M sniffed at the ground, lightly digging through the snow where he thought he spotted something shiny.
He didn't understand why the smaller one— no, Aiden. Aiden was their name. —would want this kind of stuff; weird copper strings and glass circles. They didn't seem to serve any point in owning, other than maybe the simple fact that they were shiny. But if his young wanted something, M should get it.
It was a little funny when Aiden was trying to explain it to him, though. The dramatic gestures they made had no real meaning to him, but they were definitely entertaining. Thankfully, Chad managed to translate it a little better the second time.
Something seemed to spark lightly underneath his hull.
He wondered what Chad would like. If he was getting something for one, he might as well do the same for the other. He thought about what it'd be like if he had more young— going out every other night with a little list of things everyone requested. It was a nice fantasy, one he almost wanted to make into a reality.
Something rustled in the distance.
M perked up, chattering lightly. Something else crinkled, like thin metal being crushed, and he crouched down, hastily crawling underneath a fallen wall. He just barely peeked out as the footsteps drew closer.
"I can't believe I'm doing this."
Only part of M actually understood the voice. The rest of him was focused entirely on the especially small drone it belonged to.
"He's probably dead already," the purple-eyed drone continued, kicking a detached arm, "there's other disassembly drones out there, after all."
M recognized that word— well, the part of him that was listening did. Disassembly... it meant something to him, didn't it?
"That doesn't mean we can't look for his, uh, y'know... remains, like good samaritans or something," another one said as the two entered M's sight. This one was definitely a little taller, but had green eyes instead and something covering its hair. "And besides, we've got N with us, don't we?"
The purple-eyed one groaned, mumbling "bite me" under its breath as it sped up a little. When the other didn't follow its command, M assumed it wasn't being literal.
He watched them with great curiosity. These two— small, alone, defenseless —they were young as well. Especially the purple-eyed one. M didn't understand what the green thing it carried was for, though. Or why they were even out here in the first place.
The one with the hat looked up, perking slightly, "Oh hey, there he is now!"
Something shot down from the sky, landing in front of the two young with a cloud of dust. Or snow. Whatever, it was blocking his vision either way.
M then bristled as the cloud cleared.
A much taller drone was standing in front of them now, hair a silvery color that glowed in the moonlight, though mostly covered in a different style of hat than the green-eyed young. It was taller than the young— much taller. Enough that it could quite easily be around M's size. It was turned away from M so he couldn't see its face, but he didn't need to see it for every single panic protocol in his system to be activated.
Razor sharp wings folded back into its back, a tail ending in a familiar syringe of yellow liquid swishing lightly in the air.
Danger danger danger, his coding shouted at him nonsensically.
This thing was familiar, but not in the way that M knew who it was. More like...
He knew this was a predator.
Oh. And it was approaching those young.
M jumped up. One by one, each of his panic protocols switched into defense, and a growl boiled in his throat as he shot toward the trio.
The part of him listening stood back as the mantra in his head melted into protect.
"Did you find anything?" Thad asked.
N turned away sheepishly, feeling a little guilty, "No. Just an unfinished spire." He then jumped, a little more than anxious, "Speaking of which, we should really be getting back now because—"
Unfortunately, he couldn't finish his sentence before a large shape crashed in between them.
Uzi and Thad were thrown back into the snow, the latter crying out as the back of her head met a piece of scrap metal.
"BECAUSE THIS IS L, M AND X'S TERRITORY!!"
N panicked. He's never met M in person, but has definitely met his teammates and heard what they've said about him; he was like an animal, ripping apart worker drones and even offering the severed parts to his "friends," because why the heck not. He might've been worse than V, because at least she eats most of the remains of her victims. M leaves a lot of parts lying around, even burying a few "for later," which probably explained the amount of limbs around here.
Which, in turn, meant he was not going to be up for negotiating. Not that M ever acted like he understood negotiations.
N looked around, missing the slight flicker of pink in the other disassembly drone's visor, before getting the absolute worst idea ever. Which was better than nothing, but still the absolute worst.
Before he could act on it, Thad jumped in front of him. N was about to grab and throw the worker drone out of the way when M froze.
"What the hell are you doing, Thad!?" Uzi cried, aiming her railgun at M. She couldn't shoot him though, because then both Thad and N would be caught in her line of fire.
"He's not gonna hurt us!" Thad shouted, but he didn't exactly seem too sure of himself, "S-See?"
N looked past Thad's shoulder to see the X on M's visor flicker for a second, before switching to— pink?
Very slowly, Thad shuffled to the side. M watched him closely, making little chattering noises in his throat. His wings lowered, though didn't fold all the way in, and his tail flicked curiously from the ground.
Yeah, N didn't think this was normal.
N moved to follow before Thad held his hand out, "Don't move! I.. don't think he likes you…"
For some reason, that stung a little. But it's not like N wasn't going to listen.
So instead of following Thad, N carefully started inching towards Uzi, hoping not to catch the other disassembly drone's attention before he made sure she was okay.
As soon as N reached her, though, and started helping her up, he was immediately tackled to the ground.
"Oh, come on!"