there. Don't touch anything but cleaning supplies."

"I won't," First Aid promised, with such an open honesty it left Hook off balance.

Autobots.

Sickeningly sweet pacifist Autobot.

A glance at the Protectobot showed he hadn't moved a piston since speaking, a fact that had Hook rolling his optics and venting deeply before he waved the other off. At that, First Aid scurried off to the cabinet Hook had pointed out and came out with the proper cleaning supplies. While the ambulance began cleaning, Hook turned his helm to Scrapper.

::. This is ridiculous. I refuse to have some Protectobot in my medical bay! I don't need an assistant, I'm fully competent on my— .::

Hook's rant was cut off by Scrapper's servo on his boom, the soothing press of his best friend's servo over his green plating enough to cool some of Hook's anger down. Scrapper rubbed at his boom until the crane felt his shoulders relax, and felt his temper disperse until Hook could control himself. A pulse of thanks from the crane had Scrapper removing his servo to rest it against his shoulder instead.

::. Let's clean, .:: Scrapper suggested, not an order, only a suggestion. It was rare for Scrapper to ever order his team around, least of all Hook. But it was a suggestion Hook heeded as if his best friend had ordered him nonetheless. ::. It will help both of us. .::

A vent escaped from Hook before he nodded, then approached First Aid.

The ambulance jumped when Hook bent down to the bucket of solvent, but a glare from Hook had First Aid return to scrubbing the medical berth he'd been cleaning. If the Protectobot was going to jump out of his plating every time Hook moved, this was never going to work.

Not that Hook needed any help.

The crane groused and grumbled to himself the entire night as he cleaned, stopping only when the medical bay was absolutely spotless. Not even a tool was out of alignment and the medical berths had all been polished.

First Aid had spent painstaking care cleaning every single stain he'd seen, then cleaning the tools the three of them had used to clean the medical bay with.

It almost infuriated Hook to admit that having a third set of servos cleaning the medical bay had made the work easier. Especially when First Aid's work was meticulous, similar almost to Hook's own self punishing drive for perfection.

Anger flashed through Hook as his processor instinctively compared First Aid to himself.

They were nothing alike.

But it was exceptionally late — or exceptionally early, depending upon one's view — and Hook needed his rest.

The Autobot would have to be dealt with.

"Autobot," Hook growled, too annoyed and irritated by his presence to use First Aid's name, "you will stay in the medical bay at all times, unless under escort of myself or my team. You will touch nothing without my permission, and access no data ports without my explicit permission. If you must, you can use an unoccupied berth as your own, until we get patients. There is an energon dispenser inside my office that you may use to acquire your daily ration from, you will have to use my name until Soundwave inputs your own ration card."

First Aid only dipped his helm, before he looked between Hook and Scrapper alike with another one of those infuriatingly understanding looks. He finished washing his servos, then strode over to the furthest berth, where he laid down and turned his back to the two Constructicons.

Which left Hook to pinch at the bridge of his nose and give an exhausted growl.

"Be easy on him," Scrapper whispered, "I'm sure he wishes to be here as much as you want him here."

Hook fumed, his denta grinding together as he shot his brother a firm almost glare. "I don't want him here. I don't need him."

"I don't think you have a choice," Scrapper warned, an edge to his voice that had Hook lower his helm and look away from the wheel loader.

It wasn't a choice he was happy with, but it was one he knew he had no choice in, as Scrapper said. Not when Megatron himself had commanded it. Defeat curled off the crane as he turned away from his brother, helm shaking.

::. I will spend my nights in the medical bay, to watch our prisoner, .:: Hook grumbled through their bond as he trudged towards his office.

A final squeeze of his shoulder preceded Scrapper leaving the medical bay, until all that was left was Hook and that blasted Autobot assistant. Hook cast one last resentful glance at First Aid, then closed the door behind him into his office.

Unbelievable.

An Autobot in his medical bay. As his assistant?

How had this week turned out so terribly, and it was only Wednesday?

Hook woke up from an uneasy recharge.

He'd been in and out of recharge, unable to rest for long before the Autobot's presence in his medical bay snapped him awake and had him peeking out his office window to see what the Protectobot was up to. Every time he'd checked, the blasted ambulance was asleep.

Every. Single. Time.

But he couldn't rest. Not easily.

So the crane had slipped between small bursts of recharge and organizing his office, even when it was already spotless, with not a single folder or datapad out of place.

A ping from Megatron, asking for an update on First Aid, led Hook from his office and into the medical bay itself. Standing at one berth was First Aid, his helm shifting slightly in a tell tale demeanor of investigating his surroundings.

Annoyance shot through Hook as he stepped towards First Aid and cleared his vocalizer. First Aid did not startle, nor jump. He merely turned around and gave Hook a warm… smile?

Whatever in Primus…

"Good morning, Hook!"

Hook rolled his optics at First Aid's chipper tone — could he act any less bothered by being the captive of the Decepticons? — but returned the greeting with a curt nod of his helm. The ambulance's visor glinted at the nod, and a hint of friendliness washed over Hook from the other's field.

There was a hint of dullness in his visor though, enough that Hook realized that First Aid likely hadn't refueled since before Megatron had captured him.

"Come with me, I will show you how to use the dispenser."

First Aid nodded, and quietly followed Hook as the crane returned to his office. He showed First Aid how to use the dispenser, using Hook's ration card. While First Aid was refueling, Hook responded to Megatron, informing him of the Autobot's status until Megatron ended the call.

With a "request" that made Hook's energon boil.

First Aid was still sipping at the cup of energon he'd dispensed when Hook turned to stare him down. Curious, First Aid tilted his helm to the side and watched Hook, his retracted facemask revealing no emotion as he sipped energon through a straw.

Hook felt like he was seconds away from an energon fuel line burst.

Megatron would be hearing Hook's many grievances over working with an Autobot. With this seemingly overly kind and friendly Protectobot. Why couldn't he have found a different solution to the complaints about Hook's medical bay — invalid as most of them truly were. Hook was an excellent surgeon, even more so considering his lack of training within a prestigious (or any) medical school on Cybertron. The Decepticons should be grateful he hadn't quit and left Cybertron when the war turned truly sour — than bringing a rival gestalt, and enemy faction member, into his medical bay.

Making Hook have to work beside him, as if the Autobot held the same rank as Hook.

To let First Aid work on any injured Decepticon who came into the medical bay while Hook watched?

Outrageous!

"Alright, Autobot, I am far more vexed at our situation than I would care to admit. Megatron has ordered me to observe you and ensure you complete repairs properly on any Decepticon that needs them," Hook snapped as he glared at the Protectobot, whose expression held an openness to it that almost made Hook double take. Autobots. No sense of self preservation.

Hook didn't need help.

He did not need to be undermined by an enemy!

This was his—

"I…" First Aid's openness fell away, his visor dimming as he looked down from Hook. The cup of energon in his servos was tapped at nervously before the ambulance cleared his vocalizer. "This is your medical bay. I understand your orders, but I would rather defer to your wishes."

First Aid continued to fidget with his cup of energon as silence stretched between himself and Hook.

The crane stood, rigid and unmoving. He could not allow himself to show the fact he was shocked by First Aid's declaration.

Autobot egos and righteousness were well known by all Decepticons. He'd expected First Aid to happily agree. Why wouldn't the Protectobot want to show the savage Hook how to "properly" repair an injured Cybertronian?

It was in the Autobot nature to believe themselves better. (Which Hook found laughable. The faction that most closely aligned with the government that had torn apart their home planet better? Please). Of course First Aid would find this opportunity Megatron had forced onto him as the perfect opportunity to discredit Hook's genuine hard work in learning how to be a surgical engineer.

That First Aid hadn't made Hook—

A sudden pulse of pain shot through the gestalt bond with a swiftness even Hook could not defend himself from.

A distant cry of his name went almost unheard as Hook staggered backwards, one green servo steadying him on the side of a medical berth as Hook tried to process what he'd just felt.

Then Scrapper's gravelly voice threw anti-freeze into the bond. ::. Constructicons, report. .::

::. Fine here, Scrapper! .:: Scavenger, always Scavenger first, promptly replied.

A chorus of responses from all but Mixmaster followed suit of Scavenger. Hook felt Scrapper's frustration gnaw into the bond before he controlled it with a vent.

::. Report to Hook. .::

Mixmaster didn't argue. There was no point with Scrapper.

"Hook?" First Aid was hovering inches in front of Hook, his servo extended towards the crane, as if waiting for his permission to touch him.

Hook waved off the Protectobot and straightened to stand. His legs wavered beneath him for a moment as Mixmaster's bond continued to pulse agony through their connection, yet he steadied himself.

Without the Autobot's help.

But First Aid continued to watch him with wide, visible concern from his visor. Hook watched the ambulance warily, denta grinding as he shook his helm in an attempt to chase off the other's worry.

"I am fine. Your concern was unwarranted," Hook growled, though any hint of venom was nonexistent as he worked to block off Mixmaster's bond.

He could feel Scrapper reassuring Mixmaster through the bond, his position as the gestalt leader affording him control over the gestalt bond in ways even Hook and Long Haul, as the torso components and grounding force of the bond, could not. The bond was softening, no longer spiking along his gestalt bond blocks.

::. He is on his way, .:: Scrapper informed Hook, a light pulse of affection flowing through their bond.

It almost made Hook relax, though only in mere fractions. Someday he'd have to thank his best friend for the unyielding support he always gave the entire team.

Amusement flickered through the bond as Scrapper let out a laugh, then playfully poked at Hook through the bond. ::. You never have to thank me. It might ruin your image, after all— .::

::. Shut up, Scrapper. .::

Hook slammed the bond off, but not in time to miss Scrapper's uproarious chuckling at his expense. Typical Scrapper…

A hiss of hydraulics turned Hook from where he'd still been standing, staggered by Mixmaster's bond, to the medical bay doors.

An extremely sheepish Mixmaster trudged through the medical bay doors, holding part of his left servo in his right. Blast marks scorched across his chest plate, but it was his near obliterated servo that held all of Hook's attention.

"What did you do."

It wasn't a question.

Hook stomped up to his brother, all the anger (and worry) he felt for Mixmaster turning his servos gentle as he took the cement truck's damaged left servo in his own.

But it wasn't Hook's statement that Mixmaster answered.

No, he stared past Hook's shoulder and pointed. "Why is an Autobot in your medical bay? Do I need to melt him down?"

First Aid squeaked.

Hook vented.

"Megatron's orders," Hook growled, without much other explanation.

Mixmaster blinked, quirked an optic ridge, then shook his helm. His gaze turned distant as Hook examined his mutilated servo closely.

A nudge through the gestalt bond brought Mixmaster back to the present, where he shrugged both his shoulders in mild response. "I mixed the wrong chemicals together."

Hook glared at Mixmaster, which was returned with another demure shrug. If First Aid wasn't there, Hook would have snarled every threat in the world to his younger brother. But the Autobot was watching him.

So he kept his anger in check and examined Mixmaster's servo. Three digits had been blown off, those of which were being cradled in the palm of Mixmaster's right servo. The rest of his left servo was mangled, parts of it melted and corroded, while scorch marks ran up the length of his palm and his lower arm.

::. Mixmaster. .::

Mixmaster's bond grew quiet, a tiny apology hidden in a babbling river of anxiety. An anxiety Hook vented against, but subtly pulsed reassurance to the cement truck for. Mixmaster gave him a small smile in return.

Hook finished his exam, told Mixmaster to sit on one of the berths, then stomped to his medicine cabinet. His supplies were low, as they had been for the past few months with continued raids that all failed.

He searched for the burn paste he needed, but came up empty. Just as he came up empty of the solvent he used for chemical eroded plating. It was gone too.

None of what he needed was there.

Panic edged into Hook's movements as he scrambled to find what he needed. He couldn't recall using the last jar of solvent. No Decepticon but for Mixmaster had any need for the solvent, and no injuries had been reported to his medical bay related to chemical burns. A quick check of the inventory logs showed that he was supposed to have a jar of the solvent. He'd clearly marked having one two days ago when he'd run a thorough inventory between repairs.

Had one of the Decepticons taken his solvent?

Had Hook miscounted?

"Mixmaster—"

"I didn't touch anything, Hook."

Panic settled deep into Hook's spark as he searched every cabinet and under every berth for the solvent jar. He needed the solution. If he didn't—

Movement out of the corner of his visor snapped Hook's helm up from where he was searching underneath one of his medical berths. Hook saw First Aid's servos moving towards Mixmaster. Rage shot through him before he even realized what was happening and he wheeled on the ambulance with a deep snarl that echoed of Devastator.

"Do not touch him."

First Aid froze, visor flickering in and out. He hovered near Mixmaster, his gaze fixated on Hook. Concern flickered in his blue visor.

"Hook, buddy," Mixmaster began, a trace of reprimand in his bond.

Hook ignored Mixmaster as he glowered down at First Aid. How dare he—

First Aid was offering out his medical kit.

Which was filled to the brim with supplies.

Including the solvent and burn cream Hook needed.

A surprised gasp rattled from Hook as he hurried up to First Aid, swiped a tube of solvent, then began his repairs on Mixmaster. First Aid hovered at Hook's side but the crane paid him little mind as he worked on his brother. Mixmaster was quiet, until a flicker of energy rippled off his field and brushed over Hook.

Whatever Mixmaster was transmitting through his field stiffened Hook's movements. His helm turned slowly to his left, where First Aid was bent over, repairing one of the dismembered digits that Mixmaster had been holding.

Anger flashed through Hook, his engine spooling up as he felt his hook rattle angrily in its housing—

Until he felt Mixmaster's calmness flood their gestalt bond. It made Hook's digits falter in his own repairs as he shot Mixmaster a quizzical look.

::. I gave him permission to help, .:: his brother explained calmly. ::. You can't do everything, and I'm in severe pain. .::

That made Hook flinch.

Mixmaster had been so blasé about his injuries when he'd walked in, and focused on First Aid, that Hook hadn't once checked or assessed his brother for how he felt. Not when his processor had latched onto the missing solvent and nothing else. Anyone other than his team who had hurt themselves would have been told off after Hook ran a coursary assessment of their pain.

His team were assessed while lectured, most especially Bonecrusher and Mixmaster, who were both the most prone to getting themselves hurt through various nonsensical or foolish actions. Hook was off balance with the intruder in his medical bay. He never forgot a single step when tending to his many patients.

Never.

The crane snatched one of the medical stims from First Aid's medical kit after a quick check in with Mixmaster confirmed a want for pain medication, which the ambulance had laid out on the medical berth Mixmaster was perched on for ease of access. A sigh of relief escaped from his brother as the stim was injected into his fuel line, but Hook felt none of that relief.

Not as he worked to repair the damage to Mixmaster's left servo. Not while First Aid worked diligently beside him on the three dismembered digits of the cement truck. Hook watched the ambulance out of the corner of his visor suspiciously the entire time, splitting his focus any time First Aid moved or reached for something in his medical kit.

But First Aid did everything right.

He even spoke to Mixmaster the entire time the ambulance worked, informing him of his every intention and the purpose behind each tool and solvent he used on the cement truck's digits. Mixmaster even seemed to enjoy First Aid's methods, judging by the shaded comments he made through the bond about "improvements" Hook could make based on the ambulance's method of care.

Hook's only response was a scowl that seemed to silence Mixmaster thoroughly.

It was almost mid afternoon when Hook and First Aid finished Mixmaster's repairs and had reattached his now repaired digits. Mixmaster was in recharge on a different medical berth, while Hook cleaned the berth they'd repaired Mixmaster on. First Aid was organizing his medical kit to the side, an action that kept drawing Hook's gaze away from his cleaning.

First Aid didn't seem to notice the crane staring at him until First Aid looked up and, quite visibly, startled.

A flicker of something passed through the ambulance's visor before he cleared his vocalizer and, quietly, said, "Yes, Hook?"

"Your medical kit," Hook directed, his glare fixed on the now closed medical kit that rested beside First Aid, which his servo hovered over, "how did you have it on yourself when Megatron captured you?"

(Hook ignored the desire to ask First Aid how his medical kit was stocked so thoroughly. He couldn't admit that he was jealous, not to his enemy).

"Oh!" First Aid fidgeted with the lid of his medical kit before answering, a nervousness in his gestures that Hook recognized from Scavenger. Part of Hook wondered if First Aid was as much of a people pleaser as Scavenger, or if he was anxious like the excavator, but Hook shoved those thoughts away. Why did he care? First Aid wasn't his friend or a patient. He was an intruder.

First Aid finally seemed to find a way to answer, when Hook picked up on his quiet voice cutting through Hook's thoughts. The ambulance fiddled with his medical kit as he answered, gaze glued to the floor of the medical bay.

"Megatron found me when I was without my gestalt. He ambushed me and threatened to dismantle my brothers one by one if I didn't cooperate with him." First Aid's voice shifted, a worried edge to his tone as he mentioned his gestalt. "He had me lead him to my base, where he suggested I gather my medical supplies without informing my team of his presence. I… was lucky that most of my team were away, as I can't lie to them."

Hook frowned. He hadn't even thought of the rest of the Protectobots or how they would take First Aid's kidnapping. He knew enough of the rival gestalt to assume that the four Protectobots would be furious when they discovered what Megatron had done. Maybe they would make a sweet enough deal so that the ambulance would leave Hook's medical bay and he wouldn't be stuck with sparkling sitting him.

(Though that fully stocked medical kit could stay when First Aid left. Hook needed that, much more than he needed an assistant of an Autobot. What in Primus was Megatron thinking? He should have sent a raid against the Protectobot base for supplies, not to kidnap their medic!)

"So you agreed to protect your gestalt," Hook surmised. He could respect First Aid for the choice. Gestalt was a complicated and intensely personal dynamic that changed any Cybertronian within a gestalt. From Hook's experience, gestalt loyalty superceded any other loyalty they held or were demanded. Hook would always pick his team over any Decepticon, no matter what.

Part of Hook was almost willing to voice that respect for First Aid's stated loyalty, until First Aid answered him, softly.

"That, and because Megatron told me how much help your faction needed." First Aid looked up from the floor, to meet Hook's gaze with a firm fire in his blue visor. "I could not idly sit by while fellow Cybertronians were suffering from a lack of supplies. I was given the chance to help, and I took it, for my fellow Cybertronians and to protect my team."

Hook scoffed, but turned away. "How noble of you," he growled, the sarcasm in his tone sharp and bladed.

So First Aid found himself the savior to the Decepticons?

Hook had been insulted before by Megatron believing Hook needed help, but he could not even find the words to describe the offense he felt at First Aid's statement. He could only imagine how First Aid viewed the Decepticons.

As savages who went without pain medication, who left medical bays dirty until a savior Autobot strolled in and offered to clean for them. Anger spiked through Hook and he turned on his heel and stalked into his office, where he slammed the door shut and allowed himself to seethe.

The noise level of the refueling chamber made Hook's audial receptors ache, even after he'd turned them down until the most they could pick up was the direct conversation from his brothers.

Scavenger and Mixmaster were seated on either side of Hook, neither saying much as they nursed their night rations quietly. Long Haul and Bonecrusher were discussing the latest design Scrapper had created for an energon converter the wheel loader believed would work with Earth's natural resources. Said designer was currently approaching the Constructicons' table with Onslaught beside him, the two gestalt leaders speaking to each other quietly.

Hook watched Onslaught with a raised optic ridge as both he and Scrapper settled down at their table, still discussing quietly between themselves. The Combaticon leader had been spending much of his down time with Scrapper, a matter Hook knew from Scrapper had to do with Onslaught seeking out the wheel loader for advice on how to deal with Bruticus. Something in the familiarity Onslaught expressed around Scrapper made Hook watch him, very carefully.

Hook wasn't privy to every conversation Scrapper had with Onslaught, but he wished he was. They didn't know Onslaught that well. Not since Onslaught had vanished and returned, apparently from the Decepticon Detention Center after they'd made a coup and failed against Megatron. Hook suspected there was more to Onslaught and his team's disappearance and reappearance than anyone was saying. His medical exams of the team showed intense spark damage and readings between the sparks and the Combaticons' frames that did not properly mix.

His train of thought was cut off when he heard Onslaught say his name. Hook turned to look at the other, optics narrowed behind his visor. Onslaught didn't seem to notice his glance as the missile truck gave a low, contemplative hum.

"Scrapper was telling me about the Autobot prisoner we have 'assisting' in the medical bay… How has he been?" Onslaught's query was asked with curiosity and warmth, not an edge of mockery or anything else.

But the reminder still rankled Hook.

He'd left First Aid in the medical bay when he heard the night ration bell ring through the Victory, Mixmaster following behind Hook silently. No other patients had come in that day besides Mixmaster, and Hook had not bothered to once speak to First Aid since their conversation about his medical supplies. He'd watched First Aid through his office's window, but all the Protectobot had done was sweep and clean even when the medical bay was already spotless.

It had made Hook sneer, seeing the proclaimed savior left with nothing to do but clean.

Insufferable goody two pedes.

"He finds himself a savior to our race," Hook growled, aware of the heat in his words as he looked Onslaught directly in the visor. "I hope Megatron gets rid of him soon, I don't need him."

Onslaught huffed, his expression hidden behind mask and visor alike, but Hook knew him well enough to suspect the other had raised an optic ridge behind his visor at Hook's words. The scrutiny in Onslaught's gaze made Hook look down at his cup of energon, which he'd hardly touched. Thankfully, the pressure from the Combaticon leader's gaze turned away as he addressed Mixmaster instead, though Hook noticed that Onslaught moved a servo down to rest against Scrapper's thigh as he did.

Suspicion rattled through Hook, but he pushed it away. He didn't know Scrapper's side, but he would ask. Later.

Hook listened only half-heartedly to their conversation, noting how Onslaught checked in with Mixmaster and asked how he felt, how he'd been hurt, until he heard Mixmaster mention First Aid by name. The crane stiffened as he heard Mixmaster compliment First Aid's work, turning his left servo so Onslaught could see the welds and repairs done to his servo. Mixmaster never once mentioned Hook's name as he continued to sing the praises of First Aid.

That Primus damned Protectobot, and not his brother?

Something stabbed through Hook's spark and he stood with a suddenness that silenced Mixmaster and drew a knowing look from Scrapper, which Hook ignored. "I have paperwork that needs to be finished," he growled in dismissal, before he stalked out of the refueling chamber.

He heard his brothers muttering amongst themselves, joined by Onslaught's ever dignified voice, but none of them stopped Hook. They all well knew to let the crane be when he got in "one of his moods" as Scrapper always called it.

But this time it hurt.

Shame plagued Hook's heavy, long strides as he stormed towards the medical bay.

His brothers made what he knew were jokes about hating him as a medic — at least, Scrapper had been forced to reassure Hook that the comments were jokes and meant in jest after one too many jokes about swapping Hook for a "real" medic had gotten under his plating and Hook had threatened to quit — but he'd never heard one of them so genuinely compliment, and prefer, some other medic.

A real medic.

One who had the schooling he'd never received due solely on his alt mode. His purpose as a mere construction vehicle.

It hurt.

Hook stormed through the medical bay doors, giving First Aid a snarl when he saw the red and white Autobot wave at him, and into his office. Where the crane slumped into his office chair and buried his faceplate in his servos.

Hook spent the next few days in the medical bay and nowhere else. He fueled solely from the energon dispenser in his office. Worked on the pile up of paperwork he always had following every failed raid or mission. Cleaned the entire medical bay until his servos ached, and observed First Aid as Megatron had initially ordered him too.

Most of the complaints that had come to the medical bay were minor, and all ones Hook allowed First Aid to tend to.

If Megatron was truly planning to replace Hook with First Aid, then he might as well get the experience of being the Decepticons' primary medic. Hook only interfered when the patients would squirm too much, or make too many threats against First Aid, where a single large servo over their chest plate would stop the wiggling Decepticon until the Protectobot ambulance had finished his exams and repairs.

First Aid had questioned Hook on his sudden shift in demeanor, but he'd ignored him pointedly and said nothing in response. The ambulance had gotten the hint after Hook had continued his silence, and he had not questioned Hook since. Instead, they worked in silence.

The ambulance was competent, at least.

He knew his way around every tool and procedure with strict adherence to patient comfort and care. The only time Hook saw First Aid demonstrate discomfort or unfamiliarity was how to deal with the limited supplies the Victory's medical bay had. First Aid's medical kit could only alleviate the chronic problem temporarily.

A crackle of static pulled Hook out of the medical file for Frenzy, who had come in twice in two days for joint repairs and needed his repairs and new joint materials noted down in his medical records, and to his internal comms. Soundwave's number, and a looming "Accept/Deny" message, flashed across his systems.

Hook knew better than to deny any message request from Soundwave. Not if he wanted to live peacefully within the Victory.

I read you, Soundwave. What do you need?

Thrust, Ramjet: Need immediate medical repair. Need your expertise. Arriving in thirty seconds.

Soundwave said nothing else. He need not have anyways.

Hook was out of his office, paperwork forgotten for later, in five seconds. First Aid stiffened as Hook hurried to one of his storage cabinets. The ambulance was at his side without a word, taking every tool and medical supply Hook handed him and placing them neatly on separate medical trays.

Two medical berths were prepared and ready just as Acid Storm, Dirge, Thundercracker and Skywarp came in, carrying Ramjet and Thrust between them in pairs of two. A quick examination of both injured fliers made Hook's spark plummet in its spark chamber.

Ramjet's spark was being held by threads of wire, and Dirge's servo.

Thrust was not as close to the brink of deactivation, but he was close enough.

Ramjet would need to be first, and until he was stabilized, Thrust's repairs would have to wait.

A gasp from behind Hook had First Aid suddenly push past him, though he paused to look up at Hook. "Let me do this, please. I have considerable practice with spark based surgery. I can help him best. Please."

Hook hesitated. Ramjet and Thrust were both dying. Hook could tend to both, but—

Hook nodded to First Aid and moved to where Thundercracker and Skywarp had gently laid Thrust down on one of the prepared berths. His plating was torn open, parts of his spark chamber revealed but not enough for Hook to see through to his spark. He knew the telltale wounds of Ironhide, Cliffjumper and Sunstreaker's primary weaponry on the two injured Decepticons' frames.

Hook placed a servo on Thrust's shoulder for a moment, then turned to begin his—

A squeak of pain from First Aid, followed by Dirge's voice suddenly snarling in vindictive, hate filled Decepticon binary, had Hook whirl around. The blue Conehead (the name had stuck even in Hook's processor after the Stunticons had come home from the Autobot brig giggling about the nicknames the Autobots had for all of the Decepticons) had his rifle aimed directly at First Aid, its muzzle glowing to life, as First Aid lay sprawled on the floor.

"Get away from him, Autobot!" Dirge snarled, his digit moving to his rifle's trigger.

Hook felt himself move before he processed what was actually happening.

The crane slammed the rifle to the side using his hook as he shoved Dirge backwards, against the wall. Using his immense height, Hook towered into Dirge's space, denta bared with venomous intent as he glared into the jet's optics.

Dirge blinked up at Hook, shocked.

"Do not harm my assistant," Hook hissed, "unless you want to lose Ramjet. First Aid will fix him."

A protest built in Dirge's gaze, but he seemed to think twice on it. With a nudge from Hook after he released Dirge from the wall, and a quiet command for him, and the other three uninjured, to refuel, the four Seekers left.

Once they were gone, Hook turned back to First Aid. The Protectobot was shivering, his visor sparking with static, until Hook extended a servo to him.

"They won't bother you again," Hook assured First Aid once the ambulance took his servo. Hook helped the ambulance stand, released his hold on him and resumed his repairs on Thrust.

First Aid moved to Ramjet's side, working in total silence as he did. Hook glanced across to watch the Protectobot as he repaired Thrust's fuel lines, then began the agonizingly slow process of reconnecting Thrust's repaired internal wire system so that he would be able to control and connect to his limbs, transformation cog and battle systems. To part of Hook's surprise, First Aid moved with deliberate care as he repaired Ramjet.

The Protectobot did not stop for even a moment as he contained every broken fuel line and sheltered the jet's exposed spark. A quiet request for assistance pulled Hook from Thrust, who was repaired enough to be considered stable, and to Ramjet.

Together, the two medics worked for hours on Ramjet.

Hook found himself following First Aid, rather than leading, as they worked on Ramjet's spark. It was evident First Aid was an expert in spark injuries, with every word and term he used that even Hook himself did not know throwing the crane for a loop. He schooled himself completely, not allowing First Aid to see how uneducated Hook was in this field.

The crane's servos and digits were sore by the time he and First Aid had repaired Ramjet's spark housing, using recycled materials the Victory still had in its morgue from deceased Decepticons. Long into the night they had worked, with First Aid never once showing the same exhaustion Hook felt. The only time Hook saw any hint of exhaustion, and more in a stunned moment of disbelief, was when Hook had led First Aid to the morgue for the spare parts.

For once, Hook had not taken offense at First Aid's shock. He understood the Autobots to have no issues with supplies, and thus suspected they never had to rely on their deceased faction members' frames for medical usage. Hook was used to what being a Decepticon medic meant, for it was on the frames of the deceased he'd practiced the skills he needed to save the injured, and the frames of the deceased whom he often had to use for repairs and patch jobs.

First Aid seemingly knew he had to accept the recycling of parts and had made no noise or complaints about it. Not that Hook would have been in the mood to debate on the difference between Decepticon and Autobot medical processes.

Now that both surgeries were over, Hook was seated on the floor between Ramjet and Thrust's medical berths, his back pressed against the wall as he monitored the vitals of both jets. Jolts of static pain coursed up from his left wrist, the numbness making him flex his left servo as best he could to exercise it.

He'd been so busy with repairs from every consecutive failed mission that he hadn't had the chance to maintain his servos how he liked to. The crane knew he needed to find time between watching First Aid for any attempts at sabotage (no matter how unlikely it was for a pacifist to attempt such) and tending to whomever else decided to get hurt for the maintenance. Or his numbness would spread—

Quiet steps stopped in front of him, before a flash of white and red bent down in front of him. "Hook?"

A growl slipped from the crane. "What."

First Aid kneeled down in front of Hook, his blue visor dull with exhaustion even as he stretched out a servo, where he was holding a glass of energon out to Hook. The crane looked at First Aid's offering and took it.

The Protectobot watched him for a moment before he sat down beside Hook. Neither spoke to the other, but Hook also did not find himself consumed by a desire to push the Protectobot away.

"Hook!"

Primus.

That deep, whiny voice was seared into Hook's processor as if he'd known it for millions of years, rather than the short eight months he had.

With a drawn out vent, Hook turned to the left, to be greeted by the sun bright yellow plating of Drag Strip, staring up at him with pathetically miserable optics. Curious. He usually went everywhere with his visor, believing it made him look "cooler", whatever that meant.

"Yes, Drag Strip?" Hook's tone was leaden with exhaustion, a sharp edge to it that Drag Strip seemed entirely unaware of.

The Stunticons were far too frequent of patients for Hook's temper.

Practically every other day, at least one of the Stunticons would either walk into his medical bay under their own power, or with the help of one of their brothers. Usually because their idiot of a leader had decided to pulverize his team for some failure the semi himself was too blind to see was his own fault, or by the Stunticons' own stupidity leading them to crash into the wrong Decepticon.

When the Stunticons would learn how to behave properly eluded Hook.

Embarrassment slammed off of Drag Strip's field, unrestrained and untrained, before the Tyrrell cleared his vocalizer and awkwardly shuffled his pedes. Then he tapped at his arm, before blurting out a rushed, "I hit my helm and I keep seeing bright flares of light whenever I move. I'm not scared or anything," Hook raised an optic ridge at that, "but I was hoping you could fix it, please?"

The use of Drag Strip's non-existent manners had Hook staring down at the Stunticon, before he vented, then gestured to one of the medical berths. "Sit."

Surprisingly, Drag Strip did exactly as ordered, though he kicked his pedes and swung them over the side of the berth as Hook gathered together a small examination kit. The Tyrrell continued to sit when Hook approached him and began an exam of his optic, using a penlight first to judge the Stunticon's reactions.

His red optics tracked the light, but slowly, and with notable delay.

A few more tests showed a clear concussion for the Stunticon, but no other external or internal injuries. A concussion could be cleared up with a sensory patch to his optical array, but Hook's supplies of those had been used up last on Astrotrain after he'd run into the side of a mountain in deep fog. Mixmaster had attempted to fabricate more sensory patches for Hook, only for them to have a defect that had caused the cement truck — who always tested his own inventions on himself — to lose his sight for three days. All of those had been thrown out and Hook had been left with nothing to help with any form of minor processor glitch, optical glitch or sensory glitch.

Hook's perfectionism itched painfully within his processor. The need to properly repair Drag Strip had the crane's digits twitching, until he controlled his urges with a growl and met Drag Strip's gaze.

"You will need to rest," Hook growled as he stepped back from Drag Strip and began cleaning his tools, even the ones he hadn't used. "The self repair nanites that somehow still function inside you will deal with your concussion. Should you hit your helm on something again, rest is the best solution."

A flare of frustration shot through Drag Strip's optics as he jumped off the berth, then shoved Hook out of the way. "Thanks a lot," the Stunticon snipped as he stalked towards the door of the medical bay.

Hook watched his back retreat, helm tilted curiously. He'd offered the best advice he could. Why was Drag Strip ungrateful?

"You could have helped him further," First Aid commented as Drag Strip left the medical bay in a huff, the ambulance's tone curious, but reprimanding all in the same. At least, that was what Hook heard from him.

It infuriated him. This wasn't First Aid's cozy medical bay on the Ark, run by himself and Ratchet.

It was Hook's. His damp medical bay that he had to constantly fight mold and rust off of due to the Victory's undersea prison. How dare First Aid lecture him on how to deal with his patients and their slew of injuries, minor or not.

"Autobots are swimming in supplies," Hook hissed as he wheeled on First Aid, whom, to his credit, held firm even at Hook's venomous glare, "I am not. I cannot afford to waste supplies on minor injuries, or I will have none left for legitimate injuries."

Something sparked in First Aid's visor at Hook's snarl, and the firmness with which he met Hook's gaze made even the crane stop for a moment. "That isn't what I meant, Hook. You do not have to use your resources to assist a patient with proper pain management. Drag Strip does not know how to deal with pain, he is a newspark. If you were to institute exercises or mediation, I believe you would see less minor injuries being brought to you."

"Drag Strip didn't need pain mediation. It's a minor concussion—"

"He wanted comfort." First Aid declared.

Hook glared at First Aid, his full height dwarfing the other. "I'm not a sparkling sitter—"

A laugh escaped from First Aid, the sound making Hook reel back with a snarl from his engine that radiated offense. How dare he—

Another giggle escaped First Aid before he shook his helm and vented. "That is abundantly clear. But that does not diminish the fact Drag Strip came to you seeking your help. He trusts you to help him when he's injured, why wouldn't he trust you to comfort him as well?"

Because he's young and foolish, and no one else on the ship can do what I do, Hook growled to himself.

"That is not my job," Hook reiterated.

He was a self taught surgical engineer. Every single one of his skills were earned through hard work, not through schooling or from being forged as a medic from the very start of his life.

Unlike First Aid.

Simply looking at the Protectobot's soft curves and gentle demeanor told Hook that he'd been made as a medic. That First Aid had had every chance and opportunity given to him to become the apt medic he was.

Opportunities Hook never had.

If First Aid knew of Hook's illegal medical facility he'd run in Iacon, he suspected the ambulance would begin ranting at him about "improper medical procedures" and "needing a license". He wouldn't be the first Autobot medic to turn his nose up at Hook's methods. It would only sting more from First Aid due to the fact Hook knew the ambulance was… skilled. That he had to work alongside him at the behest of his leader. Infuriating.

"If you are so determined in your beliefs," Hook spat, "then you can comfort the Decepticons. You will soon see it is pointless. They—"

Movement from First Aid flashed at the corner of Hook's vision, but he ignored it and kept on talking. Ranting, Scrapper would tease him. Until the sensation of First Aid's servo on his arm shot frozen mercury through Hook, his voice sputtering out in a trail of static as the crane turned his helm slowly to stare down at the small ambulance.

First Aid's gaze was fierce, the blue of his visor making Hook back up slightly. He could tell that First Aid was analyzing him, searching his frame for what Hook could not have guessed.

"You care, more than you like to let on."

First Aid's comment was left with silence between them.

First Aid's judgment made Hook swallow. His gaze darted away from First Aid, leaving the crane thankful for his visor that hid his optics from any who wished to look too closely at Hook.

"You cared about Ramjet and Thrust. You care about your team. The way you reacted when I went to help Mixmaster? That's the sign of a true medic's spark," First Aid fixed Hook with a stare as he spoke, his words making Hook bare his denta in a sneer at the Protectobot. "Why do you deny Drag Strip what you know he was asking for when you care about the Decepticons you heal? Is it pride?"

Annoyance shot through Hook.

He was done with First Aid's lecturing.

With a growl, Hook threw First Aid's servo off him, spat a cold "goodnight", and stalked off to the Constructicons' quarters. If First Aid wanted to sabotage the Decepticon medical bay after all of that drivel, he could be Hook's guest.

Not like it wouldn't be obvious who'd done it, if so.

Hook was certain Megatron would be rid of the Protectobot finally if he did get the mind to mess with Hook's supplies.

As unlikely as that was…

His annoyance did not wane when Hook entered his team's quarters to the sight of Bonecrusher wrestling with Scrapper. Long Haul looked up from the datalogs he was working on, a quiet greeting returned by a huffy growl from the crane. Mixmaster and Scavenger were hunched in a corner, the scent of burning chemicals a clear indicator of what they were doing.

Hook sent Mixmaster a scathing message about refusing to repair him if he blew himself and Scavenger up, then stomped into his room. The door slammed behind him, leaving a silence in the common room he did not notice.

Why was he allowing First Aid to get under his plating?

Why did everything that obnoxious ambulance say lead to such reactions from Hook?

He was proud, of course he was! Hook was the sole surviving medic of the Decepticon forces, held at a disadvantage with limited supplies and every skill picked up solely through trial and error. The crane was exceptional for it all, and First Aid dared to question him?

Hook ground his denta together, his fists clenched. An urge to draw his sword from subspace and use it on something was quelled when he heard his door open, and felt a rough servo rest on his shoulder.

Scrapper.

"What."

Scrapper didn't answer. Not verbally.

Before Hook knew what was happening, he was bundled under the covers of his berth, Scrapper's arms wrapped around him in a hug as his best friend leaned his helm underneath Hook's chin. A rumble from Scrapper's engine lured Hook's temper to eddy, his anger ebbing as he relaxed into Scrapper's hug.

Tomorrow, he could deal with First Aid.

Tomorrow.

Chapter Text

Laser bolts shot over Hook's helm as he dodged a swing from Sideswipe, then slammed the bottom of his pede against the Autobot, sending him flying. His brothers were scattered around the battlefield, engaged with the force of Autobots that Megatron had sought out to ambush.

A quick glance located Long Haul and Mixmaster, who were in a froth of red and blue that Hook thought was Warpath and Tracks. Bonecrusher was effortlessly stomping Ironhide into scrap, the Autobot's thrashing useless when Bonecrusher was as angry as he was. Hook winced as Bonecrusher's anger fed into his, causing the crane to lose focus for a moment.

The Constructicons were scattered, but Megatron had not called them to form Devastator. They seemed evenly matched… unlike Scavenger.

Scavenger was under heavy fire from Gears, Huffer, Cliffjumper, Bumblebee and Windcharger. The excavator was doing what he could to block the minibots' fire, and to regroup with his nearest Constructicon brother — that being Scrapper — but every time he moved the minibots cut Scavenger off before he could escape.

Scrapper was on the ground, Sunstreaker clawing and slashing at his faceplate with fury that Scrapper couldn't dispatch. Especially not when Sideswipe raced over to his brother to assist him, abandoning his fight with Hook.

::. Scrapper! .:: Hook turned to charge towards Scrapper, but a glare from Scrapper froze him in place.

The command was unspoken, but understood.

Hook drew his rifle, aimed it at the cluster of minibots that had just downed Scavenger, and fired.

A screech of pain burst from Cliffjumper as Hook fired off another volley that sent Cliffjumper to the ground. The others all turned towards Hook, giving Scavenger a moment's respite.

But then Hook saw Scavenger's visor flicker, and heard him screech a warning to him. Hook wheeled around in time to see a blur of red and white, recognize the roar of rotor blades, and then he was hoisted up into the air.

Blades' skids dug under his arms as the helicopter shot into the sky, the ground vanishing beneath them. Hook snarled the higher they got and lunged to grab onto Blades' skids as best he could. His rifle was long discarded on the battlefield, and reaching for his sword would make him lose his grip on Blades.

Hook did not fancy being dropped as Vortex would do to his enemies.

Protectobots incoming, came a lazy warning from Starscream.

Yes, very helpful, Starscream! Maybe next time he wound up in the medbay under his own stupidity, Hook would let him sit and suffer for an hour or so. The second in command would deserve it.

"Like heights do you, Hook?" Blades snarled when he finally stopped ascending, though a glance down made Hook quickly look away.

The ground was barely visible from the height Blades had taken Hook to, and all he could hear was the rhythmic beating of rotors. Even his gestalt bond felt a little distant. All of which made the pounding of his spark exceptionally loud to Hook.

His grip on Blades' skids tightened as a wave of fear crashed over him.

How did Blades know?

Perhaps he didn't. Maybe Blades was simply reacting, as Hook understood him to often do.

Stay cool.

"Trying to imitate Vortex, are we, Blades?" Hook scoffed, his field flashing with a sneering arrogance. His usual Hookisms, as he knew both factions knew him to have. The less Blades knew about the fact Hook was very much not enjoying this, the better. "I'd think such boorish behavior would be beneath you—"

Blades dropped him.

Later, Hook would maybe acknowledge that there was one benefit to the height Blades had taken him too: none of his brothers heard his shriek when his processor registered he was falling.

Not that they didn't already know how Hook hated being without some kind of stable footing beneath his pedes, but still.

He had an image to uphold.

Screaming while falling would devastate that image. Badly.

Thankfully for his image, the crane's vocalizer shorted out only a few moments after being dropped. His spark, on the other hand, did anything but short out. He could feel it thundering and storming the longer he fell, charging electricity through his frame that started to short out other parts of his frame.

Including his comms.

Great.

Just great.

Any attempt to contact the Decepticon Seekers went nowhere but for a sizzle of static. He would take being saved by Starscream over being destroyed from a fall currently, even if it set Hook into debt to the obnoxious second in command.

The ground rushed ever closer to him, and for the first time in his sparked life, Hook wished he had a different alt mode. Decepticon grounders didn't fly. Scrapper had tried to invent a device — a "wing" as he'd called it — that would permit him to fly, but after multiple test flights had caused Scrapper to be put under Hook's servos in the medical bay more than once, Hook had put his pede down.

Constructicons did not fly.

Maybe he should have let Scrapper follow his foolish design choice. Then he'd—

Hook suddenly stopped falling. He felt large skids hook under his crane boom and under one leg, stalling him mid air.

It wasn't Vortex. The Combaticons weren't on this mission.

Blades had come back for him.

Blades was playing with him.

Still choked by his fear, Hook shot Blades a glare (though all he could get a glimpse of was his alt mode's underbelly) as he dangled on his skids. His instincts snarled at him, warring with his fear and his millions of years of fighting for the Decepticons. But logic kept his gaze shifting to stare down at the still great distance from where Blades was hovering and carrying him, and kept Hook from thrashing or protesting much further.

The helicopter would tire of playing with Hook if the crane did not rise to his behavior. Hopefully that would lead to him not dropping Hook a second time, and rather discarding him to the ground from a survivable height. Hook was not entirely certain what he'd done specifically to the Protectobots to draw Blades' ire, nor did his processor want to be helpful for more than overthinking exactly what he'd done to annoy the helicopter.

Unfortunately for Hook and his need to know everything, Blades didn't care to explain.

With a sudden shift of metal, Blades transformed out of his alt mode, with his grip on Hook's boom and the nape of his neck ones that restricted most of Hook's movement, then they plummeted.

Hook thrashed with everything he had as the two fell. His hook loosened from Blades' grip after much twisting of his boom and, with a snarl of anger, the crane lashed his hook across Blades' faceplate.

Blades let out a howl of pain and dropped Hook, the rotors on his back spinning to catch him in root mode.

But nothing was there to catch Hook, who slammed into the ground with a plating breaking crunch.

Dirt, rocks and clouds of dust were all Hook could see as he lay, stunned, in the crater his impact with the ground had made. Weak blares from his sensors flared up, noting damages all along his frame, both external and internal injuries.

Not good…

With a shaky heave of air expelled out of his vents, Hook slowly gathered his servos and knees beneath him. He pushed himself up onto shaking legs, blurry vision whirring as his optics adjusted to the splitting ache in his helm. The crane could feel his brothers through the gestalt bond, but their voices were muffled behind the incessant ringing in his audial receptors.

Primus, he hated being dragged into combat.

Entirely beneath him.

Hook drew his sword from subspace, the pommel gripped in one servo as his vision slowly cleared.

A thud to his side was the only warning Hook had before he felt Blades' photon pistol fire an inch from his helm. Scrambling to the side, the crane slashed out with his sword with what little vision he had. He felt the tip of his blade sing across metallic plating, but knew by the roar of Blades' engine that he'd escaped the brunt of Hook's wild swing.

Spying a flash of red and white coming at him, Hook wheeled on his heel and jabbed forward with his sword. A puff of hot air billowed over him and the beat of rotors flared behind him, telling him that Blades had narrowly avoided his jab.

Just as Hook had wished for.

His vision had finally cleared enough to find where Blades was landing behind him, photon pistol primed with another round.

With a sharp snarl, Hook lashed out with his cable and hook and watched with satisfaction as it ripped between the plating of Blades' right palm and his digits.
Blades let out a shriek of pain and staggered back. An opening Hook would exploit.

Precision coiled beneath Hook's plating as he used his size, the blade of his sword and the whip of his cable and hook, to gain the advantage on Blades. The helicopter recovered but was met by a whirl of the crane's weaponry that had him on the edge of his pedes.

Hook had to dodge multiple shots from the Protectobot's photon pistol as he attacked Blades, but he had enough experience and control over himself to expect the helicopter's shots. He'd backed Blades into a corner when, with a furious snarl, Blades abandoned all decorum and launched himself at Hook.

The crane felt a piercing, sharp agony slash through his left ankle where Blades' sharp digits clawed through thick armored plating. Hook had to jerk to the side to dodge the upslash of claws that missed his chin and throat plating by an inch, if that, his balance off.

The crane could not gather the distance between himself and Blades to properly fend him off with his sword. With a snarl as Blades' claws sank and slashed into his plating relentlessly, Hook lashed out with his hook—

Blades' claws ripped through his cable, detaching his hook with an agony unlike the Protectobot's earlier flurry of slashes into his plating. Hook bit back the cry of pain as Blades grabbed Hook's severed cable and threw him to the ground.

Hook hit his shoulder hard, but scrambled up onto his pedes, the grip on his sword loose.

Blades roared, then lunged at Hook.

Hook swung his sword up.

Blades dodged Hook's swing and lunged forward, a flash of rotor blades Hook's only warning before he felt Blades' rotors impale his chest plate.

A cry of pain escaped Hook, his vision swimming with blackness as he staggered backwards from Blades. The helicopter ripped his rotors out of Hook's chest, which only made Hook falter onto one knee. He heard his brothers' voices screaming at him in the bond as he tried to stand. Hook wavered, and a sharp kick to the shin had him buckling with a shocked cry.

Blades' pede stomped down on his arm, and his lower waist, holding Hook down as he bent down to glare into Hook's visor. "What have you done to First Aid, monster?"

Hook narrowed his optics.

So that was what this attack was about.

"Nothing," Hook stated, his denta bared in a sharp, cold snarl.

Blades kicked Hook in the side, eliciting a grunt of pain from the crane. Where were his brothers?

"Don't lie to me!" Blades snarled as he reached down and grabbed Hook by his collar plating. "We know Megatron took him. What have you done to him?"

"I said it already — nothing," Hook snapped, his servos clenching as he glared murderously at Blades.

Which… was the wrong decision.

With sudden, blinding pain, Blades stabbed one of his rotors straight through Hook's chest plate. Again. Hook gasped and clawed at where the rotor dug through his plating but Blades only pushed more of his weight against the end of his rotor so that it shoved further into Hook's frame.

Hook snarled and spat, his processor running frantic subroutines as his bond flashed his pain to his brothers. He wasn't going to beg for help from them, but it was… needed.

Blades leaned down into Hook's space, until Hook could feel the hiss of heat from the helicopter's vents. With him leaning further over Hook, the rotor blade pierced deeper into Hook. The crane could swear that it was now digging into the ground beneath him.

Where were his brothers?

Desperation had Hook claw at Blades, but to little avail. Every movement he made against Blades only incensed him further, and led to more pain.

::. Scrapper! .:: Hook's shout through the gestalt bond went unanswered.

Instead, Blades leaned down and snarled at him. "There is no point in using the bond. You took our brother from us, I'm merely returning the favor."

Panic flared in Hook's frame, exuding off his field before he could catch it. Blades sensed the panic and smirked.

Hook opened his mouth to protest — to insult Blades, or to tell him exactly what was up with First Aid, he didn't know — but a roar of a diesel engine interrupted him.

Before Blades could react, a flash of green plating slammed into the Protectobot, tearing him — and his rotor — off and out of Hook.

That made Hook scream. His vision swam as he felt his spark stutter harshly under the strain and stress of the injury. He could hear Blades' frame being slammed into the ground. Could hear a roar of rotors as Blades fled. Heard a gruff voice growling his name, drawing his quickly failing vision up and to the sharp, worried face of Bonecrusher.

Thank… Primus…

Large servos opened Hook's subspace, the strange sensation of Bonecrusher's servos inside but not making Hook's conscious swim.

"I've got ya," Bonecrusher growled as his servos exited Hook's subspace.

Hook narrowed his optics at Bonecrusher, denta bared in a grimaced snarl. "Ask… permission… next time…"

Bonecrusher scoffed, his lip curling up into his own sneer. Hook expected his brother to bark back at him, to reprimand him or scold him, but Bonecrusher didn't. All he saw was that same, earlier worry flicker in his visor. "You have a terrible sense of humor," Bonecrusher growled as Hook felt his brother's servos moving over Hook's chest, though he was fully aware of how numb and out of body the touch felt to him. That wasn't good.

"And you're… a terrible medic…"

Hook's vision swam. He heard his name and felt Bonecrusher shake him, but his systems were crashing faster than Bonecrusher could repair him.

A sharp, worried call of his name was the last thing the crane heard as his systems fully shut down.

….

Static crackled through his audial receptors.

…
Angry… shouting.

Familiar angry shouting.

Megatron… and Scrapper?

…..

Light crackled at the edge of Hook's visor.

He felt like his chassis was on fire, every fiber and wire of his frame burning sharply.

A low, pained moan escaped his mouth as Hook tried to move. His frame protested hotly, a bolt of fire racing up his neck cables that made another, sharper, hiss of pain rattle from his vocalizer.

Seconds later, Hook felt a large servo grab his arm, curling it until he felt his servo brush against ridged treads and harsh plating.

"Easy, Hook. Rest. Astrotrain's almost got us home."
Bonecrusher?

"Yeah, ya daft old fool, it's me. Like I said, I've got ya. Even got you your hook. I know how attached you are to it."

Hook glared at Bonecrusher, seconds before his vision shorted out.

…

Loud voices woke Hook for the second time, these ones as familiar to him as his own spark.

Scrapper and Bonecrusher…

But they…

"His brother is why Hook's in this mess! How can you trust him?"

"Bonecrusher." Scrapper sounded irritated.

Tired.

Sore.

Had he forgotten his shots of nanite gel for his joint relief?

Scrapper was always grumpy when his aching joints acted up.

Moving weakly, which caused a sharp hiss of pain to escape Hook, the crane opened his optics and searched for Scrapper.

There.

His best friend's back was to Hook, the posture of his arms across his chest clear in how his bucket made tiny little annoyed clicks. Bonecrusher was in Scrapper's face, snarling something to Scrapper while he gesticulated angrily at First Aid.

Long Haul, Mixmaster and Scavenger watched from behind Bonecrusher silently, their bonds fuzzy to the addle minded crane.

"Scraps," Hook groaned, a far more painful process than he had anticipated.

Silence shot through the medbay as Scrapper wheeled around and, immediately, his servos were on Hook. Relief came off the wheel loader's field as Scrapper nuzzled his faceguard against the side of Hook's helm.

The crane growled at Scrapper, gaze shifting to glare at Scrapper's knees, one of which was pressed against the berth. "Did you take—" Hook cut himself off with a pained wheeze, his visor flickering out for a moment.

Scrapper gave him a worried rumble of his engine as he leaned back and stared at Hook, a silent comfort visible in his visor. But Hook ignored it as he shook his helm (with a burst of fire that followed the movement again), and glared at Scrapper's knee.

"Your nanite gel—"

"Hook."

Oh.

Hook felt himself flush.

He knew that tone. Scrapper never reprimanded him. Gently nudged him in the direction Scrapper thought Hook should speak, but never reprimanded.

Cowed, Hook vented and looked away.

A few more moments of silence passed before Bonecrusher started up the argument again, his concern for Hook touching, but…

"Let him," Hook finally interjected, his tone as firm and without waver as he could make it.

His statement was met by silence, but for the huff of vents and tick of fans. Then Hook felt Scrapper's servo brush over his shoulder. The comfort was appreciated, that much Hook expressed to the wheel loader when he turned to meet his gaze.

Scrapper nodded at him, turned, then beckoned the Constructicons to leave.

All but Bonecrusher did.

Stubborn…

First Aid glanced towards Bonecrusher, who simply stared him down, then he approached Hook. Time passed in a blur for Hook as First Aid repaired him. He was most aware of Bonecrusher hovering by his left shoulder and First Aid's voice softly speaking to him the entire time.

Whether that was for Hook or for Bonecrusher, the crane couldn't figure.

But he was… glad to have competent, trained servos there to repair him.

Not that he'd ever say as such to his replacement.

It was odd for Hook to spend the next three days laid up on one of his medical berths, with First Aid running the medical bay entirely on his own. Hook's brothers were almost always around in some capacity, to bother their eldest brother as well as to keep an optic on First Aid, and even offer their assistance if he needed.

Most of the Decepticons who had come in since Hook's battlefield injury had been quiet, their instincts taking them to their recovering medic until a sharp comment from him turned them back to First Aid. Only when he'd had to bark at Wildrider three times did Hook feel a strange twinge in his spark at the way the Ferrari, who'd been hovering nervously near Hook's medical berth, bowed his helm and skittered away towards First Aid.

He'd watched with narrowed, critical optics as First Aid tended to Wildrider — injured from another failed raid that Megatron had led just that day —, unaware of the protective growling the crane's engine was giving off while Wildrider sat and allowed the Protectobot to tend to him. When Wildrider had flinched after First Aid gave him a shot of pain aesthetic, Hook had almost climbed out of his berth until he saw First Aid pausing and stepping away from Wildrider.

The Ferrari had rubbed at the injection site between two pieces of arm plating with trace hints of coolant leaking down his faceplate. That had made Hook's engine turn up into a dangerous snarl. If First Aid saw one of the Stunticons crying, what would he think of the newsparks?

Instead, all First Aid did was sit down beside Wildrider and… comfort him.

Hook had been floored when Wildrider sniffled and then buried himself against First Aid.

Not that he didn't know Wildrider was a very touchy young Decepticon (he'd had a nervous Wildrider bury himself against Hook one too many times before in the medical bay), but that Wildrider did so with a Protectobot. The Stunticons' coding from Vector Sigma and Megatron alike made them hate Autobots. Made them incapable of trusting Autobots.

But Wildrider had allowed First Aid to comfort him, and repair him, until the little Ferrari left with a lightness in his step Hook never saw when he repaired Wildrider. To Hook's greater surprise, he hadn't been jealous but simply surprised. Confounded, even.

And so he'd watched First Aid for three days with a critical optic.

The ambulance weathered the insults and doubts from the Decepticons without complaint. He was gentle and kind where they were harsh and distrusting. The medical bay felt different when First Aid was leading it, but Hook was not sure why.

Every patient was treated to a smile, or First Aid's soft voice as he asked them what was wrong.

He listened to the many complaints, whines and tantrums of the various personalities that made Hook's life in the medical bay a near living hell.

Vortex and Blitzwing had come to the medical bay fuming, hate so strong off their fields that Hook could feel it even from where his berth rested. Neither had paid any mind to the small ambulance examining them as they argued with each other. Only when their argument had turned physical, with Blitzwing shoving Vortex and calling him a litany of insults that had the Combaticon helicopter lunging for the triple changer, did First Aid intercede.

He had jumped between the two fighting Decepticons and only a snarl from Hook's engine halted Vortex, with his clawed digits inches from First Aid's visor. First Aid had stood firm, servos on his hips, until Vortex muttered what Hook thought was an apology, then backed off.

Blitzwing had sneered one last insult at Vortex that almost made the helicopter act, but the unwavering stare from First Aid stopped him. Hook was surprised. He had to snarl at both Vortex and Blitzwing alike when they got a helm full of hot air beneath them and inclined to throw a fit in the medical bay.

Part of Hook wanted to know why First Aid was able to make both hotheaded Decepticons back off of each other, but the larger part of him — the pride of his place, of his purpose — kept his mouth shut and optics narrowed into hard flint as he watched First Aid.

He was woken from a weak recharge on the fourth morning of his "rest and recuperation", as Scrapper insisted on calling it whenever he visited the medical bay, with the sound of shuffling metal.

The lights were dim, merely enough for his night vision to not need to activate.

Movement to the side pulled Hook's helm to the right, where he saw a small, now familiar frame moving about near the supply closet. "First Aid." Hook's tone was rougher than he meant, the aftereffects of recharge making his usually smooth baritone gravelly.

First Aid made a small sound from where he stood, moments before he hurried to Hook's side. One servo moved to Hook's back, to help him sit up, while the other held out a cube of energon.

Hook took the energon and drank it slowly, the cool sweetness of the beryllium extracts making a pleased sigh escape the crane.

Which made First Aid smile.

Which made Hook scowl in turn.

His expression soured as Hook looked away from the ambulance. What was wrong with First Aid?

Overly friendly, overly caring. Compassionate. It continued to rankle Hook, even with the knowledge that First Aid had patched him up. Had repaired him and, judging from the many diagnostic scans Hook had run, First Aid's repairs had been… competent, at best.

Hook wasn't falling apart at the seams after all.

Grumpily sipping at his energon, Hook almost didn't notice First Aid pull out a datapad before the soft lilt of his voice carried through the medical bay. He read out every supply he'd used on every patient, as well as their injuries, but it was First Aid describing preventative procedures he'd given to Astrotrain that gave Hook pause.

They couldn't afford preventative procedures, as much as Hook itched to fix the littlest cracks or microfractures in the Decepticon ranks. There weren't enough supplies, never enough when Megatron focused so much of their productive means on idiotic weapon designs that never worked. (Hook always told the foolish warlord that they needed time to perfect his inane designs, but all it ever did was make Megatron rush them more. Hook missed working solely under Scrapper, who always understood the painstaking perfection Hook took to everything he did. Megatron yelled at him and simply did not understand the vision Hook had of what they could build with the proper time.)

"Before you protest," First Aid's voice whispered, a low, uncertain energy to the tremor of his vocalizations, "I used my own supplies for Astrotrain's procedure. None of yours."

Hook opened his mouth, for what he didn't know, then closed it.

"Fine," he growled, arms crossed over his chest plate in a clear sign of annoyance, his energon cube held to his side in one servo.

If First Aid wanted to use his supplies (dwindling though they were, Hook knew) then he could. Hook wouldn't protest a necessary repair being made to one of his faction.

You care, more than you like to let on.

Hook shuddered.

How could First Aid read him with such ease?

What did the Protectobot see in Hook that no other Decepticon, but for Hook's own brothers, could?

Hoping to erase that train of thought, Hook gave a low snort, then appraised First Aid with his usual criticism. "What will you do when you run out of your supplies?"

Only a fool would think Megatron would allow First Aid to leave the Victory to restock. Even if First Aid was there to become Hook's replacement, Megatron would loathe the reminders of how poorly stocked his faction's medical bay was. Hook suspected First Aid would not take being screamed at by a furious Megatron, whose fusion cannon would always be aimed at the perpetrator, as well as Hook did.

One got used to Megatron's fits when they'd known him as long as Hook did.

"My brothers would be willing to send us supplies if I was able to contact them—"

A cold, disbelieving laugh burst from Hook, interrupting First Aid.

The ambulance stared at him, his expression impossible to read as his facemask returned to cover the lower half of First Aid's faceplate. But his field was open enough for Hook to sense the hurt from the Protectobot, even as he quickly reeled in his field and hid it from Hook's purview.

"Do you truly believe Decepticons that dull, First Aid?" Hook hissed, his glare full of venom.

First Aid shook his helm, a tiny, faint "no, Hook" ignored by the crane.

Instead, Hook continued to rant, his anger over the situation Megatron had forced him and First Aid into finally coming to the surface. "If you contact your brothers, they will find the Victory, and then what do you think they will do? You already saw what Blades did to me alone, Defensor would destroy the Victory and all of us inside it."

"No, Hook, listen," First Aid tried to interject, but Hook snarled and continued his rant.

"As I have made abundantly clear before, I am as unhappy you are here as you are," Hook noticed a flash of blazing light in First Aid's visor, but plowed on. "If you want to escape, you can try it on your own, but I will never permit you to contact your team so that they may come to rescue you—"

"Hook!" First Aid's growl shut the crane up.

He blinked in shock at the Protectobot, who was standing rigid before him, hurt in his visor all over again.

First Aid's shoulders slumped, before he sat down on the edge of Hook's medical berth, servos still occupied with his datapad. "I do not believe in harming others, or leading others to cause harm to what the Autobots would term my 'enemies'. While I do not approve of Blades attacking you, or the harm my brothers have caused your team—"

Hook tilted his helm at that, but First Aid continued before Hook could stop him.

His team had been hurt beyond simply himself?

Was First Aid being truthful, or merely projecting a chance of his team harming the Constructicons because of Hook's incident with Blades?

"— it is an action I could prevent him from if I was able to secure a transmission to my team's base. If I explained the situation here on the Victory," a glare from Hook was met with a second of pause from First Aid, before his voice dipped with firmness, "without explaining your true vulnerabilities, then I am sure they would be more than willing to send us supply shipments from my stocks at the Protectobot base."

Hook stared at First Aid, judgingly.

The idea was, perhaps, sound.

Soundwave was an expert at masking the Victory's location. He was as loyal to the cause as he was loyal to his cassettes and then Megatron. Soundwave could see reason in asking their enemy for assistance.

Hook's pride loathed needing assistance from anyone, especially overly charitable Autobots. Whether this suggestion was another one of First Aid's attempts to treat the Decepticons like infant sparklings whom he needed to rescue remained unclear to Hook. (Part of Hook nagged at him for that belief, for if First Aid thought so, why had he been so gentle to Wildrider and even to the arguing Blitzwing and Vortex?)

But Hook's realism made him relent.

"I can discuss the matter with Soundwave and Scrapper," First Aid notably perked up at that, "but I can give no guarantee."

"I understand," First Aid returned, his visor softening to a warm, soothing blue as he once more stood, giving Hook his entire berth back.

Hook grumbled something under his breath and looked away from First Aid.

First Hook allowed him to work in his medical bay with him, and now he was pondering the idea of having First Aid's gestalt assist the Decepticons with their medical supplies. Logic and pride warred in his mind as Hook stared absently at his cube of energon. He felt First Aid's presence hovering near him, but no instinct told him to chase him off.

As long as First Aid didn't speak, then—

The sound of the door to the medical bay opening, and heavy, very familiar stomps of pedes, drew Hook's gaze up, past First Aid and to where Scrapper was stalking towards him.

His shovel was poised perfectly over his shoulders, which were set in a hard, straight line. It was only from his millions of years of knowledge of his best friend that Hook registered that Scrapper was angry. He was never so rigid, never so ramrod straight in posture, and his shovel "talked" more than he ever kept it still.

"Scrapper?" Hook's question hung between the three of them as Scrapper stopped in front of Hook's berth, then turned his helm to stare down at First Aid.

"Leave." Scrapper's command left ice in the air as he looked down at First Aid.

First Aid swallowed, glanced towards Hook, then stepped back with a polite nod. "I will be in the office if you need me."

Then he hurried away, closing the door to the sound proof office behind him.

Scrapper released a vent, then sat down on the edge of Hook's berth, facing away from Hook.

Hook shifted his stance enough that he could extend his free servo out to snag Scrapper's right servo, holding it close and with a gentle warmth flooding off his field to the front loader. Scrapper didn't notice, that much he could tell, as he shook his helm and stared at his knees.

"Megatron believes that the Protectobots find us the crux of First Aid's capture," Scrapper began, his tone unusually cold. "We were targeted by Blades and Hot Spot in the raid following your injury."

Hook almost choked on the energon he was still sipping since First Aid had first given it to him. His brothers hadn't told him about any further raids they were on. So First Aid hadn't been merely suggesting they'd been hurt… "Who—"

"Bonecrusher and Scavenger," Scrapper finished, the question so obvious, Hook needn't have asked.

The bulldozer's side of the bond had been notably quieter than usual, and Scavenger's was completely sealed off. Scavenger never sealed himself off in the bond. Not even when he was reprimanded for flooding them all with his immutable anxiety.

"Are they—?"

"They're alright. First Aid patched them up and both have been resting in our quarters since the raid. Beachcomber and Groove stopped Blades before he could deactivate Scavenger. Hot Spot seemed to realize what he was going to do once his team mate and the Autobot geologist interrupted them, and he called for a Protectobot retreat soon after."

A vent of relief escaped Hook. His frame relaxed just enough for him to shift completely so that he leaned up against the smaller Scrapper's side. This Scrapper finally noticed, with a grateful flash of warmth in his field.

Hook squeezed Scrapper's servo before he leaned his chin on top of Scrapper's helm and allowed his engine to purr. Scrapper's frame relaxed slowly, the silence between them calm and pleasant until Hook felt Scrapper gather himself and shift so that the side of his helm rested on the crane's shoulder.

"Megatron has banned us from leaving the Victory. We are not even allowed to leave for construction projects, and he has assigned all construction projects to Soundwave's supervision. Until this Protectobot business is concluded, he claims that we are 'too valuable to risk'."

There was a snort of derision cloaked in those words.

Memories of the Autobots' Ark. Of Devastator following Optimus Prime's orders.

Of Megatron controlling them back in return.

The implicit statement of Megatron's "value" was clear to Hook, and Scrapper both.

"I may have a solution to the Protectobot issue."

Scrapper scoffed but still looked up at Hook, the curiosity in his visor making Hook glance in the direction of his office. A hint that made Scrapper give a small sound that Hook could not decipher, before he looked back at Hook.

"Explain."

Hook hoped First Aid's belief in his gestalt would hold true.

Chapter Text

"You understand the rules we have set, correct?"

"Yes," First Aid confirmed, his gaze locked firmly onto Scrapper as Hook, Scrapper and Soundwave, further in the back, hovered around First Aid.

The ambulance was seated at the main communications console of the Victory, digits poised over the display controls. His determination and belief in himself was clear to Hook, as much as he tried to find a way this would lead into First Aid revealing the Victory's to the Protectobots.

First Aid had stood firm on his dislike for the tactics of war as he had discussed the desire to contact his team with Hook and later Scrapper. It had taken some convincing from both medics for Scrapper to finally approach Soundwave with First Aid's plan. Hook had expected immediate refusal, if not Soundwave reporting the two Constructicons for being traitors. Soundwave often ignored reason for the sake of his loyalty to Megatron — case in point, Hook's arguments against creating the Stunticons the way they did. The Decepticons didn't have the best materials for producing new members of their species, but anything natural to Cybertron would have been better than the human vehicles Rumble had stolen for Megatron's plan. Soundwave had promptly reported Hook's "disloyalty" to Megatron after he'd complained openly near the third in command, and the punishment (having to deal with Starscream for five days straight in the medical bay as Hook's "assistant") had driven Hook to near insanity.

So Hook had been shocked when Soundwave returned yesterday and agreed to the plan.

Maybe the cassette carrier saw how desperately the Decepticons needed supplies, and had considered how often Rumble and Frenzy both needed repairs.

Maybe it was more than just that too.

When Hook had asked Scrapper how he'd convinced Soundwave to agree, Scrapper had merely shrugged. Said a dismissive "Soundwave has called in the repayment of a debt he's owed me for millennia", and had left it at that.

Hook didn't prod further. He knew when Scrapper needed his privacy. No matter the fact that Hook's desire to know what had prompted the ever put together Soundwave to have a debt with the crane's best friend was still gnawing at him.

He'd been watching Soundwave hover in the back of the communication hub since he, Scrapper and First Aid had arrived. Soundwave had allowed Scrapper to take charge in setting up the communication hub for First Aid with not even a tilt of his helm to express his emotions. The most Hook had noticed was Soundwave catching the fact Hook was watching him as much as Hook was watching First Aid. The third in command watched him back, visor the same dim level of lighting as it had been the entire time.

Rumble and Frenzy were docked and had been upon their arrival. Ravage was cleaning her paws with her glossa, her optics locked onto First Aid with the same suspicion as Hook felt. They were all trusting that First Aid's pacifism wasn't simply convenient to the Protectobot when he needed it most to be.

"Begin." Soundwave's voice seemed to startle First Aid, who jumped notably in his seat, but turned to nod to Soundwave before the ambulance started fiddling with the communications unit.

Hook moved closer to First Aid, watching the way his digits moved over the communication unit. He waited for First Aid to reveal his lie, his trick, but none came.
First Aid entered the comm code for the Protectobots, leaned close to the microphone, then cleared his vocalizer.

"Protectobot base, this is First Aid. I—"

Static shrieked through the air from the receiver before a cacophony of voices responded to First Aid.

Hook recognized Blades yelling a slew of profanities and threats against the Constructicons, which had the crane glance up at Scrapper, unamused. Scrapper's gaze sharpened slightly and a tiny hitch of his engine was all the hint the wheel loader would give that he did not appreciate the threat.

First Aid said a few things to his team (mostly a slew of greetings and repeated variations of "I promise I'm okay!") before he straightened up and cleared his vocalizer.

Quiet came from the Protectobots' side of the comms.

"I need my medical supplies," First Aid began. He explained his station, working under Hook, and brushed — admittedly delicately — over the supply shortage the Decepticons had, by inferring that they could not keep up with the amount of injuries with the supplies the Victory had.

Hot Spot, who was now the sole voice speaking on the Protectobot side, gave low, contemplative growls and hums as First Aid spoke. When First Aid finally finished, he cleared his vocalizer sharply.

"We would need to agree upon a meeting point that is neutral to both parties," Hot Spot said, in a cool way that almost made Hook visualize the giant fire engine seated, with one leg kicked up, tapping a stylus against his faceguard. He sounded a lot like Scrapper in one of the wheel loader's contemplative moods.

"I have already thought of that," First Aid said, his gaze snapping to the three Decepticons watching him before he returned his focus to the comms. "We should meet someone far from human eyes. Southern Idaho is a fair distance of a drive for both Autobots and Decepticons from their point of base. Its further for us specifically, yes, but it's safe for both parties."

Hook watched as First Aid input some coordinates (not the Victory's he was reassured to see) to be transmitted to the Protectobots. A hum from Hot Spot came moments later, then a firm, "Craters of the Moon? I believe that could work. Who will run the supply pick up for you?"

"Scavenger," Scrapper spoke before First Aid could even form the idea to speak.

A growl of surprise escaped from Hot Spot. "Hello, Scrapper. Scavenger sounds suitable. You will send no one else but Scavenger, I presume?"

"Correct."

"Very well. Groove has volunteered to run supply for us in return."

Scrapper looked at Hook.

Hook gave a tight nod.

Groove had been the one to help prevent Blades from damaging Scavenger further, after all. He was a pacifist, and the least likely to decide to shoot Scavenger.

"That is acceptable," Scrapper said, before he stepped back from the comms unit, allowing First Aid it alone.

Who looked at Scrapper before he tapped the comms unit. "I think you should ask if Beachcomber will help as well. He can assist with transportation and I trust he will not speak of our dealings with the Decepticons."

Hook crossed his arms as silence met First Aid's suggestion. First Aid had discussed his choices for transport (Groove and Beachcomber, but no one else) with Scrapper and Hook beforehand, so Hook knew of the addition. It wasn't one he could disagree with either. Two pacifists weren't likely to attack Scavenger. Not that Scavenger wasn't capable of defending himself, but the Constructicons loathed going anywhere alone, especially with the Autobots around. He and his best friend were trusting First Aid on his word that neither Autobot would damage or attack Scavenger.

"I will ask him if he'd be open to a private discussion," this time a different voice spoke up, not Hot Spot.

He saw First Aid brighten and heard him whisper an affectionate "hey there, Groove" at the response.

Hook heard Groove respond back with a nonchalant response while the crane downloaded the voice print of Groove into his recognition matrix. He allowed First Aid to catch up with Groove for a bit before he cleared his vocalizer.

First Aid jumped. He looked up at Hook, hurt in his visor, then turned to the comms. "I need you to stop attacking the Constructicons. They haven't hurt me. They're being very fair and gentle with me, all things considered. I don't want to repair them again because of my own brothers. Please."

Silence.

But for some muffled growling that sounded like Blades, before Hot Spot's voice returned. "Understood. We hope you can return to us soon."

"I do too," First Aid whispered, just loud enough for Hook to hear him.

He glanced away, spark tightening in his chest plate. None of them wanted First Aid where he was. But returning him to the Protectobots without Megatron's approval would result in the Constructicons being punished.

So First Aid would stay, until Megatron decided he wasn't needed.

"When do you need the first shipment?" Hot Spot's voice barely registered in Hook's audial receptors with the torrent of thoughts racing through his helm.

"As soon as possible, please?" First Aid's voice trembled, though Hook couldn't reason why.

"Hey…" Groove's voice again. "We love you, alright? I know we can't feel you in the bond, but we're just glad to hear from you."

A tiny chuckle escaped from First Aid. "I know. I miss you."

A chorus of comments from the Protectobots flooded the comms, before Soundwave made a very clear sound from his tape deck.

"I need to go," First Aid promptly stated, the sorrow in his tone even clear to Hook.

"We will send Groove, and Beachcomber if he agrees, to the meeting site in two days," Hot Spot's deep, warm rumble softened, the sound of his engine purring clear even through the comms receiver. "Stay safe, little brother. Please."

First Aid glanced up at Hook before he turned back to the comms, and said, very warmly, "I will be fine. I've got it handled."

Something else was whispered from the Protectobots' side of the comms, before First Aid ended the call and stood up. He turned to Hook, gaze hard to read with how utterly rigid his entire frame was, then dipped his helm.

"Thank you for allowing me to contact my team."

"It was not for your benefit," Hook sneered.

First Aid stared at him. Then he shook his helm and his shoulders sank. "I'm ready to return to the medical bay."

Hook grumbled to himself, gave Scrapper and Soundwave both curt nods, then headed back towards the medical bay. First Aid followed behind him quietly.
At least verbally, he was silent.

His field, on the other servo, was turbulent.

Clashing energy struck Hook, flashes of hurt, of mourning loss, of fear and of anticipation. The crane turned his helm just enough to look down at the ambulance. His shoulders were still slumped and his pedes drug slightly as he walked behind Hook.

Hook had never been separated from his gestalt for long. The most time he was separated usually was a worksite project where at least one of his team was around. He wondered what it was like to be separated for multiple weeks from one's gestalt.

First Aid looked unwell, worse than he had before contacting his team.

"I don't need your help in the medical bay," Hook growled, "take a break until we get that shipment."

A sound of static, and confusion from First Aid's field, was the ambulance's response. But then he felt First Aid's servo brush his arm and heard him whisper a tiny, "Thank you, Hook."

Scavenger's excited voice droned on inside the gestalt bond as Hook, alongside First Aid, sorted through the first box of medical supplies the Protectobots had given them. The excavator was endlessly intrigued by the two Autobots, Groove and Beachcomber, who had met him for the supply drop.

::. Enough, Scavenger, .:: Scrapper finally said, cutting through another long winded Scavenger ramble about how Beachcomber and he had "seen a neat bit of lava rock and had examined it together" sharply.

An embarrassed apology came from Scavenger before quiet reigned once more in the gestalt bond.

A light laugh from his side pulled Hook to where First Aid was hiding his laugh behind a large stack of medical mesh. Catching Hook's gaze on him, the ambulance relented and met Hook's gaze, where the crane was met by warmth from First Aid's visor. Even with First Aid's faceguard up, Hook could tell he was smiling.

"You looked like you caught a whiff of rusted, rotting plating right then. What's going on?"

Hook rolled his optics behind his visor, but felt his mouth twitch with a smile involuntarily. "Scavenger cannot stop singing the praises of Groove and Beachcomber. Apparently they were distracted by lava rocks, and that is why they were so late to return the supply shipment. Unbelievable."

"Is that bad?" There was still that hint of humor in First Aid's tone as he questioned Hook, enough so that Hook stopped his work — sorting out different medical threadings that were used to stitch damaged plating together — temporarily to look at First Aid.

"Not exactly, no," Hook admitted grudgingly.

Scavenger was rarely happy. (Much like how Hook was rarely happy, or Scrapper was rarely happy. Alright, no Constructicon was happy). To hear and feel his brother's excitement and genuine joy meant more to Hook than he liked to express, especially to Scavenger himself. Hook's brothers teased him about his ego, but let Scavenger know you liked something of his and he'd never shut up.

A servo touched his arm.

Hook's gaze fell onto First Aid, where the ambulance was leaning into him, his right servo wrapped around Hook's wrist, visor hauntingly clear in its focus. Hook looked away, a strange warmth cycling through his frame as he returned to organizing the medical thread.

"Let him have this," First Aid whispered.

Hook vented, his shoulders slumping momentarily, but he nodded nonetheless. "If it keeps him out of the medical bay, then I will accept his blathering."

No need to let First Aid see that Hook was happy for Scavenger.

That would be as baseless an accusation as when First Aid had suggested he cared about every single one of his obnoxious, irritating, processor breaking patients. First Aid was thinking too Autobot for the crane.

(Though he was right. Of course Hook cared. How could he not?)

"Get back to work. I do not condone gossip hour," Hook growled when he felt First Aid's field softly brush over his plating. It was too comforting and soft for his tastes. They had work to do.

Blasted ambulance.

The words on the datapad blurred into each other the longer Hook stared at it.

The supply roster had become a blur after eight straight boxes of supplies. Even First Aid was flagging, as he continued to store supplies into the once empty cabinets. Hook hadn't expected to see how much the Protectobots had given them. Scavenger had made note of how hard it was transporting eight boxes, but Hook hadn't thought all eight boxes would be packed full.

Not that he was—

Heavy pedes stomped into the medical bay, accompanied by growling he well knew by now.

"Onslaught, what brings you here?" Hook vented, without even looking over his shoulder at Onslaught as he saved the progress he'd made on the supply list, then looked up at the leader of the Combaticons.

Onslaught was looming over Hook, red visor blazing, cannons smoking ever so slightly, and his shoulders were so rigid, Hook could have balanced a tray of full energon cubes on them without fear of them spilling.

It was clear he wasn't injured, so Hook could not fathom why Onslaught was bothering him.

Didn't he get enough Constructicon time with Scrapper?

"I need to speak to you."

Hook blinked, then turned back to his work. Even if the words on the datapad screen still were blurring over each other. "You already are, aren't you?"

Hook felt Onslaught's rage in the heat that radiated off the other's plating, seconds before he felt Onslaught's servo land heavily on his shoulder.

Unamused, Hook paused his work and looked up to Onslaught, optic ridge raised behind his visor. "What."

Onslaught's gaze turned frostily towards First Aid before he turned back to Hook. "As I said, I have cause to speak to you. You and Scrapper. Alone."

Hook raised an optic ridge archly. He said nothing for a time, gaze inscrutable the longer he made Onslaught wait. Perhaps part of him enjoyed seeing the ever in control Onslaught lose his patience. Perhaps part of him was annoyed at Onslaught wanting, always, to speak with Scrapper.

"Very well."

Onslaught let out a sigh of relief.

"Finish the reports," Hook said as he turned his helm to First Aid, who perked up at the focus on himself, "and then restock the battlefield medical kits."

A nod was First Aid's sole response as Hook stood up languidly.

He could take his time.

Push Onslaught's patience ever so closer to the edge.

The crane stretched, exaggerating it as he felt his hips pop from sitting for so long. He worked the knots out of his shoulders, swiveled his crane mount and boom, then finally looked to Onslaught.

"Lead the way," Hook drawled with a gesture towards the door out of the medical bay.

Onslaught stared Hook down, clearly meaning to intimidate him, but Hook simply met Onslaught's gaze coolly. The Combaticon eventually relented, turning his helm away with a frustrated sound before he stalked out of the medical bay.

"I will be back, message me if you need assistance with anyone or anything," Hook said with a dismissive wave to First Aid.

He heard a small engine rev in answer, and the continued sound of busy work. At least First Aid wasn't one for gossip, and seemed to enjoy busy servos.

Much like Hook.

Hook's engine let out an involuntary purr at that thought.

It was loud enough to have Onslaught gawk at him.

Mortified, Hook looked at Onslaught with a bored expression, challenging him to say anything.

Onslaught didn't, until they reached a door that Hook well knew led to Onslaught's private office. There, Onslaught knocked on the door, said a quiet "coming in," and then held the door open for Hook.

Hook bowed his helm in Onslaught's direction as he stepped inside — and saw Scrapper, pacing back and forth in front of Onslaught's desk.

::. You came! .:: Scrapper sounded relieved as he hurried up to Hook, large servos patting him on the shoulders and over his arm tires affectionately as Onslaught closed the door behind them.

Hook didn't respond to Scrapper but for a raised look that had Scrapper shake his helm, before he released his hold on Hook and stepped back. Onslaught took that chance to walk between the two and to his side of the desk, where Hook spotted two chairs seated close together, while two more sat on the opposite side of the desk. A fifth was scattered in the back of the room, broken and splintered as if a very large tank had crushed it.

"Brawl," Onslaught confirmed as he sat down in one of the two chairs on his side of the desk, then he gestured to the chair across the desk from Onslaught. "Sit. Please."

It was the please that had Hook double take. He glanced to Scrapper as the wheel loader continued to stand near him, and it was then that he saw Scrapper was upset.

No.

Not upset.

Scared.

Now deeply uncertain, Hook swallowed, then sat down across from Onslaught.

The Combaticon's haughtiness seemed to have left him the very second he sat down, for Hook could now see his entire frame slumped. His field seemed weak, tired, to a degree. Anger bristled off him still, in boiling waves of heat Hook could see from Onslaught's vents. And his visor…

It was dark with exhaustion. With what seemed to be a clear distance.

"Onslaught?" Hook quiered slowly as he watched Scrapper approach the desk and—

Scrapper settled into the chair beside Onslaught. Not next to Hook.

Frustration and jealousy shot through Hook as he looked at Scrapper. His best friend paid little mind to Hook as he moved a servo to Onslaught's plating.

The Combaticon let out a deep exhale of air through his vents at Scrapper's touch. Then Hook watched, horrified, as Scrapper's servo moved down beneath the table. Likely to rest over Onslaught's ample thigh, judging by the wheel loader's position and the way Onslaught's anger seemed to dissipate somewhat at the touch.

"How long have you two been seeing each other?" Hook asked, tone barbed in a way that only Scrapper could catch.

A shocked, saddened look from Scrapper was shot Hook's way, but it was one he ignored completely.

"Since Megatron assigned us both to work on the repair and reorganization of the brig," Scrapper answered, his gaze searching — for understanding, Hook believed.

Hook gaped.

That had been five months ago. Only a month or so after the Combaticons had been brought back online by Starscream.

Horrified, Hook glared between them both, then let out a disbelieving growl. "Does Megatron know?"

"No," Onslaught finally answered, his expression hard to read even with his faceguard lowered.

Hook let out a disbelieving snort.

Not yet, more like!

Angry, and aware that his anger was protective, Hook looked around the private office of Onslaught's for any potential bugs or spying cassettes. Finding none, Hook glared at both gestalt leaders.

"You both know the laws of fraternizing within the faction! Especially two as highly ranked as you both are!"

Hook hated the stress in his voice. It was too vulnerable. Too weak, especially for Onslaught to hear.

They were fools! Hook worked at his jaw, before he stood, anger overtaking his thoughts. He jabbed a digit at Onslaught, denta bared in a venomous snarl.

"If you get my brother in trouble because of your infatuation with him, I will kill you. Is this why you asked me to speak to you?" Hook spat, crane hook and cable whirring as his anger bristled out from his protoform and spark and into his entire outer plating. "I have more important matters to tend to than two love struck idiots—"

"Hook." Scrapper's glare and snarl shattered Hook's anger like a drill going through ice.

Scrapper's expression made it worse. It wasn't simply one of Scrapper's frustrated glares, no, this one was a protective, furious glare that smoldered all the way into his plating. It made him feel sick to have Scrapper angry at him.

He lowered his helm and sat back down, unable to even look at Scrapper after his reprimand. Hook restrained the urge to fidget with his servos as he heard Onslaught's vents cycle, and felt the air in the room turn cold and damp.

"I have a favor to ask of you," Onslaught began, his prideful tone entirely absent. Hook looked up, helm tilted as he recognized the strain in Onslaught's tone as desperation. "I need you to examine my team and I for—" Onslaught winced, servo flying to the bridge of his nose, while he took in slow, methodical breaths of air through his vents.

Scrapper leaned close to Onslaught, hushed voice whispering something to him Hook couldn't catch. But he did catch the way Scrapper's servo moved to brush under Onslaught's chin as he spoke.

It made Hook reel back.

Onslaught's digits dug into his faceplate as Scrapper stroked his faceplate, the gentleness in his touch the same but different from what Scrapper would give to Hook and the other Constructicons. It was caring. Vulnerable.

He truly liked Onslaught, didn't he…

Hook didn't know what to think of that.

He knew he should be happy for Scrapper, to want to see his brother finding trusted company in someone else, but it was Scrapper. Hook's best friend. The only person who tried to understand and listen to Hook. Scrapper already had enough responsibilities as the leader of the Constructicons. They needed him.

Scrapper seemed to pick up on Hook's distress as he turned his helm to look towards the crane. "What Onslaught is trying to explain is that he thinks he and his team have some kind of coding bug wrong with them. He gets like this whenever he has attempted to discuss it with me. I believe it is something like the Dominator Discs—"

Hook flinched.

Loudly.

His hook snapped so tightly against the spool that a sharp metallic clang rang through the otherwise silent office. His digits curled into fists. His vents opened and drew in large gusts of cool air.

"No."

How.

Hook shook his helm.

Megatron had destroyed the Dominator Discs.

Had promised the Constructicons they would never have anything similar touch them again. That the Autobots would never control the will of any of his faction again. The Autobots had hardly even encountered the Combaticons closely enough to use anything like the Dominator Discs on them, had they?

"Not—" Onslaught interjected, his voice oddly pained as he held his helm with both servos and took shallow, rapid vents, "—the Autobots. Meg—"

Onslaught's visor shorted out and he slumped face first onto his desk.

Hook scrambled to his pedes as Scrapper grabbed Onslaught's shoulder and one cannon and shook him, desperate worry in his voice as he called Onslaught's name. Hook pulled out his medscanner, though its feedback came back negative.

The scanner couldn't pick up on anything wrong with Onslaught. Even multiple scans read out the same negative.

But the Combaticon's frame was seizing, and energon bubbled out from his mouth in foamy, pink smears.

Scrapper looked up at Hook, the fear in his visor poignant.

"First Aid!" Hook barked over their comms as he signaled for Scrapper to help him pick up the large Combaticon. "Get a berth ready."

"Understood."

It took Scrapper and Hook not much time to transport Onslaught to the medical bay, but the decline in Onslaught's state was rapid. Where only small trickles of energon had been foaming from his mouth when he'd first collapsed, now energon was boiling out of his mouth and he was thrashing and screaming, all the while Onslaught's servos did not move from his helm.

Scrapper and First Aid helped Hook get Onslaught hooked up to energon lines and monitors as quickly as they could. Hook found tools handed to him by First Aid before he even asked for him, and a stack of supplies at his side as Hook rapidly cleansed his servos.

Then turned to Scrapper.

Who looked positively shaken as he stared at Onslaught's convulsing frame.

"Scrapper."

Hook's brother looked up at him, gaze distant, expression darkly pained.

"Don't let anyone in here," Hook ordered.

Scrapper's visor glinted, then he straightened. Purpose filled the wheel loader as he turned his back, still shakily, on Onslaught and stalked to the medical bay entrance.

Hook looked to First Aid, all trace of exhaustion gone from both of them.

First Aid's determined gaze met his, bright blue fire in his visor.

Hook didn't hesitate a second longer.

Hours passed as Hook and First Aid opened Onslaught up, searching for the source of the sudden energon bleed, while staunching the rapid energon loss he was suffering from multiple burst lines. Hook knew none of them were the source, but merely a byproduct of the source of the initial bleed. It was First Aid who was the one who spotted the source, though his horrified whisper of Hook's name made the crane — currently patching up multiple bursting energon lines — move from his work to where First Aid was staring at Onslaught's exposed processor.

The hardware around his processor's cerebellum was blackened, as if something had short circuited within it and burst the processor's many fuel lines.

"What could have done this?" First Aid asked Hook, his fear palpable as Hook slowly examined Onslaught's cerebellum with two digits.

Static leaped from the damaged cerebellum to Hook's digits, shocking him with more force than he expected. It was…

"See what you can do to repair his cerebellum," Hook demanded, "I need to look into his coding. He was mentioning that there may have been tampering in his coding before he collapsed."

First Aid nodded and went right to work, his touch expert and gentle.

Hook watched First Aid temporarily before he pulled open Onslaught's medical cable and port, removed his own from Hook's medical panel, then plugged into Onslaught.
He was met by a rush of dead noise.

Static, and faint synapses danced against Hook as he pieced together Onslaught's coding.

It was a maelstrom of incomprehensible mesh. Hook found parts that made sense — connections for the combiner coding and gestalt bond — but everything was jumbled. As if he'd been put together haphazardly and destructively.

But he had, hadn't he?

Starscream had thrown the Combaticons into rusted hulking shells of human machines. Megatron and Shockwave had… done something to the Combaticons after the fight on Cybertron. What had they done? Hook had never been given clearance to use Onslaught's, or the other Combaticons' medical ports, to see into the very base of their being.

Was that for a reason?

Determined now to find out what Megatron was hiding from him, Hook dug.

And dug.

He could hear First Aid working away at Onslaught, could hear the buzz of repair tools and could sense Onslaught's coding slowly stabilizing from First Aid's repair work and Hook's rearrangement of the missile launcher's coding. Fitting synapses where they were supposed to go, replacing burnt out codes with new ones that Hook always had installed into his systems for situations like this.

It was when he had dug through everything that Hook found what he was looking for.

It was foreign.

Unnatural.

Surging and sparking viciously even as Hook used his medical overrides to access the coding.

To—

Loyalty.

Hook felt himself collapse forward onto the berth, his subconscious catching him as he heard Megatron's voice barking commands of loyalty, of punishment, of fear and obedience and an inability to refuse into Onslaught's coding. His shoulders shook as the crane's energy depleted swiftly as he tried to override the coding and snare it out of Onslaught's frame.

He heard two concerned voices calling his name, then felt a large pair of servos grab him by the shoulder and by the boom. Grounding himself to Scrapper's touch, Hook steeled himself, then grabbed the entire strand of coding that did not belong and ripped it out of Onslaught.

The second he did, Onslaught's coding slammed into Hook, throwing him and his medical override out—

Hook staggered, throwing Scrapper off him as he slammed backwards into the wheel loader unintentionally, then stumbled to the nearest disposal receptacle and purged his tank. His servos shook as Hook clung to the side of the berth nearest him.

Loyalty coding.

Loyalty coding.

"Hook?" Scrapper's servos brushed his shoulder, the comforting strength of Scrapper something Hook openly sank into, First Aid's presence not even a thought as Hook let himself collapse into Scrapper.

"It's loyalty coding, Scraps," Hook explained, his voice high and strained, the baritone rumble broken as he looked towards Onslaught.

First Aid was staring at Hook, then back to Onslaught, who was—

They needed to finish repairs.

"Let me go," Hook whispered to Scrapper.

Scrapper hesitated but released him, though he hovered by Hook as he returned to Onslaught's side. The Combaticon leader was still pulled apart, with First Aid still working to repair the cerebellum damage from…

It had to have been a short out that had surged from the loyalty coding.

The loyalty coding was obliterated, at least.

Hook squeezed Scrapper's arm, a comforting gesture for both of them, then moved to stand directly beside First Aid. "I found loyalty coding imprinted into his coding matrices. I presume the coding flared up and caused a short circuit, judging from the burn damage along his cerebellum."

"That would explain why I found a foreign object in his cerebellum," First Aid said, a hint of venom in his voice that Hook would have noted more closely any other time, then gestured to one tray where a tiny black disc sat.

Hook stared at it for a moment, then looked at First Aid. The ambulance didn't even notice as he continued to work on Onslaught's cerebellum. A flash of respect creeped up onto Hook as he helped First Aid, the two exchanging tools, supplies and hardly a word between them until the repairs were finally complete.

Scrapper hovered nearby as Hook and First Aid placed Onslaught's armor back over his protoform, patching him up with methodical servos until there was not a trace of their work left on Onslaught's frame. Hook turned to his brother, noting the fear in his gaze and the way Scrapper's legs shook where he stood.

"Stay with him," Hook whispered, "he will need company when he wakes."

Gratefulness shot through the bond before Scrapper climbed up onto the berth beside Onslaught, minding the monitor leads and the energon fuel lines he was still attached to, and nestled up against the Combaticon's side.

A trembling sigh from First Aid drew Hook's gaze down to the ambulance.

He was shaking.

His visor was dull—

First Aid collapsed.

Hook caught him without thinking, the ambulance's weight insignificant to the crane as he slowly picked First Aid up and carried him, one arm under First Aid's back and the other under his knees. The crane carried First Aid to his office and gently set him down on Hook's private office berth.

"You did well," Hook whispered to First Aid as he slumped to the ground, leaned his back against the berth and let his optics slip closed.