Ep. 1.5 - Gladiator and Gentlest [Megatron]

[Deleted]

//ooc// Set Week 2, Day 1.

Old habits died hard. He may not have been a waste-worker of Polyhex anymore, but that didn't mean he didn't scavenge, seek, find things in the trash. Humans could produce an incredible amount of waste, some of it as ill-fitting on their planet as the Cybertronians were; "plastic" was a common find. It could not be fed on by the creatures of Earth, and Buffalo Dump had come across it as it choked and strangled animals — mostly birds.

A lot of birds, in fact, which reminded him too much of Fairwinds. The little cassette, fearful as her master made him, was warm and welcoming to all Decepticons; she had left him presents. He still had the Energon goodies she first made for him, subspaced away for a special occasion. When he wasn't gathering plastic to protect the little Fairwindses of Earth, he was looking for shiny things to leave her, as the Vehicons had told him she liked them. He stood in an unused room now, sorting various pieces of scrap metal and odd ornaments; some were dull shades of grey and silver, others more painted and colourful.

As the mech worked, his face bore a peaceful smile. He did not smile often, especially not on the Nemesis; smiling was...out of place. It belonged to Starscream when he was plotting, or to Knock Out after a fresh buffing — neither were one to cross when such was happening. Buffalo Dump usually kept his field and expressions restrained, perhaps only tinged with a touch of affection. Sometimes his EMF flared out, and as the Vehicons were swept up in it, it unnerved them; he had been getting better at not letting it do that.

If someone walked in now, they would find his massive field wavering pleasantly, flying like a flag in a peaceful wind. It brushed up against the sides of the small room, filled with pulses of contentment-business-productiveness-she's gonna like it. A large pile to the left was of scrap the ship could use; the right was smaller, and significantly varied in its colours, shining and hues. This would be the pile of little gifts that B-Dump would leave Fairwinds to find.

[Deleted]

The command team of the Nemesis met most days at the start of the first shift for a status meeting. Departmental reports, running statistics for the Nemesis, news from outposts and Generals, local mining operations - everything that Megatron, Soundwave and Starscream needed to have equal input and knowledge of. Though on medical leave and thus not obliged (nor, as he was gleaning from Starscream's posturing, welcomed) to attend these daily meetings), Megatron was making a point to keep apprised of the Decepticon's activity. The names, events and numbers meant very little to him, but he appreciated that it was only a matter of days until they would suddenly coalesce into meaning, and he did not want to unknowingly miss a significant detail.

The meetings still gave him a scragging horrendous processor-ache, however, as his neural net tried to make sense of the data. Stimulation was good and encouraged healing, but direct and ongoing challenges to his memory bank as was the nature of these meetings felt nothing like healing. They felt like an overwhelming need for a dark room and absolute quiet for at least an hour...

Megatron had not long left such a meeting, and wound through the dark corridors of the ship with a scowl quite reminiscent of his usual expression. He'd taken a route that steered clear of the main concourses and recreational area, trekking past half-full and mostly-forgotten storage areas that had once housed more Eradicons and support staff. His processor was a foggy ache and his mind lost in it.

Walking into the peripheral eddies of peace, of a calm and content field emanating from behind one of the doors, was such a foreign experience on this ship that he actually stopped short. Fairwinds' field was almost perpetually happy, but in a 'noisy' sort of way. This field was calm with purpose, focused and satisfied with a task and the intent behind it. Very strange in a ship full of soldiers.

Megatron allowed his curiosity to get the better of him, pushing the ache from the fore of his attention. These rooms were meant to be empty - only visited, not occupied. There was no sensor on the door to open it automatically when he came to stand before it, and Megatron raised a claw to the metal. He knocked twice, the sound echoing along the corridor.

[Deleted]

Buffalo Dump's field fled to his plates in a snap. He held it close and tight, wary as he turned away from his work. He wasn't expecting anyone to be in that maze of corridors and unused storage; he'd specifically picked somewhere the Vehicons rarely tread. In fact, so few were the times the room was used, dust had begun to settle on the walls and floor of the storage room.

Carefully walking over to the door, he tapped his chest-space open, quickly storing a few pieces in his hands for later sorting. Buffalo Dump hesitated as he reached forward, adjusting his field so that it was as unnoticeable as possible against his body. A few taps later, the doors to the room opened, and the massive mech stood at attention.

Oh, Primus. Megatron.

"Lord Megatron, sir!" the garbage mech huskily barked, saluting his master in a brisk whip of one servo. "I apologize, milord, I was busy sorting scrap for the ship. Thought it was best to do it here where it couldn't contaminate things; it's fresh straight from Earth. Lots of plastic they jus' leave lyin' around; nothin' on the planet can eat it. Got chemicals an' things in it we could use, maybe."

There, that sounded good enough. He wasn't sure how Megatron would take to the idea of his cassette receiving shiny things in large amounts — carriers could get...weird...with their cassettes. The last thing Buffalo Dump needed was Megatron thinking the mech would steal Fairwinds away, or be trying to convince her to do something insidious and traitorous to the cause.

Thank Primus his field was so tight to his plates — it was streaked with little ripples that resembled sweat dripping down a human's brow.

[Deleted]

Megatron's nod was short, vague and distracted. It looked like a messier, non-fairylight-festooned version of Fairwinds' cupboard behind the large mech, and not at all what he'd been expecting to find. A cursory scan of the items confirmed that the heap was, indeed, 'scrap', though far from the metal kind. And 'fresh' was perhaps not the most appropriate term for what passed across his olfactory sensors. The smell wasn't repulsive - merely strange. Heady, pungently sweet and utterly foreign.

Materials from Earth - a planet he did not know, and was medically banned from going near. He wondered how much of Earth comprised of these flimsy, chemical-smelling materials. It looked quite fragile, and it escaped him how any of it might be useful on the ship.

And it if was useful, why was this mech sorting it in a semi-forgotten storage room buried in the Nemesis? They had containment bays to prevent pollutants escaping into the ship. This looked like straight hiding, particularly with how nervous the mech was acting. Like he'd been caught.

He should, Megatron realized, say something.

"It looks," he began with a note of uncertainty, "like messy work."

Megatron's optics clicked back to the scuffed mech's, waiting for the stand-in algorithm to give him a name and a function. Some indication of who this Decepticon was and what he was doing. After a few more seconds, UNKNOWN flashed up on his HUD in small, orange glyphs.

He exhaled roughly, irritated. "I apologise, I don't know your designation."

[Deleted]

"It looks," he began with a note of uncertainty, "like messy work."

Scrap.

Scrap, scrap, scrap, and Primus on a fraggin' piston. How could he be so stupid? How could he think to try and get away with something with Megatron's current condition as it was? Starscream and sometimes Airachnid, they were the schemers, the daggers just waiting to stab Megatron in the back. The Vehicons knew, B-Dump knew it, and it was the Nemesis's worst-kept secret that those two would manipulate anyone — given time, patience and resources — into getting on Megatron's bad side.

He couldn't let his Lord think Buffalo Dump was doing the same, or worse, was complying with such plans. He was sorting things for Fairwinds and nothing more; her carrier might not approve, but he knew Fairwinds would love it. At least, he hoped she would.

He exhaled roughly, irritated. "I apologise, I don't know your designation."

"Waste Unit B-D21M-Pol, sir," the mech offered with a blink. Unlike other mechs, he had optical shutters that resembled eyelids; they had been installed to clear his optics of flying filth while working the streets of the Dead End. They audibly hissed as they moved. "I go by 'Buffalo Dump', though, 'cause that other name was what the high-casters called me, an' this one was what my cohort named me back on Cybertron."

He dared to let his field drift out a little. It dribbled still, but pulses of comrade-follower-grateful-loyal-at your command would ebb against Megatron's field, and not in an intrusive way.

"Ya, um...ya saved me from them, sir. The high-casters. I was that waste mech that started the big riot in Iacon, the one where all th'drop-casters tried t'storm a medical clinic. Was an accident, and, um...one o' your boys kept me from goin' to a Garrus. I got lost from ya, but I came back recently, when I found Earth."

[Deleted]

Megatron nodded.

It was a simple response; the end result to a complicated series of processor threads (many of which got stuck and jammed around the hardware damage and software blocks put in place to facilitate the repair of said hardware damage). Buffalo Dump's story was familiar, and it warmed his spark for reasons he couldn't articulate to hear that the mech had dismissed his old designation and taken on a name synonymous with cohort and individual identity.

"Then I am glad to have you on board," he finally murmured, offering the barest trace of a smile. Buffalo Dump's field was warm with fealty, and welcoming in a way that kept Megatron from leaving right away to the dark quiet of his quarters.

He drew a claw against his temple, frowning in thought. The tip traced unknowingly around the recently healed mesh, which appeared silver where his colour nanites had yet to seep in. "As for the riot... I do not know if you are aware, but my memory files are not... wholly accessible, at present. Of that time, of Cybertron, there are fragments, but there's a familiarity that suggests your story is one I have heard a variation of many times before."

Megatron brought his hand back down from his helm, folding his arms across his massive chassis. "It seems that a great many found more than just their names back then; the strength and conviction to seize autonomy, too."

A more friendly tone crept into his voice, and his field was reassuring as he nodded to the room behind. "Though, it seems that you still work from your original occupation."

[Deleted]

Buffalo Dump's fiery optics drifted back over to the piles of recyclables. He...wasn't used to his Lord being so sociable, let alone accepting, of something; from what experience he had, Megatron was stony-fielded and unwavering in his vicious outlook. He was a mean, dangerous 'bot that scared Buffalo Dump into doing what he was told, though the giant mech wouldn't dare voice that fact.

His field pulled back so that he wouldn't show how startled he was. He fished around in his processor for an answer, finally settling on, "It's...it keeps me grounded. Focused. Some things...some things, even if they're code, just make sense an' feel right, y'know? An', an' humans have a bad habit o' eatin' outta things that'll make 'em sick. Like this."

Walking over to the "get rid of" heap, Buffalo Dump gently closed his fist around a small pile of tube-like vessels. They were used for holding liquid, and to his knowledge, fed the equivalent of sparklings until they were strong enough to grind down their food to swallow. Holding them at a respectable (but still visible) distance from Megatron, B-Dump said, "These are all full of somethin' called 'Bisphenol A'. The humans used to feed lil' bits with these, an' it made the...um...the fleshlings sick. Ya can't make their tube-cube-things like this anymore, but they're still floatin' around in dumps and in the water and stuff."

With a slow pivot, the mech turned them around and dumped them back into the pile, flicking some stinking liquid off his palm with a shake. With the same lumbering speed, he turned back to Megatron.

"Didn't know if it could be turned into somethin' we could use, or uh, we could melt it down an' throw it on some o' these squishes while it's hot. Use their own scrap against 'em, cheap source o' dangerous chemicals to them and things like that, right? Usin' the planet to our...our...uh...."

He lightly snapped his fingers, searching for the right word.

"...To our advantage, yeah! Advantage, milord."

[Deleted]

Limited though Megatron's current knowledge of the Decepticons was, he could reasonably assume that such a well-equipped and powerful army as operated on the Nemesis would have no need for human refuse foraged from the planet, set alight or not.

Buffalo-Dump's imaginative zeal was, a least, well-meaning, and he assumed that this exercise was one of a self-directed hobby rather than an actual assignment.

How Commander Starscream would react to the mech's proposal was another thing entirely...

Buffalo-Dump was as large as the average frontliner, but his calm demeanor was quite different from he norm. Megatron wondered if Fairwinds had found him yet, given he'd said he hadn't been on the Nemesis for long. Certainly he seemed just the type she'd terrorise with her mischievous brand of fun.

For now, however, Megatron's processor was throbbing, and the collective assault of all that junk on his olfactory sensors wasn't helping. It hadn't been too bad at first, but the material has clearly been in there a while and its putrid fumes had had chance to accumulate in the confined space. Now they were seeping into the corridor.

Likely the command team didn't know about this, and probably shouldn't. Hopefully the junk would be gone by the time the Commander's memory returned...

"I didn't mean to intrude," Megatron ultimately replied, not wishing to comment on the possible validity of Buffalo-Dump's ideas at present. "I didn't think anyone was down here."

[Deleted]

"You're our Lord," said Buffalo Dump. "Y'never intrude. This is yer ship, we're just all servin' on it until the war's won and the Autobranders are gone. If anythin', we intrude on you more than, well, y'know...the opposite."

He gave a shrug. He didn't want to be offensive, and hoped he wasn't sounding like a suck-up; Megatron was still his leader, and that alone demanded respecting. The massive garbage mech wasn't going to try and "pull a fast one" on anyone in Megatron's condition...though the fact the room was full of garbage could be considered that.

He'd work out his broken logic later. For now, he looked at the warlord with a frown, cautiously shifting his field to one of concern-support-are you all right. "How are you feelin', milord?" he asked quietly, but not as if he was talking to a sparkling; it was consideration of a possible headache. Noise and headaches didn't mix, as B-Dump well knew with his migraines. "Everythin'...everything knitting back together a'ight?"

He glanced over his shoulder at the piles of accumulated waste. B-Dump was too desensitized to foul smells to be bothered by their presence, but he wondered how Megatron was faring in their presence. Knock Out hadn't let him go down to the planet, after all...and B-Dump, technically, had brought part of the planet onto the ship....

[Deleted]

Megatron's nod was a little stiff, caught off-guard by the genuine note of concern from a mech who'd never met him before. It was good to know that loyalty on board the ship was stemmed from more than mere intimidation and his position in command.

"Yes, slowly but surely," he replied, taking half a step back from the room. The odors were starting to become bothersome, now, though they weren't directly impacting on his processor. That ache was from healing. Healing tended to hurt.

The bulkier mech drew himself up to his full height, drawing his field back in away from Buffalo-Dump's curiously concerned frequency. Outward displays of sympathy and its ilk rankled him. He loathed the insinuation that he could warrant such sentiments, and suspected that if his mind were intact right now that the other Decepticon would be learning that the hard way.

"It is a temporary affliction," he added, his voice gruffer for the slight on his pride.

Megatron was about to incline his helm and bid his leave when a thought occurred, and he cast the pile of garbage another long, dubious look. His gaze clicked back to Buffalo-Dump's.

"Do not let Fairwinds have any of that... stuff. No matter what she says or does."

The warning was implicit.