The Nearest Thing

[Jasper Stoneham]

The silence all but shouts out the answer Jetfire had suspected, and he shifts to lean more heavily upon his cane. "Not everyone has the spark to be a Prime, lad, otherwise we wouldn't even need them," he remarks evenly. Perhaps that's why that little "robot civil war" had gotten so out of hand once the Primes had fallen protecting the Matrix: good leaders they'd had in plenty, but a good leader just doesn't have quite the same... presence as a true Prime.

Or the strength to stand against the Fallen.

"You're not melted into slag, or missing your spark, or twisted into an oxidizing heap, unlike my wreched self, so obviously you survived it. One assumes they did as well, aye?"

[Ultra Magnus]

Oh, Ultra Magnus knows all too well that not everyone can be Prime. He learned it in every disappointed stare sent sidelong his way, in every half-hearted cheer masked by relief, in every dismayed murmur shielded behind hands. They wanted Prime; they got Magnus instead.

"We survived long past the Fallen," he says quietly. "A very long time." Quickly, before he can dwell further on it or suffer more questions, he adds, "But it takes more than a little chaos to stop us." He straightens up, forces the pensiveness from his expression, and turns back to Jetfire. "Do you need to make another run?"

[Jasper Stoneham]

"Oh, eventually," Jetfire replies casually. "Possibly a couple more. But a refuel would be nice before I go diving back down into that sludge they call an atmosphere. Haven't seen anything that thick since I investigated that gas giant with the atmospheric sea in the Lyran Sector. Faugh, what a miserable mess that was. Was prying sludge out of my intakes for months after that," he rambles amicably, not even pausing as he continues.

"So, do you hate him so much because he wasn't there for them, or for you?"

[Ultra Magnus]

Optics narrow and brighten to slits of laser-bright crimson and Ultra Magnus stiffens at that question.

"I'll see about that refuel you mentioned," he says instead of answering, voice almost too casual, at odds with his posture as he turns on one heel. He'll even see to it personally – a courtesy no-one back home, not even Optimus Prime himself, can claim to have received from him. Not that it means much of anything.

[Jasper Stoneham]

"Hm." Nothing more to say to that so obvious evasion but that single hummed syllable. Just hm, and narrowed optics watching Magnus as the white mech stalks across the hanger bay to fetch a cube kept on hand for the space and flight mechs returning from their missions.

Magnus's response honestly hadn't surprised the spiky Seeker. There's definite anger there. A festering anger that borders on rage but doesn't quite cross into loathing. Not for the Prime, at least. Not quite. But there's definitely an unhealthy rot in that anger, and a sharp fierceness that speaks of something... something that Jetfire can't quite put his finger on, but feels so familiar.

He's quiet as Magnus approaches with his ration in hand, and takes the offered cube with a nod of thanks, downing half of it in a single, large gulp.

"What was he to you? More than a Commander, obviously. A mentor? A father? A brother?" he guesses, watching that shuttered expression closely.

---

ooc: posing of Magnus done with permission.

[Ultra Magnus]

Though the stiffness never really left him, it surges back at the continued questions and Ultra Magnus turns cold, stepping fully away from Jetfire to work on sorting the loads of parts into a more compact arrangement, making more room for the salvage runs still to come. He feels none of this is really the elder's business, but he isn't sure how much of that is the strange, disproportionate anger that still catches him unaware now and again. Magnus also reminds himself that hiding things won't help prove his contrition.

Sharing too much, however, makes him just as suspicious.

"…Optimus Prime is my brother," he finally, grudgingly explains without looking up from his task.

[Jasper Stoneham]

"A Brother?" Despite the correctness of the guess, Jetfire is still a bit surprised. "And you're not a Prime as well?" After all, that's how it works where he's from!

[Ultra Magnus]

"No," Magnus says very, very quietly, hands going still. "No… I'm not." And it was a lesson learned in a storm of pain, fear, and second guesses. He's a capable soldier; he was once considered ultimately trustworthy and loyal. Not so any more.

He was never – will never be – a leader.

[Jasper Stoneham]

The pain is a palpable thing to the Seeker, even from halfway across the bay. Jetfire remains silent for a few long moments, just watching Magnus with slitted red optics before he finally speaks again.

"As a Seeker, it was my duty to find suns with no planets, or with lifeless planets. Suns to harvest for energon to bring back to Cybertron, back to the Primes who ruled our world in a council. That was the unbreakable edict, though - never to harm a world with life, so decreed the Primes."

"I've lost count of the worlds I've seen, of the suns and systems I've visted. Lost count, even, of the stars I and mine helped to harvest, snuffing their light out forever. Never bothered me then. S'how it was done, you know."

"I've traveled very far, criss-crossed the void countless times. Found living worlds time and time again. I'd re-visit them when I could. Perhaps I shouldn't have. Perhaps if I hadn't seen time after time how those living worlds would be damaged and destroyed by their own people, see how their own inhabitants wasted them while Cybertron grasped for every crumb of energon, I wouldn't have listened so eagerly to the Fallen."

He pauses, downing the second half of his cube, and then squeezing it to disperse the containment. "He was once a Prime, as well. Strongest of the council. By the time I'd found Earth, he'd convinced me that the fleshlings would just destroy their world eventually, anyway, so why spare them when Cybertron so badly needed the energy that the fleshlings were squandering? Allspark forgive me, but I listened, and stood by while he tried to convince the other Primes."

"Too many years alone, lad. Too long in the void, though I'm not excusing it. I was a fool, and in the end, The Fallen betrayed us all. Goaded my people into a war that still rages, a war that has killed the very world we were trying to save. Cybertron is dead, or so I'm told. The Fallen abandoned us on that flesh-infested mudball to die, and the Allspark is destroyed."

He heaves a sigh, parts clattering to the decking below from his aged frame. "Not arrogant enough to think that I could have stopped him alone. Not arrogant enough to think that I could have even made a single difference if I'd followed my Primes' edict instead of doing what I'd come to believe would be best for Cybertron. I'm no Prime, just a Seeker, one who was old even then. I made a mistake, and if not me, there would have been others to do the Fallen's work. Doesn't make it right, though."

"That's still up to me. To make it right."

"Anger's a poison, lad. It simmers inside and eats you away. Eats you away and makes more of itself until there's nothing left but it and despair."

"So many years alone, hating the Fallen for abandoning me on that mudball. So many years wasted on hate, oxidizing and dying, instead of making things right. Took a long time to see how pointless it was, wallowing in all that hate."

"I'd have died trying to kill the Fallen once. Now? Think I'll go on living just t' spite him. Besides... if what the fleshling lad said is true, I think I may finally have a way to help make things right."

"Don't make my mistakes, lad. Don't covet that anger until there's nothing left. Don't waste those years. Flush the poison, lad. There's those what would listen."

Now would be the perfect time for a dramatic transform and jet back to Pz-Zazz, leaving Magnus to ponder his words. Alas, Jetfire is too old for that crap, and, instead, hobbles himself over to a good launch position, and prepares to transform in a much less dramatic fashion.

[Ultra Magnus]

Once again, Ultra Magnus doesn't answer Jetfire. He works in silence, listening to the old Seeker lecture, then shift across the deck, and finds he can't think of a way to respond. There are too many days where he isn't sure any more just whom he's angry with – or with whom he's angriest. Probably himself, he thinks while he secures the cargo.

There may be willing ears, but Magnus may not be up to baring more of the twisted wretch inside simply to find them.

[Jasper Stoneham]

Jetfire sighs; he'd hoped for... He isn't even sure what he'd hoped for, actually. A response, a reaction, something. Anything, really. First time he'd actually bothered admitting some of that out loud. Words are power.

It's all well and good to decide on a truth for yourself inside, and inside is really where it actually matters, and not the words you say... But saying those words gives them substance. makes them real, and those things you thought you'd decided inside become so much more concrete and hold so much more power when they're said outside for someone else. A witness. You can't take them back anymore, because they're real, and not just thoughts.

Inside's where they count, but it doesn't do a damn bit of good if they're stuck inside, and you can pretend that they don't exist when they're inconvenient for you. When you're the only witness, it's just too easy to lie, even to yourself, because they aren't real yet, even if they do exist where it counts. Once they're real, though...

Well, then it's impossible to hide any longer.

And maybe Magnus isn't the only one half-heartedly dreaming of some sort of forgiveness and redemption.

But the words... they're real now, finally, and Jetfire can't hide from them any longer, even if he wasn't really inclined to - he thinks - to begin with.

The old jet, though, hates that it hurts a little that Magnus wouldn't allow himself to see beyond his own hurt to... to at least acknowledge the admission the old jet had made.


"Bah. S'not about you, you wretched old fart," he mutters to himself as he steps between the still open bay doors. The scrape of his splayed toes pushing him back out into space to transform probably covers his final muttered, "Get over yourself," before he engages his thrusters and clears a vector back to the spaceport dirtside.

[Optimus Prime]

Flying Autobots. Optimus still has a hard time coming to terms with it. After some sparring on the Horizon he meandered about the shuttle until he found staring at Jetfire leaving, and continues to do so before remembering there is someone else in here.

"Ah. Ultra Magnus. Sir." Optimus offers a crisp salute, meant with the deepest respect.

...did he forget to open his mouthplate after combat training again?

[Ultra Magnus]

Jetfire leaves finally and in a way, Ultra Magnus regrets keeping his silence. He assumes the old flier was only trying to offer some sort of help, after all. At the same time, however, Jetfire – no-one here – deserves to have Magnus rant at them until he passes out of exhaustion. With a shake of his head, he curses quietly and pulls one of the securing straps tighter. He has come to the conclusion that he died in that corridor in New Iacon. He died and this place is Hell. First Shockwave, then Micromasters, and now….

He looks up from his busy work when he hears footsteps on the deck, wondering who else has shown up to help with the unloading, and almost instantly, he wishes he hadn't. There are differences, of course, and those differences are manifold, but the resemblance that may only be in Magnus's mind is no less haunting.

"You don't have to do that," he says once he can trust his voice to remain level. He looks back at the work in front of him and stifles a sigh. "I don't out-rank you."

[Optimus Prime]

But... but.. you're a Magnus!

Optimus' faceplate retracts and he falls at ease. "Sorry. Old habits."

After an awkward pause, Optimus enquires, "Is... something the matter?"

[Ultra Magnus]

Ultra Magnus will never get used to his own name being a rank somewhere. It's as ludicrous as "Prime" being a name.

"No," he lies automatically. "Just making sure this is tied down securely. And waiting on the next batch." Magnus, cargo worker. He looks up, but at the bulkhead just above the load. "What brings you down here?" he asks at length. The voice is different than he remembers; it helps.