Five individuals, three clunking, tromped through the front door of the Tenryo household.
"Hi mom!" shouted Ikki experimentally, but no one answered. He checked the shoe rack and noted that her loafers were gone, meaning she was probably out getting something from the store. Salty, however, marched up to the group with a welcoming wag of his tail. Before they could kick off their shoes, Terror-Wulf was ahead of them and kneeling, patting the dog on its head. Salt huffed, enjoying the attention, and then moved off to go doze on the welcome mat.
"You like dogs?" Erika inquired with a gentle smile, curious of the dimensions between the wolf medabot and a 'similar' species.
Wulf didn't look back before standing again and moving forward cautiously. "All animals."
Ikki shot a look at Erika, who didn't seem phased by the lack of conversation. Boy, it sure wasn't going to be easy living with this one ... having Metabee was enough!
The brown bot looked wearily around the kitchen, almost as if experiencing the surroundings for the first time. She opened cupboards, checked out the fridge, and, with a bit of a stretch, fiddled with the taps on the sink. Suddenly the bot flinched with a yelp, a rise of electricity passing briefly over her head. With a shudder, the wolfbot turned around, scowling.
"Something's different, what's different!" Wulf snarled, her tinpet quivering at short intervals.
It took a moment for any of the four still emerging from the doorway to notice anything. Ikki picked up on it first.
"Uh, your left eye is green."
Terror-Wulf paused, lifting her robotic hand half way up, as if ready to touch it, before turning away. The newly heterochromatic bot continued on through the house, grumbling faintly.
Metabee, Brass, Erika and Ikki spread out - Ikki went for the lemonade, while Erika took a seat on a chair at the table. The two humans were sweating, and the two medabots weren't feeling so slick either with their systems overheating. Erika felt Brass's armor as she passed to go sit on the couch, giving a 'yeeeouch!' as she swiped her hand away.
"Brass, you could fry an egg! Ikki, why's the air conditioning not on?"
What had felt like a cool retreat upon entering the house was now marginally less hot than outside. Ikki listened intently, and, upon hearing no whirr, abandoned the quest for lemonade to go and search out the problem. Erika sighed, got up, and began making the same drinks. Until she heard a roar of agony from down stairs.
"Ikki?!" Metabee asked, turning to go and see what was the matter - but that was when Ikki came slumping up the stairs. "Dad ... took the air conditioner ... to his office!" Wailed the young medafighter. Erika groaned, and Metabee sighed.
"I've got an idea. Lets put the sprinklers on and jump through them, okay? It won't be so bad. But after drinks. I'm thirsty."
Ikki grinned. "Good idea! Metabee, wanna go set that up?"
Metabee grumbled about slavery and over heating, but made to go toward the sliding door - when it slid open. Terror-Wulf stepped through it an out to the yard, giving the slightly yellowing grass a good once over before taking a seat on the lowest step, chin in her hands.
"Grump," Metabee commented upon passing.
"Pet," replied the rogue.
Metabee scowled, walking over to the tap. The twirling sprinkler began spinning, releasing gentle streams into the grass. Metabee immediately walked over and took a seat, steam rising off his armor as water peppered the yellow paint.
Brass appeared through the door. "Erika and Ikki are finishing their drinks and then coming out," the sailor-type stated dutifully, scooting around the unenthusiastic wolf type and approaching the soaking Medabot. She took a seat next to the beetle type and sighed contentedly as the water hit her. "This is better..."
"You're telling me ..."
Caught up in the moment of bliss, Metabee looked over at the pouting Wulf before laying back.
"You know, we don't bite ... Come on in, you know you're hot too. You know, in the temperature way."
Wulf stared at him as though he'd turned purple.
Then she raised one arm and casually shot just ahead of Metabee's foot, effectively startling him up and cutting off the end of the hose. The spiralling water slumped and stopped. Water spewed from the new hose opening.
"What is your DEAL?!" Metabee snarled, standing. Brass remained sitting, hesitant. Ooh, Erika wouldn't want them tearing apart Ikki's yard ...
"Please, let's all calm down," she quietly tried to persuade them, but it was a bit late - Wulf had stood as well, though didn't seem intent on rising to the challenge. The she-bot glanced at the two before casually moving off and examining the garden's contents - a few widely spaced flowers. Mrs. Tenryo had only finished the front yard so far.
The sienna brown medabot kneeled and gingerly fiddled with some dead leaves - and, upon lifting one radar antennae in the form of a long, slender but not unsightly 'ear' tilting up from her helm, turned.
In time to get a blast of water to the visor, naturally.
With a yowl like a banshee, Wulf leapt to the side, barely keeping ahead of the vast spray now trailing her as Metabee struggled not to wind himself up in the remaining hose. One of his metal fingers was pressed firmly over the end, forcing the pressure to direct the water out like some sort of endless super soaker from hell.
"Metabee!" Brass warned loudly, panicking - Wulf ran past the gaping doorway, and the water followed her ... shooting into the house so far it almost hit Salty, who was waiting for Mrs. Tenryo on the welcome mat.
"Oh sh-" yelped Metabee, green eyes wide against the black backdrop. His gaze drifted menacingly to Wulf, who laughed openly at his dismay.
"Ikki ... is gonna rip us apart!"
Brass fidgeted. She hated being in moments where she could be assumed as one of the troublemakers.
Metabee raised his arm in a moment of irritation, aiming the laser cannon barrel at the now solidly standing Medabot.
Wulf lunged, unable to resist the call to battle, Brass tried to move in front, but Metabee advanced in hopes of protecting the sailor-type.
Of course, as in in slow motion, all three landed in heaps with nothing to show for their efforts. The water and fine silt had made perfect mud amidst the grass.
Wulf was up first, sending a hasty and badly aimed shot for the rolling yellow bot. He avoided it, and helped Brass up and away, smeared with mud along his side. He fired a round and caught his opponent on top of the shoulder - made only possible because she was mid-leap and about to seize his midsection. The two went flying, absolutely filthy, and created something of a dent in the ground a few feet away. They scuffled for a moment, tangled and caught in each other's armor, when suddenly Ikki's voice came bursting out of the entryway.
"What is going on h-!"
Obviously he hadn't noticed the water all over the kitchen floor, because Ikki, in his swimming trunks and half way out the door, took a slip and landed face-first into the floor.
The fight stopped for a moment, both Medabots pausing to see the outcome. Ikki slowly raised his head to reveal a long red mark. His eyes were aflame with a curious craze.
"Met..a..BEE!"
Ikki lunged for his beetle-type. Metabee panicked and aimed the hose for his fighter's leaping form. A jet of water caught the kid in the face, but due to gravity and momentum, he still got the better end of the deal - Metabee was plunged into mud along with the black haired boy. Both of them growled, each trying to push the other away, but soon it turned to laughter and it was eventually evident that they weren't angry. Erika appeared in the doorway, carefully avoiding the slick tiles, and looked to Brass, who was mostly clean.
"Where's Wulf?"
Metabee and Ikki stopped mid-action, blinking. Not again. A quick glance around the yard said all that needed to be said. The wolf-type was gone.
The brown bot skidded around the corner, panting. She watched the house at a distance just long enough to see the kids emerge from the door, muddy and obviously searching for her. Terror-Wulf retreated, stepping backwards in an attempt to keep them in her sights. That was when she backed into another pair of human legs.
Samantha turned, looking to see who'd bumped her. Upon spotting the medabot, she scowled.
"Huh! A medabot. Who's your fighter?"
Wulf stood silent, perplexed. Almost like an animal playing dead, she prayed this human would leave her be if she didn't answer. Instead, Samantha leaned down and inspected the bot with an thoroughness that had the bot scowling and stepping back.
"You gonna answer?"
Suddenly Spyke appeared from the gate Wulf hadn't noticed before. An unfamiliar bot followed him, blue and armed. "Sorry it took so long Boss! Krosserdog accidentally put it in my Mathematics binder. It's done thou- whoa!" Spyke stepped back. "Wow Boss, Peppercat looks different!"
"It's not Peppercat you moron!" Samantha snarled furiously. "It's someone else's medabot."
Spyke gave an 'oh', then leaned forward over the wolf-type to examine the newcomer. "Looks like a weird version of Cog-Lupos, kinda. Anyways, new bot, I'm Spyke, and this is Krosserdog."
Krosserdog bent in a light bow. "Nice to meet you."
Terror-Wulf barely managed a nod. She looked over her shoulder to try and see the two humans with their medabots, and could have sworn she saw a glint of yellow. "I'm ... I'm lost. I don't know where my medafighter is. She's a girl with ... brown, curly hair." That sounded pretty non-descript. Samantha took note of this.
"Hmm, plenty of those around. What's her name?"
Oops, forgot to mention. What kind of Medabot didn't know her fighter's name? "An...nie."
Samantha looked thoughtful. Spike seemed more interested in the new wolf-type.
"You robattle before?" He asked mischeivously, eyeing Krosserdog. The dog-type gave a long 'uhhh...' of hesitation. Terror-Wulf backed up a step and put up her fists.
"Of course I have! You wanna go?"
"You don't have a medafighter," commented Samantha.
"I've don't have - ... to have her around, because I was trained to remember certain strategies. Let's go."
Krosserdog placed his feet into a fighting stance. "Alright. I'll go easy on you, because you don't have your master guiding you."
Terro-Wulf growled under her breath. "I don't have a master!"
Samantha began reading the essay that Spyke had gotten for her from inside his house, apparently uninterested. "Peppercat, transport."
A red cat-type appeared. She looked to Samantha for direction after briefly glancing at the wolf-type. "Watch the battle. Pick up some info on how the brown one fights - could be useful for later." Then she sat down and began correcting some errors. The red cat stood, placid.
"Okay, Krosserdog. Shoot for the shoulder!"
Terror-Wulf stared at the blue dog-type as he raised his shooting arm, stepping easily out of the way. He'd just shouted his tactic for her to hear ... didn't that defeat the purpose?
The sienna bot raised her own firing arm, shooting three shots toward the middle of the blue dog-type. The first hit him squarely, and, as he fell back, the second caught his shoulder - the third barely missed the same spot, for he'd fallen out of range. Wulf was upon him in the blink of an eye, lunging to land on top and secure her legs around her opponent so that she could pummel his upper body. As she landed, hands thrusting to push down his shoulders, a luckily placed leg on Krosserdog's part caught her squarely on her right hip.
A wave of fuzziness overwhelmed her circuits, causing the medabot to topple off with a moan, putting her hand to the side and steadying herself as Spyke's dog-type righted himself and aimed. Wulf stood, unwilling to take such an easy shot, but tilted and swayed as she moved to the side, lacking any and all luster. She wobbled before falling to her knees. Right. How could she have forgotten?
"Wait," she croaked, muffled behind a hiss of static over her vocal processors. "I'm not supposed to be robattling."
Samantha didn't look up. Spyke gave a snort of discontent. "Well why did you start if you weren't going to finish!"
Krosserdog, on the other hand, looked slightly relieved that the battle had ended in something of a stalemate. He offered the fallen wolf-type a hand, but the stubborn rogue stood with her own strength, though shook slightly.
"Well, that was stupid. I'll see you at dinner Peppercat, transport." The red medabot vanished in a flash of light, leaving Samantha with her arms crossed and a stern look on her face.
"Spyke, lets take this inside."
"What? Why don't we find the medafighter?"
"Because. It's hot out. Besides, what if there's a reward? We'll wait for flyers to go up first."
"Good thinking Boss."
Wulf would have interrupted their plot with an instant cash-cut-off, but her head was a mix of static and white noise, and a strange humming. It only started to dim when she felt an arm around her shoulders.
"This way, please," guided Krosserdog as Spyke and Samantha took the lead. "My master might be able to fix you a bit. He's gotten very good at fixing medabots, seeing as I see a lot of damage."
Terror-Wulf didn't know whether to be more pitying of his 'master' comment or the idea that he was often injured. "Why do you call him that? He's not your master," asked Wulf with unintentional quietness. She had no quails with addressing the idea at full volume, humans nearby or not, but right now it felt as though speaking too loudly would break her servers. The sienna bot leaned into the similarly proportioned dog-type selfishly, not particularly aware of the tension Krosserdog adopted.
"He is. He is my very best friend, but I am also indebted to him for buying me parts, and housing me, and everything. Without Spyke, I would -"
"-never have to worry about parts, because they wouldn't get destroyed in robattles he puts you in."
Krosserdog frowned, looking at the stoic but unshakably icy she-bot. "But I like robattling."
They reached the door to Spyke's house - a tidy, non-descript blue building with a bland exterior, and the humans lead the way.
"Krosserdog, could you take that medabot to my room? Boss and I are just going to make some lemonade."
"What is with humans and this lemonade?" Wulf asked offhandedly, a deep curiosity marring her cool tone.
Krosserdog shrugged, helping the brown wolf-type down the hall. They emerged into a boy's room. There were medabot posters on the wall, and multiple framed photographs of Spyke and Krosserdog or Cyandog scattered throughout the room. "My old body," explained the blue bot.
"I guessed." Terror-Wulf moved away from the dog-type's support and lost the shakiness almost instantly. She could hear the humans speaking below, readying 'lemonade'.
"I sometimes wish I could taste," Krosserdog suddenly mentioned, looking thoughtful. He moved and sat on the ground, before looking up to see Wulf planting her mud-slathered tin on his master's bed.
"O-o-oh! Er, please - would you be able to take a seat, er, with me? I mean, on the floor?"
The she-bot crossed her arms stubbornly, offhandedly examining a canon. "Why, pets not allowed on the furniture?"
"No, but you're quite dirty."
Wulf tilted her head, and looking down, noted the mud now smeared on the bedspread around her brown flanks. "Oops," she stated without true enthusiasm, though slipped off the mattress and took a seat on the floor, facing the dog-type.
"What is your name?" Krosserdog asked conversationally as Wulf snatched a wind-up medabot from beneath the bed. The sienna bot barely looked up at him before returning to the supposedly more interesting trinket.
"Terror-Wulf, but Wulf is easier."
Krosserdog gave a metallic laugh. "Like Beowulf. I helped Spyke with some essays on that story just last month."
Terror-Wulf stared.
The blue bot rolled his tinpet's shoulders, giving a more hesitant, appeasing laugh.
"Would you like to go for a walk?" Wulf asked bluntly, rousing a stutter from her companion.
"If Spyke doesn't mind coming."
"Spyke doesn't have to come."
"... Well I must ask him if he would like to, and if I am allowed."
Terror-Wulf sneered. Pathetic! Brainwashed in to being utter slaves. "You shouldn't have to ask to do mundane things like walking around. If he wants you, he'll call you. Besides, Medabots have personalities and spirit for a reason - so we can make our own choices."
Krosserdog folded his arms. "I will ask my master, and if he says yes then I will come with you."
The sienna bot shuffled closer intentionally, causing the dog-type to try and wiggle discreetly away. She didn't buy it. "Come on ... don't you want to do something fun? Your whole life is orders. He's just getting a drink, and I'm sure he doesn't want to be disturbed with your simple questions. He'd probably say 'Krosserdog, you know I'd say yes. Now I have to remake this lemonade because it sat here for a moment too long.' "
Krosserdog looked a bit iffed by this, and for a moment Terror-Wulf wondered if her tactless reasoning had been overruled. But then the blue bot unfolded his arms and stood. "Fine. But if I get in trouble then I'm saying you forced me."
Wulf looked mildly gleeful. Krosserdog grabbed a pencil from Spyke's homework and wrote a rough note that he left on the pillow, then made for the door - which gave the brown she-bot enough time to snatch the note and crumple it up before tossing it under the bed and following him.
"Let's go out this way," she murmured as Krosserdog looked to the front door, her own heterochromatic eyes trained on the sliding glass door through the parent's room. Before the dog-type could ask why, she strode across the carpet and yanked it open with only a gentle grind from the tracks. As soon as Krosserdog was through and closing it behind them, Terror-Wulf darted out of the yard and disappeared in to the underbrush.
Well, you can sortof get a shot of Terror Wulf's head if you go to deviantart. I'm cavada on there, and she's my icon ^^; as soon as I get a scanner, her pictures go up.