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CHAPTER 74
🕑 Added 2025-07-05 09:40:07 +0000 UTCAidan’s consciousness, unmoored from reality, witnessed the final echoes of Cybertron's tragic history. He saw the Seven Primes, the original rulers, disappear in a final, cataclysmic battle on ancient Earth, the Star Harvester and the Matrix of Leadership lost to the mists of time. He saw the violent civil war that erupted in their absence, a desperate struggle for the last dregs of energy. From this war, two primary factions emerged: the Decepticons, a brutal military force led by a charismatic and powerful general, and the Autobots, a coalition of smaller factions united against his tyranny.
The Autobots were led by Optimus Prime and a treacherous Prime, a descendant of the original seven who secretly leaked information to the enemy. In the long, grinding war, the Autobots lost ground. As a final, desperate act, Optimus Prime launched the AllSpark, the very source of their life, into the deep space of the universe, hoping to keep it out of Decepticon hands.
Megatron, leader of the Decepticons, gave chase. But his pursuit was cut short as a stray meteorite sent him careening off course, and he crashed into the frozen arctic of a primitive blue planet. There he lay, frozen in time, until the late 19th century, when an explorer named Archibald Witwicky fell through the ice and inadvertently activated Megatron's navigation system. The dying Cybertronian, with its last ounce of strength, engraved a map to the AllSpark's location onto the man's eyeglasses. This relic was then passed down through the generations, finally ending up in the hands of his great-great-grandson, Sam.
And now, in the 21st century, both Autobots and Decepticons had come to this small, blue-green world. They had come to Earth to finish their war.
The cosmic vision dissolved into a blast of searing heat and deafening noise.
"Boom! BANG! Da Da Da Da... Ahhh! Help me... I beg you...!"
The complicated, messy symphony of explosions, gunfire, and the raw, terrified screams of human fear was the first thing to greet Aidan Parker's consciousness. He opened his eyes, and the first thing he saw was a corpse crushed beneath a mountain of falling rock. The man's face was scorched black, unrecognizable, but from the mangled ruin came a faint, gurgling cry for help. The acrid stench of ozone, burnt rubber, and cooked meat filled Aidan's nostrils. He looked to his side and saw the severed remains of a leg, its internal blood vessels and nerves still squirming like a nest of maggots. Blood, thick and black, stained the ground in a grotesque, abstract pattern.
A strong, visceral sense of discomfort swept through him. His stomach rolled, his throat tightened, and he wanted to vomit.
"Wow..." He couldn't hold it back. He bent over and was violently sick on the rubble-strewn street.
This was real. This wasn't a data stream. This wasn't a filtered image on a screen. This was the unfiltered, grotesque reality of war, and his body, after years of being shielded by his own technology, was rejecting it with a primal horror.
He wiped his mouth, his face pale, and took in his surroundings. He was on a city street—or what was left of one. People were running in every direction, their faces masks of pure panic, their screams releasing the terror of imminent death into the smoke-filled air. The buildings around him were missing entire chunks, the ground was a minefield of potholes and gravel, and the sound of car tires screeching on asphalt was almost as harsh as the explosions. A missile cut through the air above his head with a terrifying shriek, followed by a violent detonation that shook the very ground he stood on. In the air, he could hear the whump-whump-whump of helicopter propellers.
And then he saw him. A giant, thirty-foot-tall robot of red and blue plating, moving with impossible grace as it battled a creature made of tank treads and excavator claws. In front of them, human beings were like kittens.
There had been no detection, no warning from the System. He had been dropped directly into a full-scale warzone.
"Hey, buddy!" a curly-haired boy shouted as he ran past, his face streaked with grime. "What are you still doing here? Run!"
Aidan let out a long, shaky breath, trying to stabilize his reeling mind. He ducked into the shadow of a ruined building. The blue Umbrella logo on the back of his hand spread rapidly, the bio-suit flowing over his body in a wave of sapphire and crimson. There was no time for a flashy transformation sequence.
He peered out from his cover and scanned the battlefield. His eyes were immediately drawn to a small object amidst a pile of debris. It was a cube, covered in intricate, mysterious lines, humming with an energy so immense it was visible to his naked eye. The AllSpark.
His strategic mind took over. The Cube. The ultimate power source. I must have it. He prepared to move.
At the same time, he saw a young man and a heavily damaged yellow robot crawling desperately toward the same object. But then, out of the corner of his eye, he saw something else. A man, holding a small girl, running in a panic across the street, trying to get to safety. He didn't forget to shield the girl's head with his hands. And from the sky, a huge, black-gray Decepticon was descending directly upon them.
They are acceptable losses, the cold, pragmatic part of his brain calculated. The mission objective is the Cube. It is paramount. He took a step toward the AllSpark, gritting his teeth.
But then, he thought of the Ancient One's words. You should look upon the dead with your own eyes, Aidan, not with your cold data! He was looking now. He saw the terror on the father's face, the love in the way he shielded his daughter. He saw Peter. He saw Aunt May.
His path changed.
The huge shadow of the Decepticon fell over the father and daughter. The man looked up, saw the impending doom, and with a final, desperate act of love, threw his daughter out of the way.
BANG! The man heard a deafening sound of impact, but the pain he expected never came.
"Hey," a slightly frivolous voice said from above him. "Your daughter is going to cry."
The man opened his eyes. And then he stared. A tall, red-and-blue humanoid figure was standing over him. And in front of that figure was a shimmering, circular shield of orange, geometric light, effortlessly holding back the massive, metallic foot of the Decepticon. The Rings of Raggadorr.
"Your daughter really is crying this time!" Aidan said, dispersing the magic circle. The Decepticon, unbalanced, crashed to the ground, shaking the street.
"Dad!" the little girl screamed, rushing into her father's arms. The man hugged her tightly, then looked up curiously at the mysterious figure who had just saved them.
Aidan paid them no mind. His objective was clear. A long, crimson line of energy—the Crimson Bands of Cyttorak—shot out from his right hand, wrapping around the AllSpark. With a sharp tug, the cube was pulled from the debris and flew into his hand. Bumblebee, who was about to reach the cube, could only watch as it disappeared. Sam Witwicky stared in blank confusion.
"I think you should leave here with your daughter as soon as possible," Aidan said, his voice now a metallic rasp from behind his mask, as he turned to the father.
"Thank you!" the man said, his voice full of gratitude, before scooping up his daughter and running.
Sam trotted over, his face a mask of anxiety. "Who are you? Hey! You have to give me that thing, quick! It's dangerous!"
"I will keep this for the time being," Aidan said, examining the humming cube in his hand.
"No, you can't!" Sam insisted. "Those robots, they all want this thing! We have to get it to the military!"
"Not necessarily," Aidan replied. He flicked his wrist, and another crimson band shot out, wrapping around the legs of a large, black Autobot that was just getting to its feet. With a sharp pull, the giant robot, Ironhide, crashed back to the ground. "Hey, kid, I'm not a bad guy! I'm here to help you!" the robot's rough voice boomed.
At that moment, the massive, silver form of Megatron, having just torn another Autobot in half, turned its attention to them.
Aidan looked at the approaching Decepticon leader. He looked at the crashed cars around them. He looked at Ironhide. "You're an Autobot," he stated. "Transform. Become a car. Now."
"Why should I? You should give that cube to Sam!" Ironhide roared, reaching out with a massive mechanical arm to grab the tiny, armored human.
Aidan dodged the clumsy grab, leaped onto Ironhide's arm, ran up it, and delivered a bio-suit-enhanced kick to the side of his head, leaving a visible dent in the metal plating. "Hurry up," he threatened, holding the AllSpark up as if to throw it to the rapidly approaching Megatron. "Or I give this to him!"
"You have no manners at all!" Ironhide grumbled, but he saw the logic. With a symphony of shifting plates, whirring gears, and clicking hydraulics, his massive form folded in on itself, transforming into a pristine, black GMC TopKick pickup truck.
Seeing the living, breathing, transforming machine in front of him, Aidan's eyes lit up with the insatiable curiosity of a scientist who had just discovered a new law of physics
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Book Warm
Thanks for the chapter
