[Video] One grumpy Seeker, coming up...

[the_other_green_seeker]

[Hello, Haven. Now appearing on your comms is a probably familiar form, though with a very unfamiliar paint job. Maybe Thundercracker or Starscream decided to try a new look?

Nope. Once this new Seeker speaks, it's clear that he's a stranger. A new arrival most likely. Whoever he is, though, he's clearly not very happy.]

Alright. I heard the story from the drone. Or Acolyte, or whatever the frag they're called. But can anybody out there tell me what the Pit is actually going on here? And why I've suddenly gained an extra, glowing brand that I don't recognize on my arm?

Because if this is all some kind of overly-elaborate joke or some Quintesson's latest idea on how to mess with us, someone is gonna get it...

Comments

[notyourblueangel]

. . . yeah, all right, that makes sense. The Autobots have Cybertron, though? When did that happen?

[He looks at the younger Seeker as the thought really hits him.]

What time are you from? Ahead of me, apparently.

[the_other_green_seeker]

[Jadewing nods, looking a little uncomfortable. Slag, he was going to have to drop the bombshell he'd been dreading fairly soon, wouldn't he?]

Earth year is currently 2006 where I'm from. And the Autobots regained control of Cybertron after the attack by Unicron about a year previous.

We- the Decepticons, that is- were basically forced off Earth in the early 2000's, and retreated to Cybertron. The Autobots went on to build several new bases, one on Earth, named Autobot City, which was designed primarily to generate energy, and two more on two of Cybertron's moons, with the equally uncreative names of Moonbase 1 and Moonbase 2, from which they planned to launch an assault to retake Cybertron.

They thought we didn't know about the Moonbases, but they'd actually been discovered fairly early on. Megatron just left them alone for intelligence gathering purposes. Which was how he found out about a supply run to Autobot City and decided to take advantage of it.

The plan was for Megatron and a team of his best warriors to hijack the shuttle in flight and use it to slip past Autobot City's defense systems, where they'd then destroy the base itself and all the Autobots in it. The first part of the plan went off without a hitch. They captured the shuttle, killed the crew, and made it past the City's defenses. The rest of it, though... didn't go quite so smoothly.

[He pauses there both to let Thundercracker comment and to put off the inevitable. He really isn't looking forward to having to inform Thundercracker of his death....]

[notyourblueangel]

Unicron? As in the Chaos-Bringer!?

[Surely not the entity himself. Someone just using his name, maybe? A namesake? Because otherwise…wow… He listened to the rest, nodding.]

So what happened?

[the_other_green_seeker]

[nods]

The very same. Though I'll get into that a little further on.

[Not that he wouldn't be glad of the excuse not to tell what he'd have to tell next, but Unicron's arrival was just too huge a thing not to go into detail about, and it wouldn't make sense if he skipped what came before.]

The battle at Autobot City lasted all night. By morning, Megatron and the attack group had broken through their defenses and were preparing to storm the city and finish off its inhabitants. But the Autobots had managed to get a message out early on in the fighting, and it was about then that Prime arrived with reinforcements.

Prime charged through the ranks to take Megatron on personally, as usual, but there was something more... serious about it that time, from what I heard. Like you knew that one of them wouldn't be walking away from it. They both went all out, and...

Well, in the end, neither one of them walked away from it both of them were mortally wounded. But Prime and his reinforcements had turned the tide, and Starscream called the retreat.

There were a lot of casualties. On both sides. Most of the seriously wounded never made it back to Cybertron. That included the Insecticons, Megatron... and two thirds of the Command trine. [reluctant pause] I'm sorry but... neither you nor Skywarp survived.

[He tensed, anticipating Thundercracker's reaction.]

[notyourblueangel]

[Thundercracker just . . . stared at Jadewing for a long moment, and no doubt a number of thoughts and emotions crossed his face – disbelief, outrage, grief, indignation – finally settling on resignation as he looked away at last. His voice was low when he finally spoke.]

I see. No wonder you were so shocked to see me

[He paused, head bowing for a moment. Then he looked up, an odd, almost knowing smirk on his face, though his gaze remained locked outward, on some distant point that he wasn't really seeing.]

So tell me - was it injuries from the battle and Warp and I just weren't gotten to a medic in time . . . or was it something Starscream did or didn't do?

[Thundercracker was neither blind nor stupid. Though he knew his trine leader as well – likely better – than anyone, and was loyal to him to a fault if only /because/ he was the trine leader, he knew - and Warp did too - that the day either of them went down, it was at least /as/ likely to be at the hands of their own trine leader as it was those of the Autobots. Be it by sheer accident, something deliberate because Starscream had finally decided that even his wingmates were in the way of his plans, or by unintentional omission. The time he tried to blow up the entire planet Earth to power Cybertron, and failed to warn his wingmates so they could get the frag out of Dodge came to mind.]

[the_other_green_seeker]

[Jadewing shifts awkwardly on his rock. Yeah. Really no good way of telling someone that. He doesn't look up until Thundercracker asks him the question. No good way to tell someone this either, but at least he seemed to expect it, almost...]

Well, as I've said I wasn't there, but... when Astrotrain was having a hard time getting back to Cybertron, someone suggested lightening the load by jettisoning those who were critically wounded. Starscream didn't object, and from what I heard, tossed Megatron out himself.

[Jadewing frowned, turning his gaze to the same point in the distance that Thundercracker wasn't really looking at. Megatron was understandable. Starscream's desire to eliminate Megatron had always been hilariously obvious. But to do that to one's own trinemates? That was cold, even for a Decepticon.]

He paid for it, though. With Megatron gone, there was an all-out brawl over leadership... inside Astrotrain, which he was understandably kinda fragged off about later. But anyway, it ended up with Starscream getting what he'd always wanted, complete with a coronation and the Constructicons on trumpets.

His reign lasted for all of about two cycles before Galvatron flew in, a pack of new bots riding his contrail. He knew who Starscream was, and even commented on how stupid the coronation was.

Starscream even realized why. Galvatron was really Megatron; he'd apparently made a deal with Unicron to get a new body and new troops. He transformed into this huge-aft canon and blasted Starscream into a pile of charred scrap metal right in front of everyone. Needless to say, nobody questioned him after that, and he claimed leadership.

And then Unicron showed up.

[notyourblueangel]

Hmn. Probably figured he could come back for us or something, only it was too late. [He vented a sigh. It'd figure. After everything else, to die abandoned in space somewhere...]

[It made him all the more resolute to stay here in Haven. Where he had a chance at a real life . . . in more ways than one!]

[He listened to the rest of what Jadewing had to say, scowling deeply in spite of himself at the news of his trine leader's demise, but then the last comment had him pulling his gaze back around to look at Jadewing.]

. . . what happened?

[the_other_green_seeker]

[Jadewing didn't comment about that scowl. Really, the only thing that had spared Starscream before that point was that he was too good at his job to replace. With Cyclonus available to take up the position of Air Commander... well, it had really only been a matter of time.

Though if the rumors were true, Starscream wasn't quite as dead as everyone had thought, but that, he didn't plan on bringing up. Mostly because he wasn't sure he believed it.

But then Thundercracker was looking back at him, and it was time to continue the story.]

Well, remember I told you about those Autobot moon bases? Well, Unicron kinda took care of those... by eating the moons. I mean this ginormous, weird-looking planet thing showed up and just... sunk its big mandibles or pincers or whatever into one of the moons and ate it like it was a piece of oil cake!

And then it did the same to the second, only the Autobots on that one were a little more proactive. They set the base, and the moon, to self destruct, and it did. Right in Unicron's mouth. When the smoke cleared? It wasn't even dented. We just... didn't know what to think at that point.

Galvatron was pretty fragged off though and started yelling at Unicron that Cybertron and its moons belonged to him. Only Unicron wasn't having any of it. This... weird red glow surrounded Galavatron, and he reacted like he was in pain, and eventually agreed to obey Unicron before flying off again with the new bots he'd brought with him; Cyclonus- his new Air Commander, Scourge- his tracker, the Sweeps- Scourge's pack of hunters, and one other bot who looked like he was the same model as Cyclonus, but who we never saw again after that.

And while they went hunting for the Autobots and their new leader, Ultra Magnus, the rest of us were left behind on Cybertron. Just... waiting. With Unicron hanging up in the sky like some creepy-aft parody of one of the moons. But even after seeing eat two of the moons as easily as we'd eat energon goodies? Nothing could have prepared us for what happened after that....

Unicron transformed.