I used to post on Seibertron.com as Wing_Convoy.  I totally forgot I wrote this.  There is a part two (never did get around to part three  :redface )

 

Let me know if you likey

 

 

Part One

 

Something Wicked This Way Comes

 

 

   Ultra Magnus flinched at the searing sensation of Ratchet’s arc welder. He was closing up a jagged scar on his arm caused by a blast from a null ray cannon. Orange sparks lit up Ratchet’s repair bay, and bounced across the oily floor.

 

   The repair bay was big, and housed assorted junk and mecahical parts all organized neatly along shelves and drawers. Long flourescent tube lights that cast a sickly green light over everything hung down from the ceiling. High-tech drills and laser scalpels were fastened snugly on vertical plasteel racks that hugged the walls of the overcrowded bay.

 

   There were two greasy lifts, one of which Ultra Magnus sat perched, as Ratchet finished sealing up the long wound.

 

   "How many times am I going to be patching you up Magnus?" Ratchet groaned, his hoarse electronic-voice crackling in disapproval. The arc welder retracted into his forearm and was replaced by a shiny red hand. He flexed the metallic digits gingerly.

 

   "Depends on how lucky the Decepticons get each time I fight them." Magnus chuckled electronically, his blue eyes brightened as he looked down at Ratchet. Ratchet looked back up at him scornfully.

 

   "They’ve been getting luckier." Ratchet grasped his square jaw. "Or are you getting slower in your old age?" He said, matter-of-factly, a smirked nestled firmly on his silver face.

 

   "You’re garage-side manner is terrible Doc."

 

   "Are you able to transform?"  He said, ignoring the sarcastic critique.

 

   "I think so." Magnus quickly transformed into convoy mode, and rested on the lift. "I don’t detect any problems. No pain." Magnus converted back to robot mode and sat up.

 

   "Transformation sounds strong and healthy. Another few millimeters to the right and that null ray would have burned out your transformation servo. But I think you’ll live. For now."

 

   "Why are you so grumpy, Ratchet?" Magnus asked.

 

   "It’s been a rough cycle Magnus." Ratchet turned his back and looked at the holographic prints of his friends along the walls of the repair bay. "I’ve known most of these 'bots since they were first sparked by Vector Sigma." He ran his metallic digits along the photos. "Now, most of their parts are being used to patch up other Autobots wounded by Megatron and his damn war." He looked back at Magnus. "Ya know, I’m starting to think that neither side is right."

 

   "Look, Ratchet," Magnus said, looking out of the bay doors at the speeding traffic. The heat from the midday sun heated the asphalt and steel, causing the view to appear wavy and dreamlike "Megatron rules by terror. He uses fear to control others, to get them to do what he desires.  He has no sense of freedom and peace. Freedom is the right of all sentient beings. Prime lives by that motto, and now... so do I."

 

   "It still doesn’t mean fighting is right." Ratchet said and looked back over his shoulder at Magnus.

 

   "It doesn’t mean not fighting is. Evil succeeds when good robots do nothing." Magnus said.

 

   "So more young robots are going to be sent to the scrap yard early for what they feel is right. Doesn’t the same go for the Decepticons? They feel they are right in what they are doing, what makes us that much different?"

 

   "We fight because we have to Doc, not because we want to."

 

   "Sounds to me like there is going to be a lot more casualties." Ratchet shook his head.

 

   "Then I’m sure I’ll be back Doc." He slapped the shorter Ratchet on the shoulder and leaped off the examination lift. He executed a perfect mid-air somersault, and transformed to his convoy mode. "Hey Doc," Magnus revved his engine.  "we’ll win this yet. You just might see the day when you don’t have to patch any of us Autobots up anymore " Ultra Magnus rolled out of the garage and into a flood of loud, Cybertronian traffic.

 

   "I’ve a feeling this war will be going on for a long time."

 

   Ratchet closed the door to the repair bay.

 

 

* * *

 

 

   "Autobots are snooping around us again, Shockwave. What do you think we should do?" Demolisher asked, spinning his right arm into, and out of cannon mode. Demolisher was a heavy armor Decepticon, sluggish in action and thought. He was a member of a new armada of transformers to have been sparked here on Cybertron. Shockwave trusted him, only because he was too stupid to think for himself. For now, he was useful. Shockwave will dispose of him when the time came.

 

   "We have it under control, Demolisher." Shockwave said, placing his gun arm on Demolishers’shoulder to stop his fidgeting. "Any information the Autobots have, we gave to them." Shockwave converted to guncannon mode and completed a brief scan of the horizon. He scanned in on a large object roughly a kilometer in diameter. "Our plans will go forward tomorrow night as planned. Shield Control has no idea that the asteroid is coming anywhere near us. Thanks to a little manipulation of their scanning and sensor network." Shockwave transformed back to his robot mode and stepped near the plexi-steel window. Night has now fallen over the Decepticon City of Jihaxus.

 

   "Once this meteor hits the Oil Sea of Titania,  the lower hemisphere of Cybertron will be hit with a massive shock-wave, flattening whole cities and towns. It will ignite the Oil Sea and will burn the Autobots. Homeland of Paxia. The one thing they cherish most." Shockwave turned to face Demolisher.     "The greatest concentration of Autobots live in that hemisphere. Those that do not get destroyed in the crash, we shall roll over easily enough."

 

   "Orders sir?" Demolisher asked.

 

   "Raid the Autobot ghettos, Demolisher. We will need new slaves to work cleaning up the bodies of their fallen Autobot brethren. We seem to have worn the last consignment out." Demolisher still stood there, looking confused.

 

   "Is there a problem Demolisher?"

 

   "Um, yes…" He put his hand behind his head. "…what’s a consignment sir?" Demolisher asked. Shockwave shook his head.

 

   "It’s a shipment or delivery." Shockwave struggled with  the urge to shoot him.

 

   "Oh right! A new shipment of slaves. Hah! I really feel like I’m getting smarter hanging around you Shockwave."

 

   "Illuminating." Shockwave was to the point of shaking with annoyance.  " Now go." Demolisher transformed to tank mode with a loud metallic screeching sound, like a descending musical scale, and left Shockwaves’ observation post.

 

   Shockwave wasn’t given a moments' rest when a signal beeped loudly on his consol, and a flat holographic screen appeared. A sinister robotic face, sneered to life on it.

 

   "Greetings, Mighty Megatron." Shockwave bowed slightly.

 

   "What news, Shockwave?"  The disembodied head flickered.

 

   "This channel is secure, yes?"

 

   "Of course."

 

  "Meteor1984 hits the Oil Sea of Titania tomorrow night." Sheockwave reported.

 

   "Shield Control has no warning?"

 

  "None. But I stress that they still have time. Their pulse cannons can disintegrate the meteor just before it reaches the outer atmosphere."

 

  "We’ll make sure they have no warning. Shield control is busy trying to track a distress call Sideways collected while on Rebus."

 

  "A distress call? From Rebus?"

 

  "No, from a planet far outside the Rebus Cluster. What ever planet it came from, it is nothing more than a memory file. The distress call is ancient from what Sideways could decipher. "

 

  "I see." The lone red optic in Shockwave's dark face glowed blood red.

 

  "The point is the Shield Control and the Sentinels will be wrapped up trying to find out who or what sent the call. This will provide more distraction for them, and allow us to proceed with our plans." Megatron let out a cold as liquid nitrogen laugh.

 

  "Excellent. Then we have nothing more to say." Megatron looked startled, but then a smirk wiped across his face.

 

   "Cold as always eh, Shockwave? That is what I like about you. Cold. Hard. Logical. Unlike some of my other warriors you never fail me."

 

   "Shockwave out." Megatrons' red optics smoldered before Shockwave flicked the image off.

 

  "My loyalty does not lie with you, Mighty Megatron..." Shockwave transformed back to guncannon mode slowly. His neural net computing and processing various thoughts.

 

   Megatron will not be in power forever. Yes, it is logical for him to remain patient. His time will come. He returned to scanning the night sky...

 

 

* * *

 

   The sun was setting now over the Autobot City of Abraxas. The light shimmered red and orange off the great pool in the center of the city. Magnus scanned several news bands to listen to any news of the terrorist war Megatron has been leading against the Autobots.

 

   "Megatron has set fire to several oil fields in the Republic of Shuraq on the southern continent of Maxim." A female robotic voice said. He changed stations again, this time, a gruff male robotic voice with a lisp came on.

 

   "A minicon has detinated itself, in the city-square of Henshin along the border between the Decepticon held province of Malix and the Autobot City Metroplex. The detonation was not believed to be nuclear, but it has killed at least two hundred and fifty Autobots. The chasis count is still coming in at this time." Magnus scanned more stations.

 

   "Some opposition to overthrowing Megatron came today from the Cybertronians who decided to not take sides in the war. Saying that the Autobots going into Shuraq is just war-mongering on the part of the Autobot Elders, and of Iacon. To them, a diplomatic solution is the only answer. Not the Autobots vain policing efforts."

 

   Magnus switched the news band off.  

 

  "Prime tried for forty years to reach a peaceful solution with Megatron." Magnus’ radiator gage jumped a few notches into the red. "The only reason he’s fighting is because Megatron has backed him into a corner like some flesh animal from Malia-6." His radiator gage eased down into blue again. "Prime gave him a chance- even after Megatron shot him when he was still Orion Pax. If Megatron wants to fight so badly, then he picked the wrong Autobot to fight with."

 

   The tall spires of the capital building came into view as Magnus turned a corner. Just behind it, The InterGalactic Port of Call still lay in ruins from the day Soundwave, convinced some minibots and minicons to blow themselves and two large FTL liners up there. Magnus gunned his engine out of anger and leaped out of convoy mode into his robot form.

 

   He was here. The Constellation Building. Hotrod and Hotshot had asked to meet him here. The tall liquid metal statues of some of the greatest Transformers ever, stood watch in the long hallway of the Constellation building. The shapes transformed as Magnus walked by.

 

   "Magnus!" Hotrod called out. He was leaning against a brass sign that stated clearly: "No vehicle modes inside building." Hotshot stood with him.

 

   "Hotrod, Hotshot, it’s good to see you. Is everything all right? Your last communiqué sounded... desperate."

 

   "Yeah we’re fine, but excited. We need to show you something." Hotrod pulled out a small circular device. "

 

   "An archive sphere? "

 

   "Yeah, a friend of mine in shield control came across this while she was filing for her supervisor. This got hushed up pretty quickly when it was broadcast on GNN. Check what’s on it."

 

   Hotrod snapped a switch on the side of the drone and a plasma screen popped out of it’s top. A frail looking robot appeared blinked to life.

 

  "Help us----we don’t know what it is---it, it’s huge." The voice crackled "All five moons vanished in a matter of milliseconds—oh my maker all those people and robots---gone. Ships are just being sucked in----"

 

   The image flicked off.

 

   "Do they know who sent this distress?"

 

   "We don’t know who recorded it or when, but we know who delivered the message. A robot called Sideways." Hotshot said, punching his fist into his palm. "His allegiance is kind of shady.  He usually works for whoever is in power.  It makes me a little weary that he would just drop off a distress call out of the goodness of his spark."

 

   "Sideways?" Magnus' blue optics dimmed slightly. "I've never heard of him."

 

  "He was an assassin from the Rebus Cluster. A lot of Transformers in the early days would hire themselves out as mercenaries to the War Barons and Feudal Lords of that system."

 

   The three of them moved outside into the cool Cybertronian nighttime. The heat from their internal engines caused their hulls to steam slightly, as they walked down the steps to the main highway leading out of Abraxas.

 

   "Can your friend in Shield Control keep digging, Hotrod?" Magnus asked. "Something here doesn't compute well with me."

 

   "I’ll see, but Shield Control is a pretty tight lipped department. If they don’t let Asteroids into our Atmosphere, I’m sure they don’t let much information out. I’m still amazed she even came across that distress signal. It's like someone wanted us to discover it."

 

     "Hotshot, maybe you can tail this Sideways character. But try to stay hidden as well as you can. If he really was an assassin- "

 

   "I know, I know Magnus." Hotshot cut in on him. "I’m young but not stupid. I’ll stick to Sideways like a bad paint job. See who his contacts might be, or where his hangouts are."

 

  Hotshot twirled on his feet and transformed into a bright yellow high-speed recon vehicle. Hotrod followed suit. Magnus kneeled down and tapped onto each of their roofs.

 

   "Don’t mention this to anyone you don't trust. We don’t know how deep this well goes." The two Autobots revved their engines in reply, and tore off.  Magnus stood there, and played the message back again.

 

  "Why are my neural relays screaming that something isn't right with this?" Magnus converted to convoy mode, a huge plume of black smoke belched out of his smoke stacks, as he peeled into the nightime traffic.

nice dude, i loved it :clap

I still want part 3....

I still want part 3....

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

 

 

 

Same here !