Chapter 12:
Face of the Enemy
When Ratchet exited recharge, the first thing he did was run a full systems diagnostic. His internal check-up immediately returned an all-clear, which severely conflicted with his final memories, which were already streaming back. The image of the strange figure holding the net-gun that had knocked him senseless burned bright in his processors, and a growing sensation of fear mixed with relief overtook him. He wasn't dead, or in stasis lock, which was good, but odds were high that also meant he was a captive. He got the first evidence of his being correct when he opened his optics to see the same, dark face from before, this time backlit by six blinding lamps, characteristic of a repair bay...or a torture chamber.
"There you are." the dark figure said, its voice rough and tinged with irritation, "And here I thought I'd need to wait until you were awake to deliver you." Ratchet glowered up at him. He was Cybertronian; that much was glaringly obvious thanks to his weathered mechanical visage, but his piercing green eyes set him apart from the majority of his species. He also lacked much of the physical modification most Decepticons chose to undergo to help improve their physical menace. He looked...almost human, particularly with his thin, cruel lips, which were pursed in a look of what almost seemed like casual indifference.
"Delivered to whom?" the medic demanded. The lips twitched up at the corner, and the face drew back out of sight. Ratchet was left to squint into the bright glow above before he felt himself being lifted, the whir of mechanized arms filling the chamber. The whining and clicking of more servos heralded his elevation to a standing position. As he was set on his feet, he looked around, neck gyros feeling strangely sore, in time to see multi-jointed armatures retracting from his joints and torso.
Choosing to take the opportunity to exercise his newfound freedom of movement, Ratchet took a quick visual survey of himself and found that his prior injuries had been expertly treated. This immediately caused him to eye the retreating arms with suspicion. Not even the most complex techno-medicinal systems could treat Cybertronian physiology without conscious guidance. It was one thing to fix a human, given how they only ever stayed in one shape. It was another thing entirely to try and comprehend the vast and polymorphic intricacies of a Cybertronian body. Oh sure, it might LOOK simple on the surface, as he'd explained to Lennox, Sheppard and the rest of the humans many times over, but the reality was anything but.
As if in answer to his thoughts, a second figure stepped into view, also Cybertronian, and very obviously Decepticon. The angular look of his chassis and red optics were unmistakable, and as he looked up from a holographic display floating over his crooked forearm, he gave the medic a smile full of cruel glee. Moments later, the pain Ratchet had been expecting to wake up to suddenly arrived in the form of a violent stab of heat that seemed to cut through his spine down to his very Spark. He dropped to his knees with a cry of surprise, his reflexive attempt to reach back and try and remove the source of his agony being arrested by two heavy cuffs that were rapidly assembled around his wrists. Shaking, Ratchet collapsed to all fours, cursing in every dialect he could think of. The Decepticon ignored him, speaking in a hissing, arrogant tone.
"I have just disabled your T-Cog, old man. Do not attempt to change modes. It can be repaired, but that is up for-" the red-eyed fiend gloated, before the green-eyed one cut him off.
"Enough. You've done your job. Go wait in the hangar." There was a huff of irritation, but moments later, the sounds of a body shifting forms and retreating from the room met Ratchet's audials, and the heat in his back receded enough for him to attempt standing. Before he could, however, he was dragged upright and pushed forwards. He staggered, looking over his shoulder in anger as he caught himself.
"Who are you?" he demanded, "Answer me!"
"Let me give you a hint." the apparently-unaligned bot replied, "Grimlock, Chromia, Strafe, Motorbreath, Breakdown, Skylynx, Sunstreaker...:" He continued to list off names, some Autobot, others Decepticon, but all of which had one thing in common. Ratchet felt fear creep into his Spark, overriding his anger and pain. He knew who he was looking at, though until today he'd only heard his name. A memory of Optimus lying on the ground in the middle of Iacon, a sniper's slug embedded in his Spark's outer casing surged to the fore as he said it aloud.
"Lockdown." The green-eyed devil smiled a small, cruel smile.
"And here I thought I might've finally met someone who hadn't heard of me. Speaking of which, how is your Prime by the way? Still in good health?" he replied snidely.
"All the better for your asking." Ratchet shot back haughtily, doing his best to cover his dread. If this infamous bounty hunter was in Pegasus, and armed with the technology and firepower he'd seen at play in the battle for the Alpha Site, then the scrap heap had already hit the air exchange. He tried to compose himself before being shoved again. He took the hint and began moving, the hunter's hand on his shoulder guiding him to a heavy segmented door.
"That's good." the bounty hunter answered gruffly, his little smile not going anywhere past his lips, "It'd be a shame if he were to die and put a damper on my business." Ratchet's own facial features curled in a sneer as the door split apart with a hiss to reveal a long, poorly-lit corridor. Drones stood to either side of the entrance, weapons ready. Indeed, there seemed to be an entire honor guard waiting for Ratchet and his captor. The Decepticon from earlier was nowhere to be found, save for the skid-marks left by his exit on the metal floor.
"So, you caught me. I don't suppose you'd be willing to tell me what you're doing here, in this galaxy?" Ratchet asked casually, stepping forward and into the midst of the blank-faced drones. Lockdown stayed close behind, and at some unspoken command of his, the whole formation began to march. Another prod in the back prompted Ratchet to keep moving, which he did, his hopes of escape dwindling with every new sight and sound.
"Doing what I do best: hunting. I've got a rather big contract right now, and my employer, as you can see, has pulled out all the stops to make sure I'm properly equipped. Granted, I usually work best alone, but with a hunt like this one, well...let's just say I appreciate the extra tools."
"I assume it was you who planted the modified Insecticon?" Ratchet tried. He'd already worked out a few things on his own, including that he was on a ship (because how else could Lockdown have arrived?), and that Lockdown's arrival had been an accident. Medic he might be, but the old Autobot was no fool. You didn't set a steeljaw trap to catch a turbofox. The tiny tracking device mixed in with the Genii radios had obviously been meant for someone else, and it had only been bad luck that had led the bounty hunter to the Alpha Site.
"Correct. Though no doubt you've worked out that you were not the target." Lockdown replied, causing Ratchet to automatically roll his optics, before widening them in fear as a second group of drones passed through an intersection in the corridor ahead. As they filed past, he decided to take escape off the table for now. Having his T-Cog disabled severely limited his physical abilities both in and out of combat. That, combined with the unknown technological capabilities and numerical advantage of these strange drones, and the stories about the lengths Lockdown was liable to go to in order to prevent his 'payday' from escaping, and overall, playing the long game seemed the best choice for now. There were too many unknowns, and too little real data for rash action. His first goal had to be to rectify that. The only real question was how far he could press Lockdown before he decided to clam up...and if he could master his own fear long enough to keep his mental processes in order. Sunstreaker kept popping up in his memory, along with the ugly wounds he'd been forced to treat after his initial arrival. The many scars his chassis bore hovered in Ratchet's mind, along with all the others he'd seen on those whom he had helped rescue from Decepticon captivity. Arcee-
"Step aboard." commanded the arrogant voice of his captor. Ratchet saw that without his noticing, the slight curve of the long, long corridor and it's inefficient lighting had concealed an elevator, with room enough for himself, the bounty hunter and six drones, who had already taken positions around the edges. Ratchet did as he was told, struggling to think of questions while his time continued to dwindle. Lockdown entered the hexagonal chamber, which sealed with barely a sound, then tapped one pede twice. With a heavy clank, a sensation of angular descent filled Ratchet's senses, like the chamber was sliding down and forwards.
"Is this a new ship then?" Ratchet inquired. It wasn't exactly the most relevant question he could've picked, but it was all he could think of. Amidst his sea of worries, he hadn't been able to help noticing that overall, the vessel seemed oddly clean, and more than that, alien. There was the heavy industrial architecture that all Cybertronian vessels shared, yes, but there was also a great deal of curvature and geometric simplicity in the design as well. Decepticon architecture tended to favor cutting edges and an overall predatory look, both hallmarks of the city-state of Kaon. That was certainly present here, but it was overlaid onto a lot of very basic shapes indicating a mind engrossed with mechanical precision.
"Depends what you mean by 'new'." Lockdown chuckled, "My employer didn't build it just for me, certainly. He's not much into shipbuilding anymore." If Ratchet didn't know better, he'd think that Lockdown knew what he was thinking, and was stringing him along. The breadcrumbs of information in that statement made it seem like he was teasing the medic, aware that he wanted to know the full scope of the strange situation he'd stumbled into, but unwilling to divulge its precise dimensions.
"The shipyards of Cybertron can't possibly-" Ratchet tried, pulling on the most obvious string, but Lockdown cut him off.
"Oh, haven't you heard?" he cut in, crossing his arms and quirking his lips in that cruel smile of his again, "Cybertron is dead."
There was a long pause in which Ratchet considered a number of possible responses, ranging from 'Pull the other one and I'll whistle a parade march.' to 'You're lying.', then decided they all sounded stupid and settled for 'Explain.' His immediate reply was a low, grim chuckle that sent chills down his chassis' spine.
"I suppose it's only natural you'd be so uninformed, here at the aft-end of the universe." the bounty hunter observed, the chamber's descent continuing onwards around them, "I'll give you the short version since we're pressed for time." Idly, the brutish bot flexed the knuckles of his hands, creating a clicking sound similar to a human cracking their knuckles.
"I'm waiting…" Ratchet declared, annoyed his captor's need to toy with him.
"Roughly around the time your glorious leader shot the Allspark into space, the Energon wells began to dry up…" Lockdown stated, ignoring the irritation in the old medic's voice, "Of course they didn't realize it until most members of both sides had rushed off to track down the Cube. By the time anyone realized what was going on, it was too little, too late. Communication lines were in tatters. The neutral colonies had closed their borders." The green-eyed devil punctuated the final statement with a snort of derision before going on, indicating precisely what he thought of their behavior. "Anyone who could raided what little was left and abandoned the planet. There's no one left there now, as far as I've heard anyway. I haven't been back that way for dozens of vorns."
Ratchet felt his Spark trembling with horror at the bounty hunter's words. The sheer scope of the cataclysm was almost too much to bear. He'd always known that Cybertron's fate was questionable, and that without the Allspark, rebuilding would be next to impossible, yet he'd always assumed that in some way, life might go on, that perhaps the planet, spared from the full scale of the ravages of war, might recover over time. At the same time though, another part of him had also known that the price for the disconnection of the Allspark from its home would have dire consequences even the greatest scholars could not foresee. He shuddered, wanting desperately to believe the honorless scum was lying, but unable to convince himself it was so. His mind spun, the weight of the information seemingly weighing him down, only for him to realize it was actually the elevator slowing its progress as it approached its destination.
"Here we are." Lockdown announced gruffly, shoving his captive forward again as the doors opened, pushing Ratchet between the drones and out onto a vast stretch of bronze-colored deck-plating. Around the area, various small craft, including ones like those that had attacked the Alpha Site, sat inert, awaiting purpose. Drones moved between them, performing various meaningless tasks, or at least meaningless to Ratchet, while on either side, the curve of the walls stretched away, its shape roughly rendering the room roughly ovoid, like the outline of an egg. The wide end of the chamber's curvature was set with massive hangar doors, one of which was open. In front of it waited a large dropship, identical to the one Lockdown had used to bring Ratchet down. Idly Ratchet wondered if it was the same dropship. He still had no idea what had occurred after his capture, though it seemed as though he had been the only one to be caught. He thanked Primus for such small mercies as he was marched towards to waiting vessel, alongside which stood the moody Decepticon from earlier, looking annoyed.
"Took you long enough." the cretinous bot snapped as Ratchet, Lockdown and the attendant drone escorts drew level with the craft, the autonomous guards fanning out behind them to form a semicircle between the hunter, his prey and the rest of the hangar.
"Quiet." Lockdown replied, his tone as dismissive of the irritant as his body language. Ratchet took some small pleasure in watching the angry 'con fume as Lockdown waved his hand towards the craft, causing the sides to unfold into boarding ramps for its interior.
"If you continue with this flippant behavior I will-" the Decepticon finally began to say as Lockdown languidly strolled past, before the bounty hunter cut him off by backhanding him across the face, sending him crashing to the deck.
"I answer to your master," Lockdown grunted, "not you. The only reason I allowed you aboard was to let you perform repairs on my bounty and check him for trackers." He stalked past the fallen, cursing lackey, gesturing for the drones to close in behind Ratchet and press him towards the waiting cargo bay of the dropship. As he stepped aboard, Lockdown turned, glowering at the angry Flatline, who was furiously returning himself to the upright position, mouth already open to deliver some scathing retort. Lockdown didn't give him a chance.
"You can take another shuttle. I don't want your servile stink rubbing off on me." he growled. Then he tapped a control, causing the doors to slide shut on the nearly apoplectic Decepticon.
"Flatline...the name is familiar." Ratchet quipped, his fear somewhat mitigated by the amusement of watching Lockdown's casual disregard for the Decepticon that had temporarily robbed him of his T-Cog.
"You don't know him?" Lockdown inquired, "Funny, he never seems to shut up about you…" Ratchet racked his memory banks for some trace of the name, though when recognition finally came, he wished it hadn't. Flatline was the name of the Decepticon that had tortured and experimented on Arcee before her escape and arrival at Earth. He'd left her a broken thing, and even though Ratchet had made her whole physically again after Giza, he doubted anyone would ever be able to properly fix what he'd done to her spirit.
"I do, actually." he finally replied, "Though last I heard, he was still in the general vicinity of Cybertron, pulling wings off Insecticons."
"Well whatever scrap you have between you, leave me out of it." the bounty hunter replied, dispelling any notion of camaraderie the spat might've generated, "I'm here to get paid, not put up with vendettas."
Before Ratchet could reply, a heavy clunk and whine of engines signalled that the dropship was lifting off. Gravity shifted briefly before thrusters fired up, and the craft's systems compensated, returning the old medics pedes to the floor. Simulated views of the exterior appeared on either side of the crew bay, partly blocked by the six drones standing to either side of Ratchet and his captor, but not enough that the Autobot couldn't see what they showed.
As the dropship withdrew from the bay doors, he got his first look at the scale of Lockdown's craft. It was big; very big. As it drew further and further away, Ratchet tried to estimate its size and settled on something in the vicinity of at least a square kilometer, possibly more. In Cybertronian terms, that put it at about the size of a heavy frigate, or a missile boat. However, it didn't resemble any craft Ratchet had ever seen, at least not completely. The ultimate shape was roughly hexagonal, but stretched, with a broad sloped fin-like structure down the center of its dorsal structure. The forward segment was identified by a pincer-shaped gap, out of which they were now flying. As the dropship turned to orient itself, he got one more quick look at the craft, which combined elements of both Cybertronian and alien, and wondered at who could've possibly built it. The shipyards of Cybertron had been major points of contention during the later days of the war, when both sides had struggled for orbital superiority. As a result, what little remained of their species' spacepower was valuable, and far too precious to waste as a gift to a lowlife like Lockdown.
As the huge craft disappeared from sight, something else rose to replace it. Ratchet's Spark sank as the visage of an enormous gas giant loomed into view, obliterating his hopes that he might at least be in the same system as the Alpha Site. Bands of greenish-purple striped the bloated sphere like some kind of pox, quickly growing more nuanced and denser the closer they grew. For a moment Ratchet thought they might actually be flying into the swirling belts of gas, before they leveled out and something else again filled the horizon through the exterior image.
"Who exactly is your employer?" Ratchet didn't realize he'd asked the question until Lockdown spoke up in response, his green optic staring coldly out into the colder vacuum.
"You mean you haven't worked it out?" He snorted, glancing sideways at Ratchet, his gaze making the cuffs around his wrist actuators ache as he longed to remove them and wipe the smirk from the bastard's face. He nodded towards the growing expanse of the gas giant.
"It doesn't matter. You'll find out soon." he growled. As if called by his words, a dozen drones suddenly appeared, traveling at speeds far greater than any human craft could accomplish. Their thrusters burned hard, and moving in eerie unison, they formed a tight-knit helix around the dropship, locking it in a targeted web of weapons. Lockdown growled in annoyance, before a voice, smooth as oil, yet full of the promise of violence, emerged from the craft's internal speakers.
"State your intent." it said coldly.
"This is Lockdown. I have a delivery to make." declared the bounty hunter, his expression indicating he'd been expecting this, but still considered it a waste of time. There was a pause, presumably as the fighters checked the craft's identification transmitter code and the encryption key of Lockdown's response. Finally the drones broke their formation and formed a new one, made to defend rather than destroy.
"Automated flight mode has been engaged. You will be transported to a pre-designated hangar. Do not attempt to alter course."
"Get on with it." snarled Lockdown. The response was an amused chuckle that sounded like a chainsaw with its teeth stuck in a rather nasty piece of tinfoil. The progress of the dropship slowed slightly, but continued towards its destination. Ratchet was tempted to comment on the irony of the situation, given his captor's treatment of Flatline, but fell silent as he saw just where the ship was headed.
It started as little more than a dot, hovering high above the churning cyclones of the gas giant, but grew bigger very, very quickly. As it did, its precise features became more distinct. From a distance it had looked somewhat like a pen, cylindrical in outline, with a large bulge in the upper portion that tapered down to a point. As the dropship came ever-closer though, it became clear it was actually three conjoined strips, arranged in a triangular fashion about a central core. From around that central axis, long spines and fins protruded, giving the thing the look of a massive space-port tower floating freely in the void above the unfathomable maelstrom of hypersonic winds beneath. With every second the approach continued, the structure grew in size, and Ratchet began to marvel at the sheer scale of it. How big was it? Twenty kilometers? Thirty? More? It was bigger than anything he'd ever seen. Bigger than the Ark, bigger than the Nemesis!
Like Lockdown's ship, it featured an exterior design that mixed Cybertronian and alien aesthetics, though it was impossible to miss the thousands of weapons bristling from every spare surface. He swore he could feel them tracking their dropship, or more specifically, tracking him, their unseen targeting beams like laser eyes trained on his position. It was about then that Ratchet noticed shapes moving around the titanic construct, and with a few more seconds to focus, realized they were ships; some relatively small like Lockdown's, others far, far bigger, easily carrier or dreadnought class. He counted thirty, maybe forty before the face of the colossus swallowed his perspective and became all he could see.
"What...is this?" he asked, his voice full of awe and dread. Lockdown's tone was flat, one of rigid self-control and just a twinge of impatience.
"Your new home." He sniffed artificially as the dropship picked out an aperture on the inner surface of one of the behemoth's protruding axial spines, then gravitated towards it. As it grew closer, it split and opened like a mouth preparing to devour the tiny craft. In his primal horror, Ratchet thought he could see figures scuttling about around and inside the yawning aperture, like scraplets on the carcass of some impossibly vast creature dragged from the bowels of the mines of Kaon. Slowly, the dropship eased its way into the waiting landing bay and settled down with a clank that seemed horribly final, the sound of a guillotine's blade slamming home. The exterior displays fizzled out one by one, leaving the drones, Ratchet and his captor in momentary darkness, before purple and red light flooded the cabin as the sides of the dropship split open to disgorge its cargo. Beyond was a hangar much like the one they had just left, full of dormant drones, idle spacecraft and thrumming activity thanks to maintenance bots. As hunter and medic disembarked, a harsh, grating voice and full of venom echoed between the parked spacecraft filling the cavernous space.
"Bounty hunter!" bellowed the unseen speaker. Ratchet glanced over in time to see Lockdown roll his green optics while striding down the ramp. The source of the voice soon became apparent, as a sharp-angled Decepticon stomped out from amidst the churning chaos of the chamber's automated occupants. At his sides were two long, thick rectangular blades with heavy grips and cutting teeth like those of a chainsaw. As he approached, Ratchet noted how his clawed digits pawed at the handles of the weapons, as though he longed to employ them against Lockdown, or possibly just anything that got in his way. As it was, he swatted a hovering welder-bot out of his way as he drew in striking distance of the bounty hunter. For his part, the green-eyed soldier of fortune hardly flinched in the face of the towering and extremely angry Decepticon, staring up into his optics with a disaffected demeanor.
"Blitzwing," he said by way of greeting, the name rolling off his vocalizer like coagulated lubricant. "What have I done to annoy you now?" Ratchet's eyes narrowed at the name; it was another he had a history with, albeit not as much as Flatline. He knew the Tri-Former of old as a psychopathic ex-con who had joined the Decepticons in exchange for a pardon. His ability to assume three forms instead of the usual two made him something of an anomaly, even among the many and varied 'races' of Cybertron...like one of those amphibians on Earth that could switch gender at will. Ratchet allowed himself a small smile at imagining the former criminal as a small wart-covered toad, before the monster's index finger jerked in his direction, his movements jittery like a human who had imbibed too much caffeine.
"HE is not part of your target list! When the Commander hired you, he paid you a considerable sum to ensure your loyalty!"
"I have not deviated from the terms of my contract." Lockdown grunted, his face remaining impassive, while Blitzwing's twisted into a mask of rage. Then, without warning, it untwisted, its expression smoothing and hardening into a cold veneer of business-like focus. When he spoke again, his voice lacked the fury it had previously contained, and seemed as disinterested as Lockdown.
"Apologies, you are correct." the Decepticon stated flatly, "However, I would still ask why you brought him here." He once again pointed to Ratchet, who was trying to work out what in the Pit had just happened. Lockdown's mouth quirked up at the corner in a tiny smug smile.
"Better." he stated, "As for him, well, I doubt anyone else is going to pay as highly as your Commander for Optimus Prime's pocket medic." Blitzwing turned his red optics (which were now a somewhat brighter and sharper crimson Ratchet noticed) onto Lockdown's charge, scanning him in more ways than one. Then they widened slightly, a tiny tell that Ratchet's identity had finally struck him.
"You could've told us precisely who he was." the Decepticon complained mildly, turning back to Lockdown, before looking past him to his ship. "Where is Flatline?" he inquired, "He was supposed to return with you." Lockdown shrugged.
"He tested my patience. Now I'm testing his. I don't doubt he'll be back aboard soon."
"I see…" Blitzwing growled, his claws scraping over the handle as his eyes flickered briefly between darker and lighter shades of red. Ratchet struggled to comprehend what he was seeing. Something was clearly wrong with the Decepticon, yet Lockdown seemed totally unphased by it, whatever it was. It was just another in a long line of questions that were quickly beginning to overwhelm his patience.
"Would you care to enlighten me as to how you came into possession of such an...esteemed individual? Our records indicate he is not even supposed to be in this galaxy. Also, I would very much like to know why you decided to take time out of your busy schedule to capture him instead of focusing on your contract." Blitzwing stated, leaning forward slightly, his facial servos reconfiguring his mouth into a cold, humorless smile, "After all, you may not have broken the terms, but the Commander is paying you a great deal...and you know how he feels about delays." Lockdown sneered, then opened a section of his chestplate that served as a storage space and retrieved a data-chip about the size of a commercial human computer's motherboard. Holding it between two fingers, he lifted it up between him and the looming Decepticon.
"A complete record of my capture of the target, from initial detection to my securing him aboard my ship." he explained, "I'm sure it will answer any questions you still have." Blitzwing reached out for the device, only for Lockdown to move it out of reach, rolling it along his knuckles like a stage magician, causing the light of the Decepticon's optics to shift to a deeper red again and his face to fill with fresh rage.
"Give it to me!" he snarled, only for Lockdown to step back and extend a pistol from his arm, still holding the chip out of reach.
"It's for your master, not you." he stated firmly, "After he sees it, I suspect he'll want to renegotiate some of the contract."
"Give. It. To. ME!" Blitzwing repeated, stepping forward and pulling one of the huge chainsaw machetes free, its teeth roaring to life. Ratchet noticed how the various automatons that had been working around the place seemed to have retreated, as if aware of the chaos that was about to erupt. Blitzwing took another step forward, arm raised as Lockdown dropped his aim in preparation to shoot the Decepticon in the knee joints. Before he could however, there was a thunderous crack and flash, sending the enraged and unstable Tri-Former flying into the hull of a nearby assault bomber. Lockdown stared at the space where the menacing behemoth lay, then traced his gaze back towards the apparent source of the shot. Ratchet, unbending from the protective crouch he'd dropped into as a response to the shot, did the same...and felt his Spark freeze in his chest.
The source of the cannon-blast was a massive battle-tank, with armor of such a deep purple it could've been mistaken for black. It was easily three or four times the size of any human-manufactured vehicle and its barrel arced and crackled with energy. Slowly, it rattled forward, treads clattering as it rolled over the metal deck, coming to a stop about fifteen meters from Lockdown. In the corner of his mind not overwhelmed with terror, Ratchet noticed that while the bounty hunter's cool and collected attitude had never slipped an inch while facing the unstable Blitzwing, it now seemed to have begun to fail him. There was a trace of unease as he watched the motions of the deadly behemoth.
For his part, upon recovering and spotting his attacker, Blitzwing struggled to rise, his eyes shifting in color again turning an even deeper red than they had during his rage.
"Commander! I had no idea you-" he began, his voice absurdly happy and light. The tank cut him off with a second shot, dropping him to the deck like a heap of junk, twitching and writhing as arcs of electricity coursed over his body. Then he fell still. There was a brief pause filled only by the sound of machines continuing their work amidst the other craft on the hangar deck, before the tank's barrel retracted partially into its turret. Then it began to transform. The heavy struts that held its treads fanned out, the treads themselves splitting and reconfiguring to form segments of legs, arms and torso plates. The massive gun shifted to the right, attaching itself to one of the newly-formed limbs as, with a horrendous chorus of creaks and groans, a humanoid form took shape from the multitude of moving parts.
Finally, the delicate dance of components was complete, and the violet-armored titan they had created stepped forward, not looming over Lockdown like Blitzwing had, but keeping him in his shadow, his single red cyclopean optic focusing down on him like a surgical laser as his forty-five foot frame towered above both hunter and prey.
"Lockdown." the giant stated, its voice metallic and passionless. It wasn't quite agendered, but it was extremely mechanical, flat and utterly devoid of emotion of any kind.
"Shockwave." Lockdown replied, his own voice betraying his nervousness in the presence of this monster among monsters. Ratchet simply stared up at the colossus, mouth agape. When Blitzwing had mentioned a Commander, he had mentally run through a potential checklist of possible candidates while the deranged Decepticon had bickered with his employer's associate. Never in a million vorns had he dreamed that the title might belong to this...fiend. Before he could gather his wits, the red gaze shifted to hover over him, and the old healer's thoughts deserted him like a pack of scraplets under a floodlight.
"Ratchet." The word was a statement of recognition rather than any real greeting. It was well known that social niceties were superfluous to Megatron's Left Hand, just like mercy, love, and anything else that flew in the face of logic. The crimson gaze lingered over the Autobot, who felt his many cycles weighing him down like steel ingots as he fought not to instinctively cower beneath it. After a few more moments it shifted away, back to Lockdown, and Ratchet looked up again, not realizing he'd almost bent double in the glow of that awful stare. Without a word, the giant Decepticon stretched out a heavily-armored hand, into which Lockdown placed the data-chip. He then opened a port in the side of his head and plugged it into a small opening. For a brief instant, the Decepticon's eye flickered and dimmed as he analyzed the chip's contents, then refocused as he extracted the device.
"Optimus is here." he stated, his body language and tone unphased by the new information. Without moving his optic, he tucked the chip into his one of his own storage compartments, then stepped back. "We must renegotiate our deal, particularly in light of this new information." Lockdown let out a snort of false humor.
"I thought you'd say that." he replied, before nodding to the incapacitated Blitzwing. "What about the rabid steeljaw?"
"I will assign Flatline to deal with him." Shockwave declared, not bothering to look towards his crumpled underling, "Clearly he requires further adjustment. "
"I'd put him down." Lockdown growled, "No point in keeping a lunatic like that around."
"Even broken things have their uses." Shockwave retorted, with nary a sign that the bounty hunter's opinion had offended him. "This is unimportant. What matters is that the Prime is here, in this galaxy. My calculations show his presence will complicate matters. We must both accelerate our work if we are to outpace his inevitable interference."
"What about this one? What about the deal?" demanded Lockdown, crossing his arms across his chestplate and glowering up at the senior Decepticon. There was a momentary pause as Shockwave tilted his head back, suggesting he was considering something, before returning his eye to the bounty hunter.
"The highest average standing bounty for the capture of Ratchet is fifty million units. If delivered alive, it is seventy-five million. I will have them gather and sent to your craft in short order. In the meantime, I am altering the contract. If you locate Optimus, do not pursue him. Do not confront him either. Monitor his progress, and report it to me. Your primary objective remains the recovery of the targets previously listed in our prior agreement, and the items they absconded with. Once they have been retrieved, and my objectives completed, you may pursue him at your leisure...but not before."
The words were dictated out like instructions from programmer to a computer, and with about as much leniency. For all its mechanical overtones, Shockwave's voice made it clear that any deviation from the contract would be met with punishment, possibly something in line with whatever he had done to Blitzwing. Specifics were unnecessary. His reputation as Megatron's chief science officer was enough. It was what made him different from his master. Ratchet feared Megatron; perhaps not as much as he once had, but enough that the idea of facing the Decepticon leader send shivers down his chassis' spine. Shockwave though…
Long ago, the city-state of Pellechrome had tried to declare neutrality, and offered itself as a haven for soldiers from both sides seeking to escape the conflict. The polity had been a crucial trading center between Kaon and Kalis, and its new allegiance had generated a weak spot in the Decepticon line of defense. Infuriated by this haven for defectors, Megatron had turned to the merciless scientist for an answer. In response, Shockwave had devised a resonance beacon designed to attract digger-bots from deep within the structure of Cybertron. The great beasts were usually harmless, living off the waste minerals rejected from the smelting plants of the planet's great forges. The only people they had ever posed a threat to were miners, and even then, only ones who tried to mine too much from a seam at once, attracting the creatures with the overwhelming scent of unprocessed ore.
Shockwave had used the beacon to manipulate the creatures into undermining the entire city, collapsing it into an unrecognizable wreck within a fortnight before the Autobots had managed to negate the device's effect. Decepticon strike troops had stormed the ruins, killing and driving out all survivors, before handily converting the wreckage into a string of new and heavily-armed fortresses that had rendered the defense line impenetrable. Most of those who escaped the carnage fled to Metrotitan, a satellite settlement of Metroplex, unwittingly mixing with infiltrators who had proceeded to spike the city's Energon supply with Tox-En, a derivative of the life-giving substance that accelerated corrosion and degradation in those who consumed it.
Three months later, the guns of the fortresses that had once been the glittering spires of Pellechrome had shelled Metrotitan in advance of a Decepticon assault that the inhabitants had been too weak to stop. Those not slaughtered outright were sent to die as slaves in the mines of Kaon. And all of it was thanks to Shockwave.
Megatron inspired fear. Shockwave inspired dread. He believed in logic, and when logic conflicted with conscience, logic won. He was not a zealot, per se. He was just efficient, in the same way a combine harvester was efficient, if you gave said harvester the brain of Joseph Mengele and the tactical skills of Erwin Rommel.
It was Lockdown's grunt of assent that eventually broke Ratchet out of his horrified reflection on how much Shockwave actually seemed to resemble the two human historical figures. He nodded, his subtle unease gone in the light of his chance to return to his hunt.
"I'll do as you say. No hunting the Prime. But if he somehow joins forces with the targets…"
"Then it would be acceptable to contravene my orders. If he joins with the targets, he places himself in direct opposition to my objectives, and becomes a threat to the future prosperity of Cybertron." Shockwave stated, "Until then, however, do not approach or engage."
"Could I expect a bonus should it become necessary?" Lockdown inquired, a sly grin crossing his face. Ratchet winced, marveling at how this cruel being could find the fire to haggle with something like Shockwave. The walking tank once again paused, his gaze flickering as he seemed to ponder a response, then nodded.
"A thirty-percent increase would be acceptable...provided the Prime is delivered ALIVE. Lord Megatron will not accept anything else." Lockdown stuck his metal chin out in defiance.
"Ten percent if he's dead. Forty if he's alive."
"Unacceptable. If the Prime is killed, my calculations indicate Lord Megatron will likely terminate you in response. Thirty percent if brought in alive. There will be no payment if he is killed."
Lockdown snarled, but then stepped back and huffed.
"Fine, thirty percent. I'll see what I can do." he growled, turning his back on the purple giant. "In the meantime, I'd best get back to work. I'll depart when you send over the payment for this one." he declared, pointing to Ratchet as he stepped aboard his dropship.
"It will be done." Shockwave intoned as the bounty hunter turned to face his employer once more. The unaligned malcontent sneered at the red-eyed tyrant as his guard drones filed into the craft behind him, while others stood from their dormancy around the hangar and assembled to replace them around Ratchet.
"Good hunting." Ratchet spat. It was all he could think to say as the ramps rose to hide the green-eyed piece of scrap and the engines of the dropship began to power up. He wasn't sure, but he suspected he heard Lockdown laugh just as the thrusters roared to life, and the hangar opened to permit his exit, leaving the old Autobot healer alone with the looming nightmare that now held him captive. The red glow of Shockwave's gaze centered on him again, leaving him feeling small and afraid, yet determined. He had been in enemy hands before. Whatever the one-eyed monster wanted from him, it would not be taken easily.
"Greetings, Ratchet." Shockwave stated. There was no judgement in his tone, which made the old medic even more uneasy. Any other Decepticon would've been gloating or openly expressing whatever grudge they held against the Autobots by now. The fact that the towering goliath had used his name instead of simply 'Autobot scum' was further reason for worry.
"You know my name?" he tried, the words being all he could think of, "I'm surprised."
"You are among Optimus Prime's closest allies. Where he goes, probability favors that you will follow. I make it a point to know my enemies." Shockwave stated. Ratchet wished that at the very least, the Decepticon had been equipped with a more standard set of humanoid features. Like many other members of Megatron's movement, the scientist had modified his body and faceplate, though in his case the work was less for the purpose of enhancing menace and more for...well, no one knew really. As it stood, the giant's visage, with its sole red optic and oddly insectile jaw segments might as well have been as unreadable as the masked sigil that was the icon of his people. It only served to make Ratchet even more nervous, a state that got worse as the mad inventor took two heavy steps towards him, placing the medic even further in his shadow.
"Your capture was unexpected, yet for the survival of our people, serendipitous." the megalithic madman stated, cocking his helm slightly to one side before continuing, "If you are expecting me to kill you, you need not waste your time. You are measurably more valuable alive than dead."
"Well I'm sorry to disappoint you, but I don't know anything of value." Ratchet retorted, "I'm just Optimus' chief medical officer. I could tell you how much Energon he consumes on a daily basis, but if you're expecting me to give you his location, or anything else about my people, you'll be wasting your time as well." He shrugged, doing his best to make the gesture as nonchalant as possible, in the hopes it would disguise his screamingly-obvious bluff. He didn't have much hope it would, not with Shockwave, but it was worth a try regardless. The red eye of his cyclopean captor roved over his own features, clearly reading him like a book. Expecting to be struck for his lie, Decepticons begin great believers in corporal punishment, Ratchet braced himself.
However, Shockwave did not hit him, or even raise his hand. He merely tilted his helm in the other direction slowly. Ratchet wondered if the giant was trying to construct a map of his body language. Given Shockwave's usual mechanical approach to most problems, it wasn't too far-fetched. Then, without warning, the Decepticon scientist simply nodded.
"I know that you are lying," he stated flatly, "but I do not care." He waved his hand in dismissal, causing the Autobot medic to flinch, before noticing that his guards had all moved away, forming a loose ring around him and Shockwave. "It is not my intention that we should address each other as enemies...not when our species can no longer afford it."
The words entered Ratchet's audials, but might as well have been in some unknown dialect for all the sense they made to him. He tilted his head forward, raising the rims of his optics in a manner similar to human eyebrows.
"Our...species?" he repeated, a fresh swell of confusion welling up inside him. As he spoke, Shockwave's gaze temporarily lifted from his. The scientist made a gesture to someone, or something behind Ratchet, prompting the medic to look over his shoulder. His quick glance revealed that multi-wheeled cargo-hauler drones had assembled around Blitzwing and were preparing to drag him away. Shockwave's light hand motion was all the confirmation they had needed apparently, because even as Ratchet saw them, they were beginning to move, the sound of the lunatic's powerless body scraping across the deck quickly becoming lost in the general buzz of drones at work all over the room. This triviality dealt with, the Decepticon commander refocused on his prisoner.
"Yes, OUR species. Autobot and Decepticon can no longer afford to remain divided. Our populations have dwindled steadily since the loss of the Allspark at Tyger Pax. The neutral colonies have sealed their borders thanks to Starscream's undirected hostility in his pursuit of the Cube. And in case you were unaware, our planet has ceased its natural production of Energon." The explanation rolled over Ratchet like an earth-mover, every statement layering fresh torment upon him, mostly because he could not help but feel complicit in each of those tragedies. He was a healer, and always had been. It was only necessity that had made him take the path of a warrior. Shockwave continued, his tone unchanging even as he continued to elaborate on the dire nature of the scenario. "Thanks to the damage this war has caused, our race is reviled by dozens, if not hundreds of space-faring species who should be in awe of us. We are scattered across the entirety of the galactic supercluster, our lines of communication in tatters, leaving us divided even from our respective allies. We have lost everything, including our home planet. Under these conditions, any other species would have long ago perished, and ours still might...unless another path is chosen."
"You're asking...to make peace?" Ratchet asked. The question sounded alien, even to him. How could there be peace? After all that had happened, how could there ever be peace?
"No. I am asking for a return to symbiosis." Shockwave said, then paused, seeming to consider his next words carefully, "There can never be forgiveness...but the survival of our race now depends on a return to cooperation. To that end...I am requesting your assistance."
The silence that followed might've been termed vacuous, given how it seemed to suck all the sound out of Ratchet's consciousness. Around him, the various mindless machines continued their labors uninterrupted, but between him and his captor, there was an utter absence of speech. The pause went on for a full minute...then two. Ratchet was at a loss. It was as if a chasm had opened in his mind and swallowed all the questions he'd been compiling, leaving only the divide. How could he offer his assistance, to this monster most of all? No matter how kindly and gently the request was made, how could he honor it, knowing the nature of the one who had made it?
And yet, he was a healer, honor-bound by his oath to the spirit of Sentinel Prime, who it was said had helped found the practice of medicine among Cybertronians in the days before the fall of the Dynasty. No matter what else he did, or what those who came under his care might do, his task was to fix that which was broken. He stared up into the red light, uncertainty filling his Spark.
"You want...my help." he finally said, indicating himself with both hands.
"To save our people. Both our peoples." Shockwave confirmed. Ratchet looked down at his hands, then around at the hangar, then everywhere except the self-proclaimed scientist in front of him; the monster who had once implanted fusion warheads into Autobot prisoners as part of a false flag operation and who had executed all the defenders of Polyhex after a few had tried to break the terms of their surrender. Finally, he looked up into that sanguine beam and nodded.
"What do you need me to do?" he asked. Shockwave's face changed not one iota, but Ratchet imagined that somewhere behind the veneer of logic and cold 'perfection', the Decepticon was smiling.
"Follow me. I will explain everything." he commanded, then turned and resumed his vehicle mode, rolling back the way he had come. As Ratchet followed, the drones guarding him maintained their distance, while in his Spark, fresh turmoil began to brew. Atop the sea of chaotic emotions, one sentence was buoyed and repeated over and over:
'Dear Primus, please let this be worth it…'
o
A/N: So that was a rather short chapter, I know; but it's one I've been hoping to get out for a while now! I wouldn't call Shockwave the chief antagonist just yet. My goal is that this will be a more morally-grey story than Reign of Unicron, which when I get my lazy ass around to writing it, will be more in the vein of a classic good vs evil tale. Meanwhile, the plot thickens! Oh, and if you're wondering, yes, I changed the continuity a bit (though to be fair it was a mess in any case. All you need to know is that Same Side (the story preceding this) and all future titles from me take place in a world where Dark of the Moon never happened, as well as a lot of the background IDW comic stuff. My lore is more reliant on the Transformers: Prime continuity because frankly, that stuff reads like it actually was put together in a meaningful manner. So yeah, Shockwave is around, and being devious. I honestly really like him as a villain because he has the power to be so much more complex than even Megatron. Is he a sociopath by choice? Or is he just 'built that way'? What secrets lie behind that cyclopean gaze? X3 The only villain who could potentially be even more fascinating would be Soundwave, and sadly he got blown up in Same Side (though don't count on him staying dead, not after Megs proved that death is only the beginning. :P). Anyways, hope you enjoyed it! In the meanwhile, leave your thoughts, constructive criticism and reviews for me! It helps me write!