[closed] giant robot sex ed

[smarterthandad]

Who: Valeria & Shockwave
Where: Shockwave's lab (or Val's if Shockwave doesn't have one idk)
When: ??? after they've been hanging with each other a while
What: Shockwave is not as subtle about his giant hopeless sun-eclipsing crush on Optimus as he thinks he is, Val is about as tactful as a note tied to a brick and thrown through your window
Warnings: jfc i hope not

Val missed very little when it came to observing people. Nothing purely physical slipped by her, and even if she didn't always read the emotional signs properly, she noticed them. Most things she let pass without comment, either dismissing them as trivial or saving the knowledge for later use.

This, however, was getting to be a problem, and avoiding it would only make it worse. Val squared her shoulders and gave herself a moment to brace for what would probably be an unpleasant discussion. Adults.

"Professor S? Do you have a second?"

Comments

[smarterthandad]

That earned Shockwave a skeptical look. Why was he neglecting the obvious solution? "Hardly," Val said. "Not that I approve--it makes adult do incredibly dumb things--but does your species form romantic attachments?"

[tomemyoutliers]

"And here I was, thinking that it wasn't obvious." He tried, okay. But the corner of his mouth twitches up at her opinion on the matter. That doesn't surprise him as much as it once would have - he's becoming used to Val's unique way of viewing the world; it's refreshing.

"We do - we call the pairs who've agreed to elective kinship of that nature conjunx endurae, but even then plenty of Cybertronians decide their relationship doesn't need to be that serious. It's not the only relationship found in our species, however the other ones are less based on romantic attraction."

[smarterthandad]

Val did the best she could with her intelligence so far outstripping her emotional development. Sometimes it got weird.

The sociological information distracted her from the matter at hand. She didn't really want to have to walk Shockwave through setting up a date with Optimus, anyway. "Most of our formalized relationships are in some way an extension of our reproductive biology. Given how intuitively easy I find it to understand your behavior, I'm not entirely surprised you have similar structures, but I'm not sure why they evolved without any drive for preserving and propagating your genetic information."

[tomemyoutliers]

Shockwave shrugs, turning away from the graph to grab his datapad and return it to his ever-slowly growing pile of ones he's cobbled together from the debris.

"Most don't tend to look at romantic attachments so clinically," he points out kindly, with a small smile. "I'd be reluctant to say our species evolves like an organic one; those of a more religious inclination would say that Primus made us this way and romantic attachments are a realization of his love. As for myself - I'm certain there's an explanation, but it's never been a primary concern. Any and all physical displays of romantic love are done purely for pleasure rather than a driving biological imperative."

[smarterthandad]

"Oh jeez, you do kissing, too?" Val reacted like Shockwave had just revealed his love for peanut butter and tuna fish sandwiches. She was entirely familiar with the mechanics of human reproduction--and non-reproduction--but she was likewise entirely disapproving of the whole enterprise. Well, almost entirely. Her parents were okay. Otherwise, what a waste of time and effort.

[tomemyoutliers]

That gets him to laugh, giving her his full attention once more. He'd forgotten that organic children required longer to develop mentally than Cybertronians - although he must admit that sometimes that never happens to them either. Proteus served as an accurate example of that particular problem.

"Why not? Organic species like yourself find it enjoyable."

It isn't that Shockwave is a giant hedonist - that title belongs to the other Senators more than him - but he is from the ruling classes of Cybertron and has had far more exposure to the co-opted habits of organic species that came from knowing those who've explored off-world. As well as venturing off-planet himself.

[smarterthandad]

"Ugh." Val rolled her eyes. "In about a decade the hormones are going to kick in and I'm apparently going to lose my mind for like 20 years. You have a choice, presumably."

She had trouble comprehending why someone who could avoid distractions like that wouldn't do it. Science was way better than boys. Even Bentley.

[tomemyoutliers]

"For the most part," ah one of the benefits of being inorganic. Other species have such interesting compulsions that they can't control or account for, and while he's glad he never has to deal with something like that he can't help but be fascinated.

Shockwave can't help you there, Val

[smarterthandad]

"I'm getting off track, anyway." Val waved the unproductive tangent off with one hand while pinching the bridge of her nose with the other in a gesture she had to be copying from someone. Toddlers didn't get tension headaches.

"The point is, whatever's involved in initiating a romantic relationship for your species, you should do it to Optimus." She made it sound like some kind of medical procedure. Not exactly the queen of emotional literacy, Val. "Maybe kiss him. That's hard to misinterpret."

[tomemyoutliers]

There's an amused hum from Shockwave, and a small twist of his lips upwards at her gesture and comment. It would be exceedingly hard to misinterpret, but it was Optimus they were talking about.

"It's not as simple as that." It isn't, even if he wished it was. "There are four million years between us now, and, well."

It's Optimus, and changing his colors to match hadn't been an effective hint. "I'll keep the suggestion in mind, however."

[smarterthandad]

"No, it really is. It's just that 'simple' and 'easy' aren't synonyms and you're scared." Val pointed at him with the datapad, which was getting a lot of exercise as a prop today.

"You only think there isn't a simple solution because you've overconstrained the problem and you're refusing to admit to yourself that's what you've done. You know you can't pull strings to make someone like you, not really like you, but you also don't want to risk anything by letting the situation out of your control. That's sustainable indefinitely, sure, but at the expense of unacceptable amounts of your cognitive and emotional resources, and it's cowardly. If the problem space requires a calculated risk, you take the calculated risk and accept the consequences. The alternative is stasis, and where does that get anyone?"

So there. Val folded her arms and looked up at Shockwave, adult poise in her child's frame. She might treat her entire life as a games theory problem, intellectualized away from the emotional involvement she wasn't mature enough to grapple with head-on, but one thing she'd never lacked was adult role models willing to take enormous chances, in love and in everything else.