NOTE: I remember hearing somewhere that Megatron's ship was called the Scorponok II somewhere…my apologies…thanks Wicked Woman (). J
Chapter Two: The Tale of the Forest [Part Two]
The sun was hot in the midday sky on Earth. Two warriors, perched on the eves of eternal duel with one another, stood back to back before they were to fight. For one, this battle was serious. For the other, simply a tool to make the other stay longer.
"All right," said Ramulus, "Hey, kid, what's your name?"
"Cheetor!" he replied. "Okay, how exactly are we gonna do this? Are we gonna, like, tell each other off first, like 'you silly yeller-bellied toad-twistin'--"
"No, idiot," said Ramulus. "We're gonna walk forward ten steps and then turn and start to fight. You never done this before?"
Cheetor chuckled. "No. Duels are meant for the leaders. I'll never even get to be second-in-command." J
"Good. So your skills aren't polished in this manner?" asked Ramulus.
"Not especially," said Cheetor.
Wow, little cat's really doing a good job of delaying this duel until Optimus can get here, thought Tigerhawk. Only a few more cycles. Optimus's transmission was clear, so he couldn't have been very far.
"All right, enough delayin', stupid feline," said Ramulus. "Start walking back as I count. One. Two. Three. Four. Fi-"
"—Hey! What's going on here?"
Both Cheetor and Ramulus stopped the duel to turn and view Optimal Optimus standing there, looking at them. Rattrap stood beside him. "Cheetor, what are you doing?" asked Optimus.
"It was the only way," replied Cheetor. "There was no other way to keep 'Ramulus' here while we waited for you. Besides, I spent a lot of time talking to him trying to delay the duel anyway. So now you're here."
"So, who are you?" asked Optimus.
Suddenly, they turned and watched as the friend they had just so recently met began to run. Morphing back into beast mode, Ramulus ran right between Cheetor and Optimus and away in the distance.
"Ramulus, wait!" cried the monkey. "Cheetor, after him!"
"Gotcha, bigbot," said Cheetor, and he was off at Mach 2.
"Heh…that was random," snorted Rattrap.
Dinobot was quite pleased with his new role as leader of the operation in which all Transmetal 2 technology would be excavated from the Darkside. (thx WW) So far, they had found pieces of a stasis pod and managed to weld it back together.
"Work faster, Predacons!" cried Dinobot. For himself, he was kicking back in a long chair sipping a tankard of Positron. "We must please Megatron!"
"Oh, shut up, clone," said Waspinator. "Wasssspinator no take orders from raptor-bot. Wassspinator only take orders from Megatron."
"Then get back to work, you good-for-nothing bug," replied Dinobot.
"I'd really like to get out and… and slag some Maximals instead of renovatin' some old ship…it'd feel real good," said Quickstrike, making the cobra that resided on his right arm snap and hiss at Inferno, who was passing beside him with a small piece of equipment.
"Who would want to disobey the royalty instead of putting the colony back together?" asked Inferno rhetorically, but Rampage answered anyway.
"Someone who has never sworn his loyalty to Megatron."
Dinobot overheard this, and quickly rectified it with one squeeze of the half-spark that resided inside his chest.
Little did they know, from far away, Depth Charge and Rhinox viewed the Predacons excavate the Darkside. "Hmm…better report to Optimus," said Rhinox.
"Don't bother with it…X is down there," said Depth Charge.
"Optimus told us not to engage. We should return to the Ark," commanded Rhinox. "Hmm…I wonder where Megatron is."
"I'm going down there," said Depth Charge, as he began to soar down towards the Predacons.
Rhinox held on as he said, "Depth Charge, no!"
But Rhinox had no control over where the Sting Ray was going. As Depth Charge crashed into a pile of Sentinel's equipment, the Predacons spread outward, away from the Maximals. "Depth Charge, maximize!" he said, and he morphed himself into robot mode. "Get over here, X!"
Rampage smiled and pulled out his missile launcher. "Ho ho ho…so kind of you to drop by. Did I ever tell you that you look just like Cyberstalker? Probably taste the same too…"
Depth charge ripped out his shark gun. "Die, you stinkin' slaggin', no good piece of scrap!"
And with those words, two pieces of artillery charged at each other. A missile from Rampage and a laser beam from Depth Charge slammed into each other halfway in between the two warriors, resulting in a large explosion. Both fighters were flung backwards.
By this time, Rhinox had already morphed to robot mode and had his two machine guns in hand. "Well, I guess it's too late now. It's slaggin' time!" And then there was a flurry of bullets and the shells from them. The shots flew everywhere. The first of the Predacons hit was Quickstrike. With each bullet, another scorpion leg from his left hand flew off and scattered away. It seemed too soon that the fuzor was lying on the ground, unable to move.
As for the other Predacons, Dinobot had his lawn chair laying down on top of him, and his glass of Positron was spilling all of the ground. Inferno had buried himself inside the ground, with only his abdomen sticking out, like an overgrown ostrich.
"All right, X, we finish this now!" said Depth Charge in his normal, hoarse and husky voice.
"Oh, Depth Charge, it will never be over!" replied Rampage. "Our battle will continue for the rest of eternity."
Both transformers stood up and began hand-to-hand combat against one another. Depth Charge changed his right hand into a spear like he does and flung out the weapon at Rampage's chest. Rampage managed to grab the sting ray's arm before the attack breached his chest into his spark. Depth Charge began to groan as he pushed harder.
"You know hearing you struggle only makes me happier," said the crab. "Your pain fuels me. It-"
"-Do you know how to shut up, X?" cried Depth Charge. "Stop trying to resist it. Just let yourself die!"
"I will never die," said Rampage. "I am invincible. But I guess all your Starbase Rugby teammates found that out for themselves, huh?"
"SHUT UP!!!" yelled Depth Charge. Both fighters then fell to the ground as they continued to struggle, Depth Charge on top of Rampage. Then suddenly, Depth Charge pulled out his gun again with his left hand. "Feel the pain, X!"
"Ha ha ha!" said Rampage before he pulled out his missile launcher and pointed it into Depth Charge's chest.
"You wouldn't dare," said Depth Charge. "The explosion would melt your circuitry. The pain would be excrutiating."
"I feel no pain."
"Feel this!" cried Rhinox.
Rampage turned his head to see Rhinox standing a meter away from him, with both of his machine guns aimed directly at his head. "Go, Rhinox," cried Depth Charge as the sting ray leapt off of the crab to leave Rhinox free to blast Rampage into oblivion.
The bullets seemed to fly like there was no tomorrow. Rampage groaned though he felt to pain; the red on his chest soon was died black with the bullet holes. It was as if his nerves tended to jump as Rampage jumped into the air from the force of the bullets and shells.
Then the bullets stopped and only a 'click' of an empty clip was heard. Then everything seemed a blur. Rampage leapt up from a fetal position and immediately ignited a grenade on the ground. Rhinox and Depth Charge went flying backwards and into piles of scrap from the Darkside. When they gained back their senses, Rampage, as well as the rest of the Predacons, were gone, and they were left with only the vestige of the battle as witnesses.
"Dear, seen any Predacons yet?" Silverbolt asked his girlfriend, Blackarachnia, as they sailed through the air over Predacon subsector Hooks.
"Nothing yet, but if I know Megatron, he's too stupid to get cover," she answered. Blackarachnia was in robot mode, perched over Silverbolt's back.
"Well, we're approaching the time that Optimus said to be back, so we should be heading back," said Silverbolt.
"Wait!" cried Blackarachnia. "It's Optimus, Rattrap, and Tigerhawk, down there, in Sector Tau!"
And so they landed next to the three pre-mentioned Maximals. "Optimus, what's going on?" asked Silverbolt. "Have you spotted Megatron?"
"No," said Optimus, "but something else—never mind, let Tigerhawk explain it to you."
"All right. Tigerhawk, what happened?" asked Silverbolt.
"We found a strange warrior transformer that takes the form of a ram. He wasn't too enthusiastic about staying except if he dueled Cheetor, and so they almost fought, but then Optimus showed up. Then the warrior ran off. He said his name was Ramulus. Cheetor is out chasing him now."
"So is this guy Maximal or Predacon?" asked Blackarachnia.
"He said that he was neither," replied Tigerhawk.
Silverbolt was frustrated. "How can he be neither?"
Optimus surprisingly looked understanding. "I think that this may have something to do with you, Tigerhawk."
"Huh?"
"So long ago, when both of you, er…well, Tigertron and Airazor went off to search the planet, looking for the stasis pods that fell, both of you were…interrupted. You never searched the entire planet. I think Ramulus's pod may have crashed somewhere, and we never went out to meet him."
"So this goathead's been alive on this planet for nearly a stellar cycle and has never found us?" asked Rattrap.
Silverbolt smiled. "I may have a theory."
"Let's hear it," said Tigerhawk.
"Well, Ramulus is a maximal. When Megatron nearly destroyed Optimus Prime so long ago and created that time storm, Ramulus must have felt it too. That must have given him some idea that there is something else on this planet. So he probably began searching then."
"And he just now found us. But he doesn't seem too enthusiastic," said Optimus.
"How will you know if Cheetor has caught up to him?" asked Tigerhawk.
"Well I hope the kid's smart enough to use his com-link," said Rattrap.
"That's all we can hope," said Optimus. "But for now we need to contact Rhinox and Depth Charge and have them meet us here. Our plan for the day has just been ruined."
Depth Charge and Rhinox were searching through the rubble of the Darkside when Optimus contacted them. "Come to my coordinates," said the leader. "Have you found any Predacons?"
Depth Charge pressed his com-link button. "No," he said. "Nothing yet. We'll be right over." And he clicked back out.
"I don't like lying to him," said Rhinox.
Depth Charge transformed to vehicle mode. "Better for him not to know. Hop on."
Rhinox responded to his request, and they began to journey to the standing stones.
Megatron kept a close eye on the autoguns of the Ark as he crept closer and closer. He wasn't exactly sure how he would break past the defenses of this Autobot ship. But he would try desperately. He was now within 50 meters. No autogun fire. 40 meters. Still nothing. 30. Nada. 20. He was now expecting it. 10. Nothing!
"Ha! They forgot to turn on perimeter defenses. They are so unexpecting," said Megatron.
The doors to the Ark were pushed open with ease as Megatron entered the command center. "Now where's that alien sphere? Blackarachnia used it to improve herself. Perhaps I can use it for my own advantages. It should be in her quarters."
So he progressed throughout the chambers of the Ark, searching for Blackarachnia's quarters. Finally he found them, on the easternmost wing, right next to Silverbolt's. In fact, there was a picture of Silverbolt sitting on a chest beside her bed. Megatron dug throughout the cabinets and such around the room and did not find the alien sphere. "Where is that blasted relic?!"
Megatron slammed the wall with his fist that nearly made the whole Ark shake. And suddenly, a hole appeared in the middle of her bed! "It must be some sort of switch," he said. Glancing in the hole, he viewed there, the alien sphere that he coveted. "Yes! The one device that I need the most, that will fuel me an army of Transmetal 2 warriors that will swear loyalty to me!" Grabbing it, he left the Ark like no one had ever been there.
Cheetor managed to gain more and more ground against Ramulus. The transformer was quite fast for a grazing animal. Cheetor followed across a gigantic plain, in fact, past several rams, until they came upon a forest. Ramulus entered the forest through a hole between two trees, and with caution, Cheetor followed.
Ramulus slowed down at this point, not realizing that he had a stalker. Cheetor also slowed until he could follow at about twenty paces. The two journeyed far into the forest, until they came upon a cave carved by trees. The passageway was clear of all brush, as if it was constantly traveled.
Ramulus came to the entrance of the cave and whispered, "Ramulus, transform." And once again he became the fierce hunter of the unknown, with blades on his hands and two dangerous horns on the top of his head. With the ram's horns he had as a weapon, he entered the cave.
"Cheetor, maximize!" Cheetor whispered behind a tree. He changed into his Transmetal 2 self, and entered the cave behind Ramulus.
Inside the cave, Ramulus seemed to have a small home set up. There was a bed made of rocks, and a fireplace set up in the middle of the floor. Ramulus set down his weapon and laid down in his bed. And that was when Cheetor made his move.
"Don't move a muscle!" shouted the cheetah.
Leaping up, Ramulus cried, "Dammit, cat, you scared me to death!! Don't ever do that again!"
"Why'd you run off on us?" Cheetor asked.
"Why did you never come for me?" Ramulus then asked.
"Huh?"
Ramulus sat back down on his bed. "Why did none of your supposed perfect teammates never come for me when my pod crashed? I was left with nothing on this world. I was unaware that there was anyone on this world. I was left with the first moments of me being online as two predators of the forest attempted to eat me. I was stranded."
"Then why don't you join us?"
"Because I don't need you. I've survived over a stellar cycle by myself on this planet, and I do not need teammates to 'be a pal' to me or any other scrap like that."
"But you're a Maximal!" cried Cheetor.
"Sorry, kid, but no," said Ramulus. "I'm not a Maximal, and I never will be. You can call me one of your teammates and all that, but I now wish I had never emerged into your lives."
"Why?"
"Because every single one of you is annoying as hell."
"Oh," said Cheetor.
"I just want you to leave me alone," said Ramulus. "I don't need your maximal pride or your silly games. I just want to be alone, by myself, in my cave."
"But why?"
Ramulus chuckled. "You can't say that I've been too impressed with the maximals throughout my life. First they abandon me to nothing in the forest, then I'm sure you had something to do with that random tornado-storm that nearly killed me."
"That wasn't us," said Cheetor. "That was Megatron."
"Oh, Megatron, I'm sure that's your enemy, heh heh," said Ramulus sarcastically. "I'm sure life out there is nowhere near as dangerous as life here. Predators hunt me in my ram mode every day. I have Scarem and Sonar tryin' to kill me every day."
"Huh? Who's Scarem and Sonar?"
Ramulus sulked. "I don't even really know. They were here when my pod first landed. Scarem is a vicious beetle. Hates me to death. Sonar is a bat."
"Where are they?" asked Cheetor.
"They pop up randomly, sometimes ambush me together."
"So they're Predacons?"
"Look, kid, I don't even know what Predacons really are. Maybe they are!" Ramulus stood up. "Look, kid, I think it's about time you leave."
"Huh? Why?"
"Let's just say you've worn out your welcome."
"But will we ever see you again?" asked Cheetor.
"Maybe. Sometime. If I ever get lonely. Haven't got lonely yet, though. Now leave."
And with that, Cheetor was off, a little bit understanding of Ramulus's situation. Whether they would ever see him again, not even the stars knew. But Cheetor left willingly, knowing that in his heart he would always remember the tale of the forest that he learned on that day.
Later on that day, Megatron paced in front of his troops on a plain, in fact, the same plain he had done earlier that morning. "My troops, every single one of you are incompetent. You have all been defeated by two puny maximals. Fortunately, I have managed to possible save our situation. I have recovered the alien sphere. As for the next phase of my plan, we will wait for that."
Continued in: Chapter Three: Other Vengeances!
