Beast Wars and all characters and things related are copyright and trademark of Hasbro and Mainframe Entertainment. This work, however, is the original work of the author.
Note: This story takes place immediately after "Journeys".
Saving Cybertron, Chapter 5
By TVfan
Tripredicus Council Headquarters
Optimus and Queen moved slowly into the dark hallways of the Tripredicus Council's headquarters. They had failed in their attack outside and had now fled inside where they hoped either the maze of hallways or some internal trap would stop the Maximal leader and the resistance leader.
"Where do you suppose they've gone?" Optimus asked as they moved down the hallway.
"Likely to whatever ship they have available to get them to wherever they have the live sparks that they stole," Queen answered as she moved more urgently then Optimus, "They have a hanger in the basement. We have to get there quickly."
"In the basement?" Optimus asked.
"The entire headquarters will open like a pair of hanger doors," Queen answered, "Now come on."
Queen rushed forward before Optimus could voice his concerns and was hit by a pair of laser blasts that seemingly came out off nowhere.
"Won't they have security systems?" Optimus questioned.
"Slag," Queen cursed, "they're going to get away."
"If the council is anything like Megatron, I doubt it," Optimus answered thinking back to countless battles in the Beast Wars where the Predicon leader didn't retreat until he was not only beaten but cornered as well.
"Megatron is a fool," Queen reminded him.
Optimus blasted the concealed laser cannons that had knocked Queen down. Queen then continued down the hallway.
"Do you know the way down there?" Optimus asked.
"Yes," Queen answered, "Remember, I served them before I realized that they only intended for the Spawn of Unicron to live."
Queen then fired her own weapon at a series of points along the wall, where more concealed weapons were, and then the control panel to a door which opened it. Optimus only looked on in surprise.
"We need to hurry," Queen answered, "We'll all be dead if they start the rocket engines on the ship."
Queen then rushed through the door and down a flight of stairs. Optimus sighed, sensing that something was being hidden from him, but followed anyway. He couldn't afford to let the Tripredicus Council reactivate Unicron. That would be disastrous for all Cybertron.
Meanwhile at the bottom of the flight of stairs, the Tripredicus Council was rapidly preparing to evacuate their headquarters.
"I can't believe we're running! Running from the resistance," General Cicadacon growled as he and General Seaclamp loaded a few pieces of equipment that thy would need in the area.
"We do not have time for this," General Ramhorn answered while he worked on a computer panel that would program the escape ship they intended to use.
All of them had taken damage from Optimus and Queen's weapons. They were certain they'd inflicted damage of their own, but they didn't think it would be enough to stop them.
"Can our defenses hold them off?" Seaclamp asked, "Queen knows about our base… and its defenses."
"It will slow them down," Ramhorn answered, "but not long enough if you do not hurry. We're already going to be leaving a lot behind here anyway."
Seaclamp and Cicadacon sighed and continued with their work.
Outside
In the main battle area, Dinobot was left tough situation. Rapther, Rattrap, Runner, Cheetor, and Terrorsaur stood beside him, largely alone against a host of drones that crewed the ships that Tripredicus Council had sent against them earlier in the battle. Their only protection were the buildings they could hide behind, or the barricade that they had erected earlier.
"We gotta push them back," Rapther spoke after a few moments as she fired a barrage of rockets at the attacking drones, destroying one or two of them.
"Are you nuts?" Rattrap gasped, "we're barely holding on as we are."
"And they're still advancing," Cheetor added as he fired a few blasts and destroyed a couple of drones that tried to rush their barricade, "we might actually need to retreat."
"But the bulk of our wounded and offline bots are under the alley we came out of," Rapther answered as she dove down to avoid being hit by several laser blasts that were shot at the raptor femme-bot.
"And we can not withdraw," Dinobot grumbled as he realized Rapther's point, "they'd come in behind Optimus and Queen and they'd both be destroyed."
Dinobot then fired his optics laser and destroyed a drone that looked like it was going to take cover in the alley.
"Perhaps we could call Spine's team in to man the alley," Terrorsaur suggested, "It would trap the drones between two points of fire, and since they aren't damaged as badly as we are, we can easily destroy the drones."
"And what if they're not there?" Runner asked, "What then?"
Dinobot only sighed.
"Rattrap, Rapther, keep the fight in this general area," Dinobot instructed, "pull back if you have to, and if you can protect Wolffang and Snowstalker as well. Runner, come with me."
"What?" Runner gasped.
"Where are you going?" Rapther demanded.
"To do something… noble," Dinobot said slowly, and leaped over the barricade carrying runner with him.
"We're all gonna die!" Runner screamed.
"THAT IS MY LINE!" Rattrap yelled back at him, and then glanced at the others, "What? It is."
Dinobot's charge took many of the drones by surprise and he destroyed several with his optics laser and ended up slicing those closest to the alley from which the Maximal and resistance fighters had come from. He could have done more if he weren't carrying Runner in his other hand.
"We can't hold here," Runner protested as Dinobot set him down.
"There is no 'we'," Dinobot snarled, "I will hold them here. You will go below ground and get the others."
"But the wounded? You?" Runner asked as he fired his weapon toward the attacking drones.
"The wounded are the ones I am defending," Dinobot answered, "and if I die in doing so, then that is my fate and I may join the Matrix with full military honors, now… GET MOVING!"
Runner only gulped and moved away from the transmetal two raptor. He then quickly went to the 'sewer' hole that the strike team had emerged from. As he arrived in the underground, he found most of the stasis locked transformers were still there and that the team assigned to get them back to the base was not there… which meant he had running to do.
Tripredicus Council Headquarters
Queen rushed as quickly as she could to go down the long flight of stairs that laid to the basement hanger of the Tripredicus Council. They had to be stopped before they could escape. To her, they were traitors to he Predicon cause and could not be allowed to live. She was fairly certain that Optimus wanted to stop them to prevent Unicron from being reborn.
"Come on," Queen urged, "even if they don't have enough sparks to restore Unicron, they'll gather reinforcements from the colonies that the Tripredicus Council has taken over or from other parts of Cybertron!"
"There are other resistance groups on Cybertron?" Optimus asked as he ran.
Queen didn't answer as a large spinning saw blade suddenly came out from the side of one of the walls, with the obvious goal of cutting one of the two transformers in half. Queen barely got past it, and Optimus had to blast it at close range to avoid running into it. As he passed where the saw blade was, Optimus stepped on a pressure sensor that ended up extended several long metal spikes that nearly impaled Queen and forced her to fall back.
"Blast it!" Queen cursed, "I thought we could beat these traps."
"We can," Optimus answered, "More then likely their sole purpose is to slow us down."
"So far it's doing EXACTLY that!" Queen answered, "they know they've been beaten. Their drones may destroy one or two of the others, but they don't have enough to get through them quickly and defeat us as well. And they've proven that despite their greater power then their drones, they couldn't do THAT much against us. They're fleeing."
"And we'll get them," Optimus answered, "No doubt they've also got a horde of information that our earlier spy missions didn't get that they are desperately trying to take with them. Make sure there is nothing we can use…"
"Are you always this optimistic?" Queen questioned, "they could easily flee and turn Cybertron's defense satellites and destroy us in a few keystrokes."
"Comes with the name, I guess," Optimus answered as he began using his great strength to bend the metal spikes, clearing a route for them to move down the stairs again.
Even with Optimus's strength, it took them time to move down the steps through the like of thick metal spikes. But as the reached the end of it, they heard voices coming from the bottom of the stairs, which meant that while the Tripredicus Council was fleeing the area, they hadn't left yet. Primal's optimism was holding true, so far.
"Come on," Queen urged as they finally reached the bottom of the stairs and rushed into the room beyond.
The two found Seaclamp and Cicadacon moving boxes and data disks toward a small rocket like craft while Ramhorn was working on some computer program, likely to program the rocket.
"They've caught us!" Cicadacon raised the alarm.
"That's right," Queen said with a smirk, and fired her blaster at Cicadacon and Seaclamp, destroying both of the containers they were carrying.
Underground Tunnels
Runner ran hard through the maze of tunnels that the strike team had taken to get to where the battle site was now, assuming that those carrying the wounded and stasis locked transformers would take the same route. He ran as hard as he could, hoping he'd run into the group as they returned to move more of the wounded back to the base. If they were already moving some, Dinobot would have to hold out on his own longer.
He ended up running all the way back to where the base entrance was when he ran into Blackarachnia coming up the stairs from the underground base. The resulting collision sent both of them falling to the ground.
"Watch where you're going!" Blackarachnia scolded as she pulled herself up.
"What are you doing here, Runner?" Spine questioned as he came out of their hidden base.
"We need help!" Runner said urgently, "they sent the capital ships after us… they're down, but the drones that manned those ships are attacking. Dinobot is holding them off, but only just barely… they could break into the sewers where our stasis locked comrades are."
Packadex was the one gasped as he came into the chamber above the base.
"You are needed to help," Runner pleaded, "before Dinobot is killed."
"That saurian is known for making suicidal stands," Blackarachnia dismissed it, "we have our orders to get the wounded back to the base."
"I am under orders as well, and if you don't help, his suicidal stand will be in vain," Runner answered, "You MUST help!"
"If it finally gives us a shot at battle, I'll do it!" Spine answered, "You can all rust for all I care since you're cowards!"
Packadex glared at the Predicon resistance fighter and shook his head.
"I will go as well," Packadex spoke, "If they break into where our wounded are, our casualties will be worse."
"Good," Runner said, "they're already attacking where Dinobot is!"
The Battle Site
And at the battle site, things were far more desperate then anything Runner could describe. The drones had more then enough numbers to attack in both directions, while Dinobot was stuck in a fairly exposed position. His transmetal two armor protected him fairly well, but there was no telling how long it would protect him. The others meanwhile continued to fire away at the drones, but they simply didn't have enough fire power to distract many of tem from going after the male raptor.
"Come on! We gotta do more!" Rapther yelled as she stood up and fired a barrage of rockets at the drones.
Her shots destroyed a few and forced others to dive away and duck behind what little cover they had, but did not do enough to divert attention away from where Dinobot was. Several of the drones then returned fire and knocked Rapther back.
"Will you get down," Rattrap urged, "You may be a transmetal, but that don't make you invincible."
"We gotta do more," Rapther urged.
"You got no argument about what we have to do," Rattrap answered as he fired a few shots, which only slowed the drones advance, "what I'm talkin' about is capacity. I don't think we can do more…"
"But… Dinobot!" Rapther spoke and fired another barrage of rockets.
"He's ignited his own recycling pyre," Terrorsaur snarled, "we'd best to look after ourselves!"
Rapther only snarled back, but managed to restrain herself from attacking the transmetal two pterosaur.
"I hate to admit it, but he's right," Cheetor commented, "we could drive them back and save our wounded, but that will leave Big Bot vulnerable… Queen as well. We may have to take Snowstalker and Wolffang and go to a more defendable position."
"No, we can't sacrifice either," Rapther insisted.
"I don't think we can," Cheetor answered as he blasted a drone that had managed to begin climbing the barricade, "we gotta pull back and hope Dinobot gets help."
Rapther looked toward Dinobot's position and sighed heavily. The teams moving the wounded transformers would likely be able to prevent the drones from destroying their wounded comrades. They would have to pull back.
"Hey, lizard-lady," Rattrap called as he had lifted up Wolffang's stasis locked form, "You wanna give us a hand here? Terrorsaur and Spots can cover us while we pull back to the hole that Optimus and Queen blew in their wall."
"Of course," Rapther sighed and turned to lift up the stasis locked body of Snowstalker. She took one last glance in Dinobot's direction and then ran after Rattrap.
While this was going on, Dinobot, himself, was not in a good position. On his own and with no protection, he had no cover to hide behind. The one thing that went for him was that the alley was narrow. He could easily block the attempt by the drones to advance, but since he could not find cover he was taking multiple shots from the attacking drones. His armor was holding, but he didn't know how much longer that would work.
Two drones rushed him, only to be sliced in half by his talons, but it quickly proved that the attack was a decoy for three others that hung back a little bit. They hit him with all they had, knocking Dinobot to a knee. He returned fire with his optics laser, but only destroyed one of them. The other three fired again, forcing Dinobot to roll backward. They had nearly pushed him past the sewer entrance that they had earlier emerged from.
"You will not win," Dinobot swore defiantly as the remaining two drones that were driving him back continued to advance on him.
He could also see that the others were not destroying enough of the attacking drones fast enough to take any pressure off of him. Judging by their overall numbers, he guessed that they were being driven back, just as he was, through sheer weight of numbers.
"You will NOT WIN!" Dinobot swore and charged forward.
He blasted three drones with his optics laser and sliced another two with his talons. But, in forcing them back he exposed himself to more fire and after reaching the street that they had earlier battled on, he was hit by nearly twenty different laser blasts and was knocked back several feet. He landed on his back and then skidded back several feet. Once he finally stopped, the transmetal two raptor had fallen into stasis lock. The drones then advanced confident that they had no more obstacles to deal with.
It was then that Runner returned to the scene. The others were following behind him, but could not match his speed. He took a shot from the drones upon emerging from the underground, but he quickly managed to recover. As Runner returned fire, and destroyed three drones, he noticed the temporarily offline Dinobot.
"Hold on," Runner told the offline raptor, "help is on the way."
Tripredicus Council Headquarters
"NO! I won't let it end this way!" Ramhorn growled as opened a hidden compartment and pulled out a heavy laser rifle while Cicadacon and Seaclamp recovered from the initial attack from Queen upon their arrival inside their hidden hanger.
His shot hit Queen in the side and threw her against the wall. It bought no time however, as Optimus turned and fired his own weapons in Ramhorn's chest throwing him back against the far wall and then fired on Cicadacon and Seaclamp as they prepared to fire on him. Those shots sent the two Tripredicus Council members tumbling into the rocket ship they had waiting.
"Can they escape in that thing?" Optimus asked as Queen got back to her feet.
"Unless the main countdown's begun, they may be able to leave their headquarters, but where they end up and in how many pieces is another story," Queen answered, "Rocket ships were designed as fast escape ships, usually only used as escape pods on larger ships. They have great acceleration, but without proper guidance pre-programmed into their computers, even the fastest transformer can not control them."
"I'll wonder why they even use them later," Optimus grumbled, "We've got to keep them from the panel that Ramhorn was at."
"That could be a problem," Queen warned, "launch rooms like this have at least FOUR such panels."
"Well that's just Prime," Optimus growled and lunged forward towards Ramhorn, who was still the only Council Member outside the rocket ship.
He arrived there just as Ramhorn reached a second computer panel. As the Council Member moved to press a few buttons, Optimus fired his blasters at the panel. One of the shots hit Ramhorn's forearm and spun him around like a top while the other hit the panel itself, destroying it. As Optimus got closer, he then landed a punch against Ramhorn that practically crushed the Council member into the wall.
"You AREN'T leaving," Optimus said firmly as he pinned Ramhorn against the wall.
"You're sure of that?" Ramhorn shot back as he struggled against Optimus, finding the transmetal two gorilla to be stronger then he was.
It was then that Optimus noticed a loud rumbling noise coming from behind him.
While Optimus charged after Ramhorn, Queen fired on Cicadacon and Seaclamp, pinning them down inside the rocket ship. Battling damage from the earlier fight, most of Queen's shots went wide of the intended target, but they did serve to keep the two Council members pinned down. The managed to return some fire toward her, but having to expose themselves to do so, Queen was able to dodge their attacks.
After dodging a few shots, Queen suddenly saw the rocket ship's engines come to life, spraying the ground around them with rocket exhaust and shaking just about everything in the room. For Queen, it helped because both Cicadacon and Seaclamp ended up falling to the floor of the rocket ship, but the activation of its engines still represented a problem.
"Primal! What is going on?" Queen hollered toward the Maximal commander, who was wrestling with Ramhorn.
"I think I've stopped him from programming the launch," Optimus answered, "but my shots have short circuited everything."
Queen then checked the panel behind her. Optimus was right, there was no formal launch programming, but the engines had been started. It presented both an opportunity and a threat. They needed to open everything the engine exhaust wouldn't destroy them all, but the un-programmed launch would destroy Seaclamp and Cicadacon. Queen then fired a series of shots into the rocket ship's interior. The resulting explosions started a fire inside the compartment, and gave her the distraction to approach the panel.
"Now to put an end to the Council," Queen commented as she began activating the various commands to open the hanger and to actually launch the rocket ship, while obviously neglecting to put in any specific programming for the ship to follow.
"What are you doing?" Optimus asked.
"Giving their rocket ship an unprogrammed launch," Queen answered, "when it crashes, it will solve at least two of our problems."
"NO!" Ramhorn growled, managing to finally throw Optimus off him.
"Queen, no, they have to stand trial," Optimus gasped as he landed near her.
"That is a Maximal idea, NOT a Predicon one," Queen answered, "and it is too late. The launch sequence has begun."
The Alley
Blackarachnia was the first of the group that Runner had been sent to get to arrive at the battle site. She quickly found the trouble that the rest of the 'fighters' had run into. Runner had managed to erect a small barricade from the parts of destroyed drones, but he was now trading shots with up to fifty more, and like Dinobot, had sustained heavy damage in doing so.
"Wonderful," Blackarachnia grumbled, "Lizard boy thinks he has everything under control, and it all goes straight to the pit… guess I better save them."
Spine and Packadex were right behind her and were quick to move forward.
"So, how will we slag 'em?" Spine questioned as he came forward.
"You and Packadex try to pin them down," Blackarachnia instructed, "I'll try to distract them."
"You'd be in out line of fire," Packadex pointed out, "suppose they use you as a shield?"
"They're drones, I doubt they have that level of intelligence, and I'm trusting you to shot at the drones that aren't close to me," Blackarachnia answered, "and we don't have time for debate, just do as I say."
"What about me?" Runner asked, looking ready to go offline soon.
"You're the reserve," Blackarachnia sighed, "if they somehow find a way to get around us, you're to be on the look out for it, okay?"
"Sure," Runner slowly nodded.
Runner pulled back while Spine and Packadex moved forward to fire at the drones from behind the makeshift barricade. As the two larger transformers began firing, Blackarachnia moved back slightly to prepare for what would have to be a fairly athletic move on her part. She quickly leaped up the sides of the buildings that made up the alley until she had enough height that she could easily leap out into the center of the street and amongst the drones. They appeared smarter then those they'd fought before, but still rather dumb and poorly protected.
She followed that with a leap toward the street and produced a blaster and fired a line of cyber webbing to swing across the street. As she did so, she fired her machine guns on the various drones that she could hit while above them. This actually destroyed several drones and lead to the destruction of several more as Spine and Packadex destroyed the drones that turned to target the transmetal two spider.
"They're better then the standard drone," Blackarachnia commented as she then leaped down and sliced through one of the last three remaining drones in the area, "but not by much."
"Maybe but they've still forced the others back," Packadex said, pointing to the other edge of the street where most of the drones were still driving the rest of the combat team.
"More fun to have then," Spine shrugged that off, "let's go!"
The other two sighed and moved forward. If they attacked the other formation of drones from the rear, they'd aid the rest of the combat team before they were destroyed. Or at least, that was the plan.
Tripredicus Council Headquarters Courtyard
In the courtyard, things seemed rather desperate. There were no mounted laser cannons from the headquarters building firing at them, but Cheetor and Terrorsaur could only fire a few shouts out through the hole they had fled through. Rapther and Rattrap formed a second line of defense with the offline Wolffang and Snowstalker nearby.
"We gotta do something else," Terrorsaur commented, "this way is too slow. Only two of us can use this hole, and they have enough to keep us pinned down. Let me fly…"
"We've all taken serious damage," Rapther growled, "you go flying and you'll expose yourself to a lot more fire."
"Well I'm open to suggestions here," Terrorsaur answered, "remember this is their base. Eventually they'll figure out they can open the main gates by command."
As if on cue, the main gates to the Tripredicus Council Headquarters began to open.
"You had to open your mouth and say that, didn't ya?" Rattrap gave a groan and blasted the two drones that had opened the gate.
"Forget about assigning blame," Rapther growled as she fired her rockets at the next two that approached, "just make your last stand worthy of the Matrix!"
"Oh sure, that makes me feel much better," Rattrap grumbled, as a sudden rumbling took everyone by surprise.
"What is that?" Cheetor asked as he blasted a pair of drones that weren't moving for the gate.
"It sounds like it's coming from below us," Rapther said in a surprised voice.
They then looked over to see the Tripredicus Council building begin to literally split in half, as if the building itself was a transformer. They also began to feel the ground they were standing on begin to move as well.
"What is this?" Rapther gasped, too stunned to realize that opening 'doors' had insured the destruction of most of the drones as they went into the area below the doors.
"They're doors, but to what?" Cheetor spoke.
"A hanger most likely, but why would they put a hanger UNDER a building?" Rattrap answered.
No one immediately answered, and soon noticed that the moving 'door' did not move the transformers standing on top of it. If they didn't get out of the area, they would fall into the basement level of the Tripredicus Council's headquarters as well.
"Time to go," Rattrap then spoke.
"But there are still a lot of drones out there that are beyond these 'doors'," Cheetor pointed out.
"Would you rather fall into the Council's dungeon?" Rattrap shot back.
"Point taken," Cheetor admitted, "grab Wolffang and Snowstalker and let's go!"
Tripredicus Council Headquarters, Hanger
Optimus was completely frustrated with the situation. Seaclamp and Cicadacon were burning inside a Predicon Rocket Ship which was getting ready to launch, but had no flight programming. From what Queen had told him, the craft was getting ready to go out of control into a building, the street, or possibly one of the defense satellites, which would result in the destruction of the craft and any on board. Ramhorn was the only member of the Tripredicus council not on the craft, but unless he joined Optimus and Queen in fleeing the area soon, he would be burned to a crisp.
Optimus then looked up to see the roof and the structure above them beginning to open up like they were a pair of hanger doors.
"Come on, monkey, we got to get out of here before that ship blasts off!" Queen urged and rushed toward the stairs.
"But… Ramhorn!" Optimus answered.
"Is slag," Queen answered, "do you think he's about to go with us?"
Optimus considered the retort and then looked back to see Ramhorn extinguishing the fires inside the rocket ship and climbing in.
"Can he do anything?" Optimus asked.
"Not enough to save themselves," Queen answered, "Come on!"
Queen then grabbed Optimus and ran out, to find tat the opening doors had removed the stairs as an option to follow.
"Slag it! We're trapped down here!" Queen cursed.
Before she could say anything more, she felt Optimus plow into her from behind. She glanced back to see that he had converted to vehicle mode and was flying out.
"Hang on," Optimus instructed.
"Can you move?" Ramhorn asked the other two council members, "Primal has fried the circuitry and Queen has set the ship to launch with no programming…"
"Do you think we haven't been trying?" Cicadacon growled back, "Queens fire on us ignited everything we had in the ship. We CAN NOT move!"
"Hold on then," Ramhorn answered and began pulling both other Council Members out of the ship, "we'll manage to escape somehow."
Outside
"Whoa! Look at it!" Runner gasped as he looked to see the entire Tripredicus Council Headquarters building split in to and begin to open, "What is that…"
"Some form of escape, no doubt," Blackarachnia answered, "which isn't our concern. We have the drones to deal with. Runner, guard the alley."
"Right," Runner nodded while Blackarachnia, Spine, and Packadex ran after the drones that were earlier going after the other members of the combat team.
Blackarachnia lead her two compatriots to the street to find a running fight. The other part of the combat team was being forced to run by the drones, mostly because they didn't have enough numbers to stand and fight and because each of them had sustained enough damage that even the under-armed drones stood a good chance of winning the engagement. Rattrap and Rapther were carrying Snowstalker and Wolffang away from a hole in the wall.
"They must of have tried to make a stand in the courtyard of the Council's headquarters," Packadex surmised as he took notice of the shattered drones in the basement of the building, now exposed to them all.
"That can be dealt with later," Blackarachnia answered, "destroying the drones is more important."
"For the fun of it," Spine laughed and charged forward, firing on the drones as he went.
Ahead of them, Rapther and Rattrap lead the retreating group of resistance fighters. Mostly because they were having to carry the offline bodies of Wolffang and Snowstalker. Terrorsaur and Cheetor managed to provide some covering fire, but there were just too many drones, and there was no cover for them.
"Man this is just getting worse and worse," Rattrap grumbled, "Anyone find a way to the underground, yet?"
"I could if I could fly," Terrorsaur grumbled as he destroyed a drone that got close. He had tried to fly, but found the damage he had sustained was more then enough to keep him from flying.
"Look for an alley," Cheetor urged, "We might be able to make a stand there."
Then as he looked back he noticed he saw several drones toward the rear of their formation suddenly explode.
"Something's hitting them from behind!" Cheetor exclaimed.
"It must be Dinobot and the others!" Rapther spoke, sounding hopeful, although she had no chance to hear a response as a drone hit her in the back with a shot, which threw her into a nearby building and sent her into stasis lock.
"Great," Rattrap grumbled, as their whole formation stopped.
With Rapther down, they couldn't transport all of the offline bots with them, and if they were left behind, the drones would destroy them before the group coming to their rescue could destroy the drones.
"Hold 'em off!" Rattrap yelled, "hopefully we'll hold them off long enough for the others to finish 'em off."
Stopping didn't help their group all that much. Terrorsaur was hit by a couple of shots before the resistance fighters could even fire and was sent into stasis lock as well.
"I think this is the end, Rattrap," Cheetor said nervously.
"Haven't I been sayin' that all along?" Rattrap asked back.
The destroyed a handful of drones, but caught in the open with no cover, and having already sustained damage, the drones managed to send both Cheetor an Rattrap into stasis lock before Blackarachnia, Spine, and Packadex destroyed the last of the drones.
"Aw… no more?" Spine complained, almost as if he was looking for a larger battle.
"More then enough," Packadex told him, "Let's start getting these guys back to the others."
The elephant transformer then lifted up Rapther and Snowstalker.
"The faster this is done, the faster everything will be done," Packadex told them.
Blackarachnia said nothing, but did nod.
Street Level…
Optimus set Queen down on the ground and then turned as if to go back into the Headquarters building.
"What are you doing?" Queen demanded.
"I'm going back for the Council members," Optimus answered, "You may have no qualms with killing them, but I will not let anyone die if I can avoid it."
"NO!" Queen yelled and jumped on Optimus's back, "the countdown has already begun. That ship will launch in a few nano-clicks! If you go back down there, you'll be destroyed with them!"
In the 'basement' Ramhorn was desperately trying to drag his fellow Tripredicus Council members out. He had just gotten to the area where the 'stairs' had been when he noticed the problem.
"No!" Ramhorn gasped, "no, the stairs are gone as part of the 'hanger' doors opening!"
He then heard a computerized voice speak the countdown.
"Ten."
"We're trapped!" Ramhorn lamented.
"Nine… Eight…"
He rushed back to the programming console.
"Seven… Six…"
"Perhaps I can shut the hanger doors," Ramhorn commented, "the doors to the stairs should protect us… I hope…"
"Five… four… three…"
Ramhorn pressed a few buttons desperately.
"Two… One…"
At street level, Optimus returned to robot mode as he heard the screams of the Tripredicus Council and watched as the rocket ship took off into the night sky. The Maximal leader looked somewhat depressed at what happened.
"Relax, Primal," Queen told him, "It's over. We won."
"We could have still captured them," Optimus sighed, "after all, they knew where all the sparks that they had stolen are, and who is guarding them. With them defeated, we could have…"
"They wouldn't have told us even if we had a thousand stellar cycles," Queen answered, "and most of those sparked transformers that still serve them are fanatical in their defense of the Tripredicus Council's ideals. They won't hand over the sparks regardless of what we could 'make' the Council order them."
"Would they try to reactive Unicron?" Optimus asked.
"I wouldn't think so," Queen answered, "because without orders, it wouldn't be for the glory of the Tripredicus Council… to be honest those three have very much in common with Megatron. They don't like anyone having an opinion of their own."
"So, Cybertron is safe," Optimus sighed.
"For now," Queen answered, "finding where they stashed the sparks will be a big thing, and we will need to find some way to make sure that some 'lieutenant' doesn't get overzealous… but yes. For now, Cybertron is safe."
The End…