081102 - Quiet pt 15
Nov. 2nd, 2008 04:13 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
koilungfish28/10/08 - Ill
29/10/08 - 530 words on Stormhangar
30/10/08 - Ill
31/10/08 - Ill
1/11/08 - Ill
2/10/08 - Quiet, pt 15
The beating was short and to the point. Counterblast punched him until he stopped moving then kicked him across the room. Prowl smashed into the bulkhead and lay still. Counterblast had made his point.
Sprawled in his side, pressed against the wall by the automatic need for cover and support, Prowl gasped shallowly, feeling the bent struts of his thoracic chassis crushing his internal fans and pinching his fuel lines. This will not aid anything. I must get free, contact the others - rescue them if necessary - and stage a withdrawal whilst we still can. If I cannot escape I must at least get them out of here.
Gibber strolled over and crouched, attempting to loom but just managing to bulk. Prowl stayed still, feigning that his injuries were worse than they looked.
"Keep watch over him," Counterblast ordered Gibber. "I need time to prepare." He was on the other side of the room - the main engine room if Prowl was right, although he'd been yanked out of the airlock and carried upwards at such speed he'd lost track of the floors. The room extended upwards, large as most Decepticon rooms were. The 'floor' - what had been the forward wall of the room - was narrow and oblong. Prowl lay at one end, Gibber lurking over him like a vulture. Counterblast stood at the other end, tinkering with equipment laid out on a makeshift workbench constructed from floor panels and chairs torn from the computer consoles. Between them lay the door, open, leading into the silent pit of the main corridor. There was another door at the stern end of the room - now the ceiling - more than time times Prowl's height away.
Prepare for what? Prowl worried.
Gibber stroked Prowl's chevron. Prowl clenched his fists and winched at the scream of noise that filled his audio sensorum. "Can we keep the arrow? I like the arrow! It's red!"
"I see no reason to keep it," Counterblast replied, half turning. Prowl caught a glimpse of the equipment on the workbench; a set of chassis clamps, a lasercore connector bundle and a set of memory drills amongst other things.
This looks bad. "What ... " He added a pause he hoped sounded weak and painful. "What are ... going to do ... to me?"
"Death," said Counterblast, not turning to look at him. "The worst death of all - the death of personality."
Prowl didn't reply, instead coughing up a wad of congealed oil. Not good. Oil in the vent system. Counterblast must have hit me harder than I realised. I need a medic. He wanted to shut down and run diagnostics, let his internal repairs work, but that was no option.
"You destroyed my partner, Chokehold," Counterblast continued, voice like the rumble of rolling lava. "It is the seventh time he has died." He turned, stomping across the room - Prowl doubted he could move any other way, the twin-rotor helicopter was a monster even by Decepticon standards - and loomed over Prowl. Each of the stubby claws on his feet was thicker than Prowl's shin. "It does not please me to lose a partner I have devoted so much time and effort to crafting into the perfect companion." Gibber, crouched and silent, looked up Counterblast with sad, fawning optics. Counterblast patted his head. "Gibber is our creation. He too I would not see lost." Counterblast reached down and picked Prowl up one-handed, squeezing his buckled torso between fingers nearly as big as Prowl's forearms. "You will not miss your body, for I will give a new one - a liberation from your miserable ground-bound existence. You will not miss your personality, for it will be overwritten. Only your life-force will remain, purified and unsullied by your original mind." Counterblast squeezed gently - Prowl felt his struts bending inwards - and carried him back to the operating bench. "You should thank me for releasing you from this pathetic shell, this pathetic personality."
"What about the - the grey?" Prowl gasped. One of his internal fans wasn't working. He could feel the blades jammed through the casing and into his wires. His battle computer wasn't running properly, distracted by shivers of desperation and pinwheeling thought. The need to get out, to drive, to flee, was paramount. He thought it back, blocking it away. Now more than ever he needed his mind clear and sharp.
"The contamination will not concern you once you are one of us," Counterblast said in a voice that flowed. "Though I know little of the sciences beyond cerebral engineering and personality programming, it is plain to see that helicopters are immune to this contagion."
"But I am not," Prowl said, and it hurt. Something was shorting inside him. Painful surges pulsed through his engine. My condition is poor and worsening. He felt a bleakness, a sort of surrender, as he enumerated to himself his chances of survival. "I am ... already contaminated."
"Hmm," was Counterblast's response. a rumble nearly subsonic. Prowl felt it vibrating his windows even whilst they were sheathed in his doors.
"Aww, is he? Is he?" Gibber asked, bouncing across the room to stand at Counterblast's elbow, jiggling on the spot, rotors whickering. "But the red, I like the red!"
"Silence!" Counterblast ordered, unceremoniously dangled Prowl by one foot, examining him with his small laser-optic. He poked the back of Prowl's doors with a finger. "So it would seem. His wiring has already begun to corrode."
Prowl very carefully failed to react. Inside, he felt himself tremble, cold and afraid.
"He will be useless to us," Counterblast said, tossing Prowl aside. Again the tactician slammed into a bulkhead and again lay crumpled on the floor, his back to the wall that had originally been the floor. "The contamination will deactivate him long before a suitable body is prepared."
"What about the pretty car, the shiny car?" Gibber asked, bouncing on both feet. "Him him him him?"
"Where are these others?" Counterblast asked. Prowl lay quietly, hoping to be ignored and forgotten. A deep dull ache was starting in his chest, an ominous feeling of pain without damage reports.
"Bridge!" Gibber replied, spraying oil-froth from his mandibles. "Sneaky blue face is there! We must be wary, wary, careful."
"Shush. How many Autobots?"
"Seven!" Gibber replied.
Seven? Prowl wondered.
"It is possible one at least will be uncontaminated. The rest will be poor sport but we have little to do until we are rescued. Come. Tell me of these Autobots."
"The pretty car - shiny and lickable, mmm," Gibber crooned. "Want him, want to taste his core."
"And the others?" Counterblast sounded almost bored.
"Sneaky blue face! Sneaker, shooter, slippery. Grey whimpering thing - all victim. No use to us." Gibber waggled his mandibles. "And the dancing Autobot! He danced! He's alive."
"He sounds suitable," Counterblast said. "One of these days I must see to repairing your counting error."
"What error?" Gibber asked, cringing. "My head is my head! Please don't change it again!"
"Your mind is mine to change as I choose!" Counterblast bellowed. Gibber dropped to his knees, arms over his head, gabbling noise, oil dripping from his mandibles.
Decepticons, Prowl thought. I do not understand those who believe we can redeem such monstrosities.
"And as for our, hmm, initial subject," Counterblast began, turning his bulk to face Prowl. "You are not long for this world." He strode over, the floor shuddering under his feet. "I do not think you are in any condition to leave. I doubt you can even move by now. But just in case ... "
Prowl tried to move but he ached, deep down inside. His limbs were too slow to respond. Counterblast's foot slammed down on his back, crushing him against the floor.
Prowl screamed, a long cry of pain that rebounded off the walls, mingling with the scream of his metal as Counterblast ground him into the floor.
The pressure ease. Prowl clawed out automatically, dragging himself away from the helicopter. There was no thought, only reaction, the need to move or die. His body moved too easily; he felt himself sliding on his own internal fluids, felt the fiery shock of pain as damaged cables were yanked inside him. He could move no further.
He bowed his head, pulled his arms in and waited.
"Leave him," Counterblast ordered. "We will have our sport with him when we return."
Gibber jumped down through the door and was gone. Counterblast stood upon the threshold and looked back at Prowl. "I do not anticipate much sport from you," the twin-rotor said. "It would be better for you if you deactivated yourself now and spared me the disappointment."
Then he was gone.
Prowl pushed himself up on his elbows and listened as best he could. The Decepticons' momentum thrusters whined tinnily against his chevron and he realised that too was damaged. He lay in a slowly spreading pool of his internal fluids, his insides throbbing with pain, his torso crumbled up like a squeezed pipe, near-deaf and still contaminated with the fatal grey.
Well, he thought, now I need an exceptionally good escape plan.
29/10/08 - 530 words on Stormhangar
30/10/08 - Ill
31/10/08 - Ill
1/11/08 - Ill
2/10/08 - Quiet, pt 15
The beating was short and to the point. Counterblast punched him until he stopped moving then kicked him across the room. Prowl smashed into the bulkhead and lay still. Counterblast had made his point.
Sprawled in his side, pressed against the wall by the automatic need for cover and support, Prowl gasped shallowly, feeling the bent struts of his thoracic chassis crushing his internal fans and pinching his fuel lines. This will not aid anything. I must get free, contact the others - rescue them if necessary - and stage a withdrawal whilst we still can. If I cannot escape I must at least get them out of here.
Gibber strolled over and crouched, attempting to loom but just managing to bulk. Prowl stayed still, feigning that his injuries were worse than they looked.
"Keep watch over him," Counterblast ordered Gibber. "I need time to prepare." He was on the other side of the room - the main engine room if Prowl was right, although he'd been yanked out of the airlock and carried upwards at such speed he'd lost track of the floors. The room extended upwards, large as most Decepticon rooms were. The 'floor' - what had been the forward wall of the room - was narrow and oblong. Prowl lay at one end, Gibber lurking over him like a vulture. Counterblast stood at the other end, tinkering with equipment laid out on a makeshift workbench constructed from floor panels and chairs torn from the computer consoles. Between them lay the door, open, leading into the silent pit of the main corridor. There was another door at the stern end of the room - now the ceiling - more than time times Prowl's height away.
Prepare for what? Prowl worried.
Gibber stroked Prowl's chevron. Prowl clenched his fists and winched at the scream of noise that filled his audio sensorum. "Can we keep the arrow? I like the arrow! It's red!"
"I see no reason to keep it," Counterblast replied, half turning. Prowl caught a glimpse of the equipment on the workbench; a set of chassis clamps, a lasercore connector bundle and a set of memory drills amongst other things.
This looks bad. "What ... " He added a pause he hoped sounded weak and painful. "What are ... going to do ... to me?"
"Death," said Counterblast, not turning to look at him. "The worst death of all - the death of personality."
Prowl didn't reply, instead coughing up a wad of congealed oil. Not good. Oil in the vent system. Counterblast must have hit me harder than I realised. I need a medic. He wanted to shut down and run diagnostics, let his internal repairs work, but that was no option.
"You destroyed my partner, Chokehold," Counterblast continued, voice like the rumble of rolling lava. "It is the seventh time he has died." He turned, stomping across the room - Prowl doubted he could move any other way, the twin-rotor helicopter was a monster even by Decepticon standards - and loomed over Prowl. Each of the stubby claws on his feet was thicker than Prowl's shin. "It does not please me to lose a partner I have devoted so much time and effort to crafting into the perfect companion." Gibber, crouched and silent, looked up Counterblast with sad, fawning optics. Counterblast patted his head. "Gibber is our creation. He too I would not see lost." Counterblast reached down and picked Prowl up one-handed, squeezing his buckled torso between fingers nearly as big as Prowl's forearms. "You will not miss your body, for I will give a new one - a liberation from your miserable ground-bound existence. You will not miss your personality, for it will be overwritten. Only your life-force will remain, purified and unsullied by your original mind." Counterblast squeezed gently - Prowl felt his struts bending inwards - and carried him back to the operating bench. "You should thank me for releasing you from this pathetic shell, this pathetic personality."
"What about the - the grey?" Prowl gasped. One of his internal fans wasn't working. He could feel the blades jammed through the casing and into his wires. His battle computer wasn't running properly, distracted by shivers of desperation and pinwheeling thought. The need to get out, to drive, to flee, was paramount. He thought it back, blocking it away. Now more than ever he needed his mind clear and sharp.
"The contamination will not concern you once you are one of us," Counterblast said in a voice that flowed. "Though I know little of the sciences beyond cerebral engineering and personality programming, it is plain to see that helicopters are immune to this contagion."
"But I am not," Prowl said, and it hurt. Something was shorting inside him. Painful surges pulsed through his engine. My condition is poor and worsening. He felt a bleakness, a sort of surrender, as he enumerated to himself his chances of survival. "I am ... already contaminated."
"Hmm," was Counterblast's response. a rumble nearly subsonic. Prowl felt it vibrating his windows even whilst they were sheathed in his doors.
"Aww, is he? Is he?" Gibber asked, bouncing across the room to stand at Counterblast's elbow, jiggling on the spot, rotors whickering. "But the red, I like the red!"
"Silence!" Counterblast ordered, unceremoniously dangled Prowl by one foot, examining him with his small laser-optic. He poked the back of Prowl's doors with a finger. "So it would seem. His wiring has already begun to corrode."
Prowl very carefully failed to react. Inside, he felt himself tremble, cold and afraid.
"He will be useless to us," Counterblast said, tossing Prowl aside. Again the tactician slammed into a bulkhead and again lay crumpled on the floor, his back to the wall that had originally been the floor. "The contamination will deactivate him long before a suitable body is prepared."
"What about the pretty car, the shiny car?" Gibber asked, bouncing on both feet. "Him him him him?"
"Where are these others?" Counterblast asked. Prowl lay quietly, hoping to be ignored and forgotten. A deep dull ache was starting in his chest, an ominous feeling of pain without damage reports.
"Bridge!" Gibber replied, spraying oil-froth from his mandibles. "Sneaky blue face is there! We must be wary, wary, careful."
"Shush. How many Autobots?"
"Seven!" Gibber replied.
Seven? Prowl wondered.
"It is possible one at least will be uncontaminated. The rest will be poor sport but we have little to do until we are rescued. Come. Tell me of these Autobots."
"The pretty car - shiny and lickable, mmm," Gibber crooned. "Want him, want to taste his core."
"And the others?" Counterblast sounded almost bored.
"Sneaky blue face! Sneaker, shooter, slippery. Grey whimpering thing - all victim. No use to us." Gibber waggled his mandibles. "And the dancing Autobot! He danced! He's alive."
"He sounds suitable," Counterblast said. "One of these days I must see to repairing your counting error."
"What error?" Gibber asked, cringing. "My head is my head! Please don't change it again!"
"Your mind is mine to change as I choose!" Counterblast bellowed. Gibber dropped to his knees, arms over his head, gabbling noise, oil dripping from his mandibles.
Decepticons, Prowl thought. I do not understand those who believe we can redeem such monstrosities.
"And as for our, hmm, initial subject," Counterblast began, turning his bulk to face Prowl. "You are not long for this world." He strode over, the floor shuddering under his feet. "I do not think you are in any condition to leave. I doubt you can even move by now. But just in case ... "
Prowl tried to move but he ached, deep down inside. His limbs were too slow to respond. Counterblast's foot slammed down on his back, crushing him against the floor.
Prowl screamed, a long cry of pain that rebounded off the walls, mingling with the scream of his metal as Counterblast ground him into the floor.
The pressure ease. Prowl clawed out automatically, dragging himself away from the helicopter. There was no thought, only reaction, the need to move or die. His body moved too easily; he felt himself sliding on his own internal fluids, felt the fiery shock of pain as damaged cables were yanked inside him. He could move no further.
He bowed his head, pulled his arms in and waited.
"Leave him," Counterblast ordered. "We will have our sport with him when we return."
Gibber jumped down through the door and was gone. Counterblast stood upon the threshold and looked back at Prowl. "I do not anticipate much sport from you," the twin-rotor said. "It would be better for you if you deactivated yourself now and spared me the disappointment."
Then he was gone.
Prowl pushed himself up on his elbows and listened as best he could. The Decepticons' momentum thrusters whined tinnily against his chevron and he realised that too was damaged. He lay in a slowly spreading pool of his internal fluids, his insides throbbing with pain, his torso crumbled up like a squeezed pipe, near-deaf and still contaminated with the fatal grey.
Well, he thought, now I need an exceptionally good escape plan.
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no subject
Date: 2008-11-03 03:20 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-11-03 10:50 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-11-04 01:03 am (UTC)Goodness, Counterblast is a nasty mech isn't he, more so than the normal Con-nasty it seems to me. Using others to animate his partner? Assume that he's done something similar for Gibber, or would if need be?
I had to go back and reread previous sections, Gibber had me thinking I couldn't count, too.
I want to wibble for Prowl though. Poor guy got quite a beating. I'm nervously anticipating the next installment.
no subject
Date: 2008-11-04 08:10 pm (UTC)Yup, he's a right piece of work. I suppose you could argue that he's only acting to preserve those he cares about at the expense of others, which is no worse than shooting Decepticons to save your friends, but ... he's nasty, yes. And yes, he's brought Gibber back a few times as well.
No, Gibber just tends to panic and say the first number that comes into his head rather than thinking.
Prowl has a Plan.
Thanks, I'm always dropping typos all over the place.
no subject
Date: 2008-11-15 01:11 pm (UTC)I love how you give Prowl robot injuries. With wires and fans and struts and fluids other then energon. So many fanfics with human injuries... grrr.
Counterblast scares me most because I'm suspicious that he's competent. I sure hope Prowl comes up with that plan!
no subject
Date: 2008-11-19 12:48 am (UTC)I really don't understand why people do that. Lack of imagination, possibly.
Counterblast is competent. Luckily, so is Prowl.