Page 10 of 16

Posted: Tue Jun 06, 2017 5:46 pm
by Warcry
Dig Site

Furos looked around at the injured and scared Titan Masters on both sides who'd gathered around the rally point, and thought to himself that he really couldn't see much difference in those on either side. As much as he craved the thrill of battle, he had a hard time convincing himself that these Decepticons were worth fighting. After losing their home world to their own follies and spreading out amongst the stars to survive, the old hatreds just didn't burn as brightly as they once had. Surely there were greater enemies out there that they could face down together, as they had with the combiner?

"We did," he told Nightbeat, "but don't let down your guard. There are more incoming and they'll be on top of us soon. We need to get down into the dig tunnels where they can't follow us."

Posted: Sat Jun 10, 2017 11:01 am
by Blackjack
Tunnel

Diac glared at Fracas. A Decepticon. He should stab him in the face, get rid of a problem right now. But with Scourge lurking nearby, he knew that that would be the end of him pretty quickly. On the other hand, he is neither dead, nor bound.

“I’ve seen better days.” Diac told Fracas, offhandedly pressing the side of his helmet to attempt to raise comms again. Still nothing. “So. Tell me. Are we in a truce right now?”
______________________________________

The Trapped Canyon

Perceptor shrugged at Hardhead’s insistence at never being called sir. “Semantics, Hardhead. Semantics. More importantly, I have located the mine site and those in charge. Last I saw them, they were evacuating before the gestalt’s rampage and our temporary truce.” Perceptor frowned. “I did not have much time to talk to them, but it appears that they are hiding something from us. Something that I don’t think we want the Decepticons to find out.”

He frowned, then added: “Where is Prime? Either of them?”

Posted: Sun Jun 11, 2017 7:37 pm
by tahukanuva
Dig Site

Deathsaurus touched ground near Ginrai's point defense, just to the side of Furos, Hardhead, and Nightbeat. They turned towards Hardhead's.. cockpit.. no, his barrel. Hmm. That didn't feel right either. All these eons, and they had neither of Deathsaurus's components had quite worked out which part of a vehicle mode to make eye-contact with. They settled on the cockpit and called over, "Your plan worked well, Hardhead. You have my condolences for it having to be done. I assume we'll speak further below ground." They then stepped off into the gathered crowd to take stock of their Decepticons.


-------------------------------------------


Infinitus slowly brought Sentinel's shuttle form in for a landing towards the edge of the mass of soldiers, then flipped the switches to convert it to train mode. The train clumsily tipped over onto its wheelbase, and Infinitus briefly feared it would pitch him straight out of the cockpit. Manually triggered transformations never did work as smoothly as the real thing.

Posted: Thu Jun 15, 2017 2:56 pm
by Warcry
Dig Site

"Nearby," Hardhead told Perceptor. "The Decepticons rescued him. Allegedly."

Furos piped up. "I'll track him down." Activating his comlink, he said, "Optimus? Diac? Are either of you active?"

"Unfortunately," Hardhead told Perceptor, "the Decepticons already seem to be aware of what is going on. Possibly even more than we ourselves are. If they weren't, why come here? Their acting commander, Deathsaurus, appears to be the honourable sort, but I don't expect much cooperation from him or his people. They are, after all, still Decepticons. We will certainly find reason to fight again before the day is done."

As the Decepticon commander went by, Hardhead acknowledged his words with a nod of his turret (and indeed, the cannon had the greatest concentration of his optical sensors in this mode -- he had to work hard not to "look" directly at anyone lest it be seen as threatening) and said, "You have my thanks for your assistance. As you said, it needed to be done. And I do suspect we'll talk again soon."

Posted: Fri Jun 16, 2017 2:46 am
by Heinrad
Dig Site:


Chromedome rolled up as Sentinel's not terribly smooth landing finished, rolling to a stop near Hardhead. His canopy swung up, revealing the scowl on Stylor's face as he glared at the Autobot's disgraced former leader. Chromedome merely sighed. "Furos? Do you want us to keep watching Sentinel?"

Hot Rod rumbled up next, backing into the bay(for lack of a better term) on Ginrai's left side, as a set of waldoes whirred out, clamping onto the sides of the vehicle mode Autobot, and lifting him into the air as repair arms slid out and started working on the damage from Skullcruncher's bite. His canopy hissed open and Firedrive leapt out, running from his partner.
**********

"We've got a repair bay?" Nightbeat stared, dumbfounded, at the image in the holodisplay, showing a representation of the damage to Hot Rod.

"Kind of," Ginrai's voice echoed out through the speakers. "It's closer to an automated first aid kit. Minor stuff, like torn armor, damaged myomers, maybe a flat tire. His internal repair systems will have to deal with the damage to his ankle servos and the jet boosters."

"What about us Titan Master types?"

"Not much I can do for them, sadly. There was talk, from what Pyro said, of installing some CR chambers, but they would have been too big a drain on my power supply."

"So having them drag either Optimus or Megatron, or Diac and Doomshot, out here to have you try to repair then would be pointless."

"Yes. Sorry."

Nightbeat shrugged. "Not your fault." He looked through the display at Furos. "Should we start getting the rest of everybody inside the tunnels?"

Posted: Mon Jul 24, 2017 1:41 am
by Selkadoom
The Tunnel

Fracas snickered at the look he got from Diac before offering the fellow minibot an energon goodie he had ferreted away "Considering how me and Scourge saved you and Prime I would certainly hope so. Otherwise we would have just lost the war for our side." he laughed unphased by the whole situatuion. That was not to say his partner was. Scourge had a very sour look on his face as he watched the targetmaster needle and rib the enemies partner.

________________________________________________________________________

Brainstorm just sat quietly against the wall, isolating himself a bit as he felt the need to properly think on the whole situation. He was slowly coming to terms with what had happened to the gestalt. It was cruel and painful but ultimately a necessary evil. Granted it was far from the quick death he expected, but he had granted them a final peace after eons of suffering as a mindless beast.

Teslor was equally torn by the whole situation but inwardly he was glad. The apparently sociopathic scientist did deep inside have a soft and caring side about how he designed the weapons he sent to be used on other cybertronians.

________________________________________________________________________

Sub-Orbit

Starscream had just managed to make the jump from atmosphere to the outer reaches of Cybertrons gravity as he began to ping the Decepticon ship.

"Come in! This is Starscream, requesting that you open a hatch so that I can board."

Posted: Wed Jul 26, 2017 3:13 am
by Heinrad
Battlestation Ginrai:


Nightbeat watched the holodisplay, seemingly fascinated by the repair systems working on Hot Rod. And keeping an unobtrusive optic on the small form huddled in the back area of what he'd come to think of as the command deck.

Okay, short of spending his time locked in Ginrai's cab as either a head or just sitting in the driver's seat, this was the only deck there was. But he was still calling it the command deck. He leaned back in the command throne, slowly spinning around to face the huddled form of Firedrive. "You okay, kid?"

Firedrive kept his face buried in his hands, horrified at what he was seeing In his mind. The death of Demolition. The savage joy and satisfaction that had surged through his link with Hot Rod. His voice was barely a whisper. "No."

Posted: Tue Aug 01, 2017 5:34 pm
by Warcry
Dig Site

Furos nodded to Stylor. "For now, yes. The situation seems to have calmed down, but he's still a VIP in need of protection."

And a wild card that we can't afford to leave unattended.
__________________________________________

Sub-Orbit

The Nemesis duty officer responded to Starscream, an exasperated tone in his voice. "Air Commander, we're on an exit trajectory with several space-based combiners on our tail. We can't afford to slow down. You'll need to match speeds with us, then get into the cargo airlock."

Posted: Wed Aug 02, 2017 3:40 am
by Heinrad
Battle station Ginrai:

"What happened?"

Firedrive's voice was muffled by his hands. "It's.... Hot Rod...... We helped murder that.... His feeling... For the love of Primus, he's so happy that it's dead......"

Nightbeat sighed, feeling out of his depth. "I wish I could help, but I'm kind of new to this, too. So's Ginrai, but he's.... What, a month?"

Ginrai's voice came over the speakers. "I'm five weeks old. Almost."

Firedrive's hands came away from his face, his gaze now boring into the deck plating. "Want to trade?"

Nightbeat chuckled. "I don't think I'd mesh well with Roddy. I think the only reason this meld has a chance of working is because Ginrai here is so young. The medtechs said my cerebro-cortex is wired up differently, so a more set mind, like Hot Rod's, wouldn't work. And while archaeology isn't my usual job, that vehicle mode your partner has would, believe it or not, probably stand out worse than Ginrai's."

Firedrive looked up at that, remembering the massive red semi rig and grey trailer, then compared it to Hot Rod's sleek styling, not to mention much smaller vehicle mode. "How is that even possible?"

"I'm a detective. Hot Rod won't sit unobtrusively anywhere. Ginrai, I can probably dress up a little. Some dust, dirt.... Maybe a busted headlight."

"Please do not break my headlights."

"I'm just using that as an example. Yes, certain parts of town, you'd really stand out in, but Hot Rod would stand out anywhere."

*******************
Some distance away from the Canyon:

The figure crouched, it's optics trained on the valley that now swarmed with the broken, scavenging wrecks going over what little could be taken from the destruction of Demolition.

It had seen the cause of it's pain. The cause of it's trouble.

And, maybe, it's salvation.

The combiner straightened, it's powerful form largely intact. And from it's vocoder, raspy with disuse, came one word: "Ssssennnntinnnellll....."

Posted: Sat Aug 12, 2017 2:40 pm
by Heinrad
Somewhere........:

Within the cavernous recesses of the dim room, six figures sat at a table. Hanging in the air before them, the images of the battle, first between the Autobots and the Decepticons, then their combined forces against Demolition.

Other than a derisive snort from one of them any time an Autobot appeared on the screen, the six made not a sound until the battle was over, and Demolition's destruction was well and truly finished. The image changed, then, seeming to zoom in on one flying form in particular. That being said, given that shade of orange, it was hard to miss.

"Well? Tactical assessment?" The leader then held up his hand to forestall any comments from the one who'd been snorting. "I think I can guess what yours is."

Before the snorter could speak, another one steepled his fingers before himself. "Most of them, we have files on. Optimus Prime, Megatron, Hardhead- I think I even picked Sixshot and Chromedome out of that mess."

"Geez. I figured they've killed each other by now."

The one with the steepled fingers glared at the one who interrupted him.

"Wow. Sorry, big guy."

He then continued. "Understandably, once Sentinel became far more apparent, we started having a harder time getting information since he started focusing on that one target. We do, however, have a few things to try to figure out-"

"We kill all those damned Autobots, there won't be that much to figure out."

Steepled fingers glared at the Snorter. Snorter glared right back.

Steepled fingers made a motion in the air, and an image of Ginrai appeared, balanced on the skysled that had brought him down from near orbit. "This being one of the things."

Another figure spoke up, this one seeming to blend in with the shadows. "Optimus Prime. How hard is that to figure out?"

Steepled fingers sighed. "Two things. One-" an image of Optimus Prime appeared, fighting with Megatron. "I think we can all agree that this is Optimus. And two-" an image of Ginrai being blasted in the head by Megatron's fusion cannon, followed by this plunge to the ground appeared.

"I could watch that all day, " Snorter chuckled.

"Be that as it may, I don't think we're dealing with two Optimus Primes here. In terms of raw power, he's an even match for us, far more than either Sentinel or Optimus or Megatron. Megatron shooting him in the head may have helped. Except for this." The image changed again, showing Ginrai grappling with Starscream, then rising to his feet and joining in the fray. Steepled fingers looked over at the one who'd interrupted him first. "You've shot enough people in the head. Was he still alive?"

"He sure looked dead to me."

"This brings us to the other concern." Steepled fingers changed the image again, this time showing a zoomed and somewhat grainy image of Doomshot. "Whatever this is."

The leader narrowed his optics. "That looks like........ Huh."

"You've got an idea, Captain?"

He sorted through the images, finding one of Doomshot and his exoarmor. "I think they're like us. Their weapons..... No, wait." He scrolled through more images. Doomshot again, locking into place as Megatron's head. The leader's optics widened. "What the hell....."

"We can pop Autobots heads off all day!"

"Shut up, Gaihawk." Leozak scowled at the image before him, then looked over at Drillhorn. "What are our power reserves at?"

Drillhorn brought up another display, looking at it critically. "Liokaiser's power levels are holding steady at 86%. Sentinel's arrival seems to have focused him a bit more on one particular target, but other than that...."

"Think we can finally get some help in no longer forming Liokaiser?"

Drillhorn shrugged. "I don't know, Jalgar. We've been stuck this way for so long now, we may no longer be able to survive as individual units.

"There's a way to fix this, Drillhorn. And we're going to find it." Leozak smiled. It was not a nice smile. It was a smile that promised pain and suffering. "We're going to capture Sentinel Prime and make them undo this."

Gaihawk laughed. "And I can pop that damned Autobot's head off over and over and over again......"

OOC: Sorry, guys!

Posted: Thu Aug 24, 2017 10:19 am
by Blackjack
Dig Site

Sixshot followed Deathsaurus as they passed Hardhead and the other Autobots. The six-changer glared at any and all Autobots that dared to even look at him, yet make mental note of those who didn't flinch at his gaze. Sixshot knew of his (perhaps too exaggerated, yet not entirely untrue) reputation among both factions, yet he would relish a chance to take stock of any of the Autobots that would be a worthy opponent in the future. To Sixshot's disappointment, Cobaltdome was not around. That was a rare breed, that one.

Chromedome. The part of Sixshot that was Revolver reminded him.

Whatever.

Sixshot kept his hands on the side of his concussion cannons. They were on a truce, and Sixshot will honour that truce. But this will not last very long, and the moment they call it off (and they always call it off) Sixshot will be ready to let loose and murder everyone with a red badge.
________________________________________

"That is troubling news. I do not put much faith in Decepticon honour -- it has always been an unpredictable variable." Perceptor scowled. Yes, the Decepticons probably knew -- or their leaders did. That much was obvious. The reticules on Perceptor's advanced monocle briefly rotated in and out, and the scientist scowled. "My sensors appear to be malfunctioning. Must have been the radiation from the battle with Demoli- with the gestalt combiner."

The scientist folded his arms. Typical. One of their leaders are at the mercy of the Decepticons. The other is off pouting somewhere thanks to his illogical pride. And the two of them are at each other's necks anyway when they're around. Add the whole mess of the dig site, the combiners and whatever secret agenda that the Decepticons are running with the dig site, and Perceptor knew that there were way, way too many wild cards in play.

"How did we end up like this?" Perceptor wondered out loud, and caught himself, scowling. Emotional responses. Rhetorical questions. Not productive. Remnant of the old Perceptor. He shook his head slightly. "The first priority needs to be locating Optimus, I suppose. I suspect our leaders know of what is going on at the dig site far more than we do, and Optimus would be a lot more cooperative than Sentinel."
________________________________________

Diac looked at the energon goodie and gave Fracas a slightly bewildered look, before catching himself and shaking his head. "I will pass, thank you." Diac said, trying as best as he could to rein in the instinct to attack the Decepticon.

Hate the cause. Don't hate the people. Diac reminded himself. You are Optimus Prime now. Optimus Prime would not stab a Decepticon offering you refreshments. Even if there is a significantly large chance that said refreshment is poisoned.

"You saved us? I thank you." Diac said, and those words came out of Diac's mouth far more sincerely than he thought himself capable. "Do you have any information about where my people are? I do need to get back to them."

Diac hated this. Vulnerability. They were in enemy hands. If it was just him, if it was just Diac, he would've fought his way out, or snuck away... but Optimus Prime's body is there, and Diac knew that it was his fault that they were in Decepticon hands. Truce or no truce, Diac would feel a lot better if he was among friends.

Diac pressed his commlink again. How long does ion shell radiation take to dissipate? He sighed. His sensors tell him that Optimus Prime is self-repairing, but it will take some time until that will go to full completion without a medic physically working on Optimus's body. Then, to Diac's relief, the static cleared briefly. Not enough to send out a full message and Diac sent out a ping among the Autobot channels that told them of his location (the lack of a distress call should hopefully confer to them that he was not in any particular danger presently), hoping that Perceptor, Hardhead or one of the other Autobots nearby would pick it up.

Posted: Fri Aug 25, 2017 5:58 pm
by Warcry
Dig Site

Furos saw Sixshot enter the site and fixed a cold stare on the large Decepticon. Then he looked sidelong at Stylor. "Keep your partner under control," he told the other Titan Master. "The last thing we need is his personal vendetta starting a shooting match in close quarters."
___________________________________________

Hardhead replied to Perceptor, "Indeed, it's worrisome."

He didn't answer the scientist's rhetorical question, since philosophy wasn't his strong suit and neither was self-reflection. Instead, he bobbed his cannon in agreement with the scientist's other statement. "Agreed. Finding Optimus needs to be priority #1. And if your sensors are damaged, then we'll need to send out search teams to--"

At that point, Diac's locator beacon popped up on his scanners momentarily.

"Or he could send us his location, I suppose. Shall we roll?"
___________________________________________

Mindwipe settled down in a quiet corner of the site and folded his wings, dropping down into a squat.

"What are we doing here, exactly?" Vorath asked him. "The others--"

"The others can vait," Mindwipe told him. "I must trance."

"What in the world are you talking about?"

Mindwipe produced the brain module that he'd recovered. "The kill is fresh. I vill wisit the remnants of the dead mind in here wia trancing. Thus vill I learn more about vat is on the other side of this mortal weil."

"This is ridiculous. There is nothing to see. Dead is dead." Vorath pulled the handle that opened Mindwipe's cockpit hatch, then dropped out of his spot in the bigger Decepticon's torso. "If you wish to waste your time, then I'll find something productive to do. Perhaps the dig workers will be willing to speak to a fellow scientist."

"If you vish for me to...persuade them, you have but to call," Mindwipe told him. "I vill be there...vunce my trance is complete, uv course."

Posted: Sat Aug 26, 2017 1:47 pm
by Heinrad
Battle station Ginrai:


The holodisplay went from showing a rotating display of Hot Rod's repair status(nearly complete), the amount of energy that was being used for all systems currently in operation(not as much as in robot mode, but far more than in vehicle mode), current levels of energy generation from enviroment(wind, light, vibration, ambient radiation), and a sensor map of the immediate area to showing a window with Diac's image as his ping registered. "Nightbeat? It looks like Diac is back online."

Nightbeat looked over at the display. "Think he and Optimus are okay?"

"It's not a distress signal, so I would say they're out of danger for the moment."

"Well, that's something, at least." He looked back to Firedrive. "I think Hot Rod's about as repaired as we can get him. Think you can deal with him?"

"No." The young Autobot sighed. "I didn't want this."

"The war, or dealing with Hot Rod?"

"Either. I know he's trying to teach me, but......"

Nightbeat shrugged. "The best I can offer is this. He means well. He really does. I knew him before he got stomped. Or at least knew of him. If I had to guess, you're worried that the you that you are is going to be absorbed into him. Right?"

"Yeah. When he felt so happy that those..... Well, some part of me felt it, too."

"Uh.... Didn't they do psychological testing to team you up?"

Firedrive managed to look somewhat chagrined. "Actually...... I kinda stole him. By the time they caught us, I'd already bonded with him. The only way to end the bond is for one of us to..... well....."

"Yeah. I've become intimately aware of how to end the bonding process. He'll keep you safe, I'm more than willing to bet." A tone sounded from the console. Nightbeat got up and walked over, tapping a couple of keys. "His armor's patched, we matched the paint, and even got the teeth marks out of the exhaust pipes. He's ready to go." Nightbeat looked back at Firedrive. "Better get back to him. And remind him once in a while that obsessions can be unhealthy."

Firedrive nodded unhappily, then got up and walked back to where Hot Rod was parked.

****************
Dig Site:


Stylor pulled a component out from under Chromedome's dashboard. "Well, as long as he doesn't transform, he can't start a physical confrontation, and I just pulled the activator module for his vehicle mode weapons. At this point he's down to insults."

Posted: Sat Aug 26, 2017 5:47 pm
by Blackjack
Dig Site

There is one. Right over there. The part of Sixshot’s psyche, the little bubble of ostentatiousnesss and avarice that was Revolver pointed out Furos to Sixshot. And there’s Chromedome, your old buddy.
But the one sitting next to him is not making any movement of the scared kind.


He could be just unaware of our- of my- of… our? Of Sixshot’s reputation. Sixshot replied to Revolver. Sixshot mentally frowned. Chromedome. Despite the running joke (his old buddy Hammer told Sixshot he needed to joke more to build camaraderie – Sixshot has been practicing) that Sixshot likes to make about forgetting people’s names, Sixshot never forgot a face. Being raised, being created as part of a faceless army helped Sixshot to – as socially obtuse as the six-changer is – easily tell people who look identical apart. And not having hobbies or interests like a normal person with a pre-war life, what passed for Sixshot’s hobby is to look for worthy opponents, or, failing that, to foster hatred in them so that they would be driven to actually possess a challenge to Sixshot.

A sentiment that is not shared, at all, by Revolver, the little swindler that Sixshot is partnered with. But then there is a reason that Sixshot’s mind tends to take nearly full control whenever they are bonded – those who have weak wills do not deserve to survive. Though at least Revolver tries to be helpful, to get on his good side. Even if he tries to market Sixshot as a mercenary under the name… mighty giant mecha ninja consultant, was it? A mouthful.

Funny. Sixshot thought. I know my self-control is good enough, but I wonder why he is not charging at us, screaming bloody vengeance for his slain colony.

Perhaps he is simply too intimidated by the mighty strength that you possess. Revolver suggested.

Or perhaps he possesses honour and respects the truce. A rarity among the vengeance-seeking types, would you not say?

Sixshot-sama, I make a business, a very tidy business, of avoiding that sort of people seeking violence upon me. So I would not know.

Hmm.
___________________________________________

Perceptor frowned, scowling. “That was convenient.” Perceptor unslung his sniper rifle from where it is magno-clamped to his back, clicking a fresh clip into it. “I do not believe in coincidences. For protection. But yes, Hardhead – we shall roll.”

Posted: Mon Aug 28, 2017 8:19 pm
by Warcry
Dig site

Furos noticed Sixshot's attention, but paid it no mind.

He's not looking for trouble...yet. And as glorious as that battle would be, I'm not inclined to give it to him. He smiled to himself. Yet.

He nodded to Stylor. "Crude, but effective. Good work. Just don't disable anything that we can't re-enable in a few seconds, in case the truce proves to be shorter-lived than we'd like."

As Hardhead rolled up alongside, Furos clambered up into his open cockpit. "We're headed off to -- hopefully -- recover Diac and Optimus. You're in charge of the camp -- such as it is -- while we're gone."

Hardhead, meanwhile, continued to talk to Perceptor. "Once we've recovered our leader, you should get Ginrai to scan you. His repair systems might be able to cure your sensor difficulties."

As he settled in, Furos noted the depressingly low ammo counts for most of the selection of shells that Hardhead used. He made a note to replenish them from the supplies the Titan Masters had brought from the shuttle, once he had a moment of downtime.

Posted: Thu Sep 07, 2017 2:35 am
by Heinrad
Dig Site:


Chromedome would have scowled, had he a face. There was Sixshot, ripe for the revenging, and he was stuck in vehicle mode, being made to keep watch over Sentinel.

Not that Sentinel was actually doing anything, but still......

But no, Stylor had to pull his weapon activator module, and was making it obvious that there was no way he was going to transform.

On the up side, at least Stylor wasn't prepping to overhaul him. Again.

--------

"In charge? Me?" Stylor looked around at the makeshift camp. "I'll do what I can, Furos."

****************
Throne Room, Ruins of Darkmount:


Liokaiser strode into the largely destroyed room, much of the wreckage having been formed into a throne fit for a combiner, and sat.

And thought.

He needed to plan, that much he understood. The gnats buzzing around in his subconscious were certainly making plans.

There were times he wished he could talk to them. They were few and far between, since most of their activity seemed to be aimed at getting him to disengage from combined mode, which was definately bad for him, but he knew, as well as they, that there was something seriously wrong with him.

He could remember tests, vaguely. Scientists talking about how they'd beaten the problem. He remembered being smart. Remembered in the simulations how well his mind had worked with Leozak's, the feeling of completion the first time they'd formed his body, his mind expanding with the rest of the team adding their parts of his mind to make his whole, their minds forming his subconscious. The first combiner to not have several mind smashed into one raging monster amalgam of several minds.

And how everything had immediately gone to hell.

He remembered feeling his mind diminish, no clue why. Given what all of the other Combiners had been reduced to, mindless, ravening monsters, he was in comparatively good shape. But being the smartest idiot on a planet full of idiots still meant you were an idiot.

But what he needed was information. And he had an idea of how to get it.

Posted: Fri Sep 08, 2017 2:41 am
by Blackjack
Dig site

"I appreciate the concern, Hardhead." Perceptor replied as he transformed into his mobile artillery changeform. "Yet I do not believe that such an endeavour is necessary -- while Ginrai is equipped with exceptionally cutting age technology, I have ascertained the problems with my sensor modules prior to this conversation. It was a combination of multiple factors -- the extreme pressures that involves a single-man descent through Cybertron's stratosphere, the depolarizing shockwave from the ion blasts of the gestalts, and the inherent disruptive elements of the radiation-blasted terrain of Cybertron."

Perceptor paused. "My Headmaster affiliate is, at the moment, attempting to rewire and reboot the relevant systems. By the time we reach Optimus Prime, they should have been reset to maximum efficiency."

"I am here too, you know." Convex complained.
_________________________________________

Sixshot glared at Chromedome, but said nothing. He was aware how silly he looked glaring at an immobile car, but he glowered nonetheless. It was better than trying to think of what to do next. That was more of Deathsaurus or Megatron's problem, not his. He was the gun, not the hand that aimed it.

Posted: Sat Sep 09, 2017 10:03 pm
by Selkadoom
Dig Site

Fracas shrugged and bit down into the previously offered stick as he shuffled on back to Scourge, lazily jumping up and vaulting onto the larger mechs shoulders before taking a seat "Geeze you'd think that we were trying to kill these autobots." he laughed lazily at Diac's dismissal of the small treat.

"Do you ever not intend to get under someones plating and needle them til they want to slag you?" he partner asked which just made Fracas laugh hard enough to draw some minor attention to the duo "Oh Scourge my dear targetmast, I think you already know the answer to that question already don't you?" he asked.

_____________________________________________________________________________________

After a long while of just sitting alone with his thoughts and some of Teslors emotions bleeding in, Brainstorm slowly rose to his feet and let out a long shuddering sigh. While what had happened to that gestalt was a tragedy but dammit he shouldn't focus on that while there were others here he could still help. Whether it be maintaining weapons, modest repairs, or possibly jury rigging up a way to escape.

He popped on his comn to the Autobots frequency and sent out a message "This is Brainstorm and Teslor checking in, Anything we can do to help?"

_____________________________________________________________________________________

Sub Orbit

Starscream snarled and kicked on his thrusters as hard as he could as he moved to make a high speed boarding maneuver with the ship. Oh he was going to have to have a serious talk with the engineers about stealth systems so he could avoid having to perform this annoyance of a task. He gunned his thrusters until they were red lining and he skidded down for a hard landing inside the hanger of the ship. The air commander would need a few cycles to recover before he could get up and ssume proper command of the ship. And perhaps a few extra ones to clean up the damage Waspinator had done to his cockpit.

Posted: Tue Sep 12, 2017 4:18 pm
by Blackjack
Dig Site

Diac resisted the urge to unsheath his blade-arms at Fracas's comment about killing him and Optimus. Truce, he reminded himself. If Optimus Prime himself, the beacon of justice, could not withstand himself from breaking a truce, what chance, then, does the notion of peace have?

But I am not Optimus Prime. I am Diac.

But at the same time, Optimus Prime IS me.

Diac didn't laugh as Scourge and Fracas joked, but he didn't say anything that would antagonize the two. They might be Decepticons, but they are keeping their word for the moment. He just wished his allies would reach them sooner rather than later.
_____________________________________

"Brainstorm." Perceptor mentally frowned as the other scientist's message reached his frequency. Perceptor's opinion on Brainstorm was twofold -- on one hand, Perceptor absolutely detested Brainstorm's unorthodox methods. There are certain aspects to experimentation and discovery that were grounded in rules for a reason. Yet on the other hand, Perceptor in the same breath, Perceptor admired Brainstorm's ability to create some certainly unconventional weaponry and inventions -- Pereceptor just disliked the fact that he had to acknowledge that Brainstorm's more sporadic methods had merit to them. He was a fellow Autobot, and a reliable one, and that was what mattered at this juncture.

"Brainstorm, this is Perceptor." Perceptor replied. "I am with Hardhead and Furos."

"(And Convex.)" Perceptor's partner muttered under his breath from where he's perched on top of Perceptor's vehicle mode.

"We are currently en route to secure what we believe to be Optimus Prime and Diac's last known location, where he allegedly is under the 'care' of Decepticons. We will retrieve them -- aggressively if required. Your assistance will definitely be appreciated."

Posted: Tue Sep 12, 2017 5:41 pm
by Warcry
Dig site

Furos smiled slightly at Stylor's unease, but considering the other choices had been a criminal, a stranger who'd somehow bonded with Ginrai and a bunch of Titan Masters whose names he hadn't had a chance to learn yet, it had been an easy choice.

"You'll do fine."

As they rolled towards Prime, the Titan Master told Convex, "Don't take it personally. He was like this before he became a Titan, too."

As they drew closer to Prime, Hardhead's turret started to track towards Scourge and Fracas. He wasn't aiming at them, yet, but he was obviously ready for trouble.

"Prime? Are you functional, sir?"
________________________________________

As it happened, Vorath didn't need to interrogate anyone. As he walked through the dig site, attracting no small amount of attention from the civilian scientists, he'd seen a familiar face. A neutral imaging scientist named Scatter, who he'd worked with a few years ago on a Decepticon-sponsored asteroid dig, had been happy to shared what he knew with the old friend who'd helped save the dig from the combiner menace.

Apparently, they were excavating an old battlefield. The main focus currently was a well-preserved Combiner body, sans head. But the scans had also shown larger structures farther south, the remains of what Scatter thought were old buildings.

But Vorath knew that they weren't simply old buildings. His friends in the Decepticon Science Directorate had slipped him some hints, suggestions about what the dig was really up to. And after what he'd heard from Scatter, it wasn't hard to guess what they were really after...

With that in mind, the Decepticon scientist took off across the site at a jog, looking for Doomshot.
________________________________________

Nemesis

The duty officer that Starscream had spoken to -- a midsized mech named Jetblade who'd pared his body down to a lean skeleton to keep under the tonnage limits that would have forced him to be rebuilt as a Titan -- entered the hangar and approached with a concerned look on his face.

"Air Commander Starscream? Is something wrong? Why have you returned to the ship?"
________________________________________

?

Mindwipe floated in a grey haze, his wings flapping absently even though there was nothing for them to push against. But it didn't really matter, because he wasn't here and none of this existed. It was just his brain's frail attempt to interpret the uninterpretable, as his psychic trance bridged his consciousness to that of the recently-dead combiner component.

Although he'd communed with the dead before, never had the experience been so intense, so real. In the past he'd only been able to feel the slightest wisp of a presence, to grasp the last few thoughts or memories that had gone through the dead mind before its life force had faded. But he'd never tasted a ghost so fresh, or one who'd died such a horrible, agonizing death.

Images floated around him, devoid of context. Broken plates. Parts being torn off from a whole robot. Pieces of a completed puzzle, falling away from one another in a jumble. But the opposite theme was visible too: those same puzzle pieces, jammed together into a whole that didn't fit, and made no sense. A person, if you could call it that, made up of bits and pieces that obviously belonged to a dozen different people.

The pain of being forced together.

The pain of being torn apart.

The wrongness of it all.

This poor, tortured creature -- he had been an Autobot once, Mindwipe grasped, an Autobot named Prefab -- had been volunteered for the combiner process by his commander. He hadn't had a choice, and even if he had, what the doctors said was going to happen was nothing like what actually did. His entire life had been stolen away.

And worst of all -- horrifying even to a night creature like Mindwipe -- was that he'd been conscious for all of it. They all had, every single one of them. Their twisted, circus-freak combined body hadn't had a mind of its own, not even a rudimentary one. Its headspace had been empty, save for what the component members could shout into it. And without a proper way to communicate -- the neural interfaces in his generation had been far less advanced than in some of the newer combiners -- Demolition's limited mind had been restricted to what all of the components could agree on: their fear, their hunger, and eventually, their rage.

________________________________________

And then, as quickly as it had come over him, the connection broke. The last ghosts of Prefab's life faded away and Mindwipe was himself again.

Mostly.

One did not commune with the dead and come away unchanged, especially when the experience was so intense. And so Mindwipe felt a new sense of purpose as he digested what he'd seen.

Now I know vhy fate led us here. Now I know vhat I must do.