Some of Ratchet's humor faded as Wheeljack explained their history as he knew it. "Geeze, don't set the bar too high or anything," he quipped, feeling just a little uncomfortable hearing it all. It wasn't that he didn't believe in Wheeljack or hadn't been through the Pit and back with him... it wasn't even that he didn't consider the engineer his closest friend, but listening to it, he suddenly felt like he'd been entered into some kind of twisted competition. And even worse, that he was being held against not just an idea, but an idea of himself. As if just one or the other was bad enough on its own.

He couldn't help but wonder if he was going to measure up.

"Don't sell yourself so short," he said, keeping everything else carefully packed down where Wheeljack couldn't take it the wrong way. "You wouldn't have gotten anywhere if you weren't you." He gave his friend--he was still Wheeljack, so he refused to think of him as anything less--a warm smile, hoping to reassure him. "And you're still you. I don't care what world you came from."

And he believed that... or at least he wouldn't let himself believe anything else. He didn't need to finally see his best friend again only to toss him away just because he wasn't what he was expecting. "Got that right. You're gonna have to start with who it was that thought it was a good idea to impersonate Stunticons."