Of all the things the Decepticons weren't expecting, Optimus Prime leading a wave of freshly-invigorated warriors on an apparent suicide mission was somewhere close to the top of the list. Bolts of violet plasma streaked into the Autobot ranks. Some soldiers fell; a few volleys were deflected off of the Autobots' forcefields. Then, the two factions met each other.
There was a great rending of metal. Pained screams and defiant shouts filled the air as Energon blades carved into the metal flesh of the Decepticon guard. The Autobots were outnumbered two to one, but what they lacked in munitions and manpower they more than made up for in renewed vigor. No army would ever just latch on to their ship, murder everyone aboard, and commandeer whatever was left to further the conquest of galaxies!
Optimus was at the vanguard, wielding his Energon axe in one hand and a massive plasma cannon in the other. The Decepticon ranks stayed well out of range of his whirling axe, which set them up to be eradicated by the wide-sweeping blasts of plasma that issued from his cannon. At some point, he ran out of ammunition in his clip and, tossing it to a nearby Decepticon grunt who toppled under the unexpected weight, settled on driving further into the horde.
Wheeljack was having some difficulty keeping up as he dueled with a ground unit wielding a long laser-edged combat knife. His twin wrenches sparked, deflecting a nasty slash that probably would have opened up his chest, but the strike left his adversary open. The jaws on his wrenches opened up as the Autobot Chief Engineer rapidly closed the distance, snaking under his opponent's guard and sending his right-hand wrench into the Decepticon's ribs. The Decepticon grunt flinched, back straightening as the pain hit him, which ended up presenting his vulnerable neck to Wheeljack. A single high-torque jerk of the twin wrenches, and it was over.
The supposedly-noncombatant scientist, Perceptor, finished off his own adversary with a glowing green javelin. Very few Decepticons remained standing, and the ones that did quickly surrendered or were cut down by their foes.
Steam poured out of the Engine Deck at an alarming rate, breaching the ship's atmosphere and quickly dispersing in the cold vacuum of space. Wheeljack couldn't help but notice that the air was rapidly becoming thinner, more difficult to breathe, as they grew closer to the portal. The Ark's finer systems were getting overtaxed. Frankly, he couldn't blame them, not after the strenuous activity in the face of the Decepticons' attack. Not too much longer and the atmosphere would deplete itself entirely, and that concerned him. Cybertronians didn't need to breathe - not in the conventional sense, after all - but ex-venting from an exhaust port would get real old, real fast; especially with the vacuum looking to tear every scrap of O₂ from the combatants' airbags. That could be messy.
He locked eyes with Perceptor and their leader and attempted to speak. The wormhole's now-audible roaring tore the words from his vocalizer, so he tightbeamed a collection of brief words. We need to move. Now.
Optimus nodded. Roger that. I'll take point.
Perceptor brought up the rear as the three mechs moved into a defensive formation. Together, they brought up their shields, physical or otherwise, and moved cautiously into the steam billowing from the engine deck. About a half dozen Autobot soldiers fell in around them, bolstering their little strike force even as they passed into the thick, opaque clouds.
It was warm and slightly wet within the Maintenance Gate, an unnatural silence enveloping them as they passed into a relatively calm alcove in the ship's structure. Currents of air flowed around them as they pushed through, listening for any auditory clue that might reveal the locations of their enemies.
There - a stifled gasp off to Wheeljack's right. He glanced off to the side and quickly cycled between infrared and visible-spectrum. As he suspected, nothing immediately came to him - the muggy steam threw off both of his checks. There was one thing he knew for sure, though. The Science Division soldier that had taken up position on his right flank was no longer there.
"Slag," he muttered to himself. His palms were slippery. He shifted his grip on his wrench and turned his back to Optimus, who was still barely visible, a series of strong red lights cutting through the smog. "Someone, respond! Perceptor! Does anyone copy me?"
A blur of movement tore past him, drawing his attention. The rearguard was gone entirely at this point, all of them having been incapacitated - or worse.
"Heads up, Optimus. We're bein' hunted," he said nervously. He tilted his head to better view the Autobot Supreme Commander, but came face-to-face with a massive gray artillery cannon instead, glowing from within with a harsh purple light. The other end of the cannon was braced against Prime's back, but then it happened far too fast for either Autobot to react. An explosive report echoed off the walls of the Maintenance Gate as the kickback sent Prime flying into the Engine Deck proper. It took Wheeljack a moment or two to realize that he hadn't been as lucky as his leader. His gaze dropped to the smoking hole in his lower torso, and a second later, the rest of his body followed the motion; he sank to his knees as his limbs became heavy. He suddenly realized just how tired he'd become after all these long, grueling days of combat and stress.
Only then did the steam part a little for him, allowing the Chief Engineer to make out the shapes of grievously wounded and dying soldiers taken off guard by the Decepticon Leader's attack. Perceptor was among them, driven to one knee with his own spear through his throat. Still alive. A . . . a skilled medic could still save him. Ratchet could still save him. But was he himself as lucky as his Science Division counterpart had been?
The consuming emptiness in his torso said otherwise. He struggled to stand up again, but couldn't. It had been such a long solar cycle.
Shoulda stayed behind with the others, Wheeljack thought as he was taken by blackness.
Optimus's chest ached. He'd not felt the fusion cannon against his back until it was too late. The whole experience had happened so fast, he hadn't even had a chance to react to the field intrusion his sensors had reported. Even so, he wasn't focused on the situation he'd found himself in, at least, not yet. His thoughts were firmly fixed on the wellbeing of his men, and he feared for their lives. If he'd learned one thing from the eons of conflict, it was that soldiers were the true heart and soul of any force, not the people occupying higher ranks such as himself.
"I see nothing's changed since our last meeting, Optimus!" a deep voice boomed. Megatron strolled out of the steam clouds, arms held wide. Everything about him seemed to convey an attitude of the utmost ease. "Look at you! Even now, as we stand on the deck of your own starship, surrounded by your own mechs and your own defenses, you're still here, crawling on all fours, groveling before me like an ashamed Antillian bumble-puppy!"
Optimus struggled to his feet, ignoring the dull ache in his chest assembly. If he was worn down and exhausted from days without sleep, he didn't show it. "Hardly. I'm giving you one chance, Megatron. Get back in your Nemesis. Go back to Cybertron. You will not corrupt yet another world with your race's incessant warmongering. We - the Autobots, the Neutrals - are merely trying to survive."
The Decepticon Leader chuckled. Evidently, the Ark's atmosphere hadn't quite depleted over the Maintenance Deck. Even so, the two faction leaders nearly had to shout their platitudes at each other. "Our race. And I thought you Autobots were supposed to be the open-minded ones. Your former leader, Zeta Prime, and Nominus before him, always made a point of pushing that envelope. Funny, how they were always the first to profit off of our suffering, no? I'm not talking about my Decepticons, of course. Remind me again - where did you work, toiling cycle after cycle with no time to pursue your own dreams, before I found you? And now look at you - leader of the noble Autobots, an almost-unheard of prestige for a mere truckformer. You should be thankful, Optimus - our war has liberated not only the disposable class - my people, my kin - but the lives of you and your fellows as well. You. Are. Welcome."
"You call this liberation?" Prime retorted. "A war that's been raging for longer than millions of Cybertronians have been online? Endless death? Endless pain? Endless destruction? You've become the very monster you set out to kill, and you know it. Just look at the Games you've subjected your POWs to." It did not escape the Autobot's notice that the two mechs were now circling each other, nor that his adversary had adopted a subtle defensive stance.
"I call this a means to an end, Autobot - and at least we haven't been chased out of the one place on Cybertron that will still have us. You may be willing to accept defeat, but I don't believe your civilians will be quite as willing to roll over and show their yellow undercarriages as their 'defenders' were!"
Megatron lashed out, a double-bladed Tironium infantry sword shooting out of its sheath and aimed at Optimus's gut. The Autobot Leader went on the defensive, instantaneously bringing up his axe - in short-range Energon weapon form - and parrying the strike. The eight that came after were just as quick, but he had a counter prepared for every last one.
During the melee, he noticed a tightness in Megatron's shoulders, a whiteness to the edges of his burning optics. Despite being about six feet taller than Optimus, arguably more skilled in combat, and for all intents and purposes in a more bloodthirsty mood, the Decepticon Emperor was scared. While Optimus couldn't say if that was because of the Titan attack that had happened the last time they'd been face to face or something else entirely, it was a weakness he intended to exploit.
He thrust one hand into subspace while Megatron dodged a stab, pulling out a sword nearly as large as Optimus was tall and swinging it at his foe's head. Megatron backstepped, lost his balance as the ship lurched, and converted into his formidable hover-tank form.
"The Corona Glaive," he hissed. "Pathetic. You've resorted to looting museums and churches, and you expect to defeat me with a rusty replica of a weapon pulled from a sparkling's bedtime story? It likely doesn't even work anymore, if it ever did at all."
Optimus's eyes flashed. "Perhaps. Perhaps not. Why don't we find out?"
A salvo of plasma erupted from the black tank's central turret. Optimus ducked into a combat roll, converting into his own alternate mode as he did so. His engine revved one last time and he flew across the Deck towards his opponent. They collided with a force that sent Megatron flying off of his maglifts, causing both of them to revert to their base forms. The Corona Glaive unfolded from Optimus's truck bed and into his hand, cleaving through the Ark's deck with a fairly unpleasant screeching noise. This sound, however, was mostly covered up by Megatron's roar of fury and pain as his right foot became anchored to the starship's deck, the sword serving as their connection point.
"AAARRRGGH! COME - HERE!" he cried, planting one massive, clawed hand around Optimus's neck and batting his raised axe away with his free hand. He followed this up by threshing the Autobot Leader's head, hooking the red-and-blue truckformer with a stout fist to the faceplate, then burying his spiked elbow into the back of his foe's battle helm. Three repetitions of this later and Megatron decided to change tactics, driving his knee into the vulnerable midsection of the Autobot until he felt something break. He wasn't entirely sure if it was his own ornamental armor or a vital component of his enemy's internal systems, but he fervently hoped for the latter; even as he transforned his right arm into a fusion cannon and blew the Autobot Leader across the Engine Deck.
"Rrgh . . . Not bad . . . for a part-time librarian. Perhaps you should have spent more time in the Pits!" Megatron taunted as he jerked the massive weapon out of his foot and tossed it away from Optimus.
"And perhaps you should have spent more time in the library!" The Autobot swung his axe, now in its two-handed Battle format, and met Megatron's sword halfway. Energon ran into his eyes as the two combatants strained, forcing him to recoil only after it left an irritating chemical burn on the surface of his sensitive lenses.
That paled in comparison to the pain Optimus felt immediately afterward. Two long gashes opened up on his leg armor and drew mech-fluid, momentarily driving him to his knees. Megatron laughed, a cruel, mocking sound, and stabbed his sword through the Autobot's arm - impaling him to the ground as Optimus had done to him.
"And how do you like it, Optimus Prime?" he cackled before rearing back and kicking his foe in the face not once, not twice, but three times. The sword left Optimus's arm as quickly as it had entered, and Megatron raised the damaged blade over his head, determined to end the Primal Lineage once and for all . . .
Only for the Ark to tear itself apart beneath their very feet. The Decepticon leader fell to his knees before his enemy, who summoned some last reserve of strength against all odds and disarmed him of his sword with an ancient Circuit-Su maneuver that had existed since time immemorial. Before either of them knew it, Optimus Prime was on his feet behind Megatron, Energon axe buried in his shoulder plating and a black infantry sword rammed through his chest.
A horrible sound tore itself free of Megatron's vocal processor as the deck they were standing on imploded, sending them hurtling into the hungry abyss. His eyes took on a sickly purple glow as his emergency reserve of Dark Energon coursed through his veins, and he detached another long, curved sword from its place, securely fastened to his back.
As the two leaders soared into the decaying wormhole, a strange quiet fell over them. The universe seemed to open for just a moment, spilling every instance of themselves from throughout the Multiverse across space and time. Megatron grew closer to Optimus, yet at the same time, it was like they'd never been farther apart. A sword, or perhaps an enormous five-fingered, clawed hand, flashed through whatever passed for the air between dimensions and buried itself hilt-deep in Optimus's gut before passing through the molecules that composed him.
It was an excruciating experience for both combatants. Infraspace was not meant for any organism, not even the hardy race that called themselves Transformers. Their minds felt as if they were being stretched to their breaking point as memories that weren't theirs, motivations that were alien to them as the new world they were fast approaching crammed into their extremely unprepared minds.
But then, a shape manifested in the near distance - a massive, golden shape - and the two faction leaders were hit head-on by it as space expanded back to its natural state once more.
Once everything was back to normal, it became all too obvious what the golden shape had been - the bridge of the Ark, in a state of utter destruction as the artificial atmosphere sparred with the endless vacuum of space to win control over its occupants.
"No . . . I will never be denied!" a wretched shape screamed as it dragged itself across the floor to reach one of the only chairs still intact in the entire bridge. "I AM LORD MEGATRON, and I will NEVER accept defeat!"
Optimus Prime groaned in agony as his internals threatened to evacuate themselves via the gaping wound in his stomach. As he strained to stay online, he remembered a cynical observation made by one of his comrades at the Iacon Precinct Police Department during his most important case: "Abdominal injuries - never good. Always messy. I pity whatever poor sap this used to be."
But he simply could not give up. The Matrix would not allow it. He would not allow it. For the good of all Autobots, he would see his mission through.
When the ships finally crashed, everyone in the mighty Cybertronian vessels were knocked into a deep stasis lock that would keep them incapacitated for a very long time. Optimus never felt the scratches that Megatron's claws left in his faceplate. Megatron went offline just as he came within inches of ending Prime's life.
Neither of them would know these things until much, much later. Millions of years later, as a matter of fact.
A lone deer grazed in a grassy valley between mountains. It was a still, calm night. The northern stars twinkled in the dark sky, and the black ocean glittered in the middle distance under the light of an autumn moon. The air was cool, but not uncomfortable quite yet, with none of the vengeful winter winds that felt as if they physically tore at the animal's skin; even through the thick coat that it had already started to grow out. In all, it was a perfect night for being out and about, for gathering energy to last through the cold season.
Until, that is, the sky began to scream.
A single bright orange star grew more fervent, angrier, as it came closer and closer to the mountain range rising out of the nearby woods. A drone sounded and only got more earsplitting as the anomaly grew ever closer.
Soon, the shapes - for there were two of them, each wreathed in fire and surrounded by massive pieces of wreckage like a disintegrating meteorite, got close enough for anyone to perceive their respective colors under the full moon. One of them smashed full-force into a peak in the range, shattering both the mountain and the enormous thing. If the deer had been alarmed before, now was the moment where its primitive mind exploded into pure terror. A shower of boulders and wreckage littered the formerly-pristine valley, and the animal was forced to run for its life.
As it ran, a rectangular piece of wreckage adorned with some type of sigil - red with clean, squared edges, heavily damaged and reeking of ozone - impacted the ground directly in front of it, spraying the panicked animal with upturned soil and a few small, sharp rocks. The majority of the rubble peppered the downhill slope with deadly shrapnel, but for now, the deer was safe, coming away from the encounter with nothing worse than a few bruises and cuts. It didn't see the object's collision with a lonely mountain by the sea, although the bright white flash that illuminated the valley was pretty hard to miss. It didn't note how the second object streaked farther south on a trajectory destined to wind up in the ocean. It was only worried about its immediate survival, and anything else was, put simply, a non-issue.
Indeed, the deer would survive that night and even thrive later on. But its distant descendants would not be nearly as lucky.
Because, under the lonely mountain - the volcano that would eventually come to be known as Mt. St, Hilary . . . something had survived.
Anonymous Guest: Hello! I'm glad you like it so far. As for your question, how will the characters be revived indeed? We shall see, but I'm certain that the reasoning behind their resurrection will be more than initially meets the eye . . .
Anyway, thanks for reading, I really appreciate it!