Written by DBX
I lost my memories, I don't know when, I don't know how. Now memories are beginning to flood back, and I find that as I regain those, I'm losing something else. My sanity. The memories are so conflicting I'm remembering things I shouldn't, and I don't remember things that I should. These memories are so vivid that I can't be sure if they're real or not. The feelings these memories generate are causing my madness, I have visions of wars and death all around me. I let the memory control me and in the process I nearly killed the Maximal Griever. For a moment I lost myself, but worst of all a part of me wanted to kill him. I wanted to find out who I was and reclaim my life. Once I had my answers I could decide if it was safe for me to be around anyone.The memory flashes occur mostly during sleep cycles, in battle and after a battle. I didn't know if it was some kind of heightened awareness or if there was some other explanation, but lately the memories were becoming more intense and lasting longer. In one such memory, I was standing around a group of other Transformers who were talking amongst themselves,
"Where's Optimus Prime?" one of them asks.
"He went off to find Galvatron." another answers.
Then I turn my attention away without saying a word and walk off. My next memory is the battle between Optimus Prime and Galvatron and the eventual outcome. My friends say that those memories might be planted, if that's true then I can't really trust any of these memories. I tried to concentrate on our mission, things had just become much more serious. Nightwolf had infiltrated the Citadel and was able to take information to the Council that Destron was behind the disappearances as well as the experiments. The Council must have believed the information and they confronted Destron about it. Destron reacted in a way that none of us could have predicted. He killed the entire Council and now blamed us for it.
We've been in hiding since what happened. Prime said that if we are caught, we would be executed on sight, most likely by an ordinary citizen, they all wanted us dead now. Ballistic was making use of what tech was left in the factory. Most of it had been reformatted but there was still some things left. We were trying to make use of the materials to build weapons and supplies. None of us needed an R-Chamber, we all had on board nano technology that repaired us over time. For serious damage we could make our own repairs with whatever tools we found. Ballistic had been working on some kind of odd-looking weapon for a few hours,
"What is that?" I asked.
"Our battle with the Maximals in Iacon was pretty easy, but I picked up some ideas from that one, Nightscream." Ballistic said, "He used a type of sonic wave that was meant to interfere with our internal sensors. But, it had to be at the right frequency to work. I've been trying to make a weapon that can send a similar frequency that can drive Techno-Organics up a wall."
"Their organics hearing is vastly affected by sound." I said realizing what he was doing, "And they can't adapt like we can."
"Exactly. I'm just trying to find a frequency that's harmless to us, but harmful to them."
"Maybe we can find some Maximals to test it on." Nightwolf remarked from his guard post. He looked out the window again and then shouted to Orion Prime, "Rhinox is back from patrol."
"Open the doors." Prime said. Rhinox walked in the door and went directly to Orion Prime,
"I've been given another message from the Matrix." he said, "There's a lot of work to do."
Ballistic, Rhinox and I left for our mission. Thanks to Rhinox we knew where to go and which of us should go. We were being sent to a scrap yard, the largest in Cybertron. There weren't many details, just telling us where to go and that this mission was important.
"Does the Matrix have a sense of humor?" Ballistic asked when we got there.
"It told me we had to go to Cybertron's largest scrap yard." Rhinox said,
"Well, that's the joke then. It's not here!" Ballistic was right, there was no scrap yard, just an empty lot.
"Let's look around. We were sent here for a reason." the Matrix's messages were often a mystery, even to Rhinox. It wasn't long before we understood their meaning but it was frustrating to go into a situation without knowing what you're doing. There wasn't much on the ground, soil, patches of techno-organic grass and a few small pieces of scrap metal. One piece looked like it might belong to a Transformer, it was a shoulder guard. Somehow, touching it caused another memory flash,
"The entrance is blocked! We've gotta find another way out!"
"There is no other way!"
"They're tearing the building down!"
The memory ended as soon as I dropped the scrap metal. Once I regained my composure I tried to experiment, maybe this was some kind of trigger to my memory flashes. I was about to pick up the piece of metal again but I noticed something laying beside of it, partially covered with dirt. I uncovered it and looked at it. It was the type of sign they put on the sides of transports, it might explain what happened to everything that was in the scrap yard. It had a single symbol on it, no words. I showed it to Ballistic and Rhinox,
"I can't say I recognize the symbol." Ballistic said.
"Me either. If we can find a database we might be able to do a search for it." Rhinox said.
Cybertronian databases were easy to locate, there were hundreds around the city, most of them on the side of the street. From them you could search directories, archives, city maps, even a population listing that was updated once a year. After the Reformatting the databases weren't kept up to date or used that often. Some of them were destroyed by vandalism, others were just removed by anti-tech activists. We found one not far from the scrap yard, it was out of service but Ballistic was able to get it working after a few minutes,
"I don't mean to sound paranoid but we are in the open. Try to hurry this along." I said.
"We're three techs on a techno-organic planet, we may as well have targets on our backs. If Rhinox could go faster he would." Ballistic said.
"I've found a match." Rhinox said, "Though I don't understand what this has to do with a scrap yard."
"What does the symbol match with?" Ballistic asked.
"It's the insignia of Kraigon, a member of the Tripredacus Council."
"They were killed by Megatron weren't they?"
"Yes, but Kraigon had followers among Predacons all over the planet. The only thing in Cybertropolis that could possibly be connected is a research facility, if they were taking scrap from here it could be transported there easily." Rhinox said.
"Then let's go check it out." Ballistic said.
The building was old, the entrance was covered with techno-organic vines that we had to cut through to get in. No one had been there since before Cybertron was reformatted. The inside of the building was crumbling and ruined. Part of the ceiling had collapsed in the corner partially covering a door. Ballistic cleared the debris and kicked the door open.
"He's down here somewhere! Keep looking!"
"This is crazy, we're going to get nuked!"
"Feel free to turn back."
The memory flashes were becoming more intense, I didn't mention them to Rhinox or Ballistic, I was afraid they might send me back to base. I had it under control at the moment. The next room had a large freight elevator that went down,
"Do you think it still works?" I asked.
"We'll find out in a minute." Ballistic said operating the controls, "Power is on, but it's weak. We should be able to make it down okay."
"What about going back up?" Rhinox asked as the elevator started to descend,
"I really have to start thinking these things through better." Rhinox and I both looked at him, "Relax, it's a joke." he assured us.
"Nightwolf isn't with us, that doesn't mean you have to make up for it." Rhinox said. The elevator made a loud creaking noise as it grinded to a halt,
"I still don't understand why we're here." I said.
"Maybe that has something to do with it." Ballistic said using a light on his wrist to illuminate the dark room. Around the room were piles of scrap metal,
"This is the scrap yard." Rhinox said, "But why did they move it?"
"It's easier to salvage what you need when you have the scrap yard brought to you." Ballistic said, "What were they taking?" I around the scrap piles looking for clues. Then I heard a voice,
"What are you doing here?! You're going to end up like us!" I looked to where the voice was coming from, it was a robot's head. All I could see was the outline and a pair of glowing eyes.
"Who are you?"
"Just another one...like you."
"X have you found anything?" Ballistic asked. I looked back to the head, shining my light on it but it was lifeless.
"No...nothing."
Rhinox started scanning some of the scrap metal and the shells that were there,
"I've found something." Rhinox said after a few minutes."What is it?" I asked.
"Out of all of the parts here and all of the shells, there's no circuitry." Rhinox said.
"Someone removed all of the circuitry from everything here? Drones, computers, even Maximals and Predacons?"
"That's right. We have to find out why."
"What does this have to do with what's happening now? If all of this occurred before the Reformatting, there may not be links to anyone still alive." I said, "Why would the Matrix send us here to investigate something that happened four, maybe five years ago?"
"I'm sure there's a reason behind it." Rhinox said.
"Well, I think I know where they took everything." Ballistic said. He was on the far side of the room looking through a door. Rhinox and I walked over and looked out of the room. There was a long underground tunnel with monorail tracks extending at least a mile or two in a straight line.
"Transport trains don't run underground." I said.
"Unless they've got something to hide."
The track felt like it was endless, we had no idea where it was leading us or what we would find when we got there.
"So Kraigon, or his followers built this line to transport circuitry from that makeshift scrap yard to wherever this is taking us. They must have had a reason." Ballistic said."The Tripredacus Council had been planning a large scale rebellion against the Maximals for several years. It would have been another hundred years before they gathered enough strength to make any kind of difference. During the Beast Wars they sent Ravage to eliminate everyone. We found out later that one of the Predacons was a spy sent by the Tripredacus Council to destroy the Ark." Rhinox said, "I'm sure they had back up plans, this may be one of them."
"Old fashioned Preds and their wars. All of them wanted to overthrow the Maximals because they thought we were evil." Ballistic said. I didn't hear the rest of their conversation, the noise was drowned out by a faint humming that grew louder and louder, it echoed all through the tunnel. The louder it got, the clearer it became until I could make out what the noise was. Hundreds of voices, all speaking at once. I couldn't understand what any of them were saying, I couldn't pick one voice out of them. It seemed like the further I went down the tunnel the louder the voices got, and the more incessant they spoke.
After nearly a minute of it I could make out one word that was repeated by several of the voices. Pain. I looked at my friends, they couldn't hear it. These were my memories, thousands of voices flooding in at once. Louder voices began speaking out over the others,
"That's an order soldier!"
"NO!!!!!!!!"
"He'll be dead any minute. There's nothing we can do."
"Leave him! He should have followed orders."
"Orders are orders!"
"Order refused."
"No pain."
"You can't stop this conflict any more than you can stop the sun from rising!"
"No, I didn't kill him. I saved him from you."
"I didn't know! I couldn't have!"
"You should have."
"No suffering."
"End this now!"
"No death."
"You have a duty to this planet even in death!"
"No life."
"Nothing."
"He's dead, leave him."
"I can't die...I wont..."
A light appeared at the end of the tunnel, we were almost out, but the voices were getting louder Rhinox and Ballistic started to notice my discomfort.
"Look out!"
"HELP ME!!"
"I watched them fight, I saw them die."
"There's nothing left here but death."
"Megatron has killed so many."
"No pain."
"No suffering."
"No death."
"No life."
"Nothing."
"Stop haunting me!!!" I yelled grabbing my head. I was losing touch with reality, the voices were so real. Someone grabbed both of my arms, I was being picked up. I looked to my sides and saw Rhinox and Ballistic helping me up. The voices stopped.
"The memories again?" Rhinox asked.
"They're getting worse." I said.
"Prime wanted to put this off until we had completed our mission to restore Cybertron but if it's bothering you that badly we should-"
"No, I'm fine. They might be getting worse but they do eventually go away." I said, I didn't want anyone else to have to deal with this, even if I couldn't handle it on my own.
"We've found the end of the tunnel. Does it look familiar?" Ballistic asked.
"Yes...this is the lab where I met all of you." I said.
"This is too much of a coincidence." Ballistic said, "Why would there be a Predacon experiment going on in the same building where they made Orion Prime? Does that mean Prime is a Pred?"
"No, he was originally a Maximal protoform. Whatever happened here involving Kraigon was kept a secret from the Maximals, maybe even the Predacons. I'm going to call in Prime and Nightwolf, they should be here for this." then another memory hit me, this one was the most intense, most vivid memory flash I had. It was all too clear.
"You're remembering something else aren't you?" Ballistic asked me, "What is it?"
"I remember being in a battle, and losing. I can see the attack so clearly and then..."
"What?" Rhinox asked.
"I died."
