[ INTRO LOG #2 ]

[robotsatan]

You don't know how you got here. One minute you were walking, sleeping, maybe dead -- then you're here, your feet suddenly carrying you down an empty street. Where's here?

Any Cybertronian would recognize this as their home planet, Cybertron, but it's not a Cybertron they've ever known. It has all the familiar hallmarks, but none of the specifics -- the city isn't one anyone here could identify, and even at a glance it's obvious that no one's set foot on the planet's surface in hundreds of years. The city and its surrounding areas all bear the marks of devastating war, of dust and rust collected over centuries. With other people relatively scarce, there's plenty to explore. In fact, if you start walking, you'll find that your feet may just carry you in one particular direction.

Despite its obvious ruin and aeons-long abandonment, the city and surrounding areas do bear some signs of recent habitation. There's a small but growing population of other people, Cybertronian and otherwise, and there's evidence of their presence -- areas of the city that have been cleaned up for use, intact rooms in ruins of buildings where people have set up to live, a few terminals here and there that have been restored to power.

A) The crater.
On one edge of the city is a massive crater left by some wartime weapon that seems to have taken out a large chunk of the surrounding metropolitan area. At the center of the crater it's broken through the surface of the terrain to reveal what looks like it might be a promising energon deposit. There is some strange but native vegetation growing around the edges, too, that no Cybertronian would be able to identify -- small, metallic, brittle-looking sprouts that bear a curiously organic-looking fruit of some kind that doesn't look like it's intended for consumption by any natives of the planet. In one rocky nook of the crater, light catches on the surface of a pool of water, which seems strangely out of place on Cybertron. On closer inspection, it seems that somehow an underground water source has formed a spring in the crater.

B) The center of the city.
If you follow where your feet seem to want to carry you, you'll find yourself in the middle of the ruined city. It seems that the center of the city was once home to a massive forum, and some of the pillars and structures still stand. At the very center of the forum is a massive, elaborately constructed fountain, although it has now long since run dry of whatever used to fill it. One of the low, inner walls of the forum has a terminal embedded in its surface, although it looks curiously ancient, out of place with the rest of the city, and unlike the rest of the technology still left around, there doesn't seem to be any way to power it on or operate it. There are a few scattered pools of water and a few of the strange metallic plants in the city, too, but they're not quite as plentiful as in the crater.

The planet was obviously once home to a massive network of communication relays, but those have all been long since destroyed. However, a few enterprising transplants have worked together to set up a working local network, which can be accessed via any one of the public terminals, any built-in comms systems your character might have (audio only), or a handheld device produced by one of the people who set up the network.

Comments

[smallandincharge]

Magnus rolls her optics. "Yes, I am aware that Brainstorm has a briefcase, and that Nautica and Nightbeat had one. But they gave it to you. Do you not still have it?"

[rodders]

"I never had it?" He's so confused, please help him, Magnus. "We had three of them here for a while. Brainstorm probably has Nightbeat's. Dunno what he's doing with them, but I decided to give him the benefit of the doubt. For now."

[smallandincharge]

Sorry, Rodimus - Mags is too busy flailing around for her own metaphorical oxygen mask to help you into yours.

"You gave him the benefit of the WHAT?" roars Ultra Magnus, but it's the kind of roar that cracks at the edges into a disbelieving squeak. "After everything he's done, everything he is, you let him take the briefcases and -- go? What were you doing? What were you thinking?" Magnus pauses, mid-rant. She raises a hand, palm out. "Wait. No. On second thought, don't answer that. I don't think I want to know."

[rodders]

"Hey," he snaps back, plating flaring for a moment in defense. He's a bit touchy on people questioning his leadership decisions, even when they're Ultra Magnus. Whose input he values, even if he knows she'd think otherwise. "I tackled him when he first arrived - he didn't even know we knew what was in the case or that we knew he was a con. And honestly, we could use him." Because they're stuck on a Cybertron that isn't their own with no way to get home. If someone could figure out how, that person is Brainstorm working with everyone else they've got.

And this is Rodimus, who gives people second chances and regular chances that often end up biting him in the aft. It's just how he is.

"The moment he tries anything more Decepticon than normal, everyone's got a free pass to punch him in the face."

[smallandincharge]

And this is Ultra Magnus, who believes that one chance is two too many.

Magnus stares at Rodimus in disbelief. "More Decepticon than -- than what? Than this?" She makes a broad, sweeping gesture that encompasses the whole of the unfamiliarly devastated landscape around them.

[rodders]

"That's what I thought, too," he says, one hand going to his hip as he stares her down. "But he says he didn't, and right now he's our best bet for getting back to the Lost Light."

Rodimus vents out a gust of air from his system, looking for a moment as deflated and worn down as he feels. "Trust me, Magnus. Or at least, you know-- try." Because his track record with doing good things with Magnus' trust is pretty abysmal, and Rodimus has at least enough presence of mind to recognize that. "We need him if we're going to find out what's going on."

[smallandincharge]

"Oh, he says so, does he?" Magnus says, crossing her arms. A part of her realizes that her biting tone isn't entirely fair, but she's too angry to care. "And, pray tell, what does he say that has you convinced that, when the whole universe collapsed out from under us, the Decepticon with the time machine wasn't to blame?"

[rodders]

"Well, nothing, but--" It's irrational, but Rodimus feels like this is an attack on his ability to make sound decisions. Which, okay, haven't been the best and Megatron didn't really help that at all but - he's trying, okay, and he doesn't want to keep justifying himself to Magnus over and over again if she's not listening to him. "Look around, Magnus. What other choice do we have?"

[smallandincharge]

Magnus vents an exasperated sigh. "We? We have no choices. You had a choice - and you already made it, when you abandoned your quarry thousands of years away!"

[rodders]

"Abandoned? I didn't abandon a 'quarry' anything, I just ended up here after being on the Lost Light!" It was completely out of his control. Really, it was! He frowns, looking more like a petulant child than he has since his six month long bout of sulking.

[smallandincharge]

Unfortunately for Rodimus, reminding Magnus of those six months of sulking makes it far too easy to assume the worst of him. "I don't particularly care about whatever convoluted excuse you've invented to ease your conscience," she says, jabbing a finger at Rodimus' chest. "You knew what he was trying to do, you were in charge of capturing him, and you decided to give him the benefit of the doubt and allow him to rebuild our world -" this statement is punctuated with a sweeping gesture instead of another finger jab "- to his twisted specifications!"

[rodders]

A flash of hurt crosses his face with the jab and the remark about his conscience, but he doesn't wince which he thinks is great progress. "In charge of capturing him? What the hell, Magnus?" His plating puffs up slightly, and he takes a step forward in challenge, staring up at her. "This isn't our Cybertron! You want to arrest him, fine. But do it once we're back in our universe. He's helped here, Magnus. And the only people that've gone around attempting to murder other people have been Tarn and the crazy Megatron with the eyebrows."

So. So there.

[smallandincharge]

Magnus doesn't need to puff herself up, so instead she just looms. It's more reflex than anything, though - her higher brain processes are all busy trying to process all of the nonsense Rodimus is producing. "Why did you think we sent you back in time? To go sightseeing? -- I know this isn't our universe! Brainstorm unmade our universe! I saw him do it! And I cannot imagine what sort of help he could have provided to make up for -- Are you trying to imply that I want to murder him? I have never murdered anyone in my life, and I have no intention of starting now. Whatever Prowl may have told you, there is something called due process --"

[rodders]

"You know I don't listen to Prowl, Magnus, why would I start listening to him about you?" He says, completely missing the point. But then what Magnus says actually registers and he throws up his hands in a clear 'stop' gesture. "Woah, woah. Hold up. Sent me back in time?"

Yeah. That hasn't happened. Yet, he supposed, because it hits him that maybe what happened with Drift is happening with he and Magnus, though she has to be from not all that further along. "We just figured out he was going after Orion Pax before I arrived here. Nothing about me traveling in time. Not that it's not cool or anything, just not something I've done. Yet. Apparently."

[smallandincharge]

This, finally, knocks the wind out of Ultra Magnus, and she stares blankly at Rodimus. "You... you don't remember," Magnus says quietly, more to herself than to Rodimus. "We saw you go. We spoke to you in the past. Why don't you remember --" Then something clicks audibly inside of her braincase, the static pop of a new neural connection being forged. "Wait. If you don't remember following Brainstorm into the past... how did he get your control case?"

[rodders]

"He had his own. Nautica brought one - she said she was on that weird other Lost Light. And Nightbeat had one, too." So there, all three control cases accounted for. Sort of. "I haven't gone anywhere, Magnus. I mean, besides here."

But hey, he travels in time! That's cool, that's exciting! To save Orion Pax and everything.

[smallandincharge]

"What? No, not his briefcase, your briefcase." Magnus punctuates this statement with the CLANG of her right index finger hitting her left palm. "The one that Nightbeat found -" CLANG "- and gave to you -" CLANG "- so you could travel back in time -" CLANG "- and capture Brainstorm." This time, Magnus hammers her entire fist into her left palm, with a satisfying CLUNK. "If you don't remember following him back in time, when did he get the second control case?"

[rodders]

"He hasn't traveled in time yet," he spells out for her, crossing his arms and looking overly put upon. Wasn't that clear? He could have sworn that part was clear. "He even says that's not what it is, but everyone here knows he's full of it."

this conversation is going nowhere i'm so sorry

[smallandincharge]

Magnus crosses her arms right back. Rodimus is out of his weight class - no one does put-upon like Magnus. "Yes he has. Whether or not you remember it happening, it happened."

IT'S BEAUTIFUL

[rodders]

"But it hasn't happened to me!" He protests, as if that makes all the different with regards to Magnus and her unshakable conviction. "I've been here for ages, Magnus. Ages."

A few weeks, give or take.

IM GLAD YOURE ENJOYING IT

[smallandincharge]

"That is -- completely irrelevant!" Magnus snaps, making a broad swiping motion with her hand that nearly hits Rodimus in the face. "This is not about you, Rodimus, this is about Brainstorm, and how he -- how he nearly..." Magnus deflates with a sigh and pinches the bridge of her nose. "And now I've lost my train of thought entirely. Wonderful. What were we even talking about?"

[rodders]

"Uh. Brainstorm? Time travel." He's lost it, too, and grins sheepishly - but winningly, somehow - up at her. "C'mon, Magnus. I've been here for a while. Most everyone's here too. We've got this."

They've got this even more now that she's here, his other point in the trinity that is him, Drift, and her. That's what's important here.

[smallandincharge]

Magnus gives Rodimus an odd look. Not harsh, just... odd. "Yes, it seems that you often do 'got this', somehow. I'll never quite understand how you manage it."
Ultra Magnus vents another sigh, as she contemplates the ruined landscape. "So. How about you try and tell me where, exactly, 'here' is?"

[rodders]

Rodimus shrugs, feeling as if this falls into the category of things Magnus says along with the stuff about how she doesn't think she has that 'whatever it is' that makes him him. Magnus doesn't ever give herself enough credit as far as Rodimus is concerned.

"Cybertron, just not our Cybertron." Ah yes, that's very clear, Rodimus. "The energon is green."

[smallandincharge]

"Well, yes, I had assumed as much --" Magnus breaks off. "The energon is what?" She stares at Rodimus in disbelief. "How is that remotely -- how could Brainstorm have -- is it all curdled, or -- what does that even mean?"