robothell | [ INTRO LOG ]

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[ 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...

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"Kagerou," Aftermath corrects himself, tone gentle.

"Are you feeling better?" he asks after a beat. "Do you need any fuel? And more importantly, can you run on energon?"

He appears to relax somewhat, at the use of his name. The question, though, gives him pause.

"Gasoline." The answer comes slowly, but more steadily. "I use... gasoline. I don't need any now..."

"Gasoline?"

Where on Cybertron were they supposed to find that? Fuel made from million year old dead organic matter wasn't exactly something you'd be likely to find on a planet that was pretty much entirely mechanical. Then again, it was an alien Cybertron so perhaps...

Well, whether or not this Cybertron had it was moot because it sure as heck didn't answer the problem of trying to find the stuff.

"That does put you in a bit of a tight spot there."

Now that just brought back the panic. The attempts at struggling, despite the paralysis in his limbs. No -- no, that couldn't be. He couldn't have gotten this far, only to starve...

"No!"

That, at least comes out clearly.

"I don't want to die!"

"You die if you do not fuel?"

It was unusual for non-Cybertronian machines. Even Cybertronians needed very specific types of injuries to die from lack of fuel. Most of the time, the body just put itself into stasis and shunted the rest of the fuel into sustaining the spark- which didn't really need that much energy.

"Yes."

He has to pause, to regain the ability to move, through the panic. To fight down the shuddering spikes of energy trying to keep him down.

"AI. My AI... has to stay powered. Or it's -- it's gone."

"And your creators never created redundancies for that," Aftermath says in a tone that described exactly how unimpressed he was with Kagerou's engineering team.

"If your AI runs on electricity, I think we can probably rig up some kind of generator to keep it running." Is this helping with the panicking? Actually, he's not sure this was helping with the panicking.

"In the meant time, keep track of your energy readouts and power down as often as you can."

"N-no. They... I'm just a prototype. Disposable."

They never meant for him to live beyond the facility. Never meant for him to so much as venture outside. No wonder there were no failsafes.

"G... yes. Generator. Okay."

"You know, if I ever find your creators, I'm dragging them in front of an AI rights court." There's pleeeenty of venom in his voice. "Not only are they incompetent, irresponsible and extremely unethical, they have clearly been abusive."

He puffs a hot vent of air and takes a moment to regather his composure before starting to speak again.

"Did they at least make it possible for you to hook up to some external power source?"

"Wh... what?"

No, really, that angry statement jars more out of him than any question about potential power sources. He even goes still, staring up at the stranger. Court? He knows what a court is.

Why would someone put the humans who made him on trial? They hadn't broken any laws. He was just an AI...

Abusive...?

"I don't -- I don't understand. Why?"

"They've clearly lied to you about how valuable you are," Aftermath points out gently. "Even without the test for it, I can see that you you have personhood. They didn't want to deal with the fact that you do, so they gave you the idea that you aren't valuable."

"It's very typical tactic that a lot of companies use to stop the AI from speaking up, from going to find help. They don't want to lose an investment." Aftermath pauses briefly to take out his solar charger and battery pack, setting them on the ground.

"Lied...?"

Why would they lie? Did that mean they were lying about Shadowmaru? How -- they can't have lied about Shadowmaru. His purpose for living can't be less than perfect. That's not possible.

"I'm not. I'm not valuable. Not an investment. They were just -- they were going to kill me anyway!"

"You're a prototype. They've probably sunk a good sum of money into making you. Your body, your AI, the personnel and resources they needed to put you together and keep you up and running." Aftermath sets up the solar array as he speaks, a ponderous look on his face.

"Why would they destroy what they've spent so much time working on? It's not a very sensible thing for a company to do." Then again, he wasn't asking the right question, was he?

"I'm -- just a prototype. Just a. Flawed version." He shakes his head a little. "They don't. Need me. They have him."

It just didn't make sense to him. He'd been drilled with it. Made with the very idea he was, and always would be, inferior. It wasn't Shadowmaru's fault. Not even a little bit.

"They. Have him. He's perfect."

"A prototype is not a flawed version." Reaching out, Aftermath places a very gentle hand on top of Kagerou's upper arm. "A prototype is a prototype. If successful, a prototype will be used as the basis of things to come."

The fact that the young mech was so distressed had Aftermath worried. This probably wasn't the sort of thing he should have brought up. Farlane would have told him to wait until a more appropriate time.

It was a bit too late for that though and perhaps, he could help Kagerou on the way to find some kind of peace with himself.

"Who is 'him'?"

"Yes... yes I am. I was made to be. To be less..."

He flinches at the hand on his arm. But he lacks the strength to pull it away right now. He can't conceive of this. Of them purposefully making him think he was lesser. Shadowmaru was perfect. He had to be.

He lets his optic power down. Trying to relax.

"Shadow... Shadowmaru. The reason I... he's the reason I exist."

"You do not have to be less for him to be perfect."

Aftermath lifts his hand away at the obvious discomfort.

This discussion seemed to be going around in circles. It wasn't a circle Kagerou seemed to be willing to break just yet either and perhaps it shouldn't be broken quite so quickly.

Sighing softly, the old truck turns back to his contraptions and tries to change the topic. "Anyways, do you have some way to connect to an external power source?"

"I don't... I don't understand."

How does that make sense? Shadowmaru is perfect so... wouldn't everyone else be lesser? Especially himself? His AI can't wrap itself around the concept in the slightest.

So he's grateful for the change in topic. He even relaxes a bit.

"There... maybe." He fidgets enough to turn his wrist toward the larger bot. There should be some sort of power coupling in there.

Whether or not Kagerou would ever understand was something only time and a lot of explanations would tell. It seemed to be some rather rigid mental programming there.

"Do you know what wattage the connectors are?" Aftermath ventures as he gently takes Kagerou's wrist, examining it.

Programming and life experience, really. Or, rather, what short life he'd had so far. He'd always known he was meant to die -- to die so that someone else would live. And be perfect.

"No," he murmurs, doing his best to allow the bigger bot to examine the ports and connectors lining the underside of one wrist.

"Is gasoline just a power source or do you need it for movement as well?"

Aftermath click a button and the head of the connector in his hand liquefies and reforms into a jelly-like state, cylindrical in shape. He presses it into the connector and lets the universal adapter remold itself.

"Power..." He murmurs. "Need power to move."

He tries not to jerk his arm as he feels something connect. He's used to humans working on him. Not other robots. This is... odd.

Aftermath notes the discomfort but for now, it wasn't something that could be avoided. He checks the wattage setting on the solar battery before turning it on.

It was on its highest setting, but that wasn't particularly high considering it was a solar charger. Hopefully Kagerou had an inbuilt power supply unit that could sort through it.

He shivers a bit, but settles in to allow the device to do its job. There's no sense fighting it. If he doesn't keep his engine running... there won't be much in the way of living in his future.

So he lies there, letting it do its job, and trying to let the crackling damage fade.

"How are you feeling?"

They should move to somewhere more sheltered perhaps. He doesn't think Tarn would take well to an alien child running around. And then he can begin searching for a medic to help sort out the power business for Kagerou.

[ INTRO LOG ]

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