"Once long ago, I made a choice, to sacrifice the present of Cybertron, to secure its future. Now I wonder, was it the right desicion?"
Autobot Outpost, Omega 7
Somewhere outside the Milky Way
Metal creaked under the feet of Megatron as he wandered the halls of the small communications station. A ire sense of glee came over the warlord as he gazed at the mangled bodies of Autobot troops on the floor around him.
He entered a large room, the largest room on this rock. It was dimly lit by computer screens and one busted light coil on the ceiling. In the room he watched Soundwave, Rumble, and Frenzy take to the monitors and sift through the data the Autobot scientists had collected.
On the far east wall, two Decepticons, Runamuk and Runabout, stood sentinel over three Autobots. Two deceased and one functional, despite his leg being severed on the other side of the room.
Megatron approached them, he knelt down to the ground where the Autobot lay in a pool of his own oil and energon.
"You know why I'm here," Megatron said to the bot softly, "When Optimus launched the Allspark from Cybertron with it, he launched a map as well. That way the map would be safe from me as well."
The Autobot glared, and spoke no answer. He had dark blue optics, cold as stone. With one look at this mech Megatron knew that interrogation would likely be futile. This was evident by the stern expression on the Autobot's face. Unwavered by Megatron's presence, that was unusual, typical Autobots would cry out in fear when they saw him. And when asked, would give him everything he wanted to know, and even things he didn't, but would all turn out to be just valuble to him just the same.
So when there was no answer, Megatron smiled, this will either be quick, resulting in Soundwave having to hack into the mainframe to find their query, or this will take a little longer, be fun. And Soundwave the time and trouble. After a few more moments of silence Runabout then kicked the Autobot in the side.
"You will answer Lord Megatron when he speaks to you," The battle charger said.
"No need for that Runabout," Megatron said with a wave of his hand, "Now, I assume Optimus knows where he hid the map to the Allspark, and I also assume that its location is somewhere inside the Autobot Intelligence mainframe."
"That would be a reasonable assumption," The Autobot muttered.
"So we can either save Soundwave the time and trouble of finding it behind all those firewalls, or we can do this in a way which I find far more efficient."
"Tell him where the Wayfinder is Autobot scum," Runamuk sneered.
"Would you tell me?" Megatron asked.
"My name is Backroad, serial number 19c8544, I am an Autobot Intelligence officer ranked Sergeant of this station," The Autobot answered.
"The Wayfinder, Backroad," Megatron asked, getting more agitated.
"My name is Backroad, serial number 19c8544, I am an Autobot Intelligence officer ranked Sergeant of this station," Backroad repeated. "And I will never tell you how to find The Wayfinder and by extension the Allspark."
Megatron growled, he reeled his hand back to smack the defenseless Autobot, or tear his head off. He stopped himself then slowly stood up, looming over the three bots in front of him, he moved his glare from Backroad over to Runamuck.
"Execute him," Megatron ordered, "And when Soundwave is done downloading all their files return to our ship."
Megatron then walked away, grinning as the sound of blasterfire echoed behind him.
Seattle, WA
August 24, 2014
2 days before the Decepticons decimated Outpost Omega 7….
Junk, scrap and mangled metal for one's eye could see. It all lay in a small junkyard in the outskirts of town, The Witwicky Auto-Recycle Center. Any totaled car, awaiting restoration or scrapping would be sent here.
At the front was a relatively small office building, attached to a larger garage. In the office, sat Danny Witwicky, the owner's eldest son. He was tall, somewhat lanky, with disheveled blonde hair and green eyes. He wore a dark gray tee shirt with black jeans and shoes.
He sat at the desk where his father usually did his paperwork. His father, Spike, well his legal name was Samuel, was away with one of the employees, picking up a load of junk to throw in the back of the lot.
Something about the truck driver getting scheduled at the wrong time, and all the crap being late. Danny really didn't care to listen after, "You're in charge son,"
So he sat at the desk, with his geometry homework in front of him, and The 100 playing on the TV in the corner of the room. Outside he could hear the clanking and grinding of metal as two of the other workers made their living.
What they were doing specifically, Danny didn't know, nor did he really care at all either.
Being in charge of a scrapyard was the last thing he really wanted today.
"Hey Danny," A voice said with a knock on the door. In walked a boy around Daniel's age, roughly 17. He was similarly tall as Danny, not as skinny, and had curly auburn hair.
"Yea James," Danny said.
"Your dad just came back," James said, "Wants to see you."
Danny nodded, and walked out of the room and building with James to the lot where a large semi was parked, it had hauled a car carrier trailer with a lot of junked and ready to cut up cars on it.
As they approached the truck, Jamie watched as his father started lowering the ramp on the back of the trailer. With a long crash the ramp touched the ground, immediately followed by a ghastly cold start of the first car. A rather beat up, yellow Dodge Viper. Looked like a second gen model, built somewhere in the late 90's or early 2000's.
The yellow sports car rolled off the trailer, the driver backing it up about a dozen feet back, then drove it forwards to the garage, before it reached the ramp up to the building it sputtered and came to a halt.
The driver, a 17 year old girl named Emily, got out and slammed the door. He ran over to the front and popped open the hood. Peering her head down she looked confused.
See, Emily knew cars. Her father was a mechanic at this shop, her older brother had also been a mechanic before he had passed. Everything they knew they gave to her. So for her to be confused was something odd.
The mechanic in the shop, an older man named Jerry came out and looked into the Viper's engine bay with her, equally perturbed.
"That don't look normal," Jerry said, with a strange ominous tone behind his words.
"That's not an engine," Emily followed, "I don't know what that is."
For when the pair looked down in the engine bay, there was instead a normal looking engine that normally goes into a car of this type. Was a black box, which had a panel on the top that looked like the normal phase SR engine. But, half of that faux panel was broken off, revealing the strange high tech looking black box.
"Should I remove the panel so we can actually get a good look in there?" Emily asked.
"No," Jerry said, having been taken aback, "Put it in neutral, Jamie, Danny come push this thing inside!"
The boys did as told and in the garage the four of them inspected the car. Everything else seemed normal, there were a few strange things. What seemed like large bullet holes underneath the car, the tires looked rubber but did not feel like rubber. More like cold, hard metal.
And most strangely was an emblem, one that no one had ever seen before on several parts of the sports car. One on the steering wheel, one on the strange engine block. And finally one very small one embossed on the rear bumper.
Emily, Danny and Jamie left the garage to go help Spike with the rest of the cars. Most of them are just junk ready to be scrapped.
Jerry stayed behind, a suspicious look in his eye, he leaned down and whispered to the car, almost hoping it could hear him.
"What are you?"
Autobot Outpost Omega 14
17 miles north of Seattle
WA, USA
August 27, 2014
"Optimus?" Prowl asked, "Are you even listening to me?"
Prowl was a taller Autobot, with livery of white and black. A red chevron crest adorns his helm, offset by bright cyan optics. From a quick glance at the Autobot Second in Command on Earth, one could figure two things about him.
He was an officer of the law. Not just because of his chosen alternate form of a police vehicle. More specifically a Nissan 350z Fairlady.
And that he didn't see as much battle action as his comrades. They were covered in dents, scratches, scars and mal head wounds. Prowl did have some of these futures, but nowhere near as many as Crosshairs, Arcee or Cliffjumper.
"He's tired of you telling him to just give up on trying to find Hot Shot alive,"Crosshairs spat, he was a green colored mech with a similar build to Prowl. He had a similarly shaped helmet, with goggles in place of the crest.
Prowl turned around and glared at the sharpshooter. For days he, Arcee and Cliffjumper had been giving him a hard time about Hot Shot's sudden disappearance off the grid.
About two weeks ago, Hot Shot, their scout, and Prowl had left the base on another expedition to find the Wayfinder. A relic that could help them find the Allspark on Earth.
The Wayfinder had been sent off Cybertron in the same pod as the Allspark, breaking off to a preset set of coordinates on the planet once it entered the atmosphere.
That was several million years ago. Optimus Prime's crew had only arrived here on Earth, where they sent the pair of relics, about six months ago.
One month ago, the rest of the crew, led by Commander Jazz and Lieutenant Hot Rod, took their ship the Ark to assist another Autobot ship in space.
This left Optimus, Prowl, Arcee, Cliffjumper, Wheeljack, Crosshairs and Hot Shot on Earth to find the Wayfinder, and Allspark before Jazz and his crew's return.
Prowl came back from their last scouting mission, Hot Shot did not. The pair of Autobots had split up, Hot Shot headed south, and Prowl headed north.
At first the team thought Hot Shot had gotten lost, then worried that something had happened to him, most likely that he had run out of energon, hence why his transponder went offline.
This was two weeks ago, five days ago, Prowl decided to change Hot Shot's status as MIA, to deceased with unknown cause.
"We've been searching for him for weeks," Prowl said, "If he was alive we would've found him by now."
"Bull!" Acree would say, "There's no Cons on Earth, and if he ran out of fuel it's more likely he's in stasis."
"I disagree," Prowl would answer, "And we cannot keep wasting our energon on trying to find him when we still haven't found the Wayfinder."
"It's called multitasking," Arcee refuted, "Do you expect us to find the Allspark and leave this planet without a definitive confirmation of Hot Shot's demise?"
"We have a 97.892% percent chance of never finding him online, I ran the numbers," Prowl answered.
"That is your hunch Prowl!" Cliffjumper would then shout, "If he is dead I want to see a corpse."
"I really don't care if you get a sense of catharsis Cliffjumper," Prowl said, getting more and more irritated, he knew exactly this conversation was going to go.
Arcee then got enraged, just as Prowl suspected. She would stand up out of her seat at the main computer terminal and storm over to the door. She was a smaller bot, with a reddish pink and white paint job. She did not look intimidating.
But one would be foolish to assume that she was not dangerous. Her skill in close quarters combat was unparalleled, whether it be a firearm, a sword or ever her fists. She was the weapon, they were her ammo.
"Well I'm going to go and see if I can find our brother," She scoffed, transforming into her alt mode, a red and white Mazda MX5, "Because I haven't given up hope on him."
Prowl rolled his optics, he turned back to Optimus, who usually had left the room by now to go and talk to Wheeljack in the lab, but this time he stood over his Second in Command and loomed over him almost menacingly.
"Prowl, I am getting sick of the narrative that Hot Shot cannot be found alive," Optimus said sternly, "Especially considering that on your orders we had given up on finding him only eight days after he went missing."
"Optimus, this planet is the smallest one we've visited in this war," Prowl protested, "If he was online I think we would've found him by now."
"Have you considered the possibility that since Hot Shot likely ran out of energon he's stuck in vehicle mode?" Optimus asked.
"That thought crossed my mind," Prowl admitted, "I considered it unlikely, we know when we're running out of energon, I don't think hot Shot wou;d've been so foolish as to remain disguised as an Earth car."
"You figured that he would transform back into robot mode, prop himself up on a tree and then go into stasis lock?" Cliffjumper asked.
"That would be the thing for a bot in that situation to do, to ensure we'd be able to find him easier," Prowl answered.
"Logic?" Crosshairs chuckled, "You and I are still talking about the same Hot Shot, right?"
Optimus waved his hand to the lab, the three other Autobots followed him to a smaller room in their bunker. A dimly lit and foul smelling room, one that smelled of melted metal and burnt rubber.
All around was clutter, tables with spare parts piled to the ceiling, and even piles on the floor in the corners erected that same height. Cliffjumper kicked parts out of the way, and Prowl nearly tripped trying to step over an engine block.
"Wheeljack," Optimus called out, "Where are you?"
From behind a pile of scrap metal came several clangs, crashes and cracks. Things fell over with loud ear scratching noises, and puffs of white and gray smoke.
"Yes Prime!" Wheeljack called out coming out from behind the pile of scrap.
"Would you mind showing the others what you have been working on?" Optimus asked.
"Yes," Wheeljack said, he then ran past the other Autobots to the other side of his lab, flying over the garbage all over the floor. Making the other Autobots somewhat angry that the mess didn't hamper his ability to navigate the room.
"This is my newest masterpiece," Wheeljack said, "A planetary energon scanner."
"There isn't any natural energon on this planet Wheeljack," Prowl muttered, "Seems rather useless."
"That's what Prime said," Wheeljack retorted rather excitedly, like he had been waiting for the opportunity to explain the device again, "Since I figured there's no natural energon deposits here on Earth, which I did later prove to be false statement using this device but that's a tangent, I figured I can use it to track the energon signatures of the Wayfinder and of Hot Shot."
"What about the Allspark?" Cliffjumper asked, "Shouldn't that doohickey be able to track it?"
"No, we sealed the Allspark in a Energon sealed cube, there's no way to detect it through conventional means like this Energon scanner, only the Wayfinder can track it," Wheeljack said.
"Wait, there is natural energon on Earth?" Crosshairs asked.
"Natural, no. Secreted from the Allspark, yes," Wheeljack said, "When I first scanned Earth for energon with it I found pockets all over the planet. Seeing as the Allspark's been here for thousands and thousands of years I guess it somehow bled energon into the Earth's crust."
"So if there's energon on earth, that means even when we extract the Allspark, this planet just became a whole lot more valuable," Prowl said.
"And that means we have opportunities to mine the stuff," Cliffjumper chuckled, "
"It would also give the Decepticons incentive to remain on this planet aside from their hunt for Allspark," Optimus solemnly said.
"But they shouldn't know where the Allspark is anywhere in the galaxy," Crosshairs said, "I don't think we have that to worry about."
"With their superior technology, the Decepticons can very likely detect the Energon on this planet, with or without ever knowing that Allspark is here." Optimus corrected, "And they will question why there's such Energon on an organic world, and figure out the hidden truth without a single Autobot being forced to reveal it to them."
"So the Allspark's very existence on this planet has created enough unnatural energon that Megatron can detect in space, to be able to lead him to the Allspark," Crosshairs asked.
"Yes, I estimate there is enough Energon on Earth by now that it is 98.42 percent likely that the Decepticons will be able to detect it in deep space." Wheeljack answered, "Which is ironic considering we picked an organic planet because it shouldn't have any energon and wouldn't be seen as valuable to their cause."
"So instead of protecting the Allspark, we really doomed it," Prowl sighed.
"Not necessarily, all we have to do is find it first," Cliffjumper chuckled, "Then fight off Megatron's sleazy forces till Jazz comes back to extract us."
"You want to take on Megatron and his crew of what, 24 Decepticons aboard the Nemesis?" Prowl said, "Just the six of us."
"Seven if you count Hot Shot," Crosshairs said, "Because we will find him alive."
"Still don't like those odds," Prowl said.
"What do you mean, the seven Autobots on this planet are more than enough," Cliffjumper cackled, "And I say, let Ol' Buckethead come try to take the Allspark from our cold lifeless chassis!"
The Nemesis, hovering over Mars
Earth date, August 27, 2014
Two Decepticons walked up the bridge of the massive Decpeticon warship. The interior of the room was a dark eggplant purple with bright red and white lights illuminating it in the cold vacuum of space.
In the front was the cockpit, and a view of the ship's next destination, planet Earth. To their right was a workstation where a few Decepticons worked on their computer terminals.
To the left were the ship's primary controls, flight, weapons, thrusters and what not. A few other Decepticons stood there, keeping the Nemesis floating in low orbit over Earth's sister planet, Mars.
The two Decepticons, Shatter and Dropkick were no more than typical grunts.
Shatter a fembot with delusions of grandeur, stood taller than Dropkick. She was bright red, the color of the Autobots, in stark contrast to the typical Decepticon color palates of purples, blues, blacks and silvers.
She liked how it made her stand out, made her feel important. She would go down the halls of the warship, darring bots to stare and gawk. To feed her ego.
Dropkick, on the other hand, was smaller. Dark blue and fit in with most of the typical Decepticon ranks. Just like he liked it. He was cold, sadistic and admittedly small minded. Thought with his cannons and nothing else.
"Shatter, Dropkick," Megatron's voice echoed in front of them. He stood before them, his back turned and hands folded behind them. He did not turn to address them.
The pair bowed to their liege and he continued to speak.
"The two of you, along with Blackout, Soundwave and Starscream will head to Earth first, scout the planet, find Optimus and his men," Megatron growled, "You will send for me when the location of the Wayfinder has become apparent to you."
"Yes my lord," Starscream groveled from behind them, "I will find the Wayfinder and lead you to the Allspark, all mighty and wise Megatr-"
Megatron, done with the sycophantic tone, turned around and lunged at Starscream. He grabbed the Air Commander by the throat, cutting him off, then he threw Starscream to the ground.
Starscream landed on his back, he flipped over and started to try to get up but Megatron then stepped on his back, slamming the Seeker's face into the floor. He then knelt down, to meet his eyes with Starscream's.
"You will not lay a servo on the relic Starscream, Soundwave is leading this expedition, and I only allow you to go without my supervision because Blackout may need Air Support and unfortunately you're the best Seeker I have on this ship," Megatron sneered, his voice cold and mellow. With an underlying hatred for Starscream behind it.
Starscream struggled to speak, the other Decepticons looked on in awe. This was the first time Megatron had struck the Air Commander in nearly a century.
"Do I make myself clear?"
"Yes, my lord," Starscream muttered feebly, "You have been quite explicit."
Megatron then stood up and walked back to his command post. He turned his back on his troops and gazed out of the window. He folded his hands behind his back and gazed at the stars in front of him.
"So what are all still doing here?" Megatron asked.
Starscream, Blackout and the others exchanged glances, nervous to speak up.
"Get off my ship, and find me the Wayfinder!" Megatron turned around after too many moments of silence, he screamed at his men like their mere presence could anger him to the point of a psychotic break, "Out of my sight!"
"Yes Lord Megatron," Soundwave, Shatter, Rumble, Frenzy, Blackout and Dropkick all said, running off of the bridge.
Starscream left the room silently after them.
"Yes mighty Megatron," Starscream whispered to himself ominously with a smirk, "The Wayfinder will be found."