gone_byebye | (no subject)

By the time the mech steps out into the alley, he's tall enough to look into the second-story windows. "Yeah, there's plenty of room," says Bob, and in a matter of seconds the robot has become a vintage Corvette race car.

Ray can't help but grin at that. "I never get tired of watching that happen," he says. "Okay, this way-"

Not that there's any way out of the alley except one. Also? There's a sudden, startled radio signal from inside the Firehouse. Who's there?

The Corvette, which had been easing its way toward the street, stops abruptly. Bob hadn't been expecting that at all.

Ecto? he signals back, hesitantly. It's me, Bob.

!! is most of the car's response before a horn honks once inside the Firehouse. Ray winces a little; he's pretty sure Janine won't be happy about that. "Come on around front," he says. "We might as well make it easier on people's ears."

"On it." The Corvette surges forward, rounds the corner (fortunately, traffic is light at the moment), and pulls up into the Firehouse proper.

Bob has been here before, but only as a file on a hard disk. He's never actually seen the Firehouse until now.

"Nice place you got here."

"Yeah, we like it," says Ray.

Ecto, for her part, is bouncing a little on her wheels. "Holy Heisenberg! Bob? Is that really you? How did you manage? You actually got a real live physical body?"

"Yeah, it's me. It was an accident, actually." The Corvette sounds embarrassed. "Optimus and Ratchet were working on a way to make it so I can use an Autobot body to get around in User-space, but it worked a little too well, 'cuz now I can't get back out again."

"Oh, oog," says Ecto. Ray moves around both cars to go and have a word with Janine. "Well, at least you got a good shape. Are you doing okay? I know it's really weird to wind up in the wrong body."

"I'm doing pretty well, I think," says the Corvette. "The size difference is freaky, though. All of a sudden everyone only comes up to my thigh."

"It's always been like that for me," Ecto confides. "Ever since I could stand up, anyway. "You might find it a little easier to deal with things if you borrowed some of Francis' senses. He lets me copy his audio and visual inputs if I need to go somewhere that's too small for me to fit."

"Really?" The Corvette sounds intrigued. "How does that work?"

"A little bit like this. Can you open some of your data ports for me? I'll pass you the relevant frequencies, but you need to prioritize your processor threads in the right order, otherwise your chips start railing and that's a real pain."

"Sure, hang on..."

This is one of the stranger aspects of the change, from Bob's perspective. Instead of being a part of a larger system, he is a system unto itself--a system an order of magnitude more complex than anything that exists back in his own world. Making data ports accessible is as simple and natural as opening his eyes.

"There. Ports 1025 through 1088 are open, is that enough?"

"That'll do just fine," says Ecto, and begins the procedural transmission. It's really a very simple connection to make, like she said. The tough part is assimilating the data properly and not getting lost in it, or pulling it in incorrectly.

"Francis is upstairs at the moment. If you follow that sequence, you'll be able to see through his optics as he comes down."

Bob does as instructed, and sure enough, the signal he gets back translates easily to sight.

Francis is, in fact, in the main bunkroom, playing with something. It's hard to see what it is until he tosses it across the room- a knotted rope of some kind that seems to stick under the chin just out of sight when he picks it up. A moment after, though, he responds to Ecto's quiet whistle and takka-takka-takkas into the hallway, then down the stairs- which means Bob gets a view of both Ecto and himself from the dog's POV.

"...Cool," says Bob after a moment. "Weird, but cool."

He should just be grateful that he doesn't have an inner ear and therefore can't get motion sickness.

"Yeah. It's a little strange, but you get used to it if it means you get to visit places like the library or the museum or upstairs or something," Ecto says. "You should totally get yourself a drone with a video camera and some auds. Maybe a remote speaker, too. Francis can't broadcast so I have to talk to Dad over his cell phone, but as long as you're in that body you're probably gonna need a drone to keep up with the humans."

"Where would I get something like that? If the Autobots had access to tech like that, they'd all be using it."

"Well, Dad got Francis from another timeline at Milliways," Ecto says after some thought. "Dad's fiancee's got K9, but K9 is sapient, so that wouldn't really work either. Maybe somebody can copy Francis for you, or we can get you a smaller device or something to use. There might be something suitable on eBay."

The mun now has an amusing mental image of Bob piloting one of the diagnostic drones from Beast Machines.

"I'll see what I can find. I haven't done any Internet searching yet in Optimus's world..."

"I'll look for something suitable here, too," Ecto promises. "Even if it's something Dad or I have to mod up for you. Not that it's not great to see you in the physical world and all, but I know how weird it is to not be able to do stuff that everyone else around you does as a matter of course."

Edited 2008-02-04 06:29 (UTC)

"And to be able to do stuff that no one else around you can," the Corvette murmurs.

"That too," says Ecto matter-of-factly. "Uncle Peter thought I was a freak for years because I can talk and think for myself, and he only got worse about it when I turned out to be able to transform. You just have to let it slide off like water on wax. People'll get used to you eventually, if they're really decent people."

"...no offense, Ecto, but I'm hoping I'll be back to normal before that becomes an issue for me."

He doesn't particularly mind this body, but the prospect of being stuck in it for months or years--or forever--is frightening, to say the least.

Edited 2008-02-04 06:58 (UTC)