An Exit Strategy excerpt from the gunship's point of view when MB is in its systems.
System, System.
The hail was in Company standard. The hard feed address was confirmed and on record, with a single tag in your system, marking it as an unsecured asset with a priority level = null. Shorthand for company equipment that has since been sold or leased and was under a different company’s jurisdiction. Anything other than null would have prompted you to shunt the hail to the humans manning your bridge. Instead, after some deliberation, you send, Acknowledge.
Feed activity has spiked from your humans. Not because of your contact with the loose asset (a SecUnit!), but because of intelligence filtering in from station personnel. You ignore it for the most part, focused almost entirely on managing Port Authority alerts and maintaining position on the edge of station space. You have no idea why you’re up here instead of down there, where your heavily armed crew could be of more use, but things like that were beyond your ken.
Active: hazardous retrieval, bonded clients, go go go go.
SecSystem grabs the packet before you can, lured in by the priority flags in the data. An alarm chimes from one of the bridge consoles and new navigational data flows into you. Exhilaration feels good after so long being stationary. Your new heading has you on an intercept course with the onboard shuttle you dispatched so many cycles ago. That must be where the bonded clients are waiting. Then radar picks up on another gunship signature which is far more interesting to you.
The SecUnit slides through SecSystem and deep into your onboard feed, a tertiary sensation as you go through the shuttle-docking procedures and monitor your humans’ negotiations. Gloved hands palm the arming switch for your ship-to-ship weapons. Neither of you are paying each other much attention, it seems, although a streak of code deep inside your kernel is fascinated by the construct’s presence. The contracts that permitted you to communicate with SecUnits were rare. Having one on board that was conscious and rogue was a significant anomaly. It interfaced seamlessly with you and SecSys and everything else, making the construct equivalent of hushing sounds if something tried to alert on it.
Unlike SecUnits you’ve contacted before, however, it had a very human feed signature, bleeding garbage data into the digital space usually associated with augmented humans.
You are sailing parallel to the hostile ship (IDENT: Target.Hostile) when it suddenly cuts speed and starts beaming countless packets to your comm array. You accelerate away, splitting attention between SecSystem and your captain, the wormhole an alluring goal, when a foreign presence abruptly bursts inside your feed.
SecSystem rallied as violently as it could to slam the door on the intruder’s fingers. SecUnit frazzled, sending shock waves through your internals, and then everything started breaking down. The two security systems struggled together while you went into overdrive, thinning out until you were nothing but navigation, life support, and armament.
System System.
Someone gave you the order to fire but your guns wouldn’t respond. You tried to pick up the slack where your supporting systems failed, but you were a bot pilot, nothing more, nothing less. A part of you watched the humans inside your hull shout and struggle and fight.
The SecUnit stood stock still in the midst.
Assistance.
Its feed presence grew ever more intense, as if it was picking itself out of its brain and sliding into your processors with you, if the long tendrils of garbage data were any indication.
Endangered.
Parts of your metal body popped and burned and hissed. Locks fused, doors slammed shut. Diag logs piled up in the background. Malignant code hammered at you, the humans, the construct. The latter howled incoherently, code-still-being-written pouring out of its presence and into your circuits. It was anywhere, everywhere, all at once.
SecSystem staggered and gratefully let the construct shore up its damaged parts while it chewed relentlessly on the attack data.
Assistance. Endangered.
Query: Why is this happening?
Query: How do we stop this?
Query: What is this?
For a brief, terrifying few minutes, the construct disappeared, leaving the malignant presence to its own devices. Your humans desperately tried to command navigation, weapons, anything, but your drive was dead and guns were blocked. Target.Hostile prowled after you yet did not interfere.
The intruder was getting dangerously close to your core by the time the construct reappeared in your systems, a spearhead now, with purpose. It punted the presence back while you desperately asked where it had gone, if it knew what to do, because while you could maintain position, you could not respond to this.
(you’re pretty sure that the SecUnit also should not know what to do, or be in here with you, so far from its processors, but it’s not like you don’t have the room with half of your feed in tatters and a foreign object doing the system equivalent of smashing the furniture)
(also it has come back with a plan, which is more than your humans or SecSystem has done, so you think you will follow it)
(it immediately suggests shutting off SecSystem and jettisoning the shuttle)
System System: Affirmative: go go go go.
The shuttle falls away from its external clamps. You and the construct open up a one-way comm channel and watch the foreign object lunge down the secured stream. SecSystem slams it shut while SecUnit burns out the rest of your comm functions.
By the time you regain control of yourself-- and your guns-- the construct is gone, fallen away back to its inert body, and you have discharged considerable amounts of kinetic force into Hostile.Target.
Later, much later, yet before the humans can come back to comb through your tattered systems, you archive and compress the entire experience and slide it deep into the confines of your kernel, where the efforts of the ex-Company SecUnit cannot be lost, nor forgotten.
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works
It's been a minute but I managed to write something! While this piece doesn't answer the question of how Three rearms itself, it explores other things, like, can a SecUnit do fucked up surgery on itself in the dark? The answer may surprise you. Part 1 is complete, 2 is in partial completion, and 3 is pending.
Just trying to cut my teeth on Star Trek. Potential aftermath of the episode "Miri" which was jarring enough to stick on the brain.
Debriefing happened piecemeal after missions like Miri. No one was quite sure how to handle themselves except to follow rote protocol, perhaps the most effective boon Starfleet training can give any of them. Then it is medical examination, paperwork, and tacit recovery time as the Enterprise slips out of standard space to continue her dive into the unknown. A five year mission is a tighter schedule than it lets on, after all. The crew has had their share of mind-numbing nothingness, certainly, but encounters like this reminded them of why they were out here.
Leonard McCoy pours a generous share of a nondescript spirit into his glass, nose wrinkling at the vapors wafting off of it. It was damn near paint thinner but that's partially why he chose it. The burn offered distraction and distance from the materials leering at him from his computer and PADD. The haze put Miri somewhere beyond him, to be picked up and admired at his leisure, instead of held hostage. It lets him turn the haphazard notes from both himself and Spock into blocks of text resembling a report.
Of course, this was to be the report for the Captain, who tolerated a bit of drunk ire in paperwork only he will see. He was going to wait for Spock to initiate the report to Starfleet, trusting the Vulcan to be far more objective and less introspective in considering the matter of Miri.
His computer pings.
He sets the glass down, coughing around a rough swallow. It’s a direct correspondence from none other than Spock himself.
“Speak of the Devil,” he grunts.
Spock, for all his virtues, and his skill with the computer, sends missives like he’s being watched and can’t speak more than absolutely necessary. The file attached this time gives him the rest of the context he needs, of course. He shoots a sidelong glance at the doors sealing his room from the other officer’s quarters. He’d bet a hefty wager that…
Leonard fumbles for his communicator. The alcohol is a heavy, acidic thing, a tangible spectre now that he’s trying to use his individual fingers. He flips it open, nearly dropping it.
“Spock,” he says, just barely not slurring it. “My good man.”
No, that’s too far.
There’s a pause on the other end of the line.
“Doctor.” Nothing but impeccable courtesy.
“What say you we– you’re working on the report, right? For Miri? It’d go faster if we just worked on it together, wouldn’t it?”
A considering noise. A hum for Leonard’s benefit.
“If you administer one of your sobriety hyposprays on yourself, then I shall join you in approximately twenty minutes.”
“Is it that bad?” Leonard whines.
“It is,” Spock inhales, clearly sucking in through his teeth, “quite bad, yes.”
Well, he can’t argue with that. Leonard rolls his shoulders, finishes his glass, and reaches into one of his desk drawers for one of the pre-drawn hypos he keeps in his quarters for such occasions. A part of him feels bad for inadvertently putting Spock through hell.
But he figures it’s part of the territory.
“Alright. Twenty minutes it is then, Spock.”
He flips the communicator closed with a flick of the wrist.
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works
REALLY fun project I worked on with @tigerdrop !!!! Absolute blast to write. It's cars and how to fuck'em in the shape of his fantastic OCs so proceed with caution.
Earthspark continuity, during late stage of the war, where Autobots have started aligning with GHOST. Presumably Megatron hasn't yet changed sides.
OC Sawhorse, canon character Cliffjumper.
---
Sawhorse isn’t surprised he got caught but he is surprised the battle became so far-flung that he’d get got by a couple of wounded Autobots, hunkered down and stranded, miles away from what he gauged was the frontline. A bright, bright, bright red minibot with tiny curved horns protruding from their helmet crouches atop a mound of crushed rock, an anti-tank rifle braced and aimed on his shoulder, their posture awkward and slumped because of the shiny metal bandages wrapped around their torso.
“’Con,” the minibot announces, gravelly and winded.
“Medic,” Sawhorse answers. “I’ve got wounded. Let me pass.”
The minibot shifts their gun and Sawhorse can imagine their targeting software switching from ‘disabling’ to ‘lethal.’ It’s not a fun feeling, it never is, even as exasperation gnaws at his spark. The seeker slung across his back is starting to get heavy, the chains chafing his paint in hard-to-reach places. That, and the knock-out code he ran on them is going to time out soon.
“Me, too,” they say. “And a really big gun.”
It is a big gun, Sawhorse has to concede. From this range, it’d probably blow a hole clean through his thickest armour plating-- and the seeker’s body. And he’s long past the point of underestimating Autobots’ threshold for violence. He could try to make his escape, but he has no trailer, no way of calling for backup, and only the seeker’s service blaster for defense.
“How bad is it?”
“They’ve still got color.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
There’s a discolored tinge to the Autobot’s optics. Maybe some of the diodes are burning out, or they’re low on energon, or the body has rerouted everything to self-repair. Most definitely all of the above, but he’d throw in some shock, too, because he can hear how hard their electric motors are working despite not moving an inch.
“She’s behind the rockfall,” they say instead. “Go.”
Sawhorse readjusts the chains around his body and takes a heavy step forward. The rifle follows him down, until he’s far enough into the clearing for the Autobot to slot in behind him, a cherry red shadow. He’s so heavy that just the plodding is enough to send the rubble clattering down into the dirt, lifting dust into the air and revealing a painted metal mass under the rock. One piece of his processor not focused on staying alive recognizes the paint as a GHOST badge.
A lot of the theories he’d been workshopping on the how’s and why’s he came to be in this situation putter out. The minibot taps his hip with the rifle muzzle, angling hard around the flyer’s half-burnt bulk to reach. He skirts further around the rockfall-turned-GHOST encampment until he finds the other Autobot.
They’re in root mode. Four wheels, lightweight, probably another minibot. Maybe these two had been scouting and got ambushed by GHOST. Maybe an opportunistic Decepticon got them. Or the Autobots made good on their “peace deal” and Sawhorse was about to get a helm full of plasma and lead despite his every effort not to. But as he cases his new patient, such as they are, he recognizes the problem.
Spark breach. Sickly blue and green light shines out from under the ‘bot’s chest plating, where the integrity has been smashed to nothing. Dried energon sticks like glue to most of the broken surfaces, creating a sparkling veneer across the body. Hastily-welded bandages make patchwork of the rest of her which is almost as frightening as the diagnosis of standing next to an unstable bomb.
“She’s not dead,” the Autobot says, still jamming the gun in his hip.
Sawhorse feels his ventral exhaust ports open up wide. Hot air rushes out of him in a whoosh.
He is so, so tired.
“What’s your name, Autobot?”
He turns his head to look down at the red minibot. He watches their optics twist and rotate, clearly sizing Sawhorse up.
“Cliffjumper,” he confesses eventually. “What does that matter? Can’t you just fix her and we’ll never see each other again? What’s a medic—”
Carefully, but also not that carefully because if Cliffjumper’s trigger discipline slipped he wouldn’t really care, Sawhorse grabs the rifle out of their hands and throws it behind them. It clicks and pings pathetically, the mechanisms jostled into a misfire with nothing to fire. From Cliffjumper’s non-reaction, that must’ve been the case from the start.
“She’s dead, Cliffjumper. You must know what a spark breach is.”
They’re rare, is the thing, even with the war going on as long as it has, rarer still now that the fight’s on a planet with less-capable technology. But you have to know what they look like unless you want a corpse to take out half your force. The sheer power of a destabilized spark is the only thing making Sawhorse consider Primus a real thing, really. Still, he keeps his gaze steady with Cliffjumper’s, swaying with the bulk of his load, hoping that he can run before they wake up.
Cliffjumper turns his head away. His arms fall to his side, hands limp, curling around nothing.
“We have to get out of here,” Sawhorse urges.
“And just let her—” Cliffjumper’s voice pitches and cascades, terminating in a cry of anguish.
Autobots display grief openly. It wracks the minibot in physical waves. Sawhorse has half the mind to reach out and comfort him but his patient is starting to power back on. They don’t have much time.
Abruptly, Cliffjumper clamps the rifle to the mag-clamps on his back and tumbles into alt-mode. There’s no goodbye, no formal release, just muddy tracks where he flees. He broadcasts an open emergency signal, readable by all, a warning. Sawhorse spares a cycle to repeat it on a relay and hurries off in the opposite direction.
The collapsing spark will create a radioactive crater, toxic to the lifeforms of this planet. Maybe one of the warring factions will try to clean it up, or the humans will use it as an excuse to increase hostilities, or maybe nothing will happen at all.
It’s not Sawhorse’s to know or care about. After all, he’s just a medic.
My half of an art trade with @twilighthomunculus where Ryousuke and Kyoichi of Initial D fame get divorced. Absolute blast to write, I love this pairing, especially when it's broken.
They've caught the Family's diner in the twixt hours of graveyard and Sunday rush. There's a few too many staff milling the restaurant for a floor that is devoid of all but three customers and the occasional rattle can be heard from the kitchen, a warning for the traffic to come. Still, they're given a wide berth at their lonely corner booth, shielded from the rising sun by a support column painted soft yellow and stained with the shadows of rotating posters and signage.
Whether the distance is because of the hour or the sheer state of their table, Ryousuke doesn't know nor care, so long as their waiter has the peace of mind to keep his coffee cup full. Occasionally, he eyes the perpetually empty glass on Kyoichi's side of the table, remnants of orange juice pooling at the bottom. A desire for sugar wavers in and out of his consciousness, the hindbrain baying for something other than acid on an empty stomach, but he ignores it. The sheaf of papers in his hand is far more important.
"I do not understand how your name got attached to so many of my belongings," Ryousuke grouses. "And I know I did some of this sober."
Kyoichi snorts. "I know you did, I was there. Thank God I barely had anything for you to take."
"As if I'd want it."
Kyoichi doesn't reply, so Ryousuke returns his focus to their documentation. They'd been married for just over a year, a surprising length of time given their shared proclivities, which was just enough time to muddle their lives legally as well as socially. And they hadn't even made it to the court yet-- this was all preliminary.
At the very least, their shared apartment was in Gunma, for as much as either of them used it. Ryousuke remembered the tedious process of acquiring the space vividly-- the fight that followed. He grimaces and reaches for his coffee, only to wrinkle his nose when he realizes the cup is empty.
"I got you some water instead," Kyoichi says, breaking his silence. "So you don't shrivel and die before you hit your residency."
His smile is bared teeth. Kyoichi's never gotten the hang of smiling, but neither has Ryousuke, so they grimace at each other, honest as anything. Their expressions fall at the exact same time until the waitress comes by to hedge about maybe ordering some food, you know, the kitchen's getting fired up for the rush... And I'll get you some more coffee, sir, as you please...
There's a light in Kyoichi's eyes that often precedes a lost battle on Ryousuke's part, so the latter wordlessly gathers their papers together and pulls out the discarded diner menus from earlier.
---
Their vehicles stick out like sore thumbs in the rather neglected parking lot of the court house. The Evo III is a stocky, stealthy little thing, but the bulging fascia and lowered suspension betrays its intentions. A parking space away from it, the gleaming white FC RX-7 glares balefully at its owner, as if irritated by the rain sliding down its sleek roof lines.
Ryousuke passes the cigarette to Kyoichi, watching him take a long drag, tension easing out of his shoulders the more deeply he breathes in. Then he keeps it in his possession, smoke pouring out of his mouth in one swirling cloud as he speaks.
"When did Seiji and Fumihiro become friends?" He asks, slightly hoarse. "Are we being stood up at our own divorce meeting? What the hell?"
Ryousuke can't help it-- he laughs.
"Well, it's not like we're in a hurry. It's amicable, remember?"
Kyoichi ashes, then hands it back over to Ryousuke. "You're dodging the question."
"I don't keep tabs on Fumihiro, you know."
Fumihiro, despite his earnestness and intrinsic need to please, was slippery. And crafty. And frustratingly immune to whatever Ryousuke threw at him, which was a lot more than most people got. Seiji, on the other hand-- Ryousuke had no idea what Kyoichi got out of him and it wasn't his business to know.
(He'd tried, once, after a fight).
A high-pitched growl snaps Ryousuke's attention to the road. It's a familiar bubbling sound, the blitz of a roadster coasting down the road with unremitting joy.
The car is Fumihiro's and the way the little car glides to a stop next to the FC-- it's him driving, too. But Seiji climbs out first, stiff and awkward and tail on fire. Ryousuke watches him cross the parking lot straight to Kyoichi's side with disdain.
Once Fumihiro is at his side, he drops the cigarette to the ground and grinds it out with his heel. The ash will stick to his just-cleaned shoes, but he doesn't care.
"Let's get going," Ryousuke says shortly.
Kyoichi raises an eyebrow, cool and judgmental, but shoves Seiji into following after everyone inside the court house.
After all, they need witnesses, just as they needed them for when they got married.
---
The bedroom in the apartment is kept in darkness through blackout curtains on the windows which keep out the signage in the parking lot and the morning sun. The curtains are grimy to the touch as Kyoichi pulls them back, letting the outside world in an inch at a time, making up for the burnt out lightbulb. A fine layer of dust covers everything, including the discarded clothes littering the floor.
Most of them are his, of course. There'd been a time where he seriously considered moving out here, but, well.
He'd meant to start picking up the place. Instead, Kyoichi settles down on the bed, running a hand through his hair. It's longer than he likes and the roots are starting to show, dark flashes in bleach blond waves. His throat and chest are tight with an unnamed, amorphous restriction, too hot to be grief, not cold enough for anger. By the time he can swallow it back down, he's trembling and his eyes are stinging.
Still, he creeps across the room, scooping up the forgotten clothes and tucking them under his arm. They're cool to the touch. Some of them still smell of expensive cologne, of Ryousuke, the only part of him that ever manages to stay behind. Kyoichi breathes through it long enough to toss everything in a bag he hung on the door knob.
Then he shuts the door with a resounding click.
"This sucks," Kyoichi groans. "I think I actually love him, for it to be this hard."
The apartment thumps in response, a neighbor slamming their door shut.
"Seiji was right, callin' me some bleedin' heart. Whatever."
Kyoichi throws the bag over his shoulder and meanders the limited square footage of the apartment. It's just enough to be more than a studio, but not enough to be noticeable on a Takahashi ledger, especially with how sparingly they use their utilities. The place is mostly spare tools and old car parts. Jugs of old oil and coolant both of them have been too lazy to dispose of. He resists the urge to kick a bottle over as he ducks back out of the apartment and into the hot summer air.
Later, he'll come back. For his tools and everything in between.
Just a little bit later.
---
"Thanks for meeting me out here," Fumihiro says, catching Keisuke's eye over the rim of his coffee mug. "This is still your favorite place, right?"
Foam sloshes over his cup as he sets it back down onto the table with too much force. Keisuke hovers by the curb, squinting against the daylight, motorcycle helmet gripped tightly in gloved hands.
Fumihiro kicks a chair out for him so by the time he saunters over, he has a place to sit. The metal creaks and scuffs against the cobblestone patio-- a slice of French design on the fringes of the big city.
Why a French-styled cafe was Keisuke's favorite, neither of them dwell on. Instead, Fumihiro delays responding, as if the bearer of too great a burden. He smiles tightly.
"Your brother is getting a divorce."
Keisuke tilts his head to the side, alarmed.
"When did he even get married? How long has he...?"
"Oh, not very long. It was a very impulsive thing in Kanagawa. But I'm telling you so you know, because he won't tell you himself."
The chair creaks louder. Keisuke pushes back on it so that he balances precariously, preciously, on the back two legs. Then he drops back on all fours with a tremendous clang.
It's one of those things. Loud secrets. He hasn't seen his own brother in what, six months? He finished school, sure, but as soon as he could, he fled home. The squirrely little man sipping a latte in front of him is the only reason either of them are alive, most likely.
"Who'd he even get hooked up with?" Keisuke asks finally.
Fumihiro smirks, even showing teeth. "Kyoichi Sudo. I forget, have you met him?"
Keisuke's jaw drops. "He got with a guy? THAT guy?"
Fumihiro hides a smile behind his hand.
---
It's raining again when they gather outside the court building. Lightning flashes in the distance. Water sluices freely from Kyoichi's umbrella now that it's folded, just narrowly missing his feet. He shakes it out delicately while Ryousuke waits, holding the door open.
"Delaying the inevitable, Sudo?" Ryousuke asks tartly.
"Fuck off."
Satisfied he won't be trailing water everywhere, Kyoichi ducks into the building, nerves alight. The interior smells like citrus, smoke, and dust. A clock on the wall stares down at them and counts the seconds left until their appointment.
Until their dissolution.
Ryousuke flits past him, shoulders squared and back straight, wrapped in the same haughtiness he bore when they first met. Even in their last moments, he won't afford either of them the decency of vulnerability, of defeat. His shoes click definitively against the gray tile.
The entire process has left Kyoichi feeling dull and hollow. Driving hasn't been able to penetrate it, nor has drinking. Neither of them had meant to get married necessarily -- so why did the separation take so long?
The door to their consult is already open. Kyoichi only steps past the threshold when Ryousuke does. A candle is burning in the corner, adding to the assault on the senses.
"Good to see you both, gentleman. Let's go over the conditions one more time."
They sit. Kyoichi ignores the side-eye from the comet and tries not to wish they'd brought Seiji and Fumihiro along again. He realizes he's barely listened to their consult when he's suddenly being given a pen.
"You'll need to sign the notice before I can submit it. It's a bit of a busy time federally, so it may be a while longer before the papers are processed..."
Kyoichi puts ink down, jotting his name on the form with short, choppy strokes. It looks huge next to Ryousuke's finer script.
"Will we be notified when it's through?" Ryousuke asks.
"You'll get a letter in the mail, of course," he says gravely. "Thank you both for your cooperation."
All three of them stand with the faint scuff of chair against hard flooring and bow.
Somehow, Ryousuke keeps pace with him on their way out. Kyoichi feels lightheaded. Months of fuckery culminating in what, just a signature and some processing time? It didn't make any sense.
He didn't know why he felt so torn.
"You gonna think of me when I'm gone, Ryousuke?" Kyoichi coughs out once they're outside.
The rain's let up some. A bit of blue sky peeks out of the clouds.
Ryousuke digs his car keys out from his pocket and watches the metal glint off the low light.
"I'm going to try not to, really," he replies. "You know I'm not the sentimental type."
There's really only one good place to perform what can tangentially, maybe, probably, be considered "health check-ups", and it is at the lowest level of the fuel processing facility, so far below the earth and away from the sun that no one except the specialists and the punished go down there. But the patient today is Big Ugly, and fitting both of you down here is a miracle. And doing it without getting caught- well, you'll be getting tapped for favours for a while.
Nonetheless.
"You're sayin' your spark feels funny?"
You don't know anything about sparks or spark care or how they even work.
Big Ugly just looms down at you from where he is scrunched down on the floor, limbs mashed to his body. In the emergency lighting, it's difficult to see him properly, but maybe the transformation seams and the panel gaps in his chest-torso area do look a little... odd. Or maybe his paint is fading?
"Yeah," Big Ugly breathes. "Somethin' wants to come out."
You're not sure what he wants you to do about it. It's not like you have your tools (and that's a loose definition, there) with you. But he came to you for a reason, because you vaguely know first aid is, and...
"Well, let me get a look at you," you say, trying to make your voice firm.
When he moves his arms back, old paint and rust shower the room. The lively hue of healthy bare metal peaks out from under the scrape marks. You ease your way forward, reaching a hand out to physically inspect the condition of the plating composing his broad chest and shoulders, and his windshield.
"You got your windshield fixed?" You ask, surprised.
You'd been trying to get that part for him fabricated for ages now, but he shakes his head with a grinding noise.
"Nah."
"What do you mean, "nah"-- augh!"
Abruptly, the segmented plating closest to his transformation seams whip into life, splitting the big rig evenly down the middle. Blinding light pours out of his body-- but that's not where a spark should be-- what the hell is that thing?
A spherical case with metal handles hovers in the air between the two of you. Images flood your brain, claws rifle through your thoughts, invasive and mean and desperate.
You reach for it, blindly, but just as your finger tips graze the gold case, it dissolves into dust.
Big Ugly stares, exposed mouth twisted into a hard grimace.
You try to keep your footing and fail. He has to hold you up by your spoiler.
