liesdontfindyou | Open Post

Agent Texas rarely goes to the locker room. Well, even that's an exaggeration. She never goes to the locker room. But for some reason today she decides to pop in, and notices that she has a locker with her name on it. There's the usual hustle and bustle of people marching in and out, on their way to work out or whatever they plan to do. But Texas approaches the locker and opens in, wondering why she's never had occasion to do so before. Doesn't she just change in her room, and go there right after workouts? She's unsure. Weird, how someone could just not remember details of their daily life like that.

She finds nothing inside but a disc drive disguised as a dog tag. She notices it's a disc drive right away because it's too thick to be a normal dog tag.

That night, after AI class is over, she slips into the room and uses one of the terminals to play the files enclosed in the drive. What she sees confuses her at first. The more she views, however, the more she understands. There's just one bit that doesn't make sense—Connie saying she's probably gone. Maybe it's because their latest mission has been delayed. She doesn't know. But she knows who she needs to talk to about it.

It's late at night according to the ship's clock. Texas knocks on the door to Connie's quarters and waits for a response.

Despite the time, Connie had never fallen asleep. The knock on the door triggers an automatic fight or flight response that she barely suppresses, forcing herself not to hold her breath but to breathe steady and evenly.

Across the room, her roommate shifts in her sleep and the fabric of the sheets rustle beneath a groan, but she doesn't awaken.

Careful not to make a sound, Connie stands from her bed and moves towards the door. There's no whistling and she hadn't been in the Invention's systems that night, which settles her frayed nerves somewhat, but despite that, she hesitates to open it. Surely, the Director's attack dogs wouldn't knock, right?

Finally, she opens the door and its both a surprise and a relief when she sees who's there.

"Texas?"

"I think we need to talk," Tex replies simply. The dog tags she'd found are nestled in her storage pocket, but she'll whip it out if necessary to prove that there is definitely something important to be discussed here.

Connie bites her lower lip and steps out from the room, letting the door shut behind her. Feeling a little bit small out of her armour, she automatically squares her shoulders and raises her head.

"Not here. South's asleep. I know a place if you don't."

"Go ahead," Texas says, nodding forward. It's important this remain confidential, she knows, and she figures Connie already knows what this is about.

She doesn't speak until they reach the place where Connie is going, and once they're there, Texas crosses her arms, contemplating how to begin.

"So it's obvious you didn't expect to be here right now."

"No, no I didn't." Connie shifts on her feet, compulsively picking at an old scar that stretches across her palm. "I didn't intend to leave, exactly, but... I knew there was a good chance I wouldn't be coming back. Then, we were delayed at the last minute and..."

She gestures vaguely.

"Here I am, and here you are. I didn't think you'd find them so soon."

Part of her wants some commiseration. She just realized she's never had a meal, never lifted on the weight bench , never even taken off her helmet. Somehow, the Director had programmed her not to question these things—until this had come up.

But admitting these things would make her feel too vulnerable, and it's not even really the point.

"So what do we do about it?" she asks. That's the point. How will they bring the Director to justice? If that's even what they decide to do.

"Well, the original plan was to go to the UNSC, but... the more I learn about my contact the less I'm sure he has as many connections as he claims he does," CT says, shifting again.

Said contact will be getting antsy, thanks to the delay. She can only hope he doesn't do anything rash in her absence.

"Not to mention, in the original plan, I... didn't have any allies here." There's something unspoken, there, an unwitting openness. Connie has been alone for a very long time and there's almost a novelty to talking so openly.

"That's the important part," Tex says. "And you do have one now."

Connie has seemed to need that reassurance.

Texas supposes that means they need to figure out if they're on the same page.

"My priority is rescuing Alpha before anything else."

Not that she doesn't want justice for the Director, because she does, at least in a measure, but the fact that the AI is being tortured is weighing heavily on her.

That comes as no surprise. Connie nods knowingly and in agreement. Though some (her contact) may have seen the torture of a living, but artificial, mind as incidental to the protocol violations, she'd never been able to shake the sense of obligation she held towards the Alpha and the other AI, too.

It's why the dog tags were placed there in the first place, after all. Not just because she believed she could trust Texas, a belief now proved true, but because Texas deserved to know the truth.

"They only recently split off another fragment. North is due to receive it— him after the assault on the scrapyard finally goes ahead. Alpha is..." She pauses to consider her words. "I don't know what state we might find him in, whenever that may be."

If Tex could look pained, she would right now. She angles her head, thinking.

"We need to figure out how we're leaving. That's the first thing to have in mind. Once we've accomplished everything we're trying to do, we need to be able to get out. Or to bail if things go wrong."

"I don't suppose you know how to fly a ship?" Connie asks. At the start of the sentence, she's only half-serious, by the end, she's tilting towards 'dead serious'. "My only way out before was through my contact. I was meant to meet him on a scrap ship and leave with him. One of the few things I couldn't plan for was bailing early, I didn't have the means."

No allies, no flight experience, meant no emergency exit.

"I do," Tex says. " I don't know why..."

Contemplating that is a futile notion. She shakes her head slightly.

"Anyway, point is I can do it. Do you trust anyone else here?"

Connie sucks in a sharp, audible breath. The question is a little like a loaded gun, or a blade against the throat of a part of her she loathes to face.

"I don't know," she says, the words spat out like she wants them away from her as soon as possible. "The honest answer is... I don't know. I thought I did, when I started this, and I want to," god, she wants to, "but... there's a reason why it took until I thought I was leaving to even 'tell' you."

"Who is it?" Tex asks quietly. Connie obviously has someone in mind. That's the important thing here, to begin with. To figure out if the person she suspected she could trust was actually trustworthy.

Connie folds her arms and pins her hand against her chest so she can't scratch that scar.

"There was a time when I thought that Washington might be someone I could trust," she says, after a moment's silence. "Only, he never listened, so I gave up trying, but..." She hesitates for another second. "He almost caught me, once. He never turned me in."

"Washington?"

Tex doesn't really know anyone here that well, but Washington never struck her as someone who would be all that forthright in a situation like this. He's too idealistic.

"That's something, but..." She shakes her head. "I don't have a good feeling about it."

"Like I said, there's a reason why I only ended up telling someone when I was meant to be gone," Connie sighs, drags a hand over her face. "He used to question things like I did, but the second it turned serious he started making excuses. He wants this place to be what we were told it was. Obviously, it isn't."

She paces a little in place, restless energy brewing.

"There's people I wish I could trust but... loyalties are tricky to decipher. I didn't even know where yours lay. I was never one hundred percent sure that you wouldn't side with the Director." Then, holding her hands up, "Not as any judgement on you! The fact was I just... didn't know you. I couldn't be sure."

"I've barely spoken to anyone," she says. "I just see how people act in the training room, and that's only if our sessions overlap."

She restlessly uncrosses her arms and then crosses them in the other direction.

"What if it just ends up being the two of us?" she says. "It might mean rescuing Alpha and taking him for evidence to whoever."

She doesn't relish that prospect. In her mind Alpha deserves to rest after what they've put him through.

Connie opens her mouth, then closes it. It's hard to admit that she isn't sure how well she knows the others either, anymore.

"I'm not sure if I trust the UNSC with you or Alpha," she admits, instead. "Alpha has been through a lot and you are... unique, and ONI are ONI. There was a time I planned to stick around long enough for Command to actually give me the fragment assigned to me, as evidence, but with my position on the board..."

She shrugs slightly. It's been a long few months of plans being made but falling through. The fatigue is written into every line of her stance.

"It's one shot, then," she mutters. They either rescue Alpha and leave it at that, or they try to bring the Project down themselves in one feel swoop. What would an act like that consist of? Tex thinks for a moment.

"Then we take him," she says. "The Director. Take him back to the land-based HQ and hold him there."

"That... could work," Connie says, tapping a foot against the floor. "We're a long way from HQ, we couldn't make it in a Pelican, but we should be due to make another stop over there... then it'd be possible."

Her contact wouldn't like any of this, she knows that much. It's more time on the ship, it takes them away from him, but her trust in his intentions and ability to follow through on his promises is failing. After so long unable to do anything, there's an appeal to taking direct action.

"All right," she says, already trying to think through some of the possibilities. "We'll have to start keeping an eye out for opportunities to connect with trustworthy agents. Otherwise we'll just put plans together as if it'll just be the two of us."

"Be wary of Florida and Wyoming," Connie says, with a note of urgency. "I may not know which agents are trustworthy, but I know that they are definitely not. There's been... close calls."

She starts compulsively picking at her scar again.

"My contact will still be expecting me if this mission goes ahead. If I go to meet him, I don't know that I can get back, but if I don't, I don't know what he'll do."

Tex reaches forward and stills Connie's hand. That little nervous habit is making her nervous.

"I can't promise you everything will be okay," she says, "but believe me, you're in a better situation now that I'm on board."

Connie freezes automatically at the contact, but makes the conscious effort to relax again.

And then she smiles, with a genuine sense of relief.

"I am. Thank you," she says. "I should have come to you sooner, but hindsight makes a genius out of all of us and all that."

"Nah, you're right, you couldn't have known how I'd react," she says. "Seeing everything...all the evidence...it unlocked something in me. But you didn't know if that would happen."

"I hoped it would," Connie says. "I came close, a couple of times, to walking up to you and telling you, because you deserved to know. You deserved to find out from a friendly face. Hence..."

She gestures vaguely at where dog-tags would hang around her neck.

"I can't imagine what it was like for you, to actually see it, of course."

"I doubt you could, yeah," she says, muttering again. She doesn't intend to elaborate any further on that, though, at least at this time. The whole thing has left her with a drifting feeling, unmoored in her own time and space. "Thank you for doing it. It was brave."

"I owed it to you to try. I owed it to everyone to... do all of this." That's what she's been telling herself. Once she saw what was going on, she didn't have any choice but to do something.

It's been weighing heavily on her and some of that weight is still visible in the way she holds herself.

"You didn't owe me," Tex says. "The Director is the one who owed this."

She draws back a half step, balling a fist. She cares for him, she can't deny it within herself, but he's being an incredible asshole and she wants him to be punished somehow. Not by the law. By herself.

"We'll get him. One way or another, we'll... we'll do something," Connie says, sounding a little surer with every word.

She starts to pick at her hand, but stops herself this time.

"First obstacle is this mission. I don't suppose you know if you're on the roster, the way you usually are? They've locked down those files tighter since they started noticing my... poking around."

"I am," she says. She'd received the mission briefing earlier, when they thought they were going to be going ahead with it. "Separately from everyone else, as usual."

"As usual," Connie says, shaking her head slightly. She has a thought, but whether that thought is feasible is another matter entirely. "How able would you be to... stray off your intended orders, a little?"

"You really think he'd do anything about it?"

The question is asked with a bitter edge to her tone. She can do whatever she wants.

Connie holds her hands up a little.

"Just checking. I don't know the length's he'll go to. But... that's good," she says, "because my next idea was that we rendezvous out in the scrapyard and you come with me. Lot harder for my contact to try and make me leave with him if I have someone with me, and if I'm with another agent... I look less like I just took off to the Project and more like I was acting in their interests."

Tex nods slowly, thinking.

"I think that would work," she says. "We'll have to make it as quick as possible, though."

"I can do quick. If he starts acting up, you have my express permission to threaten him so we can make a quick exit," Connie says, and there's almost a hint of a joke in her voice. "He could do with a little reigning in."

Tex snickers. "One of those, huh."

She glances toward the door.

"We probably better get back to our usual routines. We don't really want them to notice this is happening."

"Yeah, one of those," she says with a quiet laugh. "Right, I should uh, I should probably try and get in what actual sleep I can. I'm... usually awake around the time you came to me tonight," sleep has been difficult to come by for a while, "so whenever we need to talk, feel free to come around."

"All right." Tex nods, steps back to let Connie leave the room ahead of her, and then heads to her room.

She remembers now what happens when she ends up in there—she connects herself to the port in the wall and sets herself on sleep mode. She's resting and recharging, but not in the way a human would. From now on, she's not going to forget this is what happens. She's not going to end up remembering unstrapping her armor, taking a shower, and snuggling down in bed. She doesn't even know how those memories replace themselves in her head. But that programming is broken now.

Connie falls back into her bed with a thump that she's surprised doesn't wake the still heavily sleeping South on the other side of the room.

Despite how drained she is, there's a new energy in her; after days of feeling like she was here on borrowed time, she, for the first time, has an ally on board. A gamble finally payed off and now, there's a plan that might actually work.

It's the most alive she's felt in months.

"I used to be Air Commander," Starscream mutters, hunched over with a canister of fuel in one hand, nursing it with a vengeance. Long gone are the sleek, sweeping wings of an F-15; he may be the same colours, but time and necessity have forced him to take the alt-mode of a YSS-1000 Sabre, its engines mounted on his wings a far cry from the once iconic Seeker profile. The leap in their technology would be remarkable, if it wasn't for the fact it was organics'. His paint is faded and chipped, and that too is a far cry: a far cry from the once proud Second in Command of the Decepticons. Starscream is on his own.

"And now," he hisses, "Here I am, drinking this slag they call fuel!"

There's a quickly squashed urge to throw the fuel canister in frustration, but instead he stays his hand, hissing lowly. The last time he had caused a racket, he had woken half this ship, drawn far too much attention. It's not a risk he can afford to make. Here, Primus knows where in the galaxy, trapped in a human starship's hangar, blending in is survival. It's only luck that they found him, and only luck that he was awake enough to scan himself a new alt-mode to hide in time.

"It's just my stupid luck that nobody even thought to go looking for me. Not even to confirm I was dead! Primus knows how long it's been! Useless, worthless scrap-eaters-"

It's one of those increasingly common nights where Connie can't quite get herself comfortably off to sleep. She's taken to walking the halls to pass the time and wear herself out, though where she ends up is a dice roll at best. She's gone to parts of the ship she didn't even know existed before, just by wandering.

Tonight, though, she finds herself heading down to the hangar.

The brightly coloured fighter had become sort of part of the scenery down there; a curiosity, but one that many people had stopped thinking about unless they were staring it in the face.

It's... literal face, apparently.

She has to do a double take when she reaches the hangar entrance. The Sabre being out of place isn't a total surprise, but the fact it appeared to no longer exactly be a Sabre at all and was... drinking fuel? Certainly was.

"What the fuck?"

It's a minor miracle Starscream doesn't jump enough to whack his head or wings on the ceiling. He wheels around, null rays instinctively powering up, looking for the threat- Only for optics to land on one of the smallest humans he'd ever seen.

"...Slag."

His weapons power down, their whine ebbing to nothing. Ugh. If he left one of them a smear on the floor, more would investigate, and then he'd be without shelter or fuel. But he can't let it leave! If it outed him to the rest of the ship... Ugh! He's going to have to think fast. The exalted Decepticon Air Commander, reduced to this!

He hikes his wings up higher, a threat display in Seeker-speak, trying to look more aggressive than ridiculous despite the fact he's hunched over with his knees up to his cockpit.

"I could ask you the same!" He snaps. "How dare you interrupt my refueling!"

Connie isn't entirely sure that she isn't dreaming. She even pinches herself, just in case, but that hurts, so she figures that this is actually real.

Which doesn't make it make any more sense.

Blinking, she says, dumbly, "...so that's where all the fuel's been going," as if there isn't anything weirder about this situation than that, as if there aren't a thousand more questions and only a single answer.

There's a sharp roll of the optics that nearly moves Starscream's entire head with it. "Yes, fine, I am partaking in this sorry excuse for fuel. Not like your kind is giving me much of a choice! Do you have a problem with that, human?"

A pause, and then he snaps, "And stop staring! You would think your kind has never met Cybertronians before!"

"Met... what before?" Connie says, not entirely sure why she's still stood there and not running to tell someone that something is very strange. "I... don't think we have? We only recently met... fleshy... aliens...?"

Every new word of the sentence feels more absurd. Right, that's why she's not running to tell anyone. This is ridiculous. No one would believe her.

"Cybertronians! Ugh." Another roll of the optics. "Are you ignorant? How can you not know? We Decepticons were on your world in- Sometime in the past!" He's not sure he can remember the way humans figure out their 'years', but he's not going to admit that.

He leans forward a little, towards her, and narrows his optics. "And you are not going to tell anyone I am here."

"Like anyone would believe me if I tried."

She tries to wrack her brain for anything resembling the clearly living being in front of her, but the only things she comes back with are old cartoons that have a vague resemblance, but are more than likely nothing to do with what she's seeing. She's read a lot of old human history, and a lot of old documents she should never have had access to.

Whatever he's talking about, it pre-dates it all.

"Not as far as I know, you weren't. Whatever you are we... you are not common knowledge." Which isn't entirely surprising, even if he is telling the truth somehow.

His first instinct is to hike up his wings again in anger, to snap in response to this blatant ignorance. How dare they forget all the Decepticons had done to their kind? Surely something about their stay on Earth had persisted in their laughably short memories, even if only the Autobots' presence!

But as he opens his mouth to shoot back a snarky, cutting remark, her words click in his processor. The Transformers, forgotten... And this little human can't say a thing. The scowl that had settled on his faceplates slowly morphs into a smirk. "I suppose you will just have to leave me here then, hmm? If no one will believe you..."

"I guess so. I mean, you're huge, it's not like I could personally do anything about... whatever you're doing. Other than stealing our fuel, that is."

She's not sure if her relative nonchalance is her lack of sleep or chronic lack of fucks to give, lately. There's a thousand questions swirling in her head and trying to pluck a single one from the whirlwhind is easier said than done when every time she looks at this... 'Cybertronian', another one is added.

"What I am doing is none of your concern!" He flicks his wings almost dismissively, back to scowling again. Starscream's not having a good day, but at least he's too currently self-absorbed to notice Connie still being so baffled down there. "Besides, this fuel is subpar! Who ordered this slag? I'm worth more than this scrap!"

"I don't know who orders that stuff; the Director, I guess? Or... whoever oversees the pilots?" Her nose scrunches slightly in thought, but she shakes her head. "And anyway, it wasn't exactly ordered with someone drinking it in mind. It's just for the ships and in my experience, ships aren't usually picky."

"If I was calling the shots here-" He bites off the rest of the sentence, shaking his head with a snarl. He draws himself up to his full height - well, as much as he can without banging his head or wings on the ceiling - and sneers down at her. "I can be as 'picky' as I want. After all- You are addressing Starscream, Air Commander, Second in Command, and eventual leader of the Decepticons!"

"I'm sure that would be very impressive if I actually knew what that meant," Connie says, not even intending to be snarky.

Watch him puff up with fury like an angry bird. "Well- It's very impressive, organic! Our kind is split into two factions, and one day I will be in charge of one of them!" Ah, so he is kinda answering questions, even if Connie hasn't actually properly voiced any yet.

"And when that happens, we'll be able to drive out those blasted Autobots and take back our home!"

Ah, infighting. Connie's seen enough of that for a lifetime.

"Well, as long as that stays far away from us... good luck, I suppose? Though I guess you being 'in charge' is pretty far away itself if you're stuck in our hangar."

"How can I tell you if we are or not with this mess?" He snaps, gesturing widely at the hangar. "Last time I was online and on Earth, you had barely invented your personal 'mobile phones'! Now you're running around in fragging starships!"

He bristles at her. "It will happen. Just you wait, human. I'll oust that bucket-of-bolts Megatron, and when I do, I'll win this Primus-damned war far quicker than our 'glorious leader' has ever done anything!"

Every new word she hears him say gets filed away into the 'figure out what that means later' pile in her mind. It's quickly growing.

"I mean, the ship has logs of our coordinates, the nearest population centers and more in our databanks, with how long you've been here I'm surprised you haven't figured that out already," Connie says, cocking her head. "I know I'm a... particularly nosy, person, but I think anyone stuck in a strange starship's hangar would try to figure out where they were."

"Don't you think I've tried!? Your - ugh - artificial intelligence has proven quite a thorn in my side! I will make progress, but its presence makes it infuriatingly slow." He sounds so insulted that a mere AI is beating him.

Of course, the fact is he's trying to brute force it more than anything, and yet still trying not to get caught. The 'Con has no subtlety sometimes.

Edited 2020-08-19 21:36 (UTC)

Connie blinks.

"Our..." Artificial Intelligence? "Do you mean F.I.L.S.S.? She's not usually any good at blocking intrusions, I can get past her in my sleep."

"Yes, whatever that pile of scrap is called!" He grits his dentae. Oh, how he hates to be shown up by a mere bag of flesh and bones! "It is in my way, and the usual methods I use on your pitiful Earth computers aren't working! Unless..."

He smirks briefly, and drops his voice to a purr, "You perhaps could assist this poor, lost Seeker?"

Connie narrows her eyes at him. "Oh, I could, very easily. But you'd have to give me a reason I should."

"Ah, well, that's simple, isn't it?" The Seeker smirks. "You have a lot of questions. I have a lot of answers. A small little trade, and you get those answers. Call it an exchange of information." He doesn't mind refreshing human memory of the glory of his kind, after all.

"How am I supposed to know that you're actually giving me accurate information and not spinning me a line?"

Really, she shouldn't be entertaining giving another alien species access to any of their navigational data at all, but... whatever this guy is, he's certainly not Covenant, or anything close, or he'd just have blown the ship to high hell already. Probably.

"You wound me, human." Starscream, you're laying it on a bit thick. "After all, how am I to know you'll be feeding me accurate information either?"

He leans back a bit. "Perhaps there is some information I can confirm... Holos of my home, perhaps?" It might be a bit of a gamble, but it's not like these humans will be able to find it. Besides, Shockwave would just blast any intruders - Autobot or otherwise - out of the skies. He didn't have to tell her that.

"That'd be better than nothing."

She's still not sure why she's entertaining this, the entire situation is ridiculous, but it's the ridiculousness that's keeping her there, she supposes.

"And literally anything I give you about humanity could be verified by other sources."

"Well, if you insist..." A roll of the optics, and he grabs a datapad from his subspace, setting it on the floor and playing back something Skywarp took a long time ago (and ignoring the pang in his spark when he remembers Skywarp is dead). It's Starscream, his tetrajet mode bright against the dark sky of Cybertron, while Thundercracker's blue form keeps pace. It's the tail end of something acrobatic - leave it to Skywarp to start rolling right at the end - and they stop and transform to land right in front of the camera.

Starscream can't help but puff out with pride a bit at the sight. He slagging well earned his position of Air Commander, and in his eyes that display shows it. "There. That's Cybertron."

Connie watches it with all the curiosity that is ingrained within her to her very core, taking in the backdrop and the colours and the motions that answer at least one question on their own, about how a jet could become an almost 'humanoid' form.

"Huh. That's..." She isn't quite sure what she intends to say, but she settles on, "There really are more of you."

"We are an entire species," he snarks back in return. "Now, is that proof enough, or must I show you more?"

Slowly a hand goes to the datapad, just in case. He would rather it stayed close at hand; it was part of the deal to get his body back, that it be returned to him.

"You'll show me more," she says, with a look in her eye that says she means every inch of that assurance, "but later. I suppose it's only fair I show you some information in return."

Starscream eyes her a bit, wondering for a moment if her words are just posturing or if they mean a consequence if he doesn't comply... Only to grimace as he decides he really can't take that chance. "Fine. Show me your... Intel."

She has her own data-pad on hand, though she wishes she had her PC instead—things are generally quicker, on there, but it's not as if she carries it around. The problem with either device, she realises, is that they're exceptionally small and the text even smaller, but she'll cross that bridge when she comes to it.

Pulling up the Invention's current position in space and the nearest population centres isn't hard. It's technically public knowledge, to anyone with the most basic level of clearance.

"Here we go. We're a long way out from Earth, out here, but..."

If a transformers' eyes could bug out, they'd be doing so here. As it is, Starscream is silent for a good few seconds, going over the information with a sharp eye. For all his arrogance and his posturing, he can't help but breathe a soft, "...Primus."

But don't worry; he's gathering himself back up another moment later. "What human year is it? How can you be this far forward in your technology!?" They're nowhere near Cybertron, thank Primus, but it's startling to see how far these human starships can apparently go.

"2548. We've been space-faring for... a few centuries? Give or take a couple decades. There's plenty of documentation on that but I haven't memorised it. We use slipspace travel, we have colonies anywhere from a couple of lightyears away from Earth to eighty lightyears."

She shrugs slightly.

"I'm only in my twenties. This is all I've ever known."

A beat. Then, shrill and almost angry, loud and screechy enough to rival a certain AI, "2548!? I've been floating in space for 540 years!?" His engines rev dangerously, and his vents cycle- Five hundred and forty years wasn't much in the life of a transformer - it was barely seven vorns that had passed in their own reckoning, after all - and yet so much could happen in such a short amount of time! Where the frag were the Autobots, the Decepticons?

His kind had been losing. Had they finally lost? Had they been ground under the Autobot pede for good?

His weapons whine as they fire up in his anger, but- He forces the null rays to quiet, to cycle back down. If anything, he could be even more on his own. Even more without anything to return to. "Seven vorns. Those idiots have probably blown themselves up by now!"

Connie jumps at the sudden loud noises and automatically scrambles back, staring up at him.

"Whoa, hey, try not to burst my ear drums!"

It's not hard to make the logical leap from 'vorns' to a measurement of time passage, much different from humanity's own, at least. Wow, that's a big conversion discrepancy.

"I don't care about whatever drums are in your ears!" But he is getting quieter, and red optics flick to watch the entrances to the hangar quite warily.

"All this time and you haven't heard a peep more from us!?" Oh, he doesn't like the implications of that. The Decepticons should've blazed across the galaxy now, if they were in any shape to make a mark.

"Not that I've seen. I mean, look, I know a lot of things I shouldn't know, but I don't have access to records stretching back... 540 years," she says, holding up her hands. "I don't have access to certain levels of clearance. There could have been contact but I have genuinely no way of knowing."

She can't say she'd be surprised if there had been and numerous governments had kept it covered up throughout the centuries. If the Covenant hadn't been actively hostile and trying to wipe out the entire species, she wouldn't have even been surprised if their existence would have been hidden.

"Your species has an inferiority complex. How am I not surprised?" His tone is absolutely bitter though, stained with it all the way down.

But he squints deeper at her datapad, over the planetary information, and snaps, "What does 'glassed' mean?"

Connie noticeably tenses, swallowing a lump in her throat. Her fingertips catch at a scar across her palm.

"Destroyed. Burned to the ground. The aliens we're fighting, they... they have this special type of energy source for their weapons. On a large scale, it's capable of reducing any human city to a melted, chemical soup that we just... call glass, because that's easier to say. Gets the point across."

She tries not to think too hard about that. About what her own home had been reduced to, somewhere lightyears away from here.

Starscream scoffs. He'd be an idiot to not notice just how many planets appeared to be glassed. "A waste of plasma and resources. Your opponents are more foolish than even your kind!"

"If your Autobot friends were still around, they would have cleared up that problem for you. But it seems your governments drove them off!" Or something. Starscream's just guessing.

"They probably did, I wouldn't be surprised, but I think this is beyond the reach of whoever the Autobots are, Starscream," she says, shaking her head. "The Covenant want our extinction, they won't settle for less. Anyone who gets in their way..."

She shrugs. The war has always been hopeless. She truly doubts that even a large number of Starscream's kind could have had an impact, and doubts even more than anyone would want to step in on humanity's behalf.

"Ah, well, they always did like hopeless causes," he mutters. But if these humans are threatened, that means Starscream is too- At least, as long as he stays aboard this blasted starship of theirs.

But it also affords an opportunity.

"How about I strike you a better deal than just for my information?"

Her fingers flex slightly before curling back to pick at that scar, but Connie raises a brow at him, "Depends what that deal is."

"As Air Commander, I am an accomplished fighter. The finest flier of the Seekers, second to none in the air! I'll protect this little starship of yours from your enemies, as well as give you information of my kind."

He smiles, but it's all pride. "Is that suitable?"

They don't actually see a lot of direct combat with the ship, let alone with the Covenant considering their assignments, Connie thinks, but... she supposes if there ever was that any help would be useful.

So she nods, "Yeah, sure. That's suitable."

"Then it's a deal. How do you humans say it? 'You'll scratch my back, I'll scratch yours'?" He smirks and nods. "Perfect."

Honestly, Connie has no idea exactly what deal she just made and on behalf of who. No one else knows this... Cybertronian (wrapping her head around the word and all its implications is still a little difficult) even exists, let alone that she's talking to him, telling him things. She hopes it isn't a mistake.

"That's the saying, though I think I'd struggle to ever literally scratch your back." Oh, and she's joking with him now. Maybe she's been up too long. Maybe she'll wake up and somehow this was all a strange dream, provoked by Wash talking about some old cartoon or something.

(It isn't, she knows that really, but that'd certainly be simpler.)

To her credit, she does get a snort out of him, though he tries to cover it with a sound that's remarkably similar to a cough. "Well- Height issues aside," Starscream don't be rude, "I am looking forward to learning more about what's gone on in my... Absence."

"I can leave you with a few... less confidential, files, but I should not be down here this late." She's tired and she still has to keep to her standard project schedule in the morning, no matter how little sleep she actually gets. "Anything else, I'll have to show you... whenever I'm next down here, I suppose."

Starscream huffs, muttering to himself something about 'slagging organics and their short cycles' before turning back to her and nodding. "Fine. I will hold you to that!"

Starscream, you don't even know her name. You didn't even ask.

"What, do Cybertronians not sleep?" Connie asks, half an actual question, half a retort to his huffing.

She decides to leave him with a few basic encyclopedia-style descriptions of humanity's expansion since the Shaw-Fujikawa engine was first discovered; it's not everything, it misses out a couple centuries, but it's a start.

"Our recharge cycles are different!" And he's mostly been doing it during the ship's 'day' - when he has to - anyway.

He's going to just... Settle down there with the info and read, the expression of scrunched concentration on his face almost comical.

Connie bites back a slight amused smile that gets quickly swallowed by a yawn as she stands up and stretches out, trying to keep herself awake enough to make it back to her bunk.

"If you try and get past that AI again... keep note of how it acts?" She's... curious. Wants to know if F.I.L.S.S. is really all he's coming up again.

"Very well. If you wish." Grumble grumble. At least he looks as comfortable as he can be there, datapad in hand and still hunched over. Poor thing, the hangar really isn't big enough for him.

Connie heads back to the hangar exit, turning around at the door to give a vague wave before wondering why, exactly, she's doing so—not that she doesn't finish the gesture.

She's not going to get nearly enough sleep, assuming she manages to sleep at all before the inevitable wave of 'oh my god what just happened' hits and she's forced to confront the fact that she just met a sentient, alien ship in Project Freelancer's hangar. A sentient, alien ship that no one else knows is anything but a strangely colour sabre.

What in the universe just became of her night?

So, this was his situation. A tenuous deal with an organic of all things, refueling with subpar rocket fuel (did they still call it that? He thought it was a bit like their rocket fuel, anyway), and having to hide constantly. At least the squishy was tolerable, even being nice to him.

He couldn't even go out for a fly. That was going to be a problem.

And the worst part... More than five hundred of their years had passed, they'd reached the stars and beyond, and yet there was no sign of his fellow Decepticons. No sign of the Autobots. Cybertron was from outside their dingy little galaxy, of course, and he would admit it was fortunate that the organic didn't recognize the threat he could be, but... Why would his kind completely abandon their presence here?

There was something very strange about that, government cover up or not. And there was only one way to find out. So Starscream dug into this datapad, back into the ship's systems, and got to work.

Open Post

After Connie places the dogtags but before she defects

Re: After Connie places the dogtags but before she defects

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

In the MoI Hangar, Pre-Bjorndal

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject