Comfort? not here.
Blackout is unsettled. As usual. When is he not?
The only thing he has right now is his stupid Island. Which he still doesn’t understand, and is tired of mechs asking him. As if something couldn’t exist unless you understood exactly how it worked.
Yeah. Right. Someone explain the fraggin’ war to me, then. Explain love.
He circles around the island, slowly, inspecting it from the air for any sign of damage or…well, anything.
Nothing. He drops down, his small groundwheels bumping lightly against the soft grass of the clearing, letting his rotors spin down, slowly, languorously. It is almost a relief to let them wind down, let the engine slow itself naturally, letting inertia slow the motion, the blades drooping at the tips as they slowed, bowing down. Too many combat-shifts had gotten him so accustomed to snapping the engine dead, whipping the rotors back, bracing for the grating pain of the one and the sharp slaps of the other. This feels…almost soothing.
Not enough to comfort him entirely, though. Not enough to spin down the turmoil in his processor.
Too much is strange here, and the events of the last few cycles have just…collapsed upon him. Demolishor and the weird twinge being around him gave to his symbiont link. Starscream’s Suspiciously Nice Act. Which was really more of a variation of Starscream’s usual modus operandi: lull you to drop your guard and then attack.
He wonders if he should warn Demolishor. Who has been online longer than he had, of course, but even so, hasn’t been around Starscream as much. Starscream never forgot to collect his debts. No good deed of Starscream's goes unfulfilled.
And now, of course, Starscream had chased him away from his little...movie thingie. He couldn't go back there. The only distraction he had, and...he'd been sent off flying, Starscream hurling snide little javelins of insult at him. Not enough to win, was it Starscream? You had to chase me, make sure I felt the humiliation, make sure everyone below us knew that your little fun thing? Wasn't for me.
Is this place, as Starscream had called it, his ‘self-imposed purgatory’? Maybe so. He certainly has plenty of sins to atone for.
He flops down under the overhanging outcrop of the slab of rock he normally suns on. He doesn’t want sunlight right now. He wants to feel cool solidity behind him. He wants to feel that something is supporting him, something is getting his six. Stupid, he thinks, when your rearguard is inanimate stone.
But at least it cannot betray him.
He pulls one rotor over his shoulder, stroking it, idly. Stupid. Ridiculous. Anyone seeing him would laugh at the sparkling-like gesture, but the blades were loaded with sensors-air temp, humidity, acidity, a whole host of others-and stroking the sensors was a comfort he needed.
He has to admit: he is a failure here. He’s better off on his island where at least he doesn’t antagonize anyone. Demolishor is bored by him; Starscream seems to think that slicing at him is some kind of freaky new competition he’s determined to master. Everyone else? He doesn’t even want to try. If he can’t find common ground with mechs sharing his own history, his own side…he has no hope with anyone else.
All he has is the sunlight, glinting off the white crystals, the warm breeze, and the pathetic, listless stroking of his own rotors.
The only thing he has right now is his stupid Island. Which he still doesn’t understand, and is tired of mechs asking him. As if something couldn’t exist unless you understood exactly how it worked.
Yeah. Right. Someone explain the fraggin’ war to me, then. Explain love.
He circles around the island, slowly, inspecting it from the air for any sign of damage or…well, anything.
Nothing. He drops down, his small groundwheels bumping lightly against the soft grass of the clearing, letting his rotors spin down, slowly, languorously. It is almost a relief to let them wind down, let the engine slow itself naturally, letting inertia slow the motion, the blades drooping at the tips as they slowed, bowing down. Too many combat-shifts had gotten him so accustomed to snapping the engine dead, whipping the rotors back, bracing for the grating pain of the one and the sharp slaps of the other. This feels…almost soothing.
Not enough to comfort him entirely, though. Not enough to spin down the turmoil in his processor.
Too much is strange here, and the events of the last few cycles have just…collapsed upon him. Demolishor and the weird twinge being around him gave to his symbiont link. Starscream’s Suspiciously Nice Act. Which was really more of a variation of Starscream’s usual modus operandi: lull you to drop your guard and then attack.
He wonders if he should warn Demolishor. Who has been online longer than he had, of course, but even so, hasn’t been around Starscream as much. Starscream never forgot to collect his debts. No good deed of Starscream's goes unfulfilled.
And now, of course, Starscream had chased him away from his little...movie thingie. He couldn't go back there. The only distraction he had, and...he'd been sent off flying, Starscream hurling snide little javelins of insult at him. Not enough to win, was it Starscream? You had to chase me, make sure I felt the humiliation, make sure everyone below us knew that your little fun thing? Wasn't for me.
Is this place, as Starscream had called it, his ‘self-imposed purgatory’? Maybe so. He certainly has plenty of sins to atone for.
He flops down under the overhanging outcrop of the slab of rock he normally suns on. He doesn’t want sunlight right now. He wants to feel cool solidity behind him. He wants to feel that something is supporting him, something is getting his six. Stupid, he thinks, when your rearguard is inanimate stone.
But at least it cannot betray him.
He pulls one rotor over his shoulder, stroking it, idly. Stupid. Ridiculous. Anyone seeing him would laugh at the sparkling-like gesture, but the blades were loaded with sensors-air temp, humidity, acidity, a whole host of others-and stroking the sensors was a comfort he needed.
He has to admit: he is a failure here. He’s better off on his island where at least he doesn’t antagonize anyone. Demolishor is bored by him; Starscream seems to think that slicing at him is some kind of freaky new competition he’s determined to master. Everyone else? He doesn’t even want to try. If he can’t find common ground with mechs sharing his own history, his own side…he has no hope with anyone else.
All he has is the sunlight, glinting off the white crystals, the warm breeze, and the pathetic, listless stroking of his own rotors.