Part 3

From far below, voices drift up. No discernible words, more an overall sense. My people are one, happy and content - their lives are ordered, the chaos of war a long forgotten thing. They have been seduced by peace. This is not an unplanned seduction, it is one I admit freely to having engineered.
Have they not earned their rest? I cry to the heavens. No answer comes, whatever forces once watched over us have, I fear, long since turned away. Why? Because we no longer worship the sword, the gun? We lived and breathed war for millions of years, we were tired of it.
We buried our weapons, turned our energies to life and living. Is that so terrible a crime? Are you an angry god who demands sacrifice?
Is it not enough that every day I climb this mountain, my back breaking under the weight of memories I carry with me, memories I bring to share with you? Let them alone! Let them forget! Let our terrible past stay buried.
But no, that cannot be! And it is to that time, long ago, that my mind flees... for refuge... for answers...

---

mgnntn-mgnntn-mgnntn
'What was that?' Grimlock wondered vaguely, drifting in a pleasant, comforting fog; a beautiful womb, safe from pain and noise.
MGNNTN-MGNNTN-MGNNTN
Louder now, more insistent. Was it someone singing? Grimlock tried to turn away, cover his audio receptors. For with the noise came light. Bright, painful, light.
MGNNTN-MGNNTN-MGNNTN
It had become a steady, drilling beat now. Not singing, but chanting - monotonous, booming. And with it, bright, bright light - a jagged shard of electric agony. His whole body seemed on fire, his head a pounding blob of mushed circuit endings.
MGATRN-MGATRN-MGATRN
He was falling now, plummetting out of control towards a burning sun, filling the world in front of him. His body was stripped bare, the metal torn from his screaming bones by molten claws.
MEGATRON-MEGATRON-MEGATRON!
'Yes', thought Grimlock reluctantly, as he came fully to, 'that's what I thought it was.'
He was in agony, of that he was sure. Someone had done a considerable number on him... someone who knew all the right places to hit, shock or rip. Nothing else was immediately evident to him, but then 'Wasn't that enough?', he thought vaguely. More would require the Herculean task of raising an optical cover. Plenty of time for that later.
What else could he discover without moving anything? Grimlock realised he was merely delaying the inevitable, struggling to ignore the nagging voice that told him he had to do something... fast! He was hanging. Yes, he could feel that. More, he could feel the pain where whatever was suspending him was digging in to his metal skin. He was inside, in the medical centre most likely. He was a captive, they had walked into a trap and -
Whoa, too fast. It was making his head hurt. What had they done to them? He remembered lights, screaming noise. It all smacked of a Holocaust Trigger, a disequilibrium device. Nasty things, easy to hook up to any existing light/audio system. Yeah, that's what it was. No doubt about it.
MEGATRON-MEGATRON-MEGATRON!
Still going on, and nearby. Why was someone chanting that old name? The one-time leader of the Decepticons, the most feared ('Wimps!' thought Grimlock absently) dictator ever to wage war on the Autobots... was dead, wasn't he? According to the reports they got from old Fortress Windbag on Earth, Megatron was mashed to bits when ol' Doc Ratchet crashed the Ark. Hardly subtle, but effective. Grimlock had to admit, he grudgingly admired Ratchet. That was the second time he'd stuck it to Megatron. 'There was hope for you after all, Ratchet,' thought Grimlock, smiling inwardly, 'shame you're dead!'
Okay, but that didn't explain his situation right here, now. Or why someone (or someones) was now chanting his name. More and more, Grimlock was coming to the definite conclusion that he was going to have to open his eyes. Well, maybe just one. Trouble was, he had a nasty suspicion (blooming right now in his mind, flowering at a rate of knots) exactly what he'd find when he did. They didn't get them all on Klo... did they?
With the aforementioned Herculean effort, Grimlock opened one eye, careful not to so much as twitch his body. Though this was ostensibly so as not to alert the enemy (yeah, just call them the enemy until you're sure, no need to assume the worst until it's proven to be the case) to his recovery, if it could be called that, it was also to ensure that the pain, which had abated to a dull ache, didn't flare up again.
Wincing against the sudden light and accompanying kaleidoscope of visual input (pushing and shoving, it seemed to Grimlock, to gain entry through such a tiny doorway), Grimlock took in the scene in front of him. It wasn't as bad as he'd expected.

It was worse!
There were humanoid and robotic technicians everywhere, moving about, checking readings, running tests, preparing for a major technological operation of some sort. They were working at speed, almost as if their lives depended on it (which, coincidentally, they did). That was they okay bit. From there it was all downhill. Watching over them, prodding them with electro maces if they seemed to falter (or, it seemed to Grimlock, because it amused the prodders to do so) were the likes of Dreadwind, Fangry and Quake, last seen fleeing the battlefield on Klo as fast as their assorted modes could flee. If they were here, it was a safe bet others were as well.
Grimlock winced as he turned his head. Slightly to the right of all this activity, through a doorless doorway leading off to what he surmised was a control room, Grimlock could see Bludgeon, Stranglehold and Octopunch. Like all good generals, they'd been the first to turn tail and run when the battle tipped so savagely against them. Now they were kneeling, their heads bowed. He couldn't see what was in front of them, but from their chanting he could make an educated guess. The room, though again Grimlock couldn't see its full expanse, was some sort of operating theatre. No sort of operating theatre Grimlock had seen before, but an operating theatre nonetheless. Beyond the chanters, Grimlock could see a huge central pillar of machinery, a multitude of extendable robotic arms (tipped with all manner of surgical lasers, cutters and welders) extending off it. It reminded Grimlock of the freaked out robospiders they'd partied with on Bk'n. He grinned to himself. What a party that'd been!
The rear of the chamber was sealed behind thick plexi-plastic. The reason was clear. In a high tech furnace, energy seethed, pulsing at a front porthole like a thing alive. Feeder cables led off from the sealed reactor in all directions. Grimlock had seen energy like this before. Just once. It was Nucleon!
Suddenly all the pieces fell into place. Sure, the Decepticons had fled after the battle on Klo, but not - as everyone had assumed - to some distant dustbowl to live out the rest of their shamed, miserable lives. So much for Bludgeon's 'We are destroyed, whipped like curs, we have failed. Honour demands we die alone with our shame in solitude' little soliloquy. Such a fine speech, such a load of twaddle! No, they'd camped out on some asteroid close to Cybertron and waited. Waited for some IDIOT to lead them to the Nucleon, lead them to their rebirth! Oh, they hadn't been idle. It was becoming more and more likely that, in the months he and the other Autobots had been alternately patting themselves on the back and feeling sorry for themselves, the Decepticons had been back to Klo, disinterring their fallen brethren, and had popped in to see good old Earth again, picking up a bit of cargo while there.
He'd done a Prowl! He'd disobeyed his first rule of thumb, a rule that had kept him alive before and through four million years or so of war. He'd believed a Decepticon!
With some difficulty, Grimlock turned his head fully right. Enough hanging here feeling stupid, he had to do something. The sight that met his single eye (must remember to open the other one sometime, he thought absently, his mind straying) dashed whatever dreams of a glorious fightback he'd been contemplating completely. If he looked like poor old Swoop, and presumably poor old Snarl beyond him, then it would be a long time (if at all), before he'd be doing any sort of fighting!
Swoop hung suspended by several thin, but presumably tough metal wires, each ending in a viciously barbed hook that had been gouged into his metal skin. His visible body was pockmarked with burns, some so bad they'd melted right through to the circuitry beneath. Other patches were charred, still smoking, the electric cables that had passed current through him still hooked up to his limp form. Someone had gone to work on his wings and arms with a metal shearer, ripping open big sections and randomly pulling wires and internal mechanisms out. His left leg looked like someone had tried to twist it off, and now hung at an agonisingly awkward angle. Fuel dripped from countless wounds, puddling on the floor below his dangling body. Add to this, a multitude of dents and scrapes, and the general outlook for their continued survival was bleak indeed.
Turning away from the grisly spectacle to his right, Grimlock froze! Staring straight at him, skull mouth smiling sadistically, was Bludgeon.
He rose, an unhurried, graceful motion that bespoke power and control, and moved through the doorway towards him. "Autobot, you are about to be granted a rare honour. You are to witness the recreation of a dynasty!"
Technicians and Decepticons alike turned, surprised, wondering exactly who Bludgeon was speaking to. Evidently no-one, bar Bludgeon (who, Grimlock felt sure, had known he was conscious from the first moment a vaguely rational thought had pierced the fog clouding his brain) had realised one of the captives had come to.
"First Megatron, mightiest of the Decepticons, then, under his guidance, one by one - each of our fallen warriors will be revived, powered to levels unimagined by Nucleon! From this world, our empire will spread once more, planet by planet, galaxy by galaxy by galaxy. Too late, your fellow Autobots will realise what had happened. They will reach for discarded weapons, but it will be too late. We will crush first them, and then their world! All this you will bear witness to, and only then will you be granted the oblivion you richly deserve!"
Grimlock stared.
"Do you appreciate how privileged you are? What an honour this is?"
Grimlock yawned.
And tensed, ready for the blow, smug in the knowledge that by provoking Bludgeon to anger he had won a victory, of sorts.
Bludgeon just laughed, the brittle sound a harsh echoing rattle from somewhere deep inside his Pretender shell, giving it an unearthly, disturbing quality that ran icy fingers through Grimlock's circuits.
"Wonderful. You are indeed, as I surmised, a fitting witness, a warrior who will appreciate the... finer points of my campaign!"
With that he turned and exited the room, pausing only to slap a technician who had stopped work to watch the interchange. Despite his most stoic efforts, Grimlock's head sagged. That laugh, that terrible icy confidence, they were the final straws. With dreadful final certainty, Grimlock realised that they were doomed, and that he'd doomed his fellow Autobots right along with him. Again!
For perhaps the first time in his whole life, Grimlock actually began to wish he'd told someone where he was going.