History
"Then you admit your people were responsible for this murder," the volatile Guardian asserted.
"I only verified that B'shi has been marked with the emblem of my opponents," Optimus said calmly, forcing back the anger and uncertainty he had displayed a moment earlier, "All of my people were destroyed by Megatron. I have searched my home galaxy, with the help of Mogo, the Lanterns for Sector 2814, and from time to time some of the Guardians. Despite our efforts, we have been unable to find evidence of any survivors."
"Optimus is correct," Ganthet agreed, "Cybertron is a broken world, and there are none of his people left anywhere in the Milky Way galaxy."
"What about beyond? B'Shi was not killed in Sector 2814," another Guardian prompted more reasonably, "The universe is vast; could it be that there were Transformers who left the Milky Way?"
"It's not impossible," Optimus said slowly, using a phrase the Guardians had come to learn meant he did not think it was possible, but could not unequivocally say 'no'.
"During the early centuries of the war, certain Decepticons simply vanished," the Autobot explained, "there were rumors that Megatron had sent them into the stars to acquire materials and technology. Later defectors were able to refute many of the rumors; most of those Decepticons were executed for failures, or died during infighting. But there were a handful we could not account for."
"On the other hand," Optimus continued in a more thoughtful tone, "We never developed intergalactic flight before the war reached the point where both sides had to give up on even interstellar travel. So if Decepticons did leave the Milky Way, they probably did not do so under their own power."
"It is more likely that someone learned of the Decepticons symbol, and used it to mark Lantern B'Shi to attract Optimus's attention," Loc speculated.
"You have said that the Decepticons had some unpleasant interactions with other races," one of the blue immortals continued the scientist's line of thought, "It is possible that one of those species has a lingering resentment but only recently discovered that you survived Cybertron's devastation."
"Ten million years is a long time to bear a grudge," another Guardian countered, and Prime nodded.
"And yet all present were alive that long ago," Ganthet pointed out, "If it is another immortal or long lived creature, the killer could have personal hatred of the Decepticons, or only be a handful of generations removed from those they hurt."
"Are you all forgetting the size of the attacker?" the angry Guardian took back control of the conversation, "How many species other than Cybertronians are that size and are also capable of surviving in deep space?"
Optimus was starting to wonder if he had done something to anger the humanoid alien.
"There is not enough information to determine the exact size or position of the murderer," Loc reiterated, "And to your second point, it could easily be a person in an armored suit."
"It is also not wise to use me as a baseline for the average dimensions of Cybertronians," Prime told them, "I am larger than eighty percent of my people were. And more importantly, my race varied greatly in size, from those only slightly larger than Lantern B'Shi, to titans like Nemesis and Omega Supreme, who were roughly the same size as the Lantern Spire."
"Nemesis?" Ganthet asked thoughtfully, "Wasn't that the name of the ship were you fought Megatron for the last time?"
"Yes. Nemesis had been the largest of the Decepticons, until an Autobot strike team destroyed both his Spark chamber and his primary processor. Afterwards, Megatron had his body converted into a manually controlled assault craft."
Optimus's voice told them he considered that act highly disgusting.
"What about the Nemesis?" Loc interjected, "You said there were seventy immature Cybertronians on board, Megatron's harem to produce a new race. And they were all programmed to be completely loyal to him. Is it possible one or more of them awakened just recently, and are now targeting you for killing their master?"
"That's not impo..." Prime's known counter trailed off, "I doubt highly that the Protoforms spontaneously self-activated. They are not designed to work that way, and I have never heard of a malfunction causing that to happen."
"However," the Lantern said in a more melancholy tone, "Megatron was known for his almost paradoxical shifts between patience and haste. He would spend centuries planning assaults, designing contingencies for every counter attack. And then once the battle started, he would abandon those secondary and tertiary provisions if he thought he was winning. He often decided other plans would slow him down, and did something foolish."
"There was one time when Megatron captured Teledyne City. When Jetfire defected, he told us Megatron's plan called for his battalion to fully repair and upgrade the city's defenses, wait for the 2nd and 3rd Decepticon Battalions to arrive. Then the 3rd and half of the 2nd were to hold the city while the other half of the 2nd guarded his supply lines as his battalion attacked Dinobot Valley."
"However, after he captured the city, my forces were able to delay the 3rd. With fewer technicians, the repairs to the defenses were slowed. Megatron grew impatient, and he left the city in the hands of the 2nd as he continued with his plan. If he had proceeded according to his plan, the Autobots would not have been able to retake the city. Instead, we were able to recapture the city, finish the upgrades ourselves, and catch Megatron in a pincer attack."
"Fascinating," the angry Guardian said sarcastically, "But what does it have to do with the discussion at hand?"
"I can easily see Megatron deciding victory was assured," Optimus answered, "And starting to imprint at least some of the Protoforms before launching the missile."
"And you never tried to find this ship?" the aggressor demanded, "Even though it could contain survivors. Or killers?"
"We did, but not as thoroughly as we looked for active survivors," Prime admitted, "I never considered the possibility that the Protoforms might have been initialized before the battle, and we all agreed it was likely that the Nemesis had been destroyed while I was in stasis lock."
"Even though it could have represented a chance to restore your people?"
"I don't know what Megatron did to the Protoforms," the Autobot countered, "And if half of what he claimed was true, awakening them would more likely just unleash a new group of Decepticons on the universe."
"So there could be as many as seventy active female Decepticons out there?" one of the unnamed immortals prompted.
"Yes." the first Lantern answered.
"Why wait this long?" one of the neutral Guardians considered, "Even ignoring the time Optimus Prime was deactivated, these theoretical Cybertronians have had nearly three hundred thousand years to enact their revenge."
"It could be that they have only recently gained access to FTL travel."
"Or it could be that none of these Protoforms were activated, and this is what Humans call a 'wild goose chase'," Loc argued.
"Perhaps, but it is worth pursuing," Ganthet said, "I propose that the rest of the Corps continues to search for B'Shi's killer through conventional means, while Optimus, Salaak, and I attempt to determine where the Nemesis may have ended up after all of this time."
Finding the Decepticon warship was easier said than done. The vessel had been straining against the magnetic well, making it impossible to determine its exact heading after it escaped the effect of the bomb. Nor did Optimus or the Guardians know how long the magnetic field last or how quickly it faded. And there was the variable of the unknown charge of the ship's Energon battery. But most troublesome was that a large percentage of the potential courses and speeds took the Nemesis into a location that had experienced spatial instabilities. So instead of a several million light year area in the Milky Way, their search area included almost a dozen galaxies across five Green Lantern sectors. Twenty of the Honor Guard Lanterns were dispatched to those sectors, to search for the lost ship. The other four Honor Guard Lanterns investigated Sector 674 for any other sign of B'Shi's killer. And at the request of the Guardians, Optimus remained on Oa both to direct his fellows and to be centrally located for any news. And, he suspected, because of a variety of doubts the Guardians seemed to have.
Weeks passed, and while no trace of the killer or the Decepticon ship were discovered, there was also no more unusual violence against the the Corps. After the second month of the tense search came to an end, some of the Lanterns began to relax. But Optimus could not. Even though half of the Honor Guard Lanterns had been recalled, the Autobot meticulously monitored any news. He tried to refine the search area, calling on other Lanterns who had been scientists or pilots before joining the Corps. Though they were able to narrow the field, ultimately it only covered the regions of space that had already been most heavily inspected.
It had been almost four months since B'Shi's death, when Optimus received a call from a somewhat unexpected source.
Optimus transformed even as he exited hyperspace, hovering expectantly before his friend. They floated in the void between a frozen moon and a ringed, golden-brown gas giant.
"Where is it?" Prime failed to keep his voice entirely neutral.
"Down there," Abin Sur pointed, "buried in the icy surface."
A broad cone of light emerged from Sur's ring, illuminating the satellite, and highlighting the sharp angles of the darker metals within the frozen water. The two Lanterns began to descend slowly.
"Based on the measured activity on the surface, and the depth of the Nemesis" the organic GL explained, "it has been here for one and half to two million years.
"It was here before the Guardians found me," Optimus said reverently
"It seems to be mostly intact," the younger man noted, "It looks like one of the side modules was torn off on impact, and the lower hull is dented. But other than that it is in pretty good shape."
"And I am not detecting any gaps in the ice from anything entering or leaving," Prime stated as he scanned the satellite and ship with his ring.
"If they were active, they could have escaped before the ship crashed," Abin theorized, "Many of the Decepticons could fly in vehicle mode."
Prime nodded slowly, adding, "We will have to explore the interior to be sure. If the Protoforms are all there, or if we find an empty chamber, we will have our answer."
"What if there aren't seventy capsules?" Abin said cautiously.
"Then we will only have more questions, especially since the hold has not been breached."
A small slice of Optimus's processing threads were diverted to wondering how the Ungaran knew so much about Cybertronians. But the majority of his thoughts were on the Decepticon ship, and both the hope and threat that it represented.
Before the soldiers of Will could land, a thick beam of yellow light shot between them. Both Lanterns were thrown aside, and the ice covering the Nemesis boiled away. Abin and Optimus recovered quickly, spinning back towards space and pointing their rings at the new aggressor.
The silhouette was immediately familiar to the Autobot. The trapezoidal head, the heavy torso, the broad spikes on his shoulders, and more than anything else, the large, cylindrical cannon connected to the second mechanoid's right wrist.
"Megatron," Optimus snarled with more hatred than Sur had ever heard from the robot before.
"That used to be this body's name," the voice was mostly that of the Decepticon leader, but it was layered with a second set of tones, both more ancient and more sinister. As he drew closer, the light reflected off the planet fell on him, revealing that the gun-metal grey and purple highlighted armor of Megatron had been replaced by jet-black metal with yellow accents, including a yellow version of the Decepticon logo in the center of his chest. But what really drew Optimus's gaze was the left side of reborn robot's chest. The hole Prime had blasted through Megatron's chest had been repaired, except that the front Spark chamber was now covered by transparent aluminum. The deliberate change showed both Lanterns that, instead of the white-blue energy of a normal Transformer's soul, a mass of golden light hovered in the chamber.
"But that creature died above Cybertron, in that very ship. You may call me Galvatron."