robot satan (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
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robothell2014-12-19 11:20 pm
robotsatan) wrote in robothell2014-12-19 11:20 pm
[ INTRO LOG ]
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 no one in sight -- right at first, anyway -- 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.
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, with the bits and pieces left behind and a few determined minds, it wouldn't be too hard to build a working, if rudimentary, one...
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 no one in sight -- right at first, anyway -- 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.
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, with the bits and pieces left behind and a few determined minds, it wouldn't be too hard to build a working, if rudimentary, one...
no subject
And here he was be hoping that a little forceful interrogating would have made more sense of this situation. A location and a place to go - as well as an assessment of the enemy. Instead, it's just gotten even more confusing.
"Then this place is..."
The future. He couldn't quite bring himself to say it.
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It looked at lot better, to be honest. So far he was the only thing on this Cybertron that had thought about killing her.
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His first impulse was to consider asking how he ended up with Autobots under his command(?) at all, but four million years was a long time. The answer to that was likely long and varied, and would be unlikely to get them any closer to figuring out where they were.
"...You have a scanning device - didn't that give you any answers?"
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She snatched for her wrench, pointed it at Megatron, and it immediately beeped. "Correction, two life signs. Let me expand the scanning radius to cover the city and we'll see if anyone else has popped in while we were talking."
Yes, Nautica. Talking. That's exactly what you were doing, and why your face is now covered in glittering metallic Cybertronian dirt.
no subject
At the suggestion though, he feels a little unsettled at the thought of sitting there in the open and waiting for her device to do... whatever it does. He rises to his full height.
"You should run scans from the city," he gestures a thumb to the distant buildings,"It's more likely people are going to explore the ruins than stay here."
And there's more cover for him should any hostile surprises decide to spring out of this weirdness.
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"Sure, might as well. There could be records, too." If that turned out to be the case, Megatron was going to need that enormous strength advantage to drag her out of the library.
"Oh! I'm Nautica. Nice to meet you." She meant it. Obviously there had been a misunderstanding, but that was all cleared up now. No hard feelings.
Amazing what not fighting a four million year war did for someone's personality.
no subject
He'd reply with his own name if she didn't make it clear enough that she'd already known him at some point anyway. So instead, she gets more questions:
"The Senate and Sentinel must have been guarded with a formidable force. What happened in the battle?"
no subject
"Well, mind you, I wasn't there for any of it, but my understanding is the Decepticons infiltrated the Senate on a ruse and took them by surprise, then later you personally killed Sentinel." And built a throne out of his body, not that she knew that part. Hardcore, dude.
no subject
"Earlier - you'd said you weren't from Cybertron."
Their planet was a lot of things, including insular as hell. And he's not entirely sure how she'd managed to be born off-world, but it's definitely something picking his brain.
"Are there colonies, then? We've spread to other planets after the Senate was taken down."
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"We arrived on Cybertron after hostilities had ended." Well, official hostilities. Everyone was still pretty hostile. "Everything I know about the War is from reading history books."
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"You're rather fortunate to only experience something like that from a book."
He had no presumptions that an overthrowing of a government as deeply ingrained and corrupted as the Senate wouldn't have some ugly violence in it - needless to say of what happened before.
He was glad for her, in a way. Perhaps even a little envious.
"We should pick a place to meet again in case we need to split up."
Nautica may have her wrench, but he was devoid of any sophisticated communication tech.
no subject
Anyway. Nautica straightened up. They had practical matters to worry about.
"It should be somewhere in the city, I guess, but I haven't explored any of it yet. You don't have on-board?" She tapped the base of the antenna on the right side of her helm to indicate her built-in radio. Prior planning wasn't as important if you could just pick up the phone, and it wasn't like they were going to have their comms tapped and need to be hiding from the police. Optimus was Prime now, and he was pretty relaxed about Megatron, she'd noticed.
no subject
"It's limited. And hasn't seen maintenance in a long time. I'm not sure how reliable any connection would be."
Keeping a contingency in case whatever failing device had finally sputtered out was something of a habit.
no subject
"Oh." Though she was taken aback for a second, Nautica shifted mental gears readily enough. It wasn't Megatron's fault his society withheld basic medical care, after all. "Well, if gain's a problem on your end, I can pump out a lot of power--radio attenuates fast underwater--but we can still pick out a meeting place as a backup."
She was thinking a park bench, or maybe something near a nice conspicuous landmark. When Megatron tried to pick a drainage pipe or something they were going to have to do some negotiating.
no subject
As they get closer to the city, he attempts to run power to his own internal comm unit. It's been a while since he's used it (external ones were much easier to come by), but it managed to sputter to life and begin to feed back diagnostic results.
He stops though, at a rather familiar looking, if decrepit oil house. Looks like this Cybertron and theirs had similar tastes in energon brews. A hand reaches to stop Nautica from continuing onward so she can take a look.
no subject
"Hmm?" She followed his gaze to the storefront and perked up. "Oh! I've heard about Maccadam's! I never had a chance to visit before the Lost Light set off, though."
no subject
He'd never had any particularly good memories associated with the place (in fact, one could argue that given this was where he'd had his most infamous arrest, he'd want to avoid it), but it was the first familiar spot between the two dimensions.
And hey, it wasn't a drainage pipe.
"Radio's online. What's your frequency?"
no subject
Reading me? Her voice came through loud and clear over radio, though at this range it would be hard to miss.
Let's go see what they've got on tap, she joked as she tried the door. Even assuming there was engex left in the bar, it might not be a great idea to drink it. Doubly so given Nautica's rarefied taste in intoxicants. Ha, unlocked. My new career in burglary is going swimmingly.
no subject
He follows her inside, into the dusty remains of the bar. Whether or not they actually had any fuel left might actually be a good thing to know, since the raw energon at the bottom of the crater still needed to be refined.
Megatron goes behind the counter, running a hand over the dust and leaving a clean streak where he did so. A cloud hovered in the air of the disturbed particles. Well, there were certainly plenty of empty glasses, tubes, and canisters back here.
no subject
She pressed a button on her wrench and it lit up like a torch, casting a bluish glow around the empty room as she turned in a slow circle. "It's morbid, I know, but I wonder why there are no corpses." Given how tough Cybertronians were as a species, if the buildings hadn't worn away to rust yet, there should still be traces of the population somewhere. "What leaves a city mostly intact but no bodies at all? Did everyone just up and abandon it?"
no subject
"It is rather devoid of bodies for an abandoned battlefield."
He quietly watches her run the scans on her wrench, figuring that might be better in giving them information rather than more blind speculation.
no subject
She set down the briefcase and leaned all the way over the counter, feet in the air in a less-than-dignified manner, while she dug around in the shelves under the bar. After a brief search, she gave a triumphant exclamation and slid back to the floor, now with a bottle of faintly glowing pink liquid in one hand.
"Ha, still sealed." She brandished the bottle at him. "Want to try it?"
no subject
"Don't recognize the brand."
Not too unusual given this might not be their Cybertron.
no subject
"Copper-aged isn't my absolute favorite, but it's only a 10-year so the sour notes shouldn't be too pronounced." She paused and got roughly the same expression on her face as when she was trying to figure out deeper mysteries like 'where the hell are we' and 'why is Megatron a baby,' and started rifling through bar supplies again. "I wonder if there's any benzene left back here. A few drops ought to open up the flavor nicely."
no subject
He twists the top off with little effort as she sets out two glasses, a little surprised she'd expect him to be interested at all in the finer points of fuel distillery. Caminus must have been a drastically different place to Cybertron.
As for him? He had a simple rule when it came to enjoying specialty energon - the closer to boiling, the better.
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