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Characters: @marie , Open to all Autobots Location: Jasper, NV Content Warnings: Some language Plot Summary: Marie struggles to adjust to the whole 'now aquainted with alien robots' thing
Marie's too-thin fingers tapped away at her laptop keyboard, her light eyes scanning over lines of text. Sitting outside of Jasper's one decent café, an iced coffee on the patio table beside her, she was working on translating lines of an old French text into German for some history scholar in Europe. She'd met him once during her studies, an eccentric, odd old man. He could have gotten a contemporary to translate, as she had no doubt he knew someone else who could do this, but, he'd taken a liking to her. She didn't think too much on it. He paid very well for her work.
Still, even as she worked, she found her eyes wandering back to the Old English and Old Norse textbooks sitting on the table next to her computer. Learning these were much more difficult than modern languages, but, they were extremely helpful in understanding any of the Indo-European languages fully. Her professors had almost cried when she said she wasn't studying them. She'd finally begun to do so when recovering in the hospital. Better late than never.
She shook her head, forcing herself to focus on the work in front of her, and took a sip of her coffee. Some of these old monk dudes were weird. She had no idea what her employer wanted with this text, but, hey, she was just the translator. If she read one more double entendre, though, she was done for the day.
Another day, another bored Smokescreen out for a drive.
He was happy that they were getting more human allies, but he really wanted to have the chance to sit down and get to know them a bit better.. maybe take them out for the ride of their lives? Sure he wasn't a racer or anything, but that didn't mean that Smokescreen couldn't make some fun out of a drive or something. Pizza someone's car? Of course that would require a human, but that's where the fun came in.
While he found himself driving, he spotted a familiar someone at one of the cafés in the area. Grinning to himself in vehicle mode, he pulled over to the cafe and got as close as he could to where Marie was sitting. He wasn't sure how much attention she was paying to the world around her, but he didn't want to honk either. No point in scaring the crap outta her.
"Hey! Hey! Hi!" Smokescreen spoke excitedly in a hushed tone, flailing his windshield wipers at max speed as to wave to Marie.
Aaaaand, yup, that was it. She closed her laptop with a scoff. She now knew where that stereotype about the French being pervs came from. Ew. Like, she got the vows of celibacy and everything, but, dude. Seriously?
On to Old English, then.
Being mostly alone at the café, she hadn't a care when she propped her feet up on the chair next to her and slurped in a highly unladylike manner at her drink. She slouched over her textbook, flipping it open to the correct page. Ah, here it was. Verb tenses, her old foe.
She'd just begun to try and work out those crazy case endings when someone spoke.
Marie hadn't actually paid any mind to the car pulling up, figuring that it was another customer. After all, she wasn't quite used to the who 'alien vehicles' thing. So, when she looked up curiously, wondering if the voice was speaking in a hushed tone to her, she caught sight of the car and froze. Her pale eyes widen and she paused mid slurp, straw stuck comically in her mouth.
Shit. No. Nope, nope, nope.
She could deal with a few of them at their alien base. But this particular bot, out here, where she felt safely human was not okay.
She had to get him to stop flapping his windshield wipers at her before someone saw.
Giving a smile that was more a wince, she lifted one hand in a wave, setting her cup down.
"Um...hi...Smokescreen," she muttered, not really caring if he could hear her and feeling super awkward talking to a car.
Smokescreen continued to flail his windshield wipers at Marie, excited looking to her until he finally had her attention. She definitely seemed to have been caught off guard, and he hadn't actually meant to scare her or anything.
All he wanted to do was say hi.
When she greeted him, he finally put the windshield wipers to rest, sitting idly and looking to her in his vehicle form. "What're you doing~? I was just out for a drive and saw you so I thought I'd say hi." If he had been in his root mode, he would've been grinning like a dork. He desperately wanted to be friends with the girl, and he was gonna try his hardest without being overly pushy about it.
Marie stared at him, a bit warily. He honestly seemed like a nice enough guy. She just...had bad memories of him and a mini-con and a high speed chase. She winced again.
At least he'd stopped flailing. She got the impression that he could be a bit spazzy and a giant robot spazzing in a public human place was not good. At all. And now he was chatting. Which was also not good, when a pedestrian could randomly walk by and hear him. She glanced around, just to ensure she was still the only human present.
"I was translating a text out of Old French and into German. But, the French monks were pervs and I was tired of the double entendres, so, I switched over to studying Old English," she picked up her textbook to show him.
Marie set both coffee and textbook down, forcing herself to relax. Be nice. Have a conversation. It will be fine.
And then he asked if she wanted to go for a ride. And she blurted out the first thing that came to mind.
"You do realize that, on Earth, when a guy asks a girl if she wants to go for a ride with no specific destination, that can have certain connotations, right?"
As soon as the sentence was out, she flushed red and slapped a hand over her face in self-mortification. She prided herself on being fairly eloquent. She was fluent in numerous languages and could read and write in many others. Her vocabulary was extensive. But, her filter was gone. It has never really been that great, but, then her time in the hospital had killed it.
"Oh god, I'm so sorry. Sometimes...things just slip out. I swear I'm not flirting with you. I just...thought it...and it came out."
She was horribly embarrassed. She wanted to make a good impression. Really. It was just difficult when trying to force herself to relax around people. Because then she said things. Like the offhand comment about living at base that had just...exploded.
She cleared her throat.
"If you'll excuse my awkwardness, a ride could be...nice."
Might as well give him a chance, now that she'd gone and said something stupid and weird.
Translating French into German.. then studying Old English? Smokescreen actually grew a bit interested with her studies, especially given the work he had had to do during his time when he had to guard Alpha Trion. So much reading that he actually was forced into a small interest. There was only so many times that you could read about the Primes and all the Artifacts and Unicron and Primus' histories that it just kinda got dull. Every now and again he'd come up with something interesting and that would catch his attention.. though it was usually stuff that he wasn't supposed to be reading to begin with.
"That's a lot of languages. Are you a data clerk by chance? Studying to be one?"
He tried.
Smokescreen was curious about the book as she held it up for him to see. Some sort of.. datapad, but it didn't look like the ones they had. It didn't even seem electronic! How was one supposed to read when they couldn't poke at their datapad and it didn't actually go over to the next page?
Marie's words on what a guy taking a girl out for a ride meant did baffle the poor mech. "Huh..?" Just what did it mean? Either way she did apologize for her sudden outburst. Smokescreen honestly didn't mind, and even chuckled a bit as she finally accepted the offer.
"It's cool. I'm used to it by now. Not.. cause of you or anything. I've just had to listen to it back in boot camp and a few of the others I have to deal with on a daily basis. Either way, take your time. I'll be here waiting for ya whenever you're ready for that drive."
Marie was...totally prepared to be blown off. As usual. Normally, the comment following her explanations started and ended with "that's a lot of languages...", the subtle, snide "what a nerd..." included but unspoken. Especially in Jasper and the surrounding area. The curiosity in Smokescreen's tone was...different than expected.
She wrinkled her nose at him.
"Data clerk? Is that a type of librarian?" she shook her head, "I'm just a linguist."
She began to gather up her things, cramming books into her messenger bag. As an afterthought, she downed the rest of her coffee, wincing at the strength of the flavor all at once. She'd paid for it and wasn't wasting it, but, neither was she spilling it all over his interior should something unexpected occur. She suspected that would be rude.
At least her lack of verbal filter had gone over his head.
She finished packing and stood, dropping her cup into a nearby trash can. Her motorcycle caught her eye and she paused, considering. Who was going to steal it in Jasper? Besides...the aliens would help her find it again...right?
Marie stepped up to the passenger side door and stopped, staring at the car in front of her.
"...Is there like...and etiquette to this? Because I feel super awkward with just...climbing into you...cause...you're not actually a car...you're a person...is this awkward for you? Because I feel like I just made it awkward..."
"Yep! Well.. kinda. Think of it sort of like being a librarian but also doing the work of data entry as well. Mostly in terms of recording data, storing said data, categorizing it, making sure you don't mix up Soundwave and Shockwave when filing things away. That sorta thing."
Things like that happened when you had so many bots with similar sounding names.
Smokescreen watched as Marie got up, packing her things before hopping into the passenger seat. Sure would be awkward with her sitting in the passenger seat while he drove along, but it seemed that Marie had also picked up on that a little. It was fair enough that she'd felt that way, but he'd do his best to answer her questions regardless.
"I mean.. it's no more weird than having you sit on my shoulder while I'm in bot mode. Maybe sort of tickles a little bit, but nah. You're good." He hummed to himself, an idea springing to mind. "Ooh! You know what I could do though? I admit I haven't tried this before, but always wanted to find an excuse to use it."
In the driver's seat materialized a holomatter avatar of Smokescreen, a fairly well built young adult male with dark curly hair and a stubbly beard and mustache. Grinning, Smokescreen's avatar turned his head and looked to Marie. "Didn't see that coming, didja? So where to?"
Data clerk is like...data librarian. Got it. What was the deal with a soundwave and shockwave, though? Was that how they stored data? Weird.
It was a really good thing that Smokescreen was such a chill guy...robot. She'd go with guy. Less confusing that way. He managed to take her questions in stride and just answer without a care. He was definitely one she could get along with. At least, she thought so. He hadn't verbalized that she was weird, so....
She actually jumped when the avatar appeared in the driver's seat, eyes flying wide.
"What the crap?!" she wheezed, staring at it- him, "Warn me next time!"
Logic kicked in, then. Jetfire had been using holographs. It made sense that others could to. After a moment, she poked his shoulder.
"This is weird...but actually really makes a lot of sense," she poked him once more before being satisfied, "Um...hm," she furrowed her brow thinking, "I don't really care. Not home. I try not to go home this early," she smiled, "Know any cool places around here?"
Smokescreen's holoavatar looked to Marie in surprise. He honestly hadn't meant to startle her, but then again.. maybe a human popping up in the middle of nowhere would be startling to someone who wasn't expecting it. Mental note, a little heads up next time.. just as Marie had said.
"Sorry. Meant for that to be a pleasant surprise and not a.. heart attack? I'll warn ya next time."
He smiled a bit, turning his attention to what was in front of him. "It's at least good looking like me, right?"
A little poke and Smokescreen chuckled a bit. He didn't entirely feel it, but he at least wanted to show her he was amused by this whole thing. That.. and he didn't want to accidentally unsettle her by not reacting to the non-lethal touch. "We don't gotta go home, but you certainly asked the right guy. I know all sorts of cool places! Why don't we talk while I take you to one of those 'cool places'."
Reversing out of the parking spot, Smokescreen began to make his exit with Marie in tow to the main street.
Marie nodded in agreement with his promise. At least she knew he could do that now. It probably meant that the others could too. If she got stuck riding with one of them she'd be prepared, now. She smiled slightly at his comment on his looks.
"I guess so," and her filter shut off again, "Oh, there's a question: like here on Earth, we pay a lot of attention to stuff like eye color, face shape, skin tones, and I think there was some kind of research on pheromones playing a role? I'm not sure. But what do Cybertronians look for? Sorry if that's awkward, but I was wondering."
She sat back, watching him. As odd as it was to be in this situation, she might as well take advantage of it and get her questions answered.
As Smokescreen drove down the street attempting to obey as many traffic laws as possible as not to give Marie too much of a scare, his holomatter avatar turned to look at the girl. Her question rather confused him, having to think on it before coming up with a response. "Humans are that picky? That's just weird.. On Cybertron we aren't quite as picky about looks or anything. Mechs can like mechs or femmes, femmes can like femmes or mechs.. Appearances don't really matter cause it's really more about the spark, ya know? The only real preference some have are 'hey I kinda like fliers more than grounders', but otherwise it's just a superficial thing that no one really cares about.
"Some mechs and femmes do paint details onto themselves though. Sometimes it's for religious reasons, some do it because they're Cityspeakers and that's just the markings they have.. some just do it for the aesthetic. Otherwise it's really one of the only things I can think of off the top of my head that we do to improve looks."
Smokescreen stopped a stop light, thinking to himself. "So what about you? What kind of humans do you like?"
Holy crap, he was taking his eyes off the road and it was freaking her out. She mentally paused. Did he even need to 'look' at the road? They were inside him after all. That was still too weird a thought to pursue and so Marie pushed it aside.
At first, she was confused by his use of 'picky'. She'd really only listed a few things, how was that picky? the question was quickly answered, though, when he explained how Cybertronians didn't pay much mind to outer appearances. Huh. Must be nice to come from a culture like that, where it was all about the person and not so much the outer shell...
"I guess we would seem pretty weird to you guys," she said, smiling slightly, "And a little petty too...I bet it's nice, though, to be part of a culture where looking on the inside is the norm..."
She paused, mulling over what he'd told her. She knew that a few of the bots back at the base were pretty vain, like that Sunstreaker guy. But, if Smokescreen was to be believed, looks didn't matter all too much. Maybe it was more of a self-gratification thing? An expression of personality? That would explain all the brought colors.
"Huh?" she looked up at his holoform, eyes slightly wide, when he asked her a question. It took her a moment to process what he'd said, "Oh...uh..."
She tugged at the end of a strand of her long hair, frowning in thought.
"Well...I mean, I'm attracted to men. I had a crush on this guy in high school once. He was nice, kinda cute. He had this really kind smile. But...after that I was focused on traveling and school...then I got sick and was pretty much convinced I was gonna die, so...yeah, I haven't really given it much thought," she laughed slightly.
Last Edit: Mar 21, 2019 14:37:55 GMT by Deleted
Shoutbox
Please respect the space and don't hesitate to ask questions!
altria : please dont be dead?
Jun 14, 2023 22:40:34 GMT
Partia: Is this still alive?
Dec 17, 2022 6:02:02 GMT
Partia: Is this still alive?
Dec 17, 2022 6:01:34 GMT