This chapter is based on the Transformers episode Dark Awakening, owned by Hasbro. So I'm writing my story around that episode.


When I slowly woke up my head pounded with every move I made. As I opened my eyes and moved my arms and legs I found myself chained against the wall of one of the brigs.

I looked around through the energy bars to see if anybody was there… but I saw no one. Where was everybody?

The chains were too short for me to get up. Why did they lock me up here? Didn't anybody realize I could easily break out of here in any of my large organic metal forms?

Alerted by the clattering sound of my chains as I moved, Sludge – in his brontosaurus mode - jumped in front of the holding cell, growling dangerously at me. "Stay back, Azori'jin!"

I raised an eyebrow. "What's your problem? Why am I chained and imprisoned? Where is Optimus Prime?"

"Prime said lock you up for save keeping," the dumbest of the Dinobots explained to me. "He say you dangerous. You stay locked up 'till his return."

Ooh… now I remembered… "But what do you mean, till his return? Where did he go?"

"Prime take fleet to smash Quintessons."

"Didn't you notice anything different about him?" I asked him, not really expecting an answer that would help me in anyway, but he was the only one around.

"Me Sludge still don't like him very much. Make me and Snarl stay behind," was his reply.

"I don't think he really was Prime," I told him. "I could not sense his spark…"

"Of course him Prime, him look like Prime, him smell like Prime, him act like Prime… Him Prime!" Sludge disagreed as he stamped on the floor.

I sat down and ignored him. Why would Prime have left me in a cell like this? I could easily break out of here. The thought of breaking out crossed my mind as I looked at the chains around my wrists and ankles.

But maybe it was better to wait for Prime to come back. If I break out now, I might look even more like a threat.

"You danger to Autobots?" Snarl suddenly asked me as he stared down at me.

I looked up to him with a grin. "No, of course I am NOT!"

"Than why Prime say you are?" he demanded to know.

"It's not Prime!" I tried to make him understand.

Before he could reply to that Snarl contacted him over the com-link. "Sludge, ship approaching fast!"

"You stay put! Me Sludge come to have look." He left me alone in the brig.

Why even bother to make him understand. He wasn't one of the smartest around here.

A loud crashing sound broke the awful silence around me. That couldn't be right…?

It didn't take very long before the doors to the holding cells skid open and Hot Rod came barging in. "Alyx!!"

Now that was a sight for sore eyes! Hey, Hot Rod…? Oh yeah, of course, Prime had the Matrix!

I'd almost forgotten how cute he looked being Hot Rod! Wrong timing … I know, but still.

He quickly deactivated the energy bars and knelt down next to me. "Alyx, are you alright?"

"You're alive…!" The chains kept me from swinging my arms around his neck, but that didn't keep Hot Rod from wrapping his arms around me and pulling me near.

He couldn't break the chains, there were meant to hold even the strongest Transformer.

"What happened?" I asked him. "Optimus said you all were dead!"

"On our way back home our ship was attacked by Decepticons. We found the Mausoleum and took refuge in it. There we found Optimus was alive. When the Decepticons found us he showed up and fought them off easily. When we saw he was building himself a ship to get out of there I gave him the Matrix, cause I thought it belonged to him. And than he shot us. When we came too he was gone and had set the mausoleum on a collision course into a red sun."

"It is NOT Optimus," I told him with a serious look on my face. "I cannot sense his spark, but no one will hear me!"

He put my face in his hand. "I hear you."

"He told the other's I was a danger to the Autobots," I told him. As a tear rolled down my cheek I said: "And they believed him…"

"Don't worry, we'll set that straight!"

Ultra Magnus, Kup, Arcee, Daniel and Spike came in followed by Snarl and Sludge. Kup found the key to my chains, gave them to Hot Rod so he could unchain me.

"What happened to you?" Arcee asked me as Hot Rod helped me to my feet.

I grabbed my head as it pounded as if someone was battering with some hammer against the inside of my skull. Hot Rod held on to me to keep me from falling back to the ground.

"I think Optimus knocked me out…" I said.

"Sludge said he called you dangerous and ordered to lock you up," Kup said.

"She's probably a danger to his plan… whatever that is," Hot Rod tried to explain that. "I wonder what the Quintessons have to do with all of this, he told everybody they killed us, but we never saw any."

"Maybe the Quintessons control him?" I suggested. "He's definitely on in there controlling himself."

"How can you say that?" Arcee let out. "Just because he said we died…"

"His spark isn't in there, he's not really alive! Come on, guys, it's been years now!"

The Autobots looked at each other.

"That would explain a lot," Spike said.

"We have to go after him and stop him from taking the fleet to the Quintessons." Hot Rod concluded.

"If the Quints are behind this, they're in a lot of trouble!" Ultra Magnus added to that. "We have to hurry."

"You'd better stay here, Alyx," Hot Rod told me. "Regenerate that head of yours and we'll take care of the rest."

The others left the brig to go back to their ship, that luckily was still able to fly.

Before he took off I took his face in my hands and pressed a kiss on his lips. "Do make sure you come back!"

With a smile he left me with Sludge and Snarl.


As it turned out, it were the Quints controlling Prime. They had programmed him for their own evil purposes and he really was a mindless zombie.

Hot Rod went after him to defeat him and get back the Matrix of Leadership. But there's of course no way he could possibly defeat the heroic Optimus Prime… zombie of no zombie.

Luckily the power of the Matrix within Prime's body managed to override the Quint's evil and help Primes true heroic self – within the Matrix - to give it back to Rodimus.

The irreparable Optimus' last act is to pilot the Autobot flagship into the trigger zone of the Quintesson trap. With a massive explosion, the solar system is destroyed.


Back on Cybertron everybody understood very well that their programmed leader hadn't really been truthfully about anything. Not his fault! Since he was programmed!

Some even came to apologize for believing him when he called me a danger to them all.

"He meant of course that you were a danger to the Quintessons plan!" Sunstreaker said convinced.

"That's why he ordered to lock you up!" Sideswipe backed him up.

Still I was very disappointed.

"How can we go against Optimus Prime?" Perceptor stated. "He's legendary!"

I could understand them of course, but I was still disappointed. So much that I needed some time on my own. I felt betrayed. And I didn't want anybody to look at me, wondering if Prime – who wasn't really him anyway – was right after all.

Takehiko's cruiser had been left behind on the planet. My brother Kanaye had thoroughly checked it out and reprogrammed its computer to recognize me as its owner and obey me. (kinda like the Star Trek ships computers)

I was ready to take off… or actually I really didn't want to leave at all. I needed to leave for a while.

Rodimus was the last one left at my ship. The others who had come to say good bye had left to give us some privacy.

"Let me know where you are, okay?" he urged me.

I nodded, swung my arms around his waist and pressed my face against his chest. "You can look for my on the space station you found me," I told him as I looked up to him.

"And if you need me, just give me a call and I'll be there!" he said, looking into my eyes. He ran his hand through my hair. "I can see your heartache in your eyes…"

I let out a sigh. "I have to go now, don't worry 'bout me."

Slowly I parted from him and got into the black cruiser. Rodimus watched my ship leave and even long after I left Earth's atmosphere he stared at the sky.


AAAAAAAAAAAAAAW!!!
Well, wouldn't you need some time to get over all of that?
Darn Quints, playing around with your Dad's body? Your friends believing a zombie?

NEXT: The Return of Optimus Prime, for real this time! Or at least, part one of that.