All Plans Ascew
Chapter 1
Authors
notes....: To make my fics work a bit better, the TM2 tech was used to clone
Dinobot before the end of season 2, probably around the time of Transmutate.
Also, other than the TM2 clone Dinobot and Blackarachnia, there are no
transmetals. And Megs has not figured out how to turn an already existing 'bot
into a TM, only construct them ala the clone (thus it sort of makes sense how BA
screwed herself up and needed to be reprogrammed as a Maximal when she tried to
TM2 herself.) This just makes that TM2 device of some unknown origin (where'd
they get that thing, anyway?) more of an advantage to whatever side that holds
it, (if they can figure it out).
Other than this, I
try to keep things fairly consistent with the show, but I can't guarantee anything.
And of course, BW and all its characters belong to the evil overlords at hasbro, and to other such bloated icons of consumerist madness.
Of Time, Space, and Grouchy Robots...
The stars reeled, spun; a kaleidoscope of horror through the windows
of a wildly careening shuttlecraft. A smashed, sundered vessel destined for a
very, very, hard landing.
A lone robot worked feverishly, trying to regain control. Even her
thoughts came in gasps:
Stupid...piece
of...slag! I was...NEVER...meant to be...a pilot! Curse that...bloody
thing...blew me out of the sky...
Into her mind flashed a vision of the bizarre monument that had
blasted her ship with a thundering burst of energy...
She had never known of the danger.
It had started innocently enough...A simple mission to what was
either a small moon or a large asteroid orbiting the nearby planet, Eterix 5. An
unknown metal had been detected there and she was to go out and bring back a
sample for testing.
Hardly even a challenge...
Only when she got within range for a visual, she discovered the
strange metal was not found within the natural crevices and formations of the
moon, rather it had been shaped already by forces unseen. A large pinnacle,
adorned with many strange signs, towered over the bare rock on which it stood.
She wondered how it had cropped up there, for all the nearby
planets were bereft of intelligent life. Alas, she did not have any great length
of time to ponder it--for in the next moment it fired, tearing her vessel from
its course; sending it spiraling into space...
That was when some sort of hole opened up in the fabric of space
itself, its rippling mouth gaping ominously...In hardly a nanoclick, it had
swallowed her small shuttle whole and spewed it out into another place, another
time...
And directly onto a crash course with some sort of cloudy
blue-green planet.
She was jerked back to the reality of the present as she realized
that her only two crewmates were standing behind her, watching her frenzied
efforts. Vaguely she heard a familiar, sultry, female voice ask with eerie
calmness:
"We're finished, aren't we?"
*
* * *
Nominated for Best Battle Sequence '03
All Plans Ascew
Chapter 2
A
Dilema Spirals Downward...
Utterly
ridiculous...I, a veteran of the great war, a machine built purely for the
purposes of battle...Dead on a mining mission to discover new metals for my
defeated kind...Ah, I would never have signed up if it were not a mission with a
subtext.
Energon.
To
seek and discover...Another sort of war, only now undercover.
Had
their ideas not run so close with mine...I would not meet now with this demise.
Was
it really--such hope!--destined to cross the path of doom? Perhaps...
But
if I had let slip this trying chance...What then?
There
was the rush of air, the blaze of red hot fire. Friction wrapped itself around
the offending object, smiting it with burning blast, before--ere long--it was no
more.
My
ambitions yet ran too deep. Trying, for ages on end, to rekindle a lost flame.
Like
all my race and creed, I had my chance. If only we had been somehow
stronger...Fought somehow better, longer. Alas, carpe diem did not ring true for
us! At least not then.
My
only want was that it would sound again, for myself and the rest. That this lost
last cause would be our best.
War!
Forever,
ever more.
'Til
I met with that end in honor, the very thing which so many of my people sought
and would yet seek if the chance should take wing again, even after all these
wasted ages.
This
chance I would have given them, should it have been given to me.
It
was simply not to be.
*
* * *
Had
this been a sport, the move would have been brilliant.
The
large--almost egg-shaped--craft hit the slightly convex, sandy, cliffside and
scooted down it as though it were a ramp. It proceeded to skitter across the
dusty valley and up a jutting piece of rock that spurred over the lip of a
nearby canyon. At the end of the flat-faced pinnacle, it hit an upright--rather
tooth-like--slab that that fired it backwards, head over non-existent heels. The
slab, uprooted, shot off into the recesses of the energon-filled depths below...
The ship smashed down onto its own back-end with a mighty fireball, no doubt due
to the engine being violently rent in two.
As
though committing a final bow, it abruptly flopped down onto the ground at the
nearby pinnacle's base.
Hollowed
by fiery blast, pummeled by rock and earth, but still triumphantly whole.
*
* * *
Optimus
Primal watched the object's descent into his territory. It was no stasis
pod...Had Cybertron found them at last? He hoped it was so, but he knew it could
be otherwise.
He
would send a small team out for reconnaissance. If there were living maximals,
he would send out more 'bots and they would do all they could to save them...If
there were living predicons, this could prove an hour of bad news indeed. Even
if they did not automatically side with Megatron, there was very little chance
they would ever side with the maximals. If there was nothing left alive, this
was but a race for good spare parts.
Either
way, it was something of a waiting game...For now.
*
* * *
Megatron
had not been having a gook week...First Blackarachnia had stolen his TM2 device
and defected...Then a stasis pod had landed practically beside his base...Only
it was a blank, sparkless, protoform. Entirely useless.
If
he had known what was to come next, he would have shut himself up in his
quarters, taken a nice long energon bath, and tried to forget this world
existed.
*
* * *
"Megatron-there's
something here and I think you should--"
Rampage
got no further, as something large and very explosive crashed into his
side...Followed by another, and another. Blasts from wrist-mounted energy
cannons pummeled him until he dropped to ground, turning, his back to the
energon-filled canyon below.
"Arise!"
Commanded his adversary.
The
voice was new too him. Female, yet lacking in screechiness... Rather it was low,
melodious somehow, with an odd inflection. Not an earthling accent, exactly,
just a small, strange, mannerism. R's emphasized, nearly rolled; harmonious with
a hint of the guttural.
Alone
she stood, her only two crewmates knocked off-line by the crash. She herself was
rather damaged, yet entirely unafraid.
"Who
ARE you? And why do you fire at me--we are both Predicons!" Rampage
demanded in return.
"I
would fire at any who served the one you serve. I heard you alert that foul
criminal!...If you would know the name of your reaper, it is Trowena...Now
fight, foolish miscreant! Be valiant in this battle, for it shall be your
last."
"I
am not with Megatron by choice...I hate him, in all likelihood moreso than you
do. He holds me in a perverse thralldom, with my experimental spark as
captive..." Rampage replied.
Trowena
lowered her sword, drawn in haste as she had prepared to terminate him. An
experiment? How familiar that was!
"In
my day, I too was an experiment...My self in its entirety, my spark included,
was engineered for the purposes of the Great War. I was one of the first
Predicons! Abandoned by my creator, for I had one flaw...Thankfully it was later
fixed...Yet still..."
Here
her voice trailed off, for she knew not what she wished to say. Rampage looked
up at her, meeting her gaze. No more words were needed.
"Help
me..." Rampage said with a sort of desperation. "Help me be rid of
him...My spark is already doomed to corruption, could it not at least be my
own?"
"Upon
my honor, it shall be." Trowena answered, not quite knowing what prompted
her to do
so.
She
had hardly finished before a laser beam erupted into her back, sending her
flying. Her sword sprung from her hand and landed at Megatron's feet, just as the
Predicon leader stepped out from the cover of a nearby stand of thick jungle.
Beside him, the horrifying form of TM2 Dinobot loomed ominously.
"How
very touching, my dear Rampage,
yesssss. Such a terrible pity, to be owned
as you are. Poor crazed killing machine, too dim to realize he needs to be
controlled thusly."
In
a sudden moment of unbridled hatred, Rampage madly fired his plasma gun at
Megatron. It was a move that was essentially nullified as it began, for TM2
Dinobot wasted no time in proceeding to torture his spark. For a moment, Rampage
was paralyzed...Yet slowly, impossibly, he managed to squeeze his finger back
down onto the trigger. All the inner pain and horror that crazed transmetal put
him through did not prevent another rain of energy from tearing at Megatron.
Enraged,
the Predicon leader picked up the nearby sword and hurled it at the offending
minion. He meant only to cut the gun from his hand, but his aim was off and the
blade imbedded itself deep into Rampage's chest plate, insofar that it sliced
clean through him, the tip bursting out from his back.
Just
then Trowena arose, badly charred but still functional. She grabbed the giant
automatic rifle that was strapped to her back and began riddling Megatron with
innumerable points of hot lead. In return, he fired a missile; whose path she
quickly leapt from. The blast was so massive it knocked Megatron backwards...And
the other 3 robots flew, like so much crumpled debris, into the energon-filled
canyon below.
This
first explosion was nothing to scoff at, but it was the second that truly lit up
the sky.
TM2
Dinobot had landed on Rampage, driving the sword already imbedded in him
furiously downward...Directly sundering a cube of otherwise stable energon.
If
Rampage had not taken the full force of the explosion, TM2 Dinobot would have
been so much TM2 dust.
As
it was, he was horrendously damaged, literally blown back up on to the ledge
from whence he had come.
And
Rampage was no more, having added an entirely new dimension to the word scrapped.
Trowena
had been at the opposite end of the canyon, but it had not spared her much. She
hauled herself back towards the cliff face, sparks from her own exposed systems
showering down upon her.
On
the ledge above, Megatron threw what was left of his TM2 creation over his
shoulder and turned to leave the scene, muttering:
"Fool...Dead
trying to save that which would never return the favor...Ah, the quaint
ignorance of the self-sacrificing..."
And
yet, inwardly, Megatron was not so smug...He had, by his own hand, lost the very
powerful Rampage, and was most likely going to lose TM2 Dinobot as well...If
only he had still possessed that TM2 device, perhaps he have could re-constructed
the clone...His mind whirred away as he wondered if possibly, using some more
Dinobot DNA and the scant knowledge he had gained from the alien device, he
could rebuild his creation...Yes, perhaps...perhaps he could even make use of
that blank protoform that had earlier been a disappointment to him.
The
last thing TM2 Dinobot saw as he went off-line was the mysterious warrior that
they had been fighting haul her incredibly badly damaged self over the cliff
edge, her claws scraping desperately upon stone.
She
shot her white-hot eye-beams with the last of her energy, but Megatron had run
too far...
The
look on her face was one of pure Death as a single word rang out across the
plateau:
"COOOWWAAAARDS!!!!!"
*
* * *