by Rebel Raven » Mon Dec 31, 2007 8:44 pm
Decepticon Outpost Tau- The Skies of Tagan
Shrike didn't mind too much playing sidekick to Silver for the time being.
An odd coincidence that Shrike, too, wanted the opportunity to look over the area, but despite having no orders to do anything she put that desire aside to maintain watch over the tower incase the Autobots attacked.
Their reasons aren't the same though. Shrike's desire to evolve into the better combat machine needn't be one grand leap, and there were numerous factories here that may facilitate her evolutions.
Perhaps one would allow her to acquire better equipment? A more compact but more potent rifle? Her blueprints called for explosive launchers in her tail fins. More weapon installations of varying potencies along her body.
More of her Needler Guns, but in a larger more destructive caliber.
Extra installations of her beam cannon though smaller in scale elsewhere on her person.
Even the opportunity to articulate the armor of her abdomen so she has access to her most potent ranged weapon would suffice.
Stronger armor but light weight armors to prevent her being slowed down much more. The list would go on.
The technological level of her desired plans were not really high, they were based on assumptions of what she'd seen, and the technology of her own person.
If she had that kind of know how she would likely have put herself through evolution already.
She nods to Silver when she spoke before transforming, then Shrike transforms offering a momentary glimpse at the 580mm beam cannon, which did such great bombardment to the generators and is permanently hidden in her abdomen by the torso armor of her robot mode, before her transformed arms and legs cover it forming the blade tipped nose of the craft which resembled at closest, a gigantic red and white squid with only 4 tentacles. Indeed this would be something that could haul cargo. A shame she had below average strength.
More aesthetically speaking, her alt mode appearance in cruise mode is some blend of the aerodynamics of a Seeker and a wingless design similar to a Sweep.
A large highly maneuverable rocket.
A flying gun, nay a flying artillery piece in her assault mode which brings that cannon to bare.
It wasn't hard to confuse her for a Sweep at a distance in her cruise mode or up close for that matter as she found out before with the physical similarities obvious.
Some might believe she is a prototype of the Sweeps design based on appearances, especially the similar crest on the helmet, but she would never bring up such a topic herself.
In truth she isn't so sure herself. All she knows is that she feels inadequate compared to the Sweeps in some ways. Then again there's few she doesn't feel wholly superior to.
Before her brief post in Tyrest she was in places like Fort Scyk. Places that make Kaon look like a constant battlefield. Where most around her, but rarely herself, would plink empties nearby just to make sure their weapons still worked. Only in her most restless times would she waste her abilities on the empties, and neutrals. Just to keep her sanity. She preferred to spend her time on other constructive things to hone her talents.
There's little data on her past as far as she knows and researched, and she never inquired on her origins. All in all it's irrelevant to her.
From day one she wanted to fight. That dedication eventually paid off as she virtually, and maybe literally, fought her way out of the worst posts in the empire.
She would not likely admit it, but she even envied those drones who despite their sparkless mass production were more advanced than she in some ways, and she has desires for their technology.
But she still hated drones. She saw their purpose as a common ground between them, and that's combat, but the Drones reflected the worst side of that ground.
That's the de-spark-ification of War. Quantity over quality. Rarely average fodder to throw at a target. Disposable warriors. Pawns. Pawns of Pawns.
Even she would use them if she could, but she would at least take up a method of leadership some earthlings might call Sun Tsu-ish. She would care about them, more or less rather than let them march to their demise blindly.
It may be that she had been gifted with great luck in that her combat computer made her one of the deadliest combatants on Cybertron, or she'd quickly be replaced by a drone should her combat prowess be only average. That would truly be a nightmare. Her perceived purpose in existence to be usurped so easily by something made dime a dozen.
But back to the action.
Shrike's transformation is both simple in motion yet complex in articulation. It shows off her some of her above average agility due to heavy articulation, and likely the fact she's somewhat below average in armor with the necessity of light armor to not impede that articulation.
The only real constant of the whole transformation is the fins on her back which makes the aft end of the craft and her large skirt armor which doubled as a large articulated thruster system which heightened her overall speed and agility in both forms.
But despite the large size of her thrusters which almost reached her ankles and almost reached her shoulders they seemed horribly inefficient as Shrike hits her soon to be obvious top speed of mach 1.5 which is slow by many flyer's standards, and maybe even pitiable. Especially against the Seekers and Sweeps. And this would likely be magnified by Silver's speed advantage which dwarfs virtually everyone.
Seeing Silver's speed as she lagged behind the gray Decepticon, Shrike found yet another another burning, glaring weakness in that she is painfully slow though she has no idea that her speed is somewhat average for those who aren't Seekers or Sweeps which is cold comfort.
Perhaps the stoic war machine could feel envy and perhaps admiration in the mobility of the other femme as Silver could likely cruise many times faster than Shrike could push herself.
An engine upgrade certainly became more important and hopefully she could find herself allocated such a thing.
Some solace was taken in the potential that Shrike might have some superiority in aerial agility, but she wouldn't want to be proven wrong so she keeps it to herself, matching Silver's flight path for the most part, but not getting to close.
Even minor upgrades would be savored as a new peak of ability for her to master.
As it is she had virtually mastered her body, and hungered for more. She ardently wanted to become a stronger soldier. To transcend her limitations. Perhaps that desire would be inherent in all martial artists.
There were only two things in her processors to increase her ability to become that sweet murder machine she longed to be and those were to be taught the mystical combat arts, or to physically become stronger through technology, and either would suit her desires.
She would never want to feel like she had nowhere else to go in terms of ability. To be in a purgatory where there was nothing more for her to accomplish in terms of improving her combat ability.
Shrike knew nothing to fall back on to spend her free time on.
Ah, her perceptions of her inadequacies increased as Silver mentioned her ability to scan, even though it wasn't likely built in.
Shrike knew those infernal drones, mere DRONES, had the sensors she cold have used on this survey for materials.
Her combat computer had thought about dismantling one of the drones, or finding a dead one, if they could die being sparkless beings, and have their equipment installed into her own shell.
She spent her time visually confirming what she could, adding it to her collected data.
At the same time, despite what Shrike wanted, her combat computer took in data of her companion's abilities, and in the background of all her programs compiled battle scenarios where she were an ally, but kept in mind the potential she could be a foe, even in sparring. Tactics to defeat the mirror skinned femme cropped up like bullets in a factory. How many worked may never be known.
This wasn't unique to Silverstrike at all, mind you.
Every thing that could fight, her combat computer treated in such manner. From Sweep drones to Silverstrike, the Constructions and the Autobots she fought to Roadblock, and Scorponok. Every bot and defense she's ever seen.
It even had the audacity to plan combat tactics against even Optimus Prime and Megatron himself though her data were severely limited on those subjects having never seen either of them in person, working only on assumptions and the fact that they likely had too many advantages to fight with any sanity.
The more she knew of another being the more exacting the plans to topple them in combat. Even watching them casually added to the calculations, and pushed at her limits of combat data.
More of her mind's power had likely been dedicated to killing than most Decepticons. One day she might even surpass the greatest warriors in history, and go down in legend.
The allocations took tolls on other fields of intellect. Something that would make her somewhat depressed if she lingered on, so she enjoyed the near constant meditative mindset that kept her thoughts clear, pure, and at least on the surface, unreadable. One would be in for a surprise if they mistook that for stupidity.
Even her combat computer did not create ripples in the pool of thought staying in the background of things, buried behind the wall of hidden thought.
This mentality adds to her desire to fight. Nothing distracted her. No second guessing. War was her instinct, and she relied on that to lethal ends.
Luckily for everyone in the Decepticon army, Shrike has almost fanatical loyalty to the Decepticon cause simply because she's a soldier in their army. Drones were the limit of her animosity.
There's no desire to climb the ranks, or replace anyone in the army. There's no desire to command others unless it truly affected the immediate battle, and even then she remembers her rank.
>>Yes Ma'am.<< she replies stoically to Silver's plan to scan the area. She takes the flying space offered though she didn't really need it.
She maintains a minimum and maximum distance from Silver, which were flexible enough to not crowd the reflective Decepticon warrior, but would hopefully keep her in visual.
Her quiet obsession with updating, upgrading, and becoming more powerful stays in the shadows of her mind.
