The Energon Pub

After picking up Quickslinger and Brake-Neck last year, I was left two extra limbs, Alpha Bravo and Offroad. Instead of storing them away and forgetting about them, I decided to buy an additional Alpha Bravo and Offroad and customize them into spark-brothers for their respective figures. I named them Charlie Delta and Broadway.






I refuse to call the white semi "Battle Core Optimus Prime," so Armorless Ultra Magnus became the torso for my custom combiner team. I had initially been using a Legends Thundercracker as the chest-plate, but I bought an extra Thundercracker and Skywarp a few months ago and swapped some of their parts around to make a "Thunderwarp" and "Skycracker." Thunderwarp became the sixth member of the team.






The combined mode, Pater Magnus (Great Father), uses the CW Ultra Magnus shoulder rockets, the CW Cyclonus gun and a set of nonnef feet. I added some gold paint to the gun and feet to match it better to the torso's factory paint apps.








The backstory for the team is that all the members are sort of down on their luck and either estranged from or abandoned by their friends, factions and family members. But then they find each other and form the Geminibots, named for the team's two sets of twins.








Thunderwarp is the illegitimate spark-son of two high-ranking Decepticons, though neither ever acknowledge him, and he's constantly bullied by other Seekers, especially Starscream, because of his small stature.




After the Ultra Magnus armor was severely damaged in battle, Minimus Ambus was only able to salvage the Convoy unit.




Thunderwarp helped Minimus Ambus repair the Convoy unit, and then Ambus, disguised once again as Ultra Magnus, helped Thunderwarp get away from the Decepticons.








Alpha Bravo and Charlie Delta were as close as two spark-brothers could be, but Charlie Delta ran into problems after Alpha Bravo was recruited by the Aerialbots.










Offroad and Broadway, on the other hand, were complete opposites. Broadway saw Offroad's recruitment by the Stunticons as a chance to escape the tedium of never-ending battle and find his own path.

I ended up making this last year to flesh out the team's story. It started as me just taking photos of battle scenes and then sort of evolved into a full narrative. I was still using a normal Legends Thundercracker as Thunderwarp, and I hadn't gotten the nonnef feet or added some of the additional paint details.







Once upon a time, there was a brilliant and talented Decepticon Seeker...



...who happened to be very small.



Thunderwarp was rumored to be the spark-son of two high-ranking Decepticons, but the truth of his parentage may never be known.



Despite Thunderwarp's keen tactical mind, his virtually unmatched speed and his rare ability to teleport, Starscream, leader of the Seekers and world-class prick, refused to take Thunderwarp seriously and constantly mocked his small stature.



Denied the chance to do battle as a Decepticon warrior, Thunderwarp was habitually relegated to salvage duty.



And the diminutive Seeker might have been forced to endure an endless existence as the Decepticons' garbage collector if not for one fateful battle...



In the early days of the Combiner Wars, a group of Wreckers attempted to take out the behemoth Menasor before the Decepticons had a chance to unleash his full destructive potential.



But the Decepticons, led by Megatron himself, met the Wreckers' attack, and a great battle ensued.



The Autobots held their own initially.



They even managed to gain the upper hand.



But individual grudges began to overshadow the Wreckers' mission goals and cooperative battle strategies.



They practically forgot their primary target, Menasor, leaving Ultra Magnus to stand alone against the monster.



Focused on their own confrontations, the Autobot fighters left Magnus exposed.



Using all of his strength and skill just to hold his own against a more powerful enemy, Magnus was unable to defend himself when the mercenary Doubledealer ultimately betrayed the Wreckers.



The battle's momentum shifted quickly against the Autobots.



With Menasor in the fray, the Wreckers could no longer continue in their smaller skirmishes.



Magnus made one final stand, allowing his comrades to withdraw.



Severely damaged and no longer armed, there was no chance for escape.



And Megatron was in no mood to take prisoners.



So after all the metal shavings had settled, Thunderwarp was sent, as usual, to clean up and recover anything useful he could find on the battlefield. But this time, he discovered a surprise among the wreckage.



Now, if Thunderwarp had been a good soldier, he would have reported the small figure climbing out of Ultra Magnus' chest immediately. But since Thunderwarp was, in fact, just a trash collector and not a soldier, he decided to hear the little guy out.



The small robot, even smaller than Thunderwarp, explained that the original Ultra Magnus had been destroyed ages ago and that he, Minimus Ambus, was simply wearing the Magnus armor as the latest Duly Appointed Enforcer of the Tyrest Accord.



Thunderwarp agreed to help Ambus, in exchange for getting the Seeker away from his Decepticon tormentors.



The duo didn't have the resources to fix the Magnus power armor, but they were able to rebuild the Convoy unit.



With Ambus back in the guise of a depowered Ultra Magnus, the new partners would have to get creative if they were going to vanquish their enemies and bring the Combiner Wars to an end.



But little did they know, an even greater threat was already coming...

After finding the Autobot Minimus Ambus among the wreckage of a great battle, the diminutive Decepticon Seeker Thunderwarp agreed to help Ambus repair the Magnus armor in exchange for helping Thunderwarp escape the bullying and boredom of his current existence.



With Ambus back in the guise of a significantly depowered Ultra Magnus, the new partners would have to reach out and forge new alliances to vanquish their enemies and bring the Combiner Wars to an end.



Magnus and Thunderwarp first went to meet a trio of Autobots known for their disdain of Combiners, but the Cybertronian females wouldn't commit their support to the hapless duo.



Next, Thunderwarp tried to set up a meeting with several Decepticons whose loyalty he perceived as flexible, but the encounter quickly turned hostile.



The diplomatic overtures, however, weren't without value. Magnus and Thunderwarp learned that the severely damaged Aerialbot Slingshot had recently made a miraculous recovery, meaning there was no longer a spot on the team for his replacement, Alpha Bravo.



Around the same time, the Stunticons unceremoniously ditched their new teammate, Offroad, after mending ties with their former teammate, Wildrider. The knowledge of two newly unaffiliated combiner limbs gave Magnus an idea, especially after learning that both Alpha Bravo and Offroad had spark-brothers...



For years, Alpha Bravo and Charlie Delta were as close as brothers could be, both reveling in the glory of righteous battle.



Alpha Bravo excelled in battle tactics and strategy, while Charlie Delta edged out his brother in pure fighting skill and ruthlessness. This meant the two were not only deadly but extremely efficient at destroying Decepticons with little collateral damage.



When Alpha Bravo was selected to join the Aerialbots, Charlie Delta was proud of his brother and knew that it was for the greater good.



But at the same time, the loss of his sibling and partner left Charlie Delta untethered.



Without Alpha Bravo to keep Charlie Delta's viciousness in check, his missions became increasingly violent, culminating in a particularly brutal attack on a group of Mini-Cons.



Autobot leaders might have been able to look past the savagery of the attacks, but the antenna necklace was somewhat difficult to ignore.



Drummed out of the Autobots and too ashamed to face his brother, Charlie Delta turned to the bottle.



Despair left him a shell of a bot, a warrior with nothing to fight but his own demons. And he was losing.



As much alike as Alpha Bravo and Charlie Delta were, Offroad and Broadway were as different as two spark-brothers could possibly be.



Confident, charismatic and completely comfortable with carnage, Offroad was the quintessential Decepticon. Broadway, however, never really saw the point in waging endless wars for some remote chance at galactic domination.



When the Stunticon leader Motormaster picked Offroad to join the team, Broadway enthusiastically encouraged his brother to accept the invitation.



Offroad expressed reluctance to abandon his seemingly aimless brother, but Broadway assured Offroad that joining the Stunticons would lead to exciting new beginnings for both of them. Broadway wished his brother good luck and posted a selfie to mark the occasion.



Broadway didn't tell Offroad, however, that he was planning to leave the Decepticons and pursue his dream, a career in musical theater.



Broadway's star quickly rose as he won better roles in bigger productions at more prestigious venues.



But it was shortly after being cast as Rafiki in "The Lion King" that his luck took a turn for the worse. It turned out that the Decepticon scout Ravage was also an aspiring actor.



As Broadway held baby Simba up to the audience on opening night, Ravage transformed and proceeded to maul more than a hundred audience members, including one prominent reviewer. This brought an abrupt end to Broadway's Broadway career.



Magnus and Thunderwarp both agreed that Alpha Bravo and Offroad would make excellent additions to their planned team of renegades. While Thunderwarp questioned the wisdom of recruiting Charlie Delta and Broadway, Magnus had a plan that would require both sets of spark-brothers.



So Magnus started by tracking down Charlie Delta and forcing him to sober up.



Then Magnus took Charlie Delta to a support group for veterans with PTSD and substance abuse problems.



Meanwhile, Thunderwarp found Broadway living on the street.



And although musical theater was no longer an option, Thunderwarp got Broadway a gig as an Elvis impersonator.



After finding out what Magnus had done for Charlie Delta, Alpha Bravo was willing to follow Magnus anywhere.



Offroad was skeptical of Thunderwarp's motives, especially after learning that he had been working with the Autobot Ultra Magnus. But Broadway convinced his brother (largely with the promise of imminent and prolonged violence) that perhaps it was time to join a new family.



With the Autobot and Decepticon brothers all committed to his mission, Ultra Magnus revealed his true identity as Minimus Ambus to them. He went on to explain to the entire team that the reason he could operate the Mangus armor was because he was a load-bearer, a Point One Percenter with a special spark.



This was important, because despite the fact that Alpha Bravo and Offroad were no longer part of Combiner teams, their previous exposure to the Enigma of Combination had left them fundamentally changed. Moreover, the spark-brother link between Alpha Bravo, Offroad and each of their brothers created a unique situation that Magnus could use to achieve something that had never been previously attempted.



Ambus first attuned his own load-bearing spark to the fraternal links between the two sets of brothers. He then anchored the considerable remaining power of the Magnus armor to Thunderwarp's spark and used it to expand and spread the Combination energy from Alpha Bravo and Offroad to the rest of the group.



In a blinding blast of illumination, a new being came into existence. The individual Geminibots, as they would be known from then on, relinquished autonomous control to an amalgamated consciousness. And in his first moments, the fledgling Combiner immediately recognized the one quality that brought all of his parts together.



Each member of the team, whether Autobot or Decepticon, was lost and looking for a family. They were all searching for a place to call home. That's when the Combiner decided that he would be that home. He would be their Great Father. He would be Pater Magnus.

After Ultra Magnus and Thunderwarp tracked down two former Combiner team members, Alpha Bravo and Offroad, and their respective brothers, Charlie Delta and Broadway, Magnus revealed his true identity as Minimus Ambus to the entire group.



Ambus then used his load-bearing spark and the spark-brother bond between the two sets of siblings to create a new Combiner team: The Geminibots.



The newly formed Combiner took the name Pater Magnus, the Great Father of this unlikely family. But Thunderwarp thought "Pater Magnus" was too formal and gave him the nickname "Big Daddy."



As Big Daddy began to hear of the horrors wrought throughout the galaxy by the Constructicon Combiner Devastator, every alloy of Pater Magnus' being strained to hunt down his enemy and bring the Titan to justice. But the wisdom and experience of Minimus Ambus prevented his new brothers from acting prematurely.



Though the Geminibots had managed to successfully combine, most of the team members were still new to acting with a shared consciousness, meaning Bid Daddy's psyche was still developing, and his stability was tenuous at best.



Taking on Megatron and Starscream for their first mission as a Combiner was overly ambitious to begin with, but things really went to hell when Thunderwarp's submerged consciousness sensed his former tormentor, prompting him to immediately break his link with Big Daddy and teleport straight for Starscream's throat.



To their credit, the rest of the Geminibots didn't hesitate to join the brawl.



After all, Ultra Magnus had his own scores to settle with Megatron, and the rest of the team members didn't exactly shy away from violence.



Despite the collapse of their combined form, the Geminbots' greater numbers helped them overwhelm their more powerful enemies.



Generally one to show restraint in battle, Magnus decided that he would show Megatron the same mercy that Megatron had recently shown Magnus. Which was none.



Going forward, some of the Geminibots would need to learn how to conduct themselves with greater dignity in victory.



And some would need to stop getting so easily distracted before the battle was completely finished.



But all in all, it wasn't bad for their first outing as a team.



The Geminibots soon learned that they could improve the stability of their combined form by allowing their current mission and their general attitudes toward each other to dictate their limb positioning.



With the trucks as arms, Pater Magnus could throw crushing blows, while his helicopter legs allowed him to fly short distances.



Mensaor barely had time to register what was happening when Big Daddy dropped out of the sky and began to pummel the Decepticon monster.



The ragtag family of mismatched bots had now taken down their first legitimate Combiner, but they still had a long way to go.



In some ways, reining in Autobots was even more difficult than crushing Decepticons, as the Autobot Geminibots had greater reservations about attacking their former allies. But Superion's recent battles had become increasingly destructive, with blatant violations of the Code of Interplanetary Conflict.



Alpha Bravo was particularly reluctant to fight his former teammates, but with the helicopter twins as arms, Pater Magnus was able to fire his blasters with lightning speed and pinpoint accuracy.



This allowed Big Daddy to incapacitate Superion and convince the Aerialbots to join his crusade in ending the Combiner Wars with as little collateral damage as possible.



After learning of Menasor's destruction, the jet Combiner agreed to follow Pater Magnus and only fight when ordered to do so.



Big Daddy next hoped to gain information about Devastator and his plans, but first the Geminibots would need to defeat Bruticus. With both sets of twins at odds over the recent battles against Menasor and Superion, Pater Magnus set out to face the Combaticons with the spark-brothers combined diagonally from one another.



Despite his awkward appearance, Pater Magnus was actually at his most balanced in this form, in terms of speed, accuracy and brute strength. It was probably the only reason he survived Bruticus' opening attack.



Although several of the individual Combaticons possessed remarkable intelligence and strategic judgment, Bruticus himself was rather slow-witted.



So while it was likely that Bruticus knew who Thunderwarp was and possible that at least one of the Combaticons knew about the little Seeker's teleportation ability, it certainly never occurred to Bruticus that the skill might be used by Pater Magnus.



At least not until Bruticus saw the sword sticking out of his chest. With the military Combiner defeated, Pater Magnus was finally able to interrogate the true brains behind the Combaticons...



Big Daddy forced Shockwave to reveal that Devastator's path of destruction would eventually lead back to Cybertron. All the Geminibots had to do was return to their home planet and wait. The question was whether they'd be ready when the Constructicons arrived. Pater Magnus realized he needed more help.



Following the near calamity of Big Daddy's fight with Bruticus, the Autobot and Decepticon Geminibots were split - literally - on how to deal with Defensor and the Protectobots. This was especially dangerous because lining up with helicopters and trucks on opposite sides was Big Daddy's most erratic, clumsy and unstable form.



Fortunately, Pater Magnus ultimately went with his Autobot instincts and chose diplomacy over a brutal attack on the empathetic guardian.



The Protectobots seemed eager to help end the destruction that had followed in the Combiner Wars' wake.



Meanwhile, the Geminibots, who had all felt either abandoned or betrayed by their respective factions, were once again realizing that others outside their new family could also be trusted.



As rumors of Devastation continued to reach Pater Magnus, he knew that he would have to confront the Constructicon Giant soon, but Big Daddy was planning to recruit one last ally.



Ultra Magnus was hoping that he and his old friend, Optimus Prime, could lead their respective Combiner teams in the charge against Devastator, but there was one problem: Prowl.



The Autobot military strategist's pride was poisoning the Combined psyche of Optimus Maximus, preventing even Magnus from reaching his longtime brother-in-arms. Instead, Optimus Maximus chose to take on Devastator alone.



This did not go well, especially for Prowl.



With Optimus Maximus out of commission, it was finally up to Pater Magnus and his new family to stop the mighty Devastator. But when the battle seems hopeless, and family just isn't enough...



... that's when it's nice to have friends.

That was great, I loved the selfies

and by love I mean I may have to steal that idea for a photo challenge

Excellent work! Minimalistic, but what paint you have applied is exceptionally clean and smooth. Did you airbrush it?

Black Hat wrote:Excellent work! Minimalistic, but what paint you have applied is exceptionally clean and smooth. Did you airbrush it?

Thanks. I just use brushes and those cheap Testors acrylic paint pod sets.