(NOTE: In any scene in this chapter of the alien saga, as well as any others, in which there are JUST the aliens talking in them, are translated into English. They are actually speaking in their own language to each other. Also, special thanks to Foster Jones for the idea of Sigma Prime.)

 Cheetor awoke to find himself strapped to an examination cart,in robot mode. For a split second, he thought he was in the stadium Airazor described earlier, but he quickly found out he was wrong as he noticed that the cart was rolling. As his other senses came online, he noticed that he was indeed inside a long, metal hallway- presumably in either one of the alien fighters, or the humongous alien ship that was orbiting Earth. Which one, Cheetor did not care at the moment. All he wanted to do was get out of here. Stretching his neck up as far as the strap around it would let him, he took in more of his surroundings. One of the black aliens was pushing his cart down the hallway, and several others were lined up behind and in front of him, pushing more identical carts with the other Maximals and Predacons on them, all still in stasis lock. The alien who was pushing his cart noticed him, but did not react in any way.

 Then, as his last system came online, Cheetor felt a new feeling overwhelm him.

 Pain.

 Pain from the hard punch in the face Prometheus had given him just before the cat-bot blacked out. Pain from seeing all the other Maximals, especially Optimus, taken from the Ark against their will. Pain from the harm that had been done to all of the Maximals. No, now it was not pain- it was anger. He was angry at these aliens for all they had done to the Beast Warriors over the three years they had been stuck on Earth. They had destroyed Tigatron, tortured Airazor, and done numerous other things to the Predacons. Before, Cheetor had thought that the Predacons were his enemies. Now he knew he was wrong. The aliens were far more merciless and evil than the Preds ever were.

 Cheetor felt the anger build up inside him until he could not hold it in any longer. He screamed as loud as he could, no recognizable words coming from his mouth as he did, just screaming to get the anger out of his system. The aliens that were pushing the carts down the hallway paused for a moment and stared at him questioningly, but then continued on with their duties, obviously assuming this was just something Transformers did once and a while.

 After about ten seconds of screaming as loud as he could, Cheetor’s voice grew hoarse, and he stopped. Now that the anger was out of his system, he would need his wits if he were ever to get out of here. He looked around again, counting the Maximals and Predacons to make sure they were all there.

 Bigbot, Rattrap, Megs, Waspinator, Quickstrike....wait a minute, where’s Prometheus? Or Tarantulas, for that matter? I bet Prometheus is one of THEM, considering the way he acted, but maybe Tarantulas....maybe Tarantulas escaped! Oh, Primus! Maybe he’ll help us after all! Maybe he’ll....

 Cheetor shook that thought out of his head immediately. Counting on Tarantulas to get them out of trouble? Yeah, right. Where was that spider, anyway?

 Tarad looked on in amusement as two of his fellow aliens, Prometheus and Nighteye, brought Tarantulas into his room, the Predacon struggling unsuccessfully to escape their grasp all the while. Finally, the spider-bot gave up, and stopped trying to escape as Prometheus and Nighteye wordlessly closed the entrance behind them and left Tarantulas in the room, with the three other Vexorans watching his every move.

 Tarad liked his two sub-commanders, because both Prometheus and Nighteye were both strong, smart, and competent. While Prometheus was better at spying and acting, such as he had done when he morphed into species number 5893/192.2 and joined the Beast Wars, Nighteye was better at outright hunting and killing, as he was more silent and deadly.

 Taran dismissed those thoughts out of his head as he spoke to Tarantulas in English- a language he hadn’t used for almost a year, now.

 “You are the one they call Tarantulas, correct?”

 Tarantulas looked nervous, but it was apparent he was trying to hide it. “Y-yes, I am. Who are you, alien?”

 Tarad chuckled, as did Nighteye and Prometheus, who was still inside his “Rhinox suit”. “Don’t play dumb, Tarantulas. You know who I am, I know who you are. Let’s just get down to business, shall we?”

 “I-I don’t..know what you’re talking about, alien,” Tarantulas replied, looking around the room nervously as he did.

 Tarad sighed. “You’re just making this hard on yourself, Tarantulas. Prometheus, Nighteye, you may proceed.”

 The two other aliens nodded, and proceeded to rip Tarantulas’ arms away instantly. However, instead of wires, sparks, and circuits fizzing out as the arms seperated from the Predacon’s body, the arms cleanly came off, leaving behind...nothing.

 “NOOOO! What have you done!?” Tarantulas yelled.

 “Oh, shut up, Taran!” Tarad snapped back in Vexoran tongue, tired of the games this spider was playing. “We all know who you really are, so just come clean!”

 Tarantulas reluctantly obeyed, and black goo oozed out of his arm holes, forming four black arms- arms that looked remarkably like the Vexorans’ upper appendages.

 “Now that you’ve found out, what are you going to do about it, brother?” Tarantulas asked, both in fear and defiance.

 “Nothing- for now, anyway,” Tarad replied. “I just want to ask you a few questions, that’s all. Now, for one- why did you betray us?”

 “Because this race is going to the Pit!” Taran snapped back. “All you do is build your race’s self-esteem up, playing ‘almighty peacekeeper’, thinking you rule all space and time, when you don’t realize the full potential of our superior technology! We could conquer all other races, and rule the galaxy! But instead, all you want to do with our technology is ‘run experiments’ and ‘test subjects’. What waste of intellect!”

 Tarad looked visibly angry, but calmed down quickly, relaxing in his soft chair. “But why become one of these...Cybertronians? These robots, all they do is wage war against one another! Just meaningless, endless battles, with ‘down times’ just meaning time to reload weapons! Why join them, Taran?”

 “Because, Tarad, they are seeing the full potential of their technology and exploiting it any way possible, especially the Predacons! If they keep up with their rate of technology gain and our race keeps up with theirs, they will surpass us in technology in less than two thousand years! THEN who will be the conquerors of the galaxy, we ‘peaceful’ folk, or the mighty Predacons?!”

 “Your time with these Transformers has warped your mind,” Tarad replied sadly. “Especially some of your...odd behaviors we have noticed, such as your unsuccessful relationship with Blackarachnia we had noticed about two years earlier? What was that all about, hmm?”

 “If one must play the part, one must play the part well,” Taran snapped back.

 “Enough,” Tarad commanded. “It is obvious that you think your actions are justified no matter what we say to you. I had hoped to end this peacefully, brother, but it is becoming evident that it is not to be that way. Prometheus and Nighteye will guide you to your cell-“

 “CELL!?” Taran interrupted angrily. “I AM TO BE TREATED LIKE A CRIMINAL BECAUSE I BELIEVE OUR RACE IS NOT USING THEIR FULL POTENTIAL!?”

 “No, you are being treated like a criminal because you have committed crimes against your people by helping a war-oriented race to grow unchecked,” Tarad replied angrily. “And don’t yell at me, BROTHER, or I will see to it that you will have the worst possible punishment set for you when we get back to Vexora. Prometheus, Nighteye, take him away.”

 The two Vexoran bodyguards took Taran away wordlessly, the former Predacon kicking and screaming all the way to his cell.

 Rattrap sighed and leaned against one of the walls of the room that the aliens had wordlessly shoved him into almost two hours ago. Apparently, all the Maximals and Predacons had been taken aboard the main alien ship that was orbiting Earth. They had been repaired by a device Rattrap couldn’t describe with mere words, and then they were forced to go into three seperate, large rooms. These rooms were barren, and had cold metal floors, walls, and ceilings. Megatron, Optimus, Scavenger, Rampage, Crossfire, and Cheetor were taken into a room a couple doors down. Waspinator, Silverbolt, Ramulus, Beastbot, Dinobot, Quickstrike, and himself were in this room. Airazor, Terrorsaur, Depth Charge, Cybershark, Claw Jaw, and Blackarachnia were in a room next to theirs. Their rooms were all connected to a long, metallic corridor that stretched as far as the eye could see. The killer was, however, that the doors that led to freedom were transparent- if you could call them doors. They were actually a kind of force field that kept Transformers out, but could let any of the aliens come in and out as they pleased. Currently two of the aliens were standing right outside their door, guarding them if anything would go wrong.

 Fat chance of that, Rattrap thought. Who knew what kind of technology these aliens had. Practically no escape plan out of this prison would work, he was sure of it. So, until the aliens wanted to do something with them, they were stuck- in this barren, metal room, with nothing to do at all. Seeing that Beastbot and Ramulus were sharing this room with him, that made it all the worse. There were two ‘bots, sitting not more than ten feet away from him, that had assassinated his leader- and they were playing cards they had taken from their subspace as if they had done nothing wrong. Rattrap would have shot them dead the minute they all were shoved into this room, if it was not discovered that if anyone attacked each other, they were given a powerful electrical shock. From what, the Transformers didn’t know. So, he was stuck sitting next to two cold-blooded killers for who knew how long. Primus, what irony life was.

 Rattrap sighed and pulled a small chess set out of his subspace pocket. He wasn’t exactly a chess maniac, but he liked to play a game against someone now and then. However, he had nothing in common with anyone in this room, so he set up the pieces to play against- who else?- himself.

 Just as Rattrap was about to make his first move against himself, he heard the familiar sound of buzzing coming from his left. He turned around, and, sure enough, there was Waspinator.

 “Wazzpinator wantz to know what rat-bot is playing.”

 “Go away, bug-face, before I scrap you,” Rattrap snapped back, narrowing his eyes. He wasn’t exactly in the mood to talk with a stupid Pred.

 “But...Wazzpinator wantz to play game!”

 Rattrap sighed. Playing chess against a Pred is at least better than playing chess with yourself. “All right, I’m playing chess. You can play if you wanna.”

 Waspinator looked like he was about to hug Rattrap, but he decided against it. “Thankz, Rat-bot! Wazzpinator will never forget thiz!”

 “Okay, okay, it’s no big deal,” Rattrap said. “I’ll be white, you be black.”

 “That okay,” Waspinator replied, taking a seat on the other side of the chess board.

 As soon as Rattrap could see that Waspinator was situated, he made his first move, moving one of his pawns two spaces ahead.

 “Okay, your turn, Waspinator.”

 Waspinator stared at the board for more than half a minute before finally saying something.

 “Rat-bot?”

 “Yeah?”

 “How do you play chezz?”

 Rattrap sighed. This was gonna be a loooooong day...

 When Prometheus and Nighteye threw Taran into the cell and locked the bolted door, the former Predacon could make out four other figures in the cell....but they weren’t Vexoran. Taran couldn’t tell what they were, on account of the lack of light.

 “Me Grimlock have new visitor!” one of the figures said.

 “It isn’t just yours, Grimlock, we’re here too,” another one said, this time in a deeper voice.

 The third figure sighed. “It doesn’t matter!” the figure yelled, obviously perturbed at the two.

 “Calm down, everyone,” the fourth figure replied. “I know we’re all a little on the edge after being in here so long, but that doesn’t mean we have to show it.”
 Grimlock.....Taran ran the name through his head, and although it sounded familiar, he couldn’t quite place it...

 “Who are you?” Taran asked.

 “We’ll tell you, after you tell us who you are,” the third figure replied. “Can’t be giving our names away to people we don’t know, now, can we?”

 Taran sighed. This was obviously going to be a fun trip back to Vexora.... “My name is Taran, brother of Tarad, although I am not mindlessly loyal to my race as he is. I was captured after helping Transformers fend off these Vexorans, and I am going to be taken back to Vexora for punishment. There, now will you tell me who you are?” Taran said impatiently. He wanted to find out why the name Grimlock sounded so familiar.

 “Me Grimlock, mightiest of Dinobots,” the first figure said.

 “Ah’m Ironhide, Autobot warrior,” the second figure replied.

 “I am Prowl, Autobot scientist and technician,” the third answered.

 “And I am Sigma Prime,” the fourth said.

 Taran ran those names through his head. Yes, he remembered the first three names... they were all important Autobots that played an important part in the Third Cybertronian War. He had read about them in some book or another. But....why were they here? As advanced as his race was, they couldn’t bring back the dead. This made no sense at all....

 Also, there was the problem of the fourth name, Sigma Prime. Although the “Prime” designation was only given to the greatest of Cybertron’s leaders, he did not remember ever hearing about anyone named Sigma Prime.

 “Infrared vision,” Taran commanded quietly, and a small cover slid down over his eye. He looked at the four figures. These weren’t who they said they were! He knew the appearance of Grimlock, Ironhide, and Prowl, and the infrared vision made it obvious that their appearance was otherwise. While Grimlock was still a dinosaur, his heat signature was that of a velociraptor’s. Ironhide’s was that of an elephant’s, and Prowl’s was that of a lion’s. Sigma Prime wasn’t in beast mode like the other three, but in robot mode, and his looked remarkably like that of.....no, that couldn’t be right. Taran shut down his infrared vision. When Prometheus and Nighteye had ripped off his robotic arms, that must have made his infrared system malfunction or something.

 “You’re lying,” Taran said simply. “Your beast modes aren’t the same as the ones I’ve heard of.”

 The second figure shook his head.

 “Let me explain, Taran,” he said. “It all started when...”

 Tarad heard a loud knock on the door.

 “Come in.”

 The door opened to reveal none other than Prometheus, the Vexoran who had been a spy for their race in the Beast Wars.

 “Ah, Prometheus,” Tarad said. “I must commend you for your excellent job down there on Earth. The acting was worth that of an Earthling Emmy Award.”

 Prometheus bowed slightly.

 “Thank you, Tarad. However, that is not the reason I came in here. I wanted to request permission to get out of this Transformer ‘suit’ and back into my original form.”

 Tarad nodded. “You may do so, Prometheus. You have kept Rhinox’s spark fully functional, correct?”

 “Correct,” Prometheus affirmed. Then, under obvious strain, Prometheus broke free of his Rhinox “shell”, scattering pieces of it around him as it broke apart.

 The alien under Rhinox’s former body, however, was not what a normal Vexoran looked like.

 It was a copy of species 5893/192.2 after it had infested its host. It was a mass of interlocking, pink organic tentacles in the vague form of a humanoid. An unprotected heart-like structure in the chest area was busy pumping “blood” throughout all the slimy tentacles, and a small mass that was similar to a brain was in the chest area as well. It was a sickening sight to humans. However, since Vexorans do not look at everything the way we do, Tarad did not find it repulsive.

 Some of the tentacles in the chest area parted, and a globe-sized flesh sac was revealed, a faint light source coming from within. Prometheus took it and handed it to Tarad.

 “It is Unit Rhinox’s spark,” he explained. “I- or rather, the creature I morphed into- generated a small flesh sac around Unit Rhinox’s spark, protecting it from being destroyed after I infested it. The sac also kept any scanners from detecting Unit Rhinox’s energy signature, so as to make the Maximals assume he was dead.”

 “Excellent job, Prometheus,” Tarad commented as Prometheus morphed back to his original Vexoran form. “I will see that High Officer Grakkon commends you for this. If you have no further questions or comments, you may leave. Due to your rewarding efforts, you may have the rest of the week off duty.”

 “Thank you,” replied Prometheus, bowing. Without another word being spoken, Prometheus exited the room, relieved to be off duty for the first time in two months.
 With Prometheus gone, Tarad reverted his attention back to the flesh sac that contained Rhinox’s spark.

 “Your knowledge of your race’s technology is vast, Rhinox,” Tarad said to the spark, as if it could comprehend what he was saying. “It will help us deal with your kind- just as soon as we can crack these secrets from your data tracks. And we will, Rhinox. We will.”

 Scourge, Scarem, and Nighteye were all casually talking to each other while walking down a corridor to their quarters. They had all just been relieved off of duty for the time being, and it was relieving to talk among comrades, forgetting worries for the moment.

 “Tarad sure was in a good mood today,” Nighteye commented, “What’s he so excited about?”

 “Is there a neural network anywhere in that body of yours, Nighteye?” Scourge snapped back. “He’s excited because he’s captured those stupid Transformer pests that have ruined the Project.”

 “What’s so good about the Project, anyway?” Scarem asked. “It’s just another dumb planet we’re trying to create sentient life on so we can study it. Yippie, more work for our race to do. Whatever happened to fun?”

 “We grew up, Brother,” Scourge answered. “Father practically forced us into the military, and now it’s just work, analyze this, contemplate that. And, this knucklehead of a captain, Tarad, is really starting to get on my nerves. He’s always so strict and by-the-book.”

 "Yeah," Scarem agreed. "I don't like this military business any more. When we get back to Vexora, I don't care what Father says, I'm quitting."

 Nighteye looked shocked. "But- you can't quit! You guys need to respect your Father's wishes, no matter what! Besides, Tarad's kinda nice, once you get to know him."

 "Yeah, because you're his lackey," Scourge snapped back. He had never really liked Nighteye; he had only been Nighteye's "friend" because his Brother was. Lately, because their interests had been conflicting more and more, he was beginning to regret making this friendship. "All you do is serve 'Almighty Tarad' day after day. Well, let me tell you something, Mr. I-Live-To-Serve, wouldn't you be happier actually leading something? I mean, these stupid decisions that Tarad's making, such as capturing the Transformers, but not killing them, wouldn't you want to do it a different way?"

 "Well, yeah," Nighteye agreed. "But-"

 "But nothing," Scourge interrupted. "I'm going to kill these Transformers, no matter what he says- one way or another."

To be continued......

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