Bedtime story
AN: I was having a bit of a issue where Orion Pax is the reborn Thirteenth and I can't just say Thirteenth because it doesn't really make sense when others have names and only one doesn't, so I decided to use Orion's name and pronounce it differently. Orion in his Golden days was pronounced O-righ-on, and the tale I used would be pronounced O-ree-on for the Thirteenth.
I'm following the Prime's Aligned Continuity because I'm more familiar with it rather than the major one. Oh, and I made one weapon for one of the Thirteen (It really doesn't make sense when others have artifacts when one doesn't). I may have tweaked the story of Thirteen as well. Just wanted to warn you guys all.
Enjoy.
One thing that Sari likes about her Cybertron heritage is that they always seem to have a story to tell. She was told they were just youngling tales, but she was surprised that these tales were important and considered as an education. She guessed that during throughout that long war and keeping those ancient stories close to your spark, would probably bring assurance and entertainment for others to share.
She was even more surprised when Bumblebee admitted that he loved these tales. It seems every Cybertronians; Decepticons and Autobots alike, still follow and reprise old tales of Golden Ages. She knows this because sometimes both she and Bumblebee would sneak out and listen to Decepticon's tales whenever they were bored. They got into trouble for it, but they were just curious is all.
But right now, she couldn't sleep, and she needed a bit of distraction as well as something to do until sleep overcome her. Decided, she stood up from her spot and walked out from her sleeping quarters.
She headed on to the kitchen area, hoping that eating something would probably help her. As she reached to the kitchen, she was surprised to see Ratchet awake, drinking his late night ration by the sight of it.
Ratchet saw the young techno-organic femme in the kitchen and as if he was contemplating whether if he would greet her or not, he just gestured her in the kitchen.
"Cou'dn't sleep?" Ratchet grunted as he took a sip from his Energon. Sari nodded her head as she hovered up to the table, maybe talking with Ratchet would help her with her sleeping problem.
Ratchet snorted, "Cou'dn't blame ya. So many things had happened so quickly; I won't be surprised that tonight's a slow day."
Sari nodded to that statement. It was true, with Megatron in prison, Sentinel being a temporary Magnus with Ultra on the way to his recovery, and Optimus and others being integrated back into Cybertron society was a huge hassle in the previous month that eveybot had nearly forgotten to relax.
It was good thing that everything had been settled, but Sari knew that this is only just a calm before a storm as there was news that the Energon Farm from where Bulkhead was from was being attacked by the Decepticons. Bulkhead had been clear that he had to go back to his hometown to help protect from the Decepticons.
It was a bit heart breaking for Bumblebee, since he knew that he won't be able to see his big friend and Sari for a long time because the Council had decided that Bumblebee was sent back to Earth with a new team to keep an eye out for any rogue Decepticons they've missed.
Probably that was why Sari couldn't sleep; Bumblebee and Bulkhead were like brothers to her and to have all three of them separated were a bit straining.
"Ya shou'dn't be worried about them too much younglin',"
Sari felt her revere being jolted back to her sight as she looked up at the old medic, "They're tough mechs, even though they're much more younglin's like ya."
Sari smiled at that, maybe that's true. Trust Ratchet to make her feel a bit better. Even though he's an old gramps to her, he's still a good one (she'd always wanted to have a grandparents that either spoiled her or watched out for her).
Thinking about grandparents, Sari felt like this was a perfect time to ask.
"Hey, Ratchet?" Sari heard the old bot grunt in acknowledgement, "Do you think you can tell me a story?"
"What?" Ratchet choked when he heard the question, "Sari, ya know that I'm a medic, not a story-teller."
"Please?" Sari meeped as she looked up at the old bot with her red pupils, "It can be the youngling tales, if you want."
"The one about Primus and Unicron?"
She smiled.
"Especially the one about Primus and Unicron."
"Alrigh'," Ratchet grunted as he stood up from his spot, his joints still squeaking in protest of his weight, "but we're gonna do this the righ' way."
Pumping her fist, Sari eagerly followed Ratchet back to her room, as it seemed to be a custom for Cybertronians to tell a tale to their younglings at their berth, which was similar to her Earth home. Her berth is very special, as it was custom made as her bed from Earth-soft beddings and all (she refused to sleep in the cold hard table they call bed) and thankfully, Bumblebee was actually smart enough to bring her favorite warm blanket to keep her warm.
She quickly jumped on to her bed, snuggling in as Ratchet pulled up the blanket to tuck her in to sleep. She knew that Ratchet doesn't admit it out loud, but he does see her as his adoptive grand-youngling.
"Now," Ratchet murmured, his voice surprisingly soft, "where do we start?"
"Can you start from where they were born?" Sari's voice was barely a whisper, stars in Cybertron shining in agreement of her request. Ratchet gave her his rare, sincere smile, as he moved the chair that was close by and sat on it, his joints finally gave its last squeak.
"Milliena ago, before life was known, there was only void. Many say that it was colored white, so white that there was no ending or beginning. Many even say that the void is sheer black, filled with unknown warmth and suffocation of closed space. There was no right answer to it you see? Because other than the true entity itself, no one knows what void truly is."
"However," Ratchet frowned as he held his servo out, "out from the Void, it exploded, Chaos reigning over the whole mass space around, leaving terrible destruction on its wake. Hungry for destruction, Chaos ate and recreates everything in the Void. There are legends that tell that Chaos is filled with vile creatures like Spark Eaters and Terracons, but that is a tale that is foretold in another. Chaos has a name that brought fear amongst all naive beings, Unicron as he bares that name in pride."
Sari can imagine this happening before her birth, seeing the large, metal planet eater emerging from the depth of the Void. She was even amused when Ratchet used servo gestures to create an image of what Unicron was like.
She just hoped she wouldn't meet the said Chaos bringer.
"Out from another Void," Ratchet continued, his smile upturning "Order was born to fight after Chaos, silently and slowly; Order swept his brother's destruction and healed them with his chastity and creativity, bringing justice and light to those in need. Many had called for his name and he has many names that many have called him. God, Creator, and the One. For us, he is known as Primus, our Cybertron."
Cybertron. Their home.
"Both of the brothers fought, never stopping, never ending. Creating a huge big bang of Nova across the space, creating more life, destroying life, mixing cosmos and creating time. The younger brother, Primus was tired of this never ending war with his destructive brother, so to hopefully defeat his older brother; he created the Thirteen."
Ratchet then got serious as he began to list the Thirteen and their birth-her favorite.
"Mind you," He pointed, "that the creation of the Thirteen wasn't easy, out from the brightest stars of cosmos, Primus had created his first creation, Prima; out from the fiery plains of Nebulas, Solus was born; from the rocky depths of the asteroids Amalgamous came to life; Onyx was born from the lost souls of ferocious beasts; from the cosmic energy, Micronus was created; from the combination of every elements in space, Alchemist had been created; from the strings of Time, Alpha Trion; Vector came out from the depth of the Primus's spark; Nexus was born by the five comets; Quintus was created from the Quasars; from the depth of dark matter, Liege Maximo was born; from the stolen Unicron's Energon and blessed from Primus himself, Megatronus had been created; and finally, but not least, Orion was born by a drop of Primus's Energon.
"For every one of them, Primus had gifted them their artifact of weapons to hopefully defeat Unicron.
"For his First, he gifted Prima the Star Saber.
"For his Second, he gifted Solus the Forge Hammer.
"For his Third, he gifted Amalgamous the Shifter Cog."
"-Our transformation cog, mind you." Ratchet winked at Sari as she giggled when Ratchet went back to telling her the story.
"For his Fourth, he gifted Onyx the Triptych Mask.
"For his Fifth, he gifted Micronus the Chimera Stone.
"For his Sixth, he gifted Alchemist the Lenses.
"For his Seventh, he gifted Alpha Trion the Quill
"For his Eighth, he gifted Vector the Blades of Time
"For his Ninth, he gifted Nexus the Enigma of Combination.
"For his Tenth, he gifted Quintus the Emberstone.
"For his Eleventh, he gifted Liege Maximo the Legian Darts.
"For his Twelfth, he gifted Megatronus with Requiem Blaster.
"And last, for his Thirteenth, he gifted Orion with Verity Bow."
Ratchet paused adding the effect to Sari as she leaned closer, waiting for the story to continue.
"And then what?" she wondered to him.
"After the Thirteen were gifted by Primus's gift, they put their life to fullest to help aid Primus on defeating Unicron. The battle was long, grueling and harsh that they nearly have lost each other.
"Unicron is an Illusionist, and he had used mind tricks on every Primes-their fears, insecurities, and had made them go against each other. Their trust for each other wasn't that strong when they were born, and it took nearly millennia for them to defeat Unicron.
"However, one of the Thirteen, Orion had been their peacemaker and had helped them all lead to the great victory of defeating Unicron, banishing him into the depth of the dark space where no planets were born. It was a great win, but with a price."
Sari gasped softly as she clutched her blanket. No matter how many times she heard this story, it still gives her the feeling of dread.
"Poor Primus," Ratchet shook his head forlornly, "he had been long injured by his older brother, wasn't able to sustain himself much that he had changed himself into a planet, the planet we known to call is as Cybertron. He gave his Thirteen a new mission, to watch over their new home. As he was laid to rest, he gave a tiny piece of his own spark to them before he left from their sight.
"From that small piece of his spark, its energy flowed and from Quintus's Emberstone, Solus's Forge Hammer and Amalgamous's Shifter Cog, a new species was made."
Sari smiled dreamily, a new species known as Cybertornians.
"The Primes accepted their Creator's request and Solus forged a special box to place their Creator's gifted tiny spark and placed it in the temple where it sat there for many stellar cycles. The Primes hadn't given the special artifact its name, but to us Cybertronians, we called it the All-Spark, the life giver."
"And that concludes our race's origin story." Ratchet finished up as he watched Sari nodded off into the dreamland. He smiled fondly at the young girl as he tucked her in again to make sure she was warm and comfortable. He slowly stood up from his spot as he headed to the Sari's window to look outside at the outskirts of Cybertron better.
Ratchet was glad enough to have that story out from his chest, as he watched the newly built Cybertron from the window. However, he was also saddened to the fact that Cybertron had also been ruined by multiple wars.
There used to be more various races born in Cybertron. There were races that were descended by Amalgamous, but had nearly been long extinct by the First War only few, like Whirl and Shockwave were the last of their kind. There were even old ancient beasts that were created by Onyx and Quintus, but all had been lost to the Second and Third War-there was nothing left, but only remains of their skeleton that was left at the Graveyard. Solus forged a new race of herself, but there were barely few left after the war, like Rosanna, Arcee, and other Femmes barely surviving from that last war. Micronus had given birth to Mini-cons, but they all have been abused and extinguished by the Sixth War. (It was surprising that Minibots were the descendant of the Mini-cons and Micronus-but that's a story for another time Ratchet mused)
While Primus had entrusted his Thirteen to watch over their home and children, they all have failed, unfortunately as Cybertron was doomed to have their violent history being repeated again. It felt as if it was a huge punishment from Primus himself, wanting to erase any of his Thirteen descendants off from history.
Ratchet felt a great dread from the depth of his spark as he joined his servos together, leaning in to them against Sari's window as he thought back deeply of everything that had happened from last few deca cycle. Decepticon sighting at the Energon Farm, Ultra still in hospital, Bumblebee being ready to be shipped off back at Earth, Decepticons still at large, and Megatron in prison.
It won't be long, he dreaded, until the new War had begun.