Tinman

What Have I Done?

Two weeks later...

It was the typical start to every morning. Ironhide came out of rest stasis around sunrise and scanned the Lennox house just beyond the garage wall. The family was still asleep. Slowly, rising up on his shocks he quietly backed out of the garage so he wouldn't disturb them. He had been scolded a couple times by Will in the past because he was always making a racket at "the crack of dawn" as he put it so he decided to save them all the trouble and keep himself quiet.

Just as he cleared the garage Ironhide felt something crunch beneath his left back tire accompanied by a horrible abrupt shriek. Ironhide froze in his tracks, his spark twinged. Something very hot and wet crept into the treads of his tire. Reacting upon instinct he raised up his back tire and transformed, his foot automatically lifted up. There on the concrete lay a twitching lump of black and white fur in an oozing puddle of blood.

The Autobot's optics went wide with horror, "Oh...no."

Ironhide got down on his knees, quickly scanning the twitching cat. No pulse, no heartbeat, random neural activity, crushed ribs, and massive hemorrhaging in the chest cavity. Very gently, Ironhide nudged the tiny body with the tip of his finger—some muscles spasms but no response.

He'd crushed Sprinkles, Annabelle's beloved little kitten. He put a hand to his head in mild panic. It had finally happened...he'd gotten careless. What was he going to do? His processors went wild, trying to come up with a solution. Immediately, his thoughts went to Ratchet.

Could Ratchet fix Sprinkles? No...Ratchet could only fix minor wounds on humans for Primus sake. He couldn't fix a broken cat. Not to mention he was too far away to do Sprinkles much good.

Then, he remembered taking Sprinkles to the Vet when he'd first found him.

"Yeah...yeah! Those humans can fix Sprinkles. That's their function!" the black mech thought with great hope, carefully scooping up the fragile ball of fur into his hand. Quickly he covered the small puddle of blood with some driveway dirt, transformed, placed the motionless body on the floor of his cab, and sped off down the road toward the Vet's office as fast as he could.

...

Minutes later...

In a cloud of frantic dust, Ironhide pulled out in front of the country Vet's office. Focusing, strongly he produced his holographic human image: an upper middle aged man with jet black hair, a dark Hogan-style mustache, tall broad shoulders, a hint of a scar on his right eye and brow, and black pants and T-shirt. Utilizing a projection of simple force fields Ironhide made the holographic personification pick up the cat's body and approach the door to the Vet's office. His hologram fed back what it saw and heard just like a security camera. The hologram pulled at the door but it wouldn't budge.

Ironhide growled with frustration, ready to transform and smash the door in if necessary. But then he saw a woman come from behind the desk and suddenly notice him outside with the cat draped over his hands. Immediately, she rushed around, brought out her keys, and unlocked the door.

Ironhide projected his voice, "Please help."

The woman motioned his hologram inside and asked calmly, "Is this your kitten, Sir?"

"Um. No. No. It's my...niece's cat." Ironhide fumbled.

Gently, the woman motioned him to put the animal down on a metal table which he did. "Can you tell me what happened?"

"I...I crushed it under my tire by accident." the gravely voice admitted.

The woman touched the still form and her face fell. Out of protocol she put on her stethoscope and placed it over the animal's chest.