Hazards of the Job

++ Nova Cronum ++

The cradle of Cybertronian philosophy, education and research, Nova Cronum boasts the largest population of the Intellectual Class of any polity on the planet. Dome shaped buildings are networked together by a webbing of roadways and bridges. Bronzes, coppers, purples and blue-violet are the   major color scheme of the area, with the architectural structures rising up in corkscrews and clusters of bubble-shapes stuck to spires. Parks, theaters, universities and oratoriums fill the main blocks of the city.

Nova Cronum is host to the impressive Helix gardens, a popular spot for friends to meet and enjoy the scenery. The Stellar Galleries are a central feature, heavily guarded so that its thinkers and philosophers can contemplate in peace. Museums such as the Code Archives and Hall of Ancients can be found here, as well as the best educational facility on the planet: Ultirexx Technoversity.

Having arrived a cycle or so in advance of her meeting with Pharma, Nautica's done her best to tidy up her current workspace. She stands now in her workspace, dusting her hands off with satisfaction. If all of her things /are/ to be relocated to another lab, at least she'll have all of her current projects and notes nicely organized into boxes for the office move. Even Brainstorm's spare weaponry -- half of it unlabeled -- that had crept into her workspace has been stashed in a box (with a convenient 'WARNING! BRAINSTORM PROJECTS, DO \*NOT\* DROP.' label on it) and left in a place where he'll presumably find it when he shows up for work.

Pharma is waiting for Nautica in his office, glancing at the time every now and then as he goes through some new data at the same time. He has to admit to himself, he's pretty excited to start learning more about this polymath fembot. She should be arriving very soon...

With her office finally organized in case, Nautica glances at the time. It's another breem or so before she's supposed to meet with Pharma, but -- well, early is better than late in terms of making a good impression, right? So she sets off down the hall to the doctor's workspace, knocking on the wall beside his door. "Sir? Sorry, I know it isn't quite time to meet up, but I thought I'd check since I'm already here."

Pharma smiles and the door opens. "Nautica. Come in, come in. Yes, might as well come early unless you had something else important to tend to. I think I've almost got your codes ready." He taps something on his workstation. "So we'll head down there as soon as they come through to make sure they work."

"Oh, good," Nautica replies, slipping into the office and settling in to wait. If she can't keep herself from fidgeting, well, being nervous is only to be expected when you're moving to a new project entirely. She finally folds her arms in front of her to keep them more or less motionless. "I wasn't certain if you would need me to move things to another area, or if I should just keep the one next to Brainstorm's for now, so I came in early to make sure everything was organized."

"Oh, you needn't have worried, you'll be given a new workspace down there. If there's something you want to transfer you'll be given the opportunity to do so later." Pharma says with a nod. There's a small beep from the computer and he hands her a small card with a series of codes stored on it. "Now then, shall we make sure the codes work?" He asks, standing up and moving toward the door.

Nautica unfolds her arms, but promptly clasps her right forearm with the left hand. Don't fidget, it's unbecoming. "Of course. I admit, I'm quite curious what other projects you have down there!"

"You'll find out soon enough!" Pharma grins, and ushers her out of the office and into an elevator at the end of the corridor. "Here," he waves a display inside, and directs it to the appropriate level. "See if the codes work."

Taking the card, Nautica enters her code on the display with only minimal hesitation. This elevator /probably/ won't electrocute her or anything; she's one of the researchers, after all, and that would be inconvenient for anyone.

The elevator doesn't electrocute her, no. This would be an inconvenient place for her to stasis lock, after all. It blips its confirmation of her access codes, and quickly moves down. The doors slide open into the lower floors soon after.

And...well, it might take some effort for Nautica to keep her composure. Because there are definitely -brain modules- moving down a conveyor belt on one side of the room. On the other side are several smaller alcoves where the Insecticons are being kept in their cages. Drones move about, fetching this and that, while other researchers go about poking and prodding the brains and ...other things.

Nautica definitely is given a moment's pause at the sight. Caged insecticons, that she expected; it's why she's here, after all, even if her motives are perhaps not those Pharma thinks they are. But disembodied brain modules -- especially brain modules being actively poked and prodded at -- is not the sort of thing you routinely encounter. And so she hesitates for a long moment, taking in the scene.

"It's very... active," she offers to Pharma finally, with a gesture towards the conveyer belt. "I admit, I didn't quite expect this; I know a bit about the insecticon research, but this seems far beyond the scope of that. Is the rest of this connected to a separate project?"

"Oh, there are quite a few projects going on down here!" Pharma answers, still grinning. He walks over to a table and picks up a datapad. "Here, this is the 'EMF dictionary', if you will, that I've been working on compiling. It's quite fascinating; actually, I've been observing the fields and finding that there are actually glyphs of sorts hidden in the fluctuation patterns. I've managed to spell out a few, but I haven't been able to figure out how to put together anything remotely coherent with what I have." He hands her the datapad. "I'm no linguist, but since you seem to excel at, well -everything-, I thought maybe you could come up with something?"

"I don't know that I /excel/ at everything; I'm just a very effective generalist," Nautica corrects, though it's unclear whether she believes it or it's simple humility. Her attention is drawn quite quickly to the datapad that Pharma holds up, however, and she takes it with perhaps a bit of glee, quickly paging through the file he has. "So it definitely is a language -- distinct 'sounds', even if they're not audio -- rather than raw concepts? In some ways, that might be easier to work with, since there's more in common with our own language."

Pharma nods. "In a way, yes." He watches her page through the file for a breem or so. "So what do you make of it?" he asks finally.

"Well," Nautica says finally, copying the data off for herself. "It's a bit early to say; I'd need more samples of the actual wavespeech conversations. But, if you look /here/..." She indicates one sample in the dataset. "...and here..." Another. "You can see half of the signal is the same. And then the differing part is repeated /here/, in this other one. Moreover, this last part here seems to mark an interrogative statement. So, since since you've marked this one glyph as likely meaning 'hungry'..."

The Camien femme quickly taps a few things in on the datapad, marking the first one as probably 'This one is/I am \_\_\_\_,' the second one as 'This one is/I am hungry', and the third one as 'Is that one/Are you hungry?' She hands the datapad back to Pharma, and then adds, "Of course, this is just a rough guess. With more data, I'm sure it would be easier to piece together."

"Huh. Just like that." Pharma peers at the datapad, then smiles. "Ha, brilliant!" He claps his hands once. "You really are quite talented, Nautica. I am quite impressed. But, I'm assuming you'll want to see the live specimens themselves, yes?" The doctor asks, gesturing toward the rooms where the Insecticon cages are.

"Of course," Nautica replies with a nod to Pharma. "I've already seen one or two of them, after all." She pauses, however, to glance back at the rest of the workspace. "Though... I admit, I am very curious what the brain modules are about. That seems to be an awful lot of them."

Within the insecticon enclosures Shrapnel's head jerks around as one again sparks fly across his form. For the moment he seems to be sitting down, staring at the latest bit of scrap given to him. While in his processor he thinks of the energon given to him some time ago by the flyer along with the offer Kickback translated to him.

Pharma chuckles, sounding somewhat sinister again. "Oh, you'll find out soon enough, don't worry! But I figured you'd want to see the Insecticons first, since that's what you asked about specifically." He heads into a smaller alcove on the other side of the room from the conveyor belt full of brain modules. Inside is a workstation with three holopanel displays showing various readings as well as three separate enclosures with containment fields around them where the Insecticons are being kept. There are also a couple of berths that are faintly stained with fuel and have open restraints on them. She can only guess what -those- had been used for...

Inside the cursed halls of the surface dweller's institution, a lone Warper managed to survive the rather extensive experimentation brought forth by the sadists that had the gull to call themselves intellectuals. Bombshell couldn't help but find these individuals amusing, they try in their petty ways to prove that the gifts of the Insecticon race were nothing more than primal innovations to help the primitive race survive in the depths of Cybertron's body. It was this petty miscalculation that lead Bombshell to believe that his brothers would rise, he knew his shackles would one day be placed upon his captors but for now he was forced to wait. Impatience had taken it's toll on the rather bulky creature as he stood before the edge of his cage, his clawed servos snapping back and forth and his shimmering red optics darting from one point of interest to another.

The sight of the fuel-stained berths definitely cause a tension in Nautica's expression, but at least /that/ part doesn't surprise her. The brain modules were unexpected, but she already knew that the insecticons were being studied. She can't help but glance at each of the enclosures, looking at the two insecticons she already knows in particular. She does watch the trio curiously now; with the prototype wavespeech module she implanted in herself before work, in /theory/ she should be able to hear them talk among themselves. Even if she probably cannot -- yet -- understand them easily, or speak to them in return.

"Beautiful, aren't they?" Pharma says proudly. Not of them, but more of himself for getting ahold of them. He sits down at the workstation. "We've been learning so much about them. One of these cycles, we're going to crack open their secrets--and it's going to change -everything-. No more energon shortages, Nautica! No more Empties, no more rioting, no more terrorists." he exclaims, looking excited. "Just think about it. When all of this comes to fruition, it -will- change the world."

Shrapnel looks up as Pharma makes his way in, his face twisting into a scowl. Course unlike Kickback he doesn't speak with his mouth. He also notices Nautica but instead looks towards Bombshell and emits though wave <<Here comes the annoying one again, again.>>

"I have no doubt," Nautica replies quietly. It's not that she can't see what Pharma's attempting to do in solving the shortages; she just doesn't believe the end justifies the means, not when it involves vivisection of sentient bots. But if she's to make a difference here, she has to hide her unease and work with the doctor. Shrapnel's comment, however, earns a curious glance... almost as if the Camien could /hear/ him, this time. "I did prepare two sensor packs that can be fed to one of them, if you wanted to perform that test now? Otherwise, I suppose I should familiarize myself with the records."

With tired optics Bombshell looked over Pharma, he didn't like that one, not one bit. As soon as Shrapnel communicated Bombshell looked towards his brother's enclosure. <<The other one, she is new, intelligent, I sense it. Her mind is powerful, useful, I want it.>> and with that the questionably sane insecticon brought his gaze to Nautica, luckily for the ones outside the cage Bombshell was in no rush to show he still retained his mental weaponry. Whatever the two were speaking of it was not good but there was pity in Nautica, Bombshell could feel it and if it was profound enough, he would certainly use it.

Pharma smiles. "Of course. Go right ahead." He says, waving a hand toward the cages. "Whatever tests you want to run you're free to do so whenever."

<<She's the one that gave me energon, gon. But not going to stop if you want her, her. The other I'd kill now if I could.>> Shrapnel replies as he stares at the two outside the cells.

As Bombshell speaks to Shrapnel, Nautica's optics shift to glance his way as well. She still can't decipher most of the wavespeech, but between the dictionary and her own mental acuity, she's already beginning to build up some vocabulary to refer to. It would be easier with Kickback awake to help, especially without Pharma present. "Is there a workstation I should use down here? I'll bind the sensor packages to that, so I can see the output." She doesn't ask about the brain modules again -- not yet, anyway -- though she's quite plainly still curious. And perhaps a bit wary.

The doctor nods. "Yes, of course." Pharma stands up and motions toward the seat in front of it. "You can use this one if you'd like." He moves away from it and leans against the stained berths with his arms crossed.

Nodding at his brother's comments Bombshell continued observation of Nautica, deciding the best way to go about assimilating her into his hive mind.

Shrapnel seems to have calmed down as the sparks coursing over his body lessen. He continues to remain seated as he watches the scientists.

"So, what /are/ some of the other projects down here? More work focused on the energon shortages?" While she waits for Pharma to answer, Nautica powers on the workstation and quickly pairs it with the four sensor packages she produces. Each package is suspended in a small globe of what appears to be energon, perhaps because as a limited power source, or to make it more palatable for the subject.

After a few test readings, the Camien makes her way over to Shrapnel's cage with one of the little globes in her hand. "Hey... I've got something for you," she notes towards the electric bug. "It'd really help me if you ate this." Because, you know, if you do, it's a noninvasive way of investigating, instead of letting Pharma take you apart (again)... not that Nautica's going to say that part /aloud/.

Tilting his head at the femme, Shrapnel studies the orb before taking it. He doesn't immediately consume it as he glances to where Kickback would be if he were awake. But this time around he doesn't consult either of his brothers as he eats the energon orb.

Bombshell, who watched with horror as Nautica handed his brother something that he was yet to see the effects of elicited from him a heavy "No Shrapnel!" in the Cybertronian standard. Upon realizing his slight mishap, he moved back to his more affluent form of dialogue <<Fool, we cannot trust their foods, they wish to find out our species' secrets my dear Brother, this cannot be allowed.>> and with that he returned to silence, after all, he had nothing to say to his captors and hopefully, Shrapnel had something in mind that would set back their research.

"Oh, yes, the other projects." Pharma nods, smiling as he watches her feed Shrapnel the sensor package. "You see, Nautica," he begins, starting to move casually around the room as he holds his hands behind his back. "There is a small subset of the Cybertronian population who are...special in various ways. They often have unique abilities or talents, like creating magnetic levitation fields, projecting thoughts and/or emotions, changing appearances to -anything-, or even just being -good- at everything, able to learn at an incredibly rapid rate." That last one sure sounds like Nautica, doesn't it? He stops momentarily near the end of one of the berths and reaches subtly into a compartment under the work space, drawing out what looks like a miniaturized E.D.K TechVolt--an electron diffraction beam, before continuing past.

"Here, we've set out to discover what it is that grants these -very- special individuals with such unique gifts. Is it their bodies, or their processors? Is it both? Is it their very -sparks-?" He comes to a stop, standing directly behind her, with the TechVolt in his hand at his side.

Nautica watches Shrapnel take the sensor package. She's prepared to turn back to the workstation to check the readings, but then... /Bombshell/ talks. So far as Nautica knew, of all the insecticons, only Kickback had yet managed to learn to speak Cybertronian standard. She stares at the new bug for a moment, a mixture of surprise and -- pleasure? Relief? -- though she doesn't ask him any questions aloud. Unfortunately for her, this means her attention remains on the insecticon, rather than Pharma's advance.

Then Pharma's questions sink in, and there's that faint tension to Nautica's posture once again. "I've heard rumors about that," she allows, hesitantly, carefully not turning. Not letting Pharma see her expression yet; she doesn't want to give it away. The insecticons, however, can certainly see her growing unease. "Are you saying those brain modules are from bots... like that?"

Shrapnel's head snaps towards Bombshell as he yells out in mouth speak spitting out the energon as he had yet to fully swallow it. Glancing from his brother he looks towards Nautica and Pharma as he emits <<What is the mech doing, doing? Is he betraying her, her?>>

Bombshell looks to Shrapnel and as quickly as possible begins his invisible assault upon the distracted Pharma, reaching the tendrils of his own mind deep into Pharma's own, copying countless files, entire centuries worth of experience but it didn't stop there for Bombshell kept close the primary functions of his foe. <<Shrapnel, I leave it in your servos, shall I help this Nautica or do I allow the Mech to have his fun and save my connection for a later time?>> he trusted his brother would make the right choice.

<<Kickback would say help, help. But he too worried about his queen, queen.>> Shrapnel replies. He thinks about how Nautica was nice to him before but also recalls his handlers from the scrapyard. Glancing to Bombshell he finally adds <<Save for later, later. He may keep her alive, alive.>>

After the deed was done Bombshell disconnected, the massive influx of data from copied files forced him to a partial recharge, shutting down some minor functions in a desperate attempt to calculate and store all the copied files.

Nautica's still working to piece together wavespeech now that she can hear it. She's starting to pick up bits and pieces already, and Pharma's dataset helped give her a boostrap, but it's still not enough to get all that much. Still, it's enough that Shrapnel's talk of 'betrayal' as he glances her way, causes her to whirl and face Pharma... but likely far too late to do much. She's cornered against the cage, after all, and that TechVolt's ready to hand. "What...?"

Indeed, unfortunately for Nautica, it's too little, too late. Even though Bombshell's small-scale invasion of Pharma's mind distracts him slightly, he still remains focused on Nautica. He will have to...deal with Bombshell later. Right now he has other things to concern himself with.

So before the Camien can react much further, he fires the EDK at her. It's a smaller, low-power version of the real thing that serves as a stun weapon for the most part. Yes, he definitely wants her -alive-. He shakes his head, sighing. "Oh I don't think you understand. It's such a shame, you know, for as brilliant as you are, you don't even realize that *you're* one of those *special people*."

"Don't! I'm not..." But whatever Nautica was going to say in protest, the rest of her sentence is lost to a scream when Pharma hits her with the TechVolt. Strangely -- at least from the point of view of the prisoners -- the scream is more than just audible; the Camien involuntarily screams in /wavespeech/ as well, audible only to the insecticons. And then she's down, stasis-locked and at Pharma's mercy.

Shrapnel almost cringes at the scream but doesn't react as he watches what happens. Glancing to his brother he says nothing as he decides to rest.

As soon as Nautica goes down, that self-satisfied smirk creeps onto Pharma's face again. He picks her up and hauls her onto one of the berths, locking the restraints onto her arms and legs. You know, just in case she wakes up during the implant procedure. Oh yes, you know that tracker he was talking about putting into the Insecticons? The one that would monitor all their systems, watch their every move? Yes, that one...