#i Cannot believe some vets really are so far removed from evidence based practice

[eqan]

breeder contract says i have to neuter dewey at 6 months of age or “at the discretion of the veterinarian” but the veterinarian i saw yesterday was like “neuter him asap or he’ll get aggressive and get cancer” and i know neither of those are true so 💀 i need to find a new vet

[selanaris]

A Beastly Fate

(Note: An amazing writer @moonlightdeer739 wrote this amazing piece and I cannot wait to read more!!)

Bumblebee made an impulse buy as he and the rest of the repair crew were docked on Cybertron, most mechs buy small domestic pets to keep them company on long flights, but hey, when a hulking great big Cyger is going for less than most fancy breeds, who’s he to turn such a deal down? Little does he know just what a fate he’s set himself, the Cyger, and his small team on.

Chapter 1

Bumblebee wasn’t the brightest bot, he’d never claim that, one of the fastest online? Oh he’d say that until his final cycle, he’d say that if he was rusted to the planet itself, one of the fastest bots ever even.

But now he had a new little title to go by, Bumblebee, the impulse buyer.

He’d bought things on impulse before, upgrades, frame decals, the whole seven kliks, normal things that normal sane bots will on occasion impulsively buy.

But this?

His latest purchase had ever mech and femme leaping aside in horror, and was following him like some obedient cyberhound, keeping a good bit of slack on the leash he’d bought to attach to the blank collar of his latest impulse purchase.

The beast that’s shoulder was higher than his helm, with jaws that could snap his helm off, and massive claw bearing pedes almost as big as Bulkhead’s clumsy servos, had a colouration of bright red and blue, with near neon yellow breaking up the two in a pattern of yellow strikes that slashed downwards to the black and grey underbelly of the beast.

Bumblebee almost laughed when a mech leapt clean into a trash receptacle to escape his new purchases gaze.

Those bright, almost crystal blue optics, hazed unlike the clarity of higher sentience, continued to glance around, taking in every shocked face, but also kept focused on his new owner, the first member of his colony.

Bumblebee was practically preening himself, this was so worth it, this was worth Zeta screaming at him, worth Ratchet’s scolding at miss-using their funding for getting spare parts for the Spacebridges, Bulkhead would, well, Bulkhead would probably be too scared to be in the same room as his new pet, the big soft spark.

Bumblebee glanced behind him when the leash went taught, his impulse buy was looking at something, giant snout sniffing the ground, massive whiskers twitching as the beasts optics narrowed a bit, before winding when he gave the leash another tug.

Not a moment later, and his purchase practically trotted a few steps to stand beside him, the beasts helm was level with his own, a slightly unnerving factor.

He reached out, and after a moment of hesitance, petted the beasts helm armour, which came with an interesting addition, a detachable helm guard, which wrapped around the beasts pointed audios, the lip at the front could be pushed forwards to cover the beasts slit optics.

The beast perked up, letting off a chuffing noise at it leant into the touch.

Honestly, Bumblebee had been shocked at how… tame the beast was, all chuffs and huffs, tail wagging up a storm despite the giant blade like stinger that appeared from the second to last piece of armour on the beast’s tail.

He’d been just, window shopping when he noticed a petshop was getting a rather large delivery.

He’d gone to investigate, and after a bit of a wait, the owner of the shop, had dragged the beast into a holding area, Bumblebee had purchased the giant beast on the spot, shocking the much larger mech, who’d had to drag the beast through the shop, it’s massive talons schreeching as it tried to fight the pull.

Clearly the cybernetic beast was much happier following him, so, he kept going, taking another step, the beast ambling at a slow walk, it’s massive strides far longer than his own.

Bumblebee’s attention left his pet at the next shrill screech of someone noticing the beast on the other end of the leash he was holding.

He’d hate to return the beast, but if all the fun he got to have, was seeing those around him react to the giant beast, then it was worth the shanix he figured.

If the others, namely Ratchet, he didn’t care what Zeta wanted, let him keep the beast, he’d have to come up with a name for the beast, which was a him, something good.

Now it was just a matter of convincing the others to let him keep it.

“CYGER!” Someone shouted someway ahead.

And again Bumblebee chuckled, he couldn’t understand it really, his new pet was so… docile, like a well trained Cyber hound, only, much, much bigger.

Oh, and known for being Cybertronian eaters… back when all the Cygers weren’t locked away and domesticated-ish.

How the sweet slag had he forgotten that?

Ratchet was going to fragging murder him.

By some miracle, Ratchet didn’t slag him for using their teams funds to buy a Cyger, he cursed the minibot out about it, or at least tried to.

The Cyger made itself known again when Ratchet reached for a wrench, the growl it let off more a… chastise… over a threat of attack, and it cowed Ratchet into stepping away from the wrench covered bench… somehow…

Bulkhead, surprisingly, was absolutely enamoured by the giant beast, comenting how hard it was to get ‘such a nice balance of the primaries’, whatever that meant.

He, Bulk, and surprisingly the Cyger’s, it’s optics suddenly going wide like as if it was still a little kit and not taller at the shoulder than both him and Ratchet, were all able to convince the old war vet, that, though unorthodox, a pet Cyger would be a good guard pet for his ‘precious ship’.

Bumblebee even cited the reactions he got when he’d walked the Cyger back to the dock they had the ship parked in, refuelling for another run out to fix another bridge.

Within a cycle, the Cyger was well established, he never followed one of them for long, but when the congregated on the bridge, he’d be there two, flopped over on his side, tail wagging lazily as hazed blue optics followed the mechs, listening to them speak, but not really understanding any of what they were saying, or even the language really.

Well no, he knew what they were saying, he had enough sentience for that, just not what really to do with it, and how he should react to it.

So, he did what his base coding told him, make sure his colony was happy.

Bumblebee was easy, just chuff and huff and rub up against the mech till he fell over, laughing at the absurdity of a Cyger really acting like an overgrown Cyline.

Bulkhead liked to pet him, he was big enough to not have to worry about the larger mechs cumbersome servos crushing him, in fact, when the mech was paying attention, he was a really good at it, even knew what spots to avoid.

Which was primarily, his paws, the plating over his simple spark, and the plating that covered his interface array.

The last of which, Ratchet had learned not to go near, after having tried to check if the Cyger.

The scratches weren’t deep, but the surprising amount of fear and wariness in the Cyger’s hazed optics was enough to convince Ratchet that it was probably better not to see if the Cyger had been… fully domesticated.

Within a few joors though, the Cyger was right back to sniffing stuff in the med bay, giving the old medic a chance to ramble of explanations, it was nice sometimes just to talk about his tools, the ones he still had.

He wasn’t blind, he noticed that the Cyger had spotted the missing part of his arms armour.

The look in the Cyger’s optics had been one of a strange… sympathy, not quite there, but enough to read.

It somewhat unnerved the medic to see such a… advanced expression on a creature of sentience like a Cyger, yes they were self aware creatures, yes they were as alive as he was, but they… they didn’t have the processors for that level of emotion…

Unless he was just confused and going on his basic, run of the foundry understanding of Cyger’s, and they were all just collectively a bit sharper in the processor than many gave them credit for.

It was all going well enough, they all forgot their Captain hadn’t yet returned from his own ‘rendezvous’ with the city of Polyhex.

 Until he did, that is.

Zeta, none of them would ever actually refer to him by his title, was furious.

He threw an absolute fit, yelling all sorts of threats at the small yellow mech for ‘brazen miss-use of funds’, and other such slag they’d all worked through much more calmly.

The Cyger, evidently, did not like Zeta, the mech received no love from the Cyger, not that he even tried to show any back.

When the Cyger whimpered his way to Ratchet, the blade like stinger at the end of his tail missing, the stump sparking, and a good chunk of the tail itself flattened, it wasn’t difficult to guess the culprit.

The blade couldn’t be found, so Ratchet had to put the Cyger under, and just remove the rest of it properly, leaving a flat, weapon-less tail, that, upon waking and realising what he’d lost, the Cyger had just, shut down for a time.

At least, until Bumblebee flopped down against the Cyger’s side, and scratched the massive beast under the chin, perking the Cyger right back up.

It wasn’t spoken, but it was obvious that the Cyger, who still hadn’t been designated when they took off for the next job, was now avoiding Zeta like the red rust.

Which was fine with the less than liked captain, who amused himself by bossing around the two younger bots and trying to get on the old veterans sensors, primarily by trying to toy with the ships systems. ‘Make it go faster.’ ‘Still can’t believe you didn’t let me install a holo-screen’. And so on and so forth.

It got to the point that the three mechs actually started just… venting, to the Cyger, still not designated, but not for lack of Bumblebee trying, he just couldn’t find a designation for the life of him that stuck.

 The Cyger, surprisingly, or really, unsurprisingly, at this point, was a very good listener, and seemed to follow their vents well enough to react with similar emotions.

Zeta kicked the ships controls again? The Cyger would curl up around Ratchet’s pedes, and just listen as the mech vented out his frustrations on the latest little gizmo he worked one to keep his servos active.

It kept him from pulling at his old war wound.

Zeta called Bulkhead a bumbling foo, or some other unpleasant thingl? The Cyger would be chuffing and rumbling a storm, driving out those harsh words with the soothing rumble.

And whenever Bumblebee was given the worst jobs to do? Specifically because Zeta took offense to him buying the Cyger in the first place? They’d race in the lower level of the ship, Bumblebee always won in his alt mode, but he swore that was because the Cyger always seemed to trip, or stumble, or suddenly run out of endurance just before the finish line when he took the lead.

Bumblebee actually tried to talk about that to the Cyger, convince the beast that, no, he didn’t want an easy win, he wanted the Cyger to help him go even faster.

The Cyger apparently took it to spark, and now, Bumblebee was now really having to push himself to keep his title as the fastest member of the small team.

Within two Orns, it was almost like the Cyger had always been there.

Zeta still hated the Cyger something foul, but after an attempt to throw the beast out of the Air-lock whilst it recharged backfired, mostly because the airlock refused to open, and Ratchet finally reached the end of what could be considered his patience, and threatened to space the captain himself, considering the ship was technically his, not Zeta’s.

Since then, the Captain hadn’t made anymore attempts to harm or remove the Cyger, but the animosity still festered.

The Cyger himself seemed to be relatively unaffected by this, focusing on either recharging in places Zeta couldn’t reach, like hidden away in the engine room, or in the cargo bay, or Ratchet’s medbay.

When the giant beast wasn’t resting, he was prowling the halls, sniffing and huffing at everything and rubbing his flanks against everything, marking his territory when Zeta couldn’t see and get defensive.

And when work had to be done on a Spacebridge?

Turns out the Cyger was very much a helpful servo so to speak.

Primarily working with Bulkhead, all the larger mech had to do was point, and the Cyger would tear larger space debris to shavings, the hooked claws normally hidden away easily sharp enough to cleave through the vast majority of what blocked up the giant portal generators.

It certainly sped up the process of getting to the mechanical work.

As was the routine, Zeta would stay on the ship, not even paying attention to the work, and rarely giving a Scraplets aft if the conditions were even safe to work.

They all knew this, they all accepted that that wouldn’t change, and that they had to just keeping each other as safe as they could whilst they work.

It was on one of these more dangerous cycles when Bulkhead and the Cyger were having to fight against a small asteroid field, that had been bombarding the bridge they were now at, that Bulkhead’s wrecking ball swung wide after bouncing off an especially large piece, that it crashed into what looked to be a hollow rock.

Almost instantly, the Cyger perked up, and jumped away from his teammate, bounding to the hollow rock, huffing and sniffing as his whiskers bounced, picking up even the faintest of electro-magnetic signals.

Claws scrabbled against the rock for a moment, before purchase was found and the Cyger managed to force himself inside.

This whole incident flew completely past the others of the crew, too busy trying to prevent any more damage to the Spacebridge.

That is, until a scream came from that very same hole.

One that caught Bumblebee, who was closests, attention, in a moment he’d abandoned his position, and raced over, clambering up himself as best as he could to see what had caused that noise.

What he saw, surprised him.

In the hole, no, cave, was his Cyger, practically flattened to the ground whining, tail tip flicking as his hazed blue eyes kept staring at the other entity in the cave.

A black and gold motorcycle former with a blue visor, three pointed throwing weapons primed and ready to fight.

Realising this mech could actively hurt his pet, Bumblebee called out. “Hey! Hey! Leave him alone!” He called, catching both of their attentions, he was too busy trying to get through the hole to notice the shock on the bots face, or really hear the happy chuff coming from his pet, but once he’d less than gracefully fallen flat on his aft and looked up, he was able to better see the situation.

The cave was lived in, somewhat, there was a small stash of energon cubes, a few small trinkets and other weapons, and outside of the hole in the cave, what looked to be an exit had been blocked up.

Had the mech planned to slowly offline in here?

Creepy.

Before he could speak, his Cyger was on him, chuffing happily and giving him a lick with that rough glossa, taking some of his paint with it, he didn’t bother complain, his Cyger just liked to be affectionate.

“Hey! Hey, no, down… good Cyger.” He petted the side of his pets helm when it gave him room again, allowing him to look over to the other mech and gestured to himself. “Bumblebee, and this…” He gestured to the Cyger. “Is my pet, so put the weapon down, he ain’t gonna hurt you.”

The other mech didn’t look convinced, at all.

Bumblebee couldn’t help it, he smirked. “What’s the matter? Scared of a little Cyber-kit?”

The black and gold mech scowled. “Does your processor malfunction? That’s a Cyger.”

Bumblebee gave the mech a surprised expression, looked back at the giant metal beast, who’s helm was level with his own. “Oh? I didn’t notice, he’s cool, see, hey, pet, do the thing.”

The ‘thing’, was the Cyger opening those massive jaws as wide as they’d go, baring the rows of serrated fangs within.

Bumblebee smirked at the bot, and stuck his servo into that open maw.

The Cyger didn’t even twitch.

“See? He’s completely tame.”

The other bot just looked at Bumblebee like he was out of his mind.

Bumblebee just rolled his optics. “Fine, don’t believe me, come on, we need to go back to work, or Zeta will have even more to shout at us for… Err… Pet?”

The Cyger didn’t follow, still looking intently at the other mech, tail thumping on the ground.

Then the Cyger looked at him. “Mmmrroww?”

Bumblebee shuttered his optics a few times and looked at the Cyger. “Huh?”

Whatever had just passed between them, brought his pet to a decision, the Pet slunk up to the mech,and then reared up onto his hind pedes, causing the giant Cyger to tower over the over mech.

Within a few moments, the Cyger had the mech by the scruff bar, and was waddling the mech back over to the hole in the cave and climbing back out, completely ignoring the mechs protests.

It took Zeta four cycles to notice the new, somewhat aloof and less than amused member of the crew.

But by that point, there was no turning around, not that Zeta would, another pair of servos meant work got done quicker, and he could have them take on more jobs, meaning he’d get paid more, a win in his logs, so, he just ignored the matter, though sent the Cyger another foul look when he overheard it was the beasts doing.

It mattered little, the Cyger had already gotten into Prowl’s spark, and the mech wasn’t so keen on going anywhere else anymore, not that the Cyger would probably let him.

The Cyger was practically preening, another member, his colony was one stronger now, this was good, the bigger the colony, the happier the colony.

And when his colony was happy? He was happy.