| abstract
| - The interior of the shuttle is very roomy. There is a highly technical cockpit that seats numerous bots at various stations, and a huge cargo area for additional troops or equipment. This vessel requires Reaver to use. Syntax: DO - IE. do east, do +profile, do attack scourge=laser. l/o - Looks outside. Contents: Firey Gumbi-medic Summit Flag A lowly gumbi-medic, pulled from the darkest regions of the hell dimension. Forged by Vector Zeta, this gumbi-medic retains the usual 'aura of constant fire', which makes him a bit tricky to get repairs from. Still, if you don't mind scorched armor and a little heart-burn you are in good hands! Nightbeat is dozing in the back of the Invictus, scraps of cut-out news flimsiplasts littering the area near him, all articles relating to unexplained recent occurrences, anything that might be related to the Matrix. He may be a Reaver, but he's still a detective, and the loss of the Matrix is one of the biggest mysteries he may ever see. However, Reavers and detectives still need their recharge time, too, and it would seem he's nodded off into a light defragmentation cycle in the middle of his reading. Scrapper sits upright on one of the makeshift medical beds. There are tubes and wires hooking him up to fancy diagnostics and maintenance modules located around the medical bed. One of his arms is in the process of being reinstalled by massive robotics arms that reach out from the ceiling. The new lime green arm remains suspended near the shoulder, as the medibot prepares the site for the addition. Much of his frame had to be rebuilt after the disaster on Dis. The Constructicon looks to be in a foul mood, likely because of this. Nightbeat has pretty sensitive hearing, and eventually, some of the sounds of Scrapper being repaired trickle through his defragmentation and wake the detective. He gets up with a clatter, looking twitchy, as if he's ready to bolt. Hey, he's a wanted traitor. It's a natural reaction. Then, Nightbeat calms down. He works on gathering up his scraps of news and greets, "Oh hey, Scrapper. They sure did a number on you." "Yes. I know." Scrapper states in a gravelly, annoyed tone. The arms of the ceiling mounted medibot whirl and screw in several joints that will eventually serve as Scrapper's shoulders. The apparatus holding Scrapper's soon-to-be new arm slowly pushes it forward, making the connections between the arm and Scrapper's torso. The Constructicon himself doesn't seem bothered by the procedure. Nightbeat finishes picking up his reading material and saunters over to Scrapper to watch his repairs with no small amount of curiosity. Nightbeat's decently good with machines, though machines from Hell are still pretty new to him. He comments idly, "On the plus side, ya proved that there are horrible monsters in subspace. That's gotta count for something, right?" "I suppose." Scrapper replies. He is still fuming over the massive defeat the Reavers suffered on Dis. No, not the defeat the Reavers suffered. The defeat -he- suffered. The Constructicon doesn't take this as a failure of the group as a whole, and certainly doesn't take this as a failure of the Fallen's doctrine. He takes it as a personal failure. With his new arm superficially attached to his torso, the medibot's arms dance over the joint, applying its welder at the appropriate spots. Nightbeat shrugs. Win some; lose some. Such is life. He considers Scrapper speculatively, and the detective says slowly, "But y'know, that really was a marvel of science, there..." Scrapper's the architect behind any number of devastating superweapons, a transforming city-shark, the first combiner team, and the very first Crystal City, a wonder of beauty. Nightbeat's standing next to one of the greatest minds of his time, when he gets past the fact they're wearing different symbols. Hmm. Scrapper waves off the compliment with the use of his good hand. His other hand, the Constructicon grimly notes, is in no condition to be waving anything off. Despite having been corrupted by the Fallen, Scrapper's modesty is still present. He accepts the blame for the failure (and really, who else is there to blame? The Fallen? Surely not), but considers Perceptor's help to have made success a possibility in the first place. Peering at Nightbeat with mild suspiciousness, Scrapper rolls high on his intuitive check. "You have the look of a mech who has something entirely different on their mind." Nightbeat raises a hand to his chest, covering his Autobot symbol, and he protests, seemingly quoting something, "I gotta mind full of wicked designs," the he sobers, "but seriously, I'm sorry to see you banged up, though I was wondering, once you get your repairs done, could you maybe see about a little matter for me? See, I'm kinda slow, compared to all these turbo-revving youth elements." The medibots arms slow down as they put the finishing touches on the new arm. It's still held solidly in place, however, to prevent any misalignments with the installation. "What do you need, Nightbeat?" he asks. Although still sour about the ordeal, he appears receptive enough to be willing to help his fellow Reavers further the goals of the Fallen. Nightbeat stretches and explains, "So I got this sweet souped up turbofan engine on Monacus, back before I was enlightened," or perhaps endarkened. "Red Alert made me fill out the customs forms in quadruplicate!" He thumbs a fist into the flat of his other hand, cleatly frustrated. "So then I tried to get an appointment with Perceptor, but he's off doing the work of our Master alla the time. But you, you designed the first combiner team! Slapping in a new engine and tweaking a drive train for higher speeds has to be like enercake, right?" "Perceptor works closer to the Fallen than I do," Scrapper replies. "His time is more valuable." There isn't even a hint of jealousy in the Constructicon's voice, as he's apparently accepted the Autobot as the Fallen's favorite. Whether this is because of the Constructicon's own modesty, the recognition of Perceptor's tremendous scientific skills, or the hardwiring that forces him to be loyal with the Fallen is anyone's guess. The medibot arms finally back away from Scrapper's shoulder unit. One by one, the new lime green fingers curl, followed by the rest of the hand. Scrapper removes his new arm from the restraints, testing the servos. His feet touch the ground as he stands up off the medical slab. The wires and tubes connecting him to the diagnostic modules fall away. "I'll be happy to help, Nightbeat." he says, flexing his new fist. CUT! At first glance, Veloctrion might remind the optic of Cybertron. Completely cyberformed, the planet is different from the homeworld of the Transformers in that it is much smaller -- but also completely undamaged by conflict. Indeed, the world's criss-crossing maze of highways, loop-d'loops and bridges appear to be pristine and well-maintained. Various vehicles seem to be zipping at top speed at all times, creating quite the flurry of activity. Contents: Reaver Shuttle Race Track 2.0 Scrapper leaves the Reaver Shuttle . Scrapper has arrived. Porsche 959 doesn't exactly look like what the native Velocitronians drive, and the Invictus is on fire, so the Invictus is parked in a pit in a construction site, and Nightbeat intends to keep the less-used roads and loop-de-loops as he gives that new engine and drive-train restructuring a test run. It was definitely kind of odd to be worked on by a Decepticon, but they are all brother Reavers, united by The Fallen. Factions should be meaningless. Insert shots of Scrapper doing vague technical work involving a welder and a circuitboard. Insert shots of Nightbeat in car mode with his hood up. Insert shots of Scrapper fiddling with stuff under Nightbeat's hood. Insert shots of Scrapper wearing a lab coat and writing stuff down on a notepad with a pencil while Nightbeat revs his engine. Insert shots of Scrapper wiping his brow and slaving away on the engine installation. Insert more shots of the engine being revved. Insert a final shot of Scrapper closing Nightbeat's hood. Now put all this over the lyrics of Gonna Fly Now. Montage completed, Scrapper is in the observer's booth for the race track that has been selected. The observation booth has many monitors and dials that show the condition of the racers. He has a laptop resting on one of the dashboards, with which he can make computer modifications to the new engine from afar. "All set, Nightbeat?" he asks over the radio. Porsche 959 sits behind a white line on the out of the way race track that the Reavers have selected to use. He radios back to Scrapper, "Good to go!" Nightbeat's pretty curious about this planet. He's heard the Matrix search went here, but it obviously didn't pan out. He's also heard that Grapple won, beating Hot Rod (hey, he doesn't have the Matrix), which is hi/lar/ious. Now he just waits for the green light. Scrapper vaguely heard of this race, but he was still in the painful stages of reconstruction when the news came through. He had other problems to deal with at the time. "Don't push it this time around, Nightbeat. Rotate through your gears and make sure everything feels right. We'll take you to your fastest speeds once we've ensured that everything is running smoothly." Scrapper taps a button, which starts the light countdown. Nightbeat will be free to go within seconds. Porsche 959 the lights flash in counts. Red, yellow yellow - green! He tries to taake the doctor's orders as Nightbeat zooms out onto the track, smoothly shifting gears, and he has a lot more gears to shift through now. It's going to take some getting used to, but to see the looks on those punks' faces when ol' Nightbeat leaves them in the dust, he'll take the getting used to. Of course, shortly after being left in the dust, said punks will likely become one with the dust, victims of entropy run rampant. Such is the work of the Reavers. Scrapper sits down on one of the padded chairs in the observation booth. This is a small tower with glass windows and monitors all around, sort of like an old time stereotypical air traffic control room at an airport. Resting in a cupholder is a mug of energon. As he was unable to bring his It Ain't Easy Being Green mug, featuring Kermit the Frog, when he broke cover and became an overt agent for the Fallen, he's been forced to use a local mug that just says something about how great the Need For Speed is. Scrapper takes an animation error inducing sip of the energon as he watches Nightbeat go both on the screens and from looking out the window. "All systems are green so far. Careful with this loop de loop," he cautions. Porsche 959 takes on the loop de loop. The trick is to maintain traction and momentum. Go too fast, and he'll lose traction. Go too slow, and he'll fall off. It's a delicate balance, one he's not sure that he would be able to achieve normally, but today, he thinks he can take it. There is a hairy moment at the very top, where he feels like he's slipping off, like his wheels have lost grip, but it's just a second, and he's shooting back down the other side of the loop de loop, the moment passed. Scrapper puts the mug of energon back into the cupholder. As it is a Velocitron cupholder and a Velocitron cup, it fits perfectly with one another. Scrapper appreciates the attention to detail that the engineer put into this. Once the Fallen comes to enslave this planet, he makes a note to ensure that the person responsible is not killed, but instead turned into a Reaver. There's a beep that comes from one of he monitors, and Scrapper looks at the screen. One of the green bars on the graph has turned red and shrunk. "Bring it down to gear 2, Nightbeat. I'm going to make some modifications." This will let the punks catch up, but Scrapper doesn't care about the race itself. Porsche 959 grumbles to himself as he brings it back down to gear 2. The other cars in the pack zip by him, and he swears that he can hear the drivers lighing at him. He whines to Scrapper, "Better be quick about it - I'm going to be at the bottom of the pack soon." Sports cars are sensitive about their speeds - a payloader wouldn't understand. Cardcaptor Foxfire watches clips from the Headmasters dub. "As hilariously bad as this is, I actually like some of the voices. Hm." "It doesn't matter what place you finish," Scrapper replies, confirming the theory that payloaders don't understand how races work. "What matters is you not blowing a fuse or causing some malfunction that ends up wasting both of our time. Keep it in this gear. I'm going to run some checks." The Constructicon's fingers dance across the keyboard as he accesses Nightbeat's engine condition. He types in commands that slightly modify the fuel mixture ratio from afar. Nightbeat might feel a very subtle change, but it'd be tough to pinpoint. Porsche 959 groans as he stays in the indicated gear, watching the other racers leave him far behind. He protests, "How am I supposed to track for The Fallen if my quarry can just run away?" Okay, he could pile into the Invictus, which has FTL speed, but it's hard to fly a shuttle through winding alleys. Nightbeat does feel a bit odd inside as Scrapper works his magic. Scrapper saves his changes and closes the menu that has Nightbeat's engine specs. "Give it ten seconds for the changes to take effect, Nightbeat, and then bring yourself back up to your top speed. Slowly. Don't worry, you're going to have plenty of time for tracking at top speed. No sense in ruining it right now. And if you have to lose a race or two before you can start winning than so be it." Ten seconds pass like ten million years in a race. Finally, finally, his internal chronometer informs him that his time in the slow lane, that perdition, is over, and he brings up speed back up, engine roaring. He perhaps brings it up a bit too fast, and Nightbeat's sure that Scrapper will ream him out over the radio, but, "Sometimes, the first race is the only race that matters." "Yes well not this one," Scrapper replies. It's clear that he values this race about the same as he does the crap Scavenger brings back to HQ on a daily basis. The bar graph shows only green bars now, and the Constructicon appears satisfied. "Feel free to go all out on this jump," Scrapper says. How aewsome is this upcoming jump going to be? That's up to Nightbeat to decide! Porsche 959 is a Reaver car. Therefore, any jumps that he does have to be over fifty helicopters with rotating blades that are on fire. It's a law. Look it up! The Porsche screams as he drives up the track and launches off the ramp and into the air. Time thuds by slowly. He can feel the heat rising off the fiery helicopters, hear their blades whirl. Will he make the jump, or will he crash and burn? Scrapper can't help but wonder how the other racers also made that nigh impossible jump, but he sees that they are still alive. It will be a feat for Nightbeat to catch up due to the engineer's delaying, but not impossible. "All signs are still green, Nightbeat. Maneuver at will." Porsche 959 lands hard on the other ramp, expending the last of his momentum. He's off with a screech, back to chasing the other racers. Nightbeat's been known to drive dirty, even as an Autobot, though as an Autobot, he wouldn't try to ream an alien racer in his way. As a Reaver, he has no such compunctions. Time to get back in the race by taking this straggler out! Scrapper monitors Nightbeat's situation. The non-straggler racers up ahead are currently navigating the barricade obstacles. This is a straightaway that has the right half of the track blocked with an ultra dense alloy wall. Shortly after the left half is blocked by the same. This goes back and forth a few times, with the end result meaning the racer has to jerk left and right all over the track to avoid becoming a pancake. This will be a good test for the new engine, and also to see if Nightbeat can catch up. Porsche 959 has to jink hard to avoid the alloy walls, shifting gears madly. Fast fast fast between them, then down to lower gear for traction to turn, then fast again. Whoever designed this track was a madman, and Nightbeat /likes/ it. It makes it a lot easier to try to sideswipe this racer he's about to pass, here, when there are walls everywhere. Scrapper takes another sip from his energon mug. "I think you're good to go, Nightbeat. You've taken to this new engine like a Seacon to water. Feel free to keep testing yourself, but I think you've got it. You let me know if there's any issues with the upgrades." Porsche 959 replies, "Thanks! I'll be sure to, Doc." The Porsche pulls up into the pack, looming behind the other cars in a far more Seaconish fashion than might be expected of an Autobot. One can almost hear the Jaws music. There's a screech of tyres and a crash, a brilliant fireball as the lead car hits the sidewall, and Nightbeat pulls ahead, as the scene fades to black.
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