Chapter 5
Megatron lifts himself of the table, and looks around. He shakes his head a bit as he holds it with a hand as he steadies himself. "H-How long?" He asks
"How long?" Long Haul asks.
"Yes, How long have I been offline?" He asks sharply
"Ninety five years, I am afraid Lord Megatron." Scrapper speaks up walking close to him.
Megatron's eyes glow a bright red as he grabs Scrapper by the throat. "Ninety Five years? It took you NINETY FIVE YEARS to restore me to a proper body?" He asks and tosses the Constructicon across the room. "Incompetent fools!" He says before he regains his composure. "How much ground have we lost? Surely the without Optimus Prime we have crushed the Autobots easily. And What about that traitor Starscream? As soon as I see him again I will rip him apart piece by piece and throw HIM out of a cargo hold to float endlessly until he offlines." His processors racing as he attempts to fill the void in his memories.
Scrapper coughs and stands. "Please, Lord Megatron. I'll explain everything. But this isn't the best time for it. We are deep in Autobot Territory, they know we are here and we don't have the resources to counter a full on assault after ll it took to get here." He says rubbing his neck a bit.
Megatron sneers as he looks at Scrapper and the rest of those gathered here. He had been able to use smaller forces before to take on much larger ones, but here all but Astrotrain were scientists first and warriors second. "Fine, we shall withdraw to safer territory for the time being. But once I have my army back, I will take back all that I have lost since my death. Astrotrain, transform and get us out of here."
"Yes Lord Megatron!" He says and transforms into his new bullet train mode, opening his rear hatch and letting the others enter him. "All of you ready?" He asks as he speeds out of the room, jarring everyone even himself with his new speed. Within mere moments he thunders out of Crystal City. The Autobots that remain on watch turn towards him and start to fire as he transforms into his shuttle mode and takes off, his new armor easily withstanding the blasts. As Astrotrain leaves they rush into Crystal city and find the half melted body of Goldbug who is barely able to vocalize a plea for help when he sees them. Seeing him as a Priority the small group drops everything else and rush him to Lifeline's clinic.
------
"I'll try to explain everything since you were ejected from Astrotrain after the battle at Autobot City as it will be several hours before we reach Charr." He says as he walks over to Megatron.
"I still can't believe things have gotten so bad that we no longer even have have a slagging foothold on Cybertron. When I get a hold of those responsible I will rip them apart with my bare hands!" He says his red optics glowing brightly in his anger.
"Well I guess I'll start with probably the best news. Starscream is dead. You.. er... Your Replacement killed him in his first act as leader. Complete disintegrated him. Nothing but Ash remaining." Scrapper explains as a grin crosses Megatron's face clearly pleased by this news, his temper seeming to calm at the though of that traitor being turned to ash.
Scrapper purposefully leaves out the rumors of Starscream's ghost and resurrection, prefers to keep a good head on his shoulders... "As for losing our foothold on Cybertron, that was mostly the fault of a giant monstrous planet called Unicron.." Scrapper says before being interrupted by Megatron who's anger rises once more hearing that name.
"Unicron?" He says with a sneer. "He was the one the killed me. Promised me a new body and troops, but all I remember afterwards is pain and then darkness. And now you tell me that because of him we have lost our control on Cybertron?"
Scrapper nods nervously."Yes. Completely lost. He started by devouring the moons, and then preceded to attack Cybertron. With our currently leader off taking care of the main Autobot resistance it was Chaos on Cybertron. Those that were killed, fled Cybertron fearing for their lives thinking Cybertron would be destroyed by that seemingly unstoppable giant. Even now we're still not sure of who all died, and who might be drifting aimlessly out there. Your replacement and his personal troops though fought valiantly against the Autobots to prevent them from regaining Cybertron. Unfortunately, a new Prime took over their Ranks and knocked him senseless, before using the Matrix to cause Unicron to explode."
"Why didn't this replacement of mine try to regather the Decepticons, rather then letting them wander aimlessly?"
"He wasn't able to. He was thrown from Unicron, as the beast was exploding and landed in a lava pool on the planet of Thrull. It was almost a year before his second in command was able to locate him, and when they did the damage to him was irresrvable, The lave seeping through him during that time had driven him insane, and wouldn't relinquish his command. Though his insanity he caused us many losses, and only cared about himself. Many Decepticons were driven away by his madness, others killed, usually by him. It was after the Return of Optimus..."
Megatron's eyes flare, and Scrapper suddenly dives away from Megatron. "WHAT?" He yells getting to his feet. "Optimus Prime is alive? Get back here you simpering minicon!" yells as he grabs scrapper by the neck once again. The other Constructions bravely hiding from Megatron's wrath
"Y-Y-yeah... About two years later, some scientists found his body and planned to use it against the Autobots. But he ended up releasing these spores that amplified the worst traits in everyone, it was dubbed the Hate Plague. It turned everyone against each other. The whole universe was tearing itself apart. The Autobots needed a leader so they went to great lengths to return Optimus to life. He lead the survivors to recover the Matrix and destroy the Hate Plaque. Which has only made things worse, since your successor is no match for a mind such as Optimus' especially in his insanity."
Megatron drops Scrapper. "I've heard enough. The sooner we get to Charr, the sooner we can rise to our former glory once more. Don't spare any time Astrotrain, lets see what this new body of yours can really do!"
"Yes Lord Megatron!" Astrotrain says as he turns his rockets on max.
----
Back on Cybertron in Lifeline's clinic a new group of Autobots arrive upon the request of Ultra Magnus. A team that gets everyone in the clinic to drop what they are doing. Taking front in the group is the iconic big red robot, his face renowned across the universe for the lengths he will go to for peace and freedom. Optimus Prime. Following behind him, is Perceptor the head Scientist for the UDC. And to Perceptor's right, is Blaster head of Cybertron's communication network
Ultra Magnus exits from the hall way leading to the back room when word that Optimus had arrived. "Sir!" He says with a soft salute, ever the solider. "I am glad that you were able to make it here so soon."
"Ease up, Ultra Magnus. There is no need to be so formal." He says as Ultra Magnus salutes him, having never be fond of such formalities that come with being such a high ranked officer within both the Autobot and UDC command structure. "I've already read your report, and this is indeed a dark day for us. So many wounded, and Goldbug's mention of Megatron being brought back online. We will need to fortify Cybertron, Nebulos, and Earth as they will be large targets for the Decepticons in case this is true and he gets them in shape again. Blaster, send a message to Cosmos. I want him to monitor Charr to the best of his ability, without being noticed and to leave at the first sign of trouble. Until we have more information, any other measures would just be guesses to what they may do."
Blaster smiles and nods "Right away Prime!" He says happily and transforms into his boom box form, landing on the reception desk, as a cable snakes from the back where the battery compartment would be if he was a regular Terran boom box, and plugs into the clinic's computers to up the range of his transmission. "Yo, Cosmos! Do you hear me? I got urgent orders from ol' big red himself! He wants you to be our eye in the shy over Charr. Rumors are that some serious slag may end up going down over there, and we want to know everything that happens, without risking yourself."
"I gotcha, Blaster. I'm making my way there now. I thought I seen Astrotrain in an awfully big hurry a few minutes ago. Tell Prime, he can count on me!" Cosmos reply says as it comes in over Blaster's speakers.
"I should probably get to work." Perceptor says as Blaster returns to his robot mode. "From the sounds of the report, my research should help immensely in the repair and reinvigoration of our fallen comrades."
"Go on back, Gizmo and Lifeline are awaiting your arrival." Refit says with a soft smile.
The small group heads back to further into the clinic, lead by Refit until they reach a large room built specificity for the much larger patients even by Transformers. Inside lay Computron, who seems partiality functional and aware of his surroundings, while several medics under Lifeline's advisory continue to work repairs and hook him up to machine that seems to have been cobbled together quickly from several others, but seems to be doing its intended job of keeping Computron from offlining. Hooked up to a similar machine is Omega Supreme, or at least his head. There the monitor over his face displays a blue screen with several errors messages written in Cybertronian.
It also seems that the smaller patients have been moved into this room as well for easy monitoring. Slingshot is still unconscious but his life signs are stable. Rodimus is probably in the best condition of the three from the last battle, but that isn't saying much, as his body seems to have been severed in two at that waist, both parts of him laying on a bed, with several devices keeping his important systems online, his optics open but dim, and smiles softly seeing Optimus enter the room.
"Oh... hey... didn't think you'd... make it... so... soon..." He says weakly, and Lifelines glares over to Rodimus "You really should be conserving your energy, your going to have a long operation a head of you, so your going to need your rest. So your gonna rest of your own accord or I'm gonna make you." Lifeline says with a slight growl, clearly over stressed at the moment. Optimus puts his large hand on the Medic's shoulder. "Relax Lifeline, if your not careful you'll have to be admitted to your own clinic when you pop a fuel line." Optimus says with a soft chuckle, paraphrasing a human term he used to hear a lot.
Rodimus laughs softly. "It's alright..." he says "I do need... my... test... seeing as how badly i got... what's the human word for it..." he mutters softly to himself "ah yes... I got pwned..."
"Man, If you got pwned Rodimus, Goldbug surely got served..." Blaster says as he looks over to Goldbug, who is little more then a pile of parts; like Omega Supreme, his head is connected to machines trying to keep his vitals steady.
"Oh dear..." Perceptor says looking to Goldbug. "We should start with him, Gizmo could you come over here, I am going to need your help with gathering and assembling the items I need..." He says before rattling off a long list of items and devices whose names seems to confuse just about everyone but the young boy.
"That all? I came across most of that, while constructing the the monitor and life support for Computron." He says as he transforms back into the head for Armorhide and heads off with Perceptor to gather and build his device.
Several hours later, a large metallic chamber is bright forth into the room. Much like the life support unit for Computron, it seems to be cobbled together without much polish.
"Is that it? It doesn't look like much." Blaster asks as he looks at the machine, thinking it could fall apart any second.
"Don't doubt my work, Blaster. It might be a bit hastily put together, and we didn't have time to focus on looks, but my stuff holds together perfectly. I'm not Wheeljack after all." Armorhide says with a grin.
"Please, be quiet. I'm going to need to focus if this is to work. This process is still untested, but it might be the only thing that can save our friends if it works." Perceptor says as he works on hooking the machine up to the computers in the room and setting up the programs through the machine, which powers up with a sharp whirl as the door to it opens.
As the door opens, Armorhide begins placing the pieces of Goldbug inside on a metal seat. And presses a button next to the door making it close again. "He's all set in there Perceptor. Lets see what this process of yours can do."
The machine rumbles to life, as it begins to scan over the remains of Goldbug inside, and begins to search through the databases for a matching, dinging softly as it finds one and begins to reconstruct the small spy contained inside using all the resources at its disposal. The group outside remains silent as they watch the machine, Lifeline seeming the most tense of all as he hopes it works. After an impossibly long hour to the room, the machine stops and the door opens, smoke flowing out of it, as a robot steps out, holding his head.
"Man... what hit me?" He asks shaking his head, as the smoke clears, revealing his new yellow and black body. Though as his head comes into view, he looks more like Bumblebee then Goldbug.
"That is certainly unexpected..." Perceptor says as he looks over the reports from the machine to figure out why rebuilt him into an upgraded version of older body then his current body. "Oh dear... It seems that the file for Goldbug was corrupted, and went to the next suitable choice. Which was to use the Bumblebee file.
Goldbug's optics flash "You mean I'm Bumblebee again? I thought progress meant we're suppose to go forwards, not backwards." He says with a sigh
"Just because your in your old body doesn't mean you've gone backwards Goldbug. You still have your experiences and memories to draw on that help define who you are, and those can never be taken from you." Optimus Prime says as he looks over to Goldbug.
Goldbug nods softly "Your right Prime!" He says and then blinks "Though, I guess if I look like my old self, I should probably go by Bumblebee again.
"I do believe I have the bugs worked out of it this time." Perceptor says looking up from his work. "If one of you would be so kind to load Rodimus into the Chamber, we should be able to save Lifeline a long surgery"
Armorhide and Bumblebee nod and retrieve both halves of Rodimus and drag him into the chamber, letting the door close, leaving the group to once more to wait as another friend is repaired.
----
Meanwhile, Astrotrain approaches Charr, discretely follows by a small green saucer. While on the planet below, Galvatron looks up with an evil grin seeing Astrotrain enter the atmosphere. "Yes... Welcome home Traitors..." He says to himself. "I hope you enjoy the homecoming party I have prepared for you, because I know I'm gonna have a Blast..." He says with a mad cackle and fires on Astrotrain with his plasma cannon, watching the rogue Decepticon and his passages crash down to earth, as an army of Decepticons close in on all inside...