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gravedwe11er · 1 month ago

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Mecha AU Deadlock angst? Mecha AU Deadlock angst!

Or, I saw a post mentioning that someone is gonna have to explain human lifespans to the bots, and my brain ran with it. Based on the @keferon mecha AU.

CW: Discussions of death and mortality

Human and cybertronian lifespans are such wildly disparate things. Deadlock struggles with this newfound knowledge.

Forty local stellar cycles. Maybe fifty, if he’s one of the lucky ones.

Now, even before his crash-landing on this planet, Deadlock knew enough about organics to be aware they’re generally not as long-lived as mechanical species. Comes with being so breakable all over, if he had to guess, but-

That’s barely half a fragging vorn.

Even if he gets lucky, even if, for once, Deadlock doesn’t fail at keeping the people he cares about safe, the little organic medic is going to be dead in half a vorn. ‘That’s just how things are, for humans,’ Swerve said. ‘I’m sorry,’ Swerve said.

Slag, and what about Roddy? Deadlock’s pretty sure the pilot is younger than Ratchet, but still- that gives him, how long, a vorn? Less? Even the very thought of it just feels so damn wrong. The little guy’s so bright, how could anyone with an EM field like a fucking Prime have the lifespan of--

Deadlock desperately wants to shoot something.

Instead, he drives towards Ratchet’s workshop, transforming the moment he’s out of sight and heading straight for the doc once he finds him in the garage. It’s yet another testament to the man’s caring nature that he lets himself get picked up with only token grumbling, throwing a concerned look Deadlock’s way but not pushing the matter.

The human medic has always been scarily good at reading him. In moments like these, Deadlock can’t help but be overwhelmingly grateful for it.

Hugging the man to the side of his helm, he soon feels a small, calloused hand running gently down one finial. Deadlock wants to scream. The injustice of it all making his processor spin, his spark thrumming with pain and fear and overwhelming grief. How can he bear to lose all this so soon? He’s only just found him, the first glimpse of something like peace in eons, and he can’t deal with the thought of him gone, he can’t-

Ratchet grunts in his servos, knocking loudly on one of Deadlock’s fingers, and with a jolt he realizes just how tight he’s been holding the man. Immediately, he loosens his grip, gently petting down the doc’s back in silent apology. After a moment, a warm ser- hand pats his cheek.

“Feel like telling me what’s eating you, kid?” Ratchet asks, before lightly pushing against Deadlock’s face.

Responding to the wordless request, Deadlock pulls his cupped hands away from his helm, just enough so he can look into the human medic’s opti- eyes. He scrambles for a way to express his racing thoughts, vocalizer hissing with static, before abruptly spitting out, “Are you dying?”

To his surprise, the man bursts out laughing. “Shit, where’d you get that idea?” he chuckles, shaking his head. “Now, as much as I’m sure a bunch of my previous employers would love to dance on my grave, let me assure you that I’m perfectly fi-“

“But you’re not!” Deadlock almost shouts, engine growling. “He said- decay of organic components, and human lifespans are-“ his voice gets stuck in his throat, vocalizer jamming, and he offlines his optics for a moment. Tries to get his slag together, at least a little.

When he turns them on again, all the mirth has left his human’s face. The medic’s eyes are serious, a sad sort of expression on his face, and Deadlock wants to curl himself around the man and never let go.

“Right,” sighs Ratchet, running a hand through his hair. “Yeah, I was sort of hoping you knew about that already.”

The last flutter of hope he was harboring vanishes. “So he was right? You only live for- eighty, ninety of your years?”

“Afraid so, kid,” says the man, suddenly looking so fragile in Deadlock’s palms. “Look, I know it’s not a lot to your kind, but-“

“And there’s nothing to be done? Can’t you- figure something out?”

He’s reaching and he knows it, but the human looks so- accepting of it. Like it’s a perfectly normal thing, to barely get to live at all before your body breaks down and dies, just like that!

Ratchet shakes his head with a wry smile. “Not how that works. People have been trying, sure, but nobody ever really got anywhere. And even if we did manage to drastically expand our lifespans somehow, the psychological effects it would have… we’re just not made for that, Deadlock,” he says, patting Deadlock on the nearest finger; a ghost of a touch, but still comforting. “I, hah, appreciate your faith in me kid, but not even I can do miracles.”

“I just don’t- how the fuck can you be so alright with that?” Deadlock asks, feeling utterly miserable.

The man snorts. “What else is there to do? It’s not like worrying about it would fix anything, and I’m not going to waste my life thinking about my death.” Then the human’s gaze softens, and he stands up to be more optic-level with Deadlock. “Listen to me. I know this is a hard pill to swallow, but there’s nothing you, or anybody else, can change about it. The only thing you can do,” he says gently, reaching a hand towards Deadlock’s cheek, “is make the most of it.”

Deadlock exvents, suddenly feeling deeply tired. “Right. Right, I guess I just- gotta make it count, then,” he mutters, carefully leaning into the contact and the comfort it brings.

Ratchet smiles at him. “That’s the spirit. Have fun with Roddy- safe fun,” he quickly adds. “Take him on drives, or, hell, feel free to bum around my workshop as usual, if that’s what you want. You know I don’t mind the company, provided you behave yourself,” says the doc, his words punctuated by a mock-threatening look. “Just… try enjoy the time you have with us, okay?”

“Mkay,” he answers, voice still choked with static, before pulling the little medic to his chestplates. This close to his spark, he can read the human’s odd, tiny EM field with perfect clarity – concern, quiet affection and a deep kind of care rolls off of him in waves. Sometimes, Deadlock wishes he could tangle their fields together properly, synchronizing their frequencies in an embrace only possible for his kind, but- this is good too. More than good, really – it’s something unique to the two of them, and that makes it perfect as far as he’s concerned.

“Now, I’d really like to know which tactless bastard just dropped all this on you,” jokes Ratchet, the vibrations of the man’s voice tickling pleasantly against his plating, “so I can go brain them with a wrench for it.”

Despite himself, Deadlock snorts. “I think Swerve might be a little outside your size class, doc.”

“Oh, don’t you underestimate me, kid!” the medic grumbles, but he’s laughing too, and the return to the usual banter eases some of the weight on Deadlock’s spark.

Forty stellar cycles, maybe fifty.

He’ll make those years count.

He’ll make them be enough.

(Maybe, if he repeats it a few hundred times more, he’ll make himself believe it, too.)

#transformers #tf mecha au #tf mecha universe #ratchet #tf ratchet #tf deadlock #dratchet #ratchlock

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cosmique-oddity · 2 months ago

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Phew, my last weeks of work are now complete >:)

I loved Dratchet and Ratchlock since the very beginning of my attachment towards Transformers, first TFP Ratchet…..but yeah….two of my favorites character….plus Keferon’s Mech AU…..I had to make my own thing about it.

A story….no…an illustration ! I couldn’t choose. So I did both :}

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That was not the first time Ratchet came back to his private lab angry, but this time, yelling at his superiors, and at the system, and basically at evverything that could be yelled at except the pilotd while leaving the manufacture, was certainly the last. He quit. That was enough,

you don’t win a war with feelings they said

well yes,

exactly,

but you win a war with soldier, and frying their mind before they have their first fight because you want them to be more perfectionned ? That was a little counter productive.

So he gave up. They are on their own now.

The lightly humming of his car was barely enough to keep him awake, it have been a long time since he last returned home, usually, he stayed at his work place, to have more time to sleep, but then, he was sleeping even less. An endless vicious circle, things were often like that.

But all of that was over for him.

He granted these young greenhorn with his experience, and what did they do ? Ignored his advices. Sending pilots to death. So now, he had himself out of the infernal machinery. This mindless waste of human life, even where this is what they tried to save was absurd.

In the middle of his quiet and late ride, he heard a noise. Rumbling, was it the engine ? As he stopped the car backroad to check, the noise wasnt stopping. Came from the sky, military patrol ? He raised his two tired eyes on the sky and saw a shining rail approaching his forest, falling fast. Not quintesson shaped, and with the gaze of an experimented biomechanist, Ratchet identified a mech.

At this moment, its violently crashed on the ground, behind the trees at maybe three or four miles away. No matter how hard he argued with the scientist sooner this day or how bad he wanted to say fuck to all of this death industry who killed young soldiers, he could do something for the one trapped inside the mech....maybe.... the man regained his car as fast as possible and urgently headed for the crash area.

Deafened sound of tires on the damaged road. Ratchet was already projecting, mentally stocktaking the tools he took with him, and lucky enough for the poor pilot, he quit with almost all of his material, and even if it was mainly mechs repairing material, he also bought some instruments which were used for the subtle neuromedicine between human and mech. Could adapt some of it and stabilize the pilot....then he may have the time to go home and grab proper materials. If there was life there was hope.

" bold of him to crash himself just the day i insulted all of his hierachy".

He frowned. Almost there.

The trees nearby were crushed and uprooted. A flickering pink light catched his gaze.

Almost immediately, the Ratchet analyzed the mech. It was different. He didnt know in wich country it was made but that almost looks alien. The curves and shapes, busted and burned on several places were demonstrating an incredible display of genius ingeniery he could just admiring. But time was not for being amazed on plating.

Someone was trapped there.

He stopped and parked his car in front of a fallen tree, rushing to the car's trunk, taking few indispensable objets, including some of them to help a safe disconnection between pilot/mech. In case he wasnt out already. And a crowbar, the cockpit might be stuck, seeing all the damages the mech has taken...

The sound of slightly wet grass under his feet was covered by a frenetic noise of aeration. Ratchet listened to it, while cautiously approaching the unknown mech. It almost sounded like a breath, but was certainly a depressurisation issue. The mech had fallen from so high on the sky....

The damaged plating were hot, probably from atmosphere friction. He raised his crowbar and his eyes followed the curves of the chestplates, searching for a familiar shape, that could lead him to the injured pilot inside. His gaze stopped on a deep wound, that might have cut through the cockpit.

The engineer stepped on the hot metal, his thick boots preventing him from feeling the heat, and he started searching for a hint....anything that could be a mechanism, anything that could open this damn mech !

Ratchet considered the damaged chest plate he noticed earlier. The surroundings of the wound were leaking bright pink, a very unusual color for fuel. Another of these definitively strange things about the mech. Again....not the time for that. Maybe if he could widen the gap, then he would be able to have an idea of what was going on under this armor.

He tapped the plate, -it was starting to cool down- with one of his finger. It was a very little tap, but the whole mech startled. A hiss of pain, recognisible easily by an emerite engineer-but-i-fix-people-too, it had come from the head of the mecha. Was this modele controlled from the head, like Vortex ? But Vortex was insanely huge for a mech, way taller than this one. He moved careful, noticing the shaking of his support.

"You hear me, kid ? Its going to be ok. You crashed in a safe area.".

He spoke in his medic tone, wich mean, of course brusque, serious, but also reassuring and calm.

He mumbled about the mech's features and tiny words of comfort while reaching for the head.

A red light, not regular and rather epileptic was coming from the head, and while he was almost there, on all four of his limb to keep balance, Ratchet saw it.

A spectacularly humanoid face, with sculpted nose and lips was tensed in a painful expression, frowning, but the thing who trapped his gaze was the two optics....

....staring back at him.

Mechs dont stare. Their eyes are glowing, oftenly to mimick human face, after all, human are pretty prideful creature, no point in piloting big ass metal titan if no one could tell these where their creation.

What human couldnt mimick with technologie, on the other hand, was the subtle expression between trying to evualuate a threat, his own injuries, and looking rather on the verge of death but also ready to tear any enemy's limb appart with its teeth.

With just one....very long....look at the other's eye, Ratchet was suddenly understanding what was going on.

Well....probably not but he knew what he had to save.

The pilot, the pilot he had to save.

The mech was the pilot.

He was the one he had to save.

He stopped trying to -certainly- open his chest. If it wasnt good for human it probably wasnt for living technology.

The giant technological humanoid seemed in a high distress, exhaling a lot of air from his vents, his eye still intensely staring at him and the engineer doubted his usual technique -including trying to make himself as small as possible- would work.

"Its going to be okay Kid. I can help you. There is nothing here that want to harm you".

He did his best to convey all of these emotions with his facial expression and gaze, still firmly watching back at him.

"the world better wait till im home and officially retired before killing me".

The mech's gaze -damn it was so more living than ANY human made machinery- seemed to soften a bit but still radiated with suspicion.

Deadlock had been in several bad situations. It happened quite a lot when a specie of giant aliens with tendrils tried to invade your homeland, and he was ready to it.

Trained to kill, and to do it efficiently.

And he was *good* at it.

This time was just another of these ‘i went too far in my excitation’ moments, and he has crashed on a random planet he hoped was not inhabited. He landed hard, and pieces of his ship must’ve been thrown near his location.

And now, now there was an organic like no one he ever saw, and the organic was on his *lap* and he had the kindest warmest eyes he ever saw.

And these eyes were directly looking at his own eyes, and the well named ‘Deadlock’ was starting to wonder if he finally had reunited with the Allspark. His pained and tenseful grin faded a little and he tried to move his head forward, searching a better point of view to watch the singularity in front of him.

Ow.

Moving hurt.

Some sound came out of the organic’s mouth, probably a language. He didn’t had the proper tools to decode it but the tone of the language was extremely….comforting ? Soft ?

This was scary.

He wasn’t used to be welcomed like that after a fight.

Usually it was either another fight, either the yelling of a superior, either nothing at all. But this actual living being was carefully examinating his chestplates, and he recognized the gestual of someone who was used to heal. A medic perhaps ?

He tried to move something, maybe a hand, to reach for the pale organic, to be sure he was real, but his body was rather uncooperative, from what he could say, one of his legs was missing, and a lot of wound were releasing energon on the ground he couldn’t saw.

The high probabilities of bleeding out and crash was an issue.

He let his head hang, too tired to watch for every moves of the organic, and barely aware of his environment.

There must be a big problem somewhere….

He confusely thought, while watching the stars.

Must be a bigger injury I haven’t saw……..

Ratchet saw the bright light coming from the alien’s eyes slowly fading, and cold swear ran through his back. Yet, he could still say the soldier was alive, the lights of his body were shining, not a lot, but it was enough. He looked at his first aid kit with disappointment. That wouldn’t be very efficient since the form of life he was trying to preserve wasn’t a tiny human. The nearest thing he could compare the Mech to was….well their own mechs, or eventually….Quintesson. An horrible mess of organic and technology. It was partially thanks to their weird constitution that Ratchet had been able to make sense with the ‘he is alive’ thought.

At this moment and with this material, he couldn’t help the kid, and didn’t possess enough knowledge to tell if he was even dying or not.

He had already an idea of what to do….to fix him, at least trying to, but it involved several objects he hadn’t right now. Leaving to search for these so called objects was risking to let an injured alone, he couldn’t take that risk. He was trapped with the mech, and had to hurry and find something. He stood and reached for more adapted material in his car, trying to find something…. Anything.

Surprisingly, the most useful artifact he came across was his electric screwdriver and a bunch of screw along with a long metallic cabke. A parallel between human stitch, with sewing threads and the material he had with him right now. He could manage something between human fixing and mech repairing, that was what the ‘bio’ in bioengineer stood for.

The kid would be ok. He would live and tell Ratchet why he fell from the sky, and maybe if he saw his friend Jazz….out there…….

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:)) @keferon

(I swear I’m not insane, your AU is just kinda giving me infinite drawing stamina lmao)