[Video - Transmission from Alpha Trion's Temple]

[symmetriphiliac]

[The feed flicks on to reveal a rather furious looking boy with three white stripes on the left side of his hair, his unnatural gold eyes glowering at the camera. His chest is heaving as he struggles to restrain himself; if looks could kill, then the device would be dead five times over.]

Is this someone's sick idea of a joke?! How could anyone possibly think of doing something so twisted?!

[Of course, he must be referring to his appearance on Cybertron. Not hours earlier, he had been in Death City, speaking to his fellow classmates... It would only make sense for him to be so incensed, having been whisked away to a foreign planet!]

This marking on my shoulder! Why is there only one?! It's completely asymmetrical!

[... Or not. Even without the glyph directly visible, the very idea that he could be marked in such an unbalanced, terrible way... His skin should have rejected the ink to begin with!]

I demand to speak to the ones responsible for this atrocity!

Comments

[skidaddle]

Looks good on you, I think.

Then again, humans don't get a lot of natural paint to work with so any little bit helps.

[Hello.]

[symmetriphiliac]

It disgusts me! Who would ever think that such a lop-sided symbol was acceptable?!

I need a second mark! My balance is completely off! I can't concentrate at all...

[He shakes his head, trying to shove away the intrusive thoughts. It was still bothering him.]

I'm not human. As a God of Death, my skin should be resistant to inks and dyes. I don't yet fully understand the nature of the symbol, but it's no ordinary tattoo.

[Still bothering him.

It was sobering to think that the First Forged had that kind of power. Perhaps tattoos weren't impressive to some, but the fact that they'd managed to override his natural immunity (and throw off his symmetry) was worrisome, to say the least.




Still. Bothering. Him.]

[skidaddle]

Look, plenty of us have these 'lop sided symbols,' [He shows off his own] and we haven't died yet. Mine even matches my paint scheme.

[It's all blue like he is.]

...

You.

You are a what now?

[Skids is sure his translator did not translate that right.]

Well, they don't come off in hot water and soap, so...no. You're right there. If they were that simple, they probably wouldn't be effective at the 'protection' they're meant to provide.

[There may actually be airquotes around 'protection,' because Skids hasn't seen enough to believe in it yet.]

[symmetriphiliac]

[That doesn't help. Kid grinds his teeth, glaring at the symbol. Mechanical frames allowed for such exact, perfect symmetry... To have it be marred by such a thing...]

Disgusting. Are these First Forged from some sort of Disorganized City? How can they stand it?!

[Deep breaths. Nope, still bothering him.]

A God of Death. My name is Death the Kid, son of Lord Death. You may call me 'Kid', however - most do.

I had been told that they were meant to represent some form of ownership. What sort of protection are they meant to provide?

[skidaddle]

They're from Cybertron, which you're on right now. From what I can tell, they built the place.

They don't have these marks on them, though.

[Calm down kid, its okay. Er. Kid. With a capital 'K'. That must be a confusing name.]

I'm not entirely sure. When I went with Megatronus to fight the monsters, he was able to give everyone extra powers to help them out.

There's more to it than that, though. [His tone gets more serious--its theory time.] After arriving, I was asked multiple times to see my Glyph. Apparently, not having one means you go crazy or something.

Anyway, there's a reason why everyone around has got one.

[symmetriphiliac]

[Rubbing at his shoulder, he tried to organize the facts in his head. Organizing would help. Precise, orderly...]

A few of the others on this network have mentioned something about the madness. If they wanted to protect us, they could at least do so with balanced, symmetrical glyphs!

If the FirstForged were able to build this place, are they at least working on a way to return us to our proper worlds? From the sounds of it, the threat to those being brought here is too high to waste time.

[They may not have been souls from the planet he was familiar with, but it wouldn't stop him from caring for them. If just being here risked the spread of madness, then he would do whatever it took to get them back where they belonged.]

[skidaddle]

[Skids stares down at his glyph for a moment, trying to imagine it symmetrical.]

Our language doesn't work like that. Does yours?

[He's only seen earth-languages written out a few times--such as on the package of permanent markers he'd used to bet.]

I think they are. Everyone is pretty focused on the big tear in the sky, and from what I've heard it causes all sorts of problems to spew forth, which slows down the process.
In the mean-time, the rest of us are doing what we can to keep each other safe.

I even got put on the law committee, which sounds like the most excting job in the world doesn't it?

1/3

[symmetriphiliac]

N-No, I meant that there should be one on the other side! One on each shoulder, so they'd be balanced!

[Letters weren't all symmetrical. Well, they could have been, with some work. If it were possible to alter the glyph-]

2/3

[symmetriphiliac]

3/3

[symmetriphiliac]

[Yep. Still bothering him.]

I would assume that no one knows what caused the rift then?

Still, it sounds like everyone is at least organized. If I can be of any assistance to the law committee, I'd like to lend a hand. I won't allow any harm to come to the souls on this planet.

[Well, so long as it was within his power. He was unarmed and unable to reach his father. He was capable, but he was still young - he had his limits.]

3/3

[skidaddle]

I'd tell you to draw one on, but you already said your skin can't take dyes. Maybe you can make a patch for your, uh...what's that stuff called again? Your clothing?

[It's either 'clothing' or 'dress' and so far he's only seen Vandal in a dress.]

I've heard rumors that it's Unicron. Got one of those in your universe? God of chaos and destruction?

Either way, the application is here.

[He sends along the file.]

Re: 3/3

[symmetriphiliac]

It wouldn't be the same. If it were to ever glow, it would be completely different...

Not to my knowledge - however, given that I had not heard of Cybertron prior to my arrival here, that's not surprising. If Cybertron is far from Earth, it's possible that both the planet and Unicron exist in my universe without our realizing.

[He pauses for a moment, thinking on the similarities between Unicron and the recently awakened demon god in his own universe. They were by no means identical, but the timing was difficult to ignore.]

Thank you. I'll definitely be looking into it.

[skidaddle]

So what would make you happy, then?

[Because it looks like you might be stuck.]

That theory is sound. We get a lot of humans and Earth-folk through here so there's probably some connection, but not everyone is on the same page as far as sentient robots go so who knows.

He's a threat here, and we're here, so looks like we'll be dealing with it either way.

[He sees that pause, but doesn't press it.]