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Post by Swerve on Sept 18, 2007 22:39:52 GMT -5
No, Swerve hasn't left yet. But with Synapse gone, he can get back to the minor tweaks he wants to finish up while he has the chance to work indoors with even a slight measure of privacy. Occasionally as he works, his gaze drifts to the body left behind for Perceptor. He even debates being magnanimous and letting the blabbermouth know about it.
…Once he's done, so he can leave first. Not that finishing up will take long.
OOC: Swerve will stick around just a bit longer for lack of more entertaining things to do. The warning on bedside manner stands.
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Post by Perceptor on Sept 20, 2007 21:11:27 GMT -5
Swerve should have skeedaddled while the skeedaddling was good, if he didn't want to get stuck interacting with anyone. A certain verbose red mech is meandering his way, quite deep in thought, up the ramp back to Repair.
Cybertronians melding their lives with organics, Optimus Prime returned from death, Cybertron reinvigorated, a pandemic of unimaginable proportions, untold numbers of Autobots senselessly lost, and "peace" while those left living short-sightedly ignore the potential for trouble to once again brew into a maelstrom of war. And none of this is helping to get that fabricator online, or solve any of their current mysteries, of which, there are more than enough to keep the scientist contemplating quite deeply as he continues up the ramp to his chosen domain.
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Post by Swerve on Sept 20, 2007 21:48:42 GMT -5
Swerve will later regret not leaving earlier, mark that. He got so wrapped up in his repairs, and with the area quiet after Synapse's departure, he'd actually gotten a bit comfortable. It wasn't his garage, but he had it to himself. At some point, he even stopped keeping an optic on the entrance ramp to better focus on his work.
It's down to minute adjustments now. Stupidly minute, time-consuming adjustments he hasn't had a chance to make in a long, long while – longer than he's been here, even. Turn this screw here half a micron counter-clockwise, test the motor delay as he flexes his ankle, go back to that same little screw or move on to the next instead. Swerve wants his reaction times back up to the specs to which he built this body. Finely-tuned racer? That isn't the half of it.
The little details of this busy work take enough of his attention that he doesn't immediately hear Perceptor coming up the ramp. It's remarkably easy enough not to notice the mouthpiece when he isn't being a trap-flapping mouthpiece.
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Post by Perceptor on Sept 20, 2007 22:09:35 GMT -5
Ninja scientist is ninja. Apparently.
Perceptor makes it almost to the center of the workshop - having absently noticed Swerve hunched over his own lower leg, making the most fine tuned calibrations - before he notes the body on one of the other repair berths. He stops, chin still cupped in one hand, arm crossed over his chest bracing that elbow, and stares at it for a long, uncomprehending moment.
"Swerve? There is a deactivated body on the repair berth," he observes evenly. "Why is there a deactivated body of unfamiliar configuration on the repair berth?"
And why is the rum gone, while we're at it.
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Post by Swerve on Sept 20, 2007 22:33:28 GMT -5
That clatter is not Swerve dropping his tools to draw his gun. Well, maybe it is, but he doesn't get to the second half of that procedure when he glances to the side and his glare lands on Perceptor. That hissed curse is Swerve berating himself for getting comfortable. He's really starting to slip around here. It's too leaking easy; the Autobots don't do much of anything to keep him on his toes.
Never thought I'd start missing the underground….
He doesn't answer the scientist right away. He collects himself, and his tools, first. Swerve's optics may flash in anger as he looks again at Perceptor, or it may simply be the light playing oddly off their metallic sheen, but he makes no effort to hide his overwhelming resentment of this interruption.
"It's there 'cause that's where Synapse left it," he mutters. "Maybe he likes you or somethin'."
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Post by Perceptor on Sept 20, 2007 23:24:31 GMT -5
At the clatter, Perceptor jumps and offers Swerve an apologetic look; he hadn't been trying to be sneaky, after all. Of course, with Perceptor's luck, he'd probably have been much noisier if he'd been trying to be sneaky and quiet.
"My apologies, Swerve. I did not intend..." his voice trails off as he notes Swerve's obvious ire. "Ahem." Yes, Swerve, you can silence "the mouthpiece" with a look; he's rapidly becoming (re)acquainted with the fact that few mechs care to engage in discussion with him.
The body is a nice distraction from that heated look Swerve has aimed at him, and so he turns back to it for further study--
And promptly forgets about that glare aimed at him.
"It has been documented in some cultures of both organic and mechanical derivation, that the giving of deceased remains is an expression of romantic intention, while in others, such an offering is analogous to a declaration of intention to ally oneself in a more casual, rather than intimate manner," he rambles distractedly as he crosses to the berth and peers at the body.
Although he has a very good guess what the being was, he radios Kup on the still open line for clarification.
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Post by Swerve on Sept 21, 2007 0:24:03 GMT -5
Briefly, Swerve's glare gives way to a blank look as Perceptor rambles at him about what it means to give somebody a dead body. If that's the case, the racer has a veritable bouquet of husks to hand a future love interest.
Or he would if he hadn't scrapped them all. Selfish slagger.
Finally, his features settle back into their intimately familiar 'scowl' configuration and he looks back down at his leg. Just a couple more adjustments to make… he can stick it out long enough to take care of those, can't he? Maybe if he just tunes out the other Autobot.
"…Yeah, whatever." He takes up his tools and sets to finishing his work as quickly as he can get it done right. There's only so much of that over-exposition he can handle in one sitting.
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Post by Perceptor on Sept 21, 2007 8:55:46 GMT -5
If Swerve weren't concentrating so hard on his calibrations, he might notice the sheepish look Perceptor shoots in his direction as the racer's tone reminds the scientist that, yes, he's doing it. Again. Perceptor firmly instructs himself to keep his observations - and random musings, particularly about those odd bits of minutiae that doubtless no one else but he could possibly care about - to himself. Swerve obviously has no desire to listen, and is far more interested in his calibrations. Incredibly minute calibrations, at that, Perceptor notes absently as he turns another brief look over at the room's other living occupant. Getting unexpectedly transplanted here to Gillanan III, Perceptor has learned his lesson. He keeps his own tools, the ones he's constructed for himself that meet his rigorous requirements, safely tucked away in his subspace. It's not his nicely equipped laboratory back on Cybertron, or even the home-away-from-home on Earth, but they are swiftly becoming familiar to him, and are finely crafted - the fussy scientist has very exacting standards, after all. He is about to remove said collection of instruments from subspace and offer them to Swerve, or offer his assistance, but hesitates. The racer is unappreciative of assistance, and intolerant of interruption; doubtless he'd be insulted by the implication that his own instruments were insufficient to his chosen task. He settles for silently setting the tool kit down on the workbench that Swerve is seated beside, before crossing back to examine the specimen laid out on the repair berth for him. Perhaps Kup or Synapse can offer additional details that will assist him in his study of the mechanism.
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Post by Swerve on Sept 21, 2007 15:12:33 GMT -5
Swerve pays no heed to the toolkit Perceptor leaves, although he briefly tenses at the larger Autobot's proximity. The Autobots don't do much to keep him on his toes, but he still can't help expecting someone to just take a swing at him. It's fragging weird that no-one does.
Sure enough, Perceptor steps away without incident and Swerve gets back to work. So much work as one remaining screw can give him, anyway. A half-turn, a test, another half-turn – no, too far. Quarter-turn back… and that's it. He closes the panel and his toolkit is in subspace as quick as he can stow his tools and shunt it. Why the hurry? Well, he's been listening to the radio. The idea of volunteering to play greeting party chafes, but it'll get him out of here for a while. The prospect of a long drive is enough to put out of mind the possibility that the chatterbox on the radio will be worse than Perceptor.
//I'll go get him,// Swerve tosses over the airwaves, standing and heading for the ramp without so much as a nod to Perceptor. Looks like the engineer bonding session will have to wait. The racer transforms – his legs transition much more smoothly now, he notes with satisfaction – and with an eager rev of his engine makes his swift exit of the building.
OOC: Sorry to steal your company, Perceptor, but Swerve's out for now. You can talk his receptors off some other time, I'm sure.
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Post by Perceptor on Sept 23, 2007 13:28:06 GMT -5
Perceptor notes Swerve's precipitous exit, but then swiftly turns his attention back to the body Synapse had left for him. He hadn't really expected anything else, actually.
The body, however, should provide a wealth of information - general materials composition, radiological contamination - if any, microscopic particulate matter... any number of readings, objects, or levels to measure an analyze to possibly shed some light on the catastrophic loss of Gillanan IV.
Perceptor is well absorbed by his task. Unlike Swerve, he isn't in the habit of keeping such meticulous track of his environment. This, folks, is why Perceptor was never really known as a combatant. Needless to say, even Grimlock could sneak up on him right now. If anyone needs him, they'll have to knock. Hard.
Probably right on his head.
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Post by Perceptor on Sept 23, 2007 23:43:44 GMT -5
Long Haul's response to his radioed request turns out to be the "hard knock" against his cranium that is required to shake him out of his task. It is, perhaps, a longshot, however, there does exist the potential to find, if not information, then a lead to where information may be stored. Considering that initial examination of the body Synapse had retreived from him was proving fascinating, but inconclusive to pointing at a potential avenue of investigation regarding Gillanan IV's destruction, any possible presence of stored communications and/or data associated with a potential communications facility far outweighed the information that could be gleaned from a time-consuming and more detailed study of the body. Given the rather organic nature of the structure of the deceased life form - not a being that appeared to have been built or designed as Cybertronians were, even in their various incarnations from disparate realities, rather than one that appeared, like Tiny, to have evolved into its current configuration, much like humans from Earth had - even locating memorybanks and data storage of the mechanism might prove challenging. Perceptor passes those observations on to Kup, Xaaron, and Nightbeat, and then collects his tool kit from the workbench where he had placed it for Swerve's use. He may need it, even if he does end up having to resort to examining the facility as a little rolling microscope in order to fit into the structure. ooc: and Perceptor wanders off toward the tower that Long Haul, Arcee, and Jazz found during their explorations.
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