ROCK'EM SOCK'EM ROBOTS [BIG OPEN FIGHT LOG]

[sufferist]

Who: Signless, Robots, and YOU
Where: City Hall, and all over downtown LA.
When: April 14th
What: Signless bates the Cybetronians into having a big fight in downtown LA while attempting to get a valuable artifact. Earth civilians and superheroes are SUPER WELCOME to notice the fuss and try to stop the fighting/safe people from collateral damage.
Warnings: SUDDENLY ROBOT ULTRAVIOLENCE

Signless leaves himself, and the hammer, visible at first. He wants them to see him, to know that the battle is imminent - and with any luck, a conflict will start. He'll do his best to disappear and keep them hunting for him as as long as possible after he's initially been spotted. Maximum collateral damage is his goal.

It also helps that he's an empath. He'll be taking whatever opportunities he can to agitate people's emotions, whether it be anger, panic, or fear, in the attempt to make ever more chaos.

This is a party style log, meaning you can make you own threads and scenarios. Signless will be around with the hammer. LET'S MAKE THIS AS BIG OF A CLUSTERFUCK AS POSSIBLE, GUYS.

Comments

[deadpartners]

"Maybe not, but it's my duty to lead. To make sure we don't fail -- " Arcee cuts herself off abruptly as the heat of the welder cuts through the static of the pain, a strange sensation -- it doesn't exactly hurt, but it's not pleasant, either. Her hand tightens on the edge of the table, her entire frame going tense under Orion's touch, even as weary as she is.

[thanksoptimus]

"No amount of strength or cunning can ensure that against all odds," he says softly, resting his weaker hand against her plating in an attempt to be comforting. It's funny how, when not speaking on his own behalf, he sounds more like Optimus than any other time.

[deadpartners]

Arcee wants to argue the point, insist that this could have gone better, she could have done better -- but he catches her off guard, how very like Optimus he sounds just now, and the words die in her vocalizer. Awkward as he is even now, it is a comforting gesture, and Arcee seems to relax against the table, her hand going over his. He's right -- even in the midst of all her frustration, she knows he's right. It's just the sort of thing Optimus would have said.

"Maybe not," she says again in acknowledgment, her face softening, even though she still grimaces at the welder. That's just the trouble, though, isn't it? It's the sort of thing Optimus would say. That's what the other Autobots need to be hearing. Arcee's no longer so sure she even possesses any of that wisdom to dispense. She cycles air through her vents, sighing slowly. "But it's all we have when the odds are stacked against us. Now that Megatron has the Matrix and the Forge..." She slumps a little, her frame going slack. "I just...have to find a way to pull through."

[thanksoptimus]

Orion can no longer reasonably doubt that Megatron has the Matrix and that all of this has been a lie. Not with the way Megatron laughed at him, like he was nothing. He knows that the Forge can only be used by a Prime, so one can only assume that they are planning to do something with it and the Matrix in tandem.

But he also knows that he is the only potential Prime around and he finds himself afraid that this was somehow what Megatron wanted from him all along. That maybe they'll come for him next.

He tries not to think about it. Instead he focuses on Arcee's voice and the lines of broken metal as he welds them back together.

"You are not alone, Arcee. In thought or in deed. I have often felt inadequate here as well... But you have everything that I am, just as I know you give everything you are. You were...You are so very brave in the face of all this and I do not think I would have made it this far without your guidance."

[deadpartners]

Orion is so honest, so sincere that it moves her and she falters for a response, feeling the weight of his words settle heavily in her spark. She doesn't know what to make of the fact that Orion has such trust, such faith in her when all he's seen her do is fail, just barely scrape by at best. He doesn't know her like Optimus did, doesn't have seven thousand years of context and camaraderie and reasons to believe. Optimus had put his faith in her when he'd left her in command and somehow, even after the loss of the Matrix, Orion had kept it. At a loss, she stares back at him for a long moment before she drops her gaze with an almost dispirited huff of air through her vents, pulling her hand away from Orion's arm to rub at her face. She can feel the unevenness of her face plating under her fingers where it'd gotten scuffed and scraped in the fight.

"Sorry," she says, if only for the drawn-out silence, the lack of response other than a stunned stare. "It's just -- " She huffs out another vent of air, but this time it almost sounds like a faint, rueful laugh. "I'm the one who wouldn't be here without -- without Optimus's guidance. He's...gotten me through some tough times." There's a pang as she remembers Jetset, the tumultuous period of grief that had followed. Optimus had been there for that, too.

[thanksoptimus]

He smiles a little, with tone similar to her laugh. Even with things so tire, it's hard for it not to be a little funny. To learn from someone that he himself would go on to teach.

"I think there is something to be learned from most bots," he says, slowly and contemplatively at first, but picking up momentum. "If Optimus really was like me...I am certain that he learned something from you as well." His smile fades completely then, becoming more nostalgic and pained. "You can learn, I think, even if...the bot isn't everything you thought they would be. Even if they are not perfect." He carefully sets his vocalizer before continuing. "I would not be who I am now if I had never met Megatronus. I do not think I would have...come so far, if I had not been exposed to that first spark of the fire he caries within him. Even with all he has done."

He pauses there, and then shakes his head.

"I am sorry to wax poetic over such things."

[deadpartners]

The little glimmer of a smile on Orion's face is enough to bring one out on Arcee's, even if just for a moment -- smiles had never come often to Optimus, it seemed, and she feels somehow privileged just to see Orion find something to smile about. The little swell in her spark persists even after both smiles fade, because his words, they carry an almost familiar weight and she's missing hearing ones like them.

"Don't be." Arcee's voice is still weak and crackling with static in her vocalizer, but she speaks anyway. She's still dizzy, fuel churning in her tanks from the loss of energon, but Orion's working on it and at least she's lying down now. Her plating might still be a scuffed and dented mess, smeared with energon, but her optics are brighter now, attentive and focused. "Optimus...wasn't often prone to sharing his feelings, not like this. Whenever he chose to, it was like -- I felt honored. It's...good to hear you talk about it."

[thanksoptimus]

It's hard not to wonder about the things that must have made Optimus Prime the person he was - and the person Orion Pax would become. Orion is a private person already, and so it isn't too hard to see himself continuing to be that way...but the intensity other bots seems to describe his future self with always feels far out of his league. Even when not directly comparing himself, or feeling that he needed to catch up, it was amazing how much you could feel both familiar but yet a stranger to yourself.

"Learning of Optimus Prime so often feels like some unnatural premonition," he says, something musing in his voice. All the while, he is continuing to patiently work with the welder. "I had often wondered what would become of me, if we would succeed. This is not an outcome I had ever imagined."

He hesitates for a long few moments, not sure if he's feeling up to going on.

"The way Megatron spoke to us, towards the end...that is the way you have come to know him, isn't it?"

[deadpartners]

"Yes," Arcee says quietly, her expression subdued and somber, biting back the little flare of anger in her spark. Orion doesn't need that right now, not when he's still mourning the ashes of his friendship with the bot Megatron had once been. And Orion's seen enough of her anger for one day, she thinks. "That's how he's been for...a long time. I know it must have been hard to imagine, hearing us talk about him like that when all he'd ever been to you was a friend, but...now you've seen who Megatron's become in the last seven thousand years."

Her voice is heavy as her gaze settles back on his face, and though the post-battle ache is starting to settle into her limbs, no longer kept at bay by the rush of energon boiling in her lines, she still moves to put her hand back over his weaker one. "I know I've said it before, but -- I'm sorry, Orion. For all of this."

[thanksoptimus]

He shakes his head a little, though he easily accepts her hand on his. He appreciates the gesture a great deal.

"I have been foolish, I think," he says. "Foolish, and too desperate to salvage something with him, despite so many warnings. Right to the end, I had hopes that I still might mean something to him. They were only selfish desires."

[deadpartners]

"I'd be hard-pressed to describe you as selfish, Orion." Arcee manages a dim smile, faint and encouraging, her smaller hand barely covering the back of his. Her fingers are still smeared with energon and dust from the fight, far from clean, but it'll do for now. "I don't think I've ever met a more selfless bot. You didn't want to believe what we told you about Megatron because you...always see the good in people. You wanted to believe the best about him."

[thanksoptimus]

Partially true, he can admit. But even if he does, it's clear that he doesn't agree with that completely - his doubt can be seen in his optics.

"But only out of a need for things to be how they were before," he says, slow and resigned. "He was...very dear to me. More than anything, I feel my actions were the result of my need for him to care for me again."

Arcee makes it sound like something noble, but it's hard for him to think of it that way. He remembers his own tears at the park, and how he had reacted when Megatron first spoke to him. They feel like the actions of someone smitten and stupid, and the more he thinks of them in those terms, the more resentful he feels towards himself for indulging in them.

[deadpartners]

It's no secret that Megatron and Optimus Prime had been close friends before the war, but Arcee's rarely had opportunity to glimpse just how deep that connection had once run. Her face softens and her hand tightens over his, her voice still strangely subdued.

"Orion, you practically woke up in another world -- out of time, out of place...Megatron was the only familiar thing to you. So much happened, so much changed in the blink of an eye for you...there's no shame in wanting to take comfort in something safe and familiar when everything else you know is gone. And to have that something you trust in taken away from you, to discover it just -- doesn't exist anymore..." She lets her optics close, tensing again momentarily under the welder. She sucks in a fresh intake of air through her vents. "I know what it's like to lose someone so suddenly. Maybe not like this, but -- anyone would feel that way. We're Cybertronian, Orion, we're living things with sparks and we feel. And believe me, it doesn't do you any good to just...close yourself off from that."

[thanksoptimus]

Maybe the way Optimus Prime is described isn't so strange to him after all. He can certainly see how things could go that way, after all this. It's just the wise leader part he's having a hard time connecting with.

Her words take the edge off of his resentment, and the hard stare of his optics softens. He vents out slowly, pausing in his welding for only a moment before continuing.

"I wonder...how I felt the first time around," he says softly. Did the gradually widening gap between them make it easier to bear? Or did watching someone so dear slowly slip away just make him harder?

[deadpartners]

Arcee can see how hard this is for him, just to talk about, just to think about, but all the same, she still feels that vague sense that she's honored just to listen. Her fingers curl lightly around the edge of his hand, too big for her to grasp properly.

"I can't tell you how you felt," she says, her voice sober. "But I know that it hurt. Optimus never talked about it too much, not -- on a personal level, but...he never let it change him. He never let the war become about revenge for him."

[thanksoptimus]

Revenge isn't something he has considered. There is no craving for it in his spark - right now all he wants is for this to be over, and for Megatron to leave them all alone. Right now, never having to see him again would be enough.

But it wouldn't be enough for long. Even now he still feels tied to this.

He's almost finished with the welding now, and so he starts to hook up the transfusion.

"I have no desire for revenge," he says quietly. "I would settle for being able to return home."

[deadpartners]

Arcee smiles faintly despite herself, despite Orion's obviously grave mood. It's hard not to. This is all still so strange, in quiet ways that creep up without her noticing. "That's what Optimus wanted, too. To bring an end to the war and just...bring everybody home." The smile fades from her face and she winces slightly as she feels the fresh energon being pumped into her system, feeling her fuel tanks churn. "And I'm...doing everything I can to do that in his stead."

[thanksoptimus]

Orion doesn't know what to say, at first, and so instead he just focuses on making sure he's got everything hooked up right. There is a lurking sense of inevitability, now. Despite everything that's been said...Optimus Prime is still in a past tense. And if Megatron really does have the Matrix...

He vents slowly, feeling the edge of his wound up nerves again now that he doesn't have anything to do with his hands. He looks at her, his optics soft but still mournful.

"I will do everything I am able to aid you in that task," he says, at last. And he knows, in the end, what that will mean.

[deadpartners]

It's not hard to guess what he's thinking, with that look. Arcee just looks back at him, her expression mirroring his, feeling the weight of his dawning resignation on her spark.

"I meant it when I said I wouldn't force you to take back the Matrix if you didn't want to," she says, her voice quiet, still flanging from the damage to her systems. "If it's not something you're ready to do... When Optimus Prime left me in charge, he did so knowing full well that he might not be coming back. This might not have been how he imagined it, but...I've always been prepared for the possibility that my command might not be so temporary."

It's hard not to feel like they need Optimus Prime to win this war, that they can accept no substitutes -- but even so, even as urgently as Arcee wants this war to end, there's just something fundamentally wrong about forcing a reluctant Orion to take the Matrix, or worse, making him feel like he has no choice. If there's one thing Arcee's learned from Optimus, it's that there's always a choice.

The welds on her abdomen are still painfully fresh, but Arcee struggles to prop herself up into a halfway sitting position all the same, gritting her teeth. She's probably going to have to patch up the welds later one way or another anyway, she's sure. Her face is as quiet and somber as his but it's intent, too.

"You don't have to fight this war as Optimus Prime. You have a choice, Orion. I'm just glad...you're with us at all. Matrix or no, the Autobots are lucky to have you."

[thanksoptimus]

He just shakes his head, wordlessly. No, he thinks. It's not about him. No matter how much the fear of uncertainty may weight on him, it's not about his personal comfort. It's about right and wrong.

He owes it to his people. More than that, he owes it to himself.

"I know that you would never force my hand, Arcee," he says. "My actions are my own."

[deadpartners]

It's hard not to be moved by his sincere selflessness, his determination to do the right thing at whatever personal cost to him. It's what drew her to serve under Optimus Prime in the first place. But Orion, similar as he is, still isn't quite Optimus -- he's younger, not so accustomed to war, and he's been through so much lately, it almost makes her wish he could be more selfish. More than anyone else she knows, Orion deserves to have something of his own for once.

But duty calls and war makes its demands and they both understand that all too well. Just watching him with soft optics, mindful of the transfusion, she pushes herself slowly all the way upright, wincing as she slowly swings her legs over the edge of the table so she can face him. It's as close as she can get to standing right now, and it's clear it takes some effort, but she reaches out to clasp both her hands around his considerably larger one, feeling her spark tighten and swell with emotion. It's still a little strange, sometimes, to be this personal with someone who used to be Optimus. In some ways, Arcee is closer to Orion than she had been with the bot he'd used to be.

"You know whatever you decide," she says, her gaze locked on his face, "I'm with you. One hundred percent." She smiles faintly then, just a small fond quirk of the corner of her mouth. "I'm not going to lie, though, I'm...going to miss you."

[thanksoptimus]

His shoulders sink at that - it sounds so final. Even if he's decided on a course of action, the idea of it still scares him. What does it mean for him? Will he just cease to exist, or will it be like regaining memories he'd lost? Will his memories of all this endure with the return of Optimus's?

"We are of the same spark," he says quietly, his gaze falling, his fingers wrapping around hers in turn. "I...have hope, that such a thing will endure. That this will not be forgotten so easily."

What is this? He doesn't really know.

[deadpartners]

Of the same spark -- it's a more intimate choice of words than she'd have expected to hear from Optimus, but this is Orion. She tightens her grip on his hand, leaning forward as much as her wounds will allow. "Optimus was always a friend of mine," Arcee says softly, her gaze steady even if he isn't looking at her. "I don't think that'll ever change." She hesitates, a nervous clench to her spark that feels almost unfamiliar. It's been a long time since she's tread ground like this. "What is it that you're so afraid of forgetting?"

[thanksoptimus]

"...I feel that I have come to know a different side of you, than the one you describe having with Optimus Prime," he says, eventually. "I would not like to believe said feelings could be so ephemeral, at one's core."

[deadpartners]

It's hard to deny that her relationship with Orion differs from the one she'd had with Optimus. The perspective is all different, the circumstances -- harder still to deny that there's a certain closeness between them that hadn't been there before. She knows that his fear is at least partially justified, knows Optimus was still not quite Orion. She straightens up at the edge of the berth a little more, as much as she can.

"Maybe they're not," Arcee says, "but there's no way to know for sure how you'll feel then, not right now. And...maybe it's how you feel right now that matters."