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The Last Revelation
By nightdragon0
Deathwing pulled the lone guard into the shadows and jabbed his Gunblade through the victim's head. Dropping the limp body, Deathwing stared down at it.
All the soldiers look exactly like this. He reflected. Maybe one or two have bigger guns. Humph, reminds me of an ant colony.
The sound of footsteps jerked him out of his thoughts as the Predacon pulled himself around the corner, out of view of the passing guards.
I'll find some help first before I try figuring this out.
He had given Nightfire some information on the location of one of the prison areas, but Deathwing had another one in mind.
From what he'd been observing since he'd sneaked in, the Beast Warriors taken captive had been brought to two different locations. Deathwing was now headed towards one of them.
While he did prefer a straight fight as opposed to sneaking around, Deathwing knew the former was a pretty much suicidal course of action.
Upon reaching the door, he paused and listened. He could make out Terrorsaur whining, Muricate yelling at him to shut up, and Blackarachnia telling someone off.
Why, if it isn't the white knight, Silverbolt. Deathwing thought. Well, he's going to take a bit of convincing, but he might turn out useful.
Peering in, he counted three guards. Picking up a screw on the floor, the tossed it against the wall.
"What was that?" One of the guards moved out the door to investigate.
Deathwing, hiding behind the door, grabbed the guards and dealt with him as silently as before.
"Hey, I could use some help here." He mimicked the guard's tone of voice.
The two unknowing guards simply walked right into his trap. Deathwing swung his weapon, decapitating one and firing a shell through his body which hit his companion behind him.
"Thought you might come." Muricate grinned as Deathwing pushed the guards' bodies away.
"Don't get your hopes too high, I didn't to it just for you." Deathwing growled, shutting off the prison bars. "Get your weapons and let's get out of here."
The Predacons hurried out to retrieve their firearms from several lockers within the room. Silverbolt stepped out too, but didn't look too happy, considering he was standing in a room full of his enemies.
"Humph, funny they put you in here too." Deathwing muttered.
"Grrr…you have my gratitude for the rescue, but I feel you have some agenda behind this." Silverbolt gave him a nasty stare.
"Ever heard of 'the enemy of my enemy is my friend'?" Deathwing asked.
"I understand your point." Silverbolt nodded reluctantly.
It didn't take a genius to comprehend the current situation. And that was basically 'aliens suddenly dropped out of nowhere and attacked both sides'.
Suddenly, alarms began blaring.
"Damn, what's Nightfire gone and done this time?!" Deathwing cursed. "And this was the one occasion I required him NOT to screw up!"
"Uh-oh, I think we have company!" Blackarachnia warned, looking out the door.
"Argh! There are too many!" Terrorsaur yelled as laser bursts begun flying about.
"You know, I think he's actually right." Muricate muttered, raising her Shotgun and firing.
"If we stay here, we'll be overwhelmed!" Silverbolt added in.
The group managed to inch their way into the corridor, using the pillars for cover. However, they were still unable to reach the bend and escape from the dead end room.
"Hey, think we could get out if we had a little distraction?" Terrorsaur leaned close to Deathwing and asked.
"Hmmm…an excellent suggestion." Deathwing nodded.
Suddenly, he snatched the energy rifle out of the Transmetal Pterodactyl's hand and grabbed him around the neck.
"I also assume you'd like to play the part!"
"Nnnooooooo!" Terrorsaur screamed as Deathwing threw him towards the enemy line.
Terrorsaur's final screams rang out even as countless numbers of energy bursts tore through his body. Deathwing made full use of the diversion and sprinted round the corridor. The other Predacons and Silverbolt followed, through for the latter it was a hesitant action.
"That's a way to shut him up!" Muricate panted as they ran.
"Keep moving!" Deathwing called. "From the looks of things, we pissed them off and they aren't taking prisoners this time!"
"You would…betray your own comrade?" Silverbolt questioned, keeping pace with Deathwing.
"Comrade? Don't make me laugh." Deathwing growled. "Liability would be a term that barely defines him."
"And me?"
"You're decent enough. Just don't hold me back and I won't toss you in front of the firing squad."
"How do I know I can trust you?"
"I should be asking you the same question." Deathwing retorted.
Calico drove her fist through the soldier's dark blue chest, tearing out his core processor. She pushed the body aside and ran as even more guards sprang up to take the fallen soldier's place.
In a flash, her whip was up. She tripped up the lead soldier, sending him stumbling into his squad.
"There's no end to them…" She gasped, dashing through the corridor.
Much to her surprise, the vixen found herself emerging into a large stadium. There was no way to describe it other that it reassembled one of those gladiator arenas from the humans' ancient Rome.
Several obstacles had been set up, such as large boulders and a model of a wrecked space shuttle, as if some training exercise had been carried out earlier.
However, some energy field separated the arena from the spectator stands above it. A faint flickering gave that away. Calico touched it, only to draw her hand back in pain.
Calico ducked behind the largest boulder to catch her breath. Glancing out, she saw the soldiers pouring in through the entrance. It was also the only entrance and Calico realized she wouldn't be getting out that way.
Fighting without firearms and just a whip had taken its toll on her.
Her silver and brown armor was badly charred and burnt by laser fire in many places. Mech-fluid was leaking out through a wound in her left side. Her right shoulder ached terribly and her right leg was barely moveable.
It was strange, how she didn't even notice those things in the heat of the battle.
"The battle…" Calico said to herself. "Dinobot…"
He'd taken on incredible odds and had yet emerged triumphant. It was ironic, how she was in the same situation…but wouldn't be able to pull off a victory.
"Dinobot…I'll go down fighting, like you did." She spoke as the soldier neared her position. "I may not be the best warrior out there…but at least I'll earn a place beside you in the Matrix…"
A soldier appeared from around the boulder and Calico lashed at him with her whip. She was fully aware that another one had come up from the other side of the boulder, right where her back was facing.
Calico knew he had fired…even before the shot went through her head.
And the rest is silence…
Nightfire roared, tearing through the guards even as the multiple laser bursts burned at his hide. Kirath was by his side, unleashing his fiery breath into another group.
The green glow of Nightfire's sword flashed, his deadly blade ripping through even more victims. A shot hit his arm, causing him to drop the weapon.
Kirath clamped his jaws down on another soldier's arm, violently shaking him before hurling him into his comrades.
However, like the other Beast Warriors had discovered, there was seemingly no end to their numbers.
Are they actually hesitating? Nightfire wondered.
Several soldiers in the rear line were in a position to fire, and yet they were holding back. One seemed to be speaking into his com-link, through Nightfire couldn't hear over the noise.
Swinging his tail to clear a path, Nightfire pushed towards the suspicious soldier.
"Take the dragons alive!" He suddenly declared, raising his rifle.
Fangs and claws outstretched, Nightfire pounced. He did succeed in knocking the soldier down, but in mid-fall he fired his weapon into Nightfire's chest.
Roaring in pain, the dragon found himself stunned and barely able to move. He realized that yellowish energy was flowing all over his body.
I'm getting a bad sense of déjà vu here…
Another scream of agony came, telling him Kirath had been hit as well. That was the last thing Nightfire heard before his vision faded to black.
"AAAAARRRGGGHHHHH!" Cheetor screamed, sliding down the tunnel.
SLPOOSH!
"Hey, get off me kiddo!" Rattrap yelled angrily, throwing the younger Maximal off.
"General! Nightfire! They're still up there!" Cheetor cried.
"Excuse me, not to sound un-sympathetic, but we've got bigger problems here!" Rattrap cut in. "We're in a garbage dump for crying out loud!"
The pair was up to their ankles in murky, black water. Dozens of junk pieces like scrap metal and deformed sheets were littered about the area, forming large piles of junk. There was barely enough space for the two to stand.
"Isn't this your environment?"
"Hey, no one makes the jokes around here but me!"
"Yeah, yeah." Cheetor nodded reluctantly. "But we'd better get out of here first."
Raising his Quasar blasters, he fired.
"No don't!" Rattrap protested.
The laser bounced off the door, rebounded off the far wall and came towards the pair, who scrambled out of the way. It continued for several more times before fizzling itself out.
"I already tried that ya crazy kid! It's magnetically sealed!"
"Sorry…" Cheetor muttered. "But, what do we do then?"
"Nothing! We're basically stuck here!" Rattrap replied. "I can't blast this door open without blowing us into tiny little pieces in the process."
"I'll try the com-link." Cheetor decided, tapping his wrist. "Cheetor calling anybody. Please respond you guys! Cheetor calling anybody! Somebody!"
"Well, it could be worse." Rattrap sighed, leaning against the door.
Just then, then rumbling of gears started. The walls began to move in on the trapped pair.
"It's worse…" Rattrap moaned.
Cheetor was staring in horror at the closing walls.
"Don't just stand there! Try to brace it with something!" Rattrap ordered, grabbing a large pole and sticking it between the two walls.
"Aarrgghh!" Cheetor threw his shoulder against one of the walls, unfortunately to no avail. Groaning at the seemingly hopeless situation, he suddenly remembered the com-link. "Cheetor calling anybody! Please respond you guys!"
"We're both gonna die!!" Rattrap wailed.
"Will you SHUT UP??"
"I think we lost them for now." Deathwing muttered, leaning against the wall and listening.
It's odd, really, how the lot of them suddenly seem to run off. As if they'd been given new orders…
The foursome had found their way into a large storage room and shoved several large crates against the door.
"That's won't hold forever through." Muricate commented.
"And some of us do want to get out of here alive." Blackarachnia sighed.
"And no matter what, I will make sure to carry out your request, milady." Silverbolt declared with a small bow.
Everyone in the room sighed.
"Well, keeping bowser here around is still better than getting blown to scrap with beak-brain." The black widow tried to reassure herself.
"Cheetor calling anybody! Please respond you guys!" Silverbolt's com-link hissed.
Gasping, Silverbolt pushed a button on his wrist and replied.
"Cheetor? Is that you?"
"Silverbolt! Man, am I glad to hear you! Listen, we're stuck in a garbage disposal here! We need you to shut down all the garbage smashers on the B1 level!"
"What?!"
"Shut down all the garbage smashers on the B1 level! Where ever you are, find a terminal or something!"
"I…erm…" Silverbolt stared around wildly.
"Over there." Deathwing pointed to a wall mounted terminal.
Silverbolt raced over to it and entered the system, frantically tapping the keys. A non-essential function like the garbage disposal wouldn't be too heavily secured, but Silverbolt wasn't exactly very good with computer systems either.
"How do I work this?!" He moaned.
As the Predacons stood watching, he turned and gave Blackarachnia a pleading look.
"Oh, all right! Step aside!" She yelled, moving to the terminal. "Grrr…this might take a while…"
"Please, hurry!" Silverbolt begged.
"Come on…please!" Cheetor muttered.
The pole they'd stuck between the walls began to bend and buckle under the enormous pressure. Cheetor closed his eyes when the gears suddenly came to a halt.
The walls had stopped moving.
"Wow…bird-dog actually did it…" Rattrap gasped. "Woohoooo!"
The two started screaming excitedly.
The com-link wasn't very clear, but Silverbolt could still hear the screams.
"Oh listen to them! They're dieing!" He howled, banging his head against the wall. "This is all my fault! Why didn't I study the programming manual better?! I could've done something!!"
"Hey, bird-dog! You there? We're all right, you hear?" Rattrap's voice hissed. "We're OK!"
The three Predacons in the room burst out laughing. Silverbolt went practically red in embarrassment.
"Hey, open the doors for us and give us the scoop." Rattrap said.
Silverbolt explained his current situation as Blackarachnia disabled the door locks on the garbage smashers. Needless to say, Rattrap wasn't too happy about Silverbolt making a 'truce' with the Predacons, but being Silverbolt, he insisted they could be trusted, at least for now.
Their shared plight was too risky for them to try any treacherous ideas.
"Have you been able to contact anyone on the outside?" Silverbolt was asking.
"Ya think I haven't been trying?! Anyway, the answer is a flat out no-go. Something's blocking any links we have to the outside. Maybe, I could hotwire a communications system or something…"
"There's no point in that." Deathwing cut in. "What to you expect your friends to do? Come charging with guns blazing? I'd expect that of Primal, but it's still a death wish nevertheless."
"As much as I hate to admit it, he's got a point." Silverbolt sighed. "Neither Maximal nor Predacon forces would stand a chance in a frontal assault."
"Hey rat," Deathwing leaned close to the com-link. "If you do survive long enough to get to a computer room or similar, look around instead for a power core."
"Huh?"
"Somewhere we could attack and cause some serious damage." Deathwing explained. "They may want us dead, but we'll take them from within. Not the surest plan, but it's better than hiding in the shadows waiting to be deactivated."
"What do you think Rattrap?" Silverbolt asked.
"Coming from a stinking Pred, it actually sounds reasonable."
"Humph, I'll pretend I didn't hear that." Deathwing muttered.
"Keep in touch, OK?" Rattrap signed off.
"We should keep moving too." Muricate said. "We're likely to be found if we stay in one place for too long…"
Pain immediately hit Nightfire as he reluctantly pulled himself back to consciousness.
The black dragon was still in beast mode, and found himself shackled to the wall. Huge chains immobilized his wings, tail, arms and legs, spreading them out like some pattern on the wall. There were at least five straps on his body alone, not even allowing the slightest movement.
His head was in some sort of brace, leaving his face looking upwards. With that and the chains around his neck, it was a wonder he could breathe at all. There was enough space to open his mouth a little, but not wide enough to use his breath weapons.
Out of the corner of his eye, Nightfire made out a greenish shape. Kirath, in dragon mode, had apparently been given the same treatment.
"Nightfire, you awake?" Kirath called.
"Yeah, barely." Nightfire managed. "So much for them not taking prisoners, huh?"
"They seemed to suddenly take a rather distinct interest in us the moment they saw us in beast mode." Kirath commented.
"I sort of noticed. It was something about us being dragons."
"It really puzzles me. Unless they somehow know dragons were an old Earth myth, but why should they care about that?"
"Perhaps…they had something to do with the dragons?" Nightfire suggested.
"What do you mean?"
The black dragon was about the reply when the huge double doors of their jail cell slid open and three soldiers walked into the room.
"Well, well." One of them laughed. "It so happens I have orders to bring you to the audience chamber. You two will have the great honor of being able to meet our glorious leader."
Nightfire snorted.
"Sir, we were instructed to bring them one at a time." A second soldier spoke.
"I know, so take the black one first."
"I'm quite happy to be the center of attraction." Nightfire growled sarcastically as a blindfold was thrown over his eyes.
"Shut up you!" The First soldier ordered, jabbing Nightfire hard in the ribs with his rifle. "You won't speak unless spoken to, understand?"
Nightfire was tempted to resist as the guards pulled the entire section of the wall he was strapped to out and lay it on a moving platform. However, curiosity overcame him.
Meet their commander? The one behind all this? Perhaps this will be interesting…
"Hah! Got it!" Rattrap whispered triumphantly, pulling the last few wires of the control panel.
The door lock gave an affirmative beep.
"Get ready…" Cheetor muttered as the doors slid open.
The pair sprang into the open doorway and sent shots flying, quickly taking down the three guards within before any could sound an alarm.
"Yeah!" They gave each other high-fives before slamming the door shut.
"All righty, let's see what we've got here." Rattrap seated himself in the central chair and begun tapping at the keys. "Woo…this is some fortress all right."
"What else can you find out?" Cheetor asked, leaning over his shoulder.
"Slow down kid, and get out of the way. You're blocking the light." Rattrap shoved him off. "Look, I don't want to go peeping into their top-secret information til I have and idea of their system. Last thing we want is for me to set off another alarm."
"Right."
"OK, trying to access communications here…ah, got it!" Rattrap clenched his fist. "I just need to charge this thing up and we'll be able to contact home base, and maybe they'll have some bright ideas. Haha, who says only Rhinox can do these things?!"
"Hey, look at this!" Cheetor pointed to another screen. "I think it's about General and Nightfire."
"What?!" Rattrap spun his chair in Cheetor's direction and read the report. "Blah…blah…blah…captured dragons. What? Why should they care so much about a couple of stinking, scale bellied fire-spitting lizards?"
"Rattrap!"
"All right! All right! I know. But it says here they're gonna be…oh man!"
"Put into some gladiator arena?" Cheetor wondered.
"I have a bad feeling about this." Rattrap muttered. He began hitting the keys and calling up the cell's location. "I'm going to look for those two. You stay here and get our message to da boss once the system's charged up. And look for the power core once you're at it."
Rattrap ran to the wall and pulled off the grills leading to an air vent.
"But what if they find me?" Cheetor protested, pointing to the door.
"Lock the door." Rattrap said as he went into beast mode. "And hope they don't have blasters."
"That isn't very reassuring…"
Nightfire felt as he were a blind mouse being dragged through a maze.
While blindfolded, he could feel his platform being dragged in many directions. There were lots of turns and corners, slopes and even elevators.
Naturally, he'd tried to reach out with his psychic senses, only to hit a brick wall, as if something was blocking them. Nightfire hadn't felt anything like it the first time he'd entered the fortress and it certainly frustrated him.
All he could do was wait.
After a while, Nightfire felt like he was brought onto another elevator. However, he suddenly realized the footsteps of his guards had faded away. They'd left him strapped to his platform, hovering in some dark area.
For a long time, Nightfire waited in anticipation. Then, he felt he was not alone.
"Who's there?" He called out.
"Welcome Nightfire." A voice boomed, seeming to come from everywhere at once. "I've been expecting you."
The voice chilled Nightfire to the bone, although he just couldn't seem to understand why. The dragon tried his best not to shiver with fear and continued talking.
"Expecting me?"
"Indeed. You who clad yourself in the scales of our creation."
"Huh? You mean…my dragon body?"
"If you would call it that." The voice replied. "You certainly know well enough how you got to be as you did."
"Yes…"
Flashback
"I haven't told you how I first got this form, now did I?" He'd asked Syndrea.
"Strangely, no."
"Well, when we first crashed here, the other sent out the scanners of get their beast forms and stuff, right?"
"Yeah."
"I wasn't happy about those we got here. And Cheetor decided to run off, so I told the others to go first. They didn't know about me being a Predacon then, so they left me alone in the base, with the scanner running."
"And then?"
"That was when I started to feel an odd presence. I can't really describe it, but something like the chill you get when you think ghosts are around. Then, the long-range scanners picked up something at the very furthest of their capabilities, which weren't very good back then. It was this."
Nightfire lifted a claw and tapped his chest.
"A dragon, I knew it from the old earth myths. But they were supposedly just myths. So, I got myself into the scales and went to check it out. All I found was a footprint on top of a sandy cliff. I thumped my foot there and it was exactly the same. But then, I got a call from the others needing me in the first battle and I went off. I came back later, but the footprints were gone by then. So, basically, I never found whatever it was that gave me this."
"That's very interesting."
Present
"Wait…did you…have something to do with that?" Nightfire gasped.
"You'll be able to decide, once you know our story."
"Firstly, do you have a name?"
"Haha, is the desire for individuality so important?" The voice laughed. "Very well, you may address me as Omega."
"The end?" Nightfire asked, noting the meaning of the word.
"You'll see." Omega replied. "Our story starts millions of years back, during the times of the First Great Cybertronian Wars. We fled Cybertron during the conflict, vanishing into the deepest regions of this vast galaxy. While your ancestors fought each other, we've dedicated ourselves to research, developing technology unmatched by anything today."
No way… Nightfire thought, continuing to listen.
"Cybertron today is full of too much conflict. Peace will always be a never be realized dream, and the wars will continue. And someday, the wars may even take effect on time itself."
"Time? But how?"
"My dear boy, you stand upon the soil and yet do not know." There was a huff in his voice. "One who knows nothing can understand nothing."
"You mean this planet, Earth…the Ark!" Nightfire realized.
"Yes, one can imagine the effects disrupting the Ark would cause, now would it?"
"And I assume this has something to do with us?"
"Indeed, your presence will need to be, removed. In whatever way possible."
"We already had some bunch of aliens show up and try to do that. And they failed. So exactly what makes you think you can do the job better?"
"Don't get me wrong, I have the power to take care of any aliens if they happen to have the courage to show their faces." Omega bragged. "But back to our topic, you wanted to know about our dragons, right?"
"Your dragons?" Nightfire muttered.
"A little experiment of ours, based strangely on the Earth myths of the humans we abducted for study. Genetically engineering a beast of great power and intelligence. Sadly, organic creatures aren't as durable as Cybertronians. Few survived, but of those which did, we attempted some field testing. One happened to escape us for a while, and guess which one?"
"Yes, the very dragon you took the form of."
"But why? What for?"
"To booster the strength of my army of course." Omega told him. "My army of clones. And alongside those, the might of the mechanical dragons, modeled after the organic dragons we created."
"Then all those soldiers…"
"Brilliant isn't it? Cybertron is in peril now because of individuality. And I will take over Cybertron and eliminate that, allowing Cybertron to function as it originally was intended to be…one supreme machine. And at its head, will be myself. The beginning and the end!"
"Then why don't you go do that and leave me alone?"
"Hahaha, like I said before, you and the rest of the Beast Warriors happen to be little pebbles in the way."
Nightfire knew it for sure now. This was the mysterious fraction that had remained hidden since ancient times, plotting to conquer Cybertron and the universe itself.
However, standing before him was the very being behind it all. The very same one who'd killed Sky Lynx…killed him in his past life…
It took Nightfire all of his self control to limit the showing of his anger.
"However, I have another thing in mind, all so specially for you Nightfire."
"Which is?" Nightfire growled.
"Join me. Join me and become my second-in-command. To find another seer is rare enough, but to find one with capability, talent, a masterful blend between the machine and the animal sides…is simply unbelievable."
Omega stroked his head, causing Nightfire to shake and attempt to pull away.
"Give your talents to my service and we will rule the known galaxy. You will be granted power beyond that of your wildest dreams!"
Nightfire was dumbfounded.
Ultimate power…that's what I've always wanted…isn't it?
"I'm sure it's not a difficult decision, my dear dragon." Omega continued. "You who will become…the Dragon of Destiny!"