"I hate circles." 

Miko slammed her tray onto the table in the cafeteria and huffed.

"What?" Jack and Raf said at the same time, sharing confused looks.

She twirled her fork around her fingers, frustrated. "They make no sense in math. My grade is def going to drop."

Raf sighed. "I don't know how much I can help you this time. I have to bring my grade back up, too."

Miko, who had just taken a bite of her greasy salad, choked. "You?!" she exclaimed after clearing her throat. "You need to bring your grade back up?!"

Jack was shocked as well. "Wow. That's... pretty rare, Raf. What kept you behind?"

Raf gave him an 'are you serious' glare. Jack's mouth formed an 'oh' and he shut up.

"It feels like our search for Ratchet is one big circle," Miko sighed, not sensing Raf's upset mood. "We are getting no where."

"It's only been a day, Miko," Jack said to console both her and Raf.

She half closed her eyes, her face saying 'you are so dumb'. "Since we found out. He's been missing over a week."

Right, Jack thought, cursing himself. 

The table was silent for several minutes, but no one ate. They had each lost their appetites.

"The Docbot will be fine," Miko said quietly, picking up her tray and standing. "..Right?"

Raf looked away, not sure what to say and not sure he wanted to say anything anyway. He knew his voice would crack. Jack sighed, copying Miko. They both took their trays to the trash.

"Is Raf going to be okay?" Miko whispered to him as they walked.

Jack forcefully dumped all his food away. "He's pretty close to Ratchet, even if the Autobot won't admit it."

"So, you have no idea."

"Let's just not talk about it too much. We're there if he needs us."

Miko nodded and they returned to their seats.

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Ratchet's processor was still throbbing when he woke again. He vented slightly as he forced his optics open. His gaze met that dull ceiling again, and he felt discomforted. Remembering the previous day (at least, what he hoped was the previous day.), he rolled over to confirm his memories. Alpha was no longer there, but the same, rusty, damaged room was enough for him to know that it hadn't been a dream.

He sat up slowly, taking a sharp breath when he felt an immense pain in his chest chassis. He looked down, and now that his mind was clearer, he could see the extent of his injuries. A large, melded gash ran down the right side of his chest plates, and the left side was badly burned. His right leg was twisted awkwardly, and one of his pedes looked like had been stabbed right through. His left arm looked like it had been melded in several places, like he had been cut multiple time. He couldn't see his backside, but he could feel another gash down it, not melded but also not deep. He lifted a servo to his neck and felt a slight tear in his neck cords. When he touched it, he felt a drop of Energon leak out. When he took another closer look at the room, he saw that the ground below him was stained with old Energon, as well as the rusty medical bed.

"Oh, look, he finished his recharge!" came Omega's voice off to the side. Ratchet heard her light pedesteps hurry over before he saw her enter the room. Deeper steps followed, and Alpha arrived shortly after her.

"Hey," he greeted simply. "How are you feeling?"

"Not any better than yesterday," Ratchet replied dryly.

"You're sitting up, and you don't seem as groggy," Omega implied, looking him over. "That's something."

"Hey, I hope I'm not being rude or anything," Alpha said, crossing his arms. Seemed to be a habit of his. "But who are you? We find you, fix you up, and when you regain consciousness, you go on rambling about a base and Optimus Prime."

Ratchet shook his helm. "If you flew into earth's atmosphere, how did you not hear of Team Prime? We have been stationed here for quite some time now."

"We didn't fly here, we crash-landed," Alpha told him with an edge of annoyance in his voice.

"You're part of Team Prime?" Omega asked. 

Ratchet nodded. "I'm their medic."

"See, I told you he's a medic."

"I knew that already."

Ratchet vented in annoyance. "This planet is crawling with Decepticons. Megatron himself has grown rather attached to this planet's Energon system. There's very much of it here."

"Wow, really?" Omega exclaimed cheerfully.

"Good, our supplies are starting to run low." Alpha looked please.

"Unfortunately, the 'Cons have control over most of the Energon mines."

"Oh," he sighed, deflating a little. "Scrap."

"So what do you guys do?"

Ratchet grunted as his chest chassis throbbed once more. "It's our job to keep this planet and its inhabitants safe from Megatron's schemes. Optimus has done an excellent job so far."

"Cool," Omega said breathlessly. She had such admiration and excitement in her eyes, but also a hint of mischief. She reminded Ratchet a bit of the danger loving teen Miko. He really hoped she didn't like to run into unwanted danger. He shuddered at the thought, but felt himself worrying over the girl. He had no idea what happened to any of them, either.

"Wait, inhabitants?" Alpha questioned.

Ratchet sighed again. "This planet hold billions of fleshy beings called 'humans'."

Alpha let out a low whistle. "And Optimus wants to protect all of them?"

Normally, Ratchet would be inclined to agree. He usually thought the humans were a drawback, and while Optimus was being honorable, and Ratchet did admire him for it, he didn't agree with Optimus' selflessness towards them. Now, however, he held back. He actually felt a little angered by Alpha's last remark.

"Yes," he replied darkly. "Optimus' selflessness is admirable."

Alpha took the hint and raised his servos in surrender. Omega sensed the tension and clapped her own servos together loudly. 

"So, do you need anything? Since you're a medic, you could probably heal yourself up a bit better than we can," she said.

"Or you can tell us how to do it," Alpha said in a chipped voice.

She glowered at him. "Stop trying to one up me."

"Stop being so perky."

"YOU TOLD ME TO STOP BEING WORRIED!"

Ratchet vented in annoyance once more and pinched the bridge of an imaginary nose with three digits.

He needed to find out what had happened to him, and possibly what had happened to his team, find out where he was, find out a way to make it back home, and hopefully not burst of annoyance from these young Autobots before then.

It seemed like he had a lot to take care of.

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Yay, I updated! I thought it would be a while before I would be able to. 

I'm sorry if this story says it's completed. It's not. I have no idea how long this story will be. Could be short, could be long. However it turns out. 

If the last chapter seems really bad, it's because I was literally up in the middle of the night writing it. I don't even know why, I was seriously tired. I could barely see the keyboard and couldn't type straight. I read the chapter over again today and it looked like scrap. I may or may not edit it later. Depends on the timing and how I feel. You get the gist of the last chapter, though.

Yeah, Ratchet's going to explode before he finishes anything. Poor Ratchet.

*laughs evilly*

These characters might get really annoying. So far, I'm not annoyed. Not sure how long that will last.

Bye!

*waves*