| abstract
| - Autobot City - Munitions Bay The staging area of Metroplex functions in many ways as an armory. It is a very large room with heavily armored walls, gleaming and shining in perfect military spotlessness. Upon these gleaming silver bulkheads are racks upon racks that hold every manner of weaponry. From Ion Cannons to Plasma Ejectors, Rail-Guns and Auto-Cannons every sort of possible weapon is ready to be grabbed in an emergency. Benches line the walls for 'bots to re-arm and perform last minute adjustments before heading out on one of any number of missions.In the very center of the room is a raised dias with cables to be connected to individuals and their various forms of firepower. From here, the armorer can perform calibrations and scans to make sure that each is functioning at their best. Located in the back behind thick blast doors is a storage facility for various explosives along with a special workshop that is further armored and secured behind protective forcefields for ordnance modifications and disposal. Crosshairs is to be found in the Munitions Bay, as per usual. Well, not really as per usual. As per usual, he's been going insane trying to get the Pretenders all fixed up and cleared for combat duty. So it's been awhile since he's gotten back to his friendly project. That being a very long plasma weapon of some sort; a special sight attached to it. He's very engrossed in this, not even noticing if someone comes in in the mirrored shine of the piece.He could be doing other things, like practicing his aim on Duck Hunt, or sorting his 1,094 records. Instead, the Autobot has found his way to the munitions bay for a professional opinion. "Yo! Anyone around this joint?! The Jazz-Man is lookin' for the owner of the house!" Jazz strolls in and leaps up onto one of the large work tables, picking up a few parts and examining them. "Geez, looks like that energon-tart toaster I gave Mirage a few years ago!" That's when the Autobot notices Crosshairs is hunched over in the far corner with a pretty impressive weapon. "Yo!! There you are! Wow, that looks like it can pack a serious punch! Speakin' of which, I've got an idea I wanna run by you homie." It probably is the energon-tart toaster. Crosshairs has a habit of collecting things that could be used for weaponized parts. And oddly, there's a lot of various detritus around the bay at the moment. He must have been scavenging recently. Then again, if one looks at the toaster in detail one will see that it's missing a coil. The armorer looks up; flitting his eyes to Jazz. "Over here." He says, protectively resting his hand against the weapon almost protectively as though he expected Jazz to grab it and dissapear like Jazz is famous for. At the compliment, at least what he percieves as a compliment, he straightens up. "It's a plasma accelerator." He explains. "But, not any plasma accelerator. I figured a way to tighten the cohesion . . and now she's accurate enough t'shoot the center out of a foot wide bullseye at five miles if the shooter's good enough." His brow raises, and for once, he actually seems to half smile. "What can I make shoot better for you today?"Nothing did the trick like an energon-tart in the early part of a cycle. Jazz would have to remember to put that on his X-Mas list for the Intelligence Department. "Sounds smokin' Crosshairs! Maybe you can hook me up with one of those plasma-ba-things later for a rainy day?" Jazz leaps off the work table and flexes his metallic arms, "I'm not looking for anything to shoot better today. I'm lookin' to get myselfed PUMPED up!" the Autobot finishes off in his best Schwarzeneger impression. Walking over towards the bay entrance, Jazz returns with a crate full of parts behind him. "Ho ho ho! I've got some gifts for ya that I think you can use to give me a boost in the ol' firepower department. I figured you'd the perfect Bot to take a looksie. Ya dig?!" "If you ask nicely."Crosshairs' response is goodnatured, despite what some might percieve as a sharp tone. He shows this with a light and careful half smile. Leaning back from his work on the rifle, he places one hand on his hip as he listens to what Jazz has to say, following his gesticulations towards the crate. Immediatly, he digs into it and mumbles here and there. "Proton sequencer . . . . plasma accelerator pack . . . . magnetic induction coil . . . . core boost modulator . . . . degaussing coil . . . . . hood ornament . . . . . neutron wrangler module . . . ." He looks up, thoughtfully. "Maybe." He ventures, but doesn't offer anything more promising than that. "Where'd you find all this mess? Looks like it came off Junkion's surface. Hard to tell what is useful and what isn't -- and what the slag is all that sticky gunk all over it?""Oh that sticky gunk? Well that's just a little digestive oil mixed in with some water from the Gulf of Mexico!" Jazz dawns a grin as he brings up the file from his memory banks. "Remember that deal a few weeks back when we rocked the 'Cawns outta Mexico?! We were all sayin' OLE!" Jazz starts motioning with his hands as he recounts the harrowing events. "That big dude Trypticon crashed the party, but when he ate me, I gave him the whole enchilada if ya get my drift! Set him up with a bomb and forced him to book it! Just when I was slippin' outside I came across all these ol' school robots rottin' away in his metal belly. I grabbed what I could and the rest is history!" Picking up one of the parts, Jazz continues his silvery grin. "So...what I'm askin' is..can you PLEASE hook me up with some extra firepower buddy? Maybe you can make some of this stuff work inside my rockin' body!" "...." That is Crosshairs' reply for a long time. "Fantastic." That is all he can come out with. A long silence followed by fantastic. He flicks his fingers a little to dislodge some of the gunk that had accumulated on them. He is silent another moment, while he listens to Jazz; trying to follow the other's confusing mode of speech as best he can. He only gets half of it, but for a conversation with Jazz, that's actually pretty good. "Maybe. I don't know." It's an honest answer from the armorer, who, sighing, bends to work over the components again. "I might be able to use this, and this." He points to seemingly random things. "If -that- works to bridge them . . . you actually managed to grab a fairly good assortment of components for this sort of thing. I think I can do it. But I warn you, there might be side effects -- I mean, we don't know the quality of this stuff."Although he didn't exactly use the most conventional Cybertron vernacular, Jazz did have a knack for being crafty and he figured Crosshairs was the same way...only with weapons. "Well let's think this through and maybe we can piece together an awesome plan to get this science project going!" Walking over to a computer console complete with schematic software, Jazz punches a few commands in to start the program up. "Makin' advances sometimes takes risks and I'm willin' to put my fender on the line to get this plan in gear. You said we got a proton sequencer, a plasma accelerator pack, magnetic induction coil...and uh...what else did you say?" The Autobot runs his blue-visor over the computer panel, tapping in a few bits of information, adding the parts to the project file. "I'm not the greatest at figurin' this stuff out, but maybe this will give us a good start? I mean puttin' all the parts in this nifty schematic-a-bob thing."Crosshairs doesn't reply to Jazz initially; looking down at the mess of components for a moment. "If I . . " The rest is a series of mumblings as he reaches for scanners and testing components. Here and there, he pokes something into a socket or adjusts a wire. "That works . . " Ten minutes, he probably ignores Jazz for, and then seems to snap out of it to look where the other is working. "Well . . " He starts. "I need to scrounge up some wiring, and test the whole thing, but I think we can connect this, and this, and this, and output to that . . but I'm going to have to rebuild half of your power generation systems to do it. I'm up for it, of course, but it's gonna have you on your back for awhile." He then begins pointing the various parts out to various places on the 'flow chart'Jazz lets Crosshairs do what he does best, stepping back to look over his teammate's shoulder. "Yea Cross! You tell that computer who's the boss! Like Tony Danza! We're gonna get this plan goin' in no time! I'm totally diggin' this!" Helping how he can, the Autobot works on picking up some of the parts and draining them over a large tub in the bay. "While you work on slammin' those puzzles together, I'll get these parts in tip top shape," and his sentence is interrupted by a creak and snap of the part in his hands. "...well the ones that still have a warranty that is. Hah!" Pouring the salt water out of a power regeneration box, Jazz flicks the part over to Crosshairs for inspection. "That might help me cut down on my power consumption for an extra boost to my tactical systems...whacha' think Cross?"Crosshairs actually stops this time to give Jazz a long, considering, searching sort of look. Mentally he grapples with the idea of telling Jazz that it might be better if the other just quieted down and let him do his work. But he doesn't say it because he'd hate to hurt the other's feelings. And so he just kind of shuts up and sketches out a preliminary design. When he is handed the power regeneration box, he frowns a bit, and activates a latch. "Induces are corroded by the salt." He says. "But we can work on this. We'll use the circuitry here to connect that and . . . " A pause. "Don't touch any of this. Just, uh . . " He grabs a scummy box and thrusts it into Jazz's hands. "Use this brush and clean the drool off of this."He's like the energizer bunny. He just keeps going and going. Jazz gladly accepts his duties as drool scrubber-first class. "I gotcha Crossy! I'll get this part lookin' as shiny as that Medal of Valor I picked up for givin' Trypticon the biggest tummy ache this side of Junkion!" Looking the part over in his hands, Jazz takes an iron brush from the tool box and begins to scrub through the layers of dried slobber and salt. "It's a dirty job, but someone's gotta do it! Ya dig?!" Soon enough, the Autobots would have the rest of the old parts cleaned up and soon enough Jazz would be sporting a new upgrade. It was just a matter of time now. It's a good thing Crosshairs was here to help the process along. "I don't care what Perceptor says about ya man! You're still the king of swing when it comes to weapons dude!"
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