Ep 0 -- The Reprimand-- (closed)

(after Getting to Know the Locals)


It had been a relief, in a way, to have said more than he would have otherwise - June Darby had a knack for asking the right questions - or the hard one, or the wrong ones, depending on how you looked at it, but it'd been a relief all the same.

And a knotting pain in his ventral struts in others. Too much old history, too much talk, too much trying to remember all the slag he'd spent vorns trying to forget, archived in the depths of his processor as little more than footnotes. June's reactions had brought it all back and then piled Blue's blind optimism on top of it like grit in a cut open line. Lots of differences between 'bots and 'cons and we all strive for it kept ricocheting around his thought threads, like a replay of countless arguments he'd already had and would have again and kept on slagging having with the biggest dreamer of them all, even as he kept right on slogging along in footsteps made of dreams and optimistic filaments of ephemeral hope.

Sometimes he wished he wasn't so much of a realist but his spark was what it was... and what it was was not one fragging bit surprised when Prime's request came over the comm lines. It'd been a day, which was more than enough time for the scuttlebutt around base to have reached their leader's audios.

Time to pay up he thought to himself with a sigh, and it was with his very best reporting-to-a-senior-officer faceplate on that he arrived at the requested room, falling into something that wasn't, quite, parade rest. "Yah wanted t' see meh, Prahm?"

Ironhide kept his plates and field tucked in, face plates unmoving, stance firm as Prime's anger crackled scathingly against him. He kept his optics on Prime, focused on the taller mech's collar struts, and his tone was the same that he had been using on commanding officers since before Optimus had been sparked.

"Wish Ah could, but no, can't rightly say that Ah can," he replied, clipped and impersonal. Against his own better judgement he glanced up, meeting the other's optics, and felt the neutral facade he was holding waver. His mouth twisted, something sour and hot coiling simultaneously through his lines. "Unless yah count th' fragger havin' a mouth on him an' slaggin' up mah Blue."

Ironhide held his ground, struts stiff and straight, but only a function's worth of practice kept him from flinching. He dropped his optics once more and kept them focused straight ahead, and the sour feel in his tanks twisted the rancid memory of Barricade's voice up with the whispers - and louder - going through the base.

It loosened his vocalizer, the words slipping out before he could think better of them. "Treat 'em fair right up until yeh execute 'em, then? Or would that be lettin' 'em go? 'Cus there's a little confusion about that going around right now. Sir."

He couldn't - quite - stop himself from breaking formation and taking a half step back in the face of Prime's anger, the feel of it rocking him back almost like a physical blow. Ironhide recovered as quickly as he could, the answering hot pulse of his own spark straightening his struts.

Prime's anger, though, was as short lived as ever, there and gone, and in its wake... the feel of disappointment, of pain, ripped through his defenses faster than anger ever could have, making him shudder. Venting, Ironhide clenched and unclenched his fists, rebooting his vocalizer with a click until something other than the anger he'd been carrying around shook out. "Prahm... did yeh see th' condition we brought Blue back in?" He was pleading and knew it and hated it even as he did it, desperate for some scrap of understanding in the gulf that was suddenly yawning between them. "That wasn't combat wounds. That was torture. An' yer right, Ah shouldn't've taken it out on him when he couldn't fight back, but he said..." The words broke before he could utter them, horror and anger sweeping back through him, hands clenched, armor flaring against a nonexistent threat. "He said he... Primus, Ah can't even say it, but if he had Ah should've..."

Ironhide forced himself to stop, plates rattling as he made himself still again. "He didn't," he said at last, low. "Ah know that now. But that was not what Ah needed t' hear with Blue layin' like shredded slag in medbay." He vented hard. "He was tryin' t' get t' me, an' Ah let him. So yer right. Ah shouldn't have." He looked away at last, centering his optics on the floor between his own pedes. "Ah don't know if Ah can rightly apologize for beatin' on th' slagger, but Ah shouldn't've let him rev meh up like that."