About Town: Dead End and ?

[Dead End]

Shortly after his arrival in town, someone thinks to pass Hook's orders regarding fuel storage to Dead End.

"I'm seeing to the energon storage?" The dark red Stunticon car sounds surprised, as indeed he is. Motormaster never gave him responsibilities. "Hmm..."

Mining town... and up there, a mine. Didn't they use explosives in mining, to break rock and suchlike? If so, they had to have a safe storage place for possibly volatile high explosives... properties also characteristic of energon.

// Has anyone noticed anything like an ammo bunker or demolitions locker or explosives storage around here yet? I'm looking for the place they stored their mining explosives, // Dead End asks on the Decepticon broadband, on the off-chance that someone has already found such an item.

He doubts that they have; he'll have to go looking for it himself, most likely, and it'll probably be full of old, unstable explosives that will detonate at the first touch on the door.

Dead End's engines seem to sigh as he heads up to the mine shaft; best to look from there outwards and towards town. They wouldn't have wanted to have them in the mine, lest an accident seal the mine shaft with much commotion, but neither did they want them too far away, if they were using them frequently.

---

OOC: Anyone with fuel stores to store (that's you, Shortround) needs to rendezvous with Dead End. Anyone who wants to help him find a big pile of explosives, feel free to wander over.

[Demolishor]

Demolishor rumbled along behind him, not quite happy about the mine thing but content to have something to do. His self-repair systems had kicked in about an hour after the battle and by now he was feeling a lot better about himself and his ability to not die.

"Lemme come with you!" he called after Dead End, putting on a bit more speed (not that it meant much when comparing a missile tank to a porsche). "I'm good with tunnels. I was Megatron's main tunnel guy."

Of course he was. The other options were jets, a helicopter, and a car.

[Shortround]

Shortround, after delivering some energon to Starscream, zoomed over in the direction of Dead End and Demolisher, managing to outpace the slow tank.

"Please say you've found somewhere..." Shortround said, somewhat jumpy. He just passed a store that clearly had a sign proclaming some kind of sale, and was anxiously hoping to dump the energon, then go and explore the mine, and then take all of the rare toys. No scalpers were going to stop him this time.

[Dead End]

Meanwhile, Dead End has spotted a promising building. Perhaps half a mile from the mine shaft is a low, semi-quonset hut-looking building with earth berms around the walls. Dead End turns down the secondary road leading to it--a road lined with black mag-lev rails. They moved heavy stuff along this path.

He stops facing the door; even ground-penetrating radar doesn't get very far. The building is armored.

"Could one of you open that door, gently? I anticipate a large quantity of possibly still-functional explosives inside, and my vehicular weapons are not suitable for subtle operations."

[Demolishor]

In other words, Dead End wanted the door opened but didn't want to risk getting exploded. Cars were always such wimps.

"Oh, fine," Demolishor grumbled as he stomped up towards the building. "Might as well be me, I'm the one with the fingers." He took hold of the door delicately between two thumbs and a forefinger, and yanked it open.

[Shortround]

Shortround remains waiting for Demolisher to open the door. He wants to dump this energon as soon as possible so he can get on with random task number 2 anyway.

Shortround hovers over near to the door when Demolisher opens it, having no idea what to expect and being in a prime position to getting horribly scared.

[Dead End]

Oh look, nothing exploded. Dead End is moderately surprised; he expected that the big explosion would kill them all. It wasn't cowardice that made him ask for Demolishor to open the door--it was the lack of hands in car mode. He didn't want to transform again with energon in his trunk. There was already one cube wedged in a funny position from his in-combat transform of a few days ago.

"Demolishor, what's in there? Is it reasonably dry and is there room for our energon?" Dead End asks. He can't see past Demolishor's bulk in his low-slung vehicle form. "Any more dead bodies?"

[Demolishor]

"I'm looking, I'm looking. Hold your wheels." Demolishor bends down a bit and peers inside, letting his larger eye flick through half a dozen settings and filters before he straightens up again.

"Bunch of crates, but there's room enough for a few people to squeeze in. Probably more if we take the crates out and toss whatever's in them if it isn't useful."

The tank leans in again, taking a hesitant step inside the building. "Also something in the corner with legs, but I'm pretty sure it's dead. Nothing like the giant wiggly electric toothbrush of doom, at any rate."

[Shortround]

Upon hearing that there's something in there with legs, Shortround's turret activates, pointing towards the door.

"You're... Sure it's dead?" he asks, not wanting to be blown to pieces due to his explosive cargo. He wanted to live long enough to at least see what sort of toys this place had in stock.

[Dead End]

Oh look. The guy who can't shoot straight is pointing a plasma cannon in the same quadrant as Dead End's un-forcefielded trunk with all the highly-explosive energon in it. Today was definitely it--he would go out with a bang. At least it would be quick.

Dead End indulges himself with a moment of morbid contemplation on what it might feel like to come apart from a massive internal explosion, and then says, "Shortround, could you cover the rear quadrant instead? Demolishor has more than enough guns for anything that could fit in that building, and he's in front... of your cannon."

"If the leggy thing is mechanical, I'll take it to Hook when we're done unloading. If it's organic, discard it somewhere outside. Then get me unloaded in the available space," Dead End ordered. "After that, I will transform and join you in getting this place cleaned out and Shortround unloaded."

"Oh, don't be too rough with the crates until we know what's in them. They're probably something unstable," Dead End added as an afterthought. "I shall be annoyed if you drop one and kill us all in a large dramatic explosion".

[Demolishor]

Demolishor's shoulder slid around and pointed backward in Shortround's general direction. "Lay off, shortie. I can smell it from here, if it ain't dead it's got a serious flesh problem. And I'm not touching it, either."

It probably came in looking for shelter or food and wound up getting stuck inside. Hopefully, anyway, because Demolishor's not partial to deadly gases that might affect Decepticons for some convoluted plot reason.

Demolishor bent over and waddled a few steps inward, then waddled back out dragging with a crate the size of a motorcycle. There are several strange symbols painted on the side, probably labels of some sort, but no obvious danger marks or exclamation points.

[Shortround]

Shortround turned his turret behind him. "Just being safe..." Shortround said.

Shortround moved backwards to allow room for the first crate, however he can't do anything with it at the moment, being stuck in his alt mode. Curse his lack of robot mode space!

[Dead End]

Dead End watches Demolishor and his box intently. "And what's in the box? Parts, mysterious canisters, bricks of clay, bundles of sticks, artillery shells, what? It's probably not foodstuffs, organics don't use explosive fuels for themselves."

He shines a headlight on the dead whatsit; a multitude of legs curl up and over, hiding other details from sight. "Well, you're the only one with hands at the moment, Demolishor, and I don't think anyone's going to like it if we just plunk their energon on top of the goo."

[Demolishor]

The tank pulls a face. "Give me a long pole or a cleaner or something, I'm not touching it. There's bugs the size of screws on it."

Demolishor fiddles with what appears to be some sort of lock, delicately crushing it between two fingers and lifting the lid up. Like a fool, he pokes his head right in.

"Looks like a bunch of parts. Gears and twisties and here we go!" Demolishor reaches in and draws out, yes, a long pole with a flat portion on the end. He turns and holds it out to Shortround. "Here, you go get it."

[Shortround]

Had Shortround been in his robot mode he would have glared at Demolisher. So this was the famous Demolisher, one of Megatron's loyalist followers... Too scared to poke a thing. Shortround was supposed to be the wimp, no him!

"Little problem with transforming at the moment" he said, opening the nearest door to Demolisher to show the energon stacked in him. "Can't transform unless I get all this outta me"