Soundwave has arrived.

Scourge arrives from the IHQ Central Chamber to the west.

Scourge has arrived.

Scourge stalks into the area.

Long Haul has been standing here the whole time. 'Here' being right next to Arachnae's medical table, facing away from Arachnae and towards the door. His feet are planted firmly shoulder-width apart and his hands are clasped loosely without his back. He has adopted, without realizing it and entirely unintentionally, a proper 'parade-rest' stance. Funny the sort of things four weeks straight of being on-watch will do to a person.

Scrapper wanders in from the laboratory. He's finally finished cobbling together all the new parts that Arachnae will need, and thus, he can now set into the repair work in earnest. In addition to the parts, he carries a mysterious box that has had the lid welded to it. How curious.

Arachnae is where she has been for a length of time determined to have been just shy of perhaps too long. Not due to any particular mechs fault, primus knows she's an odd design. Stupid original designs, why can't everything be a seeker to make repairs easy, eh?

Scrapper sets down the parts and the welded-shut box on a nearby table, along with all the other newly made Arachnae bit, and paces over to Arachnae proper's table. He checks over the various readouts and withdraws his own medical scanner to get some corroboration. Quietly, he asks Long Haul, "Anyone else try to make trouble?"

You take several moments to run a medical scan on Arachnae...

Compile has arrived.

When he hears Scrapper arrive, Long Haul brings his feet together and drops his hands to his side before turning his head. He says nothing, only nods once before walking over to where he can watch both the work being done and the door. "Eh. Depends on how you define the phrase. I mean, I don't think there was any intentional troublemaking. Just a lot of unintentional scrap."

Soundwave methodically strides into the medical ward to check on his patient. But his patient is.. not there. "Location of patient Splice." He resonates to whatever medics or bodyguards or whatever are available.

--      Compile is busy at a computer terminal and looks up and nods to Soundwave.

The doorway into the Medical Bay slides open to reveal the outline of a Sweep. Big surprise there. But this isn't some run-of-the-mill numbered Sweep -- it's the Sweep Commander himself, Scourge. Quietly he steps inside, the doorway sliding shut behind him as his wings tense and relax. In his hand rests the Heart of Cybertron that Galvatron awarded Arachnae several cycles earlier, and that he is now making good on delivering. After a few moments, he steps forward to see his wing-sib for herself... and hope that she looks far better than she did when she was found.

--      Compile is sitting at a terminal andnods ot Scourge as he goes back to his job, since he was more or less not able to do anything. SOhe found other things to do. He says nothing as he works on works on the new base to be built at the Warrens.

Don't look at the table. No.. really, don't. Tubes, conduit, the usual support supplies. But there IS improvement!..

Stable core systems that have run for several series without sudden spikes or drops. Granted, she hasn't woken up for several cycles, but that is to be expected. The hunter-medic remains tranquil in the embrace of such resplendant and top of the line medical systems.

Scrapper shakes a little when he sees Scourge. Oh. Slag. Hopefully Scourge will be accepting of the fact that Arachnae is a custom design and that finding and forging the parts for her was a long and arduous task, thus explaining her current state of disrepair. Hopefully the Autobots will all kill themselves, too. Trying to keep his hands from shaking, he salutes Scourge and hurriedly busies himself with setting up for the surgery.

Soundwave's queries for his latest tapeling are paused when Scourge arrives. Turning to face Papa Sweep, Soundwave does not salute. This is not meant as offense, he simply doesn't 'do' the whole gesture thing all that much. "Scourge." He says in his monotonous voice by way of greeting.

Compile has disconnected.

Long Haul shrugs as Soundwave addresses him. He wasn't set here to watch Splice, he was set here to guard Arachnae, and thus he answers him very similarly to how he had answered Splice when she wanted to know where Soundwave was. "Dunno. She doan' check in and out with me." Then Scourge arrives. The transporter stands briefly at attention, fires off a Decepticon salute, and then goes back to just... being available to help, although he does spare a moment of pity for Scrapper. There are few things so distracting as having your boss standing over your shoulder while you work. Unless your boss is Scrapper, in which case it's the most distracting thing in the universe because you're spending all your time bickering with him.

Splice emerges from the waiting area, where she was trying to better familiarize herself with the state of the modern era by reading some of the more significant news reports of the past few years. Upon returning she notices the repair bay is now quite occupied, and spots Soundwave, probably occupied with Arachnae. She makes her way over to him to see if she can be of any help, or, barring that, to observe.

Slag? Does Scourge look like one of those slagheap Dinobots to Scrapper? Obviously, someone's optical sensors needs a LOT of recalibrating. Perhaps Revenant, if he isn't too busy...

Scourge looks over Arachnae's form momentarily, then turns his gaze to Scrapper. No words are said; no words need to be said. The threat of violence, if Scrapper manages to screw this up, that comes from the look on Scourge's face should be more than enough for even someone of Blot's intellect to get the message. He turns, finding a spot along the wall, and leans back expectantly to watch the proceedings.

Arachnae's monitoring systems emit a random sounding beep. Nothing alarming, simply denoting a change in one of the systems that have been under close observation. Intakes rasp, cleared of most debris now, simply awaiting removal of drains and suction systems.

"Why.... do I feel like.. a cadaver.. on display.. for a first term.. student's autopsy exam?" quiet tone, but some dryness to the softly spoken words that the patient speaks. Save for the words, she gives no otheri nidation of being concious, optics remaining dark.

"Splice." Soundwave intones as he spots the small tapeling again. He gestures to Scrapper's patient. "Your Co-Commander is receiving emergency treatment. Her physiology is new. Classification: Unicronian. Observe and learn."

Scrapper has to try hard to keep from shaking. Great work, Scourge. Terrify the medic who is about to be undertaking a delicate and extensive operation. His attention snaps over to the medical monitors with the sounds of the beep. Is that bad? Is Arachane all right? Is... ah. She's awake. And her sense of snark is intact. "It won't be for much longer. I've finally got all the parts ready. Just going to apply a bit of local now." He withdraws a bit of local anesthetic and start applying it to her abdominothoracic area, so that he can start work on her torso.

Splice approaches the table upon which Arachnae is being repaired. Not having practiced using her anti-grav system though, she has to climb into a chair and then onto the table in order to get to a position where she can observe without getting in the way, since Soundwave made rebuilt her so annoyingly small. She'll have to get him back for that somehow, sometime, though she admits it's not the worst thing in the world. She simply has to re-learn how to do everything.

Scourge remains at the wall. Scrapper might not like having the jitters, but at least he can't complain about not having enough motivation... other than what Galvatron, Cyclonus, and the rest of the Sweeps would do to him once Scourge was done. Fortunately for the Constructicon, Scourge's creativity is still focused on the myriad ways he can make Jazz suffer without killing him before presenting him to Galvatron.

He straightens up as Arachnae awakens, stepping forward again and looking down on her form. He nods slightly, then steps back. No sense in getting in Scrapper's way, after all.

Scrapper stifles his abject terror, reducing it to something manageable like simple fear, and finishes up administering the local and selects a nice, shiny, sharp scalpel out of his toolkit. It's the very cutting edge of medical technology, and it will suit for cleaning up the grievous wounds to Arachnae's chest, by cutting out the irreparable pieces and tidying up the edges of the wounds. His tool selected, he sets into the work, slowly and cautiously at first, just in case the anaesthetic hasn't yet taken effect, although by all rights, it should have.

Scrapper begins work on Arachnae's severe injuries.

Your repair attempt is successful, and Arachnae's self-repair systems can handle the remaining damage.

Arachnae doesn't get an actual reply to her comment so she goes quiet a moment. Fingers twitch, the local seeping into systems that were numb, then flashed active before re-numbing as reaction to the chemical concoction. A sharp intake of air... Ad she speaks again, "Not.. recognizing.. someone in the area." worried tone, talons scratching at the table as they extend. "Who's there?"

Soundwave darns. He could be spending time teaching his new initiate the tricks of the trade, but he can't. He could be terrorizing Scrapper, but that would mean Splice would be getting a limited educational on Unicronian technology. Oh well, the sacrifices must be made at times. He steps back, taking the side of Scourge. Despite whatever issues he has at times with papa sweep, Soundwave IS loyal to Galvatron, and that means loyalty to Cyclonus and Scourge too.

Soundwave answers Arachnae's question for her in his usual droning voice. "Scourge. Soundwave. Scrapper. Arachnae.(well, she DID ask..) Compile. Long Haul. Splice."

Scrapper finishes tidying up the abdominothoracic area and now starts selecting parts from the pile to replace what Jazz so rudely removed. At Arachnae's comment, he glances over his shoulder and around the medical ward. Scary scourge, less scary Soundwave, barely scary Long Haul, not scary tape... tape? Busy fitting in new 'guts', Scrapper still finds the time to say, "Soundwave, did you make another one of those cassette-things?"

Quite the audience here. Long Haul crosses his arms and again settles into a solid stance, feet at shoulder-width as he watches as well, although he does, technically, have reason. He's Scrapper's go-fer, and Arachnae's body-guard! The Constructicon snorts once in amusement as Scrapper calls Splice 'another one of those cassette-things,' but otherwise remains on hand and unusually silent.

Splice says, "My name is Splice," she responds, still not accustomed to her new voice. "Soundwave just recovered my laser core and rebuilt me." She studies Arachnae's chassis, finding it no more alien than the Earthly shapes found on some other Decepticons she encountered thus far. She intently watches as Scrapper works. At one point she finds his technique unsual and almost questions him on it, but figures he probably knows what he's doing, so she just continues observing.

Arachnae's optics flicker a moment eratically before kindling to a dim hue. "Splice is an unknown." flat tone but she's stopped flexing talons. "My my.. Why the audien-ce?"

Scrapper finishes up with the chest area, hands now covered with assorted grime from energon, hydraulic fluid, and joint lubrication gone awry. He pauses to wipe his hands clean, paying proper respect to sanitation. Despite the relatively low occurrences of robot diseases, having muck in one's servos does no good. Scrapper moves on to one of Arachnae's arms, getting out the local again, and says, "I suppose that they all just want to see you well soon."

"New initiate." Soundwave intones to Arachnae. Actually, that couldn't be more accruate. She still doesn't carry an emblem or any form of a colour scheme, so recent was her activation. And STILL hasn't been formally entered in the imperial register. He decides to report the informtion to Scourge. "I located Splice on a fact-finding mission. She served the Decepticons well as a contracter. In exchange for her life she has sworn servitude to the empire." Sure, Soundwave omits the fact that her priority loyalty is to HIM, but he's serving the empire so it really doesn't matter.

Arachnae snorts air through intakes, hissing slightly. "Either that, or everyone has.. a supply requisition they need me to file." Wry reply to Scrapper before she ever so slightly turns her head to peer at Splice. No comment is made as focus shifts to Soundwave, "Indeed." flat tone.

Scourge's optics flicker over at Soundwave. Of course the cassettes are loyal first to Soundwave, but he doesn't come out and say that. "I see," he replies quietly, glancing back at the tape-con and at Arachnae while Scrapper works. "So long as her loyalty remains to the Empire, then I trust there will be no problems."

"Speaking of supply requisitions, Long Haul, open that box for me," Scrapper gestures, handing holding a tool, at the welded shut mystery box. As an afterthought, he adds, "But don't touch the contents. You'll just hurt yourself, although you might have already figured that out." He then bends back down to continue his work on Arachnae's arm.

Compile has disconnected.

A lot of MSE's requisitions tend to at least go through Long Haul, as he's the one who has to actually go get the crap. But then, there are plenty he doesn't have the authorization to approve or deny on his own, and that's when it's time to start tormenting superiors. However, Long Haul hasn't been doing his job for the last few weeks, either, what with being put on Arachnae watch, so the transporter can only shrug his shoulders, moving his arms briefly from his uncrossed position to do so, and grumble, "Dunno." Then Scrapper speaks to him. "Uhm... you mean the box you welded shut?" He plods over to the metal box and looks at it for a moment before pulling out his pea-shooter. Why is he drawing a weapon in medical? Because his pea-shooter also has a welding/torch setting, just like in the cartoons!

Splice announces, "I am a medical technician." She pauses, still watching Scrapper. "However, advances in technology have apparently occurred, that I will need to study." She does look forward to learning and returning to work, preferrably in that order, and finding out what else has changed in the last 4-5 million years. She briefly glances back up at Soundwave, wondering what her new life is going to be like.

Soundwave just SAID they were.. tricksy Scourge and his /actual/ loyalty to Galvatron that has nothing to do with it serving his purposes. Grrr. "She will require a thorough initiation. As of yet she is unaware of recent events. This includes our new commander and re-structuring." He resonates. "And will be required to complete a standard military training programme."

Arachnae dims optics as a kind of blink, giving Scrapper a weary look, "Can't reports wait until I can sit up?" plaintive tone.

"Yes, Long Haul, I welded the box shut," Scrapper says slowly so that Long Haul will understand. He actually welded the box shut to prevent Long Haul from getting into it again, but given that he's now asking Long Haul to open the box, he'll neglect to mention that fact. He finishes up with Archanae's one arm, buffing out a scratch, and switches to the other. Scrapper comments, "That makes two, then. Inquisitra will also require a refresher course, due to her absence. I'll see what I can get tossed together. Maybe Mixmaster can run a medical boot camp or something." What, leave the crazy one to retraining those with lapsed medical credentials? Well, Inquisitra annoyed Scrapper pretty badly, and Scrapper's not fond of Splice's new dad. He answers Arachnae, trying to brighten up the situation with a bit of humour, "Reports wait for no man. Lucky you're a she-Decepticon, huh?"

Compile has connected.

"Well, then, I'll jus' unweld it!" answers Long Haul as he gets to work doing just that. At least, he starts out doing just that. However, as soon as he has just a small hole he instead forces his fingers in, bending the metal to do so, and then rips the top off to the sound of tearing metal. The force of the action sends the top itself flying and it hits the wall with a noisy clang before falling to the counter. "There. Open," he reports.

Scrapper winces and mutters, "Maybe should sign Long Haul up for that course, too." He finishes up Arachnae's other arm, so now she can hold stuff. This is important! He then takes a quick break to retrieve the contents of the box that Long Haul so messily opened and drops it on a side-table in arm's reach of Arachnae' table. Scrapper explains, "I made this for you. I had the part, and the poetic justice was just too much to resist. I know you've probably got a dozen of these things, but this one's special."

Splice looks up, startled by the racket Long Haul made, then moves to the other side of the table, closer to Soundwave, to stay out of Scrapper's way. Then she look at the medical kit, which reminds her that she needs to familiarize herself with all the modern tools and equipment MSE uses. She picks up a sonic screwdriver that is apparently not needed at the moment, and studies it, but doesn't activate it since that might be a distraction.

Medical Kit

Right off the bat, this medical kit doesn't look quite right. It is mostly white, and shines, having been lacquered over with a clear protectant to guard against chipped paint and acid stains, but its structure seems to have once been something else: a car's door, which happens to have been exactly the case. The door has been carefully restructured, with a hinge added so that it opens up, its shape bent and beaten to be more of a hollow box, and numerous internal compartments added to hold tools. Clearly, the medical kit was designed by a technician for a technician. On one side, the emblem of Decepticon MSE has been carefully engraved and enamelled. The other side bears a "4", marking the once-door as previously belonging to the Autobot Jazz.

Scrapper returns to repairing Arachnae, now patching up her legs. There's not much left to be done now, and he's bent on finishing this now. Too much of an audience not to. As an afterthought, he adds, "I built in an anti-theft device. Any unauthorized personnel who attempt to take it gets a zap." Now, why would Scrapper get the idea to do that? CoughMixmastercough.

Soundwave is actually observing by Scourge, and pleased that Splice is already making the most of this opportunity to learn about the tools. With just a brief re-aquaintance with current technology, she should be able to stun people with her resourcefulness and ability. As it stands, this should have proven to be an educational in some of the differences between dealing with Unicronian (or even semi-unicronian) technology and standard Cybertronian tech.

Long Haul stomps over to pick up the lid to the box he just flung across the room. He sets it back on top of the rest of the container despite the fact that it's effectively ruined now and then heads back to stand with the rest of the crowd. "He made it from the door that I tore offa Jazz!" he says excitedly, if unnecessarily. Something in his tone of voice indicates that if he had a mouth, it would be split in a huge grin at this moment.

Arachnae turns her head to look at the.. oooooooh pressie... She starts to sit up, balancing on an elbow, "Really? For me?" blink, optics brightening. "Scrapper, how did you know I've needed a new medkit!"

"Of course it's for you!" Scrapper exclaims and adds, a bit lamely, "Um... magic Constructicon sense? Do you like it?" He finishes up with the last of the repairs. Arachnae will need a lot of time to recuperate still, but now she doesn't quite have that Queen of the Undead look, although Scrapper has to say, she wore it really well. Erm.

Splice puts the sonic screwdriver down and picks up another tool that she can't identify. She holds it close to her optics and looks at it from every angle, then decides it's best to set it aside until she knows what it is exactly. There's so much to learn here, it's overwhelming. Where will she start?