The Diego Diaries: Requiem (dd6 272)

-0-Later that night

She spelled it perfectly.

Ironhide looked at the image of a house he held in his servo, then his daughter who was standing on the coffee table in front of him beside a growing stack of pictures. He handed her the house picture and she put it on the stack, turning to him for the next one. "THIS IS FUN, ATAR!" she said with a giant smile.

"This is insane," Ironhide said with a grin. "You're the smartest femme in the room."

Hero glanced at Halo who was dozing on the table next to her. She smiled and petted her helm. "Halo will be reading, too. I'LL HELP HER!"

"Not too fast, infant," Ironhide said as he held up another card. "She's still small."

Hero smiled, then began to spell in NeoCybex. "A-u-t-o-m-o-b-i-l-e."

Ratchet who was sitting across from the two of them working on his segment of the Squad's story grinned. "Little femme has skills."

"She has," Ironhide said as he handed her a card. Taking another, he held it up as she turned back from the stack. "Try this one, femme."

She smiled. "H-e-l-i-c-o-p-t-e-r."

She added another to her stack.

-0-The Residence

They sat together on the couch as the kids ran about playing their games and getting their fun on. Prowl glanced at Prime. "How long are you going to bear everyone's burden about this? You know you can't be everywhere at the same time. As it is, you're almost infallible even so."

Prime grinned slightly. "I have some burden in this no matter what. The Matrix makes it so."

"Maybe, but it seems that the Pantheon have already admonished you about that. You can hardly argue with Them," Prowl said as he snuggled closer. He pulled Prime's huge arm around him. "You are good. I think sometimes you forget that."

"That is what you are for, among multitudes of other things, to remind me," Prime said as he grinned at his daughters running past as they chased a wildly hysterical Miracle. Both grinned at them, watching them disappear down the corridor. "They are wonderful."

"They are," Prowl said. "The first of their kind. Focus on that. Let the rest go. Tomorrow will come soon enough."

"I am … shocked. I should not be. After all, I have seen much that is strange, but their lack of response is shocking even to me."

Prowl nodded. "They may not have the capacity to feel. They might have altered their personalities to the point where they aren't able to feel anything. How much easier it would be to do what they do otherwise? And the question then would be rather intriguing … would that absolve or make them more responsible for what they did?"

It was quiet a moment. "I will ask those questions. I find them critical to my own understanding as well."

The kids ran back in, all of them shrieking hysterically as they chased Solus this time. She ran as fast as her tiny self could, one arm held to the side, stiff and straight so that she would remain upright in the manner of all tiny children everywhere. She ran around the table, then crawled under Prime's huge leg. "ATAR! SAVE ME!"

He reached down and very gently scooped her up. Sitting her on the couch between Prowl and himself, he grinned at the others. "Safe on base."

Sojourner and Miracle laughed uproariously, then began to climb up. They would get help and they would be the perfect tonic for the moment.

-0-Elsewhere that night

"I'm not sure what I feel about telling our story. What about you?" Delphi asked as he cut pie for the two of them. Hardie was getting the beer out of the cooler on the top of the fridge.

"I'm not sure either. It's almost … I don't know how to put this but you would get my gist. Being a slave was such a shameful thing. I remember talking about it with younger mechs when things picked up after the war. They looked at me and asked me why I allowed it. Why didn't I break free sooner?"

Delphi put the dessert on the table, took a beer and sat. "I know. I remember that as well. As if somehow you could throw off the chains and the mindset in a blink. No one can understand what that kind of oppression feels like and judge anyone without the experience. I gave up talking about it. They made me feel inadequate and ashamed about it even though we were, all of us, the group that destroyed the Quintessans."

Hardie nodded. "I remember someone asking me how could you just allow it? How could you just walk around in chains?" He vented a sigh. "They wonder why we don't talk about it."

"Everyone in their prime feels invincible. Never again, they say. It's so easy. Look what happened after the Quintessans. Look how easy it was for the Functionalists to pick up the whip again. Things are very complicated, Hardie. I try not to judge others. I fail a lot but I try," Delphi said. "I will say, my dear one, you were so brave. You and Alpha and the others … you were my heroes. Nothing that ever happens will change that."

"You couldn't be taken, Delph," Hardie said with emotion. "I would have searched the universe for you."

"I know," Delphi said as he squeezed Hardie's servo. "If it helps with this, if it stops this infection from spreading, then I will tell my story to everyone."

"The Museum heard about us exempts and wants us to tell our stories for the Talking History program. What about it?" Hardie asked.

Delphi considered it, then nodded. "If we don't learn from the past, we repeat it. It happened three times, Hardie. Something is not computing with our people. We have the duty to tell."

Hardie nodded. "I agree. I will let them know."

"Ironhide was very emotional and so was Blackjack. Raptor … he hates to even think about it. Poor Raptor. He's that generation, the son of slaves. It's all hard for everyone isn't it? We have a very complex history, our people, our planet and our family."

"It might do all of us good to hear it," Hardie said. "Secrets have a way of coming out anyway."

Delphi nodded. Then they talked about other things, these two companions of all the wars of their people but the first between the Primes. It would be a comfortable evening at their house.

-0-On the road

"What do you think about Amma and Appa?" Drift asked.

Springer glanced at Drift as they rode toward the Industrial Park Cities with their share of the newbie trainee police. Every newbie had the chance to go on horse back patrol as part of their overall instruction in the program. "That whole part of our history makes me furious. I want to break things thinking about it. Then this happens. It's not just a story. It's about family. I would have loved to know all of them back then. I can't imagine what it was like, then to free yourself … its amazing to consider. Maybe sometime they'll tell us about it."

"I'll bring the beer," Drift said.

"Lots of it," Springer said as he began to gallop on the straightaway toward the Park. Behind him, the others followed. None of the n00bs would fall off. For once.

-0-Earth2

Carlos Ortega sat by the window watching as night fell swiftly around the habitat. The concourse was in night lighting, simulating the evening in a big city. There were street lights and small traffic signals on the main roads that led everywhere on all three levels. They were there for the vehicles. Most of the people walked here and there, though loads were carried on special trucks.

As the light for days went down inside and evening arrays came on, he saw his reflection and that of everyone behind him as they went about their business in the massive structure. It was about 1900 hours on the TMC and in a few, the siren for curfew would sound. All of the kids would head for home. One hour before midnight was the witching hour for kids here during the work week. Right now, the cafe, diners, cafeteria, and club was going strong. They had two bars, both of them closing at midnight during the week. Drunkenness was deeply frowned upon by management so most who liked to drink did so in their quarters or apartments.

He was waiting for the others to come and play cards here at this place. There were two soldiers who were due to come who lived and worked at the Consulate. They were onsite N.E.S.T. security who had taken to spending their spare time here, helping at the farm or goofing around in the pool. The Consulate had lots of amenities but a pool wasn't one of them. Lots of the Consulate personnel came here or Earth 1 to swim. A few even went with bots to the Water Park. He was thinking about joining them next time they went.

The sound of footfalls drew him back as he turned to watch them wind their way through the tables and chairs of this, the major recreation and dining area in the facility. They were the N.E.S.T. soldiers who greeted him, then sat. Behind them came the rest of the mercs, some carrying beer and snacks. They would sit and play cards until midnight when the two soldiers were due back at the Consulate. They would have a good time. They would dance around each other for appearance's sake, to keep the facade one would know they were more than just a bunch of guys in similar work playing cards

The mercs were Harris's men.

The two N.E.S.T. soldiers were The Resistance moles.

-0-Ops Center, N.E.S.T. HQ

Corey McFarlane sat at communications sending and receiving data from the still restricted and censored human groups. Some of it was personal, messages from their families on Earth or heading for there by the locals. Some of it was professional. They were helping NASA track several comets at the solar well. It was a quiet night as he sat doing his job. His family was deeply invested here and so was he. It was incredibly nice to go home to them every night instead of messaging them when he could.

Others around the room were the long time men and a few newbies. Some of the day shift were with the mission forever and some were new. Corey was part of a team that Lennox had put together who were tracking the transmissions of the mercs at Earth2 and the two moles at the Consulate. He was the one who sent most of the transmissions onward after careful scrutiny since the targets seemed to wait until this time of night to do it. He would run them through special equipment supplied by the Autobots, searching for embedded messages before sending them on with tags to trace where they went once received by the addressees. He was building up a list of individuals that the targets were talking with, hoping that they would be able to get an idea of what they were doing with whom.

"You want a sandwich, Corey?" Sargent Simpson asked. He was a big kid from the Midwest who was a bachelor, loved the football and climbing in the Valles with bots and/or Rick Harris.

"I would. Ham and cheese if they got it. Sourdough bread, some mayo and lettuce. Thanks, Jake," he said as he stretched. It was then that a run of messages queued up to be sent. He would be spending a few minutes doing his part before they were released.

-0-Home

Blackjack and Alor sat on their chairs eating a snack as they watched the news. Scout was in bed ready for school tomorrow and they were winding down. Blackjack looked at Alor. "I hate to think of my amma and appa ever being hurt by someone. We came too close, our family. If Appa hadn't of known about Amma being sent away, he wouldn't have been able to help him get free. Amma meant it when he said he would die before shipping out."

"Those orns are so foreign to me. I don't like to think about them. My family, yours … the fragging Functionalists … all of us were slaves. What a starting point. I don't understand how we didn't learn. It happened three times, 'Jack," Alor said as he shook his helm. "I guess we never did think about this and figure out how it affected us. We were walking in a straight line from one set of chains to another."

"It's hard to shake off an authoritarian mind set. When you can't do what you want, when you're used to being told what to do and having it called normal, patriotic, safe, and what's best for you … all that fragging slag … 'we know how to keep you safe' … 'trust us' … then I guess it happens. We never had a chance to know anything else before it happened again. It took Megatron to snap us out of it," Blackjack said.

Alor grinned slightly. "At last … something I can thank that fragger for."

-0-In a jail cell in the Courthouse

One of Twelve stood by the bars staring across the silent jail wing at the others. They were held one to a cell, all of them on cameras in case they decided to leave the world behind or hurt themselves. No one was there and it was silent. The day had not gone well for them, all of them knew. No one here was a fundamentalist Functionalist and they wouldn't understand their life and points of view. Blackstone had tried to get them to cooperate with his plans to either throw themselves on the mercy of the court or plead some form of impairment. They weren't going down that road. They had lived eons of time according to their own code and they wouldn't change now.

It had been a long time since they were on Cybertron, a long time since they had to deal with a Prime. Optimus was strong individual who appeared to have close access to the Pantheon. How that would affect their path, no one could conjecture. All that they had agreed to in the few moments that they were able to talk together was simple … they would hold the line about what they believed come the Pit or high water.

Time would pass slowly in their lock up.

-0-TBC 2-12-18 edited 3-4-18