Transformers: Retribution (43 page)

“How do you think I opened the link to Cybertron in the first place?” he said. “Your Matrix was an essential part of the equation. And although whatever you and Megatron did to the Matrix replica means I can no longer manipulate you remotely, you’ve made the mistake of coming down here. This is the heart of my power, Prime.”

“Primus … curse you,” Optimus muttered. The Curator flicked more buttons, and he slumped forward, fighting for consciousness, his optics dwindling to the point where all he could see was the Curator’s cackling visage.

“It’s fitting it should come to this,” the Quintesson said. The rumbling overhead grew louder. “Without our wisdom, without our brilliance, your race would amount to nothing more than an elaborate wind-up toy! We gave you purpose! We gave you a chance to serve! And look how you paid us back!”

“You claimed to be … creators.” Optimus could barely talk now. “Claimed dominion. You lied. You had no right …”

“Don’t talk to me of
rights
,” said the Curator. “Don’t talk to me of
lies
. We Quintessons create our own reality, and our slaves dwell within it.”

“Not anymore,” said a voice.

The Curator and Optimus looked up to see a battered and bloodied Tyrannicon emerging from the glowing hoop, striding along the ledge toward them, his trident on his back. Pieces of his armor were missing, and he
was covered with tooth marks. But he was still very much alive.

“Ah, General,” said the Curator. “You’ve arrived just in time to—” But before the Curator could finish his sentence, Tyrannicon had closed the distance between them and grabbed the Curator by both arms.

“What do you think you’re doing?” the Quintesson screamed.

By way of answer, Tyrannicon tore the Curator in two.

Or rather, he tore the Curator’s shell. From within fell something far smaller: a fleshy black cephalopod whose mantle was covered with red splotches and beady eyes. The thing was covered in a disgusting slime, and before it could skitter away on feeble tentacles, Tyrannicon scooped it up in one of his massive fists.

“I should have known you would try to have me done away with,” he thundered. “Turning my own forces against me in my hour of victory. Did you not trust me?”

“No! I had nothing to do with that!” the Curator squeaked, his voice high-pitched now that he’d lost his shell. “You’re crushing me—
urrrghh
!” Tyrannicon kept squeezing more tightly, cutting off the Curator’s shrill pleas. All that was audible was the intensifying rumbling of the approaching Hydratron, and Tyrannicon was far too angry to notice that. The only thing he cared about now was wringing the answers he wanted from the hapless Curator.

“Give me back command of my soldiers,” he demanded.
“Give me back my armies.”

“Please, please, believe me—”

“Believe a Quintesson who’s begging for his life? Never.”

“But you should,” Megatron said.

Everyone turned as he emerged from the water, which poured off his fins in sheets. Tyrannicon’s face went
dark as he saw how the Decepticon leader had changed. His eyes locked on Megatron’s shark-jaw chest plate.

“What abomination is this?” he asked.

“It is I, Megatron, the First of the Many. Be grateful you have the good fortune to witness my true incarnation.”

“You seek to usurp my rule,” Tyrannicon growled.

“Megatron,” Optimus said, “we’ve got to—”

“Save it, librarian. I’ll deal with you in a second. Tyrannicon, your legions are now mine. But perhaps we can strike a deal.”

“A deal?” Tyrannicon repeated the word as though it were a curse.

“Yes. You may serve me and lead my Sharkticons. You’ve been a minion all your life; why change now? Trust me, you’ll enjoy being my general.”

“Is that a fact?” said Tyrannicon. He stepped into the water, striding through the shallows toward Megatron, still gripping the Curator in one hand. Megatron moved slowly to the side, clearly seeking optimal ground as the two opponents squared off. The whole room was shaking now; the Hydratron was drawing ever closer. But both bots seemed to think the vibration was purely the result of their own stomping around the chamber. Optimus tried to mutter a warning, but no one was listening to him anymore. Tyrannicon reached Megatron and looked down at the Curator.

“Have you heard this farce, Curator? Megatron tells us to bend the knee for all eternity. How do you think we should reply, hmm? How shall we answer?”

“Please, Tyrannicon, show mercy.”

“I give you the mercy you gave the innocent!” Tyrannicon clenched his fist until the Curator was crushed completely. Juice ran down the Sharkticon general’s arm as he stared coldly at Megatron. “Such is the fate of any who would claim to be my master.”

“I’m going to do more than just
claim
,” Megatron said, stepping forward and swinging his fists. Tyrannicon lowered his head, charging Megatron like an enraged bull. There was a thunderous crash as the two giants clashed, locking arms, each trying to rip the other apart, shove the other beneath the water.

“Imposter,” Tyrannicon said through his teeth. “You may as well give up now.”

Megatron laughed. “I was fighting in the pits a million years before they built you. You can’t possibly hope to defeat—”

But Tyrannicon’s helmet shot a corrosive mixture of black inky acid right into Megatron’s eyes. Megatron broke away, stumbling backward as his optics tried to cope with the toxic substance. Tyrannicon pulled his trident from his back and swung it around so that the hooked pommel caught Megatron under the arm, knocking him sprawling down in the water; then he reversed the trident in a blur, stabbing out with a thrust that would have speared the Decepticon if he had not rolled to the side, diving beneath the surface. Tyrannicon leaped forward, submerging; only the general’s fins were visible as he closed on where Megatron was. Thrashing filled the water as the two bots furiously battled on the rocky bottom. Watching the fight, Optimus figured it could go either way. But the intensifying vibration now shuddering through the chamber told him that neither was going to win.

That was when he noticed something.

The Curator’s wand. Mere feet from him. The Quintesson leader must have dropped it when Tyrannicon had seized him. Gathering what strength remained to him, Optimus reached out and grabbed it. He could feel the whole room shaking now as though it were in the throes of an earthquake. Chunks of rock were tumbling from the ceiling. The Hydratron was almost upon them. Optimus
had no idea how the wand worked, but he knew he couldn’t simply turn off the bridge. That wouldn’t be enough. He had to destroy it, had to stop that thing from reaching Cybertron at any cost.

Including his own life.

The Energon stockpiles that were fueling the bridge … that was the key. Optimus set all the controls for maximum and watched as the wand began flashing bright red and the bridge started to pulsate. Out in the water, Megatron hauled Tyrannicon to his feet, grabbing him with one claw while a buzz saw protruded from his other. The saw roared to life as Megatron shoved it toward Tyrannicon’s face. It was mere feet from those cold fish eyes. Now it was inches …

But at the last moment, Tyrannicon kicked out with one clawed boot, knocking Megatron backward toward the cave wall, just far enough to swing the trident around and fire the triple blades off like a missile. They struck Megatron right in the chest, pinning him against the cave wall.

“You were saying something about your expertise in the pits?” Tyrannicon asked as he put his giant hand around Megatron’s throat.

“It isn’t possible,” Megatron murmured. He was struggling desperately, but the energy-powered trident blades had him stuck fast. “
I’m
supposed to be the chosen one.”

“Then I guess I shouldn’t be able to do this,” Tyrannicon said. He punched straight through Megatron’s chest plate and seized the Quintesson-made matrix. Blue lightning erupted from Megatron’s body and arced into Tyrannicon as Megatron convulsed, reverting to his normal form. The vast room was shaking as though it was about to collapse. Tyrannicon shuddered as though he was being torn apart. But then he held the blazing object in the air above him—

“The power is mine!” he screamed.

—and plunged it into his own chest. Blue-green energy enveloped him as he looked at his trapped opponent.

“Foolish Cybertronian. What misbegotten notion made you think this power belonged to you? This was mine by birthright.” As he spoke, Tyrannicon grew taller, the fins on his arms and legs larger. His squid helm turned black, and his scales started glowing a translucent blue. The war trident sprouted new blades that glowed with fresh energy. He was too caught up in the rush of his transformation to notice the rocks falling all around him.

“Welcome to the reign of Tyrannicon the First,” he said. “Any final words, gladiator?”

“I’ve got two,” Megatron snarled. “Scrap you.”

Tyrannicon raised his trident to deliver the killing blow, and the ceiling blasted open to reveal the hideous countenance of the Hydratron. Dozens of tentacles swarmed down, enveloping the tallest target in the room, pulling Tyrannicon up toward all too many maws; he bellowed furiously, swinging his war trident desperately, but for every tentacle he sliced, two more grabbed him as the monstrosity inexorably drew him up and into one of its mammoth gullets. The concentrated acid must have been potent indeed; there was a blue flash so bright that it was dimly visible through the semitranslucent flesh. Lightning flickered through the creature’s body and erupted from the tips of myriad tentacles, bouncing around the cave, shearing off slices of the cave walls. For a moment, Optimus hoped that the blast had killed the creature, but it didn’t seem to be affected in the slightest; instead, it kept trying to force its way down into the chamber. With sickening clarity, Optimus realized that he and Megatron were both helpless, about to be eaten alive.

“Optimus,” a voice whispered.

Optimus looked up to see the Leviacon peeking above the surface, mere feet from his face.

“I thought you were dead,” he said.

“I’ve had better days,” the Leviacon whispered. “Now get on.” Optimus crawled desperately toward the whale; it seemed like an eternity while Megatron roared and struggled against the far wall, and the glowing on the bridge intensified and the Hydratron forced its way ever farther into the chamber. Its terrible bulk seemed to writhe with excitement as it spotted the bridge, an entire portion of its body extending out toward the portal like a gigantic pseudopod. Optimus reached the Leviacon at last and rolled onto its burned back. The Leviacon began swimming desperately for the exit; half the chamber was now filled with the Hydratron’s mass. Tentacles draped down toward Megatron. He and Optimus locked eyes.

Optimus knew he couldn’t let him die like this.

“We need to take a detour,” he told the Leviacon.

“We don’t have time!”

“We’ll make it,” Optimus said as he guided the Leviacon to the side wall where Megatron was. The colossal gelatinous sack strained against the rocks above them. The pseudopod had almost touched the bridge’s blazing energies. The entire portal was going critical. Optimus reached up and tried to pull the trident blades from the wall, but he was too weak.

“Nice try, librarian,” Megatron muttered. “Save yourself while you still can.”

“I can’t leave you.”

“Sure you can.”

Optimus stared at him. The Leviacon slapped the trident from the wall with his wounded tail; Megatron fell forward onto the back of the whale. The Leviacon dived and swam desperately for all their lives. The last Optimus saw of the bridge chamber was through dark shimmering water, a circular glow slowly being eclipsed
by a titanic bulk. Tentacles unfurled through the water toward them, but the Leviacon plunged farther, ever deeper, through a maze of passageways that Optimus was certain wasn’t the way they’d come in.

“Where are we going?” he asked.

“Deep as we can go,” said the Leviacon. “We’ve got a minute at most.”

It turned out they had a lot less.

T
HE
A
RK AND THE
N
EMESIS
HAD JUST REACHED ORBIT
when they picked up the explosion on their scanners. It was a force ten blast, wiping Aquatron’s only continent clean off the map, sending up a mushroom cloud that reached to the very edge of space.

The Autobots, stubborn beings that they were, detached the Ark and proceeded to reenter the atmosphere, running low-level search and rescue passes for their missing leader, hoping against hope. Nor were they alone in their quest. Starscream had announced that he would remain in orbit supervising repairs on the
Nemesis
, but most of his Seekers flew alongside the Ark, scanning the ocean. The sight of bots such as Skywarp and Dirge cruising in formation next to the Ark made for an unusual sight from the Ark’s bridge, which was packed to capacity with many of the day’s combatants. Jazz and Prowl stood right behind Sideswipe’s command chair, scouring the readouts for any sign of Optimus. Sunstreaker and Bulkhead paced up and down while Ratchet and Perceptor ran every possible scan and then some. Ironhide sat at the back of the room with his massive arms crossed, insisting that if Optimus was gone, they would all have felt his passing, that it couldn’t be any other way with a Prime, that it just couldn’t … But he was in denial, and they all knew it. Kup consoled him with the last cy-gar he had stashed in his quarters before they’d left Cybertron. For once Rodimus and Bumblebee
were silent; they just looked on as Hubcap went over his maps again and again, trying not to look at the pillar of smoke rising from the horizon. Was there something he had missed? Anything …?

But all at once an elated scream from Sideswipe pierced the air.

“There! Down there!”

He magnified the image and put it on the main screen. It was a giant battle-scarred whale shark, and riding on its back like a knight of old Cybertron was Optimus Prime. The bridge erupted in shouts of elation and joy, a jubilation that barely wavered when they saw Megatron holding on to the whale’s tail. The Seekers whooped and streaked down toward their leader, the Ark moving down with them. With a feather touch, Sideswipe set the craft to hover mere meters from the Leviacon. A ramp lowered toward the huge whale. Optimus watched it descend toward him and felt strength return to his limbs. Since the destruction of the bridge and all the Curator’s foul works, the Matrix had surged back to life within him, burning with rejuvenated insight. Optimus had never felt better. Especially now that he knew his soldiers were alive, too. He patted his new friend on the back.