Eastside, not Westside

[Hellbender]

Hellbender slithered out of his quarters in the upper levels of the base--he'd wondered, at first, why Hook had put his quarters so near the sky, but decided hopefully that it meant that Hook intended to give him his wings back when he could. From there, it was down into the lower levels, down into the old mine tunnels--his tunnels--and through the tunnels he'd cut between the drainage aqueduct and the town sewers. If they ever hooked up pumps and pumped out the very lowest levels of the mine into that aqueduct, the town would have a serious street-flooding problem. It was probably a good thing that the Base was above town, atop the former mine.

Hellbender threaded his way through the storm sewers to the east side of town and waited, listening for the vibrations that signified ground troops moving nearby, for the rumble of engines, the clatter of tracks, the hiss of wheels. He also listened on his radio for orders...

// Ah'm in position at the edge of town under that east road what goes around the hill a piece, // Hellbender radios Sky-byte.

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OOC: Hellbender is skippable until he's needed for something, as his posts would be a lot of "Hellbender continues lurking underground"

[Dead End]

Dead End does actually hear the radio chatter when he's in a deep, black funk. He doesn't necessarily regard it as being significant. Right now, he's parked in Porsche mode in his garage hideaway, contemplating his utter lack of future, and the dreary pointlessness of the 'now' he's stuck in.

There's Autobots out there somewhere. So what? There were Autobots out there before, and no one had been in a big hurry to do anything about them. As if it mattered; Unicron was out there, and if fuel starvation and corrosion didn't get them first, the Great Devourer would.

People were being ordered to do things. No one had yet given Dead End an order by name, so he continued to park quietly where he was. Probably no one even noticed that he was missing, or cared.

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OOC: Dead End is skippable until someone gets on his case.

[Sky-byte]

//Notify me immediately if you sense anything out of the ordinary.//

Sky-Byte keeps himself above the tops of most buildings as he prowls along the eastern edge of the city. What he wouldn't give for a decent light to see by. Perhaps he should ask Hook for a large strap-on headlight. Beamy optic lights can only go so far. He's trusting that the rest of his troops are going to be using whatever light they have on them as well.

Wait, wait, wait. One of the Decepticons is in possession of a long-distance radar array. Correct? There's a moment while Sky-Byte peruses through his data and memory banks before the name pops up. Dead End.

Looks like the Stunticon won't be getting his dark contemplations.

//Dead End! I want you and your scanners at the main eastern entrance to the town immediately. Activate your radar and keep your sensor up for anyone coming close to our area.//

[Dead End]

Someone remembered he existed and had radar? Dead End was shocked. Usually only Motormaster kept track of that sort of thing. He thought he'd found a new Motormaster in Scourge, but then they assigned him to that grotesque shark-former instead. He'll never be part of a team like the Stunticons again; it's his fate to die alone, abandoned and forgotten.

He considered just ignoring Sky-byte, but the shark-thing would probably yell at him over the radio until Dead End answered. He might as well reply.

// Why? //

[Counterpunch]

Counterpunch has no fancy radars, but he is well familiar with the layout of the area around here. Right now, he's driving towards the east side perimeter. One nice thing about a mountain base on a single road is that there's only two land-based approaches: uproad, and downroad. He's currently heading uproad to station himself, but will be heading into the small bit of forest on the north side of the road before too long.

He already answered Sky-byte's general orders, so now he just keeps to himself and keeps an optic out.

OOC: Skippable until something happens that would draw his attention.

[Sky-byte]

Grotesque? Why Sky-Byte is the epitome of grace and style. In his own optics anyways.

But here's Dead End questioning his orders. If Sky-Byte had a more furry beast mode, he'd be bristling. //Because I'm your commanding officer and I tell you to, that's why! Do you need any other alternative?// If only Dead End has visual feed along with his radio, he'd see Sky-Byte's shaking fist along with his glare.

[Dead End]

Dead End considers this, idly wondering if Sky-Byte will go insecure screechy-hysterical like Starscream or just come over and pound on him until he moved like Motormaster--or actually give him a reason that made sense, like Motormaster sometimes did when he didn't want to waste time pounding on Dead End. Sky-Byte seemed to lean toward "insecure in his command" at the moment.

That simply wouldn't do. Sky-Byte needed to develop his confidence in motivating difficult troops. As a loyal Decepticon, Dead End felt obliged to help. He knew why Sky-Byte thought he needed Dead End, but Sky-byte didn't seem to have a clue why Dead End ought to feel the need to hop to Sky-Byte's command.

// Ah, because you say so! // he asked. // Capital reasoning, that. Why do I care about this pointless scurrying about in a futile attempt to stave off the inevitable? //

[Demolishor]

And Demolishor is here late. Again. Not his fault everyone else is wheeled or a flying shark or whatever.

With a distinct lack of anyone actually telling him what to do, he's tromping around the rockier areas and scanning things with his larger optic's more refined sensors, the better to see anything that might be hiding in the shrubbery.

So far he's interrupted the mating ritual of something small, squishy, and amorous. Guard duty sucks.

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OOC: See Counterpunch's post.

[Sky-byte]

Problems motivating difficult troops? Well Dead End has obviously never met the three Predacon stooges that Sky-Byte commands--or had commanded. Okay, so maybe Sky-Byte is a more than a little paranoid about all the problems that can arise in these situations.

//Because we stave off the inevitable all the time. That, and I have no plans on being taken by surprise when it comes to some marauding Autobots. Now are you going to come out here or am I going to have to find you and push you out myself?// Said push will be accompanied by a few kicks, but Sky-Byte would have to actually find Dead End first. Why does Scourge always have to be the lucky one with the vehicles?

[Dead End]

Dead End supposed that he ought to do something now. Autobots attacking his home base were quite another matter than Decepticons running off to pointlessly attack Autobots minding their own business on the other side of the continent. Sky-Byte sounded like he actually needed Dead End!

Dead End stared at the closed garage door in front of him. To drive out to the east side of town, he had to leave his little hideaway garage. To leave the garage, he had to open the door, and that required transforming. Transforming and doing that and transforming back was just too much pointless work to bother with. He'd rather stay a Porsche and do nothing, not even think.

He stared at the door for a while longer, though a creeping sense of urgency made Dead End more and more uncomfortable. What if the enemy broke through while he was sitting here? Then it would be all his fault for being useless.

But he was useless. Without his brothers, he couldn't form Menasor, and without Menasor, he was just a mediocre ground-loving car warrior in a force of elite jets, trucks and beast-formers. Mundane. Redundant. Couldn't even bring himself to move when ordered to by his commanding officer. Why should he? There was no point in it at all. He could do nothing to change things in the long run.

He should answer Sky-Byte. It was rude to just ignore him. The shark-former had addressed him directly. He should... but it was too difficult to come up with something to say.

Something deep in Dead End's mind, perhaps that part connected to certain heavy duty connectors that hadn't been used since he'd arrived, dimly recognized that he'd fallen off a mental cliff and was accelerating straight down. He needed Breakdown or Wildrider or Drag Strip, or, if worst came to worst, Motormaster to stop the dive into oblivion before he just shut himself down completely.

They weren't here. None of them were. There was no one to stop the madness from eating him alive and leaving his stasis-locked husk to rust away in this fine and private place. Scourge wasn't Motormaster; he wasn't part of the gestalt, didn't, couldn't understand the madness the five of them had kept at bay in their delicate, ever-shifting balancing act. The only gestalt brother of any kind here was... Hook.

So hard to select the frequency, turn the radio on. Inertia and bleakness tried to drag his mind down and away from the task. // Hook... // Dead End said softly, wearily over the Constructicon's private frequency, // help me. //

[Sky-byte]

So...is the lack of an answer from Dead End a good thing or a bad thing? Sky-Byte is thoroughly puzzled as he twists around, looking to see if the car-former has magically appeared from nowhere. A few moments later, his drooped position in the air signifies a very 'frustrated but I don't know what to do about it' mind-set. Honestly, if ordering his troops around is going to be this hard, something shall have to be done!

Of course, here's Sky-Byte dwelling the one problem and ignoring the fact that he has four other troops following exactly as he had ordered.

Also, there's the fact that he's got one mech injured and being dogged by Autobots and waiting for orders. Sky-Byte gives them before turning his attention back on the situation here.

//Dead End...shall I find you and push you now?/

[Dead End]

//With what, Dead End?// Hook answered brusquely. //You need to be more specific.//

Hook didn't understand. Why did Dead End call him? Hook couldn't do anything about it. Dead End wearily replied (because it would be rude to ignore Hook, Hook had been there since they first arrived on this cursed planet): // Never.. mind. Tell Sky-Byte I'm sorry, but I can't come. I'm shutting down now... //

//Stop. That. Get up, get out there, and do your job. If you make me come out there, you will regret it for every remaining cycle of your miserably long life.//

Why was Hook yelling at him? He couldn't help how Vector Sigma made him. Megatron could have, but Megatron had been too eager for a vicious commando team to care about the consequences of his command to Vector Sigma. Dead End felt rather aggrieved, which was actually a step up from the bleak numbness that had taken him over. Why was he being yelled at for Megatron's carelessness?

// I hate you, // he said sulkily, and his voice strengthened as he said, // I hate Megatron, I hate whatever snatched us here, I HATE that harpy-voiced, arrogant, back-stabbing, self-centered bastard who CANNOT figure out how to hand out basic unit assignments, and I will not have a miserably long life, I HAD A SHORT, MISERABLE LIFE THAT WILL PROBABLY END TONIGHT! //

His engine rumbled to life and growled angrily.

//Oh, Dead End,// And the way Hook carressed that name is too sharp and silken, a thin layer of cloth covering a katana. //I will ensure that you live a very, very long life.//

//Now. I do not care what you hate, you self-centered little brat. If you do not get out there and obey orders, I will extract a pound of wiring from you for every name on the butcher's bill when it comes due. Your petulance is no reason to get other people killed!//

Dead End's engine roared furiously, matching the black anger rising in the Stunticon. It was the rage of unanswered pain, loneliness, bleakness and futility, a protest against the world that made him so. Headlights flashed on; forcefields energized.

He didn't bother to open the door.

Seconds later, an angry dark red Porsche howled through the streets of the dead town. It didn't stop for signs, obstacles, or the laws of physics, finally slamming the brakes on and sliding to a long, screeching halt at the eastern edge of town. Dead End engaged his radar and began his sweep. His weapons were deployed and hot.

// No, sir. That won't be necessary. Dead End reporting for radar watch, // he radioed Sky-Byte.

Back in the middle of town, the garage door hung in twisted shards.

[Sky-byte]

My, that's quick. Sky-Byte can hear the screech of tires as a maroon car careens through the streets below.

//It's good of you to join us, Dead End,// Sky-Byte says with an approving tone. Now the Stunticon's reply was something this Predacon was looking for. 'Sir'. Mmm yes he can get used to this. No one called him sir back at home.

Now onto his newest task. Troop shuffling. Especially since Dead End, Counterpunch, and Demolisher has so kindly situated themselves on the Eastern edge of the city along with Hellbender, it would be troublesome to move them so abruptly again. The mining worm, he's much to big (no pun intended) an asset to just lend over to Scourge. But...

//Demolisher! Counterpunch! Scourge has requested that we lend some aid in looking after his portion of the city. Station yourself on the West side and report to me.//

With that Sky-Byte coasts to the edge of town to look appraisingly over his mechs.

[Demolishor]

Hey! Stuff to do! Demolishor is in favor of this.

He half-walks half-rolls down the hill and across over to his appointed position. //Be right there, just gotta blast some rocks...//

Stupid way-barring rocks. They too would fall to the glory of the Decepticon army.

[Dead End]

Dead End monitors his radar and watches Fleetwind et al down a small shuttle-bot of some kind. Oh look, there's Skyfire. Look, there's Skyfire leaving. Jets mill around. More jets mill around further out. Some fall out of the sky.

None of them come anywhere near Dead End, or offer the least chance of relieving his incredible tedium. What was the point of watching the east side of the city when the enemy was all off to the west? Oh yes, to keep them from sneaking up on them. How very clever of someone to station the radar unit on the back side of the city, so that buildings would obscure his view of any ground units sneaking in from the west side.

Perhaps Omega Supreme might come strolling up.

Counterpunch and Demolishor get sent off. The aerial units are already off somewhere, mostly falling out of the sky. That leaves him and Sky-byte and... where are the rest of their ground units, anyway?