We are a literate, intermediate to advanced AU Transformers RPG Based off of the first season of TFP with dashes of other incarnations sprinkled here or there. Characters from any continuity are welcome however must be restyled to match the TFPrime universe.
Active, with ongoing plotlines, we are always willing to integrate new characters into storylines once incorporated into the setting.
Post by Nathan Walker on Oct 4, 2021 23:05:03 GMT -5
“Fair enough.”
This setup seemed pretty familiar, almost a sense of deja vu for Nathan. Back more than two decades ago, when he had first learned to shoot under the tutelage of his grandfather. Back then it had been an old Ruger .22 cal rifle off the back porch. As he’d gotten older, the weapons had either changed or been added to until he was shooting guns like a .357 revolver, side by side shotguns, and .45 semi autos. Add onto that all the experience tacked onto that by Uncle Sam, and Nathan was arguably better than his grandfather ever was.
“Eyes and ears on.”
Nathan waited until Miko was safely behind him before putting on his ear protection, then drew the pistol from the small of the back holster underneath his button down shirt. He moved fluidly, years of training and muscle memory taking over as the pistol came up and into his hands. Instinctively, his legs spread to slightly more than shoulder width apart with his right leg taking a miniscule step back.
His knees bent slightly as his both hands grasped the handle of the pistol, right hand high on the grip with his left wrapping around his fingers, thumbs parallel and pressed gently up against each other. He held the pistol firmly yet gently, his breathing slow and steady as he lined up on one of the cans, body squared and facing the target.
Before taking the weapon off safe, he turned his head slightly and looked towards Miko to see if she had put on the eye and ear protection.
“Ready?”
Last Edit: Jan 16, 2022 22:13:37 GMT -5 by Nathan Walker
Post by Miko Nakadai on Oct 15, 2021 17:49:06 GMT -5
From this distance, Miko was pretty sure that Nathan could hit around… ohhhh… Maybe three of the five cans. They were only a few meters away, but they were small targets, and some of them were pretty dented in shape - so there was no WAY he’d be able to hit all of them first try!
And if he did? Well, he’d certainly move up a few notches in the ‘cool people at Omega’ list.
At the request, she couldn’t help but quietly scoff. She found the need for eye and ear protection to be a little excessive. Didn’t he know she liked her music as LOUD as possible? A few gunshots wouldn’t be that bad volume-wise, right? Regardless, she would comply, knowing full well he wouldn’t do anything until she had.
Sliding the goggles over her face, it took her a second to adjust them so they were snug. Peering at the earmuffs, she would scoff again - these things looked ridiculous, but hey, safety first or whatever! Again, she would take a second to adjust them, making sure the band wasn’t too loose on her head before she gave a cheery double thumbs-up.
“Ready! Bet ya can’t hit all of them!” she grinned. She wouldn’t move forward from where she was standing, though would sidestep just to make sure she had the best view of the makeshift shelf and targets.
Post by Nathan Walker on Jan 16, 2022 22:39:25 GMT -5
If Nathan heard Miko’s taunt about him not being able to hit all of them, he made no sign of acknowledgement beyond fitting his finger into the trigger guard.
Five point five pounds. Roughly the required force needed to send a copper jacketed lead projectile weighing about five grams downrange, propelled by about three to five grains with smokeless powder to a velocity measured leaving the muzzle of the weapon at about fifteen hundred feet per second. Enough power to punch through a standard car door and kill anyone hiding behind it. This wasn’t something to be taken lightly.
Nathan’s breathing steadied as he lined up on the first can, the one on the furthest left of the line, firing off one shot which caused the can to jump as it was shredded before it fell to the floor behind the makeshift shelf. The expended round would pass through the aluminum like a hot knife through butter and carry on until they smashed against the rock and concrete wall further down the room.
As soon as he verified the target was down, Nathan pivoted slightly and lined up on the next can, squeezing off another round into the second can followed by another round into the middle can, and so forth down the line. To anyone else watching, it would seem like Nathan was more machine than man as decades of experience and training were put on display.
With five rounds expended for five cans taken out, Nathan took his finger off the trigger and put the handgun on safe again, seeming to scan the line of cans as if he was waiting for one of them to jump back up onto the shelf before he seemed satisfied and placed the handgun back in it’s holster and pulled off his ears and eye protection, then looked over to Miko to gauge her reaction.
Last Edit: Mar 29, 2022 0:48:52 GMT -5 by Nathan Walker
Post by Miko Nakadai on Jan 21, 2022 13:54:33 GMT -5
Miko honestly hadn’t been expecting much. Out of the five cans? She’d bet that ohhh, two… maybe three would be taken out, and even that would be a fluke. The targets were so small that his aim would either have to be somehow completely on point or he’d have to be very lucky.
So when he hit the first can? She could only smirk. That was his luck used up for the day! Only for that smirk to quickly shift into a wider smile as can after can were hit perfectly. Her eyes widened as the fifth and final can was hit, jaw dropping just slightly - it’d all happened so quickly that if she hadn’t been watching? She wouldn’t have believed it.
Glancing up at Nathan, then back to the now-vacant ‘shelf’ - then back to Nathan? It was only when he took off his earmuffs did she do the same.
“WHOA!”
She left the goggles on for right now, but the excitement on her face was still evident regardless, the smile not leaving her.
“That was amazing!! Can I go look at the cans and maybe set up a harder target?”
Even though he’d put the gun away and things seemed safe, she thought it best to ask anyway.
Post by Nathan Walker on Jan 23, 2022 23:03:23 GMT -5
He’d figured something like this would happen.
Some people were just built to just get super enthusiastic about certain things the moment they were exposed to them. Honestly, Nathan was sure that the way Miko was acting was as close to an instant replay of his first reaction to seeing his grandfather shoot. So when she asked to go see the cans and maybe set up a set of harder targets, he returned the grin with a nod.
“Sure, go ahead. And thank you for asking. It’s important.”
One of the key rules of firearm safety, never point a weapon at anything you are not willing to destroy. That’s why it’s always important to never cross in front of a muzzle on the range, and why he had made sure that Miko was safely behind him before he had started shooting.
As he rubbed his ears slightly at the pressure feeling from having the ear protection over his ears with the eyeglasses, Nathan thought for a moment before smirking towards Miko.
“Tell you what, I’ll turn around while you rearrange them. Once you’re set up, you come back here and tell me.”
Post by Miko Nakadai on Feb 25, 2022 19:36:31 GMT -5
“Awesome!”
No sooner had Nathan given her the go-ahead did she start moving into a walk. She wanted to run but thought better of it. This guy wasn’t Bulkhead, and while the big bot let her get away with bending the rules a little bit? She was certain this guy would be quick to pull her into line. Hence the goggles that’d been kept on, even if she thought they looked silly.
That being said though, her walk was definitely on the faster side as she made her way over to the cans that’d been hit.
At Nathan’s comment she paused, however, turning to look at him and flashing him a grin.
“Alright, you’re on!”
How to even go about setting them up so it’d be a challenge? Stacking them on top of each other might be good, but then if he lined up the top can? It’d just be a matter of lowering his aim just slightly each time to hit the rest - and that was no fun!
Mulling it over as she started walking again, she would walk past the small makeshift shelf to look at the cans that’d been hit. Picking up the first one, there was a quiet hum of approval. The bullet had gone clean through the can, right through the middle - or close enough, anyway!
“Your aim is pretty on point, dude! You won’t be so lucky next time though!”
Scooping up the rest of the cans, she made her way back to the small makeshift shelf. Okay… how to go about this… Hhmm…
Carefully, she would place a can on the very end of the shelf, turning it slightly so that the bullet hole was facing to one side. She would then repeat this with the other cans - one on the other end of the shelf, two randomly near the middle that were close enough to each other that they touched… and theeeen… hm… the fifth and final can she placed atop the first can, right on the end of the shelf.
Yeah!
Making her way back - not quite a run but close enough (since his back was turned!) she moved to stand next to Nathan, easing both hands onto her hips as she swiveled around to look at the cans. As this was the element of ‘surprise’ she would put her earmuffs back on, not wanting him to turn and get a sneaky look at the new setup while she put on the safety equipment.
“Earmuffs and goggles on! You’re up!” she grinned.
Post by Nathan Walker on Mar 29, 2022 1:02:46 GMT -5
Once he got the go ahead from Miko, Nathan turned his back to the cans and placed his hands on his hips, staring at the concrete and stone while Miko rearranged the cans on the shelf for him. A grin came to his face as she called it luck.
“Not luck Miko. Skill. Same thing that got those musicians you like listening to where they are today.”
Practice, practice, practice. Something his grandfather had hammered into him, then the Army, then Captain Terrill and Sergeant Miller on the team. He had been drawn to firearms from a young age but it had taken tens of thousands of rounds fired before he got to this point. Lots of missing the target before he was able to hit the target consistently.
Once Miko came back and gave him the go ahead, Nathan slid his ear protection back on and rolled his shoulders.
“Range is hot.” He said before going into action.
As he reached back and drew the Glock from his holster while spinning around, Nathan’s eyes scanned the shelf area. It was easier when you had a basic idea of the area where the target was going to be as opposed to having no idea where the target was going to pop up. He dropped back into his stance as the pistol came up and he sighted in on the targets. First one was the fifth can that Miko had set up, the one on top of the other one. One shot, then he dropped his point of aim slightly and fired another shot, taking the second can out a second after the one on top had a second hole blown into it.
Two shots were fired at the middle, one into each can as he was able to tell they were two separate targets, then finally a final shot into the last can at the end of the shelf.
Five shots, five down.
Once he was satisfied, Nathan holstered the weapon again and looked back towards Miko, removing his ear muffs again and looking at her to see her reaction.
Last Edit: Dec 19, 2022 19:29:56 GMT -5 by Nathan Walker
Post by Miko Nakadai on Apr 7, 2022 22:47:37 GMT -5
“All of it is skill? Aw man.”
Even if she sounded a little disheartened, she could relate a bit. Even though her proficiency in guitar playing seemed to come naturally to her, it took a lot of work to maintain a level she was happy with (not helped by the fact she currently didn’t have her guitar and had to borrow a crappy one from school…) - and even then she knew she had so far to go. Honestly, it was the first thing that’d held her interest for a while, which probably helped.
Surely there was some luck involved though. He’d hit every single can almost perfectly, and while there was skill in being able to hit the cans, the luck had come from how accurate the shots had been. Kind of like her finding a guitar during one of her piano lessons back in the day and- well, the rest was history!
Her gaze shifted from Nathan to the cans as he turned, watching as he fired five more shots. Five shots that hit five cans-
Her eyes wide, she couldn’t help but grin as she moved to eagerly pull the earmuffs off her head, turning to look up at Nathan, still smiling.
“Okay some of that had to be luck!!” she laughed “I think the cans are too close!”
Even if she tried she wouldn’t be able to hit all of them! Yet he’d done it twice now!
“Can I move them further back?? I need to make it almost impossible for you!”
While this wasn’t exactly a ‘game’, she so very much wanted to win.
Post by Nathan Walker on Apr 24, 2022 22:00:05 GMT -5
“Well, there is talent for this sort of thing, but skill will trump talent any day of the week if talent is not trained and turned into a skill.” Nathan amended. “I’d bet on the guy with no talent who practiced consistently over time over the guy with talent who didn’t practice.” he said before putting on his ear protection. Some guys he knew were much better than him despite all the practice he’d put in, and he supposed they had just been born with a rifle in hand or something, like Sergeant Miller.
If Miko thought he was good, Robert Miller would have had her jaw touching the ground by now.
“Don’t move them too far away...” he chuckled as he nodded to give her permission to move the shelf back a bit. “...I’m good but not that good with a handgun.” he said as he turned around and closed his eyes to allow Miko to move the table and cans around without him noticing again.
Though in his defense, handguns were arguably the most difficult firearm to really become proficient with. It was much easier to train someone to shoot a rifle consistently at targets three hundred yards away than it was to train someone to shoot a pistol consistently at targets thirty yards away, hence why pistols were generally reserved for occupations in the military that didn’t call for someone to fire it on a regular basis. Still, handguns were useful when you needed to conceal a firearm or as a backup for when you lost your long gun.
Post by Miko Nakadai on Aug 4, 2022 13:30:26 GMT -5
“Those are some pretty wise words!” she laughed. “I get it though, I think the same kind of thing works with guitar, too?”
She wrinkled her nose, thinking.
“Though… I guess that kinda mindset works for everything!”
Some people definitely had an affinity for things - like Raf, and his knowledge of all things tech. It just clicked with him, to the point he could somehow understand Bumblebee’s beepy boop way of talking. She’d kind of worked out ‘yes’ and ‘no’ but that was only because they were usually paired with gestures to make it super obvious.
Yet he was always learning more and refining that skill. Ratchet and Raf working together to improve little things around the base, and plus he was always kept on his toes in removing camera footage of the Autobots if they got looking a little obvious somewhere.
She was kind of the same with music. Learning piano first, she had quickly become bored when she’d mastered it. Then, through the power of metal, she had switched to guitar - which was way more fun and more her style. She had talent, yes, but it was only with constant practice that she kept it up.
Probably one of the only things she’d stuck with so far, but hey!
As Nathan put his ear protection back on, she would copy and do the same. She could still hear him, even if his words were a little muffled now, grinning as permission was given.
Moving quickly, she would make her way to the small makeshift shelf. The cans had been hit twice now and so were basically all used up. Moving them aside, she would pick up the shelf, moving it back another… hmmm… he’d said not too far away, buuuuut where was the fun in no challenge?
It’d been about seven and a half meters before, and so she estimated another five or so. Twelve and a half total - or thereabouts! Plunking the shelf down, she was quick to run back to the box to get a new set of cans - this time mixing it up with two bottles as well.
Setting them up, she did a different configuration than before. One can and bottle close to the left edge, two cans together almost near the middle, the second bottle on its own just to the right of these, before putting two cans on top of each other on the right hand side.
Perfect.
Pleased with her handiwork, she’d give herself a nod of approval before making her way back over to Nathan, standing about a two-person width apart, just to give him room. Folding her arms almost smugly, she’d turn on a heel to face the shelf.
“Your move!” she grinned as she put the ridiculous looking eye protection on once more.
Post by Nathan Walker on Aug 11, 2022 16:14:22 GMT -5
“Yeah, it works with everything in life.” Nathan said as Miko began setting up the cans further away, her voice muffled slightly by the ear protection. “Music, art, sports, you name it.” Her mention of guitar caused him to arch an eyebrow in thought. “I think I remember hearing something about you playing guitar. Is that true?”
He remembered when his mother had made him start taking piano lessons when he was eight years old. He’d originally resisted, thinking it ‘unmanly’ but still going along with it because he had no choice. It wasn’t until his mother had him play a song at his grandmother’s birthday on her piano and he saw the happy tears in his grandmother and grandfather’s eyes that he had changed his attitude and went at it with vigor. Now, even though his work prevented him from owning a piano he still practiced occasionally on an electric keyboard, keeping up with the songs that he knew.
Once Miko was back behind the firing line and gave him the go ahead, Nathan’s mind switched back to the present as he turned and drew the handgun from its holster. He was a fraction of a second slower than previous two times as the targets were a bit further back and it took him a bit longer to locate them, as well as the fact that Miko had stacked one can on top of another one. Seven targets, only six shots left in the magazine of his Glock as he had expended ten shots with the other set ups.
Sighting up on the first two targets on the left, Nathan fired one shot in each can, then pivoted slightly to the other two and put one shot in each of those, followed by the bottle. With only one round left in the magazine, Nathan aimed for the top can and squeezed the trigger, and as the slide locked back empty he depressed the magazine release and reached around with his left hand, grabbing a fully loaded magazine from his belt and slapping it into the empty magazine well in the handle of the pistol, then sent the slide forward again by depressing the slide catch which chambered a fresh round. He put that round into the bottom can, then lowered the pistol and relaxed his stance, ejecting the magazine into his waiting hand and pulling back the slide to eject the chambered round causing it to fly up into the air and into his waiting hand.
Post by Miko Nakadai on Sept 2, 2022 18:25:03 GMT -5
While Nathan’s voice was also muffled, she could hear him well enough - and the mention of guitar was met with a smile as she made her way back over.
“Yep! Preeeetty good at it too if I do say so myself!”
She’d taken to guitar really quickly, though Nathan’s words were certainly true. Talent had to be trained, which meant lots and lots of practice - and there was nothing more fun than playing along to some heavy metal.
“I’d offer to show you some jams but uh… Iiiii don’t have a guitar right now. Smacked a Decepticon with it and it… kinda broke.” she wrinkled her nose, before huffing a stray strand of hair from her face. It’d been for a good cause, and was absolutely worth it - but wow she missed that thing. The loaners from school were so icky in comparison, to the point she was too embarrassed to bring them back to Omega One.
“What about you? You play any instruments?”
Between her, Raf and Jack they had a pretty sweet little band setup, but if Nathan played something too? Maybe she could coax him into jamming sometime.
…Once she got a new guitar, anyway.
Shifting her weight, she watched as Nathan took point. He was a little slower at firing this time, it wasn’t almost instant like before - however, once he’d spotted the new formation and started firing? It was one after another after another.
“Okay, now you’re just showing off dude!” she laughed. “I need to get Raf in here to set up some sort of moving target or something for you sometime, see how you do then!”
Post by Nathan Walker on Sept 4, 2022 20:38:15 GMT -5
“Smacked a Decepticon with it?”
Nathan couldn’t help the expression of disbelief that appeared on his face as he echoed Miko’s statement. He didn’t know how much the guitar had cost, but if he had to guess it had been a cherished possession of Miko’s and was probably pretty expensive. That told him something about Miko that you could only learn by observation. If you came between her and those she cared about, she was prepared to sacrifice in order to protect them. An admirable trait, especially in someone of her age.
“I play piano, though I’m not as proficient as I used to be.” he admitted. “My mom made me take lessons since I was eight years old.”
At her mention of having Raf come up with some moving targets, Nathan couldn’t help but chuckle.
“Have you ever been to the shooting booths at the fairs around here?” he asked as he holstered the pistol then replaced the round that had ejected into the magazine. “Sometimes they have something like that and you have to hit the target with a BB gun. Course, if you want a real challenge you should try skeet shooting sometime...”
He paused for a moment, a thought coming to his mind as he rolled the pistol magazine around in his hand.
“Have you actually ever been around real guns before?”
He knew that gun laws in Japan were pretty restrictive, so any real exposure to guns would have had to come when she was in the United States, though he had no idea what her social life was like when she wasn’t hanging out here in Omega.
Last Edit: Dec 19, 2022 19:29:25 GMT -5 by Nathan Walker
Post by Miko Nakadai on Sept 30, 2022 17:54:34 GMT -5
At Nathan’s question, Miko seemed to perk up considerably. She replied with a nod, grinning as she spoke.
“Yep, right in the face!”
She’d do it again in a heartbeat, too, should the opportunity ever come up - though hopefully if it ever did, there would be more to use than her guitar. Still, it’d been worth it, even if the loaners from school that she had to use now were totally lame.
Shifting her weight at the mention of piano, she would give a quiet hum of thought, thinking back to her own lessons.
“Whoa! I started on piano too, was suuuper good at it - but it wasn’t for me, y’know? Can’t really rock out on a piano!” she paused “Well, no, you probably can, but it’s sooo not the same as a guitar!”
She laughed.
“Did you like it? Piano lessons I mean?”
She’d hated them and found them totally boring - if only because she seemed to surpass each lesson with ease and needed more to do. Plus there was the fact you were stuck there to play - with a guitar there was at least the freedom of being able to walk around and jam a bit.
Shaking her head at his question, she frowned.
“Noo, I never tried! I was sorta okay at throwing beanbags at targets though, but that’s probably not the same thing, huh?” she couldn’t remember the last time they’d had a fair, knowing how boring Jasper was they probably didn’t even know what the word meant - though she’d been to plenty in Japan when she was much smaller.
“Skeet shooting? What’s that? Like moving targets or something?”
If it was challenging like he said, it was probably something with moving targets, or maybe even something silly like trying to shoot with a blindfold on - though that probably wasn’t safe.
At the question, she would shake her head.
“Nope, I mean - not really. They’re super rare in Japan, and even here I haven’t really been around guns. Least not until I met the Autobots! Fowler has one sometimes, I think - but it’s not like he ever gets it out around the base. In fact, I think this is the closest I’ve been to one!”
Did the Autobot’s built-in weapons count? Probably not, and so she wouldn’t bring them up.
Post by Nathan Walker on Oct 2, 2022 19:45:44 GMT -5
Right in the face huh?
Nathan couldn’t help but wonder what exactly an electric guitar would do to a Cybertronian’s face. Probably not too much, especially given Miko’s size. Still, the fact that she had sacrificed something that meant a lot to her to protect someone she cared about was impressive. At her mention of piano lessons and not being able to ‘rock out’ on it, Nathan couldn’t help but chuckle. While not exactly the argument he had made to his mother, he could certainly understand Miko’s feelings. Maybe with age she’d change her mind...
Her question brought him back to focus, and he was quiet for a moment before responding.
“Not at first.” he replied as he took his pistol out of it’s holster and slapped the magazine into the butt of the gun, then chambered a fresh round. “I was kinda like you in a way. I thought piano wasn’t ‘manly’, if you know what I mean.” he ejected the magazine then slipped a fresh round to replace the one he chambered, then replaced the magazine into the pistol giving him fifteen rounds plus one in the chamber for a total of sixteen.
“But then I played a song for my grandma at her birthday party. It wasn’t anything special, but my mom thought her mother would like it. And she did. I saw it made her and my grandfather happy. So...I grew to like it because it made them happy. And eventually, with age and maturity, I found that it made me happy too.”
Her mention of beanbags caused him to shake his head.
“Kind of, but not exactly.” he replied, then crouched down on his haunches when she asked about skeet shooting. “Skeet shooting is where you use a shotgun and they throw the target into the air. It’s usually a small, circular target made of clay called a pigeon that is designed to shatter when hit.” Nathan personally wasn’t a fan of skeet shooting, but it was good practice for bird season to keep his skills sharp. He’d been duck hunting out east and found he enjoyed a good roasted duck.
At her response he was quiet again, lips twisting in thought. He was technically the junior adult human here, being beneath both Fowler and Adler in seniority, so he probably would have to run this through them first. But then again...there probably wasn’t a protocol for this...
“Would you want to learn to shoot?” he asked, looking her dead in the eye as he said it.
Last Edit: Dec 19, 2022 19:28:39 GMT -5 by Nathan Walker