poly_chromatic | 48th Bounty [Video]

Entry tags:

transformers - lockdown

48th Bounty [Video]

Every day I pick more and more slugs off my hull.

[He burns a couple off his leg with a red hot metal rod.]

Not as bad a space barnacles, but still annoying. I've seen what these things do. Too bad for 'em - and good for me - my audios aren't out in the open.

[He points to his head for emphasis.]

When I get my ship back, I'm gonna take a six hour shower just so I don't feel like I got slime on me anymore.

[He puts the rod away to cool for now.]

Also, I'm gonna start charging extra for dealing with gorgons.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[You get a totally rumpled and worse for the wear Dawn. She's worse for the wear, bloody and filthy cause she's been out there right alongside her sister fighting the beasties. And currently, she's wrinkling her nose at you, Lockdown.]

You can't charge for saving people's lives. Totally been here and visited this topic before and really, it's just not of the cool.

I can and I will.

That's so unheroic of you it's not even funny. Why don't you just sit out and let the real heroes like my sister save people for all the right reasons and not for money... cause that's what she does... cause she rocks like that. Everyone's gonna want her to save them and not you.

[It isn't often that Dawn gets all chatty about how awesome her big sister is. Sand apocalypse and life saving and some weirdo trying to charge for playing hero? Yeah, this is a moment when it's all about her big sister. In fact, this is a moment when she realizes how awesome her big sister really is.]

Well, in the real world, the heroes don't always get the job done. 'Sides, sometimes the hero ain't available and bots like me are.

A bot like you can be just as heroic as the next Slayer. Duh~

[That last 'duh' was said with a sing-song slide to it and accompanied by an "isn't it obvious" roll of her eyes. She isn't even a Slayer and she knows how the whole hero thing is supposed to work.]

Besides, it isn't always about the winning, it's about the fighting and the saving as many lives as possible in the process. Plus if you start charging, the save-y is gonna stop you and be all "oh wait, where's that pretty blonde girl with the fashionable shoes to save me? She does it for free!" And then you'll be like "me bot! that'll be fifty whatevers." And the save-y will be all "oh no you don't! You don't get to charge me for this!" And then it would just turn into a yucky lawsuit type thing and all the good people in the world would rally behind the save-y because ohmigod you charged for saving someone's life??? Like who do you think you are, Mr. Bot??? So you might as well just do it because it's the right thing to do cause it's just the way hero-ing is done.

Lots of people need saving, and there's only so many willing to help to go 'round. If you've got credits or parts to spare, you go with the pro, not the freebie who might do a half-aft job at most.

I'm a bounty hunter, not a vigilante.

[She's gasping now, her mouth hung open for a brief moment of shock that slowly curls into one of the most mischievous cat ate the canary grins ever.]

I'm so gonna tell my sister what you said about her being half-whatever at her slaying things just cause she doesn't charge. And just for full disclosure's sake, she's destroyed robots before. Probably good to know before you chat with her about how good she is at kicking ass. Oh, also she's killed gods before too, evil hell gods who wanted to stomp all over the world. So she's good. Really good.

But back to the topic at hand, people do need saving. And it isn't fair to exploit the ones less able to take care of themselves by making them pay for your being all save-y on them... bounty hunter or not.

I'm shakin' in my tires.

I've charged for my work during wars, you think I'm gonna have moral hangups about charging during a crisis like this? If someone's about to be eaten and the only thing saving them is agreeing to pay me 'cause I'm their only option, they'll do it.

Then like I said, you should retire and let the real heroes do it and find something else to spend your time doing. If money's all that important to you, maybe you could do something less morally wrong like... sell tires! Oh! Maybe you could be a mechanic. I bet bots are good at mechanical... type things... Right? Oh, know what you could do? You could make the first ever flying car! Or hovering skateboard. Or... okay admittedly I know little about mechanics.

Oh sure, I'll retire from bounty hunting... when you and ten others crawl outta my exhaust pipe and Lugnut quits worshipping the ground Megatron walks on.

Your exhaust pipe? Ew. And yet very witty... in an ew gross kind of way. And hey, go on with your bad bounty hunting self if you want. That's cool with me. It's the whole charging for saving people thing I'm against. There was this girl I knew who used to be a demon and she thought my sister should charge people too. We had this discussion cause yeah, we didn't have a lot of money and lots of bad stuff had just happened and it didn't look like we'd be getting money anytime soon. But we all decided it was bad and I have to agree. You're just as bad as the bad guys if you exploit your position of being all big and awesome like that. Also, demons. Demons have ideas like that. Demons. I'm just trying to help you out here so you're less demon and more hero.

I ain't a demon, I'm a bot. I'm also seven million stellar cycles old and have been doing this gig most of my life. It works for me.

Uhhh what's a stellar cycle? Like a year? Isn't it just easier to say a year? Or is a stellar cycle a twenty-four hour period? Maybe it's like something that happens for robots once a month. That's really confusing, you know. Also, charging people for bounty hunting is a completely different thing than charging people for saving their lives. You get that, right? Two completely different things.

It's more or less one Earth year. I also don't do things outta the goodness of my spark, or else I'd be a lousy business-bot.

Saving people isn't a business! Are you not listening to a word I'm saying? I mean I know I say a lot sometimes and words can get lost in the mix but I thought I'd been pretty clear about my point here. I'm sure you have a great business thing going on with the whole bounty hunting thing but saving people's lives shouldn't come into the business part of anything. It's just the right thing to do.

...oh god, I sound like my sister.

[ He recognizes what he sees. A talking car on the network. ]

[ SWEET. ]

Space barnacles. Seriously?

Yeah, space barnacles. They're annoyin' as Pit.

How are they worse than the zombie slugs?

'Cause zombie slugs are gonna have a way harder time gettin' into my head. Plus, they probably can't do slag with a processor.

Space barnacles drain energy and multiply faster than you can say "got 'em all".