Barricade and Frenzy head for Trouble-3

[Barricade]

// Mission, // Barricade comments tersely to Frenzy, an edge of anticipation in his low growl. At last, an authorized, sanctioned excuse to go drive fast and shoot things if need be. Excellent.

The dark Saleen Interceptor rolls to a stop and pops open his front door, waiting for his demonic little partner to scramble inside.

// Shall we go hunting? //

[Frenzy]

//Yeah, yeah. Shotgun.// Like Barricade would let him ride anywhere else.

Frenzy pulls the door shut behind him and squirms in the Saleen's seat until he gets just perfectly comfortable. Then he buckles himself in and wiggles more to readjust himself.

[Barricade]

The Saleen's engine growls lowly as Frenzy squirms - to get comfortable, of course - against the leather of his interior. Oh, it's going to be like that, is it? (When isn't it, really?)

"Oh?" Barricade rumbles, innocence dripping from that single syllable. "Well then, if you don't want to drive..." The seat belt jerks tight, and smoke pours out from Barricade's back tires for an instant before they bite in for traction and the Saleen leaps forward like a launching rocket.

[Frenzy]

"Never let me drive, anyway," Frenzy mutters and folds his arms, hunching down in the seat. "Can't drive, can't fly, can't play with the guns. Just sit in the seat till it's time to get out and do things. Nngh!"

[Barricade]

The road flies under them as Barricade races off into the night toward the coordinates provided by Lord Shockwave. 'You want to drive?" Barricade asks evenly. They're still some distance off from their target; there's time for fun along the way.

"Then do it." Frenzy's seatbelt pops loose on its own, and Barricade starts drifting slightly across the road.

[Frenzy]

The temptation is powerful, and Frenzy almost dives for the steering wheel to take control of his partner. But that's what Barricade is freely offering...

Frenzy tucks his feet up on the leather seat, recrosses his arms, and glares out the window. "No."

[Barricade]

"Hn." Barricade straightens out, wheels barking slightly on the metal road as he fishtails back into the center of the road.

Sulking then. Perhaps they will get lucky enough and Barricade will be able to find Frenzy an Autobot to... question. After all, it's hard for a mech to concentrate on keeping the devlish little hacker out of their systems when their torso armor is slowly being carved from them one meticulous piece at a time. The appendage armor, of course, Barricade is always careful to remove with the rest of the appendage before getting down to work. Simplifies things so much.

"As you wish," he rumbles. "Going to get bumpy." And then he's off the road to head overland toward those coordinates. Easier to find cover overland than on an open road.

[Frenzy]

Frenzy is not sulking. Frenzy wouldn't be upset if Barricade thought he was sulking, though.

Instead he watches out the window as the miles are ground under Barricade's wheels. Wake him up when they get there.

[Barricade]

How about when they spot something out of place? Like that swift of moonlight on metal flicker in the distance. Probably looks an awful lot like what Barricade does from the same distance.

With a little wordless prod over their private channel to Frenzy, Barricade shifts his track and gooses the throttle to check it out.

[Frenzy]

Frenzy shifts slightly, one hand reaching down to unclick his seatbelt and slowly let it slide up to a rest position. Might need to dive out an open door with hardly any warning, after all.

For now, though, he keeps one eye-stalk looking forward and one to the side. He alternates which one is which, too, to cover multiple sides.

[Mirage-3]

The thought has crossed Mirage's mind from time to time since being deposited on this thrice-damned planet that perhaps Perceptor could do somthing to negate or at least extend the time limit on his holo tech. But that would place him to much in the sadistic scientist's hands, a place very few went williingly. And so, he must still cycle his invisibility, six minutes on, one off.

The moons light the sky too much here, and Mirage laments that he is not better built for driving off-road. He is fast, but not so fast as to keep up with a jet, so he can but head in the general direction of Needlenose's flight, hoping that the jet's injuries were severe enough to ground him. He speeds along, slipping under the forest canopy.

Suddenly, he transforms, jumping into the air, letting his speed carrying him untill he lands almost silenty along a footpath to the left of the road. Several sounds, off in the distance. Gunfire, both behind and before, though the sounds are muffled. And below that, the soft sing of speeding tires and the quiet purr of an engine. Tempting, too tempting to lie in wait for whomever it may be. But they are not his prey, and Mirage will not again disappoint this Prime, not for all the energon in the multiverse.

Cloaked again, Mirage begins to pick his way carefully through the forest, heading in the basic direction of the Decepticon base, and towards the area where Spinister and Oracle are fighting, though that confrontation will likely be done before he can close the distance. Mirage leaves little evidence of his passing, though even his step is not so light as to not press down tender grasses and scuff soft dirt.

[Barricade]

Damn. Whatever it had been ahead has vanished. Metal road bites under Barricade's tires again as he finds the thin ribbon of highway that splits the night between the Decepticamp and the distant disturbance. Perhaps if he tracks back along the road from his position...

A sharp jab from his partner fixes Barricade's attention on an unremarkable patch of moist ground by the side of the road. He slows sharply - careful not to give himself away too much by jamming on brakes and leaving a squealing trail of rubber in his wake - and shifts into reverse to return to the spot. Is that a track?

He'd have missed it without Frenzy's sharp blue optics scanning the night.

"Time to hunt," he rumbles, popping the door open for his nimble little partner to slip out. Now to see what they can scare up in the dark wood.

[Frenzy]

Frenzy slips out, optics obscenely bright as gather the available light and let him see the details concealed to most by the dark. He pauses at the patch of scuffed dirt and crushed grasses slowly returning to their normal position.

Needle hands pluck at the grasses as he scans the way before. Hnh... Then he tilted his head up to stare at the canopy, eye-stalks rotating slowly.

Another scuffed patch ahead, too far to be a stride. But-

Abruptly, the little spy takes off running. A third of the way to the patch, he leaps and clings to a tree, then scurries up it to a point slightly above Barricade's head.

Yeah, scraped tree-bark.

//Transformer,// he transmitted to Barricade. //Eight-bit stealther. Weren't for the trees, he'd be gone.//

He was a bootleg of a tracker, all told. But when a mech could really see, all that was important was knowing what he looked at. And being sneaky gave him a good idea of what not to leave behind.

Frenzy scrambles down again and takes off quietly after the trail. //Follow, follow, follow!//

[Mirage-3]

Quietly, so quietly, Mirage makes his way through the forest, the occasional whisper of branches against metal the only sound that marks his passing. That and the absence of sound, those noises that one expects to hear in a darkened forest missing as the night creatures quiet, hiding from these over-sized intruders who disturb their peace.

It is amazing, really the way sounds carries here, so different than on Cybertron. There you had to truly listen to hear past the constant hum of machinery. Even before the planet became a warzone. As much as Mirage dislike this organic world, he has enjoyed the challenge of learning how to maneuver as easily across it's surface as he down the wilds of Cybertron.

The scuffle to the fore seems over. Shortly after, Mirage looks up at the sound of Skyfire streaking overhead. But the hedonist explorer and his pet are not Mirage's concern. What is his concern is Needlenose. And whoever or whatever is following him so very carefully. Mirage doesn't hear anything specific that indicates he is being followed, but he feels it, like an itch in the middle of his back that he can not quite reach.

A clearing. A pleasant enough place, with a stream bubbling through it, and a deadfall off to one side. Mirage strides across the clearing, leaving a not too clear path across it. He then circles around the clearing's edge, and here he leaves no trail, so that he can crouch behind the deadfall. He conserves his cloak, relying on his cover and the darkness, until his hunter's sense tells him something is approaching. He cloaks, picking up a decent sized rock and flinging it across the clearing toward where his trail disappears.

[Barricade]

Barricade's tread is cautious as he steps off the road in Frenzy's wake, following as his small partner scampers off into the trees like a handful of dully glittering knives cast into the night. Unlike Mirage, Barricade has had some time on Earth to get used to all the messy biology and disorganization of organic life.

He doesn't have to like it, but Barricade is adaptable. He has to be; it's his function.

Now and then, his red optics pick out those subtle signs Frenzy is obviously following, although Frenzy is far more adept at this game for the moment, if for no other reason than his proximity to the ground and those bright blue optics which cast more light to pick out those hidden signs. He has no weapons prepared just yet, none save his claws. His blaster is is too bright a signal for these trees in this dark night - besides which, he can limber it with the speed of a thought - and his flail would be hopelessly tangled for no reason - and so noisy to untangle. Best to wait and see who or what they might face here.

And the feel of fuel spilling between his claws is so much more satisfying anyway.

Ahead, the trail opens into a moonlit clearing, picturesque and quaint. He hates it. If it were him stalking off into the trees, he'd never cross it so openly as the faint trail seems to show. He'd hover around the edges where the trees might mask what little trail he wouldn't be able to conceal. Unless he was laying a trap, but these Autobots, from what he has been able to discover, are just as soft and weak as the Autobots from his own Cybertron. One of them just might be so foolish as to cross so openly and leave such a trail.

Still, no harm in pausing beside his partner at the edge of the clearing, still half hidden by the trees, to have a quick look around, is there? Like the hound some of Lord Megatron's detractors had once named him, he can almost scent fuel on the wind, and his claws flex absently, eager for the fight he can feel hovering in the darkness as he warily scans ahead.

// Trap? // he observes softly to Frenzy, and there's just a hint of excitement in his tone.