| abstract | - Goa's patrol pattern has expanded again. With his duel out of the way, he's found he can take the time spent watching and learning and spend it recharging like the dead. And putting some fuel into a spin through places he hasn't seen the light of in a while. Particularly, the wilderness he'd been avoiding since he last encountered Chimera. He's just a mech, not a hard-aft, a change of scenery's good for the spark, he can now appreciate. The green car seems to be taking a scenic drive through the forest, but his grenade turret is active, a close scan kept on his vicinity. A reminder of the war. Crystal City may be his home town, but he knows he's not welcome in their territory. His scanner would go off soon enough as a familiar shaped shadow kept pace with the driving mech, though it stayed in the safe lofts of the crystal trees. "Surprise! Hya!" A playful femme voice came from the following shadow, Chimera's normal robot form suddenly jumping from the branches and straight onto the roof of his car mode. A sharp noise and Goa swerves to run off the road ... but not before a heavy something pounces him from above and catches a ride on his roof. He transforms before bothering to completely assess the situation -- this has happened to him /entirely/ too often lately. He barrels into some low-lying crystal, shattering and glimmering under his feet, using his momentum from the road to try to swing whatever's on him away. In all this chaos, though, Goa forgets to shut down a couple unnecessary subsystems -- like his radio. Which he'd apparently been using to listen to some old hits, echoing softly. Who knew the Decepticon liked pop? "Whoa!" The beast femme nearly dug her claws into Goa's armor as he suddenly decides to go off-roading, transforming in the process of crashing about and tossing her off. "Uuugh.... Note to self. Goa is a terrible driver when distracted..." Chimera groans painfully to herself as she lay some ways off to the side where some skid marks in the ground mark her wake. Goa skids to a stop, slightly crouched, 'wings' extended, arms held like he expects a fight. Fortunately, though, the sudden halt snaps him out of the combat-trance-of-sorts and he focuses on Chim's prone form. "... Chimera?" One of his orange boot-plates starts to fold up like he's going to step back, but he thinks better of it with a crackle of metal on scattered mineral. He freezes up. This could go good or very bad ... His radio cuts, and his vocalizer reduces to barely a chirp, "Chimera, what were you..." The 'Con rattles his head and stands up straight, blades falling slightly less alarmed. Realizes the question was nonsensical. "... sorry." He looks down at one of his arm guards and picks glowing crystal from the holes. Chimera manages to sit upright, rubbing her head with a hand as ears fold back. "Eh. It's alright. My fault for jumpin' you like that. What are you doin' out here anyway? Looking for me?" She grins toothily, finally standing up and stretching her limbs before moving over to the mech, fishing a crystal from his arm before popping it in her mouth. Goa stays relaxed as Chimera approaches, though he does have that vacant mind-is-wandering look ... he suddenly tenses up as she eats a crystal just like that, fingers twitching, shoulder blades rising again, like when one remembers something important they've forgotten. "I think I was forgettin' what the sky looked like." The Decepticon brings his hands in front of himself, rubbing one through the other, and looks up at the femme. "You had any trouble?" Chimera rolls her shoulders stiffly, nodding to his question. "A little. Con patrol managed to nick me last cycle before I game 'em the slip." She turns to the side, a clawed hand tracing the minor blast wound on her upper back. Nothing serious, but still painful as the slightest gleam of energon was visible. "Ah..." Goa still seems off-balance, optics darting up and down the gash, his own fingers digging into the armor of his opposing palm. He'd had time to think about this last time he was sentenced. How he could take Chimera down, how he could justify it -- his fault is he can't stay angry. Just slippery. And in the end, friend or not ... He puts on a little smirk. "You know, Chim, you want a ride, you can just ask for it. Both ... all your modes walk, yes?" Both their chances of survival were increased by hostility. Goa gets his prize, and Chimera goes down, as she will anyway -- she has to -- by ... gentler hands. "Hmm... I suppose catching a ride would be a nice change." Chimera ponders as a few claws delicately scratch her chin. "Where d'ya feel like going?" Her optics glow bright now as she smiles, tail waving happily behind her. She's obviously excited to get a free ride, which she genuinely thought it was. But whatever Goa's up to is completely flying over her head. Goa's optic ridges rise a little. "Oh." That didn't usually work out for him. He looks down and to the side, releasing his death grip from his hand to tap at his beard instead. He couldn't move over ground ... "I... donno." He shrugs. "I just drive. I can double back where there's a hole in the patrol field, show you one of the lapses. Megatron can't see it from the sky, gets ignored, know what I mean." He moves his palm from below his chin to his forehead. "One-track," he taps a finger against his helmet, "Sorry." Chimera smirks lightly, reaching out to rough the top of his helmet like it was hair, "Sounds good to me. And no need for sorry." Her head tilts to one side in a playful manner, ears perked, "Let's get goin'. Should I climb on your shoulders?" The femme chuckles to herself, giving him a light elbow bump for humor. "You like havin' your fingers pinched?" Goa chuckles back and transforms, engine purring. Turns out, nearly all of his external plating sort of folds against each other, so maintaining a grip on him when he transforms? Not unless you bring a grappling hook. Or some syk -- That was an interesting cycle. "Just keep 'way from the back where the explosions come from." "Gotcha." Chimera nods, grinning as she hops atop the roof of him, landing softly this time and laying down upon her side like a lounging feline. This would keep her out of the wind and help her stay on him better with any bumps or potholes. "What was that music you were listenin' to before? It was nice." Her voice purrs, head peering over the front edge of the roof to look at his windshield. "Music isn't as easy to come by out here, obviously, but I like it." "Music?" Goa edges back onto the road, seemingly having no issue carrying a passenger atop. In fact, his gentle turning and acceleration might hint he's done this before. The car buzzes along the road, with an obvious preference for side roads, hugging the cover of the forest as long as he can before going underground. "Oh... that. It's uh..." Hmm. Talking. Well, it'd dissuade second thoughts. "It's just something from when I was younger. Heh, my mechanic, she woulda ordered me to listen if she could." Goa's path takes them underground, into the thicker dark, speaking as he navigates. "Ah." She nods softly, hands folding over one another as head rests upon them, looking straight ahead as she listens quietly. Well, except for the occasion rolling purr starting in her chest. Chimera was actually enjoying the ride, though it's not a surprise since she didn't have to move. "So.. where exactly are you taking me again?" The femme eventually asks once they'd been driving underground for some time. You could say she's nervous, mostly a topsider and rarely venturing underground. "A hole in the patrol grid." The road starts to become ... foggier. Goa's headlights project more a cloud of light than a beam. "There's so much fog, the seekers can't do much..." Beads of condensation start to form on the Decepticon's armor. "... mm. Water. Been a while--" Rattling against his hull. Goa takes the rumbling as enough of a surprising 'distraction' to swerve off the road again, a well-executed spinout to send Chimera tumbling off of him. "Sssz--!" Chimera's tail twitches nervously as the two rolled through the steam, the forming droplets of water making her shake her head vigorously and send them scattering with a momentary 'fan out' of hair. "If you say so... But I can't see anything eith- Ah!!" The sudden spinout catches Chimera off guard, making her easily slide from his hood thanks to the water. The poor femme didn't even have time to dig her claws into Goa's roof before momentum flung her into the foggy surroundings, the harsh sound of metal on metal heard as she slid across the moist floor before finally coming to a halt. Goa quickly transforms, sliding sideways on his hands and heel tires over the slick ground. This was ... weird. Water wasn't unfamiliar to him, but the combination of water and asphalt was something new. He filters his optics to the infrared with a subtle click, the glowing sensors themselves now much sharper red points within a darker field. "Chimera?" He steps toward where she should be, and listens for a response, hopefully a stunned one. He only has one chance with this, he has to evaluate, move, fast ... optics dart up, down, around warily. On the bright side for her, though, Goa didn't lie. No other Decepticons would be around here. Only a soft groan would answer Goa, each step bringing the mech into better view of a near unconscious Chimera. She lay sprawled against a piece of debris, a small, diluted pool of energon starting to slowly form beside her head as it mixed with the water. "Nngh... Goa.. I.. 'on't feel so good.." Jade optics were dim as her head swam heavily. The culprit of her head injury nearby, a nasty looking piece of metal stuck out from a machine that held the stain of energon. "Slag..." This isn't what he had in mind. But he realizes he believes it wasn't avoidable, either. Goa drops to one knee and cradles her head, turns it in his hands, looking between it and the stained scrap -- slag, was this deep? She's not out, it couldn't've hit her neural ... "Hold on, Chim, I can fix this. Slag it, I can fix this," He brings one energon-smeared hand to the side of his own head anxiously, looking over the rest of her frame for damage, deliberating the call he doesn't want to make. Almost angrily, his other arm strikes out and bends the jutting culprit into a safer shape. "... Can you move?" Good. Got that out of the system, getting focus back. "Mmf... Feel tired.. juss gon' recharge.." Her optics grew dimmer until they were finally out and she slipped into recharge mode, the shock from the blow to her head causing internal systems to power down in a sort of hibernation. Luckily the cut wasn't too deep, evident by the small energon leak, though if left untreated she'd likely have some neural problems. In a reflex manner Chimera would curl her body into a fetal position while in the mech's hands just before powering down, her tail latching around her ankle to stay close. "Don'--" Goa bites his lip, watching the wild femme power down with cold optics. It's not that he's helpless, not at all -- It's that there's too much he could do. Turn her in. Drag her to a neutral -- no, he couldn't do that. Robustus would know. Not that that was a problem, but ... someone would know. Know that Goa cracked under pressure. Could kill her here, save her from the rest of this war -- no, he'd done enough of that long ago. So it was plan A. And this entire situation was pulling on his spark strings. Conveniently, Goa hates that. "I need medical pick-up at these coordinates..." Goa stands as he keys his radio in a monotone, letting Chimera's limbs fall away from him, stepping back closer to the road. "Ground. Bring restraints." A short pause. "That won't work. /Material/ ones."
|
