AN: Hey everyone, sorry for the wait, but we are now back for another round in the Cybertron Cosmic Era, and we're now another chapter closer to both the end of this story, and the end of the Gundam SEED Prime Trilogy. It's almost kind of sad that we're nearing the end of this epic, but at the same time, for me, it's actually a bit of a relief. After working on this for so long, I'll finally be able to bring this story to its final close.
Cagalli: Shouldn't you be saying these things after you write and post the final chapter?
AN: Maybe, but I just...I want a moment to really let it sink in, ya know?
Shinn: Hey, I've gotta ask you guys, what're some of your favorite moments from working with this series?
Kira: I think my favorite moment is from back in the first story, in the first Orb Missions chapter, when Miss Erica and I joined Optimus and Ironhide in retrieving the Star Saber, and I ended up in a face-off with Megatron himself. It was the first time we really had a Gundam fighting a Transformer, and we didn't waste time with working our way up from any of the basic grunts, we had gone right to the biggest and baddest of them all.
Cagalli: Nice. I'm going to have to go with the moment when I personally objected to marrying Yuna at the alter and then punched him in the face in Destiny Sentinels. That was a lot of fun.
Athrun: Yeah, I think we all got a kick out of that one.
Everyone: [laughter all around]
Shinn: I think my favorite moment was when I led the charge in the Minerva joining up with the Autobots of Team Prime, and started off by blasting at Rey. That felt really good considering how much of a bastard he was in the original continuity of SEED Destiny. No offense pal.
Rey: None taken. I feel the same way about how I acted in that continuity after looking back on it.
Luna: Hey, you know what we should be doing instead of just talking about this stuff? We should have like a flashback chapter where we're all talking about this.
AN: Absolutely not! We are definitely not doing anything like that, and don't you dare suggest we do otherwise, understand?!
Everyone other than AN: Yes sir!
AN: Good. Oh and for those of you who are wondering what took so long for this update, well part of the reason is because I was on vacation for a couple of weeks and didn't have my computer with me, and I also had a couple of new stories put into the works. If you haven't jumped over to my profile in a while, then you should know that these newest titles are a new little superhero adventure, Avengers Academy and my newest Kingdom Hearts story, Kingdom Hearts: Dual Keys. For more information, jump over to my profile or just read the stories for yourselves.
Athrun: You just can't stop coming up with new ideas, can you?
AN: Nope, but I am still trying to think of a title for one of my newest ideas, which is a crossover between Spider-Man and Final Fantasy XIII, so that's a thing. Anyway, I'll let you guys get on with the story, so let's roll out!
I do not own anything from any of either of the Gundam or Transformers franchises or any other franchise mentioned in this story.
Chapter 29: Heroic Return
Location: Main Universe, Velocitron
Things had begun evening out in the battle on the speed planet for a while, thanks in no small part to the quick actions that the Aerialbots and the Velocitronians were able to take in the defense of the world, along with the leadership of Override and Hot Shot, and for a short time it looked like they would be able to drive the 'Cons back. That quickly changed when a second, much large force of Vehicons, Predacon drones, and HorseMan mobile suits suddenly sprung up before the defenders' optics, led by the pilot who had identified himself as Prayer Reverie, and they were soon pushed back into a struggle to just survive. Even with the fastest of warriors on their side, there was little hiding the fact that the people of Velocitron were not the greatest of fighters at this point. Having a few Autobots on their side made up for that for a short time, but with this new, larger wave of enemies, that small benefit was making had started to make less and less of a difference.
That became much clearer when Clocker suddenly took a very severe hit from an enemy attack, even though he was fighting right next to Skids and Mudflap when it happened, and when the Second Coming of the Terror Twins moved to cover him long enough for a medic to come and help, they also received a fair amount of damage for their efforts. Seeing his friends in trouble immediately drew Sideswipe into action as well, and he was immediately moving like lightning across the battlefield until he was right next to his comrades and friends, only stopping to spare a few shots at any enemies that landed in his crosshairs for the briefest of moments. "This is Sideswipe! I need a medic at my location, now," the Autobot pilot shouted into his comm. link as he continued shooting his blasters at the enemy, now in more of an attempt to keep them from approaching than to actually take any out.
Sideswipe's request for medical assistance was soon granted by the resident medic of the Aerialbots, as Jetstorm was quick to arrive on the scene and begin using his Energon Repair Ray to reverse the damage that had been done to the three 'Bots. "Skis and Mudflap should be alright, most of the damage in their case is superficial, but Clocker needs to be moved to a medical station. He's lost a lot of energon and his damage is too great for a field repair to really make much difference," Jetstorm reported.
"No. I can…still fight," Clocker tried to protest.
"The Pits you can! If you really want to join the AllSpark right here and now, then fine, but I don't intend to let anyone die if I can help it," Jetstorm retorted. He then turned to Sideswipe and said, "I'm gonna need you to give me some cover while I get him out of here."
"Copy that," Sideswipe nodded, and he was immediately arming his other arm blaster to provide said covering fire along with Skids and Mudflap.
"Yeah, no one messes with our pals and gets away without getting scrapped," Skids shouted as his shots tore through some HorseMans and Vehicons.
"Aw yeah, boy! You mess with our pals, you mess with the twins, and you get scrapped like bad, rusted metal," Mudflap shouted in agreement.
Jetstorm had to admit that he found the two's spirit quite admirable, but he decided to leave that for later; right now, he had to get a patient to the field medical station that the Velocitronians had set up for such occasions. As he slowly moved Clocker though, the flyer could not help but despair at how much worse things were getting, and he could only pray that the others were fairing at least a little better than they were at the moment.
Location: Nebulous
"Everybody get back," Elita shouted as Fortress Maximus and Scorpnok prepared to fire their weapons at each other once again, and just like the previous time they had fired at the same moment, their blasts collided, and a great explosion of energy tore through the surrounding area. Thankfully, most of the Autobots and their Headmaster allies were able to get clear before they were caught in the blast, while a good deal of Predacon drones and Vehicons were not so lucky, but now, there was even less cover for anyone on either side to use in order to avoid being hit by enemy fire.
"Well, this is going well," Inferno grumbled as he and Roadblock did their best to cover the rest of the Protectobots as they attempted to set up any kind of barricades they could so that their side would have a little bit of cover.
"Less griping and more shooting, soldier," Hardhead shouted as he raced forward to join them in their attempts, guns already blazing.
Neither of them had a chance to continue their conversation, as the two titans were suddenly joined by the Combaticons', who had quickly combined into Bruticus just seconds after making their presence known. When he saw this new addition to the battlefield, Brainstorm quickly remarked, "Our estimates show that at the current pace of the battle, and this newest addition to the enemy's forces, our chances of survival alone are now rapidly decreasing, let alone our chances of victory."
"Well do us all a favor and keep the statistics to yourself. Not everything can be calculated so easily," Evac told the Headmaster scientist, and he then turned to his own team and gave a simple order. "Protectobots, combine into Defensor!"
Instantly, each of the Protectobots broke off from what they were currently doing, and raced into the respective positions of their team's combined form, and in no time at all, Defensor was battling it out with Bruticus. If this had escaped anyone's notice, then they were most likely blind, deaf, or unconscious, because one would be questioning how anyone could miss a battle between four titans like this just as much as Elita One was praying that some form of miracle would arrive soon to save them from their desperate struggles.
Location: Junkion
"Well, this could be going better," Thundertron sarcastically remarked as he cut down another attacking Vehicon, before he turned and blasted a Predacon drone and a HorseMan in quick succession. Not only were they now being assaulted by another, much larger and likely stronger wave of Decepticon forces, but they were also dealing with the Constructicons' combined form of Devastator as well. Add in the fact that Ro Co Zane was also present on the battlefield now in his own custom HorseMan, and no one was going to kid themselves into thinking that they would last very long at this rate.
This seemed to be pretty obvious to Blurr as well, because he was quickly tapping his comm. link and rapidly shouting, "Blurr to Cybertron or Earth or whoever can receive this signal. We're being overrun; things are bad, like really, really, really bad, and not getting better at all. Requesting backup if able to provide any. Please say you can provide backup; I'll take anything you can spare even if it's just a little Mini-Con. Is this comm. link even working?"
"Dish-appointed with satellite TV," Wreck-Gar remarked after bashing away another enemy with his make-shift staff and then firing his own blaster at the enemy forces.
Blurr did not need to be an expert to know that Wreck-Gar was actually asking if he was getting a signal through at all, but before the fast-talking Autobot could answer, he received an answer from Blaster, who had instantly rapped, "Sorry Blurr, old buddy, old pal. But things aren't any better anywhere else, so you'll just have to handle for now."
"I'll handle, but I can't make any promises that we'll still be around when you finally manage to get someone out here," Blurr replied, and he was instantly off and running, shooting, punching, and kicking any foe that was foolish enough to fall into his path like a superhero with super speed when they really got going as he went through the enemy forces.
Wreck-Gar and Thundertron just stared at the Autobot as he continued doing so, despite how little or how much help it was, and when the former spoke again, no translation was necessary to guess what he meant when he said the next quote. "He's fast."
"That he is," Thundertron muttered in agreement, and he quickly turned back to the battle at hand along with Wreck-Gar, determined to not fall today. When he saw a number of Decepticon forces start deal some serious damage to his ship, which had taken to the battlefield as well, he instantly narrowed his optics and aimed whatever guns he had on him at the attackers and shouted, "Oi! Stop trying to blow holes in my ship!"
At that moment, the Decepticons learned full well that you do not ever mess with a ship that is being commanded by Captain Thundertron of the Star Seekers, be it the Lament or otherwise, because the only thing left of the ones who had attacked said ship a moment ago afterwards were not just scrapped; they were utterly destroyed. Still, Thundertron's show of care for his vessel was making very little dent in the enemy's offensive efforts, leading him to wonder if this would end up being the day he and his vessel were both sunk after all.
Location: Cybertron
Things were not going much better on the homeworld of all Transformers, as evidenced by how brutal a beating the defenders of the metal world were taking at that very moment, whether it be in the case of the battles between Spartan's team and Cyclops', or everyone else. Though Spartan and his group were probably fairing the best out of everyone, but on the other side of things, the ones who seemed to be fairing the worst of it all, were Omega Supreme and his two passengers. Part of it may have had to do with the fact that the titanic Autobot was fighting a very large percentage of the enemy forces, but a good deal of the reason was most definitely because of the fact that he was only fighting at half strength, since he was still stuck in his alt mode at the moment. This was a problem that Ratchet had grown desperate to try and fix, and he was just about at the limit of his patience.
"Why the scrap isn't anything working," Ratchet shouted as he slammed his fist on the console he was working at in the most recent attempt to restore his old friend's transformation capabilities.
"Violent reaction not appreciated. Request: refrain from inflicting harm to the consoles of my alternate mode," Omega's voice boomed around the medic.
"Sorry old friend. I'm just getting really frustrated. Everything clearly checks out, but your T-Cog still doesn't seem to be receiving power," Ratchet explained.
"Well, the energon breach has been repaired, so it couldn't be that," Nicol reported as he came back into the room, moving to stand by a console once Ratchet had acknowledged his presence. "You have any other ideas, Omega?"
"Systems analysis currently running," Omega reported. "Analysis now completed. Possible cause for transformation capabilities continued state of inactivity: insufficient energon supply."
That made Nicol pause in thought for a minute before he said, "There was a lot of energon on the floor when I reached the point where it had been breaching…"
"And everything else we've already put into him is being used to keep us airborne and in the fight," Ratchet finished just before the large Autobot shook under the force of an explosion. Ratchet immediately rushed over to the nearest console so he could check the damage report, and after seeing it, he quickly said, "We need to figure something out soon, because we're just about to lose all shields after that hit, and we've already lost at least one weapons bank. More to the point, we don't have time to stop at an energon fueling station both because we're too far away from the closest ones, and it would take far too long to get the necessary energon into Omega with such stations."
Nicol just gritted his teeth at this news, until his gaze moved over to a monitor showing security footage of where his Gundam was still standing and a thought struck him. "Ratchet, do you still have the Nero Blitz connected to Omega's energon core?"
"Technically, it's connected to his energon intake systems that are most directly connected to his core, yes. Why do you ask," Ratchet questioned.
"Maybe we could use its Energon Reactor Core to power up Omega's transformation systems," Nicol suggested. "It worked before when we brought him back online, so why wouldn't it work again?"
"Absolutely not," Ratchet protested. "Using your Gundam to restore power to Omega's core is one thing, but if we really want to use it to restore Omega to his full capabilities, we'd most likely have to drain the Nero Blitz completely dry of all energon in its systems! More to the point, a sudden intake of that much energon could also cause serious damage to Omega as well!"
"At this point, there's nothing we can do that doesn't come with some type of risk. At least if we try this, the benefits we'd get out of it working would likely outweigh the negatives," Nicol argued.
"Don't you understand what this would mean either way if we do try this? You won't be able to enter the battle at all without putting yourself at an even greater risk than you normally do when you're piloting your machine," Ratchet pointed out to Nicol.
"Which do you think would make more of a difference here? Having me get into the battle with a Nero Blitz that isn't at its maximum power, or having a fully restored Omega Supreme enter the battle," Nicol immediately questioned.
Ratchet did not have an argument for that one, but before he could even attempt to think of one, Omega suddenly added his voice to the argument. "Proceed with Nicol Amalfi's suggestion."
"Omega," Ratchet asked in surprise.
"Sometimes, we must take great risks to save what's most important," Omega said, leading Ratchet's optics to widen a little in realization that this was something that he had once said to Omega a long time ago before he was forced to place the titan into stasis in order to keep him alive.
Seeing that he had been outvoted, Ratchet sighed in defeat and then looked over to his human companion and said, "Alright. Get down there and prep the Nero Blitz for one more energon transfer, but bear in mind, if this is going to work then you'll need to have only the bare minimum of necessary devices running on the Gundam, otherwise this may not work at all."
Nicol instantly nodded and was immediately racing back down to where his Gundam was waiting for him. After climbing into the cockpit of the machine and making sure that everything other than what was absolutely necessary for the process they were about to perform was switched off, Nicol reported that he was ready, and after a few seconds or so, he received the signal to start from Ratchet. The instant he was given the signal to begin, Nicol started pumping everything the Nero Blitz's Energon Reactor Core had into Omega Supreme, and he could only watch as the energon levels of his trusted machine for so many years began to rapidly drop at a much faster rate than he had ever seen before in every engagement he had in the machine. For a few minutes, nothing seemed to happen, and when the Nero Blitz's systems all finally shut down completely, Nicol was starting to think that it did not work, until the familiar sound that all Transformers made when transforming suddenly reached his ears, only at a much slower pace than normal, indicating one thing.
Outside of Omega, everyone had to stop and stare for a minute as the red and gold ship that had previously been taking a heavy beating suddenly began to shift and change, until the ultimate titan of all Autobot titans stood on the battlefield in his robot mode, weapons ready for action, and he simply glared at the invading attackers before he bellowed a phrase that he had not said in quite a few years. "Omega Supreme: activated and ready."
Location: Earth
If Cybertron was facing the worst out of all the battles in the current Decepticon offensive, then Earth was facing a close second, and it was fighting a battle on two fronts. Out in space, Jazz was at the forefront of the battle in orbit aboard the Omega III, along with Kisaka and DaCosta on the Kusanagi and the Eternal respectively, and none of the Decepticons up there were making it easy on any of them. There often moments when each ship's main guns were fired only to have little to no effective damage against the enemy fleet before them, but that did not keep them down for long, as they proved by throwing everything they and the rest of their fleet had against them shortly afterwards. Unfortunately, the same could not be said for things back down on Earth.
The remaining Wreckers and Leobreaker and some of his forces ended up being deployed to various points on the planet to assist in fighting off the invaders, while both the Minerva and the Seraphim provided what support they could to any other area of the planet that they could reach, leaving only Bumblebee, the Dinobots, the Predacons, and the remaining survivors of Quintessa to defend the research facility alongside the Joule Team and Banagher. Needless to say, when the Unicorn Gundam first appeared on the battlefield and the group found out who was inside, Bumblebee and Yzak had immediately told Banagher to go back and help find a way to bring their friends back home, but Banagher quickly refused and insisted that he stay and help. Before either of the two commanders could attempt to protest further, Banagher punctuated his point by blowing an attacking Predacon drone, two HorseMans, and three Vehicons out of the battle with only two shots from his machine's rifle and a quick swing of one of its beam sabers, and that was before it had morphed into a Gundam, and after seeing that, neither of the two commanders could argue any further. Even with Banagher's added assistance though, the battle did not seem to be moving in their favor or really in the direction of anyone's favor by very much at the moment, and to Bumblebee, that was not good news.
"Bumblebee to Miss Erica, tell me some good news," the Earth Division leader practically pleaded as he paused in his firing on enemy forces to check in with the research team for a brief moment.
"We're doing everything we can over here, Bee, but every time we think we've gotten close to a solution, it slips through our fingers," Erica reported.
"I'm not hoping to hear about a perfect solution at this point, Erica. I just need you to do something that will bring our guys back, preferably before we're all scrap," Bumblebee said as he slashed his wrist blade through a HorseMan mobile suit, after which, he could have sworn he got a glimpse of one of the pilots of the trio of mobile suits that had been assigned to the Dominion years ago. He did not stick around very long to see which one though, since he had other things to worry about.
"Well you may not have even that at the rate we're going," Sai stated, adding his two cents to the conversation. "The problem at this point isn't recreating the anomaly that our guys fell into; it's making sure that no one on our side is pulled in when we open it. In addition to that, when we open the gate, we need to make sure that it homes in on the exact point in reality that each of them had been transported to, so that we can effectively extract them from that point of landing, even they had been relocated from their original landing positions since their arrival."
"Say that again in English, or at least in a way that Grimlock would understand," Bumblebee groaned.
"Hey! Me, Grimlock heard that," the aforementioned Dinobot shouted from his position on the other side of the battlefield as he incinerated a number of Terrorcons with his Dino mode's flamethrower.
Grimlock's words went unacknowledged as Feldt attempted to simplify the previous explanation for Bumblebee. "What Sai means is that we're trying to make sure that we don't recreate the anomaly exactly like the one that pulled our teammates away, and we're also trying to find a way to bring them right back here even if they weren't where they were when they first arrived in whatever dimension they ended up in, since we can't be sure that they'll be able to reach the portals on their own fast enough."
"Well whatever you do, just do it fast. We need reinforcements," Bumblebee shouted.
"Where do we need them the most," Ironhide asked.
"You'd be better off asking where we don't need them," Bumblebee replied. Not two seconds after he had spoken, a loud explosion and the sounds of Autobot troops screaming reached his audio receptors, and upon turning to the source, Bumblebee's optics immediately spotted Galvatron and the Advocate Gundam approaching the facility, the Dark Star Saber firmly in the former's hand. "I'm gonna have to call you guys back. The head honchos of the 'Cons just showed up."
Bumblebee cut off the communication after that before anyone could argue with him, and he immediately moved to the forefront of the battlefield, with Grimlock, Predaking, Yzak, and Dearka falling in right beside him, each fully intending to take the fight directly to the two enemy leaders themselves. Galvatron and Le Creuset could both only smirk in amusement at the forces that were approaching them, each feeling that these enemies were likely to be far beneath their notice. Predaking may prove to be something of a challenge if he fought in just the right way, but they were both doubtful of the idea that the Predacon leader would do such a thing. After a few more minutes, the two groups' slow approaches to one another began to grow in speed, and until they were all racing to meet one another in battle, weapons ready.
No one in the research facility could stop themselves from wincing a little when they saw one of their friends outside take a serious blow on the security feed, but they all managed to shake it off and bring their focus back to their current tasks in trying to find a way to get their friends home. This was not an easy assignment, because like Sai had previously said, while they had indeed found a way to open another portal like the one that had burst to life out in space, they were still nowhere close to finding a way to make sure that no one would on their side would get sucked into it when it did open, or a way to bring their friends back from wherever they had landed. It also did not help that they did not even have a way to direct the portal to direct the portal to said locations, which would have made things a little bit easier for them in the long run, but right now, they were too short on time to worry about such sensitive matter, so they had to settle for something that would pull all of the lost Autobots and Gundam Team members back at once.
"What if we reconfigure the gravitational compensator of the Space Bridge to reverse the pull of the anomaly, and make is so…" Sai started to suggest.
"No, I already ran the numbers on that. We'd just make it so that we would be pulling whatever and whoever else is with our friends at the time, and then we'd have a new version of the same problem, only it would be trying to send back the ones who got pulled here," Erica dismissed.
"But if we were to set it so that the computer were to adjust the variables to compensate when necessary," Feldt started to say.
"We could potentially only direct the pull to anyone who actually belongs in our universe," Ironhide finished, having understood just enough to get what they were going for.
"That just leaves the problem of actually finding where they ended up. If space is vast, then reality is endless, so saying that it would be like trying to find a needle in a haystack would be putting it mildly," Sai pointed out.
"I believe I may have a theory on how to solve that," Fixit announced. "Based on past experiences, and the notes I had gathered from previous similar trips through such portals, I believe I have pinpointed an exact energy signature that is consist among all those who pass through interdimensional portals. If we were to use this energy signature, along with the energy readings of energon from our own universe, I believe we may have something of a focusing censor to direct the portal to our friends."
"Like a kind of compass that would point to where our friends are," Erica simplified with a smile. "Brilliant! How soon can you get it working?"
"With assistance, I may be able to have it working within an Earth hour or so," Fixit replied.
"Considering what's going on just outside, I think it's a safe bet that our guys may not even have a nano-cycle," Ironhide pointed out when another explosion from outside suddenly shook the facility.
"We'll work fast then," Sai said. "It doesn't have to be to any specific energon signal, just the ones that belong to our friends, or really just the ones that belong in our universe in general."
The minute that they had met the two psychopaths in the middle of the battlefield, Bumblebee's team was throwing everything they had at their two opponents, each of them knowing that if they were to do any less, they would most likely not survivor. This sentiment was quickly proven true, as Predaking and the two Autobots were having a difficult time holding Galvatron back alone, and Dearka and Yzak were not doing much better in keeping Le Creuset back, even after Shiho and Heine joined in. Every blow they managed to avoid seemed to have a ripple effect that would end up striking them, like a powerful echo of the strike, and most of the strikes they landed against their enemies, the two seemed to just shrug off like it was nothing most of the time. Most of the time it seemed as though only Predaking and Grimlock were able to deal any serious damage to the two, and even that was not very often.
Still, it did not stop Bumblebee from continuing to lead the charge against their foes, a fact that he proved true when he raced forward with his wrist blades at the ready, and both Grimlock and Predaking were both quick to follow after him. Sadly, Bumblebee's skill at swordsmanship was nothing compared to Galvatron's, a fact that the Decepticon leader made quite clear when he easily parried Bumblebee's strikes while evading Grimlock's much more savage and brutal ones and sidestepping Predaking's attacks before he finally blasted them all away with a sweep of the Dark Star Saber. "Your efforts are amusing, Bumblebee, but even now, you are nothing more than a mere insect to me," Galvatron chuckled, mockingly.
Bumblebee just narrowed his optics in response to this before he sprang up and delivered a hard hit across Galvatron's front, making the Decepticon stumble back a little bit. Once he was firmly on his feet and exchanging glares with Galvatron, Bumblebee said only one thing in reply to the Decepticon's previous comment. "So you can remember my name after all."
Galvatron did not get a chance to respond, as Predaking immediately charged him again with a roar, forcing him to move aside and duck down in order to avoid the attack. With Predaking's back to him, Galvatron was easily able to respond in kind to the Predacon's attempt at attacking him by slashing him in the back with the Dark Star Saber, and then swiping his claws into the same location, forcing Predaking to spin around. Using the momentum of said spin, Predaking raised his arm in an attempt to slash at Galvatron with his own claws, and he just had to smirk in response when both his hit connected along with the follow up strike, but that smirk quickly vanished when Galvatron managed to block his third attack. Galvatron then brought his cannon to bare, and fired it on Predaking while he was still at pointblank range. Thankfully, Predaking's armor kept him safe from suffering any serious damage, but it did still hurt him quite a bit.
Predaking just managed to lift himself up to his knees by the time Galvatron had reached him, Dark Star Saber ready to strike a finishing blow, and the Decepticon warlord merely said, "It was foolish of you to betray me, Predaking, and if you had been smart in this attempt, you would have fought me as the beast that you are."
Thankfully, Grimlock came crashing into Galvatron before he could deliver a blow against Predaking, much to the Predacon leader's unspoken thanks, and the two then shared a small look between them before facing Galvatron and as Predaking declared, "You wish to fight a beast Galvatron…"
"Then we'll give you two," Grimlock finished, and with that, the two had assumed their bestial forms with loud roars that seemed to echo throughout the battlefield and charged Galvatron, with Bumblebee falling in right behind them, his wrist blasters firing.
Things were not going much better for the four defending Gundam pilots in their battle against the disgraced Z.A.F.T. commander, as evidenced when Heine was suddenly blasted out of the air, and forced to switch the Saviour out of its mobile armor mode before it took any serious damage upon landing. That did not keep him down for long, as he instantly brought up his machine's Plasma Beam Cannons and fired them at the Advocate Gundam the minute he had a clear shot. Since Le Creuset had been engaging with Yzak and Shiho at the time, he did not see Heine's attack coming, and therefore was barely able to raise his beam shield in time to block it. As a result of this, he did receive some damage from said attack and was thrown a little off balance, a fact that was capitalized on by Dearka as he instantly fired a barrage from as many of the Verde Buster's weapons as he could. Le Creuset was soon able to regain his control again after said barrage, and he did so just in time to parry and counter a blow from the Rosso Aegis, eliciting a scream from Shiho when her machine was damaged.
"Damn you, you bastard," Yzak shouted when he heard Shiho's cry of pain, and he was instantly charging in with one of the Blu Duel's arm blades ready with a beam saber in its free hand. Le Creuset easily dodged most of Yzak's sword strikes, mostly due to the fact that the silver haired pilot was lashing out in anger for what the masked man had just done, until he finally struck back with the Advocate's own arm blade, throwing the Blu Duel off to the side the minute the blade struck.
"You are quite the talented fighter, Yzak, as are each of your teammates, but unlike Kira Yamato, each of you are no Ultimate Coordinator," Le Creuset mocked, hoping to get more of a rise out of Yzak.
His attempt failed however, as Yzak simply pushed the Blu Duel back into a standing position as he said, "Yeah, we know that we're no Kira Yamato, but unlike you, we don't have any sort of hatred towards him over a reason as petty as yours!"
Le Creuset quickly found the tables turned on him, because instead of him enraging Yzak, it was Yzak who managed to anger Le Creuset, and as a result, the masked pilot immediately charged in and started lashing out at his former subordinate in anger for the insult he had just been dealt. This played to Yzak's advantage quite easily, as now he was able to evade or parry any strikes that Le Creuset threw at him, until Dearka landed a shot on one of the Advocate's legs, while Heine blasted one of its arms with the Saviour. The two then threw up another barrage while Yzak took the time to move back and check on his other teammate, who was still down after the last hit she had received.
"Shiho, are you okay," Yzak shouted.
"Yeah…Yeah I think so," Shiho groaned in reply after a few seconds. "Rosso Aegis took a fair amount of damage from that last hit, but I can still fight."
"Then go and backup Banagher. We can handle things here," Yzak ordered her.
"Forget it! I'm not letting you fight that psycho alone," Shiho protested.
"If you stay with us, you'll be fighting at a disadvantage, and making us constantly worry about you instead of focusing on the fight," Yzak pointed out.
Shiho did not like it, but she could see Yzak's reasoning behind that statement, so she found she could do nothing more than agree to follow his orders, begrudgingly and then move her machine to backup the rookie Gundam pilot. Before she had left though, she told Yzak one simple thing. "You had better make it out of this alive."
Yzak just smirked a little in response to this before he said, "Just worry about keeping yourself alive, and I'll be fine."
Shiho nodded in response, and the two turned away from each other so that they could return to the battles that were awaiting them.
Back inside the facility, the team had finished work on the scanner, or "compass" as Erica had described it, and now they were about to attempt their first test run of the portal device to see if they could at least lock on to one if any of their friends who had been scattered throughout reality. For safety's sake, they had all made sure to secure themselves to the floor or a wall, behind a barricade of some type, and once everyone gave some type of signal to show that they were ready, Erica nodded to Ironhide to say he was clear to start the device. Ironhide immediately nodded back in reply and hit the controls, activating the scanner that they would use to search reality for their friends along with the controls for the portal, and the gate jumped to life in a manner much similar to that of a Ground Bridge or a Space Bridge. The only difference at the moment being was that it seemed to fluctuate between various different colors like a rainbow instead of just being one specific color like how the Space Bridges were blue or the Ground Bridges were green. Thankfully, they felt nothing pull them towards the vortex, so they could only assume that was a good sign, but there was nothing to indicate that they had succeeded yet, until Sai suddenly picked up something on his scanner.
"I think I've got something…a reading that's similar to that of the one of the Gundams and Autobots each," Sai shouted over the noise of the open vortex, and not a minute later, they all saw something flash before their eyes that indicated that their device was working.
There in the vortex, flashed an image of the Infinite Justice and Smokescreen, fighting in space alongside another group of Autobots, who appeared to be allied with a blue and red colored Decepticon, against another version of the Decepticon army, but a minute later, the image changed to show the Star Force Strike and Wheeljack fighting against a large 'Con and small group of animalistic Transformers along with another, much different Autobot group. Just as quickly as the first time, the image in the vortex changed again, this time to show that Gundams were more common than Transformers, as they all saw Shinn and Bulkhead engaging in battle alongside a team of five different Gundams. They just glimpsed another image that showed Waltfeld and Ultra Magnus fighting on the surface of what looked like a large meteor with another group of Gundams before the vortex suddenly sparked and shut down in a brilliant explosion, making everyone duck for cover out of fright.
After checking to make sure no one was hurt, Erica looked back at the portal in dismay, thinking that it had been seriously damaged by the explosion. She quickly let out a small sigh of relief when she saw that the worst damage was some burnt out wiring and a little cosmetic damage, but that was a small comfort compared to what had just happened. "Well, the good news is, we now know that at least some of our friends are alright. The bad news is that it seems like the generator did not have Ground Bridge enough power to keep the portal open long enough for us to get a proper lock on any of them, let alone pull them through," Sai stated as he looked over his readings.
"I don't get it," Erica muttered. "All the simulations we ran indicated that this should have worked, but it seems like we're still missing some vital piece that would pull it all together."
"Wait…Sai said that there was not quite enough power in the generator, so what if we just added a few extra generators," Feldt suggested.
"We can't whip up a handful of Ground Bridge generators in a matter of minutes. Those things need weeks to be properly calibrated and adjusted for each bridge, and the Space Bridge variety takes about twice as long unless you're an expert on the things, and last I checked, none of us fit that bill," Ironhide disputed.
"Maybe we don't need the whole thing…just the pieces that regulate the power," Sai thought aloud. "If I'm looking at this right, it didn't malfunction because we weren't giving it enough power; the vortex we need just generates a greater frequency of power that is harder to manage than that of a typical Ground or Space Bridge, so if we add a few different regulators…"
"It'll compensate for the excess amount of power that's running through the device," Erica finished.
"Makes about as much sense as anything else in this does…I think," Ironhide shrugged.
A few minutes later, which was accompanied by some cringing at the sounds of more explosions and their friends outside letting out cries of pain that were loud enough to be heard on the security feed, the group was ready to make a second attempt, at which point Erica said, "Cross your fingers and hope this works, because if it doesn't…"
"We may not have anything left of the machine to make another attempt until it's already too late," Feldt asked.
"No, we may not be here at all, and neither will anyone else in Scotland," Erica corrected, giving a very deep sense of foreboding feeling to everyone present at this new knowledge. After a few moments of silence though, a resounding determination settled into everyone's faces, and Erica knew that they were all ready to take whatever risks they faced at this point, making it impossible for her to not smile in response to this.
After running through the same checks that they had in their first attempt, Erica and Ironhide activated the device once again, and this time, it seemed to stabilize much more easily than the first. Another difference from the previous attempt was that the images of their misplaced friends started coming and then changing between one another much more quickly, until the changes between the different images began to slow down, indicating that something was happening on the other ends of the portal. The team in the research facility could only pray that it was something good.
Location: After Colony Universe
Waltfeld and Magnus had just returned from a particularly difficult battle against White Fang alongside three of the Gundam Team's members, and they had to say that they were a bit disappointed by the fact that they did not really have to do all that much. They were grateful at the same time, since it saved them quite a few precious resources, like the amount of energon that Ultra Magnus needed, but they did not expect the battle to have been so easy to handle. Another thing that they did not expect was for what appeared to be a small crack in the air to suddenly start opening up near where they were standing in the hangar, until the crack suddenly burst into a full blown portal not unlike the one that had brought them here in the first place.
"What's going on now," Duo asked as he raised his arms over his head to protect himself from the odd wind that had started blowing through the hangar once the full portal had formed.
"Some kind of White Fang tactic that we didn't suspect," Quatre suggested as he and the others in the room did the same as Duo.
After looking at said portal properly for a minute, Waltfeld immediately spotted a very familiar sight on the other side, and he quickly turned to board the Gaia once again as he shouted, "That's not White Fang! I'd say that's mine and Ultra Magnus' ticket home, that is assuming you boys don't mind us ducking out on you right now."
When no one said anything in protest, Ultra Magnus and Waltfeld both gave the young pilots a nod of acknowledgement and thanks before they started making their way towards the portal, hoping that they would end up where they seemed to be going.
Location: Future Century Universe
Shinn was starting to regret asking Domon to train him, because ever since they had stopped the Dark Gundam, the King of Hearts had been running him ragged into the ground when they were not taking care of any Dark Army stragglers that had somehow managed to continue functioning or when Domon was not either in or watching a match in the tournament finals. Bulkhead had found it admirable that he was willing to keep going, so Shinn was not willing to admit that he was praying for something to come and get them out of there, for both of their sakes. Thankfully, those prayers were soon answered when a portal suddenly burst open a few feet away from them, drawing his current sparring match with Domon to a quick halt as they turned to face it, and when Shinn saw some faint images of his home on the other side, he mentally cheered in relief at the fact that the torture that Domon called martial arts training was over for him at last and then raced over to the Grand Destiny.
"Do you really have to go now? We still haven't had a proper sparring match with you yet," Chibodee asked with a challenging grin.
Shinn smirked in response as he said, "As tempting as that offer is, I'm gonna have to take a rain check. Our friends need us back home."
"We understand. Just always remember Shinn Asuka, that a warrior's spirit burns proudly within you, and that is never something to hate or be ashamed of," Domon nodded to his unexpected student.
Shinn nodded in response to this and then powered up his Gundam before turning to Bulkhead and asking, "Ready to get back home and see how badly the others need us, Bulk?"
"I think the better question would be if they're ready to handle the new you, Shinn," Bulkhead admitted. "I doubt anyone will expect you to have become something of a martial artist while we were away."
"Hey, I'm not a martial artist, Bulkhead. I'm a warrior, and besides that, I'm completely nuts just like the rest of these guys," Shinn reminded his friend with a joking smile that drew chuckles from everyone around him.
Location: The Three Various Points in the Unicron Trilogy
All across the three different points in this universe in which three different teams of an Autobot and a Gundam pilot had landed, the same such portals had opened up in various different locations. In the case of the time where Rey and Springer had landed, and that of where Lunamaria and Crosshairs had landed, it was at a peaceful moment, in which they were all taking a breath during a brief moment of peace in their missions, and the two pairs were able to get reassurances from both Autobot teams they had joined up with that they would be able to handle themselves, so they easily left with confident smiles on their faces that these two groups would be alright even without them around. This was not the same story with Athrun and Smokescreen, as the portal had opened up while they were stranded on a deserted planet alongside Hot Shot, Red Alert, and Starscream, upon which they had encountered not only Megatron, Demolisher, and Cyclonus, but an evil clone of Optimus Prime as well, which seemed to regenerate from even the most deadly of attacks so long as one piece of him remained.
The battle had caused the both groups of Cybertronians to incur a great deal of damage, save for Athrun and Smokescreen, and they would surely have perished had a last minute miracle from the Mini-Cons not occurred in which the damaged Transformers were all repaired and then reformatted, leading to some serious cosmetic changes for the entire group. Athrun overheard Starscream mention that he looked like this universe's version of Thundercracker, while Megatron declared that he had been reborn as Galvatron. Before either of the two could comment on any of this though, the portal had burst open, and Athrun and Smokescreen found themselves faced with whether or not they should leave now and abandon their new friends, or stay and lose what may prove to be their only chance to go home.
Seeing the indecisiveness that had befallen his two new friends that had helped him so much, Starscream looked at the two and said, "Go on Athrun and Smokescreen. Go back home and leave the rest of this to us."
"But Starscream," Smokescreen started to say.
"Don't worry, kid. We can handle Megatron and those other two idiots, and besides, the other Autobots will be here any second now. Besides, you've got your own war to fight, don't you," Starscream smirked at the young Autobot in reassurance.
"That's Galvatron to you traitor," the Decepticon leader of this dimension corrected with a snarl, only to be ignored for the most part since he was not a part of this matter.
As if to prove Starscream's point, the Autobot ship that Athrun and Smokescreen had helped the team finish constructing and then joined them aboard suddenly whooshed into view, and from the ship dropped the real Optimus Prime with their newest team member, Overload right behind him. When Optimus landed and saw the portal, it took him little time to figure out what it was, and he immediately shouted, "Athrun, Smokescreen, go! This may be your only chance! Don't give up your chance to get home and help save your universe for the sake of ours."
Seeing that they could not dissuade their new friends, and knowing that no matter what universe it was they could never argue with Optimus Prime, Smokescreen and Athrun both nodded in response to this, and immediately began heading towards the portal as fast as they could. As he approached it, Athrun looked to his new partner and asked, "Well, ready to see what's going to end up being your new home, Blast Blade?"
The Mini-Con just gave a series of beeps and blips in reply, which Athrun quickly understood to be a very excited yes, if his smile was anything to go by, and he immediately nodded to his partner and accelerated the Infinite Justice forward even more so that he could finally introduce his new friend to the rest of his current friends.
Location: Universal Century Universe
Cagalli and Arcee were not entirely sure how it had happened, but somehow, they had ended up down on Earth with the UC versions of Banagher and Audrey as they continued trying to find and secure Laplace's Box, and in the process, they had become allied with Zinnerman and the soldiers under his command, while Marida had been brainwashed and forced to become the pilot of a black Unicorn Gundam that was called the Banshee. Thankfully, they had found a way to save Marida and meet up with the Nahel Argama once again in space. Now all they had left to do was secure the box. Of course, that would end up being a mission for those who were native to the Universal Century, as a portal suddenly burst forth in the space directly ahead of the two ships, and Arcee and Cagalli were quick to realize that it was likely a way for them to get home.
The blonde had to pause for a moment before she headed for her machine, and looked to the two alternate versions of her friends in concern until Banagher smiled a bit and said, "Don't worry, Cagalli. We'll be fine; you've helped to make sure of that. Just go back to your universe so that you can help them too."
Cagalli was still a bit hesitant to leave, until Audrey stepped forward and said, "We know what our answer is now, so please, believe in us like we have come to believe in you." That served to be the final bit of motivation that Cagalli needed to get going, but before she left, Audrey stopped her so she could ask one last question. "In your lifetime, did your universe's version of myself and Banagher…are they happy in the lives that they've found?"
Cagalli smiled, knowing full well what the girl was really asking, or at least a close guess of what her real question most likely was, and she simply replied, "Yeah, they are. I'd like to think that they have found their own answer too, and that they became truly strong the minute they found each other."
Audrey nodded in thanks to the blonde for that, and Banagher did the same a minute later, though he did not look like he completely understood the hidden meaning behind those words, and with that, the Gundam pilot from another universe and her Autobot partner departed, praying that their friends from the Universal Century would survive whatever their next encounter would lead them into.
Location: Robots In Disguise Universe
There was really nothing spectacular to say for when the portal opened for Mu and Wheeljack. They were simply assisting the Autobot Brothers with a patrol when T-AI called in and reported that her sensors had detected a strange anomaly forming a few miles ahead of them. Sure enough, just a short drive later, the group found the anomaly that T-AI had picked up on, and Mu and Wheeljack both gave the trio of brothers a fond farewell before blasting into the portal at their top speed. Watching over this from afar was none other than the Ultra Magnus of this universe, who could only smirk at the sight of the two leaving before he also took his leave of the area.
"It's actually a bit of a shame. I think I'm gonna miss those guys. That Wheeljack character was kinda fun to be around. Definitely my kind of Autobot," Magnus muttered to himself as he flew off before returning to the ground below and transforming to vehicle mode so he could drive away like a true robot in disguise.
Location: Transformers 00 Universe
Kira and Optimus were still enjoying the company of their new friends from Celestial Being and the alternate versions of their friends back home, when the portal suddenly burst to life directly behind them, drawing everyone's attention away from the laughs and towards said portal, in which they saw an image of Optimus and Kira's friends waiting on the other side. Seeing this immediately prompted the two misplaced heroes to start preparing to leave, with Kira heading for the Strike Freedom and Optimus making sure that the Star Saber was secure on his back. Before Optimus could start walking towards the portal, he found himself being stopped by the Autobot Prime version of Bumblebee. "Do you really have to leave us again, Optimus," Bumblebee asked. "I know you're not our Optimus Prime, but we need you. We can't do this without you."
"You are wrong Bumblebee. You are more than capable of completing the mission you all face, just as you are a very capable leader," Optimus corrected.
"No, I'm not. I can't handle that kind of thing. What makes you think I'm even ready for it?"
"You are more than ready to lead, Bumblebee, both in mine and Kira's universe and in this one. Do not ever doubt yourself," Optimus reassured the former scout, earning a nod of understanding from Bumblebee as his face hardened into a determined expression that proved his resolve to not let his former leader down was very strong, alternate version or otherwise.
Kira also had a final encounter with one of the people from this universe, only in his case it was with Setsuna F. Seiei, who had a fierce look in his eyes with a ghost of a smile on his face. "Admiral Kira Yamato, never forget you and I…both of us…we are Gundams."
Kira knew exactly what the Gundam Meister of Exia meant by that statement, and he immediately smirked in reply as he extended a hand to Setsuna and said, "We are Gundams, Setsuna F. Seiei."
After a moment of hesitance, Setsuna eventually accepted the offered handshake while his ghost of a smile made itself just a little more known, but only to anyone who was looking directly at him like Kira was. Once they had released their handshake, Kira boarded and reactivated the Strike Freedom, and joined Optimus in their departure through the portal back to their universe, but not before the last Prime stopped to give the heroes of this dimension, human and Autobot, one final nod of confidence to show that he knew that no matter what difficulties they faced, in the end, they would succeed in their mission, and with that, the two vanished from the era that they had grown stronger in while finding new friends.
Location: Main Universe, Earth
As the images continued flashing through the portal, Sai and Feldt both saw that the readings were beginning to rise to a point that would be too much for the machine to handle, and they were about to shout out for Erica and Ironhide to shut it down, but the two just waved them off, since they had seen their friends moving towards the portal from the other side. After a few seconds though, the portal finally shut down on its own, after letting out an explosion of energy, prompting Sai to jump over to Feldt so that he could shield her with his body. They both stayed like that for a few minutes until they realized that they were still alive and parted from each other, much to their slight disappointment, but upon turning to face the gateway again, they both stopped and stared in awe at what was now before them right along with Erica and Ironhide, while large grins slowly started to spread across each of their faces.
There, standing in the threshold of the portal, were sixteen figures, half of them clearly Cybertronian, and half of them Gundams, standing tall and proud as a sign of triumphant return, and even just from looking at them, they could all feel just how much stronger these sixteen were in comparison to how strong they were before, but they honestly did not care about such things, because all that mattered to them was that their friends were finally home.
A simple glance from Erica Simmons was all that Fixit needed to know what message he needed to send out along with Blaster. "Blaster, please help relay this message to any worlds that are closer to Cybertron's range of communication: attention all planets within range, reinforcements are inbound, now."
Location: Velocitron
Hot Shot had finally reached his breaking point in terms of patience when it came to the 'Cons that were attacking Velocitron. They had already lost a lot of good people to these guys, and he was just about ready to charge in and blow every single 'Con opposing them to the Pits in anger for all those they had lost, but he somehow managed to keep a cool head and think rationally about such actions, so he simply kept firing as Override, Sideswipe, and Jetstorm helped move any injured they could to safety. Things were not made any easier by that pilot who called himself Prayer Reverie, considering said pilot was able to focus the HorseMans in much more coordinated effort than the random ravaging and rampaging that they were taking part in before, but he knew they had to hold out for just a little longer, because right now, they did not have many other options, even there was a chance that there was not any help coming.
That idea vanished when Fixit's message came in, but it also puzzled him at the same time since he thought that there was not anyone left to provide support to any of the battles that were taking place. His confusion was shared by his other comrades that had heard the message, as was made evident when Override came back over to him and said, "I thought there wasn't anyone left for the Autobots to send out as backup. Who could they possibly be sending us?"
"How about a couple of Wreckers," someone suddenly shouted, and a second later, a large, crimson blast flashed across the sky like lightning and tore through several enemy forces at once, and if anyone were to turn to the Aerialbots at that moment, everyone would see that they had shocked expressions on their faces that soon turned into broad grins.
"I don't believe it," Silverbolt exclaimed happily as he turned and saw the Star Force Strike flying into action in its Sky Grasper mode while Wheeljack came racing in from right behind him.
Once he was right in the middle of the battle zone, Mu transformed the Star Force Strike into Gundam mode and whipped out his machine's rifle and fired a powerful shot that tore through several enemies at once. At the same time, Wheeljack drove up a damaged piece of road, which actually proved to be a very good makeshift ramp, and transformed in midair while pulling his swords out for action, letting him slash through multiple different foes at once. "Gonna need one hell of a cleanup crew after this," Wheeljack shouted over the explosions that had his landing on the ground.
"Got that right," Mu agreed, and he then turned to the custom HorseMan mobile suit that was piloted by Prayer Reverie. "Hey kid, ready for round two?!"
Prayer did not get a chance to answer, as the Star Force Strike had immediately blasted towards him, arm blade activated and ready for action, and as a result, the two were clashing blades with each other, while Wheeljack was left to deal with Cyclonus and Slipstream, and Hot Shot and Override focused their attention on Ransack's forces. Such odds were no longer a problem for anyone, as evidenced by how Wheeljack was able to take down Cyclonus easily enough without expending very much energy at all, a fact that drew a smirk to his face as he muttered, "I never thought I'd say this, but thank you for the sparring matches, Ultra Magnus."
Mu ended up being the only one who heard Wheeljack's compliment, as everyone else was too busy driving back the enemy forces to really notice, and that led Prayer to think that the Hawk of Endymion had left himself open to attack. This was something that Mu had wanted him to think, as it easily allowed him to use the absorb system in the Star Force Strike's shield to absorb everyone ounce of energy that was in the beam blast that had been fired at him. With that done, Mu decided it was time to finish the little game he had been playing up until now and activated his Gundam's new Cosmic Charge Mode, shocking everyone on the battlefield when they saw the mobile suit change. Using the shock and awe to his advantage, Mu immediately transferred the energy that he had just absorbed from Prayer's recent attack in the Star Force Strike's rifle, and fired a powerful blast that easily tore through a little over half of the enemy forces and completely demolished a nearby mountain that had been just behind them.
Seeing this awesome new power of their enemies must have scared the Decepticon forces quite a bit, as Slipstream immediately scowled and started shouting for all Decepticons to retreat at once, and no one argued for even a microsecond. Seeing their enemies flee the battle in terror drew cheers of joy and triumph as the Star Force Strike descended to the ground so that it could stand alongside a smirking Wheeljack, who just spun his swords around in his hands before resting one on his shoulder while the other just hung down at his side.
Location: Junkion
Even with Blurr upping his game so that he was fighting at his full strength, things had not improved on Junkion in the slightest, and now, it had reached a point where one would think that it was practically down to just Wreck-Garr, Thundertron, and Blurr, since most of the Star Seekers were now doing everything they could to help the wounded while those three had become the center of attention for the fight. "You know, it would usually be at this point where one would stick to the pirate code and exercise the oldest and most noble of pirate traditions," Thundertron remarked.
"And just what exactly would that be," Blurr quickly asked.
"To cut our losses and run away," Thundertron answered.
"You wouldn't dare," Wreck-Garr snarled, sounding like he was quoting a threatening warlord of some type.
"Fortunately, I never was one for tradition," Thundertron finished as he brought his sword to bear. "I intend to see this through to the end."
"And here I thought that a captain was supposed to go down with his ship, not before it," a familiar voice cut in before shouting out an unfamiliar phrase. "Grand Destiny Blazing Sword!"
An instant later, a flash of energy swung through the battlefield like a massive sword had come down to cut away the opposing forces, and upon turning to see who had executed such an attack, the three defenders of Junkion could only grin excitedly since they were now able to really understand the meaning behind the message that they had received a short time ago. "Well you took your sweet time getting here, lad," Thundertron smirked in good humor.
Descending onto the battlefield were none other than the Destiny Team, with the Grand Destiny leading the charge, and Bulkhead, Springer, and Crosshairs falling in right behind them. Once they were onsite, Springer had immediately taken to the air in his helicopter mode and began opening fire on anyone unfortunate enough to cross his path, while the rest of the group engaged the forces on the ground or that fell into their range of fire. Oddly enough, at least to everyone other than Bulkhead, Shinn seemed to take a more up close and personal approach to the fight by mainly using close-combat abilities, be it through the Grand Destiny's arm blades and beam sword, or with a variety of what looked like powerful martial arts moves. No one questioned it though, as it seemed to be working quite well for him, given how many enemies went up in explosions after he had finished with them, be they Terrorcons, Predacon drones, Vehicons, or HorseMans.
The sight of one of their enemies apparently playing with them, at least from his perspective, infuriated Ro Co Zane, and he immediately moved to engage the Grand Destiny, only to be intercepted when the Liberator appeared directly in front of him. "Where do you think you're going," Rey asked before he slammed a powerful punch into his foe's mobile suit, lighting the spark of battle between the two once again.
With her friends fighting such intense battles gave Lunamaria the chance she needed to move to a better position, while she pulled out her Cyber Key from the wrist device she now wore on her pilot suit. After spinning the key in her fingers for a bit, she quickly inserted the key into its slot on her controls, summoning the powerful Cyber Key to her machine, and activating its Heavy Beam Gatling Cannons. "Let's see how you guys like a taste of what the Pure Impulse can do with a little Cyber Key power," Lunamaria smirked in excitement at the chance to show off her newest trick. "Final Impulse Burst!"
A second later, the Gatling Cannons and all of her other long-range weapons burst to life with energy as they lit up the skies with a shower of energon blasts that tore through the various enemies that were unfortunate enough to fall into her line of fire. When the smoke finally cleared, there barely any surviving Terrorcons, HorseMans, or Vehicons, and the ones that did survive Luan's attack were barely in any condition to even be considered the smallest of threats. Even Devastator ended up being brought down and forced to separate back into the six Constructicons that made him up after he received a direct hit from Luna's attack, and they were just barely able to stand at the moment. Seeing this display of newfound power made Thundertron stare for a bit before he said, "I want one of those."
"You've gotten better, Luna," Rey remarked after pushing Co Zane away, but before he could engage his enemy again, his display suddenly lit up with a powerful glow, showing him an image that he did not expect to see, but smiled in welcoming of it all the same. "Shinn! Don't move for a second!"
"Why? What's wrong," Shinn asked, but the only answer he received was the Liberator releasing a pulse of energy that circled around his machine until it finally settled into its chest. Once this energy had done so, Shinn could feel a strange pulsation coming from his machine while his display showed an image of what looked like his Gundam combining together with Rey's. "Uh Rey? What'd you just do to my Gundam?"
"You've got the display on your screen right," Rey asked, immediately telling Shinn that he knew what would happen after that burst of energy went into the Grand Destiny.
"Yeah," Shinn nodded hesitantly.
"Then synchronize your movements with mine, and then go with it from there," Rey instructed his friend.
At this point, Shinn gave up on trying to get a straight answer, and just blasted his machine into the air until it was flying in concert with Rey's, almost like a mirror image of the other Gundam. After another second or so, Rey's Gundam suddenly began transforming until the disk on its back had split into two halves that were being held on the outsides of the now longer legs, while the rest of its upper half seemed to either retract or fold in on itself, while the Grand Destiny began shifting so that its own legs had become massive arms while the wings moved up a little to compensate for the sudden change. After lining up with one another, the two machines combined into one, giving each other the half of a machine that they were now missing, and giving rise to a whole new Gundam.
"Powerlinx Grand Destiny Gundam, complete," Rey reported from his cockpit that was now located in the newly combined machine's back. "Of course, maybe we should go with something more original like…Liberating Destiny Gundam."
"Uh Rey, how did you make this possible," Shinn interrupted, his amazement clear as day in his voice.
"I'll explain later, let's just get these guys," Rey told his friend.
"Right," Shinn nodded, and he immediately pushed forward on his controls, sending the new machine flying towards the enemy at an incredible speed that one would not have suspected it of having, given its new size. After racing around and tearing through the enemy non-stop and at an unbeatable rate, Shinn finally unleashed the new finishing move he learned from training under Domon while loudly roaring, "Grand Destiny Breaker!"
After the dust had clear from Shinn's finishing attack, Ro Co Zane could only scoff in disgust at what had just unfolded, and how humiliating a defeat they now clearly been dealt by Za Burrel and his teammates, but since he was smart enough to know when to cut his losses, he just signaled the others to retreat, and the Decepticon forces were off and running, leaving the survivors and defenders of Junkion to cheer in victory. After a minute or so, Lunamaria finally turned her attention to her boyfriend and asked, "Any particular reason you seem to be shouting out the names of all your attacks now?"
"Sorry; it's a habit I kinda picked up from the guys I met while we were gone," Shinn apologized with a sheepish look that he knew Luna could see without even seeing his face.
"Hey don't sweat it too much. You're not the only one who picked up a habit like that," Rey reminded his friend, leading Luna to voice an agreement with that statement, which was soon followed by a round of laughter from all three friends.
Location: Nebulous
Like the forces on Junkion and Velocitron, the defenders of Nebulous also received some reinforcements from the recently returned Autobots and Gundam pilots, and when she saw Arcee and Smokescreen racing onto the battlefield with the Infinite Justice and Diamond Akatsuki following right behind them, Elita One could only grin at the knowledge that their return brought with them. "They're back," the sparkmate of Optimus Prime whispered in tearful relief, knowing that her statement did not just apply to the four recent arrivals.
None of the four wasted any time in getting to work, as Arcee quickly blasted through the battlefield until she was right in the thick of it, but she did not remain on her own for long, as Smokescreen suddenly came up from under the ground to fire his energon bow at the enemies that were about to try and get the drop on Arcee, knocking out two of the Hive Headmasters easily when he did, and leaving a third one for Arcee to take down. "Thanks kid," Arcee nodded to Smokescreen.
"Any time, Arcee," Smokescreen mock-saluted in reply before they both turned their attention back to the battle that was still going on.
While they were doing that, Cagalli took this moment to activate the psyco-frame that her Diamond Akatsuki had recently awakened, allowing her mental awareness to become increased in an instant while speeding up the machine's reaction time to the point where it was practically responding to her thoughts before she could even think them. This allowed her to easily give both Bruticus and Scorpnok the run around while she targeted their most vulnerable points, such as their joints and blind spots, until she finally blasted to the side so that Defensor could deliver a final blow to knock Bruticus out of the fight, forcing him to separate back into the five Combaticons. Scorpnok on the other hand, was going to need a little more of a push before he finally went down though.
Thankfully, Athrun was more than happy to provide it. "Blast Blade, it's time for us to show what you've got," the ace pilot told his new partner, and the Mini-Con excitedly beeped in reply before jumping out of the cockpit and into the air as he transformed to vehicle mode and flew around to the Infinite Justice's back while Athrun shouted the command he was waiting to hear. "Powerlinx!"
The minute that Blast Blade had connected with the machine, the Infinite Justice's Blade Cannons sprang to life, and Athrun blasted his machine forward the minute they were securely in hand. Once he was close enough, he powered up one of the blade weapons so that it was emitting a beam saber much like the ones he would use when flying while docked with a METEOR and swung at the massive Headmaster with all of his might, throwing Scorpnok off balance long enough for Athrun to fire a powerful, narrow stream of energy from the other one. This combination of attacks was what ultimately left Scorpnok weak enough for Fortress Maximus to deliver the final blow, ending the battle and sending the enemy running in full retreat, much to everyone's joy and relief.
Location: Cybertron
Even with Omega Supreme joining the battle at full strength, the scales were tipped in anyone's favor by all that much, but the thing that made a real difference in turning the tides in anyone's favor was when the Gaia and Ultra Magnus arrived on the battlefield, leaving Ratchet and Nicol to both smile widely in excitement at the sight of their friends' return. Almost instantly after they had arrived, Magnus and Waltfeld were both shouting out orders to the troops, and a vast majority of both commanders' orders, while seemingly strange at first, ended up being the very thing that allowed the Autobots to start pushing the enemy back, not little by little, but practically all at once. In fact, the orders they were receiving were so effective, that some of them had to wonder if the two commanders had somehow gained the ability to see the future while they were gone.
The truth was they were at least half right, somewhat. "You seem to have adjusted quite well when it comes to effectively using the ZERO System, Commander Waltfeld," Ultra Magnus commented as he slammed his hammer into a Terrorcon, sending it flying into another one that was just a few feet away afterwards.
"Well, I guess I just had a good deal of practice, and it helps that I had a good friend watching my back to make sure I didn't lose it like I initially did that first time," Waltfeld shrugged in nonchalance, even while he maintained his focus on keeping the system from overpowering his mind.
Seeing how much the tide had turned with the arrival of the two commanders made Cyclops snarl in disgust, and it only fired him up even more as he charged towards the two, shouting, "No! I will not lose! I will not bring Lord Galvatron another failure like those incompetent, traitorous beasts! I'll crush you all with my bear hands if I have to!"
Cyclops never got the chance to do any of that, because before he was even within arm's reach of the two, he found his path cut off by Spartan, who had his sword ready and waiting to run right through him, and run through him it did as he ended up running so that the blade would end up piercing his torso the minute he had reached him. "I told you that you would die to today, Cyclops," Spartan snarled as he slashed his sword through Cyclops', letting the Decepticon commander drop to the ground.
When Roadkill saw that his commander had been killed, he immediately gave the signal for the Decepticons to retreat, leaving the defenders of Cybertron to cheer in victory, both for the fact that they had succeeded in protecting their home and that their greatest heroes had returned to them, as evident from the fact that Ultra Magnus and Andrew Waltfeld's Gaia Gundam were both standing tall and proud as they looked out over the former battlefield side-by-side.
Location: Earth
Bumblebee could not help but groan in pain as he tried to sit up once again after being on the receiving end of a very brutal beating from Galvatron and Le Creuset. Having Grimlock, Predaking, Dearka, Yzak, and Heine as backup against these madmen may have been a slight help at first, but now, it was just a struggle for each of them to survive. Even Predaking was struggling to stand, much to everyone's initial surprise, but after a moment, it did make sense that the ones who had given him life would be able to hurt him to such a degree, even if he was different from the beast he had once been not so long ago. Before he could move any further in his attempts to stand once again, he found himself being pushed back down to the ground by Galvatron's foot while the Advocate Gundam towered over him with an arm blaster ready to fire right into his face.
"It appears that your luck has finally run out, Bumblebee," Galvatron smirked. "This time, there won't be any miracles to save you when we kill you."
"And here I thought it would have been a bit more spectacular when you finally perished," Le Creuset mocked as he prepared to fire his weapon. Just as the blaster was charging up though, the sound of a truck horn reached everyone's ears, and upon turning to the source, Le Creuset found himself releasing an honest gasp of disbelief at what he saw approaching them. "It can't be! The Strike Freedom!"
Sure enough, barreling towards them as it changed out of its truck mode was the Strike Freedom Gundam, which made quick work of any other enemies that attempted to impede its advance. When Galvatron and Le Creuset turned to fire on him, Kira just activated his machine's beam shield before launching his mobile suit into the air, to reveal Optimus Prime driving into the battle right behind him, with a roar of his vehicle mode's engines. Once Kira was out of the way, Optimus immediately fired a missile barrage that bombarded the two psychos until they had finally moved a fair distance away from his allies, giving Optimus the chance to transform into robot mode and bring out the Star Saber for battle, which he immediately clashed against Galvatron's Dark Star Saber practically seconds later.
"What must I do to be rid of you, Prime," Galvatron snarled in anger as he pushed against Optimus' legendary blade.
"Far more than anything that is possible for you, Galvatron," Optimus answered as he won the struggle of strength and managed to push Galvatron back. He then swung the Star Saber around in a powerful swing, its blade glowing with blue energy as it came down on its target, and it was all Galvatron could do to be able to avoid both that swing and the ones that followed after.
Le Creuset snarled at this sudden development, and decided to take the Advocate's new artificial T-Cog for its first real test drive by transforming his dark Gundam into a massive, dark colored helicopter, allowing him to get a better angle on the two battling leaders from the air. What he did not expect was for the Strike Freedom to suddenly blast further into the air and then transform into its new jet mode before firing on the masked man that had plagued the universe with his darkness for far too long now, and the ensuing dog-fight between the two quickly proved that Kira had already become far more experienced in fighting with his Gundam's new vehicle mode than Le Creuset was at this point in time. Not only that, but the Strike Freedom's jet mode was also held a very noticeable advantage when it came to pure speed in an aerial battle, so he was able to make quick work of knocking Le Creuset out of the air.
Somehow, Le Creuset was able to regain control of his machine before he hit the ground, but not before the Strike Freedom had flown up to him and returned to Gundam mode so that Kira could capture the Advocate Gundam in its grasp, and then say a simple sentence that he had often heard Optimus say when addressing some of his foes before. "Rau Le Creuset…be gone!"
With that simple declaration, the Strike Freedom immediately spun around a few times before throwing the Advocate Gundam with all of its might, sending both the machine and its pilot flying right into Galvatron just as he was jumping up to bring down a powerful strike on Optimus from above. Upon their collision, the two tyrants were sent tumbling across the ground, until Galvatron managed to push Rau's Gundam off of him and then take to the skies in his own jet mode, thinking he could knock Kira out of the air more effectively. He had not counted on Optimus assuming his own, new bomber jet mode and he was quick to start firing on Galvatron until the Decepticon warlord was blasted out of the sky once again.
With his enemy grounded once again, Optimus transformed into robot mode, and hovered in the air alongside the Strike Freedom, right above the two psychopaths as a show of how much stronger they had become and how easily they had bested the two villains, and he said, "Leave now, Galvatron and Rau Le Creuset. Neither one of you are welcome here, and the same goes for your forces and the monsters that you have created."
The two heralds of Unicron just snarled at the two in disgust before they looked over the battlefield to see that the Autobot forces in the immediate area were easily pushing their own warriors back now, having seen that their leaders had returned at last and easily bested the two of them, and that served to enrage them even more. They likely would have done something to retaliate had they not received a telepathic message from their master at that moment. "Leave them to this victory, my heralds," Unicron commanded. "In the end, it will not matter. They will all burn soon enough."
Though they did not like it, the two leaders signaled their forces to pull back in full retreat, and they were soon racing away into the sky and the Space Bridge portal that would lead them back to whatever sanctuary that they had in their base. Any other time, the heroes of Earth and Cybertron would likely have been more concerned over this sudden withdraw and a fear that the worst was still yet to come, but at that moment, none of that mattered to anyone. All that anyone cared about at that moment, was that the universe now had the heroes it had lost to other corners of reality had returned, stronger than they had been before, and seeing those same heroes standing strong and proud at the head of whatever battle that had just been won was all the reason anyone needed to believe that there was a much more certain hope of ending whatever plot the Chaos Bringer had in store for them.
AN: Yeah this chapter was really all over the place, huh? In all honesty, I kinda wanted that to be the point, because it would allow you all to see just how insane things had become in the absence of the misplaced sixteen heroes, right up until the triumphant return of those heroes, as the chapter title would suggest.
Also, yeah, of course I was going to have Rey gain the ability to grant a combination spark to someone, but it will only be to certain pilots and members of the Gundam Team, so don't expect anymore combinations between Autobots and Gundam pilots. And yes, it was only natural that Shinn be the first one to receive a combination spark. You'll find out more on who else will get one in the next chapter.
Speaking of new abilities that got a chance to show off, which is pretty much all of them, don't think that just because the bad guys know about them now it will mean that they can counter those abilities, because they still don't know the full extent of these new powers that the Gundam Team and Autobots had gained, and while we're on the subject, of course Le Creuset's Gundam would gain the ability to transform into a vehicle mode. It is equipped with it's own artificial T-Cog now, so it wouldn't make sense to do otherwise. If you're wondering why I chose a helicopter for the Advocate Gundam's vehicle mode, blame it on the fact that Megatron had such a vehicle mode in Transformers Animated, and I couldn't really think of anything better for the thing to change into.
Now, about the next chapter, don't think that I'll be going right into the final battle, because that won't start for a couple more chapters.
Dearka: How many chapters are left in this thing anyway? I think we all want to know at least that.
AN: Uh, let me think...counting the next chapter that will come immediately after this one...I'd say that there's at least...four chapters left in this story, minimum, and that's counting the epilogue that you know that this story will have, like pretty much every other story I've written has had. So that should give you all an idea on just how close we are to bringing this adventure to a close at last.
Arcee: Hard to believe that this may be the end for all of us working together.
Bumblebee: Why don't we save that kind of talk for when we're a bit closer to the last chapter, okay Arcee?
Optimus: Agreed, we are not done just yet, so it would be better for us to not start thinking like we already are.
AN: Well said, Optimus. Now, I think we've kept the readers long enough with the sad, emotional stuff. Onto the Preview!...
After a brief moment to relax and let everyone become acquainted with the new abilities that the sixteen recently returned Gundam pilots and Autobots had acquired in their travels to other universes, the heroes of Earth and Cybertron begin making plans on how to track down the now fully revived Unicron so that they may determine what his next move could be. During this time, the New Iacon Base receives an encoded distress signal that none of them would have expected one from, leading to a shocking discovery that may change everything in their struggle so that they have even more of a fighting chance than before. Next time on Mobile Suit Gundam SEED Prime: Chaos Hunters…Chapter 30: Silver Linings. Discover a new key to victory in the most unexpected of places, Autobots and Gundam Team!
Please read and review, and I'll see ya next time!
