On Little Cat's Feet

[Ravage (ROTF)]

Day 40, Open 'Con thread, though I'd like to run into some movie guys if possible.

Ravage pads softly through the ship. He has spent the past several days familiarizing himself with its corridors, learning its twists and turns. Learning too, the temperaments and habits of these other Decepticons. They are an odd lot, this group. Unfocused, heretical even in some cases. Ravage is no Lugnut, to preach of his Megatron's glory, but the cat is loyal to his leader nonetheless. This group...their loyalty seems to change as the wind.

He comes to a crossing of the corridors. Which way?

His head comes up, mouth hanging open slightly. He draws in a quick breathe of air, tasting it. Ravage tilts his head to the left. His kind. That way. Others too.

He slinks down the left corridor, silent now.

[Barricade]

Here kitty, kitty, kitty... Ah, good.

Barricade severs the connection he'd tapped into Ship's security grid as soon as he spots Ravage taking that so subtle trail he'd left not an hour before. The infiltrator is in a mood, and not all training need take place in the sim room, after all. He grins wickedly to himself, leaves some light scores on the surface of the metal plating the corridors at the next junction, and pads silently to the right, putting a little distance between himself and the cat.

[Ravage (ROTF)]

Mrrrrrr

Ravage tastes the scent lingering on the air, embedded in those scratches. He huffs.

Barricade.

Does he have Frenzy?

The scratches are too deliberately placed, too fresh to be accidental. What does the other infiltrator have in mind here? Why try to catch Ravage's attention so?

Ravage continues to slink along the wall, silently, slowly.

[Barricade]

More like Frenzy has Barricade, most days. If Ravage gets close enough, he might even manage to catch traces of the spastic little hacker's scent mingled with Barricade's.

Confident that the curious cat must be following, Barricade slips down an adjoining corridor, crossing over to another hallway that parallels the one he had just left. Time t double back and see if he can flank the hunter.

Just because. That, and Barricade is bored. Bored Barricades beget boundless batches of balefull behavior.

[Ravage (ROTF)]

Barricade and Frenzy are so intertwined that Ravage would be surprised if he didn't pick up that bladey little menace's scent along with the Saleen's. It would mean the two had been separated at length, something which seldom happens. What Ravage cannot tell is if Frenzy is actually present. His scent is too faint.

Barricade turned here. Ravage pulls up the maps he downloaded of Ship. There is nothing here but barracks and storage. Why is the other infiltrator switching about?

Mrrrr.

Ravage's tails switches violently, the spikes sending sparks flashing as they dig into the wall. He is being played with.

For now, the cat is content to go along. How much longer, though, will remain to be seen.

[Barricade]

Of course Ravage is being played with. Cat's are supposed to like play, right? Barricade certainly does.

He skirts down another adjoning corridor, then back, turning back to continue his previous path for a dozen strides, before doubling back again to slip down that adjoining corridor once more and continue on his way, zigzagging his way down the corridor from one wall to the other in a random pattern, just because.

[Ravage (ROTF)]

It's all fun and games until someone get buried in the litter box.

Ravage follows Barricade's trail but only because it takes him in the direction he wishes to go. Ship is a large vessel, and precautions were of course taken to shut down sections in case of emergency.

According to the schematics, there is a switchbox down this corridor. It takes Ravage off the scent, but needs must.

The great cat rears up on his hind legs and paws open the cover. Careful manipulation of nose, tooth and claw, and Ravage intitates the shutdown procedure for this sector. It's a small section, and should cause no problems with any other area. It will, however, register on the logs, and might garner attention from anyone watching the activity.

It will definitely garner attention from anyone else within, as the lighting fails and the corridors are sealed.

The game board has just been narrowed to less than the size of football field.

Now. Back to the hunt.

[Barricade]

Everything goes dark. Oh ho! The game has changed!

Well, not really, but there are definitely different parameters in play now, especially since Barricade is pretty sure that he can hear the bulkheads up ahead sealing tight. Well, then. He should go see how much space the kitty has left him to play in!

His claws clench into eager fists as he jogs lightly down the pitch black corridor, trusting to his sensors to keep him from careening into anything as he rounds an open corner to another hall.

[Wreckage]

Wreckage is not pleased to find the corridors blocked off. He expects some manner of announcement if Ship has been damaged; there is no such radio call, however. So, he wonders, is it malfunction or mischief behind his current predicament? If the latter, who must he threaten with dismemberment to correct the problem?

He finds himself in yet another corridor with every branch closed by blast doors and makes a low, disgusted sound before moving onward. He walks with a light, deliberate step, listening for signs of others in the same bloc, watching, smelling. So engrossed with those senses is he that he hardly registers that nagging sensation at the back of his mind over the muffled scrape of hurried footsteps before Barricade comes speeding around the corner ahead in a burst of noise and motion. Wreckage pauses and snorts, unsurprised by this turn of events. He should have known someone like Barricade was behind this, but is the infiltrator alone in his troublemaking? No, surely Frenzy has a hand in things as well. Perhaps all four.

With such a narrow corridor and so short a distance between himself and Barricade, Wreckage has little trouble snaring the other Decepticon, simply reaching out one hand and letting Barricade run into it full throttle before he even attempts to actually take hold. Momentum alone sends Barricade's feet into the air with his middle stopped dead and Wreckage lets go Barricade's chest to clamp his hand around one flailing ankle instead, holding his catch at arm's length and letting the Saleen dangle. He turns an exceptionally flat look on his fellow soldier, optics brightening as the filaments draw tight. He knows Barricade is involved with the lockdown. Somehow.

---

OOC: Posing/grabbing of Barricade with player permission.

[Ravage (ROTF)]

Ravage does not run down the halls.

He slinks silently along the walls. He knows his prey is trapped. No need to hurry. He will teach Barricade that it takes more effort to bell this cat.

A whisper of sound, a slight scrape of metal from ahead, and the great cat pauses, a tilt of his head to scent the air, and then Ravage grows softly, a deep, low, rumbling sound of annoyance. He slips his head around the corner.

//Interloper. You disturb the hunt.// Ravage pads over to the pair. He sits back on his haunches and reaches up to paw idly at Barricade's dangling form. Claws out, of course.

[Barricade]

Barricade is too busy glancing behind himself as he rounds that corner to spot the large, stoic obstacle in his path until that arm catches him right across his midsection with a strut-jarring whumph. He barely even has a moment to register that sudden pain before he finds himself dangling upside down from Wreckage's grasp, still trying to settle his gyros and catch up his ventilation from the impact.

Worse yet, he's barely begun to vent the first low rumble of a growl, when now Ravage appears out of the pitch blackness, settling beside them both to bat at him like a pinata.

Ravage isn't the only one with claws, though. Barricade twists and kicks with his unsecured leg, trying to score a hit against Wreckage's shouler - or better yet, his head - for the indignity of dangling the infliltrator like a prize fish, while the thrashes about with both sets of claws. There should be a torso-mounted gun with particularly sensitive seams here somewhere very close... and Ravage is definitely within Barricade's reach, as well.

"What hunt?" Barricade growls as he thrashes and kicks and slashes. "I was just taking a walk!"

Honest occifer! There he wuz, jus' mindin' hiz own biznuss when dem dudes jumped him and he fell out!

[Wreckage]

Grip still clamped on Barricade's leg, Wreckage glances toward Ravage when the smaller Decepticon rounds the corner and so is paying Barricade's thrashing no mind. The infiltrator lands a blow against the cannon barrel before Wreckage notices; the barrel itself is scratched, but the gouges have no real impact on Wreckage. The jarring force against those fine, poorly shielded seams, however, elicits a slight narrowing of the optics and the barest tensing of his facial plates. He tilts his head aside, letting Barricade's foot whistle past his chin, then eyes Ravage again.

"It was not my choice to be dragged into your games," he rumbles.

[Ravage (ROTF)]

Ravages's tail whips side to side as Barricade struggles. The Saleen's claws come close, but the cat is fast, agile...he evades Barricade's scrabbling claws easily enough.

Ravage does, however, move out of reach. Once again, he settles upon his haunches, then the cat very pointedly yawns wide and long.

//No game. This one thought to tease. I changed terms.// Ravage snuffles at the air again. //Teach lesson. I am not a plaything.//

That single optic fixes on Barricade. //Where is Frenzy? Not with you; scent is too weak.//

[Barricade]

"I wasn't teasing," Barricade growls, still thrashing. Yeah, it's pretty much useless thrashing, what with Ravage slining out of his way, and Wreckage playing Ice Statue - as always - but it makes him feel better.

Besides, he might get lucky and snag something important or painful on Wreckage is he keeps it up. Except, he muses to himself, that he looks a little foolish, dangling there like a fish on a hook, flopping and flailing.

"Was training. Too good to train now are you?" he snarls, shooting glares at both of them as he finally stills and crosses his arms over his chest with a sullen grumble as he ignores Ravage's question.

[Wreckage]

Wreckage simply glares at the both of them. His middle still stings along those seams and the fact that both of them are skirting the fact that they are playing games does little but incite an urge to take them both by the scruff of the neck and drag them through one of the many closed blast doors. Perhaps several doors.

He remains standing where he is and heaves a low, rumbling sigh.

"Games," he pronounces icily. "Ridiculous games."