Ep. 2 - Alone With Company [Closed]

[Carbine]

Was he going to throw it?...

Or was he going to take it away?...

The hound watched eagerly, his mind spinning and reeling with distress and conflicting thoughts. He was so worried something bad would happen again, and his child like brain turned the fleeting seconds into agonized minutes stuck in an eternal limbo. Thankfully, Red didn't seem to wait that long despite what the canine's processor thought, and gingerly cast the toy across the room just as he did the fake toy moments prior.

Bolo's mind snapped instantly over to full glee and happiness as the toy was tossed, helm thrown back in a thrashing motion as if he was trying to expel excess energy. This thrash was paired with his legs scrabbling on the ground, attempting to turn with so much force it was as if he was nearly twisting right out of his outer plates. The armor on his frame pulled and wrenched as it tried to keep connected to the lurching protoform, and the biolights on his body lit up instantly.

Red and blue flickered across the array that skirted the edges of joints, as well as the orbs of light that sat above each shoulder. The colors spattered in an irregular pattern, the pulses spawned of excitement more than any notification or attempt to alert someone to being pursued. They were paired with a chirping squeal of a bark that was half strangled. The entire process only took a second or perhaps two, but soon Bolo had reeled about fully and charged after the toy.

He bounded and hopped after it, and when Bolo got near enough, his upper body pushed away from the ground and forelegs pulled up. With the intent focus conveyed through optic angle, ear position, and helm direction, paired with the reeling posture of his forepaws, it seemed he was perfectly happy to try to crush the Scraplet beneath his paws, though the last second changed this directive. The paws slammed down on either side of the rolling toy that he had caught up to, and momentum carried him forth with a few dances to drop down onto his stomach in front of its path to slide to a halt.

He was so happy. So long he has been cooped up, and now he got to play with something new, with someone new. While the toss wasn't particularly energetic or as fun as it could be, it was still delightful. Bolo let the Scraplet roll to a halt against his chest, letting out a yip before he clutched it carefully in his jaws and rose back to his feet. With a pleased prance of a gait, he casually strolled back to Red Alert, and held the Scraplet out for him again.

[Deleted]

To say Red Alert had not expected his lackluster toss to turn Bolo into a strobing red and blue disco-light of pure concentrated joy and unrepentant excitement would be an understatement. He had no idea what the appeal in chasing after the little corpse-ball was supposed to be, but apparently it was prominent enough to make Bolo completely lose his fragile little mind.

Red Alert wasn’t sure whether to find this quirk amusing, or worry that it was a potentially easily exploitable weakness, so he settled for a mix of the two.

He watched the scrabble of paws, the excited leap, the slide across the floor. It was endearing, almost, how something so simple could make the dog so ecstatic. If only people were half as easy to please. Mecha would be so much more tolerable to deal with if they could be placated as easily as Bolo.

As the dog made his mad scramble after his toy, Red Alert shook his head, then knelt down to the floor to retrieve a few of the miscellaneous items scattered at his feet. He only managed to pick up two before Bolo happily pranced back towards him, holding his toy lightly in his jaws. Though the cassette’s face was not capable of emoting, Red Alert had the feeling he was being stared at expectantly.

“I suppose you’d like me to throw that again.” He said, unsure why he was continuing to talk to the dog as if he could give him a response.

He eyed the toy a moment, before glancing down at the casing in his hand. A thought occurred to him then, and he held up the casing, holding it out towards Bolo in demonstration.

“Here. If you can fetch these for me--” He emphasized the word by giving the casing in his hand a little shake. “I’ll throw your toy for you.”

It was a shot in the dark, but he figured he may as well give it a try, if only to see if the cassette was capable of understanding a command of that complexity.

[Carbine]

Bolo was trying to get Red to take the toy from him, he really was. His helm outstretched, bright yellow optics looking up at him with a palpable whine hidden in his tiny field of emotion, a nose trying to touch against fingertips. Really, he was perfectly happy to try to force the Scraplet into the mech's hands, before they tried to give some kind of command to him.

The canine's helm pulled away, the long slender ears that had been folded back instead flicking up and rotating forward to zero in upon Red Alert as if he suddenly was of great interest. This motion was paired with Bolo settling back upon his haunches, hind feet shifting a few times to adjust the balance and way his weight rested upon his legs.

He understood the words, he did. They were some basic commands thrown in, and a statement he definitely recognized. The issue was trying to calculate the action and consequence aspect of it. If he does A, suddenly he will get B. But this was lost on him at first, and he just stared at Red for a moment in confusion, processor trying to calculate why he said to fetch something, but then said he would throw a toy for him.

Which was it?

After an uncomfortably long lull after what had been asked of him, Bolo turned his attention back to look at the floor, noticing that there were more of the things that the mech held that were scattered on the ground. He didn't turn to look back at the mech, and instead stared at the dropped camera casings for another long pause, before the pieces of the puzzle clanked into place and he sharply sat upright as if there hadn't been a painfully long stall between order request and reaction.

Bolo walked over to the first camera casing he could find, and dipped his helm to pick it up, only to come across a bit of an issue. His mouth was already occupied by the Scraplet. At first this was an easy fix, he set the toy down, and opened his jaws to grab hold of the camera casing, only to pause, and look back at the Scraplet after he took one step towards Red Alert

He suddenly felt like he was being tricked in some way, tricked into abandoning his toy to play with the inferior toy. With this thought he hastily dropped the camera casing with a clank, only to reel and grasp the corpse again greedy to protect it from being abandoned. But... if he didn’t fetch, he couldn't chase... This caused more conflict, and he looked back at the target again, his little mind trying to cope and come with a solution.

A moment later Bolo was smashing his mouth over the goal, with the Scraplet still lodged inside his maw. The orb of metal screeched against the ground as Bolo tried to make them both fit. It was a frantic struggle between clamping jaws that really were meant to crush, a desire NOT to crush, and a struggle to hold two round objects with basically a pair of barbecue tongs.

There was a good deal of effort, before he managed to acquire both in a secure grip without dinging them up. If he didn't care about damaging, he could have easily grasped them both by smashing them slightly to get a more secure grip, but alas he knew doing that would probably be bad, and he'd hurt his security blanket.

After the very real struggle he walked over to Red as if he had accomplished something grand, striding with chest out and helm high. The second the Camera casing was plucked from his mouth though, Bolo let out a coughing hack, the Scraplet having been lodged basically in the back of his throat. This hack deposited the corpse at Red's feet, thick tendrils of what seemed to be a sort of saliva and Energon stringing between Bolo's jaw and the corpse.

Bolo licked at his maw a bit, the branching strands that had connected him to the Scraplet snapping off to plop down onto the ground below with wet slaps. The canine didn't seem to notice or mind though, peering up at Red with sad hope that he had translated the request alright and would be able to chase the toy again. Thing was, if he did translate it right, he better damn get a reward.

Hidden under all the cute excitable puppy, Bolo was much like his Master. He wasn't all good, and part of his issues was the fact he was very prideful in his work. He feels accomplished when he does something right, and he downright demands compensation because of it. To not do so is a slight against his efforts, and if fronted enough his underlying rage and wrath could come to the surface to bite the hand that wronged him. Red was in a way playing with fire, but a fire that was easily quelled by a head rub or a 'good boy' or a toss of a toy.

Or all of the above.

All of the above was good.

[Deleted]

For a moment, Red Alert worried he had accidentally broken Bolo and fried his tiny little processor with a command far too complex for his toddler-like cognitive skills to make sense of. He watched the dog with no small amount of concern as he stared at the bits and pieces scattered across the floor, unmoving, as if his mind had frozen up upon being faced with such a challenging concept.

Then, abruptly, Bolo stood upright.

Having apparently figured out what it was that had been asked of him, the dog jumped into action, looking for all the world as if he had not spent the past klik staring into the void as he struggled to think all those big heavy thoughts. He dutifully trotted over to one of the fallen camera casings, which came as a pleasant surprise to Red Alert, then reached down to pick it up.

Unfortunately, it was there that Bolo came across another difficult struggle.

To pick up the camera casing, he would have to drop his toy, and that was apparently asking far, far too much of him, judging by the way he tried to fit BOTH objects in his jaws rather than let the scraplet go. Red Alert wasn’t sure whether to be impressed by the dog’s dedication, or concerned that he was going to get one of the two objects lodged in the back of his throat, so he settled for a mix of both and watched Bolo warily, just in case he needed to tell him to stop before he hurt himself or damaged the very item he was trying to retrieve.

After a valiant struggle, the dog somehow managed to successfully fit both items in his maw, and he triumphantly carried them back to Red Alert, who looked evenly split between being amused and mildly disturbed by just how far down his throat Bolo had crammed that scraplet.

The camera casing was deposited into Red Alert’s awaiting hand a moment later, suprisingly undamaged despite being held in a pair of very strong, crushing jaws. Though he wasn’t particularly well versed when it came to canine-minded cassettes, and how to treat them, Red Alert knew a few of the basics, and so he understood that some sort of praise was likely in order.

“There we are. Good job, Bolo.”

He refused to use ‘baby talk’ with the dog, partly on the grounds that he felt such a thing was beneath both of their dignities, and partly because he found it to be condescending. Cassette or not, lower mental capacity or not, Bolo was still a spark-bearing life-form. To treat him as if he were some sort of organic animal just seemed...insulting.

As far as Red Alert was concerned, the dog was on equal standing with most other sentient bots, and deserved the same respect. He simply needed to be accommodated for his below average cognitive skills and limited communication abilities.

Setting the camera casing on the counter next to the control console to his right, Red Alert reached down to pick up Bolo’s toy (while grimacing slightly in distaste) in order to fulfill his end of their bargain. He held up the slobbery little thing, gave it an unfavorable look, then shook his head in resignation, knowing he had signed himself up for this.

Then, he swung his arm back and then tossed the thing forward, this time covering far more ground than his last lackluster throw had.

[Carbine]

A good job?... just a GOOD JOB?

Bolo looked up at Red Alert as if he suddenly had two heads instead of one, the canine's optics staring almost through his helm to the wall behind it with an air of disbelief. He wanted more, a head scratch, some more enthusiastic praise. He wanted to be told he was smart and clever, even if he didn't fully understand what those words were. He knew such words were PRAISE however, and that was the point of everything. He wanted that recognition of just how magnificent he was.

With a soft click, Bolo's jaw fully closed again, the bottom prong of a tooth nestling snuggly between the two top ones as the mechanics flexed absently. He was in the middle of trying to decipher just how well he felt about Red Alert, and if he'd be willing to even try to listen to anything he said any longer, before the toy was lifted from the ground. Bolo's distant thoughts derailed, the motion drawing him back to reality.

There was a slight twitch lurch of his helm clicking to look up at the Scraplet, ears that had been sliding backwards in their sockets in an unhappy posture now perking upright and spinning around to face forward with full attentive detail. Red's arm pulling back, was paired with Bolo easing off of his haunches. Red's hand swiping forward, was paired with Bolo scrabbling upright and starting to turn. By the time Red had actually thrown the toy with more vigor than he had previously, Bolo was running.

Ok... Red was forgiven.

For now.

Bolo ran across the security room with reckless abandon, his helm craned up to keep an eye on the toy during its decent towards the ground below. He had been simply springing along before, but in seeing the toy falling changed his mind on his pace. He picked up his speed and actually threw his head forward, posture changing abruptly.

There was a distinctive difference between the dogs jaunty run, and then one meant for actual speed. The harness on his back folded down, his helm lowered, shoulders pulling up with forceful lunges at each thrust of his run. This transition was near instantaneous, and only lasted a couple strides as Bolo slid underneath the Scraplet and literally snatched it right out of the air with a final jump to punctuate his movements.

Landing upon the ground, part way down the hallway from the room, Bolo made his way back with a happy little gait. The movements seemed a tad sluggish however, the animal cassette's chest heaving as it tried to filter air through his cooling systems. Once he would get close again, he would offer the toy back to Red's hand.

[Deleted]

Given the cassette’s former occupation, Red Alert really shouldn’t have been surprised by how quickly Bolo could move when he was given proper motivation. As it was, he was rather impressed with the dog’s speed, though his stopping-skills left a bit to be desired. Not that anyone could really hold that against him, considering Newton's Laws weren’t exactly something he could be expected to have a firm understanding of.

So what if he skid across the floor as he snapped up the ball, and very nearly crashed into something? That didn’t matter in doggy-world. All that mattered was that his toy had been obtained in a timely manner so that it could be thrown again and again and again and again and again and--

--Red Alert hadn’t really thought things through, when he accepted this game of fetch, had he?

As Bolo happily trotted up to him, returning his toy to his hand so that it could be thrown a third time, Red Alert realized that this impromptu game could likely take a long while, depending on whether or not Bolo found himself tiring out anytime in the near future. This was...not actually as much of an inconvenience as it could have been, surprisingly, as Red Alert knew full well he hadn’t actually been doing anything of great importance beforehand. He had been watching the monitors, true, but that was busywork more than anything.

In truth, if anything questionable was going on around the base he was likely to hear it as it occurred - he had no need to catch it on the monitors. In truth, he relied on the various cameras that were hidden throughout the outpost mostly for when he was asleep or off-base, and therefore couldn’t keep an eye (and audial) on things himself. As well, of course, for the sake of record keeping so that in the event anything DID happen, there would be video evidence to back up his word.

...Or to discredit it, in the event he found himself making an error in judgement. Red Alert didn’t like to admit it, to himself, least of all anyone else, but the cameras were often as much for the benefit of everyone else on the base as they were for himself.

Far fewer false alarms happened when he had the ability to check his own perceptions of reality against hard, indisputable evidence.

Fortunately, Bolo had not chosen to visit him on one of the nights wherein he compulsively rewatched security footage over and over again, in order to check for any inconsistencies between what he thought had happened, and what actually did. If the cassette had, he likely would have been ignored outright, as Red Alert tended not to be in a sociable mood at the best of times, let alone when he was questioning the accuracy of his own perception of reality.

As it was, Bolo had caught Red Alert in a rare...well, “good mood” was too strong of a term, really. It was far more accurate to say that Bolo had come across Red Alert during a time when watching the monitors was not an end-all-be-all task of great importance to him, but just a way to occupy his time while sleep eluded him. That said, he had time to waste indulging the dog in his game, and for once, he didn’t particularly mind being interrupted from his task. The distraction was a novel one, a new change of pace from his usual routine. He had to give Bolo credit for that.

And so, despite the glow of the monitors beside him reminding him of their presence, Red Alert did not feel compelled to do more than spare a glance at them every now and again as he tossed Bolo’s toy, then requested he retrieve something for him, then tossed his toy again, ad nauseum.

[Carbine]

This was enjoyable.

A little bit of a trick was all the cassette had to do to be rewarded with an energetic game. It was not a difficult request that the mech had asked of him once he understood it, and the occasional pat of the helm was a good additional incentive to actually comply with the parameters set. It is this concoction that provided a wonderful distraction from everything else that was going on, which was exactly what Bolo needed.

Bolo really wasn't too happy about the state of his Master, and worried about him. He honestly wanted to be by his side or actually docked to just watch over him while he could not watch over himself. The dog thought it was a reasonable request, but he couldn't stay in the medical bay for one reason or another. It had upset him, but right now he was finding it hard to really think about all of that. A good game could consume his processor and give him peace to live in blissful ignorance.

However, time had a way of working against everyone, even the most resilient of individuals. Bolo may have been able to continue playing for much longer upon normal circumstances, but the fact of the matter was that he was still recovering from his injuries, and his systems were tired a lot quicker because of it. This exhaustion started to make itself shown visually when he would only trot after the ball instead of running, only to then evolve a few tosses layer into a lazy walk that was almost a saunter.

Really, Bolo just seemed so much more drained as the game progressed, optics even dimmer as if the illumination behind them just didn't want to play along much longer.

Bolo picked up the scraplet once more, gingerly cupping it behind the prong of his teeth, before turning and slowly walking back. His helm was stooped lower, and gaze downcast, ears slightly fanned to either side as gravity fought against the metal posts that kept them upright. On this occasion he didn’t fetch an object with the scraplet, and instead just walked straight up to Red where he was, and tried to flop his head down to rest on the knee armor that protruded out.

He was rather tuckered out.

[Deleted]

Bolo was not the only one who was running out of steam.

At some point during their little back and forth, Red Alert had sat back down in his chair in front of the monitors, so he could do a bit of fiddling with the control console in-between throws. He could have remained standing if had the mind to, but the hour was late, he was tired, and he would need to conserve what little energy he had if sleep was going to continue eluding him as it was.

For each object Bolo brought back to him along with his toy, Red Alert offered the dog a word of positive reinforcement before taking the retrieved object and depositing it in a storage bin beneath the counsel, where miscellaneous items which he hadn’t had the time to sort or place to put resided. He would have to make a note to get around to doing that, later on, when he wasn’t quite so preoccupied with fatigue (which was all too familiar with him) and company (which was considerably less so.)

It did not take long for Bolo to not only run out of items to retrieve, but to tire himself out as well. His ears began to droop, and the glow of his optics and bio-lights gradually dimmed as he finally tuckered himself out. By the time Bolo’s pace slowed to a lazy walk, Red Alert was prepared for the game to at last come to an end, and for the dog to take his leave and return to his room where he belonged.

That said, he was not prepared for Bolo to walk up to him and rest his tired head upon his knee, looking all too ready to stay there and make himself comfortable.

Surprised, Red Alert looked down at Bolo with an odd expression, his eyebrows drawn back slightly as if to ask the dog, without words, why he was doing what it was he was doing. Then he remembered Bolo wasn’t quite as good at understanding subtle nonverbal cues as he was open, direct statements, and subsequently felt a bit dim for expecting the dog to somehow read his mind.

He blamed the late hour. The lack of recharge was muddying up his thoughts, making the obvious more difficult to discern.

“You should go back to your room, now. Rest.” He suggested mildly, his tone dry as ever. "Your berth is probably a lot more comfortable than my knee."

[Carbine]

Bolo did not understand subtle cues unless they were emotional. If someone was distressed or scared but trying to hide it, he could pick up on the hints and try to help accordingly. But the sort of game Red Alert was playing was not one he really understood and he most definitely could not read his processor. Attach onto this an inability to even fully understand what it was the mech was saying verbally, and it was going to lead to some interesting places.

When Red spoke that Bolo should go back to his room, the canine's drooped ears pivoted back lazily in their sockets. The 'expression' on the expressionless face was rather apparent because of this, a disdain and disagreement with the concept further punctuated by a huff from his vents. His room was empty, his home, where Master and Thunder typically were, was empty. While the idea of having an entire berth open to him to sprawl out upon was appealing, being alone without Master was not.

Red was playing a distraction, keeping him preoccupied enough to not fret readily. To abandon this was not ideal, and last he remembered Thunder was probably still asleep. He could tell through the link that Master was non responsive too. If that changed at all, there would not have even been a goodbye headbut or rump wiggle, and instead Bolo would have just run away to the med bay with glee and joy.

However what Red Alert said next confused Bolo. The mech would really need to learn how to phrase his words, and what words were too complex for the dog's little processor to try to grasp onto. Because as it stood? Red just stated that his knee was a berth, and as far as Bolo was concerned, that was a damn invitation.

With little to no warning, Bolo squatted down enough to tuck his hind legs beneath his body's mass, before springing up harshly to scrabble and attempt to settle into Red's lap. The jump almost permitted his own helm to headbut the other individual, as the large canine's paws slid and scraped against their legs while trying to find traction. After a moment, ((given Red Alert didn't just push him off)) Bolo would plunk his rump down on one knee like a child would do, with hind legs sticking straight out ahead of him. His forepaws were placed on Red's other knee, while shoulder leaned into his chest.

[Deleted]

It wasn’t until he noticed Bolo shifting his weight into his haunches that Red Alert realized how the cassette had misinterpreted his words, but by then it was far too late. The course was already set, his fate irrevocably sealed.

Before he could even open his mouth to utter a word of protest, or lift his arms to fend off the attack, Bolo was already leaping up at him, his paws scrambling for purchase as he landed. Startled, Red Alert pushed so hard against the back of his seat that the entire chair began to tilt backwards, and for three terrifying seconds he experienced the stomach-dropping sensation of free-falling before his hand flew out and latched onto the edge of the control console, anchoring him in place before the chair could completely capsize with him--and Bolo--in it.

His knuckles creaked as he gripped tight to the console and leveled himself and the chair once more, conscious all the while that Bolo was still trying to make himself comfortable on his lap. He payed the dog no mind for the time being, instead taking a moment to put his free hand to his chassis as he steadied himself and recovered from his mini spark-attack.

Once his sense of equilibrium was assured that he was not in fact going to plummet to the ground in a lethal fashion, he ceased being startled and instead became annoyed. Fixing the object of his vexations with a hard stare, Red Alert frowned disapprovingly, his eyebrows knitting closely together.

“This is not what I meant, and you know it.”

[Carbine]

Unphased, uncaring, Bolo didn’t seem to really notice that they both almost went down into a free fall. If Red Alert HAD fallen, he would simply have leapt off of him and scrabbled back onto the concrete and metal flooring with an affronted huff at being dethroned from a comfy place. Luckily, he didn’t have to worry about that, as the mech had found his balance and halted the decent to the ground before it even got fully started.

Bolo didn't really react much past that, instead getting comfortable and settling down for the long haul. The only response he even offered to the mech's words, was a long groaning grunt of annoyance. Whether Bolo really understood the words and was offering a sassy remark, or whether he was just grunting because he was finally easing in to sleep, was not really known.

Red could go ahead and think what he wanted.

In the end, Bolo fully settled and remained leaned up against Red Alert, his helm tucking forward and ears flicking back. He was almost huddled into a ball in a way, curling down smaller so that he couldn't unintentionally fall off while he slept. If he wasn't jostled or nagged at any longer, Bolo would actively try to sleep, his eyes dimming down to a hazy simmer, and spark beat evening out to a low rhythm.

[Deleted]

No, no, no no no, no. No.

Red Alert was not having this.

He was not a pillow. He was not a dog-bed. He was not fond of physical contact, and he most certainly was not going to tolerate Bolo treating him as if he was. He was going to inform the cassette in no uncertain terms, in a very firm, very annoyed voice, that he was not allowed to do as he wished and inconvenience him by using him as his own personal sleeping place.

...When the dog woke up, that is.

It would just be cruel, Red Alert rationalized, to wake the cassette up and boot him off his lap when he had clearly been exhausted to the point he was able to fall asleep on what amounted to a stranger in the first place. To say nothing of the rather traumatizing experience the canine had recently suffered in the field - it was only natural that he would seek out comfort and company when separated from his carrier.

Besides, it wasn’t as if the dog was really bothering him much. He was going to spend the rest of the night sitting in front of the monitors watching the camera feeds anyway, so it wasn’t hurting anything for Bolo to be perched on his lap, rooting him to the spot.

And maybe...well, maybe Red Alert could have stood to have some company every once and a while. Silent, non-judgmental company who couldn’t see anything wrong with his behaviors, with his odd twitches and jerks, the tension in his field, or the collection of repetitive, jittery motions he made when he was trying to burn off nervous energy.

No, Red Alert decided he wasn’t going to boot Bolo off of him after all, for the time being at least. He had put up with him until this point, he figured he might as well extend his patience throughout the rest of the night.Turning his attention back to the monitors, Red Alert reached out towards the control panel, careful not to make too much noise as he pressed a few keys, zooming in on a couple select video-feeds.

And if his other hand happened to stray down to Bolo’s head, petting it absently as he continued his work-- well, the dog would probably be too deeply asleep to remember it in the morning.


--FIN.