FanFiction.Net - unleash your imagination
An Cailin Rua
Author of 11 Stories |
This is the second installment of the Tricolora series, follow-up to Paritas: Naturalized. Though the concept itself might seem a bit odd if one hasn’t read the first part, I did make very conscious effort for this to be accessible to people who have not read Naturalized. But so it continues, hope you enjoy!
A land of deepest shade,
Unpierced by human thought;
The dreary regions of the dead,
Where all things are forgot!
Soon as from earth I go,
What will become of me?
Eternal happiness or woe
Must then my portion be!
-Idumea, shape-note hymn, written 1763
Tricolora: red, white and blue, a series of three colors with special significance to some human beings.
Fraternitas: the quality or state of being brothers.
Revelation
By An Cailin Rua
My dear brothers,
In this communiqué, I endeavor to discuss the concept of meaning in relation to our existence.
Having never viewed organic specimens subjectively, and having therefore cared little for the viewpoint of organic specimens, I admit that I had given little thought to the difference between their attitudes towards existence and our own. It was well known but little studied to us, for instance, that organic species have a tendency to clump their paranoias together into superstition in order to better explain their own existence. Although I was cognizant to their infinitesimally shorter lifespan as compared to our own, mortality and the mindsets that arise from awareness of it had not occurred to me as a noteworthy difference between our species, but now it occurs to me that this difference may be paramount. Indeed, the aimless nature of human existence leads to all measure of human characteristics that I had never before encountered, or even conceived of.
“Meaning” for instance, and its relationship to life was never a concept that I gave extensive consideration (the phrase “What is the meaning of life?” is rather pervasive in the English language). To me, our meaning, as Cybertronians, was obvious right from our very creation; we, unlike humans, were each built to a specific purpose, and we are therefore meant to fulfill that purpose. The greatest fulfillment that we can achieve is fulfilling the plan that our society has built for us. I find, however, that this must not have been a notion that was shared by you, my brothers, both of whom have strayed greatly from your intended purposes. I have been alone a very long time, and have had a very long time to contemplate the exact reasons why both of you and, indeed, all of us as a society would stray so far from our functions in the name of war. But now, given my exposure to the subjectivity so pervasive in human thought, I find myself wondering whether or not you found “meaning” in what you were accomplishing as scientists, and if not, whether you did find meaning in what you have done now that you have strayed so far from scientific pursuits.
It pains me now to realize and finally come to accept that our society, at least as I knew it, is gone and shall never again return. Things now are not at all as I remember them, even to the point of our own species breaking once unthinkable taboos and forging bonds with organics, myself included among that demographic. I also find myself completely alienated from Prime’s unit, which considers itself a cohort. I spend far more time with my human liaison, who despite the all-too-organic intelligence deficiency, is far more open and far less judgmental than the Autobots on this planet. Moreover, as his existence is not predetermined, he is far more open to scientific pursuits than I might hope an Autobot to be.
And now, at long last no longer alone and no longer a prisoner, thrust so suddenly back into society, I find myself with much to occupy myself on this planet, as this species is in dire need of my aid, but to what end I have not yet decided. Indeed, if it is now my endeavor to better the lives of this species, for what reasons do I do it? Is it to satisfy my tenuous connection to the species through my human brother? Or is it, as my human brother has suggested with some worry, “because I have nothing better to do?”
My human brother has pointed out to me that my assumptions about Idioma’s motives before the coup indicate an inability on my part to understand the concept of “meaning” as it does not pertain to me. Clearly, Idioma was not fulfilled as “Idioma”, and considered Megatron’s attitudes towards our purpose as a species more “meaningful” than what we had been doing for thousands of years. This makes me wonder, what, indeed, fulfills our own ideas of meaning, if fulfilling our intended purpose was not enough? Although we were all created for the dedication and pursuit of science, out of all three of us, I am the only one, ostensibly, who has continued to engage in this pursuit, at least insofar as that engagement was instructed to all three of us; the purpose of science is to further our understanding of the universe, and to use this understanding to better the lives of all sentient beings. We were never mentored to see it used for the manipulation of one’s inferiors, and certainly not for destruction!
Inventor, I should have you know that Starscream is here on earth as well, and technically still alive. His spark now resides in a semigrade symbiote that once belonged to Soundwave, and with any luck will never be reclaimed by him. Out of fear of the Autobots’ resident Polemor, who very openly wishes to see Starscream eradicated, I had hoped to keep him apart from us altogether, but the Prime insisted that they keep Idioma’s body (I do apologize, Idioma, but I never did appreciate being forced to call you “Starscream”, it is a rather silly name) in their starship-cum-base, and he assured me he would keep it safe. Whether he manages to do this with his Polemor weapons specialist around him, of whom I readily admit I am deeply terrified, remains yet to be seen.
As for you, Idioma, I haven’t the faintest idea what to do with you other than to allow the Prime to keep you in stasis forever. As Prime’s Polemor weapons specialist asserts every time I am within audio-receptive range of him, you are too dangerous to be kept alive, and should be destroyed before something goes awry. Perhaps this is the case, and I am just prolonging the inevitable, but the Prime has allowed my indulgence, and against all better logic, I simply cannot bear the thought of losing you as well. I am well aware of how cruel it would be to bring you online as you are, in such a small and weak body with your ambitions still as alive and fierce as ever. Despite the knowledge that you allowed me to place you in that body, I believe that, given what I know about you now, you would hold it against me. I fear also the danger you might be, even in a body so small.
Given what both of you have become, this has forced me time and time again to reexamine what it was that drew me to both of you, whether or not these tendencies exist in myself, and what that meant for every notion I ever had faith in. I look at my young human brother, Inventor, and am sometimes awed by, despite the unfathomable disparity of culture, race and species, how much he reminds me of you, as I knew you. I then observe his species’ capacity for corruption, and observe also the path to corruption that I so ignored with Idioma, and wonder what happened to you that could turn the kind, creative lateral thinker into the merciless killer that has now become so infamous. In truth, I fear what my human brother might become, purely based on the unfortunate corruption I saw in both of you. I don’t believe that I will ever stop missing both of you, but I fear you, and I am now beginning to come to accept that though I may be bonded to you, the beings I was once bonded to, like our society, our planet and our future, simply do not exist anymore.
I remain your devoted brother,
Earth designation: Perceptor, human pseudonym: Percival Aidoneus
Miles turned over and looked around, his ribcage suddenly screaming with ache. Groaning, he threw himself face-first back into his bed. “I am not developing PTSD,” he said into is pillow. “You see this, pillow? This is my not-developing-PTSD face.”
While indeed this would not be what your species would consider ‘night terrors’, such intense nightmares are generally indicative of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder.
“Great, and my schizophrenia doesn’t even appreciate my biting wit,” he said, a little bitter. The fact that Percy empirically, no matter how hard he tried, refused to find any value in anything a human would consider “funny” notwithstanding, that the Percyheadvoice was even piping up at all he found a little disquieting. Miles had figured when he started noticing the weird little voice in his head that sounded like his ro-bro that it was just harmless, even comforting robot-induced schizophrenia, the logistics of which he didn’t really care to inquire into. Now, it was starting to freak him out, as generally it only happened when he was very stressed or afraid, and at that moment, curled up in the fetal position on his bed, sweat clinging to his skin, he was very stressed and afraid. Coping mechanism, or genuine mental disorder? You decide.
Miles sat up, knocking himself on the head a few times. “Hope for the future,” he said. “I have such hope for the future. I am not depressed. My life is awesome. I have a giant fucking robot for a brother.” His heart sank as he looked around the room. His giant fucking robot wasn’t there. He wasn’t even near the house. Miles could just tell.
And a big help he would have been at any rate, he reminded himself. In truth, he wasn’t even sure how he was going to bring it up. Perceptor was at his liveliest when there was a problem to solve laying around, in this case that Miles’ trauma was starting to affect his personality. Still, he was coming to a point where he wondered if the ironically named Perceptor was even capable of picking up on this sort of thing if Miles didn’t mention it, or worse yet, if he even cared. Miles’ greatest craving during these episodes was simply to be held by whoever was nearby, up to and including Perceptor. Hell, especially Perceptor, who, while rather small for his own species, was still a giant fucking robot, and also his “brother”, at least by pseudo-mystical Cybertronian standards. What good was a giant fucking robot if he wasn’t going to pick you up every once in a while? But Perceptor was much, much more likely to start pacing and go into an hours-long spiel about human psychology, followed by a postulation as to the chemical imbalances that would cause such a phenomenon, followed by possible solutions, which he would then decide to blah blah blah blah.
Miles had begun to have these dreams as soon as his body started to heal, almost as though once his brain decided that his still-fragile body could handle it, the psychological punishment was dealt. But there was something different about this episode in particular, like something metaphysical had spurred it on. This one didn’t have any pictures to put with the terror; it was simply as though a presence had possessed him, one that felt strangely familiar to him. Usually, however, the dreams had pictures; deep, burning red eyes were staring at him, sometimes to the point of sprouting the huge, wide, sharp-angled body to go with it, lashing out at whatever was nearby; sometimes Sam and Mikaela, after he watched Bumblebee get ripped into thousands of metallic shards; sometimes it was the faceless denizens of Cybertron; sometimes it was his own young siblings.
Siblings. Riiiiiight. A devious smile crept onto his face as he dared to set his feet on the ground. After all, what good was having siblings if you couldn’t exploit them?
Still trying to steady his breathing, Miles took part of his bedsheet and tried to wipe off some of his sweat, digging a clean T-shirt out of his dresser and throwing it on before sneaking into the hall, legs still shaking. The main floor of his house held all four bedrooms, each rather small but suited well enough to their purposes. First target of exploitation: biosib Virginia, who not only happened to look upon her brother as something of a demigod but was also generally too young to question anything he did extensively. Carefully nudging the door open, the boy slipped into her room and eased himself onto the bed next to her.
Virginia rolled over, unconsciously putting a hand on his leg as he brushed her blonde hair out of her face. Already, he felt a thousand times better, able to tangibly feel his sister’s presence and know for a fact that she was, indeed, safe. This inclination had increased exponentially since his little ‘incident’ a few weeks ago, partially involving his abduction by a hostile giant alien robot faction, but mostly leaving him with several crushed ribs and one collapsed lung. His biosibs knew very well the effect of said injury, which had left Miles flat on his back and hardly able to move otherwise for about three weeks. The cause, on the other hand, Miles decided to keep between himself, his mother and his “brother”. Given that the alien scientist had mysteriously shown up and started haunting their house constantly around about the time that Miles had mysteriously gotten squished, Miles’ biosibs had deduced that the awkward and somewhat terrifying “Percy” had had something to do with their brother’s injury.
Miles leaned in closer to his sister, putting an arm around her. It wasn’t, at this point, that they were particularly frightened of Perceptor. Initially they had been quite terrified, as had his mother, and the robot’s impersonal mannerisms and complete disregard for both personal space and property had only made matters worse. Given that Miles couldn’t really move, and was being constantly fussed over by both his mother and an alien robot who clearly didn’t trust any other humans to Miles’ recovery, those first few weeks had been, well, tense. “Hey, Butternut,” Miles whispered, moving to lift her up in his arms. “C’mon, let’s go bother Felix.”
Virginia almost instinctively rolled herself into a better position to be picked up by her brother, mumbling something unconsciously and leaning her cheek on his shoulder. Miles scooped her up, and quietly (really not wanting to worry his mother, who had enough on her plate as it was) headed into Felix’s room. Felix was already awake, sitting up in his little twin bed and looking at Miles worriedly. “Scootch,” Miles ordered, sitting down next to him.
Felix’s reactions to Perceptor generally varied from intense fascination to downright paranoia, and the same could be said of his reaction to how Miles had changed since acquiring the robot’s near-constant presence. He still heavily suspected that the scientist had done some experiments on Miles’ brain. Miles had never been averse to touch, to be certain, but since whatever had happened to him, Miles had been downright cuddly.
Felix, with some hesitation, scooted himself over next to the wall while Miles laid Virginia down next to him, carefully arranging the two of them to where there was enough room for him to slip in under the covers. Virginia still seemed mostly asleep, blithely innocent to the increasingly worried look on Felix’s face as Miles arranged them to where he had a good grip on both of them. “Miles?” he whispered.
“Shh,” said his brother, stroking Felix’s shoulder reassuringly. “Go to sleep.”
“You had a dream again?” asked Felix. Miles shrugged as Felix put a hand on his neck. “You’re all clammy.”
“Let us not ask questions,” whispered Miles. “You know how it works; accept my love and affection or suffer horribly.”
“I know,” said Felix nervously. Felix was observant for his age, having turned eleven just after his missing brother turned back up a few weeks prior, body broken but now sporting a giant alien robot. In truth, all three of the Cato children were; they had to grow up quickly, their father having left them before Virginia was born, and all three having to learn to support each other just to stay together. It made for an ultimately tight unit of a family, and one that noticed when something was awry with the others. “I’m just… are you ever going to tell us what happened?”
Miles closed his eyes, burying his face in Virginia’s hair. “Not now,” he said. The details that Felix and Virginia were aware of were blurry at best. Because of Perceptor’s insistence that he be a very active part of Miles’ life, there was no way the government was going to be able to keep him a secret from Miles’ family. Therefore, they knew about the NBE’s, the government’s role in hiding some of their technology and now covering up their existence on earth. They also vaguely knew that the aliens had something to do with the destruction in Mission City and New York. They did not know that Miles had effectively been taken as a hostage and crushed by an angry Decepticon (though technically, to said Decepticon’s credit, that had sort of been an accident). That part, Miles figured, he’d let them in on later.
“What was it?” Felix whispered.
“I couldn’t see anything,” Miles admitted. “It was like… I dunno. I felt something.”
“What did it feel like?”
Miles grasped for an answer. It felt like a presence, one that he had definitely felt before. Starscream, he realized, a little confused. It felt like being around Starscream. “I dunno,” he whispered. “Something scary.”
Miles immediately regretted saying that, seeing the dread on his brother’s face. He fully intended on telling Felix about everything that had happened, and even everything that might happen regarding the alien presence that so few people knew about. But not now, not at 3:00 AM.
Eventually, Felix manage to slough off his worry enough to fall back to sleep. Miles, on the other hand, had a rather difficult time of it. He found himself concentrating on that feeling, what it felt like to be near Starscream, and why it had a feeling other than abject horror. He had felt it the few times he’d been to the Ark, where Starscream’s offline body was being kept, and had gone away when he left. Similar to how he could sense Perceptor’s presence, and now that he was beginning to be able to sense Perceptor with more certainty, he was starting to realize that he was able to sense Starscream as well. But how?
It’s nothing, he told himself. He’s offline, and shut away in some sub-sub-sub-compartment in their ship. It can’t be him. It can’t be.
But if it wasn’t him, then that meant this feeling, this paranoia, was completely in his head.
Miles wasn’t sure which possibility was worse.
The human’s body was reacting poorly to what her consciousness was perceiving. As a result, she began to feel faint, the blood in her system racing through her temple as her heart struggled to cope with the sheer amount of adrenaline, each thump louder than the last until eventually she collapsed, and for a moment, her heart stopped entirely.
When the human came to, the first thing she was aware of was a strange noise the machine was making as it attempted to move. Her skin pressed against the dry, scratching leaves on the ground, she was much more inclined to curse her shoddy insurance policy and genetic predispositions than any celestial bodies that caused the stress in the first place. She stood up, looking at the aberration and clutching her chest as she breathed heavily. “This ain’t gonna kill me just yet,” she said, more to herself than any other beings that might be listening.
The ‘being’, she was slowly beginning to realize as she approached the niche it had created in the side of the mountain, rifle out and trained on what had to be its head, was definitely a ‘being’ of some sort. After slowly and painfully unfolding its many parts, the creature seemed humanoid, though clearly banged up to the point of being barely recognizable as such. It lay prostrate on its back, one arm seemingly fused to the rest of its body and its legs in various states of demolition. It had eyes, expression even, albeit in a strange, indiscernible way; its two eyes were completely different shapes and colors, and strangest of all were the two crystal-like protrusions coming out the side of its head, glowing in tandem every time the creature made a noise. But more than that, there was a simple extra-sensory feeling that whatever she was looking at was alive. It wasn’t logical, nor could she base that feeling on anything other than what her gut was telling her.
The human had to laugh slightly, finally allowing herself to look away from the creature. “Lord, really, of all the people!” She looked back at the creature, gun still trained. The machine was trying to do something with its arm, clearly recognizing that what she was holding was a weapon. Collecting all her resolve, she gently backed away and put the gun down. “Why me, huh?” she called out to the sky. The pervading darkness was only just starting to break with the calm blue of morning. “Why me?”
Neither God nor the mysterious metal man in front of her answered.
Head swimming, the human female’s mind went through a plethora of possibilities, from optimistic to paranoid, from herald of the alien apocalypse to angel in a strange metal body. Carefully, she stepped inside the still-smoldering crater and reached out to touch its “face”, quickly drawing away as though it might burn her. It wasn’t red-hot, to be certain, but there was a feeling of energy to it, undoubtedly alive. The being couldn’t speak, nor was there anyone there to give her any guidance as to what she should do. The only guidance she had was the same she had always attempted to follow.
“I got no idea what you are,” she said, voice still shaking and body still weak from her slight brush with death, “but God sent you to me, and he did it for a reason.”
The creature stilled, no longer attempting to rearrange the parts of its arm, nor wailing out that strange warbling electronic sound, nor even shining the lights on the side of its head as it did so. The human female hoped that, at least on some level, this creature understood her. “And I hope,” she continued, “I hope, that wherever it is you come from, they have the idea of you doing unto me as I do… to you.”
The metal creature only stared at the hominid as the last of the flames from his landing finally went out. In time, the human hoped, his intentions and purpose on this planet would be revealed. Regardless, as she went back to her truck to hook up the jack to try to move the creature, she assured herself over and over that she wouldn’t receive any kind of divine punishment for helping a creature who sorely needed it, regardless of how good or ill that creature’s intentions were. This was the right thing to do. It had to be. Everything she had ever learned lead to that one inevitable conclusion.
:
:
:
:
