Matrices: Part 1
A fanfic by Bill T. Taylor
a.k.a. RedStreak
The triple suns began to set in that alien sky. Over the vast, seemingly boundless tracks of blue alien forest they sank, the sky growing dimmer as the first of the three dipped below the horizon. Amid it all, there was one sole, barren spot; a glade that resembled more of a wasteland than a glade with a great stone monument at its heart. About it was a graveyard of bones, the bones of the natives of this world, drawn to the site by the forces within it only to die with arms outstretched toward it.
Within the temple-like structure, in a chamber lit by a single shaft of light, it sat. On its stone altar it had waited patiently, an artifact that was alien even to this place and planet. The dull yellow-orange light emanating from its core suddenly brightened, pulsing as it grew almost blood red in color. Its time had come.
Roughly a billion miles away a spacecraft was approaching, a courier ship it was for an isolated race whose origins lay beyond this system. The two occupants piloting the ship were up front in the main command dome, the cargo room left unattended. Numerous crates, strapped and secured, remained silent…all except one. One crate, deep violet in color, rattled. A groan came from it and then, with the piercing shriek of metal being torn apart, a sharp sword thrust up through it. Two giant hands then struck out, widening the tear.
“So Berrog,” one of the four-tentacled pilots said to his counterpart, “what’s on today’s agenda?”
Berrog, as he was so-named, pushed a button, a flat-screen monitor with alien icons popping up in a roster chart. “Let’s see…running through the Nel’Gorna system en route to Gorgon Six before we double-back to Screenus.” Berrog shuttered, his tentacles quivering from their two finger-tips to his purple body. “Nel’Gorna…ugh…I hate this place. Supposed to be ‘haunted’ or some glob like that.”
“Haunted?” the first alien wheeze-snorted at the idea, “Please! Just a few primitive planets and some spooked-up space tales! There’s nothing scary here!”
The wide console before them cracked, electrical bolts tingling across the command bay. The two aliens’ cyclopic eyes widened – a giant sword was now embedded in their computer! Nervously, they glanced back….
Giant hands clasped each of the aliens’ throats, lifting them off their chairs completely. The face of a Decepticon greeted them, smirking as the brute loomed over them, more than twice the size of the puny pair. “Nothing scary…except, perhaps, me!” smiled Blitzwing.
Outside, a pair of purple blotches squirted against the glass bubble – what remained of Berrog and company after being popped like peas. Minutes later, the courier ship’s engine section exploded. The vessel began tearing itself apart by some unknown means. Then, as it ripped to pieces…a small spherical pod jettisoned, flying off toward the second world of the Nel’Gorna system.
Later still, that same pod lay with hatch open and left abandoned as dawn came over the blue-green forest. Growling, Blitzwing overlooked what supplies he had managed to steal from the craft he stowed away on. It wasn’t much: a small cache of neutron fuel cells, some power packs, and a box of optronic circuit panels. The Decepticon frowned upon it all.
“Errrr! Lousy aliens!” he growled, kicking the box over, the useless circuit panels flying out, “Damn it! I’m stranded…again!” Blitzwing knelt down, taking one of the power packs in hand. Opening a compartment in his upper arm, he plugged it in. He sat there, soaking as much of it in as possible as he sulked.
“Lousy Galvatron…he’s to blame for this,” Blitzwing mumbled to himself, “I find ‘em walking into a Quintesson trap blind, like his optics got ripped outta him! And what did I get for helping him?” Raising up his arms, Blitzwing yelled out, his voice booming over the forest, “EXHILE FROM THE DECEPTICONS!”
His voice caused whole flocks of reptilian birds to take flight, squawking fearfully. Blitzwing took some delight in evoking fear in organic creatures, but it was hardly satisfying. He was bitter, bitter about trusting Galvatron with his loyalty as he once had for Megatron, only to have it flung back in his face. For three years now he’d been living not like a proud Decepticon warrior but a scavenger, a dog of metal pirating ships at the fringes of the galaxy.
Ripping out the power pack, he flung the drained unit to the ground. “If only there was a way….”
Blitzwing…
“Huh?” He swore he heard something.
Blitzwing…
Blitzwing pulled out his sword, feeling agitated. He heard it more clearly this time and turned in the direction the voice came from…but there was no one. “Who is it?” the Decepticon demanded to know, but only one word was returned.
Blitzwing…
There was something odd in that sound, a seductive power in that voice. Initially Blitzwing was hesitant, on edge, but the voice was calling to him…him alone. With sword in hand he cut his way through the forest, drawn instinctively toward it.
Finally he saw the great alien shrine, set in its glade of death. Blitzwing…I lay within, it called to him. Here the voice was stronger, and it seemed to emanate from the shrine-temple indeed. Blitzwing, seeing stairs going up the side of the temple but no entrance large enough to accommodate a transformer, knew he’d have to make an entrance of his own. He transformed to tank form, his turret swinging about and aiming dead center. With all the strength and power he could muster, he blasted out a hole into the stone.
Rubble fell as Blitzwing reverted back to robotic form. He groaned, the transformation taking a lot out of him. Looking up, gazing through the great crater he carved out of the shrine’s side, he saw what was calling him. It was laced with black metal, shaped much like the frame of the Autobot Matrix of Leadership, but at its heart a diamond core with a deep red light pulsing within.
A face of joy seemed to come to Blitzwing’s face. “Yes…yes. I understand now!” he spoke to some silent, invisible partner. Despite his weakness, he stood up and walked toward the stone altar where it rested. “You were taken…taken from Primus himself so long ago. Left here,” he said, now standing before it, reaching out with his hands, “all alone, cold. Heh…now….”
Willingly, Blitzwing opened his spark chamber, his chest folding down. He slid the device inside himself, its diamond core opening and wrapping around his spark. It bonded, a renewed flame inside it as it radiated like some great eye breathed in flame. Blitzwing groaned in pain, but knew something great was bestowed upon him now.
“Now,” he groaned, his voice deepening, “We shall both have our revenge!”
One moment, the shrine stood there in its glade as it had for prior centuries. In the next, a great burst of red-violet light erupted out. An explosion of energy radiated out in a dome, consuming the shrine, glade, and a section of the surrounding forest. Everything laid to waste…and yet one darkened figure stood at the center, a visor-like eye glowing bright red. It bolted to the sky, leaving this world to seek a greater destiny.
Parsecs away, RedStreak, Hot Rod, Kup, Ultra Magnus, and numerous other Autobots were undergoing the retrofit to Metroplex at Autobot City on Earth. The old city had taken its share of damage over the years, and a new paint job among other things was well-needed and well-deserved.
Kup, holding up a blue print, said to the others “Alright…a little to the left. A little bit more. No…wait, damn! This thing’s upside-down!”
“UGH!” Hot Rod gritted his titanium teeth. He and Ultra Magnus were carrying a large, gold-plated support column. It was heavy, even for two Autobots to lug around, causing much ire to be drawn toward Kup as he studied the schematics with difficulty. “FOR CRYING OUT LOUD, KUP! LET ME READ IT IF YOU CAN’T FIGURE IT OUT!”
“Hey watch your tone! I was head construction ‘bot on the Vericon Pavilon back in the old days!” Kup pointed out to the younger Autobot.
“That explains how it fell,” Hot Rod grumbled back.
Above, on one of Metroplex’s towers, Chip and RedStreak were working together to install a new communications tower. As RedStreak hovered above in flight mode Chip steadied the wire-suspended structure, trying to lock it to its base. “That’s good Red! Just hold it another minute while I weld it down….”
In a flash of agony, all the Autobots everywhere gasped. Kup, Hot Rod, and Ultra Magnus fell to their knees, grabbing at their heads growling and gritting their teeth. Above, RedStreak suddenly swerved wildly, the tower snapping off as he descended straight down with Chip standing above in bewilderment.
“RedStreak!” he cried out, but from his vantage point he saw not just RedStreak or Kup’s group…but absolutely everyone on the ground, grabbing their heads and groaning, yelling, and screaming in a searing spasm of pain. “Oh my God!” Chip uttered.
“AGH! WHAT…AGGGH!” Ultra Magnus tried to say, but the pain blurred all sentient thought. What seemed an eternity of torment to him passed in but a few seconds in reality. Wearily, the city commander got up, unsure of what just happened. He saw the same disorientation and disillusion in the others about. The Autobots in the city just stood in place, not sure what just transpired. “Let’s find Optimus Prime,” Ultra Magnus promptly suggested.
Within the command room of Autobot City, Optimus Prime himself began to stand upright, himself not spared the pain of the others. When Ultra Magnus, Chip, Hot Rod, and RedStreak came and asked “What happened?” Prime could only reply, “I…I do not know. Something intense…something violent…has happened somewhere. Something that may affect us all.”
“But what? Some kind of electrical storm in space, a quantum flux? What?” Chip asked eagerly as he sat inside RedStreak’s head.
“It is something else, for certain, something…impossible to explain in human words,” Prime told him. He paused a moment, then looked to the crowd. “Hot Rod, with me…to the Matrix chamber.”
“Matrix chamber?” Chip asked, uncertain to what they were referring. Hot Rod and Optimus Prime both rushed to into a secret panel that opened behind a console.
“The shell of the Matrix of Leadership,” RedStreak informed Chip, “They’re referring to the bay it’s still stowed away in. It may be empty…but it is still of value to us all.”
“Well dang it,” Chip said, “If it’s so important, we should know about it too!”
“Chip, we can’t just….” It was no use arguing; being a Headmaster Chip was able to forcefully direct RedStreak to the door before it sealed up, Ultra Magnus standing behind to watch. “Chip! We’re going to get into trouble!” RedStreak again tried to voice his protest, but his arms and legs were moving of Chip’s accord now.
Meanwhile Hot Rod and Optimus Prime, now in a small and somewhat cramp room hidden away within Autobot City, checked up on a shared source of greatness. Prime and Hot Rod pressed their hands against a panel simultaneously. Their hands were scanned, and the light above changed from red to green. The panel flipped around, and on the opposite side the Autobot Matrix of Leadership was revealed on a special mount.
Prime and Hot Rod heard another set of feet descending the stairs. RedStreak appeared, Hot Rod frowning and Optimus Prime turning toward him unhappily. “RedStreak! You know very well this is a highly-restricted room!”
“Tell that to Chip!” he said, tapping the side of his head, “He’s the one to blame for once!”
Optimus Prime groaned. Irritated and yet sympathetic, he said to both RedStreak and Chip, “I understand your concern…but this is something important. Bigger, bigger than Decepticons or anything else we’ve faced.”
“Indeed.” Prime and RedStreak both glanced to their left, a shimmer of blue light suddenly appearing before them all. An old Autobot, the mentor of Prime, appeared once more in his astral form.
“Alpha Trion?” Hot Rod said.
RedStreak looked to Hot Rod with wide eyes. “You can see him?”
Hot Rod readily replied, “Sure, but why you too?”
Inside RedStreak’s cerebral chamber, Chip sat at his console, seeing Hot Rod and Optimus Prime…but nothing else. He heard them talking, but with no one replying to them. “Say, what’s going on?” he asked, pushing buttons, trying to adjust RedStreak’s sensors.
“Alpha Trion,” Prime addressed the ghost of his creator, “can you explain what just happened? What was it the Autobots just felt?”
“Yeah, it was like searing hot slag got poured into my circuits!” Hot Rod said.
“You felt the pain of the Matrix…the pain all Auotbots share,” Alpha Trion explained in vague words, “Through the Matrix did you all experience it, and through the past it returns to haunt us once again.”
“Something…from out past is haunting us? But what?” asked RedStreak.
Prime also asked a question, following up on RedStreak’s notion. “Yes, are you saying something we, as Autobots, did is the source? What is it?”
Withdrawing, diminishing slightly in his glow, Alpha Trion answered, “The source is the Matrix itself…an echo of its dark side. The answers lie with both our enemies and our progenitors, but be warned! Let not the torn half of the Matrix of Leadership rejoin…least the All-Spark be shattered.” With that, Alpha Trion just disappeared. The Autobots looked on.
“Torn half of the Matrix?” RedStreak asked, looking to Prime.
“And the answers lie with both our enemies and…progenitors?” Hot Rod also said, looking to Optimus for answers as well.
Prime folded his arms in front of his chest, thinking. “Hmmm,” he mumbled to himself, “Were the knowledge of the Matrix still directly available to us, I’d consult its wisdom…but the Matrix’s wisdom is beyond us. Offhand, I don’t have a clue what Alpha Trion said about a ‘torn half’ to the Matrix…but as for our enemies….”
“Decepticons,” Hot Rod quickly said, balling up a fist at the thought.
“But…what did he mean by progenitors though, Prime?” asked RedStreak.
“I have only one guess,” stated Optimus Prime, “Quintessons. Given how they forged us and how secretive their race as a whole is…I wouldn’t doubt they know more about us than any other race in existence.” Prime then slammed his fist into his hand, declaring, “Alright, we’ll have to move out. RedStreak, Hot Rod, you go up and tell Ultra Magnus to set up two teams for a search party. I’ll join you two shortly.”
As the others returned upstairs, Prime glanced back at the still-shimmering shell of the Matrix of Leadership. Even when emptied, it gave off a faint glow. “…be warned!” he recalled Alpha Trion’s warning, “Let not the torn half of the Matrix of Leadership rejoin.” Prime heeded the warning, a need to protect the Matrix.
When Prime left, the former mount lay empty.
The Decepticons reconnoitered on Char, wounded yet strong in spirit and force even without Zarak and Scorpinok among their ranks. As Galvatron maintained his vigil atop Trypticon’s snout, overlooking his minions’ work, he knew he preferred it that way. Though as traitorous as Starscream, Zarak was the only one, even in all the millennia he lived as Megatron, that could truly be second only to him in cunning. Now, no one will be able to challenge or defy me again, the lord of Decepticons thought.
Scourge, Apeface, Six-Shot, and Mindwipe were all digging up junk in the ground, literally too. “Ugh! Some job this is!” Scourge complained, “Digging up useless, ancient rubble! If it didn’t save the extinct people of Char eons ago, what good is it to us?”
“More good than your complaining!” Mindwipe snarled as he spoke.
Thunder echoed from the sky. A hailstorm of laser fire ravaged the Decepticon excavation area, the Decepticons either falling to the ground or ducking as something massive swooped over them all. Scourge and Mindwipe both looked up, watching as a huge, turbo-charged jet grazed the thin clouds above before circling around.
“What is that thing?” Galvatron yelled out, he and Trypticon both gazing out.
“The new lord of Decepticons!” a deep voice emanated from the jet. As the jet dove steep at the jagged hills below, it transformed, the nosecone folding back as thick, armored arms and legs jutted out with a massive, triple-barreled turret clinging to the new transfomer’s back. There was much malice in the face it bore, malice and pride. The proclaimed Decepticon lord smugly looked down upon the others.
Scourge, looking up, muttered, “No…it can’t be!”
Galvatron recognized him immediately. “BLITZWING!” he yelled angrily. Instantly he flung himself in his direction, charging his cannon as he came towards the rogue Decepticon. “I warned you never to return to us, Blitzwing,” Galvatron stringently said in his growling voice, “and now you DARE to claim leadership? BAH! Now you shall die!” With that, Galvatron aimed his cannon square at the confident Decepticon, an explosion erupting on the hills.
There was a minute when time stood still. Then, when the dust started to clear, Blitzwing stepped forward, unscathed. “You are as pathetic now as you were when you first came to us, Galvatron,” Blitzwing boldly spoke, “Now I have returned to depose you, and return us to true glory!” Blitzwing raised up his arms, blasters mounted to each of his forearms. Graciously he returned fire…with a fore ten fold that of Galvatron.
“AGGGGH!” Galvatron slammed into a mountainside, the face of it cracking deeply. Blitzwing watched as Galvatron fell off, thudding weakly on the mountainside. Sensing his moment, he leapt skyward…reaching Galvatron’s side in a single bound. His hand reached down and grappled Galvatron by the neck, hoisting him up as his former leader gagged.
“Unicron made you well,” Blitzwing smiled at Galvatron’s surprising endurance, “But not well enough to stand against a true Decepticon. Not even your vile master can help you now.”
Galvatron’s rage reached its boiling point. As he hung by his neck, Blitzwing’s hand like a vice, he clenched his own fists. “I…HAVE NO MASTER!” With his right arm he shoved his gold-plated cannon directly at Blitzwing’s torso plate…and fired.
Galvatron was flung free, Blitzwing’s chest torn apart. The freed Decepticon looked up, initially with a smile, but now a cowering frown of dread replaced it. Blitzwing, although ravaged, was not dead. From his chest a faint red light glittered…at his heart, a sight that made even the maniacal, indomitable Galvaron quake.
“No…it can’t be! You…the Quintesssons said they….”
“No,” Blitzwing’s voice rumbled as he gazed upon the weakened Galvatron, “The Quintessons never possessed our Matrix of Leadership…but now…I DO!” From the wound in his chest, the device that was now one with the triple-changer blasted out a beam of deadly light.
Galvatron was once more flung back into the rockside, pinned as he silently twitched like a bug with a pin getting shoved through it. Then, when his limbs went dead, Blitzwing willed his Matrix to stop, letting Galvatron thud to the ground. The old tyrant was dead, his metal already turning black and gray in the dust.
Blitzwing turned around, a massive audience of Decepticons before him. “SEE THE POWER THAT I POSSESS! BY THE WILL OF THE MATRIX, I AM YOUR LEADER!” Smirking, noting the doubtful, still bitter eyes on him, he added one more thing. “And…to those of you that…doubt me.”
A wave of dark red light swept down from the mountainside, sweeping out over the already devastated fields of Char. A shockwave of the dark energy flung the numerous Decepticons like mere toys, scattering them away. The greatest among them, Trypticon, held his ground for a few minutes longer, but he, too, was flung back by the immeasurable shockwave, crashing backwards into a mountain nearly ten kilometers away.
Scourge dug his way out of a rock pile, he and every other Decepticon in pain. Once out, he managed to ask, “W-What did he s-s-say his name was?”
Blitzwing, sweeping down from the sky, loomed over Scourge as he could only gaze up at him. “Blitzkarion Prime!” the new Decepticon leader said.
From Cybertron Skylynx and Fortress Maximus soared out into space. Onboard Skylynx, Optimus Prime, RedStreak and Chip, Brainstrom and Arcana, Hardhead and Duros, Blaster, and Perceptor sat, their shuttle-bot ferrying them off to the depths of the galaxy. Fortress Maximus, with Hot Rod and Firebolt, Highbrow and Gort, Quickswitch, and naturally Cerebros and Spike, took an entirely different direction…to Char.
“You’re sure of this Prime?” Hot Rod asked him via the com-link.
“It’s the only way. I doubt the Decepticons will tell us much to be honest, but if we’re dealing with a force great enough to stir the All-Spark, dealing with Decepticons is but a minor nuisance,” stated Optimus Prime.
“Good luck Quintesson hunting!” Hot Rod smiled through the monitor.
“Indeed,” was all Prime replied. Clicking off the com-link, Optimus Prime said aloud, “Skylynx, take us out.”
“Roger Prime!” In his shuttle form, Skylynx’s engines fired up, emitting a cool blue flame. “To the edge of the galaxy…and beyond!” he declared, vanishing in a flash.
On Char, Blitzkarion Prime assumed his place, all other Decepticons reluctantly (if not fearfully) accepting his role. Of them all, only Cyclonus expressed any true disregard for their new, ‘Prime’ leader.
Sitting on his throne within Trypticon, Blitzkarion activated his holo-projector com-link. “Astrotrain, where is Cyclonus? He was to have reported in a megacycle ago!”
Nervously, Astrotrain replied, “Uh…err…I…don’t know Blitzwing!”
“THAT’S PRIME, YOU SPACE SCOWL!” Blitzkarion bellowed.
The holographic image of Astrotrain fumbled. “Right, right! Prime! Yes Prime! Uh, as far as I know Cyclonus was last reported in sector nine three, finishing his scout patrol. After that, we dunno.”
Blitzkarion narrowed his eyes at Astrotrain. “I’m making it your priority to find him, Astrotrain. Bring him before me…or else.” The Decepticon nodded repeatedly, the holographic image fading.
Scourge approached, walking on eggshells before the ‘Prime’ leader. “Blitzwin…I mean…Blitzkarion! There’s something you should know…an Autobot presence is entering the system! Fortress Maximus as far as we can deduce.”
“Excellent,” Blitzkarion said delightedly, “Let them land where they please.”
Scourge’s eyes widened. “Has that ‘Matrix’ of yours made you insane? We’re talking Fortress Maximus…the biggest damn Autobot ever! How can you just….”
Blitzkarion Prime stood upright, his cold glare on Scourge. “I said let them land. Must I explain myself to you…Scourge?”
Scourge shook his head. “N-N-No Prime. I’ll order the others to stand down should they approach Char.”
A smile returned to the Decepticon commander’s face. “Much better. Now, go to the storage hanger…I have need of some oiling.”
Roughly a hundred odd kilometers away, on the far side of the mountain range where Blitzkarion announced himself, Cyclonus flew down, carrying with him the body of Galvatron. Daring even the wrath of the dark Matrix-bearer, he had left patrol to find his one true leader’s remains…desiring to restore them.
“You can not be dead, Galvatron,” Cyclonus said to the inert body before him, “You are indestructible…no one can destroy you, impossible! Blitzwing be damned once I find a way to restore you…I swear it!”
There was a noise in the air. Cyclonus turned in its direction, eyeing a gray and purple shuttle hovering along the mountain range. “Astrotrain,” he muttered upon recognizing the Decepticon, “No doubt seeking me out for our ‘Prime leader’. Bah. He never had any backbone of his own.” He grabbed Galvatron once again, stowing him under a barely noticeable ledge in the mountainside. “There…he will not find you here my leader. Cyclonus shall return for you, I swear it!”
Astrotrain veered around the peaks until Cyclonus finally appeared out of nowhere. “Finally! Blitzwing…Blizkarron…or whatever is looking for you; wants to ‘talk’ with you personally.”
“Whatever; my duties took me away from my usual patrol is all,” Cyclonus muttered an excuse. He transformed and flew alongside the shuttle, both zooming toward Trypticon in the distance.
Above, Hot Rod and Cerebros watched on the monitor at the pair of Decepticons flying out. “Astrotrain and Cyclonus,” Hot Rod stated, “Where they are Galvatron and the other Decepticons must be as well.”
Cerebros looked to Hot Rod, suggesting, “We’d better land on the opposite side of the mountain range to avoid being seen directly. Even with Maximus, we’d be outgunned by a longshot.”
“Yeah,” Spike added from inside Cerebros, “I’d rather not go one hundred Decepticons against eight Autobots, with or without the big FM.”
“A stealth run is hardly my style, but what the Pit?” Hot Rod said.
Fortress Maximus hovered over the mountains for a minute, then began to drift down. The blue and white city faded from the view of one Prime. Blitzkarion chuckled to himself, “Yes, excellent” as the Autobots left his telescopic view. “Optimus Prime will come, certainly for Fortress Maximus if none other. Yes, he’d make an excellent hostage.”
As Blitzkarion Prime stood, Scourge, standing behind him as a large platoon of Decepticons waited at the base of the hill, spoke up at his leader’s words. “Fortress Maximus…hostage? Blitzkarion, you have more than one screw loose in your….”
A fiery gaze met Scourge from the Prime’s eyes, one that silenced him immediately. “Optimus will come,” Blitzkarion said, reverting his gaze back to the mountains, “and with him, he’ll bring the Autobot Matrix I desire. Heh heh…part of me knows it.” He patted his chest, feeling his own Matrix swelling in anticipation.
Skylynx was on a hot trail. Ahead of him, a small, corkscrew-shaped craft tried to desperately speed away. Both turned and swerved with uncanny ability, a match for a match. But still the Auotbot shuttle was no closer to its objective no matter how many tricks and twists he pulled.
“These Quintessons are a slippery lot! I can’t catch up with it!” Skylynx said.
“Then let me!” RedStreak said. Skylynx opened the shuttle doors, a ruby red starfighter flying out. He accelerated ahead, bursting ahead of the Quintesson vessel. He doubled-back, zeroing in on the ship as he flew head-on. “Chip, ready the laser! Target anything that looks like a navigational grid.”
“On it,” Chip replied. He activated the penetrating scanners, getting a technical read-out on the Quintessons. Whistling, he said, “Man…even High-Q’s science is getting a run for its money here! The Quintessons must be eons ahead of everyone!”
“Hurray for them…now come on! This may be our only shot at stopping them!”
Chip managed to isolate a few systems, but still everything was a jumble. “Damn, I still can’t get a solid scan. But what the heck.” Putting a finger on the screen console, he traced out system by system. “Enie…meanie…minee…moe!” he said, hoping the age-old human trick would work, “There…this one…I hope!” He grabbed a joystick and turned to another console with a targeting grid.
The laser on the underside of the nosecone swiveled into place. RedStreak swooped, speeding over the alien hull with all its curves and knotches. A pulse fired, slicing into one specific port. A larger explosion ruptured, the Quintesson vessel loosing maneuverability fast as black smoke sputtered from the hit. Finally, with its engines dead, Skylynx manage to match speed, rendezvousing with the downed alien craft.
“Well that seemed easy enough,” Brainstorm said, watching the image of the Quintesson craft nearing them.
Sailing alongside Skylynx came RedStreak. Onboard, Chip watched the scene play out…but something seemed amiss. “Wait a minute,” he muttered, peering at one monitor. There was a blur of some form on it, a distortion. “RedStreak, zero in on those coordinates. What’s that over….”
Before the Autobots, a far larger, saucer-shaped vessel, materialized. Chip, gulping down the lump in his throat, choked out “…there.”
A half dozen turrets were trained on the Auotbot vessels, the small Quintesson vessel still drifting ahead of them. Then, directly before Skylynx and RedStreak, a giant semi-transparent hologram was projected from the larger Quintesson ship. A giant head with two narrow eyes set is wide sockets glared at them bitterly.
“Autobots, by firing on one of our own craft, you have declared war upon the great Quintesson Imperium!” spoke the Quintesson over the air-waves, “I, Lor-Gavvon of the Scientists, on behalf the great council of Quinton…declare you our prisoners of war.”
“Aw crap,” mutter Duros from inside Hardhead.
Immediately Skylynx and RedStreak did an about-face, firing thrusters to run away. However, a giant yellow-green beam targeted them both. Caught in its path, both Autobots froze in place…rendered immobile by the Quintessons’ potent technology.
“A tractor beam! It’s nullifying our propulsion systems!” Perceptor declared.
“Really, what ever gave you that idea?” Hardhead growled sarcastically to Perceptor. Suddenly, the beam penetrated within Skylynx’s cabin. It changed from yellow-green to dark green, and in that move all the Autobots started to wail in pain. Groaning, Hardhead muttered, “Agh! Can’t…move…dunno…what’s going on!”
In minutes, all the Autobots were rendered unconscious and suspended in stasis lock, along with their Nebulon Headmasters. Only Chip, onboard RedStreak, remained fully conscious to watch as the tractor beam pulled them in. A large hanger opened in the side of the Quintesson saucer, a smaller one to the side opening to accept the damaged Quintesson ship with a side beam towing it in as well. Like a great maw it swallowed the Autobots, a shadow falling on Chip within RedStreak’s darkened cockpit.
“Oh no! The Autobots are doomed!” Chip groaned.
To Be Continued….