Huh, it appears I finally worked up the guts to post these little drabbles I've been writing off and on for practice in my writing class. I hope you all enjoy my attempt at writing Skids since all I have to go on is Teletraan 1 and his two (very brief) appearances in the G1 cartoon.

EDITED 11 / 12 / 209

Disclaimer: I don't, in any way, own the Transformers. Except for my Waspinator toy. That's mine.

4 -- Angsty

"You desire to know the art of living, my friend? It is contained in one phrase: make use of suffering." -- Henri-Frédéric Amiel

Skids slumped down onto his tiny berth inside of the glorified closet that others called his quarters, hugging his legs to his chassis. He shuttered his optics, trying and failing to ignore the throbbing pain coming from one of his door-wings and let loose a shaky intake he had been holding in. Unable to fight it any longer, the mech let loose a pent up whine of frustration which escalated into frame shaking sobs that he had been withholding nearly all day.

And it had been a long one, to say the least. He had started his shift early, out on perimeter patrol in an acid rain which had been highly uncomfortable but light enough that it wouldn't eat his armor off of his frame. Skids had had to remain in it for twice the recommended amount of time due to him being forgotten for a shift change, again, with only one scant cube of energon keep him up and running. With his impromptu second shift almost over, barely breems until it ended, the Decepticons had decided to attack.

The offense had lasted several joors, the Decepticons finally retreating only when they had had too many losses for their liking. The Autobots weren't without their own casualties. Though Skids himself was only covered in blaster residue and his left door-wing had been slightly dislocated from a nasty tumble he had taken in the fray, he wasn't as bad off as some of the others and it forced him down to the bottom of the medical triage.

Instead of waiting around in the thoroughly depressing hallway outside of the med bay, the theoretician wandered slowly down in the direction of the wash racks to see if he could clean some of the blaster scores off of his armor…only to discover that not one of wash racks were working due to an old pipe main bursting within one of the walls in a neighboring hallway.

Practically falling into stasis from a lack of energy, left wing still throbbing, as dirty as a rusted scrap heap and utterly discouraged at life in general, Skids resisted the urge to just fold up into a little ball and scream at the unfairness of it all right where he was. He managed to push it all aside until after he had gotten just enough energon into his systems that his processor wasn't threatening deactivation and back into his very small quarters before finally succumbing to his emotions.

Maybe it wouldn't have been so bad if he had some friends to confine in, to have other mechs that understood what he was going through and gave him just a tad bit of sympathy to ease his woes. The unit transfer he had just went through barely orns ago had made sure that that wouldn't happen. Not only did most of the mechs on base (even in his own unit!) not know him or even try to chat him up, half of the time they didn't even know he was there until he spoke.

Skids felt more alone and insignificant then he had ever felt before in his long life.

He fell into an uneasy recharge in the corner of his small berth, still hugging his legs and sporting battle damage, wishing that tomorrow would never come.