2014: Forge remembered it all, in fact just all too well. Though her memory lapses came and went, it was one of the few things untouched by her aging memory circuits. What had brought on those memories was the long absent presence of male Transformers. She hadn't believed that male Transformers still existed. Yet they did on Cybertron, the sons of Primus, and they also were at war. War brought on those memories, those horrible, pain filled times of her past, of Mechanadrons' past.
"Forge?" came Tetra Reris' concerned tone, "What's wrong?"
The elder, two-toned blue form tried and failed to smile, but she was too deeply mired in the past, "It seems not so long ago that they were killed, that we were enslaved."
Tetras' aquamarine, orange, blue, and light green form sat next to her, "It has become quite a burden on you, that I have seen. You must relieve that burden Forge. You must tell us of our past."
"You know not what you ask of me." Forge began.
"Of all the Servabots only you know the truth and I'm asking you to tell the tale to those of us who were too young to know."
Forge paused, a frown of distaste wrinkling her old face further and replied, "The Autobots and our human allies should know of it too, Tetra. They may not like it any more than you, but it will bond us together and make us stronger."
"I'll arrange a meeting for next week. Meanwhile try not to think about too much." Tetra said and left.
"It occupies every nuance of my life. Soon you'll know why." Forge whispered.
Later on that evening, the Autobots, Servabots and their human allies gather together.
"May I begin, Commanders?" Forge asked.
"Of course, Forge." Tetra Reris replied.
Forge glanced over the audience, there was about 800 beings there to hear what she had to tell, "It was about six million years ago that Mechanadron faced invasion. We were many but against the Quintessons overtook us. That took about five hundred years to accomplish. Our slave masters divided the individuals into two groups, consumer goods and military hardware. They then further separated us into genders and kept us in restricted areas. Their mastership over us was wide and varied, they studied us as well as commanded us. One thing that most intrigued them was our children and how they came to be. An idea took fruition when the military slaves become too rebellious for them." Forge paused, she looked down at the floor and continued, "There are two ways to create a child. The first is Connecting, also known as Becoming One, where a child can be created at any time of a couples' choosing. The other, Genetic Identification, is when two beings have been chosen by the Creator to create a superior child. The catch with this, as legend tells it, is that if you didn't you would perish. With this knowledge, the Quints began to match couples up until Genetic Identification occurred. It was important to them to breed more loyal warriors, so consumer and military were interbred to result in such."
Commander Elliot spoke up, "Are you saying is that they bred you like we do with pets and endangered species?"
"Exactly. It soon became evident that the older female military slaves had a hatred for males. If they birthed one, they killed it on the spot. The Quints were not happy about this. They soon had to breed the military females with the consumer males proven to be producers of female children.
This put much pressure on the consumer females to produce males, which was solved with military males proven to produce male children. All the Servabots you see here today are the children of this cruel reality."
Commander Wilson spoke up, "Forge, did you have children?"
Forge grimaced and looked sad, "Yes. Two sons and three daughters by two fathers."
"Oh my God." Commander Reeder breathed.
"Such was life for one and a half million years. The full cruelty of the Quints showed when both slave factions rebelled in full force. It took time, but we drove them off the planet and were free of them, or so we thought." color drained from her face as she continued, "To this day, I do not know what was in that mist the Quints created, but they must have miscalculated for it left us females unharmed. The males, however, were not so lucky. Their screams of agony is what I remember most vividly. The mist dissolved them where they stood, slowly, painfully." Forge looked up at her comrades, optics brimming with tears, "To see your own sons die before you, melt away in agony.. you cannot stop it.. you want to help.. but you cannot..." Forge broke into uncontrolled sobs, "We... shouldn't have.. come. They'll come.. they'll kill all... of you again.."
Tetra approached the elders' form. The throng exchanged uneasy glances.
Forge pushed Tetra aside, "Just.. leave me.. alone.." she made for the door, the sound of ungrieved deaths ringing through the hall.
The red form of Ironhide was the first to stand and leave. The last thing Forge needed was to be alone, he knew that all too well himself. It took awhile to find her in the Oregon Cascade foothills, as he had expected. Forge had curled herself up into a proverbial ball--her knees to her chest, head buried in her lap with her arms hugging her lower legs. Ironhide kneeled beside her and placed an arm around her. Forge looked up at him, lips trembling, yellow optics trying to focus. Ironhide took hold of one of her hands and gave her an understanding smile.
"They were... such good sons.." Forge mumbled.
"Remember them like that, Forge, for that is all you have left." Ironhide said as he faded to a whisper, "They would want that, I know, I have had many friends whose memories I cherish most fondly.." He trailed off, becoming lost in his own past. He's snapped out of it as Forge drew close to him and hugged him.
"Does the pain ever stop?" she asked.
"There's always something that'll remind you, it becomes a dull ache after awhile and you get used to that. But it never really goes away." Ironhide replied.
Forge sighed deeply, snuggled closer to him and whispered, "Hold me Ironhide, just for awhile."
At Decepticon Headquarters on Charr. The silver, black, red, and purple form of Trechercon Commander Electra watched Galvatron from the shadows of the throne room. Except for a few interruptions, he seemed to be in deep thought. Most likely he pondered what she had told him, that Trechercons were all female Transformers. She looked him over and caught herself at it, she berated herself for such an outlandish interest. He fascinated her, as well as sent fear through her. Why did she fear? She grasped at memories, memories of a newborn and shuddered. It had been almost forgotten, that horrid day, but now it takes full hold of her mind, body, and soul. Her hate and fear of males stemmed from her kidnapping soon after birth, from the molestation by several males. She crumpled to the floor and wept. Galvatron looked up from his thoughts, homed in on the sound, and focused on a shadowed form. He stood and strode toward the muffled sobs. He drew close and recognized the form as belonging to Electra. He paused, trying to contemplate the reason for this outpouring of tears. He reached out to put a hand on Electras' shoulder, her arm came up and shoved his away as she whispered, "Don't touch me...leave me alone."
"Our warriors will take this as weakness, Electra." the silver and purple form of Galvatron stated.
She looked up at him and replied, "You'd never understand... you'd never be able to contemplate..."
Galvatron knew something truly deep and scarring brought this on, he didn't know how he knew though. "Let me understand then, Electra, tell me what brought this on." he offered a hand to help her up.
Electra eyed him a moment, not trusting this simple act. She reluctantly took hold of his hand and allowed him to pull her up, straight into his unsure embrace. "What do you think you're doing?" she demanded.
"Holding you," Galvatron replied, "but I still need proof of your femininity.".
"No, just let me go. Just leave me alone." Electra hissed. Galvatron held her tightly against him, refusing to free her now struggling form. Her refusal of his request proved it was true, this was a female, the truth of it, however, was still shocking, "Please, let me go.. please don't hurt me." she pleaded in an unusual tone.
"I have no intention of hurting you, Electra." he consoled.
"No, you do. All males do. You want to hold us, touch us, hurt us... please let me go." Electra pleaded.
"A male hurt you, is that why you hate us?" Galvatron paused, grasping at a thought, "Did a male molest you?"
"I was a newborn." Electra sobbed now giving into her emotions, "I was defenseless, I couldn't do them harm, but they did me harm." Electra became incomprehensible and wept into Galvatrons' shoulder. He hugged her to him and stroked her head.
"It's all right, Electra, everything will be all right. Just let it all out." Galvatron whispered. He knew well the powerlessness of not being able to defend yourself against a superior foe. For a moment, he thought he heard laughter, the evil chuckle of Unicron. He ignored it.
At Servabot Base in Gig Harbor, Washington. The echoes of laser torches, laser welders,
hammering, and all other of construction noises reached Wasps' audios. It was a necessary, but bothersome nuisance as she walked through the almost completed base. She was here because she was both bored and anticipative. Hydro-Base was nice enough, but she needed to run around, keep in practice and besides she liked to get to know any turf before she fought on it. As she passed an adjacent hall, a flash caught her optic and she paused to check it out. At the end of the hall hung a small mirror, she was curious and decided to investigate. As she walked toward it, she brought to mind the Autobot profiles she had read not long ago, the mirror probably belonged to Sunstreaker she surmised. On Mechanadron, there were no mirrors, or reflections for that matter, so this was a unique opportunity to see exactly what she looked like. She paused, a bit scared at what she'd see.
She had accepted her fate that day over five million years ago, the day she lost her face. She had amazingly survived the lasers and missiles that had scorched her facial features to nothingness. Turnpike managed what she could with their limited supplies and parts. Wasp mustered some courage and stepped close to the object. She couldn't believe what she saw and touched where a mouth, chin, nose and cheekbones had been. Even her optics hadn't been spared the cruel blast. She is utterly devastated, let down and disappointed. She had been pretty once, but now she saw ugliness and she hated it. She put her hands to her face and wept. Goldbug heard the crying, he excused himself from a security detail and homed in on it, he was quite surprised to find Wasp.
He placed a hand on her shoulder and asked, "What's the matter, Wasp?"
"Don't look at me, never again." she sobbed. He slid his arms around her and gave her a gentle squeeze. Wasp looked up in surprise.
"Come on Wasp, what's troubling you?" he inquired.
She looked away, trying to deny the reaction his closeness caused and failed. "I'm ugly." she said finally, "I was pretty, once."
"I don't think you're ugly." Goldbug stated gently. Wasp looked at him incredulously. "In fact, you're still pretty, on the inside, where it really counts." he concluded.
Wasp turned toward him, "Really?"
"Really." Goldbug replied and embraced her again. Wasp reciprocated and looked into his optics, he told truly and it came as a relief to her.
"You want to tell me how it happened?" he asked.
(Editor's Note: Read "The Past Revisited for details).
Back at 'Con HQ on Charr. Galvatron held the sobbing form of Electra for at least a half hour, by then she had cried herself out. She remained in his embrace, finding that she liked it there. She pulled back her head to look at him.
"You will be rewarded for your patience." Electra said, "Therefore, behold my face." she mentally commanded it to rise. Galvatron stared, not believing the face he had known retreated up inside her helmet. His jaw dropped a notch in surprise, "Still can't believe it can you?" she said in her true voice.
"By the divine weld, what insanity made you hide a face like that?" Galvatron replied, he truly was awed despite himself.
"Tradition is hard to break." Electra answered. She attempted again to free herself from his grip and again met resistance, "Let me go."
"If you don't face your fear now Electra, it will return for as long as you remain our ally." Galvatron stated.
Electra hadn't expected a response like that. Yet he was right, she had to face her fear and conquer it. The part of her that was intrigued by him was eager for the challenge. "Yes. But I want to be in more private surroundings, I want no interruptions."
"How long would you require?" Galvatron asked.
"Depends. We could assign temporary replacements for the interim." she replied.
"Done. I will look forward to help you face your fear." Galvatron nodded.
"I shall face it and I will conquer it." Electra stated, "Until then." she ripped free of his grip, lowered her mask and left.
Forge didn't know how long they been there, but the air had cooled and the sky had darkened. She snuggled closer to Ironhide, feeling like she belonged there. She'd almost forgotten what a male felt like, smelled like, how the warmth of their steel skin radiated, how it felt to be held. She wondered if she could love again. Her past lovers were only for breeding purposes, there'd been no love. She looked at Ironhide and smiled, he smiled back at her. He remembered when there had been females on Cybertron, they had all disappeared by the time he and the others had finally returned. He hadn't realized just how much he missed them until now. Forge was relatively pretty, she had a beautiful soul under the warrior front. Ironhide found himself lost in her optics, he couldn't look away nor did he want to. Forge leaned into him and gave him a lingering kiss on the lips. He responded passionately as a flood of emotions rushed through him.