Chapter 2
Skyeblade woke the next day, knowing that his repairs had been complete. His quarters had no window so the only light that came through was his night vision courteous of his cougar form. He rose from his bed and staggered out of the room, feeling a little numb from sleeping on one side. He looked around and padded down the corridor towards the bridge of the Axalon.
He found Rattrap sleeping at a chair overlooking what appeared to be a scanning control. He gave a sly grin and padded up towards the round control table.
He cleared his throat with a loud noise, "Well good morning Rattrap."
The Rat was startled for a moment and woke suddenly to find the fuzor standing near the control table.
"Hey your better. I was just taking a nap. Scanning is quite a tiring job ya know," Rattrap said with a hint of sarcasm.
Skyeblade gave a brief chuckle, "Yes I believe you on that," and then pressed a button with his paw and he was surprised to find it beeped and projected a hologram of a plant he'd never seen before.
Rattrap looked at him for a moment and then thought about something "So eh did you have friends back where you came from?"
Skyeblade pressed the same button but couldn't figure out how to turn the hologram off, so instead he left it be. His cat face turned to the cat to answer.
"You speak of the Nexus, the Vok's home. I did have friends," he answered.
"So why did the Vok build all those devices?" Rattrap wondered.
"They are merely defence systems, if they are to be remained dormant then they will harm no one," the fuzor explained.
Optimus and Silverbolt walked into the bridge, both showing some sign of being revitalised from a good night's sleep.
"Good morning you two. How is your repairs Skyeblade?" Optimus asked.
"They are complete. I think I will go out for a patrol today," Skyeblade suggested.
"Sounds like a good idea, there hasn't been anything out of the unusual but Pred activity needs to be checked on frequently," Optimus pointed out.
The ship was suddenly hit and alarms began whaling.
"Oh you were saying?" Rattrap emphasised in a sarcastic tone.
"Warning predacon attack, Sentinel is down at fifty percent efficiency," the base announced. Rhinox and Cheetor came bolting out of the corridor and took positions.
"Activating auto-guns," Rhinox said after pressing a couple of levers.
"How many are out there?" Optimus asked.
"Well scanners are pretty much dead after that storm.I'm counting four no five preds attacking us," Rattrap reported.
"Shields were also damaged from the storm, it appears that they won't hold on for much longer," Silverbolt added.
"Okay, Skyeblade, Cheetor and Silverbolt get out there and stop them!" Optimus ordered.
The three acknowledged and grouped together on the elevator as it made its descent outside. The three jumped off before it could touch the ground and raced towards the Predacons who were partially behind cover and attacking the shields.
Cheetor and Silverbolt engaged Quickstrike and Inferno while Skyeblade found Blackarachnia. He pounced on her and knocked her over but she got a leg through and kicked him off her. He sprawled across the ground and clenched his claws into the ground to stop himself from sliding.
"Skyeblade transform!" he chanted and transformed into his tall robot form.
He was hit from behind and fell to his knees, regaining himself and noticed that it had been Waspinator who fired on him. Before he could flinch Blackarachnia held her gun at his head. A explosion interrupted them and he broke away, standing up to face the spider however he couldn't do much more as the spider regained her quick reflexes and fired a dart into his chest.
"Arghh!" he cried as cyber venom was injected into his circuits and he tore the dart form his armour. He began to feel weak and pian shot through his body but the full effect had not occurred yet. The spider smirked.
"I'm impressed not everybody survives my venom instantly," Blackarachnia pointed out and loaded her weapon again.
Skyeblade gave a low growl and fell to his knees, "Stars and moons grant me power." He mumbled something else and when the spider was just about to fire at him again, he unleashed a brief shock of lightning from his hands. The lightning struck Blackarachnia full on and she was blasted away by the small burst of energy. To his satisfaction he had defeated the spider at last but that brief moment of energy discharge drained all his concentration and strength. He staggered for a cycle more and then collapsed, his optics turning black and the full affect of the cyber venom kicking in.
Cheetor fired a shot at Waspinator and blasted him away and then saw Skyeblade lying on the ground, surrounded by purple cyber venom and was wide mouthed before he raced over and touché him. He could see that his friend had gone into stasis lock and glanced to see that Silverbolt was engaged with Quickstrike.
"Hang in there big guy, you'll be okay," Cheetor reassured the unconscious robot.
All at once the Predacons retreated and fled in the direction of their base and Silverbolt flew over to help Cheetor lift him up into the elevator. They heard the auto guns humming down as the enemies moved away.
Optimus was just about to congratulate them when he saw the damage inflicted on Skyeblade and told them to place him in the CR Chamber to repair. After he was carefully placed inside, the doors closed and Rhinox conducted a brief scan over his systems.
"It's just Cyber Venom, he'll heal from that but I'm getting readings on his core's systems. It appears that it was drained, nothing of a injury but it looks more like he became fatigued," Rhinox reported.
"Anything we can do?" Optimus wondered.
"He just needs to relax that's all, he should be fine after his repair," Rhinox answered and then raised a eye brow, "But on another matter, the scanners picked up a short burst of electrical energy during the battle."
"Oh I saw him shoot this lightning at Blackarachnia but it was only a brief outburst and then he just collapsed," Cheetor added.
Rhinox and Optimus shared a look of interest. "Seems our Vok friend has some powers but my thoughts is that he gets drained mentally if he uses them," Rhinox suggested.
Optimus nodded, "Yes my thoughts exactly. I'll have a talk with him when he's repaired. Rattrap how long until we can get the repairs completed?"
"Oh with the five of us we should get it done in a few megacycles," Rattrap said and pulled out a spanner out of an open box that was under a console.
"The most important thing is getting the scanners working. I'd like to work on some of Sentinel's programming and seen if I can increase the shields," Rhinox said.
"Good. Now let's get to work people," Optimus declared and took off with Cheetor to fix a circuit board in engineering.
-
".Then cloud-bot collapsed," Waspinator explained to his leader.
"Interesting yesss. A robot with amazing powers. Tarantulas how should we deal with this.alien?" Megatron demanded from the metallic spider. "According to Blackarachnia's account the aliens are called the Vok-"
"The Vok? Such a strange name for beings with that power," Megatron interrupted.
"Yes, the Vok that joined the Maximals must feel exhaustion after using his powers. That power doesn't appear to be as powerful as I'd imagine it to be so I'm assuming that as a delegate sent here he would have been limited on his powers," Tarantulas explained.
"Understood. Perhaps we are fortunate that only one came here, but in the mean time we must act accordingly," Megatron stated.
"Yes sir, I'm improving the Darkside's defence systems to calibrate a reinforced shield and improve our perimeter guns," Tarantulas informed him.
"May I make a suggestion," a voice called as a black pterodactyl hovered upwards and Megatron nodded.
"I'm aware that as Predacons we have a need to destroy the Maximals but I believe that destroying them bit by bit is more enjoyable. We should maximise our outer defence grids and include guns where the Maximals have previously ventured through. That is if we have the available resources on this ship," Jetstorm suggested.
"Ah you'll make a excellent third in command. Yes I suppose it is fun to see them brake down slowly but what are you implying?"
"We need all the intelligence we can get. Surveillance cameras can do but what if we can launch just a small object to the moon, a satellite of sorts? It won't be able to carry weapons since then it won't launch but if we can get a device on the moon we may be able to observe the Maximals better," Jetstorm explained.
"An interesting idea. It does not always lead to conflict to win a war and I take for granted that regular intelligence may be a huge asset to utilise. Very well then, Jetstorm make a full plan and come back when you're finished," the saurian demanded.
"As you command sir," he saluted and left the bridge. Megatron turned to Tarantulas.
"Well it sounds like a good idea. It will definitely increase our communications but the launch is what troubles me," the spider pointed out.
"Indeed another full scale attack should disrupt their attention on a small harmless device to the moon," Megatron nodded.
Tarantulas nodded and pondered to his own thoughts and then realised the importance of improving the defence systems but was lost in a way to accomplish such a task. He left the bridge to engage Jetstorm for ideas. He felt assured that Jetstorm would make a very promising predacon.
-
"Looks like sleeping beauty is waking up," Rattrap said. Skyeblade looked meekly a him for a moment and regained his former alert self.
"Was I injured?" He said looking over at his repaired chest.
"Yeah, you got shot by the spider-lady's cyber presents, so we fixed you up in the CR Chamber," the rat explained.
"Oh.thanks," he said and walked towards the command table. He was still in his robot mode and pondered about the control systems.
He experimented with a few until a holographic projection came up with the sensor grid. It appeared that the five Maximals had fixed the damage and that the ship was almost good as new. Even the burnt hull had been scrubbed clean.
"Hmm.did Rhinox improve our defence systems?" Skyeblade asked.
"Nope he's still gotta do that," Rattrap replied and continued to monitor the scanners.
Skyeblade walked over to the rat and peered at the screen, "Uh could you run a level 1 diagnostics test for me?"
"Huh.Why?" Rattrap wondered.
"Just to test if everything is running okay," Skyeblade assured him and Rattrap ran the diagnostics test, which came up with a few minor problems.
"You know your getting as bad as Rhinox!" the rat complained.
"Not quite.I'm probably worse," Skyeblade smiled and walked into a corridor.
Silverbolt came by and checked a screen, noting the completion of Sentinel's sensor grid. He glanced towards Rattrap and stood up from his chair.
"I am going for scout patrol in grid Zion," Silverbolt informed the rat and descended the elevator before Rattrap could answer.
"That guy is serious about her," Rattrap muttered and then resumed to his scan of the base.
-
"Report," Megatron demanded.
"There are no possible sites for a alien device. All likely targets from the disk have been accounted for," the ship's computer reported. The saurian sighed.
Megatron sensed someone approaching his quarters and dismissed his computer's screen and saw Jetstorm come in.
"Ah Jetstorm what have you to report?" he asked.
"Tarantulas and I have made a complete overview of the ship's resources and there appears to be plenty to accommodate a large defence grid of our territory as well as cameras, cannons or guns in maximal or neutral territory especially those areas which are quite a distance away," Jetstorm explained.
"I see and is there any chance for you to begin the preparations now?" Megatron wondered.
"Not at this time, we need to refine every gun to be able to cooperate with the defence computer and to adjust certain upgrades such as self-repair and heat/motion sensing," Jetstorm added.
"Excellent and what is the name given to this defence system?"
"Possibly Guardian"
"Understood and what progress have you made on this satellite?"
"I've completed the drafts and the smaller components but it will take time to construct a launch pad and finish of the device," Jetstorm said.
"Good you are dismissed," Megatron stated.
Jetstorm saluted, "Yes sir," and left.
"Oh Optimus you will regret the day you left your most valuable assets unguarded," Megatron said to himself more or less as he sank back into his healing bath, twitching his purple talons.
Skyeblade woke the next day, knowing that his repairs had been complete. His quarters had no window so the only light that came through was his night vision courteous of his cougar form. He rose from his bed and staggered out of the room, feeling a little numb from sleeping on one side. He looked around and padded down the corridor towards the bridge of the Axalon.
He found Rattrap sleeping at a chair overlooking what appeared to be a scanning control. He gave a sly grin and padded up towards the round control table.
He cleared his throat with a loud noise, "Well good morning Rattrap."
The Rat was startled for a moment and woke suddenly to find the fuzor standing near the control table.
"Hey your better. I was just taking a nap. Scanning is quite a tiring job ya know," Rattrap said with a hint of sarcasm.
Skyeblade gave a brief chuckle, "Yes I believe you on that," and then pressed a button with his paw and he was surprised to find it beeped and projected a hologram of a plant he'd never seen before.
Rattrap looked at him for a moment and then thought about something "So eh did you have friends back where you came from?"
Skyeblade pressed the same button but couldn't figure out how to turn the hologram off, so instead he left it be. His cat face turned to the cat to answer.
"You speak of the Nexus, the Vok's home. I did have friends," he answered.
"So why did the Vok build all those devices?" Rattrap wondered.
"They are merely defence systems, if they are to be remained dormant then they will harm no one," the fuzor explained.
Optimus and Silverbolt walked into the bridge, both showing some sign of being revitalised from a good night's sleep.
"Good morning you two. How is your repairs Skyeblade?" Optimus asked.
"They are complete. I think I will go out for a patrol today," Skyeblade suggested.
"Sounds like a good idea, there hasn't been anything out of the unusual but Pred activity needs to be checked on frequently," Optimus pointed out.
The ship was suddenly hit and alarms began whaling.
"Oh you were saying?" Rattrap emphasised in a sarcastic tone.
"Warning predacon attack, Sentinel is down at fifty percent efficiency," the base announced. Rhinox and Cheetor came bolting out of the corridor and took positions.
"Activating auto-guns," Rhinox said after pressing a couple of levers.
"How many are out there?" Optimus asked.
"Well scanners are pretty much dead after that storm.I'm counting four no five preds attacking us," Rattrap reported.
"Shields were also damaged from the storm, it appears that they won't hold on for much longer," Silverbolt added.
"Okay, Skyeblade, Cheetor and Silverbolt get out there and stop them!" Optimus ordered.
The three acknowledged and grouped together on the elevator as it made its descent outside. The three jumped off before it could touch the ground and raced towards the Predacons who were partially behind cover and attacking the shields.
Cheetor and Silverbolt engaged Quickstrike and Inferno while Skyeblade found Blackarachnia. He pounced on her and knocked her over but she got a leg through and kicked him off her. He sprawled across the ground and clenched his claws into the ground to stop himself from sliding.
"Skyeblade transform!" he chanted and transformed into his tall robot form.
He was hit from behind and fell to his knees, regaining himself and noticed that it had been Waspinator who fired on him. Before he could flinch Blackarachnia held her gun at his head. A explosion interrupted them and he broke away, standing up to face the spider however he couldn't do much more as the spider regained her quick reflexes and fired a dart into his chest.
"Arghh!" he cried as cyber venom was injected into his circuits and he tore the dart form his armour. He began to feel weak and pian shot through his body but the full effect had not occurred yet. The spider smirked.
"I'm impressed not everybody survives my venom instantly," Blackarachnia pointed out and loaded her weapon again.
Skyeblade gave a low growl and fell to his knees, "Stars and moons grant me power." He mumbled something else and when the spider was just about to fire at him again, he unleashed a brief shock of lightning from his hands. The lightning struck Blackarachnia full on and she was blasted away by the small burst of energy. To his satisfaction he had defeated the spider at last but that brief moment of energy discharge drained all his concentration and strength. He staggered for a cycle more and then collapsed, his optics turning black and the full affect of the cyber venom kicking in.
Cheetor fired a shot at Waspinator and blasted him away and then saw Skyeblade lying on the ground, surrounded by purple cyber venom and was wide mouthed before he raced over and touché him. He could see that his friend had gone into stasis lock and glanced to see that Silverbolt was engaged with Quickstrike.
"Hang in there big guy, you'll be okay," Cheetor reassured the unconscious robot.
All at once the Predacons retreated and fled in the direction of their base and Silverbolt flew over to help Cheetor lift him up into the elevator. They heard the auto guns humming down as the enemies moved away.
Optimus was just about to congratulate them when he saw the damage inflicted on Skyeblade and told them to place him in the CR Chamber to repair. After he was carefully placed inside, the doors closed and Rhinox conducted a brief scan over his systems.
"It's just Cyber Venom, he'll heal from that but I'm getting readings on his core's systems. It appears that it was drained, nothing of a injury but it looks more like he became fatigued," Rhinox reported.
"Anything we can do?" Optimus wondered.
"He just needs to relax that's all, he should be fine after his repair," Rhinox answered and then raised a eye brow, "But on another matter, the scanners picked up a short burst of electrical energy during the battle."
"Oh I saw him shoot this lightning at Blackarachnia but it was only a brief outburst and then he just collapsed," Cheetor added.
Rhinox and Optimus shared a look of interest. "Seems our Vok friend has some powers but my thoughts is that he gets drained mentally if he uses them," Rhinox suggested.
Optimus nodded, "Yes my thoughts exactly. I'll have a talk with him when he's repaired. Rattrap how long until we can get the repairs completed?"
"Oh with the five of us we should get it done in a few megacycles," Rattrap said and pulled out a spanner out of an open box that was under a console.
"The most important thing is getting the scanners working. I'd like to work on some of Sentinel's programming and seen if I can increase the shields," Rhinox said.
"Good. Now let's get to work people," Optimus declared and took off with Cheetor to fix a circuit board in engineering.
-
".Then cloud-bot collapsed," Waspinator explained to his leader.
"Interesting yesss. A robot with amazing powers. Tarantulas how should we deal with this.alien?" Megatron demanded from the metallic spider. "According to Blackarachnia's account the aliens are called the Vok-"
"The Vok? Such a strange name for beings with that power," Megatron interrupted.
"Yes, the Vok that joined the Maximals must feel exhaustion after using his powers. That power doesn't appear to be as powerful as I'd imagine it to be so I'm assuming that as a delegate sent here he would have been limited on his powers," Tarantulas explained.
"Understood. Perhaps we are fortunate that only one came here, but in the mean time we must act accordingly," Megatron stated.
"Yes sir, I'm improving the Darkside's defence systems to calibrate a reinforced shield and improve our perimeter guns," Tarantulas informed him.
"May I make a suggestion," a voice called as a black pterodactyl hovered upwards and Megatron nodded.
"I'm aware that as Predacons we have a need to destroy the Maximals but I believe that destroying them bit by bit is more enjoyable. We should maximise our outer defence grids and include guns where the Maximals have previously ventured through. That is if we have the available resources on this ship," Jetstorm suggested.
"Ah you'll make a excellent third in command. Yes I suppose it is fun to see them brake down slowly but what are you implying?"
"We need all the intelligence we can get. Surveillance cameras can do but what if we can launch just a small object to the moon, a satellite of sorts? It won't be able to carry weapons since then it won't launch but if we can get a device on the moon we may be able to observe the Maximals better," Jetstorm explained.
"An interesting idea. It does not always lead to conflict to win a war and I take for granted that regular intelligence may be a huge asset to utilise. Very well then, Jetstorm make a full plan and come back when you're finished," the saurian demanded.
"As you command sir," he saluted and left the bridge. Megatron turned to Tarantulas.
"Well it sounds like a good idea. It will definitely increase our communications but the launch is what troubles me," the spider pointed out.
"Indeed another full scale attack should disrupt their attention on a small harmless device to the moon," Megatron nodded.
Tarantulas nodded and pondered to his own thoughts and then realised the importance of improving the defence systems but was lost in a way to accomplish such a task. He left the bridge to engage Jetstorm for ideas. He felt assured that Jetstorm would make a very promising predacon.
-
"Looks like sleeping beauty is waking up," Rattrap said. Skyeblade looked meekly a him for a moment and regained his former alert self.
"Was I injured?" He said looking over at his repaired chest.
"Yeah, you got shot by the spider-lady's cyber presents, so we fixed you up in the CR Chamber," the rat explained.
"Oh.thanks," he said and walked towards the command table. He was still in his robot mode and pondered about the control systems.
He experimented with a few until a holographic projection came up with the sensor grid. It appeared that the five Maximals had fixed the damage and that the ship was almost good as new. Even the burnt hull had been scrubbed clean.
"Hmm.did Rhinox improve our defence systems?" Skyeblade asked.
"Nope he's still gotta do that," Rattrap replied and continued to monitor the scanners.
Skyeblade walked over to the rat and peered at the screen, "Uh could you run a level 1 diagnostics test for me?"
"Huh.Why?" Rattrap wondered.
"Just to test if everything is running okay," Skyeblade assured him and Rattrap ran the diagnostics test, which came up with a few minor problems.
"You know your getting as bad as Rhinox!" the rat complained.
"Not quite.I'm probably worse," Skyeblade smiled and walked into a corridor.
Silverbolt came by and checked a screen, noting the completion of Sentinel's sensor grid. He glanced towards Rattrap and stood up from his chair.
"I am going for scout patrol in grid Zion," Silverbolt informed the rat and descended the elevator before Rattrap could answer.
"That guy is serious about her," Rattrap muttered and then resumed to his scan of the base.
-
"Report," Megatron demanded.
"There are no possible sites for a alien device. All likely targets from the disk have been accounted for," the ship's computer reported. The saurian sighed.
Megatron sensed someone approaching his quarters and dismissed his computer's screen and saw Jetstorm come in.
"Ah Jetstorm what have you to report?" he asked.
"Tarantulas and I have made a complete overview of the ship's resources and there appears to be plenty to accommodate a large defence grid of our territory as well as cameras, cannons or guns in maximal or neutral territory especially those areas which are quite a distance away," Jetstorm explained.
"I see and is there any chance for you to begin the preparations now?" Megatron wondered.
"Not at this time, we need to refine every gun to be able to cooperate with the defence computer and to adjust certain upgrades such as self-repair and heat/motion sensing," Jetstorm added.
"Excellent and what is the name given to this defence system?"
"Possibly Guardian"
"Understood and what progress have you made on this satellite?"
"I've completed the drafts and the smaller components but it will take time to construct a launch pad and finish of the device," Jetstorm said.
"Good you are dismissed," Megatron stated.
Jetstorm saluted, "Yes sir," and left.
"Oh Optimus you will regret the day you left your most valuable assets unguarded," Megatron said to himself more or less as he sank back into his healing bath, twitching his purple talons.