Trypticon Training Room

This stark, spacious chamber is well-reinforced and shielded to stand up to the strain of many practice bouts. A training drone stands in one corner of the room, ready for a workout. The walls are sheathed in protective alloys that house sensors and cameras to project to the shielded monitors, allowing the combatants to observe their fight and progress. Off to the side are a few seats for spectators to observe the combatants and let out a cheer or two.

Contents:

Training Drone

Obvious exits:

West <W> leads to Trypticon Troop Quarters.

Catechism enters from the Troop Quarters to the west.

Catechism has arrived.

Fleet is at the console, tapping in the codes for the drone. He sighs. Drone fighting is so annoyingly repetitive, but he's got the urge to hit /something/ and they're not allowed to raid, so here he is.

Catechism is here to keep her skills sharp, or so she figures. It's hard to keep skills sharp when one is a blunt instrument. Besides, acting 'nice' just hurts her head.

Fleet looks up. "Ah! Catechism! Great!" And indeed he seems truely glad to see the blunt intstrument. "I was afraid I'd have to settle for another session against the drone."

Catechism glances skyward and notes dryly, "I'm glad I'm more interesting than that drone." Stupid drone, with its stupid sword... grr. However, Catechism looks just a tiny bit wary upon seeing Fleet. She glances around the room. Chiemra doesn't seem to be about. That ought to make it safer. No being dropped out of the sky, with any luck.

Yeah, yeah. All the seekers are wary around Fleet anymore for one reason or another. How very odd. "Yeah, well... the drone is very repetative. I'm trying to practice my speed... I find either I can keep dodging it until it runs out of energy, or it takes me down in one hit. But either one gets old." He shrugs.

Catechism shrugs and answers honestly, "Don't think I can help much in the speed department." She scrapes an arc on the floor with her foot lazily. Catechism's practically a generic Seeker. She didn't get the nice, fancy engines installed when she was awoken from stasis and rebuilt for Earth, even if VTOL planes are supposed to be agile.

"Well, perhaps not that," answers Fleet as he takes to the air. "But you still have other qualities to recommend you... like, oh, sapience." With that he spins all the way around once before finishing lined up so that he has a shoulder pointed at Catechism (and presents a slimmer target), reaches out, and fires.

You strike Catechism with Shoulder-Mounted Laser Rifle.

Catechism sure isn't doing much to prove Fleet correct on the sapience front. She takes the hit like a dope, and her cockpit glass cracks. Abruptly, she flips over into jet mode and jets straight up, as if inviting a stall, taking a laser potshot at Fleet as she zooms up and away.

Catechism transforms into her alternate mode: a F-35, Marine Corps variant. Her feet flip up against her shins, her nosecone rotates through her body and out in front where it belongs, her arms tuck into her torso, and her wings rotate into position.

F-35 <Catechism> strikes you with laser for 8 points of damage.

What's the problem here? Sure, Catechism got hit, but then, so does Fleet, right in his shoulder, being this time too slow to move out of the way. Once the attack lands he stops moving again, instead reaching up, taking a moment to aim, following the jet with his weaponry as he tracks her... *click*

F-35 <Catechism> evades your Rail Gunm attack.

F-35 <Catechism> races upward still, leaving Fleet's attack behind her. She finally seems to have stalled out, as she's now falling backwards. As she rotates over backwards, just before her nosecone's pointing down, she spins over, back to horizontal flight. The jet swerves to bring her guns to bear, opening up with disruptor-fire.

F-35 <Catechism> strikes you with Thundershock for 6 points of damage.

All right. Perhaps Fleet is taking this whole trying to stay still until the last instant thing a little too far. The disruptor shot scorches his intake, the energy crackling a little before fading out, most of the damage done of a non-visible, beneath the surface sort. With that, he begins to fall, then starts jinking away from Catechism, still remaining below her plane of flight as he begins to twist and dodge at random, not even bothering to stop and aim before he fires.

You strike F-35 <Catechism> with Shoulder-Mounted Laser Rifle <Pulse Mode>.

F-35 <Catechism> is a nice big target. However she's an aerodynamic one. She sets a course towards Fleet, trying to track the tricky yellow Seeker, pouring on the speed. Then, she slams on her air breaks and thumps down her flaps and transforms. Catechism uses her last bit of momentum to lunge forward for a grab.

F-35, Marine Corps variant, transforms into robot form. Catechism's feet unfold, her arms unfold out of her body, her nosecone rotates through her body and ends up on her shoulders to expose her face, and her wings rotate into position.

You evade Catechism's grasp attack.

Fleet twists to the side, slipping away Catechism's grasp (and it's about leaking time!) spinning on a more-or-less horizontal plane. As Catechism comes once more into view he fires up a few low-powered shots before just letting himself fall away from her.

You strike Catechism with Death By A Thousand Papercuts.

Catechism gets out her silly little knife and tries to fall after Fleet. Yeah, she's hit, but it doesn't hurt much. Objects of about the same mass and shape fall at about the same speed, but that's what bootjets are for. Jet mode, grab attack, blade - one would almost think she's just cycling through her lesser-used options. Catechism lunges again, trying to slash one of Fleet's wings. Hrm. Perhaps that's exactly what she's up to.

Catechism strikes you with combat knife for 8 points of damage.

Fleet's wings are sliced! Oh, no! The yellow Seeker darts away, trying to avoid the terrible knife. He's getting slapped around like a tape-bot (well, except that, unknown to him, the tape-bot is apparently kicking ass right now). This wasn't supposed to happen! And now, Fleet has had enough. He lands and looks up at Catechism. "Good fight," he says by way of conceding.

Catechism pockets the knife, first flicking it clean. While she obviously doesn't keep it sterile like a surgeon's scalpel, as this blade is only meant to harm and not heal, she does keep it clean enough to maintain its sharpness and structure. Catechism tries to be good to her weapons, as they're what keep her alive day in and day out. She touches down, an evaluating look on her face. Catechism's pleased that at least some of those less-used moves work. With a wide grin, she folds back her arms, pointing her arm guns down and away from Fleet, as a gesture of, 'I'm not going to beat on you any more at the moment,' and agrees, "Yeah."

Catechism can feel free to try beating on Fleet some more. Fleet can fly faster in alt mode. The pastel seeker sighs. "I'm restless. This isn't doing it for me, but I'm restless, none-the-less. Being stuck out here in this desert, being forced to play by the human's rules... it's wearing on me."

Catechism looks at an unspecified point in space. She says, a little wistfully, "Somehow, I imagined victory would involve more explosions, but if this play-acting serves the cause..." Catechism shrugs. Then, she brightens up a bit. "If we have to play by these human rules, we could at least get more familiar with their aircraft. I'm sure there's a detailed catalogue on file around here somewhere."

Fleet crosses his arms and nods. "It makes sense... after all, we may have to face some of them in combat at one time or another." He drops his arms and looks over at Catechism. "The terminals for that our out in the troop hall... it would be best not to tie up this computer," he jerks a thumb over his shoulder at the control terminal, "with that sort of thing." With that, he heads out.

You move west to the Troop Quarters...

Trypticon Troop Quarters

This is the barracks area where Decepticon troops spend their time in between operations. To the east is a training area for combat, to the west is a well-equipped weaponry rack, and against the far wall is a holoviewer displaying the troop missions and rankings. Assorted Decepticons are here joking with each other, grumbling about the Autobots, boasting about their abilities, or simply resting.

Contents:

Forge <F>

Sunflare's Starbase

Astrotrain's Room <AR>

Swindle's Storeroom

Breakdown's Security Room(#3351 OVeM)

Reflector's Dark Room <RDR>

Vertigo's Quarter <VQ>

Wildrider's Hall of Insanity <WH>

Octane's Refuel Emporium <ORE>

Obvious exits:

West <W> leads to Trypticon Access Corridor.

East <E> leads to Trypticon Training Room.

Catechism enters from the Training Room to the east.

Catechism has arrived.

Catechism strides over to a terminal, still looking pleased with herself. What is that Sweep teaching Fleet, anyway, how to stay still just long enough to get thrashed? The conehead taps through the database, looking for the catalogue of Earthen aircraft.

Fleet is still a new student, dammit! Besides, he can't help it if the gods of rand() have decided not to give their blessing this night! But still, even now Fleet doesn't have enough pride to be bothered by it, which is handy, in its way, because it means he doesn't have enough pride to keep him from trying again for fear of failure. The pastel seeker looks over the conehead's shoulder - one advantage to spending time with coneheads is that their shoulders are easier to look over than standard-styles or sweeps'.

Catechism is just gloating internally. She doesn't get to do that often, as she often chooses to go after impossible foes or has to retreat to keep enough energon. Once Catechism has found the catalogue, she steps aside slightly, to give Fleet an even better view. To start off with, she's called up a datafile on those jets they saw at that airshow, which was quite a time ago now. If they've still got nothing to do, maybe they can catch another show sometime.

Fleet nods as he looks at the picture. If that were an alt mode, it would probably make for a very aesthetically pleasing Seeker! "Blue and yellow isn't a color combination I would have expected off-hand," murmurs the pastel pyramid. "But on the other hand, we've got lime-green and purple folks running around, so I guess it's not really that odd. Strange formations, though... there are always too many of them. Like they have a problem with proper prime numbers or something." http://www.theragens.com/photos/Other/Blue_Angels_2003-01.jpg

Catechism isn't too up on her color theory, but she hazards, "Blue and yellow... storm colours? Maybe it's supposed to be a warning, although the storms out here don't get any really good acid, just lots of electric discharge." She looks utterly unrepentant about getting Verdant crashed out during one of those storms, too. Switching tracks, Catechism says, "Would you expect the xenos to know how formations are supposed to go?"

"You make a point," Fleet observes. Of course, she /always/ does, but that's neither here nor there. "I mean, those can't possibly be combat formations... they're so close, if one goes down, they all would! Completely impractical."

Catechism frowns slightly, thinking. Xenos are so strange. Duh. Hence calling them xenos. She says, "Do you think it serves any use? If it's useless, I'd expect they wouldn't do it, but one can't expect Terrans to be rational."

Fleet cocks his head thoughtfully, considering. "Well, I mean... that display we witnessed, that was obviously non-combative. Like they were just... showing off. Perhaps, by flying so close, they hope to demonstrate the skill of their... operators..." he says this last word with considerable distaste. Things like what he was looking at shouldn't have operators... dumb metal. Bah. "Perhaps to intimidate their enemies and keep them from attacking to begin with?"

Catechism doesn't like the idea of operators, either. Even if they weren't inferior, unnecessary creatures who'd only mess things up, they'd just get crushed and spill all over your insides if you tried to transform. Shudder. "Maybe. Wouldn't they do better to show off their shooting skills? Flying close won't win a battle."

Fleet mmmmms softly and leans back a little to give himself room to raise a hand to his chin. "Perhaps. But then, we /are/ talking about terrans here. It's hard to say what exactly they'd consider sufficiently intimidating. Maybe these formations waste less energy and ammunition, but are enough to scare other humans?"

Catechism stares at the screen and shrugs finally. "Maybe. It's probably better if we can't get in their mindset, anyway." She glances over the weaponry with which it can be equipped. Ooh, guided missiles! But xeno guided missiles are not nearly as exciting as guided missiles would be otherwise.

"Well, one way or another, we do have to deal with the things," answers Fleet, "But you do get to the point where... what they're thinking is just incomprehensible to our kind. We're too far above them." He goes back to looking over Catechism's shoulder. "Their weapons systems are developing rather quickly... less than two hundred years ago they couldn't fly. That's... disconcerting."

"It'll just make their factories more useful to us when we take them from them," Catechism replies, serenely unworried. "Hmm, flight ceiling of over (insert roboty term for over 50,000 ft here)."

Fleet's eyeridges raise in mild surprise. "Oh. Well, they eventually have to come back down, though." With that he shrugs. "What about other ones?" He reaches over Catechism's shoulder and brings up information on the F-22 (which his player is debating on whether or not she actually wants to bother looking up...)

<OOC> Catechism says, "http://www.f-22raptor.com/"

Catechism looks at the F-22 with a bit more than casual interest once she's read the writeup. "My altmode's got bits in common with that. Well, it would if it was built by those fleshies."

Fleet nods in agreement. "Yes. Designs more triangular... closer to a flat version of the pyramid design, it seems." Fleet, blessfully, still has his Cybertronian alt mode. No ugly Earth disguises for him! He pauses. "6000 rounds per minute?" he asks thoughtfully.

Catechism has an ugly Earth disguise. At least as a conehead, she didn't have as much to lose as Fleet does in the prettiness stakes. "They're still using solid-phase rounds with that one, aren't they?"

"Looks like it," agrees Fleet as he looks over the things specifications. "But it's not as though we've abondoned solid rounds entirely. I mean, they expend less energy, after all, and can still be fairly effective. Especially against the light armor as jets tend to have." Sadly, that includes Cybertronian jets while in their alternate mode.

"Energy-phase rounds reach the target faster and don't suffer as much deviation from course due to gravity," Catechism reminds, her player completely pulling all that out of a hat. "But yeah, solid phase has it charms."

Fleet shrugs. "Well, yeah. Which is why we generally come equipped with both." He scans further down the screen, then makes a face. "It has chaff. Yuck. That stuff's a pain to clean off."

Catechism chuckles, "True, but sometimes, I wish we came with that stuff. It'd be nice to have a respite in battle from being shot up by Autobots, if only for a short time. Imagine the look on their faces if their plans got foiled!" She ducks in advance, knowing that was a bad pun.

Fleet doesn't swing, but does groan painfully at the joke. "Bad, Catechism. Real bad." Then he stops and thinks. "It would be useful, yes, but upgrades are expensive, resource-wise... they're generally reserved for those who have proven themselves deserving." By earning AP! Hah!

Catechism softly kicks at the wall unthinkingly, making a quiet clank. She doesn't seem to have noticed she's done it. Speaking of upgrades, she's been saving up her extra energon for one. The conehead doesn't have enough yet and won't have enough for a while, but when she does, she's getting something done, by golly, albeit not chaff. Catechism glances at Fleet. He mentioned in advance when he was going to get his speed upped a notch. Should she? Eh, jets. She flicks over the computer to the F-15 and comments, "This used to be a really common altmode for Seekers."

Fleet nods. "Comcast has that one. As do one of the Aerialbots, actually." Damn Seeker wannabes.

Catechism makes a face. She actually feels a bit sorry for Comcast, given that he's stuck with an Aerialbot who looks like him altmode, albeit coloured differently and probably equipped with different weapons. She murmurs, "Can't they just stick to the ground, where they belong?"

Fleet shrugs. "I generally manage to make one fall every time I go against them, despite the fact that they're generally tougher and have better weaponry than I do. They seem to have trouble staying in the sky." The seeker shakes his head and then quickly tilts it ceilingward before looking it back at the monitor. "You'd think they'd take that as a hint."

That's just because Silverbolt likes crashing on Fleet. Cough.

"Autobots seem to be rather poor about taking hints," Catechism observes. She stretches. "After all, they haven't given up yet."

Hey, Silverbolt isn't the only one! Erm, that is to say, Silverbolt isn't the only one that Fleet's knocked out of the air, not that he isn't the only one that likes to fall on Fleet. That is to say...

Let's move on.

Fleet sighs and glances ceilingward. "And I doubt they will." Then he shrugs. "But then, as long as we don't, I suppose it all balances out. Eventually we'll finish them off." Or both sides will finish each other off. When Fleet's at his worst, he sometimes thinks this, although the possibility that the Autobots might win still remains beyond him.

Catechism never doubts that her cause will win. She's happier that way. The conehead nods, smiling cheerily. Then, Catechism logs off the terminal and withdraws. The words almost worn out from how often she says them, she explains, "I've got patrol."

Catechism's going to have to order a new set of letters if this keeps up. Fleet nods. "All right. I'll talk to you later, then."

But not Unicode. Grr.