Parental Advice

Shiftlock's decided to keep in touch with Hot Rod these days, particularly after news of the Institute's gotten back to her. Now that she doesn't have any official boss, she comes and goes as she pleases to any polity she wants. It's good to be your own boss sometimes.
To let him know she's coming to dinner, she radios ahead to him to see if he's awake/okay/still alive. << Heeeeeey Hot Rod. Hollaback if you're on the line, mech! >>
<< Heeeeeey, Shiftlock. >> Even by radio, Hot Rod's words and manner suggest a vibrant cheer that has a lot to do with recent news. The first touch of contact is a little distant, a little crackly, suggesting mild interference that has more to do with distance and thick walls than malicious screening. It thins as he continues, words becoming more clear. << How's life in Kaon? >>
<< Insane. Is Drift with you? >> Shiftlock radios back, running underground rather than above ground. She's taken to keeping out of visible sight anymore.
<< Ha. >> There's a brief pause before Hot Rod answers, << Nah, he's out. >> There's another slight pause, and when he radios back, he sounds a little resigned. << Guess it's smart of you to ask since last I heard he thinks you backstabbed him. >>
<< Yeah, he's probably going to try to kill me. So much for love and romance. Anyways, I have some news for you so if you have anywhere you think we can meet safely, let me know. I'm coming in -beneath- the city, >> Shiftlock states, moving through pitch black tunnels at high speeds on infrared sensors alone.
<< Oh, here, then: >> Hot Rod sends details of the lower levels of an abandoned building -- massive, from what can be seen in the portion he shares, but left in ruins. The surface map overlays the 'I am here' so that she can figure out her own 'you are here'. It looks like he's beneath the city, too, although rather than tunnels, he's in old abandoned buildings that could fall on his head at any moment. BUT THEY DON'T. << You really think he's going to try to kill you? >>
Shiftlock alters her course and will arrive at Hot Rod's location in a few moments. << Yes. I'm beginning to think he did one too many stims and fried his brain module. He's erratic as a pithed turbofox and he completely flipped his switch when he saw Blast Off in my apartment. Wouldn't listen to a word I had to say, he just started trying to kill the guy. I had to tie up Drift and even then he was screaming and bleeding all over the place and trying to -bite Blast Off-. I'd watch your back around that mech, Rod. I tried to help him before, but I think helping Drift was the biggest mistake of my life. >>
<< Helping someone is never a mistake. >> One might assume that is easy for Hot Rod to say, as Drift has yet to turn on him, but there are shadings to the way he says it which suggests -- not regret, exactly, but complications. << Sometimes they just need a lot more help than you think. Uh, speaking of Blast Off, you checked in with him lately? >>
<< No, I've been at work, why do you ask? >> Shiftlock comes to a stop beneath Hot Rod's location, and transforming into root mode, pushes up one of the access panels in the floor. It's TMNT style in here tonight! "Don't tell me," she says, one elbow on the floor as she rests against the ladder down into sewers. "He's gotten himself in trouble again."
"So much trouble." Hot Rod straightens out of his lean against the wall -- and it takes practice to affect a casual lean when you've got a spoiler the size of his. He offers her a hand up. "He took a hit to the head from a mech that I last saw working as an IAA hitman, thug, and general nuisance. Sounded personal. Helm's armoring was thick enough to keep his head intact but he didn't look so great."
Shiftlock takes Hot Rod's hand to come up out of the sewers but the moment the news comes out, she slumps forward until her helm touches the ground. Her door 'wings' droop in complete defeat. "... oh my primus I can't leave him alone for a couple of breems."
"I know /that/ feeling. Every time I hear about Drift trying to kill someone else I know--." Hot Rod gives Shiftlock a sympathetic pat on the back of her head and then moves to reseat the access panel with the scuff of his foot. "I tried to get Blast Off to go to a medic but he wouldn't listen and just flew off. So -- if he was well enough for that, so he probably got to one. Probably." He tries to reassure. He just sucks at it.
Shiftlock sits on the floor of the basement and vents miserably. "Hot Rod, when did we become parents? It's like Blast Off and Drift are a couple of branched sparks fresh out of nurturing that are obsessed with killing each other." As for whether or not Blast Off made it to safety, well... she's so tired of being tugged in every direction that she doesn't feel up to running around looking for him. Yet.
"Nuh-uh!" Hot Rod's denial is vehement, instantaneous. "Nope, /not/ parents." REFUSE. N-O. "Just -- we're the slightly more stable friends." He looks pained. "Ugh, I don't want to be the steady friend. Shiftlock, this is terrible. Next it's going to be responsibility and then I'm going to turn into Prowl and forget what fun even looks like. The murder thing, though -- it's starting to be a problem." /Starting/.
"Oh y'THINK?" Shiftlock retorts at that last comment. She shakes her head. "I blame Lockdown for this. He put that stupid idea in Drift's head and I wasn't there to stop it."
"Man, Blast Off... I swear, do you know what it's like to live with a high caste, Hot Rod? He's all 'where's my wine, where's my books, where's my servants, what do you mean I have to pick up after myself, I didn't get lost in Kaon even though I couldn't navigate my way out of a cargo box'. It's exhausting, and it seems like everyone ever wants to kill him. I really hope he can mech up a bit, I can't do as much as I used to and I can't protect everyone." The words depress her as they come out of her mouth. "... I really -can't- anymore, can I?"
Venting in a long sigh, Hot Rod says, "Doesn't mean you can't try. Do what you can, anything you can." A wiser mech would add something about how sometimes there is nothing you can do, but this is Hot Rod, and of course there is always some way that he (and thus, she) can fix it. He settles out of his crouch into a proper seat next to her and nudges her with his shoulder. "Doesn't matter what you used to do. Only matters what you can do, and what you can learn to do."
"Can't imagine living with a high caste, but Blurr's actually kind of like that," he says after a moment. "Maybe ... less with the books." Hot Rod smiles faintly. "But half the time he's clueless, helpless, and there's something going on there with the IAA that I just -- it was hard, getting him all the way to Kaon and then not being able to help. Watching him walk right back into the hands of people who are just using him. How do you protect people who don't want to be protected? Who think they don't need it? Who think they /are/ already protected? But I'm still looking for help. I'm not giving up on him. So that's what we do."
"I'm still trying to figure out who and what I am. It's taking time to sort out where I began and Mercury ended. I mean, I still have phantom tcog twitches sometimes, like I want to change into something else and I /can't/. It's -not there anymore-," Shiftlock muses, using Hot Rod as a sounding board for a little while. She could use someone to talk two who isn't the source of one of her three problems.
"I actually tried to get myself arrested," she laughs. "What have you been doing lately?"
"Weird." Hot Rod is a mech of deep insight and wisdom. /Weird/. "Who you were, what you could do -- none of that matters as much as what's you can do now." He talks as though looking back leads to death. There is only what lies ahead. "You're Shiftlock, and you're nobody's fool. Why would you try to get yourself arrested? You'd just end up right back in Ratbat's control. Getting arrested is so far down my 'to do' list." He doesn't have a list. "You saw the stuff about the Institute, right? /That's/ what I've been up to. I was in Vos the other day making sure no one got left behind or lost in those tunnels you scouted. They were a big help."
"If that place is gone, then I can die happy." Shiftlock is so tired that death seems like a nice vacation right about now. "Forgetting everything seems really good right about now. Not remembering anyone, not caring anymore, not having to bail people out who turn around and betray you, not having mechs mistake kindness for romantic interest... Yeah. Yeah, being mindwiped sounds kinda good right now." She takes a deep vent and laughs a little. "I tried to get Orion Pax to arrest me. Went in and kinda got in his face and challenged him on whether or not he was gonna do the right thing or kiss Sentinel's exhaust pipe like Prowl...." She trails off, and shakes her head again. "... You'll never believe what he did."
"Whoa, Shiftlock!" Hot Rod draws back -- not so that he can scoot away from her, although at first glimpse it sure looks like he's fleeing lest despair is catching -- but so that he can shift around to face her and then scoot closer. "'You okay' sounds kind of dumb. How can I help? You're really taking that Mercury thing hard or -- well, I guess there's the Drift thing, and the outlaw thing, and the memory thing, and the been used thing, and probably lots of other things."
/Thank you, Hot Rod/.
Concern in his expression as he watches her, Hot Rod warms to a reluctant smile and says, "I bet he did the right thing."
"The big dumb faceplate-wearing decorative arm cannon-using idiot offered to take me in and protect me. Just - just right there in front of Primus and everybody!" Shift explains, throwing her hands up in exasperation and disbelief (still).
"Yeah." Hot Rod's smile widens into a proper grin and there's more than a touch of starry-eyed hero worship in his expression. "That sounds about right." On a totally unrelated and not at all imitating Pax note, he says, "You're always welcome here, too. We don't have much, but we share what we do and protect each other."
That hurt. It's not Hot Rod's fault; he doesn't know how much Shiftlock would just like to run and hide behind someone and throw the burden of responsibilities she drags around on the shoulders of someone more capable, but her sense of duty and her sense of right and wrong won't allow her to ditch those who depend on her. "I wish it were that easy. If it were I'd have taken Pax up on his offer, but... I'm stuck. I don't have anywhere to go for a job other than Clench -- and you don't want to meet him, trust me -- and I have at least one idiot that is going to get himself killed if I don't constantly watch over him. You know I can't stay here, not if Drift keeps coming around. I think he really -will- kill me."
"I'm trapped, Hot Rod. As trapped as I was from the day I came online."
"Not as long as you can run, you're not." Hot Rod reaches out to give Shiftlock's shoulder a gentle shake -- which is nicer than picking her up and shaking her -- and leaves his hand in place with an anchoring touch. "Look, like I said, we protect each other. /From/ each other, if it comes to that. I'd stand between you and Drift any day. He'd regret it. He might not think so now, but he would. The only responsibility to have to Blast Off is that of a friend. You're not his parent, you're not his commander, and you're not his endura. I'm not saying you can't, or shouldn't help him, but you're too used to chains. Don't go looking for them and make some for yourself."
It's a bitter pill to swallow and she hates to admit it, but he's right. She's so used to having a metaphorical choke chain around her neck that once she'd broken it, she was sizing herself up for a new one - just in a different color and style. "You'd think a mech that was in the Primal Vanguard wouldn't have to rely on a empty to save him so much!" Maybe this time he's just going to have to figure it out on his own. She can't rescue him if she gets killed in the process. She relents. "But how am I gonna contribute? I can't just be a plasma leech on resources around here. I'd hate myself for not helping out."
"He's not relying on an empty," says Hot Rod with an unexpected degree of fierceness. "He's relying on a capable femme who's proven herself smart enough to get out of Senate hands with her spark intact. Can't blame him. And you're right -- if he's a soldier, he can take care of himself. You're not doing him any favors, either, not letting him stand on his own. Everyone contributes however they can. You're good with tunnels, right? Lots of jobs could use someone good at getting somewhere fast where the Senate doesn't have eyes." Way to sound totally legit, Hot Rod. "Maybe your boss in Kaon could use you in Nyon, too!"
"I'm not going to get you involved with a mafia boss running an oilsport operation, Hot Rod." Shiftlock finally stands up. Sometimes just being able to voice your problems is enough to relieve the pressure. "I'll give you guys a hand, I have before, but I'm going to have to hang back and keep my distance, at least in living space, until this whole thing with Drift blows over. If it ever does. The dude found me in no time and he climbed up the side of a tower to crawl in through my window. I'm not going to be able to stay in one place if he's chasing me."
"I'll talk to him," says Hot Rod, a promise that contains even less hope for a peaceful solution than when he said it to Arcee. "But." Getting to his feet with her, he says, "Keep whatever distance you need to, but like I said -- you're welcome here. Want to come take a look?" he offers, moving easily to boyish enthusiasm.
"Sure. It'll be nice to stop running for awhile," Shiftlock grins.