It had been a week since the death of megaplex and the city had returned to normal. Snowstorm had mostly recovered from her injuries and suffered through the trials of her new celebrity status, now hailed as prime and as the bot who took down the murderer. She had endured the emotional stress of the attack, compounded with the many parades, interviews and speeches the past week had condemned her to. The case regarding the murders had been officially closed, as the blade megaplex had was confirmed to be the one that killed bulkhead and slipstream, and his crazed state seemed to match the state nightbeat was found in; there was not much else to say about the matter. Though in the primes mind there were still questions nagging. If it was simply megaplex conducting he murders, then what of flamewar, and lockdown and all the other factors she uncovered; soundblaster seemed convinced they were connected and so did she. She shared none of her concerns with jazz or her team but knew they mattered. So much evidence pointed to a larger conspiracy, and yet when she was drawing ever closer to a conclusion, an insane culprit simply appears and ends it all. She was no detective but she knew there was more to it. Somehow she could feel it, maybe through the matrix or just her own intuition; this was not over.
She was interrupted from her thoughts when the light green colored paradronian nurse motioned that she was clear to leave. She thanked her and left, happy that this would be the last of her medical follow ups for the time being. She grunted as she went to leave, her shoulder plows again causing her to briefly jam in the doorway, earning a giggle from the nurse. She had suffered some injuries in the attack, though the worst of it had been a bad blow to the head and trauma to her arm, which had just come out of its support sling. Having dismissed her support staff and finding surprising lull from the "adoring" public, she went for a walk to clear her head. She did not want to drive, as transforming still made her arm hurt. She walked for some time, alternating between admiring the everyday life other bots could enjoy and returning to her grave suspicions.
"hey watch it lady, this is a work zone!" a voice growled
She jumped back at the shock of the short green bot in front of her. She looked up and realized she was indeed at the border of a work zone. A large number of constructicons were building what looked to her like a new habitation complex. The city was sure expanding if they still needed more hab suits. The constructions, she remembered, were originally a decepticon sub-group, but had since grown into a master work force for the city. It had recruited many a talented autobots and colonists into its fold, all of which had been repainted with the groups signature green and purple color scheme. She thought back and believed that bulkhead himself may have also been a member.
"I said move along lady, nobody messes with dirtboss' projects" the squat fork lift lectured
She witnessed with awe as the primary group combined into their famous gestalt mode, Devastator. It was her first time seeing a combiner in person and the second hand accounts did not describe their magnificence justly. The prime watched as the massive bot lifted an entire section of levels up onto the already constructed section of the building. Content, she moved along with a smile at the sight, happy to see bots united in building, working towards progress. She was ever grateful she had been far away from the centuries of death, destruction and war their race had degraded itself to.
"snowstorm prime, please come in" her comm came alive
"this is prime, what is it perceptor?"
"please come to the science guild immediately, I have an urgent matter to discuss with you"
"oh primus, what now" she worried
She pushed aside the pain and transformed to hurry along, thankful that it wasn't rush hour. It was unlike the autobot scientist to sound so alarmed; she figured it must have been important. She arrived and was led into a laboratory where perceptor, brainstorm, proxima and brains all stood with concerned faces. She was shocked to see that on the examination table at the rooms center was the lifeless body of megablex. Seeing the bot who had killed so many and tried to do the same to her, and who she had herself offlined, sent an uncomfortable chill through her spark.
"what is this?" she demanded
"prime, upon examination of megaplex, we have made a grave discovery; he too is a clone" perceptor reported
"what?!"
"not one so advanced and developed as slipstream or others but a clone all the same" proxima added
"we believe his madness may have stemmed from his cloning process being…lets say, inadequate or incomplete" brains spoke up
"However, that is not the most disturbing part. That part is the source of his data"
"what is the source of his data?" She prodded
"megatron" perceptor said flatly
"what did you say?"
"yes. Of course you know megatron was the decepticon warlord, and he perished during the war"
"not completely at least" brains shrugged
"yes, well, by all indications, megaplex is undoubtedly a clone of megatron. All our examinations confirm the presence of his data, schematics and CNA. He even bears a shell program; "megaplex" likely being a false personality likely overshadowing the copy of the original"
Snowstorm was in awe and horror, she had to sit down. Names like optimus prime and megatron were like legends now. To bots like her they seemed so far and gone to be at times thought as but stories, never sure if they were real.
"do you have any more good news for me? Maybe that the high council are all pretenders, or thunderwing the mad is coming to visit, or maybe that unicron the destroyer is hiding in the earth. Hm?"
"no, nothing like that. Those are just absurd" perceptor shrugged
"however, megapex did seem to have a high amount of condensation in his circuits" brainstorm added
"condensation?"
"indeed, he must have been hiding out somewhere with a lot of moisture" proxima said
"ok...thank you, all of you. I will take this into consideration and see what to do next. Please ensure this information is kept secret and the "remains" are extremely secured"
After they all agreed she left, still in bit of a daze after such a bombshell. From an unseen position, three bots watched her intently from the shadows, interested in her sudden mood change. All these things just kept running through her mind, fractured and broken, when suddenly she remembered one thing soundblaster had said to her when he told her of flamewar.
"and she was zealously loyal to megatron" his synthesized voice echoed in her processor.
She froze mid step and gaped at the air; with that, she understood. Everything made sense and she finally saw the big picture for what it was. To confirm her suspicions she quickly opened public records, which as prime she had full access to, and scrolled through the secure files. She finally found exactly what she was looking for.
"YES, YES that's it! This is snowstorm prime, all members of team prime, head for the river immediately. Meet me en-route on route G2-92"
She transformed and sped off full speed through the city, ignoring the pain it caused her. Roughly ten minutes from the river, drift, lancer, astrotrain and riptide converged to form around her as they moved on. She had already informed them of the discoveries she had made and soundblasters, so they had most of the same information she had, she just had to put it together for them.
"what's this all about prime?" drift asked
"we're about to bring in the ones really responsible for these murders"
"what, but you already…" astrotrain started
"megaplex was a clone, perceptor just confirmed it. He was a defective clone of megatron. He may have done the killing but he was just a mad dog. If we want justice, we gotta bring down the bots who set him loose"
"megatron, holy slag" astrotrain replied in shock
"who?" riptide asked
The group then breached the last city block where it opened to the river's edge and transformed. Further down river to their left was the marina where the aquatic bots resided.
"I'm sorry, we don't get any of this prime" lancer frowned
She turned to them with a wide grin, proud to have worked it all out herself.
"don't you see, it all fits together now, it's all been one big machination. Flamewar snuck into the city undetected and set up shop and hired lockdown to deliver her megatrons samples to clone. She created megaplex with scorponok and blackarachnia, both having experience in the field. Then, when megaplex apparently started going haywire, they decided to try again. They rehired lockdown and he delivered them something, maybe more samples or equipment. To ensure their mission remained secret, they killed him or set megaplex to do it. And when I appeared to be learning to much, they set him on me, and whether I died or he did, their trail would likely be lost."
"Wow, heavy, very heavy" riptide gaped
"this is astounding prime" drift praised
"errr! wrong. We still haven't caught flamewar, and why are we here anyway?" astrotrain grimaced
"because our first clue was correct, the watery foot prints at the first murders. Megaplexs autopsy even confirmed he was near water to a great degree"
The others looked on confused, as they had already checked the river. The prime smiled confidently, and slowly turned her head in silence to look up river. The others looked right, following her gaze and saw her implication; the dam. A large facility and completely empty and automated save for a few maintenance workers. Prime led them as they walked, following the walkway along the river. Snowstorm caught sight of cliffjumper on patrol nearby and flagged him down. She ordered him back to security force base to have the team ready itself for a possible confrontation. She was annoyed to be told that jazz was off duty, visiting the other autobot vets, but knew either barricade or chromia would ensure her orders were followed and sent the small red bot off. She then pulled up the public records she had previously accessed to show the others.
"the head of maintenance for the dam was formerly Treadbolt…" she started
Pulled up on her screen was the bot, a large and bulky yellow and black femme.
"she went missing about a year ago, and this bot here, designation Flame, instantly applied for her position"
Another image popped up on her data pad, that of flame, and with another click, a decepticon registration image of flamewar appeared beside it. It was beyond obvious that they were the same bot, but as flame she had used an electronic paint job to appear mostly yellow. Her primary paint job however was primarily black with red highlight and flame details. a rather simple minded façade, and yet it worked.
"hm, pretty on the nose, yet no one caught it" lancer frowned
"with unlimited access to such a large and unmanned facility, it would indeed make for a perfect hiding spot for her operation" drift admitted
As they approached the damn, they were accosted by one of its security guards. He was a large, bulky green decepticon with a large dump truck alt mode; his stubby head looked tiny on his massive fame. The bot was questioned, since he could have very likely been in on the conspiracy, and dismissed while they investigated. While grouchy and a bit standoffish, he didn't seem suspicious; in fact, if he were polite it would have been more suspicious. It was amusing when they found his name was Long Haul, and that he had history of grief due to confusion with him and the notable constructicon. The team made their way to a utility entrance to the dam and used caution in investigating the facility. The first large room they inspected appeared to simply house the main components and workings of the dam, but lancer soon found an access tunnel to another area. Making their way down the corridor with stealth, they found it opened into another large chamber. The ground level was clearly a base and extensive laboratory, while above appeared to be countless shelves holding hundreds of stasis pods. Seeing no movement or activity, they moved further in. They eyed the various displays, notes and equipment about the room as they moved through it; it certainly had the makings of a cloning operation.
"holy slag!" riptide shouted while still trying to keep a hushed tone.
The others came around a table corner to what he was looking at. There lay the corpses of blackarachnia and scorponok, both decapitated and impaled through the spark. A pool of their mixed energon spread from the bodies and ran about the near area.
"by primus..." drift gawked
"and in a manner similar to nightbeat" the thought to himself
"obviously flamewar didn't want to risk anyone knowing what she was doing" snowstorm shook her head
"oh I wouldn't quite say that" came a foreign voice
They all whirled around, weapons at the ready, searching for its source. It was a male voice so it wasn't flamewar, but then who. Astrotrain alone felt like it sounded familiar. They moved as a unit, coming around a corner to what looked like an odd piece of equipment on a pedestal. Under which, in a clear containment unit, was a contained spark. Suddenly a large single yellow light appeared in the center of the "equipment".
"greetings" it said in a calm accented voice
They all yelled and jumped back at its suddenly coming to life. Astrotrain recovered first and stepped forward, recognizing what he was seeing.
"shockwave?!"
"indeed" he said flatly
Perplexed, the others came to look closer. The "equipment" was in fact a disembodied head, simple and featureless; it was purple and rectangle in shape, with grey audio receptors on its sides and a blank, black visage save for the single yellow optic. It became clear upon inspection that the spark below was his own, persevered and connected to the head to allow communication.
"shockwave, I thought you got fried stellar cycles ago" astrotrain questioned
"as did I. I regained consciousness in this place a couple weeks ago. I was informed by my host that the explosion that supposedly killed me destroyed most of my body and rendered me in stasis lock. I was apparently recovered by autobot forces, who locked my husk in a high security storage facility to be forgotten. They learned of this facility and enlisted the aid of a 3rd party to infiltrate it and recover my remains"
"lockdown!" riptide thought aloud
"for what purpose?" prime grew weary
"my scientific expertise of course, and the return of the decepticon regime. Apparently the decepticons currently occupying the floor there had failed at whatever their task was. Once I had been returned to semi operational order and regained my senses, they were promptly disposed oooooooof…."
Shockwave trailed off as his voice fizzled down and his eye shrunk and shut off. Below, a stasis field activated around his spark, rendering him unconscious and inactive.
"he talks to much" a female voice came from behind.
The group spun around, weapons ready and trained on their target, the holder of shockwave and megaplexs collars and the mastermind of their troubles; flamewar.