red_diode_district | Everybody learns from *somebody*

Everybody learns from somebody

Passing the doors into the library, Megatron was pleased he had gotten the schedule correct as he saw who was sitting at the desk. If it had been completely necessary due to his own schedule, he'd have come here when he could. But since he didn't have to...

Ignoring the faint itch interfacing hadn't properly gotten rid off, Megatron approached the librarian at a lazy, casual walk. It was a pity he hadn't seen any signs at all that the surprisingly fine-lined truck-alted mech had the inclination he was looking for. Things would have been a lot easier (and, really, pleasing) if he had.

As it was, since there was no one left in the current arena circuit that he trusted with what he had to hand over, perhaps he would have to avail himself of one of the clubs. It made an irritable twitch slither down the treads on his shoulders, the thought that he'd have to do that.

It was ages since he'd had to go to an open venue like that to simply get his needs properly taken care of.

And he really would have preferred the librarian. Orion Pax - it hadn't taken anything to find out the designation when to found the schedule - was witty, somehow diplomatically argumentative and didn't give in if he knew he was right or wanted to stand for his opinion, actually had some smarts to go with said use of words and Megatron wanted to know more.

More, and more personally (most of the earlier he'd simply learned over the few times he'd been in the library when the mech was, but hadn't actually approached him). So this time, he decided to actually use the librarian's assistance in what he was looking for... and perhaps get something more out of it.

"Excuse me?"

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Huffing at Megatron's amusement, Orion stubbornly made his way down.

It was honestly easy enough, even if he was tensed simply because it was a new, unusual thing for him to be doing in the first place. It was pleasant to stretch his joints, so to speak, feeling strain in rarely-used struts and cables.

::So how far down do we have to go?:: Orion commed, not sure if his voice would carry down the awkward angle easily.

::We're going to be climbing for over another breem, at least,:: Megatron paused, considered the speed they were going at and that they needed to take the cable that linked them together into account, and then continued, ::more or less. It's harder to judge when I'm not doing this by myself. The first time I took a cycle.::

But that, of course, was because he'd had no idea how far it was or a good, relatively safe route down.

::Technically we could go deeper, but that would mean walking through corridors and down less obvious paths than simply climbing straight down.::

Which well. He had done that, but not here. He'd had the time and inclination and was sure he'd be able to find his way back. He'd still been lost for nearly two days that time.

::Quite a ways, then.::

Orion tried not to allow his apprehension to get the best of him. He was still enjoying this, after all; the climb was rather exilarating. But it was his nature to worry.

...Even if forgotten corridors sounded exciting.

::It depends on what is in those corridors,:: Orion laughed. ::Anything I might want to see?::

Megatron smiled at the laugh and shook his head even if Orion couldn't see it, pausing when the cable went taut between them as he'd unconsciously sped up a little.

::Very probably, but it's also very easy to get lost, and given what time we have we don't have days to be lost, unless you'd want to field questions about your whereabouts.::

Megatron too, of course. And while he might very well be willing to indulge Orion for both of their curiosities' sake, he wasn't sure if he wanted to be bothered by the hassle of having to field all the questions and whatelse when coming back too late.

Orion paused for a moment, making a yearning sound as he glanced into the darkness below. Visions of forgotten knowledge and ancient relics worthy of the archives shot through his head- even if he quickly had to resume climbing down, the line going taunt between them once more.

::...Maybe on the way back up? I'm sure we could find our way around in some tunnels if we were careful.::

::Maybe. We could at least check a short distance into a few tunnels, but I'm not sure how much you'd find like that. The tunnels are usually just tunnels.::

Maybe that was because he wasn't exactly formally educated - all he knew to look for in places like this came from common sense, his own burning curiosity and annoyance, and an attentive optic to his surroundings.

Orion, though, might see more than he would, and that was partly, beyond sharing something he knew the mech would find interesting, why he'd brought him here. If he could squeeze out something, anything, more, Megatron would definitely take it.

::I'm not joking about the days, by the way,:: Megatron said with a dry chuckle through the comm, ::I did get lost for a few days once, though that was while I was exploring down in Kaon.::

::I'll be the judge of that once I see them,:: Orion grinned, all but sending his pleased, faux-smugness across the commline. He had to settle from projecting it in his field at an awkward angle down the cliffside. But he also picked up the pace, and the line between them grew slack once more.

::We'll be very careful. And leave a clear path if we go any distance in at all. How does that sound?::

Megatron just rolled his optics at the smugness that was projected at him, but let Orion keep it uncontested - the mech was rather cute that way, and it didn't really hurt Megatron. Whatever he might find might even help him.

::Considering you're the one who brought cables to tie us together, I think whatever precautions you want to take would be far greater than I'd bother with, so it should be fine,:: Megatron said with a chuckle, and then paused as his next step ended with his foot dangling in this air.

Ah.

::Orion, there's a whole about where I am, I'm going to start climbing to the left to go around it.::

He'd forgotten about it and while there was no issue moving around it, it'd have been easier to climb at an angle earlier than having to maneuver around it now. But done was done.

Orion chuckled back, field going steady with approval. ::I do have a few ideas, after all.::

The fact that Megatron had climbed all this way before alone and without a support line and had managed to get lost gave Orion some doubts about his lover's ability to plan ahead. The tunnels could very well be maze-like, but it was nothing good use of markers and trails couldn't solve.

::Oh! Alright.:: Orion immediately began to alter his path as well, slowing with concern as he wasn't quite sure where the hole in the cliffside began.

Slowing down enough so that Orion could feel his way, Megatron glanced at the hole as they passed it, and his vague memory of its size was confirmed - he'd not been anywhere close to it last time, but had spotted it and judged it small enough one could probably simply drop past it.

Or into it and then continue climbing, but either way, both he and Orion were tall enough either of those were perfectly possible, but, in deference to Orion's lesser experience in these sorts of situations and since they were tied together, he thought it better this way.

::We could probably have climbed into it and then continued, but I suspect it's easier this way. Not far down to the floor.::

Well, 'floor' was what he called it, he wasn't actually sure if it was a floor or the roof of an old building, but the hole they were climbing down the side of ended there. There were a few smaller ones, but he was, actually, too big to go down them without bringing tools to make those holes bigger.

::I think I can see it from here,:: Orion agreed. Though 'see' wasn't entirely correct - he was sensing both the hole and the 'floor' on his scanners. It required constant recalibration, but the more he scanned the more he was able to see and sense about the dark area. Not nearly enough for comfort, of course, but it was better than going in completely blind.

He still nearly stepped on a portion of the safety line as he closed in on Megatron's location, swearing quietly to himself.

Megatron, who'd already unhooked the line as he was on the floor, chuckled and tugged on the cable.

"Even if it was still attached, that wouldn't have done anything. You can jump, Orion." Snapping another light rod to make it glow, Megatron made a quick turn around, but saw nothing different from the other time he'd been here.

Not that he'd expected it to, really. The guards wouldn't go down this far unless they actually realised someone was down here, and it was much more probable that anyone who did stumble in down here (or knew about it prior) could climb down elsewhere.

The roof had holes in it, little holes of darker black than the shadows around them, but it didn't matter; they didn't need to walk out on the roof, and even if they did the holes would be easily avoided.

"Yes, fine. Fine," Orion grumbled, flashing his lights to check the distance with more reliable senses before jumping lightly to the ground. Well, roof. It didn't feel terribly safe, but it didn't collapse so he considered it a win. Rolling up the end of the cable and tucking it away for later, Orion took in his surroundings, flashing his lights on full to light the area for them both.

"It looks...well. Unsettling." Like the results of some world-ending Apocalypse. He could make out the edges and lines of other buildings amoung the rocks, and the empty desolation combined with the lack of sky made the area as eerie as it was fascinating.

"It's not the most welcoming place, no," Megatron agreed with a shrug, "but this isn't our destination. This way." Taking Orion by the elbow, he led them across the edge of the roof, around one of those partly-visible buildings and then spread his hand at the wall they were faced it.

"This is where things get interesting," he said with a smirk and reached out, pushing his hand against the rock... which flickered with a shimmer of electric blue and gold, and Megatron's hand passed through the rock.

"Clearly not," Orion grumbled quietly, shaking himself past the discomfort to focus on the surroundings themselves. Despite the creepy, disturbing aura, the place was a genuine relic of lost times! Perhaps Megatron would be able to share what he had found, possibly reguardinig dates-

Orion froze, vocalizer sputtering.

"W-What?!

Too shocked to be hesitant, Orion jerked past Megatron, replicating the trick with with own hand.

"But...That makes no sense!" Who would be powering a holo-emitter this far down in ruins?

Laughing, Megatron aburptly (if gently) pushed Orion through the seemingly solid wall, and the corridor beyond was softly lit by directionless, sourceless golden light.

"Quite a few things down there make no sense, when you get past the ruined layers of older settlements," he said as he followed Orion through, looking around the curving corridor, part of it made up by what seemed to be tightly braided cables, the rest by interlocking hexagonal plates with subtle carvings along each edge.

"This," Megatron said and reached out a hand, laying it against the wall, "as far as I can tell, has never been at the surface, compared to the ruins outside."

"-Megatron!"

Orion stumbled through the illusionary wall with a yelp. It took him several moments to even notice the decor - he was too busy glaring at Megatron after he stepped through.

"That was uncalled for..." He trailed off, stepping past the taller mech to rest gentle hands on the nearest carving, before whipping out a scanner eagerly.

"Oh."

Megatron, of course, was utterly remorseless in this, merely crossed his arms and smirked down at Orion. An expression that widened at Orion's surprise and his immediate fascination with the wall.

"I think it was perfectly called for. This is far more interesting than the outside, and I didn't want you to get stuck out there when this was beyond that," Megatron said with a chuckle, his sharp grin softening slightly into amused indulgence.

This, beyond his own reasons, was why he'd brought Orion down here.

"I beg to disagree," Orion grumbled faintly, already getting caught up in the thrill of discovery. "You could have just said something." He would normally hold a bit of a grudge over the trick, but well.

The walls were very distracting.

"...I will give you interesting, at least." The scanner hummed in his hands, scanning the images, attempting to match the iconography with known references, and dating the artwork itself. Orion wasn't sure of it himself, though the style looked annoyingly familiar.

"That would've taken longer," Megatron said with a wave of his hand, tone clearly implying that he also thought that to take that extra time would've been utterly unnecessary.

"It is, isn't it?" Stepping around Orion and crossing the corridor to lean back against the opposite wall, arms crossed. "I was hoping you could help date it; I haven't had much luck, though my knowledge is limited."

He'd read what he could, but this level of archaeology was quite beyond him. While some of the symbols seemed familiar, such as those denoting warning and the quintesson iconography - if nothing else it was familiar to notice that those had changed very little.

What frustrated Megatron the most were the inability to figure out what other thing was being warned for, and something he thought had, in some way, to do with their origin.

Sure, the symbol he'd noticed that he thought meant 'origin' could refer to any number of things, but he had... thoughts, hopes, theories.

Careful fingers tracing the lines of carvings - Alpha Trion would simply murder him not breaking his habit of touching everything with such a discovery - Orion was immediately engrossed with deciphering the marks. They itched at his processor; he knew he had seen something similar before.

"...hexagonal iconography generally indicates mid-first to very early second age...but the cyberglyphics are even older, mid-first at latest...positively archaic," he marveled happily, helm progestions almost scraping the wall in his eagerness to examine everything. The scanner in his hand was chugging away, scanning glyphs and reading various sections of the wall to get the best date conclusion. It finally beeped loudly, breaking Orion's rambling monologue, and he stepped back from the wall with his hands on his hips.

"Well. It's definitely some sort of an origin-story."

Still leaning back against the wall, Megatron was utterly amused at Orion's delight, but it also pleased him that he had been able to give him this. It clearly was something Orion was happy (a bit of an understatement) about.

"Hmmm, impressive," Megatron murmured, and really, it was impressive that Orion was able to tell this from the etchings, if with the assistance of his scanner. He'd definitely made the right choice.

"I was wondering if it wasn't. Anything more specific than that?" He already had part of something useful to give to those interested; probing deeper about this wasn't really necessary except for anyone but him.

He definitely wanted to know about their possible past, both because he was interested and because it might be useful to him.

"Oh yes. It will take a little bit to translate, of course..."
Eyeing the beeping scanner, Orion's optics went a little wide as he trailed off.

"...And origin story as told back in the very beginning of the first age," he corrected himself in awe, holding up the device to show off it's dating results. Field and engine revving with excitement, Orion practically danced in place.

"Do you have any idea how rare this sort of thing is?!"

A slow, quiet bubble of something between excitement and smug pleasure bubbled up when Orion corrected himself, and Megatron smiled.

"Of course I do. While I wasn't sure it was quite that old, it was clear to me the first time I ended up in these sort of areas that it's older than anything officially on record."

And oh, hadn't that been interesting. It'd also been part of why he'd worked on getting placed here in Iacon and its arena, to more easily approach the 'proper authorities' to make some probing inquiries.

Which hadn't much gotten anywhere, but not, he was sure, because they were ignorant.

"I want to know whatever you can interpret of these," here he paused to wave at the wall, "and other things we can find down here."

"This is just..amazing," he couldn't help but marvel, even as he nodded back at Megatron distractedly.

"Of course. I wouldn't allow myself to leave even if you didn't want to know!" he laughed, gaze not leaving the wall. Processor humming eagerly, Orion traced the markings with both optics and gentle fingertips.

"...Well, the symbols for the first Primes are somewhat unmistakable, of course. Telling their tale - most of that seems similar so far, but some of the marks are unknown to me..."

Orion made a face, muttering under his breath to himself as he looked stubbornly closer.

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Feel free to make up details if you like :D

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