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Characters: Autobots Location: The area right outside Autobot Outpost Omega-1 Content Warnings: N/A Plot Summary: Restless and avoiding his fellow Autobots Prowl paces a path around the outside of their base hoping for some piece of mind.
It was an odd sensation for him, this sudden and forceful restlessness that had overtaken his quiet and ordered world. He'd been unable to simply sit still, even to the point that he'd grabbed his work to bring outside with him, though logically moving and working wasn't the most efficient method of getting things done. He was on edge, frame buzzing with energy and made anxious. There was no imminent battle for him to strategize for, and patrols for him only made his restless energy worse. He knew he should probably stop avoiding the medbay and thus Ratchet, but somehow he didn't think their irritable CMO would want to deal with him and his incurable, illogical need to simply be on the move.
He'd been out here for some time now, nearly half the day, and hadn't been able to get a single thing done. Seeing as he was usually far ahead of his work this wouldn't have been an issue for other mechs, but to Prowl it was intolerable. His carefully ordered world was dissolving into chaos and he couldn't put a stop to it. So he ambled, walking a path back and forth outside the base, working his processors into a circle of continued considerations and answers that only put him back at the original point. He was restless, but movement only made it worse, and sitting still was intolerable.
There was a distinct trail forming from his set pattern of pacing, and he had yet to come up with an answer to what it was that was bothering him. Which, he knew something had to be, for him to be this...out of sorts he supposed. There was nothing really that should be upsetting him, not to his general knowledge and now after a search of recent reports. Things were off, he knew this and couldn't explain it, like his memory being faulty, like half the time having to quickly look up who certain mechs were when he passed them in the halls and had no idea who they were. Wrong meant chaos, and chaos meant something was ruining his maintained sense of well-being and order of the world. Unacceptable, illogical, and over all irritating. Even his seemingly endless amounts of patience couldn't hold out forever in the face of such a situation. Why were things out of order? Why did he have memory chunks missing? Why couldn't he recall the simplest thing out of certain soldiers, and more why were some that he did remember blatantly missing?
The dual toned mech stopped in his tracks, doorwings fanning out behind him and angling as he tried to tune in to the non-critical chatter that almost always passed through the base. Sometimes the white noise was calming. Today, however, it seemed to just briefly distract his processors before the need to be moving overwhelmed him again. Well, as the humans said, this sucked.
Back at HQ in Iacon she at least had a place to call her own and everything moved like a well oiled machine rotated through by meticulous clockwork. Here? HA! There were no such things as privacy, indoor voices or 'leave me the heck alone' within the confines of those walls. The hustle and bustle of constant movement within the base was enough to drive the two wheeler to question all of her life choices sometimes. Locked away in the confinements of those walls with some of the loudest mechs she ever had to work with could drive a gal insane! Even her quarters was no safe haven for her, as the walls to each of the closet like rooms were almost paper thin and she could easily hear everything through them.
But out here? Oh, it was glorious. Yeah, she had been warned before about being outside of the base's confined space when not in her alt mode but she liked to bend those rules once in a while. Sitting out here along the ridge with her pedes hanging over the cliff edge and watching the sun rise and fall? There was something peaceful about watching all of the organic life as it moved along without any care for if it were being watched or not. Things were just so much different here than they were on their Cybertron, where they were surrounded by the cold metal from far below your pedes to high above your helms. Here things were warm, alive...
Fragile. At least in comparison to what Arcee was used to.
And here they were, large, mechanical beings making a mess of things. They didn't belong, they had no right ruining what the humans had. Thought did they even understand it themselves? From one on the outside looking in, Arcee was blown away by the world around her when she took the time to enjoy it. The humans? It was as if through seeing it every day that they didn't even know what they were taking for granted. Guess the same could have been said about them and Cybertron. Now that their home world had gone dark? Now they could miss it. Hopefully the humans wouldn't let it get to the same point.
So many things flooded in at once. The Great War. The Decepticons. Her partner ( her deceased one, not the one that she wanted to strangle more often than not for some of the things he would say or do). It was all a mix of things going through her processor as she sat there staring at the horizon, leaned back on her servos that were pressed to the ground behind her. It was not uncommon for her to slip into these spells where she allowed ghosts from her past to creep up on her and force her to take some alone time. This was one of those moments. She was so used to having her own space and working by herself but now she was among a herd of happy helpers and this cluster of multiple allies, partners and 'let me come with you and help' Autobots made her more anxious as time went on and more of them started to appear. She could deal with Cliff as long as she was able to have him at arm's length and he let her just do on her own when she put her pede down. Heck, even Optimus understood to give her space. The others? And the... well, what she would call youngsters? They were driving her up a wall! Arcee just couldn't deal with it sometimes.
Correction. Most of the time.
The irritating sound of movement not far from her drew Arcee's attention from her thoughts and she looked over her shoulder. It was just around the bend, just out of sight, and her optics narrowed as she thought of who it could be. Honestly, she half expected it to be Cliff out looking for her to disturb her peace and quiet as he usually did, but he wouldn't have taken so long without calling out her name as if she wouldn't notice him walking around. She rose to her pedes and started in the direction of the noise, however cautious, as she didn't know what or who to expect once she was able to lock her sights on the source.
Tensions eased when she spotted the cruiser. She stared, not hiding around the rocks but rather right in the open where he would have been able to see her. No sense in walking up on a mech who seemed focused on... pacing and whatever he was thinking so hard about and risk being hollered at and having anyone within earshot of it to come running outside. Either way, no point in being silent herself and now that he had stopped pacing she felt more comfortable with addressing him, even if he did seem a bit ridged to her still.
"I would say 'penny for your thoughts', but I doubt that kind of currency would be useful to you." This one... Prowl, if she remembered correctly. He didn't seem to be the talkative type. Good thing, since it meant that if she wanted to retreat back to her spot she could without having him follow her and chat up a senseless storm. "If something is bothering you maybe you should talk to someone about it. You don't want to be the hand responsible for one of us being offlined because you're not at the top of your game."
He heard her before she spoke, but that didn't stop him from starting when she addressed him. Doorwings fanned straight outward and he fell halfway into a defensive crouch before his processors caught up to who he was looking at. And even then he regarded her for several moments with no idea who she was before the answer came to him. Arcee, one of the femmes. He actually had to force himself to stand down when she came into visual range, venting loudly in order to reinforce that order to himself. No reason to lash out, she wasn't attacking him. Though he was being unreasonable pacing out here at least he wasn't driving anyone up the proverbial wall with the heavy sound of his pacing footsteps inside. On metal flooring. Where it would echo.
Prowl decided, after her words, that he didn't like her tone. He was already restless, and her pointing out that he needed to speak to someone didn't help matters any. "Speaking to someone about it had done nothing, I assure you." He was no fool. He knew whatever was wrong with him had no standing in a physical or programming abnormality. He'd already had it checked for that. He finally gave her his full attention, turning to face her and forcing the shifting of his doorwings to stop so that he wouldn't get all the extra feedback from tapping into the communications relays while he was trying to have a civil conversation.
His hackles were up, as the saying went. He had the sense that something was about to happen, but couldn't place what or where or why. Which he found maddening. His ordered world was dissolving and he couldn't find any sort of way to make it stop. Not that she'd understand that. He felt suddenly bitter and told himself that he had better control than this. Perhaps she was right after all, perhaps he needed to see someone about this. Possibly Jazz. Preferably Jazz. He was feeling an absolute lack of trust in his fellow Autobots, also not a good sign.
But then, she just had to cross that line. Blue optics glowed brighter for a moment as a cold rage bubbled up through his spark. "If I believed, even for a moment, that my state of being would endanger one of my comrades I would take myself off duty." He was aware that his tone was bordering on hostile, at the lowest register of his voice, that a snarl was trying to work its way out of him. He'd gone still, watching her with something very close to hostility. Or violent intent, he couldn't decide which.
This is the point he realized he wasn't at all acting like himself and folded his doorwings down in a show of apology. "I am not myself today, I apologize."
Doorwings could be such bothersome things when not under proper supervision. This was not the first instance when she had come in contact with one who had such telling ones and he probably wouldn't be the last. It was unusual for one who should have kept emotions in check to allow them to be so loud, but, hey, she figured that it more than likely had something to do with the visibly stressed state he seemed to be in.
This dual colored mech was all over the place. Doorwings fluttering, his tones rising and falling like the tides, and a flip of anger that went from risking to boil over to settling down that reflected in his optics. He had said that talking hadn't helped anything but if this was any reflection on how he had attempted to do so? No wonder it hadn't done any good! So, she let him talk when he did, offering him nothing but silence and open audials for what could turn into a one sided conversation. Rant? Vent? Pressure release? Whatever one wanted to call it, he clearly needed it. She was in no way in with the proper training to handle this matter and was much better at telling someone off than actually listening to the needs of another and offering anything related to a helpful suggestion. That usually fell on Optimus's lap. Arcee was in the process of learning that sort of patience. It was bound to have its ups and downs.
It was just lucky for Prowl that Arcee didn't take his aggressive attitude and stance as a signal that he wanted to fight or else there probably would have been a scene unfolding where someone would have had to come and separate them. She instead just stood there and stared with one servo on her hip, not visibly phased by him. When his doorwings lowered and he apologized her digits strummed once from pinky to index against her the blue of her hip before it went entirely still while she thought of how to address what was going on. Though her servo remained still now and just gingerly rested in place.
"What are you apologizing for? I don't even know you and I can tell that you're not having a usual day. We have them. Nothing to grovel over." She vented and took a step back so she could lean against a collection of rocks and crossed her arms over her chest. "I would hope that you would have enough sense to pull yourself off duty should the need arise, but all of us are guilty of believing that we're fine or... not as off as we actually are. Even Ratchet has pushed himself to the point where we all questioned whether or not he was performing his duties as a medic efficiently."
Even she was faulty of that, much to the disgust of Ratchet and the rest of the team. Not that he needed to know that about her. Nothing like feeling like something's the matter and otherwise ignoring it so you wouldn't have to take it up with those on the medical wing. Arcee just couldn't stand the looks that medics gave, be it that one of fake pity or concern for your mental well-being. Not going just meant that she didn't have to be forcibly housed and confined to the base for 'medical leave'. Like they would even be able to.
Oh! There was a thought.
"If you don't think that talking it out would do you any good, have you at least had a physical to rule out a malfunction you're not aware of? Perhaps something as simple as a twisted wire?" She wasn't a medic so she didn't know if that was actually a thing though she figured it may have been. That was someone else's job to figure out so she just went to him when something felt off. At least- just as she had suggested to Prowl- on a physical level. The rest of it was on her. "Though when I speak of you having a hand in someone's offlining, I am also suggesting the possibility of your own because you lose your focus and fail to recognize the warnings. That be through choice to push it aside or just being plain ignorant to it. Which, you don't seem to fall for the latter."
Calling the kettle black, as they say. Or however that silly phrase went.
She was purposefully trying to make him lose his temper, wasn't she? Either that or she had worse interpersonal skills than he did, which was something. He vented loudly at her again, trying to calm himself, trying to reason with the irrational rage that was starting to boil through him again. He chose to ignore her 'grovel' comment lest he put her through the side of the base in a fit of rage. And he could, and he would. Or well, he'd try. There was no telling which of them was the faster, him or her.
Prowl held his doorwings slanted downwards and still, forcing them, at least, to remain under his control. The last thing his unstable mood needed was feedback from inside the base. This femme was already testing him enough, he didn't need any further encouragement.
This was definitely a 'go find Jazz' moment for him. There was an idea. He'd excuse himself before she made him hurt her and go find Jazz. Jazz would know what to do. He always did.
"I have already been checked for abnormalities in my programming." And he didn't want to go again. He was avoiding Ratchet, since he was pretty sure the other mech would end him for his current attitude. That and he didn't particularly like going to medical. Not unless he was simply unable to function. Or Optimus made him go. Or Ratchet tracked him down and made him go.
He started pacing again, movements short and clipped as he made a few passes in front of the femme before stopping again to address her. He needed to get rid of this excess of energy in his frame, rid of the restless spirit that had infested him. Standing here talking to a femme that he didn't know and could barely tolerate wouldn't help with that. In fact, he may end up engaging in a fight if he stayed much longer in her presence. And that was simply unacceptable.
"Arcee." He kept his tone level, but only just. "I must excuse myself now. Please enjoy the rest of your day." And with that he simply turned and walked briskly back towards the base. Time to track down a certain Jazz shaped mech and see if he could rid him of this intolerable restlessness.
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