Carbombya

The grassy hills and savannas in the east, bordered by ancient volcanos and sprawling lava fields, are the only part of Carbombya not made up of barren desert. Until recently, the country depended on meager livestock herding and subsistence agriculture, but upon the discovery of a huge reserve of very high-grade oil beneath the shifting desert sands, things changed radically. The struggling democracy weathered multiple coup attempts by greedy neighbors and other interested foreigners before finally succumbing to the tender mercies of a home-grown dictator. There are no refugees from war torn Ethiopia being taken in as slave labor, not here under the enlightened rule of President-for-Life Abdul Fakkaddi!

Contents:

Hook

Trypticon <T>

Carbombyan Palace

Obvious exits:

East <E> leads to Red Sea.

West <W> leads to Nile River.

Fly <Up>

Long Haul has definitely seen better days. There are no real dents or cracks left in his outer shell, but, thanks to the Empire's chronic shortage of lime-green paint (and the fact that they're currently stuck out in Carbombya, away from many of their normal supplies), his entire torso is presently a dull primer greenish-gray. Worse, the windows of his driver's cab, rather than their usual purple, are clear (purple tinted glass is hard to come by, after all), and in general, he just looks bad. He also looks rather grumpy as he plods tiredly to where he's needed on the construction site, but then, he always looks grumpy, so that doesn't mean much.

Hook is building something. On closer inspection, it's some sort of futuristic oil derrick, designed to pump the black gold from the ground while automatically transmuting it to energon. Currently, Hook's welding.. a job beneath his impressive skills, but a necessary one.

Well, Hook's a Constructicon, which means from time to time, he's going to be expected to build stuff. If only Long Haul were so lucky... so often he has to carry around the supplies and materials to make building possible, but takes little part in the actual project. Like right now, when he's needed to get a load of I-beams - plain old, boring I-beams - over to where Hook's building. It's a small enough load, so the transporter decides to remain in robot mode for the job. He bends down to pick them up, but seems to be straining a bit more than usual...

>*CLATTERCLATTERCLANG*< "SCRAP!" the bundle crashes to the ground and scatters apart.

Hook stands up suddenly, whipping the welding goggles from his optics. "For the LAST TIME, I am TRYING to WORK HERE!" he yells, "You stupid pile of... oh. Long Haul. Ahem." The perfectionist Constructicon collects himself, clearing his vocalizer with a robotic cough. "Wait, I'll start over." Another pause, and then... "For the LAST TIME, Long Haul, I'm trying to WORK HERE! What's the matter, is even HAULING too difficult for you now?" He stops, running that over in his mind. "Yes, that'll do" he remarks quietly to himself. "Well?"

Long Haul's hands bunch into fists and, despite not having the features for it, he manages to glower at Hook. He shakes slightly with rage for a moment, then suddenly, all at once, he seems to deflate. Last time Long Haul tried to take Hook, he lost, and right now the dump truck was no-where near top form. He releases a sigh - quite a feat for someone who doesn't exactly need to breath! - and shrugs, mumbling, "Guess so," just loud enough to be heard before he transforms. "Go ahead and load 'em in," he orders the nearest gumby.

Long Haul folds in on himself and transforms into a dump truck.

What? Long Haul isn't going to punch his lights out? Or at least threaten to do so? Or deny that he's a glorified delivery boy? Hook actually looks concerned, only now noticing how damaged Long Haul looks. "Wait wait wait" he says, waving the gumby away, who staggers backwards under the weight of the I-beams, falling to the ground with a clatter as Hook produces a med-scanner, waving it over the vechicular form of his brother.

Hook pulls out a medical scanner and runs a check on Dump Truck <Long Haul>.

"What?" snaps Long Haul as Hook subjects him to the scanner. Amazingly, he's not in the mood to pick a fight (a rarity, yes, but right now he's just too damned worn for that), but that doesn't mean he can't bicker. Although at the moment even his bickering is, erm, half-assed, pun not intended.

Hook tsks at the readout. "Long Haul, your servos are still damaged from.. well, whatever you've been doing. Fighting or something. Lifting heavy things, perhaps. Whatever the case, you should be resting them, so that your self repair systems can complete the repairs without further strain." He shakes his head. "Really, this is elementary medical stuff... so simple even /you/ should be able to understand." Yes, even when he's being nice, Hook's still a complete aft-hole.

Dump Truck <Long Haul> grumbles for a moment. No, he doesn't enjoy hauling, but he enjoys admitting to weakness even less... which is why he's out here when he knows /damned/ well he's not supposed to be. "I know, I know!" he grouches. "S'just... needs to be done..." he finishes lamely.

"Psh!" Hook replies. "While it will no doubt create a large void in your life, I am forbidding you from hauling large heavy loads until your systems are restored to 90 percent efficiency or greater. Instead you can.." Hook searches his brain for something nice and simple, finally breaking into a grin. Of course! "...you can do some welding."

Which is... actually quite a bit better than hauling, in Long Haul's honest opinion. Granted, Hook's probably just doing it to try to get out of work himself, but still... being asked, nay, ORDERED to do something besides hauling is not an experience Long Haul has much familiarity with. The dump truck transforms back into his root mode. "Wha- really?" he asks, not really believing his audio sensors.

The dump truck stretches out and unfolds into Long Haul.

Verdant emerges from the city that is Trypticon.

Verdant has arrived.

"Yes really" Hook replies shortly. No use in Devestator having a sore aft, after all. And by Hook's reckoning, the Constructions are the very cream of the empire in their respective fields... or whatever else rises to the top. Sure, Long Haul is a gofer.. but he's the BEST gofer. How could he not be? Look at that green! "Let the Seekers haul the I-beams. This is more important anyway - and I can't find any other the other Constructicons." Hook sniffs, figuring they're hiding from him, the slackers. He's probably right too.

Mixmaster might be slacking... odds are, Scrapper is avoiding Hook for other reasons. Reasons that have more to do with the fact that Hook is usually unbearably annoying. Although Long Haul, shockingly, doesn't seem particularly annoyed at the moment. "Well, okay," Long Haul answers. Internally, he's practically singing, 'Not gonna haul for awhile! Not gonna haul for awhile!' "Erm... whattaya working on?"

The sight of Long Haul in such a battered state gives Verdant pause and botanist finds himself at a loss for words. His own goals in coming outside--gathering a few more cacti samples and other such things--temporarily forgotten, he can only gape open mouthed for a moment, before finally simply asking "What the SLAG happened to YOU?"

"Behold!" Hook says, indicating the bare framework of girders and pipes with a sweep of his bright green arm, and raising his voice so that the newly arrived Verdant can hear. "The Energo.." he stops, interrupted by the green Seeker's question. "THE ENERGON PUMPULATORTRON" he continues louder, tapping his foot irritatedly, "...capable of extracting 100 astro-litres of fossil fuel per astro-minute, almost instantly converting it into life giving energon!"

Woah! That's a level of tactlessness usually reserved for the Constructicons! Of which Verdant is not one. The dump-truck-former turns and crosses his arms, giving Verdant a very long look before he challenges, "What's it to ya?" Of course, in order to do this, he has to turn his attention /away/ from Hook and his oh-so-helpful lecture. Oh, well... Hook loves his own voice so much, surely he won't mind repeating himself.

"I am merely expressing my surprise," Verdant responds, not too off-put by Long Haul's response. "I had marked you as quite the capable warrior, based on our admittingly limited interaction. That anything should be capable of causing that kind of damage to you is quite surprising." As seems usual for the seeker, the situation calls for a realignment of the way in which he views the universe. So much, it seems, takes him by surprise these days. Not truly surprising, for a being several million years out of date.

WHY is NO-ONE listening to HOOK? "I /said/, it's the Energon Pumpulatortron!" he repeats. "Energon Pumpulatortron!" Hook sighs with exasperation. Contrary to what Long Haul might believe, he hates repeating himself. It's inefficient and irritating.

'Marked you as a quite the capable warrior'? Okay! Verdant is now officially on Long Haul's good side! We'll see how long that lasts. The transporter's body language indicates that he's quite pleased with what Verdant is saying, enough so that he just kind of waves Hook aside. "Yeah, yeah, got it!" before answering Verdant. "Yeah, erm, had a run-in with onna the Autobots while out on the supply run." Whoops! One? He should have said more! Well, still, "Jazz, s'onna their top guys, actually." That's true enough, at least. Long Haul clenches a black fist, "But you can bet I gave as good as I got!"

Hook throws up his hands in disgust. Maybe he should have just let Long Haul damage himself further, since he's going to just stand around and jabber. Picking up his welder and goggles, Hook returns to work. "You should have just run away, brother mine" he remarks dryly, chuckling a little at his own joke.

Long Haul run away? /Long Haul/ run away?! NEVER! Well, not until he reaches cour-end, anyway. Once more the transporter's hands curl into fists. Why, oh, why, must his brother make it so difficult for him not to fight! "I'm not runnin' away from no stinkin' Autobot!" growls Long Haul. Well, not until he gets beat up really, really badly first, anyway. "'Sides, I was /tryin'/ to leave with the supplies, but the Autobot wouldn't let me! Apparently thought the humans would appreciate it more if we just wrecked the stuff, and the whole damn site, instead!"

Hook didn't really expect Long Haul to run away, but his feeble attempts at self-promotion were irking him. Hook does a MUCH better job of self promotion. At least he thinks so anyway. "So you didn't get anything out of the raid?" Hook asks, needling his teammate further as he works on the framework. "Tsk."

"Illogical creatures," Verdant says. "Humans and Autobots both." He can understand the need to stay and fight; though not a warrior by nature, he is not without his vindictive streak. Fighting is not unlike any other project, once one starts it, one finishes it.

Well, who else is gonna promote Long Haul? The dump truck leans forward in a manner that would be considered threatening if it weren't for the fact that everyone knows that he's currently well below full strength. "I got to beat the slag out of an Autobot!" Or pretty damned close. "That's something!"

Hook has to concede that point. "True" he admits, "But usually, the point of a raid is to aquire supplies. And while beating up Autobots is all well and good..." Hook leaves it hanging. "Still, I suppose once my device is complete, there will be no need for Energon raids at least."

"Oh?" Verdant asks, his scientific curiosity aroused, even if it's a bit outside his botanic specialty. "Just what does your device do?" The obvious answer, was, of course, than it manufactured energon in some fashion. But amongst scientists, asking what something did carried the implication of also asking how it worked.

Long Haul grunts and... actually sits down next to Hook to help? Holy Cybercow! He got to fight with an Autobot and then didn't have to carry anything back, making that a rather good raid in the reluctant supply officer's book. He seems about to say something else when Verdant starts talking. Ohboy... guess it's time for Hook to practice that self promotion he's so /good/ at.

Hook looks up and...just... STARES at Verdant. Finally, he stands up, taking out the medscanner that he used on Long Haul earlier, waving it in Verdant's direction. "Hmmm" he says, looking down at the screen. "That's funny... Your audials seem to be in perfect condition.. and your memory module appears fine..."

Hook pulls out a medical scanner and runs a check on Verdant.

Verdant gives the Constructicon an annoyed look. "Are you quite through?" he asks. "I am hardly deficient. I know it manufactures energon... but there are many ways in which to acomplish that." He manages, with a good degree of success, to keep any true annoyance or frustration out of his voice. Like it or not, the Constructicon outranks him and to upset him unduly would be unwise, no matter his annoyance.

"Yes, Hook, but we weren't paying any attention t'you!" mutters Long Haul. Actually, appearances to the contrary, Long Haul /had/ been paying attention, but he figured Hook would take more offense if he pretended he hadn't been. He looks at the device, trying to figure out where he should be welding. "Hey, Hook, y'got the plans for this?"

Hook rolls his optics. "Well /that's/ clear" he replies to Long Haul, before turning back to Verdant. "It extracts fossil fuels - which this area is abundant in - and converts it to energon via the standard Transmogrificatron process" he replies snippily. Hook tosses his datapad towards Long Haul, the schematics displayed on screen, but not before adding a big THIS WAY UP label to the plans.

"Interesting," Verdant replies. "Useful too, I'd imagine." Fossil Fuels are at least of some interest to him, being derrived at least partially from plant matter, though he's never taken the time to study them fully.

Long Haul catches... tries to catch... misses the datapad, which clatters to the ground. His reflexes, never great in the best of times, are a bit slow right now, too. He snatches up the datapad and takes a moment to study it. Hrmph. Impressive, much as he hates to admit it, and for the most part well over his head, but the basic frame and welding should be simple enough...

"Of /course/ it's useful!" Hook replies. "It will suck this country dry, giving us a huge stockpile of Energon - enough to launch whatever... plan Galvatron is no doubt concocting as we speak." The pause is due to Hook having to stop himself putting "insane" in there.

"I see," Verdant replies, a slight regretful tone working its way into his voice. He's got no particular objections towards Decepticon conquest and exploitation, though he has some odd issues with them draining a planet to the point o dryness. Destruction of plant-life, things not unlike themselves, is not something he approves of, but lacks the fortitute to object to.

Long Haul doesn't care about this planet. Green is for Constructicons, not annoying plants! He sets his laser on 'weld' (the Constructicon's lasers have weld settings? Of course they do! Watch the cartoon! Even Hook's hook has a weld setting!) and takes a moment to look at what's already in place. Okay... looks like Hook left off right... about... here!

Hook doesn't notice Verdant's regretful tone, and wouldn't care even if he did. "And then /maybe/ we can get those nanites working properly. Think of it! The entire planet, gradually Cyberformed! Of course, the organic growth patterns of the nanobots are /far/ too chaotic.. but if they could be controlled, bent to act exactly to our wills.. Ahh.. think of it Verdant! A new, perfect Cybertron!" Hey, Scrapper's not the only one who can act like a visionary. Hook has dreams too you know. Sterile dreams of endless plains of perfect metal, each plate exactly aligned with its neighbours.

"I... shudder to think of that, I am afraid," Verdant replies. "This planet has much to offer us, in it's natural state. We may seek to make ourselves masters of nature, but that does not mean we cannot appreciate and use what it has to offer."

"Well, of course it's got a lot to offer!" responds Long Haul, who still, frankly, can't see the appeal of plants. Or giving up being a warrior for /botany/. "We've been raidin' this planet for energy for /years/ and there's still more left than we've taken!" Count this point lost on the dump truck.

Hook taps his chin with his finger. "Yes.. Long Haul is right" he admits. Even a stopped clock is right twice a day. "After all - we could always burn all the organic materials to power a furnace of some kind. That way we could extract the maximum amount of energy from the planet. And, of course, have nice smooth surfaces."

"That is... not exactly what I meant," Verdant replied, fighting to regain his composure in the face of such callousness. He indicated a near-by cactus. "Take this plant, for example. It manages to store water within its cells...excess water, far more than it could ever use at one time, for a point when it might need it. Should we be able to develop a similar system for fuel, it could extend both the fight time and functionality of our warriors greatly." He thought for a moment, then added. "I find the nature state of much of this planet, minus what infestation the humans have done... to be quite facinating and even beautiful."

"Well, yeah... but we're not plants!" Long Haul may be green, and he may be slow, and he may not be as smart as his brothers, but he's not a plant! "The only 'cells' we got to store stuff in are the ones we're already usin'!"

"Perhaps a ...poor choice of words," Verdant replies. "But it /is/ an adaptable process. At least, by artifical means, small storage bladders, based on resimilar liquid retaining principals, could easily be introduced into a Transformer's structure without having to alter them greatly. And that is just one of the things we can learn from nature."

Hook doesn't follow. He's an engineer. He deals in the exacting world of wires an circuits, electrical current and logic. "We have storage units that can store many astrolitres of liquid" he replies to Verdant, nodding at Long Haul's statement and idly wondering if there's something malfunctioning in Verdant's processor. "If you're that interested, ask Lord Galvatron if you can keep some of the..." he waves his hand dismissively, "...Cacti or whatever as pets. I myself plan to collect a human musician or two for my own amusement."

Long Haul visably shudders at the idea of being made more... organic like. IGH! And as for Hook's pets, "S'long as you're the one takin' care of 'em and cleaning up after 'em!" he snaps. Knowing Hook, he'd collect his little humans, and then expect Long Haul to take care of them.

Verdant makes a sighing noise. Clearly, this Hook fellow simply doesn't understand. A situation to common to other Decepticons. To blind to see what nature has to offer them, that by working with it, they can conquest far more than they ever could by working against it. "I may just have to," he says with a shake of his head. Earth has already offered him greater botanical diversity than anything else he's studied in his lifetime... To think of it all simply being wiped out sends surges through his system.

Nature is messy and random and can kiss Hook's finely sculped green aft-plate. "Really Verdant, I know you're a botanist, but couldn't you... oh, I don't know.. focus more on mutating plants into giant metal eating monsters that we could dangle individual Autobots over?"

Mixmaster emerges from the Holo Arena.

Mixmaster has arrived.

Verdant chuckles at the thought. "Oh, I am working on that, actually. There's several species of carniverous plants I'm running tests on. They're currently small and only eat insects, but I believe modification, both in ferrocity and scale is very possible," he says. The joys of being dual-focused within a desipline, he can not only work on improving quality of life, but on exterminating the Autobots as well.

Long Haul is sitting beside some sort of structure of Hook's design, his laser set to 'weld' mode (of COURSE the Constructicon's lasers have 'weld' modes! Watch the cartoon). He looks up at Hook and Verdant and would actually grin at his brother's last comment if he had a mouth to do it with. He nods vigerously. "Yeah! Now /that/ sounds like a good use for plants!" Incidently, Long Haul is looking far from his best. His entire torso, thanks to the constant shortages of lime green paint in the Empire, is currently primer green-gray, and his cab windows are completely untinted.

"Excellent!" Hook replies. "That's more like it. Not all that stuff about swelling cactus bladders!" Glancing at Long Haul, he suddenly frowns. "/Watch/ where you're welding, Long Haul!" he snaps. "I don't want to have to pry your hand off /another/ beam."

"I'm watchin'! I'm watchin'!" Long Haul snaps back, turning his attention back to his job. Sheesh, just what kind of idiot does Hook think Long Haul i- wait. Finger's stuck. DAMMIT! Long Haul tries to yank his hand away before anyone notices.

Verdant himself would be the first to admit that plant life, particularly in a non-offensive manner, is an unusual study for a Decepticon, but it is his function, his life and he takes great pride in it. Let Hook and Long Haul scoff, when he actually makes something useful, /then/ they'll see who's laughing. "Plants have many uses Hook, but militart and non. I recall once, a long time ago, I refined a pollen into a substance that caused Auobots' gears to simply lock into place where they stood. The looks on their faces were priceless."

Hook hmphs. "I've seen Mixmaster do the same thing with fire retardant foam." Heh. /retard/ ant. Ah, good times. "Which can be mixed quickly and cheaply, is easy to store, and can be produced with mucking about with...uh.. water and..." Hook tries to think of what else organic things need, "...meat" he finishes somewhat lamely.

Long Haul grumbles quietly and yanks on his hand a little harder, trying to free it from the frame it's now attached to. He would be grumbling louder, but he does /not/ want to attract Hook's attention right after Hook /warned/ him about this exact predicament.

Verdant notices Long Haul's prediciment out of the corner of his eye, but decides it best not to say anything. Somehow, he gets the impression that pointing out his difficulties in front of Hook would be a bad idea. Instead, he says to Hook. "True, true; my efforts can sometimes be duplicated elsewhere, but that does not necessarily mean they are futile persuits"

"Maybe" Hook replies, meaning 'They're totally pointless, but whatever lights your diode and keeps you out of my way'. "But now that Long Haul is taking care of the frame, I should begin work on the internal workings." Glancing at his brother and - luckily for Long Haul - failing to notice he's just welded his finger to the beam. "Remember to follow those plans EXACTLY" he warns, before nodding a goodbye to Verdant and striding off in the direction of Trypticon.

Hook has disconnected.

Oh, goody. Hook is gone, which means that it's safe for Long Haul to make an idiot of himself. Granted, Hook may find out later through interlock, but not likely... Devastator's usually too focused on causing general destruction and the Constructicons too busy actually trying to direct him for them to spend much time focusing on freak welding accidents. With his brother gone, Long Haul commences to cursing in Cybertronian before giving his hand one last, firm *yank*, freeing his hand even as he leaves a bit of his metal 'skin' behind.

Hook safely out of the way, Verdant can give is attention to Long Haul. "Are you... all right?" he asks. Long Haul is, oddly enough, some kind of fixture in his life, it seems, and while he can never be a Constructicon, he can certainly do his best to not be one of the people Long Haul doesn't like. (He could hardly presume to call himself a friend of someone in such a tight-knit subgroup.)

Mixmaster has disconnected.

No, but Verdant called Long Haul a 'capable warrior' earlier, so he's definately on the dump truck's good side for the moment. Still, the supply officer's /not/ about to admit defeat to something as simple as a welding job. He waves off the botanist's concern. "Yeah, yeah. I'm fine." He grumbles a bit, but more because he's a habitual grumbler than because he's in a bad mood or anything... after all, he's /building/ something, and /not/ hauling, and has been ORDERED not to haul, so that makes this a good day!

Verdant seems satisfied with this, even if he's not entirely sure how true it is. He knows better than to press certain issues and which ones to leave alone. "All right," he says. It idly crosses his mind to speak less than favorably of Hook, seeing as how neither of them quite seems to like him, but thinks better of it. It would just likely end with him getting a fist through his cockpit. Even with how the Constructicons bicker, they are a unit and likely are the only ones allowed to insult each other.

Verdant shows great wisdom in this. The Constructicons bicker. The Constructicons complain to each other. The Constructicons complain about each other behind their backs. The Constructicons do /not/ tolerate this from outsiders (well, not when they can do anything about it, anyway). Long Haul finishes the joint he was welding, having put a little bit of himself into his work, and nods. "Right," he answers, taking a moment to reference the plans again. Despite the self-generated chaos that follows Team Lime-Green around, when they're not too distracted with yelling at each other they're actually quite competent in their functions, something that Verdant may come to realize, should he decide to stick around and watch.