A New Direction: Part 17
A brand mission, a brand new world where many things are not as they same and thier true objective is not even known to them.
PART SEVENTEEN
Inwardly Jungle cursed as he emerged from his cover. Fists clinched, Jungle’s gargoyle like legs straightened and his shoulders arced back, bringing the dark warrior to his full height. Simultaneously, his eyes narrowed to but paper thin slits. There was nothing between the panther and the fleeing tortoise, absolutely nothing – not even wind.
Somehow, despite the ensuing chaos all around, time from Jungle’s perspective seemed to slow - one of those rare moments in life, where one seemingly has all the time in the universe to make and successfully execute their next move.
JJ’s chest guns begin to spin.
Jungle had a plan. A bit of a gamble notably, but a plan none-the-less.
Being a shadow operative, Jungle was accustomed to using what was at hand – now was no acceptation. He’d use Grapple’s summons of reinforcements to his advantage. Jungle was new to this game in play. He’d use that too. Jonas’s movement was open to all factions, be them Predacon or Maximal. He’d use that too.
Jungle would take Grapple down. In the tortoise’s state, bringing him into status lock would be easy. When Grapple’s friends came, Jungle would claim to have intervened and saved Grapple from a couple of Predacon head hunters – that in of itself was no lie. The ex-slug would claim he like them had abandoned factional ties, if asked. Then Jungle would go with them, stating he wanted to make sure he was fully compensated by Grapple for aiding him. They would in turn lead him to Grapple’s stronghold where Rhapsody was…
By having his comrades shadow his position, an extraction would therefore be plausible…
The rate in which time passed returned to normal.
A volley of rounds from Jungle’s chest guns made a beeline for Grapple…
Penji yawned as he put the ion cannon into his subspace pocket, and started back for the barracks, seemingly oblivious to the scene around him.
===
Caska cursed at the orders, and began to pull back from her current opponent, but, finding there was still a good share of chaos behind her, she then took to the air. She glided over the battle, scanning for anywhere she could help beat open a path for extraction for the others, and for where that assistant of hers had gotten to.. the second she ignored him, he seemed to disappear, and then just pop out of nowhere when he was least expected or needed.
Trance fired off another slug, the plasma ripping through the Predacon's chest. The body fell to it's knees, then fell flat on his lifeless face. Just then, Trance heard the order to fall back, and smirked. He turned to walk out, leaving the chaos to ensue between whoever wanted to. As he walked out, a rat jumped him. The rat tackled him to the ground, knocking his shotgun away from him as the rat bit into Trance's shoulders. Trance grimaced in pain as he tried to push the rat off, but to no avail. The rat grabbed Trance's head with both hands, his thumbs pointed at Trance's optics as the nails began to grow. 'Slag.' was all that went through Trance's mind as the first nail scratched then broke through his left optic. Pain coursed through his head as he tried to hold the scream in. Suddenly, a fight between two others got too close and knocked the rat off of Trance, allowing the Maximal to quickly get to his feet and find his shotgun. He soon found it and went to grab it, but felt a hand wrap around his ankle and begin to pull him back.
"Damn rat." Trance said annoyingly as reached for his plasma pistol and fired a couple shots at the rat, who let go of Trance's ankle to cover the wound in the arm, trying to stop the flow of mech fluid. Trance stood up and drove his knee into the rat's face, knocking him backwards and to the ground. The rat attempted to scurry away, only to have his right knee joint blown out by Trance. The rat screamed in pain as he collapsed to the floor, scratching his way to freedom. He looked up one last time as Trance descended on him, his claws at full length.
Two cycles later
Trance walked out of the gathering with his shotgun in tow and his hand over his left optic, swearing as he returned to the barracks.
Relic currently locked claw to claw with a great grizzly of a TM2, grunted in reply to the message that crackled over his intercom. TM2 Transformations seemed to blur the lines between beast and bot even further then the initial phases of Trans Metal mutation, and he’d be damned if he could tell whether this thing was in beast mode or not.
Seemingly in reply to Relic’s silent thought, the Grizzly’s massive jaws snapped inches from Relic’s face, splattering him with foamy saliva. The grizzly was stronger then Relic by far, and it slowly drove the assassin towards the ground, it’s dagger like claws biting into the back of his hands. Relic felt his knees starting to buckle under the creature’s strength and weight.
It was times like these that he regretted not carrying a gun… he could have just shot the shaggy bastard when he first saw him and been done with it.
Looking down, Caska saw that Relic was in trouble. More importantly, she saw an easy target. She dropped down, thrusting her sword before her into the great grizzly's back. It plunged through, breaking out on the other side, and nearly reached Relic as well. Presently, however, it disappeared, and Caska took back to the air above the roaring bear. Dematerializing the sword was quicker than pulling it out- an important point to remember in situations like this. Had she tried to pull it out, the bear would have reared back and thrown her to the ground, probably making her lose her grip on the sword in the process. But now she floated above the grizzly as he reared back, and her sword rematerialized in front of her.
As the bear reared back Relic finally had enough room to draw his sword. It came singing out of its sheath and slashed across the grizzly’s chest, sending a shower of mech fluid down onto the assassin. He rolled to the side as Caska’s sword plunged back inside the grizzly again and again, and a moment later Relic’s sword darted in, ripping internal systems apart as it darted in and out.
It was ugly work, but the grizzly lay unmoving on the ground a few moments later, his frame a pierced and bloody mess.
The fluid soaked assassin turned and raises his sword to Caska in a distracted thanks and started walking towards the barracks, “Cut it a little close didn’t you?” he inquired of the hovering mercenary, rubbing the spot on his chest she had come so close to piercing.
Caska landed by Relic, and walked with him. Flying around made her a easy and conspicuous target.
"You didn't give me much margin for error," she told the assasin.
Initially Catfish was…not worried…concerned about how Filch would react. Ah good, denial. Normal, healthy reaction to something like this and far less awkward than the homicidal rage characters often go through when someone kills their best friend. Burnout might be a problem though. Deal with that later. Now, get out of the fighting.
Catfish herded Filch along the half-decimated far wall, giving fighters who got too near warning pokes with her spear.
---------------------
There was a barking in the distance, getting gradually closer. At short length the hoverboard zipped between Relic and Caska in the insane dash of something who thinks that if it gets there fast enough it will somehow be able to avert a disaster that has already happened. Just as promptly it disappeared into the battle.
[Auditorium - Main Floor]
“BULL-RUSH!! BULL-RU…” There was a brilliant explosion, blue flame arching violently in every direction. The Pred had died only seconds after deciding to assume command of the surviving Black Ops squad. Scarab was off in his own closed off little world, and the rest of them were getting slaughtered. That was fine, let the psychotic fight. The rest of the team had a job to do. They had the tracker, still registering the ‘sigs of their two primary targets, and enough men yet to at least make a go at completing the mission. Bull-rush the crowd, get out into an open environment, engage primaries, and execute punctually. That, at least, was the plan.
It imploded along with the rest of him.
The bluish energy dissipated leaving a charred and melted husk to fall to the floor. Another Predacon, this one bearing the markings of Conformist military, hurtled the body. In his hands he clutched the large pulse rifle responsible for the preceding light show. The SiC ‘bot landed expertly and brought the cannon to bear. Another TMII fell into his sights. He moved to squeeze the trigger (always squeeze the military training said over and over in his mind. Never jerk)…and hit the dirt stone dead. An impressively smoking crater had appeared in the area formerly occupied by his spark cage. Another ‘bot moved forward in his place…this time a TMII commando systematically murdering the on-rushers with beams of blazing white energy.
The dance continued. But the tides were beginning to turn. No new leader materialized and the Conformist ‘bots were crawling out of the woodwork. Sensing imminent victory, no doubt. Maximum glory, minimum risk – the same universe over.
**********
Some of the bullets hit Grapple as he fled down the darkened streets outside the arena. Some of them didn’t. Given the severity of his existing wounds it would have been hard to tell if he noticed or not. One thought filled his blood drenched mind: find a CR chamber. Find it fast.
“Checkmate,” the dark warrior whispered as prepared to fire the finishing volley. His shot had almost aligned when a medium sized group of Lightning Corps ‘bots seemed to materialize from a side alley. One followed the flagging Grapple, while the others turned on Jungle. Gun barrels slowed and eventually stopped. There were too many for him to fight all by himself, and now there was no hope of relieving Grapple.
It was time to put the aforementioned plan ‘B’ into effect.
**********
In another part of the city, Croak walked, and walked…and just kept on walking. Assassins from both sides of the factional fence and a shadow straight out of some Terran conception of Hell! His world had turned upside down again just when he thought he’d found permanent shelter. It figured. With his luck of late, it just figured.
Sighing, Croak made another sharp turn. He was calling it a night and going back to his barracks. Once there he’d decide what to do. Looked like he might be needing another change of address form.
**********
The ax came down in a powerful arc. With even his closest saber out of blocking range, Scarab threw up a thickly armored arm, catching the blade half way. Metal bit into metal with a sickening crunch as Gaul buried his weapon halfway through the fearsome Predacon’s left forearm. It stuck there for a fraction of a second.
Scarab lashed out with a low blow on his remaining sword. The Maximal caught the effort with his knife and twisted savagely. The second saber dropped. A claw set raked Gaul’s face and the two disengaged.
“Die, dammit!” Gaul roared in frustration. Without wasting a single movement, the gray Transformer brought his ax / hammer around for another pass – sharp side first…
**********
Nestled amongst the shadows of a nearby roof sat a collection of cold stony monsters. One of them was there on business. Certain people had interests that needed looking out for, and he was honor bound to do the watching.
A flash of yellow, the sound of wings catching air, and just like that the figure was gone. Things…could take care of themselves from here on out. He’d done what he came to do. It was not in him to do more.
Angles on our shoulders…whether we want them or not.
Gaul swung his Ax around again into Scarab's remaining sabre knocking it from the warrior's hand with immense force. Scarab flipped back into a Hand-to-Hand stance waiting for Gaul's next move. "It is impossible to beat me." Scarab weezed fighting exustion. Gaul narrowed his eyes and charged with his ax. Scarab countered to the side and punched where Gaul's head should have been.
Gaul had skillfully dropped to one knee avioding the counter and slammed his ax into Scarab's mid section sinking 3/4 of the blade in. "It's not probable that I will beat you, but it is possible." Scarab optics sagged in a realization in defeat. Gaul turned and in one fluid motion sliced the predacon commander's head from his body. Gaul sighed in relief after a moment of watching the body fall to the floor. "Everyone FALL back and return to the barraks NOW." He said almost in frustration if anyone was still there.
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