We are a literate, intermediate to advanced AU Transformers RPG Based off of the first season of TFP with dashes of other incarnations sprinkled here or there. Characters from any continuity are welcome however must be restyled to match the TFPrime universe.
Active, with ongoing plotlines, we are always willing to integrate new characters into storylines once incorporated into the setting.
Well, damn. Barricade bristled a little bit, not at Megatron specifically, but at the notion of letting someone else under his plates and into any one of his fragging systems just now. Having a mountain of prep work to do planning the attack on the Autobots – that had been a worthy and pressing enough distraction to keep the Saleen well occupied and not grinding his dentals about Shockwave digging around in his head on the off chance that he was keeping data from him. The fragging smelt-eating Cyclops knew he wouldn’t report the breach of Decepticon protocol simply because, fraggit, then he’d have to admit he’d been keeping ‘an Ace’ as humans put it for himself.
The failsafe was in his head alone and he’d end this campaign on his terms. The strange thing was, actually, that Shockwave hadn’t seemed in anyway oppositional to his way of thinking… not that his agreeing with the infiltrator had improved Barricade’s opinion of him. The infiltrator hated other mechs in his systems.
::To clarify, Soundwave wants me to report in for extraneous security checks,:: said Barricade, his voice reluctant. ::I’ve already submitted to Knockout’s medical expertise. Considering that, I see no reason for Soundwave to expend time on additional precautions…:: or dig around in my head.
Megatron would have picked up on the subtle inflection in Barricade's voice without being alligned to him, but it was a still-unfamiliar feeling that provoked him to dig at it. His tone didn't gentle, but the shadow of a threat was absent. ::What is going on, Barricade? I'm inclined to believe this is more than it appears.::
::I’m simply stating it’s unnecessary and Soundwave, while acting on correct protocol, need not in this particular instance,:: said Cade through the comm, putting uncommon emphasis on his words but provided no details… admitting Shockwave did anything might have unwanted repercussions for him. Rather, eons of ‘I know what I’m doing, make an exception this time’ was dumped in how he spoke. ::It if can’t be avoided, then I’ll report in at the end of my shift. I have yet to fully commission Scatterdust for a secondary project I have for him and I’d rather get this done immediately rather than play Hide and Go Frag with Soundwave or sit through an unnecessary check-in prompted by his over vigilance... Lord Megatron.::
To Arma, aloud, he said, “Well it appears you might be rid of me sooner than I thought, but my offer stands nonetheless.” He glanced at Arma, EMF spiked with dark amusement. “It’s been a long time since I watched you rip Bots apart." Thoughtfully: "it was always a high point of any skirmish.”
'How long have we known each other?' Arma thought first. 'Not even closely enough long that i would trust you at any way.' Silent warrior thought. She did not care about the speech between Cade and their leader, her sight investigated sky above the Nemesis, not seeing anything that would've caught her interest. It was just the habit. The habit she couldn't shake away.
As Cade sounded like he had finished his discussion with lord Megatron, he started to speak to her again, making her turn her head a bit towards him. She sighed. She had really no real interest to butt in Cade's troubles, but the offer was pretty tempting. Most of her time she had just rampaged alone on earth, searching for energon, and had lost the best matches with the bots, having just some little shrimps afterwards. She turned towards Cade. "Do what you will." As she said, she walked to the other side of the room, where seemed to be some sort of table.
She removed her main cannon from her right arm, and placed it on the surface. As she did, the blue light on the ceiling lighted, revealing the tools floating under it. Arma grabbed the two of the tools with her accustomed hands, and started to defuse her cannon to pieces. Normally, someones would not bother to do something like this, but for Arma, it was just routine. Weapon of this size, had to be all functioning all the time. No malfunctions were allowed. This was the routine check and to carry out possible repairings. With these, she simply tried to ignore Cade. Her room was pretty ascetic one, even for decepticon. Arma though had some holographic decorations hidden, but never kept them in sight, as she knew someone else was close.
The interesting thing about Arma would always be her insistence on appearing psychologically simple for the simple purpose of getting other bots to leave her to herself. Barricade, however, had been commanding Decepticon ranks, Arma among them, along enough to know better than that. The battle femme was built for the blast and obliteration of war, but her personal history with other mechs, rivalries in particular, had a way of getting under her plates. Jealousy. Betrayal. Rage. A drive some might call suicidal.
Warcry.
But Barricade knew better than to bring it up. Knowing a button was there, didn’t mean you pushed it. “Arma,” said Cade, back already to her. “Our next venture determines whether Lord Megatron wins this war and destroys Optimus Prime. This could a deciding battle. If you have no interest, I will assign you to a different task.” He glanced at her, expression and tonal glyphs flat. “It’s only been two-hundred years since I last saw you. Or has your fire for the fight dimmed so far?”
Arma had mostly defused her cannon, as she stopped, when hearing Cade started to speak again. She listened every single word, before turned around, and marching to him. A silent moment passed, as Arma had locked her optics on Cade. "I already told you to do as you will. But when it comes to my fire for fight, then it has just enlightened some more." She said first. "Whether Lord Megatron wins this war and destroys Optimus Prime? It's not about whether he's doing it or not. He WILL destroy the Prime, and i will be standing on his side, when it's going to happen. There's no other option as winning in this war, it's just matter of time, as the destruction of the autobots is coming." Arma paused for an second. "And... even if there could be a slightest chance of us losing, even if i would be the last decepticon remaining, i would still keep fighting, until the end, on Lord Megatron's side." As she said that, she turned back towards her workdesk, scanning her weapon completely. Her declaration should've been more than enough to answer about her fire for fight.
"If you wish to keep your head, you'll make sure i AM in the fighting unit. But if you dare to add those useless troopers into unit, i'll still consider about tearing your head apart." As she paused, she started to put her weapon back together. "I fear no fighting, no death, nothing. There's only one reason i still exist, and it is to fight until my spark dies." She contiued, like to support her declaration before.
Though they had been hundreds of years as Lord and Infilitrator, and only 28 hours as alligned, Barricade's use of his title to close the comm. rankled Megatron sorely enough that the closest Eradicons shrank their armour close and tight, optics studiously averted. There was something else to this situation, he was certain, but whilst two of his senior officers were running around the warship like hide-and-seeking sparklings was not the circumstance to discern what.
His voice across the comm.s turned acidic and low. ::Soundwave, cease this ridiculousness now and return to your duties. Any protests you wish to make can be made to me, personally.:: The if you dare was implicit.
Then to the Infiltrator - ::Barricade, stop this nonsense and report in. Now.:: The location glyph for his chambers followed - because Megatron knew that the ensuing conversation was likely not going to be suitable for the Command Bridge.
As per usual, Barricade filtered out the death threats as Arma, when she did open her mouth, liked to make it count by threatening termination and violent dismemberment. “Well,” he said drolly, “it’s nice to know two centuries hasn’t dampened your cheerful outlook on life in any fashion, but save the head dismantling for the Bots. Trust me, Megatron will prolly find that more beneficial.”
Fraggit. ::Yes, sir, Lord Megatron, sir.:: Okay that was likely going to get him thrown into a wall, but he was in just that sort of mood.
“Be ready for the assault, Arma. I’ll likely have some of the Eradicons around to run interference so… you know, kill as few as possible. That would be good.” He triggered the door open. “Nice chatting with you.”
He left her quarters, departing for the upper deck and Megatron’s quarters where he was just certain would follow one of the most entertaining bouts of double talk and backhanded evasion he could muster. Keeping strategic secrets from Megatron was difficult enough without a bond but that would still be easier that keeping that secret from Megatron if Soundwave noticed the hack and followed back hack to his hardlock data. Shockwave knowing was one thing, because he didn’t seem to mind someone undermining Megatron’s power (of course he wouldn’t!) but Soundwave was another story. Barricade ex-vented irritably as he reached the warlord’s chambers but entered completely casually.
Megatron had only arrived a minute before, and was contemplating Fairwind's energon gummie production apparatus shoved into the corner by her cupboard. Looking over the ridiculous contraption, which was still slowly churning out the last rubbery sticks from the ingredients left in the tank, had taken much of the ire out of his spark by the time Barricade sauntered in.
The warlord couldn't parse out what was being hidden from him, only that there definitely was something Barricade was fighting to keep quiet. The smaller mech was an expert with managing what was revealed in his field and body language, but he had no prior experience or skill when it came to the spark. Unfortunately, the bond was still solidifying - too new and raw to be of any use.
Arching an opical brow, Megatron settled to give Barricade one chance to do this the easy way, knowing perfectly well that the likelihood of the offer being taken - even with things as they were between them now - was infinitesimal. "What is going on? Because this is far more than your occassionally prolongued ploy of fragging with Soundwave."
“Well,” said the dark armored mechanism, clearly at his most insincere. “I have 200 years of not fragging with Soundwave to make up for.”
He severely doubted that was going to win him points, but he was too busy focusing on the precisely wavelength of his EMF, the angle of his posture, and the exact pitch of lackadaisical disinterest in his voice. Barricade could feel the hum of Megatron’s displeasure like a note off a tuning fork, terminating through his alloy like a physical vibrato. More than at, it was in his head and in his own spark as a foreign but very real chord – nothing he would mistake for his own, but very present.
“Look, I don’t like Soundwave jacking into my systems period. He already did once. That’s all he gets to do unless there’s a pressing reason why to double check. There isn’t. It’s a waste of time.”
"A waste of time," Megatron echoed, dry as gun-grey metal. He tipped his helm a little, optics narrowing. "'Appeasing Soundwave's security assessment, pointless as you might deem it, would have taken a fraction of the time that you have wasted evading him. Just as telling me whatever it is that's going on beneath your plates would be far more expedient than trying to evade answering."
A step closer, and the warlord's field changed slightly towards a different resonance. "You will always hide things from me, Barricade - it's in your nature. However, unknowingly or not, you've sacrificed just how well you might be capable of doing so when I ask you directly. So tell me." Trust me.
Oh great, billions of years of duplicitous double dealing and infiltrator functionality apparently ran contrary to the usual prerequisites of spark bonding, what a fragging Primus slotting surprise. Barricade’s EMF rippled with decidedly less false calm and a wavelength of frank irritation became evident in the pitch and keel of his electromagnetics.
“I was not hacked by the Autobots,” he said flatly, defensively, tone hostile. “I am not compromised as Soundwave seems to think. Therefore there is no reason for him to be inflicting his brand of over precautious systems checks on me. The status of my software as it stands would permit the comm. specialist access to files I would rather leave to myself. His intel is his own and mine is mine.”
He paused a moment then added, “Our truce is such I will permit him the basic intel officer’s security checks after my extended times MIA from the Decepticon ranks, but as it stands this is not one of those times. If I were… compromised in any significant way, you would know. More to the point, while rogue Autobots have hacked prisoners, bots directly under Optimus Prime never could.”
A slant of contempt entered Barricade’s tone. “Prime couldn’t even find it in his spark to execute me given the chance. The ethical event horizon of hacking would be more than he could permit under his command. To me, Soundwave’s insistence is motivated by an opportunity to glean extra data from my systems in the wake of purely physical damage and not my interest in protecting Decepticon security… or at least not entirely in that interest.” He shrugged. “It’s simple internal jockeying.”
Partially true. ‘Physical damage’ was not, in fact, why he was rewriting his security algorithms again. Fragging Shockwave...
Last Edit: Dec 11, 2011 21:57:22 GMT -5 by Deleted
Barricade's focus on hacking, entirely unprompted, did not escape Megatron's notice. Nor did the emotional intensity of the subject, much as the Infiltrator was attempting to hide it. Megatron held no illusions of Optimus' overly optimistic sense of integrity, and maintained that him ordered the hack of a prisoner was even less of a possibility than executing one. That Optimus had taken Barricade out to shoot him was less surprising because it was Barricade. He'd entertained the thought of shooting him more than once, in the past, just to shut him up.
"I didn't mention hacking, 'Cade," he posed lightly, talons flexing across the thick plates of his biceps. Batting the point about a little more, like a cat with a half-dead mouse, Megatron went on: "And I know Optimus better than you - that he might have ordered the violation of your mind never crossed my processor, because it is not within the realms of his spark to be responsible for such an order. Just as I know that Soundwave wouldn't persist in his security duties towards you without cause, and that you wouldn't evade him, and evade me, without an exceptionally good reason." Which, Primus help you, you will now give me.
“It’s an internal matter,” Barricade repeated, refusing to rise to the admission of assault. “I was damaged. My systems are compromised. I have data that is my own and I don’t want Soundwave fishing it out while I’m still running systems diagnostics and upgrading my viral and firewall software. The… nature of the intell I’m carrying is personal and more to the point damaging. As my systems stand now, Soundwave could pick data without my out-board security catching him. There are things I’d rather he not know.”
Because if he knows I was hacked, Soundwave will want to know who, he’ll figure out who then report that who and then Megatron by rights of being a provincial son of a glitch, will confront Shockwave about the hack and Shockwave, in turn, will defend himself from the grave error of hacking a Decepticon infiltrator by telling the warlord what I’ve got hardlocked into my head: not just the shutdown code, but the hardware obliterating self-destruct. What any good and loyal Con would have handed over or destroyed the first chance he got.
What Barricade was keeping as insurance against his doubts. “The nature of the… damage to my systems would provide Soundwave with details that do nothing but compromise me and provide no extra security for the Decepticon cause. It’s pointless and detrimental to myself and, as you well know, Soundwave under my plates isn’t my idea of a good time.” He EMF flared with irritation, Barricade’s usual animosity. “Is my reasoning satisfactory?”
"I don't give a frag what 'personal intel' you're carrying," Megatron replied sharply, hands dropping to his sides as he stepped towards the smaller mech. They were still dancing, and though the tune was new the steps were very old. His field flared assurance and his equivalent of concern - inextricably woven with a possessiveness now that a full spark bond was solidifying between them.
After all this time, and everything that had happened, the Warlord did truly trust Barricade. Though Barricade was usually indirect and often came at things from a dazzlingly unorthodox angle, the mech's loyalty to him and his cause had never come into doubt. Barricade could maintain whatever mystery he wanted (Pit, that arrogantly stubborn refusal to reveal much of anything was part of his sparkmate's appeal), and he needed to understand that this questioning now wasn't the suspicion of a Commander but the dogged watchfulness of an alligned partner.
Megatron doubted the the bond was matured enough yet to convey such complex thoughts and feelings wordlessly by default, and pressed on as if it were not. A small part of Barricade's reply had barbed against the fore of his processor. "You were compromised onboard, damaged to a degree that your systems are still compensating. Tell me what happened." Before Barricade could respond, he held up one wickedly sharp claw. "Do not mistake me for planning to interfere. You're more than capable of fighting your own internal battles. I simply wish for you to tell me how this all started. Nothing more."