TFP- Family

_{Part 6/9 of a Transformers: Prime fanfiction based on the events of episode 16 "Operation: Breakdown"}


Knock Out didn't know where he was going – only that he had to get as far away from the Autobots as possible. He kept his accelerator pressed against the floor, charging in top gear along the desert roads of Jasper, not glancing in his rear-views despite the knowledge that the clouds of dust his tyres were kicking up would obscure their base from sight even if he looked.

"Useless crankshafts…" he muttered fiercely, ignoring the shrieking horn of a battered-looking pickup as he swerved into the wrong lane to overtake. "Autobots, humans… what a fraggin' waste of space, the lot of them! They drive me insane…"

In spite of his anger, he knew he couldn't return to the Nemesis without Breakdown. How would he explain himself? He didn't care what Starscream thought anymore – it was Megatron that the medic was worried about. As he found himself strafing back into the correct lane, Knock Out wondered darkly if Megatron would even care that his partner was missing. Somehow, he doubted that the Decepticon leader would order a rescue party for anyone other than himself – except perhaps Soundwave. The silent intel-bot was far too loyal and far too useful for Megatron to let be dismantled by those disgusting humans.

But Breakdown?  In their master's optics, Breakdown was assuredly nothing more than a simple soldier – and there were plenty of those already aboard the Nemesis, eagerly awaiting the next command. Even if Knock Out did return to the ship and request they use valuable energon looking for his missing partner, Megatron would probably punish him for becoming too attached to somebot other than himself. And he didn't even want to speculate what might happen to him if the others learned that he'd made a deal with the Autobots…

"Look at the mess you've gotten yourself into this time, Knock Out," he sighed, in attempt to calm himself down. Up ahead, in the rapidly-approaching distance, he spotted a set of crimson traffic lights. It took a great deal of self-restraint to ease on his breaks and come to a halt at the back of a line of stationary cars, rather than speed through regardless like he usually would have done. As he waited for the lights to turn green, listening to the reserved growling of his engine, Knock Out let out a heavy breath and retreated to the depths of his memory banks.

The pain of the grenade blast was unlike anything he'd ever felt before. He'd already suffered plenty of damage over the course of the war – after all, being a medic meant running into the line of fire to retrieve the injured – but nothing like this.

He lay on the ground for a while, momentarily blinded and deafened by the explosion, the sense knocked clean from his circuits. One of his optics wasn't functioning properly, and he could feel a strange wetness seeping across his faceplates. There was pain in his body – too much for him to process anything else. The war waged on around him, rumbling and shattering, as he lay stunned amongst the rubble.

"Knock Out – sir?!"

He rolled his head to one side, groaning, searching blindly for the source of the voice. His arm felt hot, numb. Were those Seekers in the sky? A familiar face swam into view, taut and frenzied, with wide yellow optics. That bot…Knock Out knew him. What was his name? He couldn't remember. The face disappeared, and a wide servo clamped itself around his chassis. Searing pain shot through his arm and he gasped, trying to pull away, sliding back to reality as the ringing in his audios dissolved into a staccato of gunfire.

Breakdown was still lying in the debris at the base of the chasm, trying to pull the dazed medic to safety. Knock Out scrambled upright – sensing himself caught in the crosshairs of the elevated enemy snipers who had tried to gun him down before. He staggered, too dazed by pain for movement, and fell toward cover; Breakdown dragged him out of range as the snipers opened fire. Senses reeling, Knock Out watched as their bullets peppered the broken ground like metal rain.

His lower arm was completely gone – not even the central frame remained intact. Valves and pistons stuck out at odd angles where his elbow should have been, circuits shorting painfully, streaming energon like no tomorrow. Stunned, he clamped his remaining hand over the stump in attempt to stem the flow – sending blistering agony shooting through his systems. His chassis was charred and punctured with shards of crimson shrapnel; fragments of his own body.

"What a pair we are," he hissed thickly though the haze of hurt, glancing at Breakdown's similarly one-armed body. He tried to laugh; but the effort involved made his processor spin, so he stopped. Breakdown reached for him, concerned, but withdrew his servo as the ground shook with the force of another explosion. "We have to get out of here – it's only a matter of time before those snipers get a good angle on us…"

Breakdown shuffled closer to the mound of debris and peered over its peak, quickly scanning the battlefield. A nanoklik later, he rapidly withdrew his head as the snipers once again opened fire. Knock Out ducked, shielding his head with his remaining arm, but gave a start as he realised that he was suddenly alone.

"Breakdown?!" he gasped, staring around with his functional optic.

He saw his fellow Decepticon storm across the chasm, watched him vault out of the relative-safety of the ravine and onto the battlefield. The snipers began to open fire at once – but Breakdown continued to charge straight ahead, toward the column supporting their vantage point. Bullets ricocheted off his chassis, the sound accenting the dull thunder of distant battles. A stray shot slammed into the mound of wreckage that was Knock Out's cover, scattering dirt. "Stay down!" Breakdown roared.

Knock Out complied; he flattened himself against the ravaged ground, tightly shuttering his partially-working optics as though he believed sightlessness could protect him. He was afraid – more so than he had ever been on the battlefield. Try as he might, he couldn't drown out the sound of the gunfire – he couldn't keep himself from imagining what might be happening to Breakdown…what might happen to him.

He was going to go offline – they both were. Knock Out was so sure of it that he thought he'd passed into the Well of All Sparks when an eerie silence suddenly fell over the battleground. He kept his optics shut, not because he was afraid – but because he lacked the strength to open them. The sound of slowly-approaching footsteps soon met his audios; he could hear the rhythmic crunch of metal and gravel underfoot. Odd…was the floor of the Well littered with shrapnel, too?

"Knock Out, sir?" asked a gruff voice. "Sir…are you alright?"

"I'm offline…" he muttered thickly. "And if I can hear you…that must mean you're offline, too."

"We're not offline, sir."

Knock Out cracked his optics open. Breakdown was staring down at him, battered and dripping energon from every panel of his chassis, waiting anxiously for a response. The medic gazed back up at him, processor swimming in a fog of wonder. "We're alive…?" he asked.

"Yeah…we're alive."

"Move it, you morons!"

Knock Out gave a start, surprised to hear the blaring of a horn from somewhere immediately behind him. The lights had turned green and the dusty road ahead was clear of traffic. The human in the car behind, a bluish land cruiser, was leaning out of its window, shaking his fist angrily.

"Don't you know?" asked a familiar female voice. Knock Out snapped his gaze to the side, taken aback when he noticed Arcee sitting beside him in vehicle form. Her human, Jack, was waving apologetically at the driver of the cruiser. Arcee's wing mirror tilted slightly, as though she was raising an eyebrow toward the Decepticon. "Green means 'go'."

"I know that," Knock Out hissed, flooring his accelerator. He lurched forward into drive, shaking himself mentally as Arcee similarly eased into motion and veered into his slipstream. "What do you want, two-wheeler?"

Arcee gave a sarcastic breath of laughter that was almost lost in the wind. "I was on my way to the base with Jack when Optimus contacted me," she began to explain. "He told me to keep an optic on you; I heard you had quite the little argument with Ratchet before."

"So what?" the Decepticon replied indifferently. "Somebot had to knock that fool down a few pegs."

"Wish I'd been around to see that."

Her response took Knock Out by slight surprise. "And here I thought you Autobots were a tightly-knit clan," he commented, coolly overtaking two humans riding bicycles.

"We are," she shot, swerving slightly from side to side as if to exaggerate. "We care deeply about each other, and would do anything to protect each other – but there are times when even we have our differences… and tempers can run a little high, like they probably did back at base just now. But we stick together – because we're a family, Knock Out. You probably don't understand that, but… that's the way it is."

The Decepticon fell silent for a while, mulling over her words, before slamming on his brakes and jerking his steering wheel sharply in a swift u-turn. Jack flailed a little in panic as Arcee followed Knock Out's lead; the two Cybertronians abruptly inverted their course, speeding back the way they came past the irritated stream of traffic.

"Okay – what was that all about?" Arcee asked suspiciously.

"I think I've cooled off enough," Knock Out sighed heavily. "I want to see if I can't boost your base's pathetic scanners to try and locate MECH."