Flatline

[Flatline]

-Player Info-
Name/Alias: Zercon

-Character Info-
Name: Flatline
Age Equivalent: Mid Thirties
Gender Equivalent: Mech
Species: Cybertronian
Faction: Decepticon

Original Occupation: Medical Worker Turned Sparkling Manufacture for High Caste.

Occupation/Specialization: Medical Assistant - Parts Manufacturing - Spark Tampering

Appearance:
Image: LINK

Height: Just Under Green Bar. Can't stand pin straight without aid.

Color Scheme: Predominantly Black with Red Accents.

Eyes: Flatline's eyes are red, with a white lens in the center that is disproportionately small. There is a sharp point on the bottom edge of his eyelid that leads to a line that connects with his upper lip.

Facial Features: Hollow and angular, Flatline's faceplate is a dull gray that holds pronounced cheekbones and a sunken look beneath. Between his eyes sits a small series of 'nasal' ridges that lead up to a red crest flanked by jagged black armor. Overlapping plates hook up and over his helm towards his neck, with an accent of red ringing from his temples back. His jaw is pronounced with a set of vents on either side.

Physical Build: Exceptionally top-heavy with an atypical frame.

Flatline is genuinely considered odd looking to a good number of individuals, with twisted proportions, angular armor, and more barbaric weaponry that creates an illusion of power that is not actually so. His chest is broad, a thick sternum plate anchoring flat panels that reach back towards wide shoulder armor. Said armor has a medical cross painted on its front with the Decepticon brand in its center. A set of red caps between shoulder and throat lead to a pair of harpoons that jut up and into the air on display.

His arms lope down past the knees on his digitigrade limbs, ending in broad hands donned in blade-like fingers that are far too delicate to serve well in combat. His forearm curves slightly as it leads up, flanked in patches of red, with two cylinder protrusions on the underside. Instead of a standard upper arm, the wheels of his Alt-Mode create its shape, a hollow hole in the center with two red fuel lines branching to connect to his body.

Flatline's torso hooks in abruptly to a narrow abdomen and hips, only to then push out to the other two wheels of his Alt-Mode that are embedded in his thighs. Fragile, these limbs taper down with paneling of sharp armor to the hock 'ankle' which then flares back out into two curved hoof prongs and a heel post.

Flanking his backstrut on the upper half of his torso are a series of upward pointed spines that flex and move as a clue to emotions. These act as panels to cover and protect vents.

Nestled beneath the pectoral plating of Flatline's front are a set of secondary limbs that are mounted upon red spheres. Small, feeble, borderline useless... they fold underneath his chest, though remain slightly visible. They are used for fine-tuned mechanics and jobs that require utmost dexterity. ((OOC Note: Temporarily Disabled During Reconstruction))

Overall, Flatline's posture is very poor. Hunched, his body shape is almost shrimp-like at a side view. Despite a distorted frame, he walks with care and does not lurch or stagger like some kind of beast. The only falter in his stride is a limp obtained from a recent injury, forcing him to rely on a makeshift cane. He hopes to get this rectified.

Altmode:
1960s Model Hearse
Image: LINK

Not fast, not armored, and not sporty in any way, the odd vehicle caught his eye and he figured 'good enough'.

History:
Full-Frame constructed, Flatline was planted immediately into his role as a medical assistant meant to help and aid the more trained Cybertronians during their day to day work and surgeries. He served diligently at this perceived menial job of a nurse for many years without contest. While it was worthwhile at first, he eventually grew unsatisfied with being the helping hand rather than the one to guide the blade. No longer wishing to be just a cog in the wheel, he dove headlong into trying to progress up the ranks.

More information, more respect, more power, more control... to be INDEPENDENT. To try and achieve this greater goal, he actively fought to prove himself, becoming obsessive to a point of it being alarming. Yet with his high drive and quick learning he eventually got his wish. He became a doctor.

As with his prior job, Flatline grew unsatisfied and soon looked to even greater goals, plunging himself into additional schooling full force. Gaining an even sharper edge, he transitioned from repairing injuries and surgeries to straight up manufacturing frames. This industry flowed from one thing to another until he dove into the taboo subject of Sparkling manufacturing as a sort of final challenge. Flatline was able to continue to create, but now could obtain the hefty riches that accompany such things given the primary customer base being Towerlings.

While he once more obtained what he sought, Flatline looked down upon his customers. They were entitled abominations, and his distaste at others grew into revulsion, a bitter cynicism and snarky ire blooming behind scenes. Because he had nowhere else he could see to climb, he was good at putting on a fake smile to get jobs.

Flatline worked in this field until the war was on the horizon, and he dug his claws into the ideals and moved into service for something far greater than a detestable fad. He became a Trauma Medic and served well behind the front lines to repair damages. After the All-Spark was launched away, however, he stepped aside from his placement as a surgeon and threw himself into Spark research to contest this slight against their kind. It was here he constructed his secondary arms to better serve with speed and dexterity for his new role. He stood strong for some time in this position, slamming forward with the determined zeal that he was known for. He was not mastering sciences that were already known, but trying to pave a new road that he could command as his conquest.

When the evacuation occurred from the planet's fall, things spiraled out of control for Flatline. He and other scientists boarded a smaller escape ship only to realize in the haste and confusion they lacked the appropriate supplies for such a long journey. Panic, madness, not having a world to return to and not knowing where to go other than to follow the Nemesis’ wake in a voyage they were not equipped for... the ship fell into chaos, and Flatline hid away as the modest team turned against one another. In the end the cowardly approach worked, but left him alone and alienated.

Stuck in the silent ship that was trying to catch up to the Nemesis, Flatline struggled to keep his mind active, living on minimal fuels he poached until supplies ran dry. With great reluctance, he put himself into stasis with the fear of never waking up again. The ship caught up eventually, but without a conscious navigator it dove into the sea of the planet that the Nemesis was orbiting. Here he remained undisturbed until corrosion ate enough out of the pod to surge him awake.

Retrieved by two Decepticons, Flatline served diligently, happy to have a home once again until the incident with the Nemesis. Having brought with him a disease that spread to others with more power, the end result was the great Warship crashing into the ocean. He somehow managed to survive the backlash of this. Beat down, past accomplishments looking worthless... he now lays low in Blackridge trying to find what goal he will seek next that he can even reach from rock bottom.

He fell far.

Personality:
Once an individual filled with arrogance, mental strength, and a sharp edge to speak his mind and push forward with his ambitions and goals, Flatline has changed substantially since he arrived on Earth. Pacified, beaten down, fearful... the incident with the Nemesis has left him shaken and constantly questioning his value. He dreads every day. He plays passive and tries not to draw attention to himself. He scrabbles for some kind of worth and value... However, he also strains to shackle his sarcastic edge that was so prevalent before his psychological fall.

Bitter, scathing, antagonistic... These traits had once held true and used as a crux of his persona, only to be locked away and only pulled out around those he can trust, or those that do not have authority to kill him at whim. After facing death and psychological torment so many times in a short span however, sometimes his total crippling fear will shatter away entirely to complete indifference to set these old attributes free. It creates a violent dichotomy that whiplashes dangerously so. He has a sudden logic of 'If I were to be killed for my slights, I would have been!' and 'I have value to have been kept around!' that slams through his normally crippling doubt to make him stare down the barrel of a shotgun to DARE his foe to pull the trigger and end his torture.

Passivity always resumes after the confrontation passes.

Flatline just wants stability to return to his psyche and something to call his own. To be a boon that cannot be replaced by others who overlap with his skills. He wants to be NEEDED, and unless he feels he has value he will continue to struggle.

Likes:
• Sciences: Flatline has an exceptional passion for medical science and just about everything that goes hand in hand with it. From first aid and the intricacies of a Cybertronian's frame, to theoretical sciences, to even the more mundane aspects of engineering mounting for inbuilt weaponry and basic tools... Other topics also strike his curiosity… although weaponry has never been a great focus for him other than the most primitive of blade, and industrial and transportation engineering is far outside his realm of interest and capability.

• His Work: Flatline is a devoted worker to a fault, and anything he makes he will want to protect and keep well cared for. He enjoys a challenge, and should he meet said task head on and be victorious? It will boost his confidence and make him feel good about his placement momentarily as well as himself.

• Allies: Before the Nemesis' fall, Flatline did not care about making friends other than trying to manipulate a guardian to act as his brawn. Now that he is so broken down, he is no longer opposed to the idea of acquaintances, and is a bit more reluctantly open to the concept. He is keenly paranoid if he is the one being manipulated however, so he approaches with apprehension and leeriness despite a want to breach this boundary.

Dislikes:
• Meddlers: Should anyone tamper with his projects, Flatline is not opposed to snapping to his old ways and getting particularly venomous and hostile. He sees his projects as HIS and unless it is declared a joint effort at the onset, he can be unstable unless it is one of High Command doing the tampering.

• Destruction of a Creation: Flatline's pride for his work backlashes when it is absolutely decimated. He takes it as an injury to himself and can find it painful in a way. He tries not to show this lest others can use it against him, bottling it up into a stress knot.

• Touching his Secondary Arms: ((OOC Note: Temporarily Disabled During Reconstruction)) Flatline sees his secondary limbs as the most valuable attribute he owns. Able to move with dexterity and precision that his primary arms are incapable of, and able to lend a literal extra hand to jobs. To be grabbed is a surefire way to cause issues.

• True Silence: A hum of generators, the soft sound of muttered words through the walls... This is soothing in a way, marking a functional environment. True silence with no ambiance starts to drive him into an anxious spiral and panic should it go on long enough.

Strengths and Weapons:
• Speed: While slow in his Alt-Mode, Flatline is not incapable of moving quickly when push comes to shove in his root form. His digitigrade legs act as springboards, and longer arms help with throwing momentum. His limited armor aids in this, a lighter frame with twitch response times. While he has the capability to be swift, he lacks the skill to translate this to combat or proper dodges. Due to his damaged knee his run is hindered, but if survival is on the line powering through discomfort is better than risking real pain.

• Flexibility: His lack of armor means joints are not caged and bound like true battle-ready individuals. His shoulder can hook further back, abdomen twist almost unnaturally so, and his elbows can extend pin straight. However, he lacks true full rotational joints, and is merely more adaptable than armored teammates.

• Claws: The last digits in his primary arms hold razor sharp blades along their underside. While he lacks strength to wield properly, they can lay nasty scratches to light armor, painful surface level damage to medium, however, against heavy only peels off paint.

• Rotary Blade: This tool’s damage to foes depends entirely upon the allotted time. Given a stationary target he could eventually bore through heavy armor, though in combat this is often not the case. In a confrontation it is more suited to medium and light armor penetration, which gets substantially less damaging the shorter contact is made. A quick veering swipe is more akin to shear a groove than a full boring press into a chest. Leaning into too heavy of armor too fast will bind the blade and hurt its mechanics.

• Gyroscope and Rolling Abilities: Housed on each side of his Spark are a set of gyroscopes that aid his balance and create his broad torso. He can hold himself steady and level on most moving surfaces by combining it with his digitigrade legs so he can do medical work even in less ideal environments. He learned during the war that spin launching these to create force, he can perform a mild transformation and literally roll forward at reasonably high speed. He cannot see while in this state, so he does not use it to blind launch longer than short sprints to get him further from foes, or barrel over a small opponent.

• Harpoons: For show more than anything else, the harpoons are on display as a threat to make him look more dangerous than he actually is. He only has two at any given time, and they are the only true artillery he has. They will spear easily into medium armor, and can sometimes gore into heavy if the individual is within reaching distance of the launch point. The ends can flare out and fold back on command, able to barb and hook, or slide back out to reel in on the connecting chain to re-load. He can aim with relative accuracy yet that is mostly due to its rather modest range of his height times three.

• Iron Stomach: Gore does not faze Flatline as it may others. Gutted frames, grotesque mutilations, rusting decay and disease, things torn straight out from a nightmare... with the jobs he has held through his entire life he has seen more damage than he can remember. Any unease brought on from witnessing an injury is more "Will this happen to me next?".

• Medical Adaptability: Flatline's experience through the years means he has had the opportunity to work on most frame types. He understands the build of components rather readily given subtle clues, and can determine model types and how best to service them without complications. His internal database of mechanics is rather vast, though as to be expected he cannot know it all despite valiant attempts.

Physical Weaknesses:
• Light Frame: Borderline unarmored except light plating across his chest for rather apparent reasons due to vitals, and medium/light armor in ridges along his upper spine and helm, Flatline is by far a true non-combatant and will avoid a fight unless he feels the foe is on his level or lower. His thin lower legs can be bent and broken with a sideswipe of a shin, and his hands can be crushed with relative ease.

• Strength: While he can still maneuver supplies and assist a standard patient to their feet should they not be too big, Flatline is useless when it comes to fighting with any real power. If grabbed he would be unable to pry a normal individual's hand open, and can be seen as laughably weak.

• Limited Artillery: All show no output. Flatline has one ranged attack that is quirky and atypical, and his other tools turned 'weapons' require him to be far too close for comfort. The harpoons also have chains attached, and should one miss and be grabbed it is a direct leash he can’t detach quickly. Panic can exacerbate this, leaving him shackled.

• Combat Skill: HAH, no... Untrained, and only able to lash out with wild lack of skill, Flatline can be easily outmaneuvered. While he knows where to hit a foe for damage due to his skill as a Medic, laying such a blow is rather rare, and his attacks can seem disjointed or frantic akin to a cornered animal that has no choice but to stand its ground.

• Hooves: Not good for slick surfaces, not good on ice, and able to puncture and sink into particularly soft earth to slow and make walking difficult... Flatline likes to stick to sturdier earth and rock.

• Powerful Magnets: Any high-powered magnet on his upper torso will disrupt the gimbal’s in his gyroscopes, throwing off all sense of balance and ability to orient himself. He will plunge into severe uncontrolled vertigo.

Mental Weaknesses:
• Pain Tolerance: Zero. None. Nada. Flatline does not tolerate injuries very well, and the pain he feels is overdramatized. He is prone to passing out should he lose modest amounts of Energon.

• Trust: A Decepticon since the onset, he has seen what attachment can bring and he is apprehensive and fearful of it. "They are trying to manipulate me" "They just want my medical skills" "They want to hurt me for entertainment", these sorts of thoughts torment him. This has grown after the Nemesis incident, though he is trying to be more open. The nagging voice will always haunt however, making his true WANT for allies' problematic.

• Water: He plunged into the Ocean on his arrival to Earth, and he plunged into the Ocean with the Nemesis' fall. Flatline has grown a twitchy dislike of the sea and other bodies of water will cause unrest. Rain, canals or other smaller forms do not deter, but should he look into the abyss of a large lake and not be able to see the bottom? It makes him feel great unease.

Special Skills:
• Medical and Manufacturing: A medic and frame manufacturer by trade before the war, and a narrow topic scientist after, Flatline if given the proper tools and enough time can create replacement body parts and internal components for a majority of frame types and models.

• Spark Tampering: Flatline has a high interest in Sparks, one that has grown more prominent given the All-Spark being jettisoned out into deep space. He has studied them extensively, and performed experimentation when the war was just getting going when a few slain allies weren't as big of a loss as they are now. He can cage Sparks within external chambers to keep individuals alive while their body is reformed from damage, and has been playing with the idea of severing a Spark in half to fuel new soldiers, spitting in the face of 'god'. This ability to create new life without the All-Spark is far from successful.

• Necromancy: Burning through Protoforms at an alarming rate during his experimentation on Sparks, Flatline had to adapt and he did so by poaching from those slain in battle. No need to waste viable Protoforms, no need to toil to build bodies from scratch over an excruciatingly long time... He scrabbled to cobble frames together to rip portions of Sparks into and try to make them bind. This is where his attempts at playing god fail however, for he has never got a Spark to truly stick even if the body is perfectly functional.

Extra Info:
• Surgical Tools: Located in forearms beneath the red patches of armor, these tools are the most basic for impromptu jobs to help someone survive long enough to get to a real Medical Bay. This includes a small laser cutter, plyer like forceps, a small welder and soldering gun combo, a basic medical scanner, and a modest resin gun to temporarily seal frayed lines and patch wounds.

The four cylinders on the back of his arms are replacement cartridges for the resin gun so he can try to contend with larger wounds. Two large, two small. If they are struck and punctured they will explode and coat whatever is nearby in quick hardening resin that can be blistered and broken off with only light force. It is more an irritant than a threat, unless it gets into fragile joints or eyes.