War as Old as Time Itself
Summary:Three months after The Battle For Earth, a mysterious mech abducts Optimus Prime from Cybertron and so his friends find themselves needing help to find him. A strange group departs their planet for the journey, while Optimus slowly mends gaps between his own people and the gaps with their greatest enemy.
A/N: And the journey begins!
Optimus felt strangely gleeful as he looked over the star maps Primal had left him.
It had been only a couple of Earth hours since Alpha's come online and already he, Roller and Optimus were as thick as thieves, as the humans would say. He had had to update Alpha's systems to understand the binary speech of Minicons for the shipformer to understand Roller, but the Minicon hadn't been offended that Alpha hadn't been able to understand him. After all, most bots had to adjust their linguistic programs in other to communicate with Minicons. Roller knew that not everyone was like Optimus Prime, who seemed to be able to adjust instinctively to any dialect on Cybertron in seconds of hearing the first words being spoken.
Optimus had taken the map from the captain's cabin into consideration and noted that they had quite a ways to go before they could reach their unknown destination. He still hadn't had the time to even start reading Primal's logs, seeing as he had to explain everything to Alpha. He found it strange that it didn't annoy him. Sure, he was a patient bot, his patience could rival both Jazz and Prowl's combined patience when he put his CPU to it, but he was sure even they would have gotten at least a bit ticked by now.
Instead, he found it endearing. He liked telling the big bot things no one had patience or interest enough in to listen to him talk for joors on end. He talked about everything: history, Cybertronian psychology and biology, the great war, the Omega Sentinels, the Decepticons and the Autobots, the Quintessons and all the other species, about Earth and humanity, about his team, about the clones, the Lugnut Supremes (he had to explain why they were called that and why they weren't like Alpha or the other Supremes, as well as that they no longer existed, which brought new topics), about facts and fiction, about myths, about Primus and Unicron, about the Gladiatorial pits and the Senate... He hid nothing, deciding to teach Alpha everything and let him make his own opinion on things. There were just so many tings he could tell him and tell him he did.
And Alpha listened. Listened and asked questions and then listened to those explanations.
And although all that talk slowed them down, Optimus found he didn't mind. He had told Alpha how they came to be together and the shipformer had taken to scanning the forest in case those beasts came back. He had even helped Optimus fin out what they were and their discovery worried him. They were Quintesson creations that the squids had made in labs and were quite well known to be sent after anyone the cyborgs thought of as a possible threat. Optimus couldn't think of why his now offlined friend would be considered a danger but it probably had something to do both with Alpha Supreme and the mission he had given Optimus.
And after half a day, Optimus found that they were finally ready for liftoff! And just in time. Optimus had been right. A few of those beasts, the Qvotus as they were registered, had survived and had returned to finish what they had started. They lunged at the ship just as Alpha powered up his massive engines and they took off. Optimus commanded him to activate his weapons systems and fire at the things, for once not caring about sparing lives. Those things had caused the death of yet another once of his friends so he wasn't feeling very merciful towards them. And not to mention that their sharp metallic claws would injure Alpha, so it was better this way.
The Qvotus stood no chance against Alpha's weapons and before Optimus could reset his optics, they were in the moons orbit and quickly flying out of it. He whooped, laughing as Roller struggled to stay on his little stabilizers as the ascended, their speed growing and the ride getting smoother as they exited the gravity field and the atmosphere of the little organic moon. Optimus couldn't believe how free he felt! It was almost like he was flying again!
He stopped laughing long enough to tell Alpha to trans-warp to the coordinates they needed.
He whooped again as Roller squeeked when they lurched with the transportation.
A half a klik later, the red and blue form of Alpha Supreme was no longer outside Quintesson space.
00000
''Sir! We've just detected a warp signature and it looks like they landed into Quintesson space! It came from the almost same location as where we've detected the activation of Alpha Supre- DEAR PRIMUS!'' The Intelligence agent that had ran out to make his report stopped and started cowering in his place as he saw the massive forms of three Decepticons landing in front of their Lord and master.
Alpha Trion reached into his subspace and gave the only femme in the group a cube of High Grade. ''As promised.''
''You piss me off, but I like you, Trion.'' Strika said and downed the cube in one long intake. ''Ah! Iaconina High Grade, better than even Vos's visco!''
''Hey! I heard that!'' Strscream screeched indignantly.
He was expertly ignored.
''So, what's so special about the little slagger that you are ready to face the squids for him?''
Alpha Trion huffed. ''Get in line. You're not the first one to ask me this.'' He gestured at all the bots that were pretending to be doing anything else but actually eavesdropping. When Strika looked at them, they all scrambled to do something else that required them to be anywhere but near the infamous General of Destruction.
''There, no line.'' She turned back to the old bot, making him laugh like rarely anyone has heard him in many, many vorns. The only exception was not here to witness it happen in front of all these bots. Optimus would have been glad to see his mentor so happy. The thought caused Trion to sober up faster than the speed of light. Strika would never admit it, but she was concerned for the old bot. He was older than anyone, rumors even said he was born in the first generation of their race and they were a long living race, the first in the cosmos, really. Some said Alpha Trion met and knew all the Primes, the very first of their kind created from Primus's own plating and Spark, long before the Allspark came into existence, to battle Unicron with Primus. And they said old Alpha knew them. It wasn't good for a bot even half his age to worry so much, and Strika didn't even believe half the rumors! Sure, the bot was old, but he was durable. He looked younger and better maintained then some Decepticons ten times younger than him, or even the Magnus and the old medic. And Decepticons were made to endure long wars and sieges, to last in space or on organic worlds with rust barely touching their gears.
Yet, here he was, looking younger than them all. Even with everything he had seen, he was still in better condition than most much younger mechs.
But with the disappearance of one little Prime, he suddenly looked twice as old as he should in his old age.
Even if Lord Megatron had not wanted to find the mech as much as he seemed to want, Strika knew that she would at least lend some help to this old mech. Optimus Prime would be found, if only so Alpha Trion would look like his normal self and not this old mech standing before her.
The one who had saved her from becoming the slave of Quintessons and helped her heal would not look this defeated.
Never.
Not as long as Strika's spark was free and online!
00000
As he sat in the captains chair on the bridge, looking out at the wast space in front of them, Optimus couldn't help but feel at peace.
He was holding a datapad in one of his servos, the other idly playing with an energon candy on the tray that Roller had found and brought him. The Minicon had insisted that he take a few, even though Optimus thought it was a waste of energon. But apparently Primal had accounted for Optimus's once apon a time sweet tooth he had had to surpass when he entered the Academy since the rations there were meant to prepare them for sieges and wartime. He still got a few candies from Alpha Trion every time he went to visit the old bot, and no matter how much he protested, the Archivist still got him new goodies every single time he came by.
Now he had half a storage closet filled with nothing but energon goodies, candies and high grade.
There was a separate storage room for mid-grade and low-grade energon and the medical bay had its own storage of medical-grade energon for the sick and the injured. It was also stacked with everything any medic might dream of in his own med bay. Optimus was sure that Ratchet would call it heaven on earth, as the human saying goes, and would never leave it, had it not been for Omega. It made him smile, thinking that he now understood his grumpy teammate in a way rarely anyone ever could.
Optimus sighed. Thinking of his team made him miss them more than he already did. He was sure Sari and Bumblebee would enjoy the rec-room on Alpha. After all, it had a giant screen and every type of entertainment system that had been invented anywhere in the Universe from the last five centuries at the very least. Bulkhead would probably like the gallery they had here. It seems that Primal had quite an optic for art.
And he like organic and none-organic plants. He had a little room set up with both crystals from Praxus and Iacon and various organic greenery that Optimus couldn't wait to read about! The smell in that room was the most pleasant he had ever felt with his olfactory sensors. And the crystals' song created such harmony, he could spend his entire life in that room, especially if he had a few thousand datapads to keep him occupied and some energon. He was sure both Jazz and Prowl would love this room.
A cold, familiar pang rang in his spark as he thought of his offlined cyber ninja friend.
However, he didn't get a chance to wallow in his own self misery when the proximity sensors and Alpha's alarms blared to life. Optimus sprang up in his seat, looking at the screen in front of him as the shipformer's voice rang around them.
''Intruder alert! Autobots in danger! Unknown Decepticons approaching!''
On the screen in front of them, Optimus and Roller could see a huge form, but still clearly a mech, heading at them at top speed. They were still too far away to make out the identity of the mech, but it was a well known fact that Autobots didn't fly and were at least a little less bulky than this figure. Then, when they were well within weapons range, the figure split in two and started doing stunts that Optimus knew only two bots to use as battle maneuvers.
''Weapons systems down, Alpha! They're not Decepticons.''
The shipformer did as told, trusting Optimus's judgment. ''But... there are no flying Autobots.''
Optimus smiled, but he was still worried. ''Actually...''
Just what were they doing all the way out here?