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| - Goa stalks quietly between the shards of crystal, largely obscured by them. The geographic feature was nothing new to him. He was just thankful all of it was inert material. The grounder is no champion of forethought. Were he, he might've headed straight back to Polyhex, look like everything is normal -- and it was normal, wasn't it? Nothing ought to have changed after what he learned. But it had. And it didn't take much forethought to think ahead to Slipstream or Firestorm picking up on his uneasiness. Slipstream had of coursed picked that up. But she had left him alone for awhile so he could think things out, shuffle through it all. Then she snagged Shred and told her she needed her to come with her to find Goa. She needed the backup, she explained, just in case this was going to get difficult. Shred was snagged by slipstream, but as soon as she was told it was to find Goa, she was more than happy to help. following close behind, she looks around very carefully, for any sign either of Goa, or of danger. From afar, Goa (gooey) nudges the link as he senses it closer. Goa's antennae pick up with activity not far off, and he sinks into an inset alcove of glass, biting a snarl as the shards prick his shoulder tires. Well, this was inevitable. Maybe if he didn't move ... Slipstream ignored the mental nudge, she was coming to him whether he liked it or not. And of course she knew he didn't like it. She lands outside of the valley, peering down into it. "Now you know what I have to deal with Shred." she remarks to the smaller femme, "Always hiding... secrets.. it gets a worrisome and tiresome all at once. He's trying to protect me from something.. but I wish he knew I could take it." Shred nods, and she sighs, "I get you slip. Can you pinpoint him in all of this slagging crystal? " taking her time,, she ducks past a splinter, being as quiet as she can, not wanting to cause any fractures. Goa is more than acute enough to recognize the hum of Slipstream's engine's -- not a surprise -- but it takes him a moment to place the din of Shred's. He curses under his breath. He had not expected her to drag anyone else into this, hadn't considered it, though it didn't surprise him. Or did she think he was glitched? The mech curses again as some crystal he'd destabilized above flakes off and bounces off his helmet. Then he starts counting his escape options. Slipstream is scanning, but the crystals are messing with results. So through the link she tries to see where he might be, and if that fails she just goes with where she can feel his spark. "Oh you can bet on that." she murmurs, stalking through the crystals directly toward the grounder. He can run, he can hide, but he cannot shield that spark signature if he tried. Shred nods, her own engines are actually quiet, a hypersonic whine as opposed to a great din. As a smaller aircraft she doesn't need as powerful engines. going between the crystals though is proving difficult, "Slip, I’m gonna try to get above this crap.. if you can pinpoint him, keep me appraised and I'll keep up with you." Goa seems to actually be moving toward Slipstream at a rate higher than the seeker is moving forward. He's smart enough to pick up that she isn't strictly using her sensors to navigate, so he couldn't hide, and in terrain so hostile to his vehicle mode... But he could be frustrating. He was /preternaturally/ good at that. The energy signature strafes as he tries to take a wide circle around, flashes of green and gold perhaps briefly visible through the interlocking shards, but out of reach. Slipstream continues to stalk, stepping over the shorter crystals, carefully maneuvering around taller ones. Wings flexing behind her. She acknowledges Shred's words with a clipped, "Understood." She pauses though, sensing the spark closing in, then dodging off to her right. So he's going to play it that way is he. She turns to follow after him. Shred ascends to fly just above the level of the crystals, constantly scanning below her to try and find Goa. Goa keeps circling. Frequently, he finds his way blocked, and has to skitter directly away until he can resume the pattern. He'll keep this up a while longer, and he could keep it up for cycles, but he won't. Not with Shred around. Over Slipstream's link, a few disconnected images start appearing -- Goa's parentage, his acquired memories of Crystal City -- in a desperation-tinged attempt to make her understand. Maybe make her understand why he wanted to be alone, without /fully/ explaining why. He nearly gets cornered, and has to dash over a prostrate mirror of crystal-steel to duck back into cover. At least now Shred could be assured Slipstream wasn't hunting a ghost. Slipstream keeps stalking, like a predator on the prowl, optics searching the crystals as she lets her own spark guide her to him. She tries to guess where he may go next, perhaps cut him off when he least expects it. The femme is determined to find him, the disjointed images barely dissuade her either. He's has had enough time to think over that information. It's time he share it with her, fully. "Any luck Shred?" she calls out, seeing if maybe he'll buy that as she cuts off to the left and severs that link a moment to see if she can outmaneuver him. Goa's wingless profile might've done him a favor higher up the valley wall, where the crystals are all varied and make little tunnels they're so interlaced, but here in the floor they're evened out by gravity into many separated, flat fields. Goa is too busy dealing with this disadvantage to buy or not buy much of anything, and squawks as he finds himself face to face with a black, glossy wall of seeker. He freezes a moment as that darkness seems more appropriate than ever, her thoughts obscured to him, then blasts off blindly in the opposite direction. Slipstream isn't going to let Goa get away while she has him within reach. So she pulls out one of /his/ tricks out of the bag and does a flying tackle at his back, hoping she'll catch him off guard and grab onto something, anything, before he slips away into the crystals again. Goa is (surprisingly to all parties, I'm certain) a slower flier than Slipstream. His processor is completely fixated on escape -- she'd outright told him she wouldn't be as patient the next time this happened. As he's smacked into from behind, his reflex, against environmental concerns, is to enter his vehicle mode. His wheels already spin, kicking up dust and flak behind him. One hisses and goes flat. Shred frowns, continuing to look, and she transmits to Slipstream, "No luck up here, where the slag is he Slipstream?" she is not quite where they are Slipstream grapples to get a hold of him, getting her body pummeled by crystal shards, dust, and so on isn't going to dissuade her. She keeps looking for a hold, and if she gets one she locks it into place with a death grip. "Don't make me use my lariat on you Goa." she hisses. Then she calls up to Shred, "Found him." Shred nods, "Ok, coming down.. " she twists into a dive, transforming as she does to try and actually land hard on top of Goa to bring him down, not knowing he's in vehicle mode.. if she misses, it is gonna hurt. Goa roars with pain from the gouges in his tires, though it brings him back to his senses enough to transform back to his feet and throw Slipstream from her grip on his fender. It transforms into his chest; if she doesn't let go, she'll be thrown clean over his shoulders. So much for getting out of this one, slag sake, all-- Something much smaller and faster rams him from above, slamming him face first into the ground and a skidded stop. Goa makes no point of moving. Slipstream loses her grip, but thankful he had enough sense to realize if he transformed with her hand there it would have been painful for them both. Luckily Shred drops on top of him just in time to prevent further escape. She takes her lariat off her hip and lashes up his feet, just to make sure he won't be getting away. "You can get off of him now Shred." Goa coughs pathetically, in a feint. "Alright, you win." He takes what he perceives as the calm before the storm to brush off the new scratches in his cheek. Slipstream takes hold of Goa's shoulders once Shred has stepped off of him, pulling him up into herself as she settles down and hugs him around those shoulder. She sighs, nudging the side of his helm with her own. "You are impossible, you know that." she murmurs, "Now then, you going to tell me what is going on or do I have to get nasty and dig through your cpu without regard for your feelings?" her tone is warning enough that she would do it, he has forced her hand.. much as it disgusts her to violate him.. there can no longer be secrets if either of them is to survive this war. Shred nods, getting off Goa, "Sorry for hitting ya like that Gooey." With half his ventral fans dented, disbalanced, or outright destroyed from taking flak, Goa fans off excess heat through his mouth. He growls, but isn't able to stay angry for long. Instead, he chuckles darkly. "Didn't trust me to talk on my own time. Why trust I'd give you the whole story?" He looks up at Shred in response, features and antennae tips bent downward as if to say I'm-sorry. Shred smiles, looking to Goa, "I came because Slip asked me to help her.. And besides, you're my friend, Goa, I'd rather risk my own neck than leave you to be scrapped." Slipstream holds Goa close, hands curling against his chest. "I knew you would eventually, but slag it Gooey you know full well if you out here too long and forgot to do your patrol routes that Megatron would be furious. It's more prudent that I find you, get you to talk to me, and move on." then a little sigh, "Because you cannot keep it to yourself. You are underestimating my ability to cope Goa. Do you really think so little of me?" she asks, knowing that will cut him deep, but it has to be said. This game of hide the secrets has gone far too long as it is. She smiles a little at Shred, "I wouldn't kill him. Megatron though.. not put it past him." Goa keeps up the plaintive gesture, looking Shred straight in the optic, and smiling just a click before turning his attention over his shoulder. "Was working. Wasn't coming in. Not stupid." He hold's Slipstream's hands, in a tense unsureness if he wants to pull them closer or away. "Just needed my own thoughts for a bit. Does a soldier have to give that up, too?" He chooses to simply fidget with them in place. Shred hmms, "It's neither Megatron nor you I am so concerned about, Slip, it's the damned Empties. " Goa smirks and looks down at the ground. "Empties aren't so bad." Shred says, "Unless they are starving." Goa nods slowly ... he knows. He knows all too well. Slipstream sighs softly a bit at him, waiting for him to talk about what in the pit was going on with him. "You had your time to think. I left you alone long enough. Something is troubling you." then a glance at Shred, "Why worry about them, not like they'll leave the Dead End." Goa makes a churning noise in his vocalizer that could sound something like gulping. "Crystal City.... Approached me. Explained where I came from." He leaves the hands on his chest alone. That, of course, wasn't why he was nigh psychotic. Goa had been down that road before, after all. "... So now I know. Now Firestorm has to know. Open an old wound." There. Maybe that would do. Shred looks to Slip, "Do you think there are only empties in Dead End?" Goa lowers his optic shutters just a centimeter or two. "I can handle myself around empties." Slipstream frowns a bit at Goa, then nods in understanding. "You underestimate Firestorm. She's stronger than you think." then she sighs at Shred, "No of course not. Why the sudden fascination with them Shred." Goa says nothing except a little whirr of relief. There were still volumes of other, much more worrisome things gnawing at his anxiety subroutines, but a little respite from Slipstream's prodding was better than none. Shred shakes her head slightly, "Because I know how dangerous they can be. It doesn't take the best hardware, only the right level of desperation. Goa, suppose you had encountered ME out here, before Slip found you? how I used to be? " she looks to slipstream then,,. "Have you ever been to the Grease pits?" Slipstream knows this is a distraction, "Why are we talking about this." she frowns, "Why does it matter. If they were an issue Megatron would deal with it using us anyway." she points out, "And Gooey if you think for one moment this is over, you are sadly mistaken." Goa erps a little with fear. "Would he? Good for gnoshing on stray...s," he interjects, then ducks his helmet back into his shoulders slightly. Shred shrugs, "Ok, regardless, how's about we get this the hell over with, ok? I /don't/ like being so far from Polyhex.. " Goa then blinks at Shred, somewhat confused, though less ruffledly so than Slippy. "Suppose why? I didn't." Slipstream gets to her feet, then undoes the lariat from Goa's feet. "Get your sorry grounder aft off the ground, we'll head back to the Barracks and we will /talk/. Understand me?" there's a slight grind of her denta there as she hisses those words to him. The way she said it though, it’s a commanding tone that begs you to try to press the issue. Goa stumbles to his feet, flinching as his weight shifts to his shredded treads and immediately back off. Usually, he'd jump on Slipstream's shoulders right now, if only for the sake of being irritating, and the pain made the idea all the more compelling. But he makes no maneuver to. Just stares at his hands. Shred sighs, going silent now, "There's no need for me to be here with you two, I'll see you back at base, ok?" Slipstream takes hold of Goa under his arms and lifts off. "You can come with us towards home Shred." she pauses a moment, "And we can talk later about your fears okay?" Goa flips his antennae back downward and repeats his sorrowful gesture. "See you soon, Shredder." Shred nods, "Ok Slip, I’ll stick with ya.. probably not a good idea for me to fly solo anyway --- Slipstream lands in the hanger bay, releasing Goa once she's fully on the ground. Shred lands near to Slipstream, taking a moment to look to Goa and her, "Are you two ok? " Goa lands on his knees, but has no trouble standing. He'd had no time to protest -- That was not an angle he'd flown in before, and not one he had any interest in repeating, what with the wind buffeting him. He brushes himself off, feeling over his cheek again, and smirks at Shred, "Can't say I ever am." Slipstream frowns a little, "That remains to be seen." to Shreds question, then raising a hand she points with a tone that is all business. "March." this directed at Goa. Shred nods, "I’ll see you both later.. I'm heading to the pits.." "... Pits?" But Goa still has no time to ask questions. He practically burns rubber at the speedy clip he heads further into Polyhex under. Slipstream nods to Shred, "Be safe." is offered, then follows Goa inside. --- Goa just disappears to his bunk cell. He'd briefly debated taking a public seat to be challenging ... but if Slipstream got what information she wanted, he really didn't want to be out in the open. Didn't want to be in Polyhex, for that matter. Slipstream is glad to be inside for good reason, everyone is on patrols or other duties, those that are here are in recharge. They can talk via their link and no one would be the wiser, she sits on the bunk and sighs,
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