Kup Interviews: Skyblast

[Kup]

OOC: This takes place after the Room Assignments thread, the Synapse interview, and the Wheelie and Holi interview.

Kup is just out and about for this round of interviews!

And why not? If he's got to do the job, might as well take in the immediate surroundings while he's at it.

This time the Veteran stands on the roof of garage-becoming-base. Most of the old, wrecked vehicles that had been torn apart by Tiny's parent have been moved off to one side, and every bit of them that can be salvaged has been. Before too long the rest will need to be carted off, or recycled. While he waits for his next appointment, Skyblast, to arrive he scans the horizon, working out the lay of the city, what areas are most likely to be useful, what aren't... and briefly that strange blue tower catches his gaze.

[Nimbus Tsura]

Skyblast isn't flitting around anywhere as sundry as the horizon. He cavorts in the upper atmosphere, as high as his engines can take him. When it is time for his interview, he dives straight down at the roof, corkscrewing through the air. The Valkyrie looks ready to drill himself right into the roof, but he transforms prior to impact, tumbles once, and lands on his feet.

The short jet Autobot grins up at Kup, a jaunty set to his pose with on hand on skewed hip and the other slack, and he greets, "Hiya."

[Kup]

Kup suppresses a sigh and a grimace. Kids. Surrounded by punk kids. He shakes his head faintly, but then forces a smile. "Hello. Skyblast, right? Kup," he approaches Skyblast to shake the smaller Autobot's hand. Then, whether Skyblast returns the handshake or not, he begins pacing absently as he talks, hands, at least at first, clamped behind his back. "You may have heard, but I've been doing some interviews to try and get an idea what we've got available, skill, ability, and experience wise. So, well, with that in mind... why don't you tell me about yourself, Skyblast?"

[Nimbus Tsura]

Skyblast quirks an optic ridge at the grimace and asks quickly, "Were my rotations off? I thought the last one felt kind of sloppy."

He awkwardly shakes Kup's hand back, points to the handshake with his other hand, and says, "That's a greeting, right?"

Retrieving his hand back, he places it on his own chest, over the inset silver Autobot symbol that covers his very spark, and he bows with a flourish, sweeping out his other hand. Skyblast introduces, "I am a sky-painter." He straightens up, dropping his hands to his sides. "Since the war, though, being a warrior has had to come first." Skyblast is not terribly thrilled by this development. "I wasn't made long before the war, but I really loved the peace, and the Decepticons had to go and ruin it all. So of course I signed on with Optimus Prime and the Autobots. The fighting dragged on and on, until the Allspark," reverent tones, there, "was lost. I was on a team out in space, looking for it, when we got word that Optimus Prime's personal crew had found it. And blew it up." Skyblast scratches the back of his helmet, looks down at his feet, and sighs.

He looks back up and concludes, "So I have combat experience, and I've been offworld a fair bit. I'm really good at tight aerial moves, because I need them for my art."

[Kup]

"Erm, no, your... rotations were fine, lad," Kup answers, smiling reassuringly. When Skyblast asks about his handshake, Kup's optics flash and widen briefly, and then he nods. "Uhm, yeah. Yeah, it is." It's really an amusing coincidence that humans have such a similar greeting themselves, but they do.

He stops his pacing while Skyblast talks, turning, instead, to listen. "What's this 'All Spark' business, anyway? I think I've heard folks from your reality mention it before, but it's not something we have back home."

[Nimbus Tsura]

Skyblast has this look in his optics that seems to say he thinks Kup's people are utterly weird for not knowing about the Allspark. However, he talked the issue over with Perceptor a while ago. Skyblast explains, waving his hands to gesture, "The Allspark gave life to Cybertron and created us. Being very powerful, the Decepticons wanted it, so we booted it into space so they couldn't have it. Of course, they went looking for it, so we had to, too."

Could someone explain to Skyblast why they didn't put a tracking device on the darn thing?

"They found it on Earth. The humans – those are Earth natives – had stuck it in some big dam, but Bumblebee got it out. Some human spawnling called 'Sam'," Skyblast has a little trouble pronouncing the name, "was trying to get the Allspark to safety for us. Optimus Prime was just going to detroy it, so Megatron couldn't have it, but that would have killed Optimus Prime, too. So this Sam alien shoved it in Megatron's spark, and that ruined the Allspark and killed Megatron."

"I mean, yeah, killing Megatron is great. It's awesome. Thing is, without the Allspark, we cannot make new life. We're pretty much a dead race. Perceptor had some ideas on how to help with that, though," Skyblast finishes, managing to end on a cheery note.

[Kup]

Maybe it's because the All Spark energy would have turned the tracker into a Transformer, and then the tracker would have just up and wandered off?

Kup nods. "I've been to Earth. Lived there for awhile, actually, and still have to go there on and off pretty regularly. Nice place, really. The locals are... decent." Kup shrugs. "They're people. They got good and bad like any species. They've generally been good allies to the Autobots in my reality, though. Like this one time..." and then Kup realizes he's started rambling. He coughs, a staticcy throat-clearing noise, and smiles faintly.

"But anyway, yeah. Your 'All Spark' sounds like it's similar to our Vector Sigma, in a way. 'Cept that Vector Sigma needed pre-built bodies to work with. That's the fastest and easiest way we got to get a complete Transformer personality program, but we got other methods. I was hand built and programmed myself - living proof that it can be done. Glad to hear you're talking to Perceptor about it; he's the one to go to."

The veteran paces in silence for a moment, his optics narrowed thoughtfully before he speaks again. "Now... I noticed Optimus Prime had been cut in half. Kind of hard to miss that. I know that didn't happen at the Battle of Five, at least not in my reality. I was there! And Slingshot, he don't use bladed weapons." Kup pauses in his pacing and turns towards Skyblast. "You know anything about that?"

[Nimbus Tsura]

Skyblast nods and explains, "The humans of Earth imprisoned both Megatron and Bumblebee, but they were just clueless. Once they had things explained to them, they came around and helped us. The Allspark will turn any unliving machine that gets close enough to it into one of us. Yeah, I don't get a lot of what Perceptor says, but maybe Jazz can. He's smarter, see."

He chuckles and claps his hands together. "Oh, that? You people are built so much bigger than me," he isn't short; everyone else is just tall, "so I couldn't lift all of him, and Slingshot couldn't lift him all, either. So I just made an energon blade and cut him in half." He pauses, thinking. "I should explain those. I can draw on my reserves to create temporary energon weapons. I can do paired blades, an electro-discharge cannon, or a spear. I also have talons in jet mode, but those are just normal metal, not energon talons."

So this explains why Skyblast doesn't have any obvious weapons on him.

"I guess I'm a little better armoured than average. I don't usually crash, but when I crash, I crash bad, so..." he shrugs. Perhaps this is why he doesn't look as razorblade-like as Jazz and Bumblebee!

[Kup]

Well, Kup doesn't have any obvious weapons on him. It hasn't hit him that perhaps not every Transformer has subspace access!

He nods at the bit about armor. Yeah, that does explain the difference in appearance. "So... you fly, and you fight, and you paint. You got any other skills you think might be useful or relevant to this situation?"

[Nimbus Tsura]

Skyblast reminds, "I've been around space a bit. Not this sector, but if we get out where I've been, I know a few things, like... you don't turn your cup upside down in front of an Austral alien. That sort of stuff."

[Kup]

"Oh, man, tell me about it!" Kup agrees enthusiastically, right hand gesturing out as he talks. "Why, back in my freelance days I had to meet a client in the southern end of the primary continent on Austra. That was my first time on that planet and I didn't know, and, well..." he shrugs. "I tend to move my hands a lot when I talk," a watch of his hands even now proves this to be true, "and sometimes I'll just absently play with whatever's sitting in front of me. Well, the cup was there, and it was empty, so..."

Kup makes a face, but then chuckles good naturedly. "Needless to say, I never got paid for that job." Then he rubs his chin thoughtfully and mutters, "That was a hellava fun fight, though... but oh, where was I..."

The veteran turns his attention back to Skyblast. "We should be about done here, then. Now, we're going to have some training coming up, get everyone used to working with each other, that sort of thing. But otherwise, nice to meet another traveler, at anyrate. Maybe we ought to get together and swap stories sometime?"

[Nimbus Tsura]

Skyblast winces sympathetically, his little arm-mounted wings twitching, as he listens along the story. He rubs his arm and admits, "I sort of took all our glasses and stacked them upside down in a little pyramid. Yeah. Bad idea."

He nods enthusiastically and agrees, "Definitely! Oh, one thing? Could you please just transform back and forth for me?" Skyblast tilts his head to one side quizzically.

[Kup]

Kup actually chuckles at Skyblast's seemingly odd request. He was design to minimize his 'alternate mode kibble,' and he was built at a time when Transformers weren't the norm, but still...

"Been awhile since I've had someone request that outside of a medical exam," he observes, transforming first into truck mode then back into a robot. "That good, or do you need to see it again?" he grins with amusement.

[Nimbus Tsura]

Skyblast exclaims, "Oh, that's simple!" then he moves his hand up to cover his mouth. He waves his other hand and excuses, "No, that's great, thanks. Most of you guys are pretty easy to figure out, because I'm used to seeing really intricate transformations, but you were puzzling me."

He nods a few times, happy now.

[Kup]

"Simple?" Kup exclaims, a faint touch of annoyance in his voice. "I'll have you know my Cybertronians just weren't handed the ability to transform like everyone else's seemed to have been. We hadda figure it out ourselves!" While walking uphill through snow both ways. "I was one of the first generations that got it right. Back in those days, the goal was to try and make a Transformer look as little like they actually transform as possible! My only real obvious give away is my windshield," Kup raps that with his knuckles once, "and even that's not so obvious until you're in fairly close. Once it became common for everyone to be able to transform, though, there was no need to hide it, which is why it's a bit more obvious with the others."

He shrugs. "I don't really see why a transformation would be made more intricate than it has to be, but then, I'm no engineer."