re_alignment_logs | Because comparative science is... fun..?

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Because comparative science is... fun..?

WHO: Jetfire and Skyfire
WHERE: Jetfire's lab on one of the terraces surrounding Liege's temple.
WHEN: Around now.
WHAT: Sharing history - and the differences.
WARNINGS: None.

It had hardly been a pressing priority to have this comparative talk, but it'd still been something Jetfire had looked forward to - mostly anyway, given some of the possible subjects that'd come up. The chance to get to have a comprehensive comparison of two similar-but-different angles in two different realities.

Themselves, that was.

"We know a few things already, since it's quite impossible to not pick these things up..." Trailing off, Jetfire smiled slightly, and sat down, still somewhat surprised he'd managed to find seating large enough to hold him comfortably... and Skyfire as well, in this case.

"The two immediate crossing vectors being at least some time frozen on Earth, and Starscream." The latter one didn't surprise him at all. Then he frowned slightly, resting his curled hand against his chin in thought. "You were in the ice a lot longer than I was, however. I was... er, involved in the war nearly from the beginning." Pausing, he spread his hands and looked to Skyfire.

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"Interesting, as well as useful," Jetfire said with a nod, casting a look over the contents himself, but it seemed he'd managed to keep it all safe and useful. Working with organic samples were a lot harder than ore, metal, energon or crystal after all.

Given all the similarities in their backgrounds - even with the differences, it was curious as well as... perhaps, somewhat gratifying to have such a fundamental differences in preferences.

"I hope they're all useable; I haven't had much necessity to preserve and keep organic samples for long to be looked at later."

"Ah, that much is true," he agreed, with a small smile. As much as Skyfire understood the practical importance of science and research, he was quite aware that he would be doing it just the same even if the only outcome was satisfying his curiosity.

He took a closer look at the samples, his touch still very careful. It was one of the disadvantages of his size. He would need to find appropriate tools, so he could stop worrying about breaking anything.

"They should still be useful," he said at last. "They look fresh, in any case. No obvious signs of deterioration - as far as I can tell, of course, given that they are unfamiliar species. But that's always a good sign."

Curiosity was a strong incentive for scientific research, indeed... otherwise Jetfire wouldn't be as interested in a purely theoretical discipline like pattern equations.

"Ah, good." Jetfire looked over, and picked up what tools he'd found, had made, or, in conjunction with Liege's little dissection, had been given.

"If any of these would help, I certainly don't mind sharing. Tools aren't the easiest to find around here." Jetfire's grin is slightly dry, because yes, it's not just tools in general, but the size as well.

And all of these, however few, are of a useable size.

"Thank you. I'd really appreciate it," he replied, nodding slightly. "I didn't have much luck getting my own... or many tools at all, in fact, let alone the right size."

He couldn't help but grimace just a little.

"I suppose it's not considered a priority."

"Here, or in your own reality?" Jetfire frowned slightly, trailing a finger over a few of them. "I've been considering the possibility of asking Solus Prime... or, perhaps, Liege for a greater set of tools," Jetfire said, somewhat reluctant over the latter thought.

Mostly because being careful how much he asked of the Firstforged seemed like a... ah, prudent idea.

"But no, it hasn't been the easiest to find tools, any tools, even less the correct size here... Especially if you might want something not precisely attached to the Firstforged whose glyphs we wear."

"Here, mostly. The Ark had a good laboratory with enough tools, even if they were meant for smaller mechs. But we had the means to adapt them. Besides, I did have a basic field kit of my own with me." Skyfire held back a sigh, or at least tried to.

"Of course, once I was settled in the Ark and with a proper place to put my things in order, I didn't need to keep any of them subspaced anymore. Or so I thought," he said. "So I wasn't carrying anything when I arrived here. I suppose it does depend on the Firstforged now."

And he didn't particularly like that idea.

"Ah. More or less, yes." Gesturing around the lab, Jetfire eyed the plant samples and the tools he'd put forth himself. "Most of the equipment here was from some previous refugee, I'll guess, and I've simply retrofitted what was here to suit my needs, the rest I've had to find or make myself," Jetfire said with a static sigh of his own, frown deepening a little.

"A task that wouldn't be half as frustrating as it has been if there only were more ways to manufacture anything. We have raw materials, but with a lack of factories..."

Jetfire didn't necessarily might going to the Firstforged... depending on who it was, and how much you were asking for.

Skyfire nodded in agreement. Even knowing that this Cybertron was in an earlier stage than the one he knew, at first he had expected it to be less, well, empty. The lack of supplies was almost as bad as after the war.

"It seems disorganized," he mused. "I understand that things like the laboratory tools I'd like to have aren't a basic priority. But if we're supposed to be building Cybertron... One would think factories and the like should be more common."

"That has been a thought I've had as well," Jetfire said, frowning a little as he turned around, carefully passing a chunk of ore between his fingers. "The only thing I can think of as to why there isn't is that the processes the Firstforged are concerned with are of a more basic, mechaforming sort, and that any refugees before tried more to survive with what there was available..."

He gestured around the room with a tilt of his helm.

"Like these buildings, since they have been made by someone else. But nonetheless, I still think there should be possible to activate something in that vein." Since yes, any greater assistance would need such things as factories and equipment.

"Something more or less automatized, at least, should be possible," Skyfire agreed. "The Firstforged seem to be able to make drones. The Acolytes have to come from somewhere."

He stared at the tools in his hands, as if they might somehow provide answers.

"I understand that most of us refugees wouldn't want to work in a factory - especially when we didn't expect to even be here in the first place. But non-sentient drones would be quite helpful."

"Indeed," sighing a little, Jetfire frowned. "Drones like that would be. They might make the Acolytes themselves, but I can't see some form of, as you say, maybe semi-automatic factory production with the help of drones like that would be useful."

Moving a way a little to the end of the room towards the exit, Jetfire slowly paced, considering the thought that had come up.

"I mean, as the situation is, it's quite obvious Cybertron isn't ready for a "regular" cybertronian population, refugees or not, though it makes me wonder how any of our realities got to that point." Stopping, Jetfire thoughtfully rubbed a hand over faceplates and then crossed his arms.

"Factories and such has, as far back as we have records in my reality anyway, which, admittedly is a bit lacking, always existed, but they must have come from somewhere... Built up, or created directly from Cybertron through limited mechaforming?"

"I have to admit, that is something I had never thought about," Skyfire mused, tilting his head in thought. "It wasn't my area of study. And, well, I always assumed I would have time to learn about the history of Cybertron in greater detail if I ever felt like it."

In retrospect, he regretted that. Or, perhaps, not the fact that he hadn't found out more when he had the chance - it was more the general idea of having taken his planet for granted. It was something else that most of their realities seemed to have in common.

Perhaps this was the chance to fix that, after all.

"Mine either, though given the situation on my Cybertron before the war, even if I'd had the inclination to attempt to search for some answers, it would have been difficult." Frowning, Jetfire shook his helm, considering the situation as it had been back then.

It had been odd, yes, but given the stability otherwise and the fact that it didn't really affect anyone (mostly) directly, it hadn't seemed important. It had, even, for some parts seemed perfectly logical.

"The Council of Ancients closed off a lot of older areas, citing 'concerns of safety' for anyone who wandered in. I think there were very few who thought it suitable to protest that."

"Is that so?" That part was a surprise to him.

"I haven't heard of anything like that happening in my own world. It's possible that it did, of course, but... at least in the history vids I could find, it was not mentioned."

"I believe the fact that it was happening was one of Megatron's points of contention, and that we were being kept from the truth." Here Jetfire paused, his expression turning slightly dry, along with an arch look. "Whatever said 'truth' might be, as he never went too deeply into that. But admittedly, given the fact of these areas being closed off..."

He shrugged, tapping the edge of a thruster into the floor as he thought briefly.

"Perhaps your government didn't feel the need to be as secretive as the one I come from, no matter what the reason might be for it? I see no reason why all our realities would be quite as corrupt as the others, so there might be... ah, degrees."

Skyfire nodded. It was one of those things that he wished he know more about - but he had missed such a long time, and all the stories he could find now would most certainly be biased one way or the other.

"It had its flaws, as all governments do. But there wasn't great social unrest while I was there," he said. "As for what happened after - well. I don't have the details, of course. All I know is that our version of Megatron doesn't mention any issues of corruption, not even out of convenience to himself... Surely that must mean something."

Jetfire tilted his helm in agreement, because surely that did mean something... at the least that it'd been completely uncalled for. Which was a rather unpleasant thought, since less harsh of an uprising and war or not, war was still war and people lost their lives, and if the reason had been nothing more than 'because I want to--' that... Frowning, he set the thoughts aside to actually discuss it.

"A few things, I'd surmise... either there was, and he didn't care, at all or enough to use them to give the uprising some veneer of... ah, legitimacy. Or there wasn't, making the uprising even less justified than it might have been with corruption present."

Neither option was particularly appealing, to be honest. Not that Skyfire had a way to know which one was right, but in any case... they didn't say anything good about either Megatron or about Cybertron's society in general.

"All I can be sure of is that Megatron, now, doesn't even bother to pretend that he has a good cause," he said, with a slight tilt of his head. "I don't know if he was always like this, or if time and power corrupted him until he reached this point."

"Indeed. The same happened for the one I know as well, though I believe it took to a good while after Optimus became Prime that he became more focused on Optimus... and general conquest." Pausing, Jetfire tilted his helm back to look up at the ceiling with a faint frown.

There'd been many theories for the direction of the war Megatron had started, besides the plan to get rid of the Council of Ancients.

"I can't say for sure, but there were some indications that the war wasn't entirely focused on conquering Cybertron early on, though of course that's what it turned to later." A dug-in, protracted, stubborn war where one side just wouldn't give up until they had what they wanted, and the other, because of that, couldn't.

At least not with Megatron in presence.

Without him... well.

"I wonder if anyone could imagine the direction the war would take in the end, back then," Skyfire mused. That part seemed to hold true for both of their worlds, after all. They were at a point when it was hard to tell if the fight currently going on had anything to do with how everything had started.

The thought made him grimace. And it just got worse, of course.

"Or how long it would last..."

With a sigh, Jetfire slowly shook his helm, thinking back, once again, on that relaxed stillness before the first time Starscream came back from the gladiator arena after having participated the first time... And then...

"I don't think so. I know I didn't." He looked down at the floor, angling his helm to look at Skyfire from under the edge of his helm for a moment, optics dim. "Even with Starscream's... enthusiasm when he started to participate in the arena matches, or even later, when Megatron started to draw crowds... It didn't seem like it'd become... ah, quite as big as it did."

Briefly, his arms where they're folded over his chestplates tense before he relaxed again.

"I think even a few million years in, we thought it'd end soon. Who doesn't? Imagining something like war to be able to last for even longer than it had, even when you can't see any obvious end... well." Looking up from the floor, Jetfire's smile is flat, grim. Actually thinking like that would probably lead to mental instability.

That did make sense. It must have felt gradual, for those who had been there since the beginning. He'd seen it in his own world too. Now they were at a point when even those who were old enough to remember a time before the war talked about it as if it had been going on forever.

As for the rest... Skyfire had to agree. He smiled a little, though it mostly came out sad.

"We have to believe it will stop sometime, right?" he said. "The thought of fighting on and on with no real end in sight... It'd be too much to take."

It was a little hard not to talk about it like that, even if all of them well-remembered the before. It simply became hard to think too closely on, easier to not dwell too much, and stay in the present.

"Precisely. Not beliveing it would be like... never letting your processor rest and defrag I think." Somber, Jetfire shook his helm and briefly it felt... like it was too much. But that was neither here or now and even so, they'd been close to peace more than once. It was not impossible.

"Simply not possible if you'd want to remain functional. But I don't see why it wouldn't end. For us, it almost has, a few times." That... might have been the grim latching onto a statement that simply was necessary to make and believe in.

"Then there must still be hope," Skyfire replied. Or, at least, he wanted to believe that. Even if it was just 'almost' - there was a chance that this would, eventually, all end.

How it might end was a different story. It was also something that he'd rather not think about too much.

"I have to believe that, in any case," he admitted. "That we can still work towards peace somehow."

"It's a belief I'm holding onto as well," said Jetfire as he walked back to the bench where he'd left the samples of ore and rocks earlier in the discussion and carefully picked among them.

"It gets a bit hard to avoid the depressing nature of it, thinking about it this closely." It was more an off-hand, idle comment than anything else, but then Jetfire shrugged and looked over, lips quirking in a smile. "Should we perhaps return to something of a less... ah, heavy nature?"

It might be better for now, anyway, interesting discussions to be had from it or not. Besides, who could say no to science?

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wherenobotsgone - 2013-06-01 02:05 (UTC) - Expand

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