While Megatron was getting his house in order, Chromia was coming out of her induced stasis. She saw Optimus and Ratchet’s blurry outlines, then her audio receptors picked up that they were speaking. It soon became clear to her when Optimus spoke again. “Ratchet, you’re absolutely sure about this?!”
“There’s no doubt in my mind, Sir,” answered Ratchet.
“Oh no.” Optimus sat on an empty repair berth.
“O…Optimus?” asked Chromia. Both Prime and medic then turned to her.
“Chromia, you’re awake.” Optimus’ statement came out as one of surprise. “How are you feeling?”
“A little groggy,” answered Chromia, “sore too. But I’m all right. How’d the mission go?”
“Well, to get the bad stuff out of the way, Scattershot and his team disobeyed my orders for them to stay put and Arthur gave his life to stop Morgane. Their respective actions, though, saved our stories and reality as we know it, and the Autobots now have two stable Combiners. Scattershot and his brothers are calling themselves the Technobots and their combined form is Computron.”
“I’m sorry about Arthur, but I’m glad that we won.”
“Yeah, we won, but Megatron returned with a new jet mode.”
“Uh oh. Well, I’m sure that, thanks to Ratchet, I’ll be there to…” Chromia then got a good look at her surroundings. “Hold on a cycle, I’m in a different…” panic then set into her. “Back of the repair bay?!” She turned to Ratchet. “What did you find?!”
“Chromia, easy!” urged Ratchet.
“The back of the repair isn’t called the Dead Zone for no reason, Ratchet! What did you find?!” Ratchet hesitated, then sighed.
“Metal Fatigue.” Those two words echoed throughout Chromia’s head. Metal Fatigue: a weakening of metal due to stress, leading to an accumulation of small cracks, an illness no Transformer wants to be afflicted with. The least worrisome is stage one, where an overhaul would cure the patient. If it’s stage five and the patient chooses the overhaul, there’s a nine to one chance they would die during the procedure. It’s a terminal illness no one of metallic origin wants to be afflicted with.
“H…How bad?” asked Chromia once she found her voice.
“It’s stage three at the limbs, but…” Ratchet faltered before continuing, “…but it’s stage five at the Spark Chamber. It was practically dangerous to move you here. But don’t panic, we’re doing everything we can to reestablish communications with Cybertron! With any luck, this localized version of stage five won’t…Chromia, are you listening?”
“Optimus Prime, Ratchet,” declared Chromia, “I request medical euthanasia!”
“YOU WHAT?!” shouted the two mechs.
“SHE WHAT?!” cried Prowl once everyone heard Chromia’s announcement.
“That’s absurd!” protested Grimlock. “Can’t you talk her out of this?!”
“Ratchet and I,” explained Optimus, “spent two hours trying, but her mind’s made up. Besides, the law is very clear on this matter: a soldier’s right to end their life on their terms in a situation such as this is absolute. We all have to oblige this request, no matter how much we disagree with it.”
“We can talk to her, Sir,” offered Kup. “She’s probably feeling a little down. Whatever’s she’s got-”
“Metal Fatigue.”
“…Sir?”
“She has Metal Fatigue, stage five localized in the Spark Chamber. Swoop and Ratchet told me it was a miracle she didn’t break down sooner than she did.”
“How long does she have?” asked Hot Rod.
“If left untreated, a few months. Even if she is treated, you all know the odds of survival on stage five fatigue-ridden bots. In light of these details, I hesitate to call her decision an irrational one.”
While most bots and allies agreed, the topic was very divisive. Some wanted her to take the overhaul while others wanted their colleagues to respect her wishes to end her life. One thing everyone agreed on was wanting to see her, but the repair bay in a wartime isn’t like a hospital with visiting hours. Everyone was wracked with anxiety. To make matters worse, word about Megatron’s plan to leave Mobius to reestablish communications with Cybertron reached Optimus. He believed that the Decepticons would gain allies from other planets, so he made the decision to pursue the Decepticons with the Ark. What made the work so worrisome is that everyone wanted to see Chromia, but it wasn’t practical. However, Strongarm managed to get some insight on the matter during a visit to Ratchet. She sat down on a berth near Chromia. “Regs?” asked Chromia.
“Hey, Free-Wheeler,” greeted Strongarm.
“What are you doing here? Wait, you don’t have…?!”
“No, no, nothing so serious.”
“Then, what are you doing here?”
“Got a pain that feels like a burr on my rotator. Ratchet’s trusting my feelings, but I just want to be sure before I start taking care of it. I should be out by this afternoon after a little examination.”
“…Unlike me.” The mood went serious real fast.
“I’m not gonna gold-plate it; your decision’s caused a stir among the ranks.”
“Where do YOU sit on the matter?”
“I’m reminded of the time during the first war that I got Cosmic Rust.”
“When you and Prowl had a mission at the Autobot colony on Antilla? He refused to leave your side because of that.”
“Well, he’s a sweet bot under the rulebooks he buries himself with. In any case, after the corrostop, I was sure it’d be the end of me, and I would go for medical euthanasia. But, thanks to the stage three overhaul breakthrough, I got a new lease on life!”
“So, you think I should take the overhaul?” Strongarm winced at Chromia’s question.
“I don’t know. My Metal Fatigue didn’t reach my Spark Chamber. Like most of us, I just want to be sure you’re not being too hasty with this decision.”
“At the start, I thought I was, but given how extensive the Spark Chamber Fatigue is…” Chromia trailed off.
“Where in the Spark Chamber did Ratchet and Swoop find it?”
“It would be quicker to tell you where they DIDN’T find it. An overhaul would be too expensive and-”
“What if the funds were available?”
“Even if they were and the odds of survival were in my favor, how much longer could I go on? I’m 90,000 years old, you know!” Strongarm bridled at this.
“I’m just as old and Kup’s older than all of us! I don’t know about him, but I don’t see myself picking medical euthanasia anytime soon!”
“Is that because you haven’t considered the future?”
“What do you mean?” Chromia drew in a breath before she began her explanation.
“Strongarm, our generation is full of nothing but fighters. The generations after that, up to Optimus’, knew peace. We spent our entire adult lives fighting and felt out of place once the war ended, no matter what we did. I know elderly Transformers are the best-treated elderly people in the galaxy, but how far can our wartime advice take future generations? Even the advice of the generations before us didn’t support ours forever. Our advice will only meet the same fate. Sooner or later, our time will come. This is MY time and I choose to go out this way. Do you understand?”
“Yes, Chromia, I do.” Strongarm meant it. She understood Chromia’s feelings. Ratchet told Strongarm he was ready to examine her. As he induced stasis, she thought about what Chromia said.