Pripyat: Walking Wasteland

[Bowhead]

'Twas midnight in the long-abandoned city, forgotten monitoring equipment still clicking with indication of the radioactive contamination present in the very air itself. It was on this dark night that an unidentified object would become visible upon the host country's defense network, and that the Autobot forces... and perhaps any listening Decepticons... would recieve a call for extraction.

--

Hovering over the ruined buildings, looking upon them perhaps with a mixture of morbid intrigue and disgust, the sniper boredly took a few potshots with his rifle at the local, fleshy wildlife. "Interesting... soft targets. So much more satisfying to destroy... but at the same time, I still hunger for the heads of cybertronians to fall within my sights. For the screeching of metal on metal as my rifle tears them limb from limb. These squishy things just make a mess. Maybe the idiots I associate with will arrive with Energon at the ready... might have to shoot them if they don't; say the Decepticons did it. Wouldn't be the first time they fell for that line of scrap." Stallstrip grumbled as he dialed-in his optics and weapons to pinpoint-accuracy, thankfully choosing debris instead of living creatures this time. Although oblivious to it himself, perhaps due to either idiocy or lack of attention, the crimson sniper was irradiated more than enough to be set aglow against the backdrop of the dead city. "Primus, something smells horrible here. I'm going to need a washing and waxing after this. For now, I'll just shut off olfactory sensors... wonder if the locals have any power supplies I can drain while I wait.".

[Cutlass Rebooted]

"At least it's dark here." Whysp says to her partner as they scan the ground below for the unknown autobot's location.

"I wonder what happened here?... Found them." Wraith transforms remaining airborne and shifts into his shadow form blending almost, with the exception of his optics, completely into the darkness.

Whysp also shifts to robot mode. The two of them move closer. Wraith keeps hidden in the shadows as Whysp tries to gain the bot's attention.

"Autobot?" Whysp pauses for a moment. "We've been ordered to lead you to the rest of the group."

[Bowhead]

Rotating in place to face the source of the voice, still in his half-transformed mode, Stallstrip's cockpit flashed as he leveled his Nucleon Charge Rifle at what he assumed to be Whysp's approximate location. "Yes, because I trust the random voice in the darkness not to be leading me into a Decepticon ambush. Reveal yourself, you're the only signiature I'm detecting... although something nearby is severely hindering my sensors almost as bad as Dark Energon. I'm in no mood to engage in a battle right now, so I'd really appreciate it if you were, y'know, not a 'Con trying to kill me off a few hours after I woke up from stasis. Not the first time I've gotten lead into a trap like this, so you'll forgive me if I'm inclined to shoot first and ask questions later." The sniper responded with quite clear venom, moving his rifle to the side and firing a shot into a derelict vehicle's gas tank to provide a bit of light from the resultant fire.

"I much prefer to be the giver, rather than the reciever when it comes to nasty surprises.".

[Cutlass Rebooted]

"Well that would be a rather stupid tactic on our part wouldn't it?"
Having lost much of his cover Wraith joins the conversation appearing, though still very much shadowed, behind Whysp. "If we wanted you dead we'd simply have struck out of the darkness. Why bother to engage in conversation with a mark?"
"We aren't autobots, but we are helping them out at the moment. My name is Whysp."
"Wraith. And you are?"

[Bowhead]

Lowering his rifle, the autobot lowered himself to the ground before fully transforming into his robot mode; the unarticulated, sickle-like legs emerging from his lower torso hovering a meter from the ground, thanks in no small part to the active thrusters upon his back. "Stallstrip, inmate four-two-zero-nine of the Iacon correctional facility, now an Autobot because they needed 'all the help they could get'. 'Least I still have my original head, unlike that one 'con. Unlucky scrapheap, he is. Speaking of Decepticons, seen any around? I've only got about seven cycles' worth of energon left, could use a snack... the local target practice and their energy is incompatible with my systems... and dear Primus, tell me you hear that buzzing, too. Getting on my nerves.".

The 'buzzing' the sniper spoke of was becoming more and more apparent as they remained in the city; the sound of radiation slowly beginning to take it's toll on Stallstrip's voice. "Ever since I woke up beneath that sludge it's been getting worse and worse. Optics are fuzzy, buzzing noise, sensors ineffective... I'd shoot whatever is causing it if I could figure it out. My guess is a Decepticon jammer of some type.".

[Cutlass Rebooted]

"The ship didn't pick up any decepticon activity near here."

Whysp starts to scan the area to find the source of any interference. A warning flashes on her display. "Radiation. We should leave before any permanent damage occurs." Whysp transforms apparently taking the lead.

Wraith transforms following Whysp who wastes no time in leaving the contaminated area.

[Bowhead]

"Radiation? Oh... so that sludge was..." The sniper paused and, had he a face, likely would have bore a rather perturbed expression from the dawning realization. "Oh... eugh... I need a scrub-down.".

And with that sentiment, the sniper's body whirled and took flight; leaving a streak of acrid, black smoke in it's wake. <*KKKKSHRK* Hopefully it hasn't completely scrambled my communications system, ping me if you're recieving this data packet. I'm sending with blast encoding, so it should be less affected by ambient jamming.>.