nexus_sages | (no subject)

Until he joined the crew of the Lost Light, Pipes had only ever been on Cybertron and space stations. And so, he joined up to see the universe, and have adventures, and make friends. He was very eager, very enthusiastic, very excited to be on his way.

Unfortunately, most people don't really like being around someone who's very eager, very enthusiastic, and very excited. Most people find that very annoying. So the making friends thing didn't really pan out all that well.

And as for adventures...mostly, he got hurt. He got shot and sick and hurt. Which...are sort like adventures. Maybe? At least he got to see some of the universe. He also got to see a lot of the medibay.

Then he saw the bottom of Overlord's foot. A few times, actually.

And then? Then, well. Then he died.

And that's where we come in...

A small mech wanders into the Nexus...well, he's small by Cybertronian standards. To the average humanoid, sixteen feet is possibly not that small. It's funny how that works, isn't it?

He looks around, optics bewildered behind their visor shield. "Um," he says after a moment, fingers twisting together with soft metallic whirs. "Um, is this the Afterspark? Cos...this is not at all what I was picturing."

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"Yeah, but what about that whole 'Red Rust' plague thing?" He turned around to walk backwards to talk to her. "Ohhhh, I don't think I told you about that, did I?"

"'Red Rust'? No, you didn't mention that... sounds scary." Sounds like a plague, for a place full of robot people, and that makes it sound more than scary. Even for the girl who lived in 616 Manhattan by choice.

It'll be a story to fill their walk, she figures, and another something to drink away when they find the bar. She'll navigate while he talks. That's a fair distribution of jobs, right?

That is a fair distribution of jobs.

"It is scary," Pipes answers, optics widening for emphasis. "Okay. Um. So. It was my first time on an alien planet, right? We were going to a medical outpost on Delphi, and there was snow and everything was amazing, yeah? An' I was super excited over everything. 'Cause it was all super exciting."

"Well, yeah, you got to go out into space and explore things. Anyone would be excited." She'd be excited. She may not look like she can get excited, but there's more to her than meets the eye.

"Do you not have snow where you're from?"

He's very well acquainted with people being more than meets the eye.

"I'd never seen snow ever!" he exclaims, flailing a bit. "So. So we get the the outpost, and there's nobody around at all, and there's this big red X painted on the side of the building. D'you know what a big red X painted on the side of a building means? Cos I sure didn't."

It's almost like the narrator knew that, but she couldn't possibly.

"Ah." She can sort of understand that. Seeing things for the first time is always exciting. "A red 'X', where I'm from, would mean 'you really don't want to open that'. Red is 'danger' and 'X' is 'don't go here', so... you went in and someone got infected?"

Of course she couldn't, how could she know such a thing?

"Yeah, that's pretty much what it means where I'm from too, come to find out. But, like I said, I didn't know. So! I smashed through the wall and found myself hip-deep in dead guys. Turns out, they've got this Red Rust thing, and it basically liquifies all your inner workings and such. I got infected, Drift got infected, Ratchet got infected, basically everybody got infected."

How does anyone know anything? What even is knowledge?

"Ooh." The face she makes pretty much sums up her thoughts on that: horrible with a side order of nasty. Also, that he's never going to be the navigator when they're going someplace because he's too much the break in first, ask questions later sort for her tastes. "I'm so sorry. Good thing someone found a cure."