[ti]Ep 3[/ti]Step Up, Beat Down [ Sunstreaker || Neon ]

[Sunstreaker]

Week 3 - Day 2

Omega was dead.

Not actually, but enough so for Sunstreaker to find herself bored and alone in one of the empty storage rooms on the lower levels. It was the crack of dawn, or whatever, and either everyone else was busy, or still in recharge. Not Sunny though, no. As it turned out, Cybertronians did dream of electric sheep, and she'd gone and had a nightmare. Or whatever. Nobody to talk to? Just fine. She never cared much for conversation anyway. For her, the only real way to burn off stress, and not wind up drunk in a gutter three hours later, was to hit something. Preferably someone, though as the lack of traffic pointed out, she'd have to do with something instead.

Of course their human 'benefactors' were too cheap to spring for an integrated holographic training system. Or a sparring robot. Or anything, for that matter, for her to beat the snot out of. She was left with a mat, a ceiling, and an otherwise empty room. There was, however, that human-sized punching bag laying around, which was currently hanging from a rope she'd bolted into the ceiling. She'd get to that.

For the most part, Sunstreaker had an easy day today, having not been slotted for anything too time-intensive until later. But, with everyone busy or conked out, she'd have no sparring partner. Fine. Whatever. No sparring partner meant it was time for kata, anyway. She'd get to the bag.

Sunstreaker had come to stand a few feet off-center from the middle of the mat, leaving roughly half of the room strangely empty. It was a biting reminder to nobody but the femme herself. She stood quietly, optics shut, arms held out parallel to the ground, the tips of each of her servos pressed against her palms. For anyone who happened to stumble onto her at this point, the lack of swaying and movement in general might've led them to assume Sunstreaker had always been standing there like that, as if someone had dumped an incredibly beautiful statue in the middle of this storage room in aft-frag nowhere.

Then in a single burst of motion, she dropped into a ready stance, every joint moving in ideal unison. Both hands forward, two servos on each bent to claws. Half-crouched, center of mass lowered, dominant pede put forward, nondominant held behind in reserve. Once again, she came to stand still as stone, holding her stance. Unlike before however, the transition was smooth and fluid, sweeping her dominant leg forward, pausing to advance, then repeating with her nondominant.

She held for a few seconds after the third advance. Enough with the etiquette ritual. That bag was coming down. Breaking from her otherwise elegantly composed form, Sunny did what she did best, which was a backflip. Leaping backwards and letting the momentum carry her, she met the ground with an outstretched servo, palm down. It wasn't even half a nano that her digits had touched the map, when she pushed back off of it, like a spring held down for too long, launching herself backwards even further.

Sunny sailed for a split second before the tips of her pedes touched ground again, signaling her to curl up and roll to utilize that built up inertia. Her door-wings flattened themselves against her back, and the golden femme came to rest in almost a sprinter's starting position. She'd already started of course, and now wasn't the time to stop. Steeling herself, she started to regain her lost momentum with a roll forward, then with a push to her feet, a pair of overhead kicks, and then...

Before she knew it, she was halfway up to the ceiling, mid-bicycle kick, sailing to the other end of the mat. The figurative knife that was now her dominant pede sliced through the punching bag suspended from the room's ceiling, splattering sand everywhere in all its glory. Sunstreaker could've sworn she saw it all unfold perfectly with half a nano. She landed almost perfectly, give or take a wobble for balance, very pleased with herself, something mirrored by the sly smile on her lips, now facing the door she'd just walked in on from the other end of the mat, having been oblivious to whether or not she'd had an audience at all.

"Heh..." she beamed, mostly to herself.

[Deleted]

An audience she did have indeed.

A small, wide-eyed Autobot stood at the entrance—Neon. If Sunstreaker knew her files well enough, perhaps she would've seen his name and occupation listed in the register, and surely, they've awkwardly crossed their paths in the hallways once or twice before, mainly with Neon avoiding eye contact and scampering off as to not be in the way. And even if she didn't read his profile nor remembered ever bumping into him, Sunstreaker could easily get the measure of him at a glance.

His posture was a bit stiff and he stuck close to the wall, almost as if he was trying to seem invisible—or take up the least amount of space possible. His expression was the awkward stare of somebody who felt out of place or like they were caught in a place they shouldn't be. And then he started speaking. His voice was soft, trembling, and polite; or, to use a Decepticon vocabulary: weak, terrified, and pathetic.

"Oh, I—hello! Sorry for not speaking up sooner, I...I—It looks like you are busy anyway, so I'll be on my, uh, way. Yeah. Right..."

His voice slowly lost whatever bite it had by the final few words as he put a hand to the back of his neck in a rather nervous manner. Before he even knew it, Neon was already one foot out the door, back turned on Sunstreaker. He shook his head, then the rest of his body, and got ready to leave...

...Unless stopped by a firm word or two.

[Sunstreaker]

It probably took longer than it should have for Sunstreaker to notice she wasn't alone. So taken with her brief little exercise was she that she'd failed to notice Neon's presence at all, much less how long he'd been standing there. Her optics grew along with her realization. The femme continued to hold her position as her guest apologized and turned to leave.

Who the hell is that?

Not once had she seen this mech before, not on Cybertron, or Earth. But, she didn't exactly write it down as something noteworthy. Plenty of Cybertronians she'd never met before, but Sunny could've sworn she'd bumped into every Autobot at Omega, already. Save this one, it seemed. She took a quick visual inventory in the few nanoseconds it took for the mech to turn and attempt to leave. Smooth. Taller than her. Nervous. Young. Friendly? Polite, definitely. Conflict averse. Purple? Blue-ish purple? Was there a word for that color?

Either way, he was the literal perfect sparring partner, Sunny thought.

"Woah woah woah, hold it right there, sport...." she spoke, stretching herself out to stand at her full height once more. Her tone was neutral, at least so far, hiding the hey-come-beat-the-scrap-outta-me message she'd been itching to convey. It wasn't long before Sunny was up and making her way towards the mech at the other end of the room, shifting into a bit of a quick-step as she concluded the mech was more than happy to bolt if nothing stopped him. "I am most definitely not busy," she added as she walked closer.

Coming to stand more or less in the doorframe to the training room, she planted both servos on her hips. "In fact, since you're here, I could use your help. Got a name, kid?" Sunny'd been sure to fire off a quick question shortly after her request, if only just to scramble the impending 'No, I've gotta go' response she felt was coming.

[Deleted]

No such rejection as Sunstreaker expected came.

In fact, Neon turned back around to face her with an awkward (and most definitely forced) smile. She seemed very intense and that caused him to stiffen even further as a response, forcing him to just inconveniently block the door for anybody else who might've wanted to come in and out. Bummer.

But despite his inherent awkwardness in all things social, Neon did answer the femme's questions. After all, not answering would be incredibly rude...And the fact that a mean-looking Autobot—who he just witnessed perform some seriously advanced combat moves—was moving towards him menacingly made it ever so harder to reject her.

"I go by Neon...But you don't have to remember it. I'm just, uh, the local 'tech guy' if you can call it that."

He then chuckled a little and then that embarrassingly robotic smile of his returned.

"What's, uh, what's your name?"

Neon extended a hand towards the other Autobot reluctantly, half afraid that she would rip it off at the hinges were he to shake hands with her the wrong way.

[Sunstreaker]

Local IT nerd, got it.

That'd explain why Sunstreaker had never heard of this mech before. It wasn't enough to send poor Neon on his way, however. In fact, she felt she might need to call him the ideal 'punching bag', instead of 'sparring partner'. She'd still try to go easy on him though. He might've been blueish-purple, but to Sunny, he was screaming green.

With a slight tilt of her hips, she watched as Neon extended his servo for a friendly shake. For kicks, Sunny left the poor kid to hang for a second or two, before finally meeting his gaze again, clapping her own outstretched hand with his. She didn't quite have him in the height or size department, and she'd never been that much of a heavyweight to begin with, but she damn sure did try to give him a proper squeeze.

"Sunstreaker," she replied, judging him based on the strength of his grip, silently.

"You ever punch another bot in the face before, Neon? I need a sparring partner, and you've just been drafted, c'mon." Seizing on the fact that she already had the poor kid by the servos, Sunny began to return to the center of the training room, fully intending to drag Neon along with her. Part of her had to wonder, though. Seemed that everyone around here was some kind of grizzled veteran in some shape or form. No two ways about it, Neon must've been last-sparked, but that still would've left him a long time to earn a few scrapes. Psychological scrapes, of course. You could always buff out some scratches to the finish, just not the ones inside. Kid looked and sounded squeaky clean, to her.

Hopefully, this'd been a nice learning experience for him.

[Deleted]

This was most definitely not going to be a nice learning experience for him.

The scientist did not like where this was going at all. Not one bit. People who usually introduce themselves with a question as brash and course as Sunstreaker were a pretty tough crowd to hang around. Neon learned that the hard way during his flight from Cybertron.

"I...Uh...I'm really not a fighter," he protested. But it was already too late. Instead of getting a nice handshake, the femme led Neon by the arm—pretty much dragged him with her, really—while he attempted a meek and poor stumble to stop himself.

"Wa-wa-wa-wa-wait, don't pull!" Neon whined while trying to force himself from Sunstreaker's grip, but by the time he managed to wrangle free, it was already too late. He stood in the dead center of the room, facing a smaller yet somehow infinitely more intimidating Autobot.

His droopy antennae folded back in defeat. Today was going to be a long, painful day.

"Okay, okay! Fine! What do I do?"

There it was. Neon finally caved in, knowing full well he was about to regret it.

[Sunstreaker]

"What do you do?"

She'd fed his own question back to him with a strongly rhetorical cadence, her brow almost shooting to the top of her helm. This kid had never been in a real fight in his life, Sunstreaker surmised. The expression on her face morphed alongside this realization, betraying her growing sense of disbelief. It's a sparring room. You spar, she thought quietly toward him. A part of her had held off from blurting that out loud, for fear of hurting the mech's feelings. Decent restraint, on her part, as historically she would've let him absolutely have it.

Her face visibly searched for the correct set of words to use in this situation, lips forming the outline of a sentence without any vocalization. Sunstreaker stepped out in front of Neon, raising her palm up to the mech, arm outstretched.

"You punch, that's what. Gimme a punch right here..."

Though she definitely didn't think she'd be warranted in doing so, Sunstreaker stiffened her posture and braced herself for the requested punch. It was just a simple test, really. Odds were she'd just get a smack of a punch, anyway. But by the looks of things, it seemed she had a few priorities to reorder this morning. If needed, and it was looking that way, she'd spend her free time teaching the poor kid how to knock the daylights out of someone. Herself, if required.

"Just drive it from your shoulder, and snap it," she added, having felt the need to do so.

[Deleted]

"Oh, of course!"

Neon rolled his optics, one of them getting this weird tick to it, almost as if...was he annoyed? He was still smiling for a little while after that, but it was the kind of smile of somebody barely holding it together.

He then put his hands roughly to the area where humans had their temporal lobes and sighed, eyes downcast.

"Why is it that whenever I decide to go for a stroll around the base, some pistonhead asks me to punch them."

The twitching in his optic got a little worse. First Thunder, now her. What was it with frontliners and wanting Neon to punch them? But he didn't think about it too long, and when he was done with it, he did feel a little guilty for what he had just said.

"Fine, I'll play along, Sunstreaker. Just...don't laugh."

He knew she would probably disregard that request anyways, but despite his better judgement, decided to proceed. Promptly, he dropped his hands back to the sides of his body.

First, Neon leaned into a hunched posture, same as he saw Patch do when alert or training. However, Sunstreaker, being the experienced combatant she was, could spot several mistakes right away. His posture was a little too low, his legs weren't bent properly and he did not cover his core like a veteran would. In short, his punch was bound to have amateur written all over it.

Then he lashed out with his right arm, hand formed into a tight fist. There was a surprising amount of power behind it, suggesting that Neon was not purpose-built for science, and had the basic strength necessary to one day become better in hand-to-hand.

But his technique was rather sloppy, resulting in a swing Sunstreaker could easily dodge or intercept.

[Sunstreaker]

She wondered if he knew he was talking out loud.

Now, Sunstreaker had been called just about every name under the sun, but she'd also only just met Neon. Pistonhead, she felt, was a little uncalled for, especially after she'd just done one kick-aft kata for him. Maybe he just had a bad habit of insulting folks. Regardless of his motivations, Sunny slowly lowered her brows until they set themselves into a light scowl. It was a look that definitely communicated the phrase 'Your next meal is about to be those words, pal'.

Whether or not she'd told herself not to laugh, it seemed as though she had no reason to. Sunny had braced her arm for the requested punch, though she'd done so with the slap of a punch she was expecting in mind. Instead, Neon surpassed her (relatively low) expectations and actually managed to get her arm to recoil at the blow.

He had power, but no form. With the way he was standing, she figured she could've easily just bypass his guard and land a solid blow. That wasn't even factoring in whatever the hell the kid's legs were doing, because that right there was how you lose your manifolds, if you weren't careful.

Instinctually, her mind drew up the 'Who the hell taught you how to punch?' line of questioning, but Sunny decided against it as she figured the answer would be a confident 'nobody did'. She shook her hand a few times and rolled her left arm, before quietly stepping around Neon to his side.

"Stand up taller. Bend those legs, keep 'em close to your center."

Reaching out, Sunny put her servos on Neon's forearms, and did her best to position them both more rightly in front of his chest, with his right held close to his chin, and his left held out further.

"Make sure you keep your core protected. If for instance," she paused, clenching her left fist tightly. She held it out for Neon to see, just as the built-in energy projector mounted on her wrist would fire up. A golden hard-light blade sprang forth with a dull hum of energy. "If the guy's decided not to fight fair, you wanna prevent him from getting to your chest. And the same goes even if he's fighting fair, too." The blade itself would've simply switched off and faded away, shortly after.

Sunstreaker had to give it to him, though; Neon could punch, and he had the swing to be good at it with practice. It was just the matter of giving him the right instruction, now. She gave him a reasonably congratulatory pat on the shoulder for managing not to completely embarrass himself today.

"Good arm, though. You wanna try actually knocking me down, this time?"

[Deleted]

Neon did not appreciate how handsy Sunstreaker was while fixing his mistakes and commenting on them. He wasn't really comfortable with others handling him like that. Fortunately, it was over relatively soon, followed by an invitation to continue.

"You wanna try actually knocking me down, this time?"

"Not sure I'll be able to do that, but I could try...I guess," Neon replied shily. He then adjusted his posture according to Sunstreaker's advice. It was much better now, but the uncertainty of a novice did not fade even with the change in his stance.

"To be honest, I can't really imagine a situation where I'd need to throw a punch," he explained further. Having seen the other Autobot show him her blades, Neon decided to return the favor. A pair of sharp, frizzy magenta blades formed of pure energy struck out from his forearms.

"I'm not used to fighting with these, but I made them, and I think that if I needed to defend myself, they would do a better job than my hands. Maybe you could teach me how to use them properly instead?"

It felt awkward for Neon to ask such a thing of Sunstreaker. So many Autobots knew how to fight and he despised using weapons on principle. But if Earth taught him anything, it was that he would need to learn self-defense. When thinking about it that way, there was no other solution than getting comfortable with the idea of having lethal energy blades fused to one's arms—and the fact that, eventually, they would need to be used for something other than cutting rocks and lifeless metal.

[Sunstreaker]

The fact that Neon had any internal weapons whatsoever, let alone ones he'd designed himself, came as a surprise to Sunstreaker. That being said, kid had excellent taste in forearm implements. It had been so long since she'd held a traditional blade, Sunny honestly couldn't imagine it without the faint hum of energy to accompany it. Most Autobots didn't share her taste in bladed weapons, unfortunately, which meant this was a rare opportunity to practice against a similar set of weapons.

Sunny stepped around to stand back in front of Neon again, forearm raised. "Sure thing, 'cept you'll have to learn how to punch anyway, if you wanna get the most out of them." Sitting on the sides of that particular blade-projector were a few small sliders and dials, which Sunny took a few moments to adjust. They were about to train, yes, but no way was she getting a call from Prowl for accidentally chopping poor Neon's leg off. Content with her settings, Sunstreaker let the energy blade spring back to life once more, albeit with a few changes. Instead of being characteristically golden, the blade had quietly 'whished' its way into existence with a dull-gray color. In addition, the weapon's previously nano-sharp edges had been dulled and rounded. Truly a weapon with child safety in mind.

Shortly after, her second blade was spat out from her other arm, also sporting the new modifications. "So," she began. "I was never one of those fancy 'sword femmes', yeah? Won't ever catch me trying to duel somebody with these things." She'd never had the inclination that some of the other Autobots had for fancy-shmancy swords. Sunny had made it clear to herself early on that she was far too 'low-class' to ever want to fight like that. Her dojo was the streets, after all.

She held up her wrist, and by extension her blade, to trace her optic along the weapon's edge. "I don't treat fighting like this as an art. To me, it's all about how I can keep myself safe, and to make sure the other guy can't possibly hurt me. Whether that means killing 'em, or just keeping them down, up to the situation." Some concessions had to be made in the case of war, but even before that, Sunny's goal had always been to make an arrest at the very least. But, of course, there was always the environment to factor in. Some guys just needed a limb chopped off, if you asked her.

Sunstreaker took a few steps back from Neon, adopting a slight modification of the boxing stance she'd just taught him. She lightly bounced back and forth on each pede, arms held up in a bit wider of a stance than before, as the length of each blade was meant to deter a strike to one's center. "My favorite way to use these things? Block block block," she repeated. "Then counter when you've got an opening."

"So step one... I'm gonna hit 'ya, and you're gonna grab me. And keep those blades off for now. Ready?"

[Deleted]

The talk of swords and fighting styles went over Neon's head. Unfortunately, he couldn't quite grasp the differences and nuances. Most would look at him and joke that it's no rocket science, to which Neon would usually reply that rocket science was much more comprehensive. In fact, he was such a massive gearhead that the safety mode on Sunstreaker's weapons seemed way more interesting to him. He gave her a wowed look when she showed off the feature as if to say: Now, why didn't I think of that? 

He was definitely more into the gimmick than any combat wisdom imparted to him.

But then...

"So step one... I'm gonna hit 'ya, and you're gonna grab me. And keep those blades off for now. Ready?"

That sounded tough. Neon could barely punch a few moments ago. What made Sunstreaker think that he could grab her? He may have been bulkier by a fair bit, but he hadn't the skill or strength to put the size to good use. Yes, it was true that, like most war-built Autobots, his body and armor were appropriate for all conceivable combat scenarios. But his mind was not, and that was a big problem.

Still, he couldn't learn anything if he wasn't willing to try. When he thought of it like that, Neon supposed fighting wasn't terribly different from rocket science after all.

"I think I could try," Neon replied in a determined tone, lowering his shoulders and pulling back his antennae. "Oh, right. Sorry, nearly forgot."

He jerked slightly, then planted his feet firmly and dismissed his blades, putting on a brave face. The crackle of arcing electricity faded into soft nothing. His posture was still on the sloppier side, but he seemed to have taken Sunstreaker's adjustments to Spark.

Neon was as ready as he would ever be.

[Sunstreaker]

At least he was a bit more willing to roughhouse with her now. Neon was honestly too cute trying to pose all tough like that, though. If she wanted to, Sunstreaker could have gone about any number of ways of putting the poor mech on his back, his front, upside down, or sideways. His stance was full of vulnerabilities that anyone fast enough, strong enough, or smart enough could exploit. Sunny had to knock herself out of that mentality for the moment. She was not here to kick aft -- she was here to educate, and instruct.

She was here to kick, however.

"I'm gonna kick you."

It was the only warning Neon would receive. Nothing else. No timing, no indication that it would be a real kick or a baby kick, no nothing -- simply a notification that there would be impact. Hopefully, the burgeoning martial artist had enough sense to try and visually predict it, given that he was such a turbo-nerd.

Sunstreaker telegraphed it perfectly, or perfectly enough for a complete novice to catch. She held her dominant leg back, her right leg, rearing it up for what was likely to be a wide roundhouse. Her left arm was outstretched towards her sparring partner, while her right arm was twisted out and away. If Neon didn't know any better, it would have been safe to assume Sunny was winding up like a top. If he had optics, Neon would have recognized that his teacher's body was moving along a single axis, preparing to channel all of the kinetic energy it could summon into a single point.

The windup was slow, giving the future martial arts champion ample opportunity to prepare his servos. He was going to be kicked on the left side of his body, unless Sunny could teleport and hadn't told him. But finally, the blow was here. Her right leg rocketed off the ground as her whole body twisted its energy into motion, aimed for the left side of his torso, below the arm.

[Deleted]

Truth be told, Neon may have seemed a little more confident outwardly than he actually was. His confidence seemed to fluctuate moment to moment and he had a hard time maintaining a steady focus. By the time he was done processing those thoughts, there was Sunstreaker giving him a warning.

"I'm gonna kick you."

Wait, what? How? Where?

Neon tried to firm up his posture even further, preparing for the ensuing attack to the best of his ability. Despite his disorganized mind, he tried to approach it as a scientist would. Observing her movements, he followed the wind-up with his optics almost perfectly, analyzing...Only to realize too late that while he was considering the mechanics behind Sunstreaker's movements, he was all too ignorant of his own and nearly forgot to prepare any sort of viable defense.

It was just as she was mid-kick that he raised his hands to his side in order to catch her foot with a haphazard grip, attempting to derail its course just short of hitting his body. His grip was unsteady and his footing buckled visibly under the weight of the impact, but he made a good attempt at holding himself steady—and holding onto Sunstreaker by the foot. Then, still with that shaky grip of his, he tried to pull at Sunstreaker’s foot, provided she did not break loose in an attempt to exploit his unskilled grip. The intent was simple and obvious: he was trying to unbalance her and cause her to fall with her own momentum and strength.

Granted, she could probably outmaneuver him at any point. It was up to her whether or not she wanted to let him have this. Although, even though his confidence was ebbing and flowing moments ago, he looked genuinely engaged and determined at the moment of the hit. Perhaps he had more of it than even he himself thought.