The Energon Pub

Deep in the Decepticon Labs

He had been down here for longer than he cared to know. It had been voluntary though, a self enforced exile from his people. He had known what was coming before anyone else had. They hadn’t listened to him so he went to work on his own. He knew he couldn’t save their world, not directly at least. He could, however, try to end the war before the world was completely devastated.

The Great War had reached a virtual stalemate. The only way he saw to end the war was to give some sort of new and devastating edge to the Decepticons. The war would be ended by the ultimate defeat of the Autobots. So he had retreated to the labs, withdrawing from open warfare much as Shockwave had done before him.

Unlike the other Decepticon though, he did not venture off planet. His specialty lied in the construction and enhancement of their very race. They had only barely scratched the surface of what they were capable of, or so he felt. His ideas had been rejected before by the science council, far back before the war had even begun. Now no such group stood in his way. The war also provided a large supply of test subjects in the form of Autobot prisoners or even there own wounded. Still, he kept his experiments secret from even his fellow Decepticons. There would some among even his own ranks who would not approve of his experiments, no matter what the ultimate results would be.

As time had passed his experiments grew more feverish and desperate. By his calculations their home planet had little time left. He began conducting the tests on himself, not having any more time or patience for dealing with anyone else. He ignored the orders to evacuate the planet in favor of conducting one final test on himself. While sealed in the chamber that made the modifications to his body both Autobot and Decepticon abandoned their home en masse. When he awoke he found himself one of the few beings left on Cybertron.

His final test had been a success. He was now more powerful than ever. He found, to his own surprise, that he could survive now on the ruined surface of Cybertron. It was of some comfort that he would not have achieved his final success in time to end up deactivated on a dead world. He considered contacting his fellow Decepticons, but the fact that he had ignored an evacuation order and that his test was only initially successful stayed his hand. He would contact them once he had perfected this new technology, when he could finally present them with the technological edge in the war that he had worked so hard on.

And so, time passed….

The Decepticon sat at his main computer terminal. He only vaguely resembled the mechanoid who had been left on Cybertron so long ago. His test had progressed and he had perfected the technology on himself to a degree that he had never imagined. The problem now was how to apply it to other Decepticons.

His thoughts were interrupted by a quiet alarm from his computer. A frown formed on his face as he punched commands into the device. It seemed that a monitoring station on the surface was getting unusual readings. It was probably just some error with the device, probably caused by one of the electrical storms that now seemed so regular on the planet. He would have to investigate and repair it personally. He deactivated the computer and picked up some tools and a portable scanner before making his way to the surface.

The Surface

The Decepticon had made his way to the surface from his secure lab. The atmosphere seemed fairly stable at this time, more so than he had seen it for quite a while. Could it be that the atmospheric reading he had received earlier was correct? Was their homeworld somehow recovering from the destruction and abuse they had wrought on it? He had suspected that some of the damage would eventually fade away, particularly the pollution, as it broke down over time. If things were improving now so quickly then it meant more was at work then just natural degradation.

He walked over to the weather monitoring station he had set up. Even with his enhancements it was preferable to avoid moving around on the surface during the electrical storms that tore over the surface of the world. With the heavily shielded station on the surface he could monitor conditions from his lab. He carefully removed a panel from the station and hooked up his diagnostic device, running a full scan and test of all systems.

As he waited for the diagnostic cycle to run its course he pulled out the personal scanner he had brought with him. While it wasn’t as powerful or as sophisticated as the station it would give him some readings that he could compare. He watched as the scanner came back with nearly identical readings, readings confirmed when the station checked out as fully functional.

It appeared that Cybertron was healing itself faster than he had calculated. It was an annoying error on his part, but he had been more concerned with other matters for quite sometime. It was a fortunate error at least. Cybertron was now habitable again, if a bit inhospitable. Perhaps there were even new energon deposits to be discovered. In any case the recovery of Cybertron to even this extent was a major event, one that could have substantial impact on the war.

The lone Decepticon quickly packed up his equipment and made his way back into his protected lab. With the atmosphere at least somewhat stabilized he should be able to send a clear signal through. Unfortunately he had no idea where to send the signal. He had been incommunicado with his fellow Decepticons for some time, although he had been able to follow some of the war by the various signals he had intercepted. He would simply have send a considerably powerful signal to one of the Decepticon outposts and count on it being relayed to wherever Megatron was. It would take most of his energy reserves but the information was important enough to warrant it. Perhaps that combined with his technological breakthroughs would help put a final end to this war.

He punched commands into the main control console, activating the long dormant communication system. He dialed up the signal output and aimed it towards one of the Decepticon outposts he knew of. He punched in his personal command code, one that was quite old but should still be recognized by someone in the Decepticon ranks. With the equipment set up he began his signal. “This is Thunderwing contacting Lord Megatron. I have urgent news concerning Cybertron….”