“Rhinox, we’ve got an incoming energy signature, bearing 0-2-45.”

 “Wonderful,” Rhinox sighed, wheeling up behind Beastbot, who was manning the base’s computers for the time being. “Scourge has finally come to finish us off…”

 “’Ey!” Rattrap protested from several yards away, “I thought I was the only one allowed to be pessimistic around ‘ere!”

 A couple of the Maximals in the room chuckled, but Rhinox swiveled around, his face dead serious.

 “A year earlier, you’d be right, Rattrap. But not now. If Scourge is already coming to finish us off, then we don’t stand a chance. I’m through being optimistic; not in this war! We’ve lost Optimus, Cheetor, Depth Charge, Airazor, Silverbolt, Tigerhawk, Gryphtron…” Rhinox listed, his voice wavering more and more with each dead friend he mentioned. Finally, he stopped to collect himself, turning around to face the computer screens again.

 “I…I was only joking, Rhinox…” Rattrap said quietly, taken aback by Rhinox’s uncharacteristically angry outburst. Seeing Rhinox’s back suddenly turned to him, Rattrap’s head drooped and he walked out of the room.

 “You’ve changed, Rhinox…” Rattrap threw over his shoulder, his tone a mixture of sadness and anger, “… and I don’t think I like dat one bit.”

 Rhinox grunted and glanced again at the incoming dot on the screen signifying an energy signature.

 “Run an allegiance scan on that, Beastbot,” Rhinox gruffly stated. “Let’s make sure it’s not something even worse than a Pred…”

 Beastbot complied wordlessly… until he saw the results, that is.

 “It’s… a Maximal!?”

 Rhinox’s face was a mixture of surprise and happiness. He was too speechless to say anything for the moment.

 “Well, what we waiting for?” Grimlock hooted, filling in for Rhinox. “Me Grimlock say we go out there and get them back in!”

 They all hurried outside the underground pyramid, squinting to see the figure flying towards them from the cavern’s entrance.

 “It’s Airazor!” Blackarachnia exclaimed, “And Tigerhawk!”

 Cheers erupted amongst the assembled Maximals as a struggling beast-moded Airazor flew up to them, her wings flapping furiously as she carried the stasis-locked form of Tigerhawk.

 “Hurry up!” Airazor gasped out, skipping the formalities for now. “He’s heavy!”

 Dinobot and Triceradon hurried over and grabbed Tigerhawk’s form from Airazor’s trembling talons, quickly carrying the severely injured Maximal back into the pyramid for repairing.

 “What happened?” Rhinox asked, wheeling up to Airazor, who had now landed. “We thought you were dead!”

 “Apparently not,” Airazor smiled. “I’ll tell you, but let’s get inside first. I need a bit of repairing- I think my legs are permanently stretched out, ooowwww….”

 Rhinox laughed and motioned for Grimlock and Dinotron to help her back into the pyramid.

 After her and Tigerhawk’s time in the CR vats, Airazor finally got to explain to the other curious Maximals what had happened.

 “Although I was nearly knocked offline by that fall, I remained conscious in the very core of my processor. It was very… odd. I could hear and feel everything that was going on around me, but I couldn’t do anything about it.

 “Regardless, my internal repair systems eventually kicked in, and my optics and motor systems eventually came on. I noticed that I was chained up against a wall, along with the other Maximals the Predacons had managed to take captive- Tigerhawk, Prowl, Gryphtron, and Silverbolt. I was surprised to find that the explosion created when I smacked into the ground had permanently charred and darkened my armor, which is why you see me as I am now. Fortunately, after a bit of struggling, I managed to get one of my hands lose- it seems that one of those Pred bozos had forgotten to tighten one of my manacles enough. From there, it was a piece of cake to undo the rest of my restraints. I rested there, on the floor of the cell, for several hours, slowly regaining my health back, thanks to a mostly-full energon cube a careless guard must have left in there, figuring we couldn’t have reached it anyway. Apparently, the Preds were confident enough in their ability to restrain us that they didn’t check up on us often- no one entered the cell for over a day.

 “Eventually, though, one of them did show up. Almost fully recovered by then, I managed to gun down the surprised Pred-head and quickly slipped out the open doorway, sneaking through the hallways and gunning down the occasional Predacon until I made it to the main base doors. Satisfied that most of the Predacons were apparently at their own base, and not occupying our own, I hurried back and grabbed Tigerhawk before making my way back here, thanks to his directions. It took a while, as there were several caves in the general area where he said you guys were headed, but I eventually made it here. My only regret is that I didn’t have the strength to carry the other three captives back as well,” Airazor finished, hanging her head in sorrow.

 “It’s okay, Airazor,” Ironhide said, patting the bird-bot on the back. “Yah did what yah could’ve. Yer only one bot, after all.”

 “Eh, you have to give da Preds some credit, though,” Rattrap said, “Widout dere bumblin’ and carelessness, you’d never have made it out of dere alive, bird-lady.”

 “Amen to that,” Airazor chuckled. “So, now what? What’s the sitch?”

 “Not good,” Rhinox muttered. “We’re severely outnumbered by the Preds, we’re stuck in this abandoned alien site with a limited supply of energon, and it’s only a matter of time before Scourge and his troops attack us again full force.”

 “And this time, we have no where to run…” Grimlock said bitterly.

 “I suppose we COULD try to free our comrades...” Rattrap stated, “… But I don’t see the point, really, as we’ll all be dead within the week anyway.”

 “Shut up, Rattrap,” Blackarachnia said. “It’s definitely worth a shot- what do you all think?”

 “We need all the troops we can get,” Rhinox admitted.

 “Great!” Blackarachnia said, obviously eager to rescue her boyfriend. “I’m definitely coming along- I’m a master of stealth.”

 “Eh, don’t flatter yerself, Legs,” Rattrap said. “We’ll need a REAL master a’ stealth on this mission- in other words, I’m comin’.”

 “Puh-leeze,” Ramulus smirked. “Let a real professional handle the job, guys.”

 Rhinox glared at Ramulus. “Ramulus, you are NOT going.”

 “What?! Don’t you trust me?” Ramulus asked.

 “Of course not,” Rhinox retorted. “We’re allies because of necessity, nothing else. And that goes for Beastbot, too.”

 The aforementioned bounty hunters angrily stormed off in a huff, obviously not wanting to get into a “discussion” with Rhinox right now.

 “Rattrap,” Rhinox continued, ignoring their exit, “You’re staying here. The last thing we need is you and Blackarachnia bickering during the mission.”

 Blackarachnia smirked at Rattrap, who just rolled his optics.

 “As for the other members of our little sortie, let’s get three more- four should be enough for this mission, but any more would be pushing it. Airazor, you’re coming along, since you seem to know more about where the Predacons post their guards in our old base, and if they’ve made any changes to the layout since we’ve left. Grimlock, you too, since we’ll need some brute force.”

 Grimlock merely smiled as best he could beneath his faceplate and punched his fist into his open hand.

 “Airraptor, you’ve been programmed with excellent marksmanship abilities, according to the Vexoran’s backup data files on you. Not to mention you’re another flyer. You’ll be going along, too.”

 Airraptor merely nodded in acceptance.

 “Alright, then it’s settled,” Rhinox said. “However, I need to talk you four before you leave. Come with me, please.”

 The four Maximals looked at each other in confusion for a moment before following their leader.

 All five Maximals filed into the small room, closing the door after them, and took a seat at a small table. The seats were obviously made for Vexorans, not Transformers, given their structure, but the Maximals had learned to take what they could get by now.

 “What’s this all about, Rhinox?” Airazor asked curiously, settling into her uncomfortable seat. "If it’s about my ability to lead the force into our old base, I can guarantee you-“

 “It’s not that,” Rhinox assured, “But it does have to do with something that I only want you all to know about, at least right now. I fear that if I told all of the other Maximals about it this early in the game, there’d be a big controversy, and I don’t want that.”

 The rest of the assembled Maximals raised their eyebrows at this.

 “Now,” Rhinox continued, “I have another sub-mission for you all to complete while you’re at our old base. I’ve been doing some research over the past solar cycle, delving deep into old records stored in this site to see if I could come up with anything useful. You see, I’ve found that the new Dinobots- Triceradon, Dinotron, Striker, and you, Airraptor- were not Maximals at the beginning. You were originally programmed as a “blank” protoform, and then the Vexorans sent a particular energy surge through your systems, converting your default programming to Maximal. Why, I can only guess- for experiment purposes, I suppose. Nighteye refuses to tell me any information pertaining to this subject. Regardless, one of the electrical components in the scanners back at the base, if I tweak it correctly and connect it to the appropriate instruments, could sent out a similar pulse-charge-“

 “Hold it,” Airazor said, figuring out what Rhinox was getting at. “Do you mean that you’re going to be able to convert the Predacon masses… into Maximals?”

 “Exactly!” Rhinox grinned. “It’ll take a little while to put it together, of course, and it’ll have a limited range. But if we can get all the Predacon forces in this cavern before we activate it- which I’m sure will happen eventually, whenever they decide to attack- then the scales of balance will be irrevocably turned, and we can finally win the Beast Wars!”

 “Me don’t know…” Grimlock piped up. “If we just up and change Predacons’ programming without consent, then not we just as bad as them?”

 “That’s exactly what I was thinking,” Blackarachnia commented. “Rhinox, although this would almost ensure victory, there’s got to be some other means to achieve it. This doesn’t seem… right… to me. I mean, there’s no way I’d let my Pred programming be tampered with, Maximal or not.”

 Airraptor frowned and nodded his agreement.

 “I dunno, I see where Rhinox is coming from,” Airazor admitted. “I mean, this is it, ‘bots. We’ve got nowhere to run, nowhere to hide, and I’m sure it’s less than a week before Scourge and his forces finally manage to come for us.”

 “There, see? Airazor gets it,” Rhinox said. “Look, we’re out of options. If there were any other way in which I could see us winning, I’d choose it. But there isn’t. It’s all or nothing, here. We’ve got nothing to lose and everything to gain.”

 Blackarachnia’s and Grimlock’s optics turned towards the ground, both of them still obviously standing by their sentiments.

 Rhinox sighed. “Look, I’ll confess something. I didn’t just pick you ‘bots because of your skills for completing this mission. With the exception of Ramulus and Beastbot- who I don’t trust at all- I thought you four would be the most understanding of my methods, here. Blackarachnia, you’ve dealt with the difficulties of your Predacon programming in the past. You know how difficult it can be for a Predacon to convert to a Maximal without reprogramming. Grimlock, you’re a battle veteran- or, at least, a cloned duplicate of a battle veteran. You realize that, in certain situations, you’ve got to do things you normally wouldn’t do in order to make the world a better place. Airraptor, you were “forced” into Maximal programming so to speak- but you don’t seem to be suffering from any bad or unwanted side effects, do you? And Airazor- you’ve seen how merciless the Preds can be, and how much better things would be if they were all Maximals. Come on, ‘bots- what do you say?”

 The three non-consenting ‘bots sighed simultaneously and looked back at Rhinox.

 “Alright, Rhinox,” Blackarachnia said. “For you.”

 “Me guess it alright just this one time,” Grimlock admitted.

 Airraptor nodded and smiled.

 “You know I’m in,” Airazor commented.

 “Wonderful,” Rhinox smiled. “Alright, ‘bots, let’s get to it! Let me show you what device you need to extract…”

 Scourge smirked.

 “Looks like everything is going according to plan so far, Scarem.”

 “Whadaya mean, ‘everything’s going according to plan’? Rhinox has found out a way to turn our entire force into Maximals! How is that a GOOD thing!?”

 Scourge and Scarem were both in the former’s private chambers, watching a small screen intently. Scourge had made sure to hook up his creation with small radio and visual transmitters before he had sent her off to rescue Tigerhawk. As such, Scourge and Scarem could see and hear everything Eclipse saw or heard via a specially-equipped viewscreen.

 “Oh, I admit it’s not my preferred way of taking the Maximals out,” Scourge admitted, “But, life happens. You have to learn to adjust your plans accordingly.”

 “Well, then what... Ooooh, I get what you’re planning,” Scarem said, smiling. “You’re gonna let Eclipse lead the other Maximals into a trap! Once they’re in their old base, we’ll let loose with all the Predacons we’ve got! Heheh, I like the way you think…”

 “An admirable effort, Scarem, but no,” Scourge replied, smirking at his brother’s dumbfounded expression. “I have something much more… devastating planned for them.”

 “However,” Scourge said, standing up and stretching, “first things first. All of our troops are completely repaired, re-energized, and have their weapons ready?”

 “Uh… y-yes, Scourge,” Scarem stammered, a little taken aback at Scourge’s abrupt and rather unexpected change of subject. “B-but…”

 “Good,” Scourge interrupted, apparently unaware that he did so, “Prepare to move out within the megacycle.”

 “You mean…?”

 “Yes, Scarem. We’re ready to commence the final assault.”

 Injector hated Scourge.

 Not that he could do much about it, really. With those slagging pestilence missiles of his, Scourge could completely disintegrate Injector without breaking a sweat, and the bee/lionfish fuzor knew it.

 Of course, WHY Injector hated Scourge was simple.

 Scourge had sent Injector to be one of a handful of Predacons used as Maximal target practice.

 Injector had to admit, the idea did have its merits. Have a skeleton crew remain at the Maximal’s old base outside the Ark, just to give the impression that nothing was going on when the Maximal team broke in any cycle now.

 Of course, the skeleton crew were probably all going to be shot into stasis lock. “Such was the price of deception,” Scourge had said.

 And Injector was posted as the base guard for the time being.

 What Injector hated even more than the idea that he was target practice, though, was that he was probably going to miss the big battle coming up any decacycle now.

 Suddenly and without warning, Injector heard a whistling noise come from behind a rock outcropping several hundred yards away, and machine gun bullets suddenly embedded themselves in between his eyes.

 Injector didn’t even have time to contemplate how much he hated his life before he hit the ground in stasis lock.

 “That was easier than I’d thought it’d be,” Blackarachnia commented brightly as she hauled Silverbolt’s unconscious form away from the base.

 “Well, like I said earlier,” Airazor replied, fingering the electrode she had removed from the base’s scanners, “Scourge obviously can’t keep that good of an eye on so many lazy troops. Score one for the Maximals!”

 Airraptor and Grimlock, carrying Gryphtron and Prowl on their backs, exchanged a knowing glance amongst themselves as they followed behind the two females.

 “Alright, now screw the radiator into the electromagnetic wave emitter, and you’re finished,” Rhinox told Nighteye. The former, in his makeshift body, had no hands, so he had to manually tell Nighteye how to assemble the device that was to be used.

 “Done,” Nighteye said, tightening the last screw. “You DO know, Rhinox, that this is crazy.”

 “As Optimus used to say, ‘sometimes crazy works’,” Rhinox sighed. “We’ve only got one shot at this. Once all the Preds are in this cavern, I’ll activate the device via hookup. If everything goes according to plan, the device will emit a one-time pulse of just the right frequency that will short out any Predacon in the cavern, replacing their core code with Maximal programming. Unfortunately, the surge will short-circuit the device Airazor managed to scavenge from our old base scanner, and it won’t work again. On top of that, I don’t know of where we could find another electrode like that, anyway.”

 Nighteye let out a low whistle. “Man, this is sure gonna be cutting it close. You’ve given Blackarachnia, Waspinator, and Dinobot their resistance chips? I’m sure they have no desire to have their core programming converted when there’s no real need to.”

 “I’ve given Blackarachnia hers,” Rhinox replied, “And I’ve managed to get Airraptor to sneak a chip on the latter two while they were sleeping. I don’t want to alert them to my idea just yet. As far as the other Maximals know, our team of four went on a rescue mission, and nothing else.”

 “You’re sure you don’t want to let this out until after it happens?” Nighteye questioned. “I mean, I’m alright with it, but you could be facing mutiny from some of your more honor-bound members.”

 “Better than facing mutiny before the battle happens than after,” Rhinox sighed. “I’m sorry if some of them don’t see what needs to be done, but they’re not in charge for the time being, I am. If they’re too stubborn to be able to know possible victory when they see it, well, then I can’t help them there.”

 Nighteye quirked an eyebrow at that. “Rattrap’s right, Rhinox. You HAVE changed. From what I’ve seen of the old you, you’d have never said something like that.”

 “Well, war changes ‘bots,” Rhinox admitted. “However, I think that in this case, it’s changed me for the better. I’ve grown to realize that sometimes you can’t always please other ‘bots, and you have to just go with what you know logically to be the only way out.”

 “Are Silverbolt, Gryphtron, and Prowl fully healed by now?” Nighteye questioned, hooking up the makeshift device to a power circuit.

 “Yep,” Rhinox said, “They’re a bit shaken up after being in stasis lock for so long, but they’ll be fine.”

 “Well,” Nighteye responded, “I think that-“

 The Transmetal 2 owl was interrupted by Rattrap’s distant panicked holler from the main room of the pyramid.

 “We’ve got dozens of Pred signatures, inbound! Dis is it, ‘bots!”

 “And not a moment too soon,” Rhinox whistled. “Nighteye, you go out and help defend the pyramid. Once all the Preds are inside the cavern, I’m going to let ‘er loose.”

 Nighteye nodded and quickly transformed, flying off towards the main room.

 Rattrap, being the temporary second-in-command, mentally counted up all of the Maximals running out of the pyramid to face the still rather distant Predacon armada. A couple of shots were starting to be exchanged, though, as the distances quickly lessened.

 He noticed something odd, though.

 “Hey,” Rattrap nudged Dinobot, who was firing his eye-beams sporadically at the incoming Predacons. “Where’s Airazor?”

 “Airazor” quickly but quietly crept down the now-empty hallways of the inner pyramid, searching for a lighted room.

 She found it.

 Glancing in the room, she found Rhinox’s back turned to her, all of his attention focused on the device ahead of him.

 “Hey, Rhinox!” Nighteye’s voice crackled through the Maximal’s comlink, “The guests are all here! Let ‘er loose, and hurry!”

 “You’ve got it!” Rhinox replied eagerly, hooking himself up to the device. “Here we go, Nighteye!”

 Eclipse leveled her talon-guns at Rhinox and fired.

To be continued…

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