114/The Truth of the Matter

**Aegis has posed:**
While taking an overhead survey of the planet, Aegis had noticed the huge crater that was Nyon. Unlike the ruins of Toraxxis, this was older, not ancient, but not recent either. Curious, she dropped lower and transformed. Poking around for a bit, she eventually found herself sitting on the edge of the bit crater and looking down into it, sinking deep into her thoughts. Not very exciting for an onlooker, but really convienient for anyone sent out to find the femme.

**Blurr has posed:**
Indeed, what was once the city of Nyon is now nothing more than a pile of ashes, ruined structures, and dead bodies or dead body parts. Sure, the city had been somewhat of a ghetto before, but now it just didn't even exist any more. Once a great center of art, culture, and commerce, it has been reduced to nothing but dust and rubble.

    Truth be told, someone has been searching for her. They've been watching, her, tailing her...and now they've finally sent someone to her location. She might recognize the famous racer from the spaceport, the one Swivel had recognized. It's kind of weird that someone like him would be out here, but he looks like he's got a reason to be there--he's rifling through the remains of something.

**Aegis has posed:**
Aegis doesn't give any outward sign as to whether she has noticed the speedster or not. He hasn't done anything to really alarm or intrigue her as of yet, so her focus remains on her inner thoughts. After all, she has had a lot to sort out since coming here, and that wasn't helped by the events at Toraxxis.

**Blurr has posed:**
Blurr continues searching, until he finds what he has been looking for. Marking the location with a beacon, he straightens back up and approaches Aegis, standing behind her for a few moments before making a comment. "You looking for something?"

**Aegis has posed:**
"I'm not a scavenger, if that's what you're asking," replies Aegis, looking up at Blurr. She does note that he seems vaguely familiar, but doesn't immediately make the connection. She smiles wryly. "I don't think that there will be a lot of answers in an empty crater. Answers are more likely to be found within ourselves. But the crater is empty, so it doesn't carry a lot of distractions with it."

**Blurr has posed:**
"Soooo--" Blurr just stares at her in puzzlement. "You're meditating or what? You're looking for answers? To what questions?" He asks.

**Aegis has posed:**
"Not exactly mediating, since that is usually meant to clear one's mind," says Aegis. She pats the ground beside her. "Sit, if you have a mind to. You might not." Her tone is pleasant; she won't hold it against him if he doesn't want to sit. "Mostly diagnostic questions."

**Blurr has posed:**
Blurr considers the offer a moment, then agrees, sitting down on a piece of broken paneling next to her. "Diagnostic? You sound like Ratchet. Are you a medic?"

**Aegis has posed:**
Aegis nods her head at this, her smile widening. "I am indeed," she says. "You see, I was pretty good at my job before I took a bit of a hiatus from the planet. I would figure out what was wrong with a mech, and fix him. Sometimes a mech would be beyond help, which is always sad, but usually, people can be saved. The more skill a medic has, the more chance they have of saving an injured mech."

**Blurr has posed:**
Blurr nods. "Sure, sure. Don't doubt that. So what's the problem?" He probes further. Really, he's just curious. "Something bothering you? Something you saw out--there?" He waves a hand indicatively toward the sky to refer to the cosmos.

**Aegis has posed:**
Aegis shakes her head. "No. It's pretty much everything I've seen since coming back here," she points to the ground beneath her feet. "This planet is sick." She shrugs. "If a mech was that low on energy they'd need to be charged up fast." Rubbing her chin in agitation, she continues. "But I don't know where we'd get enough energy to revitalize a whole planet from without taking from someone else who needed it."

**Blurr has posed:**
"Yeah," Blurr sighs. That certainly isn't news to him. "It's been sick for a while, honestly. Ever since Nova took charge. But now we're actually trying to fix it instead of just covering up the symptoms, and we're actually getting somewhere." He says, smiling a little bit. "It's not much, but we're making progress. I think. You wanna help?"

**Aegis has posed:**
"Saying I want to help doesn't mean much until I decide the 'how' of the matter," Aegis says gravely. "I'm sure there are a lot of people who want to help, but by running about blindly, they've made things worse." She shakes her head. "I prefer a more deliberate approach."

**Blurr has posed:**
"You're right, you have to be careful who you choose to help. Gotta find the people with the right methods. Well I'm happy to tell you that -we're- going to do it the right way. Because it's already working, it just needs time." Blurr says, still smiling. "If anything's certain, it's that fixing this place is going to take some serious unified efforts. No invidiual mech or fembot for that matter is going to be able to make everything better on their own."

**Aegis has posed:**
Aegis laughs softly, shaking her head. "Do you really think anyone would try to win anyone over with a pitch that they were using the /wrong/ way?" she asks. "I know you mean well, but 'right' is pretty vauge. Give me an example." No, she's not mocking him. She's prodding him into giving her something concrete.

**Blurr has posed:**
"Like letting Starscream have a fair trial, even though he's clearly committed treason." Blurr answers quickly. "Keeping dangerous terrorists off of the streets and confining them to places where they can't hurt anyone. Getting rid of the caste system. Not forcing anyone to do any job they don't want to do. That's like, at least 3 or 4 things, right?"

**Blurr has posed:**
"Oh and of course searching for new fuel sources like our lives depend on it because smelt it they do!" he chuckles.

**Aegis has posed:**
"Sounds like a good start," Aegis says, nodding her head. "Functionism didn't do me any harm personally, but it was a pretty bad system all in all. Not that we're the first people to invent a bad system." She presses her lips together. "Our biggest problem is that we rely on a resource that isn't easily renewable. That's where many of the organics have the advantage of us." Tapping the side of her cheek she gives a short laugh. "We can live for millions of years...but at what cost."

**Blurr has posed:**
"Well everyone has to start somewhere." Blurr replies. "Everyone has to take a first step, pull the trigger for the first time or throw a first punch. Or in your case, fix up their first patient, I guess. But if we can get enough people like you to help us, all of this will be over soon enough, and we can all go back to living normal, healthy lives."

**Aegis has posed:**
"Oh, I can fix people. Problem is, I don't care to distinguish who I fix," Aegis says. "I believe in saving lives. I think there would be a conflict of interest if I was saving the 'wrong' lives." She's not saying this to be beligerant; she's saying it because she's honest.

**Blurr has posed:**
Blurr arches an optic ridge at her. "And who said anything was wrong with that, huh? Life is precious, Optimus taught us that. Doesn't matter whose it is. The only reason we take a life is to prevent that life from destroying more lives. Because sometimes that's necessary, unfortunately. No one can fault you for preserving a life, unless that meant letting more lives get destroyed."

**Aegis has posed:**
Aegis considers this for some time, turning to look back into that pit. "I'm not interested in pulling any triggers, or rigging people with hidden explosives. If I fix someone, I'm fixing them clean," she says. "I'm no soldier, nor am I a spy."

**Blurr has posed:**
"It's gonna take soldiers, spies, engineers, mechanics, medics, all sorts of people to fix this planet." Blurr says, gazing out over the ruins of the city. It's a good thing she doesn't know -he's- one of those 'spy' types.

    He pauses, then looks back at her. "Why'd you come back here? You said you were away for a while. I mean, were you homesick or what? Hadn't you heard about everything that happened? The Senate, the war, and everything else?"

**Aegis has posed:**
"I was in space when the Clampdown came into effect. I was still on the young side and I didn't want to be tied to the planet. So I didn't come back. They couldn't keep me bound if I wasn't there to begin with. So I bounced around for a while until I found a place to stay." Her optics grow distant for a moment. "After some time I heard that the restrictions on space travel had not only been released, but that people were fleeing from a war. I figured now, more than ever, Cybertron would need medics. So I came back." Aegis then looks sad. "Besides, my reasons for staying where I was had slowly vanished over time."

**Blurr has posed:**
Blurr smiles when she mentions that Cybertron needed her. "You knew you were needed," he says softly. "Even though you knew things wouldn't exactly be nice and comfortable here, you came back anyway." He nods. "I can respect that. It's a rare thing, you know. This 'selflessness' thing. Doing stuff not for yourself, and all."

**Aegis has posed:**
Aegis returns the smile. "Now, if we didn't have such a bad reptuation on the outside, we might be able to barter for resources. After all, there is a lot of things we can do that other races can't. But with things so unstable here, we also can't afford to send people away. On the other hand, without resources, it's hard to secure a victory. It's a true dilema." The smile quickly fades under the weight of Cybertron's problems.

**Blurr has posed:**
"Well, can't do much about that now." Blurr says with a shake of his head. "The blacklisting, anyway. Not our fault but not their fault either. For being afraid of us, that is." Another pause. "Oh, you know I don't think I ever got your name. I'm Blurr."

**Aegis has posed:**
The medic extends a hand outward. "Aegis," she says, giving her name in return. "But you're right, it's a problem for a different time. Still, it weighs in the back of my mind." She shrugs her shoulders. "For what it's worth, I'm not interested in joining a bunch of rabble rousers, nor am I interested in impeding the law. I'm just here to do my job and do it well."

**Blurr has posed:**
"Aegis." Blurr smiles, shaking her hand. "That's a nice name. Yeah, unfortunately I doubt there's much we can do about the blacklisting until we get our act cleaned up so to speak, which we're far from having done at the moment, as you can see."

    "So uh...you come out here often? To um, ponder the world's problems?"

**Aegis has posed:**
Aegis shakes her head. "This is the first time. I saw the crater and it seemed like a good place to look at how far the destruction had gone. The other site was too recent. It was more likely there would have been either dangerous fragments or scavengers about."

**Blurr has posed:**
"You wanted to know?" Blurr looks surprised. "I guess some people like depressing scenes." He teases her a little bit. "Well, Nyon wasn't much of a place, anyway. At least not right before it got blown up. By one of its own denizens, no less heh."

**Aegis has posed:**
Aegis raises her optic ridges. "I some people are able to do that." After all, didn't she JUST see Prowl blow up Toraxxis? "Still, I would hope there was a reason, and a good one would be even better," she notes dryly. "And of course I wanted to know. I can't assess a situation by hiding from the truth."

**Blurr has posed:**
"A reason to what, blow up this city?" Blurr asks. "Or are you talking about the more...recent explosion?" Meaning, Toraxxis.

**Aegis has posed:**
Aegis smiles faintly. "Optimally, both," she states. "It would be nicer to think that it was a rational reason that they were destroyed rather than out of spite...even if it might not be realistic."

**Blurr has posed:**
"Well I'm not sure about this place," Blurr says with a shrug. "But I'm sure the Decepticons destroyed Toraxxis out of spite. They couldn't have it for themselves, so they weren't going to let anyone else have it." He frowns. "They do stuff like that."

**Aegis has posed:**
Aegis hmmmms. "Not much point in trying to take a planet that has nothing left to offer," she muses. The look she gives Blurr is one of scrutiny. She can't know how much he knows, so she's not just going to blurt stuff out. This isn't a femme who is looking to stir up trouble for five minutes of fame. No, she's far more cautious than that.

**Blurr has posed:**
There's brief pause, as Blurr regards her silently for a moment. "You were there, weren't you?" he suddenly asks. "At the refinery, when they attacked."

**Aegis has posed:**
Aegis nods her head. "Yes, I was. I was the medic on call at the time, and a worker came up to get my help. There wasn't anything I could do by the time I got down there." She sighs deeply. "The only thing left to do was run."

**Blurr has posed:**
Blurr gazes at her intently as she recounts the depressing tale, looking truly concerned and interested in her perspective. "What did you see? What happened? Did you--did you see how the Decepticons managed to get to the controls?"

**Aegis has posed:**
Aegis looks off into the distance and deliberates for some time. Information can be dangerous; she's seen families topple over such things...dynasties fall. Cybertron is in a fragile enough state as it is. "There were only four of us down there," she begins slowly. "One mech was pinned by another who had a beast like form; I didn't know either of them personally. Starscream was at the controls. Then there was myself; I arrived late."

**Blurr has posed:**
"Starscream. I knew it. And the beast form must have been Razorclaw. And the pinned one must've been one of ours." Blurr sighs. "So you didn't see how they got in? Well, what happened then?" He probes further. "Did you intervene, or wasn't there enough time to do that?"

**Aegis has posed:**
Aegis shakes her head. "I tried to talk Starscream down; I wasn't even really armed. What was I supposed to do? Wrestle him to the ground?" She makes a sound of amusement at the thought. "Next thing I know there are alarms and we're being told to evacuate." She flatly doesn't say who set it off.

**Blurr has posed:**
"What did he say when you confronted him?" Blurr asks.

**Aegis has posed:**
"Just that many people would be hurt if I interrupted him. That was it," Aegis says truthfully. "Then he shouted to his companion and the two of them ran." She shakes her head. "It wasn't one of my better moments."

**Blurr has posed:**
"So you think Starscream did it?" Blurr questions. It appeared before that he was convinced this was true, but is he questioning it now, or simply wanting to know her perspective?

**Aegis has posed:**
Aegis turns her head away. "I'm not really comfortable talking about it right now," she says, actually sounding anxious for the first time during the conversation.

**Blurr has posed:**
But Blurr seems insistent. He came here for a reason, other than sifting through junk, of course. "Come on Aegis, tell me!" he prods. "You don't realize how important this is. You might be the only neutral witness to what happened!" He does sound sincere...

    "Please."

**Aegis has posed:**
As the organics would say: Crap! "Witness? Is this an official inquiry now?" asks Aegis, giving Blurr a very direct look in contrast to the avoidance she was using moments ago.

**Blurr has posed:**
Blurr holds up his hands defensively. "Nonono,it'snotofficialnotatall." Yes, he still has that habit of speaking so fast that all his words run together whenever he's pressured or excited or something unexpected happened. "It's just, uh, I just want to hear what you have to say! I think it's important that we listen to other perspectives, to people who aren't necessarily all about this war effort thing. You know? We tend to view everything through the lense of our own bias, and it's not often I get to uhm...hear some insight from someone outside of the military scene."

**Aegis has posed:**
Aegis nods her head very slowly at this. "That does make some sense," she agrees, her tone light...too light. She sighs deeply and then there are a few moments of silence. "Starscream never had a chance to input anything," she finally says.

**Blurr has posed:**
Blurr's optics widen. "Wh-what? What do you mean, he never had a chance to do anything? If he didn't blow the facility then who did?"

**Aegis has posed:**
Aegis folds her hands in her lap. "There were only four of us in that room. And it wasn't me."

**Blurr has posed:**
Suddenly Blurr looks impatient, and grabs her shoulders. "No! Don't play coy with me, Aegis! This isn't a game! Tell me who blew it! Was it Razorclaw, then?!"

**Aegis has posed:**
Aegis winces in pain and tries to pull back. Really, the way he grabbed her shouldn't have been enough for to have such a reaction, but she looks more like she's been assaulted than simply grabbed. Optics wide, she shakes her head. "I'm not being coy," she says. "The planet is in a fragile state. Do you want truth, or do you want to be able to recharge with a calm mind at night?" she asks. "Which has more value to you?"

**Blurr has posed:**
"I want the -truth-." Blurr insists, finally letting go of her. He doesn't seem to have noticed her wince. "I--I was told...well you -know- what I was told."

**Aegis has posed:**
Aegis nods her head once and lowers her voice. "It was the officer with the red chevron on his forehead," she says, neither praising nor condemning the action with her words or tone.

**Blurr has posed:**
"So--so you're saying, it was us?" Blurr stares at her with unbelieving optics. "How can you be so sure?"

**Aegis has posed:**
"I saw him press a button just before the alarms went and the retreat was sounded. That's the only thing that adds up." Aegis shakes her head. "I can't say it was 'you' since I don't know if he was acting on orders or his own intution. You can't own what everyone in your military does," she adds softly.

**Blurr has posed:**
"Heh." Blurr steps back slightly, feigning a distracted look as he looks away for a moment. "Maybe so." When he turns back toward her though, his expression has changed. "But the truth is--we're a pretty good team. You mess with one of us you mess with all of us." Suddenly, his arm goes up and with the quick sound of shifting plates a weapon is being aimed at her.

    "I'm sorry, Aegis. I really am. I seriously wish we'd met under different circumstances but...orders will be orders." And with those words, he fires.

**Aegis has posed:**
GGGGZZZZZKKKKKTTTTT! The volts course over Aegis' body and within seconds she's on her back, staring at the sky. Her optics flicker in and out. If she /is/ a Decepticon sympathizer, she's probably the wussiest one out there by the look of actual pain on her face. It shouldn't have hurt THAT bad; it was just a taze. In fact, her systems didn't actualy recieve any damage. For a few moments she's completely unresponsive.

**Blurr has posed:**
Seriously? It was just a low-power TechVolt, it can't have hurt that badly. Well he know she isn't a fighter, even though the weapon isn't designed to actually do damage.

    Once she's on the ground, he steps closer to her and the weapon on his arm switches around, flipping to something a bit more lethal. She was a shuttle or seeker of some kind right, he had to make sure she didn't just fly away before he could even get a shot off. "Come on, do you seriously not have any struts, lady? Is -this- why you haven't joined up with those scrapheaps yet? I mean it was just a stun blast, no reason to look like you just took a laser to the face." He aims the weapon down toward her face. "Yet." he adds, smirking.

**Aegis has posed:**
Aegis was stunned, not unconscious. The baiting wasn't really helping her mood, and the over-stimulation wasn't helping. "Urg," she says as she gets to her feet. She must seem so slow to Blurr. "There's a story behind it, but now seems like a BAD time to tell it," she murmurs. As uncomfortable as she is, she's quick enough to transform. She has to get out of there before Mr. Mood Swing does too much more damage.

**Blurr has posed:**
It's not a mood swing, honestly! More of pretense, followed by a show of true purpose. Blurr curses when she transforms. He can't let her get away! But he takes a few steps back, not wanting to be caught in the inevitable engine trail. He himself also transforms, his body folding down into a sleek hovercraft speeder. He won't be able to pursue her into the air, but he might be able to stop her from taking off. The former racer aims his weapons at her engines, attempting to prevent her from lifting off.

**Aegis has posed:**
And even in spacecraft mode, that still hurt, and Aegis emits a sound of pain. So much for a nice welcome home. So much for respect. The duplicity hurts as much as the attacks, and it's just as well she doesn't have a face right now. It would seem that the lady does not, in fact, have the struts to do combat. She takes to the skies as soon as possible, leaving Blurr on the ground. Though he will be able to see smoke from where he scored a hit.

The moral of the story? Blurr and space craft don't get along.

**Blurr has posed:**
"Scrap." Blurr curses as Aegis flies away before he can finish her off. Perhaps next time, he needs to bring someone who can fly along. "You spread your lies and you're gonna regret it!" He shouts after her.

**Aegis has posed:**
Aegis doesn't want to tell anyone anything about that incident, lies or the truth. If she lies, she's betraying herself. If she tells the truth, she's probably going to cause other problems, some of which will include a blaster shot in the back. She didn't think she'd start to regret coming home so soon.