Changing Cards

Scene opens in the CR room of the Maximal base, outside the picture window it is morning, Whiplash comes into the room he quickly closes the door behind himself, he runs up to the CR pod holding Dinobot and Dragoness and opens the lid.

WHIPLASH: Slaggit Dinobot! Get out of there fast! They’re coming! (Dinobot gets out, he helps out Dragoness, he looks into Whiplash’s eyes pleading.) I won’t tell anyone, this never leaves this room.

DINOBOT: Thank you friend. (Dragoness gives a confused grin, Dinobot looks into her eyes and smiles.)

WHIPLASH: Okay, cut it out, our troops would like to talk to you, three of them, by the names of Pakandus, Gasha, and Vrock, the three remaining platoon leaders.

DINOBOT: I don’t remember the name Gasha. (Whiplash gives a shrug.)

WHIPLASH: He took Facta’s position after he sacrificed himself, (Whiplash looks to the floor.) it was a slaughter Dinobot, spirits are low.

DINOBOT: You think I don’t know that? (Whiplash leaves, after he exits Waspinater carries in Panthor, Panthor has a huge acid burn mark on his right shoulder and the arm is almost ripped off, the ex-Pred lays Panthor down in the pod Dinobot and Dragoness came out of, Waspinater then transforms to beast mode and lays down on a table nearby, Quadroblade comes into the room, she is carrying Pyereen over her shoulder.)

DINOBOT: How many more of ours are damaged? (After Quadroblade sets Pyereen down she looks to Dinobot.)

QUADROBLADE: Everyone else suffered only minimal damage, (Her eyes trail to Dragoness.) except... (Springblaster and Pakandus carry Drone into the room, one of his arms over each of their shoulders, in an instant Dinobot has his gun drawn and the laser sight centers on Drones head, in another half instant Springblaster has one of her blasters drawn and aimed at Dinobot.)

DINOBOT: What is the meaning of this!

DRAGONESS: Dinobot!

DINOBOT: I will not have a Predacon in our midst! (Waspinater’s antennae go down and he sighs to himself.)

SPRINGBLASTER: This Predacon saved me! (Dragoness puts her hand on Dinobot’s wrist.)

DRAGONESS: He also saved Pyereen and me, he shot one of his own to protect us. (Dinobot’s eyes look back at Dragoness, then to the Predacon with a hole in his chest, he holsters his gun, Springblaster sighs in relief and puts her gun away.)

DINOBOT: Very well, but I wish to talk to him as soon as he revives-

SPRINGBLASTER: I want to be there-

DRAGONESS: No. (Springblaster grits her teeth in anger, she and Pakandus lay Drone down in a pod, as soon as his hands are free Pakandus salutes Dinobot.)

PAKANDUS: My colleague and I wish to speak with you sir. (Dinobot salutes back.)

DINOBOT: Very well. (Dinobot motions for Pakandus to follow as he leaves the room, Vrock joins them in the hallway.) Where is the third, Gasha?

VROCK: I suggested he assemble the remaining troops inside the base and wait for further instruction, I hope I did not out-step my bounds.

DINOBOT: No, (He opens a door and steps in.) you didn’t. (The two aliens follow him through, the camera pans to show what room they are in, the storage hold, burn marks and blast points all over the walls, sun pouring in the gaping hole that ushered both friends and enemies out of the Allied Wars.)

VROCK: What happened here? (Dinobot sighs.)

DINOBOT: The last victory won by a noble leader, but that’s in the past, what do you have to say to me?

PAKANDUS: We were not properly informed sir, their forces were too strong for us. (Dinobot turns and looks into the mask of the burly alien.)

DINOBOT: It could not be helped my comrade, we had no idea of the Titans new weapons. (He runs a transmetal hand along a burned streak on the wall in reminisance.) How bad are our losses?

VROCK: All ships and drop equipment is either destroyed or now property of the enemy. As for troops, Pakandus lost four, I lost six, X-Seven lost six, and he himself disappeared with my computer, Facta and four other members of his platoon were lost, and Vactu’s schooner was taken in the air with total losses, all together thirty-two of our original number are gone, as well as one of yours missing- (Dinobot whirls around.)

DINOBOT: Who!? (Vrock looks over the small stat-pad given to him by Whiplash earlier.)

VROCK: The one who brought us here sir, Pestalance, your crew members reported him missing. (Dinobot turns around to face the opening, an ashamed look on his face- His thoughts are spoken out loud-)

DINOBOT: I hadn’t even noticed. (He closes his eyes in thought, he remembers inside the bridge. He then speaks out loud) The hatch, he fell into the ocean! (He quickly turns on his comlink.) Razorjaw, Get back to the beach as fast as you can and search for Pestalance, take two soldiers with you, once you’ve found Pestalance try to save any AV’s or schooners that can be salvaged. (Razorjaw’s face nods on the screen.)

RAZORJAW: Of course sir. (Razorjaw turns away from the screen, he is in a conference room, standing next to him is Gasha, Razorjaw wordlessly nods to Gasha, then skims over the crowd, the remaining fifteen soldiers are sitting around the room, Gasha, Razorjaw, and Parrator are standing in the front of the room at the veiwscreen, a few other Maximals are going around to the wounded soldiers.) Parrator, please keep them calm for a while. (Parrator looks at the grumpily arguing crowd.)

PARRATOR: What do you want me to do? (Razorjaw smiles back at him as he leaves.)

RAZORJAW: You used to be a comedian, tell some jokes. (Parrator flicks his chin at Razorjaw’s back.) Gasha, select a suitable soldier for this task. (Gasha looks through the crowd, then finally stops on a thin female creature.)

GASHA: Filleen Da’it, you’ll come with us. (Filleen stands up, she is an attractive female of Gasha’s species, Razorjaw gives a half smile and bends down to whisper into Gasha’s ear.)

RAZORJAW: If I didn’t know better I’d think that selection was biased. (Gasha grins as Filleen follows them out of the room. The camera goes outside for a moment to show a top hatch open on the base and Razorjaw unfurl his immense wings in beast mode, two tentacles shoot out of his body just behind his fins, Gasha and Filleen each grab onto one, Razorjaw launches into the sky, swinging the two behind him.)

Scene goes back to the storage room, Dinobot turns back around to face Pakandus and Vrock.

DINOBOT: Including you two we now only have eighteen of our original fifty? (Pakandus’s helmeted head nods.)

PAKANDUS: A staggering loss. (Dinobot steps between them and begins to leave.)

DINOBOT: Will that be all? (He is almost out the door when Vrock responds.)

VROCK: X-Seven managed to get rid of his gut-buster. (Dinobot stops.) He attacked me and stole my computer, no normal computer by the way- (Dinobot has turned back around.)

DINOBOT: How did this happen?

PAKANDUS: He was impaled on a tree when fighting the one called Chaos, the gut-buster was blown, so as far as warden Kellst back at the Rock knows, X-Seven is dead. (Vrock steps in.)

VROCK: But he is quite alive, and in his possession is a very powerful super computer designed by me, it can hack into any given system in the universe.

DINOBOT: What does he want with that computer?

VROCK: It could have been used to shut down the gut-busters.

PAKANDUS: But his was already off-line.

VROCK: Yeah, so we figured, what would he want with it? (Dinobot thinks for a moment.)

DINOBOT: He could be saving it for a wild card, (He looks over them, First the tall, burly Yautja, then the arachnoid Zandorahn.) do either of you know much about his thinking patterns?

PAKANDUS: He is the first of his species, a natural born murderer, I know if he took that computer he has a specific intention. (The camera zooms to Dinobot’s face.)

DINOBOT: What could he be planning? (The camera zooms into his eye and goes black.)

Scene goes to the beach in front of the Predacon base, a midday sun burns brightly, the beach is saturated with bodies of soldiers and Xenomorph, there are blast indentions, craters, and an infinite number of shell casings. Razorjaw swoops in over the jungle, he flies low and Gasha and Filleen jump to the sand he himself transforms, the smooth metalorganic transition, and touches down next to them. They look out over the battlefield.

RAZORJAW: I’ll scan for Pestalance, one of you see if any of the schooners will still function, if I find him we’ll be able to take four vehicles back to the base. (Filleen finally speaks up.)

FILLEEN: I’ll see if the schooners work. (She runs off, Razorjaw turns to Gasha.)

RAZORJAW: See if you can find any functioning AV’s and load them back into the schooners, if we have time, we’ll try to salvage some weaponry.

GASHA: Yes sir. (Razorjaw turns and looks at the beach, the camera goes to his vision as he scans for traces of transformers, he passes over the clusters as he identifies each set of foot print traces, Dinobot, Panthor, Whiplash, his own... Inside one of the schooners, Platoon one’s schooner, Filleen is testing the controls, the console has acid burns from a dead Xenomorph’s entrails, she pushes some buttons, the computer sputters and shoots out sparks, then everything goes dead.)

FILLEEN: Scratch one. (Inside the Predacon base, the camera moves over the floor of the cave, it quickly creeps through the long metal hallway and into the bridge, it moves up to a chair from behind, Starscreem’s captain’s console, Tarantulus’s arm reaches from out of the chair and pushes a button, the main viewing screen brings up a scan of the beach, he sees two organic life forms and one Maximal, he sits forward, the computer pans around to his front, there is a large hole all the way through his torso, showing the chair behind him, when he moves sparks fly out.)

TARANTULUS: Well, well, well, a salvage crew. (He looks to the side.) Anacronda, how are the stats on the rest? (The camera moves to a burned and dented Anacronda at a CR stats workstation, he is watching a screen of the other Predacon’s stats.)

ANACRONDA: They won’t be done for a while Tarantulus, and we are in no condition to fight now. (Tarantulus angrily turns off the screen and yells at Anacronda.)

TARANTULUS: You don’t think I know that!? (Sparks shoot out of his wound and he doubles over.) Very well, no matter, any word from Drone or Teraductile yet? (Anacronda shakes his head no.) Slag!

DARKRAZOR: Temper-temper Tarantulus. (Tarantulus screams in surprise.)

TARANTULUS: Ahhhh! (He looks at the enlarged image of her ghastly Xenomorph queen face in the veiwscreen, as soon as his fluid pump slows down-) Darkrazor, my lovely, where have you been? (She hisses at him.)

DARKRAZOR: Don’t talk to me like you own me, in your current status I could send a dozen Xenomorph and easily destroy you all. (Tarantulus responds with forced sincerity.)

TARANTULUS: Forgive me.

DARKRAZOR: Oh drop it. As for your question, where have we been, my brothers and I had an unfortunate accident in the desert, I am sure you were able to monitor the explosion. (Tarantulus tenses up remembering the Scream incident.)

TARANTULUS: Yes we did, what caused that? (His concern is masking a sly intention.)

DARKRAZOR: Nothing you’re concerned with, it was a faulty experiment.

TARANTULUS: Intended to produce what? (She opens her primary mouth and the secondary mouth shoots out and pounds the monitor, Tarantulus and Anacronda jump as the screen fills with teeth for a moment.)

DARKRAZOR: It does not matter, the experiment failed anyway.

TARANTULUS: Huh, too bad. (He exchanges a quick glance at Anacronda who responds with a tiny nod of his head.) What did you call for Titan?

DARKRAZOR: Since your team decided not to stay and defend your base you missed the introduction of my new pets, (The camera shows Anacronda’s visor glance away for a moment, then grow huge.) so I thought I’d send them to you. (Tarantulus hears a low guttural hiss behind him, he freezes in panic, his eyes shift to the left to see Anacronda, frozen at his station, his visor glued to something behind Tarantulus’s chair. Tarantulus slowly turns his chair around, the camera goes to his view as a muzzles covered with a mass of a couple dozen ribbed spikes shifts from the corner of his eyes into peripheral vision, Asp opens its mouth and screeches, a long, high pitched, roaring hiss, Tarantulus stays absolutely still, he gently uses his foot to turn his chair back around, he tries as hard as possible to melt into the bucket seat, his eyes wide with terror, Darkrazor shifts back into his vision, the huge, black, crested head looking straight at him.) Meet Asp. (Like lightning, Asp wraps around the chair loosely so it is facing Tarantulus, Tarantulus has had enough, he erupts.)

TARANTULUS: Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh! (He stops for a breath.) Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh! (Asp’s spidery eyes stare blankly through the spines at Tarantulus. Tarantulus runs out of scream.)

DARKRAZOR: Relax fool, Asp is one of my creations. (Tarantulus cautiously looks past the creature at Darkrazor.)

TARANTULUS: ‘One’ of your creations? (Darkrazor answers coolly.)

DARKRAZOR: There are two more in the courtyard of your cave, Vile and Carnage, I am placing them under your command Tarantulus, they will obey your every order.

TARANTULUS: And to what do I owe this gracious bestowment? (Darkrazor curls her black ‘lips’ back, revealing her gnarled, razor sharp teeth in a sly grin.)

DARKRAZOR: Why, strategy, my dear Tarantulus. (She transforms and brings her eerily beautiful face closer to the monitor.) When the Maximals attempt to launch another offensive, which they will, we will strike back with twice the power! (She slams her fist into her palm and laughs maniacally, Tarantulus stutters a small laugh then joins in the cackling.) Oh, Tarantulus, one more thing, the viruses may obey you, but if you get out of line, I will have them dismember you, capiche?

TARANTULUS: Of course Darkrazor. (Brutallion, in his colossal beast mode, lumbers behind Darkrazor, she turns away from the monitor, the connection cuts out. Tarantulus looks Asp in the eyes.) You and the other two rid us of these three pests! (Asp curls his body back and shoots down the hallway, it passes by by Vile and Carnage, they take file behind Asp, Carnage running on his two legs and one set of arms, Vile lumbering down on all fours. Back on the beach, Gasha is backing an AV into a schooner while Filleen talks to Razorjaw.)

FILLEEN: Only two of the schooners are functional, and only one can survive the atmosphere, and Gasha recovered one AV, we packed some of the bigger toys into the other schooner, mostly heavy weaponry like explosives or long distance rifles- (There is a screeching hiss, they turn and see Asp shoot out of the Predacon base, then Carnage bursts out, it looks around with its two heads one head sees Filleen and Razorjaw, the second head lets out a shrill chirping hiss, Vile’s burly form barrels out of the base and slides to a stop on the sand, it stands and lets out a massive hissing roar.) Oh sh-

RAZORJAW: Get in the schooners! I’ll lead them away! (Razorjaw runs off in the direction of the forest, Gasha leaves the schooner with the AV and runs down the beach to the next one, he closes the door, Filleen has already set the autopilot, it lifts from the beach with a metallic groan. Filleen quickly punches in the override for the AV schooner, she looks out the still open door to see Vile and Asp take off after Razorjaw, Carnage waits for a moment, one head watching Razorjaw, the other looks at Gasha’s schooner, then shifts and focuses its little beady eyes on Filleen, she panics and moves her fingers like mad over the keyboard. Carnage bounds across the sand on all sixes, his tails flailing behind him, the spines all over his body splitting the air, causing slight whistling noises, he is closing the gap fast, Filleen begins to scream as she frantically works at the controls, the door starts to close, slowly, she draws her rapid fire blaster and lets loose a solid stream of ammo, the shots splork into Carnages liquid metal structure, the splash marks quickly melt away, Carnage is barely fazed by the shots and keeps coming, both mouths open in anticipating snarls. The camera goes to the view of some kind of X-ray scope, crosshairs center on Carnages torso, there is a silenced ping sound as a projectile travels at the speed of light, leaving a spiraling mist behind as it slices through the air and sticks in Carnages body, the shot doesn’t phase him, he keeps moving, the door is only half closed-BANG!!- Carnage’s midsection explodes and it crashes to the beach in two halves, confused. The door finishes closing, Gasha watches Filleen’s schooner take off and sets down the rellgun. Razorjaw is speeding through the forest, he sees the two schooners pass overhead, jumps into the air, and converts to beast mode, the huge wings shoot out of his sleek shark-like body and he explodes out of the canopy. Asp and Vile stop, they watch their prey fly away, the camera moves down to the ground, then quickly skims along the dirt, past bodies of various species, to the hole made by Brutallion, it goes down into the hole to show Teraductile’s body, next to him on the ground is his bomb/light box, sunlight comes through the canopy in a single beam of light that rests on his eyes, dark and out cold, an electric light flickers behind the lenses.)

Scene goes to the Maximal base, Dinobot, in robot mode, is sitting in a chair at the foot of a CR pod, watching Drone curiously through the glass.

DINOBOT: Where do your loyalties lie? (Then to himself.) Who am I to judge? I was once Predacon, I even singled out one of my own, now Pestalance may be gone because of my bigotry. (Drones eyes open in the pod, Dinobot dismisses his thoughts and centers Drone’s own turbine gun against him, Drone’s eyes open in shock.)

DRONE: Where am I? (Dinobot kicks the CR pod with his foot and the lid opens.) How did I get here?

DINOBOT: My information holds that you helped a number of people on my side. (Drone stares at Dinobot.)

DRONE: Yes, I did. (He starts to get up.)

DINOBOT: Why did you help us Predacon?

DRONE: I was saving my own skin, can I leave now? (Dinobot tosses Drone’s turbine gun back to him, Drone catches it and puts it away.) Beast Mode. (As he walks for the door Dinobot stands up.)

DINOBOT: That was it huh? Self-preservation? (Drone turns around, his black ant head focuses on Dinobot.)

DRONE: Yeah, is that all?

DINOBOT: There’s no other, personal, reason? Because I’m sure if you were of no help to us I might as well report to Tarantulus that we have a traitor we’d like to hand over, I’m sure he’d want you back right away.

DRONE: What do you want from me?

DINOBOT: I know one of Dragoness’s troops has something for you, and, I’d be willing to bet you share the same compassions. (Dragoness steps out of the shadows in the corner.)

DRAGONESS: Drone, what do you hope to accomplish as a Predacon? (Drone falls silent, his antennae droop.) Every minute you serve as a Predacon keeps a certain friend in danger, as well as the rest of us.

DRONE: I- (He stops, his thoughts are overflowing him.)

DINOBOT: Your loyalty can only remain in one place, whether it be Tarantulus’s delusions or, Springblaster’s heart. (Drone turns away.)

DRONE: I’m not ready to choose sides. (He opens the door and walks out, he quickly moves through the halls on his six legs and disappears. Dinobot turns to Dragoness.)

DINOBOT: Drone could be a valuable asset to us.

DRAGONESS: He is at the core of Tarantulus’s power, I’ve seen their battle-style and strategy, removing Drone could collapse Tarantulus’s web. (Dinobot stares out into the empty hallway.)

DINOBOT: Yes, all true, but, it is Drone’s choice, he will decide when he is ready. (Dinobot clinks back into his chair and Dragoness puts a hand on his shoulder. In the end of one of the hallways Drone comes to the elevator, he clicks the button with one of his antennae, he waits a moment and steps into the elevator when the door slides open, he turns around with one final glance into the Maximal base.)

DRONE: Not the world for me. (He watches until the door slides closed and the elevator moves down through the inside of the mountain, when the disguised door opens at the base of the mountain he flies out of the elevator, ankle rockets at full blast.)

Scene goes into the guttural cave of the Titans, like the inside of a gargantuan beast, all three of the Titans are in robot mode, they are in the large room with the three huge CR tanks on one wall and the vast spread of computers and systems on the other wall about twenty yards away, Quake is relaxing in one of the CR tanks, Brutallion is working at several monitors at once, Darkrazor is at a large cluster of monitors, watching several video clips at once. Occasionally a xenomorph meanders by.

BRUTALLION: Do you have to check those now? (Darkrazor sneers at him.)

DARKRAZOR: I have nothing else to do while we wait fool, (She changes her attention back to the monitors, as some of the monitors fizzle and turn off she brings up another one.) out of a dozen Xeno-cams released only three returned.

BRUTALLION: That grinds me, it takes forever to install those infernal cameras, not to mention the fact that any xenomorph not from a human dies from aneurysms whenever one’s installed.

DARKRAZOR: Most likely something to do with brain mass, I’ll look into it- (She freezes, there is a moment of silence, Quake turns and looks over at her, shifting in the CR tank and letting his feet stick out.)

QUAKE: What? (She ignores him and clicks away at the keyboard, the screens turn off except for one which carries a static signal, as she types the robotic stems holding the monitors in a kind of dome around her move, they rearrange so all the monitors form one large screen in a grid, she continues to type, the single screen fizzles and all the other monitors come on, the clip rewinds, the joined monitors making a large veiwscreen, she is rewinding through a recording of the battle through a xenomorph’s xeno-cam, the screen stops and starts to play at regular speed.)

BRUTALLION: What is it? (She puts a finger up to her lip and watches, the other hand has a finger centered over a key, they watch in silence, there is no sound with the clip, the camera shifts from one side to the other as the xenomorph looks around, it has two other xenomorph on either side, the screen bounces as the xenomorph runs through the jungle, chasing a soldier, in the green irridecent light you catch glimpses of a horrified expression as the soldiers runs and glances back, he draws a pistol from his belt and fires like mad, the xenomorph to the direct left is hit in the head and falls, the soldier isn’t watching, he trips on a root, landing on his back, the xenomorph running to the right speeds in front of the camera and leaps on top of the soldier, Quake and Brutallion watch intently as the xenomorph raises a gnarled hand into the air, there is a bright flash of light and the xenomorph begins to jerk its head for a moment as the silhouette of the attack is painted in electric green and black, Darkrazor freezes the image, pounding the key into the keyboard.)

QUAKE: Hey! It was just getting good! (on the screen, the image of the xenomorph on top of the soldier is distorted by movement, the flash has faded slightly.)

DARKRAZOR: Quiet! I know this flash. (She begins to type, all the monitors go black except for one toward the top right, that screen disintegrates and materializes as the whole view, the view is badly distorted, she clicks some keys and it focuses, it is a group of robots, a tree is partially blocking the view but it looks as though a beam of energy is coming from the group and striking, a form masked by a fallen tree, she clicks some keys and the monitors flash to IR, most of the screen is blue and black except for bodies and residual heat from impacts.) The form being fired upon is Phoenix. (Brutallion is about to talk when she hisses at him, she turns back and points at the firing group.) A few transformers are in that group, one is under the tree. (The beam of energy is illuminated bright white.) I believe that this is turbine generated plasma discharge.

QUAKE: So what!? Just tell us what’s going on! (She fiercely types some more and the screen goes back to night vision, then all the monitors black out except for one at the upper left, the monitor goes to all the monitors, it is once again blurred, she doesn’t bother to focus but zooms in again just above and to the left of the origin of the shot, the full screen is badly distorted, she types of a few keys and proudly turns around as the computer focuses.)

DARKRAZOR: This, my brothers, is a new card in the stack. (The camera shows the monitors, on the screen, half blocked by a tree branch but clearly evident, is Drone’s image, his face in almost full view from the side.) A joker has been dealt.

QUAKE: A traitor?

BRUTALLION: He is firing on Phoenix?

DARKRAZOR: A completely unprovoked attack, the Viruses are not allowed to attack the Predacons, so, Tarantulus’s ‘loyal’ soldier Drone, must have been attacking in reaction to something else. (Quake snaps his fingers.)

QUAKE: He was helping the Maximals. (Darkrazor nods, her brothers stare at the face on the monitor, Drone’s face has an expression of rage.)

BRUTALLION: Should we tell Tarantulus?

DARKRAZOR: No, I have a feeling he’s hiding something from us as well, something to do with the hybrid experiment. (They look at each other in a moment of silence, Quake and Brutallion then nod in agreement.)

QUAKE: Can we finish watching the clip now?

The_Rest