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Post by Emirate Xaaron on May 29, 2007 12:16:58 GMT -5
Emirate Xaaron has his head down, poking around in the innards of a gutted landspeeder of some sort. He does, however, wave a hand and agree most vehemently, “Extremely dangerous! If not for the timely assistance that you and Perceptor provided, I would be an ex-Emirate.”
He doesn’t sound overly perturbed by his close call with death. He’s had closer. It’s just part and parcel of being who is. He’s grateful to be alive and grateful for the rescues, but he has become accustomed to enduring such dangers with an alarming frequency. If he shut down from the trauma every time, well, he’d actually be dead then.
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Post by Long Haul on May 29, 2007 12:39:06 GMT -5
Long Haul studies the tiny little dragon. He looks up at the Emirate. He looks back down dragon, and rubs behind its ear. The dragon gurgles happily and tries to move in closer to Long Haul.
Long Haul attempts to be sly. He's not very good at it. "Then, erm... havin' that kinda strength on our side... that wouldn't be a bad thing, you'd think?"
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Post by Emirate Xaaron on May 29, 2007 12:58:10 GMT -5
Emirate Xaaron hauls himself out of the landspeeder, which is completely devoid of any fuel, has been licked clean of any lubricants, and has overall been sliced up and gnawed. He deems it little better than scrap metal.
Settling a peculiar expression on Long Haul, he says, "We have no idea how long it will take that entity to reach maturity, we haven't the foggiest if it is trainable, and we don't even... well, we do know what it eats." He laughs bitterly and a yanks a thumb at his own chest. "It eats me. We're having enough trouble keeping ourselves fuelled. You want to add to that burden?"
Leave it to Long Haul to try and go befriend lunch, Emirate Xaaron thinks to himself.
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Post by Long Haul on May 29, 2007 13:36:00 GMT -5
Long Haul's optic band dims, and he looks down at the roof top. "Well, I mean, I know alla that stuff, but... I mean, I mean..." and then he gives up entirely and sighs heavily.
"Yer right. But I ain't gonna kill the thing. You'll have to do that." And with that, Long Haul removes his hands from the creature's head and steps back. The dragonette, however, wobbles after him.
Long Haul clenches his fists, then brings his head up once more to look Xaaron straight in the optic. "But you know," he says quietly, voice rough and a touch grim, "if you're gonna go around killing everything just 'cos it might be a danger to you later on, you're probably best off doing me in, too."
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Post by Emirate Xaaron on May 29, 2007 13:58:08 GMT -5
Emirate Xaaron stares at Long Haul, mouth working with no words coming. He seems rather dismayed by the suggestion of killing Long Haul along with the dragonet. Finally, Emirate Xaaron looks him in the optics, unwavering, and states, "I have no qualms with killing that creature. As underarmed and underpowered as I may be, I would have no trouble with deed physically, and mentally, that creature represents the fuel that we will need to rejoin our comrades, no more, no less. However, you clearly do have qualms."
Long Haul's opinion is important to him. He has to know how far these Autobots will go. The situation is not critical now. It may be later.
Emirate Xaaron sighs. "It's not a matter of danger, not entirely. There is also the matter of usefulness and using resources efficiently. Raising that creature to its true potential would require a significant supplies investment, and the returns are uncertain, as we don't know if it can be taught to take orders."
He concludes, "But if you weigh the odds, and you see it paying off to keep it alive, rather than fuelling you for the long trek to come today, then do as you will with it. The responsibility will be yours to bear."
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Post by Long Haul on May 29, 2007 14:35:22 GMT -5
Long Haul dips his head in a slow nod. "Arright. A little extra responsibility ain't nothing to bear, not compared with what burdens I'm already carrying around." Indeed, having something else to take care of may even make the other burdens easier, by providing him with another avenue to focus on.
With that decision made, Long Haul begins prowling the rooftop, metallic dragon warbling at his heels. Unlike Xaaron, he is not examining the remains of the other vehicles. Instead, he seems to be methodically stomping out the strength of the roof top itself, much as he had the night before when the group set up camp. Finally he nods to himself, steps back from one particular area and, when he's sure the dragon is clear, removes his pistol from subspace and fires several quick blasts at his weapon's best setting.
His pistol is not particularly powerful, but it's enough to put a hole in the roof. Then he looks up at Xaaron and explains. "Way I figure, that big beast that we faced was prolly too big to get in this thing... heck, we're almost too big, and I think I'll have to crawl. So it might not have been able to get to them vehicles we saw below." The Constructibot then picks up the remains of a cable, not the one he currently has in subspace but one from the remains of the dragons' previous meals, and goes about securing one end.
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Post by Emirate Xaaron on May 29, 2007 18:02:33 GMT -5
Emirate Xaaron considers the situation. Maybe the dragonet will keep Long Haul distracted from the fact that all his old friends want to kill him. He just hopes that Long Haul is not too distracted. They have no idea how much attention the blighted thing needs.
He does get out of the way when Long Haul draws the gun, but he's mildly peeved that Long Haul saw fit to see to the dragonet but didn't even warn him. Emirate Xaaron rubs his hands together and comments, "More excellent thinking." Thinking along lines that he neglected to mention, as he wanted to emphasise the point that the dragonet is food.
Emirate Xaaron does vaguely worry over the property damage and says softly, "It's eerie how deserted this planet is. I haven't seen any corpses. It's like they just up and left. Very strange." When Long Haul has the rope secured, he moves to urban spelunk after the Constructibot.
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Post by Long Haul on May 29, 2007 18:12:00 GMT -5
At the Emirate's comment, Long Haul stands upright and tilts his head, confused. Then, he gestures towards the roof at large. "These are corpses, right? I mean, they might be... they look kinda like they could be..."
He scratches his head for a moment, then shrugs and clambers down into the hole. He actually doesn't use the rope; instead, he just jumps down in there. The cable is there to climb back out. Then he crouches down, begins to move out of the way... and then realizes he'd have better luck just crawling. So he moves to his hands and knees and crawls.
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Post by Emirate Xaaron on May 29, 2007 20:13:52 GMT -5
Emirate Xaaron notes, "They didn't have transformations." He's a fine one to judge life by whether or not it can transform! He adds, "They also didn't have very complex circuitry. I think they were non-sapient." Or maybe he's just trying to make Long Haul feel better. After all, the Constructibot could tell if they were corpses more accurately than he can.
He uses rope because just because he can withstand long drops into hard materials doesn't mean he wants to. Short as he is, he too must go down to his knees and crawl. There are a number of Decepticons who would love to see him crawl, he knows. Emirate Xaaron inquires, "So... what now?" When it comes to taking things apart, Long Haul's going to have to be the brains here. Emirate Xaaron's just the loading wench.
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Post by Long Haul on May 29, 2007 20:40:06 GMT -5
"Whelp," Long Haul answers, crawling towards the nearest vehicle - their gamble had paid off, and it was, indeed, intact, "we should be able to get by with tearing out a few of these thing's chargers or fuel tanks or whatever. They seem to have a mix, but from what I saw up there, looks like mostly chargers. Don't got time to tear out more than a few... it's a dirty charge, not great for the systems, but it looks like that little creature's been doing just fine off of them so f-"
Long Haul cuts off. This is because the small dragon had, without his realizing it, jumped down into the hole behind Xaaron, and was now crawling up to Long Haul, kreening. "Oh, fer- back off, you!" Long Haul pushes the thing away as he finishes crawling towards the vehicle. "If you wanna eat, better just stay out of my way!" he warns, sternly and pointlessly, as he pulls himself to his knees and reaches for what looks to be a service hatch in the nearest vehicle.
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Post by Emirate Xaaron on May 30, 2007 8:17:07 GMT -5
Emirate Xaaron has no idea what is being discussed by Long Haul and Perceptor. If he did, he would consider it extremely tactically unsound. This is probably why they aren’t telling him.
He watches as Long Haul explains about the chargers and fuel tanks, nodding.
When the dragonet follows them down, Emirate Xaaron narrows his optics. If that thing gets in the way, as soon as Long Haul’s not looking… oh, oops, it fell. That’s a shame, isn’t it? Better break out the wasabi.
Then he moves to tear into the vehicle nearest him, knees scraping against the concrete, leaving a faint gilded trail behind him. He pats the vehicle down, looking for any sort of hatch on it that might lead to the internal machinery and his breakfast.
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Post by Long Haul on May 30, 2007 8:58:21 GMT -5
Well, yes, part of the reason Long Haul isn't bringing Xaaron in on their conversation is because it's extremely tactically unsound. However, the main reason is that Long Haul doesn't actually know Xaaron's personal frequency (they ought to get around to swapping those one of these days, oughtn't they?), and Omega Supreme would hear the conversation if it were held over Autobot band.
This doesn't mean that Long Haul doesn't intend to tell Xaaron, however.
The transport rips the charger out of his vehicle and presents it to the small dragon, hoping that the larger version hadn't had to do any additional processing for the energy. His gamble seems to pay off, as the dragon first sniffs at the charger, then grabs it and wraps its mouth around the unit. Whatever tools it uses to draw current from the device remain hidden in its mouth, however.
While the dragon eats, Long Haul moves along to the next vehicle and announces out loud, "We'd better hurry. Sounds like Omega Supreme's gonna be on his way over here shortly, and I'd rather you and this guy were out of the way when that happens, 'case things go wrong."
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Post by Emirate Xaaron on May 30, 2007 11:31:50 GMT -5
Not knowing Xaaron’s frequency is so an excuse! Xaaron is standing right here. What does Long Haul need to ask Xaaron for his frequency, three cubes of energon and a disco ball?
After some poking around and setting off what appears to be a car alarm – and Xaaron hits the floor, flat, until he’s sure it’s just noisy and not lethal – he secures himself a charger and extends a recharger cable.
He rolls over and sits up, propped up by his elbows. Softly, like steel wool is soft, Emirate Xaaron asks, “And how exactly do you know that, Long Haul?”
Maybe he should be touched that Long Haul trusts him to look after the blasted wee dragon. Mostly, he thinks the whole situation is just touched.
Emirate Xaaron puts in a private radio call, //Nightbeat, what’s the situation?//
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Post by Long Haul on May 30, 2007 12:57:49 GMT -5
"Perceptor called, says that Omega Supreme's asking my location," Long Haul answers, completely calm as he removes another charger from another vehicle and hands it over to the dragon.
"I told him to give it."
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Post by Emirate Xaaron on May 30, 2007 14:01:35 GMT -5
Emirate Xaaron's reaction is quite good, all things told, but some days, he hates it when he is right. Tone carefully neutral, he says, "And neither you nor Perceptor saw fit to inform me that you had made contact? Does 'staying in contact' mean to same thing to you that it does to me?"
There is no disapproval or anger in his tone, but perhaps the fact that he appears to be seriously asking the question is worse than either of those two could be. He may have dodgy ideas about what to do with baby dragons, but he isn't the one who first broke trust here.
Briskly, he continues, "Hiding you in such a city as this would be quite easy, although I suggest that once you and your... acquisition have had your fill, that we scope out hiding spots. We may not need them, but if we do, we'll be glad that we located them in advance."
He rifles through another vehicles, locates a charger, and stores it away for later.
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