Nature of the Beast
One-Shot Series: To Catch an Avioid
Part 9: Talk the Talk
*Note: In my mind, the Predacon languages are also divided into dialects depending on the general frame build rather than region. They sound a little more smooth, hiss-like, keen-like, or growling depending on frame build. Avioids kind of have a Latin/German type feel to them, Equinines have a more fantasy/elvish feel, Canipids sound a lot more growl-y or whiny as if they have Russian inflections, snake-formers sound like slurred hissing, and so on. Sentence structure for them is also slightly different for each language, but generally largely the same.
*Warning: Dialogue heavy.
Zodiac woke from a particularly restless power down, shaking off the last dregs of a nightmare she could barely remember and feeling as if the whole world was doing barrel rolls around her, spark racing. Sunlight streamed in through the balcony window, and a check of her chronometer showed it to be late morning. She stayed on her perch and did her best not to fall. Her mind instantly began to wander to help better forget the nightmare. That usually helped. That or talking to Lattice, but she worked day shifts so that option was out the window.
On reflection, she'd been busy the other solar cycle, a lot busier than usual. Her productivity, while applauded by most the CERF, concerned Corona and Sunflare. Corona – that femme knew her too well, and so knew that whenever she became a busy little glitch mouse that meant she was trying to distract herself. It was true enough. Being busy was the best way to keep her processor off her troubles. Even though no direct date about the Predacus and High Council meeting had been forwarded to her, that almost made it worse. No date was worse than having a date in the near future. She hated not having some forewarning, time to prepare. Vagueness was her one true fear. Vagueness about a gigantic social meeting...that was just emotional torture.
"Primus, make up your slagging mind you overgrown sparkling," she hissed. "You childish, stubborn, temperamental, indecisive son of a –"
Her personal console beeped, blocking off her colorful flow of language and making her helm jerk a little too quickly. Then it beeped again. And again. And again. Curious, she hooked up to it wirelessly to see what the machine wanted. The Avioid was surprised to find that the beeps were notifications of attempted communications, and they'd actually been happening for longer than she'd been conscious. The former ones were all from Smokescreen, much to her shock and amusement. They even had little text additions to them. She read through them:
Hey Zodiac? U up?
Hm. That one had been from almost a joor ago. Slag that mech was an early riser. Legacy from the War maybe? Or was it just due to his military training and career? Military mechs were still pretty busy even when not out fighting battles.
Hello? Knock knock? Anybot home?
The next message, or rather an entire ysal of them, was just Smokescreen spamming her name constantly for almost an entire breem straight before finally giving up the gig. She laughed.
"Holy...You are either completely desperate for attention or just plain bored."
His last message simply read: Ping me when ur up. Interview plz?
She stood there staring at the message for a few moments. Her slender brow ridges furrowed.
"Interview? Why the Pit would you want an interview with me? You're not a cultural investigator."
Shaking her helm in bewilderment the Avioid resumed her investigation. The remaining pings, the ones she had heard just now, were all from comm. frequencies she was even more familiar with. Normally they tried to avoid trying to contact her until the afternoon and evening joors so this caught her as a bit peculiar. But on closer examination Zodiac found that, like Smokescreen, they were simple text-based messages – just four of them total. Yeah, that was more like them. And so she opened them.
You can do it, sweetspark! We have faith in you!
–Skyshine
Let's go ZZ! Let's go!
–Fledglings
That one made her laugh. If someone had come in and read that without knowing the context they would've assumed that meant she should get some recharge or something. She'd never understood why the fledglings liked her so much. She wasn't exactly great with sparklings. Way too hyperactive for her liking, and they didn't seem to quite grasp the concept of "personal space."
Courage is what it takes to stand up and speak, Zodiac. You'll ace that meeting. I'll be right there with Skyshine and Nightscream to make sure you do. Challenge one Painter, you challenge us all. Avius folhis.
–The Artist
The final one simply read:
Itzra j'kes worfuth Æfæn
Zodiac smiled. She knew which Painter that had come from even without looking at the frequency identification. The Artist was one of the few in the tribe who readily communicated in their language out of spark-pride and a desire to preserve it. What with all the politics going on it was usually simpler to communicate with city-dwellers in the common city dialects. But Predacons would be Predacons she supposed. Each had a pride all their own. At any rate the Predacon language was far from dead, and she liked using it whenever she could. It was just sad that those opportunities weren't exactly common in the cities. Theirs was a tough language to learn and the Council wasn't exactly thrilled about their existence in the first place.
The Avioid came to a decision. She opened up a comm. channel to one of the few city dwellers who would listen to her.
"Hey, Smokescreen? You there?"
[Zodiac! Primus, you're not much of an early bird, are you?]
She stuck her glossa out even though no one was there to see it, "Shut up. I'm an astronomer, wise-aft. We're night owls by default unless we're in things like solar research or radio interferometry or something. Or radiation specialists like Sunny. Can't exactly see stars when the sun's up unless you got a satellite to work with."
[Well, don't you?]
"Sometimes. Right now definitely since I'm still grounded. But I'm also more alert at night. So," she shrugged. "Right now it's mostly satellite feeds and getting data from other planetary scientists out in the field and helping them review it and stuff. Now you've had your curiosity satisfied, you're gonna return the favor. You pinged me earlier and asked for an interview?"
He laughed a little. [Oh, no, no. Not like a professional one like the ones Headline does. I just have a bunch of questions for you. That's all. Language ones. Cultural ones.]
"Eh? Language and culture questions?"
[Yeah! Y'know. About the Predacon language and just Predacon stuff in general.]
She rapidly shuttered her optics. This was certainly a strange start to her solar cycle. And for once she wasn't completely averse to being asked questions by someone she still considered a stranger. Wasn't every solar cycle that a city-dweller in a non-academic position wanted to know about language and culture. Come to think of it, this was probably one of only a handful of times she'd been asked questions about something other than astronomy. Weird, but also strangely refreshing.
"Um...like what for example? I-Is there a reason for this?"
Smokescreen explained his reasoning.
"Why? Why are you doing this? You don't owe my kind anything."
[Let's just say I've fracking had it with the Council's xenophobic racism. Oh! And before we start this off – I had a talk with Awkward Uncle Dragonslayer. Date's still up in the air but he's definitely gonna be there. Jazz'll be there too, along with Warpath and Moonracer and Hotspot and some of the others. Told them a little bit about you; they'll back you up, and in case I can't make it for some reason, I'll transfer 'Bee's frequency to you so you can have him and me on the line. 'Bee's...not high enough on the pecking order to make it into the meeting as a peace-keeper or anything. Which royally sucks.]
"Yeah. You told me. So. Um. Where do you want to start this off exactly?"
[I mean, I know a little bit about the Predacon language but I'm nowhere near to being fluent in it. I just know a couple of phrases, and since not a lot is actually known about the language because of the political xenophobia it's not like I can pop into the Hall of Records or the Academy and just download the information. Those Academy 'bots have to learn it manually before it can be transcribed, and that requires stellar cycles of staying with the tribe and studying them. Anything you can tell me about it that might help me translate some stuff?]
"Um. I dunno. That's kind of a broad question," she admitted slowly, "But in our language there's a structure to it that's...this is gonna sound weird, but it's sort of like Witcher 3 Elvish? The structure seems a little bit off, like with word placement, but when you actually translate it you can transfer the words into your dialect placement pretty easy."
[If I give you an example would you be able to translate it?]
"I-I'll do my best."
[Htep lux tlakfo Æfæn, wundin i'ilohem.]
She blinked.
"That's Equininonian dialect. Um. Well, the first part I'm pretty sure translates as "May the great light of the Father watch over and mend" and the second part is sort of like an honorary title or name. It doesn't have a direct Iaconian translation but "wundin" means "youth" or "vigor" and "i'ilohem" means "the ones who came before the first." To us that means "forerunners" or "ancestors," which nods to the original Predacon race. In your language that would translate pretty directly to "Prime." The second part literally means "child of the first." So in short it's basically like a blessing or prayer for a speedy recovery, a wish for good luck, and a massive respectful nod all rolled into one."
[Oh? Wow. Scrap. I-I didn't realize that's what Flame-Horn said. Kinda feel a little guilty for not responding.]
"Flame-Horn? Isn't he the head honcho of the Chargers? The same guys that –"
[Body slammed me into the Sonic Canyons, yeah. But that was Trailblazer, not him. Flame-Horn told him not to but it was too late to stop him. He and Trailblazer actually visited me a about five solar cycles ago to apologize for what happened.]
"And what did you say?"
[Told 'em not to worry about it. Accidents happen.]
"Huh. You take getting body slammed into a canyon a lot better than I would."
[Oh! Wait!] Smokescreen interrupted excitedly. [There's another word: Lyrvin. Any idea what that one means? I think it's something to do with laws and the legal system, just by the context?]
"That one's easy. Lyrvin is our formal word for a trial, always capitalized in transcriptions. It literally means "to cast judgement." I'm not sure if you know how the Predacon legal system works, but each tribe is in charge of its own members. Should a member commit a crime of any kind they are brought before the highest ranking members of the tribe, along with a small gathering of their closest tribe-mates, in order to have the act reviewed and judged. If the tribe can't make a decision then the 'bot is brought before the Predacus and they make the decision. Usually only really big crimes make it up to the top. Keeps the uppers from being bogged down with little incidents."
[Cool. You said Equinonian dialect though? How many dialects are there in your language?]
"A lot more than you guys have. Different frame models have different dialects to work with their voice boxes. That's why you normally see the same or very similar Predacons in a tribe. One exception would be the Lost Children from Crystal City. They're a hodgepodge of different frame models so they use a single dialect to keep things simple, but it's actually a bit of a mismatch of Draconian, Felian, Canipian, and Hindian dialects. They got it down pat but outsiders understandably have a tough time with it. Academy people are fascinated by it because it's the first hybrid language they've got on record."
[So what does Avioid sound like?] Smokescreen wondered curiously.
"Avian," she corrected humorously, "And it sounds like this: "Avius folhis." That's a real short example of formal Avian, but that's the Sky Painter's motto by the way. Can you guess what it means?"
[I dunno! You tell me. You're the teacher here.]
She smiled and said: "Birds of a feather."
Smokescreen broke out laughing. [Should've guessed!]
"This next example's a little bit personal but I'll share it with you anyway since it's relevant. This would be an example of informal Avian: "Itzra j'kes worfuth Æfæn." The Artist just shared that with me this morning. Tells it to me a lot when I'm anxious."
[What's it mean? I know "Æfæn" generally's a reference to an authority figure, a Guardian, or Primus. Which one is it here?]
"The phrase means "A father protects his own." Another translation would be "A father never abandons his child," or something like that. It's just my alpha reminding me that while everybody else might be against the Preds, he and Primus aren't. Even if I'm personally pretty convinced the guy's an all-powerful, benevolent troll. Unlike the Council, he...well he hasn't done anything to hurt us is his point. He's actually pretty scrapping chatty with some of us."
Smokescreen laughed as he answered: [D'aaw. That's nice of him to say. I wish my boss was half that nice, slipping me little encouraging memos like that. Closest we Guardsmechs get to that here in Iacon is Jazz and sometimes 'Bee, where they go magnetizing little data-pads to your office or barrack doors with cute personal messages or jokes on them. Your alpha sounds like a pretty cool mech.]
She laughed and agreed. The Artist was probably one of the most amiable alphas of the Predacus. History showed it was a real challenge to ruffle his feathers.
[What do the other languages sound like?]
"Er. Well. Hissite dialect sounds pretty much like you'd expect. There's emphasis on the esra, zell, and other "hiss" glyphs so they're called. Canipian sounds growl-y and a bit bear-like to be honest; scabrous and a teeny bit militant. Translate it and its blunt and to the point, though it honestly depends on which Canipid you talk to. Some are chatty, like the Blue Moons, and some aren't, like the White Hound. Not chatty but he's polite. Draconian sounds a bit reptilian like you'd expect but if you were to translate it it's actually pretty flowery and elegant. Chimerian sounds real similar to it, which is why they can intermingle easier than most other dialects."
[Wow. You are just a little language encyclopedia, aren't you?]
She stuck her glossa out again. "What? Am I not allowed to have hobbies?"
[Nah, 'course you are. Everybot's got a hobby. I guess that's one last question before we move on. What kind of hobbies do you have?]
"Uh. Reading. Games. Talking with NASA or ESA people – they're wonderful by the way. I heard from Neutrino they might name another Mars survey robot or planet hunter satellite after one of the CERF just as thanks for helping them with their Tycho satellite and naming some of the priority planets. I guess another hobby that's just part of the career is planet hopping with the Bolt. Earth nerds find an interesting planet, I'm often the ship sent out to go look into it. That's how we found out that creepy planet, TrES-2b, was covered in extremely thick, super-heated clouds made of a mixture of gaseous titanium oxide, scalding potassium and a previously unknown element compound they took to calling Malikithium that's extremely absorbent of photons."
[Wow. I didn't realize you were their go-to gal. That's awesome!]
"Eh, technically it's my Bolt, the Praxian Solstice Matador, the Kaonian Dauntless, and occasionally the Altihexian Data Junkie. Just depends on who's available."
[Wait. The Altihexians have a seat on the CERF?] Smokescreen asked. That was news to him. The City of Daredevils had a CERF branch?
The Avioid laughed. "I know it sounds weird but it's true. Don't normally go associating them with scientific endeavors, I know, but it's actually a really good crew. Or so I've heard. Ship name says it all."
[Now that the whole language issue's outta the way, I got some culture questions for you. Is that okay?]
"Fire away I guess," she said. She winced and added: "Sorry for getting on my high horse and getting off topic."
[It's fine. Anyway, my main question is this: why the slag do some Preds use the natural Energon springs and pools and stuff while some only get it through secondary sources like razorsnakes? It's right in front of them for crying out loud!]
Zodiac hemmed for a bit. How to explain this tactfully?
"It's hard to explain because not all Preds share the same views. Generally we're disdainful of laziness. That's half the reason that most of us don't like groundbridges. But as for the energy question – some Pred builds, especially ones based off predatory creatures, think that simply taking Energon without earning it is disrespectful to Primus. Yes, he's offering it to them but they still feel they need to earn it. No pain no gain I guess. Some tribes, like the Sky Painters, are a little more open-minded about it. In some regions there isn't a lot of wildlife for them to hunt, but there might be pools or springs or rivers they can use. That's the case with the Manganese Mountains. Not a lot of razorsnakes or rust hounds or glitch-mice to catch in the mountains when they hole up there during the winter cycle. There are a good number of pools and springs though. So they use those instead with permission from the Xanxorian monks."
[So it's like a religious belief for you guys? Kind of?]
"Kind of," she agreed, "More like a work-spirit belief. Primus might offer us free energy, but unless we feel we've earned it the offer seems a bit...presumptuous and empty, y'know? Outside the city, laziness doesn't usually pay. We Preds don't really like being coddled. Something freely given has no value, at least in our opinions. It's like the old terrestrial downside of communism: if it's free, it's usually poor quality."
[True that. I mean, I wouldn't say spring Energon is bad quality, but I get your point.]
"I'm not a hunter though in case you're wondering. I just...don't like getting my talons dirty. Yech. Most I go after are mecha moths."
[Yeah, I actually had a picture in my helm of you terminating a razorsnake and flying off with it not too long ago. That...didn't click. What do you Avioids hunt anyway? You guys aren't exactly as big as some other models.]
"Depends. Smaller builds like me would hunt glitch-mice or small razorsnakes. Anything bigger would weigh us down and keep us from flying. Larger builds like Skyshine and the Artist can easily take down a rust hound. We refuse to hunt turbo-hawks though; we seen them as kin. If the larger models don't manage to down the whole hound it's usually shared with the smaller builds or the fledglings so scraplets and Scavengebots don't bother us. The fledglings can't manage on prey to begin with, so we also sort of use it to wean them off so speak."
[...I still think the fact you're eating other, semi-sentient creatures is, y'know...disturbing. No offense. Some 'bots keep rust hounds as pets.]
"I know it sounds weird to a city-dweller like you," she said, "but for Predacons it's fairly normal. It's part of our lives, the same way that Macadam's is for you guys. Unfortunately it's also the reason for our demonization by the Council. Y'know – "No civil Cybertronian would go hunting and consuming another semi-sentient creature, blah blah blah." Thing they don't realize is that it's not like we Painters or any Preds go hunting for pleasure or all the time. There just isn't enough prey for that to be an option. We take only what we need, and we waste nothing. Our prey is given the proper respect before termination and after. Unlike the Scavengebots who will gladly attack and consume other fully sentient creatures if they can get away with it. You guys ever deal with them?"
[Not really, no. They usually stay outside the cities, but I've heard from other Guard posts that police precincts have a bit of trouble with Scavengebots going after bodies near the city fringes. Some cops even think a few of them might be working for Thunderhoof or even members of the Council to purposefully destroy evidence. No solid proof for it, but it's a pretty rampant conspiracy idea apparently. That's what 'Bee tells me anyway.]
Zodiac nodded disdainfully with a sour expression. "Wouldn't surprise me if it was true. Scavengebots are opportunists. Sooner or later one or more of 'em is gonna wind up in a cell."
There was an awkward silence.
"Well, um. If that's all...?"
[One more. Kinda silly. Do you guys use comm. channels to communicate between each other only or do you actually use it to communicate between tribes?]
"Some do, most don't. Sky Painters are one of the ones who do use interpersonal comm's but still rely on couriers. How else do you think they'd stay in touch with me from the other side of the planet?"
[Point. Is there some kind of reason why other tribes rely on couriers? Is it to do with that laziness belief?]
"Bingo. Using comm. channels to communicate, while efficient, is also really lazy. Couriers actually have to be trained to travel huge distances at a time and train their systems to be more energy efficient. They're constantly on the move, which is why couriers (we Avioids call them "flighties") are usually highly active individuals who get bored, even listless, if they're not message running or generally moving around. They have to be skilled fighters as well in order to fend of attackers of any kind."
[Your couriers sound a lot like War scouts.] Smokescreen observed. [I am also getting very vivid Fallout: New Vegas flashbacks...]
"Because a lot of them double as scouts when not playing courier. The couriers by default will have to go through territory of other tribes. Most tribes are alright with this and the couriers are left well alone – "don't shoot the messenger" after all – but there are tensions between certain tribes and occasionally a courier will be attacked or stopped on the suspicion that they might be carting important information such as attack plans or allegiance tribute. Doesn't happen as much anymore but it is still an issue, unfortunately."
[Okay. I lied about that being the last one. I'm backtracking a bit here – but why exactly do you need permission from the Xanxorian monks to use the Energon springs? I know a little about them. They're generally pretty chill.]
Zodiac explained that while the monks were in fact welcoming of anyone who came to visit or, like the Sky Painters, lodged there during the winter cycles, the Energon was technically on their territory (even though they didn't have "territory" in the same way Predacons did) and taking it without their permission...it felt an awful lot like stealing. They were spiritual individuals as well, so that just made the stealing sense that much more pronounced. No Predacon in their right mind would steal from the Xanxorians, or any monastery or temple for that matter.
Smokescreen had to admit the Avioid was a gold mine in terms of information. Her data gave him a lot to think about.
He had to assume those tensions she mentioned were over resources and territory rather than anything solely political. The fact that Preds despised laziness was interesting and explained a lot. Some of that might even explain why they loathed the Council as much as they did. And the hunting beliefs – he hadn't grasped that Predacons were so civil about killing until now, but it also gave the Council a good route for demonization. Yes, they killed and consumed smaller, semi-sentient or non-sentient creatures, but they weren't violent or crude about it like the Council's propaganda said. They viewed the prey with respect and treated it with honor. Their spiritual views, too, were vastly different than those of city-dwellers. It was kinda funny that they seemed to have a respectful yet almost "rebellious teen" type attitude towards Primus.
To hear that Predacons, Painters especially, held such strong views against stealing was something he might bring up to 'Bee. That wasn't a correlation he'd noticed right away: thieves were usually from city backgrounds. It was rare indeed to find a Predacon in prison for theft. And murder? Even rarer.
[Um...hello?] Zodiac asked.
He started out his thoughts. "Sorry. Got lost in my own helm for a klik there."
[I-Is that all you wanted to ask me?]
"I think so, yeah. And thanks for answering. I honestly wasn't sure if you would."
[Hey, it's not like I got much else to do, do I?] the Avioid joked dryly. [Ground a bird and she's bound to get bored at some point. Nice to get my helm out of the stars for once and start talking about more down-to-ground things like language and culture.]
He smiled. "Glad I could help, then. Talk to you later?"
[Sure. Take care...and don't go causing trouble for the clinic. I know you're bored but leave the medics alone. They're just trying to help.]
Smokescreen stuck out his own glossa at that.
"You're no fun." he said, and he severed the line.
Phew! Man. Lot's o' world building here.