The Diego Diaries: Aftermath (dd8 618)
=0=The Secret Garden
"Can we help you, Yearby?" a customer asked as he stood beside his booth surveying the damage.
"Oh, its alright, Tolo," Yearby said with an edge of weariness in his voice.
"No its not. We'll help you." Tolo and his bond began to gather things with Yearby and his waiters, then sat down in the booth as the night began to go onward.
Yearby walked to the back where he worked cooking bar food that the place was getting known for, stuff with more than just the usual flair.
"Poor Yearby. What the frag. We just had a Convocation and those mechs still act like that? I can't imagine believing that's okay anymore," the mech said with disgust.
His bond, Mercury nodded. "They'll find out. I heard a story that a mech mocked the Matrix and burned up when the colony started."
"I heard that, too. Pretty radical move by the Matrix but they knew. They gave their word," Tolo said as more beer came to them and their party.
Yearby walked into the big shiny kitchen where his crew was working on really enhanced traditional bar food for the customers that came here to drink beer, play darts, cards and talk. It was a place where those who missed Cybertronian flora could come and see it. It was beautiful and was Yearby's dream after a lifetime of working in high caste clubs and restaurants for others who routinely didn't appreciate his genius. He put a tray down on the counter, then began to sort out the good from the bad, dropping things that were ruined down the recycle chute next to the big double sinks.
"Are you okay?" Blanco asked. He was his older son and helped run the bar.
"When the last slagger gets it, when the idea of the System is dead, yeah," Yearby said to his son.
The big kid hugged his father's broad shoulder. "I'll take the bar for a while. You make some of your good stuff. Ada didn't have dinner. You know what he likes." He patted his father, then walked out to run the big bar with all the beers available on world, the punters who liked to come in after work to grab a snack and a brew and newbies that had heard about the plants you could see on these premises.
Yearby would make dinner for his bond, then take it upstairs to the apartment where they lived to ensure that he had dinner. Recovering from severe protoform wasting, he was on his way back. But it would take a while anyway. The evening would roll along more quietly.
=0=The drive to jail
They rode in the front of the van carrying the mechs from The Secret Garden to jail in the Courthouse nearby. It was slow going through the evening traffic as mechs and femmes went out on the town.
"What do you think? Those slaggers are lucky that the Matrix didn't weigh in," one of them said.
The other nodded. "Traffic is picking up. The next playoff is tomorrow. Did you secure your place in the Arena?"
"Nah. I was too late. I'm going to the pub to watch it on the big screens."
"Which place?" the first asked as he drove onward with the traffic through the green lights toward the towering Courthouse nearby.
"The Sports Den," the second said.
"I like that bar. They play tournaments for darts and cards there," the first said.
"There's really good players there most of the time, some of them ringers. Sometimes Smokescreen comes in and then its game over," the second said as they turned into the driveway through the security fencing to enter the huge lot that was for the courthouse and jail. They pulled up by the intake door to drop of the nightly catch, then go out when other calls were made.
=0=In the back
They sat in silence on the drive to jail staring stonily at each other. Cylinder was making his points off line to the others who were listening but not liking a minute of it. Cylinder stared with his own angst at Haro-n who'd been the source of their troubles. His drunken off hand comments to the mini-cons had gotten them all arrested but Jarbo who was already inside the jail waiting for them to arrive. Evening traffic had held them all up. :And that's how we'll handle it. If you don't then you're on your own. I'm not getting more charges added for you, Haro-n:
Haro-n stared at him, a friend of his father and a high ranking high caste who'd made the judiciary his career. His gatekeeping at the High Court of Appeals had ensured that a lot of unjust and plain bad ideas remained in the law. He didn't say a word as he fumed in silence. It would be an uncomfortable ride to the jail.
=0=At the jail
The mechs lounged in the receiving area waiting for 'new meat'. This night for all its party-going and dining out in the city was relatively slow. They didn't mind. They were going off shift shortly as graveyard began to arrive and join them to shoot the shit and get the lay of the night's haul. Big mechs, heavily armed and heavily tattooed, they were funny like working mechs often were and relatively blasé about the way things went. They did their jobs, coached peewee football or pursued their hobbies and family life when off duty and served in the regular Army and Marines when called up. They were members of the Regular Reserve, those who were soldiers but wanted other careers full time. They only came when activated.
The night rolled on as a van came to a stop outside and the two mechs driving it stepped out of it to do the honors. Some of the jailers rose to walk to the door to watch and assist if they were needed. The last time someone came there was a stampede of horses. What this would bring remained to be seen. They greeted each other, the drivers and the jailers, then waited to see what opening the doors would bring.
You never knew.
=0=Stables
Waldeen walked to the paddock to bring in horses for shoe inspection. They were the day shift mounts, horses that had come off duty and needed a once over before being turned out into the hinterlands with the rest of the vast herd which now numbered over 7,800 horses of all kinds.
He opened the paddock gate, then patted a white mare. "Come on, Josie. Time to see about your feet." He led her into the stable toward the door where the graveyard farrier was finishing up a stallion.
Sitting near the farrier, handing him tools as asked, the graveyard veterinarian chatted with him.
The farrier, Lar-2, filed a rough spot on the shoe, then patted the horse's rump. "He's good to go," he said to the handler.
Lar-2 glanced at the mare who was standing placidly beside Waldeen who was rubbing her cheek. "Let's see about her," he said. He would clear off asphalt that had accumulated on her back hooves where she had stood in a soft spot in a parking lot, then pass her as 'good to go'.
Waldeen would walk her out, hug her neck, then after letting her into the paddock walk out another horse.
It would take a while but it would be a wonderful thing for Waldeen who'd found his calling taking care of animals who really, really needed him. It was the thing he needed that he never had, the sense that he mattered in a real way to another. He would blossom in this job and so would his dad who would come to help him on graveyard shift every other evening.
Millow would take a lot longer to reach.
=0=Metro Line Circle
He sat in the Operational Control Center of the Metro System that was in the Autobot City Overland Train Station #1. It was the one that was top side on the settled fringe of Autobot City. It was where the overland trains came and went day and night on a track system laid out everywhere. He sat plugged into a master board which was huge with monitors overhead that were bigger and ran the whole show from there. He ran the Metro lines that were underground that carried passengers, millions of them every orn. He ran the complex freight lines that paralleled and also at intervals branched off from the main lines to go all over the vast colony.
He ran the overland trains that carried passengers to every city in the colony and out to the stations and small resorts that now dotted the TransWorld Highway. Both passenger and freight lines were his purview in the overland system as he ruled his kingdom from a comfortable chair. Around him workers at consoles handling a small portion of the very big picture assisted him but he was in charge of all of it.
Given that he was, the schools that he and his counterparts on the other shifts as well as their back ups had accomplished were daunting. He and his colleagues were some of the most technically educated individuals in the entire colony and Cybertron. Even the Master who ran the Air Flight Control System at Fort Max didn't have the complexity that he had. He sat at his post snacking on donuts and hot drinks brought to him by his work wife, Sissi who was a small femme but mighty. She was slated to become a night shift back up for the system herself. She liked it so much, this highly mathematically advanced femme, that she signed up and aced the program.
Such was what it was at the Metro Control Center in Autobot City, Train Station #1 just outside of the Temple District.
=0=Earth 1
They waited for the humans to 'pee' and 'poo' as someone put it so graphically. Who it was they didn't catch in time. Given the mechs mortification over humans and their body parts in the lower hemisphere of their squishy little bodies, that soldier would probably be punted into Earth 1 for the night. The mechs sat on their mounts in the environmental entrance of Earth 1 waiting for the humans to return.
"What do you think is going to happen with those slaggers? It sounds like they broke the rules for the System. That's federal and that's Pantheonic," Lon asked as he sat his horse near the doorway.
"I don't know. Prime might have latitude for the first few but I don't see this lingering without trouble," Drift said as Yancy shook his helm. Drift patted him. "Easy, baby. You're okay."
"You have an appointment with the animal psychologist tomorrow," Hercy said. "Maybe they can help him get better about trouble."
"I hope so. He's my friend and favorite horse. He still comes running to the fence when we come," Drift replied with a slight tone of worry in his voice.
"He's a champ. He's going to be great," Springer said encouragingly. "I think we better prevent these stampedes. It makes us look like idiots."
"Well, I'm told by some it doesn't take too much," Bezel said with a grin.
"Who?" -everyone there
"High Times."
They stared at him, then Springer nudged King a bit closer. "You have a copy?"
Bezel nodded. "A friend who's worried about high caste assimilation gave me one for a moment. I took images of it when they weren't looking. He wants them to stop and he's worried that the whole caste gets the blame from the Pantheon for them if they don't."
"Send me the images, Bez," Springer said.
Bezel did.
Springer scanned them. "Thanks, Bez. This is good."
"If anyone asks I can't rat out the friend," Bezel said.
"You're protecting a source, Bezel. That's protected under our laws," Hercy said. "Good work."
The mechs murmured the same as Bezel filed it away. He felt elated but he didn't show it. He just grinned and nodded to them in return.
He fooled no one including an ecstatic Lon.
=0=Home again
They walked from the Metro and a rollicking ride with a number of kids who were celebrating their separation days. The walk to the tower was nice and quiet though the town was filled with individuals going this way and that. Lights streamed out of restaurants and bars. Across the street, mechs stood on the sidewalk with beers laughing and talking outside of Club Cybertron. A siren from an ambulance could be heard in the distance as they both entered their building to go to an elevator.
Up they went, then Ratchet bid farewell as he walked off then down the hallway to his home. Prime continued upward, stepping out at the penthouse level. He walked to his door, then entered to children and Prowl. They were baking in the kitchen so he joined them, sitting at the breakfast nook as his kids told them of their orn.
It was a good balm to a very strange evening in the colony.
=0=TBC 1-19-2023 HBTM70
I am going to take some time to visit with known and new characters to see what they're doing and get a feel of life beyond the top of the pole in the colony. Just slice of life stuff. I think its fun to do that. Kids, everyone. Love ya madly. -ME
ESL
ringer: anyone who is a master at something but doesn't tell anyone so they can beat the pants off them. Minnesota Fats, a billiards player who was one of the masters of the game used to do that. He would go to a bar, make bets, then beat the slag out of the punters. Many is the sportsman who makes their living that way. Or anyone else not telling about a skill but using it with others, usually pretending they can't do well whatever it is they're doing.
gatekeeper/keeping: someone you have to go through to get somewhere. A gatekeeper for a corporation is a large number of officers you have to talk to first before you ever get to anyone important. Their entire job is to keep you from getting there. Lawyers are gatekeepers. Its all bullshit to me. But that' just me. :D