"That's right, Hector, I'm here live outside of New Glasgow, an affluent suburb and tourist destination just outside of Tranquility, Oregon this morning, where we've been monitoring increased volcanic activity at Mount Saint Hilary for a little more than a week now. As the long-suffering citizens of Tranquility can confirm, Saint Hilary has NOT been a happy camper as of late. Geologists and volcanologists based out of nearby Cascadia State University have confirmed 37 separate instances of earthquakes in excess of 2.5 on the Richter Scale in the past three days alone - not to mention that ominous pillar of gas rising from the mountain's summit! Governor Shawn Berger has finally relented to the pressures of his constituents and reluctantly declared a preemptive state of emergency, as it seems that Mount Saint Hilary is finally about to blow its top for the first time in four million years."
"Experts say that there is a possibility the eruption might escalate in the next 24 hours, though they do want to assuage fears of another Mount Saint Helens incident. According to worst-case scenario projections provided by CSU, there should not, I repeat, should NOT be any kind of volcanic event resulting in comparable levels of destruction that we saw back in 1980."
"Nevertheless, it is recommended that Tranquilitites shelter in their homes and avoid travel within a 30-mile radius of the Saint Hilary Massif until we know more. Back to you, Hector."
The Ark's bridge lay empty, as it had for many, many years. Untouched by mankind and lava, its once-gleaming walls were nevertheless coated with an inches-thick accumulation of lime. The air was entirely deprived of oxygen, flat, dull, and lifeless, choked with minerals and contaminants like every last surface in the long-buried starship.
The Ark would never, ever fly again. It was absolutely totaled, entirely inextricable from the mountain that had first embraced the alien starship, then buried it in tons and tons of broken stone. In turn, this surface had eroded over the years, breaking down and leaving a crumbly, yet uniform strata on the outer surface of Mount Saint Hilary that had been climbed hundreds of times by intrepid men and women, flown over by millions of birds that had no idea what lay beneath them.
Pressure built inside the mountain.
More gases, more magma pressed into long-empty chambers beneath the earth. Too much. Something was about to give. And give it did.
At the mountain's summit, a fissure broke open, heralding an even larger plume of smoke, steam, and worse things that spilled into the air in quantities sufficient to be seen from Seattle. The eruption had begun.
The volcano's contents surged forth, seeking to escape confinement as quickly and violently as possible - but it wasn't the crater that yielded its deadly payload.
That very same weakened surface of the mountain, rendered weak and comparatively loamy by the enormous alien spacecraft lodged deep within Saint Hilary's heart, was the first to give way. The immense amounts of pressure and power carried by the magma and gas from deep within the Earth was unexpectedly diverted from its assumed path of least resistance - straight up the cone and out into the exterior - and flowed along the keel of the Autobots' last hope instead. An impossible task, especially for an ancient starship already significantly compromised by age and damage - but the Ark held up under the strain.
Its substructure, though greatly damaged and very much weakened from the prime of its life, was designed to stand up to the unfathomable forces of heat and energy inflicted on such a massive vessel during planetary reentry. On top of that, Chief Engineer Wheeljack's last-minute decision to paint all the Electrum reserves in Iacon over the Ark's vast hull ensured that, on those sparse sections, not one solitary scorch mark was inflicted upon the starship.
Of course, the parts of the Ark that were not protected by the indestructible alloy were damaged even further by the eruption. Despite the ship's thermal shielding, the supports built around Steerage in the ship's lowermost levels could not withstand the strain and were unceremoniously melted, then viciously compressed under its great weight. The wreck of the Ark groaned in protest.
The porous Southeastern face of Mount Saint Hilary was chock-filled with hundreds of thousands of tons of magma in less than a second and became one of the largest parasitic cones in the known history of this planet. A massive, zit-like growth came into existence on Saint Hilary's flank, then exploded with a shockwave violent enough to blow ancient pine trees on the timberline a quarter of the way across the state of Oregon. These were followed by a highly pressurized jet of molten rock and an enormous cloud of toxic gases that spewed into the spring air, washing a twenty-mile stretch of a forested valley in a coating of lava more than twelve feet deep.
Mount Saint Hilary's summit collapsed into its crater, which deflated like a sad party balloon as the mounting pressure of its imminent eruption all disappeared, vacated through the breach on the mountain's Southeastern face. One last titanic volume of gas rose from the summit into the tormented sky, a final godlike belch signifying the end of the eruption and the beginning of a new age.
To the Southeast, the waves and waves of magma exiting the mountain slowly died down to a bloodred rooster tail of particulate matter and liquid lava, showering the bare timberline and the incredibly hot, smoking black sludge that had replaced it with volcanic bombs and random boulders. The pressure had been relieved at long last.
Half the mountainside collapsed, a tremendous landslide that covered the pyroclastic flow with literal tons of rock dust and filled it with hundreds of broken boulders that sank into it like doomed sailing ships on rough seas. Among the ash-grey, blackened tones of the hellscape that had become of Mount Saint Hilary, a flash of golden, angular glory could have been seen if anything had been there to bear witness to it. The rocket boosters of the Autobot Ark were exposed to the open air for the first time since the crash.
Although, it would be quite a while before they saw sunlight again, on account of the pitch-black skies.
With a series of tortured noises, the Ark settled into its new position. Its ruined upper decks deep inside the mountain finally gave way, coming loose from the rest of the ship with a horrible tearing sound that could be heard from miles away, even through the layers of rock that covered it. The ship dropped a few dozen feet - a truly enormous length for something of its size - inside the volcano, forming an immense new cavern open to the magma chamber, far below, which had been relieved significantly enough to return to its innocuous position within the Earth's crust. The Ark slid on the glassified path that the eruption had just carved out for it, just enough to stick out of the Southeastern face of the mountain slightly, then stopped dead in its path, never to move again.
Within the starship's bridge, a firey orangish glow came through the shattered viewscreens, illuminating the devastation that was once the ship's command center. One of the many stalactites that had formed on the bridge's ceiling broke from its mounting when the Ark slid out of its rocky prison, tumbling through the toxic air that had just begun to flow into the room once more.
It shattered upon the calcified remains of an ancient control pad, attached to a Paradronian stasis and reformation pod that hadn't fully withdrawn into the system of pods encircling the bridge when its occupant had been safely stowed away all that time ago.
And just like that, the tiny reservoir of Energon ensconced within the pod's cutting-edge systems was ignited by a purely mechanical spark. It circulated, as it was wont to do. No errors. No problems.
The pod activated itself and began the lengthy process of bringing its occupant back to the land of the living.
Skywarp woke up in a stasis pod, electricity flowing through his joints as he slowly regained awareness.
Fighting. The ship's breaking apart! Where's 'Cracker? Gotta - gotta get to safety, Primus, we're all gonna die! I'm - I'm - huh.
I'm in a stasis pod.
His optics came online. He was peering through clear fluid with a greenish tint, suspended within a constraining vacuole of the nanobot solution. Data readouts flickered weakly on the inside of the synthoplasma glass that separated him from whatever lay beyond the pod.
Don't remember getting in a stasis pod, he thought with a burst of clarity. Don't really remember anything after we crossed the wormhole, in fact. Why . . . why would I ever get in an Autobot pod . . .
The train of thought didn't go much further than that, because, with a disconcerting lurch, the pod entered an active state.
"SUITABLE ALTERNATE FORM LOCATED. PROCEED WITH SUBJECT REFORMATION?"
Skywarp was suspicious, but he didn't see any other way out of his predicament. He spoke, his voice filled with static from lack of use. ". . . Sure. Why not? I'll need to leave sooner or later anyway . . ."
Even as the nanobot fluid swirled around him in tangible torrents and reconfigured his body over the course of several hours, he reviewed the technical specifications of this new alternate form and the world outside. He wasn't by any means an expert stasis-scientist, but something out there filled him with trepidation. Right now, his primary concern was the heat. Initial scans of the environment inside what had once been the Autobot Ark showed that the bridge's ambient temperature was toasty, to say the least. The alternate form - a flight-capable, vaguely delta-shaped aircraft scaled for beings about a fourth of his robot-mode height - wasn't made for such climes, meaning Skywarp would have to beat feet once his reformation was over. Of course, the temperature wasn't immediately lethal to Cybertronians, but it probably wouldn't have been a great idea to sit down and play a nice game of solitary Triad.
On the bright side, it seemed like the Ark had come to rest in the center of an active volcano and the rest of the planet wasn't nearly as hot. All Skywarp had to do was get a good idea of his surroundings, figure out what had happened to the other Decepticons in his battlegroup, and leave.
"Piece of cake," he muttered as the reformation entered its final cycles. The fluid drained, and he could feel the heat radiating through the pod's synthoplasmic window. "Let's do this, then. Open pod access door."
"COMPLYING," the computer responded, but Skywarp didn't stick around to hear it. He launched forward on newly-revitalized legs, staggered a little bit as the heat hit him, and, despite himself, took a moment and stretched. He'd been asleep for a long time.
The air was hot and close, filled with the kind of particulate matter normally found in volcanic ash. It threatened to enter his airbags via his main cooling diaphragm, leaving microscopic punctures in the sensitive material of his inner workings as it went. He ensured his filters were working at prime capacity - probably would have been a better idea to do that beforehand, but that ship had sailed - and stopped breathing normally. Instantly, his vents kicked into operation, as did his dermal porous cooling systems. He began to sweat oil through the tiny seams in his armor plating.
"Phew . . . all right, time to get down to business," the Seeker muttered to himself.
He crossed the room, locating the main computer terminal, and prayed that the shoddy Autobot machinery had survived the tests of time for however long it had laid dormant. Its name was embossed in tarnished gold on the center console - Teletraan One. He decided to take a gamble - Autobot tech had revived him. Maybe, just maybe, the software would still be addled enough to help him out some more.
Skywarp interfaced with the computer, using his handy dagger to break through the layers of calcified conglomerate caking the computer's components, and provided it with just enough energy from his innermost reserves to remotely reactivate the ship's long-dormant generator.
"C'mon, c'mon, work, ya dumb brick . . ." he muttered as he disconnected from the console. An awful knocking, groaning noise issued forth from deep below the deck. He only wished his Energon worked just well enough to kickstart the Ark.
"Angolmois would do the job . . ." a voice within him seemed to whisper. "It's a miracle substance - always available, keeps its charge forever. Potent as the Pit. Just do it. Why wait?"
But he stopped himself. He had the Angolmois upgrade, like many high-ranking Decepticons. His trine leader had insisted on it.
"Oh, come now Skywarp," he'd said, "why pretend like you don't want to be a part of something bigger? Just take the treatment. You know its specifications. You know what it's capable of doing. Do you want to follow me - follow us - into Megatron's personal guard and his good graces, or not? I just don't understand your hesitancy, kremzeek . . ."
"Maybe because it's literally called 'Dark Energon?' Doesn't exactly sound like a lot of fun, my mech. And, Primus' sake, don't call me that," Skywarp had wanted to say, but hadn't. He'd just sat down and taken the treatment like a quiet little sparkling getting his first Cosmic Rust vaccination.
He could fire up the entire ship with enough D-E. But did he truly want to give in to that stuff again? He'd seen the test results before. He knew its volatility and addictive nature. Had dozens of dense datapads on it that he'd never really taken the time to read before, on account of there being so many of them and him not really wanting to spend that much time sitting still. It was a struggle.
Thankfully, he didn't have to wrestle with the idea any longer, because - miracle of miracles - the Autobot computer got enough power and turned on.
"YES! AHAHAHAHA! I am a GENIUS!" Skywarp crowed to the blackened walls.
The computer was glitchy, performing poorly, and in really bad shape, but it successfully booted up and displayed a message on the screen, along with a logo - a simple image of a pilot's helm, composed of three wide arrows converging on a central point.
"WELCOME. ENTER COMMAND. CALL SYSTEM DESIGNATION. MAKE VERBAL INQUIRY."
Skywarp clapped his hands in excitement. "All right! Let's see . . . Teletraan One! That is your name. Yes. Give me a full readout on the remaining stasis pods in this room, yeah?"
"A-A-A-AFFIRMATIVE. WELCOME, D-d-DECEPTICON SKYWARP."
Skywarp flinched, freezing in place despite the heat seeping in from the viewscreen. "You know I'm a 'Con? Um . . . you gonna launch countermeasures or blast me or chuck a Guardian Robot at me or something?"
"NEGATIVE, DECEPTICON/SEEKER/AERIALBOT/SEEKER SKYWARP. NO - NO - NO HOSTILES DETECTED. TELETRAAN SYSTEM DOES - DOES NOT - DOES SUPPORT SUBJECT: DECEPTICON: SKYWARP. DECEPTICON PROGRAMMING NOT C-C-C-COMPATIBLE WITH TELETRAAN MORAL SOFTWARE. NO DECEPTI-TI-TICONS DETECTED. WELCOME, DECEPTICON SKYWARP."
"Wow. How long were we out? Time's really taken its toll on you . . ."
"ERROR. CHRONOLOGISTICS DAMAGED. NOTIFY AN ADMINISTRATOR IMMEDIATELY."
A grin appeared on Skywarp's face. "Sure, sure thing, buddy, but I need to know this stuff ASAP, all right? Can I have a full readout on the - heh - my fellow Autobots suspended within this room's stasis system?"
"AFFIRMATIVE. ONE MOMENT, PLEASE . . ."
After a few uncomfortable seconds, during which Skywarp began to get used to the stifling heat and ash, the system responded. The Seeker had to wipe and reboot his optics before what he was seeing really set in.
There were dozens of other stasis pods like his, situated on trapezoidal tracks that ran just underneath the deck plating, between the ship's superstructure and the interior of the room. It seemed that all of them save one - his own - were occupied.
Some of them by some very interesting people.
"Primus, that ain't right . . . no way can this . . . Slag," he whispered in disbelief. What the computer was telling him simply couldn't be true.
"Welp, looks like I really do have some work to do."
A clawed, gray hand clamped down on the side of a stasis pod. Joints popped and sparked as they were utilized for the first time in many years; and the owner of the hand rose from the nanobot bath, dripping with the greenish fluid as his optics powered on.
Heedless of the oppressive heat, Lord Megatron of Kaon arched his back as his armor slid into its battle-ready position. He lived again - but where had the spearhead of the Decepticon Empire found himself this time?
He surveyed the room as multiple other stasis pods hissed open and their occupants stumbled out on unsteady legs - all of them Decepticons in an Autobot realm. It was a small group, a little bit larger than the standard twelve-mech Decepticon raiding party, not including him, of course. Memories shot through his processor as it booted up. White-hot rage consumed him as he remembered the last thing he'd been doing before stasis lock had claimed his consciousness - reaching for the Autobots' new Prime as the wretch had himself gone into stasis lock, trying to keep his internal organs from spilling all over the Ark's captain's chair.
He'd been close. His claws had nearly pierced Optimus's throat. He'd been but a few breaths too late. It wouldn't happen again.
"Lord Megatron!" the Seeker Skywarp hailed as he came spiraling in through the Ark's smashed viewscreen. "I - ack - WHOO! Excuse me, sir - it's *kaff* the smoke. And the ash, I guess. Don't like it, whatever it is. Bad for the intakes."
"Soldier - do I look like a Paradronian medical technician to you? No. I don't have time for your complaints. Speak your piece." Megatron intoned, in a voice as heavy as the grave.
"Beg pardon, sire. I just wanted to say it's nice to see everyone up and running again. Also, if we don't get out of here soon, we may all die. Excruciatingly, as a matter of fact."
"He's right, Megatron," another Seeker, this one a blue-and-silver to contrast Skywarp's black and purple highlights. Thundercracker. An Outlier, and a rather capable warrior on top of that. Mildly less unbearable than Skywarp was. "The ash Skywarp was talking about has the capability to shred the lining of our internal workings if we hang around venting it, even if we use non-conventional ways of homeostatic cooling. Moreover, my sensors are reading heavy volcanic activity in this sector. The eruption must have dislodged some debris that, in turn, woke us up."
"And it ain't done yet, either!" Skywarp chirped.
"Correct again. Due to the unorthodox eruption, this mountain is highly unstable and the Ark highly unsafe. Without a geologic survey, it's impossible to tell if the Ark will stay in this condition for very long. Readings suggest that there's more volcanic activity to come, too. My recommendation would be to withdraw until the eruption has passed us by."
Megatron stormed over to the nearby Teletraan terminal, which was displaying a rudimentary map of the Ark's immediate area created by a SkySpy drone, probably during the reformatting process that had resurrected the Decepticon battlegroup. The SkySpy, though its finer mechanics were damaged and unreliable as well, seemed to suggest more or less the same hypothesis that Thundercracker had formulated. Nothing was stable, the Ark was damaged beyond all repair, and there was indeed a potential whisper of further eruptions.
He searched for a suitable shelter nearby, one that would serve as a field camp until the eruption blew over or the mountain stabilized, whichever came first. Finally, Megatron stabbed a finger at the screen. "There," he stated, simply. He became aware of the others crowding behind him and turned with a gesture.
"There appears to be an abandoned, minuscule military settlement of some degree not seven megamiles to the southeast - or whatever equivalent this world has to it. Hrm . . . very lightly staffed by a complement of the planet's native warriors. Small humanoids. Organic in nature. Disgusting."
Several raiders scowled and shook their heads. Organic humanoids, while usually weak and unfit to stand against a Cybertronian on their own, tended to group together when threatened by Cybertronians. If the situation wasn't handled well, this incident could spiral out of control very easily.
Thankfully, the mech leading them was Megatron of Tarn, who each mech present trusted to see them through.
He continued reading Teletraan's analysis for the benefit of his troops. "Scans indicate that it contains a sizable bunker made to resist exactly these kinds of events. We will make camp there until the eruption ceases, and then we will come back and we will take the rear portions of this wreck as our own. We will regroup in the ruins of the Autobots' hopes and dreams, use it as a base from whence we will find the rest of the Armada, and proceed from there. Are there any questions?"
He glared as his gaze swept the combined forces of the battlegroup that had successfully taken the Ark's bridge and what seemed to be most of Soundwave's Cassetticons. Their creator was nowhere to be seen - and was nowhere to be found in the bridge's stasis pods - but that was a problem for another time. Once the danger had passed and the Decepticons returned to this decrepit starship, Megatron would have all the time in the world to scour the Ark top to bottom for his long-time comrade. For the time being, the mechs in front of him would be his army - at least, the building blocks of what would come later. They would be more than enough for now.
"Something to say, Skywarp?" he barked, taking note of how the violet Seeker was avoiding his gaze and shifting in an uncomfortable fashion.
"No, sir!" Skywarp responded. "It's just that - well - What will happen to the Autobots? They're still in their stasis pods, after all. Vulnerable. Should we-"
"Leave them," the Decepticon leader finished, though he hated himself for saying it. "This bridge is compromised as it is and we lack the time to properly execute our foes. We will deal with them later, if they will not already be crushed by shifting rocks or boiled in their nanobot baths. Now come - let us make our exit."
So they did, most of them exiting the crater carefully via a ledge of brimstone that Skywarp had previously scoped out. Those with aerial alt-forms, such as Laserbeak, the Seekers, or Spyglass, the Photonicon Intelligence Specialist, took the direct route, while Megatron and his higher-ranking officers made full use of their hovering abilities. With full knowledge of the fact that they couldn't have saved everyone in the time allotted and with full intention to return later, they left behind a number of dedicated Decepticon warriors, those who weren't important enough to warrant immediate reactivation.
Perhaps they'd regret that later. But then, no one objected to the orders of Kaon's Great Slagmaker. Not even himself.
never good
i pity
he could not give up the Matrix would not
the Matrix born of the Blade that pierced the Forge to make Eternity
made metal the road after death and was called the Well of All-Sparks
for the good of all, until all are one, he would save them
you will not die today child
take up your Axe
rise
Optimus Prime
"SUITABLE ALTERNATE FORM LOCATED."
Optimus Prime's consciousness returned in a flash. He remembered everything: the high-stakes duel on the Engine Deck, the ferocity of his Decepticon counterpart, the exquisite sensation of peeling away into space and time as the Ark passed through the wormhole. His hands instinctively clasped over his midsection, expecting to find a sloppy mess of internal tubing and undigested fuel - nothing. His torso was good as new, and he was suspended in a fluid capsule. Above him, the glow of the stasis pod illuminated the corroded pipework of his ship's interior. Sparking bubbles of nitrogen flew past Optimus's head as microscopic nanobots burst from the strain of cooling their tiny forms.
"PROCEED WITH SUBJECT REFORMATION?" the computer inquired patiently. Optimus realized it had already asked once before while he was still coming to terms with himself. He rebooted his vocal processors.
"Affirmative, computer. Initiate all preliminary scans in the meantime. I'd like to know everything you have about our new surroundings. We've been offline for far too long."
From the moment he stepped out of the stasis pod, Optimus knew that something was amiss. He'd been partially informed about his new alternate mode and the local environmental conditions, but now he knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that he had to move. Whatever was left of the nanobot solution evaporated off him in wisps of acrid steam, leaving a dry, salty crust on his polished and gleaming armor. The heat sucked the air from his airbags and replaced it with something that caused his diagnostic center to throw up a warning - something about a silicate desiccant playing havoc with his vents.
"Ash . . ." he coughed, making his way to the main Teletraan terminal. Surprisingly, it was still active despite the constant close climate. He couldn't imagine how long they'd been out, judging by the state of disrepair the bridge was in . . .
"Teletraan-One, activate the viewscreen shutters!" he commanded, laying a hand on the center console. "Get the cooling system back online!"
"ERROR," the supercomputer reported, causing Optimus's armor to flare in disappointment for the briefest of moments. "COOLING SYSTEM DAMAGED. WELCOME-COME, OPTIMUS P-P-PRIME. SOLAR HEAT SHIELDS LOWER-ER-ER-LOWERING."
A dreadful screeching noise filled the bridge as the Ark's viewscreen was covered by a thick shutter of Cybertanium and heat-retardant foam. Instantly, Optimus felt better as the crimson glow of the volcano disappeared beneath the shields - it was hotter than an oven, yes, and his vents were still choked with ash and smoke, but at least some of the problem had been dealt with.
"VENTILATION S-SYSTEMS: 67% ONLINE. PLEASE ST-st-STAND BY . . ."
The inside of the bridge cleared up a little bit as the ship's running lights activated. When all was said and done, the contaminants were far from dispersed.
". . . but now, we can get somewhere," Optimus pontificated to the corroded walls and smashed computer screens. "Teletraan, it's time to wake the others. Give me a readout of the occupied stasis pods in this room."
"AFFIRMATIVE," the computer responded, displaying a cross-section of the stasis pod system. To Optimus's surprise, most of them were still occupied - and not all of them were filled by Autobots.
"Interesting," he muttered. "Very interesting."
The fire crackled as Frenzy drew closer to it. Not that it was cold - far from it - but he'd just wanted to watch something burn while the Decepticons waited out the volcanic activity. Sitting around in this cement bunker was boring, and there wasn't much else to do now that everything that Ravage had allowed him to destroy - mostly vehicles scaled for beings half his height - was in a pile of smashed metal and glass.
The bodies, about twelve of them, had already turned into lumps of charred carbon. They hadn't suffered very much and hadn't seen what killed them, either. Organics were easy to break when you caught them off guard.
"Hey, Spectro," his batch-twin Rumble said nonchalantly, "turn up th' heat, will ya?"
The hulking Photonicon said nothing, just grunted and let loose a torrent of fire from one of his many arm-mounted weapons. Flames roared higher into the air, and the bonfire finally stopped emitting that irritating, vaguely musical cacophony when a laptop computer displaying some kind of organic feline creature chasing a low-intensity laser beam melted into nothingness.
Rumble threw another electronic device, this one a slightly larger desktop terminal, into the fire. "I like it when the batteries explode."
Sooner or later, you're going to have to quit that, Buzzsaw remarked from his perch atop some type of flagpole hanging from the wall. It clearly wasn't meant for his weight and sagged almost double even as the spy shifted atop its finial ball. You're filling the room with smoke. Bad for the air intakes. We've already escaped one chemical-filled gas chamber. I don't want to roost tonight in another one.
"Primus, you're a diva," Rumble groaned. "What's wrong with a little fire every now and then, anyways? Soundwave gives you all the best tasks. I'm a Demolitions mech! A little bit of chemical fire every now-an'-then's good for you! Like the ol' man says, it builds character. Look at me! I'm inhalin' that stuff twice, three times every decacycle, an' I'm doin' just fine!"
Minus a few hundred brain cells, of course, Laserbeak snarked.
Rumble surged to his feet. "All right, that's it! You wanna go, birdy? You can shape-shift inta anything you like, an' you'll STILL wind up lookin' like a burnt-out toastah when Frenzy an' I are through with ya!"
Enough! their oldest sibling, Ravage, snapped in their shared link. Before the Nemesis's launch, he'd been on an extended long-term assignment for a few dozen years running pacification and espionage in his native Burthov, and his husky accent was slightly thicker than Rumble remembered it being. Pathetic. Soundwave would not stand for this. Lord Megatron sits before you, and still, you all act like buffoons. Does it not occur to you that our father remains trapped somewhere in the enemy Ark? Correct attitudes now, or I will correct for you.
Laserbeak dipped her head, letting her ruby-red glare leave Rumble and Frenzy's. Apologies. I do miss the boss. Guess I'm just pretty worried about him. I keep thinking about him, bleeding out like that, standing over Blaster . . . potentially about to be buried by a fragging volcano . . .
"You think he is dead?" Frenzy asked, switching to internal comms as he sat back down. His twin followed his motion, the fire taken out of him by Ravage's rebuke.
You've got the same bond with him that I do. I didn't feel him die . . . but I don't feel anything from him at all, either. It's icky.
"Impossible . . . Soundwave always comes through. Right? Ravage, what is your take?"
The black Tygar didn't respond immediately, resuming his silent pacing once he was sure his siblings had calmed down. Not important what I think. Finding Father before volcano blows again is our number one priority. He paused, briefly, as if considering the words that he was about to speak. Even if Lord Megatron does not agree with us.
Buzzsaw screeched a sardonic laugh that caused most of the other Decepticons in the bunker - who weren't otherwise privy to the Cassetticons' conversation - to flinch. Now that's unlike you, brother. Considering betraying the Emperor, are we now?
There was silence in the bunker, nothing to break it but the merry crackling of Rumble's poisonous bonfire and the nervous rumble from the other Decepticons. All of them were cut off from the Flame, the Decepticon interplanetary intelligence service. A few were consulting datapads pulled out from subspace in the vain hope of gathering enough computational power to access just a breath of information from the stars. Without their Communications officer, nothing was working.
Well, I think it's worth a go! Er, finding Soundwave, I mean, not mutiny . . . well, yeah, mutiny, but only if we're hung out to dry again . . . but you know, if you think about it, Megatron would probably feel the same way we do . . .
"Glitch, NO!" the Cassetticon Medic's siblings screamed in unison as they each received a crystal-clear forethought of what he was about to do next.
Remember what he did last time you did something like this? He cut off your forelegs! Laserbeak exclaimed.
Soundwave is Megatron's oldest friend! His number two guy! If anyone'll sanction a mission like this, it'd be him! Besides, I got these cool prosthetics from the incident afterwards! It wasn't that bad, and I don't hold a grudge-
You are making mistake, soldier. Stand down. Please, Ravage growled, but his youngest sibling wasn't listening this time.
"Lord Megatron," Glitch began on open comms, audible to the entire group. "I, heh, was just wondering . . ."
"'Just wondering' what, Cassetticon?" the Decepticon leader intoned, looking up from his fusion cannon. His eyes met Glitch's, and the Medic shrank back a bit, even as his foreleg shielding involuntarily shifted towards the front of his prosthetic limbs.
"Well, ah . . . it's just that . . . we were thinking, eh, what's next? What's our plan of action, as it were?"
"Kitty's got a point," a Stunticon Scout who'd been at the forefront of the last raid on the Ark conceded. "Much as I love a cheery fire like this, we ain't got a base, we ain't got a supply line, an' we've no idea what's going on back home. The lads and I were talkin', tryin' ta get a connection back t'Cybertron. We'd 'ave an easier time tryin' ta find the Great Interfactories of Camius then connectin' ta the Flame without a Comms officer, innit?"
"Aye, we need Soundwave. Can't do jack without a good Commsmech."
"My sparkling must be due in Stanix any moment now - I can feel my Conjunx's happiness through our bond! She's ecstatic! Oh, if I could just send one good message to her . . ."
"We can handle it, Lord Megatron. Just say the word and we'll march out."
Megatron seemed to ponder that for a while. He sat up straighter in his makeshift throne, made from an abandoned 6X6 military truck - a dead ringer for his alternate mode - and opened his mouth, presumably to begin a grand speech.
"Our course of action is straightforward, my Decepticons," he began. "We wait out the eruption, as I distinctly recall mentioning earlier. I do not wish to endanger any of you. Especially not the Cassetticons. Wouldn't you agree, Doctor Tigertrack?"
Impossibly, Glitch shrunk back even further at this, under the mercy of one of Megatron's pointed stares.
"I sympathize with your anxieties, mechs. Do not think I don't. Although I've devoted far too much of my life to the Cause to have a family of my own, I understand your confusion and the fear you must harbor of what must have happened to our beloved planet in our absence. We will march for the Ark as soon as Thundercracker proclaims it to be stable."
The Decepticons were electrified after only a few of their leader's words and were hanging on each one as spoken. Hope touched their yellow-and-red optics, save those of the Cassetticons, who still seemed somewhat unconvinced. Thundercracker looked like he'd swallowed a shotgun slug.
"I must say, Lord Megatron, I don't have the proper equipment, so there are no promises that my calculations will be accurate-"
"For now, we rest, prepare within this temporary shelter. When the time comes, we will return to the mountain and establish a foothold in the ruins of our enemy's hopes and dreams. We will recover our fallen brethren - Soundwave first among them - revive those that made it to a stasis pod, and, yes, execute the hated Autobots in their sleep! Their dynasty of hatred and oppression ends here, on this new world, this new frontier, and in their own base of operations!"
"After the Autobots are gone, we appropriate their resources, their supplies. We scour this world for opportunities to expand the Empire. We learn, we raid, we conquer, and then, Decepticons, when we are rich in energy and situated well in the seat of our new colony, we contact the Empire with news of our victory. We return to our homeworld as gods, and bring an armada of our fellow warriors with us to settle this world for our number! This is a new chapter in history, and we are both the legendary victors who will write it - and the fortunate pilgrims who will inherit its yields! Decepticons . . ."
"TRANSFORM AND RISE UP!" everyone shouted. Cheers resounded throughout the smog-filled bunker as another computer exploded in Rumble's bonfire.
Megatron was grinning fiercely, yet there was a flicker of emotion in his blazing optics, unnoticeable by most but still recognized by those closest to him. "Soon, my Decepticons, soon. But not quite yet. Our sleeping brothers-in-arms will have to wait just a while longer."
The bunker's various groups broke off to converse amongst themselves once again, and the Decepticon Emperor sat down upon the remnants of his own carbon-copy once more. And, in a twist of fate that didn't surprise him at all, the Cassetticons were already nowhere to be found, having snuck out while he was speaking.
Megatron allowed himself a raspy chuckle. "Of course, of course," he said to himself, "the only time they ever disobey orders and it's to accomplish an objective ahead of time. Well, Ravage, may the Fallen's Scepter guide your strike team, and may you revive Soundwave as efficiently as you do everything else. I will stand ready for your signal regardless of your insubordination. With warriors such as these, at a fortuitous time such as this, the Autobots will never rise again!"