| abstract | - 23/09/2011 (Intelligence Compound, Polyhex) One of the scientists must have left the light on in the interrogation room, although it hardly matters with the prisoner completely offlined and unable to reboot without external assistance. There's no more damage visible to him per se, but a number of plates on his upper torso have been removed, exposing wiring and circuit boards beneath. The restraints have been removed and not replaced, but it's very obvious that First Aid is not going anywhere. Vortex wanders in singing a cheerful little tune to himself. He locks the door behind him, then turns to his prize. All that intel must seriously have pleased his superiors, because he's been given free reign to play. It's only a shame that his toy's offline. He flicks the switch to infuse First Aid's systems with a fresh shot of current and a weak dose of energon - just enough to bring him online and keep him there. "Wakey wakey," Vortex calls. First Aid 's optic flickers to life as he onlines with a groan of static, blinking dazedly up at Vortex for a klik before his focus clears and he identifies the mech with a shudder. He ought to be grateful to be back online- he wasn't sure he was ever going to be- but faced with the heliformer again, he's not entirely sure that it's any sort of blessing. "What do you want now?" First Aid says, deliberately offlining his optic again and turning his face away. "I'm not telling you anything else." "Oh, nothing," Vortex says. He flicks the sensor block from First Aid's damaged hand, and pulls one of the remaining fingers back. In truth, he wouldn't be adverse to finding out a little more about Alpha, or any of the others First Aid mentioned, but anything he leans now will be a bonus and isn't actually necessary. First Aid sucks air in sharply, tension cables suddenly going taut as he tenses, waiting for expected pain, but resolutely keeps his vocalizer turned off. "They took your armour," Vortex says. "I can see right inside you." He pulls the finger back, attempting to snap it off. Vortex picks up the dicebag and rolls 3+(its dexterity) against First Aid's agility. Vortex's roll ties! First Aid yanks his hand away reflexibly, surprise visible on his faceplates when he's able to move his arm and not just turn his hand to try and escape from whatever the Decepticon is doing to him. "Why does it matter, you'll find ways to hurt me with or without my armor," He says vehemently, kicking out to try and force Vortex to step back. First Aid picks up the dicebag and rolls his dexterity against Vortex's agility. First Aid's roll succeeds CRITICALLY! Vortex staggers back, laughing. "Frag, you got fesity!" he says. "Is that what it does to you, being abandoned by your brothers, knowing your team's never gonna come for you? You realised you gotta fight all by yourself if you're ever gonna get out of this? Well, the straps are off, now's your chance." First Aid braces himself on one elbow and staggers to his feet, almost knocking the chair over in the process, backing away from Vortex unevenly. "My brothers haven't abandoned me, and you can't make me think they would." It's a dizzying effort just to stand, and he ends up leaning against the wall opposite Vortex and panting, stump tucked against thoracic plating. Even if he knew the code, he's not sure he could operate the keypad to open the door, and he's quickly realizing that the show of defiance isn't doing anything but amusing the Decepticon. Still, pride keeps him on his feet, at least for now. Vortex steadies the chair - he might need that later, and advances on the Autobot. "Nowhere to run," he says. "Nowhere to hide. What're you going to do now?" His battle mask snaps back into place, and he kicks out suddenly, aiming to sweep Aid' feet out from under him. Vortex picks up the dicebag and rolls 3+(its dexterity) against First Aid's agility. Vortex's roll ties! First Aid flinches back as the Decepticon bursts into motion suddenly, flailing as he loses his balance and falls hard to his right. The kick dents the wall next to where he was standing, but misses him- a moot point as he reflexively tries to catch himself on his mangled hand and his vocalizer emits a strangled cry of pain, the arm giving out underneath him and dumping him flat on his ventral plating, one leg twisted awkwardly under him. Vortex crouches over him, leaning a little of his weight onto First Aid's legs. "You made me dent the wall," he says. "How about I put a few new dents in you?" First Aid pants, sucking air in frantically as his fans ramp up in anxiety and pain, shuttering his optic and looking away, desperately wishing he was offline again. Without his hands, he can't push himself up, and with Vortex's weight on his legs, he can't try to move to where he could brace himself against a wall or something- he's stuck where he is unless Vortex moves. "Didn't make you do anything," He says between deep intakes of air into his cooling system. As though in response, Vortex aims a solid punch at First Aid's face. The punch lands hard on the side of First Aid's faceplate just as he's struggling to lever himself enough to try and push off his elbow and get off the ground, snapping his head around and momentarily dazing him as he loses his balance and crashes back to the ground with a weirdly subdued clatter, taking most of the impact of the short fall on his exposed internals. He groans, shaking his head to try and clear it. You will no longer hear messages on channel . Grinning, Vortex hits him again, not caring the damage he does, as long as he gets some hid of reaction. "Stop, please!" FIrst Aid can't help crying as the next punch drives both exposed externals and the injured orbital strut on the downward side of his face into the ground. "Gimme a reason," Vortex snarls, and aims yet another punch at his face. First Aid isn't even trying to get up, instead trying to protect his head with the arm nearer to Vortex. "It /hurts/, please, STOP!" His vents make a wheezing sound that's almost a sob. "That's so far from being a good enough reason, I don't even think you're trying," Vortex tells him. The next blow he lands is an open-handed slap. "Have another go." CRAAACK! The slap avoids First Aid's arm easily and drives his head into the ground again. "I don't know, I don't know what you want me to say!" He sobs. "Please, stop!" "Sure you do," Vortex says. "I want the names of the final three. I want the location of Groove. I want to know what they look like, where the Autobot goes when he's off duty, where the neutrals live." He plunges a hand into Aid's open chest and grabs a fistful of cables. He tugs, but doesn't tear them out - and has no intention right now of doing so. First Aid shudders, tank turning over in his chassis at the nauseating and painful sensation of someone messing around wih his internals when his system is running so hot. "No! I can't!" He screws up his faceplate, obviously bracing for another slap. Vortex obliges him, bringing his left hand into sharp contact with First Aid's face. He tightens his grip with his right. "Sure you can," he says. "I get to snuff your spark whenever I like. But I can make this last and last. I can strip your armour and cut off your legs and leave you lying there for vorns if I like, all hooked up to the machines, alive enough to feel, but not alive enough to /live/." First Aid 's voice is a staticky, despairing wail. "I /can't/!" He struggles again, ineffectually, trying to free himself, no longer thinking clearly enough to remember that there is no where to run. "Oh well," Vortex says. "Let's see if this will help change your mind. Now, how does this go... the frontal coolant pipe is connected to the lateral heat sink..." He uncouples a hose in First Aid's open chest. "Oops, not any more!" First Aid is already running hot from stress, and the feeling of fluid running over his internals and pooling on the ground around him provokes more panic as his systems heat up. "No, no, no, I can't, please-" His fans whine, spinning faster than they were ever designed to as his system tries to pull in more air to cool with. "Those aren't words I want to hear right now," Vortex says. "Now, the lateral heat sink's connected to the... nothing actually. All right, how about the capacitor. You don't need that, do you?" He doesn't break the connection, just uncouples it, in case there's anything about Autobot physiognomy that means Aid /does/ need it. Vortex doesn't want the fun to be over too soon. First Aid twitches almost spastically as motor relays lose power and he finds himself trying to drag limbs that are suddenly so much dead weight up to shield hismelf, hydraulics screaming as they lock into places as fluid pumps cut in and out with the decreased power input. Well, he doesn't seem to need it /too/ badly. Vortex leaves it unplugged. "And what's this?" he says. "That looks like it hooks up with the hydraulics in your legs..." He pulls that cable, then takes a hold of the connector for the capacitor again and gives it some consideration. First Aid makes a strangled screaming sound as the hydraulic pumps in his legs suddenly lose all connection to his control systems, straightening abruptly and without regard for how he's actually lying on them, the motion putting an excruciating amount of pressure on the arm trapped under his body. "/Stop, please!/" He begs. Vortex reconnects the capacitor, but leaves the hydraulics as they are. "Nope," he says cheerfully. "Not until you give me what I want." He shoves aside cables and hoses, and prods Aid's transformation cogs. "Why've you even got these?" he says. "Useless thing like you, you can't even transform." Control system abruptly reboot themselves as Vortex reattaches the capacitor cable, and First Aid tries to struggle away again, the world too hazy with pain to allow him to figure out what he can and can't move in order to even try to coordinate his limbs with any real success. After a couple of panicked half-twitches, he lies still, sucking air into his intakes as fast as he can as his systems continue to heat up. "Did you even make it to full medic?" Vortex says. "Just askin', 'cause you were Ratchet's trainee and all. He must be so disappointed in you." Forgetting the cogs for a moment, he reaches up to the trays around the chair and brings back a laser scalpel. "But you'll be dead soon enough. And so will your team, and Ratchet, and every Autobot you've ever known." The image of dead Autobots amuses him, and he switches the scalpel on and starts to etch a crude picture of a dead Ratchet onto First Aid's thigh. No, he hadn't, and he'd failed the most important section of his last exam, even if Ratchet had said he'd passed. The sob that escapes is equal parts pain from the laser scalpel digging into his plating, one of the only undamaged parts of his body so far, and the memory of Ratchet's disapproving look when he answered the last question on the exam incorrectly. "/NO/" is all he manages to get out of his vocalizer before it dissolves back into pained static sounds again. Vortex sniffs and makes the finishing touch to his dead Ratchet. "They hate you," he said. "You're a failure. That's why they haven't come to get you." But then his comm goes off, and a line of text scrolls across his HUD. "OK, time to get back in the chair." He lifts Aid easily and slings him haphazedly into the chair, then straps down his one arm so that if he does slither off he can't go too far. He pauses long enough to score a ragged line down the relatively un-harmed side of First Aid's face with the laser scalpel, then heads out of the door. "Back soon!" he calls as he leaves. First Aid struggles weakly as Vortex lifts him, ragged sobs escaping from his vocalizer as he tries to get himself back under control. Vortex's departure is abrupt, and the wave of relief as he leaves is almost enough to make Aid break down anew. /Please, soon, I don't know how much longer I can do this, how much longer it's worth it/ he thinks desperately of Lifeline's promise to get him out, somehow.
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