Wreckage
Major
One of the Quiet Ones
Posts: 554
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Post by Wreckage on Mar 23, 2008 2:36:49 GMT -5
"I am not," Wreckage says, voice low and dry, levelling a flat stare on Shrapnel. Sometimes, rousing from defragmentation, he has wondered if all this is a miserable hallucination, but he remains quite sure he is still alive. Unlike Blackout.
He will not end like that – broken and forgotten, left to rust. Blackout deserved far better. And what could have killed him? He was not Lord Megatron's hound simply because he was loyal. He had power to match that station.
"We… were comrades," the Stryker answers Cannonball as neutrally as possible. He shifts his weight, discomfited, wanting to look away from Blackout and forcing himself not to; the subject unsettles him for some reason he finds he cannot identify and that only leaves him feeling even further disturbed. A change of topic is in order. "There is little we can do with them," he pronounces. "Best to leave them where they can be easily retrieved." Half-sunken in the muck is, perhaps, not such a place. He starts slowly for the bodies, ignoring the sensation of something alive sliding around his legs to pay more mind his footing. Move the bodies where they are less likely to vanish into the swamp, investigate that tower of Shrapnel's, then get out of this forsaken place. And forget that little tendril of unfamiliar fear pricking at his spark.
It is easily forgotten when all Wreckage's caution amounts to nothing and he abruptly sinks to his waist in a hole he failed to notice until too late.
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Cannonball
Minor
Me, I'm dishonest. And a dishonest man you can always trust to be dishonest.
Posts: 470
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Post by Cannonball on Mar 23, 2008 13:35:01 GMT -5
Ah...foot-in-mouth time.
"Ah....I be understandin', lad" is all the pirate says, taking flight again over to the pair of bodies, checking over them for the best place to start lifting from. This could be tricky, as this bugger is bigger'n Wreckage. Eeesh...
However, the Stryker brings forth a distraction of getting up to his hips in swamp. Cannonball hovers over, no smirk or chuckle to be found this time. "Now ye need a 'and" he says, holding his out. "Grab on, I'll pull ye back up tae solid footin'."
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Post by Shrapnel on Mar 26, 2008 21:40:27 GMT -5
Shrapnel water-skates forward and around the two obstructions in the muck. Decepticons always wasted so much time on the simple things.
He crouches down and hefts the brightly-colored jet; the weight of it sinks him a little bit into the swamp. Other than getting his feet dirty, however, he ignores it.
"Well, well?"
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Wreckage
Major
One of the Quiet Ones
Posts: 554
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Post by Wreckage on Mar 27, 2008 4:27:49 GMT -5
Wreckage's first impulse is to insist he needs no aid, whether or not that statement is true, simply because he should not need any. Such obstinacy would avail him nothing, however, and would only serve to stall this mission, making him the liability he does not want to become. He makes a sound that is not quite a sigh and gives pulling a foot free on his own one more futile attempt before he looks up at Cannonball.
"…Do not tax yourself," he cautions even as he grasps Cannonball's hand… and part of his forearm, too. Shrapnel seems to have the more colourful one well in hand, but there is still Blackout to move and if Wreckage is too heavy for the pirate to lift even without the added burden of pulling him free of the mud, Cannonball will not manage the Pave-Low on his own. Wreckage will have to be mobile again to assist with the lift. With some judicious twisting and tilting of his feet and the keen of anti-gravity lifters straining with the effort, Wreckage feels the swamp begin labouriously sinking away from him.
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Cannonball
Minor
Me, I'm dishonest. And a dishonest man you can always trust to be dishonest.
Posts: 470
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Post by Cannonball on Mar 28, 2008 8:55:27 GMT -5
Cannonball glances over at Shrapnel, making a face of momentary deep thought. "Ah...I be supposin' ye kin put it on solid ground until I get Wreckage loose."
His attention turns back to the Stryker. Yeah, there's no way the pirate is gonna be able to get Blackout on his own. Feeling his partner rising up, he smirks, cranking up the output of the lifters enough to pull him up a bit more. Once Wreckage is back to where he can stand solidly, and lets go, the pirate hovers back a bit, looking over at Blackout.
"...this is gonna be a mite tricky. If'n we ain' careful, ye'll wind up right back where ye were a few moments ago."
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Post by Shrapnel on Mar 28, 2008 19:50:10 GMT -5
The arrival of the giant robots silenced the loathsome, cacophonous chorus of the swamp insects. Even the larger creatures have gone to ground, leaving the fetid swamp in silence.
Except for the soft 'plop' of something disturbing the stagnant, reeking swamp muck. A log shakes, and what might have been mistaken for a lichen-cover makes a run for it. The lizard escapes any interest save the Insecticon's as he turns towards the sudden movement.
Curiously, he watches the ripples in the water come closer, chin dropping more towards his chest as it comes right toward him.
It goes under his feet, and he can feel something rough and peculiar against the bottom of his feet for quite a while.
"Faster, faster," he advises.
The Insecticon has not been back to his hut for days, and he has not played with the little device that makes a sound he cannot hear for weeks. Some thing was not warned away from this area.
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Skyfire
Major
I'm a scientist, not a....
Posts: 891
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Post by Skyfire on Apr 1, 2008 16:58:20 GMT -5
Something else yet has not been warned away, but rather sent here. Far away and far above, Skyfire plummeted down from the black into the blue, far over the forests to the east as he descended into the lower atmosphere. He planned to approach the swamp site low and relatively slow (for him); targetting something as small as his sensor arrays would be far easier at speeds below Mach 2.. or even Mach 1.
He re-acquired the sensor feeds; the Decepticons were still moving about in the area. A slow approach might let him and Evac do the job in one pass; hanging around with multiple Decepticons just invited trouble.
"Evac, I make three Decepticons--Cannonball, Wreckage and the Insecticon--still in the area. They seem to be moving away from the sensors, though."
Pretty soon he would be low enough that Evac could fly, though still not quite slow enough...
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Evac
Cadet
"Come with me if you want to live."
Posts: 34
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Post by Evac on Apr 1, 2008 19:09:11 GMT -5
Evac stands up inside Skyfire's hold, steadying himself as he does so.
"Understood, Skyfire. I'll get ready to deploy, if necessary."
Cannonball and the Insecticon were unknown to him, but Wreckage, there was a name he recognized. As much as he disliked fighting, at least their was a familiar foe in the area.
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Wreckage
Major
One of the Quiet Ones
Posts: 554
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Post by Wreckage on Apr 2, 2008 21:11:45 GMT -5
Speed and care are two things that rarely go hand in hand, but as the developments continue to mount, Wreckage finds he must slap the two concepts together somehow. He takes his footing as lightly as a multi-tonne robot can once he stands again on terra infirma, picking his way to a patch that might not sink him too deeply when he starts lifting. With Blackout lying like this, his rotor and tail assembly are submerged… that will make extricating him all the more difficult.
"Take the other arm," Wreckage directs Cannonball while gripping the near limb and bracing himself as best he can. Once the pirate does so, Wreckage starts pulling. He feels his heel spurs sink in while Blackout's bulk begins rising with a low moan of protest as weight shifts and parts left immobile are forced to move once more. The faraway, buzzing hum of approaching engines is lost in the racket, and if Wreckage were to hear it, he would simply brush it off as the insects resuming their caterwauling; moving his former comrade takes precedence over whatever noise the local fauna are making. Once the body is clear enough of the swamp muck for Cannonball to carry it on his own, it will be entirely up to him to get it nearer the roadway.
Wreckage, meanwhile, with little else to do once Blackout is in Cannonball's care, follows the pirate's slow progress while Blackout's legs trail behind in the brackish water. The ripples that fan outward from the Pave-Low's lifeless limbs mask those flowing in the opposite direction – towards him – and he misses them as he takes careful, sluggish strides, once more knee-deep. Now that he knows better the rhythm he needs for ease of movement, the going is less unsteady than before, but he cannot move much more quickly no matter how Shrapnel urges.
He feels contact against his legs and dismisses it as yet another nuisance of an organic creature not worth the effort to kill it. His mistake, rings the thought when something wraps itself around his submerged limbs and pulls with enough force to rip his feet out from beneath him. He even looks genuinely shocked before vanishing beneath the surface.
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Cannonball
Minor
Me, I'm dishonest. And a dishonest man you can always trust to be dishonest.
Posts: 470
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Post by Cannonball on Apr 3, 2008 17:15:03 GMT -5
Before taking hold of the chopper-hound, Cannonball deploys his claw attachment for his gun-arm so that he can get a better grasp on the situation, and wonders why he didn't do so for yanking Wreckage out.
The path to the road is a slow one. Blackout is a big mech, bigger than Wreckage, and while he's moving a bit easier than the APC, it's still tricky.
And suddenly, with a splashing noise, Wreckage goes under. An exasperated look covers Cannonball's face, and he lets the Pave-Low rest about ten feet from the road. "Oh, bleedin' slag... I ain' gonna be goin' under there tae drag his heavy aft out this time..."
The roar of engines is a bit closer now, and he looks over at Shrapnel. "Oi, ye 'ear somethin'?"
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Post by Shrapnel on Apr 5, 2008 18:55:58 GMT -5
Shrapnel drops the brightly-colored jet on the road. He recognizes the roar of those engines, even if their owner likely won't recognize him. "Skyfire. He tastes good, good."
"You get Wreckage out of his hole. I can handle him, him."
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Skyfire
Major
I'm a scientist, not a....
Posts: 891
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Post by Skyfire on Apr 5, 2008 20:48:47 GMT -5
"Locking on to sensor telemetry..." Skyfire spread his wings, deployed his proton cannon, and armed his missiles. He dropped low, skimming only a few hundred feet above the treetops. "Coming on targets in 30... 25... 20... 15... 10... 5... NOW! Missiles away!"
Skyfire let fly with both missile launchers, each targeting a different sensor array. He raked the remaining sensors with proton beam fire from his cannon as he flew over--
--and if any Decepticons happened to be in the track of his beam fire as he targeted those arrays with determined precision, so much the worse for them. On the other hand, his track didn't deviate toward any that weren't in the way... yet.
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Evac
Cadet
"Come with me if you want to live."
Posts: 34
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Post by Evac on Apr 5, 2008 21:31:37 GMT -5
Evac staggers slightly as he feels the recoil of Skyfire's shots reverberate within the massive Autobot's hull.
"Did we get 'em?"
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Wreckage
Major
One of the Quiet Ones
Posts: 554
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Post by Wreckage on Apr 7, 2008 17:07:04 GMT -5
This. Is not. A hole. This is a large reptilian thing that has Wreckage by the legs and is attempting to wrap itself around more of him as it pulls him into a deep hollow he had thankfully managed to miss earlier. It possibly wants to buffet him to pieces at the same time, unless the sudden, dizzying roll it starts is just for amusement.
Let it be known that Wreckage is highly unamused. Blinded by the thick, murky swamp and deafened by the scrape and roar of the stuff rushing over his audio receptors as he is dragged through tumble after tumble, he has only pressure and contact to tell him where he might strike. One blade deploys sluggishly, mechanism gummed up with silt and algae and bits of plant torn up from the swamp floor amid all the twisting and tossing. The other unlocks but hangs up briefly when it meets scaled flesh, eliciting an eerie, muffled cry from the victim. That disgustingly soft impact only fuels Wreckage's desire to get free; he loathes the way organic creatures feel under his swords. The resistance, the vibration, all wrong. Luckily for the creature, Wreckage wants it dispatched as quickly as he can manage. The less time he spends cutting it off him, the better.
Even as he moves to strike with his free arm in that split-second moment, the surrounding mire suddenly heats to a searing temperature, hotter than laser fire. The creature shrieks and recoils from him and when a beam lances from above, scoring him across one leg and leaving the sensors numb to everything but pain, Wreckage adds his own agonised howl to the chorus. He swings both swords in vicious arcs, cutting blindly at whatever part of the serpent is in reach until it is beyond him, then he kicks and thrashes his way back to the surface, hacking noisily, spitting swamp with a twisted, sickened look. His leg is on fire, one shoulder is throbbing, he's receiving strange damage readings, and above….
Above is as much chaos as below, the scream of jet engines splitting the air. Wreckage reels for a few seconds, trying to regain equilibrium.
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Cannonball
Minor
Me, I'm dishonest. And a dishonest man you can always trust to be dishonest.
Posts: 470
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Post by Cannonball on Apr 7, 2008 20:18:41 GMT -5
Cannonball only has a moment to boggle at what Shrapnel says before it starts raining laser fire. This is followed by very angry swears from a very angry pirate.
"Blightin'-slaggin'-spawns o' glitches are gonna frag the sensors!"
Cannonball, master of the obvious. Also master of covering his aft, for he's jetting off at maxiumum speed towards the missile-targeted arrays. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that if all of these things get fragged, Shockwave will be Not Happy. Well. There goes some of 'em thanks to the lasers. Bugger.
Within a few moments, Cannonball arrives where the arrays are planted with a bit of dramatic skidding in the dirt. With a bit of strongarming, the sensors are removed from where they were placed, and Cannonball is running for cover as fast as his legs can carry him.
However, they don't carry him fast enough to escape the heat-seeker missiles that Skyfire has so graciously donated to the pirate.
"Cripes!" A few more curses follow, and he cuts to the radio - //Ach, a lil' help, Shrapnel lad?!//
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