Disclaimer: The Transformers, Beast Wars Transformers and Beast Machines Transformers all belong to Hasbro-Kenner. I don't own them, and with the attitudes of some fans, I don't think I want to. o.O The quote(s) and the title are from the musicals "Chess" and "Phantom of the Opera", which is... not mine. In chapter 3, Slash quotes from T.S. Eliot's "The Hollow Men". I'm making no money of this.
Author Notes: Gahh... BW Megatron, in my braaaiiiin... *Twitches spasmodically* Ugh... I have other stories to finish, but do you think this one cares? NooOOOOOoo! It's, "Up, up with you, Neflet, and write!" Gahh...
*Sigh* It's born from the fact that I'd really, really like to know more about the whole political situation on Cybertron, and all we really get are a few hints in "Other Visits" and "The Agenda", so...
Well, that, and I wanted to write a BW Megs story, seeing as he is by far my favourite Megatron, and then this nugget of joy made itself known.
And remember to thank all the people insisting so dilligently that the G1 Decepticons are the good guys, and the G1 Autobots the bad guys, since their methods makes it possible for me to make the Preds rather sympathetic. *Innocent whistle* ;)
*Ahem* Starts in BM, goes pre-BW and is intended to follow along from there, however far I wanna carry it. Yes, we probably will meet all the original Preds (Waspy, Terror, Scorpy...) along the way. In fact, Dinobot, Tarantulas and Scorponok have already appeared - Ranty in a cameo, but he will be back!
It is a haunted place, shadows snaking over the ground like demonic furies, and the dank moonlight reflecting over empty shells that had once lived. The buildings are empty, but whole, dotted here and there with a mish-mash of burn marks. One could imagine, at night, that ghosts creep their way across the roads.
There is no movement; no sound, but the howling of a forlorn wind, eulogising that which once was there. In the distance looms, like a second moon, what seems to be a head, the burning eyes of an angry god staring down at the misbegotten Cybertron. There is nothing else here.
The silence is then broken by the sound of a primitive beast, scavenging its way through the dead land. It seems out of place, purely organic, and yet its stance and colours seem to indicate its native origins. It sits on its haunches, sorting through trash with clawed hands, more like paws in their brutality.
A whirr, the sound of well-oiled machinery, and the creature jumps back, hiding in the shadows. A contraption hovers past, propellers driving it, and it is more beastly that the creature in its mindless droning. The creature fears it.
The creature growls silently and stalks further into the shadows, searching new places to scavenge. It is safer here than where it came from, in the city under the angry god, but the dark ones still roam. The creature has never been here before, yet the familiarity with which it moves is uncanny. It is too primitive to understand this itself.
But in the depths of its mind, where it is a he and where he speaks and he has a true name, there are memories of this place. But it is faint and distant, wafted away by the hurricane of denial, and shattered like so much ice. Memories that now lie broken, at the bottom of its mind, in the vague facsimile of fragile dragon wings...