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Post by Lynn Deanna Payne on May 5, 2008 21:54:51 GMT -5
Inside one of the cages, there is a large metal creature napping that isn't a mechadragon, although it is clearly a predator of some sort to judge by the talons and fangs. Its tail, plumed at the tip, twitches in its slumber. Eventually the creature stirs and yawns, rather loudly, bringing up a foot to scratch behind the feathered crest on its head.
Cyan optics come to life, keen and avid, immediately searching the cell. Upon recognising that she – for the gracile little predator would point out certain key structural stylings that mark her as such – she is in a place that she doesn't recognize at all, she is on her feet. Her optics narrow as she stalks to the cell, trying to figure out what the easiest way out is, because as far as she's concerned, being caged is not good at all. She is no specimen to be studied, and cages never bode well, in her book.
She thinks she hears explosions in the distance, which also does not bode well. Making a sour expression, the robotic dinosaur starts to play around with one of the wall panels, seeing if she can't figure out what activates the bars. If it doesn't seem evident, she will randomly tear out wires until something happens, and if that doesn't work, things will be smashed.
This is all because she touched that carven idol in Tibet, isn’t it?
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Optimus Prime
Minor
Oh yeah? Well I don't know what that means!
Posts: 383
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Post by Optimus Prime on May 6, 2008 5:46:26 GMT -5
There is so many things that the robotic dragon could do. Mess with panels. Play with wires. Then again, there's always the option of wondering what exactly has just landed on her head.
*THUD*
The object that has just appeared above the not-a-mechadragon might appear familiar to her. Blue and silver legs. Red chest, with windows and a grill. A blue helmet. Hmm, might appear pretty familiar to more than just this creature, actually.
The red and blue mechanoid starts to stir. Optics flicker online, taking in the world around them and attempting to assess the situation.
What just happened? I was talking with Sari and.. did her key have something to do with this? What.. what's this beneath me? It's moving!
He snaps upright as quick as he can. He's startled and vaguely embarrassed.
"...I'm sorry. I..." Wait. Who exactly is this? Not one of his crew... a Decepticon? Certainly has some of the more vicious elements like those old wartime vids he watched once told him. But much smaller than Megatron. "...what is this place? Have we been captured?"
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Post by Lynn Deanna Payne on May 6, 2008 7:33:56 GMT -5
For the record, she's a little shorter than Bumblebee in dinosaur mode, which she certainly is right now, and while one could consider Megatron to be her mother (long story, that), there is an Autobot symbol on her underbelly.
Of course, he can't see her underbelly, because he landed on her head.
Seeing stars for a moment, the dinosaur screeches like an eagle when something bigger and heavier than her lands right on top of her. Alone as she's been, she's used to being the biggest, baddest thing around. She quickly attempts to extricate herself, and provided she manages that, she clamps her forepaws over her head, growling lowly.
Then, she lets her forepaws drop and looks up to see just what exactly feel on her. She could have sworn there was a ceiling. Her cyan optics widen at what she sees and then narrow sharply. The metal of her muzzle pulls back in a snarl, her foretalons come up defensively, her sickle claws start to twitch, and she hisses in a mixture of fear and anger.
Though, she does not back herself into a corner in trying to get away from the red and blue robot. Instead, she backs herself up against the metal wall she fiddling with a moment ago. She is a Bambiraptor feinbergi, albeit not to scale, and bambiraptor is not known for impressive spikes, a menacing frill, soaring like a hawk, or being an apex predator. Bambiraptor is known for possessing an extremely high brain-to-body ratio for a dinosaur, not that dinosaurs were ever any great shakes in that department.
She's already figured out, based on messing around with that panel that the way this place wires things has all the commonality with Earth wiring of Basque and Navajo, both of which she speaks... badly.
She points and shakes a claw warningly at Optimus Prime, and she snarls, "Me no let you smelt me, too!"
Then, her dinosaur feet fold into the backs of her legs, her tail folds twice against her chest, her dinosaur head flips back against her back, and her robot mode head and hands pop out, old talons folding away. There is a warhammer in her hands, and in the next moment, it is on fire.
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Optimus Prime
Minor
Oh yeah? Well I don't know what that means!
Posts: 383
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Post by Optimus Prime on May 6, 2008 14:56:08 GMT -5
"Smelt you? Why would I..." aaand this whatever it is in front of the red robot can transform. great. With a hammer, no less.
His training would tell him to draw his weapon and prepare to engage. However, he is going to try things his way.
He opens his hands up. He's not holding anything, he's not going to do anything. He just wants things to calm down and talk. "You think I've smelted someone? I think you have me confused with someone else, I've never done anything like that."
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Post by Lynn Deanna Payne on May 6, 2008 15:16:42 GMT -5
Bambi does possess an Autobot symbol, on one side of her chest. She has no idea why. It's the Allspark's fault. Glaring balefully, she waves the hammer, raises it, and then turns away from Optimus Prime. She sinks the hook of it into the wall, and with a screech of metal, rips a rather singed hole into the wall. However, she makes it just big enough for herself, not big enough for Optimus Prime. Leaning the hammer back against her shoulder now that her exit is secure, she turns her attention back to Optimus Prime, seething incredulously, "You Optimus Prime? You forget smelting Dinobots? What, it not mean anything to you?" She throws up a clawed hand in disgust, and her face wrinkles unhappily. "Me should smash you! Eye for eye, tooth for tooth. It Hammurabi's Code 1." 1 Hammirabi's Code - Why, precisely, Bambi knows about that is an interesting question, to be answered in due time.
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Optimus Prime
Minor
Oh yeah? Well I don't know what that means!
Posts: 383
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Post by Optimus Prime on May 6, 2008 15:39:54 GMT -5
Optimus hasn't even been on Earth long enough to know what candy is, much less some encryption code or whatever it is this person--This Autobot? is talking about. Optimus' hand nearly reaches back to retrieve the axe when Bambi raises her hammer. However it's a false alarm and she's just trying to free herself.
"Yes, I'm Optimus Prime. I've only put someone offline once in my whole life, and that was to defend the All Spark! The source of life for both of us!" Technically that's true for Bambi, albiet somewhat removed. "I've never even heard about Dinobots."
Rather uncharitably, Prime wonders if the rather disjointed way this robot is communicating is an indicator that perhaps what she's saying should be taken with a grain of organic food flavour enhancement, or whatever the local term is.
Things are going from bad to worse. "Please, I don't want to fight you. There's obviously a misunderstanding here. You know who I am, but I don't know who you are. Why don't you explain what it is you think I've done."
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Post by Lynn Deanna Payne on May 6, 2008 15:52:27 GMT -5
Don't ask where Bambi stores things, particularly the hammer. You really don't want to know. However, after a bit of rummaging, she pulls out a tattered newspaper and thrusts it out at Optimus Prime.
It's open to the sudoku and crosswords page, both of which have been completed, and there is a lot of scribbling the margins about something called the 'K-T boundary layer' and relative rates of osteogenesis. Bambi pauses, scrunches up her face, and quickly flips it to the front page. Detroit Free Press, from a date that is in the future, as far as Optimus Prime would know. The headline reads, "Autobots Avert Dinobot Crisis". Someone has stabbed through the heroic-looking picture of Optimus Prime and drawn a mustache on Bumblebee. There is also a picture of some robotic dinosaurs of the same style as Bambi rampaging.
Bambi growls, "It totally biased news source, but you look here," she flips to the next page, and points to the part at the end about how the Dinobots have been smelted down and are no longer a threat to the public as a whole. She glares up at him and demands, "Now you remember? Or you need memory jump-started with hammer? Me am Dinobot! Dinobots my siblings, until you and Sumdac smelt them."
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Optimus Prime
Minor
Oh yeah? Well I don't know what that means!
Posts: 383
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Post by Optimus Prime on May 6, 2008 16:16:10 GMT -5
Optimus stares at the newspaper. For a flat representation of him imprinted on pulped wood with low-res, monochromatic staining dyes that has been since punctured at least once, it's pretty convincing. "Wait, where did you get this? I was definitely never there, and this is some kind of fraud. Look, this date is weeks out. If this news source is biased, perhaps they're biased against me, too."
Optimus finds himself almost wishing that that was the case, given his previous heralding as a hero by the humans. He also decides to stow the 'if you're a Dinobot why do you have an Autobot emblem on you' question away for later.
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Post by Lynn Deanna Payne on May 6, 2008 16:22:11 GMT -5
Bambi just stares blankly at Optimus Prime for a few minutes before reaching up and trying to smack him with the back of her hand. She thoughtlessly puts a rather large amount of force behind it, but it's pretty clearly just a 'stop being dumb' kind of swat, rather than a 'I want to hurt you' hit.
She protests, "This paper from months ago! You have retrograde amnesia, or you just lying? If you lying..." Bambi trails off, hissing, and her fingers twitch forebodingly. "Me get it from news-robot, like normal person. Wanted picture of Dinobots." She looks at it mournfully and then stuffs the newspaper away, as if it has offended her.
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Optimus Prime
Minor
Oh yeah? Well I don't know what that means!
Posts: 383
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Post by Optimus Prime on May 6, 2008 16:40:51 GMT -5
Optimus winces at the swat. Great, she doesn't know her own strength to boot. "I've had plenty of checks since arriving on earth, making sure that the atmosphere isn't going to harm us. Doctors orders. And I'm suffering no memory degradation. On my spark, I'm telling you the truth. This didn't happen."
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Post by Lynn Deanna Payne on May 6, 2008 16:54:40 GMT -5
Bambi ignores the wince from Optimus Prime. He deserves worse, really, and if wussy-bot can't deal with a little swat, that's his own problem.
Then, she tilts her head to one side and pulls out a bunch of scientific magazines, most focused on archaeology and palaeontology, all dated after that newspaper date, fanning them out in one hand.
Slowly, she suggests, "Maybe it not happen... yet. For you. Me saw you there." She snaps the fan of magazines shut and puts them away, pacing. "Me was inspecting ancient idol in Tibet when me end up here, and this definitely not Earth." She gestures. "Look at sky. Look at wiring. All wrong. Me in wrong place, and you," she points a finger at Optimus Prime, "in wrong time."
Then, she smiles, fangs showing, and concludes, "But that okay, because this mean you not there to smelt Dinobots, and me hit you if you try here."
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Optimus Prime
Minor
Oh yeah? Well I don't know what that means!
Posts: 383
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Post by Optimus Prime on May 6, 2008 17:12:24 GMT -5
"I was going to say, we should be aware of our surroundings." Prime didn't realize this wasn't earth, but he had no idea where he was. But this should be no crazier than the All Spark activating a portal that should never have been functional and kicking Megatron off a moving shuttle. "I.. have barely been on earth long enough to notice the subtle differences."
"For what it is worth.. I appreciate that you are not punishing me for actions I have not yet carried out. There must have been something to explain what might have happened. This paper isn't reporting everything, there must be something missing... I don't.. I wouldn't..." Optimus sighs. "On my honour as an Autobot, I will never smelt anyone you care about." He carefully extends a friendly hand to the Dinobot. "And I have faith that if I ever do meet another Dinobot, if they're as willing to discuss as you, we can resolve our differences."
What. What. What.
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Post by Lynn Deanna Payne on May 6, 2008 17:31:34 GMT -5
Bambi tilts her head to one side at the offer of a handshake. It's a human custom, and she's picked it up, but she guesses Optimus Prime has been on Earth long enough to get that one bit, anyway. She returns the handshake, still not terribly careful with her strength. What? It's not like he's a priceless artifact.
Bambi looks left, looks right, and brings up one hand to her chin, voice a little quieter as she replies, "Me not sure other Dinobots so talkative. Also, him Grimlock hate cars and trucks and think car and truck-robots worse."
Then, she scratches her helmet, behind one of her horns, and comments, "Aware of surroundings? Like battle me hear and munitions me smell?"
Lasers tends to leave an ozone tang in the air, and gunpowder and its derivatives have a particular scent, as well.
Moving back toward the hole in the wall that she made, she mutters to herself, "So Prime from past have no idea why we end up in zoo next to warzone on other planet, and me have no idea. Me like mysteries, but this one ridiculous."
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Optimus Prime
Minor
Oh yeah? Well I don't know what that means!
Posts: 383
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Post by Optimus Prime on May 6, 2008 18:12:06 GMT -5
"That too, but the fact that we both seem to have been put here in a cage. I have no idea how that happened. The last thing I recall I was talking with a human friend, and now I'm here, falling on you. And being fair, you could be from my future. We don't know which time is correct. Maybe neither."
Optimus distances himself from Bambi, making sure that when he grabs his weapon it could not be misconstrued as an act of aggression against her. Once he feels it's acceptable, he reaches behind his back and retrieves his axe. Without extending it, he begins to hack through the hole that Bambi made for herself, making it large enough for himself to fit through. In no time has secured his own freedom.
He holds his wrist up to his mouth, and attempts to call some of his fellow Autobots. What he hears in response stuns him. "...it would appear we're not the only ones that are time-lost. I'm in radio contact with Autobots who have heard of Dinobots before, sounds like they know them." He lowers his wrist. "This is so very confusing, uh.." He stares at Bambi. "What was your name again?"
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Post by Lynn Deanna Payne on May 6, 2008 18:21:57 GMT -5
Bambi is not intimidated by Optimus pulling out an axe. He has yet to do stupid, horrific things, and if she has anything to say about it, he never will. She'll still be watching him closely, of course.
Bambi perks up noticeably, cyan optics brightening, and she fairly demands, "Heard of Dinobots? They alive?" Then, she notes, just a bit primly, "Me never say it. Me Bambi."
Anyone who laughs is getting bitten in the knee.
She transforms back to dinosaur mode, more comfortable in it, and once out of the cage, she looks out, snout high to sniff the air, but it's her vision that gets her attention. There's a mess of aerial craft over there, and what in the world is that great big rocket tower? Her optics widen, and she reaches up, trying to tug on Optimus Prime's hand, asking, "What that?"
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