Drifting on the Wind

[Elita-1]

Open, Rock Watch, Day 30, during the attack

Elita-1 is glued to the terminal, watching the damage readouts from the ship scroll by. She fidgets in her seat, looks up and her companion, the looks back down again. It's bad enough they have to stay put while the fighting is going on, but Twin Twist...

"Blast it, will you please be still! I'm on edge enough without your constant pacing!"

Indication of Twin Twist's state with permission

[Tessan Toov]

Twin Twist has transformed at least a dozen times during the watch. Sometimes, he even revs his drills. The way he looks at the walls and floor and structures around him is positively hungry. Twin Twist looks at Elita-1, too, but the looks are different, shier. He's aware she's female. He has trouble figuring it out, but she's enough like the Arcee of his own universe in certain ways, that despite all her differences, he's pretty sure that she's a she. He's not sure it even matters. It's just a thing.

What does matter is what Twin Twist is complaining about, loudly, "Autobots could be dying, and we're doing nothing!"

He covers his face with one hand, twitching. Twin Twist needs to drill something so badly, to feel his diamond drills sink into yielding metal of a Decepticon or a wall or those stupid rocks or something, but no, Twin Twist, Wrecker and Autobot in possession of poor impulse control, is stuck on watch. If Elita-1's on edge, that least makes two!

[Skyfire]

"Twin Twist, until we get orders to the contrary, we need to hold down this position," Skyfire said mildly. "If we're not here, and a major Decepticon arrives on the rocks, we've left ourselves open to an ambush from the flank. Worse, if this chamber is held by Decepticons, and an Autobot arrives, unknowing and helpless..." Skyfire shakes his head. "We can't let either one happen."

As if to emphasize his point, Skyfire takes out his double-barrelled proton cannon and lays it alongside the console, where he can snatch it up quickly to cover either the door or the rocks.

[Drift]

Noise. Where did all the noise come from?

More than that, where is he?

He can hear chattering on the comm, names he half-seems to remember.

He drops down into a crouch, drawing his short blades, noting their positions, racing to figure a strategy to take them all. Which is the greatest threat? The big one or....

"Twin Twist?" It looks like the Wrecker, but maybe not. He keeps his blades ready.

[Elita-1]

"We're following orders Twin Twist! You think I-"

Elita-1 breaks off as she catches flashes of white out of the corner of her optic. Why do they always arrive when no one is actively looking?

"Prophetic words there, Skyfire," she says dryly to the spaceship as she steps from behind the terminal- then stares at Drift for a few seconds.

Wow. He is pretty.

Elita's hand rests on the terminal within easy reach of the forcefield button as she speaks, "Hello, my name is Elita-1. Welcome to the Event Horizon. You've been ganked out of your reality by some unknown force, dropped into this one, and were lucky enough to get dropped on the Autobot ship and not the Decepticon one. Yes, I know it sounds like a bunch of slag. No, you're not dreaming and no, we don't know how to get any of us home. Yet."

"Normally, you'd get escorted to Security for an interview, but since we're in the middle of a Decepticon attack, we're going to ask you to stay put."

She tilts her head and adds as an afterthought, "Oh, and don't shoot Long Haul- or Scrapper. They're on our side."

[Tessan Toov]

The only major difference between this Twin Twist and the Twin Twist that Drift has met is that this one has his drills stored in the backs of his thighs. People sometimes wonder if he's injured; if someone bent his drills down, but he doesn't seem to be feeling any physical pain, just a serious antsiness. There's a second, more minor difference - he has AR37 written on his shoulders and just 37 on his knees. He complains to Elita-1 and Skyfire, "Do we need three of us here? Just put up the forcefield, and if anyone dangerous shows up, they're stuck! If someone injured-"

Twin Twist stops, mid-transform, and lands back on his feet when he realises that there is, indeed a new arrival. He answers without thinking, "Twin Twist, that's me!" It occurs to Twin Twist that he has no idea who this guy is, and after a moment of looking, whether or not this guy is actually a guy. The new arrivals looks an awful lot like Override: similar helmet design with the crest and the swoopies, mostly white, some red, seems to turn into a car of some sort... Override, Twin Twist is pretty sure, is a woman.

So he rubs the back of his helmet and asks, "Uhm. Are you a woman? I mean... what's your timestamp and do you have a brain module, a lasercore, a spark, or a brain module and a spark?" Twin Twist can memorise procedures and execute them.

The blades obviously do not bother him, even if standing around and doing nothing does. Twin Twist is used to being around armed Autobots; his previous boss had his harpoon out almost all the time, to say nothing of Whirl. Elita-1's mention of the possibility of arriving on the Decepticon ship gets a twitch from Twin Twist but nothing more.

[Skyfire]

"Easy there, soldier. You're among Autobots," Skyfire says. His proton cannon is close to hand, but not in hand, and not pointed at anyone. "Elita there has just given you the basics. I'm Skyfire, though in some realities, I hear there's a fellow who looks just like me named Jetfire. Oddly, none of the people here who are named 'Jetfire' look like me. What do you go by?"

[Drift]

"All Autobots here talk so much?"

Drift dismisses 90% of the words they throw at him as irrelevant. 'Ganked'? 'Woman'? 'Other realities'? They might wear the Autobot sigil but they were...not speaking his language.

What did make it through was what Drift considered essential. 'Decepticon attack'.

Drift half-sheathes the swords, reversing the blades, but he keeps his hands on the hilts. Just in case. Two of them seem to be standing with that sort of stillness that indicated they were near weapons, even if he couldn't see them.

The one who wasn't was Twin Twist. Who was...and wasn't...Twin Twist. Still. Decepticon attack.

"You," he says to Twin Twist. "Take me to the front line."

[Elita-1]

Oh.... frag!

"Hold on there ninja-boy," Elita-1 says. After all, her reality has ninja-bots, and this guys seems to fit the type. "No one is going anywhere until Xaaron or Rodimus give us different orders. That includes you," she adds, glaring at Twin Twist.

Fidgeting for a moment, "However, I do agree that we don't need this many people here..." and Twin Twist and this newcomer can probably be of better help out there, anyway.

She asks on the broadband. (because she doesn't know that Skyfire contacted Xaaron already!)

//Emirate Xaaron, Rodimus Prime, Sirs? We have a new arrival. Looks like a sword-fighter. Autobot. Insisting on heading to the front lines.//

//Do you want us to hold here, or lock the room down and join in?//

[Tessan Toov]

Even before Drift demanded that Twin Twist take him away, Twin Twist had been planning on doing just that. It's nothing personal to Skyfire or Elita-1, but he says bluntly, "Look. When a new Autobot shows up, we gotta watch him, but no one says we have to watch him here and tie up all of us. He's healthy and armed." He looks up at Drift and finishes, "C'mon."

Twin Twist turns, waving a hand, and transforms, headed off toward Bridge Alpha. Given that he can get up to 200 MPH, he is possibly off faster than expected. His alternate mode has no notable differences from IDW Twin Twist's alternate mode.

---

OOC: Out of thread unless stopped.

[Skyfire]

"Twin Twist! Next time at least wait for orders," Skyfire calls out to the Wrecker's departing aft. "And you're responsible for the new guy!"

Skyfire isn't military, never has been. He's not going to stand on rules and rank and orders when someone decides to do what he thinks is the right thing--so long as it isn't going to get his friends killed.

He shakes his head, and points at Drift, "Would it be too much to ask to get your name and timestamp before you dash off? Report in on the general Autobot frequency so someone doesn't shoot you by mistake. Also tell Twin Twist the attack is at Bridge Alpha. There's a 50-50 chance he didn't stop to find that out."

"Elita and I will hold here until we get further orders. This is a strategic target; if the Decepticons penetrate beyond the bridge, there's a good chance they'll try to plunder this room," he tells Drift. "Keep that in mind when you're looking for the enemy."

[Drift]

"Ninja-boy." That some kind of insult? He glares at Elita. He'd had enough of that kind of attitude from Springer. "The name is Drift."

Whoever this Xaaron or Rodimus were, they obviously didn't matter very much, Drift thought, watching Twin Twist blatantly flout their imaginary order, and the small mech's direct order.

Discipline. They all lacked discipline.

Still, Twin Twist definitely had the right priorities, but he moved...way faster than Drift could. Drift moves to follow him, but Skyfire's words stop him. He strides over, glaring up at the much larger mech, rubbing one thumb on one of his short blades' hilts.

"NO ONE," he says, sharply, "Is 'responsible' for me."

[Elita-1]

As both Twin Twist and drift basically dismiss her, Elita's fist clench- her ungloved fists. She doesn't wear them when on watch, just in case a hostile shows up.

In case you haven't noticed," she says dryly to Drift, "We're Autobots. We're responsible for each other. Springer and Impactor can harass Twin Twist about rushing off later, but since we have the go ahead from command...," she looks over at Skyfire, "I'm heading out with him. If there's that many of them, my ability might come in rather useful."

Nevermind that she's only ever been in one real fight, and that there's real fear and worry tickling the back of her processors.

Moving up next to Drift, she asks, "Can I touch your arm for about two seconds? Literally. My ability lets me copy other people's weapons. It won't feel that great, but that short a contact won't actually hurt you."

---

OOC: um, I fully expect Drift to say no, but Elita has no real weapons of her own so she thought she'd ask.

[Tessan Toov]

OOC: Back, apparently. XD

---

It doesn't take long for Twin Twist to realise that the new Autobot isn't following him, so he zips back, landing in the doorway that he just left through on his feet. He's not smart, but he's used to a team setting, and he's used to making sure his co-workers are accounted for.

The Jumpstarter just catches the end of the conversation and says, more seriously than he'll be taken, "Sure I am. I'm your chaperone, and if you want to dance with the Decepticons, you have to go with me. Anyway, he's a map of the Event Horizon. It's good. Topspin marked it up. We're going here." He holds the map out to Drift, pointing.

Twin Twist may seem horribly naive, and to an extent he is, but if he does drag Drift off into combat, if Drift's no good, these problems are easily dealt with.

[Skyfire]

"Thank you," Skyfire replies once he finally gets Drift's name. He continues, the very voice of reason, "Drift, we don't know you yet, so you're getting a security escort--and someone to have your back. If we weren't under attack and needing every decent combatant, you'd be waiting for a security interview, or someone to vouch for you at least."

Skyfire nods at Elita-1 and reaches over to turn on the forcefield once Drift is clear of it. "I'll hold down the fort here, or until someone needs me somewhere else. I suspect I'll be helping to round up jettisoned hull sections when this is all over."

"Ah thank you, Twin Twist. Drift, what Twin Twist said. Good luck. Elita, may I speak to privately you for a moment before you join them?" Skyfire asks, gesturing her over.