damned_institute | Day 41: Intercom, Evening

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Day 41: Intercom, Evening

When the intercom's jingle sounded, there seemed to be some kind of tapping in the background noise, like letters being punched into a keyboard. It stopped and the Head Doctor chuckled.

"Hello, everyone! I'm actually taking a break from paperwork for once – everyone needs some recreational time, you know! – and of course, now we can all look forward to a scrumptious dinner from our cooks. Tonight, herb-seasoned grilled salmon is on the menu, served with buttery mashed potatoes and asparagus. All our regular drinks and vegetarian options are available, and for dessert, we will be serving yellow cake with a whipped cream icing.

"...Well! I can hardly wait to get my own dinner after saying all that. Good bye for now, everyone, and enjoy your delicious food!"

The intercom clicked off.

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Lockdown became all-audios when HK began talking about these 'pressure points'. The bounty hunter put his fork down, got out his notebook from his other desk drawer, and began quickly taking notes.

"And just where would some of these 'pressure points' be located?" Hopefully HK wouldn't notice his ramblings until after Lockdown had gathered a good amount of notes. This information might be useful when he went after that kid tonight.

"Statement: On the jaw behind the ear, half-way down the the neck between the sternocliedomastroideus and trapezius muscles, the radial nerve at certain points along the forearm, and the femoral artery on the thigh are all easy targets," he listed off, pointing out each one of them on himself.

"When grabbing a human meatbag's hand, driving the thumb in between the bone structure of the metacarpels grinds the skeletal components together, also causing pain and making physical manipulation of a human much easier." Once again, the area was pointed out. Then, he remembered something rather important.

"Expletive: Damn you. I should not be telling you any more."

Lockdown took note of literally everything HK said, looking up only to see where HK pointed out pressure points.

When the younger man finally realized what he was saying, Lockdown put away his pen and notebook. "Aw, and we were just getting going," He picked his fork up again and started on his vegetables. No matter, once he got his chocolate, HK would be eating out of his hand. Literally, if Lockdown was feeling kinky enough.

"But hey, don't feel too bad," The bounty hunter smirked. "You probably just made my job tonight a whole lot easier."

HK most certainly did not sulk. That word was not within his vocabulary, therefore, it couldn't happen to him. But he did finally turn his attention to his ever-disgusting meatbag fuel.

"Sarcasm: Thank you. I feel so much better now that my love of disassembling meatbags is turned against me," he grumbled, poking suspiciously at his food. After all, it had attacked him precisely one day ago. Apart from that, it seemed like it was becoming almost more bearable. Unfortunately. He didn't want to act like a meatbag.

Lockdown just gave HK a smug smile before turning back to his meal and starting to finish off his vegetables.

"Relax, HK, I don't plan on using this knowledge against you." Oh no, I've got much better plans for you, my friend.

"Statement: I should hope not, because I still have quite a lot more anatomical data than you," HK muttered before finally taking a bite of his food. 'Yeurgh' was the best way to sum up his thoughts on the matter.

HK was prone to occasional self-analysis, but he could not determine to save his life why he kept on deactivating the 'Don't tell Lockdown useful information' directive. It was extremely vexing.

"Like I said yesterday, I'm not one to throw away a perfectly useful ally." He would never think about dropping Swindle, for example. Lockdown would also be very reluctant to kill Prowl if the situation ever came up. He'd certianly been sad and disapointed when Prowl had rejected his offer for partnership and told him never to contact him again.

"Statement: And I am usually not the type to waste opportunities, such as the use of information as currency. I blame my current meatbag status." Something must have shorted out in his neural pathways. A glitch. That was the only possible explanation. He would make every attempt to hunt it down and stamp it out of existence because it was becoming really kriffing embarrassing.

"Tell me about it," Lockdown grumbled in between bites of dessert. "I offered my services to this big fellow last night, but forgot to do it subtlely. Offered myself out loud for the whole group to hear." He was still going to kill that little punk kid for laughing at him if the chance ever presented itself.

He put his dessert down on his desk so he could go to his mattress and pull out the knife the big man had given him, making sure HK could get a good look at it. "Then again, if it means more weapons like this, it may have just been worth it."

HK could entirely sympathize, although most of his lack of subtlety was his own, apart from certain incidents that he had sworn never to mention to anyone ever again. "Statement: All the more reason to regain our original bodies. Even meatbag processors are malfunctioning, slow things." Even with the limited amount of recoding he had managed to do in an effort to speed up cognitive function, it was still pathetically slothful in every calculation.

However, few things could distract HK more than a weapon. He immediately snapped out of his utterly depressing thought pattern, reaching out to touch the edge of the blade. "Observation: Very sharp, for such far less than ideal materials." He wondered what sort of quality of weapon he'd be receiving tonight. Some of the details of what he'd heard was needed were utterly confusing to him. But he definitely wanted something more than just his scalpels now, if only to show off.

"You should have seen what it did to those monsters the other night," Lockdown grinned sadistically upon recalling that memory. The way it had punctured the thing's scalp had been very satisfying, if a bit messy.

He replaced the knife into the slit in his mattress and went back to his dessert. "Had to wash myself off afterwords, though. Got covered in organic vital fluid."

"Observation: They always die so entertainingly, don't they?" It was good to be back on a favorite topic of his. "Even without quality weapons. On my first night here I stabbed a humanoid guard meatbag seventeen times with a writing utensil before it expired. It was very fun." The cuts from the scalpels he'd then ripped out of it had not been so fun.

"Statement: Blood. It tends to get everywhere when meatbags are punctured or otherwise ruptured. Something inside of my mouth started to bleed it when you punched me, for example." That had mostly settled down by now, but it was a nice reminder of how much that had hurt. However, he'd forgotten how much head injuries muddled the senses. Blows to somewhere else would probably be more acutely painful.

"You bet they do," Lockdown agreed, not losing the grin. He also couldn't help but be interested in hearing that the pens could be used as weapons. However, Lockdown had much better weapons than that on him. Plus, he didn't want to waste pens.

"Oh, is that what it's called?" Sounded like a rather unimaginative and boring name, 'blood'. When HK mentioned that his mouth had bled when Lockdown punched him, the bounty hunter said, "Sorry 'bout that, kid. Wasn't trying to hurt you that badly; just trying to fix you."

"Statement: It didn't cause much damage. Certainly not compared to some of the damage I have sustained here." Damage that he hadn't liked, because he hadn't wanted it. It all made sense to him, if no one else.

"Recommendation: And even though I do not want to reveal any more information, I really must say this: Blows to the head scramble meatbag processors, dulling the pain. Attacking other areas in this manner can be far more painful."

Well, at least that was a good sign, if HK wasn't bitter about that. Lockdown didn't want to hurt his little droid friend too badly or unintentionally. When it came to the day he finally coaxed HK into a spark-to-spark, however, things would be different. And even then, any pain HK recieved would be careful and controlled.

"I'll keep that in mind," Lockdown said, finishing his dessert. "With all the advice you've given me so far, this kid won't stand a chance."

"Statement: You're welcome," HK said without looking up from the food he had returned to, even though looking at it made what he'd already ingested want to escape.

He took another bite of the 'salmon', and then immediately realized he needed some of the water to make sure it actually went down his throat. UGH. it was like... well, getting stabbed in an actuator with a writing utensil, a feeling he knew from personal experience. Only this was worse. Finally, the food followed his directive and went downwards, rather than stalling in his esophagus. "I want my body back again."

Lockdown went over to his bed and lay in it with his optics wide open and his hands behind his head.

When HK spoke, the bounty hunter said, "I hear ya', HK." He wanted to feel this powerful metal limbs again, use his mods, and tear through the streets in his muscle car form. He turned his head to look at HK, "You didn't happen to see where they took you did you? Or how they got you back into your body?"

"Negatory: This human body was heavily sedated, and it seems they made all alterations to my real body while I was still shut down." That lead to some disturbing thoughts. "Statement: I do hope they haven't installed any malicious programs into it. I don't want to get a virus." He sighed slightly, pushing away his mostly uneaten tray of food.

"Observation: But at least it would have to be directly installed. Meatbags can catch viruses simply by breathing."

Lockdown frowned. Of course the institute wouldn't make things that easy. Looks like it was back to square one.

"Yeah, I just hope they aren't joyriding in my body," The bounty hunter grumbled. That Bob person had made it clear that he wanted to drive around in Lockdown's vehicle mode, so why shouldn't others have the same desire?

"Statement: ...Ew." That was likely the shortest sentence HK had ever spoken in his existence, beyond 'OW.' The idea of meatbags directly controlling any droid's body was quite disturbing.

"Yeah, 'ew' is right," Lockdown mumbled. "If they get any grime on my upholstery, someone's gonna have their lungs ripped out. Even if I find one shred of evidence that a human has touched my steering wheel or stick shift..." He brought his hands together and cracked his knuckles, letting that speak for itself.

After all, he really liked that chain steering wheel and skull stick shift.

"Statement: I'm glad there's no room for a meatbag to fit inside of my chassis. That is just disturbing." HK didn't really want to think about that very much. "The thought of meatbags controlling any inorganic like that is simply nauseating."

Lockdown snorted. "You think that sounds disgusting?" Which it did, but the bounty hunter thought he had something that could top humans controlling him in the ways of repussion. "Try getting space barnacles on your chassis. Those things are stubborn." He made a disgusted face at the thought.

Oh, this didn't sound good. HK froze, as if preparing to try and make a sniper shot on the concept. "Query: Space barnacles?" That already sounded worse than... well, just about any condition he knew of that a droid could get.

"They're these disgusting little parasites that usually attach themselves to ships and leech off its energy," Lockdown explained, sitting up in bed and crossing his legs. "They also go after robots, if the opportunity presents itself. They're oppossed to extreme heat, and usually have to be burned or steamed off. My informants told me some rumors that some barnacles made it to that dirtball planet, Earth, and mutated. The mutation caused the barnacles to gain control of any mech they touched, turning them dim-witted, slow-moving, snarling, and hungry for mech-fluid."

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