Grimlock
Major
There's no crying in Basebrawl!
Posts: 637
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Post by Grimlock on Jul 29, 2010 7:49:07 GMT -5
Grimlock groans, pushing up off the ground, bits of couch and ground falling off his frame as he rises onto one knee. "Things happen," he rumbles, rubbing at his dented head. Once Chromia brings his sword, he mumbles out a thanks and subspaces it.
Grimlock leans on his knee a bit, sighing. "...stupid Mirage run off. Now what we do?"
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Post by Mirage on Jul 29, 2010 10:59:04 GMT -5
Mirage was standing in the entryway, which at least means he wasn't fully exposed to the hunter's shot.
It also means he wasn't fully hidden, either.
The shot goes through Mirage's upper arm and burns along his chest before he falls back onto the stoop. One hands clutches at the sparking wires and dripping conduits exposed by the blast, but manages to keep from crying out. Just a sharp hiss of pain, and a muttered curse or three. Crying out might bring the others, and Mirage doesn't want them involved anymore.
He's hoping to have been enough trouble that the other hunter decides to capture Mirage as well as Pyrite. It's a risky, foolish move, and not something the careful spy would usually try. He needs answers, however, and really if someone wanted Mirage dead he already would be so. The clone wouldn't have bothered playing with Mirage and his companions otherwise.
Mirage just wishes he knew if Bambi were all right, or if the doppelganger had harmed her in some way.
He coughs. Some systems are starting to lock up. Mirage's expression is one of haughty defiance, and his voice is just as haughty as he addresses the empty air.
"I suppose you're quite pleased with yourself? And people call me a coward."
His radio suddenly pops back online.
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Post by Arcee (RotF) on Jul 29, 2010 21:45:31 GMT -5
Arcee's gaze lingers for a just a moment while Grimlock's gun disappears. Subspaces. She's not sure if they're the end result of a happy, working relationship with Physics or beating it senseless out of "love", but now isn't the time to wonder.
"We look for him. Both of them." Elita-1 says simply, her voice carrying an edge of determination before she sets about to doing just that. She wasn't going to call it quits. None of them were.
"We might not be able to see either of them..." Arcee says, optics narrowing in focus as she scans the area.
"...but sight's not the only way to find somebody. Look at this." Chromia is crouched low to the ground. There're spatters of paint and soap on the ground from when she blew up the cans and bottles. They start bigger and in greater number, but get smaller and fewer and far between as they go out, emulating somebody running.
"They both landed there and there," Chromia gestures while explaining, "before taking off down that way."
Arcee nods before turning to Grimlock."All we have to do is follow the trail." And if it runs out, well, that could mean one of two things: 1) there's isn't any more run-off; 2) that...that something's happened. With the first, while the liquids definitely help, she has other ways she can track, but--
Every moment they stay here, that second possibility becomes closer and closer to becoming a reality. They need to move. Now.
"We might still make it. Let's go." Arcee and Chromia are gone like shots, but Elita-1 hangs back and will leave when Grimlock is ready to.
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Post by SceneMod on Jul 29, 2010 21:52:50 GMT -5
Mirage's reply is decidedly cryptic as, all around him, a glowing rough rectangle is slashed into the air. An image materialises in the rectangle, as if it is a doorway. On the other side, there is a dark, sterile hallway.
Reactor link at 13% and falling.
Invisible hands reach down to hustle Mirage and Pyrite through the door.
Then the doorway wavers, vanishes, and is gone.
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Grimlock
Major
There's no crying in Basebrawl!
Posts: 637
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Post by Grimlock on Jul 29, 2010 22:02:04 GMT -5
This is karma's way of paying Grimlock back for being a pain in the butt when Mirage was training Grimlock and Slag, isn't it?
He is kicking himself for not paying more attention. He wouldn't have thought that stuff would've actually came in handy!
Grimlock rises up, his frame groaning slightly as he does so. "You follow trail - me Grimlock follow you - you faster, he answers, though Mirage's radio broadcast makes him stagger as he starts, then kick into what constitutes a full tilt run for Grimlock. "GO!"
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Post by Mirage on Jul 29, 2010 22:19:45 GMT -5
Mirage isn't in much shape to try and fight off the skinwalker, but he does at least make an effort to keep from being shoved through the odd doorway. He's lost a lot of fuel, however, and his determination is fighting a losing battle with his failing systems.
He tumbles through the door and right into stasis lock.
Mirage is out
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Post by Arcee (RotF) on Jul 30, 2010 2:14:55 GMT -5
Arcee starts to feel relief and what must surely be a thousand thoughts barrel off in a single second when she hears Mirage's voice. Radio! He has radio! They can find him much more easily! He--
He's gone.
She feels that cut off, that deafening silence like a blow, but she doesn't stop, doesn't falter. She can't. She has three pairs of optics, all sharper than her older ones were, and they're all wide open and looking. Arcee is very quick, but just as careful; the alleyways are far from clean and clear, there's all kinds of other wet things spattered on the ground to get in the way, but she's knows what she's looking for and will not lose sight of it.
"Hold it!" There was a bigger pattern on the ground by an entrance to an alleyway. Looks like it had time to gather too, but not by very much. Somebody stopped here, but they didn't stay long. The triplets all fan out, readying their firearms while scanning the alleyway.
"There's a bit more of the paint around here." Elita-1 says, looking around.
"They both must have come down this way, too." Arcee frowns slowly, not liking the sound of that. There was no way out of this one but for the one entrance...and maybe up. You could get yourself trapped in here.
Chromia feels her own start to cool in her lines as she grows nearer to the puddle of what she recognizes as being...
Fuel. A lot of it.
"Oh, no...."
There aren't footprints or any kind of trail leading away from it either, and for the amount of fuel that's there, there would have been. Yet, there isn't. The puddle is stagnant and mostly undisturbed. Mirage didn't go anywhere, at least not on his own power.
'Maybe he never left!'
Arcee and Elita-1 start to feel things out in the alley, move broken crates, retrace their steps. They don't know that Mirage's cloak needs to cycle, so for all they know, he could still be alive but passed out after trying to defend Pyrite, cloak still active. They start to look much more desperately when a terrible, terrifying thought strikes them: being rendered unconscious and immobile, unable to call out to anybody, injuries growing worse, and all the while nobody can see you and will never know that you're there.
They don't find anything.
"This doesn't make any sense!"Elita-1 whispers violently, for all that she's upset, she's still mindful of her surroundings, "It's as if he just up and disappeared into smoggy air." She gestures wildly in front of her, frustrated and angry. This was all her fault. All of theirs. If only if she went after Mirage when she had the chance...
There's a slow, collective vent cycle as they all take a moment to calm down. They're all still angry, still worried, still frustrated, but they need to stay clear-headed long enough to get through this and figure it out. She still blames herself, but she's pragmatic enough to realize that that isn't going to help anybody, right now. Arcee's got three heads to work with, she can do this.
Once they all stop seeing red (and settle instead for a coral pink), Chromia leaves the alleyway and heads out farther along, just in case the trail doesn't end here and there's more to see. She's still on the lookout, though: the trail might have ended there because the skinwalker's skulking about, somewhere.
"It's not that it doesn't make any sense, just that it doesn't make immediate sense." Elita-1's tone sounds much more even this time, even analytical, and Arcee continues in much the same way with, "Tracks don't lie, unless they're made to." Something that was extremely difficult to do convincingly and without error. It was also something that took time and care that just wasn't there, in this case.
They were missing something, and they needed to figure out what. Soon.
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Grimlock
Major
There's no crying in Basebrawl!
Posts: 637
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Post by Grimlock on Jul 31, 2010 11:52:45 GMT -5
What's missing is Mirage, obviously.
Grimlock follows ...well, at least one of the Arcees as best he can. They're quicker and smarter, better at the tracking bit. Grimlock might be more useful if his dinosaur head hadn't been shot.
Though, he is good for the periodic good observation, and he finally growls in frustration. "They gone! I know it not make sense, but they gone! We... We'd hear fighting if they still here!" He snarls, smacking a fist against a building. "Stupid Mirage run off, what him thinking?! And he think me Grimlock stupid one! Me not breaking off from group! Me actually listen to him for once, then him do this..."
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Post by Arcee (RotF) on Jul 31, 2010 22:05:26 GMT -5
"I think that he might have been trying to help us." Elita-1's voice is still steady . Mirage was running away with a living beacon, he knew he could followed anywhere, at any time.
Maybe he was counting on that.
Arcee feels her fingers start to clench into a fist. And that possibility is what frustrates and hurts her the most--Mirage shouldn't have had to bail them out like that, she should have been able to handle things, but she couldn't, and now they're both gone.
Chromia pulls back into the alley, and she doesn't know how, but her next words are spoken with resolve. "Even so, we'll find them, Grimlock." They had to. There was no other option. "They took him too, they didn't just leave him here." Or kill him outright. Whoever was behind this must have wanted him for something, but for what?
And how long did they have until they were out of time?
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Grimlock
Major
There's no crying in Basebrawl!
Posts: 637
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Post by Grimlock on Aug 1, 2010 21:55:57 GMT -5
"Help how?!" Grimlock demands, throwing his arms in the air. "Him all beat up against big faker thing - faker thing that make me think twice, and me Grimlock fight Unicron and live! What chance he think him have?!" Grimlock punches the building again, knocking a chunk out of the wall.
Grimlock huffs, then punts the piece of building with his foot, it flying across the street and shattering against the wall of a different building. Frustrated Dinobot is very frustrated.
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Post by Arcee (RotF) on Aug 1, 2010 23:57:11 GMT -5
Arcee frowns thoughtfully as she tries to picture Grimlock against Unicron, snapping out of it when the Dinobot Communicates His Feelings with his fists.
"I know, Grimlock, I know," Elita-1 sighs heavily, very much understanding his frustration, "but all that matters now is getting him back." Time wasn't on their side to begin with, but now it really seems to have it out for them.
Arcee transforms, preparing to head out. //Let's get out of here and back to base.// They could sort things out then.
She just hopes that they aren't too late!
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OOC: Think we're juuust about wrapped up after Grimlock's next post, if you want to get one last word in.
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Grimlock
Major
There's no crying in Basebrawl!
Posts: 637
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Post by Grimlock on Aug 2, 2010 17:37:28 GMT -5
Grimlock grumbles, heading off toward the spaceport on foot. "Me see you there. Me Grimlock spend too much energy flying and fighting."
And he needs the time to cool off, anyway.
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Post by Arcee (RotF) on Aug 2, 2010 19:17:26 GMT -5
Arcee doesn't speed too far ahead, and Chromia double backs to keep up the rear. She'll let the Dinobot have his space, but with everything that's happened, she isn't about to let him out of her sight. Not a chance.
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