Hook has actually had to convince the Cublilator to slow down production. "Retreat, Dead End, the word you're looking for is 'retreat'. Now come over here and make yourself useful."
By which Hook means that Dead End should present his trunk for packing. Assuming Dead End does so, the surgeon immediately begins to load him up, making precisely sure that he can fit as many cubes into Dead End as possible.
One hopes Dead End's trunk isn't an especially sensitive spot.
Private to Dead End: //Omega Supreme operates his own defense base. Yes, there are doors, but do you not think that I know their strength?//
Engineers can create handy things like sentry guns, health dispensers and teleporters. If you're lucky, he'll tell you where they are. If not, well, he's not there to hold your hand.
Shortround, thinking that Omega is distracted enough by everyone else, activates his fans again to fly, before disengaging his cyber key. Why does it feel strange when he does that... Ah well, he can worry about that later. What he can worry about now is how his missiles didn't so much as dent that giant Autobot's armor as he hovers upward.
Shortround landed and transformed, before accelerating in an attempt to get to where Hook and Dead End were. Somehow, beyond his understanding, his engines had managed to come back and not be missiles. Cyber keys and their strangeness...
Of corse, it would take time for the hovercraft to get over there. Thankfully he has a rough idea where the other cargo is presently collecting sand for when he retreats.
"Oh, good, I won't have to pick you up then," Dead End tells Starfighter as he drives over to where Hook can load him.
The dark red Stunticon obligingly pops his rear hatch and waits patiently for Hook to finish loading his trunk full of highly explosive energon. Then he plans to rush into battle, assuming Hook doesn't drop one and blow the whole stack up inside him. That would be messy.
"I wasn't looking for the word, I was actively dodging it."
Private to Hook: // Doors that are open have a strength of precisely zero. He's got to unload his Autobot cargo to transform, doesn't he? One never knows when an opportunity arises in battle. Don't worry, I'll try not to lose your energon. I do believe I sense Shortround and his cargo compartment coming this way--though it looks like he misplaced your salvage. //
As soon as his trunk is full, Dead End shuts it and zooms out of the power station. No point in loading his passenger compartment--that space goes away when he transforms! Now, what is going on over to the south?
OOC: and the Deadster is out of this thread and off to the Omega thread--or possibly the Jazz's Repairs thread, depending how widely he circles.
Post by Starfighter on Jul 25, 2007 7:21:27 GMT -5
That went well enough. Starfighter cycled air one more time--a bit like a sigh, except not--and transformed. He hovered nervously in the air for a moment, wondering if he should have played dead and hoped Dead End would believe the act, then circled upward and out of the courtyard.
Things, apparently, hadn't gotten any less suckier than they were before he landed. Oh well.
OOC: And Starfighter's also checking out and going to the Omega thread.
Post by Shortround on Jul 25, 2007 18:53:57 GMT -5
The white, teal and various-other-colours hovercraft continues heading towards Hook until he arrives there, his door opened to allow any cargo and showing a somewhat lack of salvage.
"Uh, had to leave it behind, my robot mode isn't very good at carrying things" he says, taking a guess at the first thing Hook will say. This is true however, as his robot mode is mini-bot sized as opposed to his larger hovercraft mode. You could say something about fuel efficiency, but the fact is, Shortround just didn't think through his cargo space well enough.
Hook raised a hand to cover his optics for a moment. "Of course you did."
Then the Cubilator dumped another energon cube in his lap. No time to bemoan the help he's gotten stuck with! Besides, even the Constructicons don't measure up to his standards. (Hook would never think of his standards as 'lofty', much less 'impossible'. This is why Hook doesn't get to talk to clients most of the time.)
"Well, let's get you loaded up... Sky-Byte ought to be able to manage the supplies." He frowns as he begins to place energon cubes into Shortround's hold. Certainly, he is packing them in as tight as they can go, and in such a way as to maximize the amount that can be fit into the hovercraft. But there is something almost distracted by what he does.
Then Omega Supreme rips off a great sheet of rock from the mesa. The whole mesa shakes, the neat stack of energon cubes next to Hook falling over, and the Constructicon himself weaving on his feet as if he's riding a boat.
"We're not going to be able to hold this place," he mutters, low enough that he's probably talking to himself.
"Shortround, relay the coordinates to Sky-Byte where you left my supplies."
Engineers can create handy things like sentry guns, health dispensers and teleporters. If you're lucky, he'll tell you where they are. If not, well, he's not there to hold your hand.
Post by Shortround on Jul 26, 2007 20:05:58 GMT -5
Shortround doesn't notice Hook's distractedness. He's attempting not to panic himself silly. Then the entire place shakes. Shortround is sent turning a bit, however can't exactly fall over.
"Right! Can do!" Shortround says, transmitting the coordinents. His voice is still full of his usual panic at the giant Mechabot-1 outside with a serious grudge against the Construction Robo inside.
"Hnh." Hook shuts Shortround's cargo door after he finishes loading the hovercraft. Most mechs would have let the other Transformer shut it himself. "Join Sky-Byte. Retreat to the west. Avoid conflict. I don't need to tell you what will happen if an energy burst hits that energon, do I?"
He turns his attention to the inside of the pyramid, peering closely at the building. There, on the ground near each conglomerate were workstations with keyboards and joysticks.
He reachs in and shifted a joystick with one finger, watching as the green screen powered up. The data on it was meaningless, as he couldn't read the language at all, nor had an understanding of their color theory. However, he records it for future reference.
A tiny tool extrudes from one finger, and he delicately begins to tap-tap keys on the keyboard. He really has no idea what he's doing, but doing something is more likely to cause something to happen than doing nothing would.
Engineers can create handy things like sentry guns, health dispensers and teleporters. If you're lucky, he'll tell you where they are. If not, well, he's not there to hold your hand.
Post by Shortround on Jul 27, 2007 23:29:23 GMT -5
His storage space full of energon, Shortround zooms off to the west, hoping for minimal contact with Autobots. Not because he's a hovering bomb, but because Shortround is still a coward.
Sky-byte resists the urge to completely hightail it out of the area as he glides silently down the mesa towards the coordinates bounced to him. He can see the laser blasts a lot more clearer now, he can hear the shifting gears and hydraulics in Omega Supreme. It's not as if he can run away with that great jet hovering over him. Skystrike isn't it? That's one Decepticon in the group that he's not entirely familiar with.
Near the base of the mesa, right before the beginning of the road, Sky-byte spots the familiar load, teeth-marks and all. He takes one look at it and sighs before clamping down, hefting the supplies into a more secure if not comfortable hold.
The Decepticon better not laugh.
"Ahhm reeaay." Translation, I'm ready.
~Who's the greatest shark in town? Who's the baddest shark around? Sky-byte! That's me! ~
Post by Skystrike/Skylar Stringers on Jul 29, 2007 1:02:47 GMT -5
Fortunately for Sky-byte, Skystrike had never been the kind of person to be easily amused. The only people who’d managed to drag a low rasping cough of a laugh from her had been one of her consorts and they were all in another dimension or something. She just gave him the odd twitch of an aileron but that was it.
“Then let us be quick.” The blue jet rumbled keeping her sensors on high alert as she hovered protectively over the shark. There were fliers in amidst the Autobots now, and it wouldn’t do to have one of them sneaking up at an inopportune moment.
Retreat to the West, that’s what Hook had said, right? Then it was a matter of getting someone else with the ability to drag a few of the freight-carriers over to their favorite Constructicon. Wait, what was that—?
Oh. Shortround.
“… Let’s group up with Shortround first until we get to the freight-carriers. It's not safe leaving him out there alone.” Strangely Autobot-like coming from a Decepticon. Then again, being the personal bodyguard of a team of fuel trucks for a few million gave her a bit of a one-track mind.
Hook continues to input commands on the console, and sometimes something changes on the screen. At one point, the tubes glow brighter and there is an uptick in the production of energon cubes. At another point, a pleasant hum rumbles to life in the walls of the pyramid. Eventually, he figures out what combination of keys equals "yes, do that". Whatever 'that' might be.
The brief conversation with Dead End distracts him from the screen he can't actually read. It flickers through several different prompt screens as he responds "yes" to each question.
Far above him, the great dish atop the station slowly rotates. There is a soft squealing as joints that haven't rotated in a year rotate once more.
Something that is obviously a timer-bar has appeared on Hook's screen. He brightens his visor, then turns to look around the courtyard. What has he just done now?
Once the dish has achieved its position, a great beam of fuschia light shoots off into the sky, splitting into a thousand different beams as they arc back towards the planet. No beam falls near the power station.1
The signals are picked up all around the globe by remote stations similar to this one. Long disused circuitry is stirred to life by the signal, and once more the soft hum of equipment can be heard on a world months silent. Would be heard, had anyone been near enough to hear it.
"Well, so much for being subtle," Hook murmurs.
---
1. The job of processing and transmitting power has been taken up by smaller, remote stations. Many, but not all, of the receiving stations have now gone back online, including the one at the city with the zoo and one at the mining town.
This opens up the whole world - neither side will starve anymore. But only controlling one power station doesn't allow for much in the way of growth, and energy isn't the only resource Transformers desire.
Engineers can create handy things like sentry guns, health dispensers and teleporters. If you're lucky, he'll tell you where they are. If not, well, he's not there to hold your hand.
Shortround slows down and turns as the huge light shines over the battlefield. "Alright, now that's slagging awesome" he says, staring at the power plant as the light dims.
Then he notices the giant Guardian Robot who is notably now much closer to the plant, and promptly turns back, continuing to the west without noticing the flying shark or Seeker yet. Shortround has a mind capable of noticing the biggest risks, be they the scalper about to take the latest box of his current obsession or the giant Mechabot-1 who sounds like he's upset at Hook selling him on uBay.
Unfortunately, his regular defense of "Fire plasma" only works on the scalpers. Monsters from some of Shortround's worst over-energised dreams are rarely able to be forced into submission by burning.
Right, Shortround...where is that hook-handed mech? Sky-byte's question is answered as a huge beam of light breaks into the sky and he thinks he can see something whizzing away westward with a large stack of glowing pink.
// Looks like he's split without us. // How Decepticon, coward (but Sky-byte really can't attest to being any better at times). // Let's get after him! //
Heaving his cargo into the air with him, Sky-byte sets to turn himself in a westerly direction and make after that soap-dish Decepticon. He does have the sense to wait for Skystrike though. No use for having cover fire if that cover fire isn't going to help you in any way.
~Who's the greatest shark in town? Who's the baddest shark around? Sky-byte! That's me! ~
Post by Skystrike/Skylar Stringers on Jul 30, 2007 17:12:47 GMT -5
If there was one thing you didn’t have to wait long for, it was jets. Even low fuel ones that were hesitating at the sight of Omega Supreme mobilizing towards the station that everyone’s favorite technician was in. Damn that guardian! Damn Starscream and his lack of coherent battle planning! Damn Hook for telling her to guard Sky-byte and damn herself for following!
There was a pissed sounding whine of engines before Skystrike abruptly turned and flew after Sky-byte once more.
//Shortround! We’re coming up to join you!// She growled over the link.