The Monster of Kaon (Transformers Si): Chapter 49

We flew through the skies, heading straight for the battlefield where Shockwave, the Combaticons, and Metroplex should be fighting the war titan Iaconus.

Well, saying that we were flying would be a bit misleading since I was the one flying in my bipedal mode while carrying the unconscious Windblade in my arms.

Seeing her severely damaged state, I could not help but feel my rage boil within my emotional matrix, urging me to leave everything behind and hunt down every single one of the modified rust worms that Sentinel used to download copies of his consciousness and use as backups in case he is ever defeated by his enemies.

Frankly, if it were not for Fortress’s memories, I would never have known that the Fake Prime was even technically alive still.

From what I can gather from my clone’s memories, he always had Sentinel’s voice within his mind ever since he came online within Shockwave’s labs.

Normally, a newborn bot would not think much about another voice in its mind since it would not know a lot about the world around it.

However, Fortress was anything but normal, as he was given a copy of my own memories and personality by Shockwave.

And as his earlier personality was a copy of my own, there was no doubt that he would be extremely cautious of anything that he did not know about, leading to his thorough self-diagnostics using the technologically recreated copy of my outlier powers, which outed the existence of the parasite within his spark chamber.

Unfortunately, despite inheriting my caution, he did not inherit my decisiveness from the looks of it, as he hesitated to dig out the parasite, giving Sentinel enough time to slowly manipulate the young clone into becoming what he was till the end.

Not to say that he was innocent or anything, far from it, since he inherited the worst of my personality traits without the inhibitions to suppress those dark impulses. But, I do think that Sentinel played a large part in the many heinous actions that Fortress committed in his lifetime.

From what I understand, these parasites that Sentinel created were concocted in that damned Institute that he used as his main research laboratory, the same place from which I rescued a lot of captive bots, including Airachnid and the Combaticons.

If I had to guess, based on Sentinel’s personality, I would not put it past him to have infected every single bot within the Institute, and any other bot that he got his hands on, such as his loyal followers within the security forces, with these parasites to improve the chances of success.

This is apparent based on how he left behind that parasite within my old body, which Shockwave modified to create Fortress.

But this raises another question. How did Shockwave miss the existence of the parasite when he was reconstructing my old body? Were these parasites just that good at hiding? Or was there another facet to their powers that Fortress was unaware of?

Whatever the case may be, he is far too much of a threat to be left alone, so I will have to concentrate all my resources on eradicating him.

The only silver lining, if it can even be called that, in this entire mess is that the only few survivors of the Institute that we rescued all those eons ago were Airachnid, the Combaticons, the famous mercenary Lockdown, and a mnemosurgeon turned serial killer called Sunder.

As for the security forces? I have it on good authority that the majority of them were killed even before the civil war began, during a time when my followers were consumed by rage and were hunting down anyone who was even remotely associated with Sentinel and his council.

As far as I can tell, Prowl, Sixshot, Scorponok, and Thunderblast were the last of such security forces.

Since I killed Prowl and Sixshot’s bodies, that just leaves Scorponok and Thunderblast that I need to deal with.

As for the bots from the Institute, with the Combaticons already with me, it just left Airachnid, Sunder, and Lockdown unaccounted for.

I guess I will have to search for them once I am done reviving Cybertron.

But all that is for the future, for now, I need to heal Windblade and take down that bastard Iaconus once again.

Seriously, why can’t the enemies from my past just die and stay dead for once!?

Soon, we arrived at the battlefield from which Windblade fled before, only to feel shocked beyond belief at the sight in front of me.

The traitorous war titan that could defeat nearly any other titan in combat was on his knees, restrained in place by two Titans, while the rest formed a circle around the rogue titan, making sure that he would not escape.

In the distance, I could also see three starships hovering in the air above the titans.

But the thing that shocked me the most was not the ships, but the beings within whose sparks I could feel even from this distance, thanks to the enhancements made to my outlier power thanks to my merger with Fortress.

Shockwave and the Combaticons were already a given, just like I expected Silverbolt the moment I spotted Unitex-1.

However, the ones who gave me pause were none other than the younglings of my faction from the days of the Ascenticons.

Glitch and his friends from Shockwave’s university for outliers.

And most importantly, I could feel Thunder, my bonded minicon.

With a deep breath to stabilize my mind, I reached within me, searching for a link long forgotten, and tugged on it, alerting my closest friend and partner from those days gone by.

The moment I did so, I felt Thunder’s spark beat rapidly, followed by one of the ships opening what I assume to be its cargo bay.

Taking that as a signal, I flew into the opening, landing squarely within the bay, and came face to face with my old friend.

Looking at my old companion, who looked positively tiny compared to my new size, I could not help but laugh loudly.

“Did you get shorter? Thunder? If you shrink anymore, I think you will never escape those midget allegations from Prion’s council!”

“Oh, Frag off! I am not the one who became a literal giant! Seriously, you are as big as a fragging Combiner! How in the name of Primus am I supposed to keep up with an abomination like you!?”

Thunder slowly stopped his triad before jumping onto my shoulder, a place that he always claimed as his own.

“….I missed you, Maximus. A lot.”

“So did I, my friend.”

Turning from my old friend, suppressing my emotional turmoil, I turned to look at the rest of the bots, the majority of whom were already on their knees.

“Lord Maximus! It is good to see you again!”

Looking at the colossal bot that is probably as big as Megatronus was, I could not help but be taken aback.

Just to confirm, I reached out with my power, and sure enough, there was no mistake in his identity?

“…Glitch? Is that really you?”

At my words, the bot reached for his faceplate and removed it, showing that it was just a mask, and revealed his face, which looked shockingly similar to Shockwave’s original face.

The wry but joyful smile that he held only enhanced the similarity.

“As hard as it might be to believe, it really is me, my Lord. And, I go by Tarn now.”

“Stop with the lord thing, youngling. You know just how much I hate that kind of formality between friends.”

“…Haha! As you say. Maximus.”

There was no need for words between us as his power activated and connected with me, allowing me to tell exactly what he was feeling due to how similar our powers were.

I just placed on Glit-Tarn’s shoulder in comfort, knowing that no words were enough to reassure him, just like they would not be enough for the rest of my friends.

Out of all the things that I hate Alpha Trion for, this is the biggest of them all.

Not only did his actions lead to the destruction of Cybertron, but they also caused irreparable emotional damage to all my friends, my family, leading to their personalities and lives twisting beyond belief.

Shaking my head to get rid of those thoughts, I looked at the rest of the kids.

“I take it that you all have also changed your names?”

“We did. But, before all that, maybe you should take that femme to the medbay, I’ll have Nickel ready the supplies.”

Nickle?

Tarn must have seen my questioning look as he simply motioned me to move inside, something I did without question as the rest of the bots fell in step behind me.

“She is our Chief Medical Officer. A minicon we picked up from Prion as a Sparkling since she was the only Sparkling of her generation to not be picked up by a Sire-Carrier pair.”

An orphan, huh? A foreign concept for Cybertronians since every spark born from the Well of Sparks is always picked up by someone, even if not as parents, then at least as guardians to show them the younglings the ways of our world before they are thrust into living their own lives.

Even during the disastrous times of the cast system, they were still taken in by one guild or another, even if they ended up becoming the lowest of the low, like the mining bots or the lower casts, they still had someone to call their guardian and teacher.

An orphan is a concept foreign to Cybertron. But, unfortunately, it is a known factor in the Cybertronian colonies thanks to Energon scarcity after the Space Bridge collapse.

Soon, we arrived at the medbay of the ship, and I could not help but feel amused, watching as a tiny Minicon barely a few feet taller than Thunder order around a group of MTO that the Decepticons called Vehicons, making them carry equipment around as she and her team worked on healing the bots within the bay.

Which also included the banged-up Combaticons who glumly sat on the medical slabs while the Minicon rushed across them, keeping an eye on their vitals.

The moment they spotted me, however, their expressions changed to one of shock before recognition flashed in their optics.

“Holy Primus! what happened to you!?”

“Yeah! Did you become a combiner or something!?”

“Hey! No moving around until I am done!!”

At the minicon that I assume to be Nickel’s shout, the Combaticons immediately cowered and sat back down on the slabs, making me chuckle in amusement, drawing the little one’s attention.

“…Ok, I knew Tarn and Thunder said you were the biggest bot they had ever seen, but this size is kind of ridiculous.”

“Hahah! Agreed. If it is of any comfort, this development is relatively new. That being said, I would like your help with this one.”

I motioned towards Windblade, making Nickle widen her optics in alarm.

“By Prion’s Shadow! Why are you still standing around with such a severely injured patient!? What are you going to do if she dies because of your negligence? Put her down right now!”

I just chuckled at her words, which probably annoyed the minicon even more based on her mad hopping, and placed Windblade on the free slab where Nickel instantly started hooking up various vital monitoring devices and Energon tubes, only to stare stupidly as Windblade’s vitals steadily rose to optimal levels. Even the physical damage on her body is slowly healing, barely visible to the naked optic.

“…Ok, what is this?”

“That would be the work of Cybermatter.”

“….Thunder was right, you make no sense.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment. I guess I can leave her to you then?”

Nickel just gave me a confident grin.

“Of course! If I can deal with a rowdy bunch like them, I can also handle an unconscious patient. But, where are you going?”

I felt the restraining on my emotions slip a little, something that the others must have also noticed since the room was briefly illuminated with the red of my optics.

“I have a traitorous Titan to deal with.”

With those words, I left the room, heading straight for the hanger.

I do not know what Sentinel did to keep the traitorous Titan alive all this time, but I know that it will not be enough to stop the damned thing from dying at my hands again.

That is what he deserves for turning on his brethren after the Quintesson War, and gravely injuring Metrotitan, who was busy with reconstruction efforts at that time, along with the Dweller of the Argon Sea.

Although I think we have been presented with a rare opportunity this time around with Iaconus’s revival.

An opportunity for the mad titan to make up for his betrayal, either willingly or unwillingly.