The children were dropped off at their respective houses, as it was getting late. June had gone out when Zucky was asleep, and did a few errands and grocery shopping for the coming week. Other than that, she bought a few non-perishable snacks, a toothbrush and toiletries.
Turns out, the base had a bathroom with a shower, so hygiene wasn't going to be an issue for Zucky.
Nurse Darby went to the drug store to buy a hairbrush, a few hair ties, a nail care kit (even though she had no idea how that was going to help with the dragon's enormous talons). Afterwards she bought a blanket, a new Bathroom towel, and even stopped by a thrift store to get some clothes and a Duffle bag for Zucky to store her stuff in.
June went back to base and dropped off the bag and went home directly after that.
Zucky was fine, Nurse Darby made sure she did a very thorough job on the wound before she left, so the bandages would last until the next morning.
I was still sleeping when the nurse stopped by, and only woke up a few hours later when I got hungry.
I yawned and rubbed her eyes. Trying to get up for a stretch, I almost fell over, due to my foot getting caught in the handle of the Duffle bag.
Fortunately, I reacted fairly quickly and caught myself on the crate next to the couch.
["Who left their bag here?"] I was going to move it out of the way to the side, until I noticed a note taped to the bag.
'Good evening, sleepyhead! :)
I was going to surprise you with this, but you were too exhausted still it seems.
I realised you probably didn't have any other possessions, besides the clothes on your body, so I went to get some essentials for you and some snacks to tide you over until breakfast, lunch or dinner.
Speaking of dinner, the container on the crate is yours. Bon Appetit!
Don't worry about anything inside this bag, consider it all yours!
See you tomorrow morning!
-June.'
["Wow, that's so nice of her!"] I thought. ["If they keep this up, I'll never be able to repay them for all the've done for me."]
Curious as I was, I carefully opened the bag and dug around in it to see what I was working with.
As soon as I saw the food, I could have sworn I heard a choir of angels in the distant skies.
I almost forgot why I woke up in the first place! There were a variety of snacks in there, including chips, trail mix, granola bars, dried fruit, nuts and crackers, but since I didn't want to wake up Ratchet, I went with the jerky.
["Hmmm... Never had Jerky before..."] I wasn't exactly familiar with the snack, but always wanted to at least try some.
I carefully opened the bag of jerky inside the duffle bag to muffle the crinkling plastic sound and tried a piece.
["Wow, that's salty!"] I hadn't had a salty snack in a long while, so I wasn't used to it anymore. Fortunately, there were bottles of water in the duffle bag, so that helped.
I continued looking through the bag to see what else there was as I ate, until I heard the 'wake up' sound I learned to associate with the bots coming from somewhere in the same room I was in.
I looked around, but couldn't see anyone, until I heard groaning coming from below the platform in front of me, but out of sight. Suddenly Ratchet transformed back into bot mode and I finally saw him emerge from his little spot at the foot of the platform.
He stood there with his back turned to me, and it appeared like he was stretching? It didn't make sense to me, but probably had a good reason. I still had much to learn about these bots.
As much as I wanted to greet him, I thought it would have been best to just let him be, he'll notice me eventually.
And right I was, The medic turned around to lean on the platform to stretch out his legs, and his expression turned to a surprised one.
I was cracking up on the inside, because it was just priceless to see, but I stuffed a piece of jerky in my mouth to distract me from snickering and I just sheepishly waved with my left hand.
"How long have you been awake?" Ratchet asked.
"Not long, half an hour maybe?" I answered. "What time is it?"
Ratchet looked up from me and was staring at nothing in particular for a few seconds and looked back down at me again. "5:00am" he finally answered.
"5 o' clock? Yeesh, I took a very long nap." I answered.
"You and me both, kid...and you know what?" The medic asked.
"What?" I asked.
"You were right...I'm feeling a whole lot better after that good long recharge." Ratchet admitted.
"You're welcome." I smiled. I then took another bite of my snack.
"What's that you're eating?" Ratchet asked curiously.
"It's called Jerky; it's meat that' s been cut into strips and dried to stop it from spoiling. They also add salt to stop bacteria from growing on the meat before they dry it." I explained.
"So that's why you woke up so early then." Ratchet figured. I simply nodded and drank some water.
"Speaking of refueling, I'm running low on fuel myself. If anyone asks, I went to get some energon." Ratchet said.
"Okay." I nodded, and Ratchet made his way to the energon storage area.
I watched him leave and he wasn't kidding, he was walking almost as good as he used to before the back injury. A little stiff but he looked so much better now.
[" I guess I still will be able to help out around here. I just have to look harder"] I smiled.
After finishing off the Jerky, Zucky climbed down from the platform and headed down the hall to find the bathroom. She remembered where it was, since Miko showed her yesterday.
She brought the duffle bag with her, since she wanted to brush her teeth, fix her rat's nest of a mane, take a shower, clean her talons...she literally took her dear sweet time grooming herself, and honestly; she wanted to get the scent of Decepticon off her.
Finally having the chance to wash off all of the dirt, sweat, grease, blood and energon that somehow managed to crawl to the roots of her furr and settle between her scales off, felt like heaven on earth!
She put on a fresh new outfit and after giving her furr a good brushing and last checks, she left the bathroom feeling refreshed. There wasn't much she could do for the ones on her shoulder, so she settled for what she had and went back to the common area.
She brought the duffle bag back up the platform with her and placed it next to a wall where it was out of the way. Ratchet was already at the computer console, working away on whatever it is he was so eager to get a move on with yesterday. ["I better not disturb him"] Zucky took out her drawing tools and started on a new drawing.
She still has lots on her mind, from how her life changed to what it is now, how she got here, her experience with the Cons and now with the Bots. The world looks hauntingly familiar from the one she's left when she teleported. Or maybe not, maybe she was in the same world, just a different location to where she was previously.
Whatever the case, she felt like the better way to organise her thoughts now, was to draw. As silly as that sounded it's all she could do now.
She opened the book to the page with the last drawing, the one with the spaceship. It looked different, it felt different. As if someone else drew it, and not her.
Now that she was thinking about it, it feels like she never left the ship! She can still feel the atmosphere.
She looks up at Ratchet again. He was working on a piece of circuitry... carefully, precise. She felt like she could understand what he was doing, what it's for... Why though? She's never seen these things before, she's never even touched a soldering iron, or a welding machine, or any one of those tools she sees strewn about that working table!
She's having a mild panic. Closing her eyes, she tries breathing exercises to calm down. She feels like there's someone else with her there, or she's with someone else, elsewhere? What is this feeling? Who is this person? She then sees a blurry silhouette in her mind. No doubt, that's the 'person' she's been feeling.
She decides to start drawing instead, to distract herself. It's way too early in the morning to start having a crisis. Maybe she'll draw something peaceful...for now...