The Start of Something Interesting...

[lastonepercent]

The day was calm, with no recent Decepticon attacks, and none suspected to be incoming for some time.  The cons were too busy licking their wounds from the last battle, one that the Autobots had decidedly come out ahead on.  The celebrations had gone on long into the night and the recreation room was already a mess.

Thus, it was the perfect chance for a lone Autobot to slip casually outside.

Mirage had no shift currently scheduled, so he was free to spend his time as he pleased.  He certainly made no move to hide his departure, greeting his comrades in the halls on the way out, but the box in his hands remained unopened despite any passing curiosity.  It was quietly shifted into subspace before long, and  the former noble shifted into alt mode just as smoothly when he reached the doors.  Despite the completely inappropriate earthen race car mode, the mech had little trouble self-adjusting before driving off into the forest covering the mountain, for business unknown...

Comments

[lastonepercent]

His expression was pretty funny, as Mirage was sneaking a peek to check on Cliffjumper's outward progress. Stiffing a laugh, Mirage grinned and cast his field awareness toward the minibot's frame, ghosting just outside the edge of his awareness.

What he found was surprising and pleasing. Cliffjumper was on the right track. And he wasn't squirming as much anymore, finally.

"Very good, Cliffjumper. Good progress. What do you feel?"

[cliffjumper]

"Gah!" Jerking, Cliffjumper twisted around in his seat and stared at Mirage before he shook his helm, looking away with a blush.

"Dunno," Cliffjumper muttered with a scowl, crossing his arms over his chestplating as he settled back properly in his seat again.

"Don't get how I'm supposed to relax with all that noise goin' on." Not just his frame in general, but his spark too - he could swear he could almost pick up the colour of it, like he'd seen those strands of light during Mirage's ritual, but that was just strange, since it was still in him.

This was annoying and odd and he wasn't sure if he wanted to try again.

[lastonepercent]

Mirage snorted at the reaction, amused and a little surprised himself. Cliffjumper was not supposed to be able to sense that.

"Noise'?" Mirage raised a optic ridge.

"It's your frame. Calm it, or allow the orderly hum wash over your audials and drown everything else out."

[cliffjumper]

"Well, it's noisy when that's the only slaggin' thing to focus on," Cliffjumper said, optics narrow as he turned his helm away, embarrassed. Because yeah, it was just his own frame.

It wasn't even that it was really loud or busy or anything - at least he didn't think so, but who knew what Mirage meant by 'calm it' - but sitting there focusing on it and it just seemed to take over everything else.

Not that he was sure why he even felt embarrassed - in fact, having realised it, it made him somewhat annoyed instead. Just because he couldn't get this didn't mean he had to be embarrassed, right?

"... but I guess it kinda was doin' the latter." Not that he was sure if just getting caught in the noise was what Mirage meant at all, because he'd also been hyper-aware of any other noise.

Enough so that when Mirage spoke, it'd startled him.

[lastonepercent]

Whoops.

Shrugging fluidly, Mirage settled back, glancing over Cliffjumper's frame. He didn't pull back his field, curious if that was what caused the minibot's jump before.

"Focusing on the noise your frame produces, or letting it fade out as you focus mentally inward, is the easiest way to fall into meditation, in my experience. It will take time to master, of course. You will have to experiment and figure out which works best for you."

[cliffjumper]

Cliffjumper didn't twitch now, merely looked grumpy. He might be sensitive, but he wasn't skilled or sensitive enough to pick up on Mirage's field when he was being careful.

Though he did rub his helm around one horn, scowl deepening for a moment.

"Right. Should've guessed." But he couldn't bring himself to say it was stupid, because he, he supposed could see the potential use. Maybe. He wasn't sure what you was supposed to get out of this, supposedly calming or no.

With another frown, he rubbed his helm again and wondered if there was something in this fragging room that was prickling the sensors in his horns, even if he hadn't noticed anything the first time he was in here for any longer time.

"Probably ain't gonna be any good at it," Cliffjumper said, though whether he was warning Mirage about effort uselessly spent or just complaining, he wasn't sure of either.

[lastonepercent]

Hmm. Perhaps it had simply been his voice. The thought was something of a relief, really. He backed off, field coalescing closer, properly around his frame.

"That's alright," Mirage chuckled quietly, his own optics going dim once again as he settled closer to his own mediation.

"The point is to experiment and try. Succeeding on the first try was unlikely, after all."

[cliffjumper]

Frowning and glancing around as the prickling feeling against his horns subsided. So it wasn't constant... Cliffjumper realised too late that he should actually have raised the sensitivity of the sensor nodes in his horns, not just sat there confused about what it was.

If he had, he might have figured it out, after all. But he was so used to not using them because if he did use them, they were pretty sensitive... It was a bit of a circular argument, he knew.

"Yeah, I guess," scrunching his nasal ridge, Cliffjumper snorted and crossed his arms over his chestplating. Did he want to try again? Shifting around in his seat and casting a glance sideways at Mirage, Cliffjumper looked away again, feeling his optics brighten and field waver.

Whether he managed to even get as far as he'd gotten the first time or not, Cliffjumper decided he'd stay... a little longer at least. It wouldn't hurt.

[lastonepercent]

Venting a pleased sigh, Mirage settled in, the calm and peace of his own mediation settling over him easily by virtue of long practice.

Cliffjumper's little field waver prompted a curious shiver of Mirage's own field, but he was slow to respond, already fallen to calm repose.

Exvent.

Fuel cycle.

Energon flow.

Spark beat.

Mirage's lips twitched upward minutely, field spectrum shifting with a mild upsurge of power. If Cliffjumper reacted to that...

[cliffjumper]

Cliffjumper, trying to concentrate and maybe, vaguely get to some sort of attempt at meditation again had basically managed to get to the point where he could sit still and start to focus on his frame and what it was doing again when the little pulse came.

It didn't startle him.

What it did do, was to seemingly make the sound of his spark flowing through his frame very loud, and accentuate the glowing bands of charge of his spark throughout his chassis, and also something bright to the left (Mirage, he realised) it'd be so easy to just---

Shaking his helm sharply, nearly swaying back in his hurry to not get caught in that creepy state he'd ended up in during the ritual, Cliffjumper grimaced and opened his mouth...

But then he closed it again, glancing over at Mirage.

Had he done that, or had that little swell come from elsewhere? Scowling at the altar in front of him, Cliffjumper wondered grumpily if it was just the room.

[lastonepercent]

Mirage didn't even have to look to sense Cliffjumper's motions, physical and otherwise. He felt him pull away, spiritual field presence fading down and back. That... definitely counted as 'noticing', even if Cliffjumper did relatively little about it.

Mirage wasn't sure if he should be amused or something else entirely.

"Hmm. Jumpy?"

He wasn't even sure if the minibot knew what he was reacting to...

[cliffjumper]

Frowning at Mirage, Cliffjumper felt as if he knew more than he was saying.

"Yeah, I guess..." pausing, almost about to leave it at that, Cliffjumper's optics narrowed, "did you do somethin'?"

Because otherwise why would he ask? And Mirage was the priest here, fully capable of manipulating energy and all that stupid slag, so it could just as well have been Mirage as it could have been the room or altar or whatever.

[lastonepercent]

So very jumpy. And still paranoid. But right, for once.

"Maybe."

Mirage calmly peered over with one lit optic.

"More like...sensed something. Which you sensed in turn."

[cliffjumper]

"What the slag do ya even mean maybe---" the initial frustrated outburst, accusing as it was because Cliffjumper was Cliffjumper, got cut off as Mirage continued and now he was just confused.

Again.

"What's that supposed to mean?!" scowling, Cliffjumper didn't even think about the fact that he rubbed his helm around one of his horns when Mirage mentioned he'd 'sensed' something in turn.

Mirage was absolutely slagging impossible when it came to this stupid stuff that even vaguely probably had something to do with him being a priest. It was utterly infuriating.

[lastonepercent]

Mirage sighed. The minibot was the most suspicious mech.

"My field shifted. In a way you should not have been able to sense."

He paused, dim optic rising up to the nubby little horns Cliffjumper was inadvertently drawing his attention toward.

"Even with such a...obvious sensor-suite."

[cliffjumper]

"It was?" staring, Cliffjumper frowned. He was pretty sure he hadn't picked up that... unless that was what he'd almost picked up on just now.

"Knew I should've upped the sensitivity on the horns," Cliffjumper muttered and gave a little glare at Mirage, before he just frowned again, "what did you do the... thing, before too?"

Gesturing with a hand in the air, Cliffjumper shifted in his seat.

"The thing that almost made all the light from ours sparks visible again?"

Even if that had a proper term, Cliffjumper would, probably, not have used it. Far too annoyed and confused to concern himself with proper phrasings at the moment.

[lastonepercent]

"It did."

Mirage met the short glare with a unyielding stare of his own, unperturbed. He wasn't going to apologize. He was, however, frowning at the realization that Cliffjumper's hidden talents went far more deep than he had originally supposed.

"...Yes. Also something most are not able to sense without training."

He sighed, repose finally cracking enough for him to raise a hand to his brow. What a mess. Cybertron almost completely without priests or those with talent - and the most gifted one he finds wants nothing to do with it.

[cliffjumper]

"Yeah, well, already knew that since that's basically what ya said after the trance thing happened," Cliffjumper said with a roll of his optics, slight waspish annoyance bleeding through.

Mostly because it wasn't like he wanted it - but he was also annoyed Mirage wasn't going to teach him anything simply because he didn't want to become a priest.

It wasn't as if the rules mattered anymore, now was it?!

[lastonepercent]

"Still," Mirage huffed, both optics coming fully back online at last. A huffy Cliffjumper made for a poor mediation partner.

"This just adds to the list."

And what a list. Cliffjumper would have made an excellent priest - and would have been enjoyable to teach, if he were not so dead-set against using the talents for what they were intended.

[cliffjumper]

Cliffjumper would probably argue he made a bad meditation partner no matter what, even if he'd technically managed reasonably up until now.

"It's a stupid list," Cliffjumper muttered, optics narrow and dim and his tone sullen as he crossed his arms over his chestplates and looked away. He just didn't understand why the slagging pit Mirage had to insist on keeping to the rules!

... But then, Mirage had always sort of been like that. Not really the rules in general, but wishing he had his life back, blah blah blah, like none of the rest of them didn't!

Cliffjumper's infatuation often warred with his annoyance regarding Mirage, but his negative opinions of the mech never managed to stomp out the crush. In fact, that crush had managed to bloom despite what he otherwise thought.

"But... uh," glancing back at Mirage and then away again, Cliffjumper squirmed in his seat, scowling, "ya know, er. Thank you..." he almost blushed then and huffed, scowl briefly deepening, "for showin' me this."

Even if he'd probably not use it - he wasn't sure when he'd have use of it at all, but hey. Mirage had taken the time to tell him and try to teach him instead of just shooing him out after his stuttered apology, and Cliffjumper thought he should at least try to thank him.

[lastonepercent]

Mirage snorted, eyeing Cliffjumper's vanishing stubborn set with something akin to amused disbelief.

"It's a list that would have made you an excellent trainee on Cybertron," he admitted, helm tilting at the minibot's blush. He managed a small smile.

"You are quite welcome. I hope it helps. I would do more...but I did take my vows. I've already pushed the boundaries of them as it is."

[cliffjumper]

"In theory maybe," Cliffjumper said with a roll of his optics, which really got to be an expression of his opinion on Mirage clinging to his wovs without saying anything about that directly, "'cause I sure as slag wouldn't have many a good one in practice."

With a huff, Cliffjumper stood up, stretching to settle cables back where they should be and realign joints. He might have stayed to try to meditate for longer if that thing and then their little argument-discussion hadn't happened, but now he just felt annoyed (not scared, no) and restless.

"Yeah, yeah. Don't see why it slaggin' matters since there ain't any more religious orders, but fine, whatever. I guess it did help a little... kinda?"

The uncertainty at the end was more from Cliffjumper feeling uncertain what he thought of the result thanks to almost getting caught seeing the lights again, not from Mirage's effort.

"I'll let ya do whatever you were gonna do. Don't think I can sit still right now," Cliffjumper said with a huff and a quick glance away, suddenly embarrassed about it.

[lastonepercent]

"I exist. Therefore my order still exists." Mirage grumbled, scowling at the pointed reminder that most of his fellow priests were lost or straight up dead.

"And it matters because vows are vows, and I took them. The only person of a high enough authority to grant me leave from them would be Prime himself."

He flicked a hand, motioning Cliffjumper toward the door.

"I am glad it helped. But yes, if you are firmly unsettled, it may be best that you go."

Before they started grating on each other any further.

[cliffjumper]

Squinting as Mirage insisted his order still existed since he did, Cliffjumper engaged his vocaliser... and then clicked it off again because what the frag was he supposed to say to that? It was true and...

Well. Maybe he couldn't begrudge Mirage that. Or at least not much. He was still annoyed.

"And he ain't gonna do it," Cliffjumper muttered with a shake of his helm, though it was just a comment without any anger in it. Prime wouldn't do something like that unless lives were on the line, and if this had really been about Cliffjumper's safety, Cliffjumper vaguely hoped (thought) Mirage would have done it in some way.

He was even... sort of... helping right now, after all, even if Cliffjumper probably wasn't that good at picking up what Mirage was trying to teach in this way.

"Uh, yeah... Good luck..?" trailing off and feeling embarrassed again because he just wasn't sure that's what he was supposed to say, Cliffjumper turned around and walked out.

Despite everything, maybe that hadn't been... so bad.

[lastonepercent]

"I wouldn't know. I've never requested it," Mirage admitted slowly, eyeing Cliffjumper as he headed toward the door. He gave the red mech a nod.

"Thank you. ...Practice if you can, hmm?"

Lips twitching at the corners, Mirage let his optics fall back offline and retook his own stance, for all appearances falling back into meditation after only a few moments.