Author: Koi Lung Fish
Disclaimer: Based on characters and situations from The Transformers (© 1986 Hasbro, Ltd). Used without permission. Text © 2003, Koi Lung Fish (Mark of Lung. All Rights Reserved.)
Subject: Optimus Prime and Wheeljack discuss the creation of the Dinobots.
Continuity: G1 cartoon, Season 1, immediately following "War of the Dinobots."
"No, no, you don't need to go!"
Wheeljack's forced cheer was audible through the door. Optimus Prime felt his hands clench into fists, anger seething up from deep inside, from the cavity in his chest where the Matrix should rightfully lie.
Don't hide behind the humans, Wheeljack. This is a matter of Cybertron law, and as Primus is my guide, you must answer for what you have done. Perhaps the Matrix was still in the safe in his inner sanctum; perhaps it was in Wheeljack's workshop. He did not dare open the safe and find out. Tell me you are a thief, my friend; for the humans' sakes if not your own, tell me you have stolen the Matrix.
The door opened, and Spike backed out, wheeling Chip Chase, who waved cheerfully at the engineer.
"Thanks for the invitation to stay," Chip called, and he sounded genuinely saddened to be leaving. "We'll come back tomorrow, when we've had some sleep."
"Yeah," Spike laughed, as the door closed. "Talk about a long day … how long's it been since you spotted that meteor, anyway?"
"Two and a half days," Chip replied with a yawn. "I feel like I could sleep for a week!"
"I suggest you both get plenty of rest," Optimus interjected, startling the two humans.
"Prime!" Spike exclaimed. "We didn't see you there!"
"It is kind of dark in here," Chip continued, sounding frazzled.
"Bumblebee and Jazz are in the control room. I'm sure one of them will be happy to drive you both home," Prime nodded, keeping his composure as normal as possible. The two young humans gave him a cheerful good-bye, and went their way into the Ark's dim corridors. Prime resisted the urge to tell them to say an extra goodbye to Wheeljack. It may be some time before you see him again, he thought, torn between grief and rage.
Unable to put off the moment any longer, Prime commanded the door to open. Wheeljack looked up from his work, clearly afraid, seeing now the deep anger burning in Prime's optics. Unthinkingly, the Autobot leader grabbed the engineer by the throat and pinned him against the wall.
"They speak," he growled. "They reason. They are alive. Wheeljack – what have you done?"
"I proved we were right," the engineer choked, forcing fuel through crushed lines to his vocal array. "I gave them life."
"You planned it all along," Prime accused. "You – you and Ratchet!"
"Leave him out of this! He had no part in it!" Wheeljack panted. "If you want to blame someone, blame me. It was my work that gave them souls."
"They have no souls," Prime replied. "They are alive without souls – Wheeljack, you have made monsters!"
"They're not monsters! My Dinobots are just as alive as you or me!" Wheeljack slid to the floor, released from Prime's trembling grip. "When I put those new circuit upgrades in, they spontaneously generated language, logic, identity – all the signs of a new Cybertronian soul!"
Prime's fist impacted into the wall beside the engineer's head. "If they have souls, they were not made by Primus," he said, low-voiced beneath the weight of wrath. "Unless you tell me that you broke into my quarters, accessed my sealed safe and took the Matrix to give them life, you have performed an act of abomination in the sight of Primus. You have given sentience to drone machines."
"They're alive, Prime! You said it yourself! Even the Decepticons treat them as living beings!"
"The Decepticons assume I used the Matrix to give the Dinobots life!" Prime shouted. "If he knew what you had done, Megatron would stand shoulder-to-shoulder with me to condemn you."
"You can condemn me, you can punish me, you can destroy me if you want, but you can't change the facts!" Wheeljack yelled, head-panels flashing an orange almost red so intense was his emotion. "I created souls!"
"Impossible!" Prime dismissed the insistence with a swipe of his hand. "You cannot create souls! Only Primus – through Vector Sigma and the Matrix – can do that!"
"Cling to that all you want, the Dinobots have souls! Look into their optics and deny they have souls!"
Prime grabbed Wheeljack's wrists. "Tell me you stole the Matrix," he ordered, fervid, almost frantic. "Tell me you have it hidden somewhere here. Tell me you will put it back, so next time I open the safe it will be there as if it had never been gone. Wheeljack, tell me you are a thief and not a maker of monsters."
"I've been working for this all my existence," Wheeljack replied with surprised calm, stunned by the order. "I'm no thief and I've made no monsters."
"Please, Wheeljack," Prime begged. "Tell me you used the Matrix. Tell me I only have to punish you for thievery. Tell me I don't have to stand before the Autobots and denounce you."
In Wheeljack's optics gathered a calm, as of seas placid before the last storm of all time. "I will not recant," he said softly, "and I will not lie."
"You know what will happen," Prime hushed. "You know what must happen."
Still calm as time, Wheeljack shook his head softly. "It's a small price to pay. I'm not afraid. I'll stand before the Autobots and say it – I'll say it to the Decepticons if you make me: with my own two hands, without divine or human intervention, I gave the Dinobots souls."
"You may have given them life, but they do not have souls," Prime insisted, trying to marshal his temper that flared with each such declaration. "I will accept that they are alive, Wheeljack. When the first spoke to me at the meteor crash site, I knew that they were more than drones. When I saw them fighting with the Decepticons, I felt inside myself that they were alive, sentient beings that could think and feel and deserved to live, not be destroyed by a chance explosion. I will not have them shut down. I will accept that they are sentient beings … but I cannot accept that they have souls."
"Grimlock asked me why you won't forgive him," Wheeljack said darkly. "I don't know what he was apologising for, and I don't intend to ask –"
"They tried to destroy me," Prime stated, glad of the topic reprieve. "Megatron deceived them whilst they were guarding the meteor, and they attacked me. Grimlock thought that he was stronger than I, and that he should rule."
Wheeljack's shoulders slumped, and his wings hung low. "I'm sorry. It's all my fault … if I'd had the courage to tell you they were alive, instead of hoping that they wouldn't speak to anyone, just hoping that the Autobots would get used to the Dinobots before realising they were truly alive, that whole incident might never have happened."
"I accept your apology," Prime replied quietly. "And I will accept Grimlock's. Wheeljack –" He laid his hand upon the engineer's shoulder. "I know that you meant no harm, and that you did what you did without ill will, but … the law of Cybertron demands recompense for your actions."
Wheeljack raised a defiant stare. "I refuse to lie and I refuse to recant. The law of Cybertron demands you gather everyone here, and before them denounce me as a heretic and … destroy me."
"I cannot do that," Prime replied, choking on the thought. "We need you, Wheeljack, and more than that, you are a friend to me. I cannot – I will not – destroy you." He bowed his head, feeling the cold emptiness of his chest ache and throb.
"There are some who will not feel that way," Wheeljack reminded him flatly. "If I'm not shot in the back or beaten to scrap in a dark corridor, they'll abandon me to the Decepticons."
Prime looked up in surprise. "You knew," he realised. "Even before you did this, you knew it would mean your death."
"I've lived in the shadow of permanent deactivation since the moment I was made," Wheeljack replied. "I just made up my mind to spend what time I had left as best I could. From the moment Slag spoke, I knew my hours were numbered."
"So you made improved brains for Snarl and Swoop."
"I had to prove it could be done. I gave them all life. I gave them souls." Wheeljack's gaze was clear and unafraid. "I'm not ashamed of what I've done." He held up one hand, palm towards Prime, fingers spread. "Five new souls. I've given the Autobots five new souls."
Prime turned away, not trusting his hands. "You have given us five dangerous, almost uncontrollable soldiers. Any one of them could wreak havoc."
"Any one of us could wreak havoc!" Wheeljack gesticulated. "On Earth, even Bumblebee could cause massive destruction."
"That's not the point!" Prime shouted, wheeling around suddenly.
"Then what is the point? That I'm a heretic? Go on! Say it! I'm sick of these taboos, I'm sick of hiding behind a mask of orthodoxy! Primus doesn't care about us, we're insects to him!"
"Blasphemer!" Prime roared. Without thinking, he struck Wheeljack, tumbling him to the ground. "Primus cares more deeply about every one of us than you can even begin to understand."
"Then why the War?" Wheeljack yelled, sitting up. "Why the death? Why the millions and millions of lives, gone? Why, Prime, tell me – why?"
"I don't know," Prime sighed, again the anger flowing from him. "Even I don't know what Primus plans."
"Primus doesn't care," Wheeljack stated flatly. "He doesn't care if we rule Cybertron or if the Decepticons do. He doesn't care if civilians die. He doesn't care if everything that was beautiful on our world is destroyed because we're all too damn stubborn to talk to each other!"
"Is that it?" Prime wondered. "Is that what you truly think? That the War started because we didn't talk to the Decepticons?"
"No!" Wheeljack snapped as he stood up. "Autobot, Decepticon, whatever, it doesn't matter. We're all sitting on what we believe in, choking it down like bad fuel, repressing, letting it poison our souls until we're all so full of hate and bias that we can't accept that someone else can see things differently to us. If we could all just talk about it, if we could just stop building walls just because … because you're Metaorthodox and I'm a Machinist … don't you think, just maybe, just perhaps, we wouldn't need to fight? If we can accept the differences between us over Primus, then surely such a little thing as engineering differences between Autobots and Decepticons can't be so hard to overcome?"
On Cybertron, even before the War, to openly declare yourself a Machinist … even in our brightest days, you would have died for that, Prime thought. You are willing to die for what you believe, even though you know you could keep silent and live on in peace …you stand for what you believe, and you do not waver, even though every Cybertronian on Earth might call for your destruction. How can I condemn you and still claim to believe in universal freedom? Your courage makes me ashamed of my narrow-minded foolishness! He felt such an upwelling of sympathy inside him that he drew Wheeljack to him, bowing his head until their sensor crests touched.
"Wheeljack," Optimus Prime said solemnly. "I have wronged you, and I am truly sorry, not just for what I have said and done tonight but for everything I have said and done to help build these walls. The Creator Below did not intend us to hate each other over our love for him. I … I will speak to the Autobots. All the Autobots. I will tell them that it is time for us all to recognise how high the walls between us have risen, and that it is time for us to tear them down. No longer will we stand divided and afraid."
"Thank you, Prime," Wheeljack replied.
"I'm not finished," Prime chided gently, taking Wheeljack's hands in his own. "I am going to find Grimlock now, and apologise to him. Whilst I am doing that, I will look at him, as I look at you now and see the soul within you, and if I see a soul in him, in them all, then when I speak to the Autobots, I will declare that the Dinobots are truly alive … and that you are the engineer of souls."
Author's notes & addenda:
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