Flashback - Gun Problems - Closed

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The Solus ship had an armory, of course, and that was the first place Flareup went to try to resolve the issue. It wasn't quite fresh off the battlefield, but close. Elita was dealing with the ringleaders of this pirate nest and their captured neutrals, but the jam-up in Flareup's subspace left her unable to transform properly and she'd retired from sight rather than wander around in... practically no plating.

She/they were very high-functioning this orn. Three of her deployers were active elsewhere, leading to a smooth trading off of functions and heightened awareness. Firebreak had been shot infiltrating the guard post near the slave mine, or it would have been four.

Darn the new guns, anyway. She/they nodded to the other sister in the room then transformed down to the alien two-wheeled form she'd picked up... quite a long time ago. Tilting a sensor panel at her, she asked: "Sola, could you do us a favor?"

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“Depends on the favor, little sister(s),” said the addressed mechanoid across the room, her dialect quick to slide to a gestalt-honorific.

Sola Dex – one of Team One’s many weapon specialists, but perhaps the most enthusiastic – looked up from the Class One, high caliber photon rifle she was working on. A rather serious weapon mod: heavy armor piercing thermite rounds, three alternate frequency targeting scope-settings, and a rapid-fire close-range loadout. She finished slapping a fresh mag into the battery mount before spinning to fully face her teammate and smile. The bright blue of her optical visor pulsed briefly, indicating that she was swapping out her visual spectrum for more conversational viewing. She was clearly in the middle of cleaning up weapons because there were half a dozen more scattered about in various state of disassembly and disrepair.

The heli-bot stood up, rolling her shoulder and flipping her previously spread rotary blades flat against her back. “If it involves me getting Elita’s Disappointed Face, we’ll need to talk compensation. What can I do ya for?”

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"I need you to remove the laser and missile attachments on this form," Flareup said. "One of them's warped, and they're blocking us from bringing the upper half of the armor out of subspace, which means I don't have hands, which means we can't do it ourselves. Flamewing, Reburn, and Flashover don't have the torque, and Firebreak's currently extinguished."

Flareup's armor wasn't normal plating, it was true armor. Not the sort that was easily modifiable either - it was thick, molded, sensationless, and punctuated with vacuum gaps. She had to shove individual sections into her subspace to get out of it. To make matters worse, the guns were a retrofit, integrated into her vehicle mode but strapped on to the outside of the armor in robot mode and powered by a cord into what was practically her only accessible external port.

So to get out of vehicle mode she had to push the weapons into subspace, pull the armor out (the upper body and lower body segments came as large single shells, with only the five smaller plates covering her deployer slots and spark chamber persisting in vehicle mode), then pull the weapon back out on top of the armor in the proper alignment.

Frankly, it wasn't really working. "I'm going to need a redesign on this whole attachment. Or a new secondary form, though it's nearly impossible to find one that would even work for me."

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“Say ‘please’ and ‘thank you’, sweet spark. It’s not like I am in the middle of, you know, everything or anything,” said Sola, beaming, and tut-tutting very slightly.

She said this only because this was a running thing with the rescue bot: the whole blurting things without really thinking too close about them. It was probably the gestalt thing. Hive-minds though in circles, thought in a million directions, thought in unknowable bizarre ways that most of Cybertronian society never fully understood and likely would never understand now that civil war was putting gestalts through the shredder. Sometimes literally.

Flare was lucky though. She, unlike many hive-minded cohorts, was somehow mostly self-contained and not crazy. Despite losses.

“Been tellin’ ya for mega cycles, this whole set-up’s a pain,” said Sola, crossing the floor and indicating that the other femme sit down so she could take a look. “One hit and you’re stuck like a monoformer.”

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"Firebreak has had to drill them off... more than once." Flareup admitted. "I didn't take as many hits when I was with Chromia."

She/they kept very still as Sola started examining the damaged attachment. "That one needs to go, at least. Maybe the other mount can stay for now, just in case. It's a little dangerous when the deployers are our only defense. They're not very good at subtle solutions to problems."

Though when one got down to it, neither was Flareup. She was good at artistic solutions, sure, but they tended to be artistically massive explosions.

"We could trade work?" she asked suddenly. "Design for synthesis. I'll be rebuilding Firebreak but we could probably manage some warheads or new compounds on the side."

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Sola, knelt now at Flareup’s side, made a noncommittal noise as she examined the other femme’s shoulder and arms. “Yeah, this retrofit is killin’ me,” said Sola, grimacing as she gently removed the outer armor plates at the offending forearm. “I’ll get these out for you. I can look into the transformation subroutines again, but as long as they are secondary level, built onto the outer armor, you’ll never get the fluidity of a real transformation. Just not gonna happen, frame like yours. Not enough chimeric potential, if you believe in that stuff.”

Flareup’s whole design, actually, was killing Sola on the grounds that she was a former Kimia researcher and nothing about Flareup was geared toward the maiming and hurting of others. The weapons were all secondary integration and not well done, fitted to her armor, instead of actual living metal plates. If someone ripped the armor off, the guns would come with and the armor came off easy. There were redundancies, many of them. The transformations jammed because they weren’t integrated into her transformation cog’s primary alt-mode algorithms. Flare was… fragile. She was fragile was the bottomline and Sola wanted to fix that.

But fixing ‘that’ was fixing what made Flareup a rescue bot, instead of a soldier.

“Hey, you’re a rescue model for a reason, remember? Leave the explosions to me, you manage those well enough in uncontrolled environments, femme.” Sola disconnected the energon feed line from the external battery mount, and removed the broken attachment. “How about I give you a new photon rifle. Carry it secondary sub-space or a mag-latch, non-integrated since those just keep jamming up on you.”

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As she went through several partial transformations to help Sola loosen the mount, Flareup made a noise that sounded more than a little like a giggle. "I'm not built for mag-latch. Can't get a solid lock through the ceramic and non-physical shielding. Contour actually designed me some strap-on boots once, for hull work."

Finally the mount came loose, With a somewhat longer transformation than typical, Flareup brought the armor through and completed the transformation. She was a fair bit larger in relation to her alt mode than was typical, even for a two-wheeler, the armor accounting for most of the difference. A violent shrug brought the other weapon mount back into existence, and she/they reached to unplug it from her outer port and fully safe it.

She stared at the offending detached mount in Sola's hands. "We're not sure what the right answer is. Maybe a port in the armor could be redesigned around it, but... we'd have to skin nearly the whole arm and regenerate it. The armor's really not modular. And that might not even fix the problem. "

A slightly chagrined look. "Maybe I'd keep more to my designed purpose if it was just me. But the deployers feel very strongly about us being able to shoot back. And explode back. I'm a little outvoted here. They/we definitely want to keep the missiles."

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“Well, that’s why you run with a damn team,” said Sola brightly, bending over the empty attachment mount, inspecting the condition of the power feeds through the armor. “So they can back you the hell up where you can’t do it on your own. You don’t gotta be a fragging commando Primus-fragging badass. Leave that to Chromia and Elita One and the other blade-class.”

There was a hiss off pressure as a small proto-plate folded back from an internal port. Sola glared at it. Every time she looked at Flareup’s systems it made things in her brain twitch and wiggle with annoyance. So redundant. Super ineffective. Weighty. Slow. Non-integrated. The non-integrated was killing her only because Flare was almost incapable of wielding a secondary side-arm. All her defensive and offensive firepower was almost entirely bound up in her deplorers with the exception of these ineffective, piece of slag, always breaking all the fragging time missile attachments.

They weren’t even at a very high grade. “Well, we can keep the missiles, but we’re gonna have to keep fixing them unless I strip the arm-mounts and refit them, re-write the transformative base-code maybe. It’s all fragging Primus slotting custom-job is the thing. And gestalt programming of course, keeps scrambling stuff." She bopped Flare companionably on the head. "You," she said with accusing fondness.

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"Us," Flareup agreed cheerfully, accepting the bop with good grace. "We really can't help running towards explosions. Chromia said we have front-line instincts in all the wrong ways. Risk is what we're built for. In rescue operations, our purpose was to shoulder the greatest risks to the point of offlining if necessary. I've died once, I would do it again."

A headtilt. "The weaponry isn't so much about hurting things. It's about drawing fire. And managing the battlefield. The armor's as close to impenetrable to energon weaponry as you can get, and that's most of what's out there, with all those drones. Getting mechs to shoot at me when they can't hurt me... that's a win. Being able to shoot at someone who's about to hurt a sister and get them to break off... that's a win. The laser attachments to the mount are basically tracers, but they can still herd pretty well. Keeping enough of a distance... can be a problem... but..." A physical shrug. "Mechs that don't herd get a missile."

Her total missile complement was around six, but that was usually enough."We/hive know about teamwork. But when we/deployers are running missions, I need to be on-site and near the commander for secure communications. Comms can be jammed, and plans involving large explosions sometimes need to be adjusted very fast. And yes, I could do it through a deployer body, but they/deployers explode violently when shot which is not always a good thing."

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“You know aaaaaall about team work,” said Sola delicately, “until Elita One is screaming at you and Hot Rod to stop pissing off the Primus-slotting Combaticons or some other fragging nasty what says he’s four stories tall and looking for a scrap. And no looks, I remember that time with Bruticus, brat. I was dinging godsdamned dents out the whole team for months.” Another head bop. “You.”

She turned over the busted missile attachement, doing a mental mem-net inventory of what their ship was even stocked with weapon and resource wise. They were kind of between supply runs and had been for months now and burning through their reserves faster than any of them would have liked. Their next drop wasn’t for another three cycles and there was no telling, in this sector, when another distress beacon, fire fight, or emergency would drag them into another throw down with Decepticons. Or marauders. There had been an uptick in mercenary and pirate actively lately, Neutral crimes in this sector. Like the Bots and Cons weren’t enough.

“I can redesign this piece of slag using the parts already here, and if I dismantle a couple of the spare godsdamned sidearms in storage, anyway. Do something about how frakking easy it warps with impact.” Sola was already cutting the outer plates from the broken attachment, laser scalpel. She looked up at Flare. “We got enough metals and spare parts for a few more fragging rounds of replacement deployers. S’all we Primus-humping got until our next supply run so if ya gotta blow someone up, you frakking make it slagging count.” Optics back on the task at hand. “Listen to Chromia: just cuz you can rebuild, don’t mean you gotta burn your bodies. Scan?”

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"We will consider your advice," Flareup said. Which was mostly rote, since the deployers, as ever, had their own ideas about things. Worst case scenario, if they faced serious resource starvation she could keep any empty deployer slots empty until the situation improved. "And I/we very much appreciate you taking a look at the mount."

"The thing with Bruticus almost/sort-of worked," she felt compelled to add after a moment. "He was definitely distracted. We just didn't realize the color red makes him extra angry." And they'd managed to knock off a couple rotor blades before fleeing in total ignominy, though that would be tactless to mention in front of another rotary.

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“Look, kiddo, there’s running toward explosion and then there’s running, screaming, slagging beating your chestplates, and diving into them with no clear plan and certain, just certain by Primus, that things will somehow slagging work out. The whole point of my position on the team – besides being charmingly brilliant and, you know, keeping you lot amazingly well armed – is keeping bots safe and getting them to safety. My main thing. That’s is. Elita One needs civvies out of a heavy war zone ASAP, without getting their pretty plates blown off, I do that. It takes military thinking because it’s not a natural disaster you’re rescuing bots from anymore, sweetspark, it’s other bots. And sentient beings, for all the slag the Prime says about choosing and autonomy, they choose to murder each other on a grade scale.”

Sola leveled a look at the bot across from her. This was a well-familiar lecture, familiar because she’s had it delivered to her once upon a time centuries ago… and sometimes still today when she got stupid.

“Your level of wartime rescue expertise is still at the ‘antagonizing Bruticus’ stage. That is a dangerous stage. Fun. You know. Funny, at least, but a dangerous stage and you and your deployer gestalt need to get that straight and quick-like. The fact you haven’t outgraded to a combat model already has you at risk. Being reckless… femme, leave that to the glitches who can generated level 9 force fields. I can afford to be a moron.” She gestured with the ruined attachment. “This stuff and a blown deployer happens to you.”

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"It wasn't just civilians in trouble, that time," Flareup said. "Autobots too." A flicker of connection within the gestalt and her hand rose to her chest. "I probably shouldn't have gone as far as we did, but... this isn't meaningless. Not while Chromia's out there." She tapped the relatively discreet painted Autobot sigil. The Solus sigil was still molded into the armor itself, of course, but remained unpainted at present.

She'd heard a tiny bit of the other femme's history. "We crossed paths, I suppose. Going different directions."

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“Oi!” Sola snapped her fingers. “Are you slaggin’ listening? This is Grade-A lecture material I’m throwing down. Handed on from sisters who been around long enough to see the round and round of Cybertron since before there was such a thing as a Matrix Bearer. I know you’re looking to hook up again with the Autobots and get reconnected, but you’re running with the Order right now and that means no more bold as brass. This is mechs that mean you some slaggin’ harm, Flare. Tell me you and your multi-brain family get that. Tell me you get that you’re a rescue bot in a war zone and you need to be more careful, ‘specially if I can’t manage an outgrade for ya.”

She scowled.

“Chromia is the baddest of the bad, okay. I get that. Big bad Autobot. She would break Wreckers in half if there were any of those suckers left within snapping distance and she’s got armaments that make a Kimia-femme go weak in the knee-rotors, but she doesn’t slow down. You get me? You hook up with Chromia again, you’re gonna end up in the thick of it and sometimes I’m not sold you understand what the thick of it means. You act like there’s a re-gen carrier ship waiting for you and there just slagging isn’t. Not anymore. You scanning me clear, femme?”

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"Yes, Sola." Flareup said meekly, even though she still wasn't quite sure why she was being yelled at this time. Yes, she was a rescue build, yes, she/they were acting as strikers despite that, but she felt their results were enough to show they weren't too fragile or stupid for the task. And it wasn't like warbuilds knew Rescue work so well as all that... most of them didn't have anything like the 'hey, that wall's about to come down' instincts she had nearly hardwired in. Or five-fold memories of a surprising percentage of Cybertron's worst modern disasters.

They were careful enough not to get killed too much, and they had plenty of real-world experience in what not to do that mechs who survived all the time never acquired. She figured that was good enough, really.