Old Spider

The goings on within the Institute may be shrouded to the public, but everything that transpires within it is is an open book - at least to those in certain positions of power. Tarantulas, the mastermind behind its forging, is in just such a position.
The situation of the three insecticons has not gone unnoticed - neither has the order for their dissection. He is not as blaze` about their destruction as Pharma, because he has an intended use for all of them, and there are secrets within their frames that the Camien polymath might accidentally uncover, and it would not do well for the spider if one of his multiple hands was tipped too soon.
Draped in a fine red cloak from the weavers of Stanix and adorned with Guildmaster and Functionist emblems, he is unbothered by security and unrestricted in his movements as he makes his way down to Containment Facility 23-XTA, the area in which Nautica has been forcibly conscripted to work.
The Camien is, once again, at her workbench, peering curiously at the scans she's taken of the insecticons. Having finished her initial work on Kickback, her attention now has turned to Shrapnel. His unique electrical powers have definitely caught her attention, but she doesn't dare give voice to her growing suspicion that they might be an outlier gift; it would only encourage Pharma to further torment the poor bot. So in the meantime, she simply studies his schematics carefully, standing at her workbench with a series of datapads laid out before her. "Oh, well, /that/ doesn't make much sense... I wonder if that system is vestigial," she murmurs to herself.
Tarantulas simply walks up behind Nautica without announcing his presence.
"HELLO!" he pipes up, grinning (well, as much as one can grin when one's mouth is composed of pedipalps that open sideways). Startling someone deeply lost in thought is one of the simple pleasures in life, and he enjoys it so.
The Camien certainly obliges; she's smart, but she gets very caught up in her work. She yelps in surprise, both audibly /and/ via wavespeech; apparently involuntary noises simply happen on both systems, whether she wills it or not. "Primus! It's bad enough you've got me caught here, do you always have to sneaaaaaa..." Nautica trails off as she turns, and finds not Pharma but a new, wholly unfamiliar, and somewhat imposing figure behind her. After a moment, she offers slightly more hesitantly, "...hello?" It was probably meant to be a statement, not a question.
"Hello my dear. Nautica, is it?" Tarantulas greets pleasantly enough. He keeps his arms (all of them) folded behind his back. "A pleasure to meet you. My name is Tarantulas, and I was interested to see what you've uncovered with my Insecticons."
"/Your/ insecticons?" Nautica asks, with a frown. "Well, all my findings so far are filed away on the Institute systems. Pharma has me working on their digestive systems, to figure out why they won't work except in vivo. I have my own theories about why, but..." She trails off, looking over Tarantulas. He seems... well, slightly insectoid himself, and that clearly piques her curiosity. Is he some later stage of insecticon evolution? But that would probably be rude to ask...
"You've never seen a beast before, have you? That's not surprising, we were the losers of the last great war between tribes," Tarantulas replies with a note of amusement. Some of his eyes are busy studying Nautica, while the others are looking at her workstation. "How are you finding Cybertron since your arrive? Unpleasant?"
"That's... certainly one way of looking at it," Nautica replies, her tone a little bit dry. She looks at her wrench on the workbench, and then muses, "Being a quantum mechanic was certainly /simpler/, at any rate. And Caminus seemed... less complicated, socially. But then I suppose colonies often are."
"You've had the benefit of escaping the rule of Nova Prima," Tarantulas explains, moving closer. "You see, there was a time in our distant past that we were at war with external threats. Nova became something of hero as part of the resistance, rebelling against the oppressive overlords that came to rule us. When we were free, he named himself a Prime, and declared that order should come afterwords. 'A form for every function, a function for every form'. It was that kernel that became the toxic caste system you now find yourself drowning in." Another couple of eyes go to the wrench. Interesting.
"Anyone who transformed into an animal of any kind was declared to be fit for nothing more than slave labor, such as the Insecticons you've been tending. I decided to pay them, and you in turn, a visit; after all, each of them has passed through my talons as a hatchling. They are -mine-."
There's a look of dawning understanding in Nautica's optics. "You're the 'old spider' that they've mentioned, the one who awakened them," the Camien says finally, glancing over at the cages where the insecticons are recharging. "But... if you did that, if they're like your /children/, you can't be happy to see what Pharma's doing to them. What he has /me/ doing to them. They deserve /better/ than this."
(How impressive,) he thinks to himself. (She's made something of a connection, but does she truly understand how much my 'children' they are? Very intelligent, very soft-hearted. She's terribly innocent isn't she? Hmm. No, not what I am looking for at all. She'll never keep me on my toes.)
"I have allowed things to progress for a reason," he points out to Nautica with a subtle tone and careless ease. His optics narrow a little, brilliant golden-yellow rather than blue, violet or red. He is not the normal color one associates with the spark or with other Cybertronians. "Although I must say I am less than pleased with Proteus. He was supposed to keep Kickback for himself, not foist the hatchling off onto his assistant! She's gone and made him soft!"
Now it's the Camien's turn to be amused. "Has she?" Nautica asks, folding her arms in front of her as she regards Tarantulas. "I mean... I can't deny there's a place for ruthlessness, at this point." Though she might disagree about the application of it; her innocent demeanor turns darker as she considers the mercy she /won't/ show Pharma if she has the opportunity. But this passes, as she looks back to Tarantulas' optics. "But I figure, Kickback's learned to see from a different perspective. He's managed to find friends and allies. No, he's probably not ruthless and cruel, but building alliances... that's a strength too. A different one, but still a strength."
"He's learned how to be -helpless-." Tarantulas moves aside from Nautica to look in on the Insecticons. "I wanted him around Proteus to pick up the attitudes he would need in order to survive. Perhaps in some golden era gone by he would have done very well for himself, but as he is now? He'll be crushed." Tarantulas sighs, hissing, as his mandibles flutter. "How long have you been on this world, and how much do you know about what's happening in our present society?"
"Clearly, less than I should," Nautica admits, with an unhappy edge to her tone. "I /thought/ things wouldn't affect me. That, since I wasn't a Cybertronian citizen, I shouldn't interfere. That I could just stick to tinkering in my lab. Studying the liquid-metal creatures on the bottom of the Mithril Sea. Working on a miniaturized set of engines for space-capable altmodes. And just pass the time until the Clampdown was lifted."
Then Nautica shakes her head, her tone turning darker. "But things are... /broken/. Wrong. The Clampdown's /never/ going to lift, not unless things are changed. And..." The Camien gestures around the lab once, finishing with a gesture towards her head. "...clearly, not getting involved hasn't work out so well for me anyway." She lets more bitterness creep into her tone than she has in the past; maybe she's stopped caring what Pharma overhears, when it's about things like this.
"What you are now entangled with is six million years of a slow, steady stranglehold," Tarantulas says, deciding to educate Nautica. "And as the pressure continues, eventuall this civilization will shatter like cerulean glass." He gestures to the room. "This facility is the last desperate attempt to maintain order by a governmental elite that can feel the public slipping from their grasp." Let Pharma hear, he'll be educated. After all, every one of Pharma's hopes of scientific fame and fortune rest in Tarantulas' claws. The 'good doctor' may not yet realize, but he could end up on one of these tables just as quickly as he sends people to them.
"The Insecticon race is already sentinent, they always have been, they simply have a language not well understood by other tribes. I did not awaken them; I simply hastened the process."
"So Pharma suspects you of having outlier abilities, mmnnn?" He drops that, changing the subject, waiting to see how she'll react.
"I know they're sentient, not just these three," Nautica replies. Then, on a wild guess, she switches instead to wavespeech for a moment. +Once I learned to listen, it wasn't hard to find others who had survived long enough to mature to self-awareness.+
Whatever else Nautica was about to say, however -- be it on politics, or on insecticons -- is forgotten momentarily when the old spider mentions outlier abilities. "It would seem so," the Camien femme replies. "I thought mentioning the range of my skills and studies would help convince him I could be useful. Get me access to the labs down here, to learn more of what was going on, to /understand/ the place. Maybe to understand Cybertron a bit better, too." A pause, and then she adds a little sourly, "I suppose I was right. I definitely have learned a bit more about this place, and by extension about Cybertron, haven't I?" Her hand taps the quantum wrench on the workbench, as if picturing using it on Pharma. It's a pleasant thought to savor. Vengeance was never Nautica's path in the past, but she can't deny there's a /touch/ of appeal to it now...
"Oh there's so much MORE to learn," Tarantulas muses, tapping his chin.
"It would be a shame if you were trapped in here too long. I tend to believe that suffering, a least for a little while, is a good thing. Pain only makes one stronger, after all. It helps you decide what is most important to you in life, and only in trial can you see what you are made of."
"Would you care for a direct neural interface?" he asks casually as if there is ANY WAY EVER to ask for that in a casual manner.
"I've certainly learned a few things here," Nautica replies, a touch sadly. Perhaps she still sort of misses her lost innocence, on some level; it was, if nothing else, far easier when she was in the Embassy, ignorant and separate from politics. But on the other hand... she glances to the insecticons, and then muses in wavespeech, +Maybe not all of them bad.+
The sudden offer of direct neural interface catches her by surprise, however; Nautica's attention snaps back to Tarantulas, before she asks in an ever-so-slightly wary manner, "Why? I mean, nothing personal, but the track record when it comes to people here messing about in my brain-module in any manner is not entirely encouraging right now."
+I thought you might appreciate a complete dictionary of Insecticon EMF linguistics. If you're going to communicate with them, you might as well be able to do it on an level appropriate to your intellect and education.+ Tarantulas says in wavespeech. "And if you're willing to cooperate a bit, I might be able to do something about all that probing in your cranial chamber."
Nautica hesitates for a moment, watching Tarantulas. But in the end, she decides her situation is unlikely to get appreciably /worse/ unless she's dismantled. With a sudden determination, she answers, "Cooperation, hm? And what would that entail?" But she's clearly already pretty much decided to take the opportunity.
"Take more books to Kickback. I'll supply them. And... continue doing what you're doing concerning their care." He smirks with his mandibles. "Seeing as how you feel very -compromised- in this situation, I thought a direct upload of useful information would be the most convenient for you." And for him, because it's probably the closest he's ever gotten to a real live femme not beating the scrap out of him for asking.
"Alright. You have a deal, Tarantulas." Beggars can't be choosers, and right now the old spider -- for all his vaguely creepy tone -- seems to nominally be an ally. Nautica isn't in a position where she can afford to turn any such away. And so she nods once, accepting the terms. "He's brilliant, you know," she says finally. "I wonder if Pharma realizes that. If he's /frightened/ by it. Given the right tools, the right options, he could change things."
"Oh I am very aware. Of the three, he has the highest intellect. Don't tell Pharma, but Kickback is nearly his rival in intellectual capacity, and with the right education and tools, well... it wouldn't be hard for Kickback to qualify for an Intellectual Class position and an altmode exemption," Tarantulas muses. "Unfortunately Kickback is still a -protoform-, only a few weeks old. He's not had time to land on his feet emotionally, and his 'queen' has mothered him a bit -too- much."
Don't tell Pharma indeed. Tarantulas knows very well that the doctor is listening.
"Maybe she has." Nautica is willing to allow that, if only because she's starting to think /she/ might have been a bit too naive. Too trusting. Inasmuch as she's ended up in the Institute, she may not be wrong. "But on the other hand, he has ideals. And maybe that will mean he can be the bridge between insecticons and 'Hollows', someday. Especially if he /can/ qualify for Intellectual class and an altmode exemption."
Picking up the quantum wrench, she fiddles with a few buttons on it and then lets her hand drop to her side. "Maybe someday /I'll/ make a difference, if I get loose," she says finally, and then -- jaw set, determined light in her optics -- she turns her attention back to Tarantulas. "Alright. Let's do this, then."
And then they neural merged, and Nautica got a little more than she perhaps bargained for...
Category:NC Institute