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OPEN |
Who: Shockwave and YOU, unfortunately
Where: Around
When: Oh man who cares.
What: Cracks knuckles despite only having one working hand - it's time for Science.
Warnings: Shockwave. Will update as needed.
( a ) city
The laboratory was stopgap; very much a work in progress with antiquated equipment identified after the sheets of dust and debris were pulled back revealing something, well, altogether underwhelming. Shockwave had worked in greater want for his nigh impossible standards met in the past, but he felt the simplicity that ruled his life now more challenge than before. All because he was presented with the rather disturbing mystery to be opened up and examined: What, in his absence, could have so thoroughly salted the earth. Reverse engineering the apocalypse certainly seemed like a task he could accomplish given time.
Shockwave needed to work - too many questions to be answered, and after Emma carved that much-needed stricture into his brow he was...spurred to begin anew with greater purpose. The bare bones of what he surmised to be a university research lab would have to suffice. For now.
Prodding the nerve endings of the network, now more noticed by the outside world than a ripple in a greater reservoir, he examined the footprints left behind by the minds behind it, amused with how rudimentary it was. Impressed that even existed at all. A Beowulf cluster suddenly superseded all other priorities; something closed and close to the chest away from prying eyes. In the matter of hours all useable hardware had been cannibalized with the stripped parts left out the front doors out into a narrow alleyway between the lab and desolate campus like bones spat out at the mouth of a monsters' cave. The afterthought of his mess a warning written loud and clear: Stay Away.
( b ) wildcard
( pick your own adventure; finding holo avatar Shockwave in somewhere too small for his regular old purplesaurus rex self or any other feasible random encounter )
Where: Around
When: Oh man who cares.
What: Cracks knuckles despite only having one working hand - it's time for Science.
Warnings: Shockwave. Will update as needed.
( a ) city
The laboratory was stopgap; very much a work in progress with antiquated equipment identified after the sheets of dust and debris were pulled back revealing something, well, altogether underwhelming. Shockwave had worked in greater want for his nigh impossible standards met in the past, but he felt the simplicity that ruled his life now more challenge than before. All because he was presented with the rather disturbing mystery to be opened up and examined: What, in his absence, could have so thoroughly salted the earth. Reverse engineering the apocalypse certainly seemed like a task he could accomplish given time.
Shockwave needed to work - too many questions to be answered, and after Emma carved that much-needed stricture into his brow he was...spurred to begin anew with greater purpose. The bare bones of what he surmised to be a university research lab would have to suffice. For now.
Prodding the nerve endings of the network, now more noticed by the outside world than a ripple in a greater reservoir, he examined the footprints left behind by the minds behind it, amused with how rudimentary it was. Impressed that even existed at all. A Beowulf cluster suddenly superseded all other priorities; something closed and close to the chest away from prying eyes. In the matter of hours all useable hardware had been cannibalized with the stripped parts left out the front doors out into a narrow alleyway between the lab and desolate campus like bones spat out at the mouth of a monsters' cave. The afterthought of his mess a warning written loud and clear: Stay Away.
( b ) wildcard
( pick your own adventure; finding holo avatar Shockwave in somewhere too small for his regular old purplesaurus rex self or any other feasible random encounter )
no subject
No. The world wouldn't tease him like this, would it? He'd gotten Shockwave back, they'd certainly gotten closer during his time here. And now...now he has to deal with this. A part of him doesn't want to. Wants to just forget that he saw this. But he knows he can't just let it go, that this demon is going to catch up to him eventually.
Slowly, but not softly (it's impossible to when you're that size), he pads up to him, unable to find the right words to say. He tries, oh...does the try, but all he can come up with is a name.
"Shockwave."
And the pain that comes with it is heard. As much as he tried to tie it down.
no subject
Back stiff and turned away, fingers gone loose around what half-finished project he left on his workbench. Sentiment kept his rifle built into his arm still at his side - reason turned the safety off.
"Prime."
A name was too close for comfort now. A harsh, burning sound in the intimacy of it that Shockwave left a thing so simple yet complicated as a name well enough alone. Yet somehow he had to fight through a heavy silence just to say that much.
"Not chasing that shadow today, I see."
no subject
He watches Shockwave intently, eyes never moving off of him as he walks forward, although making sure to leave enough distance between them.
"We are on a new Cybertron. Although I'm guessing you found that out already." Shockwave wouldn't have built a lab on a planet he knew nothing about, all things considered. His eyes flash up at the mention of chasing shadows. Oh...how stranger things have happened.
"I've already found it."
no subject
Almost before Optimus could get a word in edgewise, Shockwave retracted the canon on his arm. With the way things were between them as it stood, Optimus was more likely to fire a round in his own brain module then turn his weapon on Shockwave.
"The demonstrable fallout of something as apocalyptic as it appears to be self-inflicted left no room for doubt as to whose ashes we're standing on." Soundwave intoned, back turned as he plugged away at one of the few monitors he managed to tap into the power grid. Finding himself...displeased with Cybertron was an incurable constant.
"Rest assured, I've no intention of finishing whatever our predecessors on this Cybertron started."
no subject
Sorry, was there a point to that statement? Something about using poetry on a object of your affection? Oh well. But he notices that canon retracts, and that puts him at east slightly more. Reassured that the Shockwave he knows is still inside there.
"It seems that way, yes. That the war ended on a much more sour note than our own universe had. In some ways...I'm grateful that we didn't reach this point." It was still a shitty situation, but he'll take the one his universe granted them over this.
"...So you're going to help, then."
no subject
Shockwave answered flatly as he continued tinkering with the impossible conundrum of a electromagnetic cage with a entrance large enough to accommodate him without compromising the delicate projects he had half started and strewn all around him.
"Though with some luck we've yet to suffer a paradox being aware of the others' existence." Shockwave supplied after a tense moment of silence when the screen went idle and he realized he stopped working. Left with little more to do than actually look Optimus in the eye. Left wondering if he said that more for Prime's benefit; the idea of flickering out of existence less worrisome than his continued disquiet.
"As opposed to what?" He challenged, almost daring Optimus to accuse him of idleness or a repeat of events. Both rather inflammatory accusations in his eyes - eye.
no subject
There's a lot of 'shoulds' in their world. Megatron should be dead, the war should have never happened. Starscream should have never been elected. But in the end, that didn't matter. The choices people make are not always the most logical, but you play with the cards you're dealt.
Although Shockwave's words silence him a bit. Even in this state, talking to him was somewhat of a surprise. After being shoved to the side for so long, actual conversation was uncharted territory. His ears flick slightly, thinking things over.
Especially at that question.
"Shockwave." His voice just as firm. "You know why I'm cautious. I believe your words, and don't expect you to lie to me. But I need to know if I have your support in this specific goal.
From you. And not from logic."
no subject
That chapter where their lives intersected had not been one-sided, but something could be said for the scars left by one night that two of the biggest players in the Great War mutually upheld the charade that neither of them existed beyond a name and the damage left in their wake for most of their lives.
Heated wafted off his words like dissipating steam with slumped shoulders and near flattened atenas as Shockwave found that even, unaffected tone of voice again.
"Even if it's a stopgap solution we need to start looking forward even as we attempt to uncover what happened here," Eye contact wavered almost as if Shockwave feared he had a hand in all this, "Establish infrastructure keeping in mind ours is not the only form of life Cybertron is supporting now."
no subject
"Then it's your decision, Shockwave. To decide who you were and are now. Either way, I won't change my opinion of you. You have always been Shockwave to me, even now. Even during the four million years we tried to end each other's life."
...He'll stop there. Because wow that got awkward ONTO THE CURRENT MISSION.
"You're correct. We have humans and other organic beings making residence here. We need to make sure they're taken care of too, perhaps even before us." Because they know Cybertron's atmosphere. They're used to it.
Organic life? Might not adapt so well long term.
no subject
Sharp and sudden, a wire bin roll file with broken wheel rocked and fell over; rolled blueprints spilling over when Shockwave slammed the flat of his hand on his desk. A harsh noise only matched by the flaring heat in his voice rising and falling like a slowly suffocating flame. To think they both used to be well-known for their tempers.
Shockwave stiffened up again and coolly replied, "Cybertron itself is changing. We must adapt."
no subject
Deep down, the anger was freeing, to know that something was at least affecting the other, instead of the dead apathy he'd heard for so long. Emotion meant life, and Shockwave for the first time in four million years was living. If he had to take the brunt of some anger, he would gladly do so.
More than gladly for him.
"Shockwave--" He doesn't know what he's going to say. Anything he could possibly add would fail in both delivery and comparison to what Shockwave's probably feeling. "That's the nature of our race. We will adapt."
A hand goes out to that shoulder. A daring move, reaching towards him so suddenly. But he knows Shockwave, and if he had to take a blast from him to prove that, he would.
"It's what we're best at."
no subject
Shockwave nearly said it only for too many obstructions holdover from an eternity riding out the ceaseless, deadening indifference that had for long defined him holding Shockwave back from voice even minor discomforts. Something about the way Optimus held him as though he would shatter at any moment or even combust with his gaze alone turned his insides to knots. Anger was the quickest, most immediate emotion for him to latch onto and he wanted to hate this more than he already did. Only he was coming up short, and staring down the rather frightening prospect that he couldn't navigate this one on logic and bursts of fury alone this time around.
"You must be busy with your wayward Autobots." Shockwave said, a guarded way of giving Optimus an out as his large yellow eye drifted to an empty wall and his shoulder slumped as if the hand over it weighed a great deal more than it did. "Enough that watching me calculate the logistics of treated water within city limits is hardly worth your time."
The room grew quiet again and Shockwave realized that after a life isolating himself the sudden shift to recognizing the inherent abnormality of being cut off from all low risk social interaction made something as simple as attempts to reconnect feel futile. Like beating his fists against the walls of a vacuous, empty space for none to hear. He still doesn't want to look passed the blank wall in the far corner.
"It's...strange." Shockwave wanted to say it was 'funny' but that word felt beyond him, "Too many years playing consigliere and ad hoc medic between radical attempts at reshaping the universe itself and engineering a stable water treatment plant is taking up all my time. Something to be said there for the ills of excessive specialization."
no subject
"I'm busy with my wayward friends, no matter what faction they aligned to," he softly states, trying to catch a glimpse of that yellow optic trying to avoid his gaze. "And it's the same with you--I want to know if you are alright--if you need my help."
Now or in the future.
But the silence was louder than any shout, any exclamation could sound in the room, and it made Optimus's plating uneasy. Conversation was so easy for them many years ago. Now they were like acquaintences again, scoping for safe topics.
"Perhaps it's time you allowed yourself room to breathe, as humans would say."
no subject
The blank space between the corners of the wall stopped drawing him in, away. When he looks back his eye hooks into and latches onto Optimus in an unwavering gaze.
"I've been breathing in empty spaces for the last four million years." His hand slowly eases up until it closes around Optimus's wrist. "In that endless space it's suffocating."
no subject
Slowly, his hand grips the other's wrist, just like his is being held.
"I'm here, Shockwave. The universe has a plan for me, and until I find out what that is, I'm here."
no subject
"Don't-" Voice heavy with the strain of each infliction a flicker in the yellow light as plates shifted around his shoulders and the rolling friction under Optimus's gentle grasp ignited. "Do this to yourself again."
no subject
"I won't let you suffocate."
no subject
There were a few shared red letter days between them but the nonspecific response was not without intent; he dwelled nowadays perhaps as much as Optimus forced himself to when it came to revisiting old mistakes. Mistakes was a charitable word and they had been in no short supply of either regret or more comfortable words they used to distance themselves.
"We're no longer helpless." Shockwave watches as his fingers slip through hands that anchored him there for however loose the actual grip was and where his palm splays open on the dented and cracking chestplate he knew if he cracked open he'd see his own marred handiwork that survived a life time. "Simply tired."
no subject
"Tired is a good word for it." His voice is even softer, every sentence more like a suggestion than a statement.
"But we can't rest just yet."
no subject
Knees dip forward, the back of his legs knocking softly against the side of the desk as even the weight of Optimus standing tall over him was almost palpable. Shockwave notes his hand hadn't moved yet he didn't feel compelled to rectify this. It sends pangs pulsing deep in his chest like a freshly healed t-cog shifting constantly as it heals. Nostalgia.
"Yet you and I will, at either our best or worst depending on the perspective, would never be accused of idleness."
no subject
Stagnant in itself.
"But I don't think the planet would want that either. So maybe this new world is our mission now."
no subject
There had always been that fine line that could fissure into a gulf between involvement out of a simple altruistism and forcing change on the unwilling. Optimus may not have the cleanest hands himself, but something should be said for his unwavering dedication and near reverence for where that line was drawn. Shockwave would have liked to say the same, but that empty space dug into that chestplate was all the reminder he needed that he himself had been without fault. So much time between then and the postive outcome dimmed his normally pragmatic sense of perspective.
If only he...
Shockwave stepped away and half turned towards a running monitor on the desk.
"I want to show you something."
no subject
Sometimes he just didn't know anymore. But he kept going, because in the end...that's all he knew how to do.
Those eyes flick up, though, looking at Shockwave both bright and inquisitive. "What is it?"
1/2
Beneath their feet something came to life with the oscillating whirr of vents pouring open as an aperture under the dark glass that made up for a large part of the floor peels apart like a slowly opening eye. A beam of blue light shoots up and connects from floor to ceiling then fans out into a cubed space that nearly covers the entirety of the room save for where Shockwave is standing but domed over Optimus. The entire lab illuminated in a pale blue that shifts and flows like light on a waters' surface.
Within the space of the holographic cube at the base of it lines of code begin to build into rudimentary, pixelated shapes that begin to take on more increasingly complex dimensions and structures. In an instant - Cybertron, whole and perfect is a living model no taller than ankle height. In place of the Grand Imperium fragile looking silver spires shoot up around a complex aqueduct that runs through the city like veins weaving and flowing around the domed aerial academy and Trion Square. Iacon reimagined as a techno-organic polity that glimmers like beautiful mirage it is.
no subject
Shockwave inched forward his outline becoming more defined the closer he moved against the frail surface tension of being so close to the edges of the light box. The tips of his fingers broke through the blue wall; the light parting as if he stuck his hands through a waterfall. The pale purple of his fingers shifted to white, then his forearm turned the same color the further he moved in. The ends of his elbow fanned out to a more jet-like conformation bright green in color.
Two eyes the same glowing spark blue that surrounded them were level with Optimus. Two hands at his sides, smoother without the cracks and dents of age. One mouth curled into a smile that waxed and waned in its melancholy as the light box seamlessly turned a monster into a ghost. One face fade away like two pictures with double exposure bled back into one.
Shockwave - who Shockwave used to be walked over Iacon; the city quivered and broke apart into static in his wake. Two hands rose from where they hung limp at his sides slowly, slowly. Two hands splayed their fingers open over Optimus's forearms the physical contact emitting a dull glow that pulsed and ebbed as hands ran down to rest against the others palms.
"I've waited so long to do that..."
Optics dimmed closed with a heavy exhale. Shockwave had removed nervecircuits in his hands and wrists years ago to expedite his work and remove something so uncontrolled as pain and touch. A brief burst of affection followed by four million years of an endless nothing, and Shockwave couldn't physically feel this. But he knew Optimus could.
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