36- Flying Mind.
The Nemesis was still lying in the Kanto Safari Zone, near a ledge because of the previous incident. The Decepticons were analyzing the situation.
"Dreadwing, damage report."
"We have suffered critical damage to all mayor systems, lord Galvatron. It will be some time before we can get the ship airborne."
"Soundblaster." Galvatron called.
Immediately, Galvatron's most loyal Decepticon reproduced what the surveillance cameras recorded from the main core room: when Warpath caused those explosions. He zoomed and cleared the image, making able to identify the Autobot.
"So, it was an Autobot who crippled my vessel. They will move quickly to exploit any perceived weakness." Galvatron remarked.
"Surely they're not foolish enough to launch a direct assault, my liege." Knock Out retorted.
"Optimus has grown decidedly more ruthless since our last encounter."
Moments later, all the main Decepticons were in the power core room, about to witness Galvatron's idea to speed up the ship's reparations.
"Lord Galvatron, as your physician, I strongly advise against this. Dark energon regenerative properties are impressive, but the side effects. There's no telling how it might impact the ship." Knock Out objected.
"Dark energon courses through my veins." Galvatron said, again with his eyes purple, ignoring Knock Out's warning. "Infusing the warship will enable me to manipulate the craft as if we are one. And together, we shall crush Optimus Prime."
Meanwhile, in the Autobot base, everyone was listening Warpath's crazy adventure, even pokemon ranger Lunick and his pokemon partner: Minun, who was playing with the gang's pokemon.
"But when the Insecticons suddenly backed off, we got inspired by our proximity to the power core, and did what I like most." Warpath told crushing his fists together.
"I'm sure you two managed to surprise Galvatron trashing his ship like when we used to make Team Rocket blast off." May congratulated while she took Beautifly on her hands.
"Beautifly." The little pokémon nodded before moving to May's head.
"Beautifly looks so funny on your head, May." Bonnie admired.
"She has the habit to stay on my head when she can."
"With the Nemesis on the ground, Galvatron's big advantage is now gone." Hot Rod noticed.
"Yeah, we should hit the Cons right now, while they're vulnerable." Arcee suggested.
"Galvatron's warship may be grounded, but let's not forget that we remain vastly outnumbered. Especially since he has added the Insecticon hive to his ranks." Ratchet reminded.
"Then maybe it's time for me to call in a combined attack."
"Or for us to consider more extreme measures, Ranger Lunick." Optimus corrected.
Later, Optimus and Elita stepped inside an opening vault which contained a familiar object.
"The spark extractor? Optimus, are you certain you want to travel down this path?"
"While I am deeply reluctant to deploy a weapon of this caliber, especially one forged by Decepticon hands, this may be our only chance to end the war, once and for all."
On the Nemesis, the metallic claw of the power core room took a dark energon box and inserted it inside the power core. Next, Galvatron pulled the activation lever. That made the dark energon to flow through the conduits, replacing the ordinary energon. That also changed the ship's inside color, turning it darker than it was before, and the terminals' screens changed to red, and made the info flow faster. Everyone noticed it all around the ship, especially Galvatron.
"Yes, I can feel it."
That was noticed too in the Autobot base.
"Optimus, I'm detecting a massive energy spike at the Decepticon crash site. It appears to be dark energon." Ratchet reported before activating the ground bridge.
"Autobots, transform and roll out!" Optimus ordered.
The Autobots changed form and drove into the portal. Optimus was going too when…
"Hold on, Prime." Ranger Lunick called. "If you are gonna deploy some kind of super weapon in the final showdown with the Decepticons, is my job as a representative of planet Earth to bear witness."
Optimus and Elita looked at each other, not convinced at all. At the end, Lunick went with Optimus to the other side of the portal. Once there, the Autobots returned to robot form as everyone looked to the sky.
"By Arceus." Ranger Lunick said surprised.
The Nemesis was in the air again, only that now it showed purple lights instead of red. In its bridge, Soundblaster showed on his screen the Autobots' presence.
"Optimus, you never disappoint." Galvatron saw.
The ship deployed all its turrets and aimed at them.
"Bumblebee, now." Optimus signaled.
Bee was in vehicle form, driving at full speed toward the ship when it fired its weapons.
"Autobots, draw their fire." Elita instructed.
The Autobots went at all directions, forcing the ship to divide the fire at them. Lunick was behind a rock, seeing everything with his binoculars. Meanwhile, Bee continued his way to the ship, carrying the spark extractor inside him.
"Once you launch the spark extractor, be sure to clear its radius before it can activate." Optimus advised.
Dodging the shots, Bee changed to robot form, handed the artifact and continued running toward his objective. Then, on top of the Nemesis, an antenna-shaped object emerged before charging and firing an energy beam.
"(Almost there…)" Bee said in the moment the beam hit him, freezing him at the moment.
"Bumblebee!" Optimus called out.
The spark extractor fell at some distance from Bee, being Moonracer the closest one.
"Mine!" She said taking it.
The turret fired the beam at her next. She tried to dodge by jumping, but the beam hit her, paralyzing her and making her drop the weapon. That was also spotted inside the ship.
"I didn't realize the ship was equipped with a stasis beam." Knock Out commented surprised.
Despite saying anything, Galvatron was also surprised of not being aware of that weapon. Warpath was the next one who was going to grab the weapon, but when he did the beam paralyzed him too. Wheeljack jumped above him and grabbed it, but the turret aimed and fired at him too, paralyzing him next. Arcee made a run for it and grabbed it before keep running, and so the weapon fired at her next. Sideswipe picked it up and made use of his speed to dodge the weapon a few times.
"Hot Rod, come here. I have an idea: it can't shoot us both." Sideswipe said passing him the spark extractor.
As they made their way to the ship, they passed the weapon to each other in order to confuse the turret, like if they were playing rugby, until suddenly it decided to fire a beam that ended zapping Sideswipe, and making him drop the spark extractor. It landed near Elita One, who the weapon was aiming at next. Seeing that it was going to fire…
"Optimus, now it's up to you!" She called out passing it to him before the beam hit her.
After catching the weapon, Optimus continued advancing at the ship, with Hot Rod next to him. The turret fired again, but before it could hit Optimus, Hot Rod jumped in front of him, receiving the shot. Optimus continued dodging the beam rolling out of its way and jumped toward the ship. Unfortunately, the turret anticipated his move and corrected its way, firing and hitting him too. Optimus fell to the ground, paralyzed like all the team. As the ship got closer, Ranger Lunick saw the weapons aiming at him.
"And to think that the day had started well."
But surprisingly for him, the ship retrieved its weapons. The Nemesis zoomed one of its screens into the spark extractor, next to Optimus.
"The spark extractor! Guide us closer so that I may collect what belongs to me, and destroy the Autobots!" Galvatron demanded.
But one of the ship's terminals showed a line of cybertronian words as other one, the navigation system, looked onto some coordinates. Lunick saw the ship changing its course and leaving.
"Team's down. Requesting med-evac." He called to base with his com-link.
Of course, the Decepticons saw that too.
"What? Where are you going?! I said closer!" Galvatron yelled.
"Lord Galvatron, the ship seems to be navigating itself." One of the Decepticons in charge of piloting the ship reported.
"Override!"
The pilot tried, but they only received a negative buzzing and a shake, signs that the ship was not following the commands. That irritated Galvatron.
"The systems are bypassing manual control…" The pilot said until a bolt of electricity generated from his terminal and fried him.
"It appears the ship now possess a will of its own." Knock Out deduced.
"Impossible. Trace the problem to its source and fix it!" Galvatron ordered.
"Do not tamper with my systems! This will be your only warning!" A new grave voice said.
"Warning?!"
"My mission assumes priority. Any cybertronian who interferes will be neutralized."
"My own vessel dares to address me in threatening tones?!" Galvatron yelled in disbelief.
Soundblaster pointed to the screen with the new line of words.
"It also seems to be doing a better job of decoding the Project Iacon database than we were: it's already deciphered a new set of coordinates." Knock Out saw.
Soundblaster displayed the coordinates on his screen.
"And judging by our current course, that is precisely where the ship is headed." Dreadwing added.
"As I desired. You see? This warship is nothing more than an extension of my very will." Galvatron proclaimed triumphal.
"Your will is nothing. The Iacon artifact will belong to me."
"I am lord Galvatron! I command you to cease operations!"
"You are no longer in command." The voice said as it sent a stream of energy above Galvatron.
That caused a high-pitch frequency that affected Galvatron's head, making him scream in pain and fall to his knees. Knock Out put a hand on his shoulder, concerned about him.
"Regain control of this vessel, by any means necessary." Galvatron said when it stopped.
Immediately, Soundblaster connected his tentacles to a terminal with intention to hack the systems, but that was a mistake: the terminal sent currents of electricity through them that let him just like the Autobots.
"All hands, cut power to the mainframe, and disconnect data relays! Now!" Galvatron ordered.
Dreadwing advanced with a squadron by one path of the ship. Unfortunately, the ship was already starting its own plan: it generated a wall of stasis beams that started to move at high speed through the corridors. That caught them by surprise when they turned to the next corridor and froze them in contact. The Insecticons crawled through another way, but the ship created another one and did the same with them. Actually, it sent the walls to go over all the corridors to paralyze all the ship's crew, catching by surprise the ones who were trying to correct the malfunction. Meanwhile, Team Prime was brought back to base, still frozen like statues. Their friends seemed worried as Ratchet finished examining them.
"Are they gonna be okay?" Max asked worried.
"They're alive, but I've never encountered this form of stasis lock." Ratchet confessed.
"The Cons are crossing the ocean: making their way to the Unova region." Ranger Lunick announced pointing at the screen, which showed an image of the Nemesis.
"Wait, we can track them?" Misty asked.
"Why aren't they cloaked like usual?" Dawn added.
"None of this makes sense: they had us in the crosshairs but the Cons just took off." Lunick recalled.
"They even left behind the spark extractor." Ritchie piped in.
"Well, if the ship isn't cloaked, maybe the communication relay is open." Tracey started. "And…"
"Yep yep, are you suggesting that we just call Galvatron and ask him what's happening up there?" Ratchet asked puzzled.
"You got any better idea?" Ash answered as everyone else shrugged.
Ratchet looked at Ranger Lunick, who did the same as the kids. Back to the Nemesis, Knock Out went inside Orion Pax old work station, and saw appearing on the screen another line of words.
"Lord Galvatron, the computer has decrypted a second set of coordinates. Perhaps we should permit it to continue…" Knock Out said until another stasis turret emerged from the ceiling and shot him in the back.
"I do not require permission."
In that exact moment, back at base…
"Autobot Outpost Omega One to Decepticon warship. Galvatron, please respond." Ratchet called through the com-link, with no answer.
Back inside, Galvatron sprinted until he went through a corridor full with frozen Insecticons on the ceiling and Cons on the ground, pushing aside the ones who blocked the way, until he reached to the power core. He grabbed the lever to reverse the energon infuser.
"This mutiny ends now."
But a stasis turret fired before he could do it. Back at the base…
"Galvatron." Ratchet called again.
It passed a few seconds until they heard an answering sound. "Galvatron has been relieved of his command."
"Who is this?"
"Who is this?" It repeated.
"Have you taken control of the Decepticon vessel?" Clemont asked.
"I am the vessel. Any cybertronian who interferes with my mission will be neutralized." The Nemesis answered as it showed images of the petrified crew.
"I heard tales about the crew mutinying to take control of the ship. But the ship mutinying against the crew? That's new." Misty admitted.
"What mission?" Clemont asked again.
"Priority one: decrypt Iacon database and recover Decepticon technology."
"For what purpose?" Ratchet added.
This time it didn't answered, they only heard it disconnecting.
"It hung up? That's so rude." Bonnie remarked.
"Rude?! There's a giant spaceship flying around collecting Decepticon weapons of mass destruction! And that's all you say?!" Max asked in disbelief.
"A giant spaceship filled with neutralized Decepticons."
"You have something in mind, Ash?" Tracey asked.
"This could be our only chance to slip aboard and download the Iacon database."
"So Optimus can decode it." Serena added.
"Ingenious." Ratchet admitted. "I will infiltrate the Decepticon warship."
"That's not ingenious. You saw what it did to the Decepticons." Ritchie reminded.
"And probably Galvatron too." Max added.
"Not to mention Team Prime." May added.
"But that giant ship was aiming at me, and I'm still breathing." Lunick reminded.
"The ship may be blind to humans and pokémon." Clemont deduced.
"Which means only we have the chance to perform it without risk." Tracey supported.
"Very well, Ranger Lunick. But at the first sign of trouble, I am bridging you right back here. Now, in order to download the database, you will need a compatible transfer drive." Ratchet said as he handed to Lunick a cybertronian size flash-drive.
"A what?" He asked taking it.
"He'll also need tech support." Clemont said.
"And backup." Misty added.
"Lots of backup." Dawn supported.
"Piplup."
As the ship continued its way above the ocean, all the gang arrived inside the warship by ground bridge.
"Lunick to base, we're in." He reported through com-link.
"Good. Their data core should be accessible from any console." Ratchet answered.
The group made its way through the paralyzed Cons until they reached to where Knock Out was attacked.
"Here's one." Max said a little nervous at seeing him.
"Don't worry, Max. I'm sure he's paralyzed like the others." Misty reassured.
"But we better check it out to be sure. Minun, go and zap him." Lunick instructed.
"You too, guys." Ash instructed to both Pikachu and Sparky.
"Pika." Both Pikachu nodded.
The three electric pokémon approached Knock Out slowly and silently until they were close enough. Next, they zapped him with Thunderbolt, but he didn't react.
"Pika pika!" Pikachu called.
"That means everything is fine." Ritchie interpreted.
Even with that, May approached Knock Out and hit his foot a few times.
"Indeed. Doc Knock is knocked out." She confirmed.
"He looks very ridiculous standing like that." Bonnie said touching him.
"Look, the ship has decoded two sets of Iacon coordinates." Clemont spotted, until another group of letters joined.
"And with that they make three. Let's rip and run." Tracey said as he helped Clemont to climb on Knock Out.
The two of them and Ranger Lunick climbed over Knock Out to reach the console.
"There's the port." Clemont pointed.
Lunick inserted the drive, commencing the download. Meanwhile, something caught Serena's attention on another screen.
"Hey, that looks like New Tork city." Serena recognized.
"Why is the warship heading for there?" Ash asked.
"Because that's where the first set of coordinates are located." Max realized.
"What would a relic from Cybertron be doing in a huge city like New Tork?"
"The Iacon relics landed on Earth eons ago, Dawn. Long before the city was built at top of it." Ratchet explained through com-link.
"Which means if the ship wants this one, may have to move some buildings out of the way." Serena deduced.
"Which means it would end worse than what happened in Jubilife City." Ritchie realized.
"Our mission just got complicated. How do we stop the ship?" Lunick asked.
"I would advise disabling the navigation module. Call up the main navigation menu." Ratchet suggested.
"There." Clemont pointed.
"Step aside, kid." Lunick said stopping him.
He walked to the correct button and pressed it, but immediately got zapped by electricity, making him swayed a little before he fell to the ground.
"Ranger Lunick!" Tracey cried as they saw him unconscious.
"System access detected. Interference will not be tolerated."
"There." Bonnie pointed to the ceiling.
Some kind of camera appeared and scanned the area, but it didn't detect them.
"Reveal yourself."
"Uff, it doesn't see us." Misty said in relief.
"Yet. The ship must not be scanning for carbon-based lifeforms. But once it widens its search parameters…" Ratchet began.
"We're toast." Max ended.
"I'm bridging you back."
"No. There are millions of lives at stake in New Tork, and we are currently the only ones who can do anything about it."
"Ash's right. We cannot allow this living ship to hurt anyone because of its treasure hunt." Ritchie supported.
"You're out of your element, friends. These readings, the ship's rapid recovery, all point to the fact that Galvatron employed dark energon to repair it." Ratchet concluded.
"Hold on. If you're saying the ship's fueled by dark energon, we can dump it, right?" Misty suggested.
"Just like when I was infected with it?" Max reminded.
"Yes. When the dark matter was out of your body you immediately felt better, so maybe this case could be similar. Right Clemont?" May suggested.
"Maybe. If we expel the dark substance from the ship's place where it should be energon, maybe it would return back to its original form."
"And what happened to the Autobots will be fixed too?" Bonnie added.
"Probably. What do you think, Ratchet?"
"Hum. You'll need to reverse the warship's energon infuser. Follow the main overhead conduits, they'll lead you to the power core."
"Sparky, you stay here and keep an eye to Ranger Lunick alongside Minun. We will be back as fast as we can." Ritchie instructed.
"Pika pi." Sparky nodded saluting them.
"You too, Dedenne. I know I can count on you." Bonnie requested.
"Dedenne."
The children passed through all the frozen Cons until they reached to the power core room. After passing the piles of energon cubes, they were surprised to see Galvatron paralyzed in front of them when he tried to pull down the lever.
"Galvatron had the same idea." Tracey observed.
"Then we're on the right track." Serena added.
"The energon injection valve can only be operated manually." Ratchet told.
"Manually?!" May exclaimed. "And you tell us now."
"Fortunately, we don't have to do it alone." Ash said pulling out one of his poke balls. "Let's use our biggest pokémon to give us a hand."
"You got that right." Misty said following his example.
Ash called out his Torterra, Misty summoned her Gyarados, May called her Venusaur and Dawn did the same with Mamoswine.
"Torterra, give us a lift." Ash asked.
The giant land tortoise pokémon allowed Ash and Pikachu to climb on top of him so they could climb to where the lever was.
"Everyone ready? One, two, three." Ash counted.
While he and Pikachu tried to push the lever, everyone else tried to push one of Galvatron's feet. The big pokémon did the same with the other one. But while they were trying that, the ship's camera examined the area until it zoomed and finally found them.
"I am infested with alien lifeforms!"
"We're busted!" Max said as he and the rest looked at the camera.
They were forced to jump out of the way when the claw that used to insert the energon started to attack them. Fortunately, Gyarados and Venusaur managed to hold it off with Hurricane and Vine Whip, allowing the gang to hid between the stockpile of energon boxes. The claw started moving the boxes trying to find them, so Piplup tried to hit it with Bubble Beam, but it didn't do much damage to it. All the pokémon fought against them: Torterra used Leaf Storm, Gyarados used Crunch when the claws get too close and Hydro Pump at the distance, Venusaur used both Vine Whip and Razor Leaf and Mamoswine battled with Ice Shard. Besides their efforts, it seemed that no matter how many claws they took down, more came to replace them. One of them spotted everyone in a clearing, ready to strike.
"All parasites will be eradicated!"
But it was zapped by a Thunderbolt.
"Hey, over here! Come and get us!" Ash called alongside Pikachu, making the claw to turn at them.
"Ash, no!" Dawn begged.
"It's too dangerous!" Tracey warned.
"Run for it!" Misty shouted.
The claw tried to hit them, but they rolled aside.
"Too slow!" Ash mocked.
But the claw blocked their way immediately. Seeing that Galvatron was right behind them, an idea came to their minds. They waited until the last moment when the claw attacked and jumped out of its grip, making it to hit Galvatron's foot. It caused him to fall and pull the level in the process, as the duo jumped aside before he collapsed to the floor. Soon the fuel lines reversed the dark energon, making the normal energon to flow again and get the ship back to normal.
"Ash!" Serena yelled as she ran to him and hug him. "Are you okay?"
"Look out!" Max shouted seeing the claw about to strike against them.
"Critical power drain! I am…in…command! Prepare…to be…neutralized." The ship expressed as the claw almost hit Ash, Serena and Pikachu before the dark energon was expelled from the power core and it returned to normal.
When that happened, they saw Galvatron returning back to normal, which was a problem.
"Oh no. It seems we were right, but we forgot about them too." Misty said as everyone called their pokémon back.
"Run." Ash whispered.
The same as Galvatron, Team Prime recovered from stasis, something that Ratchet witnessed.
"(Whoa. What was that?)"
"Thank the Allspark." Ratchet said in relief.
"Ratchet, we made it, but we are in a hurry. Fire up the ground bridge!" Clemont called by com-link as they continued their way back while the Decepticons from around were getting back to normal.
They returned with Dedenne, Sparky and Minun, still with Lunick, who was beginning to stand up.
"On your feet, ranger." May grunted as she and Bonnie helped him up.
"And beavers and ducks and walnuts and grandma!" Lunick babbled before collapsing to the floor.
Bonnie chuckled, making everyone to look at her. "I'm sorry, I just couldn't help it."
Next, they saw that now there was four sets of coordinates.
"That's all that's been downloaded?" Dawn asked in disbelief.
"That Iacon file must be huge." Max realized.
Then, the ground bridge appeared in front of them.
"About time!" May cheered as she, Ritchie and Bonnie went to help Lunick. "Come on, here's our way out."
The rest were about to follow them, until Dawn noticed Ash still looking at the screen. "Ash?"
"Get Lunick out of here. There's something that it needs to be done." He told them.
"If you are referring to recover Ratchet's drive with the info, you'll need help. We're not leaving without that drive." Clemont joined going with him.
"I'm going with you two, you may need help. We'll be behind you." Tracey told to the others.
"Okay. But please hurry, and be careful." Serena asked.
"Some is better than nothing." Clemont said.
The three friends climbed up to the console and tried to pull out the drive.
"Huh, guys. We are not forgetting something?" Tracey suspected.
But then, they were alarmed when they saw Knock Out already recovered, and looking them with a sinister smile.
"Say ahhh." Knock Out said, turning his hand into a drill.
But before he could strike, Pikachu jumped in front of him emanating sparks.
"Pikachu." Pikachu said smirking, ready to use an electric attack.
"Be careful, Knock Out. Pikachu will be more than delighted to offer you a second opinion." Ash threatened, making Knock Out get nervous.
"And I'm here to offer a third one." Ratchet suddenly said from behind him, punching him on the face the moment he turned at him.
"Just in time, Ratchet." Clemont thanked before the Autobot medic grabbed them and the drive.
They returned to the portal, which closed before Galvatron arrived.
Knock Out was still a little dizzy from the punch when he arrived. "Lord Galvatron, I…"
"You let them escape!" Galvatron interrupted mad before looking at the screen. "With vital intelligence!"
Of course, Ratchet passed the info on the base's terminal, showing everyone what the gang achieved.
"The download of the Iacon database may have been incomplete, but we now possess four sets of coordinates decoded by the ship." Ratchet informed.
"Then we must act quickly, for Galvatron possess the same four sets. And he would not hesitate to obtain the potential doomsday devices which lie at the site of each." Optimus declared.